First thoughts: Place looks damned good for somewhere we nuked. Modern buildings, no real trash, just a clean modern small city.
Second thoughts: Pretty much the same until we get out of the city, where some of the more rural properties look like you'd expect from the rural south in the US. Kinda kills the view of the Japanese as perfectionists.
Tour: F, a good hard solid F. First, the tour guide actually managed to walk us past the first tour site before taking us back, which was the "samurai village", which was nothing but a few huts along a stream. They might have been interesting if we were told anything about them, but ultimately we took off our shoes to walk on some tatami mats without any information. For the record, those fuckers are like walking on gravel. The stream was far more interesting.
Thankfully we then stopped for lunch at a nearby hotel (a stunning example of a hotel not equaling shit). This was the high point of the entire tour, with soup, sushi, pickled stuff, and a rather large number of other tasty stuff I couldn't identify. I wish this had been the entire tour.
We then went to Shimabara "castle", which had once been a castle, then destroyed, and rebuilt in the 60's as a tourist trap. Nice big pile of concrete with a tourist shop attached. The world would be well served by bombing it back in to a pile of rubble.
The tour guide was moderately tolerable despite being incompetent until the trip back where she felt the need to tell us her life story complete with multiple aggrandizement. Really lady, we don't give a shit. The D just dropped to an F.
Food: I didn't actually get to try anything outside the tour, but that was excellent.
Would I go back: No, nothing of interest that I saw. Unless we nuke the place again I'd rate this about a 0/10 on the interest scale.
Chance of getting mugged: Hard to say, didn't see anything sketchy, but I saw about 5 minutes of city.
Monday, January 28, 2019
Asia Travel Part 1: Shanghai - China
This is where the whole Asian adventure started, and thankfully I got to spend a few days here before boarding the plague cruise ship.
First thoughts: This city is FILTHY, the buildings that I can see on the taxi ride to the city are streaked with grey and look like shit.
Further thoughts: This city is actually immaculately clean. Those streaks are just because this city has a major air pollution problem. Once you're on the ground though, I dare you to find a piece of litter. You won't succeed; there are people everywhere with brooms sweeping up some imagined piece of garbage. If you doubt me, look around to make sure no one is watching and drop something. Come back five minutes later and it'll be gone. I might choose a sidewalk here over an operating room for surgery given MRSA rates.
Tour: none thankfully except for a "hop on hop off" bus thing. Don't do that. Please, please, don't do that. At least here where taxis run you about $5 in the city, just take taxis. Pick somewhere that sounds interesting and go. Hit the first Buddhist temple of the trip, and quite frankly both the most impressive and least commercialized of the lot, with only one little cart selling incense for worshipers. Tossed a few Yuan at the central offering only to prove I can never play basketball.
The Shanghai Museum was well worth half a day, especially being free, but here begins my animosity towards all things Buddhist simply because every damned thing in their sculpture section was a statue of Buddha. EVERY DAMNED THING. The exhibits on the history of jade working and early currency were fascinating.
Food: First place I hit was a no-nonsense fast food kind of joint, if one where you wait for them to bring you the food. I got some solid soup dumplings, though not enough to justify the hype. The noodle soup was quite good however; I was quite happy with my first real meal in China if not blown away.
I'm just going to go out there and say you should probably stab yourself to get some hospital food before you eat at a hotel buffet. Really, it'll hurt less, cost you less, and the food will be better. You should probably twist the knife some to extend your stay.
That said, the Chinese restaurant (not buffet) in the hotel was fucking amazing, and cheaper than the buffet despite having the 3 star Michelin kind of service where there was a waitress watching our table the whole time. I had yet to realize that portions in Asia are HUGE, so I ordered an appetizer of crispy fish as well as an entree of eels. If anyone in the US ever figures out how to make anything as crispy as that fish they will own us. Goodbye to every chain who thinks they make something crispy, the Chinese will reign supreme and we will bow down for our next fix. The eels were also excellent, to the point that I really wanted to eat myself sick, though it should be said that they were not the kind of eels you think of as unagi; they were small little river eels that you can easily pick up with chopsticks so be prepared to eat them whole. I also picked up a rather expensive tea habit here, with waitresses refilling my cup of tea leaves with hot water if it even looked like I might get thirsty. I will be spending an obscene amount of money on tea in the future.
The second place I got dinner seemed like a banquet hall because it just had so many frickin tables. Took forever for them to realize the westerners might actually be there for food, but it was worth the wait. Pork with mushrooms in a black bean sauce was god damned amazing, while the dumplings and the like were good. Continuing with the theme though, ordering soup would have been a mistake as far as portions if it hadn't been absolutely delicious. Unfortunately they brought out a bowl you could have drowned a not so small child in, and I felt bad that I could only eat a small fraction of it.
Last meal was a fast food kind of joint, but frankly that bowl of miso ramen just hit the spot. Call it the cold I was coming down with, but that humble little bowl of broth and stuff was exactly what I needed.
Chance of getting mugged: Non-existent. If the bad guy doesn't get broomed to death, there are cops on just about every intersection directing traffic. You are completely safe night or day if the air pollution doesn't get you.
Would I go back: Oh hell yes; I barely scratched the surface and most of what I saw was tourist crap, but I think I could live here. I would knife someone to get to try some of the small little hole in the wall places I only saw from the highway. I just wouldn't do it in view of the people with brooms. They scare me.
Souvenir: a pair of chopsticks and a rampant tea addiction.
First thoughts: This city is FILTHY, the buildings that I can see on the taxi ride to the city are streaked with grey and look like shit.
Further thoughts: This city is actually immaculately clean. Those streaks are just because this city has a major air pollution problem. Once you're on the ground though, I dare you to find a piece of litter. You won't succeed; there are people everywhere with brooms sweeping up some imagined piece of garbage. If you doubt me, look around to make sure no one is watching and drop something. Come back five minutes later and it'll be gone. I might choose a sidewalk here over an operating room for surgery given MRSA rates.
Tour: none thankfully except for a "hop on hop off" bus thing. Don't do that. Please, please, don't do that. At least here where taxis run you about $5 in the city, just take taxis. Pick somewhere that sounds interesting and go. Hit the first Buddhist temple of the trip, and quite frankly both the most impressive and least commercialized of the lot, with only one little cart selling incense for worshipers. Tossed a few Yuan at the central offering only to prove I can never play basketball.
The Shanghai Museum was well worth half a day, especially being free, but here begins my animosity towards all things Buddhist simply because every damned thing in their sculpture section was a statue of Buddha. EVERY DAMNED THING. The exhibits on the history of jade working and early currency were fascinating.
Food: First place I hit was a no-nonsense fast food kind of joint, if one where you wait for them to bring you the food. I got some solid soup dumplings, though not enough to justify the hype. The noodle soup was quite good however; I was quite happy with my first real meal in China if not blown away.
I'm just going to go out there and say you should probably stab yourself to get some hospital food before you eat at a hotel buffet. Really, it'll hurt less, cost you less, and the food will be better. You should probably twist the knife some to extend your stay.
That said, the Chinese restaurant (not buffet) in the hotel was fucking amazing, and cheaper than the buffet despite having the 3 star Michelin kind of service where there was a waitress watching our table the whole time. I had yet to realize that portions in Asia are HUGE, so I ordered an appetizer of crispy fish as well as an entree of eels. If anyone in the US ever figures out how to make anything as crispy as that fish they will own us. Goodbye to every chain who thinks they make something crispy, the Chinese will reign supreme and we will bow down for our next fix. The eels were also excellent, to the point that I really wanted to eat myself sick, though it should be said that they were not the kind of eels you think of as unagi; they were small little river eels that you can easily pick up with chopsticks so be prepared to eat them whole. I also picked up a rather expensive tea habit here, with waitresses refilling my cup of tea leaves with hot water if it even looked like I might get thirsty. I will be spending an obscene amount of money on tea in the future.
The second place I got dinner seemed like a banquet hall because it just had so many frickin tables. Took forever for them to realize the westerners might actually be there for food, but it was worth the wait. Pork with mushrooms in a black bean sauce was god damned amazing, while the dumplings and the like were good. Continuing with the theme though, ordering soup would have been a mistake as far as portions if it hadn't been absolutely delicious. Unfortunately they brought out a bowl you could have drowned a not so small child in, and I felt bad that I could only eat a small fraction of it.
Last meal was a fast food kind of joint, but frankly that bowl of miso ramen just hit the spot. Call it the cold I was coming down with, but that humble little bowl of broth and stuff was exactly what I needed.
Chance of getting mugged: Non-existent. If the bad guy doesn't get broomed to death, there are cops on just about every intersection directing traffic. You are completely safe night or day if the air pollution doesn't get you.
Would I go back: Oh hell yes; I barely scratched the surface and most of what I saw was tourist crap, but I think I could live here. I would knife someone to get to try some of the small little hole in the wall places I only saw from the highway. I just wouldn't do it in view of the people with brooms. They scare me.
Souvenir: a pair of chopsticks and a rampant tea addiction.
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