My dreams will never come true until I start saving up and graduate high school. lol
But I really want to go. I'm trying to study Japanese but find that I do not have the time to do this. Juggling German, soon to be in Spanish, and English class all at once is VERY hard.

Hey, cheer up! I believe your dreams would come true, trust me :vsign: ! Pssst... tell u smthg, you don't have to learn Japanese to go to Japan. I knows nuts about the language but still managed to pull it off during my 5 days in tokyo. The secret lies in doing research, research and MORE research. Research on the subway lines to take, research on the best places to visit, research on the good eating places and off u go! But still I have to admit... knowing Japanese does get make your traveling around easier (the taxi drivers there noes nothing about english and it can be real frustrating talking to them:mad: )

Peace!

I just looked at some of your pictures and I see you have a Fuji gunmetal colored camera. Which model is that? I assume it's an older model from the f series? They're good but they only take xD cards which are expensive and the highest xD card that I see is 2GB but those older f series cameras are still nice with a larger battery that last much longer than any point and shoot camera on the market including the newer f series models. I just bought a gunmetal colored f40fd/f45fd which was sold by a U.S camera shop company by the name of Ritz. They had a $75 mail-in-rebate offer by Fuji when bought through Ritz. I will be using it on my trip to Japan in May and from the reviews it's a great camera that takes great outdoor pics and some nice low light pics as well. A firmware update that was recently released allows you to use a 8GB SDHC card (not sure if it's the maximum) as opposed to a 2GB SD card maximum before the update. I'm glad I bought the Fujifilm f40fd/f45fd because it seems to be a great camera for the right price.

Wow, what sharp eyes you have! My model is the F47fd and yes I've upgraded the firmware and plugged in a 16GB SDHC and all good to go. I can take hours and hours of movies without exhausting the memory card, hehehe...:D

I will be in Japan from June to mid August hopefully working at the time on a working holiday with job swap. I want to stay in Kyoto but it depends on where I get hired. I also plan to travel around Japan in my free time and I want to do a lot of shopping. I'll be staying in Tokyo during my first week.
It's interesting how many people from here are going this summer.

I'll be in Tokyo this June! :D I have some tentative plans, but also a lot of free time, so if we do have a meet-up, I'll more then likely be there!

Hey Dennis!

That's great to hear! So you're basically going to visit about the same places as I am.

In my case, it's now definitive:
I will fly to Tokyo on 27/5/08, work in Sapporo from 1/6/08 to 25/7/08, fly southwards to Kyushu on 28/7/08 and then travel back north by train until I finally reach Tokyo and fly back to Zurich on 21/8/08.
I guess our tours could cut each other, therefore it would be great to get to learn you and speak some schwitzerdütsch over there ;) . I would also love to meet your friends from Australia!
Would be perfect if you let me know as soon as YOUR exact locations/dates are set.
Looking forward to meeting you!!

Diana

hey nevik
that's a great idea!
I will post some link where everyone can enter when they could be at which place :)
the more the better!! :)

Hi Diana,
great to hear your plan. I will defenetly be in Tokyo from the 25.06 till the 02.08. After that i will go to Sapporo (i think around the 06.08), so we could meet there. I will probably stay in Sapporo for 2 weeks and be busy the first days meeting my Travelmate from Australia and here new born son, but there should be a chance to meet after some days. I´m flying from Basel, but im actually German, so i only speak high-german ; ). But i will understand your "swissgerman" because im working in Switzerland. I will write you a message when i know definetly at wich time i arrive in Sapporo.

Dennis