Nawlins

In the past few days, I've been in Nawlins (New Orleans) for a conference. I've never visited New Orleans before because I've heard it's humid. Well, having Tokyo still fresh in my system (physically), I have to say that it is TRUE. New Orleans is VERY HUMID. Actually, these few days have been "extra humid" according to the locals. In addition, it thunderstorms every evening, right when I decide to start my walking tour. It stormed so hard yesterday that here is a pic of Bourbon Street.

In addition, I've noticed a few differences (in random order):

1. People are very welcoming - Everyone from the bus driver to servers would say "Welcome to New Orleans, we're glad you came" Wow - perhaps we didn't understand it when most of the people said that to us last year.. .or maybe they never said it at all.

2. Safety - the locals are very kind in telling us "be very careful of your surroundings" and even demonstrate how I should be holding my purse.

3. Streets change names when you cross Canal St. - don't know the story behind it, but our airport shuttle driver mentioned it

The fourth one is very funny to me... I would describe it as "escalator etiquette". There's about 10,000 people attending this conference and all the sessions end around the same time. Even with all this people piling onto the escalator at the same time, I observed a couple of things:

a.) In the escalator line, I had my 24-36" of personal space

b.) Even though you can fit two people on one step, everyone naturally took one whole step
c.) On top of the 'one step per person', people also stood on the opposite end of each step (right, left, right left) to ensure optimum space. Fascinating...

Bill For Hire!

Well we have been back in the States for a couple weeks now. We went to a high school graduation party, a Berger (that's my last name) welcome home party, shopped for furniture and clothes, donated a bunch of items to a couple different places, done some various home improvements, realized we don't have room for most of the stuff we brought home, and we saw 2 movies in the theaters. Anne has started her new position (she actually went back to work the day after we landed in Minneapolis - isn't she amazing!) and I have been trying to adjust back to life as normal.

I am very happy that Anne was able to find a position at Medtronic before we got home, but now it is my turn. I am currently looking for work and doing a bunch of random house hold items as assigned by Anne. We had seen on TV in China and Japan that the economy has taken a beating since we left and it has made finding work difficult, even more so when my work history is in finance/banking which apparently took most of the hits (well, minus the automotive industry). This is also the reason the blog has been a little slow lately, I been busy looking for work and doing odd jobs, but I promise as soon as I am employed, we will have more time to get into more adventures (how is that for an incentive to get me employeed).

So keep your fingers crossed for me, even if it is just to minimize the amount of random home improvement and various other tasks Anne gives me :)

A little bit of Kyoto at home

Who knew that we had a little bit of Kyoto right here in our own home? Well, we do. If you're a diligent blog follower, you would remember Bill's blog on "nightingale floors" To sum it up in one sentence, the Japanese Emperor built floors that would "chirp" like the nightingale birds to indicate that intruders have entered their rooms.

Well, coming back to the Compound, we realized that we also have nightingale floors. That's right - we do.. and we didn't even build them into the home. It turns out that after you have hardwood floors in a home for about 50 some years, they too start 'chirping'. Not only can I hear intruders or just Bill walking around, there's also extra loud chirping in front of the refridgerator door. Nice. It's like having a built in weight watchers alarm or something.

We're Here

It's true we're back. We survived our time travel and safely arrived in Minneapolis. We did lose a little of our sanity on the trip (we always get stuck near a infant who thinks crying for several hours is a good way to pass the time). I can tell you there is nothing more comforting than landing at home, being picked up by a friend, traveling to your house and seeing that it is not vandalized, burnt down, or otherwise destroyed. It was nice to see that our car was also still working. Shortly after arriving home my parents took us out to dinner and then we reacquainted ourselves with our home, which we affectionately called the Compound (you will have to ask Anne why, I have long forgotten).

One might ask what is the first thing you do once you get home from a really long trip. This depends on who you are. If you are me, you sit down and relax in front of a TV (and enjoy the fact that it is in English). If you are Anne you clean everything in your house. I don't really know where her cleaning need came from, but she has had it since long before I met her.

Anyways, it is good to be home. Unfortunately we have done so much moving/traveling that we still feel like this is just a temporary stop and that we have to move again in 3 weeks to start a new life in another Asian country. I imagine this feeling will fade with time, but in the mean time we just have to keep pinching ourselves and remember that we are home for good.

The blog must go on!

We're back in Minnesota! Actually, we got back a few days ago but it's been a busy few days. Many of you avid blog-readers have asked, "no more blogging?" Of course not! Just because we're back from our adventures doesn't mean there won't be any adventures state-side. Maybe the experiences may not be as funny or comical but I'm sure some of it will be entertaining.

At this moment, I think jet lag has finally caught up to me. I plan on taking a nap very soon. Our shipment just arrived and for those of you that know me - not unpacking right away will drive me nuts. A few things I've noticed right away:

- Diet Coke & Pepsi taste sweeter in the US. Ice cubes rock!
- In the past 12 months, I lived off of five pairs of shoes.... so do I really need 20?
- Why do I own 10 pairs of jeans?
- Driving is like riding a bike, even though I haven't gotten behind the wheel in the past 12 months, it comes back naturally.

Stay tuned, as we transform Midwest to the Far East back to the Midwest. a ha ha