Flight Report: MNL-NRT-MNL on Philippine Airlines PR 432 and PR 431

15Mar16 007 Philippine Airlines Flight PR 431 NRT MNL Tokyo Manila A330-300

This wasn’t my first time flying with Philippine Airlines (IATA code: PR) between Manila and one of its several destination cities in Japan. Despite shortcomings in various aspects of the experience, I think it’s safe to say that it probably won’t be the last time.

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Field Report: Saga Castle, Japan (25 March 2015)

25Mar15 023 Japan Kyushu Saga Castle

Saga Prefecture doesn’t usually rank first in tourist itineraries (except for those chasing traditional Japanese porcelain), but rich cultural and historic rewards await those willing to invest a brief stop in this quiet corner of northern Kyūshū. After seeing one major attraction earlier in the day which represented Japan’s early, formative years, I travelled a few minutes west by train – and over a thousand years forward through history – to the prefectural capital for a walk through the grounds of an Edo-period castle.

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Flight Report: MNL-ICN-MNL on AirAsia Z2 884 and Z2 85 (February 2016 edition)

09Feb16 006 AirAsia Flight Z2 85 ICN MNL A320-200 Cabin

Unless an airline does something so phenomenally stupid that I slap them with a personal travel ban, I’d happily fly with them again – even on the same route and schedule as before. That’s why I found myself taking a third round-trip journey on Philippines AirAsia (Z2) this past Seollal weekend, between Manila’s Ninoy Aquino International Airport (MNL) and Seoul’s Incheon International Airport (ICN).

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Field Report: Yoshinogari Historical Park, Japan (25 March 2015)

25Mar15 038 Japan Kyushu Saga Yoshinogari Historical Park

Diego sets off on a journey to discover a very different, very ancient Japan – a land and society far removed from (and far older than) the samurai and shōgun that have long dominated popular conceptions of Japanese history.

The destination: a complete, and quite enormous, Iron Age town resurrected from bare earth and ashes, where one might glimpse a lost world that some modern-day Japanese might not even recognise as Japanese.

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Field Report: A pleasant stroll in Yoshinogari, Japan (25 March 2015)

25Mar15 006 Japan Kyushu Saga Yoshinogari

Some of my fondest memories of Japan have less to do with major tourist attractions and more to do with the journeys I had to take in order to reach them. When I close my eyes and cast my thoughts back to some random episode during one of my several trips to that country, I would often find myself gratefully and happily reminiscing about a quiet backstreet in the middle of a sprawling city, or a peaceful road through verdant rice fields out in the countryside, rather than about temples that have stood for hundreds of years or lavishly decorated palaces. The remembered sounds filling my head at that moment would be neither the measured strains of a gagaku ensemble nor the sonorous chanting of monks, but the barking of a dog tied to a rusty gate and the piercing, almost mournful wailing of sirens at a level crossing just as the barriers come down and a train goes roaring past.

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Field Report: Seaside Momochi, Fukuoka, Japan (24 March 2015)

24Mar15 006 Japan Kyushu Fukuoka Seaside Momochi Momochihama Beach

Fukuoka is a city with loads of surprises, and today it sprung one of its biggest on me: a beach within a stone’s throw of the urban centre.

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Field Report: Dazaifu, Japan (24 March 2015) – Part 2 of 2

24Mar15 011 Japan Kyushu Fukuoka Dazaifu Komyozenji Temple

With a half-day’s worth of sightseeing in Dazaifu now behind us, let’s give ourselves a moment of respite by admiring a small but quite beautiful garden.

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Field Report: Dazaifu, Japan (24 March 2015) – Part 1 of 2

24Mar15 006 Japan Kyushu Fukuoka Dazaifu Tenmangu

Fukuoka may be the nexus of power and prestige in modern-day Kyūshū, but over a millennium ago, that distinction belonged to another city located several miles to the southeast. Although reduced to a quiet suburb of the island’s sprawling present-day capital, one might say that Dazaifu merely traded one cloak for another: transforming from a seat of imperial power to a centre for culture and history in southern Japan.

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