akikonomu's VirtualTourist Home Page

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Autumn foliage

What's in a name?

Some VTers have been wondering if I'm Japanese or distantly linked to anything Japanese because of my username.

Akikonomu roughly means "the love for autumn" and was plucked from the novel "Tale of Genji". My only link to this name is that I am born in autumn and my Chinese name has an "autumn" character in it.

Although I love travelling to Japan, I can hardly speak enough Japanese to save my life. Am currently undergoing basic study and hopefully, the next time I go to Japan, I can make some new friends with my new language skills : )

Meanwhile, I remain in love with autumn.

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Ta Prohm - Cambodia

Travel preferences

When travelling, I usually pick places with good photo opportunites. This usually translates to good weather, attractive colours and not too many tourists.

Nature reserves are good, especially if they require some kind of physical exertion. Exercise is greatly lacking in my daily life otherwise.

Also, I'd like to thank all the VTers or otherwise who are visiting my pages and posting comments. They are encouraging me to produce better pages to share with everyone. THANKS!!!

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Biei - Hokkaido

Personal diary

I've decided to shift the diary to the photo album pages instead...

2006 was a pretty good travel year for me. Yet, the sad truth about my lack of exercise and coming of age begins to catch up with me. Backpacking begins to strain my back and I sleep more and sightsee less everyday during my last solo trip to South Korea.

2007 - visited some of my favourite countries like China and Japan. Flew 16 hours to Madrid, plus 9 hour bus ride from Madrid to Lisbon and God knows how many more hours of bus and train rides as we return to Andalucia from Portugal. Gosh, I thought my bag of bones were going to fall apart.

Fantastic weather - plenty of blue skies and perfect temperatures between 7deg to 29deg. Andalucia, especially Granada and Las Alpujarras, is beautiful beyond words, making the long flight, travel times and Spanish meal hours bearable.

Waiting to set up the scanner so that I can upload the pictures (shifting into a new house, so that may take a few months...). Trying to work on the pages whilst the beauty of the place is still deeply etched in my mind.

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Finally got the scanner up and filling up the Europe 2007 travel pages. This picture's of me taken by my friend seeking sun protection from the searing UV rays of the Sierra Nevada, Spain. Being sunburnt is going to be a thing of the past - I can live with the ridicule of looking like this.

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Happy cousins without a care in the world

Ramblings on 270808

All talk in the papers about declining fertility rates and measures by our local government to boost production of tiny tots. Henceforth, a huge amount of literature on the childcare benefits of different countries such as France, Sweden, Korea and Taiwan. I'm still in a blur whether the benefits are the real prompters for child bearing or simply the culture of the country.

Tots don't really bother me, at least up til now when I haven't really interacted with many, except for young cousins. Teaching young children aged between 6 and 12 has been both frustrating at times but also hilarious (with the things they could spew). Running through the teaching materials throw me back in time and present me with many basic facts and principles of life which have been gradually eroded over time - like global warming or basic morals and social behaviour, told through ancient tales peppered with little warnings how being naughty or traitorous would get you into real, big trouble.

Sometimes, I feel sorry for them young tots who, at age 7, tell me that they are undergoing stress. Woah, I never knew about stress at 7. A rather grim picture of the competitive environment we are creating - I just wished there were more happy kids without a care in the world...