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Today we left Akita and wanted to make our way to Kyoto. We made a stop in Kakunodate less than an hour outside of Akita to check out an old Samuri Village. It was raining most of the day but we checked our bags in lockers and headed out anyways. Kakunodate was a cute town where we saw lots of old Samuri Houses but wern`t really sure which were open to the public and which were still in use since there was little to no english in this town and up until now we had people to help us get around. Luckily we stumbled into what looked like a pretty big compound and it ending up being probably the best place in teh town to go. It continued to rain most of the day but we didn`t mind. We wandered through this old Samuri Village that had been used by the same family up until the 1980s so it had all kinds of relics that belonged to that house and to that family. I think it said somewhere that this was one of the best collections in Northern Japan especially since most everything belonged to the family at some time and wasn`t just a display of various things used or made during that time.
We left Kakunodate and made our way to Sendai where we grabbed lunch and went to check out Ito`s Mediateque. Today was a real gloomy day so it was good were wern`t trying to see any big sights or needing to do a lot of walking around town. Brandon finally got to eat Yoshinoya which is a Japanese fast food chain of beef bowls which he is now in love with and it was supper cheap only 380yen. We decided to call Koji who we had just learned was living in Tokyo to see if we could meet him for dinner. We arrived around seven to Tokyo station where after a little confusion we finally met up with Koji (Brandon left our book that had all our important phone numbers, places, etc. at the train station in Sendai, so we didn`t know how to contact Koji). Anyways once we meet up with Koji we went to a typical japanese style restaurant that serves tapas style dishes. Koji, Brandon also met in VAil about five years ago and up until a week ago had lost touch with. Last we knew he had moved back to Costa Rica three years ago when his time in the US ran out. But to our surprise he had actually moved to Tokyo. So it was nice to see an unexpected face. We hung out for a few hours eating, drinking and catching up. It was getting late and Koji had to catch his train home and since it was too late for us to make it to Kyoto we decided to post up for the night in an internet cafe. Before Koji left he called the Sendai station and to our surprise was able to track down our book which is crazy considering how big and busy that station is. So eventually after a few days struggle and our book being sent to the police station we were able to convence them to mail it to Shin who would forward it on to us in the States, all of which will only take about three months!
So anyway on our way to the internet cafe we made a pit stop at a bar called the GAs Panic. Without even trying we found the one bar that had more English speakers than Japanese, it seemed to be a local hang out for international students. So we enjoyed a few drinks and some old hip hop and some old American try so hard to pick up young Japanese girls with his dance moves (which were not working). We met two students one Japanese and one German who bought us some drinks and gave us some travel advice. At about two in the morning we finally made it to the internet cafe were we each got a private booth and after downloading some pics I passed out in my chair. Brandon on the other hand was busy emailing people which now he thinks he might have said some stupid things due to the fact that he wasn`t very lucid. I found him in the morning cruled up on the floor around his chair passed out snoring (well maybe not snoring but he might as well have been).
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