VS Shanghai(1)

It was my second visit of Shanghai in this year.
I am not a china freek but China is close to Japan. It is easy to go.
And it is valuable to go.
I and my friends made a tour and visited there.

My last visit was early February. It was a chinese new year season.
Then it was a holiday for many chinese people.
Many shops, restaurant, company and places were closed.
This time in March was different.
All places were open. Compared to last month, Shangahi was more active
and more and more noisy this month.

I rushed to see many sightseeing spot on the previous trip in Shangahi.
But ths time I don't have to rush.
I walked around Shangahi slowly, and I found many things I could't find last time.

Our party walked around the area where many old modern western architectures were built.
They are historical architectures when France, England, America and Japan etc governed China. They are not only historical but also very beautiful. I looked at one old church. It was like a church in fairy tale.
Now the area is a good sight spot. But also it is a target of real estate investment.
The land price becomes too high.
Unfortunately the people only watching the old houses, like me, don't drop money in the area.
It is good for the land owner to scrap them and build new office buildings.
Then I heard that the old architectures become less and less.
It's a disappointing thing.

We went to the antique goods shopping street.
Old books, pictures, photos, plates, swords, crowns, marjang pies, chinese chess boards, Mao Tsu-tung pins etc. This place was very nice. I was not bored with watching this area.
If chinese peoples sales is softer, this place is better.
They tend to hustle on business.
It is OK for electric equipment sales.
But an antique market is the place which a well understanding buyer meets a well understanding seller. Aggressive sales is not sophisticated there.
I bought some old postcards there.
(to be continued.)

VS Narita

I am in Internet Cafe in Narita airport.
From now, I am going to China again.
Narita is very uncovinient to reach. It is located in very rural area in Japan.
In addition, this airport is not attractive for me.
Maybe here is very boring for all passangers.
Then, when I found this Internet cafe, I was very happy.
Now I am waiting for my flight. I and my friends came here 3 hours before flight time.
It's a taugh work to kill time here.
I will drink beer after this cafe.

But staying in a air port is exciting for me.
I don't know the reason. I like to watch many passangers, flight attendants, air planes...
Airport has its own unique rules.
Then we have to adjust the rules. All peoples' behavier here is different form non-airport.
Many many checkings. Very correct time schedule. Existence of rule breakers.
Police dogs. Non-tax goods. Uneconomical price foods.
When writing, I become excited.

Hm, Narita may be more attracive than I thought.

VS Photo

There are so many photographer, professional or amateur, in Japan.
Everbody has a handyphone with camera or a digital camera.
And they love taking a photo. Japan is filled with a lot of photos.
But studying photo is unpopular in Japan.
We don't know which photo is good or bad.
I sometimes sell good photos to my customer.
Selling good photos encourages photo study, then I think it is a meaningful job.

Sebastiean the British photo hunter emailed me last month.
He found the very old photo recently.
His job is to find out the antique rare photos, to study them and to sell them.
To search for them, he travels all over the world.
The photo was found in Paris.
It was a portrait of Alfred Dreyfus, who was unfamilier with Japanese but maybe
famous in European history.
One musium in Japan is collecting the documents and photos about this man.
Then we tried to offer it to the musium.

We met one professor to offer the photo.
I realised soon he was very interested in it. He seemed to understand the value.
Such a rare photo is usually expensive.
Of course we wanted to sell it by higher price.
But the professor's position was oposite. He didn't want to pay money so much.
He checked it with calm face.
I checked his face with calm face.
Our faces were calm. But the situation was hot.

We found a sign "Alfred Dreyfus" in the margin of the photo.
If the autograph was written by him, the photo price becomes extreamly high.
I found the professor's nose hall to be bigger and bigger.
Maybe he also found our nose hall size changing.
But to judge if it's himselves or not was difficult.
Then now the proffesor is investigating it.
I don't konw if he will buy it, but it is sure this photo must be very valuable.
Don't miss it ,professor.

VS Live show

Tsukuba in Ibaraki prefecture is a developing city.
I sometimes visit there to see my friend,Peter the great entartainer .
This city was only rural site at first, became scientist living area next and now is becoming very young modern city.Basically the population in the cities in Japan is decreasing, but Tsukuba is getting many new comers.

This time my purpose of visit was to go to Peter's Live show.Live space was "CORK HEAD'S" which was a very good Australian bar.
The bar owner was a frank and kind guy. I enjoyed a real ozzi hamburger with beer.It was my first time burger after watching the movie "Supersize me!" a few month ago.
I had thought we don't need hamburger in our life after the movie.
But I changed my mind.
We must eat it.

His show was successful regardless of twice broken of his guiter strings.
He would think the accidents were terrible.
But I think it proves his guiter playing was powerful and perfect.
Last year he broke one Live show by himself because of too much drinking before the show.
The strings broken was not good but better at least.

I hook whisky and listened to the music with some junior high school teachers.
Decreasing children give an serious impact on all schools in Japan now.
Some famous school group is making new campuses in new location to get students.
Developing area like Tsukuba must be fitted. Of course, many competitor schools aiso exist there. The teachers I drunk with are new challengers in Tsukuba. I hope they can win the school survival race.