A few years ago I used to really love coming back to Japan after a couple of months ( or sometimes even weeks!), and be amazed at all the new hi tech stuff that had been released whilst I was away. It was also lots of fun laughing at everyone in the UK as they walked around with their brick-sized phones whilst I had a super sexy slim Japanese one.

Flip to 2006 and what on Earth’s happened? After being in the UK where everyone wants a bluetooth Walkman phone, and in the US where everyone is addicted to their Treos and and Blackberrys, China where super small phones are everywhere and even Thailand where the people who can afford it have the most amazing pda phones that are so small and do everything, today in the phone store in Japan I was well shocked! All I wanted to do was to update my phone, thinking I could get a nice pda phone that has my calendar and can be used to update the website etc. And there aren’t any! There’s nothing like the blackberry or treo over here at all. And the hand sets they do have look like they’ve jumped back to the 80s they are just so big & bulky! I noticed a couple of years ago that Korean stores we’re selling TVs and laptops that were faster, cheaper & smaller than Japan, but it looks like Japanese phones have also lost their edge now. Well thank goodness for Nintendo & Sony, otherwise Japanese Hi-Tech would be looking decidedly third world.