Japan blog

I am halfway through the Kyushu section and am really looking forward to the rest. I think it's really well written and sorry cannot think of any criticism. It conveys the atmosphere well, and I love the haiku! I should say that I have been to Japan (without bike) on about seven short occasions, of which most were in Kyushu, which has many good associations to me. But I was with locals and have never been left on my own in Japan for very long, so it is interesting to see what it's like cycle touring around there, I hope to do it one day. With your japanese learning, did you find you could make yourself understood? I put in quite a lot of time into learning it (still a beginner) before my last visit and it made a massive difference as I found I could say quite a few things, but the frustration was that I still did not understand much of what was said in return, though I was close, anyway the most useful thing was knowing some kanji and the kana which made a massive difference being able to read signs - I imagine this would be pretty handy on a cycle tour.

Thanks 22. It's nice to know that I haven't bored you witless. It is my main concern.

Its interesting what you say about learning the scripts because I also learnt them but didn't practice reading them at all and so didn't use them. For the most part I found its ok without reading - only a couple times did I have obvious problems due to that. Once I took the wrong fork of the road, went up a big steep hill all for nothing and then I had to come back up on the other side in order to get back on route.

One think i'm noticing in my blog is that while i am meeting people and talking to them all the time, I don't make much mention of it in my diaries, except when there's a story with it and that happens more in Kyushu than elsewhere.

Its hard to convey the encounters without notes to go from so it looks like i'm on my own all the time. But in fact, I never got in the least bit lonely.

Yes people understood me but I was mainly using words rather than sentences and I certainly was not able to have any sort of conversation in Japanese. Conversations when neither of us could speak much of the others language included words from both languages. I think the Japanese could understand more of my English than you'd think. Anyway they were often quite eager to chat, especially in Kyushu, Kyoto and Nara. Less so in Kanazawa area.

Anyway I had better get cracking with the rest of the text because I've a long way to go and people like you will be catching up pretty soon, I would think. I am going slowly, only about one entry a day.

No worries, take your time - writing cycling journals well is no easy task - I am just starting out myself.

Perhaps being able to read the scripts wouldn't be as important for navigation as I think, especially if you have a phone or gps. But to me it was a pretty radical transformation going from not having a clue to at least being able to pronounce (not necessarily understand) signs for streets, shops, etc. Mind you, I have nearly forgotten it all again now after not studying for a while :).

Even if it's just words and using bits of both languages, it is still much better than nothing and makes language learning so worthwhile.

I think its great - I've just flicked through randomly, but you write very well and the photos tell a great story. Maps would be convenient so the reader doesn't have to keep flicking back to googlemaps.

I'm sorry now I didn't make it this year - my current plan is to visit from late March next year, cycle from Osaka to Fukuoka, and take a ferry to Korea.

Hi Philip. Thanks. Yes i will do the maps. But its that old technology thing. It does my head in. I should have finished it before you leave and so you can wait until then to read it. :-).

I've resolved my map issue. I had missed a crucial instruction. I'll put up my route asap.

I love your photos of the small islands in the Inland Sea, they look great. Did you read Donald Richies book 'The Inland Sea'? Its a fantastic account of his travels there in the 1960's, before all the bridges brought the modern world there.

Hi Philip. No I haven't heard of it at all. But I would say that after doing my little bit of it, if i were to go back, I'd like to do more islands there.

Its a marvellous book, well worth reading if you can get a copy. By a coincidence, I've just finished reading Yukio Mishima's 'The Sound of the Sea' a lovely novel set on a fictional Inland Sea island in the 1950's, it seems to catch the isolation and beauty of those islands perfectly. It seems that region is calling out to me.