During the Roman times, the main rival of Arles was Marseille as a port town. Back then, the town was closer to the Mediterranean and the Romans built a series of canals to the sea, but over the centuries, the silt flowing from the river has buried the former harbour. Marseille is the bigger city today, but in that time, Arles was of considerable importance to the Romans. The leaders of Arles sided with Julius Caesar in his war against Pompey. Once Julius Caesar won and consolidated power, Marseille’s possessions were transferred to Arles. The city went into decline during the barbarian invasions that led to the fall of Rome.

For breakfast, again we found that the French, at least in this part of the country, don’t open any of their restaurants until noon. Even the places that are open, only serve drinks. This often left us hungry from morning till noon. At least for lunch, we went to La Gueule du Loup (literally translates to the Mouth of the Wolf). There we got to try a bull steak and a bull tataki (maybe a reference to the bullfighting event). Apart from the bull meat, the steak itself is prepared the standard way with a red wine sauce. Upon ordering the steak, I realized I didn’t know how to say rare in French, but the server was nice enough to explain it to me – “saignant” (the same server later also taught us how to pronounce Arles, like “arrrl”). The tataki was much more special – a blue rare bull steak with a miso/sesame sauce, mushrooms, and a black rice risotto topped with truffle oil (tataki is a Japanese culinary term, but the only thing Japanese about the dish was the use of miso and sesame). The black rice is grown locally in the region of Camargue, that Arles is a part of. They even brew beer with the rice, but the taste isn’t too different from other types of lagers.

After lunch, we headed over to Avignon, which used to be the seat of the Catholic church (as opposed to the Vatican) for 7 successive popes in the 14th century. Eventually, there was a dispute resulting both Avignon and Rome both declaring their own line of popes and for a time the papal succession had branched. The line of popes from Avignon were subsequently declared as illegitimate “antipopes” (but we like to say “bastard popes” for fun). The last antipope eventually agreed to relinquish the title and became a bishop. The popes resided in the Palais des Papes. The palace itself was both a fortress and a residence for the Avignon popes. The walls were intentionally very thick to withstand long sieges – to add on to that, the city has its own walls too.

The inside of the palace explains the long history of the Avignon Papacy along with different rooms in the palace. Like European history in general, it’s pretty tough to follow because there are so many interconnected people and events happening concurrently.

Walking around town, we stumbled upon a confectionary also selling the same calissons from Aix-en-Provence – they even had nougats too. This time, we got flavoured calissons, but they don’t taste as good as the original flavour. The nougats themselves are nice and soft.

As we headed out of the city, we got to see the massive walls surrounding it. They were built during the Avignon Papacy and deterred enemy attacks during the Hundred Year’s War. Heading further out, we also got to see a vineyard.

After a short drive, we reached Pont du Gard, the ruins of an old Roman aqueduct. It has three levels and people can walk all the way to the top if they follow a guided tour. The Grand Rhône runs through the area and people can spend time at the nearby beach or hike the trails in the greenery.

Looking closely at the bricks used to build the aqueduct, it’s amazing to see that the Romans were able to figure out how to cut each stone so precisely that they’d neatly fit together. And it’s also cool that they figured out how to ensure that the structure didn’t collapse under the load and that arches were the optimal shape to use. The keystones on the arch are still clearly visible.

For dinner, we ate at a nearby restaurant with a cozy courtyard. It was nearby the aqueduct in a small town, so we didn’t really have high expectations going in. But to our surprise, they were able to prepare a nice pizza, a salad, and razor clams (I’d never tried them before). But like many meals we had recently, we always get whiffs of cigarette smoke from some other table.

Check here to see more photos of Arles and Avignon

The best sushi I’ve ever had was at the Tsukiji Fish Market. The place was called Daiwa (大和) and there is always a line up to get in. In Canada, we are used to eating a lot of raw salmon, but in Japan, it is all about tuna – especially bluefin tuna. We were also served sea urchin too and I would say that was the only time I’ve ever had sea urchin that was delicious. (More info here)

Sashimi by itself is definitely very delicious too. This sashimi platter was from a restaurant called Uokin (魚金), near Shinbashi Station in Tokyo.

At the same restaurant, we also ate cooked fish head. I’m sure it doesn’t look that appetizing to a lot of people, but it definitely tasted very good, and I’m someone who does not normally eat fish head, but I tried it since our hosts had ordered it. Good thing I tried it too!

This is probably a lesser known dish in Japan, but we were served assorted shellfish that were still alive along with a grill to cook them in. I thought that was pretty special. That was from a seafood restaurant chain called 鈴木水産.

And of course, there is ramen, a classic Japanese noodle soup dish. My favourite was from a place called Ramen Shokudo Ikinaisshou in Akihabara. Some people even like to mix the soup with rice too, and that’s really good too.

Lastly, here is a type of Japanese food known as a teishoku, or a “meal set”. This one, from a chain called Yayoiken (やよい軒), has a bowl of rice, soup, and various side dishes in a tray. This is more of a fast food place though.

Link to photos from Tokyo: here

Link to photos of just food: here

Dog lovers out there beware, some people eat dog meat in Korea – in a stew form, called Bosintang. We had to go to a shady shop in an alley in Myeongdong to get it. I didn’t know that it wasn’t a mainstream thing to eat until the lady at the tourist info center told us.

The meat was very tough (typical carnivore meat), and it tasted a lot like lamb. To be honest, it was pretty good, but it’s not something I would eat more of, since beef, chicken and other mainstream meats taste so much better.

Now for something less weird than dog meat. Our friend who lives in Seoul took us to a Korean restaurant to have something more mainstream.

It’s nice to know a local who is able to introduce us to such delicious food! Aside from the pork, we had acorn jelly, chives, seaweed, etc. Next, there is eating fresh seafood at Noryangjin Fish Market – a giant warehouse looking building where people sell seafood and then buyers can take their purchases to a nearby restaurant for preparation.

Somehow it was clear to all shop personnel that we were Chinese, and people kept yelling at us in Mandarin to buy their seafood. One shop kept insisting to us that we buy crab, and as we kept refusing, they kept lowering the price even though we actually did not want to buy it for other reasons. This “unintentional” haggling, however, did get us a slightly better deal on fish, giant prawns, clams and octopuses.

Eating the octopus raw is interesting since when the tentacles were served to us, they were still squirming as they were freshly killed. I learned that the whole point of eating this is to feel the tentacle grab on to the inside of the mouth as it is chewed, but otherwise it is pretty tasteless.

We also had Korean barbecue, although for some reason, the place we went to was super expensive for very low quality meat.  We still don’t know why it was so expensive.  We went to another Korean barbecue place that was a lot better and cheaper, but I felt that the Korean barbecue restaurants were on par in terms of quality.  And oh yes, there was also lots of kimchi.

E-Sports

I’m not a fan of StarCraft, but I play DotA 2, so naturally we watched a DotA 2 tournament. There was no cost to watch the game, but there wasn’t that big of an audience either, so a rowdy audience was definitely missing. The game was exciting and we saw a lot of pro plays, but the cast was all in Korean.

Before entering the stadium, we saw people at the entrance wearing Zephyr shirts, and I thought, “they must be fans of that team or something” and asked them for directions for where to get food. Later, I found out they played for Zephyr. Awkward.

During the intermission, I got to chat a bit with “Whiplash”, one of the English casters, who was casting the game for Internet viewers. It was weird at first since he introduced himself by his online name – quite unexpected. From him, I found out that teams who play in Korea generally live together in the same house so it’s easy to practice together.

Pet Cafes

I heard much about them before my trip. It definitely sounded intriguing. Go in, get a drink, pet the animals, right? Kind of, only if you find one that likes being pet by you! Most of the animals we saw didn’t really pay any attention to us except for this one beagle who was licking my friend’s face non stop.

Plastic Surgery

Ads. Ads everywhere. In the street, in the metro – complete with before and after pictures. Walked by a lot of clinics too. Yup it’s definitely a thing in Korea.

Link to more photos: here