Controlled chaos: my trip to Japan
Hear ye hear ye, I present my sleep-addled travelogue. In it you’ll find science, love, suffering, Donke, and a maid cafe.
Some context: There’s a big annual scientific conference for consciousness researchers ‘round the world, a real “who’s who” of all the people who study the most interesting phenomenon in the universe—being! This year it landed in Tokyo, which provided the perfect excuse to go to a place I needed to go to, if only to please my barely suppressed inner child who grew up slurping down their media with a boba straw. But anyway, yes. Business trip.
Day 1: Oh, Canada 😳
This road took me first to Canananada for a bit under a day, as that turned out to save some cash and also let me say I’ve been there. Alas, the trip started out on all-too-familiar grounds for me, as I forgot both my debit card (in the car) and conference poster (at the gate), giving my humdrum life some much-needed zest, a cause for more pep per step.
The flight to Canaduh was otherwise uneventful. What was eventful was just how nice and organized the airport in Vancouver is — clearly, they forgot to leash their nerds. Everything just makes sense. And it’s a good thing, since my congenital frugality meant I was staying there overnight. I booked the cheapest and closest place possible, an Airbnb within walking distance. The walk was really lovely. Cool and misty and quiet the whole way. Really safe and clean, especially for an airport-adjacent neighborhood. The most remarkable thing was the absence of furious dogs screaming at me. I don’t know how they do it, these northerners, but they have tamed their beasts. The Airbnb was a pleasant surprise. The description was unclear and it turned out that I had a wee little guest cottage for-to hang my head.
Day 2: Oh, Saka 😳
The next morning, I made my way back to the airport and cruised to my flight.
11 hours on a plane can be made into any number of shapes, some of which are nightmarish, but mine was right pleasant. My seat neighbor is fully responsible for this, as she struck up a conversation with me within a couple minutes of settling in. An older woman, an accountant, living in Vancouver. Said she’s originally from Hong Kong, which sparked a conversation about national vs regional identities and all that — reportedly, Hong Kong is now well and under the thumb of Mother China (though this had little to do with her emigration). We talked about all kinds of things but — and this is always my bad — a lot of those things ended up being about what I research. Brains and minds and all that, as well as a lot of over-sharing about my civilian life. She knows it all.
This chatter bookended the flight and the rest was reading and annotating a really great paper formalizing how our behaviors can be turned into some straightforward math (for me, not a math god, demi-god, or even high-ranked math priest). The short of it is that I think this formalization can be appropriated for my project on formalizing how (and implicitly why) our field of consciousness presents certain things as more or less meaningful than others. Stewing on it right now, but it seems promising. At any rate, the flight was billable. The rest of the 11 hours will remain unaccounted for, but suffice it to say that someone was entertained.
In terms of time zones, well, we the people know they can be brutal. The flight got in after what was essentially a really late night back home, though it was about 4pm local time. Thus, it fell on me to fight through the sleepiness as long and valiantly as possible. But first, I had to make it through security and baggage claim and a horde of excitedly chattering schoolgirls returning from a beach arc.
From the start, I had determined that my Japanese wasn’t going to cut it , so I committed myself to sounding as American as possible, which made it and further encounters much easier than they would have gone had I pretended to have more than a passing ability to listen to (but not produce) Japanese. The biggest issue is, honestly — and this is stupid — that I automatically replied in Spanish. I have yet to download the Japanese mode DLC.
First impressions first:
- Steamy! I could tell this was going to do wonders for my alligator skin
- Structured! Things are run aggressively well (this was confirmed on the way back, where they practically threw me through security)
- Stimulating! Everything competes for your attention at every turn. These people really tap into the senses.
- Rainy! Heat and rain in the forecast and me without my umbrella.
My phone wasn’t set for international data but this was fortunately fixed with an upgrade over WiFi. And so, I was made more or less as powerful as I was going to be. These newfound powers got me to the train (cool route from the airport island) and, Americanly soaked in the warm rain, to my hotel, which was — as would be the case in all my hotels — exactly what a hotel needs to be. A tiny room, bed, combination shower/sink/tub, and a toddler-beating-IQ endowed toilet.
Given my brain thought it was something like 5am even though it was 4pm, I did my best to whittle away the hours with snacks. Made it to 6pm. Oof, rookie mistake. Woke up at 2:30am the next… day.
But first, an ode to convenience stores:
Oh convenience stores
On every corner you reveal
Delicious goods of delicious price
Long may you stand
Proud and strong and cheap
24 hours a day
You fill us
Amen
🙏
(Assume now that every time I don’t mention a meal that I was binging something at a convenience store — major highlights include the cheesecake parfait, curry bread, banana au latte, and curry rice. They’re absolutely everywhere and it made me irrationally sad to go home to a place where the best we can do is soda bucket subscriptions.)
Day 3: Ooooh, Saka!
Right so I done goofed. 2:30am. The hour of the wolf. What does one do at 2:30am? I don’t well know nor do I recall, let the record show. Billable hours. I do know it eventually got late enough that I could go join the world. And join it I did, after catching the breakfast buffet at 6:30am, featuring teeny tiny pancakes and kimchi.
I made my way over to my new digs across town (somewhere in the center). First and foremost on my list was storming Osaka castle. Built in 1600-something, it used to have a moat but then it got breached so they built a second one. On the way, I got a weirdly fancy 3-course meal with blue cheese pizza (didn’t actually know until I ate it). I say weirdly fancy because it was like $8. It became clear that this was not all that strange — the yen’s weak and the dollar’s strong and so I began my career as an under middle-aged baron.
Castle-storming went well. I bribed the guards and they let me in. The actual castle has been hollowed out into a 5-floored museum, which I think prevents it from lighting itself on fire, being historic kindling.
After this, I was feeling the jet lag so I did another bad thing and went home for a power nap. Don’t laugh—it was only 4 hours.
Awakening from my folly, I set out to explore. Fortunately, exploration was easy since I was a street away from the main big, wild market. I did immediately get stuck hanging out with a guy with perfect English, despite never having left Japan (good school, he says 🙄). Yapped at him about my research and looking for pants. I liked the green pants his friend designed but baron or not, I’m not paying $180 for pants. I had dallied a bit much so things were already starting to close up a bit, at least for the normie businesses.
The night market was still booming. Best thing were the elaborate 3D displays — very Disney ride-like, except with evil Buddhas and octopus. Bought a shirt (turned out to be endowed with a +2 luck charm) and continued to make my way deeper into the market.
Things quickly turned — that’s something you see here — quick turning. Went right from normie shopping to wild evil Buddha Disney bazaar to tiny little karaoke bars full of salarymen belting out their favorite jams, female hosts egging them on. The karaoke hallway contined to get smokier and more confined until suddenly it opened up into a new street full of bright white lanterns. Very curious. Now what could these be?
Ladies of the evening! 💃🏻
As is the case with everything in Japan, there is a structure to the business. In fact, it might have been the least chaotic thing I saw. Every courtesan has her own little storefront, herself at the center and her madame — an older woman — at a 90-degree angle from her. Said madame was most in charge of driving the catcalls, wielding a body mirror to preemptively prepare a line to slow the traffic. Speaking of the traffic, it was mostly young men, all in little groups, looking curious but not at all wolfish. Each storefront had a tea tray — after all, prostitution is not fully legal. This is serious tea ceremony business. The system is straightforward, from what I gathered without slowing my roll— guy walks on up to a booth, negotiates with the madame, and is allowed to go into the… tea room. The madame keeps watch (and ostensibly time on that watch). The client pays up and is well-wished on the way out. Very simple. There were some police officers at the end of the winding grid. Not that they seemed overly necessary — everything still felt completely safe (as all things in Japan, which is still wild to me).
The courtesans themselves were aesthetically stunning. Easily some of the most attractive people I’ve seen, to the point of looking AI-generated. Each demonstrated a different niche. Some were classy and cool, some manic and cute (cat ears, meow). My favorite was the person with big nerd glasses on, sprawling on a pile of books. Almost, almost I slowed my roll. But I didn’t have the cash, nor am I much of a tea guy.
Note to readers: this is said as a joke — I’m actually the kind of guy who would sooner sell himself (I have a story about that, fr fr) than buy
At this point, it was about midnight but clearly that meant nothing to my brain, so I kept cruising. I had intentionally brought just a couple things to wear. I looked up a retail store and discovered DON QUIXOTE.
How do I describe dear Donke (official nickname)? It’s as though they took a Walmart, made it watch anime, then shook it around like a snowglobe. It’s just a chaotic and beautiful mess and I spent many hours there, amidst a growing crowd of temporally confused fellow shoppers. But only a few hours this time. At this point, I was half-tripping and warmly delirious and having a grand old time. I eventually dismounted the Donke and headed back home.
Day 4: Toki, Yo!
A new day dawned. Finally time to make my way to Tokyo for the conference. Being a train nerd (we should all be train nerds — join or perish), I was hyped for the Shinkansen (bullet train). And it didn’t disappoint. Woooosh, wooo, shooosh, wooosh, reeeeeee and I made it to Tokyo.
There was some chaos to resolve upon arrival at the mega central train station. Had to figure out how to get a rail card (arcane arts for Android users) and then made my way through the maze under Tokyo station. Very eventually, I arrived at my hotel, relaxed a bit, then set out in the Shibuya area (known for nightlife but not specifically for me, this night — foreshadowing).
At this point, I had stopped worrying about figuring out beforehand where I should eat because I knew that the food was better than the food back home no matter where I went (one small exception — more foreshadowing), so I just sort of wandered a couple blocks in the rain (oops, no umbrella) until I found a place to duck into. Wonder of wonders, it was the best curry I’ve ever had. And it turns out that’s just my brain speaking because my stomach absolutely had its own hot take on it.
Back to the hotel for an inner adventure. That took it out of me so I kind of just passed out. So much for a night on the town but hey, many nights remained, one most magical night in particular.
Day 5: Satellites and warm asparagus
So here’s the thing. The earlier night’s suffering? A real blessing. 10 hours of sleep got me most of the way to un-jetlagged. Refreshed was me and so I went out. The agenda: catch the first half of a theories of consciousness satellite event, then boogie on over to the shorter but more interesting states of consciousness satellite. And so it was. Not much to say of the first. It was neurosciency, which is to say that it all had an air of legitimacy that makes it tricky to poke at. Seemed legitimate enough. But it was a bit of a big group and so it wasn’t a great forum for interacting (which is a reason to travel across the world, whereas sitting and listening to lectures, just isn’t anymore, thanks to Zoom).
Delicious Indian with cheese naan (always get cheese if you find the northern Indian variety of restaurant) for lunch and the cutest little bus ride around town and I was off to the states of consciousness thing. It had a couple of cool restrictions on speakers: only students present and only something that you aren’t doing at the conference. This allowed for an eclectic lineup, which is what we got. (I didn’t register in time to submit something, but I would have carried the eclectic torch.) Case in point, we got a talk about how childbirth is often an altered state akin to taking psychedelics. It might say something of me that I see zero issue with this and have already written on this somewhere. Lots of reasons to believe this and very few not to, apart from there being little direct research on it. Anyway, eclectic but not wrong, probably.
There was also a talk about things both eclectic and wrong from a certain someone I know from back home, but despite being their biggest hater and doubter, I’m happy to see this person passionately putting themself out there. And there was something useful for my research on altered states—a tracer tool for detecting and comparing altered visual phenomenology… but this is a travel blog, of sorts! None of that. I’ll be glossing over much of the gory science details from here on out.
Small aside: during a break, one fiiiine-looking stranger person came up to me and asked me if I was some person with some association or something, but I had no idea what they were on about. Said she’d be back in a second but I think she flew past without me noticing. Still, filed away. Something about that one.
After the event, a group of us nerds got to walking and found a bar that said they could give us a little party space. Bottomless drinks for men for $12. For women? $3. As unfair as that is, no one had a problem with it since cheap is cheap and it’s cute in its own way. After a bit, we headed out to grab dinner, which was doomed from the start. Guy leading the pack couldn’t do gluten and hadn’t found many sympathetic ears among the locals, so he dragged us to a Korean BBQ place he had the night before.
I was hanging with the veganarians so I huddled with them in our little corner table, cooking up meager veggie bits over a gas stove, fighting for calories. At the very least, we had a fun convo about dreams and lucid dreaming (one of the people studies them), though I suspect the one guy being down bad for the woman — telling her that he was dreaming of her and all that — caused the conversation to stick strongly there. I headed back (but not before grabbing more calories at a 🎵 convenience store 🎵).
Day 6: Playing—nay—doing hooky seriously
This was the first day of the conference in earnest, though still prior to the main event. Basically, there was a short list of long sessions we could choose to attend in the morning or afternoon, meant to enrich our understanding of a particular topic. I had only signed up for one in the afternoon on altered states, but the boys had signed up for morning and afternoon sessions.
A note on the boys: These are other dudes at about the same point in the PhD as I am who happen to share an advisor. We ride together in consciousness. One, Sergio, is all straight-laced and business-minded and the other, Andrew, is pure San Diego (my people!), which is to say he does what he wants or he doesn’t. It depends.
Sensing weakness in Andrew, I told him I didn’t have a morning session but that I wanted to go see Akihabara (weeb town!). He fled the scene with me and we headed downhill from the Tokyo U conference venue. I ended up leaving him for a bit in the local Donke while I grabbed some things at my hotel, but this led to us both getting trapped in there for a while and having a grand old time.
We eventually dismounted the Donke and headed down to Akihibara. In short, it used to be an electronics hub but then got taken over by anime and manga and video game people. You’ve got a wild array of figurines and freaky sex stuff and pachinko and vintage games and trading cards and maid/owl/hedgehog/cat cafes. And of course we partook in most of these. Most memorably, we did the maid cafe.
It ain’t what they show on TV, kids. Never meet your waifus.
The place was windowless and tacky, various shades of pink and white and mauve. The maids were dissociating openly. The only other patron looked incredibly sad and happy at the same time. Horrible screechy music was loudly blaring, and all the seats were orientated towards an empty little stage you had to pay to get the maids to do a little dance on. I loved it so much.
They forced us to put on animal ear headbands from the start. I was a bear. Andrew was… a cat, probably. I don’t know what cat has round white ears but that’s the lore they gave us. They also taught us some tricks. Apparently, saying “meow meow” is the way to summon the waitress. What they didn’t say was that it is also how you consent to be charged for additional services. Among these were a raffle with various prizes (most expensive being a used maid outfit, which was actually not all that expensive, like $45), though nothing you couldn’t just pay for on the menu. Speaking of that, there were two meal options (curry or an omelette) + an optional dessert — this also came with either a cell phone photo or a polaroid printout (which we both opted for, fearing a digital paper trail). The menu had other perks we could spring for, including animal ears to take home, a keychain, their DVD, a private greeting at the table with the whole crew, and a dance on the stage. They pushed really hard for these the whole time by trying to get us to “meow meow”, but we stayed strong. I’m pretty sure they still charged us for a few of these anyway, but I wasn’t about to haggle with a person in a stained maid dress carrying the show. The most dangerous part was running low on water, because the water maid would come over and refuse to give you water until you did a little hand heart dance and said “chu” (kissy sound). It was our life or our dignity. Easy choice every time.
At first, the room was empty, but it did fill out over time, which decreased the weirdness in kind. That and I think the human soul can get used to anything. Such is the power of the soul. Speaking of souls, a kind one sprung for the stage show, so we got to see the MVP maid do her thing. The most genuine part was when it came time for the polaroid, where we could select our favorite maid to take a picture with. We immediately, emphatically pointed at the one who asked us, as she was carrying the whole place on her kawaii-desu moe moe daiyo back.
And my curry was great, as was my cute little dessert. Kawaii kawaii, moe moe! It was seeping into our souls. We narrowly escaped, but only in the literal sense. Some part of my soul is still strapped to my chair, making “chu” sounds, waiting for the next dance.
Wait, wasn’t there a conference going on? Oh yeah, we may have missed out on the afternoon tutorials. Couldn’t be helped.
I did catch the opening conference social partly in. Not much to say — just talked to people I knew and was starting to know. I ran into that one person who confused me for someone else the day before. She didn’t remember having done this or who she thought I was but still, good excuse to talk. Immediate warm trash talk to be had, though she ran off with a girl on her back before I could get the digits. The party died down quickly after they kicked us out of the venue, which was just as well.
Day 7: Okay, now it’s business time
This was the first real day of the conference and I was determined to be a good boy scout. Though I think I did miss the opening session. (Guys, it’s just a Zoom call.) But I used that time to help all the short people put up their posters, a great excuse to chat with people before things got bustling. There was also a VR thing set up that actually does what I wanted to do with DeepDream — alter visual input to make it seem like you’re tripping. And there was also a couple of Serbians selling EEG tech I talked tennis with (Djokovic is their MJ). The poster session was great (as were all of them, including the last, with is me presuming — we’ll get there).
Then it was off to a bunch of 15-minute talks, then another poster session and some big talks (Zoom, guys). That shadowy background female character I’ve been mentioning was in some session, so I slid into the next seat over for a little banter and mutual distraction. Getting somewhere.
Jeff (advisor and all around great guy) was crashing at this point (had just rolled in the day before) so we caught some quick and delicious Indian food before sending him home. Decided to skip the Dan Dennett memorial (sorry Dan, you were a jolly good fellow). There was a plan hatched of running back to weeb town but I got stuck with that passionate but aggressively wrong homeboy person, so it never quite happened (everyone scattered to the wind). Well, we did go but we spent the whole time looking for Andrew, who clearly didn’t want to be found.
A quick trip back to the main neighborhood for the student social event, a realization we were too early, then a re-scattering until the party. The party itself was a disaster, but we’re all chill enough to not flip over it. No music or karaoke for about an hour (that was the hook) and a single, very long and slow line to the liquor. But necessity breeds innovation and by innovation I mean that people left to go to the 7–11 next door to get their own nearly free drinks and make their own party out on the curb. It was a good time just chatting and all that. Also quieter. But I didn’t last too long — had my own party to set up for the next morning in my poster session. On the way out, I ran into that one person. That one has a firm handshake. Again, some connection there. We’d soon see.
Day ♾️: Night of my life
Before getting to the night, we must tolerate through the day. Or so grandpap Smuss used to say, spitting into the bayou, looking wistful. I was part of the 10am poster session so I got up nice and… on time to get set up.
It was a lovely time. Always happy to go on and on about my work. Short version is that I was summarizing the experiment I did on VR-induced altered states and its effects on a host of things, including anxiety. Seemed to go over well with the folks who stopped by. The crowd eventually dispersed so I packed up and joined the regular flux and flow of sessions.
Lucked into finding myself in the same session with that person, at first a couple seats away but soon next to. She had a couple pens so I ruined her focus alongside my own by going back and forth with some doodles. This went over well enough that we had lunch together. Eggplant, even. Jolly good time. Then it was back to the sessions and posters and, well, it didn’t matter much in the sense that I was already down bad. For you see, there comes a time in a man’s life that he knows what he wants and he wants what he knows. This, my friends, was that time.
(This person shall now be called “S”, for serendipity and Shakira)
After the afternoon sessions, we Merced-ites again convened to have a meal, this time diner-style. My food was not good, which was refreshing in a way. It proved to me that the food in Japan is actually just amazing and not that I was making it so through my mind-genie. Jeff loved his diner dinner— soul food from his childhood.
At the end of dinner, through the gossip mill, I did get some grim news: S is taken. Hadn’t seen that coming but then again, the world is a strange and confusing place with no reason or purpose or light or truth☺. Either way, though that certainly threw a damp blanket on my flames, S was still damn good company and a much needed foil to our boringness.
S had been simultaneously invited and had invited herself, but she got caught up running (her thing) so didn’t make it until we were well and done. Not to worry, it was time to head out for a night out. We said goodbye to chaperone Jeff and headed out to Golden Gao in Shibuya.
I hadn’t done the research, but Golden Gao is basically a wee little neighborhood of eclectic bars. To get there, we of course took the subway (man, I love trains). S was being her free-spirited self, doodling on people and machine-gun rattling away questions in every direction.
We got to the Gao and started on to the first place. The owner clearly wasn’t all that keen on us but was happy to take our money, as the walls were papered with it. (His schtick was elaborately presenting all the drinks as great and rare finds but then saying he’d charge 1000 yen for them anyway.) We got a round, had some drifters drift in and join us (Seattle and Melbourne), and headed for the next place. Andrew, though valiant to make it this far, decided to disappear himself.
The next place was a tight fit, made that way by a concerted WhatsApp effort to collect all the consciousness scientists in the East into a single bar. Things got a bit hazy from here, but not so hazy that I couldn’t piece them together. But for the sake of this writeup, I’ll skip most of it.
Fast-forward several hours, drinks, and a series of neutral to fortunate events, and S and I were really, really close. Again skipping some details, but there was some smoky, taut tension that we both were digging. Some combination of good stress and powerful mutual attraction and we were suddenly in a sort of shared altered state. We left together and wandered the peaceful streets for hours, back towards our part of town. More details skipped but it all came to a transcendentally wonderful experience with another person. This was all simultaneously tragic, but that’s beautiful too. And so I’ll leave it for this account. Eventually, eternity ended.
Day 9: Tying up loose ends
The previous night was both long and intense (beyond being wonderful, but you already knew that). I still got going in reasonable time, as there was work to be done. Not that all of me was there, but I certainly made the appearance of being. Attended the posters and some sessions, a little bittersweet sidebar with S, and some more undoubtedly great presentations that were lost on me, lost as a I was. S had to head out that night, so I looked for some closure with that, though it never came. Understandable and probably for the best, or as I’m determined to convince myself. Life is the story you tell yourself and this is a good arc, dammit.
Anyway, conference over! Caught one last dinner with Jeff and now Carolyn, a former advisor. Finding a place proved a bit challenging, however—we happened to be in the racist part of town so we had to try several places before we found a Chinese restaurant that would tolerate us. (Small aside: though I ultimately disagree with the end result, I sympathize with the strong desire many Japanese people have of resisting unilateral openness to other cultures—I think it’s partly why their cities are so peaceful and clean. It’s understandable, if not fully right.)
There was a party planned for afterwards, though it was a bit far away. I dutifully attended with Sergio (Andrew had full on disappeared for good this time, Nolan’s Batman style—camera cuts away and then back and poof, no Andrew). And honestly, the party was a great time, despite the maelstrom in my mind.
I probably shouldn’t have, but I raved about my wonderful previous night to a few people I knew. They loved it and found it inspiring, which I took heart in. (Small aside — it was the first time I’d seen my doors fully opened up in 13 years. I’m glad to know they can still open, even if the present opening wasn’t right. Happy to find I can still feel that way.) Made some plans with some people I had been running into throughout the week, held a pineapple a guy gave me (in hindsight, I think it was an avant-garde flirtation device directed towards me), and had a genuinely good time.
What little mind I had left started getting mushy so I found myself sprinting through that big, famous criss-cross intersection on the way to catch the last train home.
Day 10: Extra innings in Tokyo
The peak of our story has come and gone, but there remain a few content-padding sidequests to follow—the dreaded tourist arc. I had decided to stick around Tokyo for a day and change so as to go to a psychedelic visual show thing they have in town but it turned out to be sold out. So, I mostly just loped around, tourist style. Met up with Sergio and a strange guy I couldn’t quite figure out (just one of those people you can’t read) at the modern art museum.
My mind was still kind of tripping from two days before, which turned out to be a blessing. It’s difficult to describe unless you’ve been there, but it’s a kind of synesthesia, an opening up to the complex feelings under the superficial features. I imagine actually good artists get this well enough but for me, it has taken technical workarounds to start to get into that space.
The forecast portended a violent thunderstorm and Sergio had a vintage camera and book on him, so we scrapped the plans to visit the imperial palace grounds nearby and instead hoofed it to the nearest concentration of convenience stores in search of umbrellas. This was less straightforward than you’d think, as we were in the super high-end business area of the city — every building was a mega-dank marbled monstrosity. And, somehow, within these spaces, there were humble little, normally priced, 🎵convenience stores🎵. It was honestly so cool to me that they pretty much just put a series of normal shops inside these mega structures.
We dined on heavenly 7–11 food, umbrellas in hand, and set out to our next destination — the book store. But look up at the skies — lightning! The tempest had begun. It was quite a storm. The deep, resonating thunderful booms had me giggling stupidly. Sadly, the storm relented and we arrived at the bookstore.
I mentioned that I do not know Japanese enough to speak it. But I do know some. That is, I can sound out the easy two alphabets. What this means is that I can sound out about 70% of what I see. And what this means is that this is not at all helpful, as pretty much the only words I know are either baby words or grammar. The book store was therefore an exercise in being surrounded by just enough intelligible information so as to be constantly overwhelmed by not knowing. Fun in its own way, but I feel like I’ve had this same experience in fever dreams.
Sergio was lucky enough to not know anything so he got to enjoy himself for hours, using Google Lens to hunt down some Buddhism books. I didn’t buy anything, but I did at least think about buying some language books going the other way (it’s fun to see how Japanese people talk about English — also embarrassing, since English is a right mess).
Escape happened again and we headed over to some swanky cocktail bar. Sergio wanted to go to because he’s some sort of cocktail bar geek who knows people in the community. Well, he had fun and I had fun watching him have fun. My grandmother phase.
After parting with Serg, I met up with this Irish guy who knows everyone (the women in particular — man’s a hard worker). He was too tired to be good company (getting hammered every night of the conference will do that to you) but I still dragged him through a (sadly) closed Akihibara and a Donke, which didn’t hit him as it should. All shall ride the Donke someday.
Day 11: Even more innings in Tokyo
I was supposed to be doing that psychedelic thing but it fell through — made some plans to meet up with the folks I was going to do that with, but the plans never went anywhere. So I set out on foot, a few sights in my sights but mostly just ready to wander.
Since this was a Sunday, the streets were flowing with people. Endless bazaars and shops and street food and furniture and spoons and so on. I did in fact have something of an end goal: A big shrine. And it really was big and grand. But yes, that’s more or less the whole of the day. Lots of walking, a bit of cash-only shopping, and wading through an endless, churning human sea. Tokyo’s really just the best place. (And I say this as a non-crowd person. Crowds just hit differently when people are respectful and peaceful.)
I wanted to spend the last couple days in the olde Japan, so I made my way to the Shinkansen station and rode that puppy to Kyoto (woooosh, wooo, shooosh, wooosh, reeeeeee). Definitely a different vibe from the outset. Hotel was cute. Shoes off from the front and tatami mats everywhere. Looked up places open late and somehow found myself in a Sergio-esque cocktail bar (friends, they infect you), ran by a cute young couple. Just a single bar with a few barstools and smooth jazz, tucked away from the main street. Got what was basically cake drinks and grilled cheese sandwiches and I have no regrets. Took a quiet walk home and that was it.
Day 12: Cute-yoto
I hadn’t done much reading ahead on what I was supposed to be doing in Kyoto, so I pretty much just took the first suggestions Reddit offered. The first day, I headed west, out to the bamboo forests in Arashiyama. There was a distinctly touristy vibe in Kyoto that I hadn’t had in Osaka or Tokyo, which I didn’t love — but since I was willing to walk a bit, I found some peace at some of the more removed sites. Right, so what were these? A smattering of shinto shrines and gardens. Beautiful nature, adorable neighborhoods. Ridiculous heat (might have been the hottest day of the year!).
I imagined I was in a sauna and it wasn’t so bad, minus the need to keep churning through all my change at the vending machines in order keep re-stocking my water. Just think of it as Minecraft’s survival mode. That was on the north side. The south side had monkeys!
The catch was that the monkeys were way up a mountain, a legitimately steep climb. Again, true sauna experience. Suffering is joy. The monkeys were great. Very active. Did all their monkey business. Grooming, nursing, fighting, and greedily slurping up apples and peanuts from the feeding center (my apple pieces were a hit — I’m certain they’ll remember me).
Back down the hill and back through town and I found a curry place to hit up. Ordered the triple plus size, which annoyed the chef, who assumed I did it out of bravado. I did, but I also wanted to eat a ton of curry. And so it was. The chef was tickled.
And then so it was that I took the train back into Kyoto proper. Came back just in time to catch the end of the day at a buddhist temple right next to my place. Almost no one else there. It was grand, amazingly peaceful, and a little bit sacred. Had some good thoughts about my work too. They eventually ushered us out for the day.
After a quick (this time, mostly actually quick) nap, I headed out to the main market. It is specifically called the “night market” but guess what, nope. Most things closed at 8pm. Night markets just don’t have the same values that they used to have. Still had a peaceful walk through downtown. And again had the strange experience of rapidly shifting through various kinds of streets in minutes. High-end shopping, then a market, a bazaar, then back streets, then back again. Just love Japan’s city planning. Controlled chaos. A quick run through the local Donke and that was that.
Day 12: The dawn of the final day
I’ll tell you a secret: I wrote everything but the first two days on this day on the flight home. So, this final day really is today, at least for now.
On this the final day, I a bit over-ambitiously decided to hoof it to Nara, that place with tame deer rampaging about the town. Nara’s not all that easy to return from, it turns out. But I had no thought of that in the morning. Left my things in the hotel lobby for my later flight, then hopped on the express train to deertown. Pretty ride. I caught sight of a few curiosities: A makeshift dirt tennis court, a host of senior men golfing in a big flat open field, and a grand shrine surrounded by rice paddies.
The Nara deer aggressively greeted me and my officially sanctioned snacks. They all do these little bows in hopes of getting fed but as soon as that fails, they opt to just attack you, but only enough so as to not get in any real trouble.
Besides the deer horde, Nara had the human horde. Tourists as far as the eye could see. Having learned from the day before that the tourist body is weak, I headed out into the hills to find some peace. And find it I did. A Shinto thing (besides thousands of rituals) is this well-wishing culture, where you try to manifest good things for people you care about. I like that. There were many thousands of these left all over the shrines. I followed the path deeper in until it was just me and an elderly woman who was dutifully praying at each shrine. Had some nice peace there for a good while.
But then I realized I didn’t have as much time as I had thought before the flight, as returning from Nara is a bit of a dance. I made my way back, with a few detours into other sites (including a buddhist temple, which was nice). I also got some soba, and that was grand.
Properly ran back through the deer+human hordes to the train, then back into Kyoto, where I grabbed my stuff and went right back to the station to begin the (again, surprising) complicated series of switches to make it to the airport in good time. Actually ran into that Irish bloke from the conference on the way. Don’t know the chances of that, but I know it can’t be high. Thank you, deer god.
Tricky traveling eventually led me to the airport, being thrown through security (I did say this, they absolutely hustle the bureaucracy), and right to my flight, where I have done my best to write this up into the wee hours.
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A few days have passed—so what do I think? I mean, Japan is awesome. Within just a few hours of being in Tokyo, I felt it was a place I could easily live and be happy in. I’d have to learn the language to get in deeper but I think that would also be a good challenge to have.
The conference was great. I got a lot of useful things I can use for my future work (including the hopefully groundbreaking mental health treatment company I’ve been co-founding with a few other folks).
I’m also glad I had an amazing and beautiful connection with a person, even if cruel fate hasn’t seen fit to make it possible to continue~ Like the Grinch, my heart grew four sizes that day. Here’s to keeping it that way.
Thanks for reading if you did! And for those that did not, phooey!
