Very first Japanese Calligraphy class :)

20150831 satisfaction 101% !!!! 
I lost my way after getting some bubble tea from 春水堂 六本木 (rubbish stuff, DON’T patronise, it’s not real bubble tea and it’s expensive) and Taniguchi san was very nice, he came to pick me up..

Yamamoto Sensei was very nice and everyone was nice. Nice vibe nice atmosphere.. I wanted to do this for a long time, but I kept procrastinating.. Finally done it and no regrets!!!

Last 50 days in Japan! It will be AWESOME!!!!!

sick in japan #2

20150819 so I went back to the same chuka eatery because I saw someone eating this in the afternoon and I wanted to eat it! It tasted as nice as it looks :)) I cleared the whole plate. And all the rice. Except for the soup. Because soup in Japan’s chukaryori tastes weird. Haha! And uncle finally asked me about Sandra and Tama chan, if they are from America. And he knew I wasn’t local. Uncle eyes very good …

I ate and watched tv with japanese uncle before 2 more customers came in just prior to shop closing. That lone Japanese in the pic looks so sad and lonely. He didn’t speak to uncle at all. All of us more or less small chat with him…

Went around the neighbourhood and picked up a very sweet Nashi and a box of kiwi. After going home I fell asleep after a shower. Still not feeling too good. Might go to the hospital again later.

-20150820

ARUBAITO

20150817 my first salary in Japan. Part time “job”. Money is hard earned~! Edit: not my first pay cos I got money for translation but this money was exchanged with hard labour and I got hard cash for it so it’s kind of emotional LOL

a little bit of SG in Japan #3

20150817 thanks to Dan, a fellow Singaporean I met on the hiking trip, I had fun on Monday. We met at Ikebukuro for sushi and went to at least 3 game centres!! He knew I wanted to learn how to play the UFO catcher so he taught me.. But mainly it was caught by Dan! I got the alpaca with 300yen. Very happy :D Dan had a couple of good ones too, the stitch pair with 500yen etc.. Not that I need all these but cheap thrill :D maybe we spent about 5000-6000 yen?

I met him again the next day again because he left some stuff in my bag which he helped his SG friends to buy.. He was going to stopover SG on his way to NZ for holiday. Unfortunately I was feeling unwell and had to trouble him. Lucky he knew some clinics so he let me know where and in my dizziness I managed to reach there. I hoped for doctors who can understand english but unfortunately I walked into one that didn’t so amidst my kurakura feelings I had to do it in japanese. Not so bad, I survived !!!!

Most importantly he lent me money for medicine and dinner. They don’t accept cards so I only had enough cash for consultation. When you are sick you don’t really think about figuring out where you can find an atm and to try to withdraw money.

After that we visited his office, just right above the clinic. its called Regus, with a common reception, lounge, and rooms you can rent on monthly basis to work in. a small room costs 2000 dollars!

we went to a nice mexican place to have dinner, at Shinagawa station. Nice ambience but I was still feeling giddy and all.. ( so apologetic towards Dan, i’ll treat him when he is back!!)

Thanks a million to Dan. 在家靠家人 出外靠新加坡人！謝謝！

Chie's music performance

20150816 today I met Daichi for lunch at Shinjuku as he is leaving for studies. The relationship between him and me is very funny because we were online friends, and usually online friends don’t end up meeting, but we met 4 times within these 2 months! It’s nice that the virtual relationship blossomed to real friendship, he is quite a nice guy. Had spicy miso ramen at santouka (which to me, is not spicy at all but it’s quite nice), chat at cafe and we parted ways.

Left to get flowers for Chie for her live performance at Shinjuku, at a music bar called “you can’t believe anything other than rock and roll”. Many performers came together for this overnight 27-hour festival, mostly guitar performances. I really enjoyed some, especially the imitation Nagabuchi Tsuyoshi and the performance by 店長, their performances had soul in them…

And I discovered a drink called Cassis Oolong. Basically cassis and oolong tea. I’m not sure if it has alcohol but it’s so nice!! 口に合わせる^^!!!

The night ended with a stupid incident of a bloody ojiisan trying to take advantage of me -_- he was one of the performers and he chatted with me at the bar, I alr felt weird cos he was drunk and he kept touching me. As I was feeling uncomfortable I wanted to leave, he said he will send me to the station. The moment we left, his hands got offensive… On my shoulders and he tried to hold my hands… I told him we just met for the first time, it is not appropriate. After a while he gave up. How to trust people like that… All I wanted was to chat with musicians … :(

I felt angry with him and also at myself and my inability to react accordingly. Next time I should just be very very fierce and assertive. YAMETE KUDASAI.

:( :( :(

A visit to Saitama

Alisa came to Tokyo with her husband and I arranged to meet her in Saitama :) I love Alisa! She is so nice.

It's about an hour's train ride to where I was heading to, from Ikebukuro. I took longer than expected because I was lost at Ikebukuro :( 

Met Alisa at the Starbucks at 本川越駅 Hon Kawagoe station. I was so distracted by the department store's sale....

She only had limited days in Japan so it was a meet-up + a day for her to grab all the shopping she need. 

The amazing shopping street クレアモール川越新富町商店街 at Kawagoe!! Hidden gem!! It's just 5 mins away from the station and it's situated between Hoe Kawagoe station and Kawagoe station. 

I bought so much stuff here.. and also because there was summer sale I went C~R~A~Z~Y! 

We had lunch at Hidakaya 日高屋 which is one of my favourite Chinese restaurants in Japan! It's a chain but the food is good. I love the fried rice the most (with lots of SB black pepper!!!) but today I tried a different dish.. (they actually gave me a dish that looked different, but oh well..)

After that Yori went home and we went to shop and shop and shop.. from lifestyle goods to clothes to supermarket. I'm so happy I found an interesting place near Tokyo :) and it's not that crowded..(then again it's a weekday..)

Some commotion at the Ikebukuro station. It's the Rinjiressha! 臨時列車
These trains are used for specific purposes with a fixed train schedule. For example, it was used to transport students for university entrance exams, and sports competitions from one prefecture to another. But now it's much more rare. 

(Will read the article in detail and translate when I have the time!!)

I will come back again with Alisa's recommendation to visit the 川越一番街商店街 in Kawagoe! 

Tsukuba Mountain hiking

20150809 happy SG50 Singapore! Not wanting to spend such an important day today, I went hiking ^^ I met great people today, really. Also met my first two Singaporeans in Japan ! (who are not in Waseda and not senpai Alan) 

The climb to 女体山 was more difficult that I expected :( From Tokyo, I took the Tsukuba express to Ibaraki prefecture to hike on Mount Tsukuba. The first part of the climb was all stone stairs, so it was really really difficult for me. In my mind all different vulgar words appeared. haha! why did I even thought of hiking :( It took so much effort and determination, really. Lucky Nemoto san and Maiko san were there to encourage and help. There were so many times I wanted to give up, took so many rest stops, but the people coming down kept me going. And in my mind, I told myself, this is a challenge I took up and I shouldn’t just give up like that. And I decided to hike to keep myself busy. I can’t give up. 

Nemoto san!!!!

The top part of the mountain was easier cos it was big rocks and it is actually to me, easier to climb. I did fall down slightly, not a serious injury though. Taiki kun and Hisashi san were very nice they waited for us half way. Just kept on climbing and climbing until I reached the top!!! the view was spectacular…

 I spoke to an ojiisan who had his dog with him, the dog is 14 years old!! (dog 80 years old) and she climbed together with the ojiisan. Sugoi deshou?!

Got a omikuji at the shrine at the top of the mountain

After that we went down to the cable car level and had lunch. 

My bento ^_^ yes it is edible haha. Then we embarked on another short hike to the 男体山 which Hisashi san and Maiko san didn’t come along. Luckily the hike was short if not it would have been difficult for me too!!!

Next on! 男体山!!!

On the train back Maiko san says I stay in the most dangerous place in Tokyo T.T I’m so shocked for words…. I don’t wanna die in a foreign land!!! I promise not to go home late again. LOL and Nemoto san re-confirmed that Adachi-ku is never a place that he would never go. WTF. What should I do? :(

Went down via cable car and had dinner with the Singaporeans and Japanese people. Spoke so much and ate good Yakitori :D

HAPPY SG50 FROM SINGAPOREANS!

YAY! I’m a happy kid today :)

Tokyo Bay Summer Fireworks 2015

8 Aug 2015

Today was an international meet-up because we have people from all over the world coming together to watch fireworks :) I think it's one of the best places to watch fireworks in Tokyo because of the bay view. But it is also crazily crowded. LIKE CRAZY.

We met about 4-5pm? And there was some waiting here and there because of large number of people.

Playing with Kimi's amazing camera! (Later I found out the price is also quite amazing! haha)

Doan from France, Shin and Daichi from Japan, Tamara from Germany, Kimi from Taiwan/Hsinchu, Boyon from South Korea/Wonju and me from Singapore :D

When we reached Shimbashi, oh wow, the sudden mass of people getting on Yurikamome train to Odaiba... we had to keep close to avoid getting lost.

While waiting~ Boyon and me

We made our way to Odaiba Marine Park, thanks to some research done by Shin san. This was my 3rd fireworks festival in Tokyo but I was still very looking forward to it! And it was a good meet-up for us girls to chat =)

We couldn't find a place when we reached there at about 5pm because apparently the Japanese people "reserve" space with plastic sheets. So almost every inch of the grounds was taken. We were a group of 8 and it took us at least 45 mins of choosing and giving up spaces to finally find a space that was enough for us. And that was considering we have no idea where exactly the fireworks would be appearing at.. 

During the wait time, Shin san, Boyon and me went to the convenience store to get some food. The only convenience store was near to the entrance of the park and it was filled with people! We had to queue to get in so as to avoid overcrowding. I just wanted a Popsicle :( The inside of the store was also taped up such that the direction of movement is only one way, "grab and go" instead of going to and fro. Well good system さすが日本人! 

We got our watermelon Popsicles! Yay!

While walking back to our camped space, the fireworks started! That was when our nightmare started !! Because people started to stop to watch the fireworks and many people couldn't pass through. The passageways started to jam up.. I guess nothing rules over fireworks at this time, not even Japanese manners :\ It got so bad at one point a Japanese started to say, "We are here all to enjoy this fireworks, not to suffer, please cooperate and move on...." We had to squeeze through so badly through the crowd I though my toenail was going to fall off after being stepped on.

Back at our reserved space, we were ecstatic to find out that our view was not obstructed in any way!! Yay! Full glory of awesome fireworks =)

After the fireworks, we continued to chat at our spot before walking to another station to take the train home. Not much of a crowd but we were very tired. But a good outing with these wonderful pals ;)

 

with Daichi