Jump to content

farquah

SnowJapan Member
  • Content Count

    825
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by farquah

  1. Just back last night from a top weekend in Niseko. My first time to get up there and really enjoyed it. Was a bit gutted that the top of the mountain was closed because of winds for quite some time but managed to find some great untracked powder all the same! Was really frustrating that we were stuck over at the Prince Hotel though for a while as the gondola stopped and every man and his dog tried to get the bus at the same time. Once I figured out the terrain and the routes was great fun, and off the back of Hirafu was DEEEEP!

     

    In terms of snow it was amazing, also top nightlife and restaurants. I was expecting a lot of Antipodeans but bloody hell....its festooned with you guys! However for linkage of mountains and runs, I prefer Shiga Kogen which is still up there as my number one. Need to experiance Niseko again for longer though and may change my mind.

    Will definately visit again.

     

    (If anyone is stuck around the Prince Hotel waiting for the shuttle bus and getting frustrated and bored then see if you can spot some SJ stickers strategically hidden!! New game for you!)

  2. Cheers boys,

     

    Certainly looking forward to filling my boots with the food there. As long as it doesn't leave me sat in the toilet for the rest of the airplane journey to Bali the next day!!

     

    Oyuki- Yeah, I read a bit about the Snake Alley place. May be interesting to see but not sure how much of it I'll be able to stomach.

     

    Looking forward to it all anyway.

  3. Will be stopping off in Taipei for a night on my way to Bali next week and wandering if anyone has any advice on decent places to while away the hours at? Arrive at 11pm and leave 10am next day, so prob just going to hit the night markets that I have heard a lot about then a couple of bars. Anyone got any first hand suggestions? Thanks.

  4. Went to British Anthems in Shin Kiba yesterday, good set from Ripchords but by far the highligh for me was The Enemy, rocked out harder than tungston!!

     

    THe Pippettes on the otherhand were dire, there set was as loose as a loose thing with extra portions of looseness. One of their mics broke, the levels were all over the place, and they even made a mistake in the lyrics of their opening tune! Looked like their first live gig!

  5. I went to Bandai and Gran Dekko(or however it is spelt!) two years ago. Not too far from me at all. Was late season and rainy last time I was in Bandai so not the best conditions but wasn't a bad mnt. Some decent stuff out to the back of it with a great run through the trees where I didn't see another person all day. The parks there and at Gran Nekko are pretty good lots of boxes, rails and the rest. If you go way out to the left of the map there is a super sweet run down threw the trees which opens out into a little clearing in one place which was wicked fun to piss around in. From Chiba only took about 2/2.5 hours to get to I think. Would go again.

  6. Always wanteed another degree but haven't found the time to do it?! Now you can become a fully qualified Batchelor of the Arts during your morning commute on the train, and your cell phone is your professor!!! Nuts!

     

    "Cyber University, the nation's only university to offer all classes only on the Internet, began offering a class on mobile phones Wednesday on the mysteries of the pyramids."

     

    Cell Phone College Class

  7. I think the price for wild truffles is a lot diff. as is the taste. Wild truffles are usualy found with a special boar that smells them out, I think!! Also the truffle tree can only produce truffles for about ten of its years i think and takes a while to be mature enough to produce them.

     

    I have had them a few times in Europe, it was a custom to have them when we visited a friends place in Alba, Italy (they have a annual truffle hunt here!And are the white truffles not the black ones of Germany). Fresh they have a really really strong smell. I have had truffle pate, and an amazing sirloin with blue cheese and truffles. Taste was awsome!

  8. I was at Narita today as I thought you could register your details beforehand as mentioned above. However you can only do it on the day of your travel (as the place you do it is after customs checks), and the office is open 9-5. However coming into Narita, there is a separate queue for visa permit holders and re-entry stamp holders to go through even if you haven't registered, so should be quicker than the tourists queue.

  9.  Originally Posted By: Rag-Doll
    what I'd like to see is a system that involves a person at the top of each lift to help put your bindings on. You'd just have to skate up to him, or her (preferrably her) and they would kneel down and do your binding up for you then they would give you a gentle push to send you on your way.
    .


    ..and while she is down there doing up your bindings she can......
  10. The Japanese police and government can't even catch the KNOWN KILLER of the british girl here this year, even though they have photo's and data as to where he lived, worked, etc. How they expect to be able to catch and barr from entering the country a "professional" terrorist from a fingerprint and photo that takes days to process is beyind me?!?! It isn't a tool to help spot terrorists in the slightest, just a great way to racially profile Japan. We may as well just wear yellow stars on arm bands form now on!!

     

    My point is aimed at legal residents of Japan not tourists.

  11. While intentions may be good i personally don't agree with the way Sea Shepherd work. Sometimes they do more harm than good, making us have to take steps back after lots of hard work has been done. From personal experiance when they broke in and released a load of dolphins, cutting the nets and thus causing criminal damage, the police then started to come down a lot harder and was exatly the excuse needed to put up "protective" and sight limiting barriers all over the place. Due to their illegal acts what we can now do is more limited than before, making it even harder to get results. Yes they freed a pod of dolphins but they didn't help stop the actual reason why the dolphins were there in the first place.

     

    I would not be sad to see a Japanese whaling ship have to return to port and end its catch, but wouldn't want to see it at the risk of lives or the potential for gallons of fuel spilt into the sea from a wrecked ship. I agree that we are on the edge of destruction now on many fronts that there is a need for serious action, but we should think of a long term picture not just stopping "one" ship this year.

  12. November 20, the day the new biometric system was inaugurated for foreigners at Immigration, has seen continuous troubles at every port of entry with taking prints and equipment failure.

    This taken from the Sankei Shinbun.

     

     

    "There were errors with reading data for about 30 people at Hakata Port, and after redoing the procedure, only four people were recorded. The Immigration official in charge decided to waive the procedure and everyone in. The official claimed the equipment was not faulty, rather, “It seems there were a lot of elderly people whose fingerprints had been worn down after years on the farm.”

     

    At Narita Airport, one Australian man’s fingerprints were unreadable, and the process took more than an hour. According to the Immigration Bureau at at Narita, there are cases where people’s fingertips were too dry to be read. At Shin-Chitose Airport in Hokkaido, there were reports of more failures, the cause seen as dry skin.

     

    At Fushiki Toyama Port, Toyama Prefecture, three out of five portable fingerprint readers were inoperative right after the start of usage. After rebooting their systems, only one machine became operable, and it died after 30 minutes. Use was discontinued."

×
×
  • Create New...