The last time I took a picture like this, it was a cold weekday. Today’s photo was on a warm weekend so there were loads of lantern-adorned boats (yakatabune or 屋形船) filling the Odaiba Harbor in Tokyo Bay. The Tokyo Tower changed its lighting scheme a little later in the evening. None of those pics came out very good though as the Rainbow Bridge we were walking over was shaking too much for decent night photography.

This picture was taken with my TZ10. It came out better than anything my TZ7 could produce at night but falls a bit short of my LX3 for night photography.

Posted on May 25th, 2010 under Japan. Tags: night photography, odaiba, rainbow bridge, tokyo tower, tz7 zs3. Comments: 2

It’s time to finally wrap up this series on the Takeda Shingen Festival I went to in Kofu last month. I’ll probably share some more photos from my day in Kofu later, but not in the near future.

I waited around with many other people for about an hour for the promised fireworks. They were to be fired off from the top of the castle site. Very cool I thought. However, the firework show lasted less than 1 minute. I kid you not. I’ve witnessed longer fireworks after home runs at baseball games.

The wait could have been worse were it not for all of the typical Japanese festival food available. What would you like? Yakisoba? Ramen? Takoyaki? Kakigori? Okonomiyaki? Udon? Yakitori?

Posted on May 6th, 2010 under Japan. Tags: festivals, fireworks, food, kofu, matsuri, night photography. Comments Off on Wrapping up the Takeda Shingen Festival

The hanami parties officially started on the Kanda River on April 1 (and run through April 10). That evening included very warm temperatures and a very strong wind. The “shake” in the above picture wasn’t from my hand; the cause was the wind through the trees.

The building in the background is the Four Seasons Hotel at Chinzanso.

Posted on April 2nd, 2010 under Japan. Tags: cherry blossoms, chinzanso, kandagawa, night photography, sakura, Tokyo. Comments: 2

“We took the subway to Nihonbashi. The place was practically empty, maybe because it had been raining all morning. The smell of rain filled the big, cavernous department store, and all the employees had that what-do-we-do-now? kind of look. Midori and I went to the basement restaurant and, after a close inspection of the plastic food in the window, both decided to have an old-fashioned cold lunch assortment with rice and pickles and grilled fish and tempura and teriyaki chicken.” Norwegian Wood p. 342

Posted on March 31st, 2010 under Japan. Tags: book quotes, buildings, night photography, Tokyo. Comments Off on Nihonbashi (日本橋)

My residence in China was the Fengleyuan Hotel in Zhengzhou. The place looked pretty cool from the outside at night. This first picture was taken from my room.

I went on the roof one night to see if I could see the nightly fireworks that I was hearing. I could barely see the top of them (perhaps coming from the CBD, new part of town). The place looked even better from up here, much better than during the day when gray building under gray sky looked more depressing than anything else.

The hotel was OK on the inside. The floor mat in the elevator changed daily which was kind of fun. The staff was friendly to me, although communication was difficult, to say the least, as none of them spoke or understood English. I could usually get my requests across by writing kanji or by writing a single word in English which they would look up in their electronic, cell-phone dictionary.

The biggest problems with the place are probably the same as those at any hotel in China–the smells and floor. You can smoke anywhere in the hotel (or China for that matter) and most Chinese males seem to always be smoking. The floors were also not clean, which I found to be true in restaurants and the two hotels I stayed at on my way out of the country as well.

Posted on March 24th, 2010 under China. Tags: buildings, night photography. Comments: 2