All Good Things Must Come to an End



 Living in a temperate country is fantastic. I've been walking for 6 hours and didn't break a sweat. I'm all snuggly in a leather jacket that's padded with down feathers. Every now and then I stop by for a nice hot cuppa! The only snag is the sun sets rather early, around 4.30pm. But if you wake up at 6am and leave your hotel by 7am, you'd have a good 9 hours of day light.

The temperature in Tokyo is fantastic. 2 degrees. Not snowy like in Europe. But nice and cold. The only times I perspired was when I entered shopping malls and they are heated to around 25 degrees!

All this while, stock markets worldwide have been running up thanks to QE 2. I don't think the party will end, at least until mid year. After that, we'll have several months of correction in the US due to the stoppage of QE and rate hikes. The money will flow to Asia / Emerging Markets and we'd have a fantastic rally from mid 2011 onwards. We might see another 70 - 150% of upside from current levels. Yes, you heard me right.

Japan is actually quite cheap now, thanks to decades of deflation. There are many 400 yen shops, which is about SGD6.70. This pair of Woody Alan specs that I'm wearing cost me 400 yen! Lots of down feather jackets in Uniqlo going for SGD80! In Singapore, Uniqlo down feather jackets would have cost double! I don't wanna mention Europe but it's worse! Similar items would have cost at least SGD250 even in a flea market in Camden, London.

Japan is a land of Hello Kitty. Lots of cutsey stuff, make up for ladies etc...

There was a vintage car exhibition at Odaiba and I took a picture with a De Lorean car from "Back to the Future".

We stayed at Citadines at Shinjuku and I must say it's absolutely fantastic. Just 5 minutes' walk to Shinjuku Gyommae subway station and 10 minutes' from Shinjuku Sanchome station, which is an interchange. For SGD250 per night, we had daily room cleaning, a small kitchenette, utensils, free broadband that's very very fast! There's also a mini gym and a laundry room! If you go to Paris or London, you'd have to pay around SGD300 per night and the room will be quite small, with no gym nor laundry room!

Japanese people are largely friendly and polite. In Europe, I sometimes get very rude service. It sucks because after paying for so much, you still get such a service. And worse, in Paris and London, if you're on a budget, you can get food that's very bad! The streets are very safe in Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka. I've never felt unsafe, unlike my experiences in Christchurch NZ, Geneva Switzerland, Paris or London where some areas are quite dangerous. There are no hoodlums or hoodies; kids that hang out as a big group, often rowdy and harassing others.

Of course, Japanese are very insular people. Language is a major challenge because many cannot even understand simple English. There are other peeves as with all other major cities. Overall, I'd give Japan's infrastructure 9/10, safety 8/10, friendliness 6/10, food 8/10.