Japan - Part 2

Hello there!

Well, internet conditions in Nara and Kyôto were not as good as Tôkyô and I had no chance to update my blog. Anyway, I was very tired those days and would probably not have done it anyway ;)

Fact is, it's been since Thursday that I've been back in Barcelona, busy trying to meet everyone and talk to all friends. I'm tired now, but I feel it is time to give a new subset of photos. These cover our last day in Tôkyô and our one-day trip to Ôsaka. Unfortunately I lost three days of photos covering Kyôto and Nara (unforgiveable!). These were right in the middle of the photos I'm showing now (ie, between Tôkyô and Ôsaka. You figure...). But now to the pics

The first pic gives a view of Tôkyô tower and the temple Zozo-ji (?)

more zozo-ji



Next is a view of Tokyo with Shinjuku at the far end. Unluckily a smoggy day..



Following is a photo of a typical "high-tech" toilet. Taken in the Nikko-Nara hotel :)



The next set of photos are from Ôsaka. They were taken a couple of days later due to my mistake with the camera.

A couple of Ôsaka buildings seen from Osakajo-koen



The famous Ôsaka castle



An Ôsaka view from the castle



And finally, another view of Ôsaka; this one taken from the 27F of the Ôsaka train station (not shin-osaka train station). すごい！



More pics will follow :)
Bona nit!

Japan - Part 1

Hi, as promised here are some photos from the first two days in Japan. but only a small subset wit simple comments, as we're are terribly tired and the software is playing tricks on me.

First of all here is the reception team at kansai internation airport :)


This is the sumidagawa, close to our hostel

This is the Kannan at Asakusa (or something similar, need to check my guides ;)


These photos are from today. This is a view of tokio from odaiba

This is Fuji TV building (?) at Odaiba

This is a view of Ginza on Sunday, with the streets closed to the cars. The guy in the picture is my collegue Xavi



This is the large apple store at ginza

This is the East entrance to the Emperial castle


Shinjuku (Kabukichou) in the afternoon

And finally Shibuya at night. This photo is without flash and is thus very bad


This is Shinagawa station. Yamanote line had a problem while we were returning, so we looked for a restaurant at this place :)

I promise more photos in a couple of days :)

Towards Japan

This is my last post before going to sleep. Tomorrow my flight to kansai (kix) leaves at 10:35h in the morning. I've just seen there are a couple of nice hurricanes or whatever right south of Japan (maybe close to okinawa?). I hope this does not interfere too much with our plans. Maybe getting lost in 新宿 (shinjuku?) is not a bad idea after all ;)

We'll stay in 浅草 (sumidagawa) while in 東京 (tokyo). Seems like a good place from here. In 京都 (kyoto) I will be staying at 東山 (higashiyama) which on the map looks also pretty close to the center. No idea about the 奈良 (nara) hotel.

uff, I'm so tired I'm going to sleep now. let me hear from you on this blog ;)
good night

Opeth - Ghost Reveries

Opeth's new album "Ghost Reveries" is out. I've been listening to it for the last couple of days and I'm pleased to to inform you that GR is another masterpiece from this swedish band. I was a bit confused after the Deliverance/Damnation CDs. Deliverance sounded a little too systematic. However, GR goes back to the variation and feeling of older albums more like Still Life. It is, however, not so heavy. The progressive death metal of Opeth is still there and in large quantities, but the rythms seem slower. But do not think this is some doomdeath album.

It's hard to state some songs as the best ones. I sincerly like them all. But I will cite "Ghost of Perdition" and "The grand Conjuration" as favorites, probably just because I've heard the most.

Btw, Opeth is now a quintet as their tour keybord player Per Wilborg has been added to the lineup permanently. This addition may be one of the principal differences in the sound with previous albums. The utilization of keyboards is not abused, which was one of my fears. All in all, another top album from Opeth. Just can't stop listening it. Damn! 97/100