sy

Birthday trip

2007-03-18T00:24:00.000+09:00

A couple of months back I realised my dad was turning 60 in March 07 and decided back then I'd make it back to Brunei to spend it with him and my family. In the last 15 years, our family hasn't really made a big deal about each other's birthdays and the organisation of my dad's party was quite last minute and almost didn't happen.

My brothers pulled off a nice and simple chinese banquet dinner for my dad with our extended family, dad's old friends and work mates joining in the celebrations. They even managed to pump out some side splitting speeches put together at the last minute picking at my dad's loud personality and funny quirks. When it came time for my dad's speech my aunty and myself were worried he might go on and on. We clapped and laughed loudly trying to wrap him up! "ok!! finish oredi???". He managed to keep it semi short and sweet.

Birthday noodles - eating to long life

My dad... and my mum putting on a brave face while he rambles..

I love this picture even though it makes me shake my head hehe

Our family

Highlight of any great family gathering - BABIES!

My cousins

Dad's family

The dinner was kind of supposed to be a surprise but we all got confused and just couldn't be bothered keeping it super secret in the end. So dad knew we were going out for dinner with some family but didn't realise that my brothers had invited a lot of his friends and was surprised at how big the dinner turned out to be. He seemed to have had a great time and is always happy when the family gets together. Despite my dad's casual outward guise, not fussing about family events, according to my mum we'd be surprised at how much it means to him when we make a fuss about spending time with him.

Mission: Accomplished!!!

2007-03-04T10:53:00.000+09:00

Yen and I had been training for the last few months, preparing ourselves for our first triathlon... and the countdown ended on March 4! I got up at an obscene 4 am with the moon still blaring away in the pitch black sky. The race wasn't until 7 am but you gotta give yourself time to prepare before the race and also digest your breakfast!

It was so cold that morning arriving at the meeting point in front of UWA on Hackett Drive. We had to set ourselves up in the "transition" area, which is where you keep your bike, towel, sports drink and shoes. The first event is swimming, so when you come out of the water you have to go through the transition area to where you stuff is, wipe yourself down, chuck your heltmet on, wheel your bike out and off you go again. It seems like a simple process but if you think about it a long enough you realise you gotta position your stuff well and plan your transition too! Yen said early on you have to make note of WHERE you put your bike. There a bazillion bikes about and it's easy to run past your bike (which I did!!).

Swimming in the river was quite bad. Me and Yen hung in the back of the group at the start so we wouldn't get kicked in the gut by other girls swimming in front! I swam slow and intermittently, looking up every few strokes to see if I was swimming straight. You just can't see anything further than 20 cm in front of you! It's also unavoidable to swallow quite a bit of river water, which is much groser than I imagined and kind of disorientates you. I made it in the end but I think swimming in the river will always be the most challenging out of all three.

The cycle was really good because Yen and I had gone for a practice cycle of the route before and I was looking forward to the downhill streets for a bit of a break. I usually get a snuffly nose when I ride when the cold air whips my faces so with that and after having swallowed lots of I was rather snotty during the ride and no where to wipe my nose!! hee hee

The final leg! The run! Yay the last bit! But when I got off the bike my legs were so stiff! In my head I'm thinking "oh my gosh want to stop now how'm I gonna run! eek!". I seriously thought I would have to stop halfway through the run but after seeing so many other girls stop to walk the 3 km leg I just didn't want to do it too.

We made it in the end without stopping! Woohoo! It was such a fun experience and I'm definitely down for doing it again next year.

KCI & JoJo and THE BOYZ!!

2007-02-18T00:06:00.000+09:00

Prime spot. Middle front of the stage. All set for the BoyZ.

First up was Kci & JoJo. Wow... it was really them! That distinctive "woooooOoo" of Kci was really coming from that tiny Metros stage. These fellas were energetic and lively getting the crowd revved up with their classic hits but JoJo was particularly stirring with his pelvic giration and wandering hands. They sang some oldies, new ones and even Jodeci hits.

You know when you go through a season with certain songs, subjecting them to countless repetitions... Well I've been going through a period with this oldie "Lately". At the concert, Kci uttered the first few lines "Lately I've had the strangest feeling......" *shriek* "Oh my gawd Bonnie they're singing it!!"

Then came the Boyzz...

This was our second outing to a Boyz2Men concert and despite the show being very similar to the first one we saw, we were still so giddy and excited (like school girls) to see and hear them in the flesh. We were in the back row the last time (right next to the lighting guy) but this time they were singing directly to us as they lent over the stage! The Boyz were singing directly to us!! Just like we used to imagine pop stars would when we were flighty primary schoolers. Well I don't think I ever saw them as heart throbs but I always used to sing really loudly to their songs and I remember standing right by the TV with my brother a good 12 years ago belting out 'End of the Road' while it played on Video Hits.

The Boyz2Men sing-a-long

They still got the moves!

2007-02-12T23:57:00.000+09:00

On a sort of last minute decision, Elena, Callie and myself went for a mini picnic at Heathcote Park with our chicken rolls, sparkling apple cider, pasta salad and Celebrations chocies. I've never been to Heathcote before and didn't realise what a pretty sunset spot it was. It also has the best playground I've ever seen, with a massive dissected ship in the middle of the sand!

Sunset from Heathcote

gong hey

2007-02-11T22:45:00.000+09:00

I walked into the Chans' home and was faced with the gleam of the red take away boxes on their beautifully set out marble table. My jaw dropped! Marina is quite the culinary queen and I guess I shouldn't be surprised but her nicely set table made me so excited to taste what she was servin' up!!

The Chan's hosted a colourful Chinese New Year at their place a couple of weeks back, serving chicken rice (with all the yummy condiments), young coconut juice, grass jelly with fruits and chinese snackies for us to take home.

Making good use of their label maker "**GONG XI FATT CHAI**"

Colourful yee sang

Rui adding the random crunchy condiments

Ready...

Low hey!!!

Hello Chans!! :)

Two little Yens...

2007-01-26T14:35:00.000+09:00

The last two months, Yen and I have been doing some regular exercise in the lead up to a triathlon in March. We've been swimming, running and cycling a couple of times each week to get ourselves ready for the March 4 race and I'm really glad we've done as much as we have since December. It may not be a super tight regime but it's still something and we're slowly building a healthy attitude towards our fitness and gaining confidence in our ability to actually do this stuff.

Things I discovered:
Running - I think..my worst, although I can now jog for 30 minutes straight. VERY slowly but it's 30 minutes of uninterrupted cardio. Yen's at like.. 45 minutes! Yikes!
Cycling - 10 kms on your bike passes SO quickly. You don't realise how far you can actually go on your bike.
Swimming - I can swim 100 m non stop, every session. Where as 200 m-300 m I could swim only at the training session when the trainer is looking at you and other girls are hitting your toes as they catch up to you in the lane. Swimming cap and goggle makes SO much difference to speed and comfort.

Before the actual triathlon, there's a tri-course designed to help you train up for the race and where you get tips on technique and just time allocated in your week to actually run, swim or cycle. You're supposed to have at least one other session in your own time to train for each of the events. It's quite a crazy amount of training, especially for someone who's never really even had a regular physical activity regime since I was in year 8. Anyway, it would have been way more difficult if Yen wasn't there to go swimming and cycling with!

The triathlon and tri-course is for women only and it's also structured for those who have never competed in a triathlon before so the vibe in these training sessions are pretty relaxed. We still get that motivating push from the trainers but it's still a very easy going environment. Some of the girls would ask each other "What made you get into this?". Most girls had similar goals, which were to be fit and of course be able to finish the race. Yen had done the course last year and was saying how good she felt being active and I thought it would be a good opportunity for us to encourage each other. So not only was fitness and training with Yen the motivations but I think after getting back from Japan I felt like I needed to run around in the wide open spaces! I have a picture of a dog running around trying to get air in it's hair after a bath. hehehe They go mental! But yeah, in terms of Japan, moving from one crowded boxed in place to another does something to you I guess. Makes you wanna shake out your dusty limbs.

Our tri-singlet. It's a bit hardcore. I think I'll save it for race day.

Our swimming instructor told us to write our names on our caps only because there are so many of us at the one session (around 30?). Since mine was black I had to make do.

I actually started eating power bars! I've always pictured the hard core beefcakes with thick necks, arms and popping veins chowing these down, but look at me I'm eating them too! Not beefcakey nor veiny. The tri-course booklet outlines appropriate snacks you should have straight after your training session. They list things like yoghurt and fruit, 750 mL gatorade, sports bar etc.. I just figured sports bars are lot easier to carry around with your when it's hot rather than yoghurt and fruit.

The container thingie is this powdered drink thing that's also great for recovery after a training session. It's kind of nasty but you get used to it and I only bought it because I couldn't find powered gatorade, but I've since been shown where it is in Coles! This bucket of powdered energy I bought is sooo expensive. It's like two and a half times more expensive than the powdered gatorade! I didn't know that until later so I figure I got swindled, although I admit it does help you not feel as buggered the next day.

my wheels

So the two little Yens have...just over 5 weeks to prep for the upcoming race. Holy Moly. That's so soon.

We can do it, Yen! :)

Happy Basday

2007-01-24T13:36:00.000+09:00

Over the weekend, we rounded up the girls for an early celebration of Christine's birthday at Cheers Japanese Restaraunt in Subi. Sorry, I don't have many photos!! The food was simple but delicious and the interior setting nostalgic of the izakayas in Japan where you usually go for late night supper. Simple decor (including an oddly placed A4 sized drawing of sumo), shoes off and cushions for seats.

After stuffing the last bits of green tea ice cream in our faces ("Its shoo couwld!"), we headed off to Marina's place for birthday treats, tea and of course a little sing-song for the birthday girl.

Happy BIRTHday dear CHRISteeeeeeeen, HAAAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOUUUUUU!

Hope you had a wonderful birthday sweetie. You're an awesome friend who's always a good laugh and a joy to be around. Have a wonderful year!! Kampai!

New Year's

2007-01-10T23:47:00.000+09:00

New Year's celebrations 06/07 was at the Choongs'. Nice and chill. BBQ, champers, sparklers and pictionary were key! I love house parties because is a much more relaxed affair not to mention you get to play games, eat bbq, make a good cuppa and you have a choice of chattering about fun mindless fluff or properly catch up with your best buddies.

The Choongs' are great hosts with their welcoming, open arms and smiley faces! There's also always bound to be good food at the Choongs', this time we were treated to satays and pandan kaya cake.

More teeth Choong.

As always all of us ate more than our fair share, but there was just so much good food and dessert to follow. Eat well and be merry.. and merry we were, most especially when we got stuck into the pictionary and charades. I love pictionary and remember that first and only set I got for my... 12th birthday and I inscribed it with "This belongs to Sue-Yen Yong", as I did with everything else I owned! Anyway, I digress, so after Christine and I dished out a sneaky arse-whoopin' the others retired to a game of charades.

Mule: "Nnngg!"

dishin' out a CAINING to the boys

Christine and her basket of delights

oh and Happy New Year :) Cheers!

Sajith & Natashia

2006-12-31T15:11:00.000+09:00

Congratulations Saj & Tash on your wedding day!! What an exciting journey you guys have ahead of you. Not only are you guys starting on that adventure of being a married couple but also trekking into (semi) unknown territory in Canada-town to set up a new life. It's amazing you guys managed to pull off a beautiful and seamless wedding day AND be able to move your all you sh*t all the way across the globe. Props to you both!!

**Ceremony @ St. Thomas More Catholic Church**

She looked absolutely stunning. Saj is one lucky fella.

The couple getting married in Bethlehem

**Reception @ AQWA**

The ceremony was met with a beautiful clear day and during the reception at the Perth Aquarium the lovely couple were treated to an amazing view of the sunsetting *tear*

Behind you!

Au revoir!

Best of luck in your travels and new endeavours guys. I'm excited to read your updates on blog and oogle at the pretty pictures! I'm hoping to come and visit soon!!

Have fun on your honeymoon, love birds :)

Christina & Gavin's Engagement

2006-12-28T20:00:00.000+09:00

Congratulations to Christina & Gavin on their engagement!! A truly gorgeous and lively (and TINY) couple that I love to bits and hope all the happiness in the world for. I knew they were talking about the E word for a while already but it was still an exciting mystery how and when it was all going to unfold.

Christina's been a wonderful friend who I've been lucky enough to build a sisterly friendship with these last few years. She's a girl with many talents - a completely unsuspecting chicka - (sweet, gorgeous AND tanky) who is always up for not just a bit but a A LOT of fun ;) Gav is a top notch bloke who I know will love and bear hug this girl with all his heart. You guys rock!

The happy couple

Downing some sweet sweet "pancakes"

Christina's parents

Our girl - We love you sweetie and wish you guys all the best for the year to come as you prepare for your big day *muah*

merry christmas - toot toot

2006-12-27T01:04:00.000+09:00

The present giving and church services and carols are always a welcome tradition of Christmas but this year I discovered the joys of bon bons!

For our dinner at the Oyster Bar, Pam bought some bon bons for pre-dinner hoots containing the usual paper hat and joke but included a little whistle for some Christmas music. Each one of us had a different note to whistle, which we had to coordinate together to make a carolling tune. We giggled and tooted our heads off like playful children, without a care in the world about the patrons around. Definitely a big group dinner winner.

More bon bon excitement - at our secret santa exchange we donned the paper hats and decorated our faces with Christmasy stickers. I love being a dork.

2006-12-24T23:10:00.000+09:00

The last few months have been nice getting back into a Perth groove and hanging out with friends. A lot has happened but all have been those little things that occur between the big events. Sometimes we forget they even happen so it's nice to stumble across little pictures that remind you. Plus, I definitely like posting pictures up more so than writing so here's a picture update.

Tiger Lil's

Perth Air Race

AQWA

Church Together

Caversham Wildlife Park

Mr & Mrs Michael and Yen Lee

2006-10-21T10:41:00.000+08:00

The warm spring day was the perfect backdrop to Yen & Mike's big day. In the Yen & Mike fashion, they looked really relaxed and just happy to be making that final commitment to each other. It sounds cliche but they've always seemed like they'd be together forever, but nothing really prepares you to witness your friends up there, at the top of the aisle, reading their vows to each other.

Congratulations Mike & Yen :)

Brunei - Man I missed choinese food

2006-10-16T12:39:00.000+08:00

I touched down in Brunei and for the first time I was in Brunei without neither of my parents being there. It sounds really normal but it's just odd to be in Brunei and not have them to depend on, although a lot of my dad's brothers and sisters tend to take care of us really well anyway. My brother picked me up and we were back into our normal bro-sis banter, taking the piss out of each other.

The next morning my aunt looks at me and goes "ey? you're back ah?". It seems my bro bro didn't spread the word and announce to the whole of Brunei of my arrival bahaha. I was a bit grumpy that my aunties didn't know but oh well, I got over it rather quick. I was looking forward to getting my hair coloured, legs waxed, eye brows plucked, nails pedicure and toes manicure at my other aunty's beauty salon. Hooraah. OHH and i was SO looking forward to some good old choi-knees food.

The chinese food in Japan is terrible! Every restaraunt I'd gone to always made the food very Japanesey and too sweet. My first meal was a very tasty combination crispy noodle claypot accompanied by sugar cane juice. For some cuckoo reason the meal actually made me really really happy! The week followed on with more awesome chinese - kolomee, Brunei laksa, herbal chicken soup, dim sum, chicken rice... all the good stuff.

Moving on.. to Osaka

2006-10-14T10:39:00.000+08:00

I got up this morning, gathered all my belongings and left Takarazuka for the last time. I had a moment on the noisy bus where I was thinking all of these sounds and scenery will be gone soon so I had to savour it all. I think part of me was really tired of the burden of my luggage so I was kind of happy that time was moving quickly but I had to make myself chill out for a second and absorb where I was and what was happening. There wasn't much time left.

Kanako and her mum have been so hospitable during my stay at their apartment. I was so grateful for everything they had done and it was sad to say goodbye but I had a feeling I would see Kanako again. Hopefully she'll be making another trip to Perth sometime soon! I said goodbye to them early in the morning and took a train to Osaka where I'd spent the rest of my day.

I put my stuff away wandered around and ended up buying more stuff to add to the too much luggage I had! Walking around Osaka for a whole morning it's hard to avoid those alluring shops and their wonderful goods!

Lunchtime quickly came and I met up with Cindy, Emi and Yuki for a bite to eat at the Elephant Cafe. I was really bummed that our previously arranged meet-up was cancelled because I fell ill so I was really happy all the girls free for the arvo. Cindy has been a rather busy lady and how lucky I was to get a tiny slot in her schedule that day! hahaha girl your schedule's that full you'll need a PA to book your appointments! Thanks for hanging out for one last eating, chatting and insane laughing session. We had a good ab work out with all that boistrous laughing teehee ;) Hope to catch up with you girls some day soon!

Me, Emi, Cindy & Yuki

After lunch, I met up with Taro (fellow Sanda resident) and his gym buddies Tai and Ayaka for afternoon tea. On to another eating and drinking place we went and then to another. Osaka is just jam packed with great places to check out, which can be daunting but also kind of exciting cos our appetites and curiousity for great cuisine are just insatiable!

Supper time slowly creeped along and I had to say goodbye to Taro, Tai and Ayaka and meet up with Takako and Risa who'd just finished work at the Sanda GEOS School. I was staying at Takako's place tonight, which is in Sakai city, not too far from Osaka. We got to her place, dropped off my crap and headed out to eat again. We had... er.. I'm not sure what it's called but under all the meat is udon. The whole dish is heated up on the table, meat mixed around and cooked with the udon. Very tasty - like everything else! Nothing's bad... cept japanese-chinese food.

After heading out of the restaraunt, we had one last little stroll around the ominous streets of Sakai. We got home, cleaned up and I got a sneak peek at Takako's family's kimono making shop. If I remember correctly, the little factory has been in operation for the last 2 generations and now Takako's mum sews and designs the kimonos along with a few other workers they employ.

The traditionally made kimono, as opposed to the mass produced ones sold at clothing chains, are completely handmade. Everything is done in such a raw, organic and painstaking way you can't just look at a handmade kimono and make a judgement about it in a second. There were a few bits of trivia I knew about the process of making and keeping a kimono but I learnt a few more things that just blew my mind. One that sticks out in my mind is that all the girls in the workshop, including Takako's mum cut the fabric freehand. No lines, no rulers, no templates. They sketch the kimono design and just have to imagine what the pieces that have to fit together will look like. It's absolute madness!

After the little tour, I had a big packing session that lasted til the wee hours. I would have liked to spend a bit more time with the Takako and Risa having a girly chat and poke fun at each other but the packing had to be done...

Sayounara Morimoto-san

2006-10-13T19:38:00.000+08:00

The Morimoto's are such great people and they'll be one of those I will miss a lot. They've taught and shown me so much about Japanese culture and have always been great fun and a real comfort to be around.
The Morimoto's plus one - This was the only shot I had of them that night and Akemi doesn't usually look that doughy. What a crack up though.

The Yamamoto ladies and myself

We had a little Sanda beef dinner, cooking the meat at the table on a small steamboat sized grill, with some tofu salad and sweet chestnuts. Apparently Sanda beef is the original Wagyu beef aka Kobe beef. I'm not too sure about the difference but it all tastes so rich and tender! For dessert, we had some cake and these really yummy mochi (glutinous rice) stuffed with chestnut, which are from Sasayama - about half an hour North of Sanda by train. Yamamoto-san had brought them to tea ceremony class one time and I ohh and aahh-ed at how good they were, so I was lucky enough to get one last taste of them.

Morimoto-san is of course my calligraphy teacher so before I left he gave me the exhibition piece I had written and something else that he had written and placed onto a scroll. To him I guess it's something he does all the time but to me it was so special - something I could look at when I'm back home and remember that I was once in a place so far away from home meeting some pretty amazing people.

The scroll writing was a message for my farewell and future. Akemi explained the meaning in bits and pieces saying it talked about hoping for a brightly lit road for the future and encouragement to stay passionate about following a certain path.

mini Takarazuka Reunion-Farewell

2006-10-12T22:37:00.000+08:00

Chieko gathered the Takarazuka gang at Rags Shack for one last Takarazuka hoot & nannie. I knew we were having a dinner but I didn't realise it was going to be a reunion of sorts, which was a nice surprise

Just over half of us that were there that night were from the 1997 exchange program and the other members were from previous years or following years. It's always a good time with these guys and it still astounds me that we were able to somewhat keep in touch for over 9 years despite our sketchy abilities to speak a second language!

"Do Hiroshi! Hiroshiiii!!!"

Chieko, myself & Nanako

Chieko, Yuki, myself, Asami & Nanako

Senorita SY and Senor Keita

Chieko had this great idea that included a mini polaroid camera, mini polaroid film, a mini photo album. As you take a photo, you stick it in the album and by the end of the night.. momentus album of the night's events! Genius.

Nanako, Yuki, myself, Kanako & Chieko

Halloween @ Universal Studios Japan

2006-10-12T14:28:00.000+08:00

I'm always surprised by how many people ask me whether I've been to Tokyo Disneyland when I mention I've been to Japan. I haven't been before and it's never really been something I would prioritise to go and visit. My kiddy theme park days were over, I thought, so I was rather surprised at myself for going to Universal Studios Japan AND having a really good time. It kind of reminded me of Vegas, minus the seediness, because you're transported into a completely different world . Everywhere you look it's gimmickey or whizz!bang! or bright, happy & animated! You just can't help get excited and your inner child just springs out to surprise you.

From the moment I looked at the train... oh there was excitement from that point on! Yippee Sesame Streeeeet!

It was Halloween season and USJ was the place to be for ghosts and ghouls.

A Japanese staple, more commonplace than rice... Hello Kitty and Daniel-san!

Cirque du Soliel-esque Halloween Parade

The parade was full of brightly coloured and outlandish characters walking in the parade and prancing around the stage. From fabulous to ghastly - all very cool but I loved the guy in the pumpkin with a baby pumpkin puppet on his hand and also the candies walking around on legs.

Before you enter any ride it tells you the approximate wait time so to be able to get through several rides you pretty much have to stay at USJ for the entire day. For Jaws it was 35 minutes, T2 it was 30 minutes but for Spiderman it was 50 minutes! Geez. You seriously end up spending up to seventy percent of your time in the line. That Spiderman line was a crazy LOONNG line that extended around then left then right and through various rooms and sets. It's very cleverly designed in that the whole time you're waiting you're making your way through the publishing house set where Clark Kent worked. There is constantly something interesting to look at as you make your journey to the ride's starting point. The Spiderman ride was probably the best ride and I think I got too excited about the ride and buying the merchandise I just completely forgot to snap a photo of the complex. The ride made me "WOOAHHH!!", "acckk!!" and "Coooool!" my head off it was soo awesome! Worth that 50 minute wait.

Arnie in Japanese

Back to the Future!!

Jaws

Water World

The very last ride we decided to hop on was the Jurassic Park ride. You can't miss the roars that eminate from the "jungle" and it makes you curious as to how freaked out you could get! Just as you enter the ride there are a line of vending machines dispensing plastic ponchos (at a hefty price mind you of 500 yen = $7 aussie). We hesistated because it didn't seem like anyone else got one but thinking that they must be there for some good reason we decided to don the dorky ponchos.

Another 40 minute wait and in we went into a carraige and sat right at the front... where ALL the action is. We floated off and we immediately felt freaked out... well I did because I was right at the edge. There's nothing to shield me! When the dinosour comes out to get the carraige I'll be the first to go! We sailed through the calm areas with the peaceful herbivors and then we hear sirens and approach the DANGER ZONE. Carnivore territory! Woohoo! Rebecca & I were soo scared we went mental laughing at ourselves! So along we went through the DANGER ZONE and into pitch black. All you could hear were the sirens, our laughing cries and the occasional roar! At the end of the darkness was a massive T-Rex that extended out to us and as that is making you scream your lungs out you free fall down a slide, skid wildly into the water and out of danger! Phew! I had a good long scream down that slide it was great! Like letting off lots of steam. Again! Again!

In most of the rides, snap shots are taken of you while you're on the ride, usually during the really scary or exciting bits. I kind of feels like you're getting flashed by a speed camera. When you're exiting the ride you can take a look at your shot and buy it but it was enough for us to take a quick look and laugh at ourselves!

quiet goodbyes

2006-10-11T12:09:00.000+08:00

I usually attend calligraphy classes on Sundays but since this last week I didn't have to work I made a point of going to a Wednesday night class. It was the last class I could attend and I practiced my butt off. It was a really quiet class and when I said goodbye to my teacher it was really normal like I'd see him on Sunday for another class (I was having dinner with is family on Friday but this was the last classroom encounter).

After shodo I met up with my workmates, one being the substitute teacher, Iris, who came down to cover my classes for a couple of weeks. I'd actually met Iris the very first day I arrived in Japan. She picked me up from the bus station as I'd arrived on an airport bus. It was great to catch up with her again and have her meet my students because I'm always asking her advice on how to control and entertain my kids.

Work can really suck on many occasions but having a good relationship with your work buds always helps you get through those crappy days. This is only have the guys in the Sanda GEOS crew but they've definitely made a difference in making my time at work a more enjoyable experience.

Chakai & Ikebana

2006-10-10T22:34:00.000+08:00

Every Tuesday in Flower Town (yes ..Flower Town!), my tea ceremony sensei holds lessons in her home but in the last 2 months she's only been able to have about 4 to 5 sessions, which I've been able to attend. So I got a little taste of tea ceremony and what is involved and I must say I liked it so much more than I expected. Pouring, serving, drinking tea and eating little sweet snacks, who would have thought it was so much fun!

Some Tuesday nights, one of the tea ceremony student's mum has an ikebana, or flower arranging, session. These girls have such a good sense of how to arrange the flowers yet their styles are completely different. I had a go at it and the teacher gave me a "wow thats interesting!" comment. It's great fun but I guess I'm not cut out for this flower arranging business!
Tonight was my last night I could attend tea ceremony class at Bitou sensei's (tea ceremony sensei) house and so she had made a blueberry cheesecake and gave me a gorgeous tea bowl. I only knew her a short while and I only wish I could have been able to learn more from her.

2006-10-09T20:38:00.000+08:00

Sorry I lost all this weekend's photos! Booo! So I've just jammed the weekend into one blog. The weekend was great getting to meet up and catch up with people I hadn't seen for awhile. It was also the start of the goodbyes...

Friday night, the Okaba (neighbourhood peeps) crew met up for some last minute yakiniku. Taro's gym friend, Ayano, works for this yakiniku place called Kojun, which served THE BEST Kobe beef I've EVER EVER tasted. It was soft, fatty and melted in your mouth. The whole dinner was just meat!! Rousu cuts, calbee cuts, tongue and livers... wow.. it was fantastic! One of the guys, Dan, is a true yakiniku king and he was dishing out orders of what meats to put on the grill next and that the meats shouldn't be mixed up (rousu & calbee - they're different cuts of the beef and one is softer and fattier than the other. Looks almost exactly the same!). As full on as he was I got a good meat appreciation lesson that night!

Saturday I moved out of my apartment. I'd packed all my crap up and brought it to work that day. I thought I'd be ok lugging it to and from the train stations but it was tough! I never remembered my suitcases being THAT heavy to handle. I had to stop every few metres to take a rest. These old bones!

I still had one more week to go in Japan so I stayed at a friend, Kanako's, guest apartment in Takarazuka. Kanako's family used to live in that apartment but moved to another one just down the road and now keeps it for when her dad's business partners or clients come to the area. It was spacey, comfy and closer to most things than my Gosha apartment was.

So that night after work, I had dinner with Kanako and her mum and they showed me around the area so that I could get around myself. It was strange to think I'd moved out! Yeeks. I was feeling a little uncomfortable about the fact that I had to learn how to get used to another area as well as be super organised for the week to come but I was really grateful to have been able to stay there.

I almost forgot to mention it was my last day at work. It wasn't so climactic or dramatic or emotional. It was just another day. I went to work and then I left. It was so normal it was strange!

Sunday was my teacher's calligraphy exhibition day! For the past few weeks my calligraphy sensei has been collating his students' work and preparing them for display. I've always liked the look of Japanese and Chinese calligraphy but now I can understand a little better why certain pieces look the way they do or appreciate how good a certain brush stroke is. I spent the afternoon in the small exhibition area walking around and looking at the art and serving tea and snacks to guests and some friends that came for a visit.

Later on that evening I met up with Leigh and Alison in Sannomiya for one last hoo haa at the scrumptious Ban Thai, which was later followed up by some cake, coffee and good conversation. We had a really good night chatting away about living in Japan, feeling like antisocial oldies and making fun of people walking on the street below.

Monday I had to meet with the substitute teacher who was temporarily replacing me and moving into my apartment. I just had to pass her the key and show her around the area. I had a dinner plan in Takarazuka at 5 pm that evening and I was to meet her in Sanda around 1 pm. It was going to be tight but I had everything perfectly timed. I got to my apartment and just at the door I realised I'd forgetten the key... Oh how I wanted to steal a car right there and then and just drive the 30 minutes to the apartment but back on the train to Takarazuka I went. Two hours later we were in the apartment.

I got to dinner an hour late and was so relieved the journey back and forth was over. There were moments on the train where I'd suddenly freak out and had to double check I was going the right way! Dinner was with ex-GEOS teachers and an ex-manager. I hadn't seen some of them for months and as always it was good to catch up and chat about how much happier everyone is now after GEOS! Japanese teachers and managers have a pretty tough job compared to foreignors and are subject to crazy deadlines and expectations.

I got home late that night and was sitting down to relax and unload the pictures of the weekend onto my computer and whoops.. I accidentally deleted all the photos. I was rather shocked at my sillyness and went a bit mental! hee hee I can laugh at that now but I REALLY hope it never ever happens again! Yikes.

The Okamura's

2006-10-05T10:21:00.000+08:00

The family of my student, Kiyoto (the kid with the pumpkin head), live in the most amazing piece of land that has an Okamura family history of over 150 years old. The Okamura's maintain a sake factory, a little shop front selling the sake, a sake tasting room, sake tasting cottage, a tea house and tea garden and of course their home.

Me with Kiyoto's mum and little sister, Sakura, by the rest area just outside the tea house

A few weeks back, Kiyoto had passed me a scrawly little note that his grandmother had written in English "Please come in my house. from Kizuko Okamura". I was more than happy to visit their home and wrote a little reply with Kiyoto again being the messenger boy.

When we'd arranged it, the plans were that my manager was to come along with me before classes and we'd meet at noon. She told me to remind her. I ended up forgetting, waking up late and only remembering after my manager mailed me at 11.20am saying that she couldn't come along! erk. I made 40 minutes late! Sleep is my best and worst enemy. So is shopping but thats a whole other blog.

Entering the tea house there was only a small opening to it. You take off your shoes and crawl through the small square doorway. Sakura was the perfect size! Kiyoto's grandmother served us matcha (powdered green tea) and little chestnut snacks she had made.

The tea house is quite small consisting of a plain tatami space, a tea ceremony kitchen and the tea house viewing area - usually consisting of simple flowers, hanging scroll and small ornament, all appropriate with whatever season it is.

Tea house kitchen

Viewing area

Garden outside the tea house

The family have a sake tasting room in their home as well as one just off their living area. It's in a form of a little cottage, which Mr Okamura (Kiyoto's grandfather) built! Just outside the cottage is a little hand washing area made mainly of rocks and bamboo tubes, also made by Mr. Okamura. Buried underneath the rocks is a kind of xylophone so when water is thrown over them you can hear the chimes of the trickling water.

Inside the hut - they use it for sake tasting and entertaining guests

Takarazuka Reunion - 20 years

2006-09-30T18:28:00.000+08:00

My first trip to Japan was in 1997 arranged through a student exchange program involving an exchange of students from Melville City in Australia and Takarazuka City in Japan. The students from Australia are all from Applecross Senior High and the Japanese students are chosen from schools around Takarazuka.

The year I went, our group met Kanako, who had participated in the year before us. Her English was (and is) fantastic so she came along to our bus tours when we visited Japan. Now she's an executive on the committee and has been great with building and keeping relationships with a lot of the students and teachers who have been on the exchange program along the years. It's amazing the number of names, faces and people's stories she remembers and even her mum is in on all the details. My mum can't seem to remember me and my brother's names "Kenny.. ah Ivan.. ah.. Sue Yen!!"

Kanako initially wanted to organise a 10 year reunion party for her year group but it was mentioned to her that it happened to be the 20th anniversary of the exchange program. People from the 1986 group up to the students who were in the middle of their 2006 year gathered together or wrote in letters of congratulations and thanks to the communities and the program.

This year's group of exchange students

The 1997 group.. only 4 of us were there! Me, Gohei, Yuta & Hiroshi

Me & Yoko

Yoko was one of my host student's friends at school and she actually ended up going on exchange herself the year after us. It was weird that I hadn't seen her in 9 years but could still kind of recognise her and for some reason I remember that she had given me this blue and brown mug.

After the dinner, a bunch of us walked down to an izakaya nearby and closed the night with drinks and supper. I said goodbye to Gohei and Hiroshi and that was it. See ya'll in another 10 years!

Kampai!

Harroween

2006-09-28T21:38:00.000+08:00

Back to work and our school has turned slightly more orange! My manager coloured, cut. pasted and tacked all things ghastly and redecorated our school ready for the Halloween week coming up. Apparently the kids and teachers get pretty into it, costumes and all. I missed the Halloween events last year and I'll probably just miss it this year. No skin off my nose because that means no costume for me! yay! I'll just get to see pictures hee hee

A lot of the decos and props are salvaged from previous years and this classic pumpkin head was among some of the items that were revived. Kiyoto is one of my 4 year olds I teach on Thursdays. He likes dinosaurs and ghosts and enjoys clapping his hands on his head hehe and looks absolutely adorable as a pumpkin head.

gyaa!

hee hee munted looking ghost

One of my older students, Saaya is a real fashionista who's really into ballet and basketball. yikes! A lot of the kids I teach, or in Japan in general, are on really stretched schedules filled with club activities, extra study classes, swimming, volleyball, soccer, baseball etc... Saaya is no exception and always rolls into English class super tired but always slightly peppy and upbeat. She's a really sweet girl who's totally hip and happening so it's fitting that her ambition is to be a fashion designer in the future!

Back in Perth I never really did much for Halloween. Maybe once or twice in my whole lifetime. It was generally an excuse for people to ditch eggs and toilet paper rolls on peoples houses and cars "Trick or... TRICK!". I also remember being afraid of not having enough sweets at home on Halloween to give to kids otherwise they might do something to our place!

A more innocent memory is of my mum making a pumpkin suit for me with the help of one of my primary school friend's mum's and her splendiferous sewing machine. I just remember the sewing machine being really cool because it could make the pumpkin suit! I think I still have that suit at home in the linen closest somewhere hee hee too much wadding to see it go to waste.

Tuenesday

2006-09-27T18:17:00.000+08:00

After Friday's viral attack and Saturday recovery I really thought I was 100% and in the clear so I went out Sunday and Monday. Monday I'd walked around Osaka and maybe walked a bit too much, got home with sore legs thinking it was just a little fatigue. By 11pm that night my legs, jaw and back were stiff and sore. I went to bed and woke up with more pain and just utter frustration - I didn't have to go out Monday, if I'd known I could have rested and avoided all of this! Shoulda woulda coulda!

I couldn't really sleep properly that night. Shifting in bed was painful and getting up was painful. I was swearing my head off everytime I had to move. Argh! Crazy Japanese virus!! This was some strong strain. My manager took me to the doctor's Tuesday and he told me "its common cold/viral infection". Okie dokie. He gave me some meds that looked like washing powder but hopefully it will do the trick. It would be nicer and more comforting to be taken care of by mumsy but I haven't been doing too badly feeding myself good old rice porridge, drinking tiny little vitamin drinks and eating barley Christine had left me :)

These two days have been sleeping and waking to eat and take meds. Everytime I wake up, feels like yesterday! I keep thinking I'd just gone to the doctor's today but that was more than 24 hours ago! It's been really good to really rest and the pain in my joints is less intense now. I can move more comfortably so after some more drugs and sleep maybe it'll be back to work tomorrow :)

the harvest

2006-09-25T14:27:00.000+08:00

I've been watching the fields in front of my house change over the seasons and it's quite unreal to think these fields were once barren fields and crops started to slowly appear out of nowhere. I never saw the farmers planting their seeds so it seems like the sprouts just sprung out of the ground out of habit and every year it's the same routine! After getting used to the wheat fields swaying in the background it's weird that they're gone! Harvested! The farmers have been out in their tractors and big chinaman hats working away in the fields. So with the fields gone the frogs are homeless and migrating, many ending up on our apartment staircase. It's a bit of a war zone of frog casualities on our Leopalace steps. Even for a frog disliker I am quite sad for them!

The flu?

2006-09-23T09:58:00.000+08:00

I got up yesterday morning and my whole body was aching. My thoughts were, "What did I lift? Did I run too hard to the train station? Did a spider bite me?" I tried not to flip out and slowly got up to loosen my joints. It was hard to move and nothing I did would ease the pain. I felt like such an oldie with arthritic pain. That was a scary thought...

I'd planned to go to Hiroshima this long weekend and had just bought my tickets yesterday morning despite my pain. I thought it was nothing and I'd get over it. I think I tend to push my body a bit much when I'm here. It's a holiday mode mentality I guess. I got to work and was starting to get a bit upset at how much everything hurt. I just needed to know what was wrong. So I called my mumsies (she's a nurse) and of course she had the answer! She started off with "uh-oh.. you got the flu.. you better ress, drink lots of water and get some aspirin. Don't walk too much ah! Virus is no joke! Better take care of yourself." Ah gotta love my mum.

I'm not sure why but I got teary and really upset for a few minutes then went out and got some aspirin. You'd think I've been here long enough to cope with most things and a flu of all things!

Anyway.. with the trip to Hiroshima.. I was close to going but I just couldn't risk it.. I got up in the middle of the night and was lucky enough to have my neighbour offer to buy my shinkansen tickets off me at 2.30am this morning. Thanks, Ian.

So now, my plan is sleep, eat and drugs! It's an absolutely gorgeous day today. Good for hanging out the washing and hey I get to tune in live to the West Coast Eagles and Adelaide Crows footy match after all! Yippeeee :) Go Eagles!!

oh my freakin' ears

2006-09-16T22:23:00.000+08:00

On Sunday night, Taro, Oscar, Rebecca and I went to a hip hop gig in Osaka at club saza*e. I'm by no means a hip hop buff and some of the beats they played I didn't even know were hip hop but this amateur still enjoyed it. Some of the samples they used were surprisingly mellow and almost trip-hop like. They put on a good show but it was just freakin' loud to the point where I seriously think my brain was buzzing to the beats.

Taro used to live in LA and was a regular at some of the hip hop clubs and apparently used to listen to these guys, who were playing that night, play every week. Even he said it was super loud. I'm no granny prude after all.

The club was rather swanky from the entrance to the ladies rooms. Oh the ladies rooms. Rebecca and I were given directions to the bathrooms and were finally led down a short corridor top to bottom mirrors. We were thinking "what are we looking at? Where are we?" until one of the staff pushed in a mirror and wah lah, zee ladies room. Pearly floors, white and mirror walls... and it had those nice circular mirrors that reveal every blemish on your face but makes you feel like you're in a hip hop video cos they reflect in your pupils and make that white ring. The whole clud was up and down pimp and spanned around 5 floors including a restaraunt floor where we started off with some dinner and drinks.

The view from our dinner table. We felt like VIP.. until the maitre de told us we might have to give up our table to some other more important people if they arrived haha

Taro, Oscar, Rebecca and myself

Taro and Oscar are living in Japan and I met them through friends of friends hehe and Rebecca is Oscar's girlfriend who is visiting for a month. She's fresh from a 6 month trek through Africa and it was really interesting listening to her experiences - from game drives to volunteer work at an orphanage.

Five floors down

Trustworthy Japanese...

Egon

Hikone

2006-09-11T13:46:00.000+08:00

Randomly, I decided to travel to Hikone, in the Shiga Prefecture, which is located on the edge of Lake Biwako - Japan's largest lake. It's a small town with a few nice little spots with the main tourist attraction being the Hikone Castle. I'd also recently met some GEOS teachers, Keiko and Rachel, at National training from Hikone so I thought it might be a good idea to visit them at the same time but I didn't realise it was 2.5 hours away until I'd already promised to go! haha silly me, but it was a fun little day trip and it's always nice to explore the little nooks and crannies of Japan.

Like most areas of Japan there is quite a mix of modern, traditional and religious designs. This tourist area of Hikone, Yume Kyobashi, which is a short road of shops, is built in a traditional style. The inner parts of the area have just recently been built so as you can imagine are very concrete and clean.

Not to be blasphemas but he looks like a little comic mascot and reminds me of the kewpie mayo doll.

We walked around Yumekyobashi, had lunch, stopped for a candle decorating session in a candle shop then headed for the castle.

Hikone Castle

Genkyu Garden, which is located just a short walk from the castle.

I loved the walk through the garden especially since the weather was particularly fine. The greens were vibrant, wide spaces welcoming and the stillness of the water picturesque. What would have made it perfect if we could have admire it all from the tea hut with a warm cup of tea but we'd arrived too late so trotted back to the car.

On the way back to the car from the castle there was a long wall that I think was put up to cover a construction site. Can you spot the fake? haha

floppy goose

2006-09-10T15:39:00.000+08:00

My shodou sensei is having an exhibition of his students' works this coming October so in preperation for it I needed to have a hanko (name stamp) made.

Instead of hand written signatures people in Japan usually have a small circular stamp, with their surnames engraved on them, used with red ink to "sign" their name on everyday documents. The hanko we needed was especially for the calligraphy pieces I would be writing so it was square shaped and made of stone.

We decided on writing "gan", which is the "yen" character in my name. It means goose/wild duck and we're used old square chinese script, which turns out to look like there is an actual bird in the character. My dad told me a while back that that character was given to me by mistake so I'm walking around with the wrong name. How does that happen really? haha Anywho, we used that character to carve into the stone hanko.

The stamp end of the stone is sanded to a smooth, flat texture, painted in orange ink and then the character painted on in black ink.

Here's my sensei correcting my errors with his orange ink. I handed him what I'd done and he just cracked a smile and said, "it's supposed to be flying! not flopping!"

Once the character is (correctly) painted on in black ink you then start carving the orange parts out. Again I made more errors..but nothing irreversible hee hee

So here we have my goose hanko *squawk*

Life - Inochi

2006-09-03T16:04:00.000+08:00

Probably one of my favourite characters to write. The top right stroke of the proper square script gives me strife because it's just soo hard to get right. Also, the cursive writing feels a bit awkward to write because I haven't figured out the write rhythm but I like how it turns out.

Weekend with Cindy

2006-09-03T11:45:00.000+08:00

Finally I got a chill weekend with Cindy! We dined, hung out in our jammies, drooled over Orlando Bloom in "Elizabethtown", chatted into the tiny hours of the morning, lunched, shopped.. nice girls weekend :)

Sky buffet - always a good place to dine and I always get lost getting there!

Cindy's staying in an area called Ashiya, which is fairly close to Kobe, with her former host family. She'd been here a few years ago on exchange for a year so stayed with them for a period of time and this weekend I got spend a night with them. Their place was pretty nice and spacious especialy the bathroom! Wah! Like a mini onsen! hehe Ashiya is quite an affluent area so the houses around there tend to be pretty immaculate and the area itself is rather posh. Weird thing about it is that since it is situated in the hills there are wild boars wandering around the area after dark! So it's not safe to walk around here past 9.

We bummd around at home in the morning and tried out some monjya yaki, which is kind of like okonomiyake (savoury pancake with cabbage) but mushier. It looks pretty bad but is super tasty.

Elephant Cafe

We ended up in Osaka not long after to eat more and window shop, man I'm broke. In our strolling we bumped into this cutie. I don't know what it's name is but he/she stopped walking traffic and people were crowded around with their cameras exclaiming "ahh! metcha kawwaiii!" (soo cute!).

Walking around the arcades we spotted some people eating fairy floss. Yuuuuum!!! We found the fairy floss guy who was wearing some bear ears and looking like he really didn't want to be there. We stood in front of him, watched him let out a big yawn and waited for him to notice us. When he finally decided to talk to us he tells us we have to go into the arcade, take a picture club then come back for a free fairy floss. I had to rush off to calligraphy lessons so couldn't get the freebie floss! boo! Oh well.. so now I'm left with a fairly floss craving!!

2006-08-29T12:30:00.000+08:00

Oh yeah she did it! With the help of some luverly friends I managed to get my second plate and with 2 days to spare!!

Fushimi Inari Taisha

2006-08-28T14:42:00.000+08:00

I'd been to Kyoto a couple of times but there were some spots in Kyoto I still wanted to visit (Sanjusangendo, Ginkakuji Temple, Nijo Castle) but I only managed to hit one spot on my weekend. I headed into Kyoto late afternoon to escape the midday heat and completeeely forgot that most of the shrines and temples like the ones I wanted to visit close at 5pm. I initially intended to go to Fushimi Inari Taisha last but since it was closest to the station it was all I ended up seeing.

Even though I missed out on seeing the other temples, I'm so glad I went to this shrine earlier than later because it was pretty creepy! Inari is a Shinto god of fertility, rice, agriculture and...... foxes. So there are a number of statutes of foxes around the shrine looking angry and protective. The lonely planet actually recommends going to this shrine in the late afternoon so that the statutes of foxes appear more eerie... eeks!

As I approached the first set of gates, I walked through ever so slowly and kind of sunk into my shoulders as if a spider was going to fly in my face any second. I'm such a chicken. At first it feels a little claustraphobic because its like you are in a low rise tunnel but you get used to it. Then when I thought all was ok, I arrived at a small gap in the gates...

This gate was THE most eerie - the foxes, the tall trees, the sunlight creeping through. You feel isolated and just plain scared! I just walked quickly and hoped for some other tourists to come by. On my way back through these gates I heard a Japanese guy coming the opposite way go "KOWA!" (SCARY!) and I always imagine that when i look at this picture ahha

The area is made of about 4 kms worth of these red gates, all of which are donated by various people, companies and families. It is quite spectacular and makes for a popular hiking spot. I hiked for about an hour and after getting truly sweaty and eaten alive my mossies I retreated back to Kyoto station and on to the shopping.

If you've ever seen Memoirs of a Geisha, I think there is a short scene where the young girl runs through a set of these gates...

Soumen

2006-08-27T18:00:00.000+08:00

After calligraphy class, my shodo sensei (calligraphy teacher) took his family and some of his students to a friend's home for some soumen. Soumen is a thin wheat flour noodle, kiinnd of like bee hoon for those who know what that is. Much like some of the other types of Japanese noodles you can eat it hot or cold and since it was a hot summer night, we ate it cold and in Nagashi soumen style. The noodles are slid down a long bamboo flume helped by a stream of cold water and you have to catch the noodles with your chopsticks before it reaches the end. Everyone has a cup of tsuyu, which is a light savoury sauce, so once you catch yourself some soumen - dunk it in the sauce and enjoy!!

It seemed like such an involved way to eat noodles but you've gotta love Japanese people and their cuisine. It was such a fun way to eat noodles and catching those flowing noodles wasn't always easy!!

I think if you eat nagashi soumen at restaraunts, once the noodles hit the bottom, you can't eat it, but eh, some of us camped at the bottom for a little while.

My shodo sensei's wife, Akemi, had said we were going to her friend's place to have dinner and when I stepped into the house I was a bit confused as to whether I heard her correctly. We arrived at what looked like a little shop front and inside there was a lobby with pamphelts that opened into a large space with a large concrete space.. erm it looked like a gallery.

I found out later that the building is a gallery and a residential home and that the building itself is 100 years old! Amazingly, all the original wooden infrastructure is still intact and the owners recently renovated the interior, treating and repainting the woodwork. There is also this amazing and familiar woody smell in the house - one that is a fond smell of Japan for me.

Another really interesting thing about the house is that some of the walls are made of soil or mud, which helps insulate the building. It starts off as a thatched surface on which the soil/mud is pressed on to and when that hardens, paint is applied and you can't even tell it from concrete. While they were renovating the house they purposely knocked out the soil from one of the walls so that they could show people the style of the building.

There was also a well in the house. The only explanation i got was "It's a well. It is Japanese thing. Japanese people have wells in their house."

Out of the younger bunch of people there I think I was the oldest so I was a bit hesitant when the others wanted to play chasey in the car park across the street! I was full, SUPER tired from a long day and had a niggly headache but not to be a spoiled sport I persisted to run around and chase this elusive 7 year old around.

Thankfully the kids were tired out quickly and we soon got into some mini fireworks!! I'm pretty sure it illegal to sell/buy fireworks in a regular store back in Australia but in Japan you can usually find a small section of fireworks for home use in your local convenience store during the summertime. Although, what we had were simple little sparklers (like ones that are legal hehe) strung on long thin pieces of twisted tissue paper so you had to have them burn over a bucket. I remember playing with fireworks as a kid at Chinese New Year gatherings back in Brunei, so it was rather exciting and nostalgic.

Tannowa Beach

2006-08-27T09:30:00.000+08:00

One month in the works and finally our trip to the beach was here! There were about 13 of us going so it was a pretty involved little (big) gathering, plus the beach was a good hour and a half drive away from our meeting spot in Namba.

Miki and Takako had organised the whole shindig, getting all of us to Tannowa beach in a convoy of cars. I've heard many times that Japanese beaches are rather filthy and just don't compare to Aussie beaches so I wasn't expecting anything spectacular. When I got there I was pleasantly surprised and would actually say that it was a really nice beach. The water, sand and picnic areas were rather spotless although, the sand must have been at least 40% smushed sea shells, 'cos it was harsh on the feet!!! It's not the kind you ever EVER want riding up your swimmers!

Takako had borrowed a barbeque set for the day, so we charred up some meat real good! Good old barbeque! Apparently it's really common for people to cook up yakisoba (fried soba noodles) at Japanese bbq's . I'd left early so I missed out on their second round of cooking!!

Minding the chicken - Ian, Taro, Risa, Yuka M, Kris, Me & Aaron

Sanda crew - Risa, Takako & moi

Tannowa, I think, is kind of known for it's volleyball culture so some of the girls in our group had a bit of a bash around.

Yuka M, Risa & Yuka A - I don't usually go to the beach in Aust but do people usually bring floaties? haha these were hilarious, especially Yuka M's pink, heart-shaped Hello Kitty floatie!

Chillin' out with some Kakigori (shaved ice with sweet syrup)

I got pretty burnt on my shoulders and now I am so so brown, but I like it! I look healthy ahha. What a deceiving look.

Hangin' with the Umezaki's

2006-08-26T18:25:00.000+08:00

Finally! The weekend was here. No work for another 2 days! Yay! Work has been a bit off the last week or so and everyone has been super stressed. I don't think it'll stop here. Gya..
BUT anyway I was meeting with Yukiko and her family tonight! We were heading to the little festival held at the junior high school just across the street from my work. I got kitted up in the kimono and this time I tried to pay more attention so I could do it myself when I get back to Australia. Of course, Takako (SENSEI!!) was there to guide me through. That girl.. she's good!!

My yukata sensei ;)

With Yukiko & Lila, her doggie (also in a little yukata!!!)

"Suzukakedai" something something "Matsuri"

Yukiko & her mum

The matsuri was held on the school's sports grounds, which, across Japan, are generally just dirt. People were doing traditional dances in a big circle around a tall scaffolding, where four main dancers were leading everyone on, so all the dirt was constantly being kicked around. Any longer there we woulda been covered in it, but only our photos felt the effects of the airborne dirt.

I tried my hand at some of the dances and boy these feet ain't got no rhythm. Yukiko's dad was rockin' it out! Jumping and twisting, clapping his hands and flicking his wrists. The girls were good too but her dad had so much gusto in his steps. ahah he was pretty awesome.

We were supposed to get some stall food at the festival but it finished by 8 pm! We'd only been for about 45 minutes and it'd started at 6.30 pm. One and a half hours? heh? Ah wellers..

Back at the Umezakis' house. No cooking this time, just some sushi and beer. Cheers!

Count those onigiris

2006-08-22T13:47:00.000+08:00

See there's this promo going on at one of the convenience store chains, Lawson's, where you collect 30 points, by buying specially marked food items, to get a Miffy plate. On the last day of the promo, I still had 3 points left to collect but couldn't find a damn Lawson's. I thought all was lost BUT a friend mailed me to let me know it had been extended for another ten days! So I have my plate!!!!

How sad, right? but you know I ALWAYS buy onigiri (rice balls) on the way to work so I was delighted to finally get something for all those onigiris. I started eating soumen, which is cold noodles and soy sauce, so I could get the 3 point stickers cos those onigiris are only worth 1 ahha. That promo worked a treated on me to spend my yen in that convenience store!

There's another plate design and I want it!!! Just 27 more points in 6 days... can she do it?

the sticks

2006-08-14T07:12:00.000+08:00

I'm not sure if Aussies use this term, but I've just recently learnt this new term, the sticks, from my American and Canadian friends. I usually say "whoop whoop". Anyway, at the start of this week the GEOS teachers in the Kansai area went to "the sticks" for a couple of days of training.

We had to trek down to the mother land of GEOS, Tokushima, which is about a 2 hour bus ride from Osaka. In Tokushima, specifically Naruto, we stayed at a "Wellness Centre", which is just an old hotel that GEOS owns, out in the middle of the bushes. My neighbour kept commenting on the word "wellness" questioning when it had ever come into existence! Going to the wellness centre made me think we were all checking in for rehab. Let's get well!

Despite feeling like we were being shipped to a rehab centre in the middle of no where, there is actually quite an amazing view of the river, which strangely enough none of us took pictures of. The hotel was quite simple and had it's nice little areas people could gather to chat. There was also a pool out back and you could actually walk down on to the beach but apparently it was pretty filthy, as a lot of the beaches are here in Japan.

We stayed over at the hotel on the Monday night so we had an indoor "bbq" or more like yakiniku in a really badly ventilated dining hall. The food was great but man we stank after that and even after dinner was long finished, the cooked beef smell lingered so strongly you felt like you could eat the atmosphere in there.

Miki, Takako, Rachel & me - Miki is usually quite the rocker chick and totally kicks arse when it comes to belting out rock tunes at karaoke. It's bizarre seeing her kitted out in her professional attire and with her super long mosh-alicious locks tucked away.

Lexie, me & Kris - Lookin' mighty professional (I usually look like a dag at work, but we're supposed to look spick n span from the collared shirts down to our stockings....)

Going out to the sticks for training was rather tiring and sleepy but it was quite useful sharing how we cope in our work environments and sharing those little games and tricks that help control and engage our kiddies. It was also a prime opportunity to meet and catch up with some of the new and old teachers from around the area, hearing stories of their own Japanese adventures.

Home cookin'

2006-08-13T01:44:00.000+08:00

There's something about home cooked meals that taste so much better than any restaraunt feast. I mean we're not talking about crappy dinners I make in my apartment but those made in a charming little kitchen with the love and skill of a tender wife and mother. Oh, I know it is rather daytime family movie type talk but I had the best time hanging out with a friend, Yukiko, and her parents. Yukiko, her mum and myself cooked up a nice meal of tempura, salad, niku jaga (meat & potato stew), pickles, tofu, soup... Her mum actually did most of the work and we were her little kitchen hands.

I'm not sure what it is but everything about Yukiko's family home made me feel so comfortable and at home. Her parents were so friendly and amazing, easy to talk to and have a surprisingly quirky sense of humour. Both Yukiko and her mum are very artistic and a lot of items in the home have been hand made, hand painted and hand sculpted. I LOVE things that are hand made and it was such a treat to admire their sentimental works of art.

We chatted, ate, shopped, cooked, strolled, reminisced (with Yukiko's baby photos) and just enjoyed each other's company.

Sayonara...

2006-08-07T13:54:00.000+08:00

Quite a handful of people have been leaving Japan, going back to their home lands to get started on the next chapter of their lives. It's really sad to see them go and for most I don't know when I'd ever see them again! I guess it gives me more excuse to travel to visit some in their home towns.

Yuka & Pat

Pat's gone home to Canada to start post grad studies and work at his college. We had a big dinner & karaoke night out in Osaka with a bunch of the GEOS crew. He's a freakin' hilarious fella with a heart of gold and I wish him all the best!!

***

A bit closer to home, a girl from Seattle who lived near one station away, went back to Seattle with her fiance, John, who was also living here for awhile. They'd just recently gotten engaged here in Japan and her ring is beautiful!! Anyway, I miss having her as a "neighbour" friend. For some reason, when I went to say good bye to her I totally felt like I was going to see her again so I wasn't so sad, but I still do miss having her around.

We had a late one out around Sanda, dinner and karaoke with all her AEON (another english conversation school) work mates and students. AEON used to be part of GEOS and they split a few years ago because one of the directors wanted to open schools overseas.

Awhile back there were these two kid sisters that came into GEOS for a trial lesson, so that they can get an idea of our classes. A few weeks later, in a random converstaion Anna asks me if I'd done a model lesson for these two girls, Mako and Kako. I kind of glaze over the names and reply "Nah!" then a few seconds later went.. hang on a second "YES I DID!". She starts laughing and exclaims that they signed up to her school! hahah geezz!!! How funny, but then again the schools are fairly close to each other you'd think it'd happen more often hey.

Anna & John

A beautiful duet *sniff*

Taro & Anna singing "I can be your hero baayyy beh". I don't know what it is about that song but I get a bad feeling from it hahah kimoi yo.

***

Finally, of course Christine left our shores for home back in Perth. It's very strange to me that she has left so I can only imagine how bizarre it must feel for her. What an amazing journey it has been for her and I'm glad to have been able to share some fun times with her here in Japan. She really did make the most of her time here and with a spirit like that she will for sure continue to make the most of everything wherever she is! Genki uppu babe :)

A lot of you who know Christine, knows she loves her food so what are outings with out a continual flow of good food. You know she doesn't only eat and take pictures of great food but man she KNOWS her Japanese food. Next time you're with her, play the "What's this random Japanese ingredient?" game. You will be amazed! hehe

some eating (Marisa, Alison, Christine, Me & Leigh)

On our way to Kyoto (Christine & Marisa)

more eating...

and more eating...

"part of your woooooorld" (Christine & Alison)

So with Marisa's final song choice we sang the beautiful words of the Spice girls "Goodbye my friends.. it's not the end"

Takarazuka Matsuri

2006-08-05T10:26:00.000+08:00

Christine, Chieko, Jun and myself dressed up in our yukatas to view the fireworks out at the Takarazuka Festival. You can never go wrong with a fireworks show but it was extra nice that we were in our yukatas, in Japan, at a festival.

Chieko's mum was going to dress us all in the yukatas but I had to work that day so had to get my work mate, Takako, to do it. Her parents own a little kimono workshop that operates from their home so she is quite the expert when it comes to handling these babies! I was so grateful for her yukata wearing talents and her little re-adjustment tips made these seemingly elaborate costumes so accessible! Love her work.

Chieko lives in Takarazuka, so after the fireworks show, we walked back to her place. We'd watched the show from her family friend's apartment corridor balcony because it has a 180 degree view of the river. This family friend of Chieko's actually did a one year exchange at Morley Senior High School in Perth around the same time we'd done our high school exchange! What a small world.

We sat around at Chieko's place for a bit, eating a scrumptious chirashi zushi meal her mum had made, trying to figure out where we should go next.

With our getas combined...

...we decided to karaoke it to the early morn

Christine and myself stayed over at Chieko's and we'd rolled into bed at a ridiculous hour. So as the birds were chirping we said good night..

Chieko (in her dad's wonky sunnies) , me & Christine

The next day Chieko's mum and dad set up a huge brunch for us, of which we could only eat about 30 percent! They are always so so kind. I felt like such a moocher waking up at 1.30pm and to a wonderful lunch prepared by her mum.

It's always a treat hanging out with these girls and its always surreal when we're with Chieko. All those years apart, contacting each other through ye olde snail mail, it's amazing that we've come this far!

Summer School

2006-07-25T20:57:00.000+08:00

It's the beginning of the school holidays and our crew of 85 kids and 8 teachers from GEOS went to cause havoc on an island around Okayama prefecture. The bus ride there seemed to go on forever but the kids made it interesting playing their strange games and feeding us their even stranger assortment of candies. All of them seem to have something different in their bag of goodies that would never fail to catch some kid's eye, attracting stretched out, empty, upturned palms and cavity toothed kiddies.

Bus no.1

After a really really long bus ride we arrived at this German forest to have lunch. It-was-HOOOTTT!!! The air was so thick with humidity and heat you could seriously slice it with a knife. One of the students I was sitting with felt so uncomfortable she complained she wanted to go home and jogged around in circles to get some cool air.

After lunch we all broke up into random groups so the kids could explore and buy souvenirs. There was no real system so there were kids wandering here and there so the small group of four I started with become ten. I was constantly doing head counts afraid I was going to accidently lose one. Before I came on the trip I was worried that I would lose a couple and maybe cause some dehydration. I'm glad to say despite the chaos of the trip I didn't do any kid any harm!

First thing in the morning, on my way to the camp's meeting point in Osaka, I had to pick up a student near my area. She's another teacher's student so it was the first time I'd met her and I think also the first time she'd been away from her family. I was scared that she might start crying once she said bye to her mum or her teacher, who accompanised us to Osaka station. Thankfully she become comfortable quickly and started cheerily chatting to me in Japanese. I couldn't really understand what she was saying but I was just glad she was doing so well.

Krogenhaus in Okayama - it was quite scenic but just too hot

"One, two, three.....eight, nine, ten.. Alright! Let's go!"

After finishing up at the German forest we hopped on a ferry, another bus and headed for our overnight lodging at the Carillion House.

The rest of the day was getting to know the kids, trying to remember all their names, organising them for mealtime and bathtime and bedtime. Kids are great but hard work to coordinate. That night involved a lot of running up and down stairs, getting beds together, looking for kids, looking for which floor the female toilets, male toilets, male baths, females baths were (you'd think female toilets and female bath would be on the same level right?), getting hugged, teased, tricked and surprised by the kids....It was such a tiring day but it was so much fun!

**Day 2**

The kids were up by 5am but us teachers didn't rise til 6.30am, I know right? SOO late! hee hee

After eighty odd beds were packed away, brekky scoffed and eighty odd kiddies suited up we headed down to the jetty for some boating.

The boats were simply wooden planks on thick chunks of styrofoam. I was doubtful as to how were were going to stay afloat or steer but it went surprisingly well. It was a bit of a crooked journey with, "LEFT LEFT LEFT no RIGHT RIGHT no LEFT!! ok let's count, in English!! 1, 2 , 1 , 2, 1.......2.......*clunking of oars* ichi, ni, ichi, ni.." but we made it to the other side of the shore in the end..safely!

Lunchtime!!

Lunchtime came, our last meal at the Carillion House dining hall, and that pretty much meant our camp was coming to an end.

The ride home...

We arrived back in Osaka, came off the bus and did one last head count. That was it! The end of GEOS summer camp for these kiddies. The kids seemed to have fun, being away from their parents and being able to bunk over night with new friends. It was cute to see some pair off and make little friendships that might have only lasted one 3 hour bus ride, those 2 days or could continue through out the summer and on. Times like these for kids are awesome and you can see the excitement in their innocent eyes! I always say it takes only one summer for kids to lose or create a new friendship but either way it's always a cheerful and memorable time.

not too shabby

2006-07-16T22:37:00.000+08:00

My sensei usually writes in orange.. cos he's the sensei, so the top picture is his and the bottom picture is my script. He likes to write the old form or an artistic free style version of the characters for me to do. This character is hitomi and means eye (the black part of our eye.. pupil?? haha), hence the crazy looking artistic version on the right.

Gion Matsuri

2006-07-16T22:36:00.000+08:00

Our first matsuri (festival) for the year was the Gion Matsuri up in Kyoto along the main shopping road and home ground of the geisha. Cindy, Emi, Yuka and myself braved the crowds and the heat to get into some festivities, but really we just ended up eating most of the time!!

Us with our much needed fans

Outside a roadside shrine

There were dances on one end and lanterns on the other end... and this is one long road with too many people! So after a slowly served dinner, which made us miss the dances, we headed towards the lanterns side to catch these tall structures lit up at night.

Jankada Karaoke fans! Those fanned good!

Apparently there are about 20 odd of those lantern structures along the road! We looked at two and veered off into the eating stalls. During festivals of any kind there are usually a lot food stalls selling karaage (fried chicken), kasutera (butter cake bits), kinako (plain jelly coated with peanut or matcha powder), crepes... and the list goes on. There was a new one I'd never seen before - an egg senbei (rice biscuit) stall- flat piece of senbei, sauce and egg. Oishi sou!

Toffeed fruit. Yarashii desho!

I actually REALLY wanted to wear my yukata since it was Gion, mother land of yukuta wearing, but alas I was out numbered 3 to 1 with reasons like "It's too hot" "It's too tight" "I don't have my geta (wooden slippers)" ! ahha. Anyways, it was a pretty hot and squishy night so I woulda been cranky and super sweaty by the end of it but I'm sure there will be hotter and squishier nights but I just wanna wear my yukata dang it. Til the next time!!

star festival

2006-07-15T19:04:00.000+08:00

For a week at our school the kids wrote down their wishes and dreams as part of the star Festival week. The story of the Star Festival, known as Tanabata in Japanese, is based on Chinese legend where two stars, Alter and Vega, meet on this certain day. It happens only once a year over the Milky Way and a lot of people say the stars are two lovers who are only able to meet on this special day. So people celebrate by writing their wishes on a strip of paper and tying it to a bamboo tree.

Our branches were choc-a-bloc with kid's wishes. A lot of them liked jobs like "ice cream shop manager" or "cake chef" or "pet shop manager" ehehehe very cute. Some were random and specific like "I want to be a prosecutor" or "I want to be an animation voice actor" or "I want to be a nurse and teacher and flight attendant and doctor" ahha ambitious girl that one.

I think if its a real bamboo tree many people burn the entire branch with the wishes on them, I guess in hopes of sending the wishes into the intergalactic air. Ours was plastic and we weren't prepared to light a fire ahah so we just took the wishes off and gave them back!

My manager, Risa, and the pink GEORA, GEOS Kids mascot. Risa is so so hilarious, cheesy and a bit of a poser! She's my 3rd manager in the last 8 months! Can you believe it? Anyway she's fantastic and I'm soooo glad she's come to this branch. She makes work so much more fun!

chakai & ikebana

2006-07-11T20:22:00.000+08:00

On Tuesday night I attended a chakai (tea ceremony lesson). The tea ceremony sensei requested that I wear a yukata (summer kimono) so I got dressed up into a yukata that my shodo teacher's family had given to me.

That night a couple of other foreignors, who were in Japan on holiday and exchange, were also there to watch and join in the ceremonies. I felt like such an oldie, they were all 16!!

One of the tea ceremony girls making tea for the guests

The girls who usually attend the tea ceremony class served the guests tea and sweets, all done in a specific and traditional way. When the girl makes the tea she has to pick up the utensils with the correct hand and place the utensils down in a certain way. It's quite a delicate and complicated process that it takes years and years to perfect. It was quite funny because we, as guests, didn't really know what was going on so kept very quiet while the formalities were being performed and now and again the silence would be broken by giggles brought on by the tea makers and servers dropping utensils and plates and shouting, "ah reii!! sensei what do we do now?"

My piece of "art"

Next was a mini ikebana (flower arrangement) lesson. Well, it wasn't really a lesson but a little play around with the flowers. The sensei has a number of little vases and in the vase theres this mini bed of metal nails that's super heavy where the flower ends are stabbed into. I didn't know this until a couple of days ago, cos I took the arrangement home, when I was washing it out and almost massacred my hand with it!

For some reason being in the yukata I felt like a kid. Maybe it was the young company, maybe it was the unco-ness but theres something about wearing it that made me feel very 12 years old!

The tea ceremony team and guests

bargain hunting

2006-07-07T17:57:00.000+08:00

It's sale time in Japan so I paid a visit to Hep 5 in Osaka for their "HEP 5 up bargain". It's always mad in Osaka but it was especially crazy today. Walking amongst the crowds, in and out of the shops, it felt like an uber club with a mass of different rooms each with its own genre of music..and they play that music LOUD. On top of that noise a lot of the shop keepers stand at the shop entrance with samples of their bargain clothes and shout in their nasal voices "1000 yen! very cheap! Today only! 50% off!!". Pandamonium!

Felt way more crowded that it looks here!!

By the time I got to the 8th level I think, I was getting dizzy from dehydration and couldn't find anymore energy to fight through the people. I hadn't even found shoes yet! Anyway, I retired from bargain hunting and met up with some friends for dinner.

I met up with an old work mate who moved from country livin' to the big city. I hadn't seen her since cherry blossom time so it was good to catch up.

It was a pretty warm night and after dinner we went for a spot of pool and ping-pong. We happened by some random place in Osaka and the pool hall's air conditioning wasn't working but they had their games at a discount so we braved the ishy heat for some cheap fun! It-was-HOTT man! especially during our spazzy games of ping-pong. Most of the guys in the place were so sweaty their shirts were pretty soaked.. gross!

totally missed it

Cooling off Asia style!

shodo dinner

2006-07-02T16:47:00.000+08:00

I've been doing shodo, Japanese calligraphy, for a couple of month now but have had to skip class a fair few times because of holidays, sunday outings etc. The other week I THINK my shodo sensei said to me that if I wanted to get good enough or at least be able to make some nice gifts or be in an exhibition I have to go every week. Exsqueeze me? exhibition? I figure in the end I can just be "artistic" and my scribble can pass has "arty". Anywho it sounds like fun so now I am endeavouring to stick to it every week. I love shodo, but yeah sundays are generally busy days so the probability of something clashing with shodo is high.

After bowling I rushed to shodo but I was being given a lift and ended up being 20 minutes late. I sat down, practiced for like 10 minutes, packed up and my shodo teacher took us out for dinner. Nice lesson! haha

The Morimoto family and Azumi (furthest right)

My shodo teacher's wife, Akemi

One of the other shodo students, Atsuko. She's so hilarious especially when she's trying to speak English cos she gets so frustrated with herself but in a funny way. She always asks "How bout?" whenever I try new food hee hee

Let's bowling

2006-07-02T09:54:00.000+08:00

I've always enjoyed bowling but I think I usually avoided it because of the shoes you had to borrow. The thought of the hundreds of others before that had hired them makes me shudder. The ones at this bowling alley in Sanda had such bright shoes that make you want to smile! hehe

Happy 1980's shoes

Anna & Sophie

Our lucky Hello Kitty ball

craving ramen

2006-06-30T09:38:00.000+08:00

For a couple of weeks now I've been craving ramen. I'd actually dream about it I was craving it so bad! So the night came where I got my chance and oh it was sooo indulgent. Filled up so much that I don't think I'll be having anymore for long awhile. This place Anna brought us to has the best ramen I've ever tasted. So full of flavour! and the soup forms a thin layer on the surface after awhile so you know it's made from the best ingredients!

Oscar & Taro

Ian, myself & Anna

Koyasan

2006-06-26T14:53:00.000+08:00

The weekend Meng Yen returned home, Christine and myself headed to Koyasan in search for culture, zen and sesame tofu! It's in Wakayama prefecture, which is one prefecture down and about 3 hours one way so we'd planned to stay overnight at a shukubo (temple lodging).

Koyasan is an old country town that is home to about 117 Shingon Buddhist temples, 2 monasteries and a massive cemetery containing about half a million tombs. It's quite a peaceful and small area but tourists from around Japan and the world travel to this area for its tranquility and culture, or as part of their Buddhist pilgramage.

Our ryokan

Our shukubo grounds

The temples have their own monks and priests so instead of your bell boys and conceirge of your western hotels the young monks in training are the ones who bring meals to your room, make the beds and carry your bags.

We'd arrived in Koyasan a couple of hours before dinner so only went for a quick stroll down the street and around our temple grounds.

This seemed like an interesting fox trail so we went through to the end and found a little hut surrounded by some tall forestry. It got a little creepy by the end I found myself slowly jogging on my way out.

Being a Buddhist temple our meal was a vegetarian one. When I think of vegetarian meals I always have the impression that they're light, tasteless meals but this on was a delicious feast that I couldn't even finish.

Koyasan is also famous for it's goma tofu (sesame tofu). The first taste of it wow-ed me but it was so rich I couldn't make myself finish it.

So after dinner, another quick stroll and a nice hot bath we were in our yukatas relaxing on our futons - treating our nails and snacking on our smuggled in chips and pocky.

The next morning we got up nice and early to watch the daily prayers at 6.30 am. Our guide led us to this lavish prayer room where two young monks were about to start their chanting. Straight after they'd finished we were led into another little hut to watch their daily fire ceremony, which I'm not sure what it's meant to symbolise. The monk lit a fire in a black pot and intermitantly sprinkled blessed water and spices into the fire.

By the time the morning activities had finished we were starved so were happy to see breakfast waiting for us in our room when we returned! We were still buggered after breakfast but our beds had been packed away so we so gracefully curled ourselves up on the tatami mats and napped on the floor cushions!

Ok.. I guess it was time to start our day. Nine o'clock we got back up, check out and started our exploring.

The stroll through the cemetery, onwards to Okuno-in

We got to the temple entrance and weren't allowed to take pictures, so this is the river just before Okuno-in temple. The wooden engraved planks in the river are in memory of aborted babies and those who died from drowning.

Daimon - Large gate at the main entrance to Koyasan

Konpon Daito Pagoda

Garan

Rice snacks and Tea in Kongobuji Temple

Daishi Kyokai (Daishi faith hall)

Tokugawa family tombstone.

We did well in covering everything we wanted to see and with time to spare, so we used the time to head home an eency bit earlier. From there it was train sleep, dinner (KFC yum!), got home... mid-June. My flip calender still read June 1.

hee hee

2006-06-25T11:55:00.000+08:00

There's a kindy in front of my work and every Thursday I see the little kiddies in their matching yellow hats pile onto the bus. There's also a rabbit one.. it's an actual rabbit with ears and a round nose! tee hee

sistas in japan

2006-06-23T09:16:00.000+08:00

Here are some snippets from Meng Yen & Christina's visit to Japan.

Our oogles of fun:

First night with the girls. Dining at the Sky buffet in Kobe

Polo Dog Bar. Meng Yen, Christina, Christine & Chris (yes i know! a lot of Chris's)

Keep those eyes open! tee hee

***

Nara - the town of the deers, one massive Buddha (Daibutsu) and an even bigger wooden hall (Daibutsuden hall).

Hi-5 Buddha

Christine (those are her legs!) on her way to being enlightened. The column has a hole through it, which is the size of one of (the big) Buddha's nostril and some believe that if you are able to pass through the column you will be given enlightenment.

Meng Yen: "Feeling very zen". We love the mu-mus, we wanted to live in the mu-mus. The mu-mu wearing was at this massive spa complex in Osaka, aptly named Spa World. There's a multitude of spa related things you can do there and the main one being soaking in the hot public baths (onsen). There's two floors of onsen, each floor having its own theme - one European and the other Asian - and since you have to be butt-naked in there each floor is seperated by sex, so each month the girls and the guys alternate between themes. So after a hot day in Nara we had a relaxing evening at the spa, cleaning and soaking ourselves in all sorts of wonderful baths and had dinner in our mu-mus. Everybody say "zen".

***

The girls got the tour of my rice crops

Kobe beef dinner in Kobe!

You see that Stitch teetering on that edge? We thought someone had spent squillions of 100 yen coins to get him to that point and that we would ultimately be the ones to score him. Score him we did BUT he was planted there!!! Scoundrels! We were totally sucked in by the tactics of this games shop, but it made for some good laughs. Hai, dorks we are!

***

Was that really horse meat on rice?

Shabu Shabu!!

***

Meng Yen was determined to send Stitch (whom we named Lucky) away with Christina but that girl was up to her eye balls in luggage. Three of us struggled with her luggage and for her to have made it to Tokyo with all of it by herself was a true testament to her tank status. Go tank!

A week had gone since the girls had arrived and we couldn't believe it was already time for Christina to go home. We miss you girl!! Look forward to reminiscing with ya in October, babe.

***Country livin'

Christine, Meng Yen and myself visited the public bathhouses in Arima Onsen in our quest to find more zen. Arima Onsen is one of Japan's oldest onsen towns that is just 2 stops away from my place. There are quite a few types of public baths around the area but the two main bathhouses are Gin-no-yu and Kin-no-yu, gin meaning silver, kin meaning gold and yu meaning hot water.

As for our quest for zen the kin-no-yu bathhouse was a bit of a madhouse with lockers rooms that were way too cosy. The baths were so so hot (44 & 42 degrees) that our skin turned bright red and I felt a little woozy, but nonetheless it was still good experience.

Okonomiyake in Arima

After a scrumptious okonomiyake lunch we headed to the gin-no-yu bathhouse, which turned out to be a lot quieter and much more relaxing. This bath was rather hot too so we didn't soak for too long and by the time we finished up in Arima it was meal time again so we paid a little visit to my neighbour restaraunt, sushi hachi.

I've only been there a handful of times but each time I go, the owner, Kazuya, is always a wonderful host. I never know what to order so I ask him to "o-susu-meh" (recommend) something and it's always been an absolutely beautiful feast. My dental neighbours were also having dinner there that night so we joined them for a little fun. Country hospitality!

***Just stepped out of a salon

World Cup fever. Carn Aussies!

***

Can I have smore? Our smores!! YUMM! Christine had so so kindly introduced Meng Yen and myself to these awesome snacks. Step one, heat up a marshmellow over an open flame, step two, sandwich melted marshmellow and a bit of chocolate between two cinnamon crackers. drool~

Meng Yen in her teeny tiny bed. There was lots of room for us to sleep in Christine's place but she insisted on the tiny couch.

Another week passed and that was it! Unbelievable. I had to say goodbye to Meng Yen as her and Christine were whisked away in a taxi on their way to Christine's school festival. Missing your old lady jokes, Yen! See you soon, babe!

2006-06-22T12:05:00.000+08:00

as if there aren't lots of better things i should be doing.. like posting pictures, mailing extremely belated birthday gifts, going to work maybe? heh...
but i've ben checking out zach braff's new website (yay) www.zachbraff.com
(he's the guy from scrubs)

ack its rainy season.. so of course its raining today.. which means more frogs and wet ankles

catching up

2006-06-21T21:16:00.000+08:00

Its been a really busy two weeks with two of my close girl friends coming to visit. I had met up with Christina when I went back to Perth in March and hadn't seen Meng Yen for about 8 months. However long ago or recent the last time we'd seen each other it was equally exciting anticipating the fun times we'd have - sharing weird and wonderful Japanese experiences and just catching up on where we were all at in our lives. There's nothing like a good face-to-face heart-to-heart conversation with a close gal pal - they're GOLDEN!! - and while they are simple moments they can be increasingly rare with lives moving destinations and careers getting more hectic.

During their trip here I kept forgetting that I wouldn't be hanging out with them in Perth again for awhile because they'd moved! (maybe til we have babies? haha) Duh! Meng Yen has been in Sydney for.... a year now? A year in July (I know you told me but I forgot..!!) and Christina was going straight to a job in Newman after returning from Japan. I'll see them in October for Yen's wedding but it will be a rather jam packed and busy weekend so it crummy to have to see the quality 2 weeks come to an end.

Anyway, this is just a short blog, will be posting pictures of our shinanigans soon. Have caught a cold during all the excitement. I have become just like many of my snotty students who are constantly sniffing and wiping their noses with their sleeves - I don't do that last bit ahha. The Japanese cold medicine I'm taking, which is quite a common one, has to be eaten three times a day after meals and I have to take 3 tablets each time.. 3!! thats 9 a day! Bugger me. Ah wells, back to my soggy ricey chuk now. Mmmm

Cindy's arrived!!

2006-05-28T23:53:00.000+08:00

Cindy's here! Finally. After years of wishing and hoping and scheming she has moved her life (for good!!) from Perth to Japan. So a few weeks into her stay here we celebrated her birthday out in Osaka in true Japanese style - drinks and KARAOKE!!

Minoh

2006-05-28T23:27:00.000+08:00

Ian, Naoko, Miki and myself drove down to Minoh on our weekend. Minoh is known for its waterfall, monkeys and momiji (marijuana looking leaves). Along the hiking path up to the waterfall, there are quite a few shops that sell fried momiji, which is unique to the town, and its deelish-ous!

Our ex-GEOS manager, Mayo, happened to also live in Minoh with her family so we managed to catch up with her over lunch. She was my first manager who got me settled in my first apartment, bought my bedding and just start things off for me. I hadn't seen her since she'd left in December last year so it was really good to catch up with her in her home town.

The trek up to Minoh

You can't look at these buggers in the eye otherwise they might attack!

2006-05-28T00:42:00.000+08:00

About a week ago, our neighbour, Yoko, had her birthday and Ian and myself, dropped by her house tonight to wish her a belated happy birthday. I got some pressies and Ian got some cake together and we had a mini birthday party.

A lot of the cake shops only have individual slices of cake so we made do. It was a "mini" birthday party after all.

2006-05-21T14:00:00.000+08:00

With all the rain the last couple of days it was sooo awesome to have a beautiful sunny day, and thank the heavens it was a Sunday.

I joined Christine and some of her JET friends to Toji temple in Kyoto. Every 21st of the month the temple area is a market place and this 21st happened to fall on a weekend so it was a perfect opportunity to check it out. The market was quite a complicated maze of stalls selling, often random, second hand goods, little Japanese trinkets, beautiful Japanese textiles and a lot of miscellaneous goods. The place was packed and with the hot sun and body heat combo we were boiling!

After the temple and a bit of afternoon tea, I went to Temma, which is just one train stop from Osaka, to check out a Rock Festival. I didn't have a clue what it was at first, I just knew i'd agreed to go to a "concert at a park" and didn't ask questions! In the end, it turned out to be a rock festival organised by a heap of foreign associations, featuring Japanese and foreign amateur rock acts. It was a really laid back vibe, people just sipping beers, chowing down on burgers and pies, laying on the grass.. There was a bit of hardcore moshing by the stage but nothing earth shattering, just some light entertainment for us non-moshers.

On the way home, I managed to meet with a friend, Chieko, at a train platform in Osaka and she invited me over for dinner at her family's home. I couldn't say no to a home cooked meal! Mine are so terrible it was great to get one cooked with a mother's love and talent!

Itadakimasu!

Chieko's an old friend who I'd met through our high school's overseas student exchange program back in '97. I'd never been to her place, or at least I don't remember ever being to her place but now I was here, 9 years later! We went through her photos of their trip to Perth all those years back and, as expected, all our baby faces, round and chubby, made me "oh my gosh!" Chieko to death! Everyone looked so different except for maybe Mike Lee. For some reason he had a face of a 24 year old back then!

sugoi green

2006-05-13T22:14:00.000+08:00

I was gone from Japan 2 weeks and the scene here completely changed. The greenery around my train station is SO nice and green it looks fake and I keep cursing at it like a crazy person accusing it of someone heinous crime. Speaking of green things, the frogs have also come out in their droves. There are heaps of rice paddies around my place and they're now filled with rain water, which means they become homes for the froggies. Sometimes the ribbiting drives me crazy but only if it stops for a minute then starts up again. Like the whirring of airconditioning. You don't notice it til it stops for a second.

The pathway to work in Minami Woody Town

March

May

going, going...gone!

2006-05-11T23:45:00.000+08:00

I kind of dreaded going back to Japan, thinking "crap noone speaks English here, ack". It was comforting being in the arms of an English speaking country for awhile again.

Straight from the airport, Kenny, Yvonne & I went for some Kobe beef. We hit Sannomiya and went to Moriya Steak House, where I'd taken my other brother to when he was here in Japan in December.

The following night we stayed around my hood, Sanda, and I brought Kenny & Yvonne to "alla Giapponese" for some italian nabe (soup). It's like a steamboat but with boullabaise as the soup. It's SO good, but with weather heating up I don't think we'll be wanting to have this for awhile, so it was good to have it again this one last time. Friday morning we headed to ShinOsaka where Kenny and Yvonne were to catch their bullet train to Tokyo. I couldn't believe I was saying goodbye to them after seeing the 24/7 for 2 weeks. I was afraid of going home from work that day to an empty, quiet apartment.

Hot! Hot!

Last few pictures together as the travelling team!

USA The Final Part: San Francisco

2006-05-08T21:16:00.000+08:00

Our holiday was nearing an end as we touched down on our last city, although Kenny and Yvonne still had Kobe and Tokyo to go! By now, we were actually hoping to go home to rest for awhile then come back to the US and finish off the rest of the trip! There was such an overload of new-ness and luggage! I mean we were loving it all but just needed a second to digest all the fabulous things we'd seen.

San Francisco was another very different city. Definitely an older area with so much more grit and charm about it. There is so much here that it's hard to do it justice in one post but here goes! ;)

Union square

The entrance to Chinatown

Alcatraz

I think these are the ruins of one of the prison guards' blocks

Kenny wanted to visit Alcatraz and we'd found a tour that incorporated an Alcatraz tour plus a city tour. I had no idea what to expect from Alcatraz except that it was a big, island prison where bits of the movie "The Rock" was filmed. I wasn't particularly excited about it. It's a prison. Geez. In the end, I came out of the place amazed and wanting to know more. When you enter the prison you're handed a head set to listen to a fully guided audio tour. It tells you where to walk and what to look at while their commentary and sampled audio clips are being played. I didn't get to finish it! I kept rewinding, going in the wrong direction and eventually wound up stopping the tape and listening to a historian tell me the stories! If there was more time I might have continuted but time was precious and we had to move on.

Isolation chamber - EXTREMELY eerie

To get to Alcatraz, you had to take a ferry over, so we caught the early afternoon one back from the island to the mainland to catch up with our city tour bus. Our first stop was the Palace of Fine Arts.

These ladies looking into the "flower boxes" I think were meant to be half covered with foliage but designs were changed for some random reason, which I vaguely remember the tour guide telling us. He had said that the designer hadn't been told that his art would only be temporarily displayed at an exhibition held at that venue until the day he started construction. As a sign of his protest he decided to make them face inwards. I wasn't sure if I'd heard right so I googled it and got some other explanation that was unconfirmed. Bizarre! Maybe I just heard wrong. The guide had also said that someone had asked a guard one day about why the ladies were facing inwards and he'd made up that the ladies were weeping at the lack of appreciation for art in the world. Although that explanation is also in official sites. I'm so confused. Anyway, aside from the confusing history it was quite a sight to see, something I'd expect to see in Rome but not San Francisco.

Then there was the Golden Gate Bridge stop. What else could you say? I couldn't believe I was really seeing it. I could just swim out and touch it!

Apparently the bridge is painted everyday. It's a never ending job. Unbelievable!

A dissected cable

The tour guide took us through a couple of the districts and neighbourhoods - Castro, Mission and Hill, Golden Gate Park (only around the outside), Richmond, just to name a few. There are quite a number of these "neighbourhoods" located around the city and although they are so close together they represent very different parts of the city. You have your gay community, yuppy town, ghetto areas, tourist central, night spots, little Italy (strip of italian restaraunts), celebrity hot spots.

The view from Twin Peaks - great lookout point

Our last picture stop before getting dropped off at Fisherman's Wharf was Alamo Square's "painted ladies". This is supposed to be one of the most photographed scenes in San Francisco not only cos of the great looking houses but because of the view of the city behind them. The yellow one is the Full House house!

I'd never really done tours before, thinking they were too expensive and unnecessary but I thought this one was pretty fantastic (Super Sightseeing Tours). The sites could speak for themselves but he just brought them alive with his great commentary and humour.

Infamous Clam chowda in a cup or chowdeer in a bun at Fisherman's Wharf

Me & Yvonne with the smelly but very funny seals lazing around at Pier 39

Some exploring of our own...

Haight-Ashbury, home of the hippies

Golden Gate Park. Who could ask for better weather?

Ice cream in the park yum yum!

Japanese Tea Garden inside the Golden Gate Park

On our city bus tour we were warned of this bush prankster. He would hide behind a pathetic looking bunch of leaves and scare passer by-ers with his loud growl. From our bus he looked pitifully obvious - a bush on a bitumen sidewalk - but when we actually walked on that road we were duped by the bush man! He shouted "BAH!!" and we all freaked out. It should have been obvious also because an unusually large number of people stand around staring at the bushman waiting to burst out laughing at his next victims. Once you get done, you stand aside and wait for the next. Hee hee

Dinner at Scoma's - recommended by the tour guide. Pricey, but excellent lobster bisque!

Lombard Street - the Crookedest street in the World

For dinner on our last night in San Francisco, we went to the Cheesecake Factory. Poe had recommended it to us in Seattle and at that time I only expected to serve cafe food. I didn't realise it was a massive restaraunt chain that not only had awesome cakes but a full-blown dinner menu. We went to the Union Square branch at the top floor of macy's department store. The department store was closed so there wasn't anyone around but when you got to the top the place was brimming with people.

It was probably one of our best dining experiences in the US even though there wasn't anything mind blowing about a particular thing, cept maybe that cake! We'd sat outside in the perfect evening weather, had a nice view, eaten scrumptious food and been served by a nice waiter (that we were happy to tip!). We'd also had a good chat, looking back at what had happened in the last two weeks, picking our favourite bits and freaking out that it was our last night there.

Woooo! Reese's peanut butter and white chocolate cheesecake. Best cake ever.

I'd read this guidebook that quoted Walter Cronkite: "Leaving San Francisco is like saying goodbye to an old friend.." and it really did feel like that at the end of it. It was also the end of our USA trip so it was extra weight added to the unwanted goodbye. Ah well, we'll be seeing you again some day :)

USA Part 3: Seattle

2006-05-05T09:13:00.000+08:00

Back to San Francisco and on to Seattle! 4 out of 6 flights down.

It was a bit of a shock seeing a normal city after being in the neon backdrop of Vegas for 5 days. Seattle is so very very green and was absolutely beautiful. The climate behaved so well for us and we had gorgeous sunshine for the 2-3 days we were there.

Being in Seattle I was excited to meet up with Poe and Janlyk, Perthians turned Seattlites, and discover the city that they would be calling home for awhile. Poe picked us up from the airport and we later met up with Janlyk for a scrumptious steak dinner.

How did we fit all that meat on one tiny table?

The next few days were jam packed with awesome food, gorgeous Seattle views, good company. All achieved in record time thanks to Poe & Jan.

Even after only 2 days in Seattle I could see why everyone who's lived in or been to Seattle love it as much as they do. I thought it was so much like Melbourne, unfortunately I've heard so is the weather. It had a young vibe and seems like a great place to bring up a family. Mind you this is only from a couple of days there, so I'd ask Poe or Jan for confirmation ;)

Pike Place Market (Kenny, Me & Yvonne)

First things we saw at the market. Beeeaautiful fresh flowers.

Taking a breather in an artsy little cafe

"Welcome" to the Chen-Choo's

Pacman!

View from Kerry Park (Queen Anne area). LOVE this view.

Troll Ave

Gas works

Atop the Space Needle. Brrr icy winds.

The night's viewMicrosoft Visitor Centre

Me & the Microsoft family

We met "The Man". The Man is HOOOTTT, spicy...chilli! Poe took us to this little place called Dixie's BBQ that's operated out of an old mechanic's shop. We got the low down from Poe and the story is that the owner used to have a mechanics shop and turned his shop into a little takeout place. Their star attractions are their pork ribs and, of course, their potent chilli, which can only be served to you at your table. The owner came around to our table with his little pot of chilli, which looked like a witch's broth. It even had a little chilli bubble on the surface just to add effect. He got us to taste the chilli and for real, he only got us to dip the VERY tip of the fork and DAMN it was explosive.

Good tucker

One other interesting thing about this place is that the owner likes to keep track of where his customers are from. So while you're there you have to mark out where you're from on their display maps.

The first 3 Bruneians at Dixie's BBQ

Through my neighbour Ian, I'd met this American guy, Justin, in Japan who had just recently moved back to Seattle. We'd only met up a handful of times in Japan so it was good that we were able to meet up with him a couple of times in Seattle.

Agua verde (Janlyk, Matt, Poe, Yvonne, Kenny, Me & Justin)

Justin's friends, Nick and Matt, Justin and Janlyk

So that was Seattle in a nut shell for us! Again, a city with so much more to see. Hopefully we'll be visiting again some day. I've tentatively made plans for a visit to Vancouver in the next year or two.. then maybe take a little drive down to Seattle? Ok yah Tina? :)

USA Part 2: Grand Canyon

2006-05-01T21:13:00.000+08:00

The Grand Canyon is really as amazing as people say. So breathtaking and it made my palms sweat as I knelt over the edge and looked at the long, long rocky edge.

We almost didn't get a chance to see the Grand Canyon. The tour company we booked with managed to miss picking us up even though we confirmed the night before and called three times that morning to ask where they were. After 2 hours of waiting and bs we quickly booked a new tour through the hotel concierge and our luck changed so quickly. We got a free upgrade on our new tour and it was a lot shorter being a plane instead of bus tour so we had extra energy and time to chill out in Vegas.

The tour took us only 3.5 hours and it flew us over Hoover Dam and the Canyon. We landed, visited some landmark sites of the Hualapai Tribe, who are the American Indian owners of the land and had lunch at the canyon's edge.

We flew there in a tiny little plane that seated about 10 people and the journey there was soooo choppy half the passengers nearly yakked. Choppy flights make my palms sweaty too! It was so worth it.

Views from the plane:

Look at all the pools!

Hoover Dam

Safe on land:

Hualapai Tribe teepee

Eagle Point

USA Part 1: Las Vegas

2006-04-30T21:28:00.000+08:00

Was all of that just a wonderful dream? Twelve awesome days in sunny USA. It-was-awesome!

My brother and cousin first flew into Japan on a Wednesday. We left Japan Thursday and arrived in Vegas the same day.. sweet! It was so surreal being on the other end of the international date line.. The journey consisted of an 11 hour flight, an hour transitting in San Francisco and another 1.5 hour flight to Vegas. We were buggered but buzzed!

I was a bit apprehensive about going to Vegas at first because I just expected tackiness, bright lights, casinos and seediness. I wasn't far off but it had such a fun vibe that made you enjoy it all. The weather was H-O-T and it felt like everyone else there was on vacation too... wearing flip flops, daggy swim shorts, travel bags and clutching cameras. The people were so friendly, always offering to take our photos when we were struggling, but some were so enthusiastic it made me sweat a little thinking that the next person might run off with my camera!

Out front New York New York Hotel

On the first night we went to see "Xtreme Magic starring Dirk Arthur" - a David Copperfield type gig with white tigers (alllll the magicians in vegas work with white tigers and are into animal conservation!). It was surprisingly really good apart from the interludes of half naked dancing girls. So wrong.

The three of us had been awake for over 24 hours so we were half asleep for some bits of the show. At one stage my cousin and myself had fully dozed off and when we opened our eyes Dirk Arthur was standing right in front of our table with his back to us, thank goodness, after making a dramatic reentrance as part of one of his tricks. . Sorry Dirk! Good show though.

We stayed at the Tropicana that night and moved to the Polo Towers Hotel on Friday night. What a difference! Check it..(Tropicana left, Polo towers right)

vs.

The next few days were filled with buffets, outlet shopping, a Wayne Brady show, Cirque de Soleil "Mystere", hotel/casino hopping, loads of walking in the hot hot sun (the strip is so much longer than it seems)...

The MGM Grand lion and me :)

Cirque de Soliel's mystical giant snail (I don't get it. Why snail?)

A little piece of Venice at the Venetian Hotel

Out front the Bellagio Hotel, by the singing fountain

Singing Bellagio fountain

With casinos all around, I just had to get into the punting mood even though I'm a chicken when it comes to gambling at a casino cos I'm such a novice. I had a go at the roulette tables at the Bellagio and unfortunately I wasn't a winner. I was hoping maybe I would win myself some outlet shopping money but well that plan fell through hehe.

Downtown vegas

American Diner-ing. The food at this diner was awesome and maaasssive! It was such an unreal little diner you'd see in an American TV show.

Paris!?

First US-mexican meal! Yummo enchilada.. (i think)

At the Venetian, after a little dancing and drinkies at "Tao - religious clubbing" haha

The club we went to, Tao, seemed like a nice little lounge from the outside. It's located at the Venetian in the shopping mall. Tao is also a little shop that sells incense and asian goods like teapots and oriental cushion covers. By night, the shop is cleared out and becomes a little lobby area to the nightclub, which is actually a few levels up and what we see from the mall is their restaraunt. Now that's making your shop space really work for you.

While we were waiting in line to get in, the door guy points to us and says, "You, you and you.. come through" and added us to the "special line". Woooo! We were totally racially profiled and sent into the club to add atmosphere to this asian themed club. We were confused and laughing! After we were let into the "special line" this chick in front of us says to her friend, "Is this the VIP line or what? They seem to be letting just ANYONE in! We must be in the wrong line." Haha they sure do, if they're asian! Anyway, who the hell says stuff like that unless their in a teen flick? There were also so many people badgering bouncers with random comments about who they know in the club and who they're friends with blah blah.. It was a weird vibe but it was still an enjoyable night after we got in, got some drinks and bopped around a bit. The club was quite nice and big inside, simple decor with sploshes of red here and there.

This was a store front mannequin of a clothing shop, which was right next to the nightclub, called David & Goliath. Makes me laugh everytime I look at it. His shirt has 3 gnomes on it and says "Rollin' with my gnomies".

Treasure Island Hotel (aka "t.i."), where nightly shows are performed on the faux ship. My cousin tells me this is where Miss Congeniality 2 was set.

The Luxor

So much more I tell you and it's as crazy as they say it is!

you know its not winter anymore when...

2006-04-19T00:34:00.000+08:00

1) you have to open the window to let the air into your hot and stuffy apartment (and you don't know how to work your air conditioning)
2) there are bugs everywhere (IN the apartment.. bleah)
3) your farmer neighbour starts tractor-ing away at his field of....rice?
4) everything is green
5) you can hang your clothes outside on the line rather than inside - along the walls, chairs, door hooks, bathroom curtain rail.....
6) you feel hot in your thinnest jacket
7) you're using your aircon (once you figure it out)

I'm used to very simple changes in season so it's very refreshing being somewhere where it's so noticeably different. I guess it's a bit early to be talking about summer but since the cherry blossoms are starting to shed you really feel the time passing and realise this part of spring is over. I was sitting at my train station looking at the cherry blossoms slowly float off the tree as the light breeze came through. When the train came by... wooosh.. a flurry of white petals swept off the trees, twisting and turning wildy, and quickly calming down to make their gentle descent onto the train tracks. It was so simple but a really nice moment.

So its DEFINITELY not winter anymore.. it only took 2 months to shake off haha but we have still been getting cold days. It's rather rainy now so hopefully it'll be gone by may. Fingers crossed.

shockin'

2006-04-16T22:24:00.000+08:00

This week at calligraphy I wrote "Man Kin" - Man = ten thousand; kin = gold...ten thousand gold? mm anyway My efforts were shockin' and my sensei made a comment about the roof of one of my "kin"'s... "it's so shallow if a hurricane passed through, it would surely fly away". hehe love his funny honesty. We also did "yume" (dream) again but this time with a bit of cardboard as the brush. My first attempt, i dunked the bit of cardboard way too deep into the ink pot, soaked up lots of ink and immediately broke through the paper when i schlopped it on. hee hee
Calligraphy can be tough but I still really enjoy it everytime I'm there.

at least i got my visa

2006-04-13T23:13:00.000+08:00

I got my tourist visa for the USA! wahoo!
It's massive - takes up one whole page and is valid for 10 years? Am I reading it correctly? Mmm well if thats the case I'll just have to make the most of it by visiting the USA a couple more times! Yay!

Later that night, I did the smartest thing ever! I went to the train ticket machine, stuck in a 5000 yen note to buy a 860 yen ticket, took my ticket and 140 yen in coins and went to catch my train. I didn't realise I forgot to take the remaining 4000 yen til much later that night. Jeepers. Ah.. I just bit my lip and thought "OH MYYY.. you eeeeeediot" eh.. felt like a ning nong. I'm so used to just sticking in a 1000 yen note and getting back coins. How stupid. Who does that? WHO? ohh i know.. "ME, PICK ME!!!"

oh well! at least the visa is in me hands! phew

hanami weekend: monday

2006-04-09T23:20:00.000+08:00

After an excessively long visit to the USA consulate to get my tourist visa I dropped into Kyoto for another day of hanami. No picnic and baddy games this time, just lots of rain!

I thought it might not be worth going with the rain pelting down but it may be my last chance to see them in their droves (cos they usually only last for about a week or so) so I took a chance. To my surprise there were many other who were braving the rain to stroll along wet and muddy pathways to take pictures and just take in the sights.

I started at Tetsugaku no michi, which means Philosophy Road. It's near the famous Ginkakuji Temple (Silver temple), which isn't actually silver anymore. It's a simple gravel road with small shops and homes to one side and on the other a wonky sidewalk lining a little canal, which the cherry blossoms hung over.

The road isn't really long but I wasn't really sure where the end of it was. While I was heading back the opposite way, the wind started to pick up, pulling my umbrella left and right. At the same time, the cherry blossom petals were flowing into the canal and covering the sidewalk. It looked like snow gently flowing down from the sky.

Next was supposed to be Gion, where the shopping is, but I made a quick stop at Kiyomizu dera - very famous temple. I'd been a few times before but decided since I was already in Kyoto and its sakura season, it'd be a shame to not see what it looked like in this flowering season.

I was just taking a shot of the hills because the mist caught my eyes but this couple happened to be in the shot. Quite sweet. The guy was a foreignor, I think Swedish, and the girl Japanese, both in traditional Japanese attire.

I think after seeing the hundreds of cherry blossom trees in Osaka Senri Park I wasn't so impressed by the blooms in Kiyomizu dera, but it was still beautiful and I still enjoy coming to this location.

This time round I managed to sneak in a back way and got in for free! I was just innocently wandering around and was sort of following some old ladies who seemed to know where they were going. I noticed that most people were walking in the opposite direction and then saw some red signs indicating "no entrance" but those old ladies just kept walking. So I just kept on walking behind them and their big umbrellas. It was just too easy. I'm thinking we might have been lucky to walk through while the security guard was on a toilet break. We'll just have to test it out again another time. hehe

Next stop was Gion, but again I was distracted. Just in front of the bus stop I arrived at is Yasaka Shrine, which has a scenic park at the back of it. Christine had just been there recently for hanami and had just told me about the park so I went in for a gander.

By this time it had become fairly dark so I was lucky enough to see the lanterns in the shrine being lit up. It's quite simple but still very eye catching.

I kept walking forward and the park's grassy areas were covered in the blue tarpoulins that picnickers would have used but tonight they were soaking wet. Past the tarpoulins was this amazing cherry blossom tree. You'd think after 2 whole days of looking at millions of sakura I would be tired of it but seeing them illuminated at night was just exciting as seeing them for the first time. It was stunning.There was quite a crowd standing around taking pictures and others just staring at it in deep thought. Many couples were sharing a romantic moment too. The tree made for quite a breathtaking scene and actually gave me shivers (the good kind).

I strolled out of the park and the shrine and headed into the shops for more wandering and strictly window shopping.

There are cherry blossom trees all over Kyoto but some more than others make you stop and take a picture or two.

By 7.30pm I was spent! I guess I still could have kept going despite the lethargy but I got on the train and developed a niggly headache, which later become a massive migraine. Went to bed at 12 and had a nice 11 hours of sleep. All better the next day and ready for work.

hanami weekend: sunday

2006-04-09T22:36:00.000+08:00

The cherry blossoms have finally bloomed into their full gorgeousness in Osaka. With a drawn out winter and slow start to Spring we were wondering if we were ever going to see the sakura bloom! Well they're here and they're so beautiful - blooming everywhere you look. Many have said that Spring brightens your mood and is especially comforting after those cold winter blues. Even though it has been rather rainy, I must say they do bring a smile to my face.

Sunday I went to Osaka Senri Expo Park with a friend, Yukiko, who just recently left GEOS kids (my work), along with her some of her friends. I was sooo excited about my first hanami experience, (hanami meaning looking at flowers) even though it's simply a picnic under lots of trees.

Being in Japan there's always crowds everywhere - entrance, exit, toilets, elevators, trains... dessert stands.. so when we got there..guess what? huge crowd. When we got into the park at about 11:30am there were already tonnes of people spread all over the grassy areas munching away at their picnic lunches. So little grass, so many picnickers..but there was enough sakura for all and more!

The many views of sakura

From left: Maho, "Kappa", Yoshi, Tsuneyo, Yukie, Me and Yukiko

For lunch we had sandwiches, fresh salads, mini bento boxes of assorted goodies, potato salad, strawberries, dango (japanese glutinous rice balls with sweet fillings), onigiri with sakura (rice balls with cherry blossom petals in it)... wish i had close up photos of the mini bento things, they were awesome and all home made by Maho (Yukiko's boyfriend's brother's girlfriend..phew). For the sandwiches, Yukiko bought little flags to put on top of the bread. So cute!! Love it. One of the girls brought boursin cheese! mmmmm boursin cheesee is sooo soo good - herb & garlic goodness.

Took one home! This one says "gambari masho" meaning fight on/keep on going! (not fighting match fight)

After stuffing ourselves we went for a little run around in a surpringly spacey but crowded play area. It was a wide open space with the cherry blossom trees surrounding it and there were HEAPS of people kicking soccer balls around, skipping rope, playing baddy, lacross, baseball.. and one group playing "eat a donut threaded through a string". How old school! I remember doing things like that back in Brunei at our birthday parties.

I had sooo much fun running around playing baddy. Anyone for baddy in Japan? Come on.. you know you wanna play... We ran around for quite awhile, long enough to get sun burnt! All of us! I was sooo pink.. like I had over done it with my blush and spread it all over my nose!

Everyone seemed to organise themselves very well around each other. Big city people are amazingly efficient.

On our way out of the park we took some pictures in front of this statue called "The Tower of the Sun". Its quite scary I reckon. It is a kind of mascot for this Expo that is apparently held every 50 years. Looks like an angry sun with arms and a bird's head on the tip of the sun's cone head. Bizarre.

Not exactly Rio's statue of Christ the Redeemer

As we were heading back home, at one of our train stops we decided to stop for a coffee and saw little piggie being pulled along on a lead by it's owner . What the? We sat down in the coffee shop, got our drinks and hear this "oink oink". The pig is in the cafe!!! We then deduce that the pig lady is the owner of the coffee shop. The little piggy was free to roam around and sniffed around our ankles, bags, chairs, one guy's crotch and then, literally, trotted back to its owner. RANDOM!! It made me think of Luke Perry! From my Video Hits reading days his profile read that he had a pet boar and they had this maze "Help Luke Perry find his boar". Double random..

So after the pig incident, a short subway ride back to Osaka station and saying goodbye to Yukiko and her friends I met up with Christine in town. We went for dinner at the Elephant Cafe again and I had discount vouchers from the last trip and forgot to use them! cripes. Oh well, will have to go back again then. It's a great little restaraunt, bit random at times but still a nice place to eat and as Christine pointed out - nice big portions mmm

I should be lovin this!

2006-04-03T22:08:00.000+08:00

Yesterday I thought...right, gotta be productive tommorrow. Use my weekend wisely. WELL.. best laid plans.. often don't go! Not that i had any good plan. It was just to wake up early and try and start the ball rolling with my visa to the USA.

Anyway I ended up waking up late and MAN how was I supposed to know this visa process was going to be this much pain. Pretty much didn't get shite all done. Silly me. Argh. Alls I did was drew out a wad of money to pay for my air tickets. So I was grumpy AND loaded up with cash... you must know what happened next.. retail therapy!

Honestly, I don't think I've ever really resorted to buying something to cheer myself up (cept maccas chippies or a snickers maybe-this is even worse though kiddies). I always thought I would end up buying something I really didn't need and it'd be such a short lived "happy" moment, if it even got to that point. Despite myself.. I went and got meself a bag and top. Oh joyful day! but I don't recommend this behaviour! It's evil!

Osaka is great and exciting but it can be a bit suffocating and tiring especially if you're grumpy (and you haven't bought yourself anything!) I kept thinking to myself that day, I'm in a happening city, why aren't I lovin' this?? WHY???? I was totally letting my crankiness get the better of me. Hence the unnecessary purchases.

Later that night, I met up with a work mate, Takako, for dinner at the Elephant Cafe (Christine and I had gone once before). I'm glad we met up not only because it was a yuck day but it was nice to be able to get to know her a little better. Also, my work place can get a bit tense so it's always a good idea to get to know your work mates. Takako is great and she's a real crack up. She lived in Boston so has a strong American accent so I always turn into this full-on yank when I'm around her.

Busy cross walk just into front of HEP 5 (the big buidling) and est (walk way on the left of HEP 5, where i got my spoils!!)

Some random building, near Yodoyabashi, that I passed by when I was a little lost. The cherry blossoms are starting to really bloom.

I came home super late (I guess I made up for the lost time today) and was so buggered but managed to stay up to a ridiculous hour. I think I'm addicted to late nights.

so far so good

2006-03-31T01:26:00.000+08:00

Settling back into life here in Japan after the whirlwind Perth trip has gone surprisingly well. I have heard that it can be quite strange trying to get comfortable again and may take a little bit of time, but with lots of support from awesome friends and big ears to natter into (hehe) I have had an easier than expected landing back here.

The first night back, instead of being clever and going to sleep early (I hadn't slept properly for 4 days) I went to visit my neighbours Yoko and Nori and their puppy Titi (whom i've secretly named booby). Just wanted to say a quick hello and drop by some small goodies I'd picked up from Malaysia (Kota Kinabalu - had to stop over there) and Perth. It was good to see them and to be able to just drop by for a quick chat over a cup of tea. Only a five minute walk to their place - ahh bliss.

Another thing that has kept my mind busy these few days is that April/May USA trip, which I am now frantically organising with my cousin and brother. The plan is Las Vegas, Seattle, San Francisco. So we've been looking at hotels, shows, tourist destinations... It was a nerve racking waiting for my leave approval because it could so easily have been knocked back but THANK GOODNESS it was approved! phew... So anyway, if anyone has some suggestions about where to go, where NOT to go (within these destinations).. etc etc let me know!

Marina Chan

2006-03-30T00:37:00.000+08:00

The Chan wedding has come and gone in a flash! Marina is a gorgeous girl but was so stunning as a bride. Gotta love those eye lash extensions - they do wonders! Aside from the gorgeous hair and makeup, she really did look radiant and so happy.
The gorgeous couple. Extremely surreal moment. I can imagine us looking back at these photos for many more years to come.

Christine and I were saying that her dad looks rather small as compared to before when we were younger. We figured we've maybe just grown slightly taller hahaha (but us? grow taller? haha more likely he's just shrunk).

The ceremony was held at the Bell Tower Barrack Street Jetty. I was surprised at how many people the venue could hold. Apparently 140 people? Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but there seemed to be a lot of people up there. There was a string quartet playing on one side and everyone else, for some reason, squished up on to the otherside of the red carpet. Anyway, minor details aside, it was such an exciting occasion and I was so glad to be there to see it all unfold.

The wedding reception was a huge event (about 300 guests) and was at the Burswood Grand Ballroom. It felt like a university ball (just like those MSU ones) but one of our good friends was a bride! Bizarre.

I'm so happy for Michael and Marina, having finally found that ONE to share their life with and make the decision to commit to one another. I guess we (us high schoolers chums) have always imagined Marina in a magical wedding like this but I can't believe it's all already happened! Cheers to the Chans :)

enough me time

2006-03-28T08:41:00.000+08:00

Lots have happened between the haircut and today! hehe there was sumo.. and of course my trip to perth! Now i'm back in my little apartment. The apartment kind of smells new again.

I know "me time" is important to just get your thoughts in check but after travelling for 30 odd hours from perth to japan by myself I'm really sick of me time. I just want human contact..someone to share some thoughts or scenery with.. a familiar face and voice. There are the familiar people here who I've met over this 4 months, but its not the same.

The last few days of my trip in Perth, I would fidget so much in my spare time. I couldn't stand not doing anything or not talking to someone.. I thought.. how needy! I was just so edgy and couldn't stand to be by myself.. I always had to call or text someone. I didn't want to waste the opportunities I had to just be with a friend after a matter of a call and a short drive. Here I'm surrounded by quiet (and little kids). But there is Christine of course.. helps me a lot :) let's play pool!

It sounds a little dramatic and yes it was my choice to come here but I guess being fresh from seeing an old friend get married (she was so beautiful - so made to be a gorgeous bride), catching up with old friends, even doing goodbyes to people I may not see again for a long long time - all of it made me more of a baby than I am hehe.

I may have said this a million times but having family and friends around really keeps you sane. Being able to tell them what you're up to and share with them your good and bad moments is so so precious. Never take them for granted and always make the effort to make them know you care. I know I slip up with this sometimes. Sounds nice and fancy but yeah it's easy to take for granted and not give the effort.

Anyway I know I should get a grip but yes this is how I'm feeling .. emotional, strange and uncomfortable... and I'm sort of learning to not keep these things too secret. Sorry bout the downer blog, hopefully next time I'll be back to normal :)

Miss you all so much back in Perth.. will post pictures up soon

sumo??? sumo.... sumo!!!!!

2006-03-12T00:36:00.000+08:00

I didn't even know the sumo tournaments were in town until a few days before and they were starting on the weekend. It seemed like a lot of effort cos its a whole day event plus its in Osaka. Osaka is great but its always lots of effort to head to Osaka. It was sooo soo last minute and Christine and I juggled the idea back and forth a little but we decided it was an event we should check out and managed to drag our butts there.

The guy on the left is the Mongolian sumo champ, Asashoryu. The guy on the right, I don't know. Cut outs of course.

I guess like any other sporting event it's so different actually being there than watching it on tv. Plus you pay lots to get the seat so you're making sure you have a good time!!

Christine and myself had nooo clue as to what was what in sumo...terminology, rules, formalities and ceremonies. Even if you didn't know what all of it meant it still made you go "ooohh ahhh..". From the way the sumo tie, gel and fan their hair out, to the way the sweepers swept the dirt ring, aka doryo, (sometimes in unison), to the many costumes, colours and people floating around the ring.

The sumo aka rikishi (these guys were the big guys) dressed up in their best sumo attire, parading around for all to see. The roof is, I think, Shinto style shrine roof. The white, red, green and black tassles hanging from it represent each season (don't ask me which represents which).

Christine and I tried our best to keep up as the matches were going on, reading up our little "Guide to Sumo" booklet and some info Chris had downloaded from the net (Thanks babe!). I guess we managed well enough.

We had gotten to the stadium at 11am and even though the stadium was open from 8:30am, the big pro sumo guys didn't start their matches until about 3pm. So throughout the whole day there are matches being fought on the doryo. All the trainees went first, then the big dudes would come out and their matches would take up about 3 hours, which went by surprisingly fast.

The sumo in the red so looked like fat bastard (Austin Powers)

There was this hardcore sumo fan to our left, who from 2:30pm was cheering, singing weird opera (it was really weird!!!), punching the air.. until 7pm... I had bet that she would tire by 5pm.. but NO.. that woman had so much juice. We had no idea what she was ranting on about.. "Go Go Let's go.. (unrecognisable chanting)". We went through stages where we thought it was hilarious, then we thought maybe it was a normal sumo fan thing, then maybe teretts and finally I concluded with "oh my gawsh SSHHH!!". It wasn't THAT bad but yeah it was niggly. You think she'd stopped but then she'd start up again singing some opera in a breaking up voice.

It was all part of the atmosphere I guess.... hehe

"We love sumo!"

clean cut

2006-03-11T00:20:00.000+08:00

Finally got my feral hair CUT! It was so nasty that I didn't care that I was using lacky bands to tie it up. YESSS I know MAJOR faux par but it's the only thing that holds up my teeny pony tail.

Going to the hairdressers has always been stressful for me but it's less stressful when I've got a picture to show them. None of the "I want it...like this.. and kinda like that but not too like that. you know?" and it would have been even worse in broken Japanese.

I'm sure not all salons in Japan do this but you had to pay extra for shampoo, but I only found this out AFTER I had boarded the train home and read the brochures they gave me. I was a bit confused when the hair washer guy just wet my hair and scrubbed it. I didn't hear any squirting of shampoo or nice fragrant clean smell. I thought maybe I'd missed it but, no, they didn't use shampoo. Ew! It's weird getting your unwashed hair wet then dried. Despite that it was a nice salon and the staff were really friendly and sweet! The hairdresser walked me out and kept bowing at the entrance, I wasn't sure when to stop looking back. She had a really cheesy grin too so I was sort of smilling and trying not to laugh cos she just looked kind of awkward. Hehe. It was still great, nice place, might go back again...

Then...guess what happened next.. me and christine went out to eat.. again..tee hee My neck is gettin thick!! And now with a shorter haircut, its waay rounder looking haha. Anyway, we had Indian again and as usual it was delicious and too much for our bellies. Mmm.. next meal together will be in Perth..!! woohooo!

more goodbyes

2006-03-07T00:48:00.000+08:00

Tatsuki's mum plus the two cutest babies I know, Hina & Tatsuki

This pictures does not do them justice! They're way cuter, especially when they're going nuts over The ABC Song. (The lady is Tatsuki's mum) This was their LAST LESSON! boo.. it was a sad day.

ack!

2006-03-06T23:35:00.000+08:00

It's past 12 at night and I let out the biggest scream in my apartment. Sorry neighbours!! My walls are so thin you can hear the next door neighbour cough. I saw a bug on my wall and I went up close and it was so pretty like a lady bug, black and red spots. My walls are made of a kind of soft plaster so I didn't want to squish it on to the wall. I tried to scoup it and it frickin' FLEW off!!!! The damn thing has wings!!!???? argh!!! I freaked out then found it again a few seconds on the floor and looked closely at it and it just suddenly opened its wings and flew to I don't know where and I just FLIPPED and let out a huge scream. It's not like I think "oh this is a scary situation, I think I will scream." The screaming just comes without notice. Stupid bug. It flew into the kitchen and I put on some rubber gloves and gave neither the walls nor the bug any mercy. SQUISHin time! bbrrrr!!! I swear the bugs are listening because I had just been talking to some friends about bugs and creepy crawlies that will apparently come in the summer months - snakes, frogs, mozzies!!! I haven't seen ANY bugs since coming here except for a fly on a subway train.. and that gave me a shock. My apartment building is right next to a rice field, a hill and loads of bushes.... this is creepy crawly city...eewww!!!! This country side thang ain't so beautiful anymore...

in the hood

2006-03-06T00:04:00.000+08:00

So my neighbour and myself had another get together with the couples in Sanda - our OTHER neighbours hehe. It was a simple night with delicious and fantastic japanese food! Okonomiyake! (o-koh-noh-me-ya-keh) I never really liked okonomiyake cos it always seemed really doughy and not so tasty. How to describe..erm ..its pretty much a savoury pancake that usually has cabbage, squid and okonomiyake mix (which is just flour), theres heaps of possibilities! Before you put the mix onto the grill you have to spread thin bits of pork onto the grill and the schlack the mix on top. wah lah! you have okonomiyake. yarm.

love this grill - the okonomiyake doesn't look so appealing but they were delicious!!

The couple (Yoko & Nori), who hosted the dinner, again, has a gorgeous puppy, Titi. She's not really potty trained yet so she kind of does it everywhere. They're constantly cleaning up after her. Anyway, I won't go into that too much but yes, pee a plenty.

"herrow!" *wave*

After the dinner we got into some card games!! Love games! I hope I won't ever get too old to have a good game of spoons! It was a simple night but sooo fun..lots of laughs, full bellies and.. puppy pee pee... just how i like it hahah puppy and all

Kobe with a side of Shodo

2006-03-05T23:52:00.000+08:00

It's always nice to pay a little visit to Kobe city and today was a beeeeautiful day for it (although it suddenly started raining tonight! what tha..????) I've been a few times before and love the shops there! Once again, I had no money to splurge on the pretty things but also no energy to really think about buying anything, I was happy to just stroll around leisurely.

The end of the "Mosaic" shopping walkway, where there is a very small amusement park

Kobe Harbourland on a gorgeous sunny day

After strolling leisurely for ages and majorly heating up in my down jacket I headed back towards home and stopped in Sanda for my shodo lessons. Yay! Shodo!
I think my teacher is too kind to me! He gives me undeserving ticks/circles/marus. As much as I suspect that they are pity marus I am encouraged and have so much fun when I am there for the hour.
Today's lesson: 7, 8 ,9 ,10 and "tsuki" meaning moon.

My teacher did three forms of the moon kanji (chinese character), which was awesome, pity I don't have pictures of them. He said they represent the different phases or types of moon - clear moon, cloudy moon, crescent moon.

With these ones he wasn't so kind and giving of pity because he scrapped a few of my efforts! bahahahha but I totally agreed!! I only managed to churn out and ok clear moon (left) and crescent moon, my crescent ain't really a crescent but nonetheless I quite like it.I so want to paint more of these in my spare time but am afraid to splash ink all over my apartment plus my teacher used some special brushes for these pieces. A work friend, Yukiko, who's Japanese, had joined me for the lesson tonight (I'm so glad she was there to translate, even though I'm meant to be learning!) and the teacher explained to both of us that it is not just about learning the brush technique but also having fun while doing it. I have the fun part down pact.. now I need the right technique hehe

hostess with the mostest

2006-03-03T23:44:00.000+08:00

Christine is a culinary queen!! hontou! She had a bunch of us over at her place this weekend for an absolute feast! She cooked up some hardcore dishes - not your usual spag-bog, even though that is an awesome dish but I can cook it so it's really not so exciting - beef rendang, sambal squid (yes SAMBAL!), chicken curry, bruschetta, cucumber yoghurt salad and MORE...they were ALL delish! Didn't I tell you? HARDCORE!!

yuummm!!!

I worked on that Saturday until 6pm and bolted straight after class to catch my train. I was looking forward to a nice night in (at Chrise's place) doing two of my favourite things - chilling out with friends and eating! After the train long trip/s and making the trek up the mega hill from the station to Christine's place I was boiling in my down feather jacket and couldn't wait to put down my overnight bag! I turned into Christine's apartment block and there's this Aussie flag hanging on her front balcony! Classic christine! Couldn't help crackin' a big smile and it totally added to the relief of "I'm here!! Woohoo!!". I really wanted to take a photo to capture that moment but my arm was like jelly and I haven't yet reached that motivational level of photo taking.

Thanks babe for hosting an excellent night! Good times, good times! Cheers to you hostess with the mostest! Look forward to more good times and rendang! hehe

march on

2006-03-01T22:52:00.000+08:00

February is gone! Where did it go? I guess being 28 days long it makes for a short end of season month. So this means winter is officially over here in Japan, although when I stepped out of the train on the way home there was snow on the ground! There was also so much slush on the steps leading up to my apartment, I had to tread with extreme caution. I thought this was supposed to be over! Although, I have been warned that March can still be a cold month. I really liked winter and all the beautiful snow that it brought, but my skin can only handle so much dryness and I think my jackets are in need for a break. Of course, not to mention my poor pair of diesels that I wear EVERYWHERE. I brought four pairs of shoes but I mind as well not have brought the other three since they are now collecting dust and taking up precious space in my apartment. Anyway, digressing.

I'm excited about this month. Spring! Yay! Can't wait to see the first specks of pink amongst the trees. Of course, it may not be until the end of the month or early next month until they bloom around this area. I've been told that the cherry blossoms usually start opening first in Okinawa and the bloom sweeps upwards through the country. It'll be fabulous when it hits Kobe and maybe living in the cold cold mountains/countryside will hopefully finally have its great payoff hehe! I'm hoping that the hot springs site (Arima Onsen) and mountain side (Rokko Mountain) near my place will be a beautiful location to explore.
(Long) Side note: around my hood it's quite hilly and I have yet to be numb or "too used to it", I say this because whenever I point it out to my neighbour he just goes "Oh." haha so I'm learning to keep my thoughts to my self when I'm around him hehe. I'm always amazed and in awe at the shadowy shapes of the hills in the distance, which are always the backdrop of every which way I look. When I'm riding on the train towards Osaka and the train goes through a tunnel, I look back, there's this massive hill just staring back at us. Awesome. So different from home.
I guess it's sometimes more special when you keep it to yourself but.. but... when I have those "hill moments" I just think, man, I'm so far away from home.

Anyway, despite the excitement of spring and mesmerising hills, I'm most excited about my trip home. It'll be great to be able to see everyone back in Perth and of course witness Marina & Michael get married! She will be a beautiful bride when I next see her. Woah.. *shakes head*

I haven't been away from home for that long, maybe 3.5 months, but so much always happens in short spaces of time. So there is always much catching up to do and there's nothing like a hug from a friend and getting those sad, happy and shocked expressions right there and then over coffee talk. Look forward to it. March on, March!

ma ma monday

2006-02-28T00:19:00.000+08:00

It's MONDAY! woo!

Usually I start off the day with a sleep catch up.. but today me and Ian were meeting up with a work colleague, Miki-sensei, for lunch in our little town centre, Sanda. Miki is a Japanese English teacher at GEOS who's been with the company for about the same time as me, something like 3.5 months. She's a really kind and funny lady who's often helped me out with getting settled in Japan. She's also quite a restaraunt guru, especially for the Sanda area, and today's lunch was no exception to her restaraunt-ing prowess

Miki & Me: Ittadakimasu!

Miki managed to scout out a fabulous lunch deal, which was limited to only 20 people (a day, I think) over 3 days. It's usually 3000 yen but it was half price, so for 1500 yen (just under AUD20) we got...

...entree and sashimi and then...

...yaki shabu and then...

sushi and miso soup and fruits..(then coffee)

1500 yen ($20)! all this! Crazy!

But it doesn't end there! As a little parting gift the waitress gave us each a packet each of um.. sake dregs? I'm not sure what it is called in japanese but it a sort of flavouring for soups and looks like a big calico bag thats been neatly folded. The sake smell is strong and it's so simple looking but difficult to describe. Basically it's sake sediments that have been collected and probably neatly compacted and folded into this shape. Not sure how to use it but i think it's worth a go.

After being stuffed and amazed by a fabulous meal we headed to the Hotel New Hankyu for some karaoke! It was only 2pm! My first daytime karaoke experience. Karaoke has always been about dark, cramped and smoky rooms where the tables are always wet from all the icey mixed drinks and littered with half drunk glasses. This was so different! The room was MASSIVE - for like 20 people (and there was just 3 of us!) - so bright, so clean...and we were served tea and cakes! Now thats what i call good, clean fun! Was such a blast!

Our massive room, called the "Lilac Room"

We were kicked out of our room by 4pm and I headed out on my own to Sannomiya to meet up with Christine. More shinanigans! hehe! No.. we were rather chilled - had a good yarn over some delicious dinner and dessert; played a couple of rounds of "guess that muffled song over the restaraunt noise" and then we headed off round the corner for a few rounds of pool. It'd been ages since I'd played even though our family has a pool table at home. Anyway, Christine is quite the butt kicker and had the "ooohh aahhh" factor going in her shots! You're game's tight, hunnie! hehe 'til next time! challenge-y (cha-ren-jii)!

whatta spazzy look

Monday funday truly lived up to its name and even though I've burnt a hole in my already hole-y wallet it was so worth it! Now it's back to the working week and cup noodles.

more blogs

2006-02-26T00:32:00.000+08:00

I know I'm revealing the big dork in me but I can't stop checking out random people's blogs! There are some really intriguing reads! Of course, there are the strange and scary ones. The girl who took the "sueyen" url is a15 year old girl who seems a leeeettle bit scary, but I'm sure shes a nice girl in real life.
Anyway, I had to mention this - MC Hammer has a blog! It just happened to be featured on the blogger sign in so I clicked on... www.mchammer.blogspot.com

sunday sunday

2006-02-25T23:45:00.000+08:00

Sundays are my first day of the weekend, so it's a great day to procrastinate about washing and cleaning the house and just head out the whole day! I try to get more sleep on weekends too but with having to depend on public transport I really have to get out of the habit of doing that because I don't tend to leave much time for myself to eat or get dressed before I have to bolt out!

Today we had a teachers' outing for us GEOS teachers that work in the Kansai area, which is sort of the west japan region... but it just looks like the middle of Japan (just think Osaka region), anyway the plan was Osaka Aquarium, dinner, beer, karaoke...

I skipped the daytime visit to the Osaka Aquarium but was definitely down for some karaoke action and to get to know the other teachers over a nice drink or two. before getting into that I headed to church and got to witness one of the band members get baptised. I didn't really know the girl, only that she played the keyboard in the band and had a young son. She gave her testimony and I shed a little tear and was really happy for her to have come to this point in her walk with God. The pastor dipped her in this massive portable bath and when she stood up in the tub after being immersed I think she knocked the plug and all this water starting gushing out the bottom and I was thinking, "Is that normal?" Eekss!! but with many helping hands and lots of towels and buckets we managed to control the leakage and clean up the spillage! phew!

So Namba/Shinsaibashi was my next stop! It's in the South bit of the general Osaka area and its quite a trek (1.5 hrs by multiple trains n subway)! We (me n my neighbour) were wandering aimlessly to find the pub to meet the others at and miraculously bumped into our manager!!! Crazy!!! Osaka is huge and complex so to see a familiar face on the street was so bizarre!!! And she looked COMPLETELY different.. like she led a double life. She usually keeps her hair pulled back and of course I always see her in work attire but it was great to see her all crazy with curls and wearing colours! We were also so lucky to see her because she led us right to the spot we needed to get to. We so would have been wandering around for yonks if it weren't for her.

Me & Rie

So the pub we went to was called The Hub:Shinsaibashi. We'd arrived just before the end of happy hour so quickly got into some half price cocktails!

Me & Nerida: "Cheers!"

Nerida is a teacher from another area, Tokushima, which is about a 2 hour bus ride to Osaka. I had gotten to know her when I first came to Japan, because I had to do training in Tokushima. I'm so glad to have met her. Hanging out with her those first few days of my time here saved me from my homesickness and she introduced me to chocolated covered peanut clusters!! mmmmm She was down just for the day to join us in our shinanigans! Was great to see her again!

So after some drinkies and bit of fish & chips "british style" (just seemed like normal fish & chips to me), we headed elsewhere for some karaoke action!! oh yeah! hehe! Lots of laughs, drinks (esp shochu, yikes!), singing/screaming/screeching/scatman-ing.. and tambourine a-shakin'! (very simple and effective karaoke extra)

Pat & Tristan getting into the spirit of nomi hou dai (all you can drink)

Ian, Jacqueline & Nigel (tambourine man)

Me with Erica & Erin

It was a fabulous night and I'm glad to have finally met some other teachers in our area, hopefully we'll be able to catch up again some time soon.

2006-02-24T21:50:00.000+08:00

Kids here love to draw. Makes sense since this is the land of animation of ALL kinds! and i mean ALL kinds... In the classrooms I teach there are heaps of little random pictures students have drawn and this is one of my favourites. The boy who drew it is awesome - so nutty, funny and a great student too. Examples of nuttiness - our schools are really small so you can hear every noise that happens inside those walls. Just recently we've discovered that he sings in the toilet... and says "wahooooo!!" I'm not sure what that symbolises.. but its HILARIOUS. He also does some other random stuff, like run around like a monkey, which could potentially be really annoying but its not somehow!!

an "ok" day

2006-02-22T22:16:00.000+08:00

it rained. i stacked it, bruised my shin. tension at work. i lost an awesome student. got home super late. hmmm but it was an ok day. heh? must be the coffee i've been slurping!

My student Yuuka is a gorgeous ten year old that I love teaching on Wednesday evenings! To my surprise, it was her last day today!! Apparently she will be taking up some other after school activity.. sigh...

a little farewell snack from Yuuka *sniff*

No pictures of the other bad things so I'll leave it at that hehe

(p/s: the snack was yuuuummy!)

of all the things

2006-02-21T23:40:00.000+08:00

of all the things to do in Japan.... but poker? heehehe! I guess because "the boys" back home have been fiercely at it for a couple of months so it seems like theres no escape! hehe naw i played a few rounds tonight and it was actually really fun!! poker texas hold 'em style. My neighbour, Ian, met a group of american guys through his monday japanese classes and we went to their apartment to play a few rounds. They're the nicest guys! So down to earth and hilarious.

Poker is pretty huge back home in Perth and of course with the boys into it.. it was funny to see the guys here with their little silver suitcase of chips.. just like wine's hehe but our poker night was without the mighty battery operated shuffler, even though it does shuffle unevenly, its still awesome.

We all put in 500 yen in each but because me n Ian had to leave early to catch the last train the guys so kindly refused to keep our money.. so 500 yen saved for another sesh..I'm actually looking forward to it, how odd! Its also tickled the board game lover in me... i'm thinking of going out and buying a scrabble set or something.. miss all you hard core board gamers out there! I"ll be back soon for a mini reunion hehe.. Let the games begin :)

mondays

2006-02-21T00:47:00.000+08:00

Christine and I have decided to change the horrible image of Mondays. Goodbye mondayitis, Hello mondayfunday.
I have Mondays off so its usually a very laid back day for me to catch up on sleep, do washing and for some reason I don't seem to get out until about 6pm something. If I get myself together early enough I may head to Osaka now and again. I'm trying to save some dosh to go to the USA in April/May so I'm just holding off on expensive days of shopping and travelling until AFTER. Although, the eating keeps on going, which I'm totally cool with! Some days I think, just stay at home and save money, but I just can't! I eventually get out that door!

Christine recommended yet another winner of a restaraunt called Tapas (Spanish dining). Kobe really isn't short of wonderful and exciting little places to have a drink, nice meal and awesome desserts. I am continually amazed and satisfied by the cuisine. Dining out is a definite must do if you ever visit.. food glorious food

indulgent duo

and of course the night wouldn't be complete without our fave choco croissant from Sanmaruku Cafe. MMmmm mondays

blog

2006-02-20T15:53:00.000+08:00

what a lazy day, too much sleep. indulgent. but i did manage to do a load of washing, which has been sitting in the washer for half an hour, should get it out. i've been very slowly downloading scrubs season 5... i just watched episode 9 and 10 and thought.. hmm i wonder how old zach braff (main guy) is..so i goggle-d and found out he has his own blog... what the? so i clicked on.. check it out
http://www2.foxsearchlight.com/gardenstate/blog/
worth a little squizz
my washing awaits..

shodo

2006-02-20T00:19:00.000+08:00

So i'm getting cultured! Finally!
Ever since I tried Japanese calligraphy back in 1997 I've always wanted to take up lessons and finally I'm doing it! I first tried shodo when I was on exchange here in Japan in year 10 and went to a shodo lesson with my host student Izumi.

My very first attempt this time round was doing the character "yu me" (pronounced you meh), which means dream. It was so nerve racking because I didn't know how I would fair and with three Japanese people looking on I just couldn't bare to massacre their language with my horrible script. To my surprise I didn't do TOOOO badly and got a big "maru" (circle - they don't use ticks for correct answers) phew!
The second lesson I had was much simpler.. or so it seemed! I had to do 1,2,3,4,5, and 6 and i kept muffing it!!! how hard can it be???? but its so difficult!!! You have to control the pressure of your brush, the angle, turn it a certain way at a corner.. OMG.. i think the hardest part is actually straight lines... its impossible! the young kid next to me was WAYYY better!! anyways here are my poor efforts..
and the finally the teacher got me to do some artsy fartsy calligraphy, which i know is supposed to be art so really anything goes but man... i had to laugh at mine! the hiragana (simpler japanese characters) were heaps better but maybe not so arty...

let's hope i can churn out some quality script by the end of the year...
My teacher speaks only Japanese so I'm also hoping this will be a sort of Japanese language lesson too! gambatte! fight on!

random rendezvous

2006-02-19T23:36:00.000+08:00

Tonight me and my neighbour had a gorgeous oyster and pizza dinner with some complete strangers!

A bit of history: There is a little restaraunt just next to my apartment and a some weeks ago me and my neighbour Ian had gone in to grab some dinner. Its a tiny little restaraunt so its easy to listen in on other people's conversations. The table next to us were a small group of slightly tipsy men (a dentist and a doctor we later on found out: "If you break teeth, please see me, if you break bones, please call him.") who came over to chat with us. When we left the restaraunt we thought we'd probably see them there again soon! They were great! So last weekend Ian had gone in on his own to grab a bite and those guys were there again and had invited us to have dinner at their house. It was funny when Ian was replaying bits of the conversation:
Hiroshi san: "Too much drink, too much food..."
Ian: "Too much...fun?"
hehe hilarious... some classic japan

There were two couples Hiroshi & Yuko, Nori & Yoko. The couple that hosted the dinner (Nori & Yoko) live just next to the Family Mart (convenience store chain) that is really close to our place so it was awesome to get to know the locals in our hood hehe They were fantastic people with a gorgeous three story home and a beauty of a puppy golden retriver named..titi.
They were sooo hospitable and so kind. Who would invite strangers into their home for a nice oyster dinner??? We coulda been freako foreignors for all they coulda known!!

We drank some beer, (aussie) wine, ate MASSIVE oysters that we steamed at the table, pizza and fruits..mm was fantastic! I soo should have taken photos of the food!! Its not automatic for me yet but i think i must make it a habit!!! So many kodak moments!
I managed to explain the card game SPOONS so we played a couple of rounds with ferreros as spoons! After the last round, were treated with a duet-loser version of Queen's "We are the champions", namely "We are not the champions" (my friieeeend!) by the joint losers of course! hehe good times..
I hope we'll be able to get together with them again.. ma ta shimashou

Clockwise from top left: Yoko, Yuko, Nori, Hiroshi and Ian

Titi! 5 months old and SO adorable

3am

2006-02-19T02:46:00.000+08:00

bedtime and first post.. why these two converged? delirium...