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.