Back in Tokyo - holiday trains

We arrived back in Tokyo last night.  JR did magnificently with holiday crowds.  They seem to know the patterns of people movement well. The Hanawa sen had an extra carriage on the way up, but not on the way back (3 carriages vs 2 carriages).  Despite the snow, and crowds there were minimal delays (3 mins late leaving Morioka which wouldn't be enough to even be reported most places).
The NY is staggered this year.  Hiro returns to work today, many other people (who have companies with a little imagination) have today (Friday) off as well & will return over the weekend.   The train on the way up and  back were fully booked (people were standing on an all booked seats train).  But it didn't feel crowded anywhere.

Shenkansen on holiday timetables at Omiya station.  The Tokyo bound trains are on  the right, the north bound
(Sendai, Morioka, Aomori, Nagano, Niigata) on the left.

We had the good fortune of catching the Hayabusa

The Hanawa sen had beautiful scenery, as usual, though the condensation
inside and the snow fall outside made it difficult to see it.
http://ponkanchan.blogspot.jp/2011/01/snow-country.html

The Hanawa sen at Kazuno on the way up.

Christmas wasn't kind to Rudolph

I was a bit taken aback to see a Christmas display in Ikebukuro station with a taxidermic reindeer....  I'm a hypocrite - I'll happily eat a stuffed chicken  - but a stuffed Rudolph... it just doesn't seem quite right...

Another quake

Another quake in a very similar location. At 7.3M it's a lot smaller, but things still shook a lot here.  A tsunami warning has been issued. May it turn out to be minor and that there are enough blankets on hand to keep people warm.  It's a very cold night, but thankfully no rain or snow.

http://www.jma.go.jp/en/quake/20121207172950391-071718.html

JMA 11 March 2011

Signs and English

Usually - in fact almost always - I get irritated by posts that poke fun at strange English.  In most cases it's nice that they made the effort in the first place. (My generous spirit usually doesn't extend to places like the Edo Tokyo Museum which should have someone paid to being doing the job properly.)  

These two I did get a chuckle from.

The Tama Cemetery (nicely called Soul Garden) which is probably
a pretty apt description of the Japanese notion of a cemetery.

Hair Oops... say no more...
I've been going  past it for years and it's still going strong -
I guess not as many Oops happening there as the name suggests.