I woke up in Hokkaido II (Noboribetsu)

Noboribetsu has a village up the hills where giant hotels span and bus loads of tourists arrive at all hours.

It was snowy and freezy when we got there. Just in time for us to don the traditional costume (everybody in the hotel did!) and soak in their famous hot springs.





The sulphur rich steamy bath juice comes from Jigokudani (地獄谷, the hell valley) from behind the hot spring village, named for its barren appearance, overlooked by some well preserved woods blanketed in snow.

I woke up in Hokkaido I (Sapporo)

Hokkaido (北海道, the north island) is cold in winter. No wonder, it borders Russia. We stayed at Sapporo, where they produce the famed Sapporo beer, for three days.



Odori Park (the large street) at downtown was all lit up with Christmas declarations. I took a few pictures of it.

I woke up in Tokyo

I've been to Narita for transit many times, but this is only my first real visit to Japan. It has been interesting. I had always pictured Japan as this ultra modern metropolis littered with cigarette butts ridiculously expensive.

Not so really. The truth is even with the Japanese Yen at its highest in recent years, Tokyo remains surprisingly affordable. More unexpectedly, smoking is banned in most Japanese streets, awesome.

Infrastructures such as the subway, office buildings are disappointingly uninspiring I must say, different from the futuristic city I originally had pictured. Railway stations looked old and ordinary citizens' homes are quite simple.

But that doesn't mean Tokyo's skyline is not respectable. Quite the contrary, I think it is more awe-inspiring than that of New York's. We stayed at the 22^nd floor of a hotel at Kabukicho (歌舞伎町, the play area) in Shinjuku (新宿). The view of the city was stunning and the night live there does not disappoint.

Tokyo night view from my hotel room

Shinjuku's skyline

Streets of Kabukicho

Ginsa area

More Ginsa

Tokyo Tower

Japanese Garden at Kaminarimon

Tokyo at dawn

Creative disclaimer

So I got this memory card in a plastic package, at the bottom was the bar code that says "Removal will void Warranty"... apparently throwing it away will not...



Baffling.

Frozen fly

So, tell me, aren't those windows supposed to be sealed air tight? How did a fly get in there then.



This I took on a tiny United jet.

Apple monopoly

Remember how Microsoft was sued for violating the anti-trust law because it was bundling Internet Explorer (and I've talked about how integrating a browser into the OS is the right move) in an attempt to shut out competitions?

Apple is doing just that, shutting out competitions in favor of its own products on its platform. It's surprising I haven't seen an uproar in the tech community.

Despicable.

LEGO computer

I had build stands and racks out of LEGO bricks for practical purposes, but I have never thought of building a PC case out of LEGO bricks. I need a PC case to house the used computer I got from my brother, but I don't have enough bricks.

Signs of a bad economy III

So, you know about all these electronic transfer scheme online, like Paypal, online only banks, etc. that lets you transfer money to and from a regular checking account, right? They establish the relationship with your checking account and authenticate your identity by depositing 2 small amount of fund, and you have to report back the sum online to prove you have access to that account.

The two amounts are normally under $1 each, most of the time, under $0.50 each. Security flaw aside the latest amazement is, they take the money back after you are authenticated. This is the first time, Payapl doesn't do that, other online banks never either.



If your company is so cheap that it won't waste $1 for account setup, it's hard for me to entrust you with my money.