Just a short, picture-free entry to tell a few really cool stories.

Story #1 - The Japanese are honest people. You've probably heard people talk about the low crime rate and generally law-abiding culture in Japan, and let me tell you, it is a truly incredible thing. For example, since coming here, I seem to have developed a tendancy to drop things. First, I dropped a pair of sunglasses in a restaurant; a server saw them, picked them up, and brought them over to me. Next, I dropped a pen I was carrying in my back pocket in the middle of a busy market; someone behind me picked it up and gave it back to me. Third, I dropped my subway ticket in the station (you need one of these in order to get out)...take a guess at what happened....yes someone picked it up and gave it to me. Fourthly, the most impressive one...I was getting lunch at a bentoo shop near my work that I often patronize. After returning to work and eating lunch, one of the Japanese staff informed me that the bentoo place had called and said they had found my teki (train pass), which I had of course dropped while buying lunch. This pass was worth about $100, and anyone could have easily taken it and used it themselves, but, rather than doing this, the staff had tracked me down (they likely assumed that the white guy who always comes in works at the English school across the street), called my work and told me I had left it behind.

If all this wasn't enough, the best story comes from my room-mate Vladimyr. One day he was looking for his wallet in our apartment. He pretty much tore the place apart for 3 days looking for it. Finally, as a long shot, he had one of his Japanese friends call the local police to see if it had been turned in. As it turned out, he had dropped it on the street, and someone had returned it to the police. He got it back with everything inside, including Y20,000 (about $200, that he had left inside). It would be nice if people everywhere acted like this.

Story #2 - I love shiatsu. Last night my roomie and I were looking for something to do (as my friends had cancelled a planned kareoke outing because they were all broke...a common theme here around this time of the month), he recommended checking out a massage centre/Japanese spa. There was one a short bike-ride away. We headed over to check things out. Although we hadn't planned on spending too much money, an offer came up that we just couldn't refuse: for Y5500 you could get a 50 minute shiatsu massage, and use the spa/hot tub/sauna facilities for as long as you liked, including spending the whole night. So that's what we did. Japanese massage is quite the experience...you know those films/pictures you've seem with the massuer walking over the patron's back and such...yeah, well let's just say that is based on actual practices. Although it was somewhat painful at times, you come out of it feeling very calmed. And there's nothing like a sauna (choose one of three) and hot tub (choose one of four...one of which was a tea bath) to calm the muscles afterwards...as long as you don't mind being in a tub of naked Japanese men (no trunks at these places).