The Time Machine

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An English gentleman referred to only by the term Time Traveler is entertaining his weekly guests, a group of men from different fields interested in a machine he has devised which he claims to have the capability to travel through time. A week later, the Time Traveler is late to his weekly party and uses time travel as an excuse, narrating how he has just returned from traveling forward hundreds of thousands of years in time to the year 802,701 where the world is no longer how it is at present. While the planet still exists and remains habitable, mankind has evolved into two distinct species: the pretty but seemingly naïve Eloi who inhabit the world above; and the primitive and brutal Morlocks who fear the light and thus have evolved to live underground. He is also introduced to a young Eloi named Weena, whom he takes along with him in his quest to get back his time machine which the Morlocks have hidden in The Sphinx.

Disclaimer

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Documentary filmmaker Catherine Ravenscroft has enjoyed a stellar career as a journalist despite having a long break to raise her son. Receiving one award after another, the last thing she expects to see on her desk is a novel she has no memory of buying and discovering upon reading it that it is all about her and a secret she has been harboring from that time two decades ago when the family went on vacation at a beach in Spain. Later on she finds out that she is not the sole recipient of the book. Her son Nicholas and, eventually, her supportive husband Robert also receive their respective copies. Soon the family is subjected to stalking by an old man named Stephen Brigstocke, who has an axe to grind with Catherine, blaming her for the doomed fate of his son Jonathan who met his death in an accident and figured in her past.

The Committed

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The Major is back as a second-time refugee, but in his fatherland this time around. After his 2-year reeducation with Bon in the hands of Vietnamese communists in their homeland, the duo make it out of the country alive and arrive by sea in their new host country, France, where the oft-mentioned Aunt in The Sympathizer is finally introduced and serves as their temporary host in their new home. There they adjust to a new life and mingle with thugs in Paris’ underbelly for survival. While Bon remains a hired gun, the Major segues to drug dealing where he has no choice but to get entangled in a complicated web of turf wars and the like. That is, however, only one of his many problems as figures from his past in the form of Man and Lana come over for a visit, with news that might just turn his life upside down.

[KANTO] Budget and Itinerary (2)

FRIDAY: September 13, 2024

Air Asia (Manila - Narita) - 8,245.00

Keisei/Shinjuku (T2/3 - Yawata - Shinjuku) - 1,210.00

7 Eleven (Groceries) - 120.00

JPY9,575.00

[KAWAGOE] Little Edo

I wouldn’t have visited Saitama if not for this new visit-all-of-Japan’s prefecture challenge. Whenever I hear the name of this prefecture, all I conjure in my head are images of Tokyo’s extended urban sprawl, where people who work there choose to reside to save up on expensive rental costs. Perhaps that’s what I would’ve ended up finding had I decided to just ride a train to Saitama station if ever there is one just to get it over with. Instead, we enlisted the help of Wikitravel and ended up with a viable alternative called Kawagoe which is said to house some preserved architecture from the days of Old Tokyo in an area named Little Edo.

[TOHOKU] Budget and Itinerary

SUNDAY: September 15, 2024

JR (Tohoku East Pass) - 30,000.00

Locker (Sendai Station) - 200.00

Yoshinoya (Gyudon Bowl) - 498.00

Bridge Fee (Fukuura) - 200.00

Burger King (Double Bacon Cheeseburger Meal) - 850.00

Lawson (Groceries) - 1,324.00

R&B Hotel Moriokaekimae (4 Nights) - 21,662.00

JPY54,734.00

[AKITA] Lake Tazawa Roundtrip

Akita must be the shortest and simplest itinerary in this Tohoku trip, all thanks to the availability of the roundtrip sightseeing bus, which is not really a sightseeing bus per se but rather one of the local buses that go around the lake in clockwise direction. I opted to put this trip on the last day of the itinerary, the same day heading back to Tokyo to take advantage of the rail pass. While I have already maximized the rail pass and spent more than double the amount I paid for it, this Tazawako - Tokyo route was the longest at 3 hours and most expensive at around JPY16,000 (~PHP6,140). I spent the entire trip standing up. More on that later.

[YAMAGATA] 1000 Steps to Yamadera

The decision to explore Tohoku with a rail pass meant exploring itineraries and prefectures, in this case the five northernmost ones on the island of Honshu. Neat. Day 4, Wednesday, was Yamagata prefecture day. Sometimes I get lazy with destination research and always just end up at the capital, in this case Yamagata the city which is farther inland. Searching for alternatives, I ended up with a suggestion from Google. YAMADERA. Yama means mountain and Dera means temple. Soon enough, it would be obvious as to why the place was named as such. Yamadera is also closer to Sendai by a few stations. Good deal. Ready to hike?

[HIROSAKI] Rice Field Art, Neputa Village, Hirosaki Castle

Aomori the city was supposed to be part of the itinerary but it ended up jam packed with Hirosaki tourist attractions that I just had to drop it in the end. From Morioka, the bullet trains heading north all stop at Shin-Aomori station, which is NOT in the city center. If you are going to Aomori, you can transfer to the local orange Ou line. If, like me, your destination is Hirosaki instead, then you hop on the same train line but going south. Both the local Ou line and the bullet train are included in the Tohoku East rail pass. Morioka to Aomori is just an hour on the shinkansen. Shin-Aomori to Hirosaki is around 45 minutes.

[IWATE] Ryusendo Caves Daytrip

By now I don’t really remember why I chose Morioka as my home base for this five day tour of Tohoku. I’m guessing I just looked at a map and picked a random point somewhere in the middle, in which case why didn’t I pick Sendai? Well, Morioka seems like the better option because it puts me directly in the middle of the bullet train routes to Aomori and Akita. And so I booked a cheap business hotel and then looked for day trip options within the prefecture itself. There are many suggestions on Wikitravel but one that struck me in terms of accessibility and looks was Ryusendo Cave.

[MIYAGI] Cloudy Day at Matsushima Bay

As for Miyagi, the choice was between Sendai and Matsushima. Sendai will always be a necessary stop anyway as it lies between Tokyo and Morioka which will serve as my home base for this Tohoku trip. Tokyo to Sendai on either the Tohoku or Akita bullet train will take an hour and 40 minutes, plus another 40 minutes onward to Morioka. Once in Sendai, you transfer to a local JR Senseki train to Matsushima-kaigan. There is another station named Matsushima but this is farther from the attractions you will be visiting. The local train takes 40 minutes and is totally included in the rail pass. Why did I opt for Matsushima instead of Sendai then?

[YOKOHAMA] A Day in Japan's Second Largest City

Yokohama is Japan’s second largest city, its population almost half of Tokyo’s. The two cities are also just right next to each other, so close that some of their subway systems are linked to one another. This is the reason why I really had to look for more info whether Yokohama’s Minatomirai line would be covered by the 24h/48h/72h Tokyo Metro Pass. Apparently not. There are alternatives on offer, some giving you a day pass of Yokohama’s Minatomirai line along with a return trip to a station in Tokyo. I ended up just paying for my fares separately.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Through the Looking-Glass

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A young girl named Alice tours the river with her two sisters and lays bored along the riverbanks when she sees an oddity in the scenery, that of a white rabbit wearing a coat and staring at a pocket watch as if late for an appointment. Her curiosity brings her to a rabbit hole where she falls down and finds herself in front of a tiny door that her size wouldn’t allow her to enter. Taking advice from a bottle with a note that says “Drink Me” scribbled on it, she finally enters the door. What follows is a series of growing and shrinking by way of eating and drinking certain food and drinks in the strange new world she finds herself in. Along the way she meets a variety of weird creatures such as talking animals, insects, and a pack of humanoid cards led by a Queen of Hearts that has an obsession for beheading her constituents.

Atonement

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13-year-old Briony Tallis wants to be a writer and makes it a habit to write stories and plays that she asks her cousins to present, with her as director. This summer is no different as her cousins Lola and her twin brothers Jackson and Pierrot all spend time at the Tallis’ vast country estate in the midst of their parents’ divorce. Cecilia, Briony’s older sister, is bored after her stint at Cambridge and is annoyed at her childhood friend Robbie, who lives with his mother in a cabin that her father has gifted them in exchange for housework. Also coming back home are Leon, the sisters’ eldest sibling who is bringing his friend Paul Marshall along with him. At the end of a long day, the family dinner is marred by the disappearance of the twins and what is later concluded as sexual assault of their sister Lola by an unknown assailant, whom Briony swears she knows and saw, leading to an accusation that will ruin one too many lives.

Interview with the Vampire

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Louis de Pointe de Lac is 200 years old, but this is not because of a gluten-free diet. As a French migrant whose family had established a new life in Louisiana, he had been living a good life as an indigo plantation owner when a vampire named Lestat de Lioncourt decided to leave two bite marks on his neck. As Louis’ humanity died, he was introduced to a life of immortality as a blood sucker fatally allergic to the sun and spending most of his day asleep in a coffin. What follows is a rollercoaster ride with his new friend, their vampiric ways differing greatly as far as hunting and diet preferences are concerned. Soon, they turn an orphan girl named Claudia into one of them, which is not really a good idea considering she would be a woman trapped in a young girl’s body just decades later. All this Louis narrates via an interview with an eager journalist who wants to introduce him to the world.

The Silmarillion

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In the beginning was the creator named Iluvatar and he created a group of spirits called the Ainur. The Ainur referred to him as Eru and he bid them to create beautiful music for him, which they did, to perfection. The most powerful of them all, Melkor, decided to break the harmony of their music and composed his own, openly defying his creator. After their disagreement, Iluvatar offered them a vision of Arda, a new world that they could all descend upon to govern. There they became the Valar, basically gods, while their subordinates became demigods called the Maiar. Thus begins the battle between Melkor and his siblings for dominion over the new world they have been entrusted to oversee. As the first children of Iluvatar, the Elves, come into being, a tug-o-war of influence between Melkor and the other Valar ensues, causing confusion and sowing division that will persist until the coming of Iluvatar’s second children: Mankind.