the pen-ultimate addition.

well welly well. it was the second last day today. day 20. a late start was had by us all. aprt from koshos mum who was very excited about going upto tokyo to see a concert tonight. she was travelling on the shinkansen there and then getting the sleeper back. without the bullet train, the sleeper takes seven hours. the journey for us was 2andahalf. thats a hell of a fast train. i am very excited about coming home. new flat, new beginning. i have alot of material (? photos and stuff) to share with you all and look forward to hearing about everyone elses adventures while ive been away. to be honest with you i cannot wait to fly again. on the flight over we saw the flat plains (Planet Earth style wilderness) of lower eastern siberia. oh my god they looked pretty darn special. adn ofcourse the films were good too. i hope its a different selection for on the way back. i think i watched all the ones i wanted to on the way here. i have managed to fit all of my stuff into two bags. i feel pretty clever about having brought a spare. Genius even. tonight i went out, after watching matrix revolutions on kosho's dad's projector adn 5.1 cinema surround pioneer sound system. it is an actual private cinema. i'll need to take a photo of his t.v. with chris in it (the photo) for scale. its big...oh yeah. and took some photos using our new tripod. funtimes people. the area is pure colin mcrae style japan. really beautiful little windy roads white street lights and the longest little single track tunnel i have ever seen. its actually perfect. so i made use of it.


what do you think of that then eh? no photoshop necessary just a torch adn some manic running around. i like it. although i got pretty sweaty and scared by all the japanese racers who use the tunnel as a track. not as many as there would be though as its local folklore taht its haunted. kosho and his family are quite funny in their superstitious and then stubborn ways. they wont go in the temple at night andthey wont go al;ong the tunnel. even through the day. oh we saw real wild monkeys today. first time for me. discounting the ones in gibralter as they were just midget spaniards. the area up the side of the arashiyama lake, a damned part of the river nearby is like a proper jungle, with real jungle sounds and monkeys. i say real jungle sounds because on the top of the kyoto station they have piped in bird song to make you feel more with nature in their ultra fake rooftop garden. so i was weary of the sounds until i realised where they were coming from. primarily flopping fish, cecadas and monkeys. i tried to get a photo but they are fast little buggers and prettyu aggressive too, so didnt want to use a flash or appear threatening in any way.


i thinkm it looks a bit like that photo of the saskwatch. you know the one where it is supposed to be him running through the woods. big foot. we had a nice walk actually. and came upon a collective of people which kosho was very scared of. so then we went back. some religious sect or something. here is one of their signs.


mount delights water laughs sounded alright to chris and i ass it was very sticky adn it had just been raining so we were wet anyway. chris was very tempoted by the river. i was wet enough, although not really wet at all, just soggy. he deciedd no.probably a good idea given the depth of the river and the probably significant raisins.


it was quite funy as we were watching a big monkey in a tree chris was unintentionally mimicing his actions by picking away at his arm adn shoo-ing away flies. it made me chuckle and remember about the fact that we are animals too. just we have umbrellas.
after our walk we walked to the supermarket adn after deciding taht we were going to make fish pie for the family, had to opt for the whatever was recognisable and available in the shops approach. a tasty chicken adn vegetable dish was produced though. a kind of chicken lasagne slash potato hot pot. as there were no lasagne sheets. tasty. and much appreciated by the family. as was the peach crumble and cream we had after. yum. was just a shame koshos mum wasnt here. although she wont let us do anything, no waching up no helping cook, no nothing. such a good host. although i appreciate it i think it frustrates chris, as he likes to be able to help. my help is to stay out of the way. and be grateful. fair enough i think...maybe.
this was our dish, photographed in a traditional japanese style way. you order foiod by pictures and plastic copies in restaurants.


it was kind of our way of saying thankyou. and i shall make a card too, as chris says he is no good at this. im sure he is though.
ok its late. adn i am tired. so if i think of anything alse i did today, other than pass out on the tatamis this morning, and wake up with mary snuggled into my side. it took me a while to work out it was her. but i got there. as i said, we were all a bit tired. although chris managed what soiunds like a fairly hefty run this morning. in this heat, i think hes mad. there are guys who pull carts around for a living though. but not on bikes just running. properly nutters. but big resp[ect for their fitness. heres a photo.


ok im done. i shall read my book, a hand me down froim chris. i enjoyed the first part. the second is a bit too long. but i shall persevere and hope that the third part is better. a;though i may just skip this one. its about a guy who lives in trees all his life. what was that guys name again? oh yeah, swampy. i wander what hes upto now. anyway. hope you are well.
big love.x