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the lonely party guidebook to japan
#1
This idea came up as i was sitting in an empty dorm room with a cup noodle, small bottle of sake and a lonely planet guidebook for company. Its my personal set of rules based on my limited experience of travelling, and thought id post it so you could laugh at it and/or suggest improvements.

1. dont rely on the guidebook

being mentioned in the guidebook as a good cheap place to stay is a near guarantee that the place will be full or close to it, and random wanderings get kind of boring. Also descriptions of a restaurant along the lines of "look for the plastic bowls of noodles outside" gives a choice of roughly one of fifty reastaurants.... and the maps arent all that accurate.

2. dont rely on other peoples advice.

talking to other people before going up mt fuji told me that i should bring copious amounts of water because its expensive, and that its impossible to get up and down mt fuji in a day due to the annoying bus timetable. As it turned out it was tipping it down on mt fuji that day, and somewhere close to the top i discovered that out of my almost completely water based rucksack i had drunk just one litre, so i tipped most of it away. I also made it up and back with plenty of time to spare despite getting a combination of hypothermia and altitude sickness on the way up, while on the way down i slipped, cut my hand open and spent some time both patching myself up and repairing the patches at regular intervals as it started to fall off.
3. dont rely on the phrasebook

Two reasons... the first is that after spending long periods getting my pronounciation right i could successfully ask for directions and be understood first time. The problem came when a torrent of japanese came back at me of which i generally understood not a word. The other reason is that it got soaked on mt fuji and turned into an interesting lump of multicoloured paper-based stuff.

4. bring anti-dihorrea stuff

A few days back i talked to an austrailian guy who enlightened me on the joys of travelling with dihorrhea for the last month. naturally i gave him some of my tablets... and he was much happier. Later i got that wonderful condition myself, but happily it died off quickly with aid of the joyous pills.

5. dont travel with someone who respects culture less than you do

Its a bit of a downer to have a bored mate with you while visiting a castle or the like, or yawning on a rollercoaster saying how the ones in america are so much better.

6. In fact, its probably best to travel alone

No disrepect to my friend of 8 years, but we do things at different speeds, its as simple as that. Mind you, my complete lack of a sense of direction would be a bit of a problem there.

7. carry condoms

unless you are happily married and/or catholic. my only comment is just how annoying it is being in a foreign country and not knowing where they are sold.

8. the more you talk to your parents, the more they want to know

keep them on some kind of rationing system as far as contacting them goes.


9. The most run down places are generally also the most fun.

Because the sort of people who actively look for cheap accomodation are just like each other..... a nice busy place with 4 or 5 drinking buddies more than covers for the cockroaches. Also theres normally someone there who speaks japanese in some way shape or form, thus raising the possibility of kidnapping them to use as your translator for the rest of the trip:D
EEEEXCEELLEEEEEEENNT!!
[Image: SkaWars.JPG]
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#2
if at all possible it is best to travel with a local...they know all the cool places and speak the language
and I totally agree that you should have a base line interest with your traveling companion, I am a people watcher and a planner ....if you dont like knowing we are eating between 7 and 8 right before we go to the club and after we visit the sites...you do not want to travel with me....then again...the right person can always get me to change my mind and be spontaneous.....suggestions of hours in the room can always persuade me to throw away my schedule;)
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#3
I'll ask you again.....


Did you see Godzirra and run for your rife!!!:D
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#4
still, it's hard to set aside a sense of adventure and spontaneity. without taking risks, you'll never be able to fully experience the culture. and you never know when adventure will take you.

my sister was stationed in Misawa, Japan for 6 months last year, and one night she decided to go out to a bar in town with a few co-workers. the only guy with a car had just got his car that day, and while it is similar to american cars, there are small differences (like the signal light lever and the windshield wiper lever are on opposite sides of the steering wheel in Japan). Eventually, they get to where they were going, which is about 35-40 minutes away from the base.
After a couple hours of drinking with people that speak NO english, they went outside to discover the dude with the car left the lights on, and the battery died. so then, they had to gesture to local civilians for help, and after about 3 hours, they found someone that understood.:D
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#5
I want to go to Japan...
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#6
Quote:still, it's hard to set aside a sense of adventure and spontaneity. without taking risks, you'll never be able to fully experience the culture. and you never know when adventure will take you.

Hey brokend.....why don't you take a trip to Mexico and use that adventure and spontaneity to down a few
glasses of pure, thick, drinking water down there and experience the culture.:blink: You will be adventuring
all over that bathroom.:P
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#7
PIX,Jul 13 2004, 01:44 PM Wrote:
Quote:still, it's hard to set aside a sense of adventure and spontaneity. without taking risks, you'll never be able to fully experience the culture. and you never know when adventure will take you.

Hey brokend.....why don't you take a trip to Mexico and use that adventure and spontaneity to down a few
glasses of pure, thick, drinking water down there and experience the culture.:blink: You will be adventuring
all over that bathroom.:P
<_< believe me, it takes far less then a single glass. and that small mexican hospital was no treat either.
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#8
bwahahaha:P
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#9
FreeFall,Jul 13 2004, 03:21 PM Wrote:
PIX,Jul 13 2004, 01:44 PM Wrote:
Quote:still, it's hard to set aside a sense of adventure and spontaneity. without taking risks, you'll never be able to fully experience the culture. and you never know when adventure will take you.

Hey brokend.....why don't you take a trip to Mexico and use that adventure and spontaneity to down a few
glasses of pure, thick, drinking water down there and experience the culture.:blink: You will be adventuring
all over that bathroom.:P
<_< believe me, it takes far less then a single glass. and that small mexican hospital was no treat either.
I hear ya.
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#10
PIX,Jul 13 2004, 03:30 PM Wrote:I'll ask you again.....


Did you see Godzirra and run for your rife!!!:D
sry dude godzirras been avoiding me so far... otherwise id kill him with my shiny new wooden practise swords, not so much a party item for back home as an item to prevent the rest of my house being used as swords during parties.
EEEEXCEELLEEEEEEENNT!!
[Image: SkaWars.JPG]
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#11
I hear ya on the travelling by yourself, I personnally am good with directions and can appreciate different cultures more than if Im with my friend who is like your friend. Besides his parents being 100% Mexican, he can't speak a lick of Spanish which sucked when we went to Mexico. After leaving me at a bar with too much to drink I had a moment of clarity and started ranting off in Spench (spanish & french) somehow I said where I was staying and someone gave me a ride to the border where I meandered back across the river. What a trip !!! ^_^
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#12
PIX,Jul 13 2004, 01:44 PM Wrote:
Quote:still, it's hard to set aside a sense of adventure and spontaneity. without taking risks, you'll never be able to fully experience the culture. and you never know when adventure will take you.

Hey brokend.....why don't you take a trip to Mexico and use that adventure and spontaneity to down a few
glasses of pure, thick, drinking water down there and experience the culture.:blink: You will be adventuring
all over that bathroom.:P
actually, i've done that, and i didn't get sick. mexico is an amazing place, and i am more than willing to return. the water is fine, if you get it at the right places. i took mine inside a "restaurant" that was really some local's kitchen. the food was the best i've EVER had, and the water didn't make me ill.;)
todavia soy un gringo, pero tengo respecto, no obstante.
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#13
peut-etre on parle francais?? not that its any good to me in japan........

so far i can say....

excuse me - sumimasen
thank you very much (polite version) - dohmo arigato goza-i-mashta
yes - hai
is there a post office around here? - kono hen-ni yoobin-kyuku ga arimas-ka?

unfortunately after asking for directions i normally get a torrent of fluent japanese back which is a problem solved by

wakarimasen - i dont understand
EEEEXCEELLEEEEEEENNT!!
[Image: SkaWars.JPG]
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#14
two strange points that you dont find in guidebooks on japan...

1. it is illegal to use public bathes if you have a tattoo.

tatoos in japan are almost exclusively gang related which is a pity cos they are so much cooler than the english ones. still... thats a major bummer for a lot of my friends who would love to go to japan.

2. asking questions about pearls is a bad idea, particularly if the person you are asking does not speak english very well.

why?? because in japan pearls are not jewellery. They are sold to be stuffed inside a japanese guys foreskin to make the girl enjoy sex more. That is a condensed version of a very strange conversation with an oldish japanese guy and a roomful of foreigners... particularly as the old guy seemed to think he could tell if a guy needed to use pearls by their faces.....
EEEEXCEELLEEEEEEENNT!!
[Image: SkaWars.JPG]
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#15
thanks for sharing....how many did you buy?
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#16
lol... i think ill get my tattoos at home thanks. and i have no need for pearls.





go on.... raise the question ^^
EEEEXCEELLEEEEEEENNT!!
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#17
Damn the doctor didnt think of that when I was born, see now i dont have anywhere to put them. :(
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#18
frito what they do is. . umm. . well you see. wait ... no where to put them??:huh:
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#19
Are they surgically implanted, or do you tape the foreskin shut so the pearl doesn't fall out?
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#20
I saw a thing about it on tv once. a while ago... they do it surgically I believe so they'd be permanently implanted. but I'm sure annatar knows for sure! (it's not supposed to be insult, but if you'd like it will be)
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#21
hmmmm....i have an idea.
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#22
i dont wanna know wank.


i dont think they are surgically implanted but iono..... the only girl ive got with here was american so pearls didnt really come up.

also... my drunken mission to find a rock club at 4am seems to have ended in a net cafe..... the language barrier really sucks sometimes.
EEEEXCEELLEEEEEEENNT!!
[Image: SkaWars.JPG]
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#23
when you going home or are you there for the duration?
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