For any music or book lovers out there, go to Tower Records in Shibuya. If you go to the Hachiko exit (You can find it by walking down the Yamanote line) then walk down the road to the right of the massive Starbucks, you will find a big building called Tower Records.

In there is a countless array of music and DVDs etc, but if you go up to the 9th floor there is a heap of English books. They have a great selection and they also have a sales bin where I was able to pick up a couple of bargains. Towards the back of the store is a load of Japanese study books and flashcards for learning Kana.

If you don’t already know kana, then it is really easy to learn using flashcards. Once you have learned it then you can read al the train stations and other useful things. It also helps you to identify the Japanese that you already know, and in conjunction with a little grammar study will help you to understand the basic sentence structure of Japanese.

Memebers can recieve points or something from the store, but I have never really understood what for or how to cash them in, still, might as well do it in case I ever find out what they are actually worth.

If you didn’t know this, there is a program called Skype which allows you to call people from all over the world. All you need is a headset and you can call mobile phones and landlines very cheaply. If the your friends or family have skype, then you can call them for free!!

When you buy a headset, a USB one is best, as I found that my Mic port is broken, so I had to get a new headset and give my other one to my family.  Which is okay, because then they can use it to call me anyway.

You can buy Skype credit in Family Mart. There will be a kind of computer screen thing. Go to it and select “Pre-paid services” then you an buy a voucher of 500-or more yen.  You can also use this computer screen thing to buy other things, such as stadium tickets, museums, etc. The ones in Family mart usually have an English option, but others are not so easy to use.

500yen will probably last a long time, so it is worth it. You an download Skype for free and it is easy to use.

Well, just though that would be useful for you to know…

Hey, we all wanna go to Fuji-Q for my friends Birthday.

 For those of you who have never been…Fuji-Q is awesome!!! There is a crazy rollercoaster that drops you backwards-headfirst toward the ground and then spins you all over the place.  I remember hurtling toward the floor headfirst backwards, my legs flipping over my head and then, suddenly, I was really high again on a track that was twisting and I was locked into a carriage that was flipping me around.

I didn’t have time to be scared as I was in awe of the speed and by the time something had scared me, I was somewhere else.

JUST WATCH: ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Egy_uL9CS8Q ) By the way, I didn’t film this, I just found it on youtube.

  Later, I went to the ride that is called the “Hospital of the nameless Ghosts” basically, I got chased by Zombies through a Silent Hill-esk Hospital…..FOR ONE HOUR!!! Eventually, I was chased with my friend screaming down a corridor and through a curtain into broad daylight, much to the amusement of the visitors lining up to go inside the hospital of terror.

In the event that you get sick, you can call the public health centre. This service is available in English on 03-5285-8181. When you call them, make sure that you say which language you would like to receive help in. Tell them where you are and your symptoms, they wil then try to find a hospital or clinic near you. I don’t think that this service is used for emergencies though.  I can’t believe that I went so long without knowing this!!!! I hope that it is useful for all of you!!! When I got sick, I was glad that I had that number. I ended up going to a hospital relatively near my house as the public health centre tried to find me a hospital that was near and had an English speaking doctor.

On Sunday Night, one of my housemates decided to throw a “Thai Food” party for his farewell.

He was in charge of the basil chicken and green veggie curry, others made some yakiudon, fried beef with egg, maguro, and I made some satay tofu, oh and of course there was beer. There was sooooo much food! It was all so delicious!

I really like my guest house as we always seem to have a party or some sort of dinner soiree together. It’s great getting to know everyone in the house and even better to share a meal and good times.

We also had bought a load of fireworks that day and intended to go crazy with them in the park after dinner, but unfortunately it started pouring down rain and well fireworks and rain don’t really work together – as was confirmed. The boys couldn’t help themself and decided to test out some of the fireworks outside in the street in the rain.  It was actually pretty funny, the fireworks just kept on dying as they landed in a puddle. Even the ‘spaceships’ and ‘bees’ didn’t work.

It wasn’t too bad though as the next night had clear heavens. And away to the park we ventured, fireworks, lighters and a waterbottle(just in case) in hand.I like how the “sparklers’ here change colour from green to red, although they to tend to be reallllly bright! and its really cool watching the tiny delicate fireworks ( i forget the name)crackle away, my housemate said that we had to see who’s one would last the longest as you had to hold them really carefully or they would go out too quick.

At the Park there was also this awesome slide! Its really big, and goes for quite a bit. We figured the best way was to get a few people on at a time and link together like a train and all squat so our feet were resting on the roller things, and boy did we go fast down that slide. Everyone was in hysterics, and out of breath from soo much laughing, it felt like we were all ten again, and we have the scraped knees and scratched arms to prove it.

In other words a pretty fun couple of days with some pretty awesome housemates!

Last night my housemates and I had a Ghibli movie night. I really enjoy Ghibli films. There is just something about them that makes you feel relaxed and gives you an overall pleasant cinematic experience. The Movies which we watched were “Tales from Earthsea” and “Whisper of the Heart“. I love the music that is used, and the overall craftsmanship that goes into making such excellent anime. The scenes never cease to amaze me with their technicality and creativit- that allows us to be transported into another world. So yeah- basically a big fan, especially of Hayao Miyazaki’s work. He is just a great director.

Before the movies my housemates and I attempted to make popcorn. After the first three attempts, we finally got the hang of it. heh, lets just say attempted was the key word.

We started pretty late probably 11.30 and finished up at like 5.30 in the morning. I have to say from all the Ghibli films I have watched so far my favourites are Spirited Away and Howl’s Moving Castle, but I still have a lot more that I haven’t seen…I think we might even be renting some more out tonight.

06/05/09

After work I went to Karaoke with my co-workers. I finished later than everyone else so we met up in Big Echo. They had already been singing and drinking for a while so I had to play catch up. I sang a few songs and then we moved on to a nightclub that was nearby. As it was the end of Golden week, the night club as dead except for four boys sitting at a far table who were dancing among themselves. We drank and chatted for a few hours and then finally left. My family were coming back tomorrow.

07/05/09

My family arrived back from Hiroshima. They had gone to see the shrine that lies in the ocean. They have now official been to more places than I have in Japan, so I wish I could have gone with them. They showed me pictures of where they went and it looked beautiful. We hung out in Ueno and got drunk in a local bar. We chatted for hours and ate a lot. It was a pretty relaxing day.

08/05/09

I worked. Not much to say about it really.

09/05/09

We went to Yokohama and watched the giant robotic spider running a mock ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqolwulVlsc ) (La Machine). That was pretty cool. After we had watched the spider we went into this old warehouse that had been converted into a shopping centre. There was a food court and while we were eating a young lady came and asked if she could interview us for the local radio station. Turns out, we didn’t know anything about Yokohama, so I doubt she would have used our answers.

10/05/09

Me and my family went to a random place on a whim. It was called Nasu. We found it in the guide book that was available at my family’s hotel. I slept on the train, and we ended up in the mountains. There were lots of carved statues of a small man with large hands praying and a mountain path to walk along.  When we had gone full circle, we put our feet in an onsen. It was really hot and I could see my feet turning red.

  As we got on the coach and returned to the train station we travelled through a forest, it was really nice and there was grass in between the trees, I have never seen that in a forest before. What’s more, as we passed through the forest, I saw a route master bus (Double-decker bus) between the trees!!! It was really old and had “Victoria Station” written on the front. That was quite random; I have ridden that bus in London too.

On Satuday I went to the Design Festa in Odaiba. There was an unbelievable amount of artists exhibiting their works at that place that after 5 hour of looking around I felt mentally exhausted. Luckily about ten minute before closing this guy who made animals and things out of balloons was selling his stuff for 100 yen each. It was too good an offer to turn down so I got myself  a little ballon guy with a purple hat and his tounge sticking out , I thought that he would be a nice addition to the guest house. On the train ride home my friend and I were trying to think up a name for our new inflated friend, we eventually came up with the name Rubber Johnny,we both felt it was the most appropiate name we could think of.

I let  Rubber Johnny settle in on the couch. He was well recieved amounngst everyone at home, but after a couple of days I noticed was something wrong. Rubber Johnny wasnt looking too well. He was drooping  on the couch and looking really under the weather balloon. I very abruptly had to come to terms with the fact that  Rubber Johnny was on his way out. I would hate to of witnessed Rubber Johnny’s slow and agonising demise so i did the right thing and made sure Rubber Johnny would go out with bang.

I got some fire works in Akabane. That night we all went to a park nearby, set up a firework underneath Rubber Johnny, said our good byes and then watched his head explode. All that remained was the  mangled and melted remainents of what once was. It was how he wanted to go…I think.

After a few drinks on a Friday night at the guesthouse we started to watch some videos on youtube. We came across the old Mentos and Diet Coke clip. Our house manager could  not believe it actually worked and was determined for us to test it out. After an argues search we discovered that Japan seems to no longer sell diet coke, so we settled for coke zero. Then the next hurdle would be to find some Mentos. After a late night search through 3 convienient stores  all we could find was grape mentos at Seven Eleven. I was doubtful it would work having strayed from the original recipe and knowing from watching Mythbusters that the regular fruit flavored mentos does not work due to it’s smoothed out surface.

Every one at the house gathered out  front to watch.  We cracked open the 2 litre bottle of zero, dropped in 4 mentos and …..success!!! It worked a treat (no pun intended) shooting a fountain of coke  about 3 metres up in the air. It turned out that the grape flavoured Mentos had a similar surface as its mint flavored friend. It did leave a decent size puddle of soft drink on the ground, but at least we wouldn’t be drinking grape flavored Coke for the rest of the night.

Last Saturday my bf and I made our way to Odaiba for the first time for the 29th Design Festa held at the Tokyo Big Sight. I had no idea what to expect, but I like art and want to be a graphic designer – so I thought it would be a good place to be inspired.

The monorail trip was really cool, the way that Odaiba is set out is fantastic. The architecture and the open space was such a contrast to the cramped city sights of Shinjuku or Shibuya. It looked like a lot of work and thought had gone into creating this seaside wonderland. Unfortunately we would have to explore it another day.

Tokyo Big Sight was well pretty damn big, with a giant saw right marking that we were in the right place. The pathways to the entrance were teeming with people coming in and out of the exhibition. Carrying bags of goodies. I couldn’t wait to get inside.

As soon as we entered, I already new that we wouldn’t be able to see all the work on display. There were THAT many artists with their stalls set up across two massive floors and so many rooms. First item on our agenda though, was to meet up with another housemate and his family. We found each other with out hesitation-despite lack of phone ownership, and started our way through the aisles of art.

There are sooo many talented artists here in Tokyo, I was amazed at the standard that was exhibited. Many of the artists sold their works in the form of postcards- i wish i had had enough money to buy them all! That’s how good the majority of them were. From traditional art to computerised images, it was so overwhelming! I was inspired to start making something of my own, and I actually wish I had known earlier so I could have a go at selling my photography. It was inspiring yet demeaning at the same time as I thought to myself it would be impossible to compete with such a high standard. We ended up buying about ten different pieces – due to lack of funds, but picked the ones we liked the best anyways.

I think the design  festa is such a great idea for artists to let themselves be known and share their work with the greater community. I wish that Sydney had something similar.  By the time it came to closing, my feet were aching and we still hadn’t gone to see one of the halls- but i wasn’t too fussed, (my feet really hurt lol).