SparkFun has a nice summary of the flood here.
Tokyo Desu
We’ve been back less than two weeks and I miss it already. I recognize almost all of the locations in this video:
Last Photos from Japan
As you may have surmised from my Twitter feed, we have returned home. The trip was excellent–very relaxing, no trips to the emergency room, no brush-with-death experiences. We were, as always, sad to leave.
There was a taifun passing not far from Japan during our last days there. It was probably responsible for some amazing skies we saw from our hotel-room window, including a double rainbow over the Sky Tree on the last evening and a spectacular sunrise the next morning:
Speaking of the weather, on the way home we flew straight into the first winter-like storm of the season as we descended over the Rockies and hence encountered some rather awful turbulence. I very nearly tossed my proverbial cookies, but at least it woke me up for the following drive home from the airport.
Ramen With Rafael
As he put it, dinner with our friend Rafael at the Ippudo ramen restaurant is now a traditional part of our visits to Japan. Here are some photos from a couple of evenings ago.
Silliness in Asakusa
Did some shopping in Ginza and Asakusa today. Why is it that I consistently find shoes more interesting in Japan than in the US?
Hase
We went to Hase to see the Great Buddha today. I’ve taken numerous photos of him on our numerous visits, in spring and in fall, in dry weather and in rain. The challenge now is to find something different to capture and portray with photography, other than the usual obvious portrait-like shots. Today I didn’t seem to be up to the challenge, so, for variety, here’s a photo of some trees near him.
Yes, Generally Speaking
The Japanese text for “Koto blend coffee” and “Iced coffee” says “blend” and “ice” respectively. The Japanese text for “Weak coffee” says “American”.
Things We Saw Today
Today we went to Uji, a town near Kyoto known for its production of tea. We first stopped at the Agata shrine, one of the oldest of its style in Japan:
We bought a couple of matcha bowls from this gentleman:
He has a small but beautiful stock of tea ware. We bought a bowl from him during a previous visit, but didn’t discover until today that he has a rather good command of English. It turns out that he has visited the US a few times “when [he] was much younger.” His website is here.
Body Surprise
Smaller text says “Refresh Place”. Seen in Kobe, Japan.
Alley in Kyoto
