Odds & Ends & Everything In-Between

What have I been up to lately? Well obviously not blogging.

While I was away for the weekend Yukiko was visited by Keiko & Yuka-chan.

Keiko & Yuka

Yukiko & Yuka

Yuka-chan


Yukiko also went for an overnight trip to an onsen (hot spring bath) resort with a group of her friends.

Picturesque Ryokan (Japanese Inn), except for those ugly power lines.

Girls gone wild.


My birthday rolled around once again and I was planning to have a big dinner party at a delicious vegetarian, Chinese restaurant. However, as often happens in Japan, once you find something you like it is quickly gone. Yukiko phoned the restaurant to make reservations and discovered that it had closed down in December, shortly & without notice after our last visit. As I alluded to earlier this isn't the first time this sort of thing has happened. The Subway restaurant that I frequented in Sannomiya was replaced with an adult video store (despite the millions already nearby). The video store near my train station was replaced with a bookstore. My bank's ATM, which was also next to my train station, has closed.
Anyways, I was really hoping veggie Asian food when I remembered a place my friend Sara had told me about. She had even drawn a map for me (thanks Sara!) and I ended up making reservations at Yum Jamu in Sannomiya. There was a nice mix of Thai, Vietnamese and Chinese dishes. This restaurant went both ways (veggie and carcass) so I think everyone was happy.

The birthday bashers: Olivier, Craig, moi, Tomita Sensei, Cliff, Kelsye, Dan, Owen and Yukiko.


During the 3 day weekend Yukiko joined me on my weekly trek to Tokushima. We went to see one of the big 'touristy' things in the area, the Naruto whirlpools. Naruto is a small town about 1 hour away from Tokushima that is known for 3 things:

1) the above mentioned whirlpools
2) the Otsuka Pharmaceutical Company, which makes Pocari Sweat among other things.
3) the Otuska Art Museum, home of thousands of ceramic reproductions of many of the world's greatest art pieces.

Due to our fabulous wealth we decided to pony-up an extra thousand yen to get seats on the 'Aqua-Eddy' glass bottom boat so we could see what whirlpools look like under water. Unfortunately you really couldn't see anything underwater. Looking through the boat windows was almost the same as watching a laundry machine in the middle of a cycle. Lots of white water and bubbles but not much else. The view from up top was much more impressive but less so than I expected. I was hoping for giant drag-ships-to-the-bottom kind of whirlpools but there were none to be found. In fact the Naruto whirlpools only last for seconds at a time. They are caused by currents of water from different directions colliding. Our boat was never in any danger whatsoever. What a drag.

Our mighty vessel, the Aqua Eddy.

The interior of our special underwater viewing boat

The water is that-a-way

My internationally acclaimed blowfish impersonation

The famous Naruto whirlpools

Biggest, scariest one I could find

On our way to the bus station in Tokushima I saw this really tiny fold-up bicycle. Designed to fit in the trunks of really tiny cars I suppose.
The new style hybrid bike. Rear wheel for riding through whatever Nature throws your way. Front wheel for negotiating those difficult supermarket aisles.