Thailand: Actual

I arrived in Bangkok at about 4pm. We'd decided to sleep in a hotel the first night and get an early start the next day. I thought I could make it to the hotel in before the sun went down at 6pm, being only 30 miles away, but that was way too optimistic. By the time I figured out how to get my bike case to Phuket, the sun had already gone down. It wasn't the 10min process that Erdem reported, having gotten there the previous night. Not having a phone, I decide to take a cab so Erdem doesn't think I'm dead on the highway.

I finally got to the hotel and put my bike together by about 8pm. When I got to the room, Erdem was fast asleep. I guess he wasn't very worried. We filled each other in on the details of our trip. Erdem told me that before he had left, one of his tubes popped in his apartment. He said it was so loud that his ears were ringing. When Erdem got his bike at the baggage claim, he put it together immediately. While in the baggage claim, he began pumping up his tires, and he kept pumping them up, until they popped. He said people were looking around and ducking. I'm surprised he wasn't arrested. I then go over and feel his tires and they are solid as a rock. He decided to let a little air out of them. In all fairness, my tires have been continually under-inflated. I've gone through more tubes than him because of this. I guess we both learned a little.

We then decided to go out for a bite to eat. I put on my sandals and we left the hotel. My first step off of the hotel property and my only footwear fails me.

This was not the start I was looking for. Luckily, we were still in the city, so it was pretty easy to find a cheap pair of sandals. They were only a couple of sizes too small, so they would suffice. After that, we went to the backpacker area, Khao San Road, to get something to eat. I got a couple entrees to get a few more calories for the trip. After all, 600 miles is a long way.

In that same spirit, we filled up at the hotel's breakfast buffet before we left the next morning. By 7am, we were on the road. The route was a little tough to follow, but Erdem had GPS and Google Maps on his phone, so it wasn't that bad. We just had to stop every once in a while. After about 30 min, we were well on our way out of the city and onto the first highway. The roads were flat and in good condition, the heat wasn't too bad, and it wasn't very windy. Conditions were pretty ideal.

Things started to take a turn at around 20 miles. Right as we were about to get on the major highway, I look back and Erdem is nowhere in sight. After backtracking a little bit, I see Erdem sitting on the side of the road. Luckily, he hadn't crashed, but had a bad cramp in his back. His backpack was too heavy. When he decided to throw some of his clothes and other stuff away, I decided to take on as much of it as I could. We started riding again, but it wasn't enough. The cramp was already there. We ended up having to stop every mile or so. This was not a good start at all. It was not looking good.


Erdem had taken about 10 Advil when he first stopped, and they eventually starting taking effect. Thank god for that. After about 30 miles, we finally started getting into a groove. We rode for about an hour straight at over 20mph before we stopped again. We stopped at a little restaurant on the side of the road for some water and Pepsi. At the restaurant, as with what seemed to be the rest of Thailand, there were some stray animals to keep us company.

We decided to ride for another 2 hours before stopping for lunch, so we each ate a Clif bar and started the next 40 mile leg of our trip. The sugar and caffeine must have given Erdem a real boost because we were now riding about 10% faster. Things were starting to look good again.

Things started to take another turn an hour later. With 37km to go, Erdem started hitting a wall. We progressively started having to stop at shorter and shorter intervals. What was supposed to take 1 more hour ended up taking about 2 hours. Phetchaburi and, therefore, food started to seem farther and farther away.

By the time we reached Phetchaburi, it was a much more serious milestone than we had planned. Phetchaburi certainly didn't diminish the accomplishment.

Erdem was in agreement. He was finished. He could barely stand up, literally. I wish I had taken a picture, but he fell over on his bike right after we got to the town. By the time we found a place to eat, he barely seemed conscious. It was probably for the better, though. Being conscious let's you get distracted by things like the fact that the restaurant you're eating at doubles as a daycare.

Or that the city is crawling with monkeys.

So we were finally eating a real meal after our 7 hour trip and 20 minutes of trying to communicate what we wanted to eat. After about 7 small entrees and a gallon of water, we were ready to go. We had about 45 miles to our final destination for the night, Hua Hin. Unfortunately, we were not going to be doing that by bike. We had seen a sign for a train station, so we decided to take the train the rest of the way. We could use the help if we were going to be doing this for another 3 or 4 days...

We were lucky to make it to the train station just in time to catch the next train. Erdem made a few friends on the train. They probably took about 5 camera phone pictures with him. They were this guy and about 7 mulsim girls. It wasn't all friendly faces, though. There was a strange guy giving us an evil death-stare with blood-shot eyes the whole ride. To be fair, he was probably just looking at us.

After we got off in Hua Hin, we talked to a woman who recommended a hotel on the water. Her directions involved going past the Hilton. It took a lot of self-restraint for Erdem to follow that part of the directions. When we got to the hotel, we got a room with AC, of course. Unfortunately, we didn't realize we could turn it down, so I spent the whole night going between being too hot under the covers and being bitten by mosquitoes without the covers. It wasn't until morning that we discovered the dial that controls the AC. In case you're interested, air conditioning is called "air cond" in Thailand, as if it were discovered through the options list of a discount rental car company.

After waking up late, eating breakfast, and wasting a few hours, Erdem announced that he wasn't going to be able to ride 45 miles that day to the last town before the 120 miles stretch with no big cities, which was already out of the question to ride. We figured, we might as well enjoy ourselves if we weren't going to do any riding that day. This is probably where the reality of the trip departed from the plan. Our next move was a haircut and shave.

At this point, all bets were off. We finally came to the conclusion that we should just get to Phuket as quickly as possible and do as much good riding there as we were willing. So that night, we took a train to Surat Thani.

And a truck to Phuket.

Yay, we made it. That was much easier than we thought it would be.

The first thing we did when we arrived was get a hotel, with AC.

Thailand: Expected

I packed a small backpack, and 3 small bags that fit on my bike. I was going to ride from the airport in Bangkok to the airport in Phuket, and spend a couple days riding around Phuket. Attached to my backpack was a bivy sack. To get every last ounce of riding effort possible, we were going to sleep wherever we were when the sun went down. We didn't want to be riding in the dark too much. If the roads weren't dangerous enough, the malaria-carrying mosquitoes were, which only come out at night. Erdem got some malaria pills, but I thought the bug repellent and bivy sack were enough. I brought a tarp to protect us and the bikes from possible rain while sleeping outside.

The distance between the airports is almost 600 miles, and would definitely be more with the inevitable detours taken into consideration. After all, we did want some time to relax at the beaches along the way. We wanted to spend a couple days in Phuket, so we had to make the trip in 4-5 days. We figured that 150 miles/day would get us there in the right amount of time. To do that much riding, I brought about 15 Clif bars that were certain to be necessary. I also brought some tupperware and plastic bags to save food from restaurants. We were going to need to eat a lot of food.

Even eating as much food as I could, I knew it wouldn't be enough to maintain my weight. I ate more food than average for the week before the trip to gain a little extra weight that I would surely lose on the trip. That was definitely a good start to the trip.

In short, we were expecting a tough trip.

Death Rattle

It has now been a couple weeks since I last posted. As suspected, the posts are getting fewer and farther in between. Part of it is because I've been trying to push harder with work. I've also been reading more. Whatever the reason, it's going to be hard to keep it up. We'll see if I can keep thinking of things to post. And when I do think of things, we'll see if I actually post them.


You might think that Heather is equally sad about my lack of posts, but this was supposed to be a follow-up to my post about Heather's TV-watching; better late than never. I'm not going to try to think of anything clever to say because the picture says it all.

This is a picture from the top floor of our building. As you can see, the park next to our apartment is pretty awesome. The buildings at the bottom left of the picture are part of the British embassy. For those of you who like seasons, you can see that, despite it's temperate weather, Tokyo has them. There are some very impressive views.

This was on another 5 hour ride down a different river. In case you're wondering, this wasn't a particularly beautiful spot, it's just where I happened to get a flat tire. As a fixed my tire, I watched everyone ride by on their silent, perfectly-maintained bikes. I was loudly squeaking for all 120km of this ride. It's pretty embarrassing. Just as I haven't taken the time to post, I haven't taken the time to figure out how to properly take care of my bike. I wish I didn't have to keep it outside. That would make it much easier.

This was just another farm area I passed on my ride. I think it's impressive how many of these you'll see around the city. Tokyo definitely has the weather for it.

I leave for Thailand in less than 2 weeks now, so my next post may be in 3 weeks. Hopefully, it will be sooner. There was a funny public service ad in the subway, so I might try to get a picture of that and post it.

...And Up Close

This is a little harbor on the east side of Hong Kong Island. This is where we began our attempt to climb the mountains of Hong Kong. Why at the one place where you are guaranteed not to be one a mountain? We asked the cab to take us hiking (after several attempts at asking him to take us somewhere more particular) and ended up at the Museum of Coastal Defense. Rather than waste time getting driven somewhere else we couldn't hike, we decided to just walk towards the mountains and hope for the best. The island is mostly covered in mountains, so it shouldn't be that hard.

After a little effort, we finally made it. And by effort, I mean, withstanding the complaints from the person pictured above. And by a little, I mean, a lot. That was a very satisfying "I told you so" when she was ecstatic about the scenery. There were little treats scattered about, as well. Heather is sitting next to a little shrine with incense for passers-by.

The trails were a well-worn, but cozy. It was a great combination for trail running. If only we had started sooner, we could have gotten a real workout.

We didn't do too bad, though. From here you can see down to the bay where the first photograph was taken. It seems like a long way, but it isn't that far. We could have gone a lot further.

These are the apartment buildings we passed on our way to the mountain trails. They are all extremely tall. It's no surprise that Hong Kong houses about half of the 100 tallest residential buildings in the world. These aren't luxury apartments, either. This was not a neighborhood I would want to live in. Maybe I've just been spoiled by the immaculate conditions of Tokyo.

This was the view in the other direction. As you can see, plenty of room to roam. And as you can also see, the pollution leaves no place untouched.

This was the great complement to our workout. These are the Xiao Long Bao that Hedy addicted me to in Shanghai. They are so delicious. In 3 Chinese meals we had 7 orders of these. I hadn't had good Chinese food in so long. I couldn't get enough. It was such a relief to not be charged an arm and a leg like in Tokyo. I could finally eat to my stomach's content. Food probably costs less than half as much in Hong Kong, along with just about everything else. Cheap food and cabs make it a great city to visit, but with the Tokyo-range rent prices, maybe not so great a place to live.

This is a view of a typical street around Hong Kong. This picture was taken near Spencer's apartment and near where we hung out. This area felt a little more cramped than the rest of the city. It wasn't uncomfortable, though.

Well, that was until this. This was a bathrooms of one of the places where we hung out for a bit. I didn't think anything of it until I couldn't get in. I am certain that someone much bigger than me would have to use the urinal from where you see me standing.

This was a hookah bar we went to with Spencer, his girlfriend, and her friend. That is Spencer in the background. This is the second time Heather has seen Spencer since she was 7, and I was with her the last time she saw him. It's fun because we're getting to know some of her family, together.

I had a great time in Hong Kong and would love to go back, but right now my sights are set on Thailand.

Hong Kong at a Glance

I haven't posted as frequently as usual the past couple weeks. I'm going to blame it on our recent trip to Hong Kong. We had to leave the country for a few days since we don't have Japanese visas, yet. We figured we might as well visit Heather's cousin, Spencer, given the opportunity. He is working as an investment banker and living on Hong Kong Island.


This is a picture of the area where he works and lives from the other side of the harbor. The tall building to the right was in the new Batman movie, and the second tallest building, in the middle, is I.M. Pei's Bank of China building.


This is a picture of the sun coming up over the east side of Hong Kong Island, where there are more residential buildings.

There is a walk of fame along the harbor that is similar to Hollywood's walk of fame, but scaled down and all but completely missing camera-bearing tourists...

This was one of my favorite parts of Hong Kong. Bruce Lee is one of the most intriguing people I've ever read about. It was fun to see his statue on the walk of fame. I read that the building in the background can be disassembled and reassembled elsewhere relatively easily.

Bruce Lee!

Grey's Depressing Anatomy--Hilarious

While some of you may watch the show, Grey's Anatomy, I watch the show, Heather Watching Grey's Anatomy. Your show is a drama, but mine is a comedy. I could not have imagined Grey's Anatomy being worth the cost, but I am clearly just not that creative. It has created a show for even me to watch. I will show you a an excerpt from the show so you can see what I mean. Below is a particularly hilarious part of the show:

I think what's happening here is Heather is watching some doctor losing a patient, or dropping a kidney on the floor, or discovering the difficulties of workplace romance. My bet would be on the first one, because that can be particularly poignant.

Booyah! I was right. I can't wait until next week's episode. I hear Heather might watch some doctor learn some lesson in humility, or something.

In case you're worried about her brain, don't be. Above is a cross-section of the other half of her brain. It's a nice contrast. The collision of the two halves provides endless entertainment.

PS - No Heathers were harmed in the making of this show, or blog. Consent to share this information was verbal, and implied by not putting your hand up in front of your face while I took your picture, so please don't sue or bite me.

Costco Japan: Where Immoderate Moderation Meets Inefficient Efficiency

Heather first told me that there was a nearby Costco several weeks ago. For a while, we tried to plan a way to take advantage of it. We finally decided to take the subway and bring my rolling suitcase. While trying to find which subway lines to take to get there, I realized that there were not only many Costco stores in the area, but they were all at about the same inconvenient distance for a subway ride. Heather didn't seem to be into the arduous journey, and I'm even less thrilled about wasting the day to go shopping.

Even though the nearest Costco would have been a pain to travel to by subway, it wasn't too bad of a bike ride. It was about 20 km away on a very simple and direct route. I noticed that their website mentioned they had a delivery service, so I took a chance. Just in case I couldn't use their delivery service, I brought a duffel bag. I have small duffel bag that conveniently has straps on the bottom so you can wear it as a backpack. It's one of those features where you say, "Wow! How useful," but never end up using it. After 6 years of owning the bag, the feature finally proved itself.

This is a bridge I crossed along the way. The Costco was only about 2km beyond this bridge. You may not be able to tell, but the area on the other side of the bridge is a little more industrial. A fitting place for a Costco, I suppose.


When I got there, it closely resembled any other Costco. The only differences were the nationality of the clientele, and the language of the translations. Even when I applied for membership, I ended up being served by a guy from San Francisco who went to school at BU. That's hitting pretty close to home.

I shouldn't say those were the only differences, they were just the most immediate ones. Japanese moderation had also worked its way into Costco. It ended up being a nice balance. I get a discount and won't have to go shopping as often, but we can still fit the things we purchase in our apartment, barely. Let's just say, the drawers we recently discovered under our bed are now used as food storage.


Another subtle difference might be the items that are sold. It was mostly stuff you would find in an American Costco, but there were a lot of exceptions. Above is the most obvious exception that I noticed. An un-chilled bag of orange "Fish Stick." With a name like that, you'd expect something more like this in Japan: http://www.japanwindow.com/images/20050803052614_050725_nagano-fish0.jpg.

I haven't been to a Costco in a while, so I don't know if food stands are that normal, but I'm sure glad they have them. After a 20 km bike ride in the city, I'm going to stop at every stand at least once, unless they're serving "Fish Stick." The stand above was serving mangoes. They were delicious, but cost $4 each. That's still not a bad price for Japan.

The trip worked out perfectly. I could use the delivery service, but they wouldn't deliver quickly perishing items. My duffel bag ended up being just big enough to carry those. Now, the hard part would be getting home. Riding 20 km with 20 kg on your back isn't completely trivial. I had gotten a flat on the way to the store and replaced it with my last tube. On the ride home, every noticeable bump made me cringe with fear, but I made it home just fine.

Above is the view from the bridge going in the other direction. Things to notice in the picture: a railing so clean that it's very reflective; a decorative sidewalk, which is very smooth and clean; and some noticeable pollution. They really do a good job of keeping the city pleasant despite the crowding.

Things are nice, but sometimes it's too much. This was how they packed the Costco delivery. It was very nicely packed, which leaves me with a good feeling when I think about my last shopping experience in America. Some woman tossed a can of beans on top of a package of raspberries, the only thing in the bag at that moment. There are times when things are clearly done with too little care in America. They tend to go in the other direction here. Despite the comfort of knowing that the bag of chips you see in the picture isn't crushed, even slightly, it is annoying to have to spend 10 minutes unpacking this box.

It was a great move to start putting olive oil in plastic bottles. I have dropped a full bottle of olive oil on the floor, and the pain of the instant flashback to holding the plastic bottle in one hand and the glass bottle in the other, weighing my options, was enough to justify the future purchase of plastic. The ensuing clean-up of glass and oil just sealed the deal. It also seems logical to shrink wrap two bottles together. But to, then, wrap that package in several layers of cellophane seems a little overboard; especially when you only have dull knives around the house.

No biggie; yay for Costco, yay for Japan, yay for bikes, and double yay for double food.

Hell and Back

I decided to go for a ride yesterday to actually challenge myself and get a better taste of what the Thailand trip is going to feel like. Erdem said he was going to go for four continuous hours, so I decided on three hours once I got to the river, which should come out to about four hours total. As soon as I left the house, I knew I was in for a painful ride. There were strong gusts of wind even by our apartment in the city. I knew the river was going to be grueling, but it was the only place I could go for some open ground.

I stopped at the bike shop beforehand to pick up some more tubes. I used my last tube this week and did not want to get stuck 30 miles away from home with no cash. After that, I headed to the river. As expected, it was windy, in the wrong direction. I started out biking into 20 mph head winds. That is the one thing that makes biking no fun to me. But I had to keep going.

Things only got worse from there. The wind was only getting stronger. Wind seems to make everything hurt more. My calves felt twinges of cramping, both feet took turns cramping, my back was aching, and I was only 30 minutes into the ride along the river. The only thought that kept me going was that the ride back was going to be a piece of cake. Even that thought started to fade as I saw the sun getting low. I knew the winds would calm down at some point. The thought of not going head-first into the wind was still enough to keep me going.

After about two and a half hours I decided I was too hungry to just turn around and go back. I had to find food if I was going to make it home. I turned off of the river and looked for anything. I made it to a 7-11, but alas, they do not take American credit cards. I was not feeling well, and was getting desperate. I headed for some big buildings I saw nearby, assuming I would have better luck there. And I did. I found a Lawson, which is now my go-to convenience store because they take Amex.

I couldn't resist getting faux-Pringles and ice cream sandwiches. I knew I needed salt and calories, although I probably could have picked something better. I sat out back and had my ~2500 calorie meal feeling pretty happy. The sun was getting low, and there was a lot more open space this far out.

This was the view from behind the store. There were a lot of farms, but not the kind you'd expect in the US. There were a lot of small farms, that seemed they might actually only be for personal use. This was one of the bigger farms.

While I was behind the store, a fellow cyclist, who had seen me in the store, came out back to talk. He didn't speak much English, but enough to have a chat. It was a pleasant break, but with my stomach full, it was time to head back.

This was the best view of the entire trip. It was where I got off of the river to find some food, and where I started my journey home. As you can see, the farther you get away from Tokyo, the more that baseball and soccer fields become golf courses. They equally shared the river banks with farm land out here. There are many nicely-paved bike paths out here. It is not something I would expect to find in the US. Below is a short video I took in one section that, I assume, had a golf course on one side and farm land on the other. I couldn't take a picture while I was riding because it would be blurry and I didn't want to stop.

The tail winds were great on the ride back, for a while. My average speed went from 23 kph to 40 kph. But that slowly dwindled. As the sun was setting, the winds were dying. My average speed worked it's way down to 35 kph. At that point, I was 20-30 km from my exit off of the river, and the winds started to change direction. I was hitting a wall at this point. Not only was I physically drained, but emotionally. My main motivation to keep pedaling was to prevent my legs from cramping, which would happen if I stopped. I didn't think I could make it home, without stopping. At this point, I reconsidered the entire trip to Thailand. This was only half of one day of my trip. There was no way I could do this twice in one day. And what was I going to do on day two?

Just as I was at my worst point, the winds finally stopped. Riding in neutral wind was much easier. My feet were numb and my legs were still cramping, but it was a much more peaceful cramping than before. I, at least, thought I could probably make it home without stopping, which I did. It ended up being about a 5 hour, 120 km ride. I think without the wind it would have been a four hour ride or 145km. It would have also been less painful and tiring.

When I got home it was time to eat. I can't remember the last time I ate like that. I made a full ~1750 calorie dinner and ate it easily. After a couple hours of rest, I was starving again. I made another ~1000 calorie meal. I would go broke if I worked out like this regularly. My appetite finally slowed down this morning. I've had ~1250 calories and am finally not getting hungry again.

All things considered, I think the trip is do-able. There's going to be more eating than even I thought, and it will be a little more physically draining, but I think we can still do it. That is, as long as there isn't a head wind. If there is, I'm just going to hop on a bus.

Update on Thailand Trip

I just bought a speedometer/odometer for my bike last week. I partially used the trip as an excuse to buy it. It will be very handy, though. Today was my first time really using it. I wanted to do a test run to get a feeling for what the trip was going to be like. We're planning on trying to do the 800 km trip in about 5 days. I thought 30 kph would be a good goal pace.

My ride was going well until I got to the river. Somehow, both directions I went had a really strong headwind and I ended up going about 24 kph for a lot of it. That was pretty demoralizing. The city was the easiest part, despite the traffic and lights, because there was no wind. Without the lights, I would have averaged about 35 kph. If we do the trip in 4 days, that will be about 7 hours of biking per day at a pretty good pace. I did 2 hours today, and I was already starting to get a little nervous about the trip within the first hour. I was getting tired, my back was hurting, my butt was hurting, my legs were tired. That's not a good sign. I need to start training more. I don't think I could do today's workout 3 1/2 times per day for 4 days in a row right now.

At least I'll have much more motivation when I'm there: http://www.braun-rentacar.com/add_images/similan3_2.jpg.

More Biking

I went for a ride the other morning as the sun was coming up. The weather was perfect for a hard ride. Unfortunately, I was too tired to really push it. Instead, I just played a couple of games. One is called, "Try To Find Your Way Home," and the other is called, "Don't Get Hit By the Huge Trucks." They're both pretty exhilarating. This was the first time I had taken a route home from a reasonable distance that I had never taken before. The more I get to know the city, the easier this kind of thing gets, but it still would be really easy to get lost. Especially since it was a cloudy and foggy morning and I couldn't necessarily use the sun for direction.

That game wasn't that hard. The other game was a little harder. Those trucks were trying to beat me at it. I'm only considering it a competitive game rather than a cooperative one because of the few trucks who don't seem to agree. One truck left me just enough room to pass by a parked car so that I would try to pass between the car and the truck rather than wait for the truck to pass by first. In the end, I won. I made it home in one piece.

I took another picture of the palace garden right next to our apartment before going home.

I also took a picture of ,what seems to be, another one of Tokyo's personal challenges to bikers.

That small gap is to prevent motor vehicles from driving on the path along the river, and simultaneously challenge bikers to ride through the smallest spaces they can without getting off of their bike. This one is actually not bad at all. I thought it was the first time I went through, but then saw the other ones along the path. The gaps on those are much smaller and have more little bars sticking out, trying to catch your feet or pedals as you pass through.

Trip to Thailand

After some planning, my friend, Erdem, and I have decided to take a trip to Thailand. We were going to go to Australia, but the tickets were much more expensive for this time of the year. We're going in the second half of December, which is when everyone in Tokyo is on vacation. This causes airline ticket prices to jump up dramatically. That part of the plan didn't work out too well, because what was supposed to be a $600 ticket to Thailand ended up being a $1200 ticket to Thailand. I think I just booked too late. Oh well, I'm really excited about the trip, anyway.

We're going to be biking from Bangkok to Phuket. It's about 500 miles. We're going to get to Phuket on the 20th and leave from Phket on the 27th. Hopefully, we won't have so much biking that we can't take some time explore. There are organized bike trips that do that route in about ten days with about eight days of biking. I think we should be fine. The hardest part is going to be getting my bike box from Bangkok to Phuket. I still have that part to figure out. I'll probably just ship it to a hotel and stay there for the last night. We have been planning to sleep in bivi sacks along the way, but it only costs about $15 / night to stay at an inn, so we'll see.

I'm really excited about the food. It's the perfect place to be for a bike trip. We're going to need extra calories with all of the biking, so we're going to have to eat enormous amounts of delicious Thai food. I just wish I didn't have to wait for two months.

http://www.beachbumparadise.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/thailand-phi-phi-beach.jpg

I almost hope something goes wrong so I don't have to leave.

My New Haircut

Before this weekend, I hadn't cut my hair in a while. It was probably about 3 months before leaving for Tokyo when I last got my hair cut. Since I got here, I've avoided getting my hair cut because I don't carry cash with me and I doubt the barbers take credit cards. It had gotten so long that I contemplated letting it grow indefinitely, partially inspired by my good friend, Dr. Shearer, and his mop-like hairstyle.

That could only last so long. Eventually, my anxiety-driven personality features will lay waste to anything that draws their attention. This weekend, that is exactly what happened. We had initially planned for Heather to cut my hair, but I ended up cutting it the moment I got my hands on some scissors. If it seems not so bad from this angle, just trust that there is an angle at which it will seem that way.

I wish I had taken a before picture. I think living in Tokyo is actually helping me be more self-sufficient. The small inconveniences involved with doing various things drives me to just take care of them myself. Anyway, my head feels much better now. And I think having one less oil-soaked item in the apartment makes it that much more fire-safe.

PS - I wanted to post a video of me calling out for Jager bombs, but I don't know if anyone would get it. If you would, good on you.

More Simple Stuff We Can't Use

What is it this time? The trash. We were very able trash-handlers back in the US. Here, we are handicapped. Here is the sign on the door of the trash room:

I assume this tells you the day and time that different types of trash are taken out. We haven't figured it out yet. Within the trash room, it's even tougher.

There are many signs and places for trash. This is only 1/3 of the room. I am fairly certain that we aren't using it appropriately.

I'll leave you with a quote delivered somewhat excitedly by Heather while in the trash room: "Is this stuff all up for grabs?" It probably wasn't as bad as it sounded, but I didn't find out what she was talking about, just in case it was.

Our First Day Out

We went to a small theater in Shibuya to see the movie, "Stolen" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1071832/). It was definitely the smallest theater I've ever been to. We were sitting in the very back of the theater, so you can see just how small it is. The movie wasn't very good, not that I expected it to be. It was about how several paintings were stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum in Boston, Massachusetts. She didn't seem to be a very interesting woman, the paintings didn't seem all that interesting, and the criminals involved weren't that interesting. The most interesting thing was probably the insurance company investigator's history with the Navy. They performed tests on him that involved putting him under UV lights. He developed skin cancer when he was in his 20's. That was the most interesting fact of the entire movie.

Shibuya is a huge shopping area. This city and area clearly has a lot of money. Below are two pictures of almost identical Ferraris that were parked within about 100 feet of each other. There are outrageously expensive cars all over the city all of the time. I saw a car from the same era as this one: http://www.yorkwa.com.au/Motor.Museum/images/1934MG-NE.500x210.jpg. It was just riding around on the street. I can't even remember seeing that anytime in the US.

This picture isn't very clear, but it was meant to show how much personal attention there is in a lot of the city. Every major store has an abundance of human help. You probably can't see it in the picture, but there are about 5 guys standing outside of this department store to hail cabs for people. In other stores there are people just holding signs to advertise the products next to them. That job would typically be done by a low-to-mid quality stand in the US. That alone would explain the high prices around Tokyo. We went into this department store, but didn't even come close to buying anything. The most basic kitchen utensils were about $30, and there's no spoon worth that much to me (barring some freak combination with something like a 20 in LCD screen).

I took a picture of a keyboard just to show how similar they are to ours. The only difference is that the keys have additional functions to type Hiragana.

This is just an unusual McDonalds product. I hope it's not something new in the US that I just don't know about.

This is a sculpture about 200 feet from our front door. It's nothing special, except that it somehow eluded our attention this entire time that we've lived here. How could something this big and yellow completely escape our attention? I was looking almost directly at it when Heather pointed it out. I honestly didn't even see it until she did.

This picture is just to show how many people ride bikes in this city (not how poorly I take pictures at night). These collections of bikes are everywhere in the city. Any place with a reasonable amount of people is bound to have many bikes parked near it.

We ate out together for our second time while we were out. We had Italian this time. It was delicious. It was about $17 for what would normally be a side dish in the US. I had a very small plate of orchiette and Heather had a reasonably-sized pizza. After that, we went to a bakery and had a couple of dessert pastries. One thing I would like to note is that there are bakeries everywhere. Between here and Heather's work (10 min walk), you can pass about 8 bakeries/dessert shops.

The last thing I would like to note is that many things that have faded into history in the US are still alive and strong here in Tokyo. Two things I noticed this weekend were the chain, Tony Romas, and the show, Alf. Amazingly, right after seeing the show Alf, I encountered a reference to the show that assumed your knowledge of it. I wish I could remember the reference, but it talked about aliens that like to eat cats. If I hadn't just seen the show, I wouldn't have caught it.