The first day I got into Japan, I was dead tired and after two hours of trains and subways to get to my hotel from the airport I crashed. Luckly I have my own little Japanese style room, complete with the bed on the floor and hard pillow=) The next day I visited the Tokyo National Museum. Japanese art is very beutiful and simplistic. I especially liked the ceramics, lacquerware, kimonos...and, my favorite, the masks. The expressions on the masks used for their plays are very creative and fun. After that I headed to Omote-sando adn Harajuku street. Omote-sando is full of fancy and expensive stores...Louis Vuitton, Prada, etc. Harajuku is where all the young and trendy hang out and shop. My funny favorite was Condomania, this little store specializing in every kind of condom and fun extras you can think of=) I also bought a pair of glasses, since getting glasses in Asian countries is so much cheaper and faster than in the States. ($50 for everything! and I actually like the frames too) I also visited the Meiji-jingu shrine. I enjoyed the gardens around it the best since they were so peaceful and smelled so good. I got a boxed dinner, since everything is so expensive here, I couldn't get myself to buy a real dinner. Today I went on a day trip to Kamakura, 50km south of Tokyo, since I really wanted to see the Great Budda and I couldn't handle too much more of the crowded, expensive and fast paced atmosphere of Tokyo. Kamakura is full of temples and shrines and was the capital of Kanto from 1192-1333. I first visited Kencho-ji, "Kamakura's most important Zen temple." The gardens were very pretty around it. Next I went to Tsurugaoka Hachiman-gu, a temple dedicated to Hachiman, the god of war. It was much more ornate than Kencho-ji, with lots of bright colors. After that I saw the Daibutsu, Great Budda, which stands 11.4 meters high and weighs 850 tons. This bronze statue was cast in 1252 and in 1498 a tidal wave swept away the temple covering the budda. It was really impressive. On my way back I fell asleep on the train and missed my stop by 5 stops! and had to get off and back on in the other direction. oops.. then I got stuck in rush hour "traffic" on the subway going back to the hotel. I don't think I could ever live here...there is not an inch left of space anywhere. Well I'm off to Thailand tomorrow morning, Bangkok first, then Chiang Mai, then somewhere down south. About Africa, I uploaded all my pictures onto my computer at home and mom is going to put some up on the website when she has time... so if you're impatient, you can nag mommy=) If I have time I'll write more about what I did in Africa, but most likely you will all have to hear about it from me first hand, since there is so much to tell. Love you all!