Mr Maxwell, you are an angel. There is nothing quite like getting home after a long day, towards the end of a long week and finding an unexpected Australia Post Box jammed into your mailbox. It's even more special when it's an entire box of chocolates. And a little letter saying "Heard you've been blue, so thought I'd make ya smile".

Mr Maxwell and I met through the internet a couple of years ago - he emailed me after finding my site. He was a graphic designer from Sydney, planning to come and live in Japan and wanted some inside tips to find work.

When I got an email announcing that he was off to Berlin to propose to a woman he'd never mentioned before but whom he "loved more than he ever thought possible" a few days before he was supposed to arrive in Japan, I confess I wrote him off as a bit of a flake who had no idea whether he was coming or going. Anyway, the proposal was rejected, his heart was broken and the trip to Japan was on again. I found myself offering to meet him at Narita and get him to his hotel safely. I had figured he was a bit of a greenskin. I figured right.

It was a hellish experience coping with typhoon rains and a fella who had a lot of gear and no idea where his hotel was - just an address, despite my tips to print out a map (including which station exit to use) because, as any Tokyoite will tell you, having an address to a place does not, by any means, mean you will find the location. It was getting later and later and we, of course, exited the station by the furtherest possible exit from the hotel. When we eventually found it, we found an exit virtually at the end of the street. This experience further strengthened my flake theory.

I took him around with me (and the old Komaba house crew) to a couple of parties and gigs for a week or two then he started his part time teaching job and was given an apartment far away to the south-west of Tokyo. I must point out that there had never been (nor is there now) any whisper of romance - it was never that kind of thing. I didn't see him for quite a while. Then we started meeting for the odd coffee, and much to my surprise, the "flake" had settled in to his new surroundings like a fish to water. He had become a great, popular teacher, found a (crazy American) girlfriend and was out and about heaps, always making new friends. He was even learning some Japanese. We became good buddies.

Our get-togethers over coffee or lunch became almost fortnightly events that I always looked forward to. We talked about lots of stuff - Japan, life, love, problems, graphic design, the internet. He became this subtle driving force in my life and I no longer saw him as a flake, rather as an infectiously optimistic, highly motivated, creative, flexible, highly adaptable and very sweet individual. Whenever we met up, I'd come away with a million creative ideas formulating in my head.

It was great to have a male friend to hang with - in Australia I had a pretty large circle of male friends (working in music that is a kind of inevitable thing, I guess) to hang with, but here in Tokyo pretty much most of my friends are women, and their boyfriends/husbands. I really miss just hanging' with the boys.

Anyway, Mr Maxwell broke up with his (crazy American) gal and after a while declared himself finished with Japan, he wanted to go finish his masters in design in Sydney. Bwa ha ha. In typical Maxwell form, he met a new woman in the month before he left and decided maybe he wasn't quite so ready to leave Japan.... and ended in an agony of indecision. Talk about bad timing!

He's in Sydney now, working hard in a design job, having postponed his studies and will be returning to Tokyo in February to work for another English-teaching company. His new GF is planning a trip to Sydney to meet the family. They seem pretty serious about each other and I hope it works out for them.

I can't wait to get back to our coffee and conversation routine again. Mr Maxwell, thanks for your lovely and most unexpected prezzy and for being so damn thoughtful.

Excuse me while I tuck into my 4th choc'wat.... Mmmmm, maybe a caramello koala. YUMMMMMMMMM.