My name is Jono Ori and I'm a 20 year old American film student from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. After two years of dating a Japanese citizen who spent a majority of her life in the U.S., I decided that when her time was up here, I would try to help her in moving back and getting acclimated to living in her homeland with her family. When the time came, I was both disappointed to be losing a person I loved and excited to be visiting a completely different world.

This is a blog I kept while staying in Japan with my now ex-girlfriend and her family during the month of July in 2006. Throughout my month in Japan I celebrated my 20th birthday, visited the site of my grandfather's radiation from the atomic bomb in the U.S. Relief effort following World War II (at Hiroshima), traveled to Kyoto, dug clams in Oita, went clubbing in Tokyo, shopped in Harajuku, went to a Saitama Lions Baseball game where I saw Daisuke Matsuzaka (now of the Boston Red Sox) pitch, saw the John Lennon Museum, many Buddhist Temples and Shrines, and much, much more.

Please enjoy the articles posted here.