Part VII of Travels: East vs. West

Sorry it's been so long since my last post, I didn't even realize it until I checked my stats and realized it's been a while! Anyways, back to my travels. One of the greatest things about Japan is how diverse it is. Tokyo is a modern crazy busy city while there are other rural areas that are still very traditional and old school. My hotel experience is a perfect example of that.

"West" (even though Asia is west of Los Angeles and not the East, we'll call the more Americanized modern hotel "West")

In Kyoto I stayed at the Hyatt Regency, a beautiful, new and pretty modern hotel (especially for a city like Kyoto which is more historical and less modern than Tokyo).

I loved this room, it has beautiful amenities and also a hint of the "east" with the Japanese cloth above the headboard.

"East"/Traditional

On the way from Kyoto to Tokyo we stopped by an Onsen for a day and night. Onsens are Japanese hot springs and are very popular in Japan. Many hotels are are built around these hot springs where the entire experience is centered around soaking in the natural hot spring which is supposed to be very good for you (something about opening the pores and sulfur, etc . .). The hotel I stayed out was very beautiful and relaxing.

The hotel room does not have a bed, it's a large room where during the day there is a table a few chairs and at night they move everything and put down futons. You also eat in the same room on the table. We had this very cute lovely lady who took care of us and brought in the food, changed the beds etc . . (In Japan you don't tip either, we gave her a tip and she used it to buy me a present).


This is what it looked like when we slept.


You also eat in the room (food is included in the price) and it is a wonderful meal that is several courses. This is only dinner!






Here's breakfast

Pretty different from Western hotels huh?

Here is a picture of one of the hot springs, most hotels have more than one pool. The hot springs are HOT, hence the name, and yes, you don't wear any clothes in them. I could only soak for about 15 minutes at time before I had to go rinse off with some cold water.


At the Onsen you also don't wear regular clothes, they provide you with Japanese style robes which is what you wear all the time. They are very comfortable and it's pretty awesome to basically spend 2 days in your robe. You even get a little jacket (right).


Here is the outfit for men.


Instead of shoes they give you slippers with special socks to fit specially into them .


Pretty cool huh?