Take Over Wednesday - Changing it up

It's Wednesday once more and I know I usually let Adam take over the blog to speak about his interesting adventures of living in Japan, but I thought I'd be a nice sister and give him the week off. I think he deserves it since he's given me the final revisions for Shinigami Eyes and has been a pain-in-my-butt... I mean, very helpful and critical art director who's constantly on my back about how to fix the graphics that will accompany the story.

So, this week I've decided to share a few of my experiences in Japan. Yes, I have been to Japan twice. Both times in winter and going from the heatwaves of Australia to freezing temperatures in Tokyo really is a big adjustment.

Being in a foreign country really can be quite intimidating and anxious and exciting, all at the same time. Some times it didn't matter about language barriers, for instance all the trains in Tokyo read in Japanese and English, and most restaurants have food displays in their windows so if you don't know what to order you can easily point at it. Some times language barriers as a big issue, like trying to post a box of completely random trinkets (aka toys and hotel shampoos... yes, I stayed at the Disney hotel and had to collect the bottles :p) home to Australia. I was lucky I had a brother who was having a nice 30 minute conversation with the clerk.

It wasn't just Adam that helped over in Japan though, and I would recommend this to anyone who wants to visit a foreign country, I was able to find tour guides that were able to take us off the beaten track and show us things that we wouldn't have found out by ourselves. I owe some of my research to these tour guides as they took us karaoking and down back streets of Tokyo where I could see the houses and make notes.

I have tried to learn Japanese, but I don't have the time or patience to sit down and devote myself to another language with everything else going on in my life. One day I will learn it though - that's my promise - and the next time I visit Japan I would like to be able to pick up some words. I'm sure Adam would like that, then when we go to the theme parks or movies he won't have someone sitting beside him going "what just happened?" or "what did she say?"... Although he does the plot summary of movies quite well (I've seen 2 movies in Japanese theatres... that's without subs or dubs and he's kept me up-to-date with the action for most of the movie).