Summary

We talk about some of our international travel and discuss great places to visit in Japan.

Content Notes

Brief mention of sexual assault.

Transcript

Kisstopher: Lately I’ve been thinking about just how absolutely gorgeous the country of Japan is. I think it’s one of the most visually stunning countries that we’ve visited. I think, and this is my personal opinion, I think that Japan is more beautiful than France, at least for me.

Chad: I think the parts that we have seen, definitely.

Kisstopher: Well, in France, all we saw was Paris.

Chad: Right.

Kisstopher: And I didn’t find Paris to be particularly beautiful, but even if I put Paris up against Tokyo, I think Tokyo is more beautiful than Paris.

Chad: Yeah, I think we had a nice view in Paris. We were on the Rive Gauche, the left side of the river I guess, and there were trees and things but it wasn’t arranged in the way that Tokyo was arranged as far as parks.

Kisstopher: Well, and we were out and about a little bit in the city, and I think that like, the Eiffel Tower… it’s desolate around the Eiffel Tower. It’s just like, the Eiffel Tower. Then like the Arc de Triomphe is just an arc in the middle of traffic, so for me, I feel like, in Japan, I don’t know… the structures feel more living to me. They feel more alive. There aren’t a bunch of stone squares. There … I don’t know, maybe because the architecture in Japan is so different to me.

Chad: Well, we have the Nagoya tower here in Nagoya, which is in the middle of a park, and then-

Kisstopher: But it’s in the middle of a park.

Chad: Right. And then in Tokyo there’s-

Kisstopher: With tons of trees and nature.

Chad: … there’s the Tokyo Tower, which is in the middle of a park.

Kisstopher: Right. And all of the castles are in the middle of like, park-like grounds.

Chad: Right. Historically that was so you could kill people coming to invade the castle, but-

Kisstopher: Yeah. So, today’s topic is talking about traveling in Japan, and for me, I really do enjoy going abroad. This is an interesting thing, travel, to me. We traveled tons inside Japan when Rasta was little.

Chad: Right.

Kisstopher: But then as soon as Rasta was old enough that we could travel without him, we started to travel abroad more.

Chad: Yes.

Kisstopher: Because I’m a cheapass.

Chad: So our first trip inside Japan, we came to Japan like several years before we decided to move here.

Kisstopher: Yeah.

Chad: We came to Kyoto.

Kisstopher: Yeah.

Chad: And we saw a display for a dinosaur museum.

Kisstopher: Oh my gosh, yes.

Chad: I think Rasta was about eight years old at the time, so this was four years before we moved here. And Rasta said he wanted to go see the dinosaurs. So we said, “Great, let’s go see the dinosaurs.”

Kisstopher: Oh my gosh.

Chad: What we didn’t realize was that it was advertising for the Fukui Prefectural Museum, which required us to take a 90 minute train out to Fukui Prefecture from Kyoto, where we were at, and then a 30 minute bus ride out into the middle of nowhere to the museum. Which, the museum was great.

Kisstopher: And we spoke no Japanese.

Chad: None.

Kisstopher: Like, I’m surprised that they gave us train tickets because in English, you could say, “I’d like three tickets please.”

Chad: Right.

Kisstopher: And in Japanese you would say, “I’d like two adult tickets and one child ticket,” and so I was saying, “Three tickets,” and they were ju