A note about this morning’s post: yes, I know it appears twice! When publishing there was an error with the database, thus I published again, only to find tonight that it’s appeared twice! I then deleted the first entry, but despite the fact that it’s gone from my list of posts in Blogger, it’s still appearing online! Nevermind.

Shari, thanks for your comment. I did publish it, but it seems to have got lost in the confusion.

I would invest in a second DVD drive were I to remain in Japan, but as I’ll be leaving pretty soon I don’t really want to acquire any more gadgets! To be honest, it’s extremely rare that I do have a non-region 2 disk (Japan being the same as Europe) – I was careless when buying this one, assuming that as it was a BBC release it would work fine for me. I went back and checked on Amazon, and sure enough, it clearly states that it’s region 1!

Following this morning’s emails I’ve had an invitation from a newspaper in Sheffield (with a circulation of about 23,000) to publish my Trans-Siberian stories via their blogging platform. They’ll publish an article about my trip prior to my leaving Japan to publicise it. Unfortunately I won’t get paid for it – let’s hope Google Adwords comes up trumps! It’ll be nice to have a wider audience though, should encourage me to put a bit more effort into my posts!

This has also prompted me to buy a digital SLR camera, something that I have been wanting ever since they first came onto the market many many moons ago, and thinking about buying all this year. You may recall me getting all excited about the Sony (Alpha) A100 last year, although my current research into entry-level SLRs has persuaded me that this is not the way to go after all. For one thing, it’s very bulky. Instead, I’m going for the D40X, a relatively new model which does well in the reviews.

I used to have a Nikon SLR; it was a beauty. My first ever proper camera I think (after the Olympus OM10 dad dropped in the sea). I then went on to the Canon EOS300, but the cost of processing 35mm films combined with my first ever trip to Yodobashi Camera persuaded me to enter the digital age.

Since then (2001?) I have really missed using an SLR. Sony DSCs are all very well and good, but you just don’t have the sense that you’re taking a photograph when you use them! I love photography, and I long to get back into it. It makes me very happy.

Somehow, having an SLR gives one an excuse to take photos where otherwise people might think you were a bit odd. “Oh, he mast be an artist. He’s got a big lens…” The drawback is that you can’t take unscrupulous shots of salarymen sleeping with their legs up the train walls, but I’ll live with that if it means I can get some better shots at taking REAL photos.

I’ve taken the first step towards buying the beauty – purchased 2 x 2GB SD memory cards on Amazon. Have you seen the price of flash memory recently?!! I was shocked! You can get a gigabyte for £6 now! I remember the days when that would cost you about £500!

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My thanks to B for an enlightening, thought-provoking few hours tonight. It was a delight to wander from place to place: a park, a department-store roof-top, a lively entertainment district, a nice cafe; all whilst discussing the things I’ve been going through lately. Very therapeutic.

Well, I’ll be off now.

Till next time, tarra.

Till next time, tarra.