Hot dogs for breakfast.

I had hotdogs for breakfast this morning. I was slightly surprised, but apparently it's not that unusual in Japan. The problem I have is that I can never tell when my お母さん (okaasan, mother) is making Western-style food because they eat that in Japan these days, or if she's trying out new things to suit my Western palate. (Japanese people, my お母さん excepted, are usually surprised to hear that a foreigner can eat Japanese food. "But Japanese food is raw fish. Foreigners don't like raw fish.") Whatever the reason, imitation-Western food is never quite right. Hot dogs for breakfast, for example.

More updates later today, when I don't have a presentation to prepare for. I have exciting news!

"Arafat is a slob. If he put on a suit he'd have a country by now."

Wanna see something funny?

Okay, so, APEC is gathering right now. They're in Hanoi, which I learned the other day got a stock market in the last couple of years, but that's not the point.

As part of APEC our great leaders all get together to take a family photo of sorts. It's a wonderful tradition. They get a chance to dress up in the colourful garb of foreign nations. We get to watch them trying not to look uncomfortable. Everybody gets to enjoy themselves a little bit.

They did it in Korea in 2005. Paul Martin is a pimp.



And of course they did it this year too. The traditional Vietnamese garb is not as black and pajama-like as G.B. Trudeau would have us think (Dad, at least, should know what I'm talking about. I hope). It actually looks quite good on, say, Hu Jintao. Vladimir Putin manages to pull it off even.

Harper not so much. He kind of looks like, maybe, an easter egg?

Something you don't see every day.

Jesse was in need of a beverage this morning, and though he got us lost on our way to his usual watering hole, we did come across this massive array of vending machines.



Japan is an amazing country.