The photos below shows bamboo trees bent over with the tops stuck in the snow! The snow causes the trees to bend over till the top of the tree touches the snow on the ground. Further snow buries the top branches tying the top of the tree to the ground, and it will stay like that until enough snow on the ground melts, even though the original snow that bent the tree in the first place melts first like it did shown in the photos.
This winter of 2010 has the most snow I’ve seen in the Niigata area of Japan since moving here in January 2002. A couple days ago it snowed again, and the trees were covered with snow, but it melts in the daytime. Only at night the temperature will drop before freezing. In spite of the snow, I consider the winters in Niigata to be pretty mild compared to that Siberian like city in America where I grew up — Chicago. And to think that a few newspapers in the United Kingdom ten years ago ran a story that snow would be a thing of the past by the year 2010. Ha!
Princess
In the circle is my little Shih Tsu dog, Princess. She’s white hardly noticeable against the white background of snow.
I realized today it’s been a little more than a year since I started to use Wordpress blogging software. My first post was on January 7, 2009. I’ve grown used to it and think it’s probably better overall and easier for me than the HTML / CSS hand coding coding method I used to use. Not that it’s not good to learn HTML and CSS. Because I know these technologies, I can do things with Wordpress that others cannot who do who do not know them.
Wordpress blogs are easy for me to keep up with. Since my friend in Taiwan started to use Wordpress for his Paradise Post blog, I can now keep up with him much better than when he used his former method of making web pages. What that was I do not know, but my Firefox browser didn’t seem to like it. It would freeze up on his older web site — on my Linux PC with near state of the art technology, a CPU not even a year old, (AMD Phenom II) and 4 gigs of DDR 3 RAM!
I consider the Atahualpa theme to be the best theme for Wordpress, and I use it on several other Wordpress websites I created such as starsandpearls.com. When I first started to use Wordpress, I would change themes from one week to the next never being satisfied. Depending on the theme, some of the plugins wouldn’t work. After using Atahualpa, I’ve stuck with it because it is totally tweak-able, and after spending much time tweaking the layout the way I like it, the temptation to change themes entirely is now a thing of the past. If you go to the Atahualpa theme page, you’ll see that the default theme doesn’t look so much like this site at all.
I noticed the performance of a certain Windows XP PC was down again, even though I cleaned it from malware only a few months ago. I installed and ran Super Anti Spyware and it found over 1500 security issues!! The browser was hijacked and a fake anti-virus program called Antivirus 2008 was installed. SuperAntiSpyware cleaned it up and its running fine again.
Jan. 10: I had to make an emergency trip to Oyama city in Tochigi prefecture to fix a PC. Oyama city is a good 270 kilometers from home. It was snowing this morning, not a particularly good day to hitchhike! In order to save time and avoid hitchhiking during the snowfall, I took a train to a station about 30 kilometers away from where I hoped to walk to the Sakae parking area on the Hokuriku Expressway. Later I found it was way too far to walk to Sakae parking, but a kind man who was going to Kashiwazaki took me to Ozumi Parking which was even better for me. Continue reading »
The year is almost over and I probably won’t be going on the road again this month. Last night I added up the distances hitchhiked this year and they totaled to 19,530 kilometers. This is nearly 1000 more kilometers traveled compared to my previous record of 18,537 kilometers hitchhiked in 2005!
The red line shows my proposed route to Aomori. The green line shows where I wound up -- in Tokyo.
My destination: Aomori city, northern Honshu My mission: To bring back home to Niigata a Shizu dog from friends who are unable to give her the care she needs any longer. My problem: Rainy weather in Fukushima prefecture Reason for problem: I probably should have taken the slow but sure route to Aomori along the Sea of Japan where the weather was better that day instead of gambling on catching a ride on the Tohoku Expressway. Result of problem: To escape the rain and possible health problems as a result, I accept a ride going the opposite way to Tokyo!
Details: It was cloudy in Niigata when I started off at 8:15 AM. I walked about 20 minutes to a main highway that headed toward Fukushima. The first vehicle was a truck that took me to route 49 and Agano City. The wind was so strong in Agano it was difficult to walk toward eastward, the direction I wanted to go. I had to lean my body in the wind to keep falling over! Continue reading »
From November 30th to December 5th, I circled central Japan and reached my year end goal of 90,000 kilometers distance hitchhiked from August 2003. In 16 vehicles I covered 1420 kilometers passing through Tokyo, Nagoya, Kyoto and Osaka. This trip also broke my previous record of 2005 of kilometers traveled in one year.
An interesting person I met on the way to Tokyo was a man who lived in Iraq for 5 years during Saddam Hussein’s administration and 6 months in Iran during the the Shah’s reign. He is a soil specialist. He was driving a dirty truck and didn’t look like the scientist and specialist he turned out to be. He also surprised me with his good English. I asked him if he enjoyed his time in Iraq and he replied that he thought he would die several times! He often had to work in the desert suffering both heat and cold. He said that the mental attitude in that part of the world holds those who are robbed more evil than the robber!
Mother with daughter who caught the H1N1 flu virus
Laid back trucker
The first car was a lady with her 12 year old daughter. I asked why they were wearing face masks and the mother replied that her daughter just caught the swine flu! At that point I wanted to get out of the car, and especially so when she said she would take me to a train station which was a bit out of my way. But when I asked the lady to take me only up to the next major intersection, she replied that she would take me to route 8, a major highway going to the Sanjo interchange. I decided to accept her offer.
A truck driver leaning way back in the driver seat picked me up and took me to the interchange.
In Kawasaki city I pioneered a new way to get to the Tomei Expressway: Take the Denentoshi line to Fujigaoka and walk to the Kouhoku Parking area which is only about 1.5 kilometers distance from that station.
On the way to Kouhoku, it started to rain. At first it was only a fine drizzle and I hoped it wouldn’t get worse because I had no umbrella. I walked into a shop to ask directions and the shop lady, seeing I had no umbrella, offered me one. I was so thankful to have that umbrella later because it really started to pour when hitchhiking at Kouhoku.
Dr. Sato, a professor of medicine in Niigata University took me back home. It’s always interesting for me to meet highly educated men. We always have deep conversations about life, health, relationships, politics, science, the economy, etc., etc. No matter how erudite they are, or think they are, I keep up my side of any conversation with them despite the fact I barely graduated from high school. God gave me a marvelous education as a missionary with the Family International.
University professor Dr. A. Kusumi who took me to Niigata from Hirosaki city in Aomori Prefecture
Again I went to Aomori city and back, 1060 kilometers, this time in 12 vehicles which includes two trucks. The highlight of the trip was to meet A. Kusumi, a professor who teaches environmental research at a university in Nagoya. I met him at the entrance of the Tohoku Expressway near Hirosaki. His car was packed with his belongings and at first he told me there was no room for me to sit. But after rearranging his gear I was able to squeeze my feet into a small space on the floor and sit in the front passenger seat. Dr. Kusumi was on his way home to Nagoya and said he would take the expressway all the way. I rejoiced knowing this would take me all the way home because the route passes through Niigata!
Dr. Kusumi became very tired after passing Sendai and stopped frequently at parking areas to rest. My home is about half way to his destination and I suggested that he spend the night as my guest. He accepted, took me home and met the rest of my family. I was so glad to return a favor to this kind man for taking me 550 kilometers back home for free and even buying me dinner along the way. Dr. Kusumi lived in Israel and studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem for 3 years. (Click on his photo to have a closer look at his sweatshirt.) You can bet we had quite a few interesting discussions.
This trip took me over the 89,000 kilometer mark since I’ve been keeping stats from August 2003. I think I can surpass the 90,000 kilometer mark before the end of the year by making another trip. I’m planning one that will take me to Tokyo, Shizuoka and the Kyoto / Osaka / Kobe area, and this will bring me well over 90,000 kilometers.
Some of the kind people who picked me up while hitchhiking
Random Quote
We shall have world government whether or not you like it, by conquest or consent. — Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) member James Warburg to The Senate Foreign Relations Committee on February 17th, l950
February 21st, 2010 
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