Nagoya

Backing up 3 months.... I was expecting the city of Nagoya, a place I'd never heard of, to be about the size of greater New Orleans. Maybe a million people, max. But it is huge. It is so big that the people who live here don't even know how many other people live here. We heard 4 million, but Wikipedia says 2.2 million, not that I would know the difference.

But for a city this size, it feels like a much smaller place. There is no attitude. No paranoia that someone is somehow trying to screw you over. Everybody is just really nice and trying to get through the day. We have certainly had our wierd encounters with people that weren't so pleasant, but they were one in a thousand. Our issues are limited to fast drivers, fast bicyclists, and, for David, passive-aggressive diner waitresses that won't let him take ice coffee to go in June through August and poke at the change in his hand while he pays when he is FULLY CAPABLE OF FIGURING OUT WHAT JAPANESE COINS WILL PAY FOR HIS BREAKFAST. THIS LAST THING REALLY REALLY PISSES HIM OFF.

Anyway... Tokyo-snobs make fun of Nagoya for being "country" or unsophisticated, but it has everything we need: a great subway system, great museums, beautiful temples, shopping. No real hip scene, but we no longer qualify as hip anyway. I could stay forever. David, on the other hand...