The class are the Morning Musume chicks, the teacher is Thane Camus, Alberts grandchild.

Last Sunday we celebrated Brad's birthday, next in a row. Obviously the party took place on lovely volcanic, sandy beach in Enoshima.

at Kuba's place last Saturday. Japanese are rather not familiar with this kind of party. We explained some rules.

Brad tries Polish beetroot soup.

Greg's butt narrows visual area.

And me, slightly immobilized, on antibiotics and soft drinks.

Thanks to one of my reader's suggestion I'm testing a new video streaming service. Much better quality, unknown performance.
Unfortunately you have to install a divx web player.


Theme from Laputa performed while waiting for main dish by Hanako.

Kuba and Juri were our guests last evening.

We recall interview with Tomek, Christmas Eve, Dave's farewell and some other nice moments.

Some additional pictures from a nightwalk at Okinawa main city.

Okinawa is a kind of a strange place. Shoko is here for the first time and she was expecting something more different from the rest of Japan.
From Tokyo point of view Ryukyu archipelago is the poorest part of the country. Big companies are placing their secondary branches here cause it's cheaper. Taxi costs 200JPY/km cheaper than DC, a plate of fresh prawn in the supermarket same.
A big part of the color is made by American army. The main island is filled with military facilities. You can listen to American village radio station, have a hamburger or buy a replica of an army uniform (eg. suitable for gaspanic club later ;).
You can find jumbo's together with F4 Phantom's standing in a takeoff line at the local airport.

Okinawa is also famous of golden sandy beaches. We visited one city beach yesterday. Just after rain stopped the rescuer climbed onto his watchtower, the boys started playing football and we jumped into the ocean.

A friend had just send me a link to an interesting documentary about Japanese gigolos, The Great Happiness Space: Tale of an Osaka Love Thief (IMDB). A bit of Japanese reality, If you have a free hour check it out.

Rainy weekend at Okinawa, a two days cloudburst as a matter of fact. Closed freeway, everybody are sitting in bars and drinkin awa mori. Only we drive around some thicket delighting in the open space.

Nothin is goin on. I'm tryin to use my time to maximum, wringing attractions but still nothing is happening. A fast lifestyle habit makes bruises in you, which are difficult to fill by anything else. The lack of plans and everyday life kills.

Japan is seized by summer hanabi seazon. Fireworks are done everyday in a different place. There look best on the beach. Yesterday, at Miura Kaigan, they were shooting from ships. I have to admit, it was made with much more finesse than last week, at Yokohama. I'm only wondering where the hanabi tradition came from. In western world we shoot for something (weeding, new years eve). So far nobody answered my question, why fireworks are organized in that local, but extraordinary form, in Japan.

Arrangement of company's incentive party, on the local fireworks show is not an easy job. It begins early morning, when carefully selected representatives from every office (mostly the youngest staff) are assigned to choose and to keep an eye on the spot for evening picnic. Hanabi starts in 10 hours but there is a noticeable congestion at the site. During all day the representatives are fighting with wind, sun and oilcloth. The chosen ones are visited on lunchtime by the other colleagues, to fill water lacks and inspect the spot. At sunrise a thousands of people are coming to the site and the party is starting. Finally you can see your female colleague wearing yukata. The cross-office integration is not into practice. Also invitation of family members is not so common.
Of course the civilians, students and holidaymakers are coming, but with their own subgroups.