Halogen Light Placement

about the nature and Disneyland


Few people can be happy without hate some other person, nation or creed.
-Lord Bertrand Russell

After Kyoto, for my birthday, I went to Disneyland.
To reach this huge park is taken from Tokyo, a special train: it is easily recognized as the windows are in the shape of Mickey Mouse ears, and inside and 'all decorated in a Disney style. The park is about an hour from home and Kanako and 'at the airport near Narita.
The entire complex has its own hotels, restaurants and places where you can even get married: I have seen all the parade with his wife in an Italian-style houses waving from a balcony.
In fact this year I visited DisneySea and that 'next to Disneyland because this huge amusement park and' split in two. The the first part that I did last year is the classic Disneyland can be seen in Paris or in America consists of more or less rides based on characters from the Disney. The second part I saw just this year consists of four different landscapes: the first is a gulf Italian (with a lot of Italian restaurants), equal to Portofino, which is also located within the area that recreates Venice (the gondola ride) and even the Duomo of Florence (only as a background), the second part is a volcanic island and there are games based on Verne (ten thousand leagues under the sea, the adventure center of the earth), the third party in style ancient persia el ' Last devoted to the Aztecs. Everything is taken care
to the smallest detail is the exterior and the rides. The latter are all very nice and even if they reach the peak of a heart attack in Wonderland (they are all quiet like "sit and watch") refer nicely more than once (we were lucky, there were few people and not There were queues).
Every two hours there are some really great shows (some fireworks all based on the elements water, fire, earth, air. For example, from the Gulf in the Italian style came a mechanical dragon everything that was burning off by a huge fountain which looked like women. Other theater very well done) to see that only one worth buying the ticket (40 €).
At ten in the evening leave the fireworks that last for about fifteen minutes.
Even the weather has given us a fantastic sunny cloudless for which it was a memorable day (and then added the Christmas theme with Christmas trees and music of this genre have made it even better).
How much money do in this park do not know why to pay the hundreds of people who work there, architects, engineers and all the shows must go away a lot of money, it is also true that every day thousands of people from all over Japan are here, eat, buy souvenirs and residing in hotels.
The way I see the entry price is low compared to the costs that addresses this amusement park.
Some people do not like these places in the arguments that we should entertain for strength. It is not true. There are many sets of conditions for which a day spent in amusement parks is a good day. Meanwhile, the company: that is hard to go alone, but you will always be a group of friends (or boyfriends) that you already start with the idea of \u200b\u200bhaving fun. Secondly, the atmosphere of these places is always pleasant, both for small parks such as the Italians who more so in this huge. Third, the rides, not necessarily all wish for fun roller coaster or something, but there are many types of these parks and the most suitable location forever. If the opportunity arose
have fun without thinking about whether we should necessarily fun or not.

**

I saw up close the buildings in Shinjuku. In one of these, which cost one billion dollars, there is' the seat of Japanese government. Ripert, but I would not like other "neighborhoods" that is also completely "hollow": dozens of subway lines run underground and generally hundreds of shops and restaurants. You can walk for an hour underground and always visiting new places.
This "neighborhood" 250 000 people work in the morning so underground lines are so crowded that at every door is the type involved in pushing people on the train (every day at this station are moving two million people).
The buildings will be about ten: they have high design for the Yokohama or Roppongi but they are all but they are all impressive.

**

I will never believe that God plays dice with the world.
-Albert Einstein

I was back to Kamakura, a town near Tokyo. Armed with a camera I did it again tour the temples and the Great Buddha. Clear day, perfect weather.
Worthy of note, I managed to watch the first sunset since I came here, we are get off the train at five o'clock in the afternoon in a village on the sea (sea is simplistic as it is an ocean) when the sun dips into the waters red now. Aiming at the horizon from the beach, close to the sun, you can see Mount Fuji from the top sprout, timid, white clouds.
Slowly the blue sky gives way to suffused with red / orange sunset, a flash in the sun is swallowed by the ocean and the sky is getting darker.
admire this show of nature makes me think why I consider so beautiful. Why nature arouses feelings so sublime? No human construction can only rely on the beauty of a sunset framing the mountain Fuji (which is only an option). Perhaps those who have the sensibility to appreciate these shows is not so different from Voltaire, by Albert Einstein, by Giordano Bruno who, with different words but with the same spirit extolled the beauty of nature and the laws that govern it.

Wards Ap Biology Lab Activity #8

Kyoto


Life is short, art wide, the occasion instant, experience misleading, the assessment difficult.
-Hippocrates

If you want to get an idea of \u200b\u200bhow you take Kyoto Roma: wipe off from top to bottom, all traces of immigrants eliminatene / ugly faces / rabble in general, add a little ' and change the nature of Christian churches with Hindu temples / Buddhists. The glories of the old shogunate
can be seen here as the decaying structures of the Roman Empire in Rome: Everywhere you see temples, Zen gardens and statues of some strange deity.
not remember the name of all the temples I have visited it are all alike: a beautiful landscaped garden in every detail, ponds of water and gravel, and finally the temple (the pagoda) of wood inside which sits a Buddha or a painted some God, all things flavored with various symbols and metaphors for life.
Let's go! At 9:00
take the bus from Tokyo (it's a guided tour) and after about an hour to our right emerges among low clouds l’imponente vulcano Fujihama: è affascinante soprattutto perché non ha colline o montagne nelle sue vicinanze quindi sembra ancora più grande. La sua cima innevata è a forma di cono e pare che debba eruttare lava da un momento all’altro. Per i giapponesi è ancora più impressionante considerando che in Giappone non esiste una montagna più alta, ma per chi ha visto le Alpi non è poi così eccezionale: andante a Saint Moritz e salite lungo la funivia per raggiungere la vetta di una delle tante montagne. Una volta in cima ammirate il paesaggio che vi si presenta a 360° gradi. Varrà ben più di cento Fuji. La bellezza del Fuji non sta tanto nella montagna in se quanto ai suoi caratteri che ricordano molto la cultura Japanese is difficult for a European carp: is a solitary mountain whose imposing figure can be seen from many places tens of kilometers away, is a mountain inside which resides a powerful fire that destroys everything with a terrifying force in the case decides to erupt, it is a mountain with no trees or vegetation. The Japanese love these characters: solitary meditation, a great inner strength, a luxury made of a spartan space (the more expensive Japanese restaurants do not have ornaments in them and everything is reduced to essentials such as old-style Japanese houses or temples) . You can understand then why Mount Fuji is so revered in Japan.
Pass another two hours we arrive in a village surrounded by nature: we are moving towards the top of a hill covered with trees. Nature is very beautiful especially in this season the trees have very bright colors: red, like fire or yellow like the sun. The contrast of these colors with the blue sky make the environment even more attractive.
Atop the hill is the temple, in painstaking detail, and very similar to all other temples that I'll see later.
the evening due to a queue on the motorway we spend four hours on the bus through the streets toward the provincial and 23:00 we finally arrive at the hotel in Osaka: an industrial city quite as bad is poorer in Tokyo (no big cars or skyscrapers Ultratech) but is even more full of huge mansions and buildings that seem to sprout from the ground without apparent order. Consider that I've only seen from the road and my opinion may be influenced by the fact that I had spent 15 hours on the bus.
The hotel is in Western style, nothing special. We are looking for a restaurant nearby and we find one that offers Korean cuisine: not bad.
The next morning we go to another town near Kyoto: Remember those rural villages that are seen in Sampei, with the river that passes through and the trees that surround the houses.
We have four hours to spend here and visit a very nice house built on a hillside overlooking the valley of Kyoto. A kind of Japanese Fiesole. This house, which belonged to an actor who died recently, is obviously very appealing, but it is even more around the park. Beautiful to look but not live there because I could not stay in a place where everything is precise, well-kept, even the stones have their own logic to stay where they are.
lunch in a restaurant kitchen and I eat Japanese tempura, which is two ebi (shrimp) and other fried vegetables.
Finally in the afternoon we go to Kyoto, the ancient capital of Japan. Here, fortunately, is forbidden to build houses and then apartment blocks have remained in their old style, each house from the roof and arched dark is a small house surrounded by a small garden.
abandon the tour and continue on their own. Peniamo a bit 'in the search of the hotel and we find it only with the help of the taxi. The hotel is totally in old Japanese style, he even kept garden all around and a nice river that flows nearby, full of herons and other birds like the beak and long legs.
Once we take off our shoes at the entrance and the change with a pair of slippers that provide us with the waiter. The room is huge room with a small table (very low) in the center (you have to be to sit cross-legged, there are no chairs) and a small ledge where you can enjoy the view of the river and the garden. There are no beds, they are in the wardrobe: the mattresses (futon) that will be placed on the ground (on the mat, that is the floor, which is not hard but slightly soft) in the hour in which you want to sleep. Before I go into what Onsen (hot spring) the hotel and relax a bit. These baths, divided by sex, are the public pools where people are immersed in water to more than forty degrees. Before entering these tanks there are showers where you can wash with soap, shampoo etc, but no standing because they are not divided and / or away from the tanks so you have to sit to avoid splashing the people: it is deliberately on purpose because here is as it was in ancient times, when there were no showers it was poured hot water outlet from the bowl using a wooden spoon. Everything is done by following a particular ritual, even for bathing.
Then we go to dinner, raw fish, cooked, fried shrimp and other vegetables. Routine.
pajamas and a kimono that provides us with the hotel: I seem to have the skirt and you have to be to sit in an uncomfortable position. But you know, you have to adapt to take full advantage of these cultures so alien.
The next day we visited several temples: one national treasure, is the tallest wooden building in the world. Even in ancient times to the Japanese liked build palaces.
Another 1033 are inside statues as large as a man of the Hindu goddess Vishnu (or Kali boh) that with many hands. Each statue has a different face and there is' a belief that says that at least one of the statues has your face. The children are hours watching the statues in hopes of finding one that resembles them. An elderly Japanese who was absorbed in the contemplation of the sacred Buddha (buddha call them, even though they are Hindu deities), I note with great admiration, and tells me that these statues are there from the foundation of the temple, that is eight hundred years before. The answer must be that if you are really tired from standing so long. Maybe he does not understand the joke that hides Zen meaning, but asks me where I came from and heard the reply tells me that would be both in Italy, but it's too old. The answer is that you're never too old for anything, and unfortunately I have to go. Apparently she wanted to say more, but thinks better of it and I greet and thank.
In another area, once it was built a wooden bridge connecting the two temples, but the beauty of this bridge is that it is suspended over a multitude of trees, red, orange and yellow and creates a very suggestive.
the morning of the fourth day we visited two other temples, one called Silver (but did not track) and another gold (in fact it is completely covered with gold leaf and the sun, glare). The temple itself has nothing special: they are small buildings of three floors with many mirrored arched roofs, but the gardens are manicured and as always worth the visit.
In the afternoon we book train tickets (the famous Shinkansen) and go to the station means a building ultra modern and huge: 430 meters long and inside the top one hundred is the most impressive I've seen, not because of the height or length, as to the form in general that makes it seem even bigger, in fact it does not have a roof (it only has the wavy glass windows similar to the rainbow), so it seems infinitely more spacious. Going up the endless escalators can be reached the top where you can enjoy the view of Kyoto and there 's even a garden with trees and a Helypad. Obviously there are many underground floors full of shops and restaurants. The card works as in the subway (and airport) to enter the area where trains must be entered in the special machines that stamp and you I'll open the gates.
The Shinkansen, of course, in time, has a wavy shape that resembles a submarine, but much longer. E 'is an all-white exterior and the interior is fitted with LCD screens that show the bus stops, railway stations, the miles that are missing and in general all the information that can be used. It 's a superfast train that bend bends like the bikes, took two hours to return to Tokyo.
Visit Kyoto is mandatory for those who come to Japan and is a journey and an experience that I recommend to everyone.


PS: Thanks to the parents of Kanako that over to join us in this adventure, they paid out of their pockets the Japanese hotel, restaurants and travel. I have paid only the first two days of organized trip to a value of about 250 €.

Making A Melamine Ball Python Cage

Religion


In Ireland, if they ask you what religion you are, say, Buddhism.
-Daniele Luttazzi

To know religion of a person who says we have to listen to profess faith, but we must find his brand of intolerance.
-Eric Hoffer

Where there is an altar there also exists a religion.
-Joseph De Maistre

There is only one religion, though there are a hundred versions of it.
-George Bernard Shaw

Going through the car near a Buddhist temple / shrine decide to stop. And 'Sunday and there is' a party for which the children of 3/5/7 years should be in this temple with traditional Japanese clothing (kimono winter, summer yukata). I did not understand what children do, but the richest parents rented a religious leading up to the temple where the ancient murmuring a few words, he blesses them. To complete the work the children will have to pull a bell which I imagine would avert the feared evil spirits.
I am surprised to see such small children have those characters that will grow into adulthood: the child-man dressed in suit and tie and has a serious look impassive and holding the hand of the girl-woman even made up with lipstick Looking around while waiting for both the photograph is taken. Here it is Japan! In the eyes of the child and the child there 'already aware of a life dedicated to work and absolute respect for the rules. Our children tear the strength to pull the bell rope or playing hide and screaming under the stone statues of monks, gets on your clothes and all those things that would make a child's right to do. These little guys are not.
While I was lost in these thoughts inside the temple know that there are people who pray. But what do they pray? Here, as in all religions there are dozens of superstitions and rituals designed to explain what you do not understand and to ward off evil, so you must double-tap your hands before praying, and then hit a bell, bow and kneel before a priest (bonzo? monaco?) that sings hymns in a language that even old Kanako barely understand.
And I, from the outside, I watch them.
I observe them trying to understand why pray, surely they believe strongly in their religion and how to perform every ritual must be followed, with absolute sincerity and humility.
beginning in me lies an evil thought and feeling, here I am in a land of people who have beliefs absurd and ridiculous superstitions. But I do not know that it is all fake? As if I were in some remote African tribe intent on the worship of totems, looked as if the American Indians dancing in a circle so that the rain goddess bless them with his holy water.
repress this feeling.
Who am I to know what is true and what is false? In Europe there has been slaughtered for centuries, it was invented unimaginable torture and burned thousands of men, has fallen into a theocratic darkness for almost a thousand years and what are the questions (cases) that was put in all this time? Here are just a few: Jesus is the Word? And if it is the Word, is emanated from God in time or ahead of time? And if it emanated from God is co-eternal and consubstantial with him, or a similar substance? E 'separate from him or not? E 'created or generated? It can generate itself? It has the virtue of the authorship or production without fatherhood? And the Holy Spirit, is created or generated or produced, or proceeding from the Father and the Son proceeding, or both? And how, having precisely the same nature and essence of the Father and the Son, can not do the same things as those two people, that he himself? What is the Soul? Does it exist? And if it exists and 'material, intellectual, spiritual, extended?
I do not understand anything, no one has ever understood anything, and this is the reason why there has been slaughtered and the earth is bathed in rivers of blood.
I read the Bible. It took me six months to do it. And there 'nothing like that. Not if they find any trace in the apocryphal writings nor in the early church fathers.
I'm not Christian, are not Muslim, not Hindu Buddhist them (although each of these religions has a piece of wisdom that should not be ignored and I had not see that well), but I'm not even an atheist and I'm not agnostic. An atheist says, "God does not exist." All right, let it show and it was over. What is Man? Why are these particular immutable laws which rotate the planets and atoms? Why is there life? What was there before the Big Bang? There is therefore a desire in all this? Or is it just the unknown that makes us believe to be higher and some clever?
The fact is that I could write a book with dozens of unanswered questions, with scores of theological and philosophical assumptions, with dozens of charges, with dozens of tests, without coming to anything. For years I could burn my brain trying to figure out if it exists and what is the nature of God because everything exists as it is and I realize I'm the exact starting point.
But man is not made to live like a brute ...
With great irritation and disgust I see Messrs cardinals, bishops and priests (but not all, fortunately, although anyone who thinks otherwise has no power to do anything) in Italy , do everything to impose their will to those who do not think like them, and look at you with the same eyes with which their ancestors looked burning and torturing "the wicked": with the same certainty of being right, infallibility, in the Truth.
What is Truth? All believe they are in truth but I say: " watched by men who say they have no doubts"
believe that truth is something common to all men. Voltaire says: "morality is God, the dogmas of men . At any time and place are such that men and beasts, they know that crime and theft are vile things, and that virtue and doing good things are right and admirable. What is observed in Japan, such as going to the temple every month to pull the strings, is foreign to the rest men so it's not a superstition, prejudice.
In this regard I quote yet again, for his idea of \u200b\u200breligion, under theist, his philosophical dictionary: " ... [the theist] does not embrace any sect because they all contradict each other. His religion is the oldest and the largest, because the simple worship of a God has preceded all the systems in the world. He speaks a language that all people want, but they did not mean to each other. (...) He believes that religion is neither the opinions of an unintelligible metaphysic, or in equipment rooms, but in worship and justice. Making well, here is his religion; be subject to God, here is his doctrine.
The Mohammedan's cries: "Woe to you if you fail to make the pilgrimage to Mecca!"
"Woe to you," says the priest, "if you're not a trip to Our Lady of Loreto" Loreto
He laughs and Mecca, but it helps the poor and defends the oppressed . "."

How Long Do Germs Live On Chap Stick

Not Like



The essay seeks to achieve the absence of pain, not the pleasure
-Aristotle

Japan is not a paradise nor a perfect place first because these places do not exist (but there 'there are those who swear in another life) that it has its problems and its shortcomings.
Describing my experience in Japan I can not help but compare what is wrong in our country with what I see here. I could do the opposite, of course, but in that case I would be biased and conceited. If I was in between the Borneo headhunters, after ensuring that the mine is not edible, I would do the same with regard to their ability to embalming than our own. I think this is natural to describe the experience based on what amazes me more and is often the case that what stands out to me eye here is the fact that things generally work better. It 'something that comes naturally, for example, when you take the train and you wonder who is on time and not invaded by ticks. It is natural to many times I assure you. Italy
My criticism is not a form of contempt on the other hand are a reflection on what's missing in our country. There are also special
known as time passes and I do not like Japan's worthy of being reported separately and this is the purpose of today's post.

The fact that in every store you wish to enter (or even simply looking at the window) there are many jobs that scream "Ishaimaseen" (welcome) with a chant worthy of a Buddhist temple that when you go out and contend with a "gozaimastaa-arigatou" (thank you) sung this well, it's quite ridiculous: there are some contracts that I began to set in secret that are not even more the case if there is a customer or not, they sing the two words every five or six seconds, rhythmically, swaying his head in a bit of respect for anything. In ten hours will tell you a thousand times. I imagine their dreams made of bells that echo endlessly thanks and welcome. In banks there is' a light sensor that activates a robot with speakers / welcome, but we can see that you prefer to shop for the person in the flesh. Terrible.
Japan is not a very cosmopolitan country so often that someone fixed the street or on the train. Not with bad look (which I have not seen in any case since I came here) but as if I were studying, and immediately avert your eyes if they see that I see them. Moreover suppose that the same thing happen if a Japanese goes to Ponsacco or any place where there is a lot of people used to seeing foreigners. If an Italian is in France and writes on the Italian front, I think the reaction would be far worse. However, when I wear dark glasses, the percentage of people watching me fall considerably and I am more at ease. However, there is one thing that particularly bother me, after all, not many people look at me.
I do not like the water is almost impossible to find a drink: in Japan all have tea, various concoctions, anything except plain water. At the restaurant or bar they give you than tap water with a bit of ice (at least for free) and also at home there are no bottles. If you really want to drink water I buy at the supermarket or vending machines that are scattered every hundred yards (but thirty drinks often exposed to the water there 'and when it' costs a lot).
I do not like people to smoke in public places. In Italy, only recently has become the just law of the smoking ban in public places here, but, strangely, still there '. Ironically it is forbidden
smoke outside on the street because there 'a lot of people and if a smoker is likely to burn someone, nothing is said about the greatest damage to the lungs. In smaller restaurants or pubs that do not have a smoke, is torture.
I do not like that people work themselves to death even though, as I mentioned in a previous post conditions are definitely better than here.
I find it absurd for a remote parking area there are four people in uniform, paid by those who do not know, that help the cars to park. Always better than the Neapolitan abusive, but four seems a bit too much.
Looking more closely at the TV I noticed that the majority of programs are recorded and that people participating in the quiz are for the most famous actors that lend themselves to the party. I find this quite ridiculous. Moreover, now the magicians are all the rage on TV on different channels then there are a host of magicians with their craziest tricks and it is unclear whether the game will never be "real" or be altered to off camera.
Sports programs and advertisements are a lot of sports "part of" give this example, yesterday played the Japanese national women's volleyball against the Polish, I saw much of the game and end Japan loses. Then in all sports programs or advertising showed almost all the sessions in which Japan was or did lead somewhere. If I had not seen the match I could have sworn that Japan had won. Maybe it's done on purpose so that people began to look more often like a game of volleyball or think it's because you are a Japanese people like to be very nationalistic victorious even though they are not. However, not always the case: I looked somewhere else and the fact you are not repeated.
often happens that the school history books disappear particularly embarrassing as the massacres of the Second World War, the bloody pre-invasion war etc., this is because the textbooks are totally managed by the government. Even as the rest of us the same thing happens, not to promote the Italian race, but religion and the Christian fascists. After a century there is again necessary to study God's creation rather than evolution in Darwin's and Mussolini as a great statesman.



PS: From Monday to Wednesday I will be in Kyoto so that if I try do it by phone.

Palmolive Dish Soap Msds Sheet

She killed herself by throwing a circular saw. The TV was on site and the shooting incident. The footage was aired as sections.
-Daniele Luttazzi

The best TV is turned off
-Anonymous

In Japanese TV you can not find a program that uses the woman dressed as a tool to do ratings. I watch more TV than I consider this a real insult to the intelligence in Italy to have an entertainment program filled with half naked women: letters, letterone, passaparoline and companionship. It 's like we Italians watching these programs because we like them, but we choose the transmission based on how many there are women in bikinis. I understand that there is evidence that a woman attracts more attention than any bullock cart, but on television if you decide to do a quiz program, women who do not speak, but only show, there should be. Same goes for all advertising, including print, which shows a naked woman with something just to attract more and I'm glad to see a beautiful bosom while I will advertise a dental floss, but maybe a bit "off topic "No? This is one of many reasons why I almost stopped watching TV in Italy (Note: not because there are naked women, but because it is trash TV that takes people to a mass of decerebration) were it not for the dvd I choose to buy or the news. Unfortunately the latter is now completely controlled and watch it just to see something while I eat, otherwise even that would be a memory. Just look at a foreign TG of a civilized country to realize this. In Italy you prefer services such as the new flea collar rather than showing the country's problems: what makes those who govern, not what you do, what laws and why, what really happens. You get lost (make us lose) in useless debates on the "case of the moment" that can be a deadly virus as a murder, but enough to see a Tg free (in Italian) to understand that these things are banana republic, by Third World.
Just to be more verbose than usual, but this business of beating alleged perpetrators in TG I find it disgusting. If Mr. No one was arrested, immediately slamming his face causing him enormous damage anywhere and just matter who might be innocent. Journalists should have a stop to this sort of thing and as it is prohibited to broadcast the faces of minors so it should be for those people who are accused of something but have no decision issued by a judge. It should also be prohibited by law from morality as it is go to the people who suffered an accident and ask him how he is and continue to be posted under the house of these unfortunates in the hope that would release a statement. I threw him out the window the hot oil, other than crystal.
This mania of TG to the national cases (Cogne, etc.) to make audience and also to obscure what's really going on is a disgrace to the order of journalists who should be the first to denounce and asking the right questions. There are programs that are saved with difficulty, as the Report and a few others, in which journalists do their job and are not totally subservient.
Giving to religion (read: the Church) all this space inside the television is a shame that as usual it only happens in Italy, what do I care to me with a service of 15 minutes on the Pope and C. TG when it takes 25. As he likes the powerful bow to these people, all to get more votes and how he pleases Ruini priests and meddling in the facts of a free State (?) And above all secular (?).
Purge because people do not like the powerful is lousy (Luttazzi, Grillo, Santoro, Biagi, Guzzanti, etc.). It is one thing that one of these people may not like the things you said / done, another is purged. It 'obvious that Santoro has gone too far in its battle against the Right because he had already figured out that if the coalition had won he would never set foot on TV. Some people may dislike Santoro as it was not to afford to say those things, but Biagi? I do not think he ever put direct questions, but only facts. Luttazzi? It has one post (where he took the money?) But the question of a comic today is worth more than that of a politician because people have come to trust most of the comedians that of politicians. So you see that Santoro will gone too, but her fear was not unfounded as we see today in the pseudo-regime in which we live. Sorry if I
longwinded as usual, the fact is that writing the words slip on your keyboard and make me lose the way that I had embarked at the beginning. Moreover I hope there is no teacher to judge what I write and I assign a bad grade because they are too "off topic "

Banery Reklamowe Obrotowe

TV Ready? Fight! Oasis happy


The word is a woman, the action man.
-George Herbert


Wandering the streets of Tokyo I came across one of the many arcades and decide to enter. This particular one is a five-story building in each of which there are several types of video games: the so-called fighting games (pictured), strategy games, slot machines, etc.. People of all ages playing manic rhythms with their little hands pale and thin from the long fingers like those of women. You can see the banker fifty fight furiously against the sixteen year old boy in a bloody duel to the latest version of the "Beat'em up" (kind of games where you choose a fighter and is facing several opponents with his fists and kicks ) on duty, in Japan it is not strange to see people far more than adult play games or read comics. Are considered entertainment for all age groups in fact often coming home on the subway, there are a lot of people lost in reading comic books (in Japanese manga) and the same goes for games.
Intriguing new concept in video games where you place cards (five) on an electronic table and the game recognizes and displays them on screen: These cards represent different types of armies (archers, pikemen, infantry, etc.) and people faces in clashes between armies. It is interesting that depending on how you rotate or move the card on the table, the army is moved accordingly. Winner is the one who best strategically manage their armies and defeat the opponent. Whoever wins gets a prize from the card slot and if you can find great fortune to be used in the subsequent armed conflict.
One thing that caught my attention is the role, in this case universal, the woman next to her man who is playing, watch the screen where you play the facts so apathetic almost autistic (not talking about me because you Kanako refuses to enter any place which games because of some moral principle, not written).
I wonder what she's looking really with that blank stare and suddenly I see: the woman with her eyes beyond the screen and circuitry inside it to get to somewhere in the underground where his focus mind all the best shopping malls full of designer clothes and jewelry brighter. How do you explain
then this love of women for things that sparkle? be a marked ancestral memory in its genetic code, which requires the woman's search for the best ornaments with fine, sometimes unconsciously, to get noticed. Normally in nature is that the male must get busy (see for example the peacock, the female that enchants with its beautiful plumage) with these things but you can see that the human species a different matter. Even the fish have this obsession with things bright in fact that the octopus is a stupid place always in front of his lair shiny things to attract them close to him and devour them. Stay
therefore unclear whether the woman is more like the octopus or the peacock.
However there are several rooms in these games, but also those around the world, staring into space, impaled behind their man and often their problem is directly proportional to the concentration of their comrade.

Minimum Width Of Hallway Ontario

And then we went to see the stars
-Dante Alighieri

Ropponji I was in another city luxury in Tokyo. Joint with the subway I have to face three sets of escalators endless fifty yards each. The subsoil here is completely coated wire floors and floors of shops, subway lines and so on.
finally arrives in the area I am in the chaos of a main street full of people and machines with a highway that roars over our heads. At first glance it does not seem a particularly beautiful place, but walking a hundred yards and turning a corner I find myself in another world: a garden decorated in style with lots of Christmas lights on trees and framed by a huge Fontane building, high and hyper on the shape whose sides are projected beams of light reminiscent of snow falling from the sky. Actually it has a very strange shape this building, full of angles and lighting: I think that can be opened by at any moment and come out a style robottoni Mazinger.
entering this magnificent building can not but note the care with which architecture has been achieved. I honestly did not think I see something better than what I saw in Yokohama but I have changed my mind: hard to describe each corridor or bridge, any window or waterfalls that come down do not know where they crash and gleaming marble; rivers flow through strange oblique walls and bamboo antique lighting makes this modern skyscraper not I see the summit.
E 'consists of the most respected brands, the usual Armani, Gucci and company, but the most incredible thing is the design of restaurants and bars, everyone is unique, created here in the old style, the modern style, everyone has a different soul, but he never had seen so fascinating.
I normally come to a decision based on how I eat, but I must admit that the effort to make this place so beautiful to the eye are almost forget that you can also eat and drink. Who knows what
never have felt the great poet in his wanderings the empyrean heaven, but surely if he had seen the wonders of this place it would have been equally fascinated.

Monster Stories Using Vandertramp

Shorinji Kempo in Japan


Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body.
-Joseph Addison

Last Sunday I was another mega sports arena to see a national training of students practicing Shorinji Kempo. I tell students as long ago as I told those attending a school must also do a sport. In this case, part of the university and high school students who had chosen sport as Shorinji Kempo and again in this building for training. rticolarmente nice, but walking a hundred yards and turn Japanese inaction, but, just sign here is not unusual to have a big car.
on a "iha leather seats.
I met my friend Yuki who showed me how it works here, in practice about five boys aged between sixteen and twenty-three were training together with the great masters, in this martial art. I see so aspiring doctors, engineers, chemists and so on. thrashing of beating each other. There 's even a school, Yuki tells me, that focuses exclusively on sports. Its members practice every day chosen sport to become real champions (or at least tries) as well as pre-study materials. In Japan there is a phenomenon that an athlete but also a fool. Here to become a champion you have to be smart too well in this school you study and do a lot of sports. I say it's a very prestigious school and only a few can enter, because the admission test are very difficult, in fact she is one of those girls who tried to get in there and failed. Many graduates of this school if they do not become champions in their sport can joins the Japanese national security, a kind of army to defend the country, earning the most money.
Students of Shorinji course of this school win it all: I saw a really fantastic performance in which they were engaged in an Embu (simulated combat), synchronized to the millimeter, sixteen people (usually a Embu is done in pairs or three \\ four maximum); robot seemed these sixteen people were moving in unison in the most difficult techniques of Shorinji without a command give him the go, to achieve such perfection I have no idea how many hours we have spent to run in one minute and thirty seconds of an Embu precision.
I should know because I also made a public demonstration in Embu eight people and be synchronized is very difficult, question of a lot of practice, and we had a voice command to start all together with each technique.
really good, but like the rest do not expect this from people who trains six hours a day with rhythms from army?

Today came the father of the new Mercedes Kanako. I have not seen good model but it's one of those with dual headlights and leather seats. As a family, after seeing her, have settled with a "nice" such a lady of the machines, just sign here is not unusual to have a big car.

All 493 Pokemon Images

Cinema and animals (living and dead)


size and moral progress of a nation can be judged by how it treats animals.
-Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

Today I visited the Shinagawa Aquarium in Tokyo: it was not very big but well maintained and clean. I attended a performance of two dolphins leaping in the air in exchange for some herring.
In principle I do not like it Zoo earth, nor water for these poor animals are kept locked up in cages that do not make it the immensity of the bush or deep ocean depths. It pains me to see them running in circles all his life without a purpose, just waiting for the food. Some philosopher might allege that the same holds true for many men, even if they are not in cages or even all that we do not see a cage, but this is off topic philosophizing. In truth I think that animals should stay in their natural habitat, especially large ones such as dolphins: the public is on a "ooooh!" When he sees them jump into the circle or play with the classic ball and happy babies cry, but for an eye this show is worth more sensitive. The dolphins are amazing creatures and keep them trapped in a pool of ten square meters is a crime. The same is true for sharks or other large fish. A fortiori, this applies to the big cats, monkeys, hippos and all the big creatures so it's a pain being in the cell.
This summer I was at the Zoo of Pistoia and it soon becomes clear as you enter the decay of the prisons for animals, many animals are sick or sleep all day, other obese or thin as skeletons.
Steps aquariums with tropical fish or small animals that do not suffer too much, or perhaps have an advantage in terms of extending the life course and pass all the pets that over the centuries have adapted to this life but the whole rest should be prohibited by the common moral sense.

Taking up the thread I was saying that, as in all these places, even here children swarm everywhere, in fact even in the city where I live, Azamino, there are many children of all ages. From the moment you start going to school (six years) learn to fend for themselves. Crescendo will see very little their parents who work like mules so they are forced to travel alone or stay at home with no one is watching them. Typically ten years have no trouble juggling the lines of the subway, buy clothes, food etc..
This system has many positive sides certainly helps and then as an adult to act as such and not as a child to see how it happens in Italy even at forty, but let's face it I think a child should stay that way as much as possible, we are in a hostile world in which we must work to live in cages for rabbits for hours and hours daily compared repeatedly with new problems that life offers us kindly. An old Zen proverb declared: "Man is born, suffers and eventually dies." Without being so drastic we are certainly not in a happy world and perfect (after all, a perfect and happy world is a nice paradox) because you then become aware as a child? Children must have parents present and need to learn to tie his shoes at the earliest ten years or risk becoming adults before their time and lose the youth is an abominable crime.

(above: a view of the large aquarium in the restaurant)

For dinner we went to the restaurant of a friend of ours who works for a change, as a cook (he told me who works ten hours a day, five days a week, after all, you do not kill as the brother of Kanako). The restaurant's name says it all: Luxory. The entrance is shaped like a cave with marble blacks illuminated by dim red light, past the cave you will reach a large room dominated by a huge golden and beautiful aquarium (in theme with the day) not less than four meters high and off six or seven where dozens of fish swimming multicolored tropical.
The atmosphere is tasteful if a little kitsch with little light as befits this type of premises. The waiters in tuxedos and supplied headset to communicate with each compete to find the best table in the meantime we salute our friend and chef whose specialty is dessert. The restaurant offers a wide range of foreign food including the ever-obvious choice my carbonara and spaghetti with clams ordering Kanako. When I see the smiling waiter holding two huge dishes of bite to rejoice that I am going to do but, with regret, I must note that the food in them fills a tiny portion of the pot. In practice, with six forks (I've counted) I finished. Delicious but as usual too little. Cost? € 4.5 to € 5 for the carbonara, and clams. Less than any tiny Italian trattoria. Of course if I did not want to spend that evening to take the set menu that costs about 40 € and fill me with delicious food in an environment that does not even compare to the best restaurants I know of Italian luxury. I wonder how do the leaders to pay all employees including the huge aquarium and live decently. I do not know and anyway it's not my problem. About
also offered us free dessert which was excellent.

**

Yesterday I went to the cinema to see The Brothers Grimm: horrible direction, terrible story, acting unwatchable (not If there is a 'Bellucci). It is not suitable for adult audiences to a young man he also ticket costs almost double that from us and the room in which he was shown was about half that of the Warner Village. I do not think I'll go to the movies except maybe to see Harry Potter 4 comes out Nov. 26. Here in Japan, films are screened in original language and subtitled in Japanese: a better system of dubbing as long as you know a little language with which they are projected. In Italy we have very good voice actors, but when I have the DVD and I watch movies in original language there is a big difference.
Often for smaller films or cartoons (not for children, those called "animated films" in Miyazaki, the Oscar winner, is the undisputed genius) the dubbing is terrible. Not to mention the Italian dubbing of video games that are always the same for 10 years: there ', Bolognese, Neapolitan and Milanese. Yuck.

**

I was at the fish market: a large open warehouse where all vociano to sell their wares. There are plenty of other fish, some already living sbuzzati swimming quietly in the display cases unaware that their life is counted in minutes.
on the planks of wood are lying big tuna el'addetto of the break-up, holding a long, thin sword, makes them into slices, another member of staff takes these frogs and chops, and another takes the slices of tuna and put them inside the plastic boxes which then sells.
There are many strange fish that had never seen a more than abnormal amounts of clams, oysters and giant snails. There are also many fish eggs that will garnish the most delicious dishes.
I find myself in a seemingly chaotic frenzy where everyone runs, buy, sell, some even on the minifurgoncini charge on which the fish and bring them to the restaurant where presumably they work.
Frankly, I expected better. I remembered by the fish market I saw years ago in Spain (Bilbao? San Sebastian?) And was much more fascinating. Perhaps the problem lies in the fact that this is not just a market but a wholesale to the public especially for restaurants, supermarkets, etc., then the atmosphere changes.
Unfortunately I had to see this market quickly because we had an appointment and we were getting late, though I planned to return alone to enjoy it in peace.

**

I made friends with some friends from when she works Kanako so often encounter. One of them, Roppon-chan decided to help me with the Japanese language so she offered to be my teacher in exchange for some Italian lessons. We speak English, she speaks very well (even the Chinese, which is very different from the Japanese) I am a bit less, but I just have to get used to speak as I understand it without problems. I was already filled with tasks in the evening so often I'm studying to not look bad to the next lesson.

39 Weeks And Doctor Stretched My Cervix

Food, art and nature



(Yokohama by night)


















Admitting man Nature has done much more than a calculation error: an attack on itself.
-Emile M. Cioran

In these days when I have not updated the blog were taken from the first home video I made with the camera. It lasts twenty minutes and not in HDV (High Digital Video, aka high definition) because the laptop Lapo (and you thought) is not powerful enough to handle it. However, it has the quality of a camera and a normal size of four gigabytes I compressed to 192 megs with no apparent loss of quality. I'm looking for some way to be able to upload on the Internet that, in the future, who cares (who can) if you can download.
I also started a photoblog to Flickr where photos will put more cute / curious that I did.

During the past week I visited Yokohama, which since 1856 has, in fact, the port of Tokyo. In the past
Tokyo and Yokohama were two separate cities but in the last century houses have held throughout the region to which it is not possible, by eye, to distinguish from one another if not for the fact that Yokohama is on the sea: it's not clear where it begins and ends the city because what in the past had to be a gulf is now full of bridges, buildings and huge ice shelves that they recover quickly everything the sea has eroded over the centuries. From the point of view of nature is a shame but from the standpoint of science and technology is certainly fascinating, after all the gulfs in nature there are many, losing a will not be a disaster.
turned our eyes to the horizon, toward the ocean, you can see many Construction of the great pillars among which acts to hold a double-decker bridge connecting the two ends of the bay. It will be two or three kilometers long and at night is lit by blue lights that fascinate the viewer.
One thing I noticed today is that the sea is clean, transparent. I could hardly believe that I filmed and somehow I must be weird results to the Japanese sit on the promenade alien intent on seeing this film, one of the palaces and other attractions, the shallow water of the port a few meters from him. Maybe they do not know that in Livorno, a city one hundred times smaller than a hundred times less Yokohama industries, water and 'black and if you fall into trouble.
In Yokohama water instead of the port is transparent, you see all the beautiful backdrop to several meters below. The rest had already spoken of the rivers where people bathe in the summer so why be astonished if the water in the largest port in Japan is clear?
While today I was headed for Chinatown, I spent a bridge over a river, the water was dark blue, clean and swam in the waters placid, huge big carp more than half a meter.

A gentle breeze caresses your face as we turn our backs to the feared ocean (in the minds of the Japanese sea still arouses a sense of mystery and fear, after all islanders have in past centuries and those who lived on the coast fed almost exclusively of fruits of peach) and aim the motionless, noble skyscrapers built years ago when Japan was in full "bubble economy" and seemed able to buy the entire planet.
Today these beautiful architectural jewels attract some tourists, but most are filled with offices and luxurious restaurants. One of them is the most majestic of others not only because of its height, but the feeling I get from looking at it, if it could talk I'm sure I would say arrogantly: "Hey, try to give me a push, so I do not move an inch." Exudes an aura of strength and yet is only a building, but it seems that its foundations, its roots are deep, so abysmal that nothing can move me from where it is. And 'the tallest building in Japan and certainly the most beautiful places I have seen so far. At night when hundreds of lights illuminate it is less "strong" but more scenic.
Walking through the city no longer the case f or more cleaning and organization that reigns supreme here and the silence and the breeze helped me to associate the French city to a metropolis like Paris Brest or if it was not here for the Gulls more replaced by huge ravens croak constantly. Yet I have seen gulls but in this region there are few birds and the ones that survive well are just these huge, dark, crows. Moreover
against the pigeons were taken many measures so that these birds there are few means any area where they can perch or roof is covered with stilettos and somehow the eggs are removed from the nests. Among other things, the shape of the buildings is not sufficient to permit easy for the birds nest (but also for other birds) especially in the center because there are no roofs. Given that the streets are clean and there are not many insects have little to eat so we find them only in parks. Bidding farewell to the pigeons but also to give the swallows and other birds that we usually see in Italy. Yokohama
loses a bit of fascination with the mind if Brest gazed at sunset, with its gull and their song, a city of sea gulls is not difficult to imagine, but here in Japan has lost a lot of nature. Just
the absence of gulls in Yokohama as a city judge "cold, lifeless? The crows, perhaps, not have a case? It takes the development of the sea, the invasions made by man against nature to judge it this way? Maybe yes, maybe no, but then there are a lot of beach town in the world, losing a will not be a disaster.



** I was also at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo in Ueno district to view an exhibition in which they were exposed several works of Japanese authors, including that of a friend of the father of Kanako. I did not like much: let's face it I do not know what art is, I'm not an expert. From
profane which I think work is good if it meets the aesthetic standards which not only harm the feelings but portray something real, unreal or even outside of physics.
A beam pinned to a wall does not give me any feeling except the envy of the artist who conceived it and maybe it 'became famous for this work. A huge framework with three colored cubes under buckets of colored paint as above.
work and do not say that 'if this is not the same as a Caravaggio but at least shows me that if a landscape that is "clean" and designed well, can have strange colors, be distorted, upside down to what you want but the hand of the painter should give the idea of \u200b\u200bsomeone with a brush and a lot we can do. Get
Picasso, many outsiders consider it an inability that has been lucky enough to invent a genre. I am not among those so different from his feelings show through clear and sharp pictures that create a feeling in the soul of the viewer defined. However, if
to me absurd to propose a Caravaggio paintings by Picasso for ten I would not doubt what to choose.

**

(the father of Kanako eating, happy, a dish of soba)

enthusiasm for life is what you hunger for food. -Bertrand Russell
Food. I am passionate about food that I consider torture to walk the floors of shopping and only find food, all types, shapes and sizes.
In Italy you have to go to eat sushi restaurants from 40 € per person and here you find in supermarkets entire parcel to two Euros. Everything is different, strange, special. How can you not fancy while wander these halls filled with mouth-watering dishes without trying to taste something? It 's impossible for me. How can you not have tears in their eyes as you travel in these worlds beyond this world made of rice, tofu, desserts, sandwiches filled with everything, sandwiches, omelettes, udon (rice noodles), ramen (soup with soba noodles), food Vietnamese, Korean, Chinese and more? Impossible.
I know people that if you feed them with ribs and sauce rather die of hunger. Another individual in the example I always though it has forgotten the face and name, tended to divide the peas more dark to lighter ones just before eating and only one of two types.
When I went to Paris with friends from the gym I remember that were disgusted with the French cuisine with all its flourishes and strange colors. The contempt too, but certainly not because it is bad but because it is little (if we talk about Couisine novels, which appears to have gained the upper hand). In terms of taste and presentation that I can not file the plate with his tongue.
But my friends do not eat anything, not even tasted the foie Grais or other delicacies brown bubbles in the category that all produce.
I wonder how they could survive in Japan, where what you eat is much more alien.
Yesterday in a restaurant typically quite expensive and also a friend of Kanako asks me if I've ever eaten liver. The answer: "Yes, in Italy you eat and I like a lot even though Spain is better."
"Raw?" Asks me quiet.
"Yes, very good among other things," he says, recalling fondly the delicious delicacies savored a few days before.
"Fish?" He asks quietly.
"Oh no, no fish," I say quiet, hoping that no one notices from my expression that I had no idea that fish had livers. Clearly
leave me the burden of the liver taste of raw fish and I do it willingly delicious. Then we
switched to a common plate of sashimi here: several slices of raw fish, tuna, salmon, mackerel, etc., I think it's better than that spans various cooked (and then there are no bones!).
I tasted sea urchin eggs (raw of course), oysters (but those we are eaten raw) and other delicacies cooked and raw that many of my friends and acquaintances would turn up a lot of his nose.
Well I say to those who have read with disgust the few foods that I described above:
"knowing how to feel, taste and appreciate things for us so different is a gift and who does not have it will never understand how beautiful eat. "

Blueprints On A Kitchen Island

Travel Clubs



The world is a book. Those who do not travel read only a page.
-Sant `Agostino

************************

These days it rains due to a typhoon that is skimming the coast of Japan. Because of this rain I did not do anything special, even here, an Italian, even walking down the street is special.
However, in short, I visited the districts linitrofi and bought a video camera, the Sony HDR-HC1K. This camera that costs less than half here in Italy, uses a high-definition video technology to record images with the quality of a DVD.
I already tried to download movies on a computer, compact in divx, burn them on DVD and so on. Everything perfect. I just have to become familiar with these video editing programs otherwise offer the public the risk of a long boring movie than 5 hours.
I also heard my first earthquake of this year: Sunday afternoon while the laptop tinkered'm shaking all over, I do not care and come back to play with. Later they told me here at home when there is an earthquake is running well on the top floor of the house because if it were very strong the first thing that happens is that some of the Twin Tower: The upper floors of those crushing lows. Beautiful is not it?

Apart from these toys last night we were in my car with a `friend Kanako, the streets of Yokohama.
this girl's car is similar to many other machines here, a kind of huge van, quiet, comfortable, ultraspazioso, hyper with integrated GPS and of course with an automatic transmission.
burn some red and committing the usual lack of attention that only a woman can commit to the guide, led us gently for a couple of hours' walk to Yokohama, between neighborhoods full of restaurants, nightclubs, pubs, buildings, offices and even over a huge bridge that recalls' what they want to do to the Strait of Messina but here `s have made in less than a year.
We left at 19:30 and returned at 22:00. Code found? None. Traffic? the same that we can all be in Florence is one of the night.
but now I wonder how it is possible that in a city that has 10 million people there is no traffic? simple, everyone, even in the hot hours like these, take the public services that work seamlessly, are clean and the cost right.
Each shopping center, neighborhood or important public building in Tokyo and Yokohama (remember that they are virtually two cities attacked, indistinguishable one from the `other` to nowadays) is connected via an underground network of metropolatina / train. Every three minutes exactly is a train which can either be local in that it stops at every station, or espresso (which runs every 15 minutes) which stops in the most important ones. Each written on large display of departures / arrivals is bilingual (English Japanese).
here if a train has a delay of two minutes the company running the train must pay fines salty and of course the strike does not exist because everyone is paid more than good and then never a hardship.
Needless to say, when we have to move underground is the best and quickest. The train
is always clean, has air conditioning / heating and is just a bit boring because they all take it to the 18/20 return to work and gets stuck between the people (which is very quiet even if they are from industry professionals packed into the train make them fit all).
In the race yesterday evening only one person has played the horn when he noticed that he was going to dab my (ah wing mirror, when did women remember that there?) And travel and has been quiet in this sort of spaceship that was his huge Nissan.
Passing through the streets, all clean and full of huge buildings and lights phantasmagoric wonder when in Italy you can watch this general.
I think ever.
L `Italy for his apparent luck (instead is one of his greatest misfortune) lives on the decomposed remains of an Empire and later on the ruins of ancient civilizations that we in the modern world are a curse. You can not dig without finding some artifact. On one side is a good thing, but forcing us to live in a small area blocked by cars and smog with no possibility of solving the root. Here the other day of the plates do not know what they are, the air is clean, not to mention the rivers where people bathe there.
The bathroom! can you imagine now the people who bathe in the Arno or the Tiber? perhaps suicide.
Here the rivers that pass through Tokyo and Yokohama are so well kept and clean that people there are bathrooms and picnic on the shore.
with us if you get too close to the bank risks that tarpon you drag in the water-to devour.
One other thing-denoting a civilization superior to ours: the bathrooms.
Each store has its own bathroom, also a hairdresser. If you need to do you can safely walk into a store and ask where is the bathroom without anyone to use it you look bad.
Every mall has one or two bathrooms per floor (normally has nine storeys in height and two underground). All the bathrooms are clean, smell and even have well classical music in the background.
and I've yet to find a dirty or stink.
with us when there is one already is expected to clean the place that houses the top of the top, type restaurant from € 100 per person.
And to find one you have to travel for miles, and if you find you have to pay well. Ridiculous.


I am ashamed when I think of those Japanese who come to Italy and see where we are ... because many of them only know us for our fashion and our machines. In every place you see Italian brands, Prada, Gucci, Barilla, Ferrari ... etc. and we admire very much for this. Then come to Italy and I guess you wonder if the plane is Nation's wrong, maybe the pilot in command is confused and is not landed in Somalia Italy.
But unfortunately no mistake.

Thank You For Referral Cards

Updated!

Sometimes the greatest wisdom lies in not knowing or pretending not to know. Baltasar Gracian y Morales-

*********************************** Sunday, 09/10 / 2005

The flight from Florence and 'party with a few minutes late arriving in just over an hour in Monaco: we had not run for miss the connection with the Boeing direct to Tokyo Narita leaving the stomach the tasteless cheese sandwich that austere hostess Aryan us, with that sense of superiority, of which only the Germans are capable of, given.
Despite the rush was noted for not being in Italy because the strange silence of the crowd mixed with a meticulous cleaning made us understand clearly that we had landed in another state. However, no 'is never said that Italy and' worst in all: German boarded the airplane I noticed with regret the lack of mini TV plugged into the back of each passenger as normally happens in every international flight that respects. This means that for ten hours I could not help but listen to the speeches of a nearby group of over thirty German skinhead who is already a few moments after sitting in their seats drinking, in the up and the burp, cans of beer. These individuals who seemed interested only in magazines Harley style motorcycle rigorously cleaned by big woman naked have done nothing but bark all the time sounds very similar to those we hear barking in the famous film about the Third Reich or echo in another language especially in the South Peninsula Italica. The only satisfaction to see them all pass before the Japanese police intent on patrol every corner of their suitcases causing him to lose all the time that I was robbed poor Italian less sleep.
past controls the family we are Narita airport. We head quickly to the type involved in the shipment and storage deliver the heavy burdens that accompany us from Italy.
take the train on time and of course with some decrease, reaching Shibuya district of Tokyo where the young pavement is not visible due to the amount of contempt for the crowd.
We enter into a case of huge buildings and skyscrapers covered with bright lights and TV acting as a huge shopping malls and reached the ninth floor, the restaurants, there 'will be spoiled for choice: Italian, Japanese, specialized the fried (tempura), the ramen, etc. .. Choose the one that produces only soba dishes, a sort of spaghetti under cold water and passed soaked, but that 'our job, in a watery substance soy taste slightly salty.
eat greedy with our sticks and go home with a stopover in two or three underground stations.
The town where we're headed is more located in Kanagawa Prefecture, Yokohama and Tokyo, which is how I remembered it: a quiet, full of shops and big car of any kind.
About the cars in this part of Japan if they are of all brands, even the Italian ones, even of FIAT, but strictly above the € 50,000. Even the guys you see them turn in Porsche and all anyway The Japanese seem to prefer the style Jeeponi Cayenne or their counterparts in Asia and always fitted with satellite navigation. The reason for this and I 'unknown but probably' to be reported in the Japanese love of things mechanical and technological robottoni see the cartoon, Mazinger in the first place.
In this tangle of streets and people do not hear anyone scream, honk or anything else that is not in any Italian city 'than the norm.
Yeah I remember when I was in Rome and I found myself with the mother of Kanako in the same taxi as the driver, absolutely unable to speak without shouting, it joined with people who did not even know shouting phrases in strict Roman how was this beautiful chick or the car they drive or anything else had the excuse of some dialect to howl Meo Pattaca "On the Road." "Aciiiiiiiiiii" cried the screanzato, I later discovered to be a dialectal variant style ciccio ah "or" beautify "and being a true Roman bulla over generations. I explained to Ms. Fujimoto
that these cases are rare and although we really believe I was denied again after the third or fourth taxi driver (even one of Florence) with whom I was dealing with. Rome has made me feel in a third world country but not the way to do that may be, if we want to find an excuse, also characteristic the area, but for the conditions of extreme hardship locate especially near the station (each station, but Italian is not a receptacle of thieves and gypsies) but also in any other way: North Africans, Romanians, Albanians, junkies and all that There 'more disgusting can be found in the slums of a "metropolis" decadent and rotten like Rome. I'm not saying to beat these people in a beautiful ferry in some subtropical prison enclosed by crocodiles and killer whales, but certainly there is' something wrong when one has to travel with one hand on the portfolio as well, and the other is not sufficient to protect from this scum.
It 'possible that if you go to some other country civil, can not find this scum? It 'possible that in these countries, stations, airports, crowded public place, not in the hands of these people? It 'possible that the streets are clean, not because there are those who clean, but because people are not dirty? It 'possible that there are the usual smart you pass from the right, you are put in front when you're in the queue (of machines or people)? It
and 'possible and we Italians are in this situation because only our, our way of being: go to Naples and see the people throwing the dirt out of the window in Naples because the inside of your home and' a covered of holy (holy covered San Gennaro & C), neat and clean, but outside, who cares, not 'their stuff, but the State must clean.
In Naples, the Japanese do not make them get off the bus but the visit as a safari with the windows tightly closed. And I imagine as the Neapolitans to raise rice to see these groups of Japanese locked in their bunkers, while not aware, the Neapolitans, to be zebra, gazelle and antelope.
The blame for this tragic situation can be found in Italian history, reading how the disaster and 'pulled forward over the last thousand years now. Of course, the guilt and 'also of the politicians, gang of mobsters, that amongst all there is not' one, not even on the horizon, capable of being a Zapatero, that is' not a saint, but one that does what it says before being elected and he does and pursues it as a duty, not as a pleasure to be eaten between us and the other
However
and I rambled and I'm sorry, but after all this, and 'a diary and I write what comes to mind.
Returning to the main line, we finally reach the home and between greetings, exchanges of gifts and bows Kanako and I go out to go to buy a cell phone.
I die from sleep, while the officer politely explains the endless range of mobile phones and many times the risk of them falling asleep in front of her, however, between a brick "I Mode" ultra-equipped and a fair radiotelephone clamshell camera for the price of 3150 yen (24 €, in Italy there is the smell in that figure) I choose the latter. I note with irony that, apparently, has not yet arrived here in Japan, but the Bluetooth to share data should still use the archaic infrared. It may not come because there would be such a mess of links to be unable to send a picture in the middle of the jungle and there are already signs that there would be.
Whatever the truth as I see the bullies sister Kanako cursing because the two phones are not well aligned and therefore does not pass the signal, which in Italy are much more advanced. I
This brings to mind when years ago in Tunisia guide told us, proud that his country was at the forefront of medicine as the bus passed, strictly with the windows closed, not too safe areas.

finished the day with a nice Japanese dinner around the table made from exquisite sashimi (raw fish) and other delicacies that I can not describe to you at the time.

Goodnight everyone.
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Monday, 10/10/2005

The fourth floor of the building

thinkers are divided into two schools and those who know each other.
-Gino Zappa

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I get up at 8 and after breakfast with coffee and a fruit that reminds me of melapera, are preparing to go see his sister Kanako Today's competitions of gymnastics with the school. She is 15 years old and a kind of high school for nurses to whom I did not understand the name. In Japan, all high schools last 3 years and the sport and 'considered a very important matter.
As I look at the evidence of the boys I start to think, for a change, to the Italian situation of the school: a tragedy. There are so many good examples to be taken but governments are bent on making "reforms" that have only a different name or catchy slogans such as false as the school of the three i. The high school in 3 years I find it a good thing, we unnecessarily harsh in more than two years: Whereas it takes to make the universe, the more the argument (there is something more appropriate) the more "fantastic" CoCoCo, more apprenticeships, we can begin a graduate to have a decent job and if in 30 years' lucky. If you have had the courage to choose medicine then we talk about 40 years, I believe that then the doctors even though they are always hungry for money overpaid.
In Japan, people are graduating at age 21 if they graduate and find good work now in important positions, being relatively quiet for a lifetime.
Coming back to the school and sport: beginning of the year each child chooses his practice in the after-school sports.
Each school lasts from 9 to 15, has a uniform and there is' the prohibition of dyeing their hair or wear makeup: it kills the individuality focusing on the community, the strength of the group rather than the individual, but out of school and not working when people dress, the makeup, is painted in the worst ways: some really outlandish, others stylish, other metalheads, but most As is normal as in Italy, except for the boots, especially young women, put them above all else. Each student and
'also avid supporter of his school which has a team known more for each sport (including judo and karate) and a flag that represents it.
fact, there is a regional and even national tournament between the schools and you can win prizes as well as substantial scholarships to major universities (with the difference that in Japan an athlete must, a fortiori, also cultivate his mental qualities) Kanako
won some tournaments race remaining unbeaten for several years in a minimum reached in the 100 meters, his name and 'still etched into a slab to' entered his school with its time. In our two hours per week of physical education are used to review for a practice match or a football at best.
However after a good half hour trains and subways come to the sports hall that the school year book for this event: and 'huge, nine floors of most of them contain a large hall the size of three basketball camps.
the 4th floor the whole school uniform class needs to do a trial of exercise that are more fun than an exercise in itself: the track with obstacles of every kind (military stuff) and make a ping pong ball on a spoon without dropping it, etc..
Nao, the name of his sister, in after-school football practice and then 'a racing, and running fast from what I saw. His team 'came first and not' was a surprise in the family. Nao
Considering that in that school and 'a freshman, that' the first year, and for me it 'was.

After a couple of hours I go with Kanako shopping in a neighborhood near shopping malls full of (what a surprise) but I find nothing interesting to me except a dvd of karate kid but that does not include: DVDs in Japan cost a lot more than here. Kanako
you buy a skirt and we go to the restaurant for dinner.
I eat my tempura and even today the day and 'over.
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Tuesday, 11/10/2005

In the heart of Tokyo's two photos of this beautiful park.

must eat to live, not live to eat.
-Socrates

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Today I was at the restaurant where she works Kanako's brother, Key. She works in an elegant French restaurant but not too much. The menu 'consists of lunch and dinner B respectively 1500 and 2000 yen (10 and 15eu approximately). We chose the lunch that allows you the choice of an appetizer plate a "central" and dessert. Dishes are very accurate but, as the infamous nouvelle teaches, very small quantities, mild flavor, pleasant, but not much. After three or four sandwiches with butter (the only thing that kept the door once finished) I feel much better. Key
is my age and worked for a couple of years in this restaurant which is located about forty minutes by train / metro from the house. His day starts at six, have breakfast, prepared in suits (even the most menial provides for "uniform") and goes to the restaurant where he stayed until midnight. A house falls into each. Even has a day off on Sundays is considered lucky because usually on Sundays and 'the day when there is' more work, and instead he is sitting at rest.
It seems that these rhythms are normal in Japan. I do not know how much and 'paid but I hope so.

After lunch we walk a bit between webs of streets and buildings and turning a corner as if by magic we find ourselves in another era: a forest with its temples and lakes. We walk in the peace of the wind rustling through the leaves, but the city reminds us that this place 'there, by hammering away with its noise and its buildings in the background beyond the trees, touching the sky their peaks of cement.
arrive in the area of \u200b\u200bthe temple in which, by paying 500 yen (about 3 €), you can leave a tag of wood with writing your desire or anything you've wanted to write. So many people have hung signs in their proper containers and scrolling with the look of me understand the writing (mostly British ones but there were also two or three in Italian) which are all known only wishes. In any religion or any custom (who said the fountain or well) there is' always the classic wish come true with a little sacrifice (often money is always in favor of those with practice, we earn). Reading all the wishes of the people I realize how similar people are even thousands of miles away: health, money, happiness. No one has written
nothing different, just like, only requests, only hopes.
I believe that man can never realize their desires because desires are like cheese in the mouse. The mouse manages to get brave and lucky to its cheese but then what? Once eaten, and not 'at the beginning of a new search to find a new cheese.
And so the man. Will always have a desire to achieve and will never be satisfied. It can not be otherwise his life would be pointless and would ultimately commit suicide. A man without desire, without a goal can not be a happy man and so it 'a contradiction. What 'your desire? What 'your target? Follow only the instinct or have a clear plan to achieve it?
ask questions and 'important. Fatevele.
Looking at these signs so I wonder, why not write something different instead of the usual required, the usual hopes on deaf ears.
So I guess a good sign hanging that says: NO WISH (no desire), or a nice DEiTY NO, NO PRIEST, NO TRASH MONEY (no god, no priest, no money down), or I am the architect of MY WISH, phrases like that, different from the crowd.
These cards are taken each year and burned in a way, by tradition, that their ashes to be able to reach the deity so fulfill the wishes of us lowly mortals (insegnamogli to use the emails that you before) ... we hope that you burn.

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Wednesday, 12/10/2005

The inclination to trade, barter, exchange one thing to another is common to all men and is not found in any other race of animals. -Adam Smith

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We woke up pretty late and we had lunch in a restaurant close to home really delicious: 5 square meters will be great and kitchen and 'as a storage room where the owner / chef cooking the food and then waiting tables (5 in all over the counter that will be 7 other places I think).
ventilate the room where the food is classical music that eliminates any stress on an LCD screen and slide images of sunny beaches and heavenly warm tropical waters.
home, relaxing atmosphere.
The owner, a tall standard for Japanese cuisine all by yourself and make some of the dishes that are a mix of all cuisines in the world: for example, I got the chicken and noodles were in the same dish, chicken crispy fried and soy sauce and mayonnaise. Really good, too good spaghetti.
I wonder why in Italy someone can not do such a thing, a quiet, small and exquisite in which the costs are small but not more revenue dopottutto. Perhaps because here the gain is based on the arc and not the day from 12:30 to 14:00 and from 19:30 to 22:00 hours in Italy where there is' full house while in Japan, remaining open, they have moments when I am very busy (even those clearly in the hours here and there 's all good in the rooms full, but being open all day this is noted otherwise). We would see Francis
well in such a place. Sure and 'a difficult choice ...
Since Kanako's parents know the owner and she has already' worked here In the past, asking if she can still work as a waitress here (besides, there is no room for another cook) and he accepts. From Thursday to 18 up to 23 will work in this small, quiet little place half an hour from home (on foot, by car 3 minutes, but nobody uses it here: you prefer to use their legs or public transportation). The
Kanako pay should be about € 10 per hour. Japan
In any job, even cleaning toilets in shopping centers, is paid up to € 10 per hour. We believe that 's all clean (in fact there is' little to clean, people are not dirty, as I explained in previous post).

Another thing I noticed ' that for every job there are lots of employees, more than necessary. For example for every car there are three (sometimes four) guys out with all accessories (sticks, gloves, uniforms) each with a different function: the first ringranzia and invites you to enter the second directs the hand to the parking lot, the third directs the hand to the empty seat, or in a building / house / road under construction, there are people in every corner of the neighborhood for hours indicate the presence of ongoing work and often obviously do not have to do is go up and Down the road until you pass someone and then they can give the best.
late last night began riasfalatare Azamino a highway (the town where we are) and when this morning I rehearsed for that was the whole street was riasfalatata (type 2 km) in a few hours at night and took a job in Italy it takes five days by blocking traffic at any time.
Surplus And I see this in everything.
Counting this and who are paid much more than here, Kanako ask how much tax you pay in Japan because we have these "waste" does not exist. He replies that are high but does not know for sure.
Now I wonder if it depends only on the Italian mentality, the quality of work that is provided. If everything in Italy there were 5 employees in more than paid twice maybe things would be different from us. But where did the Japanese take the money to pay all these people? I think that here there is less corruption as well as a sense of duty towards those who commit any type of work, in the sense that the Italian businessman wants to earn as much as possible and takes fewer people as possible by giving as little as possible. So in my pocket finds himself having spent a little more but providing a worse service (but he earns, the other who cares, I think).
In Japan even if you do a job or humble you are the last wheel of the cart you get paid very well (and let's not forget that here the cost of living 'like ours and no less. Example: I saw the rents of houses, leaving from 300 € to 600 ones with 3 bedrooms kitchen + bath), you have better conditions and depending on where you work a number of options which allow you to save on everything (drugs, transport, etc.).
This means that in Japan there is no need to strike (has no knowledge of things) because entrepreneurs do not only think about their own personal gain but to a community growing.
What they say in the short and secular theories of Adam Smith? What if the worker earns more than his wealth will be redistributed and eventually entrepreneurs earn more money.
But when he said these things? Centuries ago, when there were still slaves and workers were not paid nearly this person (but in fact there was already a form of movement of enlightenment, but I digress even if this ends up writing a book) began to think and say that perhaps if a worker to pay him more in the top pocket of the owner is less in the long run the workman will buy more and will create more demand = more profits for entrepreneurs.
In Japan I do not know if they know Adam Smith but, generally, follow these maxims.
In Italy they are all underpaid, all work in squalid conditions (as in performing a job for two or five similar cases) and it 'clear that in the end everything worked badly. I
in Italy I have the nokia 6210, six years ago and worked for 3 and a half in a wholesaler that sells phones. Why I did not buy the new phone? If the Lords
Developers would pay more, perhaps I would have liked to spend to buy a new phone every 3 months, if everyone did so in the end would be a huge gain for the Italian industry of mobile phones (and all others).
But this does not happen because maybe Adam Smith and 'was stopped at customs.