some of my friends are going back to their home countries, this time, Aussie.

before they went back, we went to this Udon place, which my friend and i used to go very once in a while, to have some of their infamous not expensive but yet taste wonderful Udon. it really is great.

(picture above)  向こう、it is my friend who has a huge “vegetable” tempura, i guess if oil is never bad for us i “might” consider having one of those, but fried things, esp. tempura, never crave for them, McDonald’s french fries is another story though.

(picture above)  this comes from my Udon, i ordered one with some white thing and a “half-cooked” egg, geez, i did a good deed for myself that day, haven’t been this generous for a while. not to mention, this great taste “green onion” you see, can be refilled as many times as you want. unfortunately for that shop, i am a HUGE fan of green onion.

speaking of “generous”, since my good friend from hk brought me some great load of food, i think it has literally been “weeks” i haven’t been to a grocery store, isn’t that amazing? well, not to mention i am too poor to do regular grocery anyway. but even that, i still manage to 頼む my lovely Chinese friend to get me some ¥400 麻辣 today when she went to 池袋、what can i say? lazy people always think of things to get around.

talk about this 麻辣, i love it soooooo very much not 1 single day i not think about this taste ever since the first night i tried it. my goodness. i had it tonight a few times, till 2 am in the morning, crying out loud.

(picture above)  this is what my friend called “お風呂うどん”, soooooo cute!!!!! the bowl!!!!! it is made of wood, if u are able to tell from this small picture. so cute. so adorable!!!!! it really makes me have the appetite, however, i still like a real Udon instead.

(ok, alert, this has nothing to do with the just mentioned event — friends leaving)

(picture above)  this is the INFAMOUS メロンぱん、the time i tasted it, nothing special. cause i bought it from a convenient store. but i was fortunate enough to have someone bought this fresh for me from a bakery, and … yes it is completely different, of course it taste better, and the best part is, the Crunchiness of the topping, it makes ALL the difference. PERIOD.

from the previous post, even an insensitive person can tell i do regard the more asian part as “the civilization”, nothing against any western もの、ただ i personally just feel way more connected with 東方のもの／こと。once again, no offense to any western cultures, just the way we were born, i really have absolutely no interests to spend more than 50% of my lifetime in somewhere that all i can see are natural born blue/hazel eyes or blonde/dirty brown hair, on tv, at work, on the street, even in my nightmares … or even way worse, people that are super overweight who comes from “somewhere somewhere”, or loads of people that gives no xxxx of fashion 365 days a year. not that i am super fond of those fashion crap like some idiot i know, whose whole life is 101% fashion and it invades/twists one’s personal conception sooo bad that it got to the point of no return — got no brain or common sense for other things. and honestly, it is not like this dude has much fashion sense to begin with … sad, isn’t it?

anyhow, enough mean words, let’s get to the point — one of the wonderful things of being here:

Garlic Sprout ~

please do not tell me these green things do not look delicious … cause man, they DO taste great. garlic’s sprout? as i was told.

Raw Liver

try not get deceived by just the look, or the name of it, these things taste just … wonderful … but personally i think i am the most impressed with the very first ones that i tasted, i will never forget them …

Beef with Rice ^^

i cannot quite recall the name of this actually, but it tastes great, esp. the sauce.

ok, now i have some good things on my mind before i head to bed for real.

a while back, keep on getting this reminder telling me that Hotmail is no longer holding space for our blogs, and we have to manually do something if we want to keep our blogs and photos around, and the place we have to migrate to is … man, when i see the name it seems so familiar, now i know, cause it is the infamous WordPress that Oakhouse has been using ~.

and while transferring, of course i just could not help but keep looking at the blogs that i wrote years ago, goodness, it was back in 2006. by looking at them, it just so giving me the old feelings back, NOW and THEN, so completely different. the 気持ち back then, i can still taste them when i read the words.

and i came across the following, i just could not help laughing.

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

i got the ticket la ~ !!!!!!!!

at around 1pm, Aug 7, 2007 US time!!!
call me crazy but i have to write this down, since it is SOOO unexpected!!!

I canNOT believe the timing!!!

SOOOOOOO COOOOL!!!!!!! i did not even know that they have a concert till yesterday, all i heard is that they are going to Malyasia in Chirstmas and i was like … ah … i x know if i want to go “there” … even tho all my good old college friends are there, really, however, …

Fiona you rock la ~ ! Thank you ah Fanny u help us so much!!! Lucky u found the site!!! I am soooo bad at this!!! and u seem also had a crush like i do at the same time i am sure u know how i feel ~ !!!

FINALLY!!! 1 step closer back to the civilization!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! “SAY 4”!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAAAAAAAAAY!!!

• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

the funniest word is “civilization”. and i still cannot agree more. that is right, i AM in the civilization now. thank goodness.

Valentine’s Day this year passed without much fanfare.  I had work and my boyfriend was busy as well so nothing was planned.  So when the opportunity arose on the night before to go out for Yakiniku (Japanese BBQ) with other members of the guest house we jumped on the opportunity to treat this as our little celebration.  The only problem being is Yakiniku isn’t the cheapest and in Japan, women only give presents to men on Valentine’s Day (don’t worry ladies we get another day a month later!).  So the bill was on me.  Oh well, it was a treat and It’s only money, right?

Wrong!  Well, not exactly but there is a cheap delicious solution to this problem!  It’s a restaurant called Gyuzo on the Seibu Ikebukuro Line.  This was probably the best Yakiniku that I’ve had in Japan (although I’m not a connoisseur).  My favorite was the Karubi (short ribs) and the Rosu (loin chucks) but the raw meat wasn’t that too shabby either! (yes raw! yum!).

I definitely recommend this restaurant to anyone looking for some good Yakiniku at a reasonable price (around 4000 yen a person) but I would make reservations (while we were there someone called to make a reservation for June!).   The restaurant is at Fujimidai station (富士見台駅) on the Seibu Ikebukuro Line (西武池袋線）.   Check out a video here!

Meat! Yum!

Talk about “BLESSED”, i would assume more than 50% of the human being cannot not relate “blessed” to “food”.

My food streak did not stop, it continues, every month, photos of food. dang.

This a restaurant that serves buffet. even better than i thought. some food there actually i have never taste before. Ocra! SOOO good!!!

And the thing that really got me of course, is the dessert. the plate they use there is also interesting, made of wood, don’t get me wrong, and i seriously mean THAT is a plate for holding food “directly”, not to do it like me, in this way.

Wo, what is THAT? yes, choco cake, the taste is ちょうどいい。申し分がない。it taste great!!!!!

I just cannot not take photos of these type of dessert, it is my weakness, one of my many weaknesses, sorry. creamy, white thing, and fruits with different colors, it just looks so darn tempting to me, crying out loud. ooooooh! >.<

My goodness, THIS is one of the things i am talking about. something that i have never tasted before and it taste SOOOOOOO fine! melt in your mouth guarantee.

This is the WHITE COFFEE! 信じられない、そんなものもある。i wish i can let my dad try this, he would definitely loves it. i do miss my dad. 偉いから.

OK, sorry, i really have to take a photo of this thing by itself, cause, as you can imagine, i had it definitely more than just once! i ate maybe … 4? hehe.

Thanks to certain someone that took me there ^^. 本当にありがとう。色々。

Not 1 single day i took it for granted.

February is super busy.

Many things going on. Visa thing, translation project, small graphic project, student’s composition, the silly market, parents’ overseas problems … blah blah blah, it seems never ends.

But yesterday, many troublesome things seem to give me a “stop”.

e.g. The translation project suddenly said it is SO out of budget and told me to stop for now. i am a little down to hear it, wonder if my little working timetable update (report my time so to get paid? ah …) scared him? (but i did do it within his budget like he told me to …) or is it because for 3 weeks almost every day i work 1-3 hours and that just sound TOO many days for him? i don’t know, heck knows what it is on his head.

But once again, translation is not my profession, i would love to do it, like to get paid to train my reading japanese, but even that, when i suddenly was told to stop after i had spent SO much time and had been thinking the whole time how to finish this and that … the sudden gushing feeling of disappointment is hard to suppress …

でも、this is not what i come here to do, i really have to keep telling myself this so i would not get too attached to things, like other 10,000 things that i get attached to so darn easily. from もの to こと.

ちょっと前、and I also finished a small graphic project. the day before and after i received it, of course i felt like shit, cause man! deadline, always, SUPER tight, if that is not an understatement.

BUT, the feeling after it is completed, and the days after, whenever you opened back the file and looked at the completed picture, it always gives you a “wonderful” feeling …

THAT, is what i come here for.

Taking away some of my unnecessary part-time, is like whispering to me, “please concentrate on the things that really matter, you silly kiddo~.” まだ成長できないのか？

ごめんね〜＞。＜　私いつも遅いから？

Other than the translation thing got stopped, (and yesterday i 我慢我慢で finished the “scattered” mistake, endure and endure, just want to finish it! so when they asked for the whole thing i can just GIVE them and not have to worry about it … >.<) the graphic thing got finished fast. and also the student’s composition completed days ago, yay, THAT really drove me nuts, too. well, what does not? and yesterday night, um, this EARLY morning, i also finished preparing my parents’ insurance application, for the step 1. aai aai aai …

So all of a sudden, seems like many things has come to a small stop for now, it kind of feels good.

I don’t remember if i mentioned before, this year, my luck just has changed completely upside down, in a GOOD way. Thanks to a certain someone, but ultimately, it is all God’s work.

Please do not be so harsh and tell me this is not cute … >.<

I think it is a great design, another wonderful “creative” thing of Japan.

This is no ordinary rabbit. this rabbit is from a 新年もち that is sold in japan. the mochi itself has no taste. but the sticky texture is good.

When i was in US, i also bought something like this (not this fancy of course) once many years ago in a VERY small japanese grocery store. at that time i really did not know how to deal with that mochi thing and turned out it went wasted … could not eat. i guess i over-microwaved it. now here, after staying in japan for a while, i finally realized, a mochi can be … microwaved, but you HAVE to do it in very few seconds. please do not set it for minutes, it will turn …

Anyway, back to the main topic, this year is a Year of rabbit, and so far so good. Rabbit is my MOST fav. animal among all the 12 なになに chinese year animals.

“ChiChiMi” that my lovely koreans friends made for us … so sweet.

Another flavor of “ChiChiMi”, ain’t that nice? ^^

A cute パン that i bought after i visited my boss.

Korean food that sold in Family Restaurants in Japan ^6^, taste great.

抹茶 ice-cream, one of the best inventions on earth, believe me! >.<

It might look like crap to you but it is not, me and my very good friend here made the おでん together and we ate it, because of the purple cabbage that is why the color looked like this. it taste good. i helped made it too, of course. it really is nice to eat with good friends at home, at the guesthouse.

One of my my lovely korean friends (a very cute and fun korean girl) one time secretly looked at my camera, and looked at the photos i took, and got a little shocked, because almost ALL are just photos of food.

um, YES, i crave for LOVELY Asian food badly. especially if you come from a place, in the middle of nowhere, that really suck at food.

Many people asked me, why my cell phone, my camera, are SO full of useless photos like this. But to me, they are like my diary.

I cannot write diary everyday, and of course i never share to anyone. but, since my memory is very poor, and i always write too much, so, picture is the best.

When i looked at the pictures, i remember things, things that words cannot describe so well.

Whoever 偉い人たち who took part in inventing “digital photos” technology, we absolutely deeply owe them some SERIOUS thanks.

I plan to write during the Valentine Day but I did not have time.

This day is SOO pretty, it SNOW sooooo hard and for so long. Outside it was just stunning. I have been in Tokyo for 2 years, never for 1 time have seen the snow at this level.

This is the entrance of the guesthouse, quite pretty isn’t it? i was very surprised it can turn to this.

This is also a picture i took from the guesthouse, when i went down to the entrance and looked up to the sky at my right hand side, it is some tree and a building nearby … look at that snowing sky, the color is completely different than usual, so gloomily purple, MYSTERIOUS ~.

This one is taken when i was a little “away” from the guesthouse. actually, this is where we live. ^^ not bad isn’t it?

Here really is a good place, so many people around, they are so kind and fun. this guesthouse’s outside appearance, i have to admit, is one of the most “stunning” design i have EVER seen. quite creative. and inside, with glasses wall and all. super interesting when i first found it out online.

Honestly, when i first looked at the photos of this place, i already 超気になっちゃう. and no matter how many times i looked at other places online, i just cannot shake the image of this place off my mind.