On Screen #2 – Istanbul

Posted on September 17, 2013 by tokyofox

Turkey’s economic, cultural, and historical heart is often considered by westerners to be something of a mysterious city; one which is rarely portrayed well on the big screen as its used as a backdrop for international intrigue. Add to that, some stereotypical snapshots of cruel moustaches, belly dancers, hookers, men in fez’s and meat on a stick and you’ve pretty much got the full picture. Of course the days of scary prison melodrama’s are something of a bygone era as Istanbul these days is a modern, hip, young, clean city with Europe and Asia facing off across the Bosphorus Strait.

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Istanbul was the European Capital of Culture in 2010 but it was two years after that when it really put its name on the map in terms of being a popular destination to film in. 2012 was a golden year for Turkey’s most famous city in the movies as it featured as itself in the 007 blockbuster ‘Skyfall‘ (above) as well as the critically slammed ‘Taken 2‘ (below)

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(which I actually quite liked!) and its famous Grand Bazaar also doubled up as the Iranian bazaar (below) in the award winning ‘Argo‘. Apart from that, Istanbul has for the majority of the time played itself which is in stark contrast to On Screen #1 where Vietnam was faked almost every time!

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James Bond just can’t get enough of Istanbul with three 007 movies having now been filmed here. ‘From Russia With Love‘ (1963) (below) was the beginning of the secret agents love affair with the city as two busty belly dancers sweated it out in the name of

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trying to win his affections. The huge atmospheric subterranean-like Basilica Cistern (above) is a nice cool break from the heat and used to store the city’s water supply.  It is actually beneath Aya Sofya but in the film it’s situated under the Russian Consulate and is where Bond and Kerim Bey escape with the Lektor decoding machine.

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Bond and his accomplice Tatiana board the Orient Express (above) on platform 1 at Sirkeci station. This station also fills in as Belgrade station where Bond sends a message to ‘M’ and Zagreb station where he is contacted by fake agent Grant. It was also not surprisingly the setting for ‘Murder On The Orient Express’ in 1974 but wasn’t actually shot in Turkey as France was used instead.

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The Maidens Tower on a tiny islet off the coast at Uskudar (above) featured in ‘The World Is Not Enough’ (1999) and is where ‘M’ (Judi Dench) is taken prisoner. As well as Spice Bazaar Bond also visits the Grand Bazaar where he is driven to meet Ali Kerim in ‘From Russia With Love‘ but that wouldn’t be his last visit to the place. In ‘Skyfall‘ Bond pursues assailant Patrice in a high-speed chase through the crowded Eminonu Square and onto the famous Grand Bazaar where the thrilling action takes place both on the rooftops (below) and inside what is one of the largest and oldest covered markets in the world. Fear not as no damage was done to the roof tiles for reinforced steel roof panels were used to carefully protect the historic structure. They filmed scenes in the bazaar on Sundays and paid the owners to keep their shops open.

It doesn’t end there though for the very same rooftop was also in ‘Taken 2‘ and ‘The International‘ (2009); the latter starring Clive Owen (below) and Naomi Watts as agent and attorney respectively. Owen’s character travels to Istanbul to try and expose corruption in a merchant bank but finds himself fleeing from assassins.

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Topkapi Palace Museum is very much part of the tourist trail and is usually packed. This place played host to Peter Ustinov and co in the 1964 film ‘Topkapi‘ (below) in which they attempt to steal an emerald-encrusted dagger. You even get scanned on the way in which is presumably to stop anyone trying to repeat the antics of that movie.

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The Four Seasons Hotel used to be the infamous Sultanahmet jail depicted in the 1978 film ‘Midnight Express’ (below) which tells the story of a young American student sent to a Turkish prison for trying to smuggle drugs out of the country. However, the majority of this film, which is of course not a great sell for Turkey as a country, was filmed in Malta due to some kind of disagreement with Turkish officials.

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Anatolia, Pecenek and Saraycik were the principle Turkish locations ‘The Charge Of The Light Brigade‘ (1968) used Istanbul for the arrival of the troops and in 2000 ‘Armageddon‘ featured global atmosphere shots of the Blue Mosque which admittedly is a bit of a tenuous connection to this great city but its still a link nonetheless.

Unlike Vietnam (in ‘On Screen #1‘) very few TV series have been set in Istanbul so I’m left with a perennial favourite to fill that void. Anthony Bourdain’s TV series’ ‘No Reservations‘ covered many places around the world in its eight seasons on the Travel Channel and Istanbul was of course no exception. In season 6 episode 2 he sampled some truly amazing looking dishes such as lahmacun, doner kebab, islak burger, midye dolma, börek and raki and visited both the Blue Mosque and the Basilica Cistern. Sadly, when I was in Istanbul in 2011 I had some major financial problems which meant that I couldn’t really afford to eat out properly but hopefully that can be corrected next time I visit.

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Posted in Films, James Bond, Middle East Travel, Movie Locations | Tagged , , , , , | 13 Comments

TF Flashback: The 3rd Tallest Statue In The World Is Actually In Japan (2004)

Posted on September 14, 2013 by tokyofox

I had pretty much forgotten about this place until I heard it mentioned a couple of weeks ago in the ‘Factoids’ segment on Steve Wright’s BBC Radio 2 show. Listeners were told that the three tallest statues are all Buddha ones; Spring Temple Buddha in Henan, China (128m), the Lakyun Setkvar in Monywa, Myanmar (116m) and the Continue reading →

Posted in Japan Travel, Quirky Japan, Tokyo Daytripper: | Tagged , , , , , , | 8 Comments

London Filming Locations: Skyfall (2012)

Posted on September 11, 2013 by tokyofox

This triumphant return to form sees Bond go back to his roots with some beautiful scenery including the Scottish Highlands and lots of London scenes which were very satisfying for this misty-eyed Brit living abroad! Before all that though, ‘Skyfall‘ starts off with Bond (Daniel Craig) and Eve (Naomie Harris) in Istanbul on the hunt for a stolen hard drive in a city which also appeared in two other 007 films; ‘From Russia With Love‘ (1963) and ‘The World Is Not Enough‘ (1999). Their pursuit of the assailant takes them through Eminonou Square and the Grand Bazaar (below) with the latter also featuring in the critically acclaimed ‘Argo‘ and the critically panned ‘Taken 2‘ last year.

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The chase continues on 500 miles south-east to Adana where the spectacular Varda Bridge sees Bond involved in a bout of fisticuffs on top of the moving train before M (Judi Dench) orders Eve to take the shot which results in him supposedly plummeting to his death 90 metres below.

M is driven to a meeting with Gareth Mallory (Ralph Fiennes) at Willis Faber on 10 Trinity Square (below) near the Tower of London. Only a limited part of the building is seen on screen but more of the building can be seen in ‘Lara Croft: Tomb Raider‘ (2000).

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On her return to MI6 at 85 Albert Embankment (below) M witnesses it blowing up. This building was also used in ‘The World Is Not Enough‘.

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Bond is alive and waiting for M at her home in Knightsbridge (below) which was actually the home of 007 composer John Barry who passed away a year prior to the films release. The address is 82 Cadogan Square and Sloane Square is just about the closest Underground station.

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Not too far from here on 22 Ebury Street is a house which is worth a little detour if you’re in the area and it is a very important one for Bond fans. A little blue plaque on the buildings exterior tells us that it was the house of the man who created 007; Ian Fleming.

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Bond is driven across the River Thames with the London Eye in the background. The car continues onto the secret MI6 underground facility which is actually Smithfield Car Park opposite the meat market.

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Deemed to be fit again, Bond makes his way to the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square where he meets up with the new Q (Ben Whishaw) in front of The Fighting Temeraire by JMW Turner.

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Of course photography is not permitted inside but one can always try and take a sneaky one with the worst usually being that you’ll be told off by one of the guards

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It’s Shanghai next for 007 and though the aerial shots are real the rooftop pool scene was actually filmed in London in Canary Wharf at the Virgin Active Classic Health Club.

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Still in “Shanghai” Bond follows hitman Patrice into a high-rise building but yet again its London and the Broadgate Tower at 201 Bishopsgate although its the entrance on Primrose Street which is seen.

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The real Gunkanjima (formally known as Hashima) is used for the distant shots but the rest was all filmed on a set built back at Pinewood. Full details about this location, its history, how it was faked and how to get there can be read here.

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Silva is captured and brought back to the UK but he soon manages to escape into the London Underground with Bond in pursuit of him between Temple and Embankment stations on the District and Circle Lines. There are only brief shots of those stations before Bond finally emerges at Westminster station and rushes to save ‘M’.

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Bond’s journey takes him along Whitehall where he eventually ends up back at Trinity Square not that this is referenced. We are made to believe that this place, which is a couple of miles eastwards, is one of a handful of government buildings in the area.

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Bond and M flee the carnage at the public enquiry and change cars beneath the train tracks at Parkside Industrial Estate on Arklow Road in Deptford. It probably doesn’t make too much sense that one of the garages there is home to the Aston Martin DB5 car from 1964′s ‘Goldfinger’ but it’s a nice nod to the past. The closest station is New Cross on the London Overground and it’s about a ten minute walk from there.

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Bond decides to take M to Scotland to draw the villain Silva out into the open and though it is the real Highlands of Glencoe, the “Skyfall” childhood home of Bond was a set built on Hankley Common in Surrey which has also been used in ‘The World Is Not Enough‘ and ‘Die Another Day‘ (2002).

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Back in London, Bond and Eve appear on top of the Department of Energy and Climate change at 55 Whitehall and the Old War Office building alongside it played the part of MI6 in ‘Octopussy‘ (1983), ‘A View To A Kill‘ (1985) and ‘License To Kill‘ (1989). Not surprisingly, its not possible for the general public to go up on the roof which is a shame as that would be one hell of a shot to recapture! Instead, one has to just settle for seeing the building from street level only.

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See other James Bond filming locations by clicking on the places below:

Tokyo        London        Prague        Venice        Como        Istanbul        Las Vegas        Phuket        Vienna        Hong Kong        New York        Panama

For other London filming locations click on the links below:

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace    Trainspotting    Mission: Impossible    Lara Croft Tomb Raider    The Bourne Ultimatum   Harry Potter & The Philosophers Stone   James Bond    About A Boy    Quadrophenia    Bridget Jones’s Diary    Goodnight Sweetheart    Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels    Basic Instinct 2    Batman Begins/The Dark Knight    The Italian Job    Snatch    Rom-Com Special    Notting Hill    The World Is Not Enough

Posted in James Bond, London Film Locations, Movie Locations | Tagged , , , , , , | 59 Comments

Tokyo To Host 2020 Olympics

Posted on September 8, 2013 by tokyofox

The trains weren’t exactly abuzz this morning with locals excitedly discussing the fresh news that came from Argentina during the night time but being almost-silent on public transport is how things are done here anyway. The local population’s poor support for having its first Olympics since 1964 looked like it might work against it at one stage but over time thinking has supposedly changed according to some government statistics. There were over a thousand people waiting anxiously in Komazawa Olympic Park for the news although the opportunity of being seen on every TV station in this country, as well as around the world, may have helped them decide to stay up all night!

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On waking to hear the news today, I can’t say I really felt any emotion but no doubt that will change as it approaches although I really can’t even be sure if we’ll even be living here in 2020. That seems ages away right now, and indeed it is, but given that I only planned to stay here for a year or two when I arrived all those years ago the odds are that we’ll be here and if not, then I’m sure I’ll be pretty excited by it all. No doubt it won’t be too long before people start enquiring about staying in our ‘spare room’ during the Olympics but this is Tokyo remember where space is at such a premium and nobody has a spare room!

I should not forget that it was the World Cup of 2002 which partly inspired me to get myself over here. That was back in times when Japan had more favourable relations with some of its Asian neighbours and the government and Japanese citizens really need to re-address its attitudes to them.

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Tokyo’s safe option campaign saw it triumph over rivals Istanbul and Madrid in a race which was perhaps a little underwhelming with no real stand-out candidate. In one sense Tokyo is the best option as the infrastructure is already pretty much in place and with the Rugby World Cup also being held here (perhaps unknown to the majority of the country) in 2019 the venues need to be more ahead of schedule than we’ve seen in recent games history.

I have no worries that Tokyo will put on a fine show as people have a real affection for the Olympics here. Sadly, the same can’t be said for the Paralympics which helped Britain’s wave of enthusiasm roll-over last Summer but there was hardly any mention of it in Japan at all. Appearances are everything in this country and, as one of my colleagues said at the time, “it’s not their thing” to which this attitude to such games really needs to change over the next seven years.

It’s also interesting to hear how the rest of the world views Tokyo and there have been many comments across internet forums with the main worry being radiation. For people with little knowledge of the country, Japan IS Tokyo and as far as they know Fukushima is just next door. Evidence has long shown that radiation has never really been an issue in Tokyo and having been to Fukushima since the big disaster I can tell you that its nowhere as bad as what you may believe. However, Japan must do all it can to deal with Fukushima so that visitors will actually dare visit and enjoy the games without any fear. If you think radiation is an issue for athletes who will be in Tokyo for a fortnight or so then spare a thought for those of us living here now!

Putting my sarcasm aside for now, the government would be well advised to hurry up its clean-up and reconstruction in Tohoku whilst splashing out billions of yen (which given the debts of this country they don’t have) on an event which hasn’t yet captured the imagination of the public. Plenty of time for that though and I have no doubt that the locals will embrace it when it matters most. Many people (both locally and internationally) will be curious to see the extent of the recovery in Tohoku so with the worlds eyes on Tokyo it would be the ideal opportunity to show everyone that progress is being made in the stricken areas.

In terms of my work, I’m bracing myself for seven years of people crowing on about ‘orinpiku’ but hopefully the country, which ranks very low for its English ability compared to other nations, will realise that being able to speak English is a very important and useful skill with the rest of the world soon to descend on these shores. This will hopefully mean a rise in student numbers and I’ve even heard of some Japanese kids already tweeting about studying English so they can become Olympic volunteers.

Of course there are some serious issues to be fixed in Japan before 2020 as well as other things like 24 hour ATM’s and English signage but if its Chinese rivals Beijing can do it then so can Tokyo. The growing costs of hosting the Olympics every four years is a worry but a successful games will make this a true world city and hopefully rescue it from the downward slump its been suffering from in recent past.

Posted in Japan Life, Sport | Tagged , , , , , , , | 8 Comments

TF Flashback: The Tropical Island In Tokyo Very Few People Have Been To (2005)

Posted on September 4, 2013 by tokyofox

When I watched ‘Battle Royale‘ (2000) recently for review in the Films Set In Japan section of this site I was under the impression that Hachijojima was where it was filmed and so I started doing my research on the place for this series which will enable me to dip back in to places I visited in Japan before Tokyo Fox went online. Whilst back in England last month I scanned some of the pictures and then I found out that my tenuous link between the film and the island I once visited wasn’t even true! It was actually filmed on Hachijokojima which is nearly five miles west of Hachijojima. Oh well, too late now!

Other than a few goats, Hachijokojima is uninhabited after the government evacuated people from the island, but its much bigger sister island is very much open to tourism. Both islands are actually part of Tokyo even though they’re located nearly 300km south of the mainland.

Back in August 2005 my then-girlfriend and I, equipped with just the one t-shirt it seems, took a night ferry from Hamamatsucho at 10.30pm which arrived on the volcanic island some 11 hours later! Of course you can fly there a lot quicker with flights taking just under an hour but thankfully I managed to sleep most of the way there.

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Due to the fact that Hachijō-jima is a volcanic island, there are a few black sandy beaches with the main one being next to the main harbour of Sokodo (above) where we spent our first day in the foreground of the elegant but unoriginally named Hachijō-fuji mountain. With its wide-flowing appearance this image really does represent the island in a beautiful way. From what I remember we could do some snorkelling there and it was so hot that I just had to sit in the shade. I also did a couple of big jumps into the water (from the pier?) with the latter one affecting my hearing for a while after!

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The task the following day was to hike to the top of Hachijō-fuji which stands at 854m and is a composite volcano with an inner crater that has been dormant since its last eruption in 1707. The crater can be seen from a walking path around its rim which we reached from the fifth base where we parked our hired car. We ended up only walking round part of the rim (below) as it was so incredibly windy up there in stark contrast to the strong heat further down.

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Near the foot of the mountain we came across a small ranch called Fureai Farm (below) that offers some scenic views of the island. I can’t recall much else from here other than being surrounded by a load of cows amid all the mist whilst consuming some expensive ice-cream and milk coming directly (well more direct than the usual process anyway!) from the farm animals.

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I’m not usually one for hot spring baths in everyday life but on holiday it’s ok and so we did go to Uramigataki hot springs which is one of a handful of onsens in the southern parts of the island. It was free, had nice views and was for both sexes meaning that bathing suits were required and, unlike in the western world, no soap or shampoo can be used. Shoes also had to be left at the top of the steps leading down to the pool. Uramigataki Falls is a nearby waterfall (below) and offers further respite from the islands tropical humid atmosphere which is usually controlled at lower altitude by the cool winds blowing from the sea.

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A sushi restaurant, a secluded snorkelling area and Noboryotoge Lookout (above) completed the second day before we got drunk after dinner and then met a Japanese guy who we went to the Anchor pub (not sure if it is still in operation) with which is owned by an Australian and Japanese couple and isn’t too far from Sokodoko ferry landing. Not feeling so good the next morning we left the island, and its gentler, slower, old pace at 10.30am heading back to urban Tokyo!

Posted in Japan Travel, Movie Locations | Tagged , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Journeys Into The Ring Of Fire Episode 4: Japan

Posted on September 1, 2013 by tokyofox

This four part series, which was recently repeated on BBC4 whilst I was back home, saw enthusiastic presenter Dr Iain Stewart travel around the Pacific Rim visiting some of the world’s most volatile places. The shows journeyed through the perilous landscapes of Indonesia, the geological booby-traps of California and the hostile peaks of the Andes before concluding in Japan which has had more than its fair share of volcanic disasters.

Geologist Stewart’s passion shined through and he explained and demonstrated everything with relative ease in the name of telling how the rocks beneath our feet have played a fundamental role in shaping human history in this country which has turned geological adversity to its advantage.

To be fair, I only really watched this as I wanted to take advantage of BBC iPlayer downloads to give me something half decent to watch back here in the land of awful dumbed down TV. I never realised at the time of watching that it was a repeat until the end where a feature on miniaturised electrical items seemed a bit dated and I was suspicious as to why the big earthquake of 2011 was never mentioned.

Unlike the usual documentaries on Japan, which tend to just focus on the weird and wonderful, this one was a bit more unique and showed how the country’s culture has been inescapably defined by the rocks. That is the everlasting message of this show and to be honest it did become a bit tenuous at times, particularly the latter part of this documentary where he focused on pachinko, haikyu poetry, walkman’s and miniaturised technology. Of course it was geology that played a starring role in these things.

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Around 75% of Japan is mountainous and with these area’s being less sympathetic to urban settlement it has forced its inhabitants into some of the most densely populated places on earth where space is scarce and every square centimetre is at a premium as the places are 20% smaller than in Western Europe.

I guess the one particular place which shows how overcrowded Tokyo is (due to the rocks remember!), is the morning commuter trains and naturally they feature here as indeed they did only a few days before (August 9th) on the Channel 5 documentary ‘World’s Busiest Train Station’ which showed the ridiculous nature of how pushers are used to cram people in like sardines.

One of the highlights for me was seeing the Nakagin Capsule Tower which actually doubled up as love hotel in ‘The Wolverine‘ (2013). Stewart visits an international lawyer who has been living in these 5 square metre rooms for 15 years with no kitchen and a fold out desk and bed to really optimise the rooms tiny amount of space.

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Rather than the perennial regular haunts like Tokyo and Kyoto, Stewart did at least travel the length of the country where he visited the U-shaped river valleys (formed by glacial sculpting) of Kamikochi which is a really wonderful part of central Honshu that I visited back in October 2005 during the Autumn leaves season. He also went to Kyushu and in particular to Mount Aso which is almost constantly active as the toxic gases bubble away down below and if it ever gets to the surface there’ll be one hell of a big bang.

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Further south is Mount Sakurajima; another perilous environment where the locals have to be ready for eruption at any moment. Furthermore, these hostile mountains have landslides, the soil is thin, stoney and unstable and heavy rains leech them of nutrients and its this kind of inhospitable terrain which has forced Japan’s 127 million people to live in huge urban sprawls.

So basically the rocks have caused overcrowding resulting in people craving personal space which led to the invention of the walkman (and its more recent incarnations) giving them their own personal cosmos. All this is in stark contrast to contemplating zen through meditation! The show, originally shown in 2006, concludes with how a big earthquake would not only affect Japan but the rest of the world who have invested here. Not even Stewart’s trip to a Tokyo earthquake prevention centre to experience a simulated quake could have prepared him or any of us for what happened two and a half years ago.

Posted in Japan Life, TV Shows | Tagged , , , , , , , | 12 Comments

England 2013 Pt VI: Finishing Off In London

Posted on August 29, 2013 by tokyofox

After a wonderful four nights back in my hometown we returned to London on August 14th to spend a couple of nights with friends Richard, Mizuki and their eight month old baby Tatsu at their swanky new apartment in East London.

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The London 2012 Olympics were a huge success and I missed the majority of it due to living in a country where they ONLY show their own sportsmen and women in action. Luckily, I picked up the Olympics dvd box-set (which I’m still yet to watch) while I was at home and was also able to see the Olympic Stadium (below) up close as the village where the games took place was a short stroll away from their place. Yet another canal walk took us there and onto Stratford which has Europe’s largest urban shopping mall.

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On our first afternoon, my girlfriend and I headed into the city to see The Tower of London (below) and Tower Bridge before taking a much needed rest on the grass at Trinity Square Gardens which is just a stone’s throw away from all the crowds and the exterior of Willis Faber (below) was seen in ‘Lara Croft: Tomb Raider‘ (2001).

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Buckingham Palace (below) was our first port of call the following day but sadly we couldn’t see the changing of the guard at 11.30am as in August this crowd-pleaser only takes place every two days and typically our day wasn’t one of them! We planned to return the next day but it never quite materialised…….not that I was that bothered!

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It was nice to just wander the streets of London and from Buckingham Palace we found our way to Knightsbridge and Harrods department store (above) as I had remembered that my girlfriend wanted to go there. She did…..but only to see it’s exterior!! Despite my countless visits to the nations capital I had never ever been in this area and I didn’t exactly stay too long as I had to go and meet a couple of old schoolmates in St James’ Park (above) whilst my girlfriend did do some shopping albeit in the shops close to Harrods.

Whilst I’m not really a fan of most tourist places in London one area which I like a lot is  Camden Town. What with its international culture and bustling markets full of ethnic food, this is a pretty cool place and the location where I met up again with both my girlfriend and Richard.  Along with baby Tatsu we went into ‘The Worlds End’ pub (nothing to do with the recently released Simon Pegg film of the same name!) to meet Will who we used to work with in Japan a few years ago.

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Another ex-colleague was met the next day in the form of Asif (who has appeared on this site numerous times over the years) who we met for lunch by the river before heading on to the British Museum. However, my girlfriend wasn’t feeling at all well so we didn’t venture beyond the lobby and instead just chilled out in the outside grounds of the place.

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For our final night in England we returned to my sisters house which is currently being renovated which explains why she is doing the washing-up in the bath in the picture below! With my parents down in London the next day we all went out for a boat cruise along the Thames from Kingston to Hampton Court Palace followed by a pub lunch and that pretty much brought the curtain down on my first trip to my homeland in the Summer time for a good ten years and it sure was nice for me (and my girlfriend on her first visit) to see the country at this time of year.

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Posted in Euro Travel, Family | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

England 2013 Pt V: Stratford Upon Avon

Posted on August 26, 2013 by tokyofox

What I knew about Shakespeare before visiting this famous English town could probably have been written on the back of a postage stamp! Now, I’m not saying I now know that  much more but I did have a very enjoyable day out in Stratford-Upon-Avon with my girlfriend and parents on my first trip into Shakespeare country.

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First up was a quite lengthy walk to Anne Hathaway’s Cottage & Gardens. This was a rather nice little thatched cottage where a young William Shakespeare courted his future wife. The guide kept things brief, lively and informative which was news to my ears as some tour guides do have a tendency to waffle on and on.

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With there being few records of Shakespeare’s private life there’s been considerable speculation about certain parts of his life but the guide was very honest about this and words like may, might, could and expressions like ‘its thought that’ were used a lot.

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As an English teacher it was good to hear how certain idioms originated from within this place such as sleep tight and a fair few more which I sadly have forgotten.

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Back in the main centre of Stratford we had yet another pub meal before heading to the Shakespeare Centre & Shakespeare’s Birthplace. More than satisfied with his wife’s cottage and not wanting to fork out the entrance costs we decided against going in and it was probably a wise decision as we worked out which was his house. That may sound easy but given that there’s just an entrance building with no signage on the house next to it its not so clear and we hadn’t done our research in advance. Furthermore, we got to see the back of the house too by entering the gift shop to the right of Shakespeare’s place.

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There really is no escape from Star Wars as inside the shop there was a display advertising a book by the name of ‘Verily, A New Hope‘ (below) which is written by Ian Doescher and is basically the original Star Wars story told using William Shakespeare’s stylised language. A style which is something I’m unable to get my head round!

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Even with little knowledge or interest in Shakespeare, Stratford-upon-Avon is a lovely place to wander round with its fine black and white timber framed buildings, the shopping on Henley Street, the river Avon and the Royal Shakespeare Theatre which is one of Britain’s most important cultural venues.

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Many of my Japanese students have some mis-conceptions about Britain and one of the most common ones is that ALL Brits have afternoon tea every day! Soooooooooo not true for the majority of people but having said that we did indeed have afternoon tea and scones (below) in a very nice tea-room before making the visit back home.

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That evening I managed to just about find enough room to accommodate a fish finger sandwich (below) as I was keen to show my girlfriend a British food classic! The next morning we sadly had to leave my hometown. Another day would’ve been nice but I guess its best to leave while you’re still enjoying it and not bored. We had train tickets booked to take us down to the nations capital and news of that will appear ‘England 2013 Pt V’.

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England 2013 Pt IV: Home Sweet Home

Posted on August 23, 2013 by tokyofox

What better time to arrive home than on the afternoon of the Great Bowden & District Garden Society annual show! No sooner had I put my feet up to watch the Athletics on TV (below) and I was off down to the Village Hall to see a mix of flowers, cakes, jams, home-grown vegetables and a tombola showing off local village life at its best and something that my girlfriend (nor me!) probably couldn’t envisage. For £1 we could draw 5 or 6 tickets which if ending in 0 or 5 were winners. Between the four of us we managed to win a fair few prizes including bottles of alcohol, shampoo and soft drinks!

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The beautiful surrounding countryside as well as my parents garden was all very impressive for my girlfriend and after the excitement at Great Bowden Village Hall we took a short walk through the fields accessed over a bridge crossing the train line which runs through the village. I’ve never seen anyone so excited to see some cows in a field!

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A day trip to Stamford followed the next day culminating in a traditional home-made Sunday roast and crumble for pudding which was all very nice.

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It wasn’t actually till our third day back home that I showed my girlfriend the delights of Market Harborough town centre including the Old Grammar School above. Never have I spent so long in town (excluding drinking sessions!) as we went from shop to shop before I finally treated her to lunch (two meals for a bargain £6.99) at my old haunt ‘The Sugarloaf’ below.

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Foxton Locks is just a few miles out of town and is very much part of the tourist circuit for the few people that actually do more than just passing through the heart of rural England! I may have been fairly underwhelmed by the vast locks in Panama earlier this year but these locks are always a joy to behold having been a regular day out as a child whenever friends and family came to visit us in Market Harborough.

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Free to enter, this site is a unique 10 lock staircase that takes narrow boats up and down the 23 metre hill and has been around for just under 200 years. It is also famed for the  remains of its Inclined Plane boat lift which was originally built as a solution to various operational restrictions imposed by the lock flight. However, it wasn’t so successful and was only operational for a decade although there is some kind of campaign to fully restore the Plane.

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The Roebuck is a fairly new addition to the Harborough pub scene and so my girlfriend and I treated my parents to a slap-up pub meal (above) there in the evening.

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England 2013 Pt III: Stamford

Posted on August 20, 2013 by tokyofox

Keen to impress my girlfriend on her first trip to Great Britain, my parents and I thought that nearby Stamford might be a nice place to visit. This medieval town is actually located in Lincolnshire but is only about an hour away from my parents place in Leicestershire and is best known for its old timber framed buildings, medieval parish churches and 17th–18th century stone buildings which were very interesting as on closer look many of them were just your typical high street chains but without their usual eye-sore decor!

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Under-dressed in our Summer clothes we weren’t quite prepared for the cool weather (it did become sunny later on!) on the Sunday in August when we visited this very pleasant town which was lovely to roam around and a good warm-up for our visit to Stratford-Upon-Avon a couple of days later.

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The town is situated on the River Welland which is the same river that runs through my home town of Market Harborough and for that reason it holds many memories from my childhood. It was nice to see it in a different part of the country but didn’t quite feel the same!

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Daniel Lambert (below) is one of Leicester’s most cherished icons due in part to his huge size (he once tipped the scales at around 335 kilo’s) and for that reason a name which has been etched in my memory since hearing about him as a child when I recall sitting in his chair at a museum in Leicester. He actually didn’t eat or drink to excess and presumably died due to a glandular condition. He loved horse racing, which is why he was in Stamford when he died in June 1809 at what is now the upmarket hotel called The George. We had a quick look at this hotel which features some interesting information about this former gaol keeper (no, not goalkeeper which is how I first read it!) and animal breeder. When he kicked the bucket a window had to be taken out to extract his body and it took 20 men to lower his body into his grave in the churchyard.

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Our final stop in Stamford was Burghley house which has been portrayed on screen a few times. As well as featuring in the BBC TV adaptation of ‘Middlemarch‘ (1994) it has also starred in films like ‘Pride & Prejudice‘ (2005) and ‘The Da Vinci Code‘ (2006) with the latter being my main reason of interest for visiting. The interior of ‘Castel Gandolfo’ as well as Saunière’s retreat in the flashback scenes were filmed at this stately home. In the former it was used as ‘Rosings’; the palatial home of Lady Catherine de Bourg played by the legendary Dame Judi Dench. England’s greatest Elizabethan house is a hefty £12.70 to get into but its free to wander the vast area outside which is exactly what we did.

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Corby Asda is a place I used to visit with my school friends over 20 years ago as there was a free bus going there from Market Harborough. We used to take advantage of this to go and get the 99p English breakfast and visit InterSport to look at all the latest trainers as that was what we were heavily into back then. Both those things are no more but Asda is still standing and we all had dinner there at a nice, cheap price (my girlfriend loved her meal in this place which is quite a worry!) before wandering the huge supermarket chain. After that we had a brief, final photo stop at the 82 arch Welland Viaduct (below) which is the longest viaduct in Britain…or something like that!

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The fun definitely ended there as back in Market Harborough I took my girlfriend to ‘The Village Inn’ to watch Leicester against Leeds on Sky which ended 0-0 and was quite possibly the most boring game of football I’ve ever seen! Thank god I had decided against splashing out on a couple of tickets for the game which would have taken up far more of the day and would have meant forgoing the trip to Stamford.

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