From Osaka through Tokyo to Saitama, 28 August 2025
Yesterday morning I got up as early as four, checked out of the hotel at five, walked to JR Temma, took the train to JR Osaka, changed trains, went to JR Shin-Osaka, and took the six o'clock Nozomi ('Hope') No. 210 to head for JR Tokyo. It took us only 2 hours 23 minutes to travel from Shin-Osaka to Tokyo, covering 552.6 km (approximately the same distance between Los Angeles and San Francisco; between Munich and Berlin; between Milan and Rome; or between London and Edinburgh). Right on schedule so admirably. The fastest speed it ran at between the two major cities in Japan was over 280 km/h. The superexpress is indeed a great technological accomplishment Japan has had to boast to the world for as long as six decades now. Japan's technology rules! We couldn't admire it enough. We could no longer live like those in the Middle Ages.
Today's Goethe's 276th birthday, so I'll drink a lot of beer to celebrate it, reading an English translation of his 'Italian Journey'. The season of Oktoberfest is nearing and I'm really looking forward to flying back to Munich next summer and then to traveling by train to Weimar, where the Sage lived for most of his life enlightening the world. Until then I'll have no option but to stay in Japan, where I'm a citizen, but even so, by that time I hope I'll have traveled to at least one more place in the country. Exactly where? You shall know early next month. What!? Go traveling again so soon? Yep. So what? Surely you aren't a follower of that outdated French philosopher who tried to mislead us by reasoning that we should all be introvert recluses like him to be able to live happily? Clearly he thought everyone else should live like him, but was he right to think so? What if everyone followed him? Then the world would have already stopped functioning! Haha. The philosophers freely say whatever they like as if they thought they were the most intelligent species of people, but the problem is that they never take responsibility for their errors. Why should I believe them? I believe none of them. Will taking such a risk ever pay off? One very important thing to remember is that none of them has ever succeeded in proving or disproving the existence of God. Will they, intelligent as they may be, succeed in making Satan get angry or grin from ear to ear sooner or later? I doubt it.
Das war's für heute. Schönes Wochenende. / That's all for today. Have a great weekend.
At 5:21 a.m. on August 27
At 5:32 a.m. on August 27
At 5:49 a.m. on August 27
At 6:49 a.m. on August 27
At 8:35 a.m. on August 27
At 8:27 a.m. on August 27
Around 8:30 a.m. on August 27
At 8:30 a.m. on August 27
At 8:34 a.m. on August 27
At my mother's (6:34 p.m. on August 27)