Monday 20th September

First official day of the tour! Up bright and early and suncream on! The weather here is insanely warm, it’s what I was expecting Australia to be. Im getting used to it, you kinda just have to accept “sticky” as your natural state. (Stiiiiiiiickkkyyyy!!)

We took a train out to an Inari shrine which was really high up a hill/mountain. Plenty of hilarity en route.  Josh has a habit of narrating/translating everything he sees – posters, adverts, people. It was soooo funny but sorry you had to be there!

Josh about to enter the bat cave (probably)

Josh killing Dennis with nonsense

The  place was very pretty - we visited similar ones in Tokyo earlier in the year. It was Jeffreys first time and he had a riot getting up to all sorts.

Next up was a trip to a castle. Gorgeous views and photo ops. In Japan there are vending machines everywhere. There is a vending machine for every 10 people in Japan. You find them everywhere. I bought myself a drink and got a horrible surprise when it turned out to be some sort of dirt-flavoured tea. It was boggin!!

Next stop – the Manga museum! We walked there and passed loads of cool stuff along the way. There’s so much to see in Japan. The garden of the museum was filled with Manga geeks reading comics! Ive never seen anything like it. Inside photography was forbidden to protect copyright. Outside there were stingy caterpillars but even though Jeffrey searched for ages he couldn’t find any. He told me later he wanted to fill my handbag with them. Charming.

Manga readers

After the Manga museum we went for a bite to eat. It was then time for my appointment with Kozuru woo-hoo! Crystal and I got a taxi out there. When we arrived I produced Jeffrey and Crystal translated for me. 15 minutes later Kozuru showed me a drawing and I fell instantly in love with it. Time to get inked! I giggled the whole way through it. It wasn’t that painful but it was sooo tickly! I ended up having quite an audience watching me. Im very very pleased with how it turned out!

woo-hoo! Jeffrey tattoo!

Awesome end to an awesome day!! Roll on tomorrow!

Sunday 19th September

Bakuto day!! Up bright and early and straight to the Tattoo Convention.  There was lots of last minute preparations to be taken care of so everyone got stuck in. (Except Jeffrey who just hung about “networking”). All the tattoo artists attending the convention had been asked to paint a Daruma doll – the results were awesome!

                                                     Josh hard at work Jeffrey "helping"

                                                                       The Dolls

Whilst at the convention Crystal (our fantabulous tour guide) got a neck owl tat from Adam. She tried to get a tattoo organised for me but Kozuru was really busy so we made an appointment for the following evening. I was happy to wait as I was certain he was the right man for the job ;)  

                                                 Adam, Crystal and Aureole. So much fun!!

                                                                 Adam hard at work

Me and Jeffrey were quite happy to sit and people watch Japan is the best place in the world for this I think. Jeffrey was a total hit. People here don’t really stare at me when Im carrying Jeffers around, in fact, its quite normal.

                                                            Jeffrey making friends!

                                              I wasnt the only peep with a pint-sized friend!

Mitch O Connell did some drawing while he was here it was awesome getting to see him create! I bought prints from him for my best friend in the world Flappy McGee. He promised to write a personal message on them just for her (love you baybee!).  Another guy threw some paint around and got rather messy indeed!

Also part of the entertainment was Robot Wars – two mechanical dangerous collections of scrap metal throwing equally dangerous missiles about the place and a guy in a glorified go-kart. (Think Flintstones feet sticking out the bottom). Flame-throwers, flying golf balls and firing nail guns mere inches from the crowd. I was quite glad I was on the second floor watching this.

After a day of crazy antics and awesome ink everyone got packed up. While waiting on our taxi we caught some more performance art. This guy was rolling around on the ground and covering himself in paint of many different colours. He was making crazy screaming moaning noises the whole time. Stunning. Back to the hotel for dumping of stuff and then off out for eats!

                                                                  Scary paint guy!

                                 Not quite sure what this cigarette vending machine is trying to say?

Wow so many crazy antics and the tour hasn't even started yet! Awesome :)

Saturday 18th September

Woke up at 6.30am DING! Wide-awake with  0% chance of getting back to sleep. Got myself up and organised and met Josh at 8.30 to go early bird exploring. I was surprised at how warm it was that early in the morning. The streets were deserted! 

                                                              Nice and quiet!

                                                 A gold glittery bin lorry. Of course.

                                                              View during the day

We wandered round in a big circle, most of the shops were closed and the busy street we walked down last night to get to the restaurant was empty except for casualties of the night before, loads of rubbish and street cleaners. Osaka is pretty much a party town filled with gorgeous 20-something kids who party all night and sleep all day. They go for days at a time!  Oh here's some crazy info - There was a Krispy Kreme doughnuts store and I swear no matter what time you walked past the queue was out the door and halfway up the street! They had security guards and a notice letting you know what the average waiting time was (I never saw it less than 45mins) and it was a bit like Alton Towers. Except for doughnuts. Serious.

As there was no wi-fi in the hotel we decided to visit the internet cafe.  I sneakily pretended I was taking a pic of Jeffrey so I could capture the dude sleeping at his computer desk. People that stay out partying all night and cant get a train home come to internet cafes as its only a couple of pounds an hour and they provide blankets! You’ve got small kids playing online games in the same room as guys looking at porn and guys sleeping. Bizarre!

Jeffrey in the internet cafe with sleeping beauty

Met up at the hotel with the group to go exploring. We swung by Chopstix tattoo studio and peeked in a few shops.

                                               Me, Jeffrey and Bruce havin a quick rest

Then it was time to head to the tattoo convention so the peeps could get set up.  Had a quick look around there was a stage set up outside and lots of stalls and some crazy looking robots. Bands were playing the music was loud and there were loads of very unique people wandering around!

                                              Mitch O Connells flyer for the show

                                               The view from the 2nd floor

                     Crazy loud music, musicians dressed as beekeepers, glowsticks ahoy

Later on the entertainment started outside. There was a girl in a school uniform doing some crazy jerky robot moving while creepy music blasted out and bizarre strobe lighting cast freaky shadows everywhere.  Time to head back to the hotel methinks.

                                                        Jeffrey and Adam BFF

                             The entertainment - The Osaka kids know how to party!