Just because I can! And because it’s somehow cool to fly low to the ground at more than 200 kmh. How the world has changed since I first travelled via the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Toyohashi in March of 1998.
The ticket guy has just bowed to the passengers from the front or the car. I’ll have to dig mine out and save battery power.
As I wanted to explore Tokyo Station before leaving for Toyohashi on the 12:33 Shinkansen, I hightailed it out of my hotel at 8:00 via the free shuttle to Akihabara. There the crushing surge of humanity moved like gravel on a beach in a rhythm all its own. Continue reading
I AM NOT WEIRD I AM A LIMITED EDITION
CALL ME HANDSOME
DISCOVER THE REASON OF YOUR BIRTH AND JOY OF LIFE
EAT PARADISE
NOW. LIFE IS LIVING YOU
*
Manifesto. Credo. Philosophy. Self Help. In songs, on t-shirts, temples, windows, walls. The signs are everywhere.
Photo: EPA/Friedrich Von Ericsson in The Telegraph UK
I was up in the air! Literally. As high as I could get on Tokyo SkyTree’s 451.2 meter Sorakara Point along the Tembo Galleria “air walk,” a gentle slope from floors 445-450. Below, the city of Tokyo glittered and flickered. Continue reading
The Japan Sea at Sunset from Chirihama Beach, Ishikawa, Japan
Yesterday we drove out of Kanazawa to Chirihama Beach where vehicles are allowed on the sand. We arrived an hour before sunset and enjoyed a picnic: yakitori, pumpkin salad, potato and sausage salad, apple and celery salad and onigiri (rice balls). Alcohol is permitted in public places so we drank the sake which had been blessed by Hime shrine (except for our driver as the blood alcohol tolerance for drivers is zero percent). Continue reading
Breakfast finished and the laundry hung to dry, I have half an hour to download photos before going out for the day. I reach for the card reader kept in the case containing portable, secure WiFi delivered to my hotel by Japan Wireless on arrival. Bonus, the handy bag is perfect for all my tech gear. The reader, however, is nowhere to be found. I am sure I haven’t moved it to a “better” spot, but it isn’t in the case. And it is driving me crazy. Continue reading
Night view from the Hotel Nikko Kanazawa
Thirty stories up in Le Grand Chariot Sky Lounge of the Hotel Nikko Kanazawa, the mists shroud the night and bring the view surprisingly close. On the windows, spatters from the rains which came hammering down right after my arrival diffuse the light. Continue reading
They–a whole bunch of them get the attribute–say that you can’t step into the same river twice. So five years on since my last visit to Orbite, my favourite spot to drink and write in Kyoto, I arrive to discover it’s gone. Vanished. There ought to have been an obituary for the place. Continue reading
It was smart to stay in a new part of town this trip. I wandered the streets and got myself turned around by going straight. Yup. But that landed me in front of Takashimaya just at the time my feet were competing with my belly for attention. That, of course, put me right up the escalator to the 7th floor restauran gai where I’d found Kenzan eight years ago. Continue reading
Apologies. Apparently the “Was the Son of… ” video didn’t embed correctly in the post which went out to subscribers. However, if you wish to re-visit the blog entry from the website to access the video click here.