At what feels like very very long last, I've finally reached our last day in Japan! This blog can once again turn back into its usual self - a record of our renovation!
But first, here's what we did on our last day in Japan.
We obviously had to spend a bit of time getting ourselves packed and ready to go, and then we left our bags at the hotel while we went for a final exploration trip in Kyoto.
A few blocks from our hotel was a fancy furniture and kitchen shop. We decided to be daring and actually go inside for a bit of sticky beak at what is supposed to be fashionable in Japanese home design.
They like their acrylic furniture and glossy metallic kitchens...
Odd-sized armchairs (which I loved) and mirrors that look like they're melting...
And pendants made from bowler and top hats. But more traditional farmhouse tables too...
I desperately wanted to steal this diamante-encrusted calculator for my office wall at home, but Tom preferred the glittery dog.
We tore ourselves away eventually, and went for another wander down the main shopping strip, Shinkyogoku. Where we had cause to wonder what kind of customer they're trying to attract with a store named 'Game Panic'.
We wandered through for an hour or two, grabbing a few souvenirs to take back home as gifts. Our main goal was to find the fancy lunch that we'd promised ourselves after our Supermarket dinners the previous two nights. We obviously weren't looking in the right places, because we really struggled to find a restaurant that looked nice! Although we did entertain ourselves in the meantime by laughing at the beautifully old-fashioned naming of the rubbish bins.
Finally, I had the brainwave to go up to the top level of a department store, recalling that we'd had some success with that when we'd stumbled across them in the past. And thankfully, we found a choice of about six different restaurants to choose from.
We settled on a Korean BBQ place (very Japanese, I know), since it looked like fun, and there was a sign in the window saying you could get a free beer if you told the waitress that the manager is handsome. True story!
We went a little bit crazy, ordering steak and salmon and scallops (in addition to the all-you-can-eat buffet of vegetables available), and then spent a happy half hour cooking our meet on the hot plate in the centre of the table.
The scallops were the best part. The marinade that they came in dripped through the gaps in the hotplate, making flames come shooting up! Food is so much more fun when there are flames involved, don't you think?
All too soon, we had to leave lunch and return to our hotel to collect our bags, so that we could make our way to the train station for the trip from Kyoto back to Narita Airport (outside Tokyo). I was thrilled to get to capture the extremely thoughtfully tiled line-up areas on the Shinkansen platform! They think of everything!!
We settled into our reserved seats on the Shinkansen (wouldn't catch me traveling non-reserved again!!), and that was the end of our touristy enjoyment of Japan!
We found our way to the airport without any major dramas, and made our way through the extremely uninteresting (but very important) process of lining up and checking our luggage, etc etc etc.
And then we scraped together our last remaining coins and lashed out on an inexpensive chicken teriyaki dinner overlooking the runway before making our way onto the plane for the long flight home.
Flights are never much fun. But sunrise from a plane window is pretty amazing.
Daniel showed his appreciation for his souvenir once we got back home.
And so ended our Japan trip! It was only just over two weeks, but given that it's taken me nearly two months to record it, it feels like it's gone on forever!
Back to the renovations!
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