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Machida Gardeners do light painting!

When you live in a guest house, you meet all sorts of people from different backgrounds.  The best is when you discover people with interesting skills… like my housemate. My housemate is an amateur, almost professional photographer. He made us discover light painting , something I didn’t know it existed until last week. Pretty much is this:

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You paint or draw with lights and it is not that difficult. Everybody can do light painting , All you need is…

1. A camera that can hold long exposures and perhaps a tripod. Yes, my housemate has a super camera, but you can do it with non-professional cameras as well.

2 A dark room. Well yea, we don’t  have a dark room, we just closed all curtains in our living room  and it was late evening:)

3. Flashlights! Color flashlights. The more colors you find, the more creative you will get

4. A model, at least 2 people. One that paints and one that takes the picture.

Once you get all these things, you can start creating. So how did we do it…Well, it depends what you want to do. If you want to do something like the picture here, you have to ask the model to not move at all. Then a second person has to move around the model with a flashlight, drawing around the person. Now this second person has to move fast enought to not appear in the picture, but not so fast to actually make a figure with lights.

See the picture below:

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There actually two guys in this picture: one with a red flashlight and one with a white one. They moved fast enough to make different faces, but stopped a few seconds in an specific spot to make scary faces 🙂 Notice we forgot to close the curtains, but we managed to have the picture anyway.

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In this picture there are two drawing around a model who doesn’t move at all. I actually appear in the picture (left). I have the red flashlight and I didn’t move fast enough, so I do appear in the picture a little bit.

Now, you don’t necessarily need models for you pictures, you just need yourself to move fast while drawing and you can get this:

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Well, the picture above was made by my housemate who is a professional illustrator, so if you don’t get this the first time, keep practicing 🙂

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In this picture ” I love Tokyo”, we were two to draw : I was with the red flashlight and my housemate was with the white flashlight. We managed to not appear in the picture 😛

I hope this gives you ideas of how to spend a rainy sunday evening indoors ! Enjoy drawing!

Guest “home”

Like Sands Through The Hourglass, so are the… rotation of my housemates.

One of the first good traits you’ll hear about living in a guesthouse is that you are able to meet people from around the world and this IS true.  You get to know their culture, their food, their living style and maybe even a bit of their language.  But most of all, you get to know them, meaning these interesting and worldly people all become your friends.  You eat together, drink together, play together, learn together, cook together, study together, and generally do the things you would do with your family.  However, one of the less desirable traits of the guesthouse is that all these people are on a relatively short time limit — AKA their visas expire.  I’m no different but I have been fortunate enough to get a long visa with stable income while a majority of the people around me are students, people on their working holidays or in-between moves/jobs, so the guest house is really just a bit of a layover.

You’re probably thinking, “So, what’s your point?”  What I’m trying to say is that these people are the reason I’m not searching for a tiny 4 tatami mat studio to live in.  Basically all these people are what makes this guesthouse a home.  While I look forward to each and every new housemate, I miss the people that have left.   But I’m not going to get too sentimental on you; after all, I can just send them a facebook message.

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Cleaning !

If living in a guesthouse is an enjoyable experience, it also comports duties. One of them is to keep the house clean. This is not only one’s room, but also includes shared space. Oakhouse provides all the necessary equipment : vacuum cleaners, mops, cleaning detergents, etc.

The usual rule is that everyone take one’s turn every week to clean the place. In practice, things don’t really happen this way, to wipe a bit where it’s dirty or take the garbage out by oneself is very much appreciated. This, as with summer, cockroaches may appear if the place is dirty.

To experience Japanese housing

To live in a guesthouse is an enriching experience as one can meet other people and share information daily. It is as true for Oakhouse as the majority of residents are Japanese, allowing for cultural exchanges.

Moreover, some of Oakhouse’s houses propose Japanese-style rooms with tatami flooring. It would be a pity to miss on this, wouldn’t it?

Japanese style room with tatami

If you come in winter, I strongly recommend you to ask for a kotatsu , a low table equiped with an electric resistance for heating. It is usually used with a futon in between the two boards of the table to make it warm below. It’s very pleasant in winter.

Farewell party

One of the advantages of guesthouses is that during one or more months, you leave with other residents. Guesthouses are thus a wonderful place to make new friends from many parts of the world. It is already 1 year and 8 months I’ve been living in a Oakhouse guesthouse, and I’ve met a lot of people, some of them having become very good friends.

face drawing

Yesterday evening, we had a farewell BBQ party for two residents, an Australian girl and an American man who were to leave the house on the following morning. The party lasted until early…morning. With much booze flowing, it’s not surprising that some passed out after a while like the Oakhouse manager on the above picture who got drawings made on his face by everyone.

It was a really good party during which everyone had a lot of fun. It reduces the sadness of parting.