Giveaway!

Does anyone still look at this? I'm pretty bad at blogging, given that I stopped less than a week into the venture. But for those who still like to look at this interesting layout etc., or receive a Google reader notice about this, check out Jelly's blog/give away!

(Click for the blog/giveaway page~)

頑張るぜ！

P.S. Shall I begin updating again? I definitely will farther into the future. :3

コンチニュード

I didn't have my camera on hand to take pictures in the airport/on the way to my homestay... you'll get those later. For NOW:

first picture in Tokyo! The lights changed colour. :^D

Different colours, see? Also, lol Denny's. It seems popular here.

Building with some water-wall embedded.

Shot from a station platform.

Poster for an animation college!

Beyonceeeee being fierce. This is for my little sister! :^)

Standard hand-dryer in Japan. Reminiscent of the "butt dryer" at Katsucon 2008.

Starbucks in Shimokitazawa.

Talented Photography.

That's all I can fit into this post. These photos all date from Dec 30 - Dec 31. See you again soon!

写真をとりました！

This is the set from the Canadian Airport, YYZ. Please load Rush's YYZ prior to viewing so that you understand my experiences there. Thank you.

Intense, industrial moving walkway.

Snowy upon arrival!

Random tigers in the lobby...

Oh, Canada...

Insane yellow (cough, dandelion/marigold) wall! So pretty...

Neato necklace on display in the waiting area near me...

Spoons? Different artist, same waiting area exhibition.

More from the exhibition.

Delicious, delicious airport food. Expensive, but soooo worth it.

That's all! Part two coming very, very soon.

Japanese word of the day: 動画　（どうが）－douga. Meaning: moving picture, animation. Seen on japanese video sites, and in the name of Japan's youtube Niconico douga (meaning "*onomotopaeia for smiling* Animation," I'd venture to say!

Song of the day: POLYSICS - SAIKO SAIKO san

Eastern Adventures Unrelated to the Hall I Occupy at Oberlin College

みんなさん、お元気ですか。

To start, happy hecka belated new year. o_o;; My new year in tokyo was partially uneventful, because I am a huuuge n00b & didn't know how anything worked, so basically I ended up around shibuya (?) where festival food was eaten, crowds were watched, freezing off of extremeties occurred, and a new year was rung in as I returned to the apartment. There didn't seem to be any of the anticipated fireworks, but everyone at Tokyo Tower like. released a balloon into the sky, assumedly carrying with it their dreams for the new year!

I am baaaaack from my adventure in Aomori&Hokkaido, which are both in the northhhh of Japan. Aomori is more or less at the tip of the main island I guess, and Hokkaido is the island above that. We stayed in Hakodate, and it was beautiful. I've found that they don't really salt roads in Japan, and I love that! Snow salts completely ruin the experience of snow for me and make the roads look unpleasantly dirty. Good riddance!

But yes, HAKODATE. Highlights:

-sleeping on the ferry ride
-Living across from a Lawson (best conbini, in my opinion)
-Being in a nice hotel
-going into the local temple and having the sweet old man there at the time tell us excitedly about everything.
-understanding some of what said sweet old man said.
-seeing a Russian Orthodox Church
-Seeing the Greek Catholic church from the hill of the Russian Orthodox Church.
-The views in general
-lights at the harbor at night
-eating in a santa themed restaurant, and then getting DELICIOUSSSSS OMG shake and fries there the next day.
-sleeping on the bus ride back

and of course

VISITING AN ONSEN. It was indoors, and lacked the masses of old people I expected to find. Actually, it was basically empty. Just the girl I was staying with (who only spent a few minutes in the bath because of the temperature). I was happy, obviously. Imagine your perfect relaxing hot bath, but larger and with the water coming out of a bronze lion's head. I miss the ridiculously hot bath, now that I remember it. it was sooo perfect for a short period of time. Haha. Uhmmm.

Hakodate is a beautiful city. I wish I could go to Yuki Matsuri (The Snow Festival) in February. ): it looks like a blaaaaast!

All in all, Hakodate is/was spectacular.

Lately, I haven't been up to very much. Uhmmm let's see. This week, I went to Shibuya, Akihabara & Harajuku. Shibuya was pretty gross/scary. At least, the downtown part is. It's like New York City more or less, and NYC is probably one of my least favourite places on earth. HOWEVER, I found a good magazine shop there and alssoooo, successfully crossed a scramble (but not the scramble. maybe I'll find it & make it happen.) AND ALSO, however, the outersuburbs are gorgeousss! There was this wonderful shop I found called Tsubakico that sold delightful and reasonably priced hand-made trinkets & rare dolls. :^) I'll visit once more before I go, definitely. The housing beyond that was what I like to call "The Shibuya Tangle." It's a bunch of wide alleyways, pretty lights and dead-end roads. Being lost in it while trying to find downtown Shibuya was pretty great when I didn't get paranoid about killers. Ahhhhhh! But, yes. All of the architecture in the tangle was terribly unique. Sarah's boyfriend says it's because that's where all of the people with money live, and that in Japan if you have money to buy a house, you might as well tear the ones you're moving into down and build your own. Amirite? Great, great thinking!

Akihabara was noooot like Densha Otoko. Since it wasn't exactly the bee's knees, here are the highlights:
-Short metro ride from my place to Akihabara
-cheap-ish store with great stuff was located
-Evangelion Interface Headset hairclips were obtained, as well as an Axis Powers Hetalia Russian figurine (OMG, THESE ARE LIKE TWO OF MY FAVOURITE SHOWS EVER *FOAMS* KOLKOLKOLKOLKOLKOLKOL...)
-Interesting escalator that looks like spacetube was ridden
-More Hetalia figures were purchased in a 9-pack (!!)
-Music-box renditions of some of Joe Hisaishi's compositions for Miyazaki films were heard (I look forward to obtaining this music in the fu-chyaaaa)
-Gigi!!! (The cat from Kiki's delivery service)
-I got 6 reeeeeally good singles for 1000en.
-Really good pastries were eaten.

And nowwww, Harajuku! Harajuku is bizasically Tokyo's ~fashion center~ as it's where all of the crazily dressed people go to parade, it's by one of Tokyo's most famous dept. stores, etc etc, and is another tangle of alleyways, except that in this tangle, there are shops and not houses. I got a really good gift for someone in my first few moments there. :^D Will not say who or what. Should I do an afterthefact post with pictures of everyone & their gifts?

Anyway, I will let the pictures posted later speak for themselves, but it's everything you could imagine shopping in Asia to be like. Narrow roads, crowded streets--throngs of people EVERYWHERE, a lot more booth/boutique stand-styled businesses. Also, African hustlers getting into fights. Lolwat. Pretty much, everything you need fashionwise could be found on the streets of Harajuku (past the gate right across from the train). I even saw a wedding in passing! The H&M and Forever21 were soooooo incredibly crowded. They had to have security at the door of each (particularly F21) controlling the crowd and trying to disperse it effectively. Crowd-wise, I'd equate it to Walmart on Black Friday, yeah?

But the best was definitely Laforet Harajuku. This is where I spent my money--quality goods, range of prices from cheapie cheap to designer madness. But there were also a lot of sales, and I walked away with two great sweaters because of that. :^) One is by a label affiliated to furfur (which is like A FAVEEEE) and the other is by a local brand I'd never heard of. Harajuku is very pretty at night, and there's still a lot for me to explore. I've also got to see some shrines, Omotesando hills, Koenji and the Oriental Bazaar (which is like, the biggest place to get souveniers. I'm assuming it's reasonable or else so many people wouldn't mention it). Ah! Also, Tokyo Tower & the palace!! )): MUST.

I leave in like 10 days for Kyoto/Hiroshima. I'm only at 500 cranes though, so basically, 100 cranes a day from now on. Owww, I guess it needs to be done. ); I need to get more paper, if that's the case... But I'm really looking forward to all of the culture and history thar a place like Tokyo can't offer me (at least, not so readily).

To close, here's one of my favourite songs of the moment to close things out. SHIINA, HIIIIII, I'M SORRY I MISSED YOUR CONCERT, BUT I'M TOTALLY CONSIDERING COMING BACK TO JAPAN TO CATCH THE END OF YOUR TOUR, EXCEPT I HAVE FINALS THAT WEEK. ;_________; WHY IS TOKYO JIHEN SUCH A PERFECT BAND?

*runs away*



P.S. next post is pretty much ALL PICTURES. Be excited, because it's going to KILL ME to try and upload them all.

P.P.S.

Word of the day: おすすめ　－ recommendation. Typically found on signboards outside of restaurants & cafes.

Song of the day - 見つめていたい (Mitsumeteitai) - by flumpool. I will translate this as either "It hurts to see you," or "I want to see you." Someone who knows Nihongo, help me out? Oh, and go watch the video on their site: http://flumpool.jp -- all of their other songs/videos are great too, so you won't be disappointed!

Peace out, girlscouts!

乙女の夢 (A Maiden's Dream)

みんあさん、おはようございます！ (Good morning everyone)

Today is the start of my first legitimate full day in Tokyo! However, since I am just sitting around under the kotatsu (a table with a heater installed under it--something I've always wanted to do) in my pajamas and watching some newsy show, I'll recap the "first" day aka the ARRIVAL.

We left the house at around 2:30 AM EST for my 6AM flight (since the pseudo-terror attack caused regulations to change, so check-ins needed to be speedier). My dad ended up driving toward the wrong airport, though, so a 30min drive became an hour and a half drive (providing me with ample time to take a refreshing nap--I needed to abate sleep as long as possible until the big flight). Fastforward to me flying to Toronto. It was super great; a smooth, uncrowded flight. The girl across from me had her small dog with her. One of the flight attendants said he liked my origami, too! :^) This, of course, made me very happy.

While hanging around YYZ airport, there were a few key points amongst the humdrum airport-waiting nonsense:
1. There are like. Superstores. Yeah. I made a small video addressing it which I'll post later.
2. FRENCH PEOPLE WHFJKENEEJKFD WHYYYYY (jkidding! ...right?)
3. I got lunch at a pseudo-pricey place while waiting but it was SO. GOOD. SO GOOD! I now have Canadian $$$. :^0 There was a poster in the airport, too, regarding the high number of moose-related car accidents. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH WHAT???
4. I saw the Japanese John Michael. You can only imagine how cool that was.

The plane was pretty large. I've never been on one that big before! All of the stewardesses were very sweet and the food was actually enjoyable! I was in a three-seat row, but there was no third person. My rowmate (a nice lady from the Philipines) and I had a great napping schedule. When I wasn't napping she was, and when she was I wasn't. This = getting to lie down across two seats instead of being cramped in one. I watched A Serious Man and Inglorious Basterds on the flight. A Serious Man was great, but I feel like a lot of it went over my head since I'm not Jewish. :^[ Inglorious Basterds was gratuitously gory and I wanted to punch Brad Pitt for his accent at times. The characters weren't all agreeable and the complete lack of loyalty to anyone ever whether or not they were your own men/whatever kind of annoyed me, but. Meh. It's war. It was entertaining, but really, really long. KAjkwsd. Salsa, they had like 5 eps of 30 Rock available for watching btw. I thought of you when I saw that!

The plane was just full of adorable, non-screaming forever babies, too. There were a loooot of mothers about walking the aisles and bouncing their kids. So cute. :D Uhm, yeah. Since I was flying east, we got no darkness despite it theoretically being an overnight/redeye flight. Bonkers! I liked seeing a little steamboat in the ocean off the coast of Russia (?). The clouds looked like huge ice floes, which made the image better.

This is basically all that happened of note on the 13ish hour flight. :x What comes next is the best though, because it's actually ME GETTING TO JAPAN.

Let me say first that going to Japan has been my dream since I was like 5 or 6 years old (thanks Sailor Moon!). I took like 2 Japanese lessons at age 6 or 7 and have been listening to the music since age 8 or 9. So, yeah. DREAM. DREAMS COME TRUE. Some are meant to die, but this was not one of them. And so, I am here. Now. Ahahhaahdbjsfeuhfukjrejgklre :^)))))))

Back to the trip: As the plane pulled into Narita, I felt a giddy excitement that I have probably not felt for ages. Not the excitement/anxiety of the first day of college, or the overwhelming glee of acing something, but the feeling of a dream being realised. I was simultaneously ready to begin adventuring the city and to vomit every single organ in my body up due to the rumbling joy.

After going through customs &c, I met Dan in the main lobby--I exchanged currency, fawned (NOT like the very fawn gates we know today) over items that the airport shops were selling, and we went down into the station (it's so beautiful, btw... I'll get pics of what the bottom of metro stations look like here later on). I got a PASMO (Japanese equivalent of a SmarTrip for those familiar with DC travel) and we began our two hour-ish journey to Taito-ku.

The area just outside of Narita is absolutely gorgeous--sprawling farmland, sporadic shopping centers in muted colours, big temples, crumbling stairs, traditional Japanese houses with strings of laundry and the glow of the setting sun painted beautifully across all of the serene scenery. Breathtaking! Hbdkjasbdjkasdcs <-- how I felt seeing it. DREAMS. Augh, anyway, yes. The journey was mostly uneventful. We met a guy named Michael on the train. He was from BC, Canada and is a chef at a gentleman's club in Roppongi (the district with all of the high-price bars and clubs, more ore less).

Side note: A commercial that was just on TV had a video of that cat from youtube who liked to launch itself stuck into boxes. There's also a priest grinning weirdly and doing a circular body motion on this newsy program. Looks like it's related to the New Year celebration?

Anyway, Michael has a huge, winding dragon tattoo that he's working on, and he plans on traveling to more countries to taste different foods, learn techniques and expand his cooking repetoir. How great, right? :^)

As the night finally came, we finally arrived at the apartment. Getting into the apartment proved the most troublesome of anything that night (including dodging bikes with several 889343893lb suitcases in hand/on back)--the key was supposed to be left in a visible place, but due to mail delivery, it had not only been placed out of reach, but was under stacks and stacks of mail and small packages! But,with guts and effort, we successfully removed it and got into the apartment (the process of obtaining the key earned us reaaalllyyy weird looks from a young couple leaving the building).

Japan has been nice so far--Sarah has an amazing, spacious and comfortable apartment. Daniel and I wandered Taito-ku (the neighborhood where I'm staying) in search of food after dropping off the bags. We stood outside of a ramen shop for several minutes trying to decipher the menu and decide whether or not to go in. While this was occurring, an older Japanese man sort of wandered past, staring. I dismissed it, since we did look pretty strange. However, not moments later, I heard a dripping noise and looked over to find him peeing on a streetpost. Uhm, yeah. He then approached us and spoke rather unintelligibly, but went into the ramen shop asking the owner (who he said was his friend) to give us a good, cheap deal! (HOW NICE, AMIRITE? omg) The ramen shop owner was shutting down, though, so we'd missed our chance. We wandered a bit more, checked out the grocery stores and tried to find me a rental/prepaid phone (no such luck in this small area), which I'll try again for tomorrow in the actual city-area.

We went to a bookstore whilst wandering, and I bought a large volume of Shin-chan (children's manga) to enjoy/use to practice my reading, and the new issues of Zipper Magazine (my favourite Japanese magazine!) and SPUR (which is pretty good this time around). Across from that was a cool bento (box lunch/meal) stand. The chefs spoke enough English to help us out and also had an English menu! :^) For a small bento with rice, seaweed, a small serving of veggies and some seafood plus a small bowl of miso soup, I paid only 430 yen! (this is like 4.50 USD)

We came back to apartment to eat our cheap food and it turned out to be pleasantly delicious. However, halfway through my tempura-styled-thing, I realised I was eating a tentacle. Now, I've eaten tentacle before, but for some reason the fact that I didn't realise it as I was eating it made me nauseous and upset, so I flew into a rage (hahahaha, no. not really.) and ended up dropping it off of a balcony. Uhmmm. Yeah. Did I mention that the balcony/hall thing isn't really enclosed? I'll take a picture, since I can't figure out a sensical way to communicate how ridiculous and amazing the design seemed.

Well, we finished eating and Daniel needed to get home before the trains stopped running (which is between 11 and 12, I think? It was about 10 when he left). Upon Daniel's exit, I asked him to press the doorbell before he left so I could see if it worked out properly. When he got down to the lobby area, he did so, but I'd accidentally pressed an alarm button when trying to turn on the video call option. I thought I had turned it off, but a security officer ended up coming to the apartment to address the issue. Mind you, I speak rather little Japanese (especially in relation to crime, accidents and such) and he spoke no English whatsoever (I'd tried speaking English to him, but when he contacted the office, he asked what language I spoke). Things were resolved rather quickly after that--I used an online translator to explain what had happened, and he came in to turn off the emergency alarm setting. So, Moritaka sama, wherever you are, thank you for your help!

I watched some TV after the madness (on Girls Bar, a late night talk show sort of deal for young women), some of the girls sang the Neon Genesis Evangelion theme song! (I know all of the words, btw, and was A. SO PUMPED TO HEAR IT (it's one of my favourite songs from one of my absolute favourite anime), and B. SO PUMPED TO BE IN JAPAN WATCHING A SHOW WHERE PEOPLE KARAOKE'D THE EVA THEME SONG).

My sleep pattern is kinda wonky right now/the apartment is currently pretty cold, so I've been up since about 5:30AM Japantime, buuuuut because of this, I caught a clip of the concert I didn't get to see on the 30th. A clip, specifically, of Tokyo Jihen's performance. TOKYO JIHEN, I LOVEEEE YOU, I AM LISTENING TO YOUR NEW SINGLE AND IT 'S SO BA I CAN'T HANDLE IT (they are my fave band, obvs).

Okay, I think that's aboot it for my first day. Sorry there are no pictures, but I don't have access to my own laptop right now, so they'll come later.

それ、じゃまたね！
L8r, sk8rs!

メリークリスマス！

HEY. HEY YOU GUYS. Yeah. You.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!! Or other celebrated Holiday. You know.

Also, happy belated Festivus--check out the wiki page for that; it's pretty boss.

Uhmmm, I got little this year because everyone is funneling money into my trip (THANKS SO MUCH, BTW, EVERYONE. I LOVE YOU ALL.)

SO! Onto the gifts.

Exhibit A.

I got A SUITCASE...set. Now I don't have to use my mother's anymore. Mine is smaller, but certainly fabulous and easy to distinguish at baggage claim. :^) And the colours of the Japanese flag (my mother was very excited by this fact).

Exhibit B.

I also got PROFESSOR LAYTON AND THE CURIOUS VILLAGE. YES YES YES. I'm so terribly excited. Now I can learn the ways of a true gentleman! I'll wear my hat while playing it and everything. And playing it will make me cool, because I'll be playing a JAPANESE game in ENGLISH... IN JAPAN!

Exhibits C, D & E.

Uhmm, I also got pocky! Hiiii, messy desk. Look, the Oscar Wilde book my roomies got me! It's all kinds of lovely. You can also see Persona 4 AKA video game obsession...

Exhibits F & G

Exhibits H, I & potentially J.

I also acquired some Christ-mas-socks, and slippers (which sort of resemble foot-consuming larvae... or Pupa, if any of you play(ed) Ragnarok Online)! Comfort heaveeennnn, thanks Dad + Auntttt. (I love that my elderly nature is being accepted and they've given up on buying me girly/scented things. God, yesss.) And say hi to Alex's shirt!

Oh, and another present... I've finished the next 100 cranes! *presses like button* And one of my roommates sent me a bunch more paper to use. Thanks so much, Bibka!Uhmm, HERE IS A PIC, YEAAAAHHHH (a la Bibs). My cat Leena is inspecting them. Hmm... かっこいいね？ 1/5 of the way there!

She smells a case!

Ah ah ah, in closing for this rambling entry, two of my favourite Christmas songs ever:

Poor quality, but this special is GOLD. I absolutely love how cheerful it is without being cliche... maybe because it's under the ocean? FILLED. WITH. JOY.

"Go a-way before I harm you bodily!" (never change, Squiward).

Mr. Krabs has the most beautiful falsetto ever, btw. Obvskies. And, finally, the Ranma 1/2 Christmas special song. I have been obsessed with it for approximately a decade--I have ALWAYS wanted to celebrate Christmas with this song as my festive-mood-setting centerpiece.


Uhm, this is only the video version... it's a bit longer. But yes, WONDERFUL. And cute. Rumiko, where did your magic go, bb?



Sidenote: I LEAVE NEXT WEEK. HOW WILD IS THAT? I hope to enjoy some vlogging at the Canadian airport. (YYZ... really good Rush song, too).

Ahhh, Japan, I am coming for yooouuuuu... *laughs creepily*

All of that aside, I hope everyone's holiday kicked epic tuchus. Any good gifts/fun family time/how many episodes of Dexter have you watched? Or seasons of Scrubs?

新世界へようこそ！

Jkidding! This isn't a new world by any means.

This is kind of a new start for my blog, though.

Well, excuse me while I panic about how close the trip is!

I haven't got my things packed, or my new wig delivered, or anything, so much to do!

よんでくださって、ありがとうございます！

(Is that right?)

Oh, P.S. here is a picture of the first 100 cranes! Thanks to everyone who helped--the next one hundred will be done before I take off. :^)