As I have told you all, I am living in Zushi here in Japan.  It is a coastal city 30 miles south of Tokyo, and it is home to animals with interesting feeding habits.   Sometime within the first month of moving here, I went to the 7-11 that is 2 minutes from our apartment for a snack.  I decided to get myself an onigiri, a pressed rice ball that can be filled with various meats or vegetables. I went outside the store to eat it.  I unwrapped the onigiri and took two bites from it.  Suddenly something hit me like a big gust of …

Sarah and I arrived in Japan on March 4th after our honeymoon in Hawaii.  We had decided to live for the first month in Metro Tokyo while we looked for a more permanent place to live for the rest of our stay in Japan.  The place we settled on was a small apartment in Shin-Okubo, Tokyo’s “Koreatown” neighborhood in the Shinjuku Ward.  I think small might be generous for the place we rented, because this place was tiny!  It was 16 square meters or 172 square feet.  I knew the size going in but didn’t think that quarters would be as tight as they turned out …