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.

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.

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.

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.

My Weekend in Kobe and Kyoto

The Wedding I spent my last weekend without family in Kobe and Kyoto for the wedding of the daughter of the family I lived with as a home-stay student 16 years ago. This was my first trip to Japan. Who knew then it would turn out like this? Anyway, I turned the wedding into a long weekend in some of my favorite areas of Japan.

The wedding was a traditional Shinto wedding, a first for me. There is a part in the wedding where the bride and groom will drink what looked like ritual water poured by the priestesses. Then each member of the wedding party, as a symbol of I guess unity, partakes of the ritual beverage. Now, if you know me, you know that I don't drink alcohol. Let me tell you, that was NOT water I drank. Can I just marvel at how such a small thimble full of sake can generate so much heat in the mouth and throat? Wow.

Geisha / Maiko Oddly enough I had many opportunities to interact with geisha and maiko (who are apprentice geisha). The father of the bride is a patron of a geisha house and has access, which is extremely uncommon. So throughout the weekend we had geisha and maiko attend and perform at the wedding, dinner the next night and at an after-party at a local cabaret. Not to mention I did my fair share of stalking them with my camera on the streets in the districts of town where one can find the geisha houses. I wasn't the only one. There were a lot of tourists, like me, and other fan-boys whose main hobby it is to hang out in these districts to take these girls' picture. Seeing that was almost equally as interesting as the girls themselves.

Here is my take on the whole geisha thing. It's incredibly interesting. These are young teenage girls who choose to move away from home to learn a very traditional way of life. Their access to friends and family is limited. They learn traditional forms of dance, music and singing. They learn a high form of etiquette. To me, I find these girls beautiful in the way I find a statue beautiful. Everything about their appearance is a work of art. It takes them about an hour to get dressed, 30 minutes just to put on the facial make up and their hair takes so long that they only have it done once or twice a week. The clothes they wear costs thousands of dollars. Even their mannerisms and attitude are trained to be mature, docile and agreeable. It's not necessarily who these girls are, it's who they're being made up to be. And they're being made into a work of art. It's a really interesting world. A funny example of this training came at a dinner the night after the wedding. I was sitting next to one maiko at dinner, translating for the group, and she would not eat any of the food until she was invited to do so. I didn't know this and she just sat there until the father of the bride told me to let her eat.

So it was one of those really cool and rare experiences to get so much time interacting with these girls. This isn't a normal thing, even for Japanese...many of whom have never seen one in person let alone talked to one.

Akashi Kaikyo Bridge Ask my wife, and she'll tell you that I'm a sucker for heights and panoramic views. So, I decided that I would take a tour of the world's largest and tallest suspension bridge. It may not sound interesting, but the climax of the tour was an elevator ride up to the top of the main gate, 300m above the 4km long bridge. You emerge from the elevator and you're outside with nothing but a chest high wall keeping you safe. You have unobstructed views of the world around and below. For my metrically challenged friends of the U.S. (I used to be one of them!), 300 meters is about To give you perspective on the height of 300 meters, for my metrically challenged friends that's just under 1000 feet, or about 90 - 100 story building.

Kyoto Other highlights of the weekend included the trip to my favorite shrine in all of Japan, Fushimi Inari Shrine. This is a mountain shrine that has many kilometers of steep pathways up and down the mountains that are enclosed by giant red torii gates packed in one after the other. These are gates that are purchased by companies and donated to the shrine as an offering for prosperity for that particular company. There our thousands of these gates of all sizes lined up one after the other.

Bamboo forests, river cruises, zen rock gardens. It was a very traditional Japanese tourist weekend and I loved it. I was only sad that I couldn't have shared it with the family.

So, definitely check out the pictures by clicking on any of the photos in this post. I took hundreds of pictures, but I picked the best ones and put them into one gallery. There are some really cool shots of the maiko as well as some panoramic shots from on top of the bridge. Definitely check out the video below.

Rockabilly dancing in Harajuku

Nothing says manly like a bunch of dudes dancing in the street in a circle, playing air guitar and flaring the collar on their leather jackets. This is the image created by the rockabilly scene here in Harajuku. While it's just another sign for what makes Tokyo so unique, I do have to give these guys credit for the really brash display of public alcohol consumption and greased up hair-do's. It's been a revival of sorts. Word is these guys and gals dressed up in Grease-style 50's era leather jackets and poodle skirts and danced through the better part of the 80's and 90's before the goth-enthused Harajuku girls stole the limelight. Now it looks like the Rockabilly is making a comeback.

There are multiple rockabilly clubs that meet in Harajuku on Sundays and they all have their own audio equipment that they blast for public consumption. And it wouldn't be Japan without there being some sort of hierarchical structure in place for the club - not everyone can be as outgoing and with their dancing moves. Some people are relegated to play air bass and others are more "back up dancers."

There seems to be enough room for the greaser-rockabilly man and the goth-Harajuku girl, though. That's good to see. You'd hate there to be acrimony between Fonzi and Little Bo Peep. Speaking of the Harajuku girls, there was one who looked like a kind of Strawberry Shortcake doll, who seemed to like posing for people.

Click on the picture to go to a small gallery of shots. Or watch the youtube video I shot below.

Fresh Fish

I went to dinner with some coworkers last night. We ordered a plate of sashimi and on the plate was a fish that had seconds before been alive and well, but who now sat on our plate skinned and carved up into sashimi. We were told not to put our finger in the fish's mouth, because it was still "alive". Low and behold the fish kept opening and closing his mouth, and would even constrict its head and tail if we touched it. Talk about fresh fish!

There's something awkward about looking at a fish who seems alive, and who's being used as a platter on which is served carefully slices of his own meat. I think to myself that I'm sure glad that's not me. But he was delicious.

Japanese Honesty...

I got the following email from someone in our office - it shows just how honest the Japanese people can be.

Did you forget to pick up 50yen from vending machine? We found 50 yen in vending machine in the lounge this afternoon. Please contact office services if you forgot to pick up 50yen. Thank you.

50 yen is the equivalent of 50 cents. Someone took the time to find the 50 yen, walk it up a flight of stairs to our office services team, who then had someone craft an email that went to over 100 associates in the entire office. That's a lot of work for 50 yen.

On a related note, vending machine drinks used to be free in our office, but with major cost cutting in effect that subsidy has been lifted. I can see how there could be vending machine mishaps. It just so happened that I lost a 500 yen coin ($5) trying to fish out my 50 yen for a drink. And as luck would have it, the 500 yen coin popped out of my wallet, rolled across the room and stopped underneath the same vending machine. I've tried for the past few days to get it and I can't. Nothing reaches.

I know what you're thinking, and no, I didn't try to claim the 50 yen as mine to recoup my losses!

Spooning on trains

There have been two instances in the last month where the subway I've traveled on is so crowded and so many people feel it necessary to pack themselves into this train that I've literally felt like I've spooned or been spooned by two other passengers. With one, at least I could swing my work bag to give me some space. You know, for those of you who have attended an LDS dance and had to be "Book of Mormon" distance from your dance partner. The other time, however, no such luck. And when you're packed in there like that, there's no concentrating on your book - there's hardly room to lift your hands to read it!

All I can say is that I'm glad I'm not in any other city in the world...because there would certainly be more violence on the trains. Can you imagine people in New York packed into trains like this? There would be civil unrest. I guess Japan's not all sunshine and puppy dogs when it comes to their packed trains. Japan suffers from serial gropers - people who take advantage of the tight quarters to cop feels of other unsuspecting passengers. Groping has become such a problem that most trains now set aside one train car solely for women during the morning commute. I've not seen these train cars, but I imagine there's tea, soft music and pedicures between each stop. And how are us guys treated? Well, we're in the rest of the train cars forced to spoon one another on busy days. But I guess in the grand scheme of things, I would rather be spooned than groped.

Why I run for trains

They joke in Los Angeles that the one benefit of a recession is that it reduces traffic. I wish that were the case here in Tokyo as well...but it's not.

The train station nearest my house is the terminus for the Chiyoda subway line - a busy subway line that runs through most business districts in the city. It's also the transfer point for the Odakyu train line, that connects Tokyo's western suburbs to the city. During rush hour these lines, and this station in particular, serve as a major transportation artery.

Consequently, the tiny station is always packed with people. The Odakyu train will come and go at least twice, dumping off its transferring passengers, before an empty Chiyoda subway train arrives.

This subway platform is more than 200 meters long. There are 10 cars per subway. Each car has 4 doors. Standing before each door are three rows of people about 12 deep. That's 144 people per car, or 1,440 per train. Standing next to the three orderly lines in front of each subway car door is ANOTHER three lines of passengers some waiting for the next train, some waiting to make the existing 1,440 existing passengers pack in line sardines. That means at any one time on the platform, there are over close to 3,000 people waiting for a train. Let's say every 10 minutes for two hours this station turns over close to 40,000 travelers. And we're talking about a relatively small station. Can you see what I'm getting at? This place is crowded.


That's why I run. I used to make fun of those businessmen who would burst into a full sprint as they got closer to the train. Oh, how I mocked what I didn't understand! They weren't running to catch a train, they were running to beat another trains' passengers in line! That's exactly what I'm doing. As soon as I hit the train station, I'm using my long legs to propel myself up two flights of stairs, briskly walking through the turnstiles and up another flight of stairs to the platform. If I hear an Odakyu train coming with thousands of other passengers that want my place in line, then I'm running hard and I'm not afraid to push people out of the way. The result is that I'm WAY out of breath and sound like a panting dog by the time I finally get in line. If I can beat the other train's passengers, then I usually can either find a seat or at least stand in a place where I'm protected from the crowds. But if I can't, then it's like being packed in a can of sardines. But more on that in another post.

Pet parents strike again

Tokyo is the land of pet parents - people who treat their pets less like animals and more like their own offspring. Meet Leon the dog. We saw Leon this weekend being held by his pet parent. Leon was sporting pretty cool goggles to shade his eyes, because we all know dogs hate the sunlight.

Leon's owner told me somewhat defensively that the glasses were from the States - as if to tell me 'back off American, these are from YOUR country.' I was then informed that Leon has some allergies. Yeah, poor Leon, surrounded all day by pet dander. If true, where is the doggie surgical face mask?

Look it might be entirely plausible that Leon has allergies, but come on, what's with the Lilo & Stitch hoodie? Leon is sooo EMO. This screams raving pet parent trying to make a fashion statement.

Cherry blossoms

It's that wonderful time of year when for 10 days the endless concrete of Tokyo is consumed by these soft pink and white blossoms. Despite their extremely short life, their beauty invigorates a country emerging from a cold winter.

This year, my birthday fell on a Saturday and we joined the many thousands of other like-minded locals along Meguro river. It's an especially urban and narrow canal where clusters of sakura trees line both sides of the river creating a beautiful canopy of cherry blossoms. It's quite the sight to behold.

On a day like this where literally thousands of people were cramming into these small streets to view the sakura, it gave occasion for many photography enthusiasts to get out and practice their craft. Now, I like to make fun of Japanese people because it seems to me that they are in love with standing in lines...any line. If there's a line of people there MUST be a reason that people are standing there - so they'll stand there to find out. That's the stereotype, anyway. Well, Shelley served it right back to me saying that if there was a group of people taking a picture someplace, then I would HAVE to go over to where they were and see what they were taking and take a picture myself. Sometimes the truth hurts.

Anyway, sakura viewing, picture taking, family time, wonderful pizza in the park - all in all a great birthday.

I took a few pictures from that day - click on the picture above to see a small gallery of pictures of the sakura and the family.

My new drivers license

What is it about government issued photo ID's that make you look like anyone and anything but yourself? This looks like a mug shot. In my defense, they purposefully tell you not to smile, but I didn't know I look this unbelievably dorky.

Taking the driving test in Japan is less an exercise in showing off your driving skill, and more about jumping through hoops - like driving as slow as you can go. A 1.2 km course, the test should take a normal person driving on normal streets no more than 2-3 minutes. But in this exercise it takes about 10 minutes. I don't think, but for one stretch where it was mandatory, I got the car above 20 km/hour. In my almost 19 years of driving I don't think I've ever driven that slow. (I'm counting the year I had my permit when I used to take my parents' car out -- sometimes with their blessing, sometimes without. But come on, when you're 15 and your parents let you drive all by yourself once, it's a blanket OK to take it out whenever, right? Right? Anyway, I digress.)

I don't think I've ever driven that slowly. Imagine driving down the road without touching the accelerator and just letting the idling of the car propel you down the road and you're about at how fast I was driving.

When I clipped a curb turning left a bit too sharp, I thought I was a goner. But the examiner must have been in a great mood because he passed me on the first try. And now I finally am driving legally in Japan. My two month stint of joy riding sans license in Tokyo has come to a happier ending than when I was 15 and caught by my parents for taking the car out...and slightly scratching it. But that's another story for another day.

Anthon versus the monkeys

While visiting the historical mountain village of Nikko, we got up close and personal with wild monkeys that were hanging out by the lake. There were three of them, two parents and a baby, and they were getting harassed by onlookers who were jokingly trying to pick fights with the monkeys. Naturally, when the monkeys tried to fight back, the onlookers ran away like sissies.

I was of course filming some of this, hoping to catch something funny - like some dude getting pelted by monkey feces. After a few minutes, Anthon and I retreated back to where the rest of our family was, and we took out some bread and sembei (rice crackers) to eat. One monkey, about 40 yards away, charged towards us, resulting in our quick retreat. He ate our bread and then made a deliberate march towards Anthon, who was holding a sembei. Shelley screamed for Anthon to get rid of the sembei, so being the closest to him, I grabbed it out of Anthon's hands and threw it at the monkey who happily backed off to eat the loot. Anthon wasn't too happy - his sembei was stolen by the monkey. Later, Anthon offered tough words about the next time he came across the monkey - he was going to "kill him by slicing him with his sword"...my little samurai.

Here's a quick little video of the monkeys and the aftermath of their taking Anthon's sembei.



It's interesting to note that the two people that the monkeys proactively stalked and went after were little kids. They vigorously defended themselves (and their young) when adults came too closely, but they made two unprovoked advances on children their own size. I guess the primates take to heart the belief that you should only "pick on someone your own size."

Multiplying and Replenishing Japan

I can't take credit for finding this article and video done by CNN, but I think it's nevertheless funny and insightful.

With a work culture used to 12 hour days (sometimes more), I find it an interesting sociological tidbit that Canon has to forcibly turn off the lights to get people to leave. When I was working in LA, if you were told by the company that you could leave early, you left early...and oftentimes skipped lunch so you could leave even earlier. Here, leaving early, even when the company tells you that it's OK, is not such an easy task. I mean, I'm surprised that turning off the lights was such an easy fix. Some people in my office would need the power cut, the office tear-gassed, and then to be carried away by commandos before they would leave.

Then there's the whole "big brother" aspect of your company telling you to go forth and procreate. It just takes the whole romance out of it when "it" becomes your civic and corporate duty, right?

But I have to hand it to Canon, with work hours as they are, at least they resisted the urge to take a page out of the US prison system by going the conjugal visit route!

It's time for some sumo

Shelley and I recently attended the year's first Grand Sumo Tournament here in Tokyo. I'm sure you caught highlights on SportsCenter, right? On the surface, sumo wrestling looks like a bunch of fat Asian guys in ornate g-strings pushing and slapping each other inside a ring. But it's so much more than that.

Sumo wrestling has deep roots in the Shinto religion, and started literally as a symbolic wrestling match against the kami, or local God of the shrine. Today, every aspect of the sport is embedded in the Shinto religion from the construction of a shinto temple roof over the ring, to the coordinated rituals that are done before and after matches. One interesting one is done by the Grand Champion(s) (called the yokozuna) who enters the ring, and purifies it by driving away evil spirits by doing the big leg stomp. Certainly a site to behold...on a number of levels that I don't think I need to go into.

Sumo wrestling is going through an interesting time. Because while it is quintessentially Japanese, it is being more and more dominated by foreign wrestlers from Polynesia, Mongolia and Eastern Europe. Four of the last six grand champions were foreign born and the many of the top wrestlers are foreigners. How do officials of this very traditional Japanese sport deal with it? They place limitations on the number of foreigners that can participate, of course. But that's beside the point.

The point is, seeing it live is awesome. I'd seen it on TV a number of times, but you don't get a feel for how strong these guys are, and how much real technique there is. While the guiding principles of the sport underscore a need for little emotion, seeing it live you pick up on intense competition and bitter rivalries that percolate underneath the surface. Plus, as one of my friends put it, it's a great opportunity to remind your wife that she should be glad us husbands don't look like that.

We enjoyed ourselves so much so that we're hoping to head back in May when the tournament comes back to Tokyo. Anyone care to join us?

Click on the pictures above to see a small gallery of photos taken from our nose bleed seats. There is also the video below that we shot of a few rituals and matches. Be careful, they contain images of large, scantily clad Asian, Polynesian and Eastern European men pushing each other around. Best not seen within 30 minutes of eating.

Shichi-Go-San

Sometime in mid-November marks the shichi-go-san (7-5-3) festival, or rite of passage, for Japanese children. Girls aged 7 & 3, and boys aged 5 dress up in formal attire, usually kimono, and come to their local shinto shrine to be blessed, by the priest, for a long and healthy life and to drive away evil spirits. This ritual has been around in some form or another for at least 1,000 years.

The family made our way to Meiji Shrine to see all the little kids dressed up and to take some pictures. Plenty of foreigners like us were playing paparazzi and stopping people to take pictures. Whenever I see kids dressed up in kimono like this, I can't help but think they're tiny adults, not kids. They look so grown up. The funny thing is whenever Japanese see western kids dressed in formal wear, like a suit, they think the same thing of us.

A hodge podge of updates

Yokohama Triennial 2008

The family spent the day in Yokohama a while back, and I reaffirmed my belief that me and modern art aren't really that good friends. Every three years the city hosts the Yokohama Triennial, where modern artists from around the world show off their creations. My personal "favorites" include a wall of print outs of emails and newspaper articles talking about "NoMo phobia" or the fear of having no mobile phone. Another had a saddle ridden by a Vietnamese Catholic bishop just lying in the corner with the rental agreement tacked to the wall. Are these artists really trying? Where's the art in all of that? I really don't get it, and at this point don't care if I do. And don't get me started on the short videos. What happened to the whimsical and fantastical side of modern art? Why does everything have to be so dark and cynical? Well, at least I took a cute shot of Ella.

Fall Colors at Shinjuku Gyoen Park

Growing up in Southern California, it's well understood that there are really only two seasons, spring and summer. Winter is really two weeks of Autumn, and anything cold or wet would be treated as massive newsworthy events, not seasons - like when it rains the news is always on "Weather Watch!" for hours. So while I'm not complaining, I am stating as fact that I never knew the simple joy of making a pile of fall leaves and jumping into them. We had a large liquid amber that dropped a lot of pretty leaves, but twice as many of those really prickly balls. If you jumped into a pile of that, you'd come out looking like you'd been a victim of really poorly done acupuncture. So, at a local park Anthon and I gathered up as many leaves as we could, and he had fun jumping into them, as well as picking up arm fulls and throwing them at me.

Setting up the Christmas Tree

And finally, here is the video of our setting up the Christmas tree in mid November. It's a bit long and the video size is a bit big. So have some patience with it while it downloads.

Seeing the lions at Tama Zoo

Our first major excursion with our new car was to the Tama Zoo, a rather large zoo on the outskirts of Tokyo with an impressive array of animal exhibits. Certainly the highlight was the lions. There were probably 10 lions inside a large enclosed area, half male which is odd since I didn't know male lions got along. Inside their habitat are roads upon which a plexiglass encased bus drives visitors around to see the lions. Now to make sure that the visitors get their money's worth, parts of the bus are covered in meat so as to ensure that the lion will attack or lick the side of the bus to wow the guests. If you didn't know any better, you'd think the lion was going to reach in and attack you. We took a short video of us offering Ella up to the lion as a sacrifice in return for the bus' safe passage. As you can see from the second picture, Ella does her best imitation of the lion in attacking Shelley's chin.

The other interesting thing we found at the zoo was the number of people there with high powered telephoto lenses - we're talking professional ones that cost thousands of dollars. Shelley jokingly asked if I would rather have the camera and be left only with enough money to take pictures at the zoo? Or go to Africa and take along my current camera. There are evidently people who choose the former. One such guy shot a lot of the orangutans. He pulled out two magazine editions that featured his work - saying that he had visited this zoo over 150 times in the last year. Wow. People really get into their hobbies here. Even if it means they have to come to the zoo to get their fix of wildlife photography.

For those in Tokyo, Tama Zoo is well worth a visit. There's a huge insectarium with butterflies everywhere. Shelley felt like she was in a princess fairly tale land. Orangutans aren't caged up, but are allowed to swing free through a tall network of cables over the zoo. Lots of cool stuff at the Tama Zoo.

The view from our office and thoughts on bubbles

As seen in the picture above, this is the view from our offices in the Marunouchi district of Tokyo. As I look out, I thought about the current economic mess that resulted from, among other things, the bursting of the real estate bubble in the U.S. My mind turned immediately to the strip of land before me, the Imperial Palace grounds. During Japan's heyday, some valued the 2.1 square miles of Imperial Palace land MORE than the entire real estate available in the state of California.

When put in its proper perspective, as seen in the red-circled land below, it is ridiculous that a strip of land so small could equal the value of land in a state that has the 7th largest economy in the world. But that's what people were saying. This underscores how easily asset bubbles can quickly get out of hand when investors form irrationally lofty expectations and greed clouds the better judgment of otherwise smart people. It makes me think that it might take some time for the global economy to be able to unwind and regroup from the mess that we're currently in.



Now that we're hitting winter time, the air is a lot more crisp and clear, which allows us to have these splendid views from our 33rd floor reception area. The jewel of our view, however, is Mt. Fuji, which can be seen off in the distance only on clear days, and usually then only in the morning.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

So, it's the middle of November and around Tokyo we're starting to see a lot of Christmas decorations. At least in the United States Thanksgiving is a significant enough holiday that people have to focus on it before they can start to digest Christmas. But not in Japan. As soon as Halloween was over the retail shops went into full Christmas mode. Christmas trees, lights, decorations...the works. And there's the unique Japanese spin to it all...I mean what do Godzilla and Christmas trees have in common? If you know, enlighten me.

It's a little disconcerting to see that a country whose population is 99% Buddhist/Shinto has been so taken in by the consumer aspects of the holiday and not the true meaning behind why Christians celebrate Christmas. Truly, this is a holiday that has been hijacked by retail marketers. The story goes that Kentucky Fried Chicken, back when they were new to the country, spent a load of money promoting fried chicken as THE Christmas meal. According to NPR this is one of its biggest money making months of the year. Et tu, Colonel?

So in that vein I'd like to say that the Cannons have joined the masses in starting to celebrate Christmas. Though we would like to retain our rights to make this a more meaningful holiday season. At Anthon's urging, we put the Christmas tree went up on Sunday. Since Halloween Anthon has been talking about it nonstop. Anthon has spent a lot of time staring at the tree and playing with his favorite ornaments that are at his eye level - a squishy santa and a tin nutcrakcer. He even discourages turning on other lights in the room so as to not take away from the tree's sparkly lights. Shelley and I can tell that this is going to be a very fun Christmas season with our extremely excited boy.

Sleeping on Trains

Allow me to paint with broad cultural strokes - the Japanese, especially those in Tokyo, are world class sleepers. This isn't to say they get a lot of sleep, quite the contrary. I believe many in Tokyo suffer from a chronic lack of sleep. But when opportunities for sleep arise, the speed at which people fall asleep is impressive. It's as if there is a latent genetic narcolepsy that takes hold across society at the opportune times. There is no better example of this than on Tokyo's trains. Long work hours and insufferable commute times make trains a fertile ground for sleeping.

You may be thinking that I should leave these people alone. But sleeping on trains is not a victimless crime, mind you. Many sleepers are looking for places to rest their weary heads, and that usually means encroaching upon the space of the person sitting next to them. It's at those times when you have to develop a quick response elbow to keep people from resting their head on your shoulders - something that's happened many a time. A quick jab to the ribs, however, is only a temporary solution as most train sleepers will fall right back to their sleepy ways within moments.



As you can see from the guy above, others sleep on trains because they introduce immense levels of alcohol into their system and it causes them to lose their sense of Japaneseness. This guy uses his man purse as a pillow. He stretches out across four seats and even keeps his shoes on! I've never seen such a brazen display. I have seen, and come to expect, this from mass transit in the U.S. **cough** LA's Metro Gold Line **cough**, not Japan.

Other train sleepers are more advanced - they have mastered the art of sleeping while standing. They jam themselves into a corner of the train and sleep, or they use handlebars as make shift pillows. Some brave souls just stand like cows and let the crowded trains be their protection against the buffeting from the train. Still

The worst of all train sleepers are the fake train sleepers. These are people who fake being asleep so they don't have to give up their seat to the elderly, pregnant or disabled - usually in areas of the train designated for such people. You see them everyone once in a while peeking out to see if the coast is clear.

There a whole host of varieties of sleepers, including the massive snorers. For a non train sleeper like me, this brings nonstop amusement.

Camping at Lake Kizakiko and Matsumoto Castle

Fall is here in Japan and a few weeks ago we escaped into the mountains with some friends to do some camping. Here are a few thoughts:

Not only were we getting out of the city, but we were doing it by car that were actually driving. This was the first time in my four plus years of living in Japan that I've driven. And for all my attempts to play it cool, I turned on my headlights by turning on the back windshield wipers, and signaled my intention to turn left by flipping on the front windshield wipers. The Californian-Car-Dependence gene inside me kicked in and became more and more convinced we needed a car.

I remember when I would camp as a Boy Scout and I could carry on my back everything I needed for a week's worth of camping in the High Sierras. But on this trip we filled the car full of odds and ends from hot plates and sauce pans to coolers full of food and pillows.

Japan is an incredibly beautiful country when you're actually in nature and for as densely populated as Tokyo can be, rural areas can be equally as remote. It was a great time to photograph nature.

I think Anthon found his first camp girlfriend, a daughter of a family we just met. He sat next to this girl who's his age and she reached across the camp chair and was tickling his knee. For about a minute they stared at each other giggling. It was really cute. The whole rest of the day they couldn't be separated playing hide and seek, building airplanes with logs and just being the best of friends.

Bonfires, hiking, fire-jumping and even a quick trip to Matsumoto Castle - the second time in two weeks for me - were also highlights of the trip. Click on the pictures above for more pictures, or on the picture below to see a short video.

A cure for Japan's bad demographics

While Japan is a crowded place to live, it will only getting less and and less crowded. Japan's population is shrinking, and has been getting smaller since 2007 when births fell below deaths for the first time. If things don't change, Japan's population could halve by the end of this century...a pretty amazing event with severe economic implications.

While Japan still remains the second largest economy in the world, it is still recovering from its late 1980's economic bubble. And demographics as they are, it may continue to muddle along without a fresh injection of labor. With low birth rates, it certainly won't be home grown. Immigration is another route, but Japan is not a very immigrant friendly country. As technologically advanced as Japan is, you'd think that greater automation and perhaps even the use or robots would be the solution. But I never thought in a million years that the Japanese would turn to monkeys to help solve labor shortage. See the video below of my new favorite restaurant.


I want to go there. Who's coming with me? If anyone knows where this restaurant is, please let me know because I want to take my family there and let my son freak out over the monkey bringing him a hot towel and orange juice.

Blind runners

Japan is a nation of runners. If you're up early and head to Yoyogi Park, one of the major parks in Tokyo, the pathways will be filled with runners getting in their morning exercise before work.

On the weekends you'll see a large group of blind runners descend upon the park and take to the paths. There usually is a large collection of seeing eye dogs lounging together as their owners get their exercise. These runners partner with someone who can see and run in rhythm thanks to a tether that both runners hold. This not only guides the runner down a safe path, but ensures both runners maintain the same pace.

I've been critical of what I sense as being a lack of charitable spirit in Tokyo. But this is a great example of a grassroots effort to meet the needs of a small population in need. What a selfless and efficient way to help someone with a disability to more fully enjoy his or her life, while at the same getting exercise you would probably get anyway.

To that end, Shelley and I are in the midst of looking for a cause or organization to get involved with - something that we could do as a family. For my Tokyo readers/friends - any ideas, suggestions, recommendations?

It's Matsuri Time

We recently celebrated the fall festival, or matsuri, in our neighborhood. This festival, and many others, are an interesting expression of ancient agrarian Japanese culture rooted in the planting and harvesting of rice. Not unlike most religions and cults, the rice is harvested and sacrificed/offered to the God of the field (or perhaps shrine), so as to ensure continued prosperity. This matsuri, celebrated on the autumnal equinox, has evolved into its modern and urban equivalent - neighborhood leaders and businesses sponsoring rituals for the continued prosperity of their businesses and neighborhood.

Each neighborhood sponsors a mikoshi, which looks like an arc from the Old Testament, and houses the Kami (God-like spirit of Shinto religion) of the neighborhood. Men and women get wildly inebriated and carry this mikoshi around the neighborhood, chanting and drinking along the way, for the prosperity, health and well being of those in the neighborhood. The day’s events culminate in a large gathering of people at the Shinto shrine where there are booths set up for games and food. People will then pay their respects to the Kami (God) of the shrine and make offerings, usually of money.

Shelley grew up in Indiana, in a town very much tied to agriculture, and they too had a huge fall festival to, I presume, celebrate the harvest. While the fall festival in Shelley's home town boasts culinary delights such as deep fried twinkies, frog legs and alligator jerky, the festival food in Japan is not far behind -- chicken skewers, fried chicken, breaded balls of octopus, fire roasted whole fish, Japanese style pancakes, candy, shave ice and chocolate dipped bananas. There are lots of games too, including a game to catch goldfish. Anthon came home with four. A week later we had killed them all. One jumped out of the bowl and dried out over night - we've ruled it suicide. The other three, who were named Nemo, Nemo’s Father and Dori have all gone to “heavenly father” as Anthon put it. I think we starved two of them. The last one may have starved but seemed a bit too stupid to eat. He kept getting close to the fish food, but couldn’t ever get it in his mouth. Anthon, ever the optimist, has asked to go back to the festival for more fish. Shelley may need some convincing.

In the morning there was a child’s mikoshi and drum procession - each child was invited to participate. Run by older community leaders, it was a nice way to transmit important parts of the Japanese culture and history in a fun way to children. We thought Anthon would enjoy it…we thought wrong. We couldn’t get him out of the stroller. He rebounded and at least took some pictures in his matsuri get-up.

Festivals are a great time. Even though Japanese modern society has evolved from its agrarian roots, people still celebrate the spirit of the festival - being grateful for their well being, health, etc.

I’ve uploaded some pictures (as seen above) and a short video of our day (as seen below).

6 Hours of Trains, 1 Hour of Work, 30 Minutes of Sightseeing

I’ve been traveling more for work, which is actually VERY nice. I love getting out and meeting the people who sell our mutual funds and to hear what they're going through. I’ve been heading into more rural areas lately as well. Last week, I went to a town called Matsumoto, home to a 400 year old feudal castle - one of the most famous in Japan because it is the original structure. Matsumoto is a 3 hour train ride from Tokyo. We had a few minutes before our meeting so my colleague and I played tourist.

This is the kind of town where foreigners aren't aplenty if you catch my drift. In Tokyo, as odd as it may seem, I can actually blend in quite a bit. But in towns like Matsumoto foreigners are either English teachers, tourists, or Mormon missionaries. And in the course of our brief visit, we actually ran into all three. With my colleague by my side as we walked around in our dark suits, ties and white shirts, carrying heavy bags, I felt like we were missionaries. But instead of talking about religion, we were preaching to our audience (financial advisors), "Invest for the long-term, be patient, don't panic!" Unfortunately, as it was when I was a missionary, our words seem to fall on deaf ears.

As an aside, I was a missionary in a similar town to Matsumoto with a similarly old castle. Behind each castle is usually a large park. We would regularly come to the park and throw around a Frisbee as a way to meet people. We would throw it to each other for a few minutes and then pick someone to talk to and throw the Frisbee "inadvertently" in their direction and strike up a conversation. This usually was an effective way of getting people to interact with us, but not as effective once we switched gears to introduce the Mormon church.

Anyway, I digress. Seeing the castle made me really happy. I mean, it’s not everyday you sightsee during your work day, right? And yes we did actually do work. After our our of work we had to run as fast as we could back to the train station to catch the three hour train ride home. The tally for the day? 6 hour train ride, 1 hour presentation, 30 minute tourism. Not bad.

And for those interested in Los Angeles, on the way home, our train took us through Chino. I mean, I knew Chino was in the 909, but I didn’t know it was THAT far away from civilization.

When in Japan, work as the Japanese

The Japanese language can be a psychologically humbling language - and not for the obvious reason of it being a difficult language to learn. There is a forced humility in the certain words and phrases that one uses.

Case in point, I leave for home each day around 7:30 PM. As I pack up and walk towards the door, I say, "saki ni shitsurei-shimasu" or translated literally, "please excuse my rudeness for leaving before you." Everyone that is still there replies, "o-tsukaresama deshita" or "you were a hard worker." It's not as awkward as it sounds, it's just a cultural norm replaces saying goodbye or goodnight.

But the fact that they don't simply say goodbye and goodnight in and of itself is telling. Japan as a society values working late, which value has been ingrained into millions of workers. It's not just about getting work done, but it's also about 'doing the time.'

And while I'm of the first to get to work, there aren't any accolades that come to those who come early...just those who stay late it seems. Only the last one home avoids having to apologze for leaving before the others.

I tried to work my hours, early in - early out, but when I would leave for the night the cynic in me hears a more sarcastic reply of coworkers who are stuck having to work, and in their minds are saying "o-tsukaresama deshita...NOT!" Because of that vibe that may or may not be there I changed slightly my hours - not working any more or less, but being there later. We'll see how it goes.

Weezer and my first rock concert in Japan

I first heard of Weezer in 1993 when I was a freshman at the University of Utah. My friend at the time told us a story of the girl he was dating at the time and how while they were making out one night she had a bad asthma attack and she had to be rushed home and hooked up to a big breathing machine. On the way home because of the constricted airways into her lungs she was wheezing quite a bit. She was henceforth called, you guessed it, Weezer. It wasn't until a few years later that I actually knew Weezer for their music.

I had the chance to see Weezer play at a venue two train stops away, or literally a brisk 20 minute walk, from our apartment. I mean, you have to go right? I have to agree with my wife when she says that she is the best wife a guy could have. She not only told me about the concert, but she stayed home with the kids allowing me the chance to see Weezer, whose music I've re-discovered of late with their new album. I bought tickets blindly on an online Japanese auction site, below face value, and I ended up with 12th row seats on the floor. Being head and shoulders taller than everyone in front of me I had an unobstructed view to Weezer...or said differently, Weezer had an unobstructed view of my head.



Concerts in Japan have some interesting differences to concerts in the States. Namely, when a concert is said to start at 6:00 PM, the concert begins promptly at 6:00 PM. There's none of this starting late BS. When a song ends, people cheer, sometimes loudly, but then the crowd of 20k+ gets really quiet. It's almost an invitation for loud Americans to shout something...which happened quite often...but only sometimes by me. And finally, when the concert was over, thousands of Japanese sat there until their section was excused by the faceless PA guy. I kid you not. It was reminiscent of church in my youth when our teacher would only excuse the rows of kids who were quiet and behaving well. No way this flies in the U.S. I of course didn't notice most people sitting until I was well on my way out the door. Come on, I'm from Los Angeles. Weezer is lucky I didn't leave before the encore was over to beat the rush! :)

Both opening acts were local Japanese rocks bands. One of the bands had a guy who seemed to be a J-Rock version of Flava Flav. His job was to sometimes play the electric piano, the kind you sling over your shoulder that looks like a guitar...remember those? And clearly his bandmates were humoring him because he only got to play every third song or so. During the rest of the set, the guy did a lot of fist pumping, a fair amount of mini-trampoline jumping and even tore off his white t-shirt to a less than excited crowd. If this band were the TV show Survivor, shirtless-wonder would be the nice old lady who had fought cancer but was a total liability to her team on any of the physical challenges. He was that guy. Except this time, his cancer zapped him of any and all musical ability.



Knowing I would have only slight interest in the warm up bands, I brought along my Blackberry and let my corporate side mingle with my anti-establishment alt rock side. I was engrossed in some great Washington Post articles about the Lehman bankruptcy, Merrill acquisition and the domestic surveillance controversy. I highly recommend checking them out - even if you're not waiting for Weezer to come on stage.

So, finally to the main event, Weezer. They do something pretty cool before their concert - called a Hootenany. The band gets together with some fans who play a wide variety of instruments and jam on some of Weezer's songs. Even the shirtless / talentless guy was part of the group, fist-pumping to Island in the Sun. All in all, Weezer rocked. They played 20+ songs in their set, even did a cover of Radiohead's Creep. Astonishingly, Rivers Cuomo, the lead singer, spoke most of the night in basic but quite good Japanese. Good energy, sound was good. They rocked. Fun night.

Here's a bootleg video I shot of the concert.

Company Softball

The Tokyo office of the company that I work for takes softball VERY seriously. Every summer we field a team that enters into a local corporate league...and they've won the tournament two of the last four years.

When I think of corporate softball leagues, I think of sweaty fat dudes in their shorts and ratty t-shirts running around and having a beer in between innings. It seems like it's a casual, family affair. It's way different here. The first thing I noticed was that we have uniforms, and hats, made especially for our softball team, with our corporate initials on them. We look like the Yankess. I don't have one, mostly because I probably couldn't fit into one. Nevertheless, I did my best to fill the sweaty, ratty casual stereotype of an American softballer! Another difference is how formal everything was - opening / closing ceremonies, speeches from municipal leaders, real umpires, etc. I was waiting for someone to present the national colors of Japan, someone to sing their anthem and a ceremonial first pitch. No luck.

In my quest to bring more closely together my family life and my work life, I brought Shelley and the kids to the game. Though it was an extremely cloudy day, it was about as chockingly humid and stuffy as it has been all summer. I broke into a good sweat just standing around and thinking about playing softball. On top of that, we all came away with a really good sunburn - even Ella. She looked like a cute cherry tomato. But my family were big time troopers. Nothing screams fun like going to watch someone else play softball.

But having my family there was the best part of playing softball...not the actual physical activity or comraderie with my coworkers. Hearing the cheers from my son is seriously one of the best feelings in the world. Even for a few minutes, I was his hero. From the moment I ran out to center field I could hear Anthon yell, "Good luck Dad!" If I caught a fly ball, get on base or score a run I could hear him cheering for me. Now, all good things come to an end and after a few innings he was off chasing other kids and playing ball. But it was fantastic while it lasted.

Thankfully for Shelley, all of the cheers and congratulations one gives in baseball is just a Japanized version of what you would say in English. Nice catch is "naisu-kachu", one out is "wan owto" and so on. Shelley said it was the most Japanese she had understood since moving here.

My goals for the game were to: 1) not embarrass myself; and 2) not be a hindrance to the team. My first at bat was reminiscent of the scene in the movie Major League when Willy Mays Hayes strides up to the plate, swings hard and knocks the ball maybe three feet down the third base side. When he legs out a single the first basemen says, "Boy, you really knocked the crap out of that one." That's what it felt like to me too. To my credit, I ran hard and legged out a single. I think people were so surprised that someone who swung that hard could have such a piddly result. My next at bat, I hit the ball pretty far into left field, but got caught stretching a double into a triple. I was greedy and couldn't slide underneath the tag and didn't want feel it right to plow into the third baseman. Despite that, I think my goals were achieved. I caught a few balls in center, drove in a few runs, scored a few times and in the end we won the tournament, third time in five years.

Harajuku: Pink Eye

I took this shot right before leaving for the States this summer and I've been sitting on it. As you can see, this girl whom I saw in Harajuku, is wearing pink color eye contacts...not a strange occurence in Harajuku. She was posing for a local magazine that highlights the fashion and trends of the Harajuku style. So like the hack that I am I stood behind the photographer (as did a few others) and snapped a few pictures.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

An Ode to Rachel

Before coming home to LA, we had Shelley's youngest sister Rachel out for a month-long visit. She just graduated from high school and sacrificed some of her last summer at home with friends to be with us. To say we were ecstatic to have her here for a month is an understatement.

Anthon of course glommed onto Rachel, claiming her as his and referring to her as, "my Rachel". He'd say, "I need my Rachel" and "Where is my Rachel?"

As you can see from the pictures below and in the corresponding gallery of Rachel-centric pictures, we kept busy while she was here. We tested her food limits - she even tried sushi - and took her all around the Tokyo area. She got up close and personal with the local women, though we couldn't quite get her to buy a cosplay outfit (like the one below) to wear on the plane home. And, like Shelley, fell for the wiley charms and sugary lips of the Buddah.

Thanks for coming all the way out to see us, Rachel. Good luck at the Y.

More Harajuku Girls...

Sundays mean church, family time and trips to Harajuku. I would have gone the last two weeks, but it's been raining. So I had to stay at home. This was Anthon and Rachel's first trip here and I think it's safe to say that Anthon wasn't too impressed. The people giving out "free hugs" were a bit too forward. They would rush after him in their make up, piercings and goth outfits. If I were his size I would freak out too. Fundamentally, Anthon hates strangers touching him...especially his face (inherited from his mother)and so the thought of getting "free hugs" pushed him over the edge and was a bit overwhelming. One of the girls in a pink little-bo-peep outfit, was actually quite gentle and nice to him...but unfortunately Anthon hadn't warmed up to the scene quite yet.

We showed up a bit late, so I think the crowds of "locals" had died down. But the girl you see in the upper left was by far the most interesting. Dread locks, bandages, tattoos yet striking features. Part of what fascinates me is thinking about what these people do in their Monday - Friday lives. I mean, the girl obviously is wearing a wig and what does she do when the bandages come off, where does she work and do her coworkers know she looks like this on Sundays? Not that it matters, but it's interesting to see how people in Japan express their individuality.

Click on any of the pictures in this post and you'll see a few more photos from the gallery of shots taken that day.

Daytrip to Nikko

While the town of Nikko houses some of Japan's most well known cultural artifacts, it in many ways is the antithesis of Japan and parts of Japanese culture. Nikko is nestled in a rural part of Japan 90 miles north of Tokyo. Nikko is cool and crisp to Tokyo's hot and muggy. Nikko looks like an alpine village to Tokyo's concrete jungles. Tokyo is modern while Nikko is steeped in cultural tradition. Nikko is home to a spectucular array of colorful temples and shrines that one would argue are a better in China than in Japan. It's one of my favorites places in the area.

Nikko was founded more than 1200 years ago, but didn't become a draw until after one of Japan's most famous rulers - Tokugawa Ieyasu - commissioned a shrine and his final resting place as a legacy to his rule. If you've read the book Shogun, it's based on this guy. He is credited for unifying Japan's feudal Lords under one regime with the samurai class at the top of the food chain. His rule sparked more than 200 years of Tokugawa rule that was eventually toppled in the Meiji Restoration, which restored the Emporer as sovereign of Japan.



When you come upon Nikko you first pass over Shinkyo Bridge, which spans a small river. Before modern roads, this was the only "legal" way one could cross the river to the shrines. Only samurai, other top government officials and religious leaders were allowed to cross the bridge and enter the holy shrines and temples of Nikko.

It's quite a breathtaking site for a few reasons - one it's sheer beauty, and two the elevation. Not only are you in the mountains, but there is a fair amount of step climbing that's done throughout the course of the day. Ella was so overwhelmed in her Baby Bjorn that she promptly pooped all over me. That felt nice. Anthon did an admiral job considering he wasn't interested in one thing we saw. He was interested in throwing rocks, touching important artifacts that you're not supposed to touch and wandering in directions we as a group weren't intending to go.

But as far as highlights go, you have to see the see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil monkeys (Anthon does his impression in the picture gallery). There's the carving of an elephant done by someone who had never seen an elephant before. You have to try yuba in soba noodles, which is the skim of tofu in warm noodle soup. Go into the Futarasan Shrine (circa 800 AD), and try throwing rocks onto the lower bar of the torii gate (for good luck!) and drink from the sacred spring water for longevity. Listen to the dragon cry at Yakushido Hall. See the hundreds of stone lanterns covered in moss. Though we didn't have time, definitely go up to Lake Chuzenji and Kegon Falls.

We did this in one day, and each of my now five times I've done one-day trips. But this would be an easy overnight trip, especially if you're going to do some hiking and spend time at an onse (natural hot spring).

Harajuku: Peacock Feathers

This girl is really fascinating to me. She is obviously really into the Harajuku goth/moulin rouge dress up scene and she is Japanese, but she has these really pretty green/gray eyes...much lighter than the typical. She wasn't too interested in posing for anyone. She was sitting around a larger photography crew and was turning slightly away from us amateur hacks...but only slightly.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Hakone - Part 2: Eating Black Sulfur Eggs

Hakone was the gateway into the Edo (now Tokyo) during the Shogun rule. A road linking Edo and Kyoto (the old Capital of Japan), called the Tokaido road, was a primitive version of the interstate. A check point was set up here in Hakone to filter who came into Edo.

Hakone is mountainous. It's an extremely volcanic area, which is why there are so many hot springs here. Our course for the morning was to see Lake Ashiko where a Shinto torii gate seemingly floats in the water. Then we take a pirate boat (doesn't quite blend into the scenery) to a ropeway (gondola) that takes us up to where they mine the sulfur. Here at the mountain tops you can do some hiking up to where they actually boil eggs into the sulfur hot springs. It's quite an operation. There's pulley system that transports many loads of white eggs to the top of the mountain where they place them into the sulfur hot springs. The eggs then turn black cooking in the sulfur. They sell a half dozen for 500 yen and then ship down the valley via the pulley system the remaining black eggs.

The eggs certainly don't look appetizing, especially if you're not a big lover of the hard boiled eggs. But I guess for novelty's sake you have to try them just to say you've eaten a sulfur egg. Plus there's a sign that says if you eat one of these eggs, you tack on 7 years to your life. Hmm. Once you crack them open they don't taste any different, but they sure are hot! Anthon, not the best eater in the world, downed a full egg all by himself. Maybe we need to start cooking things in sulfur now.

The funniest part, and probably the greatest proof point that Ella has an immature father, was getting Ella to suck on the sulfur egg. She won't take a bottle, and she won't take a binky. Yet she'll take a sulfur egg. At least she's a good eater otherwise.

It's an interesting environment because you can smell the sulfur, which has a rotten egg quality. And as you're hiking around you see plums of steam rising up everywhere from the hot springs. It's almost like you're in a wildfire without the fire.



I think if I were to do this again, I would include in our trip an overnight stay with a trip to the Open Air Museum with a large collection of paintings and a huge sculpture garden. Further, I think a trip to the Gyoza Center (potstickers / dumplings) is in order.

Lastly, here is a video of our black sulfur egg eating exploits.

Harajuku: Little Bo Peep

I found this girl hanging out with the "Free Hugs" people - a group of people who do just that, stand around offering to give free hugs to people. She was quiet and shy, but nice enough to pose for a picture. Check the main website for pictures of this girl. She's in full pink Little Bo Peep regalia. No pink sheep following her around, however.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Hakone - Part 1: Bathing in Coffee, Tea, Wine, Sake and Rose Petals

Japan is a country that loves its natural hot springs. It being a volcanic island - you'll find hot springs EVERYWHERE. In college in Utah, I did a fair amount of hiking and when we would happen upon a natural hot spring it would usually be inhabited by a few naked hippies. So we moved on. And when I was a missionary in Japan, we were not allowed to enter into the hot springs...so I am a relative late-comer to the hot spring (called onsen in Japanese) party.

Hakone is a resort town close to Mt. Fuji, two plus hours south and west of Tokyo. And there are tons of onsen in the region. Onsen are typically segregated into mens baths and womens baths. You strip down, shower off and then soak in the various pools they have. Being onsen newbies we felt a conservative approach was in order here! So we elected to try the family onsen, where everyone was in bathing suits. Think Raging Waters but for hot tubs. It was awesome.

There are seemingly dozens of different kinds of pools you can get into. One outdoor pools has a water slide and a waterfall. An indoor pool is shallow and has balls and toys that kids can throw and play with. One was a salt pool where you could float. Then they get to be a bit more outrageous. One pool is bright pink and has tons of flower petals floating around and smells like a rose garden. Still other pools have coffee in it, or wine, or green tea, or Japanese sake, or charcoal...or my personal favorite fish...yes, those fish that will come up to your legs and feet and eat away the dead skin. That pool was aptly named Dr. Fish and was the most popular pool by far. It was gimmicky, but it was fun. We found ourselves hopping from one pool to the next. Anthon got into it. Ella even got into it. She was so calm and relaxed wading around in our arms in these various pools.

The funniest part was in the wine pool. Three times a day an onsen worker trots out with a huge bottle of wine and like a rock concert the crowd (in their swimsuits) starts crowding the man. Kids were crying, wine was flowing everywhere. We threw our hands in there to get our hands on the wine and upon having some poured into our hands we just looked at it and thought, "Ok, we're not going to drink it...now what?" If you're familiar with the Mormon religion, then by now you're catching on to the irony of the situation - we don't drink coffee, tea, or alcohol, yet we're soaking in it. I think that increased the novelty of it for us. They say it helps to soften the skin. But the only difference in my skin was that it smelled like coffee after the coffee pool, wine after the wine pool and so on. This leads me to the question, can one get drunk via osmosis? :)

Ok, so I'm a full fledged convert and love this place, Yunessun. I'm already thinking about when we can come back.

If you haven't seen it already, Shelley posted about our trip to Hakone as well. Click any of the pictures or this link to see more pictures from Yunessun Hot Springs.

Daytrip to Odaiba

Before jumping into this post, first some background. a few months ago, Anthon choked on a chocolate covered ice cream bon bon. The babysitter knew the Heimlich maneuvre and got him to cough it up...thankfully. Anthon's love for this babysitter has reached saint-like status. Every Sunday at church Anthon, without fail, will go up to her and say something along the lines of, "I was chocking and you saved my life." It's really cute.

Anthon had another brush with danger this weekend at Odaiba - a beach and resort area in the Tokyo Bay. He was stripped down to his diaper, throwing rocks, shells and wet sand into the water, while walking among dead jellyfish and sand crabs. As he walked into the water to wash himself off, he went in a bit too far, lost his footing and tumbled into deeper water. Had he realized it, he could have stood up and been fine, but the water kept him off balance and he struggled to keep his head above water. We were right there and it took a second for both my and Shelley's brain to register that what we were seeing was our boy drowning. He was no more than a few feet from me so I walked into the water and pulled him out. So now at home Anthon will come up to me from time to time and say, "I couldn't get out of the water and Dad saved my life!"

So if Anthon were a cat, 2 of his 9 lives would be gone by the time he's 3 years old. Here's a video.





I've done this once before with my Dog, Lexie. She was hounding my little niece who was walking with a plate of french bread outside. One piece fell off and the dog choked on the french bread. One of you (not naming names or anything) mocked my dog for not knowing how to chew. But I did the doggie heimlich and out popped the french bread.

Anyway, Odaiba is kind of a cool place. It's built on reclaimed land, so you're pretty sure where it's going to end up when the big one hits Tokyo (read: underwater). But in the mean time, there's a replica Statue of Liberty, a giant Ferris Wheel, lots of restaurants, shopping and even a Toyota store where you can test drive cars around the showroom. We took the family there, including Shelley's sister, Rachel, and spent a nice afternoon. Click on the picture below for more pictures.

Harajuku: Bandaged Beauty

Harajuku is a funky part of town not too far from where I live. Young kids, mostly girls, gather on Sunday afternoons in costumes that represent everything from gothic-inspired, anime, Little Bo Peep, Lolita and everything in between. It's a great site to behold.

This girl here has dreadlocks, tattoos and bandages across her face. A very odd exterior, but soft features nevertheless.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Dragonfly

This picture was taken on the same day as this picture of a drop of water, and this other picture of a drop of water. I was in the Imperial Palace gardens shooting for a good part of the morning on an extended business trip to Tokyo in October 2007. This dragonfly was just hanging out on this hedge and didn't seem to mind that I was following, watching, and shooting him. It was really cool. He was really big!

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Yet another water drop

You might think that I'm obsessed with water droplets, what with that other two shots of water drops that I've uploaded to the photo blog. Yes, you're right. But I couldn't help myself with my macro lens. It really does make it so easy to get up close to clearly see things like a drop of water. Anyway, the depth of field and the focus is the hardest part, of course. If you don't have a steady hand...which I don't...then it could make taking shots really hard.

Anyway, this time this photo was taken in Tokyo. It wasn't in a very peaceful place at all. It was along the side of the road on my way to the Imperial Palace...where I took this shot. It had rained the night before and despite the throng of pedestrians and the rumbling of traffic behind me, I was able to snap this shot. I promise this will be my last water droplet shot for a while...until the next time, right? This shot happens to be my background on my work laptop.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

The Easy Bake Sushi Maker...or something like that.

So in America we have Easy Bake Ovens. In Japan? They have sushi makers for kids.

We found this at the local Toys R Us and to our delight that's not all they have! There's a donut maker, bread maker, shaved ice maker and rice ball maker.

It's 4:30 AM

Some people look forward to the weekend because they get to sleep in. That thrill doesn't exist for me anymore. Not because we have two kids and they wake up early...though I think that would be a factor if it wasn't already bright at 4 o'clock in the freaking morning. That's why I can't sleep. Japan doesn't have a daylight savings time, which is super smart for a country that is full of people who aren't morning people! So let's waste some sunlight so that when it's time to go home, it's already dark. That's good for the psyche.

Japan used to have daylight savings time after WWII and it was jettisoned soon after Japan regained its sovereignty in 1952. I say, bad move, Japan, bad move indeed.

In case you don't believe me, here is a picture I took after waking up at 4:30 AM one morning. It's cloudy, but it's bright.

The Big Buddha

On a recent trip to Kamakura, there stands what many consider to the be oldest outdoor statue of buddha in the world. Now this is a bit controversial, because I think every country boasts one of these. And until a few hundred years ago, it was an indoor statue. It would have stayed that way until some pesky typhoon came and knocked the enclosure over, leaving buddha exposed.

Anyway, this is kind of a cool place to come visit. I like this picture as I turned it into a black and white shot and blew out the white and darkened the blacks and grays. It gives it sort of a gritty feel.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Our Neighbors, the Harajuku Girls

Harajuku is quite a site and probably one of the most interesting places in all of Tokyo. On Sunday afternoons, girls (mostly) dress up in a variety of goth / lolita / anime-inspired costumes and hang out. In a country that's well known for their homogeneity, these Harajuku girls stand out as the antithesis to Japan's group-orienetd culture. You have girls dressed like gothic versions of clowns, little-bo-peep, little house on the praire, and adorn themselves with spiked piercings, tons of white make-up, massive hair, freaky-colored contact lenses, etc.

Certainly these girls come to be looked at. They come to hang out with their friends. Some are there as part of the "free hug club" and freely want their pictures to be taken. The more hardcore set, oddly enough, can be hostile to having their pictures taken. While they themselves won't stop you from taking pictures, they either turn away from you, decline a picture request, or have one of their old-guy fans (also a photographer) tell you that you can't take their picture. Let's see...public place, girls dressed to shock and get attention. Gee, sounds like people who don't want their picture taken! Though it's not made explicit, my Dad thinks that perhaps a few yen will increase their cooperativeness. Though admittedly, no one likes a gothic sell out. So I choose to grab a zoom lens and shoot from a distance. Click on any of the pictures to see the gallery.

This was actually my second time to Harajuku to see the 'locals'. The first time was when Shelley came to visit me in 2004 when I was here on an extended business trip. She arrived on a Saturday and I took her here on a Sunday - all jet lagged and tired. To say she was freaked out would be modest. Admittedly, it was probably a tactical mistake on my part to take her here so soon. We now live two stops on the subway from Harajuku, or about a 25 minute walk. Upon hearing that we were that close, Shelley told me, "I don't know if I want those girls to be our neighbors." She's coming around though. I don't know about you, but I think Shelley's search for a Halloween costume is over.

There will be more pictures to come. I'm certainly going back with Anthon to not only gauge his reaction, but to also see if he can't interact with some of them. Should be some classic moments.

Asakusa Shrine

On one of our outings, we went to Asakusa Shrine here in Tokyo. I found myself having a hard time shooting because there were so many people and ultimately I couldn't get a good shot without people in the way. I sort of gave in and shot anyway.

I turned this shot into black and white and tried to darken the photograph a bit to lessen the prominence of the people. And as I have done a lot, I colorized the middle lantern.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Golden Week

I always felt that in the U.S. I got ripped off for not having enough national holidays...real national holidays...not like Columbus Day. We don't even get one a month there. It seems as if everyone else in the developed world gets far more days off. And it's true. In Japan, on top of getting about one national holiday a month, there are two times a year when there is basically a week's worth of holidays right in a row. One happens over the new year and one happens in the last week of April / first week of May. It's called Golden Week. This isn't to imply I don't like working. But I just like having time off more.

Our Golden Week was a bit early and a bit short, since our baby girl is hopefully due any day now. Shelley's Mom is en route and we have a backstop date to induce Shelley in case it gets to that point. So the end is near. Stay tuned, we'll post pictures and let everyone know when Ella arrives.

Anyway, we spent the time off doing things locally - zoo's and parks. In retrospect, a very animal-centric long weekend. You can see pictures by clicking here. My favorite of these pictures is of Anthon trying to feed the goat and the goat getting too hungry and nipping at Anthon's fingers. The look on Anthon's face is priceless.



In other updates...
I've uploaded a few more videos from recent outings - mostly of Anthon during cherry blossom season.

Pet Parents

There are studies that show the Japanese population could be cut in half by the end of the century. While I could get into a serious discussion behind the reasons for the lower birth rate and its socio-economic end game, I won't. I want to talk about something infinitely more trivial - a frivolous outgrowth of a latent need to parent something, anything - pet parenting.

To set the stage, here are some statistics: there are more than 23 million pet dogs and cats in Japan. That's 5 million pets MORE than there are children under 15 in all of Japan (18 million kids). Pets are the new millenium's children.

There is plenty of anecdotal evidence. I am hard pressed to find pictures of people's families or kids at the office, but there sure are tons of pictures of people's cats.

Small dogs and older dogs are usually carried around town in baby strollers.

We've seen dogs dressed up in hats, sunglasses, sweaters, long-johns with the button-flap over the bottom, etc.

Then there are articles from MSNBC.com and Nikkei Weekly that outline a variety of services that pet parents spend on their pets, including: accupuncture and physical therapy for aging dogs, spa treatments and aromatherapy, funeral services including joint pet/master gravesites, matchmaking parties and doggie wedding services that can cost upwards to $3,000. I wish I were making this up. But I am not.

The video, while all in Japanese, shows one of these wedding ceremonies, including the ceremony, cutting the cake, photo session, throwing flowers at the happy couple and an interview with a girl who is throwing this party in hopes that her future wedding will be this, uh, nice.

Japanese Dog Wedding

Kamakura Umbrella

This shot is obviously of a Japanese umbrella, taken at a rest stop at a hillside shrine in Kamakura, a resort town along coastal Japan. This also is one of Japan's most culturally significat cities.

I decided to shoot this shot because I saw someone else, who didn't speak English and I don't think spoke Japanese, was crouching down taking this picture. Because I'm a total hack and not below copying other people's work, I thought there must be some merit in snapping this...and I think there was.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Brother, can you spare some...butter?

Japan is going through a weird butter shortage. I kid you not. For a country that has the second largest economy in the world, with one of the largest per capita GDPs, and is on the leading edge of most technological innovations, it's hard to imagine that it would have a hard time making something as simple as butter.

But it's true. The supermarket in our local area will get butter a few times a week and if you're not there within an hour or two after its restocked, you're evidently out of luck. This is reminiscent of Soviety-era bread lines or the 70's gasoline shortages in the U.S. In response, I've been turned into a butter mule, smuggling in butter at the request of my wife. Luckily, it's not an illicit trade...yet...and I've been spared having to ingest small balloons of butter to evade authorities.

The problem is that demand for milk is falling, which has forced milk producers to cut back their "supply" of cows and milk products, or redirect them into higher margin business like cheese. For you economics buffs out there, you're probably thinking that retailers should just import butter. And would you believe that the domestic butter market is highly protected? There's roughly a 30% tarrif that's levied on all butter imports, along with a 1,000 yen ($10) per kilogram tax placed on all butter imports. Basically, that leads to an 800% increase in the price of imported butter. That's why you NEVER see imported butter in Japan. Now we rarely get to see any butter at all.

If you're interested in a little butter-arbitrage scheme, maybe we can work something out. We can probably make a tiny fortune selling butter to the poor expats in our area! :)

Links:
Japan Today article
Asahi Shinbun

Our Male Model

We spent last Saturday at Shinjuku Gyoen Park and spent the late morning underneath a small grove of cherry blossom trees. We brought a lunch, and a bat & ball to keep Anthon entertained. We didn't on, however, Anthon being the subject of no less than 6 photographers.

For those of you who know Anthon, he's a very outgoing and verbal kid. He's fun loving and because of both his parents incessant picture taking, he is used to hamming it up for the camera. He knows when he's on and can be quite boisterous and entertaining...at least to his parents. We were playing around and I noticed in the periphery one lady who was ducking behind a tree snapping pictures of us. This went on for about five minutes before I made eye contact and she approached us asked if it was OK to take more pictures of our son. Literally 15 minutes later and she's snapping both film and digital pictures, directing on how to position him and how to make him laugh, etc. A bit odd. Then as I'm playing tee ball with Anthon (I hold the ball, Anthon swings the bat, and more often than not hits me in the process), another man comes up and starts taking pictures of Anthon playing ball...another 10 minutes following us around. We had two more groups of people ask to take pictures with Anthon and then two other, more shy photographers, that were more intent on either taking video of Anthon running around or taking pictures of the photographers taking pictures of Anthon. All in the space of two hours.

I certainly hope this doesn't turn Anthon into a Zoolander clone. I would hate to have him ask me, "Have you ever wondered if there was more to life, other than being really, really, ridiculously good looking?"

Here's a picture Shelley took of one of the photographers taking pictures of Anthon.

Sakura Thoughts

I saw that Shelley posted a few thoughts on Sakura here, and here.

This is probably the single best time to be in Japan, and while it is hard to plan to time a visit to see the cherry blossoms at their peak, it's well worth a trip. I think in many ways Japanese view cherry blossoms as a metaphor for life - in that it's delicate and fleeting yet inherently beautiful and should be celebrated.

On the flip side, sakura were used as a symbol in World War II to signify those young Kamikaze pilots who were flew suicide missions and never came back, essentially giving up their lives in their youth. In the same way, according to our friend and neighbor Walt, sakura symbolize the Japanese warrior, including the samurai, who are honored while dying in their youth in battle.

Despite the heavy symbolism, sakura season is a great excuse for the Japanese to party. As Shelley put it so eloquently, it's as if it's one big tailgate! And it's true. Walking through Ueno Park one night we saw thousands, literally, of people sitting on tarps on the ground, with their shoes off, underneath (mostly) the sakura trees, drinking heavily and eating. I would guess that these spots had been staked out for hours. Everyone seemed to be happy, even the homeless people in the park were happy collecting all the recyclable cans and bottles...it was payday for them. The daytimes were even more croweded families, friends and coworkers gathered to have "hanami parties" (flower viewing parties). Shelley remarked that it was one of the first times to see the Japanese cut loose like this and it was good for her to see that, I think. Seeing people get so excited about sakura showed a very human side to our adopted country.

And finally, we went to a park called Shinjuku Gyoen Park to get one last view of the sakura before the rains came and wiped all of the beautiful blossoms away. We happened upon a grove of trees that had shed half of its blossoms - which effectively covered the ground with what seemed like millions of white and pink petals. It was like snow, so peaceful and serene. The wind was blowing gently so you could pick up the blossoms and toss them in the air and they would float away. Anthon particularly liked that, though he would do more throwing at or mashing into people. Or he liked to try to eat the blossoms.

So if you have any desires to come visit us during the sakura season, it's normally the last week of March and the first week of April. Click on the links below to see pictures from our various sakura outings. Just be aware that pictures do not do this justice...sakura season is something to experience.

Showa Park, Ueno Park at night, Imperial Palace Moat, Shinjuku Gyoen Park

Day Trip to Kamakura

Shelley and I haven't really discussed who's on our top 5 list of famous people that we could kiss if we had the chance. If I had to guess, I'm sure Matthew McConaughey would be right up there at the top - as would Carrot Top. But I never in my wildest dreams thought that my wife would have the hots for the Buddah. I guess I should have read into her getting into yoga with a bit more scrutiny than I did.


The Japanese can be very hospitable hosts. We certainly didn't expect to be welcomed to Kamakura with a sign welcoming the "Great Kannon." I admit I am flattered. Not to be a nitpick, but couldn't they at least spell our names right?

And finally, as Shelley said in her blog about our trip we happened upon a couple who were getting married in this very public place. On the one hand I felt excited to see this, but I also felt bad that I was opportunistically snapping shots of their special day. While I was taking these pictures, Shelley was watching Anthon, who decided that he wanted to just go exploring on his own. Well, that didn't see well with Shelley who went after and resulted in our son, who has a pretty good set of pipes, screaming all the way back to his stroller after Shelley caught up to him. Nothing like being the one with the screaming kid to disrupt a wedding ceremony. Like a good father and husband I pretended I didn't know them.




All of the pictures are linked to a page of photos I shot from the day. Or you can clik on the link to go there.

Amish Cooking in Japan

This post is brought to you by our new sponsor, Cafe Amish - for all your Amish food needs.

A great thing about living in Japan is that believe it or not, you can get pretty much any kind of ethnic food you want. Of course we love the Japanese food that we can get here, but we've been surprised with the level of quality of the hamburgers, the Italian food and we've even had very good Mexican food. As I've written about before, the Japanese are just foodies.

Well, for those of you who fear that if you were to move to Japan you'd have no outlet for your Amish cooking cravings, rest assured that we've found such a place for you in the tiny, rural resort town of Kamakura...about 90 minutes by train south of Tokyo. Taking a quick look at the menu, one realizes that perhaps the proprietors of this Cafe might be of a smaller, less zealous branch of the Amish. Maybe a more liberal, reformed version? I'll let you be the judge. Here's the menu:

Let's see we have such Amish staples as toast, lattes, 2 kinds of beer, and white cream & bean paste cakes.

Now I'm no marketing genius, though marketing is my job and I did study it in school, but I've never considered before using the Amish as some hip ploy to lure customers. I guess if you're going to differentiate yourself, you might as well REALLY differentiate yourself, right?

Masks

During the winter and early spring months in Japan it is common to see people walking around wearing what appear to be white surgical masks. These are worn for a variety of reasons, most notably by those who are either sick and don't want to infect others or those who aren't sick and don't want to be infected by those who are. No matter how stupid they make people look you find people all around town wearing these - from old guys to rather fashionable young women...at work, on the trains, walking around...everywhere.

To me wearing these masks is a very important statement about Japanese culture.
I really respect a culture where people by and large consider the feelings of others when they make a decision or a deliberate act. Certainly putting the group first over the individual has its downsides, but I think living in a city of 20 million people you have to make certain sacrifices just to get along in such cramped quarters.


There is speculation, however, that this is all one bizarre show of solidarity by millions of adoring fans of the one, the only, King of Pop. Certainly Michael Jackson has his legions of fans here in Japan. Or, could this be some trendy new fashion statement that could be sweeping the States come next fall? I hear gauze-padded surgical masks are the next fashion accessory to replace hand held Yorkies and Chihuahuas.

In the end, despite my desire to be Japanese, I can't quite get myself to don one of these masks in public. I think being a foreigner exempts me from a lot of societal norms - this being one of them. So much for my being considerate of others, my support for Michael Jackson or my keen, forward-looking fashion sense.

Tokyo Tower from Roppongi Hills

Roppongi Hills is a newish development that has a 52 story building - rather rare in earthquake prone Japan - with a city-view observatory. This has a wonderful view of Tokyo from an almost 360 degree view. Here is a shot of Tokyo Tower looking north and east.

I'm not sure how I feel about this shot. I think I like the idea of it and the ideal of what this shot could become. The execution I think is lacking. For one I was standing a few feet back from the glass, in which you can see faint reflections of people standing. That's too bad.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

DIY Japanese Food

I think it can be accurately said that the Japanese are foodies. More than the average American, I think the average Japanese enjoys the experience of eating food more. I was reminded of this recently when I went out to eat Korean BBQ with co-workers who would literally ooo and aww at each tantilizing bite of food that they would eat.

I don't want to paint a broad brush here - I don't think that Americans' attitude towards food boils down to opening your mouth and shoveling it in as fast as you can...though I'm sure there is some of that...especially with me! I just think to the average Japanese, eating, especially eating out, is about more than just the one sense of taste.

It's because of that need for a multi-sensory experience, I believe, that in Japan there are many foods where, if you go into a restaurant, you have to cook your own food. I can think of at least three distinct types of wildly popular foods in Japan where you walk into the restaurant and pay for them to bring you your food so that you can then begin to cook it. They are Korean BBQ, Shabu-Shabu and what we had earlier this week, Okonomiyaki. Shelley loves Shabu Shabu, likes Korean BBQ, so I introduced her and Anthon to Okonomiyaki this week.

Okonomiyaki is essentially a Japanese-style pancake - batter filled with things like meat, seafood, vegetables, noodles and spices. You mix it all together and let it cook on a griddle in front of you. It looks weird, but it tastes good. The circular griddle with the spherical shaped holes are for something called taco-yaki - breaded balls filled with octopus. The griddle also has room for yaki-soba, fried noodles, like chow mein.

Even in a dive like this one, the experience of eating something new and cooking it yourself adds to the multi-sensory experience that I think Japanese foodies crave. I really think we enjoyed our food more because we cooked it than had the okonomiyaki pancake had just showed up for us to eat. So, maybe the Japanese are on to something there. I'm waiting for some bright business school grad to take this business model to the next level and have people pay to not only cook their food, but to also clear the table and wash the dishes.

Four

There is a place in Tokyo called Roppongi which I guess could be called the entertainment capital of Tokyo, especially for foreigners. In reality there are different "entertainment capitals" depending on your demographic. Anyway, On the back side of a large shopping, movie, restaurant complex is this cool lighted wall of glass with numbers spaced every few yards.

Anthon was running around wildly and we were having family night out so I didn't get to spend too much time shooting. I waited for a group of people walking in front of me to get the contrast of darkened, shadowy profiles of people in front of the large number four.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Picture of the Week: Tokyo has a Nudy Boy!

When we told friends we were moving to Tokyo, they asked us if Tokyo had stores that we were accustomed to, you know - The Gap, Costco, Trader Joes, etc. Well, if finding a Nudy Boy clothing store isn't validation that you live in a big, westernized city, then I don't know what is.

I'll be back in the States in April. Get your Nudy Boy clothing orders in to me early because space is limited in my suitcase.

Anthon is kawaiiiiiiiii

Since moving here to Tokyo, Anthon has received his fair share of attention from people we randomly meet on the street. Invariably, they'll all the same thing about Anthon, that he's "kawaii," or cute. I've found that the level of cuteness that Anthon has at that moment is directly proportional to the length of the last sylable "ii" that's spoken. There was the dignified grandmother who was biking towards us - almost running into us by the way - and made a polite gesture towards Anthon, keeping her "kawaii" comment the way it was meant to be said.

That was topped a few days later when Anthon and I went to Mister Donuts, a donut chain in Japan. While we were eating our donuts the teenage girl next to us let out an elongated "kawaiiiiii" adding, "He's so cute, it makes me want to cry."

But that was topped yet again as Anthon was playing with an interactive movie that would sense his body movements and let him kick balls and grab fish. a small crowd of about 10 lunch-goers stopped to watch Anthon and many in unison let out multiple kawaiiiiii's.

I don't know where it goes from here. But Anthon certainly has been able to charm a lot of people. Now I'm not saying that my son is any cuter than other kids. It's just that, naturally, he doesn't look like most of the kids running around Tokyo. So he gets a lot of attention based on that. And because is a ham, he eats it up and likes to perform.

On a side note
I'm finally getting around to updating the video archive. I've added three new videos, please do check them out if you have the time.

Tokyo Mosque

With our move to Japan we didn't expect to get a view of a mosque. In fact, I didn't even know there was a mosque. But it has a prominent fixture in our home as we can see it from any room on the western side of our apartment. It's particularly beautiful in the evening and the sun sets behind it.

This shot was taken on one of our first nights here in our new place in Tokyo.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Potty Training...

I'm writing this in hopes of coaxing Shelley into sharing her experiences so far with potty training Anthon. We're well into our second week and I am regailed daily with stories of not just soiled pants but also slow and steady progress towards potty training. Here are a few thoughts and stories:

1. I came home one night and noticed Anthon didn't have any pants on - only his Little Einstein underpants. I came to find out that he had blown through all of his pants. He had no more pants to wear. One word comes to mind: prolific.

2. Anthon likes to cry wolf. He thinks it's funny. Well, one of these days we will all be sorry.

3. As a reward he gets 1 M&M for a #1 and 2 M&Ms for a #2. Those double if we're away from home. I'm thinking, why hasn't the maker of M&Ms come out with M&Ms for potty training kids? You know, yellow and brown M&Ms???

< sarcasm >
4. We're not without support. Thank goodness for Japanese educational videos that are helping our son become a "pants man" in our new home.


< /sarcasm >

Shelley deserves all the credit for this. This I'm sure has to take a lot of patience and a dulled sense of smell. And what I know of pregnant-Shelley - she doesn't have a dulled sense of smell. And I guess I should be grateful to Anthon for not enjoying living in his own...well...you know.

Costco, the balm that cures ills!

Months ago when Shelley and I were starting to think seriously about our move to Japan, I was anxious about whether I could provide her enough of a life that resembled "home". As you can imagine, life can be very different here. I was really excited to learn that there were a number of Costcos in the Tokyo area. That certainly had me excited. Turth be told, the Costco that we go to in the States is really crowded and a big huge pain to navigate through, as people seemingly buy up cart loads of things they don't need...at least from our eyes. We go to Costco in the States to get stuff at a discount not to load up. Little did we know, however, that the Costco here in Japan would be the balm that cured our ills.

Naturally, this is the biggest move that our family has had to make. And we really didn't think that it would be this physically draining and somewhat emotionally taxing to live in limbo for a while before you can feel totally settled with your new life, all your stuff, new friends, different language/culture, etc. And so, for the first week to have only gone grocery shopping for a few things and to only have to eat "little smokeys" sausages for breakfast every day can push someone over the edge! We debated whether or not to ask our relocation folks to take us to Costco as it seemed like a glorified taxi service, but we were desperate.

In preparation for our trip, we had to get enough cash. Since we hadn't funded our local bank accounts, we had to max out our daily ATM withdrawals...for the both of us. We also had to make a list of the things we wanted. About two minutes into the planning we just decided that we would go up and down every aisle and throw into our cart anything that looked remotely good.

It was the most wonderful Costco experience of our lives. If we wanted it, we threw it into the cart. We filled up two big carts worth of goods and we looked like those people that you see at Costco that you hate. We were unashamedly those people. We were the happiest people that ever walked through check-out. It took forever to load the car, unload the car, lug it all up to our apartment and then put it all away. But when we were done we had huge smiles on our faces. It was a big mental hurdle that we had cleared and suddenly we felt so much better about our lives here in Japan.

Without disclosing the total bill, the receipt did run up from the floor to reach Shelley's waist.

I love Japanese toilets

I'll be honest, I love a lot of things about our new place. But I love nothing more than the toilets. These babies have a little sensor that causes the lid to open up when you approach the toilet. Come on. Really.



The seats are always warm. You never have to touch any part of the toilet. There is a little remote control that you push to flush, bring the seats up or down, activate the bidet, or hot air spray, etc.

Japan has come a long way in their bathroom technology. I used to live in fear of having to use the dreaded "squatter"...I think you can visualize what I'm talking about. If not, then think of a hole in the ground.

As is the case with any new revolutionary, life-changing technology, you're going to get those who don't totally embrace it at first. Shelley was a little annoyed that the toilet would raise the lid in excited anticipation whenever Shelley entered the bathroom, even when she only wanted to brush her teeth. She at first made me turn off the automatic setting, only to come around after pushing a few wrong buttons and almost falling in late one night.

I'm not sure what one of these babies cost, but as Ferris Bueler once said, "It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up."

I think the only thing it doesn't have is captured nicely by Saturday Night Live...


The Love Toilet

Our apartment

We've been buried in Tokyo without internet access and so we haven't had a chance to update our blog with pictures and stories about our first few days here in Tokyo.

Our apartment is on the third floor of this four story building pictured to the left. We live below a friend of the family who I've known since my days in La Canada...small world. They've been incredibly nice to us...so much so that Anthon has a new "Grammy" that he talks about all the time.

We live in the relatively quiet urban neighborhood of Yoyogi Uehara. It's about a 15 minute walk to Tokyo's version of Central Park with lots of green space, ducks, dogs and open space to run around. The area has a lot of expats as its the closest bus stop to the American School. So there is a nice mixture between local and expat families.

We've found this life in this area is very different from our life back in Pasadena. We can walk pretty much everywhere we go and for longer trips we take the train. Talk of buying a car has been put on hold until at least our little girl is born. Then we can revisit that topic at a time when many expats move home. But we are a two minute walk to the grocery store, three minute walk to the train station and within 5-10 minutes from a variety of small, family owned restaurants, flower shops, book stores, bakeries, etc. It's what I imagined living in New York would be like.

The apartment itself is quite spacious. It's double the size of our Pasadena condo and normally wouldn't have been within our housing budget. But it sat for 6 months open and I think the landlords were looking to get any cash flow possible. We lucked out because they recently upgraded the whole place. While our place is sterile and drafty because our stuff is still on the slow boat, it has a lot of potential. The kitchen, living and dining rooms and master bedroom face the western sunset. While all this light is a blessing in this cold winter, I can only imagine how hot it could get in the summer. The view to the west is of a mosque. Not what we thought we'd be looking at, but as you can see from the picture to the right, it does provide quite the view at sunset.

The kitchen has tons of storage space, granite counter tops and US-sized fridge, dish washer and oven. The bedrooms are large and afford Anthon to have his own room, Ella her own room come May, and an office.

If you're a Google Maps geek, like I am, then here is an arial photo of our place. Yes, it doesn't look like much.


View Larger Map

We'll pass along a more detailed video of our place. But in the mean time, please enjoy a few pictures of our place.

How to Contact us in Japan

Though we're now on the other side of the world, we don't want to stray too far from our family and friends. There are a number of ways to get in touch with us while we're in Japan.

Email
These stay the same. If you don't have our email addresses, click on the "Email Tony and Shelley" link on the top right hand column.

Address
Tony, Shelley & Anthon Cannon
3-37-3 Nishihara #301
Shibuya Ku, Tokyo
Japan

Phone Number
Email us and we'll send you a US-based phone number that will ring our phone in Japan. The only charges incurred by you will be what it costs to call the 626 area code (Pasadena, CA.)

If you use Skype...our user name is: tokyocannons.

AIM / iChat

We bought a Mac and are looking forward to using iChat with family and friends. If you'd like to see what we're up, add us to your buddy list. Our username is: tokyocannons.

Japanese TV is AWESOME!

So I've fretted about what to do about TV viewing when we move to Japan. There are only a few English channels - but conspicuously missing are such beloved channels like ESPN. Most of the first run shows in the US are at least one or two seasons behind in Japan, if they're broadcast at all. I toyed with the idea of buying a Slingbox, hooking it up to TIVO and placing that in my parents condo in Salt Lake City. Then we could stream live TV as well as shows stored on the TIVO...all controlled from our apartment in Tokyo. But that seems like a hugely expensive technical error waiting to happen.

Within the last few weeks, I've come across a few great Japanese TV shows, that at least for now, has piqued my interest....and you don't even need to understand Japanese! There are plenty more of these shows on YouTube.


Human Tetris

Japanese Obstacle Course

Guess the picture...

So this is a lovely view from inside our new office building in the upscale Marunouchi district in Tokyo. But can you guess where I took this picture you see above? Good guesses would include an office, the entry way to our floor and maybe even a conference room. But you'd be wrong...
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...If you guessed the urinals in the men's bathroom, then you'd be correct! I find it odd that I am close enough to look into the office of someone in the building next door while I'm, ummm, taking care of business. I presume they can see us, at least only from the chest up, though. Good times. :)

Green apple

When I come to Japan on business, I get to stay at The Peninsula Hotel, an upscale hotel that just opened up in Tokyo in September. One of the great aspects about the service at this hotel is that the staff brings to your room two servings of a really great fruit each and every day. If you don't eat it, they bring in new fruit. I've had huge grapes, kiwi fruit, clementines, Japanese pears, etc. Over the weekend they brought me a couple of green apples, which became the subject of this picture.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

A drop of water

I actually took this shot today. I'm on an extended business trip to Japan and had the entire day free on Saturday. I lugged all of my photographic equipment all the way to Japan for just such an occassion.

It has rained the night before I took this shot and that meant plenty of opportunities to take pictures of leaves with little beads of water on them. I've never successfully shot one, and I'm not quite sure how I feel about this one. maybe it's the closest one I've taken to being remotely shaprly in-focus. This was taken inside the public gardens of the Imperial Palace. I took a lot of time looking for shots - nearly two hours. I had my iPod on and I tuned out the world while taking pictures. A very good day.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Anthon's pasport picture

Many of you know that our little family is moving to Tokyo, Japan in January. We're in the early stages of learning about the logistics of our move. One thing that we have to do is apply for Anthon's passport. I think it's funny that at 2 years old, he needs to get a passport. I don't think I got my passport until I was 13 or 14. Oh and when we move, we'll get to fly Business Class, something I didn't experience until I was 25...Anthon? The ripe old age of 2. Is it any wonder that as you get older you find yourself starting conversations with your kids with "In my day." I just didn't think it would happen at 32!

So, anyway back to the picture. I was typing away at the computer and I noticed his passport application with his mug shot attached to it. I thought I'd upload it for your viewing pleasure.

Shibuya at Night

I was in Japan a few weeks ago and I spent some time after work one night in the Shibuya area of Tokyo. Shibuya is known for being the hang out for the young. This shot is taking from Hachiko Square, near the main exit to the train and subway lines and the main entry point into the shops, restaurants and other nightlife of Shibuya.

The picture taken below is a panorama compiled from four individual shots I took with my Nikon. I then stitched the photos together using a really nice piece of free software called, Autostitch. All you need to do is take a number of pictures in succession with some overlapping scenes and then drop them into the program and after a while a panorama will appear.

Over the next few months, I will be spending a lot more time in Japan for work. I am taking my camera each time so that I can take more panoramas of places like the Imperial Palace and the Ginza area, etc.

A shot like this really needs to be seen in a much larger size. Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.

Salvaging a Bad Day

I moved to Tokyo, Japan in September of 2000 for a 10 month assignment with work. My previous experience with being in Tokyo was as an intern in 1998 and I lived in the middle of nowhere and had no money to explore. So I was eager to get out of the city this time around.

2 hours by train outside of Tokyo is a place called Nikko, an alpine get-away that used to be a retreate for the Shogun rulers of Japan in the 1600's. It's full of temples and is one of the neatest places in all of Japan.

Well, on my trip up to Nikko, it was raining and it was crowded and it was a miserable experience. I had wanted to visit Lake Chuzenji, pictured below, but all I could see of the lake was this bridge. I couldn't even see a huge waterfall nearby. I could only hear it and feel the mist. The fog was so thick I couldn't even see the stupid waterfall.

I like this picture becuase it's simple and it's bleak...kind of like my day. If the fog were any thicker and the bridge any longer I would half expect the bridge to just vanish like those baseball players when they walked in the corn in the movie "Field of Dreams." The other reason why I like this picture is because it was one of the first few sets of pictures I took with my first digital camera. It was a 1.3 megapixel camera from Olympus. The thing took a few seconds to capture an image and a few more seconds to recover so you could take another image. In hindsight, the image quality wasn't anywhere a film camera, but the "cool" factor was certainly high.

Download the full photograph by clicking on the image below.