Hell for a weekend

Last week flew by and landed us straight in Hell. In a fun sort of way.



We`re imperceptibly becoming adept at life in Japan. We get to school no problem, we know where to buy the food we want to eat, we know where to exercise and who to ask for help. I`m getting used to feeling like a boy band as I walk anywhere near the vicinity of school with hundreds of teenage girls screaming my name followed by "Kawai!!!!!!! Kirei!!!!!", which mean cute and pretty respectively. Absurd? Yes. Flattering? Yes. Funny? Very. But it makes holding a class`s attention REALLY easy. Sure beats spit balls.

Amidst all this adaption some wonderful fellow JETs helped us arrange to get ourselves to Noboribetsu, a coastal town not far from here famous for it`s onsens (bath houses) and Hell Valley. Transportation is ridiculously expensive here, but carpooling is a much cheaper option. So we hopped in with some girls on their way down to soak up the sulfur fumes of Hell Valley and take in Hell Festival.

Our first stop in Noboribetsu was this beautiful, stinking, boiling hot lake. The sulfur stench is strong, but worth it. It was the first time Brian or I had ever seen such geothermic magic.


A bit of dillying and dallying later we found ourselves in a posse of fellow JETs exploring the stinking, steaming wonderland of Hell Valley. Strange moonscapes of burning water and a bubbling little geyser drew us in despite the stink. If I were to make a 1950s movie about aliens in Mars I would film it in Hell Valley. It reminds me of Christmas on Mars actually. Wayne Coyne could`ve popped right out of that geyser.
We opted out of trying the bath houses which Noboribetsu is so famous for because it was so hot. Instead we headed towards the festival to eat drink and make merry with the demons in town. Most kids were terrified of these demons, but this little guy loves em.


After dark the revelry got started. First came the demon parade.

Then a spell of taiko Japanese drumming (if this sounds boring to you, or even if it sounds good, it`s way better than you`re imagining) came before a parade of costumed people doing a devil dance in the street. It wasn`t quite a parade because the line of people was continuous and they went around in multiple laps.

Finally Satan himself showed up to tell us all we are foolish humans and he`s taking us to Hell. These were his minions.
And the King of Evil Himself!
Why is there a Hell festival you ask? Every town in Japan (Korea too for that matter) has a cute little mascot and because of Hell Valley, Noboribetsu`s mascots are a red and blue oni (demon). These are your basic humanoids with spiky clubs, dreadlocks and horns, but the big statue of one near the entrance to the town enigmatically has soft serve ice cream cones for horns. Hell Festival is the town`s summer celebration, and it`s lots of fun.


This week is promising to be quite slow because of the big standardized tests that are going on. That means days with no classes and lots of desk time. But this weekend we`ve got a van load of Sapporo-ites road tripping to Lake Akan for camping and marimo viewing (cute algae, easier to show you than explain). So we`ll spend our days acclimatizing and day-dreaming of algae balls til then.

Next Stop: Thailandia

From Burma we flew to Penang, an island just off the North Western coast of Malaysia, to meet David and Duck. we devoured the delicacies on hand there for a couple of days before busing up to Thailand. Compared with the poverty and difficulty of travel in Myanmar, Thailand seemed a land of luxury and easy living. We spent nearly 2 weeks on the beaches of the South and a week in the mountains of the North. At the end of our trip we came back to Bangkok for the 4th time, but it was the first time we'd had a chance to explore it.

The beginning of South East Asia: Myanmar (Burma)

After a tearful goodbye to our home for a year we began an incredible journey around and about South East Asia. We started out where few dare to go in Burma. If you're confused, the militaristic dictatorship there changed the name to Myanmar, but it's often still referred to as Burma so as not to grant any authenticity to the dark and dangerous government currently and illegitimately in power.

We spent 2 weeks in that hot, beautiful place where the going is rough but the people are kind. We visited Yangon, Mandalay, Inle Lake, Kalaw, and Bagan. It was one of the most rewarding parts of our trip, but also the most difficult.


We've got a lot of catching up to do, so it's light on words and heavy on pictures.

A note on ethical travel in Burma:
Amazingly, it's fairly easy to prevent most of your money from going into government hands. If you take privately owned buses, stay in privately owned guest houses, and sneak around the back way to temples with government fees then the only money that you send directly their way is your visa fee, entrance to Bagan and entrance to Inle Lake. We were conflicted whether or not to go, but having been I highly encourage travelers to visit. You'll support the people living off the tourism trade and you'll protect them with your presence. You'll hear people's stories first hand (highly illegal and dangerous for the local telling it, but very common) and see what pictures can't show you. But you should read the pros and cons and decide what you are personally comfortable with. The Burmese themselves say come.

Beijing and Mongolia Part 1 Videos a la Brian

Brian's become a video editing software wizard and has worked some magic with the clips of video we took in Beijing and Mongolia. Here's Beijing and the Great Wall of Chiner. The music is from an album Bart gave Brian of music from Chinese movie soundtracks.

This one is the first half of Mongolia, before we got to the Gobi. The music in this one is from a CD we bought off of the people you'll see giving us a concert of Mongolian folk music in our ger. They were amazing and I love the Mongolian instruments and throat singing.
Maybe next week we'll get the Gobi video up and Shannon's photos. Only 10 more days of teaching in Korea before we're off to the next adventure!

Take Anything You Want

I know that we dont post many outside videos on our blog. I hope that everyone felt that "Be Cool About Fire Safety" was worth your time. This will be our second posting of outside material, but I feel it is vital to anyone travelling to an English speaking country who doesn't know the basic "survival" level english needed to get by in a different country. With that being said - I present the following: