It was my birthday yesterday and i became a somewhat reluctant member of the 1/4 century club. I guess it's not so bad. 25 is a nice round number and easy to remember and...that's about it. I should have got up early but i didn't. I was so tired from the night before. I woke up around one, went to Sunshine City, bought a T-shirt, got subway, came home, did laundry. My friend came over to give me a present and bought be snacks and baileys. At 7pm, Ben showed up at my apartment and kidnapped and blindfolded me with the assistance of Motoko, his ninja assistant/ assassin. Ben told me earlier we were going to Tokyo Tower for dinner, but they actually took me to the Vampire Cafe in Ginza. I had always wanted to go there but i just never had a chance. It was so much fun. The waiters were really attractive and had red or white contacts and vampire clothes. It was really gorgeous inside, red and black walls and candles. They food was really delicious too. All in all, one of the best birthdays that i can remember. I love my friends. 

 

Yesterday was pretty fun. I decided to make the most of my day off by seeing three of my favorite individuals. I was kind of tired from the night before and also a little hungover but i didn't want to waste the entire morning sleeping. Justin woke me up around eleven and i rolled out of bed and had a shower, dried my hair...shuffled papers in an attempt to make my apartment look less like a bomb shelter. The usual. Last week, i decided to try and save money by washing some of my clothes in the bath and drying them on my balcony, however, this whole genius idea backfired when one of my socks got sucked into the bath drain. I have no idea how this happened, not that it matters now. I tried to get it out with chopsticks, a fork...i even unraveled a coat hanger to try and fish it out but it was all a massive failure. SO... now the water won't drain properly and i will probably have to pay for a plumber to come and fix it which will be a lot more expensive than paying ¥400 to do washing in the first place. Sigh. 

So...back to yesterday's events. We decided to go and see our friend Takashi play flute at Sophia University in Yotsuya. It was the school orchestra's summer concert. Really fun actually. The band was really good and the commentary was really cute. I like visiting Japanese universities actually. They always seem to have really good performances, sports events and festivals.

Justin stealing Takashi's flute and being pervy.

Sophia Universities Band. Well some of it. 

Afterwards we visited Motoko's apartment for the first time but not before going to the international supermarket nearby and loading up on soda. So much for attempting to be healthy. I invested in some cherry coke and Dr. Pepper and i was slightly excited to drink out of a can with a picture of Robert Downey Jnr. on it.

A mysterious store of Christian bits and pieces. Kind of rare to see in Tokyo. I was the only one game enough to take a picture... Seems everyone was afraid of getting cursed or being banished to the depths of hell. 

 

Sexy half naked pregnant woman releasing a single and getting her own giant billboard in Yotsuya. Tasteful or not?

A very sad pinwheel dying out the front of the 24hrs McDonalds in Ikebukuro. 

Almost?? Bring on August. 

 

Stalkerazzi. Pretending to take a photo of Motoko when in fact trying to capture the brilliance of a man wearing a yin and yang sleeveless jacket with no shirt. 

All in all.... a very lovely Sunday. <3

Just came back from meeting Anna in Baba. She is going back to the states for a couple of weeks so i wanted to eat curry with her before she left. I took my bike to meet her as always. Technically its rainy season now but it really wasn't that bad UNTIL ABOUT HALF AN HOUR AGO WHEN IT STARTED POURING LIKE CRAZY! And of course i didn't have an umbrella. Seriously, i am drenched..... It looks like i just jumped into a large pool fully clothed. It's a good thing i was going home and wasn't meeting anyone. Bah. Not happy. I passed about a billion salary men, who either waved at me, grinned, gave me a look of sympathy or a look of complete bewilderment because no-one ever forgets their umbrella in Tokyo. Apparently. Or if they do they just steal another one. The only thing that pushes Tokyo people to the thievery is rain. They really don't like getting wet. 

 

Time for a shower.

After receiving a bicycle, a nice one that i didn't have to buy for myself, i parked it at Takadanobaba station when Andrew and i were on our way to visit Anna in Kami-Shakuji. Upon returning to said place of parking after visiting our friend, i was less than amused to realize that my bike had disappeared. I locked it with a combination lock but that didn't prevent it from being taken. In Tokyo, you can leave your purse on a train with money sticking out out of it and it is very likely that you can get it back in the same condition it was in when you lost it. You can leave your bag open on a bench at burger king and go and order and when you come back, your bag will remain untouched. Its WONDERFUL however, the same rule does not seem to apply to umbrellas or to bicycles. So many bicycles are stolen every day so if you report it to the police, they never seemed particularly enthused about helping you because they probably will never find it. So that's why, when i was going home the other day from my friends house and i saw my stolen bicycle parked at the supermarket, i couldn't let it go. Everyone asked me, "Are you sure it was yours?" but considering i had to luminescent care bear stickers on the handle bars, another few green stickers on the wheels and a dent that i did myself when i rode into a bush, i was certain. I probably shouldn't have but the idea of some douche bag riding around Tokyo on my bicycle, in the exact same area that they stole it, really rubbed me the wrong way. When i first saw it, i decided that it was as the Japanese ALWAYS say "shouganai" (It can't be helped) and i ignored it, but after about 5 minutes i turned around and went back. Sure enough my bicycle was still there. I rang my friend to help me steal it back, and now i have a transportation vehicle again in my possession. 

 

So at least some of the badness lingering from last month has lessened. Woot!

 

Yesterday was pay day so i wanted to eat some kind of food with Justin and he wanted to eat Singaporean food so we decided to go to our semi-new favorite restaurant. We always eat Nepalese food at a restaurant called Maya but we are trying to be versatile and try new things. It's not working very well but at least we are trying :-) In fact, we went to this restaurant once before for Heather's birthday. She grew up in Singapore so we threw her a Japanese popstar themed birthday party in the same restaurant. I remember the the staff were super nice and they were excellent at accommodating our vegesaurus friend Anna which is often really difficult in Japan because they put some kind of meat in everything here. Even a lot of vegetarian food has meat in it. I remember going to dinner with Anna in Ginza and i asked the waitress if she could make a vegetarian dish for her. She then asked me "Sausage OK, right?" with a big smile on her face. This kind of response happened ALL THE TIME. So vegetarian food in Japan often means food that has vegetables existing within it. Any way, last night i ordered the curry dinner set and the Chijimi which i think is originally Korean but Singapore style was so delicious!

 

 

The remains of our coconut juice. SO delicious but probably unhealthy. 

 

Cute interior. Really nice lighting. I am really sensitive to bright fluro lights, especially when i'm tired so this was good for me. 

I love this lamp. I smashed mine the other day by accident so i want a new one kind of like this. 

My curry set!

I love chijimi. Kind of like a Korean Okonomiyaki but without mayo. 

The salad was the least exciting part of our evening but good just the same. Well kind of. 

 

The last point i want to make is that i am not liking today's weather. It has become rainy season or 梅雨(tsuyu) which i think is a pain in the ass. It is about 33 degrees today but really humid and everyone turns into a shiny sweat ball as soon as they go outside. Not enjoyable at all. It's like Thailand or somewhere tropical like that, only everyone is wearing black business suits and trying to dab off the sweat with towels. Fun! At least it is better than the blistering heat that comes in August. 

 To end on a happy note, i went to Akihabara yesterday because i work near there. I always go there when i am lonely or feeling neglected so i can bathe in otaku wonderfulness. Yesterdays unnecessary purchase was six Bleach phone straps. This is my favorite anime at the present moment. Actually, i like it for many years and i still like it so i guess that means it has staying power. I even dresses up as one of these characters for halloween last year. It is a costume that i will have to bring out again soon. Anyway. AKIHABARA, good. RAINY SEASON IN TOKYO, bad.    

 

A lot of bad things have happened this month, being sick and getting my bike stolen are among just some of the wonderful happenings this May, HOWEVER on the UP side, i have had some extra time to watch some films i had been wanting to see.

 

The first is Funuke: Show some love you losers  (腑抜けども、悲しみの愛を見せろ). I watched this a couple of weeks ago when i was in a bad mood and it completely made me feel better. Not in a happy whimsical kind of way but in a dark comedy kind of way. I couldn't help but laugh even though i was trying my hardest to be depressed. Generally, the story focuses on a slightly demented family in the country side. The parents of this family have just died in a car accident (they were trying to avoid hitting a cat) and the oldest sister, a failed actress and all round psycho returns to her childhood home for the funeral. There are many dark family secrets that are exposed, including, but not limited to incest, attempted murder, manga and DV. Happy happy!

 

Next movie i finally got around to watching is the final installment of 20th Century Boys (20世紀少年). I somehow managed to miss it at the cinema but i am happy that i have now completed the trilogy. Number three was a good pay off actually. The ending was a little different from the manga i heard but it was still satisfying. Last month i purchased all of the manga volumes in Akiba...all 20 something of them but i am only about 4 books in so i am not yet allowed to pass judgement. Anyway...watch it. It will probably appeal to the more otaku type but maybe not. 

Next....Honokaa Boy （ホノカボーイ). A sleepy little movie about a somewhat lonely boy living in Hawaii and working at a small country town cinema. By chance, he strikes up an unusual friendship with a unique old lady and becomes closer to the unusual characters that live in his town. This film is really slow paced and dreamy but kind of beautiful in its own way. It kind of made me want to pack up and move to Hawaii. 

Last one. Dear doctor (ディア・ドクター). To be honest, i only watched this because EITA was one of the leading actors. He usually plays a more energetic and emotional kind of character but i was very pleased to see him in a more subdued role. Dear Doctor is also set in a small country town and follows the daily life of the local doctor, who is actually a fake. Eita plays his new intern. I watched this really late last night. It is really slow but i enjoyed it a lot. 

Well, i really should get back to work. Over and out. 

 

<3

To stay true to Justin, i am updating my blog by the end of this weekend. He said he would delete me from his blog list because he only wants "active blogs" shown on his site.

A LOT has changed since i last posted anything. Nothing that i was complaining about earlier is really relevant at the present moment. Funny how times change things right. 

I will give a brief synopsis of things that are not as they were. I plan to be more diligent and detailed from today onwards so for now, some skimming and trimming is needed in order to glide over past events. 

 

So......

Since Jan...

Winter was cold. It snowed in Tokyo quite a lot compared to past years. One particularly snowy night i got lost walking home from Otsuka station. It took me over an hour to get home when it should have only taken 15 minutes. 

 

I decided that i wanted a new job because i don't like finishing work so late or working on Sundays. I interviewed at a few places, was generally successful but settled on a company that was started by a Japanese casting director and teaches english to mostly kids through a strange drama/ acting method. Its super tiring and i haven't really decided whether i like having a job with actual responsibility but i guess it is still early days. Anna got a job at the same company so i'm happy we could move on together. 

 

Spring came. It was still pretty cold so the sakura lasted a bit longer than usual but because it was still cold, sitting outside under a grey sky with ice wind wasn't as nice as last year. BUT WE MADE IT WORK <3

 

Heather went back to Canada. Very sad. One of our family members has been engulfed by the maple land yet again. 

 

I have a boyfriend now, J...it's a long story and those whom i love already know.  Motoko asked me to let her know when i am out of my sparkly stage. 

J gave me a bike. It is cool and blue and i named it Aoi-chan. 

Ai chan came to visit for two weeks and i missed her so much. I want her to come back to Tokyo. 

I was in a TV show for NHK. It was about udon and they filmed me going to Kawgawa to eat noodles. Tiring but fun. It should go to air in July i think. 

Golden week was very golden. The weather was perfect. I met a boy. I saw my friends a lot. I didn't even do a tiny bit of work. Excellent. 

The convenience store near the love shack had 100 yen onigiri. (And for some reason, even though i have a Japanese mac, i can't find the yen symbol and it is really annoying me). 

Today was one of the nicest days i have had in a long while. I had lunch with J, then we went for a bike ride around Ikebukuro and Mejiro, he showed me his university and we had an amusing time in one of the big lecture halls playing with the whiteboard and the button that makes the board go up and down. The class on Monday is going to get a surprise when they enter the hall. 

After than, we rode a bit further to Takadanobaba and J played some basketball with the Koreans that often hang out there. 

Finally...ice cream and El Torito, the best Mexican restaurant in Japan (maybe not), but at least Ikebukuro. 

That is about all my news. 

Will write another entry soon <3

 

 

Today was the first day back at work. I was totally not in the mood because i have been enjoying my holidays for the most part and especially enjoying the not working part. Despite the emotional tennis within, i can safely say that i had a wonderful winter vacation. I saw old friends, my liking of current friends deepened more that i was aware of and i made new friends. Today, i was very happy to see my bestest who seemed to be doing much better after her unlucky pneumonia and strep throat attack. I missed her a lot and i was relieved to see that she was in fact not dead and completely capable of being as feisty as usual. Yay Anna. Work was actually nice. Only two lessons with a kind of strange but kind of attractive guy. He recommended that i mix shochu with coffee for an exciting drink and although it sounds disgusting, it might actually be one of those mysterious cocktails which actually work well. Like Ben's marmite vodka drink. Was it vodka? Maybe it was tequila... but i guess it doesn't really matter if there is marmite within. Marmite seems to cancel out any other kind of flavor. 

Anyway, work was good. I'm very sad that our Ginza Wednesday trio has been torn apart because Miss L. left us but happy at the same time that Miss S. came to replace her. Actually, she is one of my new favorite girls and super fun to hang out with so yes, i'm very happy on Wednesdays.

After work we all went to Shinjuku to drink a whole lot of beer and eat those cheesy squares that Anna and i were obsessed with. It's kid of good that they limit our intake of cheesy squares. They are kind of expensive, more expensive than the pints of beer actually but I LOVE them more than most things in life. Shinjuku is kind of gross at night but i did taekwondo for a year, Anna is naturally strong and Sarrin is super tall so we can fight off any creepy salary man. We went to our usual cheap bar. I say usual but i haven't been there in over three months. SInce i moved out of Shinjuku actually. It kind of felt homely in a weird way. I wish we had more time to talk but at least we had a couple of hours to gossip and drink. I finally mustered up the courage to send a message to someone which i really should have sent months ago and now i am burrowing in regret. I will probably feel worse in the morning but there is nothing i can do about it now. Unless i activate some kind of dormant time travel skills which i may or may not possess, i'm going to have to deal with the consequences of my beer influenced decision. 

So now i am listening to a collection of "storm sounds" which is pretty much over two hours of thunder and heavy rain ambience that i downloaded which is supposed to help me sleep. I don't know why i thought this kind of background sound would be beneficial but i think it's relaxing me ever so slightly. 

After 24 years of no Thanksgiving, i have decided that it is totally necessary. Australia needs to fall in line and join the delicious pumpkinny goodness. I must say that i love pumpkin pie. I also love ice cream pumpkin pie thanks to Andrew. Actually, pumpkin anything is pretty spectacular. My Canadian thanksgiving was lovely last month. And my American one was equally lovely last week. I had the nicest night i have had in a while and learned some intriguing things about someone.

Ok.. i was a little stroppy the last time i posted but i did get what i wanted in the end so my mood improved quite a lot. I had a nice pancake making session Tuesday morning and was completely happy to spend time chilling out in my apartment and finishing packing. I really should have cleaned before i left because my room resembles that of a crime scene. I almost missed my flight because i was too content to laze. I took Wednesday and Thursday off work to go to Shikoku. A three day work week is just wonderful. Wednesday is my easy day and Thursday is my difficult day so at least i was pleased to get rid of my difficult day last week. I raced to the airport in the rain. T. helped me carry my bags to the station. The rain was super heavy so it was not much fun. Tokyo has suddenly become pretty cold and gloomy. I think the
seasons are very exact here. I caught the train to Shinagawa and transferred. It took only forty minutes or so to get to Haneda airport. Much easier than Nari
I left just over an hour before my flight. I was actually surprised that i wasn't late. I even got held up at customs because i kept beeping every time i walked through the metal detector. Turned out i had to take off my badges, shoes, jacket, socks, belt and jewelry before they would let me go through. I met Nikki and Dez at the gate.  It only took about an hour and 20 minutes to arrive in Matsuyama which is amazing because Shikoku is really far away. It really does prove just how small Japan really is. At the airport we had a driver waiting for us. We were lead to a creepy looking shiny black car with tinted windows. Kind of like something Al Pacino in the Godfather would feel right at home in.  

We were driven to a nice sushi restaurant and then after taken to the golf course where we were staying. To say it was amazing would be an understatement. The guest building was designed by a famous architect, Tadao Ando 安藤 忠雄. He has a very unusual and beautifully modern and stram lined style. He takes advantage of natural light and uses very broad, streamlined shapes. This place had a really nice gallery too. We were all given our own room which just so happened to be an entire floor of the building. We were amused at the size but kind of creeped out at the same time so we all decided to sleep in the same room. Next day, we went touring around Matsuyama. Saw the castle and had Italian for lunch and after that we went to visit Daio paper factory. It was actually fun. Noisy but somehow mildly interesting to visit. I really enjoyed the drive as well. There were endless rows of Mikan trees at the side of the road and the mountains were gorgeous. Absolutely lovely. We went to the party to welcome the female golf tournament players in the night, it was kind of weird because we were the only foreigners and we were probably inappropriately dressed but the food was good and we met the former prime minister of Japan which was interesting. Back at the hotel, we sang Kung Fu Fighting extremely badly at the hotel bar, made the most of free food and alcohol and finished the night off with a soak in the hot springs. I wish i could go every day!

Last day was Kurashiki. Kind of like a more Venice-like Kyoto but smaller. Very lovely, very quiet, famous for peaches. We met a 7kg cat and ate some super delicious udon. Tokyo needs to upgrade its noodle quality. Seriously. ....finally, shinkansen...Tokyo...Ikebukuro... being followed by a stalker... police station then home...

I couldn't do what i wanted today. Very sad:( I get stroppy when things don't go my way but i have learned to deal with disappointment. Anyway, i met up with Miss Leanne instead and of course she was a worthy replacement. I rolled out of bed around 10am. I kind of hate my bed, i really should save up for a new one. It's kind of on a slant and it creaks when i turn over. I spent almost 10 months sleeping on a futon and i think i actually prefer sleeping on the floor rather than a single bed. So.. i met up with Leanne in Roppongi Hills under the giant spider. (I hate Roppongi by the way. All the bad things about Tokyo are to be found in this area. Daytime is not that bad though.) It was nice to see my Ginza girl. We grabbed some fancy burgers at Rigoletto and went for a wander. It was a nice change from pasta. We eat so much pasta, it's crazy. I don't know why Italian food is so insanely popular in Japan. Still... i have yet to find a wonderful lasagna in the city. Lasagna and a perfect red beret is on my wish list.  I wanted to go to Shimokitazawa to check out some vintage dresses but Leanne convinced me that Koenji was closer, has less train changes and better than Shimo in general. I took her advice because i have never actually gotten off the station at Koenji and it was actually really lovely. There were dozens of wonderful vintage clothes, furniture and book stores as well as a heap of cute cafes. I didn't go into any of the cafes because i wasn't in the mood for sitting alone drinking coffee but i did make a mental note of where i want to go next time. I am beyond poor but i found a ¥1000 purple 60's dress that i love <3. I don't even like purple that much but it's growing on me.   I need to clean my apartment and pack which i am not that excited about because i won't be home until Thursday night. Bah!

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