A.D.D. and the Japanese consumer

Japan has a reputation for being a country of savers. In fact, one knock on Japan's economy is that the consumer doesn't exert the kind of muscle that, say, its American counterpart does. In a country that is perceived as being thrifty, conservative and mono-cultural - you'd expect consumer tastes to be fairly stagnant. The reality is that the Japanese consumer has ADD and is incredibly finicky.

There is no better case study than with the Kit Kat. I am a big fan of the Kit Kat. When I was single living in Japan, I would treat myself to a 100 yen ($1) Kit Kat just about every day. That's where the habit began. In the US the Kit Kat comes in one, maybe two or three flavors. In Japan I can't count how many flavors of Kit Kat there are. That's because every month there is a new flavor of Kit Kat that comes out. Over the last year alone I've had chocolate, strawberry, orange, kiwi, caramel pudding, mango, dark chocolate, apple, red bean, and soybean cake. As you can see from the picture, I recently consumed a ginger ale Kit Kat. These flavors don't last long. They in stores for about a month and then a new flavor hits the shelves.

No doubt this is pull marketing at its best. The Japanese consumer is conditioned to act now to try a new flavor or lose out forever. This conditioning has developed a natural belief that new is better...and if it's not new, then it's not worth buying. You see new consumer products all the time in candy, drinks, automobiles...anything. In the soft drink market, over 1,000 new drinks are launched each year into a 7,000 product market. Like the various flavors of Kit Kat, many of these drinks don't last longer than a year.

To garner further buzz, many candies and drinks will incorporate local flavors and be sold only in that locale. So, on our family vacation to Kyushu last month, we saw a flavor of our favorite candy - Haichu (a soft, Starburst-like candy) - which was only sold in Kyushu. The flavor was a locally grown mandarin orange. Not only did we see this at convenience stores, but also at tourist trinket shops wrapped like it was in a cardboard suitcase. Of course, we bought some.

As a consumer, it has its pluses and minuses. You certainly don't get bored as a consumer here in Japan. But you better not get too attached to something you like, because it might be gone in a few weeks/months. As a marketing guy myself, I respect the genius behind the product development strategy. You try to protect your turf by constantly innovating to keep the consumer's interest.

Nevertheless, I'll be honest, this consumer mindset wrecks havoc in my field of employment. The Japanese are notoriously short-term oriented investors. This has frustrated us to no end since we are fairly conservative when it comes to new product launches. It makes for difficult going when investors are looking for something new to invest in every three months.

Ella is talking...a lot

Ella is growing up and becoming quite the talker. Shelley and I have always talked about how great Anthon's was verbally growing up, but Ella is starting to really ramp up her words and sounds. We took a video when Anthon was 18 months old and quizzed him on certain words. Now that Ella is days away from being 18 months, Shelley took a quick video of Ella talking and making noises.

On a personal note, it's been within the last month, month and a half that I've been able to develop this nice father-daughter relationship with Ella. She is quite a charming little girl and I am smitten. She wants me to sing songs to her at night and will try to sing along with her favorite ones. When she wants to give you a kiss she'll place her hands on my cheeks and guide my face to hers so she can kiss me. She loves giving tight squeezes around my neck and will grunt like she's squeezing so hard. She loves reading books. At night when I come home I can hear her yelling "dada, dada, dada" as her little feet are running towards the door. She can't quite beat Anthon to the door. He's pretty swift. But Ella isn't far behind. She's so polite. She says thank you for everything. She'll fold her arms and listen patiently through the prayer, even long ones and give out a very enthusiastic "AMEN!" at the end.

We're amazed at what new things she is saying, learning and doing from one day to the next.

Anthon as a budding photographer

When I was younger I remember distinctly lining up my stuffed animals and sticker books outside on the brick wall of the front yard and taking pictures of them. I even wanted to dress up my dogs in hats and baseball jerseys and take pictures of them to use as "baseball cards"...for dogs. I guess at an early age I really liked photography.

In a similar vein my son has been bitten with the photography bug. And as parents we've found an incredibly HUGE carrot to dangle in front of my son to behave. And thankfully, with digital technology we don't have to develop anything...all we have to worry about is Anthon not breaking the camera and deleting most (all?) of them.

I won't lie, he's making progress with his photo-taking skills. At first he struggled with getting the subject in the picture. Hence you'll see pictures of my stomach. Then he struggled with putting his finger over the flash. So we had a bout of really dark shots. Now we're working on keeping the camera still when shooting. I think you'll find he's pretty good at the self portraits.

Nothing is more lame, I know, than looking at someone's else's pictures. And I'm sure it's worse to look through some 4 year old's pictures. I include these pictures for the humor. If you know my son then you might be able to channel the joy he takes in shooting for fun of it.

Click on the picture to see the gallery.

Mt. Fuji Sunrise

I took this picture on our recent camping trip to Lake Motosu. This is obviously a Mt. Fuji sunrise. I was up at 5:00 AM with my fellow photo enthusiast friend Ryan, and were lucky to have such a clear morning. We thought we were being pretty sneaky being the early worm, but when we arrived at our perch we realized we were late to the party. About 20 other photographers were there with their expensive cameras and tripods lined up in the 'good spots.' One guy drove 4 hours from his home, arriving just after midnight, whereupon he set up his tripod and camera, then ducked back into his car to wait in the warmth for hours before sunrise. The dedication of some of these Japanese photographers!

Some looked like serious hobbyists. The one thing I know about the Japanese is that if they have a hobby, no matter what it is or how good they are at it (or want to become) they go all out and buy the best gear. It's a "go strong or go home" mentality...which I think is good.

Back to the photo. This is somewhat of a famous vantage point. On the back of the 1000 yen note (roughly $10) there's a picture of Fuji and it's from the Lake Motosu vantage point.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Camping at Lake Motosu

A few weekends ago we went camping with about 10 other families in the Fuji 5 Lakes region at Lake Motosu. In only about a 90 minute drive from the center of city we felt like we had completely escaped the city sprawl of Tokyo. It was a wonderful long weekend away.

Shelley and I aren't quite sure we're camping people - or at least in the camping stage of our lives. People were pretty amazed that an 8+ month pregnant woman was choosing to go camping. Hey, I didn't force her to go folks! We like camping, but don't do it often...maybe once a year. But our kids were Jekyll and Hyde this weekend. For as bad as it was on Saturday and for as much as we wanted to pack it in and go home, Sunday was its equal in fun and relaxation. May I present the evidence.

We were camping by a lake, so we decided to take a walk around. The really easy, paved and flat walk around the lake turned into two hours of parental torture. For some reason Anthon has an extreme aversion to walking as a means of transporting himself. In his mind that's what cars, trains, strollers and a parent's arms/shoulders are for. If his attitude were a song lyric, it would be "Walking in LA, only a nobody walks in LA" from "Walking in LA" by Missing Persons. Talk about a meltdown. Crying, whining, yelling, everything. We had incident after incident. And mind you, this is flat, paved road.

Contrast that with Sunday. We rolled the dice again and took Anthon on an off-road, steep, slippery hike up a mountain. He must have viewed this as fun, because this hike was tiring, even for me, and much more difficult. Yet we didn't hear one peep. Not a single complaint. He was talking, he was joking around. He was having fun. So I guess we've learned that walking on pavement = functional and boring. Walking on dirt = fun and enjoyable. Good to know. Maybe we need to bring dirt everywhere we go and sprinkle it in his walking path so that he thinks he's hiking instead of walking from point A to point B.

The aforementioned hike was beautiful. There were two intermediate "peaks" before reaching the top. Each stop had its own view of Mt. Fuji. But for the last 2/3 of the hike you had completely unobstructed views of Fuji and the valley below as it sloped up and formed this most famous of views. I don't think I've ever seen Mt. Fuji so right in my face like this.

So I think Sunday made up for Saturday. We left Monday morning thinking we had a good time overall. Maybe we just need to be smarter campers. But soon with three kids 4 and under, I wonder how much more camping we can do for a while.

Anthon turns 4

Anthon turned four years old last week. I know everybody says it, but it's hard to believe that he's getting to be such a big kiddo. And despite it being only four years, I can't remember my life without him in it.

We had a family celebration where Anthon got to choose his birthday dinner - shabu shabu. For any of you who know Anthon this shouldn't be a big surprise. More than burgers, more than pizza, more than any thing you'd think a kid would love, Anthon's favorite food is shabu shabu. If you don't know what it is, google it. He got tons of presents - including a Spiderman costume for Halloween...with built in muscles and everything.

We also had a birthday party for Anthon and some of his friends from school and church. This is the first party we've thrown for our kids. Anthon had a very specific theme to his birthday party - Spiderman...of course. Everything was Spiderman: cups, napkins, party favors everything. He even requested a Spiderman cake. Now, they don't do kids cakes in Japan like they do in the US. So any special request cake had to be made by hand. And if you can see in one of the pictures posted, Shelley made from scratch a Spiderman cake. Talk about love! And it was really cute to see how much she doted and worried about the shape of the face, the eyes, the color of the frosting, etc.

We had the party at a park locally and rented bicycles with training wheels and ordered pizza and let the kids run around how they wanted. We strung up the pinata and gave kids a go at hitting it. They were far too kind in their first go-around. But once they saw candy fall out of the burro, the hits became more and more fierce. He didn't last too much longer.

Now being four years old comes with some new responsibilities. Anthon now has a list of chores that he has to complete everyday in order to get his full allowance - 200 yen per week (about $2). This includes things like making his bed, practicing his reading, setting the dinner table, and picking up his toys at night. He no longer gets to ride in a stroller - something we instituted when we learned that #3 was coming soon. He did get a scooter for his birthday, however, which has lessened the pain somewhat. He's scootering everywhere now and in a matter of days Shelley is having to run to keep up with his quick pace to school on the scooter. On his birthday Anthon told us that he didn't feel like he was four years old...which is kind of a grown up response, and probably the first step in realizing that birthdays aren't that big a deal! But after all of the new rights and responsibilities of being four years old in the Cannon family kicked, he admitted that he felt four and liked it better than being three.

Trip to Kyushu: Kurume & Fukuoka

Our last stop on our trip to Kyushu were the cities of Kurume and Fukuoka. I lived in Kurume for 7 months as a missionary. As a tourist destination it's not much. But this place houses a lot of great personal memories for me. One of the great memories was teaching a person who worked at the first Subway sandwich shop in Kyushu. And we as missionaries, longing for a decent sandwich, would frequent this place. The other main reason to frequent this place was a guy, nicknamed Gonchan, who was interested in the missionaries and then eventually joined the LDS church. Gonchan was our age and had boundless energy. He would call us when his boss wasn't there to tell us to come down and he would make us sandwiches. He even made me a Subway nametag and got a uniform to fit me and I was able to be "sandwich artist" during our lunchbreak.

The only other things that make Kurume somewhat famous are 1)a gaudy and 200ft tall statue of Kannon the Goddess of Mercy; and 2)the Ishibashi family. You may not know the name Ishibashi, but you've probably heard of Bridgestone Tire, the largest maker of tires in the world. They are from Kurume and started the company there. As a side note, the daughter of the founder married a future prime minister of Japan. And one of their sons is the current prime minister of Japan.

Our time in Kurume was spent with Gonchan and seeing other friends that I knew in the area. It was great to catch up. For those of you Fukuoka missionaries, I have to tell you that we dined at the best tonkatsu place on Earth, Hamakatsu. For those of you who don't know what tonkatsu is - it's a flattened, breaded and deep fried piece of pork (usually pork, but also chicken). It's served with a cabbage salad, miso soup and rice. You dip the katsu in an Asian style barbecue sauce and it's wonderful. As missionaries we used to lust after this restaurant. We would always get the chicken katsu and we would go to town on the all you could eat cabbage salad and rice. It was a decent sized chain 15 years ago, but nowadays it's absolutely everywhere. We had to stop in to eat there once. It's so good. Anthon loved it so much he downed a whole thing of tonkatsu, then threw it up in bed with me later that night. In what was undoubtedly major inspiration, I woke up, sat up and moved out of the way literally a split second before Anthon spewed half-digested tonkatsu everywhere. I escaped the sickness. Yes!

After our one day in Kurume, we spent a half day in Fukuoka, killing time before flying home to Tokyo. Fukuoka is the 8th largest city in Japan and doesn't really hold any real special feeling for me, except for the LDS temple that was built on the site of our old mission home. A friend of mine from the mission, Greg Peterson, and I were able to fly back in 2000 for the dedication of the Temple. It was surreal to think that the old home that we would visit on the large plot of land was now a temple. From my LDS perspective, what a blessing that is for the members of the LDS church in Kyushu.

Our final stop in Fukuoka was Ohori Park - a large park created on the old castle grounds. We devoured McDonalds hamburgers and fries and let the kids run. I think our vacation went a few hours too long because in what should have been a fun ride on the paddle boats turn into a nightmare of crying by the children. My attempts to get us back to the dock to stop the madness were futiles as we were paddling against the wind and it made our trip back not only slow but very physically taxing on my legs! If you like hearing kids scream and cry, then please feel free to watch the short clip Shelley took below.





As always click on any of the pictures to be taken to a gallery of the few shots we took in Kurume and Fukuoka.

Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots

About an hour south of the city of Kagoshima is a small mountain town called Chiran. This was the home of the air base that launched kamikaze attacks on Allied warships towards the end of World War II. The air base is long gone, replaced by a museum dedicated to the 1,000+ pilots who died flying suicide missions in their explosives-laden airplanes.

From an American perspective, it's really easy to dismiss the kamikaze as faceless fanatics blindly following the edicts of the government. Or, perhaps using modern terminology - suicide bombers.

Visiting this museum, however, you get an extremely personal view into the lives of the pilots who trained here before flying to their deaths. At its entrance you're immediately struck with the reality that these were just boys. The first image you see is of five boys who are in their flight gear playing with a puppy. Three of the five are 17 years old and the other two are 18 and 19 years old. The picture was taken the day before their mission. All five died.

Pictures are displayed of every kamikaze pilot througout the museum. Some of the final letters written by the pilots home to families have been translated and digitized for all to read. It's a sobering insight into the mindset of these young men. Some say they look forward to dying so they can bring honor to their family, the emperor and their country. Some write home to young wives telling them that they will always be near, even in death. Others write specific instructions to little children to be good, study hard and take care of mother.

The tragedy in all of this is the wasted future of these young men. Families were robbed of sons and husbands. The thieves were Japan's militaristic leaders that deceived its people into thinking their cause was just, that Japan was freeing its Asian neighbors of western influences. These men's lives could have been so much more. They could have brought honor to their nation by helping foster the most stunning economic recovery of the 20th century - not dying in the ocean. They could have been family men and made more of a difference in other people's lives. And while I admire the courage and dedication to something I hope they believed in, I can't help feel sorrow that their leaders were all too eager to mortgage the future of their young to preserve their interests in the present.

Applying my feelings to the modern day, I first think of my son and hope that he never has to go to war. Secondly, I respect every member of any military around the world who is fighting for just causes of freedom and equality of all people. Thirdly, I hope that as an American my leaders will engage in only necessary and just warfare. The standard set forth in the Book of Mormon is something I've thought a lot about of late.

Anyway, I'm sorry for the rant. But this museum is one of the most sad and thought provoking museums in all of Japan. It is a definite must see if you're ever in the Kagoshima area. I urge you to visit the website of the museum, which has a lot of information that's found in the museum itself.

Trip to Kyushu: Kagoshima

Stop number three on our week-long trip was Kagoshima. I served here as a missionary in two stints to start my mission (5 months in the city of Kagoshima) and to end my mission (3 months in the suburb of Taniyama).

For you Japanese history buffs and Tom Cruise fans, Kagoshima is the home to a guy by the name of Saigo Takamori, who is a local hero. Saigo, once a military man closely allied with the imperial government, he resigned his position in a huff because the government didn't go along with his proposal to attack Korea over their failure to recongize the newly formed Japanese government. He returned home to Kagoshima and with 40,000 disaffected samurai, and local soldiers, he led what is known as the Satsuma Rebellion. They got as far as Kumamoto, burning the castle, before being driven back to Kagoshima. The final battle was the basis for Ken Watanabe's character in the Tom Cruise movie The Last Samurai.

Kagoshima is also known for it's gigantic, and quite active, volcano Mt. Sakurajima. It's quite a spectacular sight! It sits 15 minutes by ferry across the bay from from Kagoshima and dominates the view from almost any part of the city. The volcano used to be an island until an eruption in 1914 poured enough lava and rock to bridge the watery gap between the island and the nearby peninsula. Ash is spewn daily from the volcano and on particularly heavy days, if the wind is just right, it can feel as if a light rain is falling on you...but not a refreshing rain. As missionaries who would have to bike in this kind of environment, our shirt pockets would fill with ash and if we had a cold or allergies, the phlegm would be black. And let me tell you, when it actually did rain, the mixture of water and the ultra fine ash made for slippery roads. Good times.

We decided to stay two nights at the Furusato Kanko Hotel, on the volcano itself. The hotel has a famous hot spring that backs up against the bay. We enjoyed the expansive views the sounds of the lapping waves. The hot spring also has a shrine inside it, which meant that so as to not offend the kami (god of the shrine) we had to wear cotton robes to cover our nakedness. The benefit was that it was a mixed gender pool so we could enjoy the hot spring as a family. They even had tiny robes for Anthon and Ella, which was so cute. Spending that time in the hot spring was definitely a top 5 highlight of the entire trip. The hotel can be a bit pricey, but it's worth it. Dinner and breakfast are included and each night you dine in your own private tatami room. The food is quite good and focuses on local cuisines (pork, sashimi, etc.)

Our time in Kagoshima was spent touring the volcano (which has a large park filled with large fiberglass dinosaurs of all random things) and traveling south of Kagoshima to see the massive tea fields outside of Chiran. We also spent time in a museum dedicated to the kamikaze pilots who at the end of World War II were sent to die as a last ditch effort to prevent defeat. More on that later as it deserves its own lengthy post. And above all it was nostalgic for me to be back in Kagoshima.

Click on any of the pictures to be taken to a gallery of photos.

Trip to Kyushu: Kumamoto

Stop number two on our trip was Kumamoto. I spent 7 months here as a missionary in 1995 and in the process had some great experiences. I’ll share some of my experiences in a later post.

From a travel perspective, Kumamoto typifies everything that’s great about Kyushu. There are some beautiful seaside towns with views to tiny islands that dot the bay. Then as you head east you run into the city of Kumamoto which has a surprisingly international feel. It has really made great strides to welcome foreigners to visit, study and work there. Finally, as you head further east you scale mountains and volcanoes and enjoy hot springs, rivers and gorges. It’s really a diverse area.

Kumamoto Castle
This is one of the premier castles in all of Japan. While it’s a replica, it’s a stunning piece of architecture that is THE signature building in Kumamoto. It sits on a bluff and overlooks the town. We made our way there on a hot Sunday afternoon and didn’t really get to enjoy enough of our time there since the kids were tired and cranky.

Mt. Aso
The Mt. Aso region is one of the world’s largest volcanic caldera and according to sources it’s also the most densely populated caldera in the world...which has got to be nice since it's technically still an active volcano. Admittedly, Aso did most of its damage more than 100,000 - 300,000 year ago.

You can drive to the peak of the active crater and peer into it. We went on a national holiday and were happy to leave early in the morning because it was busy. I kid you not, we were within 5km to the parking lot of the crater and it took us 90 minutes to travel the last 5km. Talk about ridiculous. And we were the lucky ones. There were drivers who, I’m sure, had to endure two hours just to get into the parking lot. It was a great reminder that no matter how rural one gets in Japan, one is still in Japan…great lines of people will happen everywhere!

Boshita Matsuri
Animal rights activists and my Korean friends might not like this festival, but the Boshita Matsuri celebrates the pillaging of Korea hundreds of years ago and involves parading large horses with phallic symbols strapped to their backs. The horses are fed beer and prodded to a point where the horse will often times run wild through the streets or rear up and buck. Many years ago, some of the horses would then be killed and the meat of the horse would then be served raw, which in fact is a local delicacy called basashi.

Watching the procession is really fun. People parade around town for hours in their summer festival clothing (happi) and are impossibly drunk by the evening (when we got there). They’re chanting and singing and looking like they’re having a good time. Ella got into it and due to her being impossibly cute she got quite a lot of attention from the passersby who wanted to give her stuff – glow sticks mainly. Anthon was instantly jealous. He took a cue from Ella, started to act cute and soon saw glow sticks come his way.

Kikuchi Keikoku Koen (Kikuchi Gorge)
This is one of my favorite places and is off the beaten path. If you don’t have a car, then you’ll likely not get a chance to come here. The gorge is on the back side of Aso, to the north, and is a set of hiking trails that meander up a river with a series of beautiful waterfalls. Tons of trees shade the trails and it’s a wonderful place to hike, picnic and play in the water. It would have been the perfect outing except of course Ella lost her shoe while trying to resist being picked up by Shelley. The shoe dropped from the bridge to the water. We tried to track it down the river but we lost it.

The drive to and from Kikuchi is great because you pass by a ton of fruit farms and fresh fruit stands. We stopped by a vineyard that sold gigantic purple grapes. Behind the stand were the vineyards. You could tell the fruit had just been picked. I don’t think I’ve ever tasted grapes that good ever.

We love Kumamoto. Click on any of the pictures to go to a gallery of shots from our three days in Kumamoto.

I See God!

While looking out over the Nagasaki bay from Glover Garden, Anthon looked through the binoculars and proclaimed, "I see God!"

Gotta love the kids.

Trip to Kyushu: Nagasaki

The family took a 9 day trip to the island of Kyushu, one of the four main islands in Japan's archipelago. It also happened to be the area where I served my mission. I wanted to show Shelley and the family where I lived for two years.

Our first stop was the city of Nagasaki, a town in which I didn't actually serve as a missionary.

Nagasaki is an interesting city that is as beautiful and scenic as it is steeped in history. The city sits on a peninsula where water and mountain terrain intermix to dominate the city's scenery. It is definitely a city built on a hill. This solid foundation must certainly be a metaphor for the resiliency of its citizenry who, over the centuries, have persevered through many trials.

Obviously, Nagasaki is most famous for being the site of the second atomic bomb blast on August 9, 1945, which effectively forced Japan to concede defeat and put an end to World War II. If it were not for a museum, a park at the hypocentre of the blast and another peace park close by, you would hardly know of this city's place in modern history. I think this is a credit to the city and its people's ability to reconstruct and restore the city to its natural beauty and charm. More on that later.

The city has a much more important ancient history, however, as a trading port. It was through Nagasaki that many new ideas were introduced to Japan from the outside world, including Christianity. When western influence began to be perceived as being politically disruptive, Japanese rulers effectively closed the country to foreigners. Christian influence was seen as subversive and Christians were persecuted. Followers were forced to renounce their faith or suffer death - some by crucifixion. It wasn't until centuries later when Japan was forcibly reopened to the outside world that it was made known of a vibrant underground Christian population in Nagasaki who were practicing totally unbeknownst to the government. Those centuries-old influences are still prevalent today. In our day and a half of touring the city we saw more Catholic priests and nuns walking around than we've seen in our nearly two years in Tokyo.

Being an American visiting Nagasaki can be a bit uncomfortable. While there are precious few outward signs that the city was decimated by a plutonium bomb, visitors to the atomic bomb museum are given insight into the affect the bomb had on the people of Nagasaki. And I really am not sure how local people, especially the elderly who could have lived through the blast, feel about what happened to their city.

I happen to fall into the camp of people who believe that this was a tragic event that cost the lives of tens of thousands of completely innocent people, but probably saved the lives of millions of other people in Japan and perhaps throughout Asia. The Allies were preparing to invade Kyushu after a long and protracted battle in Okinawa, while the Soviet Union was advancing into Manchuria. It seems as if the stage was set for a fierce and costly battle on Japan's homeland.

Putting aside the tactical or ethical argument of the bomb, and focusing instead on the physical impact of the bomb, I was left in total unbelief of its vast destruction. Video footage from the air shows a massive mushroom cloud shooting nearly 20km in the air after detonation. The bomb produced instantaneous heat that was several thousand degrees celsius, sending a wave of immense heat and radiation that destroyed buildings and killed people in an instant with two kilometers of the hypocenter. All told, almost a third of the population died due to the blast and subsequent fires, with probably half sustaining injuries and widespread radiation exposure.

It's hard to fathom that in one instant life can be normal, but in the next instant there is a flash and life has changed forever. Seeing the amount of death, destruction and suffering makes one wish that there was no need for war. At the very least it made me question what constitutes a war of necessity.

While in Nagasaki, we took advantage of having a car and drove south on the peninsula and were treated to vast views of ocean and islands. There were plenty of places to hop out and enjoy the rocky beaches and endless tide pools. We also drove to the top of Mt. Inasayama which provided 360 degree views of Nagasaki city to the north and east, the bay and islands to the south and the ocean to the west. A great place to see the sunset. If you don't have a car, there is a ropeway that takes you up to the top.

Video will follow, but click on any of the pictures to be taken to a small gallery of photographs of our time in Nagasaki.