Hotel Associa Shinyokohama

... and our proctors were Kate from the field office and one of the English teachers. I didn't get much sleep the night before because of being nervous and the ship rocking so much but my adrenaline definitely was pumping when it came time to take the test. It is a lot of material on the test that ranges from coral reefs to diseases such as HIV, SARS, and influenza to Vietnam War history ...

... nejakych pat blokov dalej v centre meste. Mali, mladi, starsi aj nastarsi, vela z nich v tradicnych kimonach smerovali na niektoru z vlakovych stanic v okoli. Cestou kupovali obcerstvenie v mnozstve stankov, okolo ktorych sa postupne hromadili macky, holuby a odpadky. My sme tiez nieco vyskusali, tentokrat ani nic nevyhodili. Na vlak do Tokya sme sa dostali tesne pred desiatou, co sme mali v plane, aby sme stihli posledny expres do Tsukuby...

... decided we needed to try Kaiten Sushi, which was this neat restaurant where you sit at table next to a conveyer belt and as the food goes by endlessly, you just grab whatever looks good. Most of the items cost 100 yen which is about a dollar, but a few will be 160 or 200. Anyway we each ate about 7-10 plates and it came out to be around 7 bucks for a complete meal consisting of some of the best sushi I've ever had. We had a good time just sitting there, eating, and ...

... of real "Harajuku Girls"! How about the woman and her two adult children who come with dad. Dad has obviously had some trauma and cannot speak or walk with out help. They help him out of his chair and up to sit next to me. Their love is so obvious, and when I talk to him, mom watches with great joy in her eyes and the kids look on with joy. Parents who bring a tiny tot up to see Santa and Duffy and the child gets terrified out of his/her mind. These parents continue to force ...

... his predictions. Maybe I ran out of subjects and I was just padding up the blank space of the paper. My composition ended with a hurried note. "In any case, the 21st century would be a `sugoi` century [sugoi means anything impressive, great and positive]". Right at the end I even the exact date and time that I wrote the composition complete with my address. This was a vain effort to fill up the blank on the sheet ...

... quarter with all the skyscraper and the quarter of the sin Bar Disco Karaoke Strip bar, and Love hotel. I guess you must come in the morning to work and after a hard working day, you go on the other side of the station to play drink and ... I ve seen also a whole group of Love hotels: these hotels where the Japanese who don't have the required privacy at home with their wife or other, come to express them self widely. Currently, they are ...

... and it wasn't until the police came that we noticed that one of my watched was missing and all our drawers were open. Thankfully it was my cheap watch and .. well ... we had no money in the bank let alone our drawers. On a slightly connected note, the Japanese police are bloody useless. Anyways, that Monday we both took the day off to wait for our window to be fixed. That and Junya had to take the day off as on the Sunday ...

... a brisk walk in the cold morning air to the appropriate metro station, hopped on, and hopped off at the metro stop closest to Tsukiji, where we were met with a sign saying "Fish Market Closed Today." Quite disappointed (but knowing we could try again tomorrow), we plopped down on the floor, pulled out our guidebook, and re-planned our itinerary. Dane had something on the list that was really important to him. For those of you who ...

... So there we were on a busy train w/ the big, blue suitcase, a heavy dufflebag and a computer bag. It's nice to get that over with. I was walking with the big duffel bag down a windy side street. It is a maze and will take a long time getting use to some of the places. Yes, the apt. is fine. I've got a bed, desk, plenty of storage space for what I brought and a small frig. There's a small kitchen area, too, for the 5 people on this floor. I've met one of them so far: Ai, a ...

Had a bit of a lie-in but gave up when it got unbearably hot in my dorm! Decided to go for a wander around my area, which although it has many shops, has an older, nicer air to it. It's home to the Senso-ji shinto shrine, which was all dark wood and red lanterns. It was really nice to walk around as it was wonderfully hot and sunny, and the buildings were really interesting. I watched people write on prayer tablets again, and "bathe" in the massive incense pots to ...