Tokyo and tech through the eyes of a split pea

Running in circles

The weather in this country is bizaar, to say the least. Although winter seemed surely upon us for the past two weeks, and rain was forcasted for this past weekend, instead we got 26C heat and blue skies. All beautiful, except for the fact that during a half-marathon I ran Sunday morning, people were passing out due to heat-exhaustion. The Tamagawa Half Marathon organizers placed a water table every 4.5km or so, which is perhaps fine for the first 10km, but with scorching heat, it would have been nice to have water tables a little more frequently along the last 10km or so. Well, regardless I managed to finish under my goal of 2 hours, which if I doubled means I could potentially run a full marathon in under 4 hours. But after the way I feel today, to think what I did was only half. Ugh. The run was great though — the terrain doesn’t get any flatter, running alongside a river (the “gawa” refers to river) is a decent view, and the event was well attended. Somehow I managed to continue the rest of my day watching the Gotan Project — one of the most interesting fusions of tango, electronica, and hip-hop I have heard in a very long time. Highly recommended. After that was a fantastic dinner at The Oak Door. I either have more stamina than I’d ever known, or I’m being infused by a new energy source.