Saturday, December 24, 2011 Turning Devastation into Peace and Hope Nagasaki Thursday, December 22, 2011 WOW! I'm on the train, leaving Nagasaki and am truly impressed. Nagasaki is the "little Hiroshima" that was bombed by the US on August 9, 1945 at 11:02 am. Nagasaki was actually the secondary target but it was such a cloudy day that troopers could not spot the primary target, and aimed for Nagasaki instead. As is the major tragedy of most ...

Saturday, December 24, 2011 Japan Part Ni Beppu Wednesday—the plan was to wake early and go for a run but since I was up late and then didn't sleep well, thanks to another snorer, that didn't happen. After a slow start and awaking to discover my ipod not working, I spent the good part of the morning on the phone with Apple and trying to fix the darn thing. By the time I was done with that and made it to the town of Beppu, it was 12:30. ...

Thursday, December 22, 2011 Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto Sorry, I just had to! And I will admit that I was very grateful for terrible 80's music because, sadly, it was just about the only exposure I had had to Japanese and it is a useful phrase! Okay, so a run-down of my days in Japan. Fukuoka: Fukuoka is the city where I arrived and my home-base...

Thursday, December 22, 2011 I Think I'm Turning Japanese Thursday, December 22, 2011 Today is my fourth day in Japan and I am So impressed so far and regret not having more time to stay in this wonderfully welcoming country. I arrived Monday afternoon around 1:00pm after a nice 3 hour ferry ride from Busan, Korea. The ferry was quite comfortable and enjoyable and getting to town from the port was an easy bus ride away. As I do in any new c...