Kenn and I have finished watching Arrested Development Season 1. I definitely appreciate the humor now that I've watched it again. We watched "3000 Miles to Graceland" recently and "Office Space" (again of course - great movie). I watched "Love Actually" yet again, one of my personal favs. Those we watched on DVD.
Now online, we've been keeping up with the latest Lost and Grey's Anatomy. I pay for both of those on itunes because can't bear to miss them or wait for them to get online. For free, I've been keeping up with Ugly Betty and watching whatever newer episodes of Family Guy we can find.
Thanks Alexis for the url. Here are some others I use:
http://peekvid.com/
http://www.alluc.org/
On TV here, we've been watching a lot of Discovery, Animal Network and National Geographic. Getting sick of it although I have learned a lot of interesting things :)
Saw an interesting show on filming lions in the wild. We also watched a really interesting documentary about an explorer expedition that was the first group to travel the entire length of the Nile.
Movies on TV here recently have been:
Armageddon
Karate Kid
As Good As It Gets
Broken Arrow
Flightplan
Ocean's Twelve
Erin Brokovich
Cheaper by the Dozen
Some of these are just plain awful but it's easy to get stuck watching them because of the limited English channels. I hardly stand watching CNN anymore...
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Sunday, February 25, 2007
Weekend of down time
It was finally a nice weekend spent with a lot of down time. We stayed in on Friday night, cooked dinner. Saturday we met up with Serena and Justin (couple who just moved here from NY) and Justin's coworker and friends for dim sum. It was an all you can eat dim sum place for about $25 and we went crazy. Most of the dishes tasted pretty authentic to dim sum I'm used to so it was really good but we ordered and ate way too much. The rest of the afternoon and day was spent lounging. I mistakenly thought it was my friend Lauren's bday dinner Sat night but I got the date wrong. We ended up staying in and watching movies and tv shows online. We watched Jackass 2 - so hilarious. After sleeping in and a slow start to Sunday, as well as getting a little lost on the train, we made it to the aquarium. It was small but nice. It has a cool glass tunnel so you can see fish all around and up close. Just as good as scuba diving w/o all the hassle. There were also huge sting rays, giant turtles, dolphins, penguins, sea lions and sharks.
Less than 2 weeks to Bali! For those who may not know we're going to Bali for our wedding ceremony and honeymoon!! Yup, we're really looking forward to it. :)
Less than 2 weeks to Bali! For those who may not know we're going to Bali for our wedding ceremony and honeymoon!! Yup, we're really looking forward to it. :)
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Signs
Japan is of course infamous for it's funny English signs. Here are some of my personal favorites that we've snapped pics of:
Outside of a restaurant/live music place - what the heck is "HerB-ful"?
This is a sign on the street outside of Yoyogi Park advertising a band I think - interesting name for a band:
This one's a store's sign - D-Pops I can see as a store name but why the acronym??
And last but not least - Pizza Hut - it definitely makes me smile and be happy! Haha:
Outside of a restaurant/live music place - what the heck is "HerB-ful"?
This is a sign on the street outside of Yoyogi Park advertising a band I think - interesting name for a band:
This one's a store's sign - D-Pops I can see as a store name but why the acronym??
And last but not least - Pizza Hut - it definitely makes me smile and be happy! Haha:
Ishiuchi Part 2
Here are the pics from snowboarding. Like I said, it was a gorgeous day so there are some nice ones! During our lunch break, we went to one of the lunch lodges on the mountain and everything was in Japanese. But we saw pizza and ramen and a few tables so ordered that. It was actually really good and we didn't feel gross afterwards so we were able to keep riding. One really funny thing we saw was at one of the lifts, there was a girl standing there with a microphone saying "welcome" in Japanese over and over again. We were amazed that that was her job and she just stood there happily repeating herself. Japan is so interesting!
Today, as I was getting out of the subway station by work, there were probably 5-6 people handing out various things tissues, magazines, free samples.. and they all were saying things at the same time, it was strange. I got more tissues of course and some mango gummy candy. I had no idea what it was at first, I thought it was a packet of tea until I opened it.
Here's the link to our total photo blog again. But on the main page, Kenn put up a few videos we took at Sumo. Enjoy!
Today, as I was getting out of the subway station by work, there were probably 5-6 people handing out various things tissues, magazines, free samples.. and they all were saying things at the same time, it was strange. I got more tissues of course and some mango gummy candy. I had no idea what it was at first, I thought it was a packet of tea until I opened it.
Here's the link to our total photo blog again. But on the main page, Kenn put up a few videos we took at Sumo. Enjoy!
Monday, February 19, 2007
Ishiuchi
We had another great snowboarding trip, this time to Ishiuchi. It's in the same area of mountain ranges, in Yuzawa. We took the same train as we did last time but chose a closer resort to the station. Accomodations were great, they picked uw up in a van from the station, the rooms were western style, we had our own bathroom, and breakfast in the morning. They didn't speak much English but we managed. We went up early Saturday morning, dropped off our stuff and went straight to the lift which was right behind the hotel. At first we thought the mountain was pretty small, but then we just kept taking lift after lift to different parts of the mountain and higher up. It turned out to be fairly big, we pretty much explored all different trails. Weather was beautiful, fairly warm and sunny and the snow was great. Powdery in some areas, packed in others but soft. Unfortunately Kenn caught the cold I had last week so we only rode until the early afternoon. It was a great day though.
I tried out the onsen/public bath in our hotel. Since it was early in the afternoon, no one was in there. It was really nice and relaxing. We didn't book dinner reservations at our hotel in advance (didn't realize we needed to) and there wasn't really much else in the area. So we ended up eating ramen in the room and drinking chu-his from the vending machine all night. :)
Sunday morning was gloomy and it looked like it had been raining. Since Kenn wasn't feeling well, we decided to just head home. There's this awesome service in Japan called takkyubin where they mail/messenger your bags or snowboard gear to/from the resort. We figured out how to do it and didn't have to lug all our heavy gear back home! The crazy thing is that it only costs like $10 and there's no weight limit. It's so weird, Kenn and I can't figure out why they have such a service here and how it can be profitable. But we're not complaining.
We'll get our pics up soon, there are some really great ones because the weather was so nice. More details to come...
I tried out the onsen/public bath in our hotel. Since it was early in the afternoon, no one was in there. It was really nice and relaxing. We didn't book dinner reservations at our hotel in advance (didn't realize we needed to) and there wasn't really much else in the area. So we ended up eating ramen in the room and drinking chu-his from the vending machine all night. :)
Sunday morning was gloomy and it looked like it had been raining. Since Kenn wasn't feeling well, we decided to just head home. There's this awesome service in Japan called takkyubin where they mail/messenger your bags or snowboard gear to/from the resort. We figured out how to do it and didn't have to lug all our heavy gear back home! The crazy thing is that it only costs like $10 and there's no weight limit. It's so weird, Kenn and I can't figure out why they have such a service here and how it can be profitable. But we're not complaining.
We'll get our pics up soon, there are some really great ones because the weather was so nice. More details to come...
Friday, February 16, 2007
6 months!
I can't believe it. I've been in Japan for exactly 6 months now. As far as I know at the moment, I have 6 more months to go. Wow, time has gone by unbelievably quickly. I knew one year would feel like nothing. These days I feel kind of torn about whether I am going to definitely feel like I'm ready to come home after the year is up or if I would actually stay longer. There is no talk right now of it going either way yet. A lot will depend on the next few months I guess. But right now, just trying to enjoy the experience. Kenn and I booked a ski lodge Japanese B&B type place for Saturday night. It's the same area as where we went snowboarding last time but a different mountain. We're staying at the Esprit Hotel. Western style rooms with toilet but I think it's a communal bathroom-onsen type thing. A step up from our last accomodation that's for sure!
Regarding some recent comments:
Livia - Yes, I thought you would notice the background on that pic! Haha. It was in fact a taco night that we did before going to Cancun :) It turned out really good!
PC - regarding that noodle place, that is just totally disgusting and should be reported to dept of health or something!
Ging, I haven't seen ads on eggs yet. But they do give out a lot of free tissue packets with ads. I never have to buy tissues! I've also seen cool ads on the entire escalator handrail. There are ads all over the subway cars including window stickers, handrails, and stuff hanging from the ceiling. I've noticed that the poster ads in my subway station change very frequently too. Not like in NYC where at some stations you still see movie ads from months prior.
Regarding some recent comments:
Livia - Yes, I thought you would notice the background on that pic! Haha. It was in fact a taco night that we did before going to Cancun :) It turned out really good!
PC - regarding that noodle place, that is just totally disgusting and should be reported to dept of health or something!
Ging, I haven't seen ads on eggs yet. But they do give out a lot of free tissue packets with ads. I never have to buy tissues! I've also seen cool ads on the entire escalator handrail. There are ads all over the subway cars including window stickers, handrails, and stuff hanging from the ceiling. I've noticed that the poster ads in my subway station change very frequently too. Not like in NYC where at some stations you still see movie ads from months prior.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
So many interesting things about Japan
I could probably talk all day about the funny little things I notice about Japan and Japanese culture. They're so fun to compare when you talk to other expats or visitors.
The corona here comes with it's own little lime juice packet:
When you do something wrong, inappropriate, or they simply don't have an item you asked for at a restaurant or something, they give you what I call the EX. Either a small X where they cross their 2 pointer fingers to form an X - or sometimes you the the big X where they cross their arms to form an X. I find it really amusing.
All service people are super duper nice. It may be a front but the extreme niceness is sometimes so ridiculous. A million thank yous are often rapidly repeated along with a series of bowing. Kenn starts to crack up when it's a bunch of women who simultaneously sing the thank yous in their high pitched cute little voices.
You can be in a crowd of people and it's dead silent. Like at Disney for example, there were massive crowds of people everywhere and it was so quiet. Almost eerie. I just wanted someone to scream or something.
You WILL get asked to step behind the yellow line at the subway station if they see you walk or lean over it.
During the day, usually after lunch, Japanese women will spend time in the bathroom brushing their teeth and completely reapplying all of their makeup.
They're so consientious about litter here that in most neighborhoods you can't smoke while walking, there are designated smoke areas.
On the flip side, the amount of plastic they use must be detrimental to the environment. They wrap every single little thing up. If you go to the grocery store, they will put your eggs in a plastic bag, veggies in a separate one, drinks in another, etc. then put them all in another larger bag.
Each egg in a carton of eggs (which are sold in 6 or 8 by the way) has it's own label with the expiration date on it.
I can go on and on but I'll save it for another time...
Hope everyone had a good Valentine's Day, if you celebrate that sorta thing. In Japan, women are supposed to buy men chocolate. Then they reciprocate on White Day which is next month. We went out for delicious Udon with our guest that's staying with us. The night prior we went for Yakitori again and did some bar hopping. We let the Nigerian bouncers give us their happy hour cards and tried a few places. They were all pretty dead but drinks were just 500 Yen. :)
The corona here comes with it's own little lime juice packet:
When you do something wrong, inappropriate, or they simply don't have an item you asked for at a restaurant or something, they give you what I call the EX. Either a small X where they cross their 2 pointer fingers to form an X - or sometimes you the the big X where they cross their arms to form an X. I find it really amusing.
All service people are super duper nice. It may be a front but the extreme niceness is sometimes so ridiculous. A million thank yous are often rapidly repeated along with a series of bowing. Kenn starts to crack up when it's a bunch of women who simultaneously sing the thank yous in their high pitched cute little voices.
You can be in a crowd of people and it's dead silent. Like at Disney for example, there were massive crowds of people everywhere and it was so quiet. Almost eerie. I just wanted someone to scream or something.
You WILL get asked to step behind the yellow line at the subway station if they see you walk or lean over it.
During the day, usually after lunch, Japanese women will spend time in the bathroom brushing their teeth and completely reapplying all of their makeup.
They're so consientious about litter here that in most neighborhoods you can't smoke while walking, there are designated smoke areas.
On the flip side, the amount of plastic they use must be detrimental to the environment. They wrap every single little thing up. If you go to the grocery store, they will put your eggs in a plastic bag, veggies in a separate one, drinks in another, etc. then put them all in another larger bag.
Each egg in a carton of eggs (which are sold in 6 or 8 by the way) has it's own label with the expiration date on it.
I can go on and on but I'll save it for another time...
Hope everyone had a good Valentine's Day, if you celebrate that sorta thing. In Japan, women are supposed to buy men chocolate. Then they reciprocate on White Day which is next month. We went out for delicious Udon with our guest that's staying with us. The night prior we went for Yakitori again and did some bar hopping. We let the Nigerian bouncers give us their happy hour cards and tried a few places. They were all pretty dead but drinks were just 500 Yen. :)
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
Cancun pics
Here are the Cancun pics posted up on our photo blog. Many scenic pics and lots from the interesting club we went to.
You can also check back at the photo blog main site to see new pics from last Friday ("Roppongi #2"), Disneyland and our apartment (bottom few links).
Enjoy
You can also check back at the photo blog main site to see new pics from last Friday ("Roppongi #2"), Disneyland and our apartment (bottom few links).
Enjoy
Monday, February 12, 2007
Tokyo Disneyland = Land of a million lines
Friday night we met up with my friend Karen and her fiancee Jason. I've known Karen since elementary school and they were passing through Tokyo for a few days before visiting some other Asian cities. We had a great dinner at this Yakitori place right around the corner from our apt. I've been wanting to try the place out and glad we did. The Yakitori (grilled chicken speared on sticks) was great and so was the sake so Kenn and I will definitely be going back there.
Afterwards we went to our favorite local bar Propaganda for a few drinks and then to another bar nearby that Jason passed by earlier and wanted to check out. Super small place, I think it was an old diner car or something. Very random, I remember shots and meeting random people both Japanese and expats... Kenn and I hit ramen afterwards :)
Saturday was a relax and recovery day, I felt a cold coming on. The plan was to get
up early on Sunday to head out to Disneyland. There is also another park next to it called Disneysea.
The main thing I can say about Tokyo Disney is that there are lines for absolutely everything. It was a holiday weekend so maybe that added to the crowds but it was pretty bad. Just 30 minues by train from Tokyo, most of the major attractions were 2-3 hour waits. There were lines for tickets, lines for food, lines for snacks, lines to take pictures with Disney characters, lines for bathrooms, there were people everywhere!
I have to admit that kind of distorted the fun a bit, making it not quite the happiest place on earth. I cannot believe how calm and patient Japanese people are. Amidst all the crowds, no one seemed to be aggravated. At one point the crowds passing through one area were so thick, I thought I was going to get stampeded. They even closed ticketing for a few hours due to the crowds! Now that to me is just insane. Kenn and I managed to get on a few rides and wait only 20 minutes for pizza. We decided to try going over to Disneysea to see if it was any better. This is when we discovered ticketing was closed. Our tickets were only good for one park so we went to a shopping and eating area and walked around and ate at Planet Hollywood for awhile. We decided that we were never going to come back to visit so might as well try to check out Disneysea for the rest of the evening. It turned out to be pretty cool there and by that time it was less crowded. First thing we did was wait on line for the Tower of Terror.
We ended up waiting nearly 3 hours. I know, stupid. It's hard to explain our thought process. We thought we should at least see something. Once you start waiting, you just feel committed. Weather was not really cold during the day but by the evening, it was getting chilly and windy so after a few hours we were freezing. It was a cool ride, broken elevator-themed free fall kinda thing but as you can imagine it was not worth the wait for the minute we spent on it. We managed to sneak in a few other rides too. By an hour of close time, things thinned out. Anyway, it was an interesting day. We can say we experienced Tokyo Disney now. No more Disney until if/when we have kids of our own....
Afterwards we went to our favorite local bar Propaganda for a few drinks and then to another bar nearby that Jason passed by earlier and wanted to check out. Super small place, I think it was an old diner car or something. Very random, I remember shots and meeting random people both Japanese and expats... Kenn and I hit ramen afterwards :)
Saturday was a relax and recovery day, I felt a cold coming on. The plan was to get
up early on Sunday to head out to Disneyland. There is also another park next to it called Disneysea.
The main thing I can say about Tokyo Disney is that there are lines for absolutely everything. It was a holiday weekend so maybe that added to the crowds but it was pretty bad. Just 30 minues by train from Tokyo, most of the major attractions were 2-3 hour waits. There were lines for tickets, lines for food, lines for snacks, lines to take pictures with Disney characters, lines for bathrooms, there were people everywhere!
I have to admit that kind of distorted the fun a bit, making it not quite the happiest place on earth. I cannot believe how calm and patient Japanese people are. Amidst all the crowds, no one seemed to be aggravated. At one point the crowds passing through one area were so thick, I thought I was going to get stampeded. They even closed ticketing for a few hours due to the crowds! Now that to me is just insane. Kenn and I managed to get on a few rides and wait only 20 minutes for pizza. We decided to try going over to Disneysea to see if it was any better. This is when we discovered ticketing was closed. Our tickets were only good for one park so we went to a shopping and eating area and walked around and ate at Planet Hollywood for awhile. We decided that we were never going to come back to visit so might as well try to check out Disneysea for the rest of the evening. It turned out to be pretty cool there and by that time it was less crowded. First thing we did was wait on line for the Tower of Terror.
We ended up waiting nearly 3 hours. I know, stupid. It's hard to explain our thought process. We thought we should at least see something. Once you start waiting, you just feel committed. Weather was not really cold during the day but by the evening, it was getting chilly and windy so after a few hours we were freezing. It was a cool ride, broken elevator-themed free fall kinda thing but as you can imagine it was not worth the wait for the minute we spent on it. We managed to sneak in a few other rides too. By an hour of close time, things thinned out. Anyway, it was an interesting day. We can say we experienced Tokyo Disney now. No more Disney until if/when we have kids of our own....
Friday, February 09, 2007
National Foundation Day
So Monday's holiday is National Foundation day. According to the earliest Japanese history records, on this day in the year 660 BC the first Japanese emperor was crowned.
Kenn and I can't find any available accomodations for snowboarding this weekend so we're going to relax and maybe hit the zoo or something else in Tokyo and also go to Disneyland which is really close to the city. That should be fun.
I think I mentioned Chu-hi's which we've been drinking a lot here. When we were at the airport last week, we saw a label that said they were vodka & flavored soda. I doubted that's what they were but just looked it up. Originally the drink was made from Japanese Sho-chu but variations of it now are vodka. My favorites are lime or grapefruit. Here's what the can looks like:
Tonight Kenn and I are meeting up with my friend Karen and her fiancee. They are in town for a couple days so going to meet up with them for dinner/drinks in Roppongi.
Kenn and I can't find any available accomodations for snowboarding this weekend so we're going to relax and maybe hit the zoo or something else in Tokyo and also go to Disneyland which is really close to the city. That should be fun.
I think I mentioned Chu-hi's which we've been drinking a lot here. When we were at the airport last week, we saw a label that said they were vodka & flavored soda. I doubted that's what they were but just looked it up. Originally the drink was made from Japanese Sho-chu but variations of it now are vodka. My favorites are lime or grapefruit. Here's what the can looks like:
Tonight Kenn and I are meeting up with my friend Karen and her fiancee. They are in town for a couple days so going to meet up with them for dinner/drinks in Roppongi.
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Jet lag
We're back from Cancun! It was a great trip, just too far from here. We had a good time, it went by fast. Weather was mostly nice but a bit windy. We spent most of the time lounging around the pools. I got to catch up with people but also felt like I didn't get a chance to talk to a lot of people I wanted to. The last night I suddenly felt sick so didn't get a chance to spend the last night there hanging out so that really sucked. I was so careful about drinking the water but I guess you never really know what's in the food or how it's prepared... While we were in our meeting, Kenn got the chance to take a little boat tour thing (cross between jet ski and boat) and did a little snorkeling. One of the nights we hit a major club- that was an adventure. The place was kind of like a vegas show, a circus, and a club all in one. They had all these mini shows with performers imitating singers (Beyonce, Michael Jackson, Madonna, etc) and also people on trapeze type things swinging around. Very elaborate smoke, lighting, confetti systems. Very odd but interesting experience. I'll post some pics soon.
Now back in Tokyo we are all messed up schedule-wise. I woke up at 4am this morning and could not go back to sleep. Kenn fell asleep after dinner and just woke up. At least I think it's the last time we'll have jet lag for awhile. I think for the next few months our travel will be limited to elsewhere in Japan and Asia. I have a 3 day weekend, I forget what National holiday it is on Monday. We were thinking of getting some snowboarding in but it's too late to book a tour and we're not sure where to go. Guess we'll see. Have a few ppl we know coming through down Thursday and Friday too so we'll be entertaining a bit. (friend of a coworker and my friend from HS
There's the quick update. Time for some sleep. Wish me luck ;)
Now back in Tokyo we are all messed up schedule-wise. I woke up at 4am this morning and could not go back to sleep. Kenn fell asleep after dinner and just woke up. At least I think it's the last time we'll have jet lag for awhile. I think for the next few months our travel will be limited to elsewhere in Japan and Asia. I have a 3 day weekend, I forget what National holiday it is on Monday. We were thinking of getting some snowboarding in but it's too late to book a tour and we're not sure where to go. Guess we'll see. Have a few ppl we know coming through down Thursday and Friday too so we'll be entertaining a bit. (friend of a coworker and my friend from HS
There's the quick update. Time for some sleep. Wish me luck ;)
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