Japan

Tokyo = So great it requires bullet points to ensure nothing is omitted

Tokyo is amazing because.......

- they have high tech vending machines that sell cold milk coffee and 10% alcohol whenever you require it.

- When you get lost, which is inevitable because of their ridiculous street adressing system, Japanese people will automatically help you out in a way that also doesn't make you feel like a total dimwit

-you can spend an unbelievable amount of time in their slot and pachinko arcades staring wide-mouthed at the grown men betting on plastic horse races.

-such arcades also have photo booths where you and your friend Lina can spend many a happy hour, taking preposterous photos of yourselves...over and over

-they have an entire area in Asakusa dedicated to kitchenware. Here Lina found her Meca amoungst the hundreds and hundreds of plastic food displays, gently and lovingly handcrafted by artisans trained in the ancient fine art of food replication. A costly but rewarding souvenir.

-Food food food, as Lina is the authority on this matter, i might let her explain how amazing the food we ate was. Personally, as long as it was battered i didn't mind. When i get home, i am getting me a deep fat fryer

-Shibuya and Shinjuku are the craziest places i've ever seen in my life. They come alive at night and are home to some of the worlds weirdest fettish joints. Bizarly, or possibly not, from the outside they all look like you could bring your five year old in to see Barney.......But's probably Barney for business men, if you know what i mean.
The place is all lit up, creating your typical Tokyo postcard image and close to Shinjuku is an grid of alleyways called the Golden Gai where you can hangout in a bar called Ghetto, the size of a shoe box and drink until the early hours with the semi-famous japanese actor owner.

-It's a city that never seems to close, after leaving your new local you can jump on the metro and go to the early morning fish markets and eat fresh sushi for breakfast, this is if you manage to make it through the markets without loosing a limb. The markets are actually fascinating, really intense as there's giant frozen tuna the size of yourselves been flung through slicing machines, high speed buggies bombing it around the place and lots of guts and blood and dead gross looking fish things. It was fantastic.

-They have this alley way in Shinjuku called 'piss alley' where all the business men go and have noodles before they stumble home to their wives. We met up with Shinya, an ol Japanese Bodytonic faithful over there through a friend of Lina's and he brought us by the hand to eat in Piss-alley. We went to this one place that only seemed to sell skewers of chicken bits. Shin ordered for us and also excitedly informed us the cook was in the mafia! If i remember correctly, we had skewers of chicken meat, chicken skin, chicken heart and chicken cartiledge. Then after our food had settled, we went to hit a few baseballs in a cage right smack bang in the middle of the city. I thought my previous Under 15 Rounders Connaght final experiecnce would stand to me, but the 80km pitched balls were too much for me and my girlie swing. I managed to hit 2 balls out of about 25.

-They have Harajuku kids! I went to Harajuku on the Sunday but unfortunately it was raining heavily. They were still out in force but my camera was dead. In someways this was good as i think i am so eager to take photos sometimes i forget to stop and take in what I'm photographing. I have to say i thought they boys were a bit more stylish. All of Harajuku is a teenagers dream, with clothes shops and trinket shops and fast food joints. Imagine Adhoc's the entire length of Georges St. (For anyone that doesn't know, Adhoc's that tacky shop in Templebar where all the Emo kids get their piercings and glow in the dark tongue rings)

-Electric Town!! A whole area with hundreds and hundreds of shops selling usb leads and cables and cords of all kinds! I spent an afternoon here in one building called Radio Hall. This place is just plain weird. On exiting the train station, the first thing i meet is about 50 girls dressed in french-maid outfits, handing out flyers. This could be a new approach for any promoters reading. Radio Hall has about 6 floors of gadget shops, manga stores and manga toys. There is one whole floor with just doll parts. If you're inclined, you can customize your own doll, ranging from very small to very large. I found the eye section particularly unnerving. Floor to ceiling displays of doll eyes?!

As i'm running out of adjectives now I'm going to take a break, read a thesaurus and finish another time.