Hanami

Look who I met today! Recognise him? It's the guy from the Smile Party! There's a video of him in my last post.

It's sakura season in Tokyo right now. For those of you who don't know, Hanami is a time of year - lasting from a few days to a week - where the cherry blossoms bloom and people take some time to view the them. It doesn't sound like anything to get excited about until you actually do it. Celebrations range from taking a casual stroll under the trees to going there with your company and drinking. It's the reason you always see pink in Japanese paintings. It's the reason Tokyo residents put up with hay fever for two months solid.

I enjoyed this short show of flowers this week, before wind and rain blew most of the pedals off the branches. Most of this was right outside my office, which is located in one of the best viewing places in Tokyo (aside from the parks, of course). I took a lot of pictures and put a permanent link to the album on the travel map.

 

This year's Hanami is overshadowed by the earthquake. Western news has finally stopped covering this, but make no mistake: it's still going on. In a situation like this, where a celebration occurs under the worst of circumstances, one of two things happens: you cancel the celebration out of decency or you do it anyway for morale. Most venues chose the latter, except for the most popular one in the city, Ueno, which closed its park to any Hanami-related activities. Not that I'm one to criticise this decision, but I think the morale boost would have worked wonders.

Note that I made some changes to my Engrish page - not that anyone looks at that. I broke the old one, so the old link won't work any longer. Also, I added one more item to Quake Resources.

Gosh, work is just grinding along. I figured out that my industry, pharmaceuticals, is the most lucrative but is also the most saturated. Every recruiting company out there has their hands in it. It seems to me that people in other industries at my work have an easier time booking in candidates as the people they are calling don't have recruiters call them up every day. That being said, my company is at quite an advantage due to the information it has collected over the years. Hardly any ground on which I could complain.