Tag: Japan

Travelling in Japan: Tokyo
“Tokyo offers a lot of spectacle and confusion. This is just a facade. Behind the neon glare lies a steady rhythmic and miraculous everyday world […]

Travelling in Japan: Kinosaki Onsen
We only had three weeks of our month in Japan planned with accommodation booked. This gave us the freedom to use our JR Passes flexibly […]

Travelling in Japan: Ibusuki and Kagoshima
The longhaul train trip to Ibusuki, south of Kagoshima, was relaxing and offered great scenery with the opportunity to read for long stretches uninterrupted. We […]

Travelling in Japan: Osaka & Himeji
“Welcome to Osaka. Few major cities of the developed world could match Osaka for the overall unattractiveness of its cityscape, which consists mostly of a […]

Travelling in Japan: Hirosaki
Hirosaki is singularly the most Japanese city I know. Will Ferguson We stayed in Hirosaki not because I can’t read Japanese train timetables at all well but […]

Travelling in Japan: Hokkaido
Japan is not a small country; no matter what the Japanese themselves may think. The main island of Honshu alone is larger than Great Britain. […]

Travelling in Japan (Part III): Reflections and Highlights
“What must be admitted, very painfully, is that this was a disaster made in Japan…Its fundamental causes are to be found in the ingrained conventions […]

Travelling in Japan (Part II): Literature, Books, History & Photography
It seems to me, albeit very late at night and when a little weary, that if your profession, hobbies and passions involve reading, literature, history, […]

Travelling in Japan (Part I)
Japan Please indulge my musings about our travels for a few posts during January. My family has arrived for three weeks in wintry Japan during our […]
Travelling in Japan: Books & Bookshops
“As in China, the Japanese literati were an unstable combination of two opposites – Confucian scholar and free-minded Taoist – so they tended to lean […]