Back To Japan

Like i said in my last blog been back to the UK for my mums 90th which was a good and went well, everyone enjoyed them selves and thanks to my sister her husband John and the rest of the family for putting on a great spread. Uncharacteristically for England when you're having a doo outside the weather was great, in fact it as probably a bit too hot, wow did i really say that about English weather, in fact the whole week i was over there the weather was great. Also saw both my sons while i was there, told Ben to prepare to sweat when he comes over here as it's going to be hot and humid during the day and hot and humid during the night.

Like i said before he's coming over on the 13th August so am looking forward to that, should be interesting to see what his reaction is as it's his first trip anywhere in Asia and it's definitely different to anywhere in the west.

Got back to Japan on the 2nd of August, flight was good flew Lufthansa this time, and got the train from Narita to Utsunomiya. Finally got back to my apartment and had i bit of a kip, i can't really sleep on planes, it is unnatural to be 35 thousand feet in the air after all, i know it's the safest form of transportation and all that and i know all the statistics but i still like to be on good oll Terra Fir-Ma.

So I'm back and i get up about 7pm n think I'll go to the gym, so get in the car and off i drive big mistake, unknown to me there;s a festival going on in Utsunomia this weekend. Not sure exactly what it's all about but some kind of harvest festival type thing pray for a good rice crop and all that i think. All i know it was jam packed and most of the road in the center were blocked off so i was stuck in traffic with no where to go couldn't get near the gym in the car, so decided to go back to the apartment park up and walk up town. Thank god for air conditioning that's all i can say because getting back to the apartment took quite a while and even though it was about 8pm by this time it was still about 80F and real real humid.

Got back and i walked up town, took some photos while i was going most of them didn't turn out as everyone was moving around quite a bit chanting banging drums carrying shrines dancing around all pretty hectic but everyone seemed to be having a good time and letting there hair down so to speak. It was all pretty interesting found out it finished at nine and true Japanese punctuality bang on nine all the music stopped, so off i went into the gym for an hour, came out of the gym a bit later no music but there were still a lot of people hanging around.