Sick of Bali posts yet?

Too bad! ;)

Gorgeous morning at the villa:


One of my favorite pics that Kenn's sister took:


Monkeys at the Uluwatu temple I wrote about:


Kenn and I watched our videos last night. My brother bought us a digital camcorder. Fun to relive it all. I need to get off this Bali high.

Woek is carrying on as usual. Livia and Doris are back from Kyoto tonight so hopefully they'll be up for some fun.

PHOTOS GALORE

Cherry blossoms in Yoyogi Park:




Wow, what an outfit:



Video: Check out this guy with his nunchucks - hilarious!

Video: Death of a fish

More Bali Pics (I sent these around to some people already):
Pics we took in Bali
Honeymoon in Nusa Dua and Hokkaido

Dreamland beach in Bali:


Livia's bf was in Bali too :)

Tokyo update & Bali details part 2

Livia and Doris explored a bit of the city yesterday and last night we went to our favorite Oudon place then to our favorite local bar Propaganda for a couple. They took off for Kyoto today.

So back to Bali-- the day after the wedding, we lounged a bit and headed to Seminyak for some exploring/shopping. We went to this place called Ku De Ta for dinner. Expensive by Bali standards but regular priced for NY/Tokyo. They had great lounge chairs that overlooked the beach and sunset. Dinner was great. Kenn and I even went back to this restaurant our last night in Bali.

On Friday most everyone left for home. The few of us remaining went to another nice local beach and into Kuta for dinner. Saturday we sadly departed the wonderful villa with promises of returning someday.

Off Kenn and I went to Nusa Dua for our honeymoon, staying at a resort hotel on the beach. The hotel was gorgeous, really nice decor. We spent the next few days laying on the beach, by the pool, snorkeling, eating at the restaurants, and getting spa treatments.

We spoiled ourselves and enjoyed every minute of it!

livia wu foo & chefengster are dorks

Dorks for commenting on my blog while in Tokyo. :)

Upon the dorks' safe arrival, we went to a delicious Tonkatsu place in Roppongi Hills for dinner. This morning we all woke up early and went to the Tsukiji fish market at 6am. The first time Kenn and I went was a little later and we saw even more action today than last time. Of course a fish market trip ends with a delciously fresh sushi breakfast. Yum! Charles left for home this morning and I forced myself to go to work, though don't feel very tired right now. Tonight we may explore the new Tokyo Midtown development and find a new cool place for dinner. It's been so fun so far having friends from home around.

Backing up to Bali, I do want to spill some more details about that trip. Here's some more info about the gorgeous private villa we stayed at:
We had the main 4 bedroom villa, it's 2 bedroom guesthouse, and 1 additional 2 bedroom villa rented out. This came with (along with amazing cliffside views of the Indian ocean and volcanoes) 2 private pools and a full villa staff. The staff cooked and cleaned every day. Meals were extra but were so cheap. On premises was a spa where as I mentioned previously you could get $20 massages or a $45 3 hour spa treatment which included foot wash, hour massage, body scrub, facial, hair wash and flower bath - heavenly!

Saturday and Sunday involved relaxing pool side, going to one of the local beaches and going into town to Kuta for shopping.

Monday evening when most of the guest had arrived, we had a pizza dinner where they cooked personal pizzas with our selected toppings in their on premises brick oven. The evening ended with a little Marco Polo in the pool! :)

Tuesday late afternoon/evening we had a tour of the Uluwatu temple where there were aggressive monkeys that if aren'tcareful would steal jewelry, hats, cameras,etc from people. Eva, one of our group got her necklace pulled off my a monkey. They were pretty scary, eerily human-like. But the tour ended with a traditional balinese dance at sunset which we enjoyed. We ended the evening with a seafood dinner on the beach. We got to select our fish, shrimp, lobsters on site.

Wednesday morning we of course woke up to full on rain. But as I mentioned it stopped in the afternoon prior to our ceremony - yay! Everything else went off without a hitch and we really had a blast. I got a little tipsy and somehow missed a step while we were taking a group picture towards the end of the night. Got a little scraped up and a bit of blood on the dress. It aint a wedding til the bride gets hurt right? hehe. The evening ended yet again with late night pool games...

Missing Bali

Large private pool and beautiful sunsets, boy do I miss Bali :)

Short work week but it feels like I never left. Work is busy these days. We went out pretty much every night this week too since Charles is here visiting. Kenn showed him around during the day. It's warm now in Tokyo and cherry blossoms are in full bloom. They are as pretty as they say and people here really go crazy over them. Drinking while cherry blossom viewing is big. People go as far as camping out over night for goods spots and bringing portable karaoke machines.

Livia and Doris arrive tomorrow so the party continues...

Wedding pics!

It's been really busy since we've gotten back. Second day back at work and back into the full swing. I almost feel like I never left. We had an amazing time in Bali, it was perfect. When I free up some time, I'm dying to write about the details. Hokkaido was also good, great mountains. It being late in the season and a warm year though, we didn't get any fresh powder. More on that to come too. Our friend Charles is visiting Tokyo right now on a last minute trip and then Doris and Livia are here next week. Busy Busy Busy. Enjoy some pics I've rushed to get up. If I haven't sent them to you check them out here

We're Married!

Everything ended up perfect in the end. When we woke up on Wednesday morning, it was pouring rain and it rained all morning. I know it would have been ok, still a good time, if it rained but this place is just so beautiful it would have been a shame. We headed into town for a little shopping and on the way home it started to clear up a bit. By lunch it had stopped raining and by the time we were getting ready for the ceremony it was clear and dry. Totally amazing how it worked out in the end. We had our ceremony on the cliff overlooking the gorgeous view. Slightly overcast skies should make for great views. Buffet Indonesian dinner was delicious. Decorations were amazing. It was a great time ending with all of us playing pool games late night.

The beginning of the week included lots of sun and pool time, visit to a local beach, a tour to Uluwatu temple, watching a traditional Balinese dance at sunset, and seafood dinner. There's so much more to write about but I'll have to regroup and organize my thoughts for writing them all here.

It's raining today and Nestor and Eva just left for the airport. The rest of us will wait out the rain in hopes of some more beach or pool time.

I'll try and post again soon.

GREETINGS FROM BALI!!

Gotta love the internet! We arrived safely and almost everyone is now here except my brother Greg and Caroline who are coming from Tokyo tomorrow. There are no words to describe this place. This Villa is absolutely breathtaking. We have taken a million pics (which will be to slow to upload right now) but they will not do this place justice. It's just so extremely peaceful and beautiful here. Having the villa all to ourselves is amazing. The staff here is amazing, they serve us meals and clean and its just a dream, this whole trip. I miss all of you who aren't here and wish you could experience this. Everything is just stunning, I couldn't have asked for a better place and week. It's only day 2! Food cooked and served at the villa is dirt cheap, like $3-$7 per person. Massages are $20 an hour, had one today and it was amazing. We've just been lounging by the pool all day so far.

Ok, gotta run to our villa cooked Indian dinner now. Will try and write again soon.

Twas the night before Bali

and we're packed and ready to go! I finally got through the work week. I expect to have over 1000 emails by the time I get back but I am absolutely excited to go to Bali for the next 2 weeks!!! We're really looking forward to it, I can't say that enough.

To be honest, I don't have anything else to blog about.

Ging is right by the way, we are going to Niseko in Hokkaido. Looking forward to that too. After 2 weeks of relaxing in the sun, it should be interesting to put on winter gear and go snowboarding.

I'll try to blog from Bali and even send some pics through :)

2 more days to Bali!

I started packing last night. Very excited to leave. :) I have a ton to do at work so have been pretty busy and not blogging, sorry. Glad to be going on vacation. It's nice to have a break every once in awhile. I need to win the lotto so I can go on perpetual vacation.

Hmmm i really don't have anything interesting to blog about. Here's the Villa we'll be staying and getting married at: Canang Sari Villas


Cool huh?

Right when we get back from Bali, Kenn and I are leaving the next day to Hokkaido (northern island of Japan) for more snowboarding! Going for a 4 day weekend. Supposed to be some of the best snow in the world because of the weather pattern from Siberia. Last snowboarding trip, when we get back, Tokyo will be in full spring season. From summer to winter to spring all in a couple weeks. hehe.

Spring skiing

Another fun snowboarding weekend although the weather was really warm, spring skiing style. The side of the mountain we were on was pretty bare on the bottom, we actually had to take a lift up, walk off of it to another lift to get up higher for the snow. It was crazy that just 2 weeks ago, it looks so different! The snow up top wasn't bad though, soft. Kinda nice, easy to ride, but fast! We also paid an extra $5 to access the mountain next to Ishiuchi - Gala Yuzawa. Snow was even better over there but it was too crowded. That mountain actually gets a lot of day trippers cause the the train stops right at it. We rode for a few hours, stopped for breaks and light food along the way, and called it a day fairly early cause it was hot and we got tired. Man we're getting old! I remember the days we would ride all day long until the last lift. Then again, we didn't go snowboarding often and lift tickets are expensive in the Northeast so always wanted to get our money's worth.

Ending the day early also meant I could hit the public bath at the hotel while no one else is in it. We had dinner at the hotel this time, good food - Italian style. Salad, penne, baked chicken, clam chowder, dessert.

We got information and a taxi to the Yuzawa snow festival. That was really really cool. The town holds a festival each year, normally they have snow sculptures but I think because of the lack of snow they skipped that part. They had booths of food including cheap ramen in this huge pot. We'll get pics up sometime. They also had free Sake!! As you can imagine, Kenn and I went to town on that. ;) Then there was the traditional carrying of the shrine. A bunch of town people carry this big heavy shrine down the street and they chant, sing and make a bid to do. Kenn decided to jump in on the action and try to help carry it. They let him in and I took a bunch of pics and videos of it. Such a cool experience, the vibe was really something. Then there was a fireworks display. Big fireworks, but not very many. Lastly, they do this really cool thing every year. A bunch of skiiers come down the mountain single file holding these lit up torches, kinda like flares. The resort is blaring music from the loud speakers as the skiiers trail down against the mountain and the night sky. It was gorgeous.

All in all another great weekend, we skipped riding on Sunday and headed home on the train. The commute is easy and we had all our gear messengered so had no issues.

4 more days to Bali!!!

Busy week

What a busy week it was! Of course now things are really picking up at work and we have a bunch of projects starting right before I leave for vacation to Bali for a few weeks. Guess that's just how it goes...

Thursday night Kenn and I decided to go out. Stopped at our fav watering hole and tried out a local club called Vanilla. Admission included 2 drinks making it actually free admission :) It being Thurs it was kinda dead at first and the main room was playing really lame music. Dance versions of random songs like Dancing Queen, Uptown Girl, Beautiful. I'm talking serious dance versions, it was aweful. We were about to give up on the place when Kenn went up to the DL booth and asked for hip hop and found out the other room had hip hop. We stayed around for awhile, that was much more fun. The night ended with a Mc Donald's cheeseburger. 100 yen menu with the exchange rate means 82 cent burger! Hehe

This weekend is yet another snowboarding trip. We're going back to Ishiuchi and staying at the same hotel. Figure we have the process down no so why mix it up. Happens to be the Yuzawa Snow Festival this weekend so should be cool. Fireworks and snow sculptures and stuff. It's been warm so snow is a bit bare now but that's ok.

Will post more pics- enjoy your weekend!

Recent TV and movies

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...

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. :)

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:

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!

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...

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.

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. :)

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

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....

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.

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 ;)

Green Tea

"Better to be deprived of food for three days, than tea for one." (Ancient Chinese Proverb)

Kenn and I are addicted to green tea. Hot and Cold. I'm still drinking about a liter of cold bottled green tea a day. They're unsweetened bottles like this (this is a small one):

We've also been drinking hot green tea. We switched from tea bags to infusing. I felt like for awhile if I didn't drink it, I would start to get headaches but I don't think there's that much caffeine, not as much as coffee (there are approximately thirty to sixty mg. of caffeine in six - eight ounces of tea, compared to over one-hundred mg. in eight ounces of coffee ). But I guess if you drink as many cups as we do, it adds up.

I'm sure most have heard the research by now, green tea is supposed to be good for you:

------------

Today, scientific research in both Asia and the west is providing hard evidence for the health benefits long associated with drinking green tea. For example, in 1994 the Journal of the National Cancer Institute published the results of an epidemiological study indicating that drinking green tea reduced the risk of esophageal cancer in Chinese men and women by nearly sixty percent. University of Purdue researchers recently concluded that a compound in green tea inhibits the growth of cancer cells. There is also research indicating that drinking green tea lowers total cholesterol levels, as well as improving the ratio of good (HDL) cholesterol to bad (LDL) cholesterol. To sum up, here are just a few medical conditions in which drinking green tea is reputed to be helpful:
cancer
rheumatoid arthritis
high cholesterol levels
cariovascular disease
infection
impaired immune function

--------------

Uh huh, gonna keep drinking it....

Party weekend

Kenn and I will be heading to Cancun this week for my company's annual strategy meeting. Yes, what a nice free trip! It's a long way for a short time but it will be worth it! So this weekend, we decided not to go snowboarding or anything and stay in town. We went out for pizza on Friday night and then tested out a few local bars. One place Kenn wanted to try out near our apt cause it had a sign saying it was like a hip hop bar rejected us. We're not exactly sure what happened, it was early and there was absolutely no one in there. The bartender or owner or whoever said some stuff in Japanese when we went in, then turned away and ignored us. So we just left.

We also checked out a random place on the 5th floor of a building that had a sign outside saying it had happy hour until midnight. It was a really small bar and we couldn't figure out exactly what the deal was - if it was a front for something else or what. Seemed like there were these 2 women in there who might have been escorts but it was hard to tell. Anyway, other than that the bar was normal so we stayed for a couple cheap drinks.

Then we tried some reggae bar but it was pretty dead. Stayed for a few drinks there too before deciding to get some more pizza. But at this place we tried for pizza, we saw roaches so ran out of there without eating our slices. Gross!

Saturday was spent on the couch. We watched the first disc of Arrested Development. I gave the show another try and found I actually do like it. It's subtle dry humor but really a funny show. Saturday night we were invited to Lauren and Sara's friend's birthday dinner. One of their coworkers who turned just 24! Ouch, I feel old. Dinner was great though - we went to this Portugese Restaurant. There's a pic on the site of these cheese ball things- boy, were those good!

Kenn really wanted to try this club where a famous house dj, Kevin Yost, was spinning. The club is called Yellow, one of the popular house clubs in Tokyo. Here's a description/review I found of it:
Club Yellow is simply the club where all the biggest pure house djs in the world and in Japan dream to play. It is a symbol of the Tokyo nightlife and a place devoted to music and just music. The club itself is not big with a capacity of 800 people and honestly its not gorgeous on the decoration side or on the lighting side but what make Club Yellow so unique its the at-home feeling and the amazing sound system. Anyway all the biggest house djs are playing or have played there and if you are into house music, well nothing cant beat yellow in Japan; thats simply the place to be.

We convinced most of the group to go with us and had a great time. It's been a long time since I've been to a club that was so fun. The music was great, the vibe was amazing. I don't know if you can find a vibe like that in NYC anymore. We had a couple of drinks but I was completely sober and we stayed out super late (or early depending on how you look at it). One of the best parts for me was standing up by the dj booth watching the DJ watch the crowd go wild. It must be fun to be a dj at a Tokyo club. We of course went for ramen afterwards. They have some seriously good ramen here!

Needless to say, Sunday was more couchtime with more Arrested Development. It was nice not having a hangover though. We also tried to watch 40 Year Old Virgin but the DVD player didn't allow it (burned copy). I watched that latest episode of Grey's Anatomy - wow the ending - what a surprise!

Perhaps this was a boring post, but it was a fun weekend! :)

Photo blog is ready!

Check out the PHOTO BLOG that Kenn put together. It will include all the pics we take from Tokyo and anywhere else we visit while we are out here. It's separated by location/categories and it looks great! Check back for updates. I'll keep linking to new sections in my blog when we add new photos :)

So here are some more of my recent observations in Tokyo - some funny, some interesting, and some ever-so-slightly irritating...

- I may have said this before but they play the most random music in the most random places. For example you can be sitting at a cafe or a bagel shop having breakfast and they're playing gangsta rap. It's hilarious. I've heard the explicit version of Akon's I Wanna Love You at the entrance of the snow resort and in the grocery store. If only they understood the lyrics... it ain't just swear words that these Japanese families are listening to...

- Japanese people seem to like to cover their books. On the subway, I noticed that almost everyone reading a book has put a cover on it. Are they embarrassed to let people see what they are reading??

- I observed a mother and her 2 young children on the subway last weekend. The 2 kids were fighting over a handheld video game. The mother saw this and told them to stop and hand it over to her. She didn't yell, just quietly whipsered and held out her hand. The older sister immediately stopped but the little boy took the game. He was probably around 4 years old, he looked like he was going to throw a fit. The mother continued to ask him calmly and quietly for the game over and over until he finally handed it over. The whole situation was fastinating to me. How the mother was stern but never screamed. How the kids were being kids but were so obedient as if they knew better not to have a tantrum in public. If this scenario took place in the States, I bet there would have most likely been plenty of screaming, yelling, and tears.

- On the people-mover walkways that I take to get from the subway to my office, I've been noticing a lot of people in a rush these days. Maybe it has something to do with the time, I'm usually on them close to 10am nowadays and maybe people are rushing to punch in by 10? Anyway, people kind of do this light jog as if that's any better than just walking quickly. Sometimes you get a whole bunch of people sort of running together in a pack. Even women in their ultra high heels and short skirts. I find it irritating to have groups of people running by you on moving walkways.

Happy Friday and Happy Weekend!

When a Stranger Calls (& links to more pics)

Ok, yes I've been on a photo kick lately. It's probably nice to take a look at pictures of what I've been up to, no? Anyway, now that Kenn is here I have an official photographer and he takes good pics too. I sometimes get lazy at snapping pics and I certainly don't have as good of an eye. Kenn will be making a photo blog actually so I'll be able to link to that once it's done.

So here is the link to all the snowboarding pics in case I didn't personally send it to you: Snowboarding in Japan

Here is a link to all the pics I took during the first few months I was in Asia: First few months

I have not been doing so well with my new year's resolution and am extremely disappointed. I realized today I have been here for 5 months!! I don't know any Japanese - that is just horrible. Well, I should give myself some credit, I do recognize a lot of words and phrases but I can't really speak any real meaningful sentences. I need to work on this. On the flip side, I have been working out pretty much everyday. Combined with eating meals here, I feel pretty good and healthy these days. :)

Kenn and I have completed watching Season 1 of Lost plus the bonus disc. Man, that show is good. So well thought out and executed. Everything is amazing, the acting, writing, editing... I can't wait for the new episodes to come out, just a couple more weeks. Thank goodness for itunes downloads. We watched one of the many movies we have on DVD. This one was a real B movie. We bought it at Kmart from the $4.99 bin or something before we left. "When a Stranger Calls" - you may remember the commercial where they say "the call is coming from inside the house!" I mean that pretty much gave away the whole movie. On top of the fact that it was pretty typical "scary" movie making and just plain awful. But I did invent a great drinking game to play along with it. Take a sip of your drink whenever someone says "Hello or Hi". You can get drunk pretty easily considering the killer guy calls like every two minutes and the girl answers the phone with "hello" every time! - HA

Sumo and link to pics

So Sumo was also a real treat and a fun Japan event. The professional wrestlers, the top ranked ones, don't have matches until around 2:30-3pm. Kenn and I arrived a little earlier to walk around and check out the Sumo museum. It wasn't really a museum so much as a room, but it had some cool pics and stuff. Some of the lower ranked Sumo wrestlers were walking around the stadium. Man, Sumo wrestlers sure are big guys. Not just fat but tall too.

We settled into our second floor seats which run about $45 a pop. Lower level box seating is at least a hundred dollars or more. We were able to see perfectly fine, the stadium is not that big.



It was all pretty interesting. Most of the time is spent with rituals. The wrestlers come out. They stomp their feet (stomp out the bad spirits), slap themselves, throw salt in the ring (purify it), and drink water (purify themselves). The matches take less than one minute each. Though these guys may look fat, they are pretty flexible, have great balance, and many different wrestling techniques. It's pretty cool to watch.



The pic below is one of the ceremonies where they introduce all the wrestlers at that level. There are a few white guys in the professional level - 2 brothers from Russia and a Bulgarian guy who rose up the ranks pretty quickly. But there has bascially been one winner, the same winner in the past like 12 years or something. The only time he didn't win was when he had an injury that prevented him from continuing the tournament. No one really knows if he is just really awesome or everyone else is just so-so... Anyways, he won again this tournament.



Here is the link to all the Tsukuji market pics, a few from Omotosando/Harajuku shopping, and Sumo. If fish guts and the like gross you out, you might want to skip over those and straight to the others ;) I added titles/comments on some so you know what you're lookin at. Enjoy!
Tsukuji and Sumo pics

Tsukiji Fish Market

Description: Tsukiji Central Wholesale Market is a large wholesale market for fish, fruit and vegetables in central Tokyo. Tsukiji Market is best known as one of the world's largest fish markets, handling over 2,000 tons of marine products per day. The sight of the many kinds of fresh fish, shellfish and other seafood and the busy atmosphere of scooters, trucks, sellers and buyers hurrying around, make Tsukiji Market one of Tokyo's major tourist attractions.


Kenn and I woke up early on Saturday morning and made it to the fish market around 7:15am. It was after the fish auctions are over although auctions have been closed to the public since 2005 anyway from the sheer number of and interference by misbehaving tourists (visitors touching tuna, obstructing people at work and causing distraction by flash photography). But 7:15 is still the heat of the action at the fish market and there were just tons of workers bustling around. Many of them were on these scooter-truck things hauling around fish, ice, etc. I could swear they were out to hit tourists, I kept jumping out of the way to escape them.



We walked through the market with all the water and fish gunk all over the groud - ick. I have to say it was one of the coolest things I've seen in Tokyo... actually probably one of the coolest things I've ever seen at all. There were tons of fish and tons of huge tuna - check it out:



Workers were cutting, packing and moving fish all over. Kenn took tons of pics of the fish and all sorts of gross things from the sea. Many of them not for the faint of heart but I'll send them around so you can peruse at your leisure.

We also walked through lanes and lanes of fish and seafood being sold at wholesale.



And on the perimeters of the market were fruits and veggies sold at wholesale as well as small shops selling assorted related goods like sushi knives:


We bought some t-shirts at one shop and then chose a little restaurant for a nice sushi breakfast. Freshest fish we'll ever eat probably! There were huge lines for some of the places (many people come early and wait on line or come right after clubbing) but Kenn and I couldn't figure out why some restaurants had lines and others didn't. All the fish must be fresh, how could they differ? Best we could figure is that they had famous chefs or some specialty dish. We chose one with no line and pointed to one of the many many pictures of tuna sashimi they had up on the wall which to us all looked identical. At any rate, it was absolutely delicious:



After our breakfast, we walked around a bit more and discovered that the local neighborhood also had all these shops selling cheap produce and packaged goods. It kind of reminded me of Taiwan and Hong Kong night markets because there were tons of food stands as well. We bought lots of snacks and stopped for fried crab on a stick which was really yummy! :) As we walked around, one of those scooter-cart thingies passed us and it was carrying a group of Japanese women who were laughing and screaming. It totally made me laugh:



Tsukuji was a great experience that in my opinion no one visiting Tokyo should miss.

We went home for a nap and later walked around Omotesando and Harajuku at all the high end and boutique shops (think Soho) and young & trendy shops (think Village). We stopped to check out the Prada store which was really cool inside. I "accidently" purchased a wallet. For the record, I really needed a new wallet. ;)

A day of walking around was exhausting so we rested up for Sunday's Sumo. More on that in my next post.

Sumo

This Sunday we have tickets to the final day of Sumo in the January tournament. Six tournaments are held every year, each one lasting 15 days. Three of the tournaments are held in Tokyo (January, May, September). I didn't get to go to September's so this will be Kenn and my first Sumo experience. Should be fun!

The basic rules of sumo are simple: The wrestler who either first touches the floor with something else than his sole or leaves the ring before his opponent, loses. The fights themselves usually last only a few seconds and in rare cases up to one minute or longer.

If we can get wake up early enough tomorrow, we plan to try to go to the famous fish market for a look around and the freshest sushi breakfast imaginable. :) Tonight we're staying in for a Lost Season 1 marathon. We're already through the first disc.

I LOVE SUSHI

***NOTE: Because I had it saved to my drafts before posting, there is a new post under the snowboarding one with pics from my visit home. Scroll down to check it out - Don't miss it!***

So for my birthday (yes, if you are reading this and forgot you suck- haha j/k) Kenn took me out to an awesome sushi dinner. A place in our neighborhood written up in a guidebook we have - called Roppongi Fukuzushi. We had lots of sake and did the set course menu which included salad, sashimi, steamed egg pudding, soup, soft shell crab & grilled steak, sushi, dessert and coffee. It was quite the feast and I barely made it to the end but it was sooo delicious. Check out the pics:









Did you know? -- Sushi is very high in vitamins and low in saturated fats. Even fatty fish have fewer calories per gram than chicken,and may actually help reduce cholesterol,so the traditional Japanese diet is associated with very low rates of heart disease.

We decided our favorite local bar is this one called Propaganda. Sophia introduced me to the place. Lots of ex-pats but decent music and very chill. Inside you would never know you were in Tokyo. Could just be any old dive bar in NYC. We were messing around with the settings on my camera and taking funky pics. I also remembered I can send emails from my mobile phone so sent some of you emails and pics from my phone. It was like you were there at the bar with us. Ok, not so much.... I missed you all but I have to say I had a blast for my birthday in Tokyo with Kenn! :)