Harry's Last Leg

...continued from "Zach comes to Osaka"

By the stage Zach had left, Harry had already been here about a week. It had been great to spend time alone with Zach, then with both Harry and Zach as a team but now it was time just to hang out with Harry.

Unfortunately neither of us were very active with our cameras. We did manage to catch some photos when we went to Kyoto however. I will try to keep this post short and sweet with the main part being the juicy stuff. The first one also includes some cultural (maybe thats too extreme a word) information about Japan.

Here in Japan tax on Alcohol is extremely low. A bottle of Moet & Chandon will set you back just 30-40 dollars, Laphroaig single malt is similar, and your cheap stuff - smirnoff, Suntory, Jack..etc are all about 10 bucs for 700ml. Beers on the other hand are taxed a similar amount to Australian prices so the smart Japanese beer companies have come up with a new alcohol that tastes like beer but does not fit into the category of beer and receives less tax.

All this means bars often offer a service called Nomihodai. This means pretty much All you can drink! Earlier on during Zach and Harry's stay I had been to a friends birthday party at a restaurant which not only offered Nomihodai but also Tabehodai (meaning all you can eat).

Harry and I decided this would begin a big saturday night perfectly. Get lots of beer into us but still have a good amount of food in our stomachs to get us through the evening. Unfortunately they only offer 90 minutes so you have to rush a little to get the best bang for buck. Harry hadnt realised this and was disappointed when at the end he discovered he could have been far more drunk than he already was. I think it was lucky Harry hadnt discovered this earlier.....

Our next actions found us with some of my friends from Japan who were heading to a club called Pure. Conveniently for Harry Pure also offers Nomihodai. Japanese clubs work slightly different from Australian clubs. Usually on a saturday doors open around 12 and close at 5-6am often with many still rocking out on the dance floor. We arrived a little after 12 and got straight into our Nomihodai.

Within half an hour the dance floor had warmed up and the tracks were causing Harry to slowly move to centre stage. from this point till close the dance floor was defiantly ours. The white russians were flowing, some classics were playing and Harry was on fire. His favorite place for the evening was up on the stage where only girls were allowed to dance. Harry took that stage as his own and was pulled down from there many many times. Soon drinks were up and we felt we no longer had any reason to stay.

Following this we ate Maccas and ventured on home in an extremely rowdy manner - a story for Harry to tell sometime if your keen to ask him.

We expected this to be our last big evening out on the town. It was decided Harry should experience more than just the party life of Japan so one day when I was at work Harry shot off to Nara and explored the temples. Another day we made it to Kiyomizu-Dera on Kyoto. It was hard to catch many good photos as this place was so big but I can tell you it was really amazing. The view over Kyoto and Kansai was pretty awesome too.

Unfortunately, like many temples in Japan, it was over run by tourists, tour guides from China with loud speakers, local school kids, heaps of noisy Americans and it was right at the peak of summer so the heat was unbearable. Because of this we decided to make a pit stop at a nice little cafe along one of the paths in the temple grounds. We sat on the tatami floors and overlooked a nice bamboo forest.

After this we moved on to Ginkaku ji which was had unfortunately just closed. By this stage we were both pretty hot and bothered and decided it was time to head home.

Other than this trip, Harry's last week in Japan was mainly spent in Osaka drinking coffee, enjoying nice lunch and dinner and drinking a few beers here and there. Nothing too out of the ordinary but still a nice week hanging around. One day we did venture to Kobe - another city in the Kansai region. I had work till 7 so Harry went on a trip up the mountain and looked across all of Kobe.

Later I met up with him and we wandered around the city of Kobe. It is quite small and very new. It has the feeling of a planned city. It was completely ruined by an earthquake in 1995 which flattened the city so it has been in a rebuilding stage ever since. Despite this it was quite beautiful and Harry and I found a nice Italian restaurant to set down at and enjoy a fairly decent meal.

After this the excitement of Harrys trip was pretty much over. On his last evening we went out for Ramen at our favorite place. The owner went off and got his lady friend from across the road who sat and drank with us as we ate. As we invited her it was our shout for the beers. Later on, after I announced it was Harry's last night the owner served us a celebratory 1l bottle of Sake on the house. As we enjoyed this our new lady friend continued enjoying our free beers. Soon another random dude joined us so now we had a small party. After about 2 hours of drinking and chatting we finally decided it was time to leave. As we got up to pay the last man who joined us went to the counter and paid the entire bill despite him not drinking/eating anything.

The man told us it was a going away gift for Harry. As we walked home we decided we had to make use of the 60 bucs we had just saved and headed into town. We went to Onzieme, one of my favorite clubs in Osaka. It was a fairly random night so the club wasnt so busy. Soon we discovered it was in fact punk night! Harry was so pumped. They were playing some awesome old school tunes. Harrys request was Rock the Casbah which went off! Again Harry took to the ladies dance platforms. This evening was a sweet crowed who were down with pretty much anything so he remained there all evening.

It turned out a surprise evening of fun and capped off a fun trip. Again, it was awesome to have a chance to rock out with my homies from Melbourne. Thanks to Harry for coming over even during Summer - his least favorite season. It was a lot of fun! We defiantly rocked the d floor like back home in melbourne.

Next up is Manny's trip where we ventured up north for Fuji Rock festival. Check back in a few days....