Welcome to Japan: land of contradictions. It was supposed to be the rainy season while I was here but I didn’t see a drop of rain all week. I also didn’t experience an earthquake which I’m delighted about.

Here you can still smoke in restaurants but signs try to dissuade you from smoking while you are walking down the street.

I learned that those masks you see people wearing aren’t due to worries over pollution. They’ve for combating the spread of germs. Specifically, your germs. You know, so if you’re ill you can still go into the office and not contaminate anybody else. Surely, any culture that has a specific word set aside for death from overwork can’t be all that healthy. On the other hand, in the longevity stakes, Australia (even with its new-found fattest nation status) is number two to Japan.

It does kind of make me wonder what age people would live to here if everybody did suddenly stop smoking.