Marco Smolla: Japan - 平仮名ひらがな

Japan. First time of my life. And it's amazing.

It really is a completely different world over here. Not just the amounts of snow and nature but most of all the small details in everyday life that make you feel the difference.

It's hard to describe in words but I guess everyone has got some pictures in mind about these extremly forthcoming and respectful people or the crazy noises and blinking lights with these weird signs.

Let's start with the picture story to give you a brief insight on what's happening right now. These days we are focussed on snowboarding:

Actually we have not been too lucky with the snow so far as everyone told us about something like 25 crazy powder days a month but just since we've arrived it has not snowed that much anymore. Still the amounts of snow are crazy over here and we managed to find good snow almost every day after thinking really hard for some time...

Today Fips Strauss and me had a very fun session. At first Fips tried to do some BS Miller Flip over a dead tree which looked really sick.

In the end Fips owned himself a whole sixpack of beer by proving to our Filmer Alex Schiller that he can actually do a decent Method first try.

Unfortunately Alex missed the shot as he was too busy playing in the snow...

A couple of days ago we went Night Snowboarding in Niseko which was an amazing experience since the snow was so light although everything was tracked already...

But of course it is not all about snowboarding over here. For example we took part in an "English Night" at the Hilton Hotel Niseko where we were having dinner with a huge group of 17 year old students who wanted to practice their English. They could hardly say more than "Do you have a girlfriend?" but we had a great time together anyways.