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I’ll be at the Osaka 2007 Athletics World Championships tomorrow (Friday) night Japan time. Look out for a (possibly drunk) gaijin on the curve where the 100 metres line starts.

The butt-biting insect. Perhaps the most bizarre thing I have seen in the 3 years I’ve been on this island.

Isabelle loves it.

Anyone in Namba, Osaka and looking for some decent ice cream could do far worse than go to Namba Parks‘ Cinemas on the 8th floor and enter the Astonish ice cream shop.

They have some of the best ice cream I have ever tasted. I recommend the Suntan Beach.

Isabelle has started speaking. She can say, “Mama”. She`ll point at somebody or something and say, “Mama” which either means she is confused about her parents or it means something else to her. It means anything from, “Give me!” to “Look at me!”

She`ll say, “Dada” sometimes but not on queue. I told her if she could say, “Dada”, I`d do anything for her. Play with her, take her to look at something interesting or　buy her illegal drugs. Anything.

I`m still waiting.

The latest edition of Kansai Time Out has a funny article about the Kanji Typo Contest

This is a contest where members of the public send in examples of kanji typos which happen when someone enters a word in hiragana, presses the space bar to change it into kanji yet chooses the wrong word or phrase.

The article gives a few examples such as 今年から海外に住み始めました。（Kotoshi kara kaigai ni sumihajimemashita, This year I began living abroad”) accidentally written as 今年から貝が胃に住み始めました (This year shellfish have taken up residence in my stomach)

今日は見に来てくれてありがとう　(Kyo wa mi ni kite kurete arigato, Thank you for coming to see us today)
今日はミニ着てくれてありがとう　(Kyo wa mini kite kurete arigato, Thank you for wearing a miniskirt today)

うちの子は耳下腺炎でした (Uchi no ko wa jikasenen deshita, Our child had parotiditus [inflammation of the ear])
うちの子は時価千円でした (Uchi no ko wa jika senen deshita, The going price for our child was 1,000 yen)

You can see more at (the all Japanese) Kanji Typo Contest

I haven’t done a You are what you eat post for a long time. This is Matsuzaka Beef Donburi eaten in Ise near the grounds of Ise Shrine. It’s beef on rice in a bowl.

Matsuzaka Beef is even more delicious than Kobe Beef in my opinion.

The standards maintained for Matsuzaka beef are very high. The cow is raised in a quiet, serene area surrounding Matsuzaka, with the Kumozu River to the north and Miya Gawa River to the south. It must be from a good breed, and must not be bred. It will live quietly for two to three years and treated with the utmost care. It is said that if the cow has calves, then the sashi, the fatty parts, do not retain the characteristic patterns.

For the best feeding methods, each farm has a different approach, such as including beer in the diet. The key lies in the feed. The beef is sold in specialty shops in the city of Matsuzaka, with the finest cuts costing the most, but some of the meat available at a more affordable cost.

The entire English section of my local bookstore

Is there anywhere more depressing for an expatriate to be than in a foreign bookstore? Upon entering you are faced with row upon row of books and magazines that you`ll never understand.

People you don`t know grace the covers of books you`ll never read. Whole sections are devoted to concepts you don`t understand.

And then there`s the English section. You can guarantee there will be a few Harry Potter books, The Davinci Code and then not much more besides.

If there is a proper English language section, the books are twice as expensive as normal and if you`re lucky enough to find one that sells magazines, you can expect to pay up to three times as much.

I understand that if the same is true of a foreigner entering a bookstore in England. But entering these places really makes it home that you don`t belong there. The place is not for you. And that you`d do better not to go there.

Do you have any ideas for campfire activities for 12 Japanese kids aged 8-11 please?

This is one of my favourite pictures from Shanghai. It’s on a road just off a main city centre shopping street. It shows how Chinese men like to raise their t-shirts above their stomachs (the man in the red shorts) to keep themselves cool.

The most people who do this are pot-bellied Chinese shop owners. You’d think they’d do anything to try to get tourists to come in their shops rather than scare them away like that.

I went on a Japanese tour to Shanghai. It was one of the most unbelievable moments of my entire life. Shanghai is a great city but the most exceptional point was the tour itself.

The first day we went to what I took to be a tea tasting session at a touristy cafe. We sampled many different types of green and black teas and it was very enjoyable. After we had drank 7 different kinds, they proceeded to try to sell us the teas we’d tasted. This was a pattern that repeated itself throughout the day.

The next stop on the “tour” was a silk factory. A rapid 5 minute explanation about silkworms and a fascinating (yet short) demonstration of silk weaving preceded a 10 minute sales talk about the futons you could buy there and how they were cool in summer and warm in winter. Then they tried to sell us the futons.

After that there we saw a fashion show conveniently modelling the silk clothes on sale in the next room. We spent a WHOPPING 45 MINUTES in there.

Next was a trip to what I took to be an ancient Chinese sculpture museum. They showed us pots that took 7 years to sculpt from one piece of stone. In another room was a set of these. Our “guide” asked us how much we thought they cost. Then he told us how much they cost (10,000 USD) and told us if we were interested, they could send them to us in Japan.

Only then did it click. I’ll admit I’m a little slow-witted but it took the shock of a person I took to be a serious museum guide turning out to be a salesman to see we were being led like lambs to the slaughter around Shanghai.

It all made sense. They all spoke fluent Japanese even though they were Chinese. They all had their sales pitch and movements honed to perfection thanks to contact with slow witted tourists with a desperate social need to buy souvenirs for their friends, colleagues and family.

After that episode, the guide gave up all pretense of actually showing us around Shanghai and took us to a “Jade factory.” This turned out to be a large shop selling overpriced souvenirs with a small, abandoned workshop where statues were allegedly carved out of Jade. Possibly the last time anything was carved there was 10 years ago.

It wasn’t all bad. We went to the City God Temple and the guide was very knowledgeable about it. The people who buy large at the places they are sent to, help keep the price of the tour down for the others thanks to the commission the company gets. And the second day was all to ourselves. When we went to Hong Kong, we had to pay an extra 100 USD to opt out of the tour. Yet the tour of Shanghai was an experience. And one I won’t be repeating soon.