Hiroshima 2016-17 Pt II: Away Days

Posted on January 16, 2017 by tokyofox

Miyajima-guchi station is the gateway to Miyajima and it’s World Heritage listed Itsukushima Shrine. Almost everyone arriving at the station is about to visit the island but not Tokyo Fox though! One likes to do things differently and so I headed in the opposite direction on a fairly lengthy walk up into the hills just to see the exterior of an intriguing looking building which I’d read about in a magazine.

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When I arrived at Itsukaichi Station that morning my idea was to go eastwards towards the city but then I changed my mind completely. 12 minutes later I was at my destination station and set off on a forty minute journey to see the bizarrely named  Continue reading →

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Hiroshima 2016-17 Pt I: Local Life

Posted on January 13, 2017 by tokyofox

The food may be different but the Japanese New Year is quite similar to the British Christmas in that it’s spent mostly in the home with family eating and drinking. Despite staying in Tokyo for the Christmas period in Tokyo the lure of spending the New Years holiday with her family was always going to be difficult for my wife to resist so we returned to Western Japan for our fourth visit of the year. This time though we ventured over to Hiroshima closer to New Years Eve unlike the year before when we flew over on December 26th.

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We ate a wide variety of food during our stay with my in-laws and first up was fugu (above) which I haven’t eaten since Continue reading →

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Dining Out: Namja Town In Sunshine City (Ikebukuro)

Posted on January 9, 2017 by tokyofox

Not only can you eat an abundance of delectable cuisine in Japan but you can often experience creative themed restaurants and cafes offering interesting and unforgettable memories too. When I first arrived in Japan all those years ago I was always keen to visit such quirky places but the novelty wore off a bit as the years progressed.

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However, every now and again I am happy to visit such places and this was one such occasion. After our rabbit cafe experience back in November we popped a few doors along to the huge Sunshine City shopping complex in east Ikebukuro as I wanted to go to Namja Town which is a bit of a Continue reading →

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Tokyo Museum Grutto Pass

Posted on January 6, 2017 by tokyofox

You’d think having a special pass that entitles you to free (or discounted) entry to nearly 80 museums in Tokyo would be a fantastic privilege. Indeed it is. However, with this booklet of coupons comes two high-pressure months of trying to use every spare moment to visit places you’re maybe not even interested in! On the other side of the coin, some of these museums you didn’t realise would interest you, do spring a surprise or two!

Grutto Pass

One of my students told me about the pass last Summer and it sounded a wonderful idea. Two months where you can visit 79 museums (as well as zoo’s) in Tokyo for Continue reading →

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TF Flashback: Driving Across The Nullabor In Australia (2002)

Posted on January 3, 2017 by tokyofox

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One of the most common questions I get asked by students is why I came to Japan. I’ve talked on here countless times about World Cup 2002 being an influence but the main reason for my interest in this country is to do with my time in Australia, particularly Perth. Whilst spending ten weeks in Western Australia I met many Japanese Continue reading →

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TF Top 20……Tokyo Fox Hits Of 2016

Posted on January 1, 2017 by tokyofox

So 2017 has only just begun and already Tokyo Fox is looking back!! For about seven years now there have been exactly ten new posts on here each and every month and these are the twenty from 2016 which got the most hits. I have excluded all TF Top 10…….list entries from this feature so the TF Top 10……Tokyo Fox Posts Of All Time marking a decade of this website does not feature. Of course those entries from earlier in the year had more time to accumulate hits which may explain why so much of the top 20 is from the first half of 2016 as Leicester City were on the verge of achieving a miraculous Premier League title win. That may explain the inclusion of many foxes-related posts in this list. A couple of posts from the latter half have sneaked in though…

1. On The Trail Of John Rain (雨) Part X – Paris – With the help of the author himself these posts often do well in the wake of him tweeting the link to his thousands and thousands of followers on that particular social media platform. More details here

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2. Leicester City Supporters Night In Tokyo Bar – What a time to have our first Continue reading →

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TF Top 10……Filming Location Trips For 2016

Posted on December 30, 2016 by tokyofox

Last year was a feast of filming locations and it was always going to be difficult to better that but that’s not to say that Tokyo Fox hasn’t brought you anything in the way of location blog posts this year too.

This 8th proper full year of filming locations may be a little 007-centric at times and certainly includes topping up pre-existing entries but there are some completely all-new Japanese locations as well as a Thailand one.

Here then, in no particular order, is the TF Top 10……filming location trips for 2016…

1. Babel, 2006 (Click here)

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2. Kamichu!, 2005 (Click here) Continue reading →

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Christmas 2016 In Tokyo

Posted on December 26, 2016 by tokyofox

For the second year running I was in Tokyo for Christmas but it was a little different this time as Christmas Eve and Christmas Day both fell on the weekend with the 23rd a national holiday too. That meant my wife was not at work and around to spend it all with me! Hmmm, I’m still wondering if that was good or not! Ha!

It seems to have been picked up by the UK media quite a bit in recent years and indeed it is true that eating fried chicken, particularly that of Kentucky Fried Chicken, is a big thing at Christmas in Japan. I first blogged about it back in December 2007 in a post about Japanese festive traditions.

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Turkey is very scarce in Japan so back in the 1970’s KFC promoted itself as Continue reading →

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Review: Films Inspired By Japan – Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence (1983)

Posted on December 23, 2016 by tokyofox

It may be lacking in plot and have some fairly average acting at best but there’s something alluring about this WWII film which goes way beyond the beautifully, haunting self-titled theme song. ‘Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence‘ is a powerful character-driven war film albeit one without any real action.

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Despite having the word Christmas in the title, this movie is a world away from your typical festive films though I seem to remember it often being shown very late at night (back in the 1990’s) in the UK schedules at this time of year. I had actually been trying to locate a copy of this for a few years but had no luck when I asked at the rental stores and the prices on Amazon and eBay were ridiculously high. Then David Bowie died at the start of this year and Continue reading →

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Tokyo Daytripper: Todoroki Valley

Posted on December 20, 2016 by tokyofox

Tokyo may be a city somewhat lacking in green areas but that’s not to say there is nowhere to go to take a break from the concrete jungle. There are a handful of beautiful gardens and parks but little did I know that there was an unconventional green space amidst the densely populated Setagaya ward.

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Just a couple of minutes walk away from Todoroki Station on the Oimachi Line is Todoroki Valley; an attractive walking towpath stretching for just over Continue reading →

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