Tokyo - Day 1 Arriving to Shinjuku

17/9/12

1138 (local time)

Tokyo, Japan

Written in: Jack (couchsurfers) nice cold apartment in Osaka, Japan – after a big party with some guys that I met in Syria!

Tokyo is such an amazing city! Every day I went out it just completely blew me away! Ok so this post is going to MASSIVE as I have so much to say about the places I visited, so at the end of each major day ill write a little TL;DR which stands for Too Didn’t Read!

6^th of September - Day: 1 Arriving to Shinjuku!

So I arrived to Narita airport from a brutal 23 hours in Moscow airport, fortunately I had met an awesome Japanese dude on my flight called Kosuke but I will talk about him a bit later. So we both caught the cheapest train from the Airport to Shinjuku station which took roughly 1.5 hours and cost about $15AUD.

When I got to Shinjuku my plan was to find a place to dump my big bag and then cruise around the hustling and bustling city of Shinjuku. After about 1 hours of constant sweating I found a place to store my bag – it cost 500YEN ($6.5AUD) so expensive! But I had to do it!

So I walked around the city and my main aim was to head to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building which has a great observation deck on both the east and west sides, and the best thing is… is that its FREE! Perfect! So I took the elevator up 42 floors and saw the hazy city with the storm clouds coming across.

I was absolutely knackered from hardly sleeping, but I just focused on keeping my eyes open. After I took some photos from the top, I saw a nice park near the tower that I thought I would check out. After walking for about 30 minutes I realized that it wasn’t so close.

When I eventually made it too Meiji Jingu park the weather closed in and it started to rain, which wasn’t so great. I was just trying to find stuff to do until 8pm until I met my first couch surfer in Tokyo – Brad.

8pm rolled on in, and I met Brad who is this unfit 30 something year old Aussie guy, that has been teaching English in Japan for 8 years yet has never really spent the time to learn the language.

I dumped my bags at Brad’s place then we went out to a local restaurant where I spent a lot of money on delicious traditional food and all you can drink, I wasn’t all that keen for it, but felt obliged seeing that I was staying with Brad. The night ended pretty late and I was ruined. Jet Lagged and drinking is a bad mix!
TL;DR – Made it to Shinjuku, walked around the city, went up the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, Met Brad my Couchsurfing Host had some lovely food and drank too much.

My first proper view of Japan... somewhere in Shinjuku.

Little side streets full of neon signs!

High Buildings litter the sky!

From the observation deck!!

See the storm looming!

Blacken out the city!

"Take care not to bump into the glass" How many people would have done this to make them put a sign up!

storms are coming!

even japan does some good clouds!

This is the building where the observation deck is "Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building"

The entry of the park!

When your inside the park, you dont feel close to the city at all!

Entry to the shrine!

The Meiji Jingu Shrine

Finally Tokyo at night! Look at the neon signs!!

Next Blog Coming Soon! Tokyo Day 2 in the Electronic District!

Photography and Partying In Prague!,

29/7/12

1637 (localtime)

Prague, Czech Republic

Vienna, Austria

Written on a bus from Vienna to Bratislava - listening to Deep Purple \m/

Hello all those young and reckless fans out there! What a very busy weeks I have had! My last post was on the 23^rd of July, and now it’s the 29^th. In that small amount of time, the Figjam has completed more than the average man could have done… in their lifetime.

Let me start off with Prague! Before I even arrived I was pre-warned about Prague’s nightlife, and coming from there I have to agree with everyone. Prague is definitely more of a night time city. I’m not going to bore you with all the standard ‘going out and getting drunk’ stories.  But I have to admit, things are different in Prague. I’m not sure if it is because of what they put in the water (or the beer) but as soon as the sun sets – people party.

On my arrival to the hostel, I was forced into a drinking game with a whole bunch of guys from other countries around the world – it was great, when I realised it was a kid’s 21^st birthday! I planned to make sure it is memorable! I’m a nice guy, its what I do, and this we certainly did.

The next day however I dragged myself out of bed, as I was joining Scott who was the Aussie guy I met on the bus for one of those free walking tours. I’m normally not really one for these tours, don’t get me wrong, it was interesting – but I much prefer walking the streets on my own taking everything in myself. After the tour finished, Scott and myself tried to look for a nice viewing point to watch a sunset, unfortunately it didn’t work out, but we did walk through some lovely parks.

On the way back down from our lovely walk through the parks, I headed ‘left’ off down to the Castle of Prague! By this time I was knackered from walking all day. But it was nice to just sit and look at the castle as the sun was going down, Remember Rule #2 Enjoy the little things. J

On my return back to the hostel, I cooked some food and sat down on my laptop and watched a movie whilst I ate my dinner.

After a while, I got chatty to a group of guys from all over the world: New Zealand, Canada and Australia. The funny thing is that, the guys from Australia are from Parkdale, the place where I’m from! Crazy ey! It really goes to show that the world is just a village!

Drinks were drunk, and shots were had up until the time where everyone decided to go out. I wasn’t going to say no to my last night out in Prague, so I joined.

Lovely clock tower!

Prague was nice... just so many people everywhere!

Prague Castle!

The End!

Munich & Dachu

MUNICH

1900 (local time)

16-6-12 (Yves Flat – Zurich - Listening to the lovely church bells in the background, with the sun on my back)

So, I caught a ‘lift’ via this website called Car Pooling.co.uk, its based off this Germany website where you go to this site, tell it where you wanna go, and BOOM! 30+ people are offering lifts to what ever destination you want to go to. All you do, is just chip in for petrol money. It’s a great idea, and I have saved SO much money doing this. For Example –

Trip to Berlin – Munich via Train =                             99Euros.

Trip to Berlin – Munich via Car Pooling =                30 Euros.

BARRRRRGAIN!

Anyway so I got a lift to Munich and I was greeted by a couple that I met travelling through Jordan (in 2009), When I met Bec and Simon we chatted for ages, infact we hired a car and all hell broke loose in Jordan! Anyway, so we kept in touch hopefully meeting one day up in the small town of Bendigo, where my Grandparents live.

So we kept in touch and Simon and Bec decided to do more travelling and live in Munich, rent a flat and use it for a base for their travelling! When I emailed them about coming to Munich they invited me to their flat for a couple of days.

So we set a meeting place and met up in Hungry Jacks, took me back to their lovely flat no more than 10 minutes from the city! PERFECT.

 When I got settled, they then took me out for an awesome dinner at a trendy Hamburger place! Legends!

The first day meant that I headed out and SESSIONED the city! Did the museums and walked around all day! The weather was on and off (like Melbourne) so I was having to walk under shelter, instead of along the river.

So I first visited the “German” Museum, it was very German. The photos will show this…

The German Museum 

Very German!

Anyway, That night was nice and quiet. Simon had to do his Exams, so me and Bec watched a Movie called Run Fat Boy. It was average.

So, the next day arrived and I caught a Train all the way to Dachu, which is 16KM North West of Munich, the reason for this visit, is that I wanted to check out ‘The first concentration camp in World War 2’.

I made some friends with some Indian guys that were heading the same way as me, we mostly chatted about the cricket!

We walked for what felt like ages to find this place, we found it so confusing. I swear all the signs point different directions.

We eventually found it, and WOW. I didn’t expect to see it like this… I never really understood what a Concentrate Camp was. Obviously I saw it as a place where horrible horrific place were a few thousand died. Not correct, Jews alone there was 4.1million!

The structure itself was massive, 4 ‘bases’ huge fences, Watch towers! Everything. Inside the main base, there were museums, and churches cemetery and even a Gas Chamber.

I’ll put some photos up so you can have a look.

That night was rather big, as Germany was playing their first soccer match against Portugal. Simo and myself got on the beers, and I dragged him away from his studies. We went to a nice ‘touristy themed’ bar I’m normally not one for these types of places but, it was literally the only place that had standing space for the TV. Funnily enough the place was mostly filled with Germans, and no tourists.

A beer at that 'no tourist' place! Beer the size of my head!

Beers were drunk, pubs were found… it got late and Simo and myself headed home to a sore head the next morning, where I had to catch another ‘lift’ from Munich to Zurich.

Easy morning! No Dramas, made it to Zurich!! To party with Yves!

NEXT UP! SWITZERLAND! What Zaney Things Will Happen To FIGJAM On His Next Adventures!

Checking out the BMW museum, it was really cool! 

Nice Beamers!

Cant fit much windsurfing kit in this little guy!

This is the front gate for the Concentration Camp in Dachu, the writing on the gate says something like "Work sets you free" They didnt know any better...

Still in Dachu, on either side there used to be the several places where camps were.

The gas chamber, and crematorium 

Gas Chamber

The Indian guys!

The Memorial Shrine.