Astro Boy

Astro Boy is a Japanese manga/anime character first introduced in 1963.  I remember in the 1970s they were broadcasting English dubbed versions on a couple Canadian television stations so as a kid I was well aware, and excited by, Astro Boy’s existence.  Because of this early childhood fascination with Astro Boy it was quite fitting for him to be the first character I saw once we exited the Kyoto train station.  Memories of running around the house in pulled up red socks flooded back to me when I saw our robot friend here:

Since we’re on the theme of manga (Japanese comic books) and anime (Japanese animation), I had the pleasure of going to the Kyoto International Manga Museum. 

  Beyond Japanese manga the museum also featured several exhibits dedicated to other forms of comics books internationally.  My personal childhood favorites, Tintin (Belgian) and Asterix (France) were featured as well as the original Smurf comics from Belgian.  The international selection of manga was small in comparison to the Japanese offerings.  The Kyoto International Manga Museum is essentially a huge, multi-floored library where you can go in and read comics.  If you’re a comics fan, this place is a dream come true.  A annual membership allows you unlimited access all the manga in the building.  As you can see by the photographs below, the walls are lined with thousands of manga!

 

Thank you Kyoto for bringing back that carefree, excitable kid in the silly red socks!

No, I’m not wearing my Astro Boy red socks in this photo but if I remember correctly, I was wearing some pretty snazzy red undies!

Cherry Blossoms

April is cherry blossom season in Kyoto, Japan.  It seems every tourist in the world had the same idea as us to go to Japan during this time.  Hotels were impossible to book but finally, after a week of searching, we located a hotel in central Kyoto.  I’m glad we were able to book this one hotel because without it, we were debating on altering our travel plans and go somewhere else.  I’m glad we didn’t, Kyoto, Japan in April is an amazing and beautiful sight to see!  The photographs below were taken in various parks, streets, and temples throughout the greater Kyoto area.  Beyond the stunning cherry blossoms in the photos you may also notice another important happening:  Aimee’s pregnant!  That’s right, our son isn’t even born yet and he has already been to Kyoto, Japan.  Not only Kyoto, but also Canada, Philippines, China, and Hong Kong.  Lucky kid!  He’s been to more international places as a fetus than I was within the first 25 years of my life!  I hope he enjoyed the cherry blossoms; Aimee and I certainly did!  Take a look:

   

Kyoto Cute

Japan is the land of cute! Every where Aimee and I went in Kyoto we found overly cute and obsessively-happy cartoon characters staring back at us. Something as simple as ‘please clean up after your dog’ becomes a happy frolic in the cutesy theme park where there’s a never-ending supply of Prozac to go around. All signs are cute; it doesn’t matter if it’s a personal shop owner’s sign or a government issued sign: everything is damn cute in Japan. Since I found myself constantly being surrounded by cuteness I decided to start taking pictures. Here are some of the photos I saw while there:

Beyond cuteness there is also sadness. Sadness because the poor English language sometimes gets a little abused in Japan. While in Osaka I saw this in our hotel room:

You would think that before they printed out several hundred of these sheets for the hotels rooms that they would run the spelling by at least one fluent English speaker. I mean, how is it possible for a business to get a translation so badly wrong? I mean seriously, MICHLOWAVE? VANDING MACHINE?? NON SMORKING ROOM??? Sad sad sad. Sad yes, but extremely funny too! Aimee and I were giggling about that all day. Or maybe it was the Prozac cartoon characters that were making us giggle?

Roots Backpack R.I.P.

It's a sad day for us all in the world. It's a day of sadness and regret but also of reflection at the exciting times we had with our ... Roots backpack.

Let us pray...

It will be an open coffin funeral. You may look lovingly at the dearly departed now:

Our dear friend backpack has had quite an interesting life. It has joined us on our travels in over 10 different countries over the past 7 years. It has been an exciting life but it hasn't been an easy one. During our France trip both straps snapped off because of the weight of the travel books we were carrying. Most backpacks would have given up at this point but Roots backpack is quite the little trooper. It asked to be repaired rather than giving up. We took it in for repair, not once, but twice. The first repair was an odd one. Rather than stitching the straps back onto the body the seamstress stitched the straps together making it rather useless. The second repair was more successful.

In Australia our Roots backpack got a little embarrassed when it discovered the Australians use the word 'root' as a slang for 'sex'. Our backpack asked to be left in the hotel during this time because it couldn't handle the constant giggling from those crazy Ozzies.

Beyond the injuries and embarrassments our beloved Roots backpack has been a wonderful addition to our lives. But sadly, our current trip to Kyoto, Japan will be its last. Like in France the travel books were too much for our backpack to handle. It ripped from the top and the bottom and although a repair is possible we feel it's time for retirement. So rest in peace our loving cloth friend we will miss you greatly.

As much as we're sad to see our Roots backpack go we've already replaced it with a Diesel backpack I purchased at Stanley Market in Hong Kong. And beyond the Diesel backpack I have this bag on standby:It's a cool messenger bag with plenty of space for my notebook computer, cellular phone and other masculine-type things likes beer, breast milk and diapers. The beer is for me obviously but the other things are for our son who will be born in three months. This bag, if you haven't guessed by now, is a diaper bag made specifically for men. It's called Diaper Dude! I'm sure Diaper Dude bag and I will have many exciting stinky diaper adventures in the future!

The chapter of the Roots backpack might be closed but the new chapter with Diesel and Diaper Dude is now open. Oh what great times lie ahead!