If I’d believed in karma I guess I’d deserved this but for now I just consider feel unjustly treated by lady Fortune. After reaching Odawara and seen what’s to been seen we decided to be safe rather than sorry and was aiming for getting the tickets as close after midnight as possible. So after waiting out the clock we strode towards the desk where we would show our stamps and wait for the train.

The communication involved them marking a cross with their arms when I showed my note from the Tokyo station with the name of the night-train we were aiming for. After help from a guy from New Zealand who worked as a teacher here and another guy from the railways the message was clear; The train was cancelled due to a typhoon. We had noticed the continuous rain but to cancel trains seemed a bit unfair. This also meant we had nowhere to sleep.

We laughed and went back into the rain for search of some internet café or similar but had no luck. So instead we crawled in to an entrance of some karaoke place or whatever and found a unguarded powerpoint. This allowed us to replenish the battery for our lifesaver with saved mails, maps and so on.

After a few hours (I actually slept a bit) we went back to the station and slept homeless-style until about 05 when we met the New Zealander again. He and his girlfriend where heading the same way and we started traveling at 05:52 from Odawara. There where transfers all the time and I guess we would have missed a few if it wasn’t for our japanese speaking friend.

We hadn’t been able to check for mails from Sho (since the plan was to pay him a visit today) so we decided to take a break in Nagoya, the 3rd largest Japanese city to try get internet access and some food.

The station was quite big and according to a saved wiki-page the station was the largest in the world if counting floor area. We left the station and hit what we thought would be the main road but there weren’t many shops or stores but only office skyscrapers. Which was a little strange, this city wasn’t that small after all? In an attempt to cross a larger road we entered the subway and realized that below the streets there was another level of shops and boulevards.

Quite cool, literally, which was a nice change from the once again moist heat around 35°. When browsing we found a Dell store (which by the way I thought didn’t exist) with really cheap monitors and we managed to check the mail very quickly and saw that there was no answer from Sho. So we thought it would be better to start heading for Kyoto and try to get some accommodation there before sunset.

Just before leaving we checked the view from the ‘central station towers’ to get a better idea of the size of this city. It was big even though it only had 2 million inhabitants, or 9 if counting the prefectures. I’m writing this on the way to Kyoto, given that we manage to get all transfers right 😉

Today had been quite a roller-coaster, we left the hostel after packed everything and acquired us some umbrellas for the light rain. When we got to Tokyo station and was going to buy the Japan Rail Pass that would allow us free traveling by high speed trains (and all other trains as well) we were told that this was not possible without a voucher. This voucher could only be bought outside Japan. We didn’t believe this but had to find counter evidence or tips for a workaround on the internet. So we only had to find an open network, or an internet café. You might guess if when we actually needed access we succeeded in doing so.

After more than hour we gave up and headed for a place we knew would give us free internet for sure, the Apple store in Ginza. We got there and found to our demise that the lady was correct. This was the first time something in Japan were absolutely insane, in a bad way. We did some research, mailed the only travel agency in Sweden that were allowed to sell these holy vouchers for help.

We thank wikipedia who told us about some Seishun 18 ticket who was almost as good as the japan rail pass, maybe even better for some travelers. The pass only works on old shabby trains which means lots of stops in strange places but this didn’t seem like bad to us. The name of the ticket also explains that it’s mainly students or people under 18 who use this during their semester breaks, which happened to be right now. Filled with new hope we went back to Tokyo station.

When talking with the clerk I opened up my Macbook and also found and open network. Sometimes destiny just loves to play with you I guess. We bought one pass each for 11500 Yen which is around 700Kr. For this we are allowed to five (not necessarily consecutive) days of traveling. So we ordered an ordinary ticket for Odawara where we would catch some night train towards Kyoto/Osaka at 01:04.

We got there after some 70 minutes of traveling in what seemed like an ordinary subway train. It struck us that we were still in ‘Greater Tokyo’ when we got out, which might give you some perspective of how huge this city actually is. The rain was pouring down but wikipedia had told us about some castle so we hit the rainy streets with our white umbrellas.

We found the castle, it wasn’t crowded since it now also had gotten dark. We tried to take some pictures but the rain and darkness made the pictures look like something a drunk had captured with a broken camera. So we checked out some local cuisine and are awaiting the night train for more adventures. We also added another gallery and found how to let people add comments.

When going gets tough, the tough gets going 😉

When we got back to the hostel we started doing some laundry and since the temperature was only just above 30° we decided we would do some running. Said and done.

I, as always, started at quite high pace and was the one pushing the tempo while we were slaloming between pedestrians and bikers on the sidewalk. At the stops for traffic lights we sparred and jumped up and down and ran on the spot. This, my friends, it’s not regarded as typical behavior for the japanese and we were for sure once again regarded as mad gaijins.

After running straight for a while the sidewalks began to get a bit too crowded so we changed directions a couple of times at random crossings. It didn’t take long before I had to slow down though, I guess I’m not as fit as Ulf after all 😉 It was about then it hit us that we had no idea where we were. But as a wise man once said, you are only lost if you care of where you’re going.

Running in a slower pace we started to check for maps which might show us names or kanji we recognized. It turned out that we had actually run in a U-shape so we weren’t that far from where we started. We even had some luck and found a park which gave opportunities to push-ups, pull-ups and other training. Ulf hadn’t done pull-ups before and wasn’t pleased at all when I beat him by far in this exercise. We did some extensive stretching and then we went back and after a shower we went out for food. The running felt great afterwards and it was definitely a good idea to bring shoes and running clothes.

We concluded our nice dinner with a a classic shochu on the rocks, this time we saw that the waitress poured, quite much, shochu from a 2L plastic bottle we had seen earlier in supermarkets. This was not créme de la créme among shochu so to speak. Later it showed that buying this ‘drink’ costed around 20Kr which might give away some information about the quality and taste. Bad moonshine topped with the smell of nail polish remover is the closest description I can think of right now.

But we are men from a barbaric, err, I mean nordic country so we drank them quickly with a smile on our faces. This made quite an impression on a japanese guy sitting in the bar and he offered Ulf some of his korean chochu. Ulf is a man who never questions the motives of older men buying younger men strong liquor so he gladly accepted.

It tasted way better but since we had to take care of the laundry and do some preparations for tomorrow’s journey I could politely decline his offer when I’d emptied my first glass. He was nice to talk to and came from the town located at the base of Fuji so when we told him we’d climb it he gave us advice and instructions on how to get there smoothly. Japanese people are really friendly and helpful, I think Sweden could learn a few things here, me included I guess.