Blogs from Japan, Asia - page 7

It's almost 2:00 PM here at LAX as I'm writing these words, about an hour from boarding time on my flight on Singapore Airlines to Narita. I assumed with the length of layover I have here (over six hours) there would be plenty of time to update my travel blog. However, I haven't been able to access the Internet despite a tantalizing list of network names that seem to be some various of "LAX-WiFi." The flight to LAX on Alaskan Airlines was very pleasant. I sat in a window seat in row 23, right behind the wing. There were some great views taking off and landing. The middle seat was empty and my neighbor at the aisle quietly alternated sleeping and reading. I read the entire in flight magazine and then finished reading a free YA ... read more

I have now officially been awake for 24 hours, but despite a general fatigue I seem to be feeling a second wind. Maybe it was the two dinners Singapore Airlines served me (one at what was 1 AM Pacific Standard Time) or all the juice and green tea I drank. Or perhaps it is a false rush of adrenaline I received after the frenzied race through Customs, buying my ticket to the Skyliner, and getting to the Skyliner. Now I'm kicking back a window seat in Car 8 of the Skyliner waiting for it to take off from the station. I look forward to seeing what the night view of Tokyo is from the Skyliner. All I have to do now is get to Ueno Station and find the McDonald's where I am meeting my sister. ... read more

Tuesday 24/04/2012 And the sun came out. And it was good, and warm! Kindy from 10-1 today. I was in charge of activity time, and got the children to colour in rainbows, then stick them on large pieces of blue paper (the sky) all ready to put in their end-of-year books. They all looked fantastic. Back to work 4.30-8.30pm. Studied ‘feelings’ again with this bunch of classes. Again, some classes were finished really early, and I could challenge them, but other classes were so very slow. When quizzing one class on last week’s ‘the body’, I pointed to eyebrows, asked ‘what are these?’ and one boy replied ‘Eyebrushes!’ with such conviction that I nearly fell off my chair. He’s actually quite right, they do look like eyebrushes, especially some people’s. Before Juku, I brought in my ... read more

Not too long ago, my friend, Barbara Tucker and I, took a spur of the moment trip to Kyoto. We used overnight buses from Willer Express and found an amazing hostel, Khaosan Hostel, through Hostels.com. Our hostel was located minutes away from downtown Gion. Both the overnight bus and the hostel were decently priced. We arrived in Kyoto around 7 a.m and spent the next hour or so looking for the hostel. My sense of direction terrible, so I had us going the exact opposite way for about 30 minutes. We arrived at the hostel, since we couldn’t check in till 3 at the earliest; we just dropped of our luggage ventured out. We decided to check out the National Garden, which was about a 20 minute walk from the hostel. Though it was raining a ... read more

Ok so it seems the last blog was a bit of a sweeping epic on my apparent fondness for the Japanese people and way of life, it's only now when reading it back that I realise what a soapbox moment it was! It has struck me that it's only when I sit down to write a blog that I actually collate all my thoughts and finalise my opinions of places. Writing the blogs has shifted from simply informing family and friends of what I am doing, to become a very cathartic process and a neat way to organise the convoluted, contradictory, and corrupted mess that is my head space. Plus you lot get to skip all the boring stuff and look at the pretty pictures. So here is the final part of this particular trip, Japan ... read more

Tsukiji Fish Market, the largest in the world, is a fascinating amalgam of fishermen, fishmongers, and sushi chefs at the doorsteps of Tokyo. Many people know it for the famous tuna auction held there during the early morning hours. Just this past January a 754lb bluefin tuna caught off the northern coast of Japan was auctioned at a world record price of $736,000! Just saying that Japanese people are tuna-crazed doesn't give justice to the statement, I would say it's more like everyone's personal but publicly solicitous love affair. A Japanese person that claims they don't eat tuna meat would be like saying they didn't drink water or breathe air, it's simply inhumane. How can I blame them, it is truly the king of pelagic fishes. I could go on and on about the accolades of ... read more