TrevorPeace2 comments

It's all in your mind.

Besides, in Canada now, they have to make it all a single price. I think an earlier poster said that.

Who cares? Blaming bureaucracies for extra charges is mindless. The cost is the cost. Example: I leave Victoria BC on May 21 and arrive in Sendai May 22; the return from YYJ/YVR/NAR/SDJ is $1600. Who cares how they divvy it up? I'm flying halfway around the world, in the air for about 14 hours, and at a cost of about $120/hour??? Get a taxi for that, I dare you!

You drive on the wrong side of the road, and 80% of the world's vehicles are left-side controlled. Look at the success of the show's participants from a global share perspective. Economics 101.

As a former athlete, I'd be concerned about the air quality. From the pictures and videos I've seen of Tokyo lately, I'd say it's a no-go, a pipe dream, a figment of the imagination worthy of spending $4.5 billion (that's dollars, folks, not Yen). As for the 2019 Rugby World Cup venue, it's money spent; why add to the pain?

So I guess I'd better not say any of the Japanese women I meet during my month-long visit to the country are beautiful or well-dressed? Sure am glad I retired before this pettiness infected the ad agency business.

None of my four dozen tomato plants produced fruit that good-looking!

They're not French, and they're not fried. They're turned out on tiny little lathes in the slums of Brazil. And they're equally as bad for you. Seriously, though, you've hit an issue with me, so during my imminent visit to Japan, I will try a few of those places and compare them to the establishments where I get the real thing, here in Canada, or in the UK - chips in newsprint, with a splash of dark cider vinegar and a light sprinkle of coarse sea salt. Of course, I don't expect to find them anywhere in Japan, so I expect to teach a chef or two that I plan to meet just how to do it right.

What about people who don't wear underwear?

$35,900 Yen? That's about $375. For 'Golden Week'? Sounds more like charity to me.

I won't go into the conspiracy theories, but would like to suggest some food for thought. Efficiencies in trade bring about a higher standard of living, in general. Individualized upheavals in labour, production, distribution and other economic factors are a sore spot for humanity. But humanity doesn't look after those people properly. I think the WTO will continue to exist as long as its leader is a true free trader. It's when we're all true free traders that it works.

And then there's the the Spirit Bear Preserve in the largest temperate rain forest on earth, on the coast of British Columbia, which of course you can't get to by road. But like commanteer says, these lists are only the judgment of the authors. And the giant sequoias of California are indeed magnificent - almost as big as the 1,000-year old cedars and Douglas firs on Vancouver Island and Haida G'waii. Yet, as Jim Poushinsky writes, northern Ontario is something to see, too - in autumn it beats anything Japan can offer, when it comes to rioting colours. There's nothing quite like the beauty of a virgin forest.

It's a good piece. Nice background, cogent explanation of the change of warfare methodologies, exposure of the politics involved in shutting down needless domestic bases, etc. As for the mention of a 'samurai sword," if my recollection of history serves well, a lot of Japanese culture originated on the Korean peninsula, and it was the samurai who fought off an attempted invasion of Japan by Koreans. Maybe Baby Kimmy wants to try again. LOL

The fact of the matter is North Korea is desperate. Desperation almost always leads to aggression. Read history, chill out and stop insulting each other. From what I've read on this thread only one of you has a thinking brain. The others have not only a limited vocabulary but no global strategic intelligence.

I'm still coming to Japan in mid-May and will stay for at least six weeks, nuke threat or no.

America's waking up. And like all similar occasions in the past, it's the young entrepreneurs leading the way. Who will they support for president/pestilent in the next election, I wonder?

Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.

Y130/$1. Bet on it.

A perfect example of why I call Twitter users twits.

Having given up my cable service five years ago because of the exorbitant cost of dozens of channels thrust into even the most basic package that I never watched and never would, and then having given away a perfectly good larger-screen TV, I can say unequivocally I DON"T MISS IT! Except of course for Super Bowl, but I can watch that at a pub, or with friends at their house.

It's about time. Kids are taught to read it, but can't speak it worth a hoot(er). Since I'll be a guest teacher of Canadian and British Columbia geography and culture to a class of 6-year olds, and another of 11-year olds, when I visit Sendai, next month, I think I'll be able to confirm that without equivocation.

You should see Victoria's! I'd post a pic, but it would be boasting, and I don't know how to do that for JT. Chasing the sakura around the globe - wouldn't that be fun? Of course, we'd need our own private Mach3 SST, but what the hell, it's only money - a fleeting this-worldy thing, just like cherry blossoms.

Court is unnecessary. Give the offenders a ticket on the spot, with the fine attached, like they do in Canada. If they don't pay the fine, toss 'em in jail. If you're stuck on the opinion that it's just a cash-grab, you obviously don't care about your own safety on a bike, or anyone else's. Nor do you care about right and wrong, just your own silly potential abuse of law and order. Peace, order and good government is what the Canadian Constitution says, and funny, IT WORKS.

SamuraiBlue, you've hit the strategy nail on the head. Provoke an attack by NK and strike back, hard and fast. China will sit still, except for arming its border with NK so heavily as to prevent a mass exodus. However, you'd have to seriously regret the casualties in SK and somehow make it up to them.

This Canadian soon to be in Japan for a few months says:

JonathanJo asks: "Should Canada politely accept, or politely decline? That's a tricky one." No tricky about it Jonathan. Politely decline.

sfjp330: I think you're right, that as a whole Canadians are 'wonderful people', but Victoria is the capital city of British Columbia, not an island.

LH10: about that musical performance...not AKB48, I trust?

As to the so-called Canadians who bemoan the Canadian government for this that and the other thing, go to another forum.

Canadian, eh, sf2k? You must equally despise our Free Trade Agreement with the U.S. It's a pity you sound more like a conspiracy fear-monger than a citizen of the world. The TPP is all about eliminating trade barriers, and since every country has them, and every country wants to eliminate them (mostly), it will be a long drawn out process of negotiation. I say stay tuned and don't panic or pass along false premises.

Thank you, A_cross, for that clarification. Of course, a clear-cut by any other name is still a clear-cut. If the Canadian armed forces did that to any of our national or provincial parks those responsible would have been court-martialed. Japan has plenty of mountains on which to train its SDF - why pick a monument like Mt. Fuji? What a blight!

Did you all miss the clear-cut on the bottom left? Hardly a national monument, if its slopes can be logged.

C'mon people! It was just weather. The train's engineer was doing everything possible to keep things safe. Give it a res!

Gunma prefecture wasn't on my 5-week May-June tour itinerary, and still isn't. Guess I won't miss much.

Well, that's icing on the cake for this 50-something Canadian male and soon-to-be tourist in Japan - obviously I'll have to look for young women for conversation. Pity, eh? ;-)

I've canoed often enough to know that If they had no lifejackets on they were inviting disaster. Sad but foolish.