Adrian

I don't think that selling on ebay an item with a misleading description should be considered fair game because the seller is willing to refund the purchase price. The auction page says "no bends", if the bend was as clear as bobtail says it obviously was a problem that should have been clearly described. Online sales are a matter of trust, attempting to pull this kind of tricks isn't exactly trustworthy.

If the description is way off, I think a honest seller should offer full refund including shipping. My 2p, of course. Description on the auction page says "flawless" and "no bends".

I guess it depends on what you call a "beginner". I agree that it would be too intensive for someone who is making first contact with this hobby and wants just to get the basic notions. IMO beginner is someone who is already past this stage.

Amazing situation, I got mine about 18 months ago at a very low price (something like 40-45$, can't remember exactly but was in this range). There were like 20 listing on ebay.co.uk at the time, now there's none. And the amazon prices are just ridiculous. I can understand this on a book that's been out of print for decades and is in very high demand, but for something that just went out of print... Anyway, it's a very useful book for beginners and hopefully the publishing company will print it again soon.

With you keeping the score, USA would have won the Gold Medal in the Olympic tournament hockey :lol: .

Brian, I fully understand that it's difficult for a newcomer to follow all this "history" on several boards and so on. That's exactly why I said that in the end Guido may be right about calling "Stephen II" (sorry, couldn't find anything better) a troll. However, based on his contribution to THIS board (the one which is easily accessible to me) I don't see any rational reason to reject his claims. At least so far... Of course, refuse to provide decent photos would seal the deal quite fast. Also, if some of his messages were deleted long before I joined the board, don't blame me if I don't know that he already failed to provide proof to back up his claims and so on. :D

Contributing to the ADVANCEMENT of Nihonto is something that obviously exceeds my competence at this moment. But saying that I didn't made any Nihonto related post is an obvious lie. And posting obvious lies about what other forumists do on a board IS TROLLING. This being said, you don't seem to understand what is a FORUM and how it works. I doubt that anyone can say that my posts on this topic were anything but constructive, before you posted an (uncalled for) personal attack. And one more thing: you need to learn that being a nihonto expert doesn't make you an expert in any other field. I wasn't questioning here your opinion about the attibution of sword X to school Y, just the fact that you called a troll someone who did a good deal of valid research on the whereabouts of confiscated nihonto.

Thank you for proving my point even further :lol: Others may notice that I brought a very solid argument for my rather neutral position, while your aggressive stance is (so far) only backed up by your self-proclaimed superiority :lol: (Keep in mind we're not talking about nihonto here but about historical research on the fate of some very famous nihonto - one doesn't need to be a nihonto expert to dig the relevant documents from the archives)

Apparently logic and common sense can be very annoying, particularly for the self proclaimed guardian of the absolute truth :lol: . To someone like me, who doesn't know who "offended" who on God knows what board or mail list some 10 years ago, the fact that X proclaims Y to be a big troll has absolutely no value. However, the fact that someone went trough the trouble of doing this kind of research viewtopic.php?f=9&t=12074&st=0&sk=t&sd=a actually has enough value to make me keep an open mind about what this guy may have to say. Of course, as I already said, this doesn't mean that you're necessary wrong, you may as well be proven right by his reply (or lack of it). But a rational person will just wait and see. Someone who dug up this stuff may be up to something (or may be trying to put up an elaborated hoax, time will tell). download/file.php?id=31345 download/file.php?id=31346

Not sure about that, I just read this topic viewtopic.php?f=9&t=12074&st=0&sk=t&sd=a and the guy doesn't look crazy or stupid to me. He seems to have done a good deal of digging trough the archives. (which of course doesn't mean that he actually found and acquired the sword, but at least gives him the benefit of the doubt).

I think that the first thing to do IF you want your claims to be taken seriously would be to post some good photos of the sword. Short of that, your post is just an obvious target for poking some fun.

I don't have any of these search problems, but I guess that's because back in 1999 I had to register my ebay account in the USA, as my country wasn't even on the list at the time :lol: . Funny is that a few years later, when they added the country, I changed the address to the proper one, but the account still behaves as a US account. Don't worry, even most of those outside the USA will get it. :D Fox news is, well, special :lol:

Well, if you look at the timing of the bids and of the retraction/cancellations you'll see that his explanation doesn't make much sense. He just tried to shill bid on the guy who bid 1800.99$ and had to cancel the whole thing when that guy retracted his bid, otherwise he risked to be forced to eat up the ebay fee (which is pretty stiff these days) if no one else beat the 1800$ mark. Obviously he wasn't going to let you have it for 475$. Tbh I wouldn't risk more then 1000$ given the no return policy.

Look carefully, the 1800.99$ bid is retracted but the 1800$ bid is canceled. After taking a closer look, my 2p say that someone bid 1800.99$ on Mar-10-14 11:08:35 PDT, then the seller shill bid 1800$ on Mar-13-14 13:49:48 PDT to push him all the way up. Then the first guy either figured out he was being played (or simply changed his mind) and retracted his bid on Mar-18-14 05:09:00 PDT and then the seller promptly canceled the whole thing on Mar-18-14 06:55:36 PDT. I'd steer clear from any seller who resorts to shill bidding. But again this has nothing to do with the sword :lol: , it's just a personal approach to doing business.

Common sense says he wouldn't have canceled a 1800$ bid if he knew the item wasn't worth 1800$. But common sense (and two clicks on his feedback profile) also says that the seller is far from being an expert so even if he really thinks that the sword is worth more then 1800$ that's not necesarely true. It all boils down to what you think you can sell the sword for and the risk you're willing to take. What I see in the pics looks like a nice package but I doubt it's worth risking 3000$. The photos aren't exactly aoi-art grade so the risk to meet a hagire upon inspection isn't small. And the fittings won't help you out of the hole in that case. Of course, that's just my noob opinion given to someone who hates my guts with no apparent reason :lol:

The only problem I've ever had with USPS was with a relatively expensive item shipped with Express Mail and declared at full value. Apparently the Amsterdam hub (which handles most of the packages coming from USA to the EU via USPS) was using prison inmates for handling packages during the Christmas rush. One of the corners of the box got ripped off and the content was taken out, leaving the empty box to follow it's course to destination (the post placed the box in a sealed bag and added a note that it was missing weight). Took a lot of determination to get the money back out of the 3rd party insurance company which was covering the shipment. Since then I've had all my stuff declared under 50$ and shipped USPS priority. Never had the slightest problem, even on quite valuable items. Sure enough, this isn't an option for a company, but... If declaring the stuff at it's real value, avoid using USPS. My 2p, of course.

Well, if the Japanese started to press the issue real hard (which is not the case and probably won't be in the near future), I wouldn't be amazed if the US govt "discovered" in the records that the ship taking sgt. Coldy Bilmore back home was lost at sea :lol: Not the Bermuda triangle, but close enough :lol: . End of story.

I'm fairly sure they bothered to look for it. Not because they cared about a priceless historical artifact, but because of the historical and political importance of this particular sword for Japan. If you read a bit about how determined was Patton in looking for the Holy Lance, you'll see where I'm coming from. Now, of course there's a possibility that it was destroyed before the US authorities could get to it. And, of course, the whole Colby, B.imore speculation cannot be ignored or downplayed, given the inherent chaos of those days. But I'm fairly convinced that the US authorities would have sorted it out anyway, unless of course the guy who took from the police station Tokugawa Iemasa's lot of swords was a determined crook who used a false identity. Sure enough, if we accept the rather farfetched idea that the US govt is unable to locate the whereabouts of a sergeant, while knowing his regiment and knowing that he walked with an artifact worth millions of dollars, we can also speculate that the incident never took place and was just an excuse fabricated by the Japanese authorities (or even some group of Japanese officers) in order to keep the sword. For all we know it may be in some hidden room in the Imperial palace...

Tbh I really doubt that this particular sword is anywhere else but in some US govt storage. Even if "Sgt. Coldy Bimore" or some other American soldier had it long enough to bring it home, I bet it was tracked down by the American government a long time ago. As for the sword being allowed to leave Japan again, I guess that it would depend by a multitude of factors: who owned it, under what circumstances would it enter Japan again and so on. I'm sure that the nationalist factions would make a big fuzz out of such an event and put a lot of pressure on the mainstream politicians. IMO the Japanese wouldn't openly break their own law, but if they were to find some sort of legal glitch that allowed them to seize the sword without losing face... who knows? It would all depend on how the public opinion in Japan would react. In any case, I'm VERY sure that a handsome offer would be made to the owner. Probably something too good to refuse. ( and I don't mean in the Godfather style).

Chris and Ken, what happens if the customs in the destination country decide to reject the item? Common sense says they will simply return it to the sender's address, if the return address is also in the destination country. Are you saying that USPS would accept an international package where both the sender's and the destination addresses are in a foreign country? (and identical for that matter)

Thank you Ian. Indeed it would be silly to allow petty disputes to block the discussion of interesting subjects. That's how I feel as well.

That's very well said, you can instantly tell when someone has experience with this kind of things. :D Chris, just to make things clear, the premise of the debate is a foreigner attending a sword show (the example given was Chicago so we're talking about TSA rules) and purchasing there a sword, then having to come back with it in his country. In this particular situation, if you chose to mail it yourself and something goes wrong (just one example: some idiot at the customs in your home country rejects it and sends it back) there is no valid return address (you can put there the hotel's address or something like that if the field is mandatory). Unless you put there the seller's address or have him mail it to you (and in this case the sword would be returned to him - so you need to know and trust him). Of course, it's a completely different ballgame if you have residences in both countries, or even just some reliable contacts in the country where you purchase the sword.

Yes, if the entire world can be reduced to you, then you're probably right Cheer up mate, it's not like I'm your sworn enemy or something and you need to fight me whenever you see me .

Well, that's obvious, it's not like I'm beating you with a (checked in :lol: ) baseball bat to accept that you're wrong :D We're discussing the matter, I gave you a few arguments based on the TSA rules, that's all. Of course, if someone has a pathological fear of flight, of enclosed spaces and so on and needs to take 10 pills just to be able to board a plane, probably it won't be a good idea for him to add the stress of taking a valuable item (which happens to be a sword) in his luggage. But other then that I don't see any problem.

If you want to start splitting straws :lol: , I have to say there are quite a few big errors in your story/speculation: 1. Why would you have to tell the ckeck-in girl that you have a sword in your luggage? Since you're boarding at Chicago and the TSA rules clearly state that it's OK to check in swords and don't require that the swords be declared at check-in? 2. Even if you specifically told the girl that you have a sword and she freaked out (being the first day at work or something :lol: ), why would the custom officer lead you to a room instead of telling the girl "It's OK, TSA allows these to be checked in"? Worst thing that could happen is that you'll hold the check-in line a few minutes, until the customs officer comes and sorts out the matter. It's that simple. You only need to do your homework, know what is allowed and what is not. Maybe bring with you prints of the relevant regulations, if you want to be really paranoid. I'm not sure if you know that in the USA you can check-in firearms and ammo, so the idea that even an inexperienced check-in girl would freak out because of a checked sword is quite farfetched. http://www.tsa.gov/traveler-information ... ammunition