Thursday our company took the entire day to participate in an outreach project within the local community, as part of a regional effort within our network of sister companies to do something to improve the world around us for a day.

Our task was to clean up a beach down on the coast near Kamakura.

Ordinarily this would be a brilliant idea, except it’s still winter and the weather for most of the week consisted of rain, drizzle and biting wind along the coast.  Knowing this, we put on our hiking boots, bundled up and took bets on which of our female co-workers would show up in the most inappropriate shoes (like open toed heels).

After a two hour bus ride, we were armed with surgical gloves, fabric glovels and two foot long tongs to make sure no one actually had to touch anything.  I think this might be a good time to note that our CEO was questioning if there would even be litter to pick up as this is Japan and others were wondering if the Head of HR had spent the night at the beach ripping up papers for us to pick up…Japan is that clean.

Long story short we picked up quite a bit of trash with the majority being cigarette butts, bottle caps and even more cigarette butts.

After finishing our two hours of beachcombing M and I set out with a friend to check out the local aquarium with the free time the company provided. Initially the entry price of 2,000 JPY seemed a bit steep, yet the fish were actually pretty interesting, especially the dolphins.

As it turned out we missed their last show for the day, but what we saw instead proved just as entertaining as the trainers fed them, checked their vitals, and played with them.  For the second time in the span of a week I found myself dumbstruck by animals that could be both smart and funny.

With the prospects weatherwise being just as dreary for Sunday, we decided we would check out the local aquarium with the hopes of having some repeat success.

Instead our results were mixed. M got some good shots, but the lighting inside made things a bit tricky.

Some of the fish were simply too fast to capture on film, but I’m thrilled that M got a picture of this little guy. (Editors note: I think it’s a type blowfish if you are curious. His smile was likely due to the fact his residence of the aquarium would keep him off of local restaurant tables as a delicacy. )

Finally on the way out after finishing with the fish we were hopeful in seeing the seals and penguins, but ultimately disappointed.

The seal was all alone and chasing his own tale for entertainment and Penguinland looked like one of the saddest places on earth.  I think even the Beijing zoo penguins were better off.

All in all, we did see some cool fish but I’d have to say the Kamakura aquarium was quite a bit more cheerful than the Shinagawa aquarium.