Well, I tried to post on Saturday but due to murphy's laws, lost an hour's typing! I do hate that SO much. So anyway, I don't have much time to post about Laos and Vietnam at the moment. The reason I am short on time is that I am back in Tokyo after having accepted a job forming and leading a Product Engineering team for a small company here. ( Read more... )

After Japan, it was back to Bangkok to start the next segment of my travels. The first task was to hand in my passport to get a visa for Vietnam. The next day was Christmas which was a bit a non-event in that I knew no-one in town and it just didn't seem to feel like Christmas (even though there was a tuk-tuk made up to look like a sleigh with ( Read more... )

After Hiroshima, it was off to Kyoto, where I spent a couple days exploring temples and castles. The first day I spent wandering around the castle and then heading to a temple on the Northern edge of Kyoto before heading back to the hotel to check in and get some rest. The next morning I spent a long day visiting a half dozen temples in the east ( Read more... )

My visit to Nagasaki began with a train ride into Nagasaki station. This route took me right into Nagasaki only a few hundred meters away from the hypocenter of the A-bomb. However, there was no way of telling this. The city which had been reduced to rubble by the blast and following fires, has been completely rebuilt. There are in fact only a ( Read more... )

Well, it is now more than two weeks since I left Japan, so it is probably about time that I posted a little more on my visit, before I forget ( Read more... )

Well, I had been working on a post (which failed and I will have to rewrite later) on the rest of my time in Japan the other day when the news broke of the earthquake and tidal waves. A number of you have emailed wanting to know where I was and if I was ok. I *AM* in Thailand, but far from the affected areas ( Read more... )

After my rather confusing start in Japan, it was up in the morning to go find some internet access and a cup of coffee. The weather ended up being absolutely fantastic with sunshine and temperatures in the mid-20's (centigrade that is). After finding some overprice net access at Kinko's I grabbed a quick train to visit the National Museum. There ( Read more... )

Well, after a month at home, it was back on a plane back to Asia. First stop Tokyo, Japan. I arrived in town late afternoon on Saturday and after getting my rail pass, renting a phone (Japan has their own technology so this is on of only 2 or 3 places in the world where my phone won't work) it was off to Tokyo from the airport. The ride was ( Read more... )

After spending almost a week up in Chiang Mai, it was back to Bangkok to catch a flight to Denpasar, Bali in Indonesia to go back to Gili Trawangan for a couple weeks. Upon arrival in Bali I had to try to get on a (standby) flight to Mataram in Lombok. Unfortunately I was not able to get a flight. Of course this could have been avoided easily if ( Read more... )

Well, I guess there is no doubt about it - I have been SERIOUSLY slacking on updating the blog ( Read more... )