Alright, after the huge amount of people begging me to start a blog (two), I decided to do it. I know, I am too kind. So here we go! (Btw, it's going to be a looong post, bear with me. Have a lot to catch up on :D )

I'm backpacking. Seriously, I am. With two backpacks. You read right. TWO. Sick. Anyways, the plan is to travel for between two and a half and three (and a half) month, through Japan, China and Malaysia, maybe Thailand. Not sure yet. In any case, I started my journey in Japan, where I'll stay for a month. More precisely, I started in Tokyo, Japan, six days ago. And let me tell you, there is some weird s*** going on in that place, but I'll get back to that.

Nice people are nice. Japanese people are... Hmm.. If you take nice, then add som more nice, then some more... And then just throw the whole bag of NICE in there, you have the recipe for half of how nice japanese people are. I arrived in Tokyo around 11 pm on Monday. It was dark, I was tired, and bit confused as of where exactly my hostel was. Looking as confused as I did, a japanese couple heading in the opposite way of me stopped and asked me if I was in need of help. I asked them if they knew where my hostel was, and sure enough they did. They turned around, and started walking, telling me to follow. After around 200 m, they pointed in an alleyway, at a sign that had the name of my hostel on it. And that is just the start.

Then I spent the next five days in Tokyo, going to the different neighborhoods, looking at all the different people, a temple and some Shinto shrines, hanging mostly with a french fellow, meeting some pretty cool locals and patying a bit, cos I'm just that cool. I made a few discoveries over thos five days, some cool, some a bit more creepy. A really cool thing is that everything has it's own tune here. Like stores, diners, the train even some pedestrian crossings. If you ever have played the Pokemon games, it is a bit like when you walk into the Pokecenter or Pokemart. Pretty elaborate tunes, and while they only are played when someone enters or exit the stores, it's pretty god damn awesome.

Some weird stuff: Many of the girls here likes to wear huge, colored contacts, which kind of makes them look like scary porcelain dolls. Some of them also likes to dress up as dolls, which is even creepier. There was this one doll I ran into, who was advertising something for some store, and she might have been the creepiest creepy thing I have ever encounterd. And she spoke with a little girls voice. Needless to say, I peed my pants on the spot and started crying, but this being Tokyo, no-one seemed to notice. And then there is the 40-year old something men who stand around in stores, reading hentai. Cartoon porn. Yeah. And then they walk off to the arcades, playing video-games. Okay, I would have been at the arcade ALL THE TIME if we had them in Norway, but still.

So after a few days in Tokyo, soaking up the disturbing, but still pretty cool vibe there, I said sayonara, backed my backpacks, and went to Nikko. As some of you might know, I want it to have my babies. It was so cool and nice there, and I slept at a hostel with traditional Japanese interior and bedding, which was freaking fantastic. Tatami mats, futons, those gliding walls, laterns. T'was nice. And the nature surrounding this mountain town was quite proper indeed. In other words, blerghauragAMAGADjapanstopbeingsobeautiful. At my hostel I met this spanish guy, who knew spanish, german, english, japanese and I think even french. Not really impressive at all. We went to a BBQ, met some cool people, and had the time of our lives. Well, not really, but it was much fun. The next day, today that is, we went to see the temples and shrines of Nikko, many of which are UNESCO World Heritage Sited. And they were awesome. Set in the middle on an ancient forest, full of stonewalls covered in moss, and mist sweeping through the trees, needless to say, it was pretty darn nice. So after some hourse there, I and Mr. Language parted. It was time to head to Mt. Fuji, through Tokyo.

While on the train for a place called Utsinomiya, where my transfer for Tokyo was, I was approached by this slightly elderlylooking Japanese woman. She wondered if I had the time to talk to her, as she wanted to speak some english, I said sure, and we started talking. NICEST LADY EVER. After the half hour spent on the train, having talked the whole way, she had given me her phone number and said that if I was wondering about anything, I should give her a call. And if I ever was near Utsinomiya again, where she lived, I should come by her place and eat dinner with her family, and she could teach me some japanese and show me around. You might think "lol rapey rapey", but tiny, 67-year old japanese women aren't as scary as they might seem. When my time to leave for Tokyo came, we said our goodbyes, and I went straight to Tokyo, and then to Lake Kawagochi near Mt. Fuji, to hours shouthwest of Tokyo. It was, and still is quite dark here so I haven't seen the mountain yet, but I'm looking forward to it.

Damn, that was a freakishly long first post. They won't b this long from now on, I promise. peace out