What goes swish, swish sizzle?

Last weekend (April 20) Shizuka and I went to Tokyo, just for a visit and to do a bit of shopping. Because I am of greater proportions than your average Japanese gentleman I have found it difficult to buy shirts in Niigata. Most shops stock only S M and L, I'm a 3L depending on the cut (see arm in picture). Toyko is not your cheapest place - the Schinkansen (bullet train) tickets alone are £50 each way. Hence the title:
Qu: what goes swish, swish sizzle?
A: My credit card in the Shibuya 109 Department store.
We stayed in this 3 star hotel for one night around £70 - £80. Nice room, well located and looked after the shopping when we sent sightseeing

Too bad if you missed it

The best time to visit Japan it is often said is Cherry Blossum season. Japan seems to have an abundence of certain trees that around April explode into full bloom with spectacular results. Parties/feastivals (Haname) are held under the trees (any excuse) hot Sake (not pronounced Sa-key, but Sa-kay) , food stalls and a great atmosphere. Here are a few pictures taken around Kyoto (early Apirl 07 W.G) The willow tree is the centre piece in Maruya park (...and there was much rejoycing)

A brief history of time

Unfortunately, due partly to my general laziness and partly due to Glen doing such an excellent job of writing up our exploits so far (I couldn't blame myself entirely) I have now been blogless for 6 months. Now he has buggered off and left me here by myself, my Japanese experience will be divided into two distinct time periods.
W.G. : pertaining to With Glen time periods and
P.G. : pertaining to Post Glen time periods
However, it is my intention not to fill these cyber pages with what went before i.e. W.G . but with P.G. stuff mainly to show that I am at least partly capable of getting up to stuff without his organisation and general all-knowing-ness about all things Japanese - even if most comes from his Rough Guide.
However, I may borrow on the W.G. archives from time to time to demonstrate the differences and contrasts in cultures (but mainly because I forgot to take my camera.) In such times I will endeavour to credit the original photographer to avoid law suits and comments like 'Oi Yorkie, why don't you use some of you own pictures for a change'

An introduction

You obviously waded through my profile page and now know all about me(yeah right!) but I suppose you are probably reading this as a friend or relative and can skip all the profile stuff - to be honest I just cut and paste most of it from my CV which is why it probably sounds a bit formal.

So allow me to introduce a person who I hope will feature a lot on future posts. This is Shizuka, my official bonefide Japanese girlfriend (I asked and everything) . I am also hoping that there isn't some kind of blog curse thing that dooms your relationship when you post a picture of your partner.

This picture was taken in April at Terao park, close to Niigata Diagakumai, the area where we live during cherry blossum season. We are by the coast and although you can't see it here, it was seriously windy.

The first post is always the hardest

er.. right then... testing testing 1 2 3.... is this thing on? Ok, then I'll begin.
I have started the blog that I always promised my friend and now ex-work colleague, probably never believed that I would. So firstly a big 'na na ne na na' to him with knobs on.
An explaination of the title first, for those less knowledgeable in Japanese than myself (I don't know what 3 year olds would be doing looking at my blog anyway)
I have now been in Japan for around 6 months, arriving on the 2 October to start a engineering contract in Yoshida, near Niigata. Now I'm not a language person - ask my poor German teacher, I'm an engineer and therefore deal in logical stuff most of the time. Language has a habit of being logical to a point before someone decided to get silly and make up all sorts of rules that make things unnecessarily complicated. With 3 alphabets, many polite and impolite ways of saying things, and numberous counting systems depending on what size, shape or day of the week it is, Japanese is basically bloody hard. Despite a few baffling lessons using a beginners book helpfully written intirely in Japanese the sum total of my language comfort zone is

1) 'watashi wa Gareth desu' which means 'I am Gareth'. Unfortunately, there is no 'th' in Japanese, and 'r's and 'l's are a bit difficult so it's actully pronounced 'Gar less u', close enough.
2) 'watashi wa Engineer desu' which means 'I am an Engineer', at which point most people are very surprised because 99% of all the foreigners out here are English teachers.