Japanese People

Hello All,
We had a beautiful day here after the rain the day before so I climbed to the top of the mast and inspected my rigging. I polished all of the stainless parts and enjoyed the view from 47 feet in the air. I am not a big fan of heights but I couldn't talk anyone else on the dock to do it for me. I also replaced one of my sail lines that lift up the staysail. I keep a lot of spare line on the boat just in case I need such a repair. That took me most of the day, I did take a break in the middle and got a long overdue hair cut. There is a barber shop close by so I decided I needed to get rid of my mop I had for hair. Wow I feel so much better, the last time I had it done was in Port Vila, Vanuatu, that was in September.

I just emailed my friend Toshi and I am still on for hanging out with his family tomorrow night. This should be heaps of fun, I will get to see how the Romans live. The Japanese culture is so much different than ours when it comes to foreign visitors. Every one that I meet always asks where I am from and welcomes me to there country. They are extremely polite and offer to help in anyway they can. The language barrier makes it interesting but I can usually get the point across. Like in French Polynesia English is way down the list of languages spoken. Most of the yachties here speak some English but that's all you have to do is go a block into town and I am back to sign language and pointing to stuff that I want. I was at the store yesterday for lunch and I was looking for sweet and sour sauce. After 20 minutes of looking at 100 different types of sauce I finally decided I didn't need it that bad. You can't read the labels and who do you ask. It makes it a lot more fun to shop this way. You never know what your going to get. I will be interested to see what this COSTCO store sells tomorrow. I will bring a list and see if I can find the stuff I need.

I am heading off for lunch so I will talk to you soon.

PEACE