The bed was shakin'

Monday morning I was in a deep sleep and at 5.26 am, was shaken out of my dream. I kinda came to and thought I was having an Exorcist-like bed shaking experience. Until I realized I was sleeping on a futon. I jerked awake and three separate tremors, about three seconds each, snapped me out of my sleep and I lay there realizing I was experiencing my first earthquake.

Jeremy's Legacy

Jeremy flew into Tokyo last weekend. His main legacy was a demonstration on the perfect way to deal with Japanese starers. It had always perplexed me that Japanese people, who are otherwise a fairly shy race, have absolutely no shame when they stare at you. It mostly happens on trains where commuters are bored and have nothing better to do than check out the foreigner. Some will even go out of their way to move so they can see you.

My defense is to ignore them, Matt's defense is to stare back, some people pull funny faces, but these tactics rarely work.

Jeremy, on being confronted by a curious young man on the subway, blurts out a hearty "Konnichi-wa!" to him, loud enough for the rest of the train to hear, and kind enough for the young man to be shamed into blushing and looking down at his feet...