I found Haruhi Suzumiya. She’s working in a popular chain anime goods shop in Osaka’s Nippombashi district. I didn’t plan to find a god-like entity hocking over-priced character goods, but it just sort of worked out that way. Nippombashi has…
A visit to the Nogeyama Zoo
In the hills of Yokohama, not terribly far from the skyscrapers, shopping malls, and night life of Sakuraigicho and Kannai, there is a large hilltop park in a quiet neighborhood called Nogeyama. Large parks in Yokohama are not all that…
Okunoshima: Poison Gas & Bunnies Island
After dragging her through multiple atomic bomb ruined schools and two days of visiting bomb-centric Hiroshima museums I took my lightly traumatized wife to an island full of bunnies to recover. The island had beautiful, natural scenery and uncountable therapeutic…
Japan’s Unchanging Schools
Think back to when you were young. Did you ever go, perhaps with family or as a school trip, to visit a school from a previous era? I can think of a few times when I was a kid that…
A Weekend Getaway in Tsuwano
Tsuwano I’d see the hillside trail, a zigzagging path covered end-to-end by red torii gates the night before. It was lit up by lanterns along the way which in the inky night almost appeared as if floating in the sky,…
It’s the Journey, Not the Destination: SL Yamaguchi
When riding an old steam engine I want to feel like I’m riding in a relic of the past, not just being pulled by it and to get that experience my wife and I boarded SL Yamaguchi. Operating since 1979,…
Chasing Birds in Yamato
Happy New Year! 2018 was a very busy, and very difficult year for me. I changed jobs, focused my free time on establishing myself as a photographer, and when I had the time, which was not nearly as often…
The Satomi Clan and the Battles of Konodai Castle
1564. Satomi Yoshihiro looked out across the Edo River at the Hojo forces arraying against him, just as his father had 26 years prior. The elder Satomi, Yoshitaka, was defeated by Hojo Ujitsuna in the first battle of Konodai and…
Fantastic Steam Engines and Where to Find Them!
How does this sound for a travelogue- Japan on the Go: How the Hell Does a Country the Size of California Have So Many Transportation Museums?! It will be 500+ pages long and be nothing but preserved trains and museums…
Finding History in old Photos
Lately it seems that I’m being pulled more and more into the historical aspects of photography. I don’t mean photographing history, we’ve always done that here. I mean diving into old photos, old methods, and even a Meiji Period…