You might not see him as regularly

Peek-a-boo!, originally uploaded by gardahsam.

Huh? What's this all about? Don't worry, he'll be fine - the camera is the one that is in trouble. I dropped it today and it is done. Not far from the A-Bomb Dome in Hiroshima, Japan, it took it's last photos. It was a trooper, especially as of late. I took nearly 1000 photos with it in December and even more this month (I have been going photos bonkers on this trip - like you hadn't noticed!), so I guess maybe it was time.

I bought the camera, a Casio Exilim EX-S770, in late 2007 from the "opened" table at the AAFES PX on Yongsan Garrison, Seoul, South Korea. It has been ran ragged since then, going with me on all manner of trips, taking innumerable photos of John (it really liked him!)...Barb said that maybe it was fate and I can buy a new one at the same place I got it (we'll be in Seoul pretty soon). Perhaps, but it is unlikely I will be able to get as good a deal on it - I think it was 40% or something crazy like that (like I said, it had been returned or something; the package had already been opened). From that point of view, it would be a hard argument to say that I didn't get my money's worth.

So that's why there are relatively few new photos and video today. I would have taken a lot more in Hiroshima, but I was just getting started when "the incident" occurred.

Quite frankly, I don't know if I can wait to buy another camera. I am so used to having it by my side, I find myself reaching for it every time I see something I think would make a good photo! We'll see...

Since I can't really tell the day's story in pictures as I have been doing up until now, I will try to use words to describe it. We started off in Kyoto and caught a Shinkansen train from there this morning, heading south and west across Honshu, the largest of the Japanese islands. We took a total of four trains today - the first was a really short ride only as far as Shin-Osaka station. Once there, we got onto a different Shinkansen (this one called the Hikari Rail Star - check out the cool picture of this thing on Flikr - looks like some kind of spacecraft or something!) and it took us the rest of the way to our intermediate destination, Hiroshima.

We had only about 2 hours there to look around, so I decided we needed to make the most of our time and take a taxi where we wanted to go, which was the Peace Memorial Park - basically "ground zero" of the atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima in 1945. This was our first cab ride since coming to Japan and likely to be our last, because it was expensive (about 1300 yen, at about 90 yen per dollar) and slow (20 minutes - no faster than public transportation, as we found out on the way back). Nonetheless, we arrived at the A-Bomb Dome and started looking around.

I took a few photos and began to move about the area, casing a good photo and not paying the requisite attention as I traversed a step up onto a curb. Somehow during this process, I lost my grip on my camera and it fell to the earth, extended-lens facing down. Noooooooooooo! I cried. But it was too late. I knew once I picked it up that it was not in a good way - the lens stack was lop-sided and the display screen was blank. I fiddled with the lenses for a moment to see if I could get them back into trim so they would retract, and I was able to do so, but not without applying a fair amount of leverage to them. This application of force by me in an attempt to rectify the mis-aligned lenses may have contributed to the camera's current state, which is, of course, non-functioning. However, had I not attempted to do what I could to fix the lenses, they would still be, at this time, fully extended, and thus the camera would be a) broken and 2. extremely unwieldy to carry. At least with the lenses back on track and able to retract, it can still be conveniently carried in a pocket! But now it's nothing more than dead weight. :-(

With the demise of my trusty camera setting the scene, you can guess how the Hiroshima visit then played out. It had been raining most of the morning while we were on the train, but thankfully the rain had stopped in Hiroshima as we got started moving about the area. There was another irritant, though - the Small One was carrying on about some slight, real or imagined (there are a lot of these when you are 3 years old). He was complaining about how he wanted some candy, but we maintained that we would be having lunch soon so he couldn't have any candy.

Not to bore you with this business too much (a frequently encountered scenario when traveling with a young child), we soon began looking for a place to eat lunch. There was one Italian-themed restaurant just by the side of the Matuyasu River, but the prices were certainly inflated due to its proximity to the Peace Park and A-Bomb Dome. About then, John spied a playground a couple of blocks farther down the riverbank and across the street that he wanted to check out. At this point, anything would have been OK to stop his incessant prattling, so we went to check it out. Unfortunately (but not entirely unexpectedly, since it had been raining all morning), the playground was little more than a mud bog underfoot and all the equipment was similarly soaked, so we didn't let John play. This, as you might imagine, only served to enhance his sense of dissonance, so the "waterworks" began anew - not rain, tears.

It was about now that we decided to head down a sidestreet to find lunch - maybe some food could resuscitate this short visit. We saw a little curry place and decided to try it. It was a good choice. If you ever visit the A-Bomb Dome in Hiroshima and are beset by pangs of hunger, head on over to "Ox" Curry and Cafe Restaurant. Even Barb, who normally doesn't care much for curry, liked it.

A good meal in our tummies, we were all feeling much more mellow. Too bad our time to visit Hiroshima was up. We had to get back to the station to catch train 3 of 4 for the day! This time we decided to figure out the public transportation to get us back there - we were not interested in being "raped" by another cab driver. Turns out the trolleys in Hiroshima will take you anywhere in town for 150 yen. Great deal and got us back to the station in the same amount of time as the taxi took. If I ever see that taxi driver again....Grrrr!

We had one more ride on the Hikari Rail Star, and the scenery from the train really started to get interesting once we left Hiroshima. (And with me suddenly camera-less, wouldn't you know it!) It was a grey and rainy day all-around, but as we headed west from Hiroshima, the generally flat terrain that was most of Honshu that we had seen to this point suddenly became mountainous and very green. Add in the mist and clouds and there were some very striking views of Japanese villages among the hills with the various forests and trees. This was the scene pretty much all the way to our next trans-loading point, Hakata (sometimes called Fukuoka). This was the end of the Honshu Shinkansen line and we had to get on a regular train the for the remainder of the journey.

We still had about 2 hours of travel to our final destination for the day, Nagasaki, on Shikoku. To this point, we had traveled with reserved seats on all the trains, but we were unable to get reserved seats for this fourth and final leg of the trip. Soon we would see just how important that would be.

All the trains up until now, ever since we left Tokyo almost a week ago, were not close to being full (this goes for the Japan Rail trains we rode from Tokyo to Kyoto, in and around Kyoto, and then from Kyoto to Hiroshima and on to Hakata). This one, though, from Hakata to Nagasaki, was absolutely packed. Standing room only, "cattle car," it was not looking like a good scene to be standing, holding a 3-year old, with large luggage, for a couple hours on a swaying train. Oh yeah, don't forget that Barb is excess of 7 months pregnant - not a good scene. The train was so full that the doors could barely close as we pulled out from Hakata Station.

Luckily, before long, Barb spotted a seat that only had luggage on it and she was able to convince the people nearby to move their stuff so John could sit down and look out the window (he is a lot more fun to be around when distracted by looking at scenery). We came to the first stop and a few people shouldered their way off the train - but unfortunately at least as many new passengers barreled into the train to take up any freed space. Soon we were underway again, and now the folks sitting by John invited Barb to sit with John. Thank goodness! Only about 20 minutes into the ride, we were able to get both of them sat in the packed car! A little while later, a small space opened up near the front of the car and a nice woman let me put one of our large pieces of baggage near her feet, clearing a great deal of the car's obstructed walk-way. A stop or two later, two gentlemen sitting on the other side of the car got up to get off and offered both seats to me and the baggage I carried. Yes! I quickly moved myself and the bags into the area opened up and there was even enough room after I got done moving stuff around that another person who had been standing was able to sit down in the seat next to me. This was how a potentially really bad 2-hour train ride turned into one that was not nearly as bad - people were being nice. Thanks, people!

It was dark by the time we got in to Nagasaki and we haven't yet had any opportunity to see any of the city (save our hotel). IF I am able to come up with a camera in the near-term, you can expect to see some new photos again here soon. If not, then you might see more words like these (maybe not quite as many, though - it takes a long time to write all this stuff!).

Until next time,

GJS

Kyoto, III

Back on train-watch, originally uploaded by gardahsam.

I didn't take a single video today, so I can't share any with you, but there are 175 or so photos I took (including this one) ready for your viewing on Flikr. Today we added a castle visit to our regular temple rounds. The castle, called Nijo-jo, is yet another UNESCO World Heritage Site (can't hardly seem to take a step in Kyoto without tripping over one!) and was yet another place where it was "hard to take a bad shot," as the saying goes. There was one other temple we visited, near Kyoto Station, called Higashi Hongan-ji (not a UNESCO site, hard to believe) that boasts one of the largest wooden structures in the world! It was so big that I was never able to get it all in one shot. Like I said, all this and more is waiting for you at Flikr!

Weather-wise, it was another very fine day and we are enjoying the relatively mild weather that almost certainly will not last once we cross over into South Korea in a few days. You'll no doubt note the blue skies and puffy clouds that are liberally represented in today's photos.

Stay tuned for more from Japan soon.

GJS

Kyoto, Day 2

We tried to do something more fun for John today. The results were mixed. First up was a visit to the Iwatayama Monkey Park in the Arashiyama District of Kyoto. We enjoyed a nice walk on a beautiful day to the park from the train station and then had a bit of a climb to get up the mountain to where the monkeys actually live at (some 150m above sea level - quite a lot higher than Kyoto proper). After "monkeying" around there for a while, we moved on to something more interesting to us "grown-ups" - a thirde UNESCO World Heritage Site, called Tenryu-ji. This Zen temple and the adjoining garden was very beautiful and I took many, many photos during our visit (please visit Flikr to see them all). John was bored before we even started looking around, so we hurried through a bit to get to another site that he was a little more interested, the adjoining bamboo forest. It was fun to go for a walk in this forest, which was unlike any I have ever been in before (and I think it is a place that pandas would love to visit!). After these three visits, we enjoyed a nice walk back to the Arashiyama train station, taking in some nice views of Kyoto as we went. I then took some shots of Kyoto from the train on the way back to the hotel and a few more shots of the sunset over Kyoto after we got back to the hotel.

I have to admit, I think Kyoto is the best place we have seen in Japan yet! We are looking forward to the rest of our visit here and seeing some more beautiful Kyoto sites!

GJS

Kyoto - Day 1

And we're back again. It was a good day of "touristing" in Kyoto and we saw some really cool temples. It has been said that "it is hard to take a bad photo in Kyoto" because there are so many beautiful things to see (and take pictures of), and I would have to agree. According to my Lonely Planet guidebook, Kyoto itself has 17 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, two of which we visited today. The first, called Kinkaku-ji (or the Golden Pavilion) is with reason one of the most-visited sites in Japan. The place was just flat-out breathtaking. Head over to Flikr to see some of the photos I took. After the Golden Pavilion, we tried to head to another nearby temple, called Ryoan-ji, but unfortunately it was closed. Luckily for us, not far away was another very beautiful temple, Ninna-ji (the Old Imperial Palace) that was also very beautiful. The grounds of Ninna-ji were far larger than those of the Golden Pavilion and there was no shortage of intricate classical Japanese architecture to photograph.

I really enjoyed the opportunity to visit these two sites. As for John, well, he's got the attention span of a three-year-old, so by the time we were nearing the end of walking around the second temple site, his "fun ticket was punched" so to speak and he was having a lot more fun playing in mud puddle from the morning's rains (see the video for the visual). Oh well, clothes can be cleaned, right?

We'll be at it again tomorrow, hopefully something more up John's alley.

GJS

Mt. Fuji and more

Two videos on YouTube today, this one and one of John going batty about trains. You may have surmised that I would try to get some shots of Mt. Fuji, and if so, you were right! Pics and video (all of them) are up on Flikr for your enjoyment. Lots of photos of the same thing today - a really pretty sunset in Kyoto. A couple of the pics came out pretty well, but I have posted all of them to Flikr so you can see for yourself.

Riding the Japanese Shinkansen (bullet train) is pretty much identical to riding the high-speed rail (HSR) in Taiwan that links Taipei and Kaohsiung (it should be pretty similar - the HSR is a Shinkansen-built train). The Japanese have taken it to the next level, though - this country is literally wrapped all up in rail lines, which is nice, makes it easy to get around.

Kyoto presents another fun subway "rat nest" to try and sort out, just when I was starting to feel like I had the Tokyo Metro halfway figured out!

More tomorrow.

GJS

Today's Twofer

I posted two videos on YouTube today - this one and and one featuring a xylophone. And even if it's not really a xylophone, I just love that word, so I will use it freely. You'll have to access my YouTube page to see the second video ("Musical Interlude").

Today's tourism was all in Tokyo's Ueno Park. It's a large urban park featuring a bunch of museums, a zoo, walkways, greenery, and so forth. We went to the zoo and to the Tokyo National Museum, photos from both of which are already posted at Flikr. Some really neat stuff at the museum, but we didn't really get to do more than scratch the surface - kind of how it goes when touring with a 3-year old. Not a lot of patience in those little ones a lot of the time. Much better when we got to the zoo, but it was a tad chilly there today - I think today may have been the coolest day since we have been doing active tourist stuff here in Tokyo (can't really speak for the days when we were mainly at the hospital when we first got here).

Hope you enjoy today's photos and video. Comments welcome. I have been trying to tag a few of the pics with some explanatory note, which might make them a little more enjoyable, adding a bit of context. By the way, I had quite a few of them tagged with comments last night when I went to upload them, but due to operator error, at least half of the tagged comments were lost when I had to re-start the upload about half way through. By the time I got it going again it was so late that the last thing I wanted to do was go back and re-tag them. Good intentions derailed once again by poor execution.

GJS

Today's video: Pint-size tour guide

Today we visited the Yasukuni Shrine and then went to a place called the Railway Museum. Video and photos are going up to Flikr right now, but I posted this particular video to YouTube already for your viewing pleasure.

The Yasukuni Shrine is controversial because it commemorates Japan's war dead, including some convicted war criminals. Whenever a high-level Japanese politician visits to pay respects, it really upsets neighboring countries who were victims of Japanese aggression during World War II. I found the place to be quite peaceful and pretty, and if you didn't know about the meaning behind the place and the controversy that sometimes bubbles up about it, you'd probably think it was a nice place, too. I felt like I needed to have a look at the place myself, and now you can have a look, too. Just head on over to Flikr and check out the photos.

Then we changes pace a bit and went to the Railway Museum. This place was a blast, although a little far away (over an hour on the train to get there). As one would expect, John really enjoyed it. The pics and video tell the story, I think - go check 'em out. We probably could have spent the entire day there, quite frankly (at least according to John we could have).

GJS

New video and photos

I'm back at a hotel that doesn't block me from using Flikr, so I have already uploaded today's photos and video, which includes this one (also on YouTube - this post courtesy of...). I'm also going to upload the last 2 days of material from Tokyo Disneyland and DisneySea to Flikr so that everything is in one place. One stop shopping, can't beat that! After using Picasa the past couple days, there is one feature I really like about it - it scans faces and groups all pictures you have by who is in them. Pretty cool feature. Since the free Picasa upload limit is only 1 GB (photos and video eat that amount up pretty fast), what I might do from now on is post what I consider to be the best pics to Picasa while continuing to post ALL pics and video to Flikr. That way, if you just want to see the highlights, check out Picasa. But if you want to see everything, surf over to Flikr. It's just an idea I have been kicking around, not sure if I am going to pursue it or not. Your thoughts?

All we really did today was switch hotels - a rest day of sorts. Hope to be back in the swing of things tomorrow and make the most of our last few days to see Tokyo.

GJS

Tokyo DisneySea

We had a good time at the DisneySea park today.  We were fortunate with the weather both days - relatively mild, and lots of sunshine today. (OK, I'll admit that it was a tad cold for my taste - looks like it started off in the upper 30s today and almost got to 50.) There seemed to be a lot of people at the park today, a lot more than we saw at Disneyland yesterday, but I would bet that it was a light day in terms of paid attendance at the park in comparison to when the weather is warmer and when school is not in session.  I couldn't help but run the numbers listed on Wikipedia talking about attendance at this DisneySea park, some 12.5 million guests in 2008.  That works out to almost 35,000 each and every day, assuming that the park is open 365 days a year. (I think I saw somewhere that it is closed sometimes, maybe a dozen or less days a year.) That's a lot of people to get in and out of the gate, on rides in an orderly fashion, fed, "restroomed," and basically entertained.  And the folks at Disney do a fine job of it.  I was impressed by the parks and the experience overall (although the prices for anything involved, from hotels to park admission to food, do not come close to being a bargain, not by a long shot).  

Here are today's pics (also on Picasa - please let me know if you are having trouble viewing these at all):

Tokyo DisneySea

John is holding up pretty well, still coughing some, but for the most part back to normal during the day.  Sometimes at night he is still having a little bit of a hard time.  I think soon he will be completely over his sickness.

Next few days will be general sightseeing around Tokyo - we are done with Disney.  One more day might have been nice, but I think the day and a half we had was enough for us.

GJS

Yesterday's pics - Tokyo Disneyland

John with his new friend

OK, I've discovered a work-around for my non-ability to access Flikr - it's Picasa, Google's photo sharing service.  In fact, all the photos I upload to the blog (for use for various posts, like the one above) are already there, but this is the first time I've actually used Picasa itself for uploading photos.  Why were the uploaded photos already on Picasa?  Well, it's quite simple - Blogger, the blogging service that I use for Garblog, is a Google entity, and so is Picasa.  They work together.  Flikr belongs to Yahoo, so it is not as compatible as two services that belong to the same giant company.

At any rate, here are the photos from yesterday:

Tokyo Disneyland

Yesterday we did Tokyo Disneyland and it was a lot of fun.  Today was the sister theme park, one that is unique in the Disney pantheon, called Tokyo DisneySea.  While the Disneyland park here is essentially the same as the one you can visit in Anaheim or Orlando, there is but one version of the DisneySea park, and you have to travel to Tokyo to see it.  Reportedly, it was the most expensive theme park ever built, and the fastest to reach 10 million visitors (just over 300 days).  I got this info about the parks from Wikipedia.

Today's pics to follow soon...I must be slipping, I took far less than 100 photos in a full day at the park! (yesterday was over 100 in half a day)

GJS

404 Error

I've tried about every way I can think to get today's batch of photos up on the web, but I've been repeatedly stymied and am throwing in the towel.  You'll have to settle for the single "teaser" pic above.  It gives away where we were today.  I think my internet problems are a function of changing hotels today - for some reason the new hotel's network won't let me upload my stuff to Flikr.  That just means that there will be several hundred to upload in a couple days when we are at a new hotel and (hopefully) I can upload again.  See, I was trying my best to do daily uploads to stay ahead of the game, but I have been thwarted by technology.  Grrrrr!

GJS

Waiting for the train

CIMG6136, originally uploaded by gardahsam.

OK, the Flikr upload is done, please go over and have a look. Today's activities included attending the sumo tournament (video below) and going to a place called Roppongi Hills (funny name, because there are no hills, just tall buildings, one of which has an observation deck on the 52nd floor). I took about 120 or so pics today, some good, some other. Hope you find something you like in there.

Enjoy!

GJS

Sumo

Couldn't pass up on a chance to go to a sumo wrestling tournament. The other night when we were at the ER with John I saw the tournament coverage on TV and later I looked into getting tickets. Timing just happened to be right (in Tokyo at the right time) to catch it - kinda neat thing to have seen live. There may be one more sumo video uploaded to YouTube, but I don't plan to post it here, so it you want to see it you will have to check there (the recordings are too long to post on Flikr, so they won't be found there).

Pics will follow to Flikr, hopefully yet tonight (Thursday).

GJS

Tokyo

CIMG6027, originally uploaded by gardahsam.

Just uploaded the first batch of photos from the trip. There were about 50 photos and one video (if you've already watched the latest YouTube video below then you've already seen it). Hope to have lots more in the next few days.

Enjoy!

GJS

Recovering

 John's last nebulizer treatment

John is doing a lot better today.  The prayers must have helped.  :-)  He was discharged from the hospital at about noon and we have been taking it easy at the hotel since then.  He took a long nap this afternoon and we have been watching the Disney movie "Bolt" tonight.

Passed out at the hotel

Tomorrow morning he has a follow-up appointment at the hospital and hopefully he will be feeling well enough that we can do a little sightseeing tomorrow afternoon.

More to come.

GJS

"A Perfect Ending to a F**ked-up Day" ***[UPDATED with photos]***

Bonus points if you can tell me what movie the quote that is the title comes from.

I thought the quote does a nice job of summing up some of what happened today, our first in Tokyo, in particular the second half of the day - the part where we were in Japan.

All was well until riding the shuttle bus from the airport to our hotel.  Narita Airport is about 2 hours away from the center of Tokyo, where our accomodations are at.  John was tired and taking a nap on my lap.  He was squirming around a bit, trying to get comfortable.  Before long, he woke up and was coughing with a raspy, seal-like barking sound.

He'd had a bit of a cough the previous two days, but nothing that should cause us to cancel our travel plans, right?

Well, as of this writing, John has been admitted to a hospital here in Tokyo for observation.  His coughing became so severe on the bus that we were a hair's breadth away from stopping it in the middle of traffic and getting an ambulance.  It was as if he was choking, but not due to any sort of object obstructing his throat.  The obstruction was his throat itself, irritated from the raspy coughing.

He was able to calm down enough and smooth out his very labored breathing enough to allow us to get to our intended destination.  Once we were at the hotel, we began burning up the phone lines to get treatment arranged by the company that administers our medical insurance.  Once this was done (it took the better part of an hour to coordinate things and locate a suitably close treatment facility), we took him straight to the emergency room.  That was at about 5:30 PM local time.

The doctors drew blood, gave John nebulization treatments to help him breathe, and eventually prescribed an oral steroid to try to deal with the inflammation of his throat.  By the time all the medical procedures and waiting for a relatively solid diagnosis was done, it was nearly midnight.

Most likely what he's got is a case of viral croup that will resolve in a day or two (hopefully).  We'll have more information in the morning after the hospital has a chance to run more tests.  The disturbing part to us was the sudden onset of severe symptoms, i.e. being barely able to breathe.  One person I spoke to tonight said that it could have been triggered by the colder-than-we-are-used-to, dry Tokyo air.

This is a good example of something that would be relatively easy to deal with when on familiar turf, but that becomes exponentially harder when in a completely new environment in which you understand very little of the local language.  Indeed, one of the things I almost immediately remarked upon to Barb after we got to Narita was how I felt extremely limited by how little Japanese I recall (my most recent lessons in Japanese ended in late 2004).  The comparison is with Chinese, of course - I know a fair amount of Chinese and feel pretty comfortable moving about society in Taiwan and doing the things I need to do on a daily basis, using Chinese, but I can barely manage "hello" and "thank you" in Japanese.  Barb thought this was pretty funny, noting that now I know what it feels like to be her  in Taiwan.  Touche!

More updates will follow as the situation develops.  Pray for John!

GJS

Riding the tram at Narita

Here's my first attempt at using YouTube to post a video here at Garblog. If it works, expect to see more in the future!

This is a short video taken just after we arrived at Narita Airport not far from Tokyo.

GJS

In-flight entertainment

Aside from looking after The Small Mailman on the flight (it's a
nickname I sometimes use for John, borrowed from the new Pixar film
"Up"), I also started reading my new book, "The Good Soldiers" by
David Finkel and watched the Michael Jackson film "This Is It." I had
been wanting to watch this movie but was waiting for an opportunity to
do so without having to pay. It was a strange thing to watch,
knowing that Jackson would live only a few more months after the time
it was filmed. It was also pretty amazing to see Jackson run circles
around the young dancers in his show - he was such a natural talent.
Arrived in Tokyo at about 1:30 PM local.
GJS
Sent from my iPod

On the way to Tokyo

Well, let's "tuck into" the first update from the road - or maybe more
appropriately, the "wing", since we are flying right now. The JAL
flight does not have wireless, so this post will sit in the queue
until we get on the deck in Tokyo. I am ok with that.
The trip to the airport this morning was uneventful, which is good.
The Kaohsiung MRT has a station right at the international airport, so
it was very convenient. The airport itself is of a decent size and
seemed to me to have been built fairly recently (the terminal
buildings, etc.). There was one thing there I would have liked to have
taken a picture of - an green area near the departure gate with a
variety of plants. It was almost like a garden and people were
gathered all around it, chatting and waiting for their flights. In
addition to making the area look nicer, it also made the air in the
terminal smell much fresher than in your typical departure hall. A
nice touch!
Will have more to add soon!
GJS
Sent from my iPod

Small photo upload

Hello again.  Just wanted to let you know a small photo upload is now taking place – only about 60 pics this time, so it shouldn’t take long.  I just want to “clear the books” before leaving on the trip, and you are the benefactor!  All are pics / video from around Kaohsiung.  And one video is the one you have all been waiting for – me doing laundry!  In fact, I only took that particular video to test out the new “GorillaPod” camera tripod I got for Christmas (which, by the way, is a great gift!  Thanks Beth! Uh, I mean Santa Claus!).

 

Pics will be found here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/gjsamps/

 

Enjoy!

 

GJS

Globetrotting

Well, for all intents and purposes, the first semester at NSYSU is over and we are on the cusp of our first trip since moving to Taiwan.  Tomorrow (Tuesday) we are heading to Tokyo for about a week and then on to Kyoto, Hiroshima, and Nagasaki before heading across to South Korea.  Will spend a week or so there, primarily in and around Seoul.  Really looking forward to this trip in every way except for - the weather.  Gonna be cold in Japan and Korea!  Been spoiled by the super-comfortable temperatures here in Southern Taiwan.  For instance, today it's 77 degrees F and sunny in Kaohsiung, and it looks like the temps in the places we will soon be visiting range from the mid 30's to the low 50's. (Daytime temps - will be quiet a bit colder once the sun goes down, I am sure.)

I hope to do quite a lot of photo-taking in the next 3 weeks, and I really hope that I am able to share some of these with you here as we go - it will be much better that way than if I end up waiting until we are back here in February to upload some pics.  I plan to make heavy use of Flikr and may even try to use YouTube to get some videos on here.  Stay tuned for more!

If you are in Japan or South Korea, we hope to see you soon!

GJS

Kaohsiung's Central Park last week

Kaohsiung's Central Park last week, originally uploaded by gardahsam.

It was a nice day.

GJS

Second time's a charm

Ready for New Year's near Taipei 101! (look familiar?)

Hello all...was able to complete the photo upload today. Still not quite sure why it stalled out yesterday, but no matter. The result is that now there are nearly 2000 (!) visual media items for you to enjoy at my Flikr page.

Some may wonder why I post so many photos, why not sort and sift a bit more? I have a couple answers to this: 1. I believe in the "people's war" theory of photos - that is, win through overwhelming numbers (I should hope you will be able to find something you like amidst the many, many options!); and (b) well, simply because I can. Digital photography enables me, as well as the the limitless upload capacity (when the "pipes" are working as they should be, anyhow) afforded to my by my Flikr account (not free, but not terrible expensive either).

Enjoy!

GJS

Houston, we have a problem

Be on the lookout for the notorious "George Washington" Bandit!

I think I may have overwhelmed Flikr with my attempted upload today. Perhaps the daily upload capacity per person tops out around 2 GB, for that's about all I was able to force through the "pipes" thus far, despite repeated attempts to get the rest to go. Perhaps I will try again later tonight or tomorrow. At any rate, about 350 new items were uploaded, including all the video (these comprise the most voluminous portion of the media). Like I said, I will try to get the other 600 or so photos up later. Hope this tides you over!

GJS

It's Time

"Flikr Ops" are about to commence. I am not done with my papers and such (mentioned last time) but it's time for a break. Plus, I don't want these photos to not be uploaded by the time we head out on our semester break, because quite frankly I hope to take at least another thousand or so pictures on the trip!

These pictures encompass the whole of December 2009, which includes some stuff from my school, Christmas, New Year's, Patrick and Maxine's visit, and so forth. Uploading will commence shortly, and I expect it will take no less than an hour (maybe longer) to complete.

"Teaser" photo included above. More to come!

GJS

Crunch Time

Don't think I've forgotten about you, faithful reader - I have lots for you! But now the end of my first semester of study draws near, and that means, of course, finals. I have no exams, but instead a pair of presentations (this week) and four (4) papers due next week, one for each class I am taking. What this means to you, dear reader, is that you will have to be patient and wait to see the nearly 1000* new photos that will be uploaded to Flikr at sometime in the not-too-distant future. Meanwhile, I shall be hard astudy.

GJS

*With a few days left in 2009, I remarked to Patrick that I though I could make it to 1000 photos on the month (December 2009 - hey, it was the holidays! -a period of increased photo-ness, right?). At the time I was at about 750. Patrick, Maxine and I went to Taipei for the New Year, and I was on track for 1000, with visits to the Taipei 101 observatory, the Sun Yat-sen Memorial, and the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial, but my camera's battery gave out before my "shutter eye" did. I managed a few anemic pics of the fireworks from Taipei 101 before it gave way completely just moments after midnight, and sure enough, once I got home to see where I ended up, the verdict was...999!!! Alas, I this number was before I "culled the flock" a bit and got rid of the blatantly blurry or just plain no good shots (there are always at least a few - thank goodness for digital photography, I'll just take more pictures!) So I ended the month at about 950 pics. Again, these will be uploaded to Flikr sometime soon - don't worry, I'll give you the heads-up when this is happening to you can check for new photos. When that happens, it will essentially *double* the number of photos I have on Flikr, all for you, dear reader.