We're just looking to record.  Pounding the stone
     (or frustrating kanji keyboard)  to leave that indellible mark.
     We came.  We saw. Here it is for those who stayed home.

    We arrived in Japan in August 2001 or
     heisei 13 nen no hachi gatsu as we've since come to
     know it.  Of course to get accepted onto the JET
     Programme we had to feign a life-long interest in
     Japan when our priorities were actually as follows:
                   1.  pay off Canadian student loans
                   2.  travel to as many Asian countries as possible
                   3.  record our experiences (hence this website)
                   4.  learn about Japan

     Before coming to Japan, we had only ever lived/worked/
     studied in Canada and coming here made us realize how
     many presumptions we had based on our own limited
     (though believed-to-be complete) vision of the world.
     We have landed in another "nation", also very proud of
     the power and domination of its culture, but with another
     set of semiotics quite different from those we knew.

     In the past few years, we've also had the chance to travel to
     neighbouring countries so close in geography to Japan
     (relative to Canada's enormous spread), yet so different
     in custom and economic condition.  We have come to
     realize that textbook politics of far-off places are actually
     mere shadows and simple guess-work.

     It is our hope that this site will communicate some of
     the turmoil/questions we've felt about the making/systematic
     destruction/recreation of that oh so precious thing:  home