the fashion crimes continue...it's all over japan....i guess for liz, she's become desensitized to it all, but i ALWAYS laugh and point out the girls and their funny fashion sense...it's so weird, like liz says, it's like in toronto the people that dress retro or have their own "sense of style" do it to be different...but in japan, they do it to be the same.

went to kobe today and the china town there...it was PACKED full of people. two words i use alot in japanese are "sumimasen" (excuse me) and "arigato" (thank you). people aren't very polite here, they just kind of push me and i turn around and say "sumimasen" like I had pushed them and then they look at me like i'm crazy! hahaha....had kobe beef at this really cute restaurant, Ryu-en, that looked out over the harbor of the 'port of kobe'. we also went to the top of the 'port of kobe tower' (nothing compared to our CN Tower) and did some shopping! there are soooooo many shops that sell 'cute' stuff. cute is the name of the japanese game. everything is cute...from stupid 'hello kitty' toys to the cute sound of the siren on the japanese ambulances.

we went to mount rokko later in the evening because we wanted to see the 'spectacular' city lights from the top...BUT when we got there, we saw nothing but fog and mist because it had begun to rain. it was SOOOO funny, liz and i were like we totally got suckered..hhahahaha, we couldn't stop laughing, i have a couple of pictures of us in the dark with NOTHING behind us...hahahaha...

went searching for okonomiyaki for dinner...didn't really happen because the town of sakasegawa basically shuts down at 8 pm (well except for this really neat shrine right by liz's place) so we rented a really sweet and sad movie called 'my life without me' with sarah polley and scott speedman while eating instant ramen in a bowl...ah you gotta love instant noodles...especially when i spent so much money today... anyway, we're supposed to go running tomorrow morning so sleep is in order.

no grace, haven't visited the pachinko places yet...maybe tomorrow in osaka. ;p