We are a few days away from our exciting adventure to the Orient.  One stop will be Taiwan.  However, Japan-China relations just deteriorated. Japan's first female Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi met with Chinese President Xi Jinping on 31October2025.  All went well. But on November 7, Takaichi veered from Japan's policy of " strategic ambiguity " about Taiwan, suggesting that an attack on Taiwan could amount to a "survival-threatening situation" that would permit Japan to exercise collective self-defense. This drew the ire of China, which has maintained that Taiwan is part of China, and that they will someday, by force, if necessary, regain total control,  as was done with Hong Kong.  We also will visit that city, twice on this trip. Takaichi refused to retract her remarks. Usually, most of what happens is just tense talk, but this time, China urged their citizens to hold off on any trip to Japan this year. If the Chinese take this seriously, Japan will be si...

There was period from early 2020 into the end of 2021 when this blog site on Thursday was devoted to COVID-19. Remember that the official worldwide count of Covid deaths is just over 7 million.  However, the suspicion is that perhaps 36 million actually died. As far back as late 2021, it was estimated that  nearly 44% of the world's population caught Covid at least once .   This rate was as high as 79.3% in sub-Saharan Africa, as low as 13% in parts of Asia and Oceania, and 31% in the U.S. and Canada.   Forty countries had more than 70% at least once infected. Of Americans under 18, through the end of 2022, only 10% were not infected ( Novids) . 25% of Americans had still not caught Covid by the end of 2023 .  However, and this was not explained, 55% of adults think they have never had Covid. Only 13% of those 16-29 years old were Novids.  The infection rate for Blacks and Whites were about the same, around 77.5%. Asians 66% and Hispanics 81%. A...

Today I continue my  nostalgic  Pearl's Ashes  series , focusing on  Bangkok .  But there will be a few informational detours, leading to a nightmarish journey to my hotel in Tokyo, and finishing with a hint of what will be my posting next Tuesday. I flew first class, and left Honolulu on 1March2011, 24 hours later arriving at my favorite hotel in Bangkok, the Sheraton Grande Sukhamvit. My philosophy when flying is, "if free, every drink not drunk is money wasted."  I'm not sure my body, and liver in particular, would agree, but it makes for an enjoyable flight. Go to my posting that day for the details , but I had 16 different alcoholic drinks getting from Honolulu to Bangkok. I selected the  Grand Palace for Pearl's Ashes #15 . Here is a  short video of this attraction . Official residence of the Kings of Siam, now Thailand, since 1782, until 1925. Over 8 million visitors/year. One of Pearl's very favorite spots on Earth is the   Grand Pala...