Name: Loranne Vella
Age: 39
Occupation: Writer and translator

My best holiday ever…

Berliners are the most open-minded people I’ve ever encountered. They make their wildest dreams a reality

I’m lucky that the best holiday I’ve had so far was when my dream trip came true and I spent one month in Japan in September 2010. It was slightly too hot and humid to my liking, especially in Nagasaki, but (almost) everything else was perfect.

We started off in Tokyo then started travelling west to Nagoya, Kyoto, Fukuoka, Beppu and Nagasaki, then back, stopping at Hiroshima, Miyajima Island and Tokyo for the last few days.

Visiting Japan is like travelling to another planet – too many cultural differences to feel you’re still on your home planet. The loos, for example. But more about those later.

I must have visited hundreds of shrines and temples in Japan. The first temple we saw was Sensoji (Asakusa Kannon Temple) not very far from the ryokan (Japanese style hotel) we were staying at in the northern part of Tokyo.

This is the oldest Buddhist temple in Tokyo. I was taken aback by the fact that the streets leading to Sensoji were completely deserted, but once we got there we found hundreds of visitors.

My fondest memories during this holiday include the day we spent in Nikko: crossing Shinkyo Bridge, discovering by chance the 70-something stone statues of Jizo (each wearing a red cap and bib); visiting the Studio Ghibli Museum at Mitaka, and wanting to be a three-year old girl again to be allowed to climb the furry Cat Bus.

I cried at Hiroshima and Nagasaki A-Bomb memorials and I will never forget my first view of the floating torii at Miyajima Island or discovering the wonders of the nine jigokus (the ‘boiling hells’), featuring boiling, steamy ponds of hot blue, red or milky-white water.

The best three days were probably those we spent in Nagoya withour Japanese friends Ayumi and Tetsuya, the only three days where Iexperienced the wonders of extremely rare vegetarian Japanese cuisine.

I would never return…

To Tunisia, because I just couldn’t relax with all the streetwise kids bullying me into giving them money. And Rotterdam, because it feels like a soulless city to me.

The most dangerous place I’ve visited…

I don’t do danger. Ever. So this one’s difficult to answer. Perhaps going up Aso San, an active volcano in Kyushu, (which occasionally burps and kills a couple of tourists) is the closest to danger I’ve ever been.

The streets of Cairo are pretty dangerous too, with at least four cars madly speeding side by side in a street that’s intended for two.

Australia’s another place full of dangers. Poisonous insects, blue bottle jellyfish, alligators and poisonous frogs – but those cute koalas make up for it all.

My favourite city…

Europe is cluttered with beautiful cities, and Paris would be an easy choice.

But Berlin is my favourite European city by far, especially the Kreuzberg area. It’s decadent, wild, and Berliners are the most open-minded people I’ve ever encountered. They make their wildest dreams a reality.

And I love the graffiti, the street art, the dodgy squats, the bookshop-cum-art-gallery-cum-restaurant, the scruffy cafés, the audacious decor in some of these places. And the fact that even a dingy café is backed by a ferocious political belief of some sort. You don’t mess with these guys.

I was there last November. My friend Staci took me to a café called Morgenrot on Kastanienallee for a buffet breakfast. When it was time to pay, the guy behind the bar asked me how much I could afford to pay – between €5 and €9, depending on your salary, he said. I paid €7 and later felt guilty I didn’t pay more.

Kyoto is perhaps my favourite city in Japan, the shrines and temples, the geishas, Kinkaku-ji Temple (the Golden Pavilion), the Philosopher’s Walk, and last but not least Pontocho Alley, the narrowest street ever, lined with exquisite Japanese style restaurants. I can see myself living in Kyoto for a year, or two… or more.

My most treasured holiday souvenir…

My memories of our 10-day stay in Fiji are perhaps the most treasured souvenir I could ever bring back with me. I was there with my family from Australia for my sister’s wedding.

For someone who dreads attending weddings, it was quite extravagant of me to travel to the other end of the world to attend one. But it was worth every second.

It was 10 days of beach strolling, sunbathing, coral gazing, boating, swimming, Nemo-finding (yes, we got to see a family of clown fish), coconut eating and rain dancing.

The dancing always worked: everyday, at 3 p.m. sharp, after a hot, sticky, sunny morning, it poured for about an hour, then the sun came out, accompanied by a gentle fresh breeze, and we could all go swimming and sunbathing once more. After the downpour the air always smelled fresher.

Most memorable experience on an aircraft…

I don’t like air travel much, so flights aren’t that memorable to me unless something goes wrong.

My worst flight was probably on my way to Sydney in 2009. I wasn’t feeling well – so the hours felt like days.

I remember watching Never Let Me Go and another three films during that flight. I was on my own and it felt awful.

A couple of days after landing in Sydney I was back on a three-hour flight to Fiji for my sister’s wedding, which actually lasted five hours (the flight, not the wedding). I felt trapped in some surreal dream where I couldn’t get off the plane.

If you ask for directions in Japan, they’ll help you no matter what. Even if it means spending the rest of their day in your company

My biggest gaffe…

Probably my worst blunders all took place in Japan.

I can think of a few, like making a phone call on the metro (not allowed), holding my boyfriend’s hand in public (not polite), eating a rice cake while waiting for the train (food should be consumed at home), stopping at the wrong end of a queue (terrible mistake), and so on…

The friendliest people…

The Japanese put everyone else to shame. It is thanks to a Japanese couple that we managed to find our ryokan (which was wrongly placed on our map) on our first evening in Tokyo. And we didn’t even ask for help.

They could see we were lost, they asked us if we needed any help, then spent the next hour-and-a-half walking around in circles and making one phone call after another trying to figure out where this ryokan really was.

I’ll stop here to inform you that Tokyo has the meanest address system in the world. It’s not a question of having a street name and a house number, but a code which needs to be deciphered.

This means that if you’re a tourist and there’s a mistake on the map you’ll spend hours trying to locate a place. Unless … you find a helpful Japanese soul, or two.

However, this helpful quality has its flipside. In the West it’s easy to ask for directions even if you already have an idea where to go. You ask simply to confirm your opinion. You’ll probably get a nod or a shrug and move on.

In Japan they never say ‘no’, because it’s not polite to say ‘no’. So if you ask them for directions, they’ll help you no matter what. Even if it means spending the rest of their day in your company trying to find out, or take a bus, visit a long lost uncle who might, or might not, know the answer to your question, make overseas phone calls, and come back to you a week later.

This might all sound exaggerated. But in truth it’s only slightly so. I swear.

I never travel without...

My DK travel books. They probably contain less information than other travel guides. But when I’m travelling I don’t want to read long chapters – an image and a caption will do the trick.

The taxi ride I will never forget…

And here it is, the famous taxi ride. Drivers in Cairo have completely succumbed to road rage. They press the horn as soon as they enter their car and will probably continue honking if it were possible to do so when they get out of it. And they drive like they’re the chauffeurs from hell. Their eyes glow red behind the wheel.

Every taxi ride I took in Cairo was a life-threatening experience. But one was just slightly deadlier than the rest.

I think it’s because we haggled too much over the (already ridiculously cheap) price. But you’re supposed to haggle over everything in Cairo, that’s what the guide book said.

Nevertheless, I’m still here to tell the tale, so scary though it may have been, we emerged unscathed, physically at least. My legs only stopped shaking the following morning.

My all-time favourite holiday photo...

I have so many travel pictures it’s difficult to find one that stands out from all the rest. So I’ve chosen one which could have been taken anywhere really.

I was in Amsterdam with my parents a few years back and it was lovely weather. We were staying with some friends on their boathouse.

Brussels had been experiencing a heatwave so we didn’t take that many warm clothes with us. But on the second day of our stay it was so cold we had to borrow jackets and scarves. The above picture was taken on that day, and I remember us laughing at our silliness.

An unforgettable hotel...

Here’s where I talk about the Japanese loos. No, wait I have to qualify that. They’re ‘Western-style toilets’ in Japan. The Japanese toilets are holes in the ground.

Whereas the Western-style toilets are computerised contraptions fitted with fur-lined heated toilet seats which play ambient music and waterfall sound-effects, give your butt a shower and have a million other functions which not one single person in the West would ever dream of using!

The loo we had in our hotel in Kyoto was even more sophisticated than any other Western-style toilet I had encountered so far.

What’s more, as soon as you sat on it, it welcomed you with a gentle flush of water – the first time I experienced that I thought I was peeing without knowing. Then I tried it again... and again... you can easily get addicted to these contraptions.

There was one other slightly similar state-of-the-art toilet in a park, where there were buttons for everything you can imagine... except there was no button, handle or cord for a real down-to-earth flush.

Up to this day I still wonder how that public toilet remains immaculate. Maybe there’s a self-flush setting. But I did wait a few minutes to see what would happen. Maybe it’s a shy toilet. Maybe it’s programmed to not flush in the presence of toilet users, it might offend them in some way. Maybe...

I return most often to...

Germany, probably because it’s so close to Brussels. It was one of the first countries I visited as a teenager. Since then I’ve been to Cologne, Bonn, Hamburg, Berlin, Fussen, Nuremberg, Bamberg, to name a few.

I’ve also been to Prague a few times, and the last time I was there (last year) I drove all the way from Brussels to Prague through Germany, stopping in Bamberg and Karlovy Vary on my way there, and in Nuremburg on my way back. Prague is a gem of a city. But I’m sure I’m not the first one to say that.

My ideal travel mate...

Someone who wakes up early, sticks to the itinerary, is very punctual, and does not have crazy (travel) ambitions like power-walking up a mountain, risking one’s life in the jungle and doing all the wild stuff that Leonardo di Caprio enjoys doing in The Beach. I hope my travelling companion for the past three years is reading this.

The best cuisine...

Turkey – Ottoman cuisine is perfect for vegetarians. Spain also has many vegetarian hotspots.

In France vegetarianism has now been declared illegal (or was that a joke?). And Japan was a nightmare for food since there’s fish in practically every dish in every possible form .

I don’t like fish, I never did, not even in my pre-vegetarian years. My favourite is Indian cuisine, but India is currently not on my ‘to visit’ list.

Next holiday plans…

New York and New Orleans, Finland, Paris (again), and Malta (where else) for summer and the winter holidays.

In between long trips I often go on weekend breaks, somewhere not too far from home.

Most of the time these are just an excuse to allow myself time to think about the story and the characters I’d be writing about at the time; sometimes the holiday takes the form of a writing holiday.

Which reminds me… I need to take a short writing holiday soon since work on my new novel starts this February. There’s a perfect place for this... Rolley Castle, near Bastogne.

My dream trip…

I think I’ll start saving for a second and longer trip to Japan.

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