Across Russia to Japan and Malaysia - Part 11/12 (Malaysia)

Our time in Malaysia was spent resting, eating and chatting with relatives, although we did find time for a couple of excursions.

 Reading the local newspaper.

Photographer Henry.

 Modern love - Khuan-Hoong and girlfriend with their phones.

 Jia-Yen with her phone.

 Kwan with her phone.

 Jia-Qi without her phone.

 Kwan and Theng-Theng enjoying dim sum.

Kwan took us to a school fundraising concert, which was done most professionally, if rather loudly.

 Saxophonists in the school band.

 A flamenco dancer.

 An erhu player.

 And two pipa players.

We also dropped by the Penang Butterfly Farm, where we were supposed to get a butterfly to help H-M with her book. 

One of many butterflies.

We were in Malaysia on my birthday and the relatives arranged a very nice meal.

 The whole gang.

 Some of the dishes in close-up.

 Shrimps.

 Fish caught on Henry's ill-fated off-shore fishing trip.

 

 Lotus root.

 The birthday boy.

And that was that... The next day we flew with Malaysia Airlines back to Europe. Malaysia Airlines has had some troubles in recent times but I've used them for nearly twenty years and have always been very happy with their service. Finnair, however, has gone rapidly downhill and they managed, not for the first time, to lose our luggage, on the last leg from Paris.  It did, however, arrive safely a couple of days later.

Our luggage has arrived and it's all over!

In a sense, our journey was a trip-of-a-lifetime, but having been born under the star sign of Leo makes me a cat and cats have nine lives, so if I'm lucky I should be able to manage a few more expeditions yet.

Across Russia to Japan and Malaysia - Part 10/12 (Osaka, Japan)

After checking-in at the hotel, we only had time for a quick shower before having to head out again. We had arrived on the second day of the Osaka Tenjin Matsuri festival, one of Japan's largest festivals. Our friend Yuko had given us some tips where to go so we made our way down to the river to watch the boat procession and fireworks. We didn't really understand what was going on, and there were thousands and thousands of people. But never mind, everyone was having a good time, with lots of eating, which it seems is a local pastime in Osaka, and the firework display was spectacular.

 Japanese women buying snacks.

Some people were dressed in traditional costume but the majority were in western dress.

 One of the many many stands selling snacks.

 Something happening involving a fish.

Representative firework.

The firework display went on for a long time. There would be a five-minute burst followed by a pause and the next burst of firework.

In Osaka we did many of the typical tourist things. We went to the Umeda Sky Building, spent hours in a gigantic electronics store while Henry examined the gadgets, visited Osaka Castle, went to the Osaka Science Museum, had a short cruise on the river, and more. It was action all the way.

Downtown Osaka is a city of skyscrapers.

 

 The top of the Umeda Sky Building.

 The mirror effect of the glass. (Can you spot us in the other photo?)

 The ferris wheel on top of the HEP Five shopping centre.

 On the way to Osaka Castle.

 Osaka Castle.

 Henry with a group of teenagers and their teacher, who interviewed us as part of their English lessons.

 Navigation is often a problem in Japanese cities as, unsurprisingly, everything is in Japanese, and the tourist maps are rather vague. We spent quite a lot of time feeling lost but generally got there in the end. One exception was when we went to the suburb of Ikeda, where we wanted to visit the Daihatsu car museum, Humobility World. After about an hour of wandering around in the searing heat, we gave up, even though we could see a huge Daihatsu sign in the distance and the wall of what we presumed was part of the factory. Luckily, Ikeda has another attraction, the Instant Ramen Museum, which was fun to visit and cheered us up, especially Henry.

Momofuku Ando, the inventor of instant noodles and a hero to most students, and one of his fans.

Japanese need their noodles even in space and Space Ramen were developed for zero-gravity conditions. Guests to the museum could develop their own flavour instant noodle - all part of the fun.

Space Ramen noodles.

 

 Part of the production line for guests' own inventions.

Henry looking forward to a cup of the original flavour Cup Noodle, bought as it should be in Japan from a vending machine.

During our action-packed few days in Osaka we even managed to squeeze in some evening entertainment, a soccer game, Cereza Osaka versus Sagan Tosu, and an absolute highlight, a trip to the Koshien Stadium to see a Hanshin Tigers baseball game. Many thanks to Yuko, who arranged the tickets, we had a great time, even though we know very little about baseball, although Henry did once play Finnish baseball. Anyone in Osaka at the right time should certainly make an effort to see the Hanshin Tigers.

 Henry in his Hanshin Tigers gear.

 Strike!

 The crowd getting ready for the traditional release of ballons at the end of the seventh innings.

You can even get beer delivered to your seat - most civilised!

This was our second visit to Japan and I have to say we are Japan fans. We like the high-tech, the sense of adventure (i.e. being totally confused much of the time) without there being real danger, the cleanliness and efficiency, the quirkiness, and the way Japanese do things their way. If you have the chance you should really go there and see the country for yourself, with an open mind and a smile you'll have a fascinating time.

En route to Malaysia.

Across Russia to Japan and Malaysia - Part 9/12 (Sakaiminato, Japan)

Japan is supremely well organised so when we got off the ferry there was a shuttle bus waiting to take passengers into town and everything went swimmingly. Even more surprising was that the man on duty in the ticket office of the railway station spoke excellent English, which made getting our tickets to Osaka very easy.

Sakaiminato is a small, sleepy little place famous for GeGeGe no Kitaro characters. There are statues of monsters (Yokai) all along the main street.

One little monster.

And some more monsters outside the railway station.

 

 Monsters on the train.

We were heading to Osaka, so we had to change in Yonago and Okayama.

Japanese train tickets.

Japan is a great place for train travel. The trains are punctual, clean, and the Shinkansen really fast. Of course, quality needs to be paid for, so long-distance train travel is not exactly cheap. People resident outside Japan can buy a Japan Rail Pass and within the metropolitan areas of the major cities there are often various day passes and railcards.

The local train from Sakaiminato to Yonaga.

The train from Yonaga to Okayama.

The Shinkansen bullet train from Okayama to Osaka.

Shinkansen travel quite fast as can be seen from Henry's phone. We did break the 300 km/h barrier but have no photo. The other thing about Shinkansen is that they are very comfortable, there is none of the shake, rattle and roll of high-speed trains in Europe.

 GPS map from our Shinkansen ride. The position of the train is the blue arrowhead and the speed is given in the top-right.

From Shin-Osaka station we made our way by metro to our hotel, Hotel Claiton. Why this particular hotel? As mentioned above, Japan is not a cheap country, although by no means as expensive as one might imagine, providing one takes care. The hotel was reasonably-priced and in an excellent location, very close to a metro station. Of course, you get what you pay for, and the room was rather small, but this was no problem for us because we were only there to sleep, and as with all Japanese hotels, it is important to ask for a non-smoking room. 

To keep costs down, we didn't bother with the hotel breakfast. We had a rhythm where we drank some juice in the hotel room in the morning (to get going), set off on the day's activities, had a morning coffee and sandwhich somewhere, ate a late lunch in a restaurant but taking care to get the lunchtime offers, which are very reasonable, and then picked up some evening snacks from a local convenience store, for example, Lawson's.

One of the differences between this trip and my travels as a student was that while we were by no means 'splashing the cash' we didn't have to turn over every penny before spending it. This greatly reduces stress levels, and meant we had some room for impulse purchases, like two Japanese peaches we bought from the high-class Daimaru store. They looked like the peaches from Roald Dahl's book, 'James and the Giant Peach'.

 Our trip as a whole was not as expensive as one might imagine, although it is not something that I could afford to do every year. The costs were kept down by the fact that we spent so many days on the train across Russia, meaning that there was no need for hotels and limited opportunities for spending money. Costs in Russia are reasonable, at least on a western salary, and we tried to behave sensibly. The reason for the roundabout route back from Japan, we didn't take a direct Finnair flight home, was also to save money. The cost of one-way airline tickets is often prohibitive, generally more than an economy return. However, the low-cost airline Air Asia has a flight from Osaka to Malaysia, and Malaysia Airline's policy on one-way tickets is not as ludicrous as that of many other airlines. Of course, this suited us perfectly since we have relatives in Malaysia and could thus kill two birds with one stone.

Across Russia to Japan and Malaysia - Part 8/12 (Ferry from Vladivostok to Donghae to Sakaiminato)

After a relatively strict border control, at which I was asked, "Is this really you?" by the border guard looking at my passport photo (since the two boys became teenagers I've aged a little), we boarded the vessel 'Eastern Dream'. The ferry goes first to Donghae in South Korea, arriving in the morning, before departing in the evening for Sakaiminato in Tottori Province, Japan.

Korean shipping companies have a mixed reputation and this part of our journey was not one that I was looking forward to. However, we were very lucky with the weather and everything went very smoothly. It has to be remembered that we were travelling at the start of the typhoon season and having seen the effects of a typhoon on land I wasn't very keen on seeing them at sea.

Departure from Vladivostok harbour.

The passengers were let onto the bridge of the vessel, something which certainly does not happen in Finland. The chap in the black baseball cap is steering the ship.

Henry in our cabin.

Sunset at sea.

We arrived in Donghae in the morning and had about eight hours to explore the city. We discovered that Koreans speak English just as badly as Russians, which is a surprise as they have a massive English language teaching industry. 

When we got off the ferry we found out that the only way into town was by taxi, so by taxi we went. The problem was that we didn't know where we were going and when we asked the driver to take us to the centre we were met with a blank stare. The driver then said, 'bus' and we agreed on that, at least we were going somewhere. We ended up at the long-distance bus station. 

We then set off looking for the town centre but the tourist map we had was rather vague. After wandering around for a little we found a place where we could have breakfast, Paris Baguette. While we were there a group of Korean men came in and wondered what we were doing there. They guessed correctly that we were lost tourists and tried to help. Total confusion duly ensued and we all had a good laugh.

Some friendly Korean guys.

Our destination was the Cheon-gok Cave, which was a good place to visit on a very hot day.

Ready to go down into the cave.

 Stalactites and stalagmites.

More stalactites and stalacmites.

After visiting the cave and tasting some Korean food, very spicy, we made our way back to the harbour.

The seas around Russia, North and South Korea, and Japan are the site of geopolitical tension so care is needed when taking photos. Mind you, we are not very good at following rules.

 Warning sign on board the ferry.

 Korean coast guard vessel.

 Korean Navy vessel.

 And another one.

Night-time on board with the lamps of fishermen fishing for squid on the horizon.