The May/June page of the 2011 One Piece calendar.

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They were all super cute!

I spent one and a half hours playing with them.

I also got invited to go play with the 20 week old one at his home. Who wants to come?

They move around a lot, so didn’t take many photos. I videoed hehe.

They soooooooooooooo cute!!!!

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The “Safe House” designed by KWK Promes, a Polish design company, looks like the ultimate Privacy-enhancing home. No more having to worry about neighbours peering over fences or from their windows into your bathroom.

With sliding and moving concrete blocks, it also looks like the perfect zombie-proof house.  Provided the “open” button isn’t big and red and easily pushed.

Read about it and see more pictures here: http://all-that-is-interesting.com/post/4956385434/the-first-zombie-proof-house

Yet all the rage is for integrated devices. Your mobile had a camera, your tablet etc. But you are trading quality for convenience.

My Galaxy Tab has a camera on it. It’s average. It’s terrible at night time photos. But, the Tab also had the great ability to edit photos, add comments (see the TV sushi post) and then post them up into the internet, as I’m doing on this blog.

But how do I edit and upload photos taken by my standalone digital camera? You need a computer/laptop. But wait. I’m using my Tab as a laptop replacement. I mean it does everything I need it to.

Digital cameras should get the ability to bluetooth photos. Built in or as an addon. Then it is easy to use them in conjunction with new devices like ipads or the Galaxy Tab.

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The photos got taken with a camera (vs with my galaxy), so will upload the photos later when they get onto a computer. If only cameras could bluetooth photos.

Then, here is a panorama photo of hiroshima city, looking out towards the sea and miyajima from the hotel we were staying at.

And here’s a couple of panorama, photos from the house I’m staying in. It’s super close to the sea, and the local oysters…mmm!

And the view from out the back.

Going to tokyo tomorrow lots of exciting things to do, eat and see.

Merry Christmas!

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I’ve always found it bizarre that you can book ahead for being sick. In some cases it makes sense, especially specialists, but for GP’s… and when you’re sick now, not in a couple of days…

In Japan, you don’t book ahead for the doctor. You turn up on the day, put your health card in and you get to see the doctor in the order you come in.

Apparently you can make an appointment, but it apparently isn’t that common a thing to do.

There are pro’s and con’s each way, but it makes sense to go to the doctor, and be able to see them when you need them.

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I love Japanese vending machines and the fact they are everywhere in Japan. Australia lacks the culture around vending machines, so I was greatly surprised to see a working and modified japanese vending machine in melbourne. It’s at melbourne uni, squeezed between two normal coke machines. I wonder how often the machine gets used and stocked.
I’m attempting to attach a photo of the machine, to make my mobile blogging more fun

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But given some of the experiences I’ve had lately, I really wonder what training, if any, staff are getting in customer service. As a customer, I have expectations of a level of service and civility to receive.

When I receive bad service, it sticks in my mind, and I usually get a little annoyed, which spoils my mood and my experience. AND, most importantly, we say that we won’t go back to that place. And we don’t. They’ve lost a customer.

There are a wide range of examples of poor customer service.

The Rydges Hotel on Exhibition St in Melbourne has lost our custom due to a very poor experience and an expectation of service that wasn’t met. There are dozens of hotels in the Melbourne CBD, so as a customer I can, and will, vote with my feet and money. But it would only have taken a little bit more effort on their behalf to have changed my opinion and keep me as a client.

And restaurants. The number of bad experiences. We have our favourite Chinese restaurant in the city, Hutong Dumpling, but the last time we were there for our anniversary, we had a surly waiter which soured our night.

We ordered some wine from a waiter, who went away to get it, but then an older waiter laughed at the request and told the waiter to go back to us and tell us that it isn’t suitable for us. Wtf? We’ve had the wine before, at that restaurant and quite enjoyed it. I insist it is fine. So they bring it out. In a tea pot. Wtf? Last time they brought it out in the bottle and kept it in a wine bucket (as you normally do). When was the last time YOU had wine from a tea pot? The wine also normally comes with shot-like glasses and a little sweet fruit. But as it is in a teapot…and in tea cups…we’re a little lost. We ask the waiter for them and the waiter says “No. You can’t have those.” Wtf? We had them before here… “No you can’t get them”. Righttt. So we end up drinking a tea pot of wine. There’s always a first for that…

And there are heaps of other examples at plenty of other places. Getting the attention of the waiter and them shouting across the whole restaurant “What?”   “err…we’d like some water?” Awkward much.

Oooh and don’t get me started on call centres. No offence to the workers, as I have a few friends that do work there, but they really lack the proper training to meet customer service expectations.

Making a comparison of Australia against Japan is a little unfair, as Japan is the centre of customer service excellence. It’s unbelievable in Japan. You almost feel like a King (or queen) when you go out shopping.

Western Australia, which doesn’t do daylight savings, along with Queensland, said the time gap will cost WA businesses “millions of dollars”, as they are out of sync, time-wise, with businesses on the East coast, and the window of opportunity each day to deal with businesses on the otherside of Oz is limited.

Queensland is famous for comments like ‘daylight savings is bad because the extra hour of daylight will fade curtains’ and such. Daylight savings happens every year, and sure WA tried it out for 3 years, and then had a referendum where 55% voted against daylight savings. I wonder how many people voted ‘no’ for similar silly reasons… Those poor curtains… And I wonder how they determined that ‘millions of dollars’ would be lost…

Have a great Year of the Ox!