Hotel Meiken Tsuchiura

... out that it was “Man’s Day”! Every Monday is “Man’s Day” and men who eat there get double points on their “frequent diner” card! Many stores and restaurants have point cards for some discount in the future so Toshi got 4 points today for the two of us eating there.

Then we strolled down the street (because he needed to go to the cobbler and pick up his shoes) and found a Pachinko Parlor. I have never played Pachinko ...

... padding is only used when the young boys (face-characters) play Santa in the parade. They took the pads out and, WOW, it was so much better.

The exciting part came after work! We we to the 100 Yen store (like our 99 cent store but better stuff!). I love the store and love to find things to decorate my apartment and stuff to fill my kitchen drawers and cupboards. Today I’m going back!

More later . . .

... were drastically changed at 5:00am on Saturday morning. Air Canada's flight reservation system apparently went down the night before, wreaking havoc on a number of flights including ours out of Regina. The flight was canceled and we had to be rerouted based on any available seats. Hana ended up traveling via Calgary and Vancouver and I sacrificed myself by traveling through Toronto.

I have never done this trip by going through Toronto and I can ...

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The people here are just fantastic and we have met a number of foreigners now living and studying/working here in Japan. Some of their stories are absolutely fascinating as is this country. I love Japan.

Unable to connect via wireless internet so more difficult to upload photos but may try later.

Mate ne. (see you later)

... never thought you'd actually do. Everything about the airport somehow seemed better, brighter and cooler than your average western airport (Maybe the transition from China helped this)- it was clean, efficient, everyone was polite and most people I engaged with at desks etc spoke basic english. Woo hoo!!! I arrived quite late and so headed directly to my hotel- The Radisson in Narita which was neat, clean and had a pool, gym and even a mini golf course! It's a stop ...

... No sign of Mount Fuji today because it was too cloudy so it was a good job we went up on the cable
yesterday, Whilst walking round the lake we came across a large group of Yr 2 children on a day out, They had caps in different colours to keep them within their group.
Next saga on toilet(especially for Barry) is that in our last hotel,in the public area toilets, there was an ...

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I didn't get an upgrade. I was told that they have changed their policy again and aren't doing that. I wish I had known about the policy change when they offered to let me upgrade with miles. I don't know if I would have but I would have thought about it more. I had an aisle exit row seat, so it was pretty comfortable anyway. I got a few hours sleep on the way.

Flug von Amami-Ōshima zum Haneda Airport in Tokyo. Dann mit Metro, JR und Taxi nach Narita ins Hotel. Leider etwas weit weg, zumal ich am nächsten Tag wieder nach Tokyo zurück gehe. Hatten wir aber schon länger gebucht. Ich habe mir da mal wieder nicht wirklich Gedanken darüber gemacht. Wir sind etwa eine halbe Stunde nach Mitternacht dort angekommen und mussten dann erst mal noch was zum Essen auftreiben. Dann schlafen.

... of the royal family, this building was GORGEOUS. You walk in to an Foyer that has 3 ceiling to floor Lalique glass panels of Art Deco female figures softly lit from behind, giving it an eerie green glow. The rooms that followed were rich with wood, marble, Art Deco and Arts and Crafts influence. Each room was more gorgeous than the next, and we found ourselves more entranced with looking at the detail in the architecture (small heat vents that looked like a ...

Yes you read it correctly...I did see a shark today...a whale shark at the Osaka Aquarium. I was very impressed with the aquarium and glad I made the effort, it was something different to temples and shrines, which can be easily overdone. Getting to the Aquarium using a JR pass is something more of a challenge, particularly when Alicia didn't have a pass at all. We ended up on the wrong side of the peninsula ...