we thought we would be smart, coming here just before the rainy season... well, not so much - it starts half a month earlier in Tokyo, ie now. As a result, it was pouring it down yesterday although today promises to be quite nice. This is the last day we`re here, I`m not quite sure what the plan is but I already dread the flight home. It includes an 8 hour stop over in Sri Lanka, which is one of the bleakest airports I`ve ever been to. On the upside, it`s what made the flights so cheap, so I can`t really complain.
Thinking about things I didn`t get round to doing, only two things come to mind. I never found mochi ice cream and I`ll never manage to make my way through all the tasty things that the bakery around the corner has, ie my breakfast heroes. And that`s only talking about the sweet section, not the savoury bits. Breakfast is good. It`s a neverending adventure of tastiness, as while I never know what I`m getting (or what`ll be on offer), I always end up liking it. Now there`s a bit of western imitation that I wholeheartedly approve of.
Otherwise... we went on a day trip to Nokogiriyama (something like that) and although it was a rather misty day, the views were well worth it. Not so chuffed by the birds (hawks?), who circled over my head with me thinking that it was a great opportunity for a really clear picture - until I noticed the warning sign that I couldn`t read, but which made me leave the platform rather swiftly. There will be pictures on Flickr later, when I`m back somewhere where I can actually upload them.
Oh, and to finish off a random bit of explanation: people on the trains or even shop assistants sometimes wear these masks, which makes them look like they`re very afraid of pollution or some disease or something - but far from it: it`s them who are sick, and they wear the masks in order to stop their germs from spreading, in consideration of the people around them. This country, where someone else is playing "sit between the japanese people and see who scoots away first in disgust of the foreigner" on trains, is just full of contrasts.