BrianDavidCrane.com

I turned 26 on Friday, August 15th.  It was my first birthday out here in California (and a lot has happened in the past year that has led me to be here).  The party was a lot of fun.  Probably 25 people from a couple different social groups at a late dinner and then dancing. 

The ironic thing about 25 for me is the fact that I passed up the chance to take a trip around the world (vis a vis 25at25.com) where I was planning to visit 25 countries while I was 25.  I look back on that trip as "what might have been" and don’t feel remorse just…well…wonderment.  Basically, I shelved that plan after my last trip to Europe for personal and professional growth reasons.

As far as the last year has gone (and where I am now), there is a lot to recap:

• At about this point in 2007, I was returning from a summer in Dallas.  I’d spent most of the summer in Dallas working on the private equity fund.  Dallas was awesome but unproductive from a personal growth standpoint.
• I spent the next couple of months bouncing around Knoxville.  Between translating at Blount Memorial, running the private equity fund, and doing some serious web design, I was decently busy from a professional standpoint although none of those "jobs" were long-term in nature.  This time also saw me move into Megan’s house near UT’s campus for my final stint in Knoxville and taught me that living with all girls isn’t as cool as it sounds.
• I went to Japan with Haji.  SWEET trip! I also lived with him for a short time before I left Knoxville.
• Towards the end of April, after losing a signifcant amount of money - not the private equity money, my own - in the stock market and feeling like I wasn’t going anywhere in particular,  I reached out to Ben here in Silicon Valley to explore a new direction.  The rest, they say, is history as I flew out in May and made the decision to join PSM during my initial visit.  It was - and still is - a fantastic decision.
• Dad and I embarked on a cross-country road trip to get me out to San Francisco and set up temporarily in my new subleased apartment.  I was living in Cole Valley (GREAT neighborhood) and really enjoyed the 1.5 months I spent living there while I searched for something more permanent.
• After going through a whole lot of hours fruitlessly searching for an apartment in S.F., I finally moved into one near Alamo Square.  Overpriced (but awesome) older building that was in the center of the city (but just didn’t feel like home).  Within 2 days of moving in, I began to search for something closer to work in Palo Alto.  The weather in S.F. and the commute back and forth were terrible.
• A week before my birthday, my family (aunt, uncle, cousins, and parents) came out to visit for a week.  We visited the Bay Area and also went over to Yosemite.  This trip just-so-happened to fall right at the time I was moving (again) which turned out perfectly.  Everyone got to see the difference in living conditions between S.F. and my current house in Menlo Park and, as a result, everyone agreed that I needed to get out of S.F.  As far as the actual trip goes, the video and pictures say it all - it was phenomenal!

As far as now is concerned, I find myself living in Menlo Park in the heart of Silicon Valley.  I’m about 1.25 miles from work and I ride my beach cruiser of a bike back and forth every day.  The weather here is beautiful - every day.  I’m living with a Stanford Ph.D. neuroscience candidate and a Turkish guy who designs microprocessor chips down near San Jose.  The living situation couldn’t be better (well, maybe a little - if only it were me the one who owned the house instead of paying rent!).  Challenges abound and yet it’s fun being the "country boy from TN" as people out here either (A) don’t know what to make of me or (B) totally underestimate me.  I can be funny here.

My work is really challenging and the company, PSM, where I’m at is growing like crazy.  I really love the job and the people I work with.  This is a bit of a surprise to me as I didn’t think I’d like an office job, however, with bosses who are 20 & 24 in age, it’s significantly different than your typical office job! :-)  I am surrounded by super-sharp people.

Soccer games are abundant.  I am meeting new friends and enjoying all the new technology people obsess over in Silicon Valley (I’ve got an iPhone…).  The food is fantastic.  My neighborhood has a Mexican grocery store, a yoga studio and a coffee shop within biking distance.  San Francisco is only a 40 minute train ride away and San Jose is only a 20 minute train ride in the other direction.  I feel like I am learning and growing as a person and as a professional.

All in all, life is going really well and I have a lot to be thankful for as I turn 26.

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Aunt Mary, Uncle Mike, Cousins Andy & Angie, and "Los Viejos" came out for a week to visit California (Sis Lauren couldn’t make it).  AWESOME trip!

Andy & Dad were the most prolific photographers.  Click on the titles below to view some of my favorites:

• Silicon Valley
  • San Jose Church
  • 101 University Ave. Palo Alto
  • Andale
  • Aunt Mary at Stanford Univ.
  • Mike & I at Stanford v.1
  • Mike & I at Stanford v.2
  • Stanford Main Quad
• Saulsalito:
  • Saulsalito Sailboats
  • Mom in Saulsalito
  • Family Picnic
  • Saulsalito = Tuscany
  • Roadside Food Vendors + Vacation = Brian’s Sick
• San Francisco:
  • View From My 2nd Place In S.F. and the (fish eye shot of the inside)
  • Andy at GGB
  • Da Boyz
  • GGB
  • Coit Tower
  • Foggy (per usual)
• Yosemite:
  • Packing (and packing…and…packing…)
  • Half Dome
  • David Curry - President of TuerCrania
  • Yosemite Valley
  • Half Dome at Dusk
  • Andy The Photo Guy
  • Overlooking Half Dome
  • The Ladies of Vernal Falls
  • Base Camp
  • A Quick Dip
  • Biker Gang
  • Andy & Angie
  • End of the Ride
  • Green Moss
  • Tuercks Being Turkeys
• Santa Cruz
  • Real Dads Wear Pink
  • Communist California
  • Group Shot
  • Mike & Mary
  • Tilt-A-Whirl
  • Smiles All Around

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Photos from the Crane/Tuerck eating festival better known as the 4th of July in St. Louis & Southern Illinois.

A couple highlights:

• Mom & Aunt Mary
• The mythical "White Bread Fish Sandwich" from the Steeleville Fair
• Annual Steeleville Parade
• Candy toss
• Ladder golf

There are also some pretty amazing pictures of fireworks (courtesy of Cousin Andy)

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My Dad and I drove from East Tennessee to San Francisco in an 8 day cross-country road trip that covered roughly 3,800 miles in a rented (and stuffed!) Chevy Malibu. It was a blast!

From Tennessee:

To the Grand Canyon:

With a stop at Hoover Dam:

All the way to California’s coast on Route 1:

We took the following route:

View Larger Map

As is evident from the map, we made signifcant stops in the following places:

• Sat: Knoxville, TN to New Mexico (1,400 miles in about 22 hours)
• Sun: Santa Fe & Taos, NM (camped in Santa Fe)
• Mon: Albuquerque, NM
• Tues: Grand Canyon, AZ (camped here)
• Thur: Hoover Dam, NV
• Thur: Las Vegas, NV (stayed at the Golden Nugget)
• Fri: San Luis Obispo, CA (camped here)
• Sat: Monterrey & Carmel, CA (up Route 1 along the CA coast)
• Sat: San Francisco, CA

I had second thoughts about the time & cost of the trip initially, however, I am very glad my Dad talked me into it and went with me. Such a trip leaves you amazed at how BIG our country really is!

The entire photo set from the trip is available on Flickr here or in the Photos area of my site. Enjoy!

ADDITION:  I also created a 7 minute video about the trip:

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Adding the following to my list of life goals.  From Forbes Life:

But the must-do activity at Tongabezi (Zambezi) is a morning, lunch, or teatime visit to Livingstone Island, the place from which Dr. Livingstone became the first European to view Victoria Falls.  If you are feeling brave, a guide will lead you into the river on a rock-hop and short swim to the Devil’s Pool, a sort of eddying whirpool, maybe eight feet in diameter, that is inches from the stone lip of the Falls.  You jump into the pool from a rock and, held by its eddy, can actually lean your head and chest over the 300-foot falls - the world’s greatest falling curtain of water and one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World - with the cataract pouring out from under you, thundering onto the rocks below and sending a mist boiling around you out of the chasm to 100 feet in the air.  In a long life of physical thrills, this was for me one of the top.

Sitting in an eddy pool looking over a 300-foot drop at Victoria Falls sounds pretty amazing to me!

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Haji & Brian Japan 2008

World Premiere (and includes sound so turn your volume up)! 
Full screen version available here by going to YouTube and clicking the icon in the bottom right corner of the video screen.

Also, the pictures from Japan are up.  You can view them here on BDC or view a Flickr slideshow here. 

Please comment and let me know your thoughts!

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On Wednesday, Haji had to work in the morning and I was still suffering from my cold.  I decided to try and sleep the cold out of me (didn’t work).  I spent a great deal of the afternoon in another Internet cafe trying to catch up a bit on work-related tasks and couldn’t shake the feeling that I was getting behind by being away.

Nonetheless, later that day, Haji & I did what I have found is one of my absolute favorite activities in whichever country I visit:  Attending a professional soccer game.  Having seen games in Brasil, Mexico, Argentina, and France, I was really excited to see a Japanese J-Leauge game.  Haji & I were in luck.  We saw Tokyo Verdy play Jubilo-Iwata, two of the better-known clubs in Japan. 

It was only the 4th game of the season for both teams and the stadium wasn’t anywhere near capacity but the game was awesome.  Jubilo won 2 to 1.  Haji & I sat/stood in the Tokyo Verdy cheap seats (20 bucks p/person) and sang "Japanicized" fight songs - English football or Spanish futbol songs sung in Japanese - throughout the entire match along with a couple thousand other Verdy fans.  Haji & I both agreed it was one of the highlights of the trip.

After the game, Haji & I made our way back to the NW side of Tokyo - Tsuruse - where his Mama-san lives.  We met up with his cousin, Narumi, who I had met on the first night for some Korean barbeque and drinking.  It was sort of a going-away dinner for Haji from his cousin as Haji was leaving for his parent’s house in Northern Japan the next day, Thursday.

Like just about everything I have eaten here except fish eggs, the dinner(s) were delicious.  We ate horse!  And cow tounge!  As Haji would say, amazing!!  Korean barbeque is sort-of like shiskabob (sp?) except a lot of weird cuts of meat show up on those skewers! :-)  I say dinner(s) because the meal was actually spread over 2.5 locations:  1. The initial nice restaurant / 2. The Korean hole-in-the-wall restobar / 2.5. The ubiquitous Lawson’s convenience store.  It was a fantastic farewell feast.

On Thursday afternoon, Haji left.  I was officially alone in Tokyo.  Haji was very excited to go home and see his parents & friends.  He had a wedding to attend on Sunday.  He also was really looking forward to fishing and seeing the some of the snow that apparently still covered the northern part of Japan. 

I spent Thursday shopping and visiting a couple areas of Tokyo I hadn’t previously visited:  Harajuku & Ueno.  Harajuku was where the Olympic Village was located when Tokyo hosted the Olympics in the 1960s and the area’s international flavor is quite distinct.   Ueno is another area of Tokyo filled with an endless supply of 6 to 10 story buildings all decorated in neon signs.  Ueno is also where I met Haji’s friend Miwa for dinner on Thursday night. 

Miwa and I went to a place called ‘Arabian Nights’ in Ueno.  Talk about culture shock.  The place was in the basement of a building and was decorated like a ‘Japanicized’ version of Aladin.  They even had a genie’s bottle you had to rub in order to open the door and enter the restaurant.  This golden bottle looked 100% legitimate and was wired with motion sensors.  It took Miwa & I 3 to 5 minutes to open the front door.  I get the feeling there was no back-up so that if you weren’t smart enough to use the bottle to open the door then you shouldn’t be in ‘Arabian Nights’.  Only in Japan!

Once we finally entered, the intial culture shock I mentioned earlier went up a notch or two.  Japanese people dressed like Aladin (complete with Shriners-esque hats!) working in a place straight out of the famous book Arabian Nights with the occasional (Japanese) belly dancer wandering the ‘labyrynth’ of the restaurant carrying around incense.  Wild.

Dinner with Miwa was very nice.  Besides working for a subsidiary of Citigroup in Tokyo, Miwa lived in Ithaca, New York for two years and has also lived in Oslo, Norway for a short time.  The conversation at dinner ranged from the stifling Japanese social customs (in her opinion) to my dislike of America’s ghetto culture and how it seems to be the one American dress style you can find nowadays in any country you visit (a sad observation of mine).  Talking with Miwa about the negatives in both out cultures, the thought struck me more than once that the expression "the grass is always greener on the other side" never rang more true.

As had been previously arrainged by Haji & Miwa, I crashed at Miwa’s apartment before my flight on Friday.  Friday morning before I flew out, I went to the Tsukiji Fish Market.  Tsukiji is the largest fish market in the world as there are some 2000 tons of seafood that change hands every morning at the market.  Restaurants, commercial buyers and regular consumers come here to get the freshest seafood Japan has to offer.  I had a sushi breakfast of Miso soup coupled with shrimp, tuna, yellowtail, squid, mackarel, and some other sea creatures that I couldn’t identify from the pictures in the guidebook.  Without Haji here, I am flying (and eating) blind!

As I write this, we are just crossing the International Date Line.  I will be touching down in Houston later for a one-night layover where I will visit some friends before heading back to Knoxville on Saturday.  Honestly, I am tired and ready to go home. 

As far as my lasting impressions of Japan go, I have a huge list of all things Japanese that I loved and will be posting it later this weekend.  I will also be posting my pictures and (hopefully) a pretty funny short video about our trip. 

Domo arigato gozaimasu! (Thank you very much!)

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Picking up where Tokyo P.1 left off, I picked up a bit of a cold after spending the night in the Kyoto internet cafe with Haji & Kataro.  We didn’t stay at Kataro’s house because he lives with his parents (he recently moved back to Japan after living in the Atlanta area for 15 years) and they really didn’t have the space for both of us.  It was a weird night in the internet cafe.  All five floors were packed with people until about 4:00 A.M.  The cafe had some couches and private internet booths where all three of us slept.  They even had showers in the building.  Apparently, there is a national Japanese social problem of kids living in these internet cafes (which doesn’t surprise me) as there were a couple other young Japanese guys sleeping on the other couches as well.  You pay roughly 17 dollars for the 11 PM to 8 AM time slot so its cheap to stay there.  However, after three hours of sleep and a weird sleeping environment, I had the beginnings of a cold (which has progressively gotten worse since).

Kataro had to work the following day (he is teaching English in a Japanes public school) so Haji and I went into Kyoto by ourselves to explore.  If Tokyo represents the new part of Japan, then Kyoto represents the old part.  Filled with almost 2000 Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines, it is probably most famous in the West for the Kyoto Protocol on global warming that was written here.  The temples in the city are truly beautiful.  They are built on the high points overlooking the city.  Haji and I went to the most well-known of the temples, Kiyomizu-dera.  Not knowing or understanding much about either Buddhism or Shintoism, I thought the temple was beautiful and had great views but not a lot else.  It was PACKED with Japanese tourists. 

We visited several other temples and shrines throughout the city as we sort-of aimlessly wandered (this was the first time Haji had been to Kyoto as well).  The city is much older-feeling than Tokyo and the small houses and older-style roofs reflect what Japan used to look like.  We also came across a lot of street vendors/festival vendors who were cooking food - such as fried squid on a stick - for the cherry blossom parties coming up later that night. 

We walked around Kyoto looking for geisha women and found several (pictures forthcoming).  Kyoto is also famous for its geisha.   While Haji has been a great tour guide, he doesn’t seem real interested in Japanese history or culture as I would ask him about the history of the geisha or the importance of Shinto shrines without getting much of a response.   Regarding Shintoism, it seems to me that the majority of the shrines are dedicated to good luck - especially in business - and that the incense burned out front of the shrines also contains good luck as people purposely stand in the middle of the smoke in order to try and absorb some of the smoke’s good luck.  Kinda odd; I have some video that will give a better explanation.

As the day wound down, we went back to Kyoto’s main train station (I cannot say enough good things about the trains here!) and met back up with Kataro for dinner before Haji & I headed to Nagoya to visit a friend of mine, Tomomi.  Speaking of the trains, it is about 500 km (300 miles) from Tokyo station to Kyoto.  We covered this distance on the Shinkansen in approximately 2 hours with maybe 5 stops.  Haji and I showed up at the train station 15 mins before the train was scheduled to leave (a train departs every 30 minutes) and we were in the center of Kyoto roughly 2 hours later.  No driving.  No security checkpoints.  No checking your baggage.   None of that and we covered the distance from Atlanta, GA to Jacksonville, FL in about half the time (and we both got to sleep as well!).  Amazing.

We left Kyoto on the Shinkansen and headed north to Nagoya (where Toyoto is headquarted) to visit a Japanese friend of mine from the Univ. of TN named Tomomi.  She studied at UT back in 2004 - 2005 and we have kept in sporadic contact since I left for Argentina.  She is working in the import/export department of a subsidiary of Toyota.  It was awesome to see her as she really hasn’t changed a bit (actually, I think her English might have gotten a bit better since I saw her last!).   

Tomomi, Haji, a friend of Tomo’s named Saeko and I all went out for dinner when we arrived in Nagoya.  Haji basically orders for me every single time we eat  as I like just about everything he picks and everyone seems to eat in a more communal manner.  This is good because I am trying a bunch of new Japanese food but also bad as I can’t ever remember the names of the dishes I am eating!  I have lots of pictues though and hopefully he can help me label the dishes when we are back in the States.

After dinner, Haji and I went back to Tomo’s apartment with Tomo where she lives with a Chinese guy and an American guy.  Chris, the American guy, just bought an English school here in Nagoya (the largest private school system that taught English recently went bankrupt).  Sleeping quarters were cramped but Tomo’s flatmates were really cool and, as I said before, it was great to see Tomo. 

The next morning, Haji and I left Tomo’s for the famous Nagoya Castle, which is crowned by two huge golden Japanese dragons.  The castle is similar to some of the feudal castles in Europe (albeit with a Japanese twist).  It burned down during WWII and was rebuilt by the Japanese in the 1950s.   Speaking of the 1950s in Japan, I would have loved to have been here during those booming years as the Japanese rebuilt their war-torn land.  From what I can tell, the pace and speed at which things were rebuilt seems mind-boggling.

After the Nagoya Castle, Haji and I were both ready to get back to the big city of Tokyo.  While it was very cool to see the older parts of Japan (and learn a bit of Japan’s history in the process), the lights and action in Tokyo are so impressive that even when you are in a city the size of Nagoya (2.1 million) or Kyoto (1.4 million), you feel like you are in a small town!  We left Nagoya in the early afternoon and arrived in Tokyo later on Tuesday, where Haji had already set up a birthday party for a Taiwanese girl I met in the train several days before named Becky. 

And so the story of Kyoto & Nagoya ends; Tokyo P.2 might wait until I get back to the States as I only have two more days here in Japan!

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I am in a 5 story all-night internet cafe that is filled with hundreds of video games, neon lights, pool tables, a climbing wall, a recording studio, a mechanical bull, walls of Japanese Anime comics, massage chairs, computers, a soccer field, and showers.  It’s outside of Kyoto and is where Haji and I are spending the night after coming down here to meet up with his friend Kataro. 

Haji is a Japanese friend of mine who I met in Tennessee while playing soccer.   He has come back to Japan for the first time in three years to renew his work visa and go to a friend’s wedding.  As far as part 1 of Tokyo goes (Haji and I were in Tokyo for 3 nights), it is one crazy story so without further ado…

Haji & I are staying with his Aunt in a suburb of Tokyo called Tsuruse (about 40 minutes on the Metro from Tokyo station).  His Aunt, who I call ‘Mama-san’, is awesome.  Haji has two nieces; these two nieces have four children.  Mama-san has been taking care of all four of the kids - ranging in age from 3 to 11 - since we arrived in her small two bedroom apartment.  It is cramped but lively to say the least. 

I met the four children, Mama-san, and one of Haji’s nieces when we finally arrived at Mama-san’s apartment around 7:00 PM on Thursday.  To get from Narita Airport in Northeast Tokyo to Mama-san’s apartment on the western edge of Tokyo took probably 2.5 hours on three different Metro trains.  To say Tokyo is HUGE is like saying Brian would be lost without Haji in Japan; both would be an understatement!

There are so many people in Tokyo it is breathtaking and yet they all seem to get along amazingly well.  Japanese people are polite.  Really polite.  And really clean.  Tokyo has to be the cleanest big city I have ever visited.  From what I can tell, it seems really safe.  It is also the most difficult to navigate for a Westerner as the general lack of English characters (although I am told that English characters on the subway are a recent addition), the lack of spoken English, and the general lack of street signs make it very very difficult to easily get one’s bearings.   I have said it once and I will continue to say it:  Without Haji, I would be 100% lost.  Utterly confused.  Dumbfounded.

One of the main reasons I really appreciate being around Haji is because on the first full day we were in Tokyo I was unfortunatley not around him.  Not too smart.  Haji had his visa appointment at the U.S. Embassy  the day after we arrived.  I took off walking by myself once we arrived at the Embassy with an agreement to meet back up with him in three hours.  I got lost.  I didn’t have a cell phone.  My map was wrong.  I felt totally out of my element.  It is funny looking back on it now but at the time it was very frustrating (and this was after less than 24 hours in Japan!).

During those three hours, I visited the Dojoji Temple in Tokyo along with Tokyo Tower.  Tokyo Tower is a larger, Japanese-version of the French Eiffel Tower painted in red & white stripes with big satellite dishes strapped to the sides of it - le horreur!  It has some pretty smoking views of Tokyo which made me appreciate just how big the city really is.  I will post pictures from the Tower (along with the rest of the trip) when I get back to the States.  I have some pretty funny videos of electronic toilets, TV cell phones, super-smart vending machines, and a whole bunch of weird food that I also want to compile and post when I get back.

As far as sticking with Haji goes, I didn’t learn my lesson the first time and promptly (and purposely) separated from him later (in the same first day no less!) only to find out that I had written his cell phone number down wrong.  This caused us to be separated again without a way to find each other when we were supposed to meet back up on Friday night.  We separated because he wanted to go back and get a Japanese haircut by Mama-san’s house so I stayed in the center of Tokyo and wandered around eating food that I couldn’t name, taking pictures of buildings I couldn’t believe, and oogling electronic things I couldn’t quite understand.  It was really cool (except for the part about Haji & I having trouble meeting up for the second time in 12 hours). 

The buildings and technology in Tokyo are so…Japanese.  There are neon lights on everything.  Daytime could be nighttime and vice versa.  Ginza (one of the poshest areas of Tokyo) is packed with hundreds of fashion designers who sell outfits no Japanese person would wear (for the most part, the Japanese people dress pretty conservatively although there are young girls with some really outrageous outfits).  The average person carries around a cell phone that would put most of our laptop computers to shame.  They watch live digital TV in the subway and receive animated customized text messages from McDonalds on their cell phones.  They take pictures with their built-in 5 megapixel cameras, record movies, pay for things, e-mail, surf the web, and do a hundred other things for 40 bucks a month all while traveling 200 MPH on bullet trains which don’t require you to take off your shoes and belt to board.

I went to the Sony Showroom in Ginza on Friday and was blown away by some of the items Sony offers in Japan.  The size & weight of the notebook computers on display were amazing (they would put the new Apple MacBook Air to shame).  HUGE 1080 Hi-Def televisions.  Cameras which take a picture automatically when someone smiles.  4 floors of stuff which Sony puts out there to just show how crazy small they can make things. 

On a more personal level, Haji has tons of friends in Tokyo.  Many of these friends have lived in the States and knew Haji when he lived in Atlanta.  We met up with two of them, Yuusuke and Miwa for drinks & dinner on Friday night.  The way the Japanese socialize is very nice (and a cool blend of old traditions and new technologies).  They tend to go to restaurants where you can sit 4 to 8 at one table instead of a bar to have a drink.  The table is equiped with a touch screen menu.  You order the drinks and food from the menu and, honestly, the food and drinks show up within what seems like 15 seconds by servers who are exceedingly polite (of course the are polite, they are Japanese!).  

As far as socializing goes, the Japanese can drink.  They are not sloppy in their drinking (I doubt they are sloppy in anything) but just about everyone seems to drink.  Young.  Old.  Happy.  Sad.  It doesn’t matter.  There are so many ways to turn rice into alcohol that there doesn’t really seem to be a reason not to partake in a beverage!

Not many people drive so there is no real enforcement of ID laws (you must be 20 to drink or buy cigarettes in Japan). Haji tells me that there is virtually no drug use here (although I would guess 65 to 70% of people smoke cigarettes).  You can drink in public on the streets (just don’t litter!) and you can bring beer with you on the trains (including the bullet trains).  Karaoke is really just an excuse to drink and sing and be merry.  It is really a lot of fun and I am surprised it hasn’t taken off more in the States (although the ‘all you can drink for 2 hours’ setup isn’t really conducive to a culture that relies so much on cars).  Three of Haji’s Japanese friends and the two of us rented a karaoke booth on Saturday night and it was a blast. 

Food prices in Tokyo are OK by big city standards.  You can eat for 5 to 7 dollars (ramen noodles & meat).  Sushi = Amazing.  They have these conveyor belt sushi bars where you can easily eat a small school of fish for 20 to 30 bucks a person.  Hot bitter green tea is really growing on me as is the spicy wasabi paste you can mix with soy sauce to give anything a little extra kick.   Haji really likes Tamago-yaki (Japanese omelet) along with shouchuu (rice vodka) - although not at the same time! - and I like both of these things as well.

It is getting late here and I am tired.   There is so much to write about but I guess the underlying emotion I want to convey in all that I have written above is three-fold:  A profound sense of gratitude for how Haji is sharing his country with me, an admiration for Japan (and an indication as to how much I like it!) and my frustration at my inability to communicate or even remotely understand 90% of what is going on around me. 

For now, domo & sayonara (thanks & goodbye!).

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This may be stating the blazingly obvious, but BDC.com has undergone a new blog design. This included switching from the publishing platform ExpressionEngine to WordPress; customizing the template here to also include all of my pictures (which are now hosted over at Flickr.com), and switching web hosting companies over to Media Temple (amongst other geeky things).

There should be a poll directly to your right –>
Please tell me what you think of the new design: Is it better or worse than the old one?

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