First week in Shanghai

The 'great china fire wall' prevents blogging from our apartment.  We have snuck around the wall to publish from Bruce's office.

We've arrived in crazy Shanghai.  This iconic view from the Bund is only topped by one from a bar inside one of these high-rises…martini in hand...

The streets are not quite as chaotic as Mumbai but just as dirty and you always need to watch that you're not run over by a stack of cardboard on wheels.

Many small groups of men meet in parks to play games (cards here)

Barracuda for sale in the wet market 3 blocks from our apartment…not sure I'm brave enough to attempt cooking them.. and also a bit nervous about the heavy metals in the locally caught fish.

Final few photos from Japan

It's cherry blossom season and the country has gone mad...

… there are tourists everywhere and even Olivia and Julia from the Bay

Early morning Keiko (sumo training) with some trainees that obviously need to eat lots more rice.

The shinto monks at Meiji Jingu performing morning rituals

Daily tuna auction at Tsukijii….at 5am…yawn

'Snow Monkeys' in Jigokudani Park (close to Nagano)… they were all distracted by a young male being 'put in his place' by a dominant male

A day of spring skiing in Hakuba (close to Nagano) with Ralf.  A few locals joined in our impromptu baseball game and had a good laugh

Ghibli: our favorite museum in Tokyo.  Obviously we're not the only ones as the waiting list to get into the museum is about a month long...

Goodbye, Japan… I miss the formal bows already...

Kyoto

The 'Golden' or Kinkakuji temple is the best known temple in Japan, with meticulously upkept gardens.  The army of gardeners in Kyoto never stops working.

The Nijojo fort has rooms with creaky (nightingale) floors to prevent assassins from sneaking up on the emperor.

However, the decorative details...

…and mossy forests were my favorites

We were fortunate to see this friendly couple on their way to be married in one of the temple gardens.  These rickshaws are popular modes of tourist transport in Kyoto… but typically they wear t-shirts

Jex and Bruce reviewing plum and cherry blossom photos..

Origami Kaiken

This small store/museum has amazing pieces of wet folded as well as traditional and unit origami on display.

The fabric on these pieces is hard to tell apart from the real thing.  Even the tree in the background is made of paper

We took a class with Mr. Fukui (author of one of the books) and learned a bit about the wet folding technique  (frilled lizard on left).  Jex also bought a couple of books and we now have dozens of creatures and unit origami pieces all over the apartment.