How Did I Get Here?: You Might As Well Throw Away Your Kobe Beef

So much has happened since the last time I blogged, even though I only let about a week go by this time! Where I left off last was of course having an awesome time in Nagasaki with Izumi and Sumihiro, my two favorite people. Also a giant centipede which was a "little" centipede, and the promise to get pictures of a big one wrapped all the way around the border of the city, which I'm still waiting on.

I greeted the weekend with open arms. My boss wanted to take me out of town on Saturday, and as is common with bosses and holidays, he said we should plan on leaving town even earlier than I normally even leave my house for work. So I got up about 10 minutes before he got there and took the world's fastest shower because it takes me about 9 and a half minutes to get dressed for some reason. Here's a picture of me in the shower:

We drove and drove and drove and drove until finally we came to a town known to the locals as "Hirado" and known to everyone else also as "Hirado." Hirado has, hands down, the finest beef in all of Japan. I don't know why the rest of the world is gaga (no reference to Lady) over Kobe beef. We ate the most wonderful steak lunch.

That steak practically melted in my mouth. It was so tender and juicy. And then it came with dessert.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. I guess I was a little too excited about the food. BEFORE the food, we spent like 5 hours hiking around town to various historic sites and panoramic views. Here's the Hirado Castle:

Actually, that's a minor outlying building of the castle, taken from the top floor of the main castle building. We also went to see a view of temples and a church, 110 meters to the left of this sign:

I suppose you want to see what that looked like. I'll have to post that in the next blog, I didn't get a great shot of it so I'll have to get it from my boss. But here's a picture of him getting a great shot of it.

We also climbed a lot of stairs.

After all that, I went back to Omura, where I met up with my friend for dinner and drinks. We had dinner at his place, and then went to the bar his cousin owns called Shochu Bar Mizu. His cousin was treating us that night, and insisted that I have the opportunity to try some of the finest and rarest wines available in Japan available at his bar. For example, this beauty:

"Tamaekane" runs about $15 a glass. The owner told me to order it by its name in English: Balls.

Later in the evening, after my best friend ditched me, this also happened:

The very very next day, I went sightseeing in Nagasaki again, this time with my good work friend. Nagasaki is a big town, so there wasn't much overlap in my Nagasaki sightseeing trips. We got to see the Peace Park which is pretty much where the bomb fell.

We also went to Glover Park, which is where some guy named Thomas Glover bought a bunch of land a long time ago and became famous, and they still keep up his historical house. He also had something to do with Madame Butterfly, and maybe some koi.

And here I am carrying a little person:

We ALSO went to see the night sky view of Nagasaki. This is where Sumihiro and Izumi and I went too, but we went during the day. My work friend and his wife and adorable daugter and I went after dark. We parked low on the mountain and hiked nearly a mile to the top, only to reach the observatory JUST as the rain started coming down. So we RAN out onto the roof and snapped a few quick pics and said "That's good. You good? I'm good." Then we took a taxi back down to the car.