trip to Japan

["Melissa & Jim" <jadney@vwtype3.org>]

Type 3ers:

Since some of you have been kind enough to ask, and also because I 
woke up at 1:30 this AM due to jet lag.  I thought I'd tell you a 
tiny bit about my trip to Japan.  To satisify the VW requirement I 
can say that I did see at a couple of T3s in a dealers lot, but none 
on the road there.  Japan is a RHD country so the T3s there, like 
most of their cars, are the RHD variety.

I DID see a Lotus Super Seven on the road.  It passed us (easily!) 
while driving up into the mountains.  I got a couple of camera shots 
off as it came by, but don't know yet how they came out.  So far I 
have never seen a Seven on the road in the US, but I have seen 4 in 
Japan over the years.

These last few trips have been to a rather beautiful mountainous area 
north of Nagoya.  It does not have the hustle of Tokyo, but most of 
the time that's fine with me.  The towns are small and nestled in the 
valleys between the mountains and there was a river which flowed down 
the center of the valley just outside our hotel.  The weather there 
is pretty mild, but we did have a couple of typhoon close calls, and 
there are periodic small earthquakes.

This was not a pleasure trip.  I've been gone for 6-1/2 weeks and got 
only one day off.  We should have taken more, but the hope that we 
could finish and not need to return is a very strong motivator.  Most 
days were 10-11 hours long with a few that went 14.

Eating was about our only recreation and the food in Japan is always 
excellent once one gets over the usual cultural barriers.  Raw fish 
takes a bit of getting used to, but it is really great stuff.  I 
don't know any westerner who managed to truly like it on the first 
try, however.  I love it!  It's just amasing how many kinds of truly 
delicious foods most of us just have been raised to refuse to try.  
Of course there are many kinds of more normal foods that most anyone 
would enjoy.  Most of these are never seen in Japanese restaurants 
outside Japan because they don't fit our stereotype of what Japanese 
food must be like.

I find the people to be pleasant and interesting, especially in the 
small towns.  They will go out of their way to help you at times.  A 
restaurant owner once drove us four blocks back to our hotel when we 
were trapped after dinner by a downpour.  We didn't ask for this 
service nor had we even considered the possibility.

The language barrier is almost complete.  The only way to describe me 
in Japan is illiterate, even though I know enough words and 
characters to keep from starving.  Most of the young people will have 
taken 5 years of English by the time they graduate from high school; 
puts our system to shame.

Well, enough off-topic babbling.  My 72 sqbk started with some 
difficulty after charging for a couple of hours and priming the fuel 
loop.  Ran as good as ever after about 20 seconds.

Jim
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       Melissa Kepner                                    Jim Adney
                             Laura Kepner-Adney
                         jadney@vwtype3.org      
                             Madison, Wisconsin
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