Back in the UK

Its election time in the UK and while I am back in the UK and have the right to vote - I wont be. Not because I don't live here but because there is absolutely no point in voting - not in this country or any other. Thinking that we can make a difference by voting is a mistake. Which every party or president comes to power does not matter because the only thing that matters to them is that they use their position to do what's best for themselves - not the people. I come back to the UK every year and see the same headlines on the news - transportation fares constantly rising but the quality of transportation not rising with it, taxes forever going up, National Health Service does not have any more beds and keeps chucking out patients, etcetera etcetera - you get the picture. The situation is the same as what it was over five years ago when I left the UK. You would think that the UK media has freedom to report and investigate what they will but is it not interesting that they never ever cover how much the government spends on arms? The cost of a couple of harriers is probably enough to cover the cost of schooling for hundreds of thousands of students - but instead it seems like many students are graduating with an average debt of 13 thousand pounds. The weather in the UK is appalling - a walk down the street and you will notice that the colors of posters, buildings, peoples clothes just seems to be washed out or grey - it is really enough to cause one to be depressed. The news of late is that young folks (hooligans) set fire to properties of public facilities and when the fire brigade comes to put out the fire, the hooligans try to kill (my own words) the fire fighters - I say kill because they throw rocks, bricks, scaffolding at the fire fighters - one was even shot with a shotgun. What on earth is this country coming to ?

OK - so what *do* I enjoy about being back in the UK then? Well the food is great - I hear asian people complain about English food and I just don't understand what they are talking about - how can one not like chips, salavoy, beans and the good ol cream cake from Greggs - and what about tea? Tea only tastes good in the UK - I take tea bags back to Japan every year and make tea the same way I do in the UK but it just does not taste the same - must be the water. Clothes in the UK seem to fit me better - there's only one store in Japan where I buy my clothes form - Comme Ca - but in the UK there's tons of good clothes everywhere. There is also a great selection of shoes at Aldo - there's two on Oxford street (shoes in Japan are nasty).

The food in China town is just lovely - would like to warn you about a place called Yee Tung though - they used to taste good when I lived in the UK but now the food tastes like plastic.

I do prefer the mobile phones over in the UK. I like the way that you can pick up a sim card for about 5 pounds and you'll instantly have a phone number - stick the sim in a different phone unit and you will still have all your phone numbers - that is if you saved your phone numbers on the sim card. Many of the phones in the UK have a speaker phone ability too which is great.
While the phones in Japan allow you to watch TV, play some rather cool 3d games, and pay for your groceries and train fare (many of the phones over here act as a debit card and transportation card - a chip inside means that you just hold the phone against a detector) the phones in Japan are a pain in the backside - your phone number is attached to the physical phone and if you want to change your phone, you have to change your number (unless you stay with the same carrier).
I am not sure about Voda Phone in Japan but the majority of the carriers weld the sim card into the phone and you need a sledge hammer to remove it - understandably many people don't bother - even if you can remove it - it probably wont fit in any other phone. The thing with Japanese mobiles is that the OS that comes with it is utterly crap. I have an AU phone which I use because I can use it outside of Japan but the OS looks like 28 shades of camel dung. I don't understand why the Japanese don't start to develop phones with decent OS's which can exchange data freely with a computer.
I have kind of gone of track here but the point is that I would rather be using my Motorola V3 than my Japanese AU (I did not used to think like this though) While some electronic appliances in the UK can look a bit iffy, the furniture looks much better and stylish than what can be found in Japan. Now that we have our own place in Tokyo, I am buying more things for the home but much of the stuff in Tokyo is really really bog standard. The best thing about the UK and being back here is that I get to see my folks who I only get to see once a year. Oh and another thing - Areas like Battersea look particularly nice on a sunny day. London does look nice on a sunny day - wish there could be more sun though.