Pollution

A friend of mine once described life as 'just' a series of "hello's and "good-byes".
That describes our trip, and yesterday was a wrench leaving Matsumoto. We had been so generously received and well treated everywhere. It was lovely to catch up with James and Yukari, Eleanor and Ceilidh and other family members after so many years and to spend time with beautiful grandchildren.
So we said our sad farewells, committed to not waiting so long before meeting up again, and after a night in Narita flew out to Kuala Lumpur. Here we have one night before heading south of the Equator for wintry Brisbane and some more "Hello's" and reunions with family.
Today's blip is not an exciting picture, but it does illustrate a major event - the polluting smog that has engulfed southern Malaysia and Singapore in the last week from the firing of forests in Sumatra. The distant building (KL air terminal) in the picture is only some 400 metres away from our hotel but is almost invisible in the all-pervading smoke and dust. Combined with a temperature of 39C, just about the "ton", and high humidity - you can guess what it feels like outdoors.