Hiroshima to Naoshima

DAN

Leaving the peace camp was a slightly emotional affair. It felt like we had made some friends while we were there, though it was a relief to think that we would be sleeping in proper beds again. The women's showers were crowded, but the men's were completely empty, so Emma sneaked in with me. About 5 minutes into the shower a load of sweaty sports guys came in, so Emma had to hide in the shower cubicle while I tried to distract them. They all saw her sneak out though which made the situation pretty awkward. The look of bewilderment on their faces was pretty funny.

what can I really say about this picture?

The day of travel seemed to be much easier than before. It kind of feels like we finally 'got' Japan. There's that initial scariness of not knowing how any of the systems that you're going to be interacting with are supposed to work, so you're not sure if here is some terrible mistake that you're making. Once you've used different services you realise that they are organised in easily graspable systems. Most people can interact with them daily without thinking and bearing this in mind gives you the confidence to take things easy. We even stopped off at a massive swanky department store at the start of the journey and traveled through the floors gawping at stuff we couldn't afford, then sat at the tenth floor cafe for a toasted sandwich and one last view of Hiroshima before we went. On the fifth floor we checked out the aquarium fish. The Moray eel looked pretty depressed in his tank and the jellyfish just floated about a bit. It was kind of like a mild cruelty zoo.

On the way to Naoshima we took a little local railway through loads of small towns. It was the first time we'd seen small places and the proper countryside in Japan. It was really nice. So many of the towns here look like small models that someone might have carefully constructed in their attic. Everything seems really well planned and intricate. Everything is also about 80% the size of things in Britain too, from cars to building floor hights. The smallness and intricacy both combine to give you the feeling that you are in a slightly unreal world. It's great.

We had to catch a ferry to Naoshima. The ride took about 20 minutes, but it was quite eventful (at least for me) as the ferry went right through a massive flock of moon jellyfish and the sea was full of them. We even got to see a barrel jellyfish, which I have read so much about and always wanted to see. If I had a bucket list then seeing one of them in the wild would definitely be on it.

Naoshima is a small island on the south coast of Honshu that is famous for becoming a haven for artists. Every Japanese person that we've mentioned it to has an instant look of confusion on their face and shakes their head when we ask them if they've heard of it (even if they live just 10 miles away). It would be tempting to think that we are saying the name wrong, but having checked our pronunciation with the locals it seems that a lot of Japanese people just don't know it exists. Maybe it's to do with the fact that there are almost 7000 small islands around Japan, so they can't know about all of them.

The thing that first struck me about Naoshima is that it's like a jungle. The temperature is a tropical 35 degrees (realfeel 40) and it's covered with jungle like forest that is just teeming with animal life. Every hundred metres walk a different massive insect flies out of the bushes into your face. It's like I've died and gone to heaven. I've chased and tried to photograph loads of shiny beetles and butterflies already. There is also a constant background cacophony of cicadas, crickets and bullfrogs that really gives you the feeling that you're in the wilderness.

The whole place overflows with life

The guest house that we're staying at is really nice. It feels like the first comfortable place that we've stayed in, we might even get a good night's sleep!

It's run by a family, who I am guessing are artists that have moved here and started a guest house. I have no real evidence of this but my imagination. They have the cutest, friendliest 5 year old son. He really wants to talk to you, find out where you're from and then continually fly a pterodactyl toy into your arm and make explosion noises. His mum keeps shooing him away, but he comes back 10 seconds later.

The last thing I want to mention is the way Japanese people wear sandals in the house. In our guest house there are certain sandals that you're supposed to wear in each specific part of the house. There are sandals for the outer parts, inner parts and toilets of the house. So if you need a wee during dinner you have to change footwear twice. I've started cheating when I don't think anyone's looking. I wonder if most people in Japan secretly do too. I'll be interested to know what will happen if I get caught. I'm expecting that instead of getting told off I will get the silent treatment which would be the worst punishment of all.

The shoes are often also a little bit small