For two weeks in the April of 2016, I set out to explore this small yet enchanting country. This post serves both as a space for reflection, but also hopefully as a helpful resource in planning out your own version of a trip to Japan.
It all started in Ahmedabad. I was booked on an Indigo flight from Ahmedabad to New Delhi. Trishla was separately booked on a flight from Bombay to New Delhi and from there we would get on the direct flight to Tokyo — no hassles.
Or so we thought.
The first hiccup was that my incoming flight from Goa was delayed by 2 hours. I had accounted for a few hours of delay so if they stuck to the rescheduled time, there was no reason for alarm.
The inbound flight did arrive by 7 (as was scheduled after the delay). It was supposed to make a 30 minute turnaround and be in the air again by 730. Didn’t happen and got delayed to 8pm. My flight from New Delhi departed at 0125 Hrs that night. Getting close but nothing to panic about. Yet.
Something had started to feel odd about the speed at which the plane was pushed back after the doors were shut. It was way too slow and I was getting a little uneasy. I had shut my phone: with confirmation sent home and to New Delhi that the doors were shut and the plane was being pushed back. But something was seriously wrong and I had to check what time it was.
830PM and we are still only beginning to taxi to the runway. Anyone who has been to the Ahmedabad airport knows that it isn’t much more than a shed with a runway. It never takes more than 10 minutes between pushback and take-off and yet here it had been well over 45 minutes.
After starting and stopping multiple time, it became clear that the plane was going to turn around and go back. This plane was going nowhere. So my already delayed flight just happened to get another technical snag.
I switch on my phone frantically — which by this point is also low on battery (Murphy’s law had kicked in by now) — and called Trishla to tell her to make her way to the international airport and let the people at ANA know what’s happening. And also to prepare for the very real possibility that she may be traveling to Japan alone. She’s worried but stays calm.
I find that there is only one more flight going from Ahmedabad to New Delhi that day and it happens to be an Indigo one. It’s at 940pm. By this time, it is already 915pm and the plane has still not found its way to a parking bay. The captain is giving no clear indication of what the problem is, whether we are going to fly, flight is cancelled — nothing.
I am really driven to make that 940pm flight. I know there is no other option. Missing the Tokyo flight would effectively ruin the months of tedious planning that went into this trip and getting on this flight was the only salvation.
There was another girl on this flight who also had to make her connection to Germany — same departure time. By now other passengers had also started getting very frustrated — macho uncles to the fore who started yelling. It helped a little, this girl Shivangi and I became the distressed travelers who needed a way out, which we were. Shivangi even nursed a few tears which went a long way on the sympathy meter.
This is when Indigo really came through. They got my bags out from checked-in luggage, new boarding cards issued and back-through security in 15 minutes flat.
Finally felt like something right was happening. Made it onto the flight which took off (I mean actual lift-off from Ahmedabad) at 955pm. It was still going to be touch and go but the ANA counter at New Delhi had said that if I make it there by 12:15, I should be able to make it.
Anyway, all of this happened and I hadn’t even got on the flight for Tokyo. I did make it by 12:15 and went straight through immigration and security to make the flight.
The trip only really began when NH918 left the tarmac for Tokyo but I already felt like the trip was well on its way.
If you’ve made it this far, you deserve a TL;DR version. Following is a quick, dense pack of information about my learnings of traveling in Japan.
If you are more a spreadsheet person, here’s the day-wise itinerary in a Google Doc. Side note: this doc may also come in handy when applying for your Japanese visa because, true to their nature, they ask for a day-wise itinerary of your proposed stay in Japan. You could use this as a template, change your stay reservations and dates, and print this out to give to the consulate as your application.
General
– Travel in the months of the Sakura — early April or September. A lot will be said of the number of tourists in the country at the time, but it never came across as a hassle or hindrance.
– Carry all of your money in cash. Get a Suica card done on your first day — you can almost use it everywhere. You won’t have the hassle of change and it’ll make life much much easier. It’s accepted almost everywhere — from the metro to different stores. Plus no hassle of having to get rid of the 100’s of ¥ you will no doubt collect if you transact in cash all the time.
JRail
– If you have taken a JRail pass (which I highly recommend you do), get it activated from the Narita airport itself to save yourself 20–30 minutes at the main JRail stations in Tokyo.
– Many online advise to reserve your seats on the JRail but in my experience, it isn’t always worth your time. It is advisable to reserve your seat on the Shin-Osaka to Hiroshima sector in Mar-Apr-May but for other trips, the time taken for reserving a seat might not be worth it.
AirBnb
– Send all your hosts a short note a day or two before you are scheduled to stay with them.
– They are very particular about check-in and check-out times. If you need to check-in early, write to them at least 24 hours advance and ask if it’s possible.
– Make sure you get a place near a major station. You might end up paying a little more, but it will considerably make your stay better — especially in the cities: Tokyo, Osaka/Kyoto and Hiroshima.
– We spent 5 nights in Tokyo, 4 nights in Osaka (travel to Kyoto is 15 minutes by the JRail), 2 nights in Hiroshima, 2 nights in Ogawa (small village) and 1 night in Tokyo on the way out.
– I think the itinerary worked really well for us except Hiroshima. In the 2 days that we were there, we went to Miyajima for 1 day which is unmissable. It’s a lovely day trip. But the rest of Hiroshima could have been compressed — 2 days and 1 night is enough. I would add that balance night to Tokyo. In fact, there’s probably scope for a trip just to Tokyo and day trips around for 2 weeks.
Misc
On the tech-front, be sure to get Google Translate installed on your phone before your trip. Sometimes you may be dealing with a device (water heat system in apartments, heaters in remote AirBnbs etc) where taking a photo of the script and getting it translated might be a big help. This is tip is the result of one freezing night in Ogawa where we couldn’t get the heater started.Get a data card from the airport. The counters are quite confusing with their numerous plans. Recommend doing what you often do when confused about your options in Japan — turn to a vending machine. You can get a reasonable to 4G data card for 2 GB for 2 weeks for ¥3,000.Take a limousine bus to the middle of the city to Shinjuku station from the Airport — it’s easier that taking the subway if you have a lot of luggage and are unfamiliar with the train system. If you are flying in international, you will likely land in Narita which is almost an hour and a half from Tokyo.
Food
– Eat at the local places. Cannot recommend this in stronger words. Most places will have an English menu inside even if nothing on their display has a word in English. You will very quickly able to identify the main dishes from the food models they keep out in the windows.
– My favorites:
*Tempura* (any kinds) — in fact any fried food. The Japanese really know how to deep fry some of their food without it feeling overly greasy.
I actually didn’t have Sushi all trip except for a bite from Trishla’s food. This is also when you come to realize the breadth and depth of the Japanese cuisine and Sushi is really just the most popular food that made it out.
*Gyoza*: it is the mother of dumplings. Usually you’ll get a plate of 6 pieces and it’s out of this world.
*Ramen*: arguably the best Ramen in Tokyo is available at Nagi ramen in Shinjuku. It’s in a blink-and-miss-it hole in the wall place. But what it lacks in space and pomp, it more than makes up in flavour in their ramen. You can’t miss getting a taste of this while here.
Gyu Tataki: Thinly seared beef pieces with a Japanese whisky. Had this on our second night in Tokyo — one of the most understated but best meals of the trip.
Fugu: Had this controversial fish for Trishla’s birthday meal located in a small little alley of Kyoto. Sashimi (thinly cut slices of Fugu). Great meal and definitely worth the experience. It’s not everyday that you eat a fish whose liver is 12-times more poisonous than cyanide and needs a state-approved license for it to be cut, cooked and served.
*Okonomiyaki*: Hiroshima is often visited for the Peace Memorial Park and to remember a low point in humanity for the atrocity committed on innocent civilians as a result of the atomic bomb. But a rather under-appreciated benefit of visiting this city is savouring their delicious okonomiyaki.
This section is dedicated to day-wise highlights for the duration of the itinerary. It will cut across the topics that I have touched upon in the TL;DR version above with a more personal take.
31 April
Our Airbnb host was Henry, a Brazilian man who had spent over 20 years living in Japan. Very kind guy who gave us a quick tour around the things close to our shared apartment and told us some of the things to be mindful of during our stay in Japan.
He took special care to let us know of the intricate garbage separation, how you might want to say a friendly ‘Konichiwa’ to anyone passing in the hallway and a few other tips to note while interacting with the locals. Didn’t take much time to realize that system and custom play a big role in Japan and quicker you understand this, the better your trip will be.
This is also something I had observed when reading Master of Go by Yasunari Kawabata in the pre-trip immersion.
1 April
Walked to the Meiji Shrine and it’s surrounding complex and gardens. It served as a great first spot to visit in Tokyo because there were enough tourists and eased us into understanding the different customs of interacting with the local Japanese by observing the others.
Spent time in Yoyogi Park. According to the Sakura calender, we were among the first few days of the Sakura season in Tokyo. It’s absolutely beautiful. We lazed around on the grass for a bit and got some food (Takoyaki (Octopus balls)— there will be multiple stalls selling this). I wasn’t the biggest fan, but definitely worth trying.
The Yoyogi Olympic Stadium is very close by and worth a walk-by for it’s interesting architecture.
Sampled some fine Japanese whiskey at a bar in Shinjuku to find that everything one hears about how good Japanese whiskey is true. For dinner, we went to this small, nondescript place called Momo in Shinjuku. The food however was anything but nondescript. I had some Japanese omelette and thinly seared beef (Gyu Tataki).
2 April
Walked out to the Imperial Palace ground in Eastern Tokyo. The word ‘palace’ can be a little misleading because the main palace complex does not exist any more. But still go here for the beautiful cherry blossoms on display and the views of the Tokyo skyline. There is also a lot of history hidden in these gardens which is easy to miss unless you have someone to talk you through it.
We had signed up for a guided walking tour that was completely free and definitely worth. Highly recommend making sure you align your visit to the Imperial Palace with their dates. (Link to their Facebook page)
Met some other travelers later that night for a fun evening. Also ended up exchanging some notes on places to go. This is also when we realized that visiting Hakone may not be worth it because “it’s almost like Mahabaleshwar.” Obviously said in jest, but enough to dissuade us from the day we had planned to spend there.
3 April
Walked around Roppongi, National Art Museum, Tokyo Design Hub in Midtown and Aoyama Cemetary (tough to beat the irony, but this cemetery has some of the most beautiful views of Sakura in the city)
4 April
Walked around Akihabara. The quirky side of Tokyo’s culture is on full display here. Vintage arcade games on every corner, women dressed as anime/video game characters (read mortal combat) with unreal heels and pink hair. For all the zen like qualities this country had shown thus far in the way they go about living, Akibahara represents the other side and is an attack on the senses.
Also visited the Senso-ji shrine which was nice but missable in my opinion. Dinner in Shinjuku at Minache
5 April
Next morning, we started the leg of the trip away from Tokyo on which the first stop was Osaka. The Shinkansen was another reflection of how precise the Japanese are. Inter-city travels leaving and arriving right on the minute — not a single thing on any of these trains seemed out out of place.
Had some gyoza (which is truly the mother of all dumplings)and egg-noodles.
6 April
Kyoto! It was the capital city of Japan for 1000 years. The Kamo river flows from the North to South of Kyoto and gives a lot of insight into the city.
Went to Kinkuji temple. Very crowded with an average viewing of an undoubtedly beautiful shrine. I am also told that it is a lot more stunning on a sunny day because of the gold on the shrine and we were unfortunate to have caught a cloudy day.
Went to philosophers path from there. Underrated and beautiful place to walk through. Continued walking from there towards the famous Nishiki market. Again did not enjoy it much thought I did pick up my first macha soft serve ice cream.
Highlight of the day had to be Trishla’s birthday dinner of Fugu, or what is better known as Puffer fish, or what ought to be even better known as the fish you want to make sure your chef knows how to prepare damn well. Why? Because this puffer fish is one of the most poisonous fish in the world.
7 April
Rained out day. Were supposed to go to Nara but had to change plans. Found the closest Starbucks and caught up on work, pending accounts and bookings. Turned out to be a slow day but a blessing in disguise after 8 days of continuous traveling.
8 April
Made an early start and went to Nara. Fun, low-key day trip to stroll around with these unbelievably friendly deer in Nara. Definitely buy some rice puffs (widely available in and around Nara) to feed the deer.
Once back in Kyoto later in the day, we timed the walk to much photographed Fushimi Inari Shrine (below) with the sunset. It’s an enchanting experience with the fading light, tall trees & rivulets and the orange arcs to walk through.
9 April
Hiroshima day. Took the Jrail up to Hiroshima and walked on over to our AirBnb for the next 2 nights. We had reached a little before our check-in time so had to stick around. Grabbed a bite to eat.
Take a reserved seat for the line between Shin-Osaka and Hiroshima. It was quite crowded and honestly, we were a little lucky to have gotten an unreserved seat on the first train out today.
Took a bus to Hiroshima Peace Park. Walked through the museum section first and then walked over outside to the memorial. Definitely account for some time to just take in what had happened here all those years back.
Walked around before taking the tram back to our guest house. Ate the “Hiroshima-style okonomoiyaki”. While there are several other dishes made by topping or mixing vegetables and sliced pork with wheat flour batter, such as Kansai-style okonomiyaki and Monja-yaki (from Tokyo), Hiroshima-style okonomiyaki is made with a unique recipe.
Wabi-Sabi (n.)
A way of living that focuses on finding beauty within the imperfections of life and accepting peacefully the natural cycles of growth and decay.
A casual text message from my mother a few days into the trip about the above concept put Japan in perspective for me. I was looking for words to describe the dichotomy I saw in everything around me: the precision juxtaposed with the rough edges and human touch, the zen minimalism against bright neon greens and pinks of Akihabara.
Japan is an interplay between the past and the future, and the present chasm that connects these two world makes for some inspired travel.
Special thanks to Anirban Datta Gupta, Sahir Patel, Sneha Ramchandran, Arjuna Ravikumar, Nikhita Kishore, Sonali Shah and Paramita Sen for being generous with their itineraries, recommendations and time. This trip would not have been what it was without your collective suggestions and experiences.
Resurgence of Arvind Kejriwal
Repost from a post I had written on 10 February, 2014 — close to the time he first rose to prominence. Thoughts on what he represents with parallels drawn to evolving business models.
This year saw the meteoric rise of Arvind Kejriwal. For many, he brings in a new brand of politics — non-corrupt and forthright. For me, his ascendancy also signals the coming of a far more revolutionary shift — the age of a truly participatory movement.
In a first for India, he successfully raised money for a mainstream political campaign from ordinary people all around the world in a clean, efficient and transparent way. Its not like crowd-funding is a new concept. However, from a technology perspective we are probably looking at the first time where crowd-funding, and adaptations of the concept, have the potential to disrupt more established institutions in politics and business.
Take for instance the publishing industry. We are already at a stage where people can publish their own books and be read by people everywhere. No more are inspired authors limited by the ruthlessly competitive and subjective eye of the publisher. Does this mean publishers are useless? Absolutely not. Innovative publishing concepts like Bloody Good Book are spearheading change by embracing crowd-sourcing. They request people to upload their manuscripts online, and visitors of the website rate them in terms of potential. They then index a mix of visitor ratings and publishing expertise to pick and publish certain entries using their resources to market the book.
Similar evolution happening in education. Look at a platform like Udacity; where people have the ability to create and offer courses to other people around the world and earn money for it. It is the perfect example of crowd-sourcing a skill or talent, and matching that with a group of people who are willing to pay to learn those skills. Technology enables this in a clean, non-clunky way by removing the barrier of heavy investment or infrastructure, making it a win-win situation for both.
Same with transportation when one thinks of ideas such as Uber and ZipCar. In the space of hotels and renting places you have AirBnB. Its even happening with health with platforms like Healthtap getting traction.
The power of the individual and the crowd has never looked more promising. From influencing legislation to publishing to business — we are truly entering a phase, enabled by technology, where the idea of democracy can spread to beyond just a system Government.
Just a trip to Cambodia and Vietnam
This is a memoir of my short trip to the fascinating countries of Cambodia and Vietnam smeared with pop history, travel tips and some photos.
“Wandering restablishes the original harmony which once existed between man and the universe.” ~ Anatole France
This is the first time I ventured to the East of the Indian subcontinent in more than a decade, and it was such a good decision. The itinerary was to go backpack through Cambodia and Vietnam for a 2 week period with a halt in Singapore on the way there and the return. The initial plan was to do just Cambodia, but in retrospect I am so glad we decided to add Vietnam to the plan.
I say we to include my travel bud Trishla who gets much of the credit to get me excited about this trip as well provide the initial push to make the initial few flight bookings. Had those bookings not been made months before the trip, it would have never materialized. It also helped immensely that she is someone who knows how to travel and has documented some of it on her awesome blog here.
So first stop on the trip was Singapore. As far as transit hubs go, it’s difficult to find a city in the world that is more efficient than Singapore. It was also awesome because I was staying with a cousin who’s been living Singapore over 7 years now who knew his way around the city like the back of his hand.
Highlights of Singapore:
Dinner at one of 100 food courts that give a great meal at an affordable price. I went to one near Little India.Night out: starting on Club Street and end up with going to 1 Altitude, which is the highest point in the city and makes for a pretty spectacular view from the top. Props to Arik (afore mentioned cousin) for getting us in without paying cover! When on top, keep an eye out for Eduardo Saverin’s penthouse pad and a large part of the F1 city race track in Singapore. This place can be pricey, so make sure you don’t go crazy on ordering too many beers here!
After a weekend of Singapore, we were ready to leave the rather ‘sterile’ city of Singapore to get a taste of what we had really set out to experience. On the flight to Phnom Penh was when we first felt like the trip had begun. Everything thus far seemed very comfortable and familiar, in part because of the friends we met with in Singapore, and in part because we had both been to the city before.
And we dived into the madness from the minute we landed. We took the first tuk-tuk guy who responded to the instructions, “bus-station Siem Reap” (yes, it’s funny how you begin to sound when you’re trying to communicate with a populace whose first language isn’t English). We were taken to the most shady looking bus-station ever with absolutely no-one who spoke any English. Thankfully the next bus to Siem Reap was 5 hours away — enough impetus to look for another bus service. For US$4, we were happily taken to the Sourya Bus Service station where we found a bus leaving in the next 5 minutes. Perfect.
Or so we thought for a few minutes. We had the last two seats in a rickety bus which was packed to the brim. Of course, packed to the brim doesn’t mean the same thing as it does back home: the ratio of the number of people to the number of seats remain 1:1. In India on an equivalent type of bus service, it’s 2:1 or more. Even still, there was enough here to suggest that this was going to be an interesting ride. And it really was. Half way through our journey, the bus broke down for about an hour in the middle of nowhere. After this we stopped for lunch at a Cambodian style Dhaba. By this time, we had made friends with 3 Australians who were on the bus with us, and sat with them to get some food. As if the bus breakdown wasn’t enough drama for the first day in a foreign country, there was a HUGE blast about 30 feet away from us where the food was being cooked. One the gas cylinders must have gone off. What was bizarre to see was how quickly everyone returned to work — including the station which had the blast!
The book I had picked up for this trip was Amitav Ghosh’s Dancing in Cambodia. I had no recommendation for it except the name of the book and the author that wrote. It turned out to be an excellent choice, for in it’s format of long essays, personal notes and narration of history, Ghosh makes for the perfect companion on a travel trip through the landscape of Cambodia. I learnt a lot about the history of the Khmer people and region from the his notes in the book, and it added a vital layer to my trip across this landscape and it’s people.
One part of what Ghosh talks about really stuck with me for a while. Anyone that lands in Cambodia will notice the importance the ‘image’ of the Angkor Vat plays in the lives of the people. Right from the graphic on it’s currency to beer bottles to taxi services to massage places, the silhouette of the Angkor Vat is a constant. His assessment of this phenomenon was that there was a stark difference in what the monument stood for fo the people of the country and the people of the world. For people from abroad, the Angkor was an image of a bygone era — something that transported you to a time in the past. But for the people of Cambodia, the Angkor had become exactly the opposite — it stood a symbol the bridge into the future.
#research
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The highlights of the Cambodian leg of this trip were the following:
Angkor Vat is as beautiful as its made out to be. The scale and magnificence of the temple complexes and the surrounding forests transports you to a different time and space. It’s worth giving yourself at least 2 full days if not more to get completely lost in these temple trails.REAL cheap foot massages that you get almost anywhere along Siem Reap. They range from USD3 — USD 10. We got went into the first one we saw and got fleeced because we paid USD 10 for half an hour, which at the time seemed like a steel. Till we found out about the others near the city center. Ignorance really is bliss sometimes.Siem Reap has some awesome dinner places — all the meals there had some amazing food. Pub street is full of good places — the sights and smells you get while walking about are the best indication of what’s good. O Bistrot des Copains is worth the hype if you’re looking for some great French food.
Given the less than ideal bus ride that we had from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap, we decided to pay 5 times the amount plus forego the purchased return bus tickets to take a cab to the airport. Great call in hindsight because the entire trip was so much more comfortable and helped refresh before the the Vietnam leg of the trip!
Enter Vietnam
Landing in Vietnam was smooth enough and the visa on arrival was a breeze — probably spent no more than 20 minutes there which is much better than some of the horror stories that you read when you Google ‘visa on arrival Vietnam’. There were some couples/families that had not applied for the pre-approval letter (which is mandatory so definitely something you want to get done if traveling from India. I used this one for getting my pre-approval letter to travel as a tourist to Vietnam and it’s legitimate. )
The destination the next morning was Mui Ne — a beach town about 4 hours north-west of Ho Chi Minh City. It’s a small sleep town with basically one road that goes through with pubs, hotels and stores on both sides.
It’s fascinating to see how similar these beach side town evolve and resemble each other around the world; Maui (Hawaii), Goa (India), Galle (Sri Lanka) and Mui Ne (Vietnam) all have some very similar characteristics. Even beyond simply town-planning/look-and-feel of the place, there seems to be a similarity in the lifestyle and outlook of the locals that have settled there. Even the flora and fauna is similar.
The second day was the one that I was really looking forward to with me trying wind surfing. I had read that this place was much better for wind-surfing than it was for normal body surfing, and I was excited to try something new. I had seen some guys surf across the section of the beach the previous day and it seemed like a fairly easy thing to do.
Was I wrong. And how. I found wind-surfing far more difficult than the first time I surfed. Not only do you engage your core as much as you do for surfing, but you are also engaging your arms. Catching the wind to power you is an amazing feeling, but also overwhelming when you realize how much power you can harness from a sail. Watch this to see an *extreme* version of windsurfing.
Things not to miss in Mui Ne
Go to Joe’s cafes in the evenings. Really nice atmosphere and vibe. Good foods, lot’s of people and overall very chillDragon night club is a LOT of fun. Definitely worth checking out on a Saturday night if you’re in Mui Ne — prepare for an all-nighter.Rent a scooter and go beyond the edge of the bay to the other side where all the fishing boats are parked. If you’re lucky and it’s a clear day, you’ll get to see an amazing sunset.
The ride back to Ho Chi Minh was also the first sign of the retreat of the trip. We were lucky enough to get introduced to a local friend on the last night in Ho Chi Minh to get a taste of some authentic local cuisine as well as stroll around the city center. Snails, clams and french bread not only make for an unique experience but also some delicious food.
All in all, it was such a good idea to step out of the country and do this hopping trip through Cambodia and Vietnam. Brought a lot of perspective on the region. But more importantly, it inspired me to travel as often as I could. There is something about landing in a new setting that triggers parts of your brain to come alive. It energizes you take on tasks in a different way. But more than everything else, it gives you perspective. Perspective that’s completely different from the reality of your daily schedule and world. There’s a certain routine that most people have. From where they live, to who they meet, what they eat and what they wear. Travel removes you from that to remind you that there are other ways to live. Not necessarily better or worse, but different. There are people who eat differently, sleep & wake up differently and still thrive. For me that perspective becomes invaluable when problem solving and growing.
Surf in India
Surfing is slowly becoming one the things that I enjoy doing the most, although I am extremely clumsy at it still. Not only do I come from a country where surfing is unknown, let alone be popular, my hometown is at least 15 hours away (by train) to any respectable beach.
I thought I’d write a short post on my trip to the Shaka Surf Club in Kodi Bengre near Manipal, and tell you a little about the small but burgeoning surfing community in India.
I flew the first leg from Ahmedabad to Bombay, where I met up with my friend Karan, who planned the trip with me (and deserves a lot of credit for making it happen). We were taking the Mangalore express to Kodi Bengre which left Bombay at about 10 PM. We were due to reach at noon the next day. Important point to note here is that the station to get off at is Udupi.
We reached and hopped straight into a prepaid rickshaw that would take us to the village of Kodi Bengre, which was about 30 minutes away. The third friend coming with us was Vishal, who had arrived earlier in the day by an overnight bus from Bangalore.
Now to get a little categorical:
About Shaka Surf Club
The Shaka Surf Club is run by a really cool couple — Ishita and Tushar. They graduated from Manipal University nearby, and decided to follow their passion for surfing — one they developed while studying close by. Not only is it inspiring for two city kids to take the risk and follow what they love doing. Great respect for all the hurdles I am sure they had to cross to make this happen. Totally worth visiting.
Surfing
Some of waves were actually quite decent. I am pretty sure we had some waves going to about 3.5 feet (which though seem small, and more than what one can ask for as novice surfers). The undercurrents were quite strong, and it made getting out there quite tough.
At a personal level, I shifted to a much smaller board than what I had used on my earlier surfs. In retrospect, this might have been too early for me because I had a rough time.
I also felt like the waves broke quicker here than what I’ve seen in Sri Lanka and Maui. These things are seasonal of course, but this was my experience in mid March.
Food
The food was AMAZING! Manglorean fish curry with neer dosa and what not. Ate at some of the village joints, some of whom did not even have any lights. Turns out lanterns, moonlight, beach and awesome food make for good times ☺
My trip there was from noon Friday till noon Sunday. So that’s two full days — which can realistically get you 4 sessions (one session is 2 hrs). I got 3 of them. I have tried it twice before so some of the stuff was familiar, but the wave are still challenging (and fun).
You will have the option to stay there with; they have a camp site with tents. They charge 7k for 2 night, 3 days — with I think 3 sessions (each session is at Rs. 1,200) and meals included. My friends and I found that to be a little expensive for the budget we were on so we opted to stay at a Nature Cure center about 4k away. Its very basic accommodation, but its clean and workable since the only thing we did there was crash at night.
When you aren’t surfing, you’d mostly just chill at the camp site. Its nice and quiet. They are in the middle of a quaint fishing village, so there isn’t much else to do there. You could go to Manipal which is close by for a night out or something — they have pretty cool student joints.
Originally published at abhikbasu.com.
“Our product has traction in Japan! What now?”
If you find yourself asking this question, you’re in good company. Japan is an amazing place to have a following, as many startups have discovered. With 115 million internet users and a sophisticated consumer culture, anything is possible here. Twitter, for example, who invested early in Japan-specific research, content, product and marketing, grew from 7 to 35 million users over the last five years in Japan.
As a product design studio based in Tokyo, we’ve helped teams around the world navigate the massive opportunity and unique cultural challenge that Japan represents.
A year ago, Medium began to explore how it could better serve Japan, working with local editors and ambassadors to support writers. Recently, we sat down with Luke and Marcin from Medium’s international and design teams to map out what to do next: information architecture? UI translation? help content? After looking at the product from every angle, we realized what was most important: typography!
Why type? In our 12 years of UX research for internationalization, careless Japanese typography has consistently hurt perceptions of product quality, yet it usually takes teams years to address the problem. We’ve heard Japanese users described products as “unnatural”, “foreign”, and “suspicious.” Pinterest, in Japan since 2013, began refining Japanese type last year after an employee described their homepage as “when someone tries to overcome a language barrier by talking louder.”
The work to get from unnatural to perfect is not hard, and there are more interesting challenges for you to spend time on, so we’ve put together a little primer to get you most of the way there. (If you want to go further, we’re happy to help.)
Designing in Japanese
Written Japanese consists of thousands of characters across four character sets, hiragana, katakana, kanji and the latin alphabet. The four character sets are used in combination within the same sentence, each with its own purpose and rules, as well as its own visual weight and texture. Visually complex kanji combine with each other to represent most objects, ideas and actions. Flowing hiragana connects and conjugates kanji among other uses, while angular katakana represents non-Japanese proper nouns and concepts.
In my former work as a print designer, I often worked into the early hours of the morning, carefully combining fonts, replacing characters, tracking and kerning, to achieve an expressive, readable body of text.
As a UI designer, none of these techniques are reliably available to me. The major operating systems have only a few font families each, with nearly no overlap. Web fonts, now a common luxury in English, are still unviable in Japanese if you are designing for speed. Even kerning tables are not a certainty.
To date, these limitations have reduced design diversity and created a different, arguably less beautiful standard for Japanese text on the screen. If you are a designer new to the language however, these limitations might be helpful constraints as you begin to become familiar with the fundamentals of the language, and learn to see when something looks right.
A few simple rules for perfect Japanese typography
Match sans serif with gothic, serif with Mincho.
There are dozens of type styles in Japanese, but like English, only two dominant and readily available. Gothic families share the aesthetic and functional qualities of sans serif Latin typefaces, and Mincho those of serif. Adding one of each to your respective font stacks will result in a harmonious combination of Japanese and Latin characters within the text.
2. Don’t use italics.
Italics don’t exist in Japanese, but CSS italic rules will force an unnatural-looking oblique on Japanese text in some browsers. Use font weight variation or brackets to offset Japanese text as you would with italics.
3. Keep line length between 15 and 35 characters.
Shorter for just a few lines of text, multi-column layouts, and captions.
Longer for longer, single-column body text.
4. Justify your text, once browsers catch up.
In print, body text is almost always justified, the most natural treatment of the predictable width of Japanese characters. Screen rendering engines still don’t know how to deal with inline URLs, creating huge white gaps in the text, but hopefully they will soon.
5. Reduce font sizes by 10, 15%.
The full-cap height and square profile of Japanese characters make them appear larger than the Latin alphabet. Compensate by reducing your body text by around a bit, and your headlines by a bit more.
6. Increase line height by around 10, 15%.
The high-density, square profile characters of Japanese need more breathing room between lines to allow the eye to travel across the page without jumping lanes.
Increases to line height must be balanced against decreases to font size, however. With shorter line lengths, you may only need to adjust one of the two. And if you are setting columns of Japanese and Latin text side by side, changes to line height will disrupt the harmony of the page, so you’ll want to reduce font size first.
7. Stick with horizontal.
It is true that Japanese is set both horizontally and vertically, sometimes on the same page. Vertical typesetting is well suited to the horizontal flow of scrolls and printed texts, but is awkward to read and paginate in apps and websites which scroll vertically, which is most outside of e-readers.
We’re making a book!
We get into web fonts, punctuation, font pairing, Japanese type terminology, text decoration and more in our little book of Japanese type, available for pre-order here: http://eepurl.com/b86D2z
This was originally published on the AQ website.
A big ありがとう to Medium for letting us publish this, and to Craig Mod, Tomoyuki Ishida, Ian Lynam, Jihun Lee and Raphaël Mazoyer for reviewing.