I don't even want to think about the fact that I spent 21 hours on planes this week. Another whirlwind trip to the corporate motherland in Osaka. Actually, much preferable to the Tokyo office. KIX is much smaller and neater than Narita, even if it's on an artificial--and rapidly sinking--island. Always fun to see the guys building a new island just to the north so they'll have an airport when KIX slides under.
It was also the first time that Japan wasn't oppressively hot, and it only poured one day. On the other hand, I still don't understand how it can be more humid than the 100% days in Illinois, but they always manage to kick it up another notch. Even in 73 degree weather, I was soaked. Not much came out of the meetings, but I had an extra day that I spent in Kyoto temple-ing and gorging myself on Kyoto cuisine the first night and $1 per plate sushi when I was templed out the second day. Since I was the only foreigner for miles, I'll just assume that raw egg, spam, duck breast, and raw chicken sushi is normal. Fugu tastes just like very weak squid and is actually quite disappointing. My lips went a bit numb, so it was apparently the real stuff. The cook was nice enough to show me the special locked bucket where they have to keep the livers for the health department.
Oh, if you ever fly United--BRING YOUR OWN FOOD. The stuff they served was right behind 1980s Aeroflot for the worst ever.
