return

It`s great to be back in company of great friends. I hung out with Kuniko on Thursday and Friday. We went to Mangekio onsen in Chiba. Oh, how I missed onsens! When I was planning my trip, I was hesitant because I haven`t been to any new place in the last three years. But now, I`m happy to be here. This is my first real holiday in three years

Yesterday, I walked around Yachiyo-Chuo. I found this beautiful walk way that meanders around the city. It is a brilliant green space. The flowers are labelled and the wood railings gave a touch of Japanese esthetic to this Disney Land city. Chiba is situated East of Tokyo. One of its main attractions is Disney world. While I was on the train, I saw Cinderella`s castle and Aladin`s palace. Japanese love Disney, which makes sense for this ultra stress, high pressured society to be in-love with fairy tale endings.

I have been eating amazing food. Kuniko prepared a feast yesterday for Kenta, Yumi, and I. We ate, drunk, and danced salsa in Kuniko`s leaving room. Since Cuba is the last place Yumi went on a holiday, she created Havana for us by dousing our coffee with rum.

In couple of hours I`m heading to Nagano. I`ll be taking the famous Shinkansen. The three years I lived here, I didn`t get a chance to take the bullet train. My town Chino has the rapid Asuza, I wonder how it compares to the SHINKANSEN?

Midnight's Children

It took me a year to finish Midnight's Children. Every morning a list of errands appeared on my desk and Salman Rushdie’s words were pushed aside. It is a great book. It inspired me and best of all, it made me laugh. This is my favourite part:

Commander Sabarmati walked out of the apartment block with the smoking gun in his hand (he was seen, through the crack of a door, by a terrified Latin tutor); he strolled along Colaba Causeway until he saw a traffic policeman on his little podium. Commander Sabarmati told the policeman, “I have only now killed my wife and her lover with this gun; I surrender myself into your . . .” But he had been waving the gun under the policeman’s nose; the officer was so scared that he dropped his traffic-conducting baton and fled. Commander Sabarmati, left alone on the policeman’s pedestal amid the sudden confusion of the traffic, began to direct the cars, using the smoking gun as a baton. This is how he was found by the posse of twelve policemen who arrived ten minutes later, who sprang courageously upon him and seized him hand and foot, and who removed from him the unusual baton with which, for ten minutes, he had expertly conducted the traffic.