Obon trip

At the end of Obon I went to visit my mother-in-law in Shimonoseki.

It was really hot but we decided that at least once we should go somewhere nice and cool. We managed to convince one of the Aunts to come along as well.

The first stop was near a small waterfall. 

Sushi, Fireworks, thunderstorms and shopping

Hey, it's a second post in a row. Well what do you know, I'm on a roll :)

The Saturday right after I finished work there was a huge fireworks festival on Sumidagawa river. Obviously, we had to go see. Since it was a special occasion we decided to hang out all day.

First we went to the fish market. Eric wanted to go at 5 in the morning, but in the end it was more like late noon. Hahaha

Apparently, this is what wasabi actually looks like.

Wooosh - - - there it goes!

After almost a month in Tokyo I got used to the 12-hour working schedule. Now it doesn't seem as tiring. Time flew by so fast. I do really love working.

CAt is really nice. To tell the truth I wouldn't mind working there even with all the smoking.

Today was one of those days where I felt enthusiastic about work. Although I don't particularly like making paper models, it seemed like the day was over in a flash. I was just returning from dinner and suddenly it's 2 hours later.

I can't believe tomorrow is the last day O_O

This weekend will be really busy though. I am both looking forward to and dreading it. Hahaha...-_-

We went out for dinner to eat 刺身丼 (さしみどん), which is basically rice with raw fish. It was delicious as expected.

Exciting ramen

Food in Tokyo costs a lot. But on the plus side there is a huge amount of places to spend all your hard earned money. Or is that a minus?
Recently I've been going out to lunch more, rather than just buying stuff in konbini. I can't really complain because eating proper food is so much better on so many levels.

Today I also went out to eat dinner. Eric found a ramen shop nearby which had all sorts of different flavours. I've only ever seen regular ramen before, so I was really excited. I ordered 'Genova' ramen, which was, apparently, the most popular. It had tomatoes, spinach and lots of herbs from what I could see. It smelled absolutely delicious and tasted accordingly!

I really want to go there again and try other flavours. So exciting ^_^

Weekend trip - Seso-ji, Asahi, Tokyo Sky Tree

I was way too tired yesterday to post about my day. Suffice to say it was pretty awesome :)

I met up with Andrea, Eric, Damian and 2 other girls at Kaminari gate near the Senso-ji temple.

wasting paper :)

As usual, here are some pics I took on my way to work

I had succumbed to the delicacies of the 'Natural Lawson'. They even have a bakery section with absolutely delicious buns. In there I stumbled upon tortillas - something I've heard about, but never had the opportunity to try. They turned out to be pretty good. I also got dinner there as well - some fancy 4-compartment mini bento. But because both those things had raw onion in them I got a stomachache. Luckily I didn't have to suffer for too long in the office.

There doesn't seem to be any particular work at the moment for me, so I have the leisure of just doing loooooots of study models. Massive paper wastage. But you do learn new things in the process. As it is with anything handmade, it's all about the practice.

I was invited to join Andrea and Eric with their group of friends this Sunday. Yay! I don't mind walking round alone, but it's so much better when you have someone to chat with (and by that I mean me talking).

Out the window

One thing the office has going for it is a really nice view. The windows look over the park, so you see tree tops on both floors. Super relaxing.

I got to have lunch today with Takahashi Akiko - a lady I met through 東峰テレビ broadcasts. It was fun to see her in real life. We went to eat some delicious curry and chatted about this and that. We ended up talking mostly in Japanese and mostly about me. The truth is I am alway too unsure of my language skills to ask questions. I usually just get the general concept of the things people say, not the specifics. I will try harder in future to make better conversation.

At work I got to do some simple layout compositions, which I love to do. The only downside was that I was extremely sleepy, so I couldn't concentrate. In the afternoon I resorted to buying chocolate. It perked me right up. However, I home next time I can go without, as I still want to fit into my fancy clothes. 

something or other

Today we had a barbecue party somewhere near Shukugawara station. It seems that lots of people from other companies came as well. I was pretty surprised to see 2 people from Tanaka-ken. The world sure is small. I guess finding a job in Tokyo might be a good option.

As usual when I am among people I become overly talkative (because I'm usually alone). So now that I've talked almost continuously for 10-12 hours I feel really really tired.

I was very diligent at putting sunscreen on. However, not so diligent at where I was putting it. I remembered my face and arms, but not my chest. I got burned pretty badly in that area. I'll have to wear a button up tomorrow. Good thing it doesn't hurt too much.

After the barbecue Andrea, Eric (the other interns), their friend Damian and I dropped by Omotesando. The guys did some last minute shopping before closing time, because Andrea received a 50% discount coupon. Lucky :)

We decided to take a quick walk along the street to see the golden dinosaur, because - obviously. The big corner building at the first crossing had already caught my eye before with the fancy entrance. Here it is with no people (the better to see for...nom nom (obscure reference ;;;;-_-))

I really like this deconstructivist-ish entrance, but I wonder if it doesn't make people dizzy. I do want to go back and look around more some other time.

 Our friend the dinosaur. Take 50 points.

This building marks the corner for the shortest route to my house. Why yes, I am so very fancy >_<

The sea will part

'When it's 29C at night, it's not fun.'

I have never had trouble navigating busy streets. But lately, when I can't be bothered to weave through people, I adopt a new approach. If you just walk forward briskly with your head held high, people just get out of the way. Just goes to show that if you walk with confidence, the sea will part :)

Also on the subject of walking, I wore my fancy trousers today. They are the best for hot weather as they are super wide - like 2 skirts, one for each leg. However, I may have lost weight or something, because I keep stumbling over the hem even when I wear high heals. So very dangerous, especially on the stairs. But what can you do - 'Fashion'.

I think I should hem them some more.

After working all day on gluing textures to a huge model, we went to a small drinking party. For a job well done, since this morning they submitted the competition entry. We went to a very busy bar, which, I was told, is the cheapest in the area. It was really fun and we even remembered to take some pictures.

A special thanks to Andrea for uploading them so quickly.

The snacks were delicious and the company excellent. Thank you everyone  ^__^

Small things

I came to work slightly early, so I decided to relax a bit with an ice-cream in the park. The ice-cream was a bit disappointing - definitely not cold enough, but the view was pretty nice.

I worked around 9 hours on colouring a single picture. Ridiculous. But it had so many tiny parts that had to be individually coloured. The last hour and a half of the day I had nothing to do. The small changes to the presentation sheet were covered by regulars. All the interns had nothing to do.
So this is what I did ^___^

I know it looks like I don't work at all...

Lab trip - day1

At the end of February our lab planned a trip to Hiroshima.
It took around 5 hours by bus, which meant I had to get up around 5 or 6 in the morning. The long ride meant I could sleep on the way so I didn't mind too much.
The first stop was 厳島神社 (Itsukushima shrine) - famous for it's torii that is surrounded by water during high tide. More on that later.

Entrance to the ferry towards Miyajima island.

Weekend trip

Last Saturday we went on a small trip to Aso. It was raining really hard in the morning, so I felt a bit reluctant to go at first. But it was pretty fun, so I'm glad I did.

Plan A was to go photograph もみじ (maple trees) if the weather was good, plan B was to go eat 馬肉 (horse meat). When I first came to Japan, I was against eating cute pony meat. But as it turned out, horse meat is delicious. Nowadays I'm totally fine with it.

This is the restaurant we went to. The view is just amazing.

I tried making the base for the project model to motivate me to work harder. But all it did was make my hands hurt after cutting all that paper for 2 days. I want to be less lazy!

The paper was expensive. I must work hard!!!

After finishing the base, I decided to celebrate by buying lots of food and sweets. I think this time the シュクリーム wasn't that tasty though.

Ah, but now my teeth hurt because a day later I bought a huge amount of caramel sweets. They remind me of 'iriski'...

I saw this while buying my stash of caramels. Hehe. Would you buy one?

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なつやすみ

Aah, it's been such a busy couple of weeks. And now it's summer vacation. Or so people say. Architecture students don't have much free time.

I signed up for a workshop in Oguni with our lab. It was pretty fun. Everywhere you walk in that small town you can hear the sound of water, because the streets are lined with irrigation canals. It has a greenhouse where they grow strawberry and some other red berry. There's also an old sake brewery.

We had a barbecue in the evening, and when it got dark, we played with fireworks. After that we visited the public bath. My first time - はずかしいーー！But it's really nice to sit in a big hot bathtub.

We had breakfast the next day at a very cute cafe that sells natural apple juice. I believe they make it themselves. Everyone was oohing and aahing at the juice, but to me it felt very diluted with water. I guess not a lot of families here make their own juice :).
We ate lunch at a bar type establishment - so much food. Very good karaage. After the super huge lunch we went to play in the river with kids. So refreshing. But right at the end a local kid sprayed me with water. How dare he! So I jumped in and stole his water shooter. It was easy to operate, but I ended up spraying myself just as much as others.

Tomorrow we have an end of term party. And on the weekend I really want to go to the anime exhibition in one of the local museums. Can't really make plans further than that because of all the meetings and preparations: have to make a model on a Monday, Tuesday is for preparing for Open Campus that's on a Wednesday and a meeting after that.

Recent stuff

I haven't written in a really long while. Since February in fact, and it's already April.

I have been to Latvia and back. Spent only about a week there, running around the place. I think that week we got all the yen out of Rietumu Banka.

Currently awaiting my papers to go through to change my status to 'Student'. Yes, I am going to study at a university here. For now it's been a bit of a disaster really :) I feel very out of place on a campus that is predominantly made up of asian kids. Been getting too emotional as a result - no idea where I'm going, how to ask where to go, and what to do.

I also miss my parents a lot. Knowing that I won't see them for at least a year and a half makes me very sad. At the same time though, I'm pretty happy here. So maybe it balances out in the end.

I got my hair cut. It cost quite a bit for what you get. Next time I'll try explaining more what it is that I want. Maybe even in pictures. I doubt that my hairstyle is so unusual in Japan that the hairstylist couldn't understand the idea. So now I have a fringe... :D It's not too bad, but very hard to style and looks hilarious in the morning.

For now the days are peaceful. The weather is great - it's already 20C. Dreading Summer. Mostly I just lazy around and occasionally do useful stuff, like cooking, washing and cleaning. Very housewifey :)

I found this great site with easy and quick recipes - http://www.japanfoodaddict.com/

I've been trying them out a bit. Even with my culinary skills they are achievable. And with practically all ingredients I used to use at home unavailable in Japan, these recipes help out enormously. A sort of a guide for beginners into Japanese cooking.

That's about it. I suppose starting next week I'll have a more busy university life. がんばります。