21/7 Ian - It's rainy season in Japan....

So we’re moving on again today from Matsuyama to Hiroshima for the afternoon, then on to an island Miyajima. And, sweet lord, it’s absolutely tanking it down. Big, warm rods of torrential rain that would bring England to a standstill. The sort that soaks you through in seconds. It might stop by Hiroshima – who knows. In the mean time, we’re stranded in a ferry port for an hour or so, so I thought I’d wander around and take a few shots to try and capture some of the joys of urban Japanese living.

First up are the plastic food displays. These are in the windows of the majority of restaurants, tempting would-be punters in to sample their delights. If no plastic food, photos are often substituted. And yes, even the drinks are plastic, along with the sauces and broths. Mad as a box of frogs I tell you….

Next are the vending units. They're everywhere – outside convenience stores, on street corners, half way up hillsides, in parks, on ferries, in stations – everywhere. Actually, they’re a godsend as it’s so damn hot most of the time, so us westerners need to keep our fluid levels tip top. You can get water, pop (Fanta Grape is phenomenal – tastes like bubblegum, but don't get it mixed up with the Japanese jelly version, which is like slurping down bubblegum flavour frogspawn), isotonic electrolyte balancing stuff (‘Pocari Sweat’ is a favourite, although I suggest they consider a re-brand), ice cold coffee, hot coffee, jelly coffee (?!) any manner of green tea varieties (plus green tea-based soft drink subset), ice cold sweet milky tea, sake, sake alchopops (difficult to track down – we keep buying pure sake) and lots and lots of beer! They’re ace – everything costs about a quid or less, with 24 hour convenience. Kampai!

Ok, what else? Oh yes, in this particular ferry terminal you can get married if you fancy it. Seriously. The sign says so, just up the elevator on the left, before departure gate C. How very romantic.

As we get more confident, we’re also starting to look a little more closely at the produce on offer in the various shops we’ve visited. To be fair, you could snap away all day long, so much of it is so weird and different, but at the moment I particularly like discovering western products which have been transmogrified for Japanese taste preferences. Here’s one such beauty – a green tea Kit-Kat! Tastes like Caramac – sweet, but no chocolate flavours coming through. Odd, but nice!

And finally, here’s a shot of the booze we managed to ‘sample’ our way through last night. A couple of different beers, three different types of sake (our western taste buds couldn’t really discern significant differences), and a tin of Suntory whiskey and club soda. All very tasty actually, helping that aforementioned fishy badness slip down. And all perhaps a touch stronger than we had originally anticipated when we went back down to the 24 hour Family Mart for more! Suffice to say that we were rather ratted by the end of the evening, and definitely aren’t our usual spritely selves today….