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| THIS PHOTO, FRAUDULENTLY USED IN THE LAST BLOG AS IF TAKEN IN THE GEISHA HOUSE WAS ACTUALLY TAKEN IN THE HOTEL MENTIONED LATER IN THIS BLOG BUT I CAN'T GET IT TO PRINT IN THE RIGHT PLACE! |
Each time I stared Julian would shout "Dad! You are disgusting! Wait 'til I tell mum!" and I would quickly turn my head in another direction only to glimpse another even more lovely pair of legs cycling by!
He eventually resorted to snatching my glasses off my face so that I could only see blurred images. Still even blurred they weren't too bad !
I was still a relatively young red-blooded male and although I make no apologies for my behaviour I can see how my sons may well have been embarrassed at my inexhaustible ability to letch!
The thought of my own father harbouring salacious thoughts disgusts me at sixty three and the thought of him and my mother..........I'm not going there!
As I remarked in TOKYO 1, I was rightly not privy to Julian's innermost desires but I got pretty close to working them out when the three of us took a ride on the immaculately clean underground system which seemed to be full of over-worked sleeping students and businessmen.
Jonathan and I sat on one side of the carriage and Julian sat opposite us. As I rose to let a woman take my seat Jonathan grabbed me back down and warned me that such a gesture in Japan was considered an insult! How odd!
Shortly after this a truly beautiful young woman in a short black silk skirt split to the hip and sheer white silk blouse unbuttoned to her belly button got on and stood strap-hanging right in front of and facing Julian!
From the steam escaping from his ears and eyeballs and the long barely controlled groans coming out his throat and the totally uncontrollable spasms wracking his entire frame and his utter refusal to look at Jonathan or me when we called him and wolf-whistled and generally made it impossible for him to deny hearing our attempts to distract him and his crossing his legs repeatedly whilst pushing down on several stone in weight of magazines on his lap, I took it that he had noticed her and Jonathan and I had to force him off the train at the end of our journey despite his pathetic screams begging us to leave him to die right there!
We were off for another meal in a place where everybody sat round their own fiercely hot table-top fire and grilled slices of raw beef and other meats brought to them on a variety of plates. I think it might have been a Korean restaurant but whatever, Julian and I had both had enough of foreign food and begged to eat western just once!
So back in that world famous Tokyo square, where thousands of people can be seen crossing the widest road imaginable on the biggest black and white pedestrian crossing ever painted we found first a Starbucks for a hot chocolate which was nothing to write home about and then a KFC which I have always found utterly revolting but which the boys loved. I almost craved a hundred year old pickled egg after that ghastly experience.
That night we were off to a hotel in the mountains which was built as an exact copy of a Swiss chalet and Julian insisted that they served a western breakfast which they promised they would.
This photo ( NOW AT THE BEGINNING OF THIS BLOG! ) really captures the mildly-supressed-hysteria that greeted our full-on Japanese breakfast with Julian half-laughing and half-crying saying, "I'm not eating any more of this shit Jonathan! You said that they promised bacon and eggs! "
We ended that trip on the coast, in the town where the Americans forced the Japanese to accept and sign a trade agreement with the outside world in about 1866 which act actually led to the Japanese attacking Pearl Harbour nearly eighty years later in a gesture of retribution for the humiliation that they had originally suffered. And that's a fact!
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| THE BOYS COULDN'T BEAR ANYMORE MADAME BUTTERFLY STORIES ! |
I had a rare experience there. Turning a corner I came face to face with the Consular building where "Madame Butterfly" took her own life after falling from grace as a result of Lieutenant Pinkerton's infidelity!
The tragic tale is one of my favourite operas!
The hair on the back of my head rose and my throat and eyes swelled!
No! I don't know why ! I must be human after all!.
As briefly as possible; Butterfly, a beautiful and innocent young girl, left pregnant by the handsome Pinkerton, waits years for his return,shunned by her family and society. He does eventually return but with his American wife. Butterfly, bereft, realises that her only recourse is death and blindfolds her small child before committing Hari-Kiri.
I'm bothering to tell you this because of what I saw an idiot do in Scottish Opera's production one Friday night in Newcastle!
In the story, Pinkerton realises that he truly loves Butterfly and comes running up the hill to tell her. But he's too late as she has stabbed herself just before she hears his voice calling and dies in his arms!
Generally the whole theatre audience is sobbing by this point!
In the version I saw, the small, squat and quite ugly Russian tenor that had been brought over to play Pinkerton obviously missed his cue and came running onto the stage before Butterfly had stabbed herself leaving the truly exquisitely fragile and perfectly cast American singer to stare at him in horror and stab herself then!
The audience let out a collective groan and the applause for him was extremely muted!
And real butterflies the size of my outstretched hand were glued to the windows, attracted by the bright lights of our final restaurant on the way home from that trip.
Thankfully it was a western chain and served burgers and fries! Hoobloominray!
I only mention this one because of my eldest's prodigious appetite!
His consumption was about three times Julian's and mine put together and as I had paid through the nose for whatever the three of us had eaten for ten days, this final meal emptied my wallet completely and I even had to borrow the fare back to the airport the next day!
Flying home, we were served a delicious slice of chocolate cake which Julian spat all the way down the cabin when he bit into it and discovered it was yet more disgusting cold rice covered in black seaweed!
Back in London and once more jetlagged we couldn't believe how dirty the city and underground trains were and Julian vowed that he would one day go back and live in Japan forever!
We stayed that night with a brother who the next day took two rather dispirited men up The London Eye in fog and rain before taking us to eat " The best fish and chips in London! "
He then marched us to an empty dump under a set of dirty railway arches where we were forced to squeeze past an unkempt and greasy waiter who was leaning against the unpainted entrance smoking, wearing a fetid apron and who then approached our table with resentment written all over his face before asking what we wanted!
Well I would have thought that " The best fish and chip restaurant in London " would have indicated a fairly restricted menu but chose not to try and make a light-hearted comment referring to that.
To my surprise my brother asked for steak as a traumatising childhood experience had left him unable to eat fish!
The meal, served on a foul and I would say rarely cleaned, if ever even wiped, plastic tablecloth was so typical of just about every meal I have ever eaten out! Yuk!
If this blog is ever read by a 'celebrity' chef who can really cook delicious food that is spread out on a plate rather than presented as a cylinder, would you send me a message and I'll come and eat at yours. For free of course because then I'll write nice things about you!
Julian and I returned home and I know that despite what I've 'jokingly' written about the food, it took both of us some weeks to get Japan and it's people out of our minds!
Somehow, though I've thought of importing low-saddled bikes to Blyth market place, I don't think that the sights would be quite the same in this over-Gregged-and-McDonalded world compared to the heavenly glimpses in the east.
Sorry Blyth!
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