Easter was celebrated by Tokyo Orthodox community this Sunday. Lots of eggs were boiled, painted, blessed and eaten. Boiled and painted eggs along with baked Easter bread called kuliches (куличи) are used to break long fast. The colorful tradition dates back to pre-Christian pagan festives.

There are two major orthodox churches in Tokyo. Newly renovated Nikolai-do or Св. Николай cathedral in Ochanomizu is the more famous one. It's certainly one of the most impressive historic constructions in Tokyo, which survived major catastrophes of 20 century: Great Kanto earthquake of 1923 (although roof collapsed) and 1945 American bombing and fires triggered by the bombing.

It's difficult to surprise those who spent in Japan couple of years. When you wake up to the sound of a loudspeaker chanting the same mantra thousand times while slowly approaching your house, you instantly know: election time has arrived. Damn! Where did I put my earplugs?

At the end of 2001 three former classmates descended onto Taipei and in about one week managed to make complete circle around the island.

I badly wanted these lens for long-long time. It's not that I couldn't afford them before. I just never buy photo-equipment unless I feel that I absolutely need it. Usually passion for camera or lens develops slowly and naturally before you would go ahead and buy it. And yes, it's not cheap and even on Yahoo actions you can hardly win it for less then 45.000-50.000 yen. I tried. I decided to go for brand-new one and I paid about 56.000yen (or ~460 USD) at the Yodobashi Camera chain store in Ueno.

I was passing through small station in Tokyo suburbs when I spoted this stall selling umbrellas.

As you can see, single umbrella goes for 300 yen or roughly 2.5 US dollars, while for two umbrellas you pay as little as 500 yen.

I just went to a friend's wedding. Since he is American and the bride is Japanese it wasn't completely standard Japanese wedding ceremony. However it had most of elements of it. Here is the list of things you need to know before going to wedding.

1. You've probably received gorgeous invitation envelope that includes the reply card.

When you reply don't forget to cross out the self-neglecting character 行 from after person name and replace it with respectful 様 -sama. The closest match in English would probably be Esq.

There is an expression in Japanese　 税金泥棒 (Zeikin Dorobou) which literally means Tax Thief. Or there is more polite expression 税金無駄使い (Zeikin Mudatzukai) which means One Who Wastes Taxes. Each time I go hiking to Okutama I remember this expression when passing in proximity of this bridge.

One of all-time favs:

I stumbled into this album while cleaning my old harddisk. It's only of marginal interest for those who didn't work for Merrill's Tokyo at that time.

Bonenkai means Forget-the-year party in Japanese as oppose to Shinnenkai which is New Year party.

Nozawa onsen is famous for it's small public baths scattered around the town. Onsen 温泉 means hot springs in Japanese. Usually it's a small wooden building with two sections: for man and woman. I haven't seen mixed baths (called konyoku) in Nozawa. There is usually small undressing area with cloths cells followed by the main washing room and pool with hot mineral water. The temperature varies from place to place and depends on season, but it's VERY hot. It's actually used to boil eggs called onsen tamago　温泉卵, so you can imagine how hot is it.

Usually entrance is free and baths are unattended. However everything is clean and tidy. I was always wondering who is that invisible creature that takes care of the baths. The mystery was explained when I once wondered into one of the bathes very late at night. It was empty, only this local man in traditional straw hat was finishing his daily cleaning routine.

Every day I am passing through the Tokyo Imperial Palace on bicycle. From Kasumigaseki I enter outer Palace Area through Sakuradamon 桜田門 gates, which are located at the southernmost part of the palace. The gates built by the old moat and consist of two constructions: external facing Kasumigaseki and internal facing Otemachi. There is small inner yard in between them. Just in the yard leaning against the moat there is my favorite cherry tree. Right now it's in full bloom.

I was passing through the Palace yesterday when I saw this aged man resting by his heavy duty bycicle.

I finally got around and published photo album of our trip to Nozawa Onsen. It was snowing heavy both Saturday and Sunday and visibility on slopes was bad. That's why most of photos are not about skiing rather about soaking in hot springs and other apres-ski stuff.

What is my goal? Do I have a goal? Why am I switching to Weblog from simple static photo site? Am I going to preach you, teach you and try to change the world? Good questions. The short answer is not. I am going to blog you for sure though. I just like the idea of blogging and visit some blogs when time permits.

My friends are all over the place and mostly very busy, I feel like loosing some of you just due to luck of time to communicate. I hope with this blog it will become easier to keep in touch. I am planning to write a bit about my life and adventures in Japan and other places I lived and visited.

I also would like to add some dynamics to this site. It has been stalled for years. Of course I was and still very busy with Valuecommerce project. But there are other purely technical issues. To change static site I have to write HTML pages, test them, then upload to my site with FTP. With Movabletype all I need to do is type the text and push Publish button. I can push this button from anywhere in the world, all I need is a browser.

I am using MovableType for my WebLog. First I tried to post Japanese or Russian text I found that all characters converted into HTML-Unicode which is bunch of &# and digit codes, e.g. if I enter my name in Japanese　アナトル or in Russian Анатолий it's was converted into something like &# 26085; on the entry screen. At the same time the page was displayed correctly on the public site itself.