I Went Back to Japan!

It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Well, after 14 months, I returned to Japan! But I only stayed for 11 days. You may wonder why I was in Japan. It was for family reasons. My wife’s grandfather passed away, so we attended a ceremony for him. More on that later.

I decided to do a vlog series on our visit to Japan. I’ve already done the first three videos, which you can see below.

First up is before our flight. Check it out!

Next, we’re flying to Japan. I do a lot of talking about our flight and what it’s like to return to Japan after more than a year. As a bonus, my daughter is featured a lot. She’s 5 years old now.

And finally, getting reacquainted with everyday Japanese things. We go shopping, we eat out, we take a train. Oh yeah, sushi!

More will be coming soon. If you want to keep up with my adventures in Japan, then please subscribe to my channel. I also do book, movie, and TV videos there.

If you have anything you’d like to say, let me know in the comments section!

Enoshima Island Tour

Hi everyone! It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Well, I haven’t abandoned this blog. Just been focused so much on my other blog. Plus the fact that I no longer live in Japan has made it more difficult for me to regularly post about Japan. However, I intend on posting here once a week again.

To begin, let me reintroduce you to a video series I’m doing called A Taste of Japan. I’ve done several videos in this series already. Here is the most recently published video, all about Enoshima. There will be more than thirty more videos in this series. Please enjoy!

As you may have seen, it’s a fairly long video, and may be one of the longest in this series. But I hope you found it informative and interesting. If you have any comments, please leave them in the comments section below!

A Look Back at Typhoon Phanfone

It’s been more than a day since Typhoon Phanfone passed through the Tokyo area, and I’ve been able to see the effects around my home.  Thankfully, there was no damage.  The wind wasn’t so bad, but the rain was incredibly heavy.  South of where I live, there were evacuation orders for those living around the Hikiji and Sakai rivers in Fujisawa.  I live about a 10 minute walk from Hikiji River, but my area wasn’t included in the evacuation orders.  However, when I went out to go to work, I saw the water level in the rivers around my home.  Unbelievable.

I’d like you to check out all of the posts I made during the typhoon.  I was live-blogging the entire time.  So, have a look.

October 5th (morning) – My original post.

October 5th (early afternoon) – Rain and wind were increasing, but nothing major yet.

October 5th (early evening) – On my way home.  It still wasn’t so bad, but I was getting wet.

October 6th (after midnight) – My last post before going to bed.

October 6th (8:42 am) – Holy crap, that’s heavy rain. The typhoon has arrived.

October 6th (after 9am) – Very heavy rain.  That’s a downpour.

October 6th (10:37 am) – We’d heard the evacuation order for Fujisawa at this time.  50 mm/h rain!

October 6th (around 11:30 am) – The rain had stopped suddenly and it became sunny quickly.  But look at these photos of the rivers.  They were incredibly high.

October 7th – A few thoughts about the typhoon.

So, today (or I should say yesterday, as it’s past midnight now), I went down to the Hikiji River to see the aftermath of the typhoon.  The water level had risen about 2 metres, which is pretty impressive for a river that is only about 50 cm deep.  So, please watch this video.

It Can’t Be Halloween Yet, Can it?

It’s early September, and what do I see?  Halloween decorations.  Sounds like some businesses are very enthusiastic about Halloween to be decorating this early.  Not even out of summer yet.  Well, I made this video a couple days ago about how businesses in Japan tend to decorate for Halloween far earlier than they need to.  Keep in mind that the business I show is an opticians and they don’t have a special Halloween sale going on.

Now, this video isn’t just me talking about Halloween decorations.  You’ll want to watch to the end, because I had a rather creepy encounter.

I sure didn’t expect that.

Moving Out? Demolish that House

Anyone who lives in Japan will notice a lot of old houses get demolished.  You never see a for sale sign in front of a house.  Why is that?  Well, the real estate industry is much different in Japan than it is in North America.

In North America, when someone moves out of a house, they sell it.  It’s usually appreciated in value, especially if work has been done on the house to improve it.  Houses are also built to last for decades.  They’re solidly built.  That’s not the case in Japan.  Houses are not built to last.  They’re rather thin-walled, poorly insulated, and many of them these days are prefabricated.  Old houses are usually torn down and replaced with two or three new houses on the same property.  Near my home, there was one property that was divided into seven.  The value of a house is not so much in Japan.  It’s the property that’s valuable.  Moving out? Tear down that house and let the new property owners build their own.  Or are you tired of living in an old house? Tear it down and rebuild in the same location.

I made a video about this as I saw a house in my neighbourhood being torn down.

Whenever I see something like this, I wonder what’s going to be built in its place.

Driving in Japan

Have you driven in Japan?  I’ve had a Japanese license since I switched my Canadian license for it a few years ago, and when I drive, I rent a car.  Usually, we rent a car to go to Costco.  I made this video and discuss what it’s like to drive in Japan.

So, have you driven in Japan?