After two weeks in China I’m glad to be back “home” in Tokyo. Let’s back up a bit to my first photo of China…

Snow had covered everything but flights didn’t seem too affected.

The contrasts between the snow and everything else made things a bit more interesting than the normal, smoggy haze.

The Beijing airport is huge. I took a train after passing through immigration just to get to the luggage claim. Then I took another to get to the terminal where my connecting flight was. I wandered far and wide to try to get the free internet advertised but failed in the end.

I had come from Haneda Airport in Tokyo to Beijing, where I changed planes for Zhengzhou (郑州). Despite the snow in Beijing, all was warm and cozy in the airport.

This plane’s design looked more fitting for a tarmac in Hawaii than Beijing on this day.

I was a little bit surprised to find myself the only non-Chinese person on the plane from Beijing to Zhengzhou. I had no idea that the last non-Chinese faces I would see for two weeks would basically be those I saw in the Beijing airport. I was introduced to two, short-term, visiting faculty (one from the UK and one from New Zealand) like myself, but, other than them, I didn’t see a single non-Chinese for two weeks.

Posted on March 21st, 2010 under China. Tags: aerial photography, snow. Comments: 1

Unfortunately, the People’s Republic of China blocks those within China (including me at the moment) from accessing this and many other websites. This is my first, and only, post I have made or will make from China. I’m doing so by using an internet proxy. However, the proxies are very unstable and only last for a minute or two so rather than getting kicked off in the middle of a post and losing my work, I will put blogging on hold for another week until I am back in Japan. Thank you for your patience.

Today’s photo was my view of Mt. Fuji from the air on my way to Beijing.

Posted on March 15th, 2010 under China, Japan. Tags: aerial photography, mt. fuji. Comments: 4

Another shot from the Ebisu Garden Place Tower… I really love it when the sky does this.

Posted on February 6th, 2010 under Japan. Tags: aerial photography, clouds, skywatch, Tokyo. Comments: 2

I previously mentioned the nice view from Ebisu Garden Place Tower on the day after the typhoon when the skies were extremely clear. I was recently there again, this time with my camera, on a day when the weather was changing.

Beyond Ebisu, in the immediate foreground, you can see Shibuya. I like the way the sun, between a break in the clouds, drew a line under the Shinjuku skyscrapers in the distance.

Posted on February 3rd, 2010 under Japan. Tags: aerial photography, shinjuku. Comments: 2

After Phuket’s Big Buddha, our next stop on the way to the airport was a store called SuperCheap. It was a huge mistake to go here in the middle of the day as there is no air conditioning. The place felt like it was over 90 degrees and humid, not exactly a pleasurable shopping experience.

The inside was sort of like a Costco in the states…

…only it was much bigger…

…and the selection was different…

…and included a carcass of something which you could order a piece of if you like.

We didn’t actually buy a thing. Instead, we looked and looked. When we could stand the heat no longer we went to a nearby restaurant for smoothies and shakes to wait for our cab driver to come back.

Given the hustling and outright scams in Thailand, we couldn’t fully enjoy this day with our cab driver. Not only did he try to drive us to a bunch of places we didn’t want to go (so that he could get a commission if we purchased anything at these places), but he had all our luggage in the trunk of his car. Until we made it to the airport my heart couldn’t rest easy.

We did eventually make it to the airport, with luggage too, so we did finally relax. The sunset out the plane’s window was fantastic.

We pulled into Tokyo the next morning to a glorious sunrise. Even though we had some great times in Thailand, and Tokyo is far too cold at the end of December compared to Thailand, I was happy to be “home” in Tokyo. I like living somewhere with a decent infrastructure, where you aren’t asked every two seconds to buy something, and where you don’t have to worry about your safety and security as you walk the streets. The streets of Shinjuku, when we returned on December 29, were very peaceful compared to what we experienced the prior nine days. Actually, they were peaceful compared to most places in the world as most businesses were closed (for the New Year holiday which lasts about a week to 10 days beginning the 29th), many people had left town, and those Tokyoites that were still around stayed warm by staying inside.

Posted on January 24th, 2010 under Thailand. Tags: aerial photography, clouds, phuket, skywatch, Travel. Comments: 1