Last Sunday we went to have a look at the Tokyo Sky Tree (see left), a new building due for completion in Spring 2012 that will have a height of 634m, making it one of the world`s tallest (in fact the tallest "tower" in the world), and the tallest artificial structure in Japan. Its current height is about 450 metres or so and there is a PR office nearby which has a two-weekly collage of photos showing the progress of constrution starting on 14 July 2008.

Interestingly this tower was named by the people of Tokyo. After a month of collecting names from the general public, six names made the final shortlist: Tokyo Edo Tower, Tokyo Sky Tree, Mirai Tree, Yumemi Yagura, Rising East Tower, and Rising Tower. The winner turned out to be Tokyo Sky Tree, as a result of a nationwide vote in which it received 33,000 votes out of the 110,000 cast. The runner up was Tokyo Edo Tower ("edo" being the old name for Tokyo).

As I read on Wikipedia, its primary role will be as a television and radio broadcasting tower as Tokyo's current broadcasting tower, Tokyo Tower, at 333 meters, no longer tall enough to give complete digital terrestrial television broadcasting coverage as it is surrounded by many high-rise buildings. Digital terrestrial broadcasting in Japan is to be replace the current analog broadcasting which will end in July 2011 (and Mariko is not as tall as she looks in the picture on the right!).

Speaking of tall buildings, and being someone who is not keen on heights, I am always in awe of our ability to engineer such things, and have a lot of respect for those people who work on the top of such structures in order to get them finished. For me 634 metres is amazingly tall, but then its still some way short of the tallest building in the world, the 828 m tall Burj Khalifa in Dubai, which opened in January 2010.

We also had a day trip out recently to a place called Sawara in Chiba, about 70 kilometres north east of Tokyo and only 15 km from Narita Airport (if that helps you in any way to place it). Its a really cool place to walk around and it has lots of waterways. The streets are still like they were in the Edo period and you almost feel you are in a time slip.

There a many buildings from the latter half of the Edo Period (period in which Japan was ruled by the Togugawa Shogunate and lasting from 1603 to 1868) to the beginning of the Showa Era (1926). Its really interesting to see buildings as old as 200 years in some cases such as furniture stores and general stores that have been operated as family businesses since those days continue to operate and make money (albeit primarily from tourists).















We also managed to find a very nice and reasonable restaurant for lunch.

As we were leaving, we enquired at the tourist information office about a nearby park and instead of that we were advised to go and have a look at a field of cosmos flowers which was pretty much in the middle of nowhere, which for an entry fee of 100 yen, gave you the right to cut as many cosmos as you liked and take them home with you. You can get the idea from the photos below.

So the weather has finally cooled down a bit here recently but still in the low to mid twenties which is not bad for the second day of October. Went out for a run this morning and then did some grocery shopping at the supermarket about 250 meters from our place. That particular supermarket opened about four months ago and is really ideal for us - reasonable prices and within very easy walking distance. Their point card is pretty good too and like most other supermarkets they give you one point for every 100 yen you spend which you can then use against the cost of future purchases (so effectively like 1% interest), but quite regularly they offer 5 times points days (aka multi-point days) but the catch at this particular supermarket is that you can only get this extra 4 points per 100 yen if you pay in cash. For someone like me who still hasn't learned to carry enough cash in his wallet to cover sudden needs and who isn't so inclined to research in advance when these multi-point days are I sometimes have to forgo such things, however, I am safe in the knowledge that I will be accumulating points on my AMEX card when I use plastic. It sometimes feels like a bit of swings and roundabouts, however in just 4 months we have racked up 1,787 points, effectively 1,787 yen interest on spending of about 90,000 Yen or so, much better than what you get at the banks, and not bad considering you need to eat to live.

Almost every store in Japan offers you point cards - Mariko actually has a separate card case full of them and she is a master at always being able to produce the point card wherever we seem to go, even if we havent been to a particular store for a while - we even saw a TV show recently where certain individuals were explaining how to maximise all the benefits of point cards and other additional benefits. I lost what they were saying after a few minutes but it seemed that there is a science behind it all. In a society where there is so much competition in almost every sector, especially retail, if you dont have point cards then you are not playing the game and you will also lose out on a lot of savings and benefits. We recently "bought" a great set of knives exchanging points accumulated on credit card, and when we bought a digital recorder at Yamada Denki, we got 15% of the cost value as a points gift, meaning we basically got 200 quid or so for free. There are a plethora of methods and special deals out there if you join in the fun of it all. Mariko' challenge is for us to get to 10,000 points on the supermarket card, and then we can shop free for a month (hopefully) however there is the temptation to buy too much or lots of unnecessary things but so far we haven't been stockpiling or gaining weight so we must be doing OK.

Yesterday evening we went to watch Eat, Pray, Love - a movie starring Julia Roberts, at a nearby multiplex cinema. Now that we have a car we can actually explore a bit more, so coming home after work, getting changed and then heading out again made a bit of a change to leaving work, heading out and then coming home. Not a major lifestyle change but the chance to do something a bit different. The film itself was quite enjoyable and the location shooting was really good - New York, Rome, Bali and India - not a bad combination for places to live during ay year. As we were driving there, I thought at one point we were going to run out of petrol as my attention to the navigation system was lacking and we veered off course a bit and then the warning light came on, but luckily we managed to find a petrol station and fill up the tank. We got the car with a full tank of petrol and did 565 km and yesterday we paid 6,750 yen for 50.75 litres of High Octane (Super Unleaded as its called in the UK) fuel (or 133 yen per litre) which comes out to about 1 pound per litre at current exchange rates, so quite a bit cheaper when compared to the UK (about 1.16 pounds). However, when compared to the US, where the price is around 2.75 dollars per gallon, and as 1 US gallon equals 3.785 litres, that means we got 13.41 US gallons so thats an equivalent of 500 yen or 6 dollars per US gallon at current exchange rates - significantly more expensive if I have done my maths correctly and probably partly to do with the strength or the Yen at the moment, which is another story in itself.

Anyway, after that little calculation session, my head seems to be in a spin, so I will write off now and probably go get a much needed haircut. Already 3pm here on Saturday.

Until next time.

Hello there.

As I just turned 33 (the best age I was told recently) I thought I would write a blog, firstly to see if it was still switched on (not sure of the expiry dates on these things) and secondly to make my wife happy as she has been asking me to update it for a while. But more importantly, I wanted to actually write down a few things about what has been happening in the past few months.

I think I last updated the blog in June 2009 (doesn't time fly by!) and said that I wanted to start writing regularly again and also challenged myself to be able to run 20k by the end of the year. Sadly, I failed in both respects, and I am not sure which one was the most unrealistic, but in regards to the jogging, the most I ever managed in one go was 12k. Anyway, I still run regulary and am still in pretty good shape.

Well, so much has happened in the past year I am not sure where to start. Our marriage is probably the best place. Mariko and I finally tied the knot on 25th September 2009 at Meiji Shrine in Tokyo, with our parents and close relatives in attendance, followed by a reception the next day the Hotel New Otani in central Tokyo, attended by our familes, past and present co-workers, and friends. I wore traditional Japanese kimono (hakama) in both the ceremony and reception which was a great experience and overall thought it was pretty comfortable. Mariko wore the traditional all white kimono (shiromuku) and then in the reception wore a beautiful blueish coloured kimono (a gift from her Mum) and then changed into a wedding dress which she had made. All in all those couple of days were so amazing it would be hard to repeat them, with everything going to plan and the weather being very kind to us.

About a month later, we took Mariko`s parents (going overseas for the first time!) with us to England for a couple of weeks and had a marriage blessing at my local church, followed by a "wedding breakfast" at an elegant 16th century ivy clad mansion just outside Sheffield on 7th November, followed by a few days in the Cotswolds and then in Oxford before we came back to Japan. Again, what struck us was how lucky we were with the weather. After arriving in London on 3rd November to grey and rainy skys which continued up to the 6th, we were astonished to find that the 7th was probably the best day it could have been - not a cloud in the sky! I will never forget driving down the M1 in our wedding car sipping champage thinking things couldnt get much better that this!

After getting back down to work for a month or so, we then spent New Years with Mariko`s parents in Shikoku and then decided it was time to buy some property so we bought an apartment right next to Oyamadai Station in Setagaya Ward in Tokyo at the end of March. Giving up our top floor apartment near Toritsu Daigaku was hard but the two of us had outgrown in and wanted some more space and somewhere we could call our own. The new place is less than 2 mins wallk from the train station so its extremely convenient. We also recently bought a car which we are starting to get used to having. Last of the big spenders you might say but we are actually taking advantage of our lending power and low interest loans for once!

As people usually do on birthdays and when anniversaries are approaching, I was thinking back to last year when my parents arrived here in Japan for our marriage celebrations. I remember standing in the hotel lobby of the New Otani patiently waiting for their airport limousine bus to arrive so I could greet them all after so long. My parents, Grandma, brother and his fiancee came together and it was so great to welcome them all to Japan at the same time. Amazingly, my Dad managed to walk straight past me without recognising me (as I was significanly slimmer than the last time he saw me) and then I was informed that their luggage hadn't managed to make it along with them, hence the urgent shopping trip to find some clothes for Dad and my brother before my low key stag party later that evening. Uniqlo came to our rescue and a good time was had by all!

We had figured that it would be a good idea to take a little trip over my birthday (21st Sept) and enjoy some time together before we got ultra busy with the wedding preparation towards the end of the week, so Mariko and I had arranged a one night stay at a Japanese Inn (ryokan) in Izu Peninsula, usually a couple of hours drive from Tokyo. So we hired this 8 seater car and set off. I wont say too much about the trip other than as soon as we got on the expressway we were at a standstill and we probably spent as much time sitting in the car in a fixed position on the road or moving very slowly due to the volume of traffic as we did outside the car. In hindsight, it probably wasnt the best idea to have gone to such a place on a national holiday weekend but you never expect it to be so busy for so long! Although we enjoyed the scenery and the ryokan (food, bath and room) was great, I think the games of eye-spy we played in the car were more fun!!! Won't be doing that again in a while!

Speaking of trips, we have decided to take our long awaited honeymoon (15 months overdue to be exact) in New Zealand at the end of this year and have arranged a fabulous looking itinerary with the help of a travel agent in New Zealand. I've never been to New Zealand and Mariko has only been once, but we have some good Kiwi friends and we both really wanted to go and see it for ourselves. We are going to be visiting North and South Islands, staying in some great places and hopefully eating a lot of great food!. Going over Christmas and New Year has it plus and minus points but I think overall we are going to have a great time. I will state for the record however, that no bungy jumping has been included in the itinerary thus far, and that is the way it is going to stay. Unfortunately, I just dont have the stomach for it to be honest!

So I will close today but just telling you about the weather here in Tokyo. It been an exceptionally long summer and on yesterday's news they said that we had 71 days where the temperature was over 30 degrees Celcius between 9th May to 22 September. Thats about 75% of the time, and a number of those days up to or above 35 degrees. It really has been hot. Finally, today, although it was rainy, I could finally feel a bit of colder air and it felt good. The weather forecaster said it looks like a colder than normal winter this year which would figure because we just had a warmer than usual (if not ever) summer. We will soon find out.

Until the next time, and have a good evening.

Good evening! Half way though June already doesnt time just fly by.

Recently I have been doing quite a lot of exercise, including quite a bit of running - mostly on the treadmill in the gym but also on on the roads. I am now doing a 10km run two to three times a week and for someone who wasn`t used to running more than 5km in any one run up to a month ago I think I have made significant strides (no pun intended) in the past month. However, there is simply no fun in running for me and the best part of any run is the last few seconds when you know even if your legs give way, the momentum of the treadmill will take you over the distance even if you are flying through the air waiting to hit the ground with a bang. Time honestly seems to stand still and one hour of running often feels like ten. Admittedly, I have only just entered the 10k club and have to get used to making it the minimum distance I run, but boy is it a struggle. I think I hit the famous `wall` about three or four times during a one hour run! I often wonder how many glasses I would fill if instead of making my t-shirt and shorts soaking wet, my sweat could be siphoned off somehow so that when I`ve finished running I don`t feel as though I have been running in a thunderstorm. Anyway, luckily I have enough energy to write this blog tonight, and although its been 90 minutes since I finished the run, I am still trying to cool down. Lets hope that it gets a little easier - my target is to be able to run a half marathon by the end of this year (that about 20k) so please keep your fingers crossed.

One other thing that I wanted to write about was the `pusher`men and women who work in the Tokyo Metro and at other train stations to help with the movement of commuters on the amazingly overcrowded morning rush hour trains. For example, just check out the following video I found on You Tube!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0A9-oUoMug&feature=related

Its a really amazing thing to actually see in all honesty. I travel though a station called Oimachi in the mornings to connect to Hamamatsucho on the JR Keihin Tohoku Line, one of the main lines running from Kanagawa, up through Tokyo and on up to Saitama. Its gets crazily busy in the mornings, especially in the cars at closest to the exits at the stations where most people get off. You have to think that some Japanese commuters are preprogrammed in the sense that each morning they need to take the same train and they will take that train at all costs - even if its means hanging on to the frame of the door when it is 99% sure they are not going to get on - until the pusher man comes to their rescue. To me, why would you try and crowd into carriage 3 when carriage 4 is only twenty metres further away from the exit at the next station - why make it more uncomfortable. I have also seen people (usually well built businessmen) charging into the crowds and just pushing themselves in - and I know exactly how the people inside feel - you just physically cannot move. To be honest, if I was the pusher man, I would just start pulling people out and make them wait for the next one but they are ultra polite and try their best to make sure everyone is pushed in with the minimum of pain - all very efficient. However, it is just me that thinks this or is it crazy for a developed country to flaunt health and safely regulations so badly on its railways makes me wonder what will happen if there is an accident - I think many people would die as a result of overcrowding accentuating the problem.

I often feel like saying to people `Why dont you take the next train? Its not like you need to wait very long!` but again people just seem to be on autopilot and although the fact that they try to enter the train makes it more unbearable for everyone else including them, they just don`t seem to mind. I sometimes calculate (quite sad I know) that in one carriage there may be anywhere up to 150 people (about 25 sitting and 125 standing I kid you not) and at nine carriages per train thats about 1250 people per train give or take and on average there is a train every four minutes on this particular line so 15 trains per hour is about 18,000 people per hour. Maybe its more, but I have no idea how to verify it. Sometimes your mind just gets lost in amongst all the craziness. And try to deal with the situation when a train is 2 or 3 minutes late which means the number of people waiting is almost double what it would be if the train was on time and there will be almost double the number of people on the train as it comes into the station - you can see where I am going with this. Thank the Lord I only have to take that train for 3 stations - it really can be 8 minutes of pure hell.

All in all its been a pretty uneventful day really (even the journey to work was pretty average today). Its pretty humid and pouring down with rain at the moment and the forecast for tomorrow is not much better. As I said on the last blog, we are now in the middle of rainy season so we have to expect and accept quite a bit of rain at the moment.

Will write again soon. Look after yourselves.

Hello again! Hisashiburi desu!!!

After a lot of (friendly) pressure from Mariko (my fiance) I have decided to relaunch my blog after about four years, even though I do vividly remember actually writing a post about two years ago, but I guess it either didn`t get posted or something mysterious happened to it. Anyway, here goes again and this time I will try to keep some regularity to it.

I think at this stage its a good idea to fill you in on the past 4 years and I will try to do that in one paragraph. After working for the company I mentioned in the last blogs from before, I left them about 15 months ago after a good three years and joined a small Japanese audit company, where I continue to be today. In terms of living, I moved from the place I was living in Shibuya to an apartment in a very nice part of Tokyo (near Jiyugaoka) in September 2006 and am still here today. Lastly, and defintely most importantly, at the end of March 2006, I met the lady that I will be married to later this year. Mariko is from Kochi City in Kochi Prefecture on Shikoku Island (the smallest of the four major islands that make up Japan) and we actually met in my former company`s offices after a networking event organised by a good friend and ex-colleague of mine. At the time, Mariko was working for a bilingual recruiting firm doing Ad-Sales and has recently moved on from there to a large American IT company based in a very modern (and pretty new) shopping, business and entertainment complex called Roppongi Midtown. As you may have guessed, she speaks great English. Anyway, since that first meeting and no doubt as a result of my romantic courtship and her acceptance of a few of my unique ways, things went from good to better to great, and I finally proposed to her in January of this year in the suite of the hotel in Tokyo in which were staying at the time. She said 'yes', and so we will be married at the end of September here in Tokyo at a very well known Shinto shrine followed by a hotel reception, and then followed a few weeks later by a wedding in England at the start of November - its all very exciting.

Well, what else can I say in this first post back! I guess the weather is always a good topic of conversation, especially in a country with four seasons. A couple of months ago we had Sakura (cherry blossom) season and since then the weather has gradually been warming up and now we have hit rainy season (albeit a week or so early), or 'tsuyu' as its known in Japanese. In most of Japan, the rainy season lasts from the beginning of June to mid July, while it affects the islands of Okinawa about one month earlier. Hokkaido, Japan's northern most main island is barely affected by the rainy season - lucky them! It doesn`t actually rain every day but it can always be expected to! So heed to the warning and always carry an umbrella!

The other thing at the moment that could have big implications here is the Japanese bid for the 2016 Summer Olympic Games. Tokyo made it to the shortlist together with Chiacgo, Madrid, and Rio de Janeiro. The winning bid will be announced in October 2009. Tokyo is touting "the most compact and efficient Olympic Games ever" with a dramatic setting on the waterfront of Tokyo Bay, an area used in the past primarily for industry and shipping. The area will be redeveloped and the waterfront will be revitalized with housing, retail, and entertainment venues, with some from land reclaimed from Tokyo Bay. Whether Japan (and specifically Tokyo) needs the Olympics is another question and not one for me to answer, however if Japan does win the bid it can be assured they will host a memorable event. Anyway, we shall see.

Another interesting thing happening in Tokyo is the construction of the 'Tokyo Sky Tree', which when complete will be one of the tallest buildings in the world with a height of about 610 metres. Contruction started last year and the Grand Opening is scheduled for Spring 2012 and although still a while away, I think people will be looking forward to the great views of the city, which will undoubtedly be better than those you can get from Tokyo Tower. Albeit probably Tokyo`s most famous landmark and a place which has a place in the heart of most Tokyoites, the main observatory stands at only 150 metres, and whilst there is a special observatory at 250 metres, the Sky Tree will be something different altogether. It will interesting to watch the progress of how it shoots up into the sky - we might even be able to see it from our 10th floor balcony (top floor of the block by the way!).

OK thats all for today. Watch this space for more posts soon.......

Good evening all,

Last weekend I went to a former co-worker and good friend`s wedding in Hakone, near where I used to live in Gotemba. It was a super day and the great weather helped to make it feel just that little bit more special. The wedding ceremony itself was held in a small wedding chapel on the grounds of a hotel - a quaint little building with only enough space for about sixty people - and lasted for about twenty-five minutes. The couple chose a Western-style wedding so the bride wore a really simple but beautiful white dress and was walked down the aisle by her father. It was all very touching.

The service itself went off without a hitch - no missing rings, no mistakes etc - and we sung a couple of easy to sing Japanese songs. I could kind of make out what the priest was talking about although I couldn`t make out the details, but as I knew the format of what was to come it was pretty easy to guess what stage they were at - and especially when the bride and groom in turn said "Hai, chikaimsu" (Yes, I promise) it all made perfect sense.

After a longish (but no where near as I have experienced in England) photo session the newlyweds were whisked off in a limousine to the Italian restaurant where we were to have the wedding lunch. I had actually been to the restaurant about two years before and I can tell you it is VERY nice. First we were `treated` (well maybe not the right word - please read the next paragraph!) to a champagne and finger buffet reception, followed by a four of five course meal (which included some absolutely divine tasting beef) - actually I lost count of the number of courses! - lots of (too much in my case) wine and beer, and to finish, the wedding cake itself which was a delicious cream and fruit concoction, but fantastically delicious. There was also a four piece band playing well-known songs and a compere who guided the proceedings. Professionals at work I thought!

It is not the custom to buy a wedding gift for the married couple as it is in England. Instead, we have to give money - there is no fixed amount but the amount usually depends on the relationship you have with the married couple - and we must place the money inside a special envelope and present it upon arrival at the wedding reception. In England, couples usually receive lots of gifts, usually for the house in which they will live after marriage, which kind of helps them to start their lives together, unless they are already living together and have everything they need - in which case they can just get a new set of everything from pans to bathroom towels!!! However, they usually have to fork out a lot of money (actually, it usually comes from the parents) to pay for the wedding.

In Japan, on the other hand, the money that is received from the guests is used to pay for the cost of the wedding so therefore I guess that`s why maybe you can have more lavishness or entertainment etc - but at the end of the day you are kind of paying for it, although I don`t think many people actually think that. To be honest, I enjoyed myself so much I would have happily paid what I gave as a gift as the price for day`s entertainment. Its pretty interesting to see the culture at work and the actual reception was intesting - usually the father of the groom speaks a few words at the end of the lunch (which he did), but there is no best man (therefore no speech) and no speech by the father of the bride, which form my experience of English weddings are usually fun to listen to. Anyway, they are now enjoying their honeymoon in Barcelona and Paris!

After the wedding lunch reception we had a couple of hours off and moved back across to Gotemba for the evening`s entertainment. Usually this consists of a party (given the name "ni ji kai" or "second party") to which other friends who didn`t go (and some who did go) to the wedding ceremony can attend and usually family don`t attend (although I need to check this!). A few weeks ago I had been asked with a Japanese friend of mine to organise this party so I willingly obliged and then set about making some games to play. To be honest, I have never played games at a wedding party so I was bit lost but after checking the internet and a couple of books I got some ideas and we ended up having a great time. The second party was only two hours so the time went really quickly.

Anyway, I got them to do a multiple choice quiz about the married couple which went down well as I had asked some quite personal and secretive questions which seemed to create much conversation and discussion. This was followed by a game where a man and a woman couple had to blow up a balloon and then burst by squeezing the balloon between their two bodies (front, back, side, anything OK!) without using their hands - it was really funny to see some of the position people got into to burst them - and I felt really sorry for the couple who didn`t blow it up enough so it was extremely difficult to burst!

Next up was a game where first the groom had to find his wife`s nose from a group of five while wearing a blindfold- with one being his wife, three other wome female guests and one being his MALE friend from college - he was put in for a joke!) - it was interesting that the two he narrowed it down to were his wife and the guy, but he chose correctly and avoided having to drink down a half litre of beer in one as punishment. Hi wife wasn`t so lucky - she had to find her husband`s right ear and included in the group was her sister. I can`t remember well, but she chose the wrong guy, but maybe she secretly wanted to down the beer and show off!

The final game I played was a game where couples had to eat squares of chocolate from paper plates using extemely long cooking chopsticks. I had got this idea from a TV show I saw last yeasr so I thought it would be a cool and fun game to try to play. The catch was that the block of six squares first had to be broken into six and then each square eaten one at a time, with each person holding one chop stick each and using teamwork to pick up and lift the pieces of chocolate into either of their mouths. Really funny to watch and probably extremely fun to do. Anyway, as I hadn`t clarified the rules properly, one team just picked up the whole block and the guy managed to nibble it bit by bit as it fell into his mouth - I thought it was cool as that was the most logical way to do it, however much it seemed against the rules! Anyway, it was so much fun.

In amongst all this game-playing, we had lots to drink and eat, although to be honest I had eaten and drunk so much earlier in the day that I used this time to sober up ready for the next party - yes you read correctly - next party! Basically the culture is that some people from the second party will go onto another place with the married couple for more drinks/food but without the formality of the second party. We actually managed to make it to five parties (although the last one was one hour of karaoke!) and we finally rolled out around 2.15am. A pretty long day (considering I had woken up at 5.30 to catch the bus) but a really fun and memorable one. I am already looking forward to my next weding invtiation!

If you want to see some of the photos please cut and paste the following link into your browser:

http://www.kodakgallery.com/ShareLandingSignin.jsp?Uc=n75v5t6.ap1eucy&Uy=-9zlvji&Upost_signin=BrowsePhotos.jsp%3FshowSlide%3Dtrue&Ux=1

To see the photos you will need to create an account with email and password - it takes about two minutes - if you have a problem viewing them let me know please. Any comments on how great I look will be very much appreciated!

I will write again soon with a couple of funny stories - until next time then!

Kevin

Wow, has it really been over a month since I wrote anything here! Time flies doesn`t it!

Anyway, I just finished my workout at the gym, completing yet another pretty usual day for me at the minute. My new job is going pretty well - fifteen days done and dusted and a lot learned (but an awful lot still to learn). Overall I made a good decision to take the job and I am enjoying it. So far I have been refreshing my memorty of accounting and tax rules and stuff like that as well as learning some new IT systems and of course, trying to remember the names of the people in my office (although you might think that shouldn`t be a problem as I had to do it almost every week when I was teaching!) - its strange but for the Japanese we usually say "surname san" eg, Nakamura san, and for the Westerners "first name" only, eg John! Its a little weird but thats how it is. If you unsure as to what I am exaclty doing in my new job, then you can check our website at: www.strataworks.co.jp

It`s great for me actually as I can also walk to work inside twenty minutes (reminds me of when I lived in London) and the actual job is much better and more interesting than what I did before and I am starting to feel like I can at last start to make a contribution after a couple of weeks of feeling a bit overwhelmed. A new challenge is good though and I am enjoying it so far. Actually having a regular 9 to 6 job again feels pretty good and the office banter and social side of things that goes with it is nice to have again after my recent teaching job in which I sometimes felt a little lost and lonelty as I was teaching in many different companies and offices around Tokyo and seldom met any of my coworkers. The only hard thing to get used to is sitting at a desk all day again using a computer, but as least I have a desktop and a big monitor this time instead of a laptop with a small screen that`s hard to focus on!

On a more social note, once again its cherry blossom (or sakura) time in Tokyo again - and the time when you know spring has definitely arrived. People really get into the cherry blossom thing here and make an effort to enjoy it while it lasts! Its usually come and gone within 10 days so we have to make the most of it! I guess next weekend I will go to a hanami (cherry blossom viewing) party somewhere in Tokyo - its basically a good excuse to meet friends and drink alcohol while sitting under beautiful cherry blossom trees and having a good time. I will take some pictures and put them on the next entry - whenever that is.

I don`t really have much else to say - I`ve just been concentrating on work and trying to get into shape, so I have been hitting the gym as much as possible recently and I can definitely feel - and see - the difference. If I had the energy or motivation, I would wake up early and be in the gym for seven in the morning for a pre-work workout instead of going late in the evening but I can`t quite find the motivation to get up at about quarter past six in the morning nor to go to bed earlier for that matter so I guess I will just maintain the status quo for the time being - its working just fine so far!

I will sign off now, and bid you goodnight. Take care and hope to write again soon,

Kevin

Good afternoon,

Well, the sun is shining here in Tokyo today after what has been a really cold week.

It was actually snowing on Thursday night as I came home from work, a kind of wet and heavy snow, not the light and fluffy kind I usually see. When I was leaving the house at about 4.30pm, it looked as though it would either rain or snow later that evening, however, stupidly, I didn`t take the advice of the old man, watching me eye the sky somewhat skeptically from across the street, to take an umbrella. I should have listened to him and prevented myself from having a free hair wash!

Also this week, as well as having a very heavy cold, I also managed to get an excrutiating toothache on Thursday afternoon before I went to work. As I didn`t have any classes on Thursday afternoon I had taken a short nap, but when I woke up it felt like someone had stabbed me in the cheek, so bad was the pain. Although it did subside a little, it definitely came back to bug me during the evening classes and the small social gathering after. Although I guess I have never really experienced terrible pain, I do think toothache is pretty bad - its the recurring thrusting of the pain and the constant aching that seems to make it so bad. So on Friday I went to the dentist - the first time I have done so in Japan.

After not having been to the dentist for two years (!), I guess my teeth must have been in pretty good shape as the dentist didn`t start moaning at me for not brushing etc! However, he was pretty concerned about the fact that I had an infection in my right wisdom tooth and after an x-ray, he told me I would need to have it removed sooner rather than later. He then proceeded to give me a couple of injections (which I had forgotten can really hurt) and clean the infected area. To cut a long story short, I will have them removed on March 9th. The dentist seemed pretty concerned because I have a double root on my wisdom teeth which means a rather more complicated procedure than for people with only a single root, which he said was more common in Japan. So I have to say I am not really looking forward to it that much, but I guess it needs to be done!

I have some other news for you too. On Monday March 14th I will start a new full-time job, working at a financial outsourcing company in Shibuya, about 20 minutes walk from where I live. Therefore, I will quit my current job as a teacher and once again work in a finance role. I have really enjoyed teaching since I came here just over two years ago and I feel it has helped me to better understand myself and develop my confidence and character. However, I want to try to get back into a job in finance and see what happens. I still have an interest in this kind of job and want a little more job security and regularity of hours and location. I will let you know how it goes, but at the minute I am working out the notice period on my teaching contracts.

What else is happening in Japan these days you may ask? Well, not so much, that I know of, apart from anticipation of a large earthquake in Tokyo. In the last two weeks we had a couple of very large tremors, but no major problems (unlike the poor souls in Iran). I just read a very disturbing article which discussed a recent government report which estimates the economic cost of a big earthquake hitting Tokyo (which is long overdue by the way!).

The article said that when Tokyo gets hit by the "Big One", it will probably face an economic loss of 112 trillion yen (about 550 billion pounds - I think!), split between direct damage to repair and reconstruct buildings, utility lifelines, traffic routes etc, and indirect damage arising from downtime at factories and businesses, and loss of tansportation services, which could last six months.

The report also suggested that 13,000 people would probably die if an earthquake of 6.9 on the Richter scale struck western Tokyo. An even stronger tremor of 7.3 in the northern tip of Tokyo Bay, would apparently force around 7 million people to evacuate their homes, and of these, up to 4.6 million people would be expected to remain at evacuation facilities for lengthy periods. Possible derailments of bullet trains were also looked at for the first time in this report, and it concluded that about 200 people would be likely to die in the immediate aftermath of an 8 a.m. quake, and in addition, another 200 commuters could die in train and subway derailments. However, the better news for drivers was that, due to past reinforcement of major highways to resist powerful quakes, the number of people expected to die on highways or conventional roads was put at only 30.

You might ask what are the chances of all this happening, well, they are pretty high. There is a 30-percent chance that a powerful earthquake will hit the southern Kanto region, including Tokyo, within 10 years, with the chance rising to 70 per cent within 30 years. So, starting this summer, the government will start to work out estimates for measures to reduce damage, including strengthening the current quake-resistance of buildings and infrastructure and planning aid for people who find themselves stranded. Its all quite scary when you read the black and white of it, however, you just continue to function as normal as you never quite know when the "big one" is going to strike - what else CAN you do?

I hope I haven`t scared anyone back home too much by what I have written about above - Ann, are you OK? - but I guess earthquakes are part of life in Japan, and a big earthquake in the Tokyo area is long overdue. So hold on to you hats folks.....

OK, that`s enough pessimism for one day, but unfortunately, there is not so much optimism today to counter it with, apart from telling you this. According to an recent opinion poll in a leading newspaper here in Japan, seven out of ten single Japanese women believe they can be happy remaining on their own, with this figure having risen by 10 per cent since 2003.

I guess this seems to suggest that staying single is no longer the social stigma it used to be, and the survey found that about 73% of single female respondents and 67% of male respondents agreed that women coule be completely happy living on their own. I am not sure whether this necessarily optimistic news for me, however, after reading the earthquake report I talked about above, anything seems optimistic.

I wish you all a good weekend, and I will do my best to post something new soon,

Kevin

Hi all,

Another cold and miserable day here in Tokyo - I just ventured out of the house and walked about 20 minutes to he gym only to find it is closed on the 20th of every month - I had known about this but I guess my brain wasn`t really in gear when I left the house. I decided to stop by Starbucks on the way home and treat myself to a Chai Tea Latte and a few minutes in a really comfortable old arm chair (in which it was very difficult not to fall asleep!).

Starbucks in Japan is almost the same as Starbucks anywhere else, although while the prices are roughly the same, the cup sizes are smaller. A short size in the UK is a medium in Japan, and a medium a large in Japan, and so on. They are offering a "Coffee Jelly Frappuccino" at the moment but I haven`t tried it yet. Its a bit cold for frappuccinos these days! They also sell lots of delicious (but vastly overpriced!) sandwiches which I refuse to pay for. The only good thing about Starbucks in Japan is that it is completely "no smoking" unlike some other coffee shop chains in Japan.

So I recently moved house as I said last time - no I haven`t been to the sento again yet, although after a lot of work outs this past week, I feel my body is owed some relaxation time. I thought I would show a few pictures of my neighborhood, and some from the main square in Shibuya taken in a recent typhoon. It probably looks like any other residential neighborhood of Tokyo actually, although we are only about fifteen minutes walk from Shibuya - the centre of young life in Tokyo. I guess I will add to this collection (which is not so fantastic at the moment) as I take more pictures. There are also a couple of picture of two "interesting" shops I took recently- I will let you make up your own comments.





So, not much else is happening here at the moment - life goes on pretty much the same as usual. I think I am catching yet another cold so need to take care I guess, not sure if its my diet or just because I experience a great number of temperature changes from day to day, going in an out of different places. As a kind of freelance teacher, I seem to be moving around an awful lot in order to teach in different places, although I am getting to walk a fair few kilometers everyday which is not a bad thing for the old frame.

Have a good day,

Kevin

Good afternoon from a sunny, but somewhat chilly Tokyo.

Yesterday I visited a Japanese `sento` for the first time. If you ever want to see your neighbours in their birthday suit (your male neighbours that is!) this is somewhere you should go! Actually, a sento is a Japanese communal bath house. The sento in my neighborhood is about five minutes walk from my house and has, I guess like all other sentos, one large room with a tall barrier separating the sexes, a line or two of showers, and a single large bath (although it is divided into three different parts - one like a jacuzzi, one with jets of water to massage your shoulders or back, and another which is a little bit warmer than the other two) for the bathers who have already washed to sit in and relax. The sento near my house also has small sauna, although you have to pay extra to use it.

In the past, every neighborhood had one and since small houses could often not accomodate a family tub, a local sento was the equivalent of something like a village hall or village green, a place to catch up in local gossip, as well as to warm yourself up during the cold winters. Actually, I didn`t have a `good old chin wag` with anyone, and I didn`t hear any good gossip, although that may probably have been more due to the fact that I don`t really know anyone in my new neighborhood yet and my Japanese listening skills are far from perfect!

I read on a website (the link is below) that since the 1980s, these communal type bath houses have been decreasing in numbers as more and more Japanese bathe at home. To encourage fir prevention, private baths were outlawed in the Edo Period (1603-1867), and there were as many as 600 public baths in Tokyo in 1868. As more and more old Tokyo buildings are torn down and new homes are equipped with private baths, this trend will no doubt continue.

Actually, some Japanese people are concerned that without the "skinship of mutual nakedness, children will not be properly socialized". Its strange for me to agree with this as I grew up without ever going to a sento (nor anywhere where I took a bath naked with my friends or my family). After having visited countless onsens, and now one sento, I have grown accustomed to this tradition and I think I would have liked to have had the chance to experience them from being a child. I don`t think there are too many more relaxing places in the world than an onsen. For those of you who are wondering, an Onsen (which I have talked about before) is a special form of sento, which is a sento using water from a natural hot spring.

If you are interested in reading more about sentos here is a good link for you to read:

http://www.japan-101.com/travel/sento.htm

The parts about "Voyeurism and related problems", and "Foreigners" are especially interesting to read! - after you get to the site, you need to scroll down the page to find them.

Another place I visited recently, actually it was before Christmas, was a place called "Oedo Onsen Monogatari(translated as "Great Edo Hot Spring Tale") in Odaiba, Tokyo. This is a kind of bathhouse themepark opened in March 2003 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the Edo shogunate, offering onsens in an atmosphere reminiscent of old Tokyo streets and towns. On entry, you can choose from 19 different types of yukata (which is an informal cotton kimono) worn in the summer) and be transformed into a resident of Edo (the old name for Tokyo).

The naked bath area (offering a variety of baths) is divided between men and women, although there is only one natural hot spring. There are also saunas and an open-air foot bath ("ashiyu" in Japanese) which is similar to a trail that you can walk along or sit down. It is a mixed bath where you bathe in your yukata and the footbath is calf deep and paved with stones to stimulate your foots`s pressure points. The onsen also offers sand and stone baths, facials, beauty treatments, scrubbings, and foot and body massages for an extra cost and it also also has a variety of Japanese food and souvenirs. The cost to enter for one day is about 2,600 yen - about thirteen pounds.

Here are some pictures from when I went there:







OK folks, that`s all for today. I hope you have a good weekend, and please come back and visit my blog soon.

Kevin