Japan - Some Observations

I want to give a day-by-day account of our trip to Thailand.  Before I do, however, I want to give an overall impression of our vacation and Japan in general.  There are some things that just span the whole trip, or do not fit neatly into the day-by-day narrative. 

Overall, I had a fantastic time on our trip.  Unlike some places that I have visited, I eagerly look forward to visiting Japan again, perhaps multiple times.  There were a lot of really great things about Japan.

Transportation

Getting around in Japan without a tour guide was very easy.  They have a superb public transportation system that includes trains, buses and subways (of course air travel as well).  Most signs were in both English and Japanese, so it was never too difficult to find out how to get where we wanted to go.  In those times where we did have difficulties, people were more than willing to help us (more on that below). 

We bought a seven day JR Rail pass, which gives unlimited use of the JR rail lines.  Our trip was for ten days, so we didn’t activate the pass immediately.  We used the pass for JR lines within Tokyo and Kyoto, as well as traveling between Tokyo, Osaka, Nikko and Kyoto.

I would highly recommend getting the pass for extensive travel between cities in Japan.  At nearly five-hundred dollars per adult and half that per kids, it is not cheap, so if you are staying in one city the entire time, it is probably not worth it.   But a round trip between Tokyo and Kyoto on the bullet train (Shinkansen) practically costs as much as the rail pass. 

The JR rail pass does not cover the local subway lines, but the JR lines do cover access to large areas of Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, and probably other cities. 

People

I was really pleasantly surprised by the Japanese people.   With few exceptions, I found them to be nice, polite, helpful and orderly.  On many occasions we would stop and ask someone for help with directions, and with one exception everyone went out of their way to be helpful.  Sometimes you could tell the person was struggling to help us in English, but they almost universally tried.  When I ask for help, I was never (except once) made to feel like I was inconveniencing the other person; they were really great.

After spending quite a bit of time in Thailand, and making a few trips to China, my experience with queues has generally been rather negative.  Many Thai people have very little concept of waiting in line, instead cutting their way to the front.  At least my experience in Thailand is not as it was in China, where it was not uncommon to have someone shove anyone in their way in order to get somewhere a few seconds faster.

My experience in Japan could not have been more different.  Even though it was often very crowded, it didn’t feel like it.  People were very respectful of other people’s space.  On the few occasions that I was bumped into, the person who say “excuse me” in Japanese.  Well, I think that’s what they said, maybe they said “get out of my way idiot”, but I think they were being polite.

The people of Japan have queue skills that rival anywhere in the world.  They would line up single file to wait for the escalator.  The right side of the escalator was for standing, while the left side for walking, and I almost never saw anyone standing on the left side.  There was no pushing or shoving to get on a bus or train, everyone just waited their turn. 

Waiting in line, even a longer one, when you know that everyone is waiting their turn is a lot more pleasant than having to aggressively work to maintain your position.  It so much easier to travel with the kids when you aren’t constantly worried about them getting trampled or separated from us by the crowd. 

Sights

There is so much to see and do in Japan, and I felt that we really just scratched the surface.   My wife and I really enjoyed seeing the historic sites; the temples, shrines, and castles.  We only saw a handful, and could probably spend weeks there doing just that.  The grounds are so meticulously maintained, and the ones we saw were just beautiful.

It’s not just the ancient that Japan has to offer.  There is so much to do in Tokyo, and we only did a tiny bit of it.  The family could easily spend another week just doing things the kids would enjoy, not to mention visiting places like the fish market. 

Clean

Japan is so clean.  It’s funny because it is sometimes hard to find a garbage can around.  Sometimes we are looking for a while before we come across one.   Still, I didn’t see any liter. 

Maybe the fact that it is consider rude to eat while walking cuts back on some of the trash output in public.    Most of the things that I need to dispose of when I am walking around are probably food or drink related. 

Things I Didn’t Like

The things that I didn’t like about Japan and our trip were actually pretty minor.  My kids were not interested in seeing the historic sites, and Jacob and Nalin bickered and fought quite a bit.  Jacob was actually pretty difficult sometimes, taking offense to any perceived slight.  Of course, my kids behavior is not Japan’s fault.

There unspecified rules that it is easy to run afoul of.  I’m not talking about getting arrested, rather having someone come up and tell you that you shouldn’t do what you are doing.  Once I was sitting down on the ground taking photos of Tim and the girls in front of a park, and a guard came up and told me that I shouldn’t sit down like that.  I was not blocking pedestrian traffic, so I’m not sure of the problem, but of course I complied. 

Once we bought ice cream as we were leaving a museum, initially forgetting about the prohibition against eating while walking.  We stopped right outside the building so that the kids could finish, and after ten minutes someone came over and told us that there was no eating there. 



Finally, I was admonished against taking photos in a certain part of a shrine.  I was absolutely fine with that, as it is really not that unusual for more “sacred” parts to be off limits for photography.  Usually places post notices informing people of this rule.

The thing that probably frustrated me the most was our last night in Kyoto when we stopped in the Gion area to get dinner.  I was really looking forward to a nice dinner, but we had trouble finding a place that we wanted to eat that accepted credit cards.  As we were near the end of our trip, we were low on yen, which severely limited our options. 

Even though the last dinner was a bit of a sour note, the trip was still an overall success.  As you’ll see in my future posts, we saw some really interesting things, and I took quite a few photos.

Narita Express

We took the Narita Express from the airport to Tokyo. There was about a forty-five minute wait at the station, so I got out my camera. I didn't have a tripod with me, so for the shots with me in them, I ended up placing the camera on my suitcase.

Japan, Here We Come

The family has just recently returned from our trip to Japan.  This trip has been a long time coming; we cancelled four trips to Japan over the last few years; reasons ranging from visa issues to last minute business obligations.  Our trip last year was scuttled by hell and high water cause by the tsunami and nuclear issues.

For some reason, I was just not that excited about going on this trip.  Perhaps planning it several times and having things fall through had left me a bit jaded.  I booked the flight and hotels, did some of the research, but let Tim do a lot of the detailed planning.

Our plan was to spend five nights in Tokyo, and then head south to the ancient capital of Kyoto.  We planned to take some day trips from each city.

We flew into Tokyo on JAL arriving in the late afternoon.  By the time that we arrived at our hotel, the Hotel Century Southern Tower in the Shinjuku district, it was already getting late.  The hotel  location was less than a five minute walk from the Shinjuku train, bus and subway station, making it very convenient for getting around Tokyo.  The Krispy Kreme Donuts shop across the pedestrian walkway made eating many dozens of donuts very convenient.

Interestingly, the hotel lobby was on the 20^th floor.  We took one set of elevators to get to the lobby, and another set to get to our room.

After getting checked in, we went to get something to eat.  Our first meal in Tokyo was at Yoshinoya, a restaurant that sells curry and meat dishes.  The place was small, with a counter upstairs and one downstairs .  There were no booths or tables.  I had a curry dish with pork that was really quite tasty.  The kids loved the place, and we ended up eating there on at least one other occasion. 

Everyone was pretty tired by the time we ended up getting to bed. 

Easter Morning

On Sunday, the kids cousins Noodee and Pad came over for an Easter egg hunt.  Before they left, I took some photos.

Playing in the Light

I've been playing around with some photo techniques lately that have been a lot of fun.  The first is the use of multiple flashes on a single image.

The idea behind multiple flashes is to take advantage of the a longer exposure (1 second or more) in dim light or darkness.  During the single exposure, you fire a flash multiple times.  Since the lighting is too dim to capture anything with ambient light, the only thing visible on the photos occurs when the flash fires.  In effect, this let's someone appear multiple times in the same photo.

For example, I could set up an image with a shutter speed of 3 seconds, and set my flash to go off one time per second for three seconds.  By moving between flashes, I can appear three times on the same image.  No need for Photoshop, it comes straight out of the camera that way.  Here are some examples:










You see where there was a gap in the black background behind my feet in the "middle" Brian in the above image.


I was firing the flash 2 or 3 times per second in the above shot, and you can see multiple heads on the last body of Aleena.

I did not Photoshop these, the multiple images were each captured by the camera. I did make some adjustments in Lightroom to make parts of the image look brighter or darker. For example, I darkened the background so that it looks completely black in order to make the people stand out.

Originally, I was doing these photos outside, which presented some challenges.  There would always be a light or something very lightly colored in the background.  The ambient light from the background object would be strong enough to be exposed in the photo, so I could end up with a light in the middle of the model's body.

Now I am taking the photos inside and use a black background.  By closing the curtains, I can actually take the photos during the day.  I am having someone mount some brackets so that I can have a longer background for the photos.  I would have done it myself, but like so many things here, I don't want to buy the tools because I'm only going to be here for a little while.

It seems like the kids really like to pose for these photos, as do some adults.  I should have the background set up by the time we get back from Japan, so I'll definitely have more shots after that.

Happy Easter

I want to wish everyone a happy Easter.  This morning we had an Easter egg hunt with the kids and their cousins Noodee and Pad.

In addition to searching for the traditional plastic Easter eggs, I had the kids use a QR scanner and discover some virtual eggs as well.  When they scan the QR code, it displayed some facts about Easter.  When they collected all five facts, they received a prize.  Did you know that there are over ninety million chocolate bunnies made for Easter each year?  That is a lot of candy.

This afternoon we are going over to Jack and Douan's house for an Easter egg hunt and a cookout.  In the meantime, Tim and Tham are discussing the upcoming trip to Japan.

Aleena Said

Aleena and I were talking about baseball the other day.  She told me that at first she didn't know how to play, and she had thought that everyone would be on the field at the same time.  We laughed about it, but I guess since she had only played soccer and basketball, it's not really that surprising.

Paying It Back

Tomorrow is the parent-student conferences at ISB, so the kids are "off" school.  They have to go for a short time for the conference, but otherwise are off school.  The conferences are normally spread out over two days, but today was a makeup day for the eight or so days that they missed because of the flood.

Lady Gaga

Tim and some of her friends are going to the upcoming Lady Gaga concert in Bangkok this May. Apparently Joy knew someone who was able to score them tickets before they went on sale to the general public.

While they did not ask me if I wanted to go, I was hardly upset, as I probably would have declined. One person in our family who did not take being excluded very well was Aleena. When she learned that her mom had tickets and that she (Aleena) would not be able to go, she started crying. At one point she was on the floor weeping loudly stating "I want to go". Tim was at work at the time, so I had the joy of dealing with that myself.

I explained that none of her friends were going; that this was only for the moms. Aleena asked who was going, and when I told her, she said that one of them should give up their ticket so that she could go instead. Unsuccessful with this tact, she wrote a letter to her mom, which included a picture of herself crying because she could not go.

Aleena has brought it up a couple of more times since the initial outburst of tears, and while she didn't cry, it's clear that she is not happy about it.  I guess I'm going to hear about this for a while.

Gymntastical

Run, Hit and Catch

Jacob had a couple of games over the weekend.

Ninety More Days

Tomorrow is my interview with Thai immigration to receive my ninety day visa extension.  When I get back from our April trip to Japan, then I will need to apply for my one year spouse visa.

If things go as expected, then that will probably be the last Thai visa that I need.  Our plan is to leave in the summer of 2013, so if my one year visa expires in April, 2013, I can make a trip or two out of the country if necessary.  Realistically, a trip is probably more work than just doing the paperwork, but it is also likely to be more fun.

Let It Rain

The girls camping trip was certainly a memorable one.  On their second day, a strong storm swept through the campsite, tossing around the tents, and even knocking over some trees.  Most of the girls were out doing activities at the time, while a few mothers who had stayed behind to rest frantically tried to zip up the tents to prevent everything from getting wet.

Some of the troops made the decision to head back home on Saturday night and forgo another night at the camp ground and the next day's activities.  Aleena's Brownie troop was one of those who chose to go home, while Tim stayed with her Junior group.  The lodge allowed those who stayed to move into rooms instead of staying in wet tents.  I think that this made for a more pleasant stay the second night, because while the rooms are not air conditioned, they have fans and are much more comfortable than sleeping in a tent.

I remember two years ago when Jacob and I camped at the same place while he was a Cub Scout.  We had not properly attached the rain guard on the tent that first night, and were rewarded with some rain in our tent.  Fortunately we woke up before things were too wet, and I was able to correct the problem.  We were certainly not the only ones to get wet that night, several families faring much worse than us.

International Day

This International Week at ISB's elementary school, when the students celebrate their diverse backgrounds and countries of origins.  During the week, they were allowed to wear t-shirts that represented their homeland, and today (Friday) they are encouraged to wear their countries traditional costumes and outfits.  International Week was originally scheduled in November, but had to be moved back due to the flooding in Thailand.

Nalin and Aleena decided to wear traditional Thai outfits.  Aleena would bemoan the fact that there are not really American costumes, dismissing the cowboy motif.

The day starts off with a parade from the sports fields to the Chevron theater, where they have a student assembly. There are a lot of parents along the parade route, taking photos and waiving at the children.  After the assembly, the students return to their classrooms, where parents have setup stations to teach the kids about different countries culture.

Last year I went and took some photos at the parade, but this year I decided to sit it out.  Instead, I had the girls pose for some photos in my "studio" before they went to school.

Jacob's Birthday

Last Saturday Jacob celebrated his last pre-teen birthday in a pretty low key manner. The family went to dinner at a Korean BBQ in Central Changwattana at Jacob's request. After dinner, we returned home for some cake and presents.

As is evident from the photo, Jacob enjoyed the cake, even before he started eating it.