Japan Travel Moment: onsen

Japan is famous for its onsen baths so you must put it on your itinerary; however, as with many things in Japan, there are specific rules you should follow. Here are my TOP 10 observations: Bathing is always done nude. Don’t be shy about exposing your whole self to random Japanese men (or women, but …

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Japan Travel Moment: natto

I have eaten many “unconventional” things in the past, including things in Japan that twenty years earlier would have made me gag. At one time, neither Julia nor I would touch sushi, let alone sashimi, yet I had no problem eating raw beef with a raw egg, sea urchin, and I dutifully gulped down every …

Japan Travel Moment: trains

One of the coolest experiences in Japan is taking the bullet train, or Shinkansen. They're dizzyingly fast and so smooth you can eat from a bento box, even with less than adequate chopstick skills. Train technology in Japan is decades ahead of North America, so if you’re planning on visiting Japan, and traveling to several …

Japan Travel Moment: breakfast

Japan has adopted many Western traditions, like whisky, Jazz, and Christmas, but breakfast isn’t one of them. We had already walked around Ginza in Tokyo searching for breakfast and Kanazawa didn’t provide the usual breakfast goodies like bacon, eggs, toast, and omelettes either. This is strange considering coffee is everywhere… literally everywhere, offered in millions …

3. Commit your trip to memory

I am not an expert on memory, or am I? A few years ago I decided to learn Japanese because, as an English Second Language teacher, I wanted to "put myself out there" and see how hard it was to learn another language. Of course I didn't want to make it easy on myself by …