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Djibouti is unlike any place we ever been to.  We arrived at Djibouti after 22 hours on the plane.  When we got off the plane at 1am, I immediately sense the heat is trying to consume us with its fury.  Although it's passed midnight, it's still around 90 degrees outside.  We got on the bus from the airport and I can feel the cold air blasting from the A/C at maximum setting.  When we got to our destination, we found out that water is extremely precious in Djibouti.  There is a policy at our destination that requires people to take 3-minute shower.  At first, I was astounded at the request.  I didn't think I can fully clean myself in three minutes.  But then I found out that the water we use to shower is not suitable for drinking or brushing teeth.   If we drink the water we use for showering, we would get sick!!!  At about 2am, we finally arrived at our luxury hotel - the tent.  For our entire trip in Djibouti, we will have to stay in tents.  It's kind of fun if you are into camping.  The tent we stay in is not an ordinary tent.  The tent has 11 bunk beds and can host up to 22 people at the same time.  If the tent was full, I am sure it would look like a refugee camp.  Luckily, only the 4 of us are staying in this tent.  It might not be a Hilton or Marriot, but at least it's spacious. 

 

During our stay, we had the opportunity to visit the local area one day.  The experience was eye-opening.  As we were driving through the local town, I immediately sense the poverty, the despair among the people.  People were poorly dressed; the houses were made of cheap materials and they were much smaller than a typical house in the state.  Children were playing in area full of garbage.  It's feels like poverty wanted to consume these people alive.  According a person we work with, 50% of Djibouti's population is unemployed.  Thinking back, I have seen and I have heard about statistics and things like that in TV before.  But until I am here to live the experience myself and to look these people in the eyes, I have no idea what adversity they have to overcome. 

 

One thing I can appreciate about Africa is its quiet night.  It might be hot every night here but it has that peaceful feeling you couldn’t experience in a big city.  The stars and the moon seem brighter here without the pollution.  I can look as far as I can into the horizon with a skyscraper obstructing my view.  Although what I have seen might not be enough to make me fall in love with Africa, but it sure make me appreciate it more.   

We finally arrived in Japan on the 4th after a 13 hour flight.  The flight was easy for me as I slept most of the time.  After we landed in narita Airport, we ride the bus for 2 hours to get to Yokosuka.  My first impression of Yokosuka is that it is very clean.  It's a average size city in Japan.  Yokosuka and it's neighbor city Yokohama are very busy port cities.  There are alot of commercial activities at the port.  The streets are full of people and different stores.  It kind of reminded me of GuangZhou. 

 

On the second day we are here, I woke up at 6:30 am in the morning and jog for 45 minutes along the ocean front near our lodge.  The scenary along the running trail is beautiful.  I can see many ships carrying cargos coming and leaving the port.  I can also see the bay area between Yokohamma and Yokosuka from where I run.  We went to work at 8'0 clock.  We got off work at 4:00 pm .  After work, one of my coworker and I ventured out into the city.  We mindlessly walk around the street and malls in the downtown area.  I ended up eating at a food court in one of the mall.  I ordered susimmi on rice.  The suimmi is tuna.  The meal comes with a small bowl of miso soup.  The meal cost about 680 Yen which is only equivalent to about $6.  When I ordered the meal, I had a hard time communicating with the owner.  She didn't understanding English and I tried to order my meal using my fingers.  It was kind of funny how two people that doesn't speak the same language can communication using signs and hand gestures. 

 

Communicating with waiters in Japan always pose a challenge for none-Japanese speaking foreigners like us.  On our third day here, all six of us went out to eat after work.  We went eat at the top floor of this mall on what the Americans called the "blue street" (the street is paved with small blue tiles).  None of us speak Japanese, so we struggled with ordering our dishes.  It took alot of finger pointing and guessing for the waiting to understand what we want to order.  We confused the heck out of the waiter but we had a good time.  The restaurant we went to is a triditional Japanese restaurant.  We need to take off our shoes to enter the restaurant in bare food.  The floor of the restaurant is all hard wood and it sits high up on the hill so we were able to see most of downtown Yokosuka from where we sit .  The meals we ordered were delicious.  I had a Unagi (eel) Spagetti.  

 

We finished our work here on Friday and under the recommendations of our clients we decided to start our excursion to see the big budda in Kamasuka.  We decided to take the train to go see the budda.  The Japanese Subway system is huge and very develope.  It can take us to almost anywhere in the greater Tokyo metropolitan area.  However, it is also very complicated for foreigners like us.  We had to ask for alot of directions to get to the budda.  The budda we saw was huge.  We took a lot of pictures at the budda.  On our way back, I convinced my boss to try the Japanese green tea ice cream.  He spent 300 Yen for a green tea ice cream and he threw it away after one bite.  I felt bad for telling him he should try the Japanese green tea ice cream but It was also funny to see his reaction when he had his first bite of the ice cream.

 

We decided to go to Tokyo tomorrow morning and spend our whole day there.  Tomorrow should be the high light of our first week in Japan.  I am really looking foward to it. 

 

We left Yokosuka for Tokyo on Saturday 8:00am.  We took the train and got there at about 10:00am.  My first impression of Tokyo is it's very crowed.  When we got off the train station, we were surround by people trying to get to the train and get out of the station.  I lived in NYC for many years and have seen a lot of crowed places in the city but Tokyo is much more crowed than NYC.  Our first stop in Tokyo was the imperial palace where the emperor of Japan used to live.  The imperial palace has a lot of history and stories behind it.  It was nice and beautiful.   Our second stop is the Ginza shopping district at Tokyo.  Ginza is just about a 10 minute walk from the Tokyo Train Station.  It is full of name brand shops.  If you have money, this is a shopping heaven for any body looking to stock up some name brand clothes.  It basically has all the name brands you could ever want at one place - LV, Gucci, Burbbery, Boss, any thing you can imagine.  I have never seen any place that come close to this place interm of selections.  Tokyo is busy and glamourous but the pace here is very fast.  It could be a very lonely city if you don't know any one here.  People are always going some where, doing some thing.  No body even paid attention to their surroundings.  It reminds me of scenes from "Lost in Translation".  You know you are here but you also know you don't belong here.  Unfortunately, that's exactly how I felt after spending 4 hours in Tokyo.

 

We woke up at about 8:00 am on Sunday and three of my coworkers decided that they were too tire from seeing the neon signs and walking the streets of Tokyo and don't want to venture any where out of the hotel.  So they stay behind and the 3 of us set out to see Mount Fuji.  Getting to see Mount Fuji is a pain.  It's far and expensive but I must say the experience that it takes us to see Mount Fuji is well worth the money and the time.  It cost about $60 for transportation per person to get to see Mount Fuji but I must say it was the best $60 I have spent in my life.  Our trip begins by train.  The train took us to a town where they sell a lot of local specialties.  All the local vendors in that town have free sample for tourist to sample.  We took advantage of the free samples and got to taste alot of different variety of food.  After our free meal, we hop on a special train that took us up the mountain to about 500 meters above sea level.  We got off the train and discovered a small down in the middle of the mountain.  The town is famous for hot springs.  After we walk around the town and took some pictures, we hope on a cable train that took us to about 700 meters above sea level.  We a detour and a bus and visited the Venitian Glass Musem.  After the musem, we hop back to the bus and took a cable car that carries us to about 1080 meters above sea level.  We had lunch at the highest point of our trip and took the cable car down the other side of the mountain.  The cable car put us in front of a beautiful lake just on the other side of the mountain.  We hop on a pirate ship that took us to the middle of the lake.  We watched Mount Fuji on the ship in the middle of this beautiful lake at a far away distance.   It whole trip took us about 10 hours but it was so worth it.  There were so many museums to see, so many food to try, so many different things to see around this area.  Although we could have spend another day in this wonderful place, we need to travel to Okinawa for our second leg of the trip the next day.  It was just a perfect adventure that ends our first week in main land Japan.