Land of the rising sun

When we arrived, we tried to call Shomi on the number she gave us, but all we heard was a recording of another lady saying all this stuff in Japanese! We don't know much Japanese yet, except "Biiru demo do desu ka" and "Ikimasho". So we just went to Shibuya Station for a while and freaked out.

Convenience food

Preparing for a tight 9 minute change-over at Okayama
"Which train goes to Kochi?"
Success!

The view from the bridge between Honshu and Shikoku.
Fun train.
Nice pot plants at the railway station. There are pot plants busting out of every nook and cranny of Shikoku.

"The sending office of the fashion"
Our host for the week, the moderately wild Dan Lucka.

Kochi city by night, magical and vibaceous.
Joanna with our indispensable travel companion. Whenever a Japanese person looked at it they seemed to skip straight to the romance section which features handy phrases such as "it helps to have a sense of humour".

Kochi castle.

The tiny cafe where we were watched eagerly by the whole family as we sucked up our soba noodles. For the record, the woman between Dan and I has a son Joanna's age, unmarried.

Friends we haven't met yet.

Makino Botanical Gardens.

Fake logs at the botanic gardens.
Look-out!
How did they do that?
Tomitaro Makino loving his plants.

Rock studio.
Joanna is always taking photos of me sleeping. We are at a traditional ryokan recommended by some worldly Japanese lady friends of Dans' who we met earlier that day at their cafe.

There was a minor mix-up with our rooms and our wonderful hostess, Chise, thanked us for being so cool about it by giving us free beer and tonkatsu, taking us up to the rooftop at dusk and vibing the place out to the max.

It started to rain and Chise moved us indoors to a little 'penthouse' den, which is her private room. She dimmed the lights to get the ambience just right and Dan hit the decks (well, just one deck). Cosmic Village, NICE AGE didn't live up to the splendor it's title and robotic mantaray cover promised, but Space Jungle Luv, ONENESS OF JUJU successfully transported us to another dimension.

Habotan: a bustling Izakaya serving country style Japanese food. The staff were surly but good humoured (not unike a Japanese 'Pellegrinis'). For the record, even though it looks cool, that is an organic low tar cigarette I am smoking.