Hello All,  Jamie here signing on to write a few quick thoughts…..

I have always loved Japan and the Japanese culture. I loved it prior to coming here three years ago, I loved it after and I love it still. I will however admit that I had forgotten a lot about what the culture was like since my last visit. I am fascinated by the Japanese book of standards and the rules they live by. Everything is about Honor and everything is about Pride. Regardless of what it is they are doing, whether it be sweeping the ground at the train station, preparing food, or conducting a train….it is done with Honor and Pride. Another thing I had forgotten about was how clean everything is!!! The city of Tokyo is literally spotless. Most of the trash cans (which are few and far between) hardly have trash in them because they are emptied so often. Im still so baffled by the the amount of effort it must take by all the citizens to keep it this clean.  Another thing to note is the efficiency of this culture.  Everything is simple and everything works how it is suppose to work. Space is used wisely and it is bikes and trains over cars by every citizen.

So far on the trip we have spent 4 days in Tokyo, 1 day Snowboarding and 3 days in Kyoto. Both Kyoto and Tokyo are great cities but each are much different. Tokyo is viberant and alive! It`s the NYC of Japan and its full of energy. Kyoto gives you a mental picture of what old Japan must have been like. Everywhere you turn there is a Temple or Shrine.  The streets are narrow and the architecture is just how you would expect it to be.

I suppose that this is all I really wanted to tell you. I know I could sit here and outline eachday but I think you`ve all got the jist of our purpose and what our visit has been like thus far. At the moment we are still working out some technical kinks with uploading our photos. They should be worked out very shortly so please keep an eye out our photos page. They will be entertaining!

Hope all is well in the states or wherever it is you may be. Take care and wish us luck in China. Talk to you then.

Signing out from Japan.

JC

P.S. In the meantime feel free to check out our photo group on Flickr. Ryan, Koye and I will be posting all our pictures in our group. Join Flickr it is really cool!! We have a specific web address for our photos -

www.flickr.com/groups/nostepnostory

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