New York

Nothing like being in NY for the holidays. Kenn and I went to see the tree on Sunday, did some shopping, and had take-out Chinese. Classic NYC style. Christmas dinners and family time on Mon and Tues. I am trying to fit everything and everyone into my schedule for the rest of the days I'm here. I can't believe how 2 weeks can get filled up so fast. It's nice to be home though.

Just hours

I am leaving for the airport in a few hours. Getting to the airport in Tokyo is a real pain in the butt. It's so far away and takes forever. I personally like taking the aiport shuttle bus from a local hotel because it's simpler than dragging around bags to the train. Train is faster but in my opinion less convenient. Bus is about $26 and takes 1 1/2 usually but can be longer with traffic.

So I already had enough miles to upgrade my flight back to business class. I could have saved the miles but figured, live it up, why wait. I change planes at LAX, hopefully there are no delays because of that whole Denver weather mess.

I hope there are good movies and that I can sleep on the plane a bit. I'm one of those weird people that like plane food too - ha. Business class plane food is pretty ok though.

See some of you in NY soon!

Ok I am at the Red Carpet Club at the airport, I got here with waaayyyy to much time to spare but it was worth it because this lounge rocks. It's huge and i can have beer. :) And wireless internet and all that goods stuff. *sigh* I wish I were rich so can fly business or first class all the time. It seriously makes a difference in the whole flying experience. They have the coolest beer machine here. You take the frosted glass from the fridge then place it on the machine, press a button, and it tips the cup back and poors the beer. Cool man. ;)

Ok so I have some time to kill and just read an old comment on my blog from Alexis. I guess I have a blog reader from Japan-- Alexis, if you are reading this, here is the link: alluc.org -- enjoy it! We should meet up sometime in Tokyo!

Ok folks, one more hour til flight boards. They just pulled the shades here- that is random. Guy next to me is talking really loud on his phone or on skype or something. And the guy on the other side just got up to leave after I asked him why they pulled the shades. Maybe I smell?? Haha...

Bye again!!

1 more day

Just one more day of work and I'm headed home to NY. I'm so excited I can hardly contain myself. Reasons:
1) First and foremost this marks the end of the long period of Kenn and I driving or taking the train/bus to see each other. And the end of the 4 months of being apart. Marks the start of living together!
2) I get to see family and friends I've missed
3) I get to be in NYC, my favorite place
4) I get to go home for Christmas, one of my favorite times of year
5) It ends the boredom of being at work with nothing to do

So last night I met up with another friend of friend I was introduced to. My friend Adam from college has a friend living here in Tokyo and we've finally been able to sync up for dinner. Nice guy and he also introduced me to a friend of his, she was really nice too. Even though our meeting was brief we seemed to click so exchanged numbers and hopefully I'll hang out with her again, both of them.

I realized that I have that 'getting older' bug where you sometimes feel too lazy to go out and the thought of staying home and vegging seems so much more appealing. Never used to feel like that in my youth but admittedly sometimes it's an effort to go out now. So sad. But what I realized is that it feels really good to be out and meet new people and interact with people. It's more rewarding than staying at home...so I've decided that I will push myself to make more of an effort. Life is short, why waste it one the couch?

Should I do it? ok fine... ODE TO MCDREAMY

Haha-- I am now taking requests for blog posts.

I guess it doesn't make for an interesting read about what I'm up to in Tokyo but to be honest, I haven't been up to much besides work and even that is boring as I wrap up the year. But let's see I'll write some tidbits: I am still drinking a liter bottle of green tea every day. For breakfast I am addicted to premade sandwiches with the crusts cut off and cut into triangles - they usually are a variety pack of egg salad, ham, etc. I make something simple for dinner like pasta, noodles, fried rice, or buy something pre-made. My Japanese vocabulary hasn't grown much but I noticed when my friends were visiting that I definitely know more than when I first got here. I can kinda direct a cab (at least to the main intersection in my neighborhood). I can ask for water at a restaurant and understand what the wait staff is asking (like "what would you like to drink"). I can understand simple commonly used phrases like "it's cold", "that's cute", "what is this?" "that's expensive". I can even decipher some katakana characters, enough to figure out words. What I really need to do is take lessons so that will be my new year's resolution.

Ok, back to Ode to McDreamy. If you are totally in the dark, McDreamy is a character on Grey's Anatomy (of course!) and is Patrick Dempsey's character and Meredith Grey's love. He's definitely dreamy - handsome, a brain surgeon, sweet. He's a new yorker but loves the outdoors and fishihg. The way he looks at Meredith just melts your heart. Here's a pic of him from the episode where the guys go camping in Season 3:


Now Patrick Dempsey is actually pretty old, though he looks good for his age. He's turning 41 next month! He's orginally from Maine. He has been married twice. First marriage was with a woman 27 years his senior- ick! And now he's married to a make-up artist. They have one daugther and twins boys on the way.

5 more days

I took a nice long walk yesterday around the neighorhood and neighboring hoods. Weather was nice. Did a little shopping too. If I can just get through the next boring 5 workdays. It's a busy time of month in Japan and for my coworkers, clients are all trying to spend the rest of their advertising and research budgets. But for me, that means it's slow because my coworkers are all swamped with other things and can't help me. Because of the language barrier with many clients, I can't even send follow-up emails without translations. So here I am posting to my blog, Christmas shopping online, emailing friends, reading news.

Oh bummer.. I just checked my phone and noticed that I had a voicemail (which I hardly ever get so hard for me to notice the little symbol). I mentioned awhile ago in an old post that a couple I know from back home (girl used to go to my church when I was in HS) might be relocating to Tokyo. Well it turns out they are moving here. Serena is in town this week on an "apt finding" trip. Looks like she tried to call me yesterday but I totally missed the call and missed the voicemail. That sucks. Anyway supposed to meet her tonight for dinner.

Ode to McSteamy

AKA Dr. Mark Sloan AKA Eric Dane AKA Delicious... haha.
This post is at the request of Livia and for the enjoyment of Johanna and other female fans.

WARNING: the following pic is not for children or the faint of heart.







So Eric Dane is 34 years old, from SF, and married to Rebecca Gayheart. For those of you who have no clue. McSteamy is a character of Grey's Anatomy.

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So Friday's office outing was a ton of fun. It ended up not raining. The clouds cleared briefly for an awesome view of Mt. Fuji. The amusement park was fun and we went on this awesome roller coaster where the seats spin around. There was a drop where it looks like you are just falling straight down to the ground, cool stuff. The only downside to the day was that my coworkers spoke Japanese most of the time (none of the expats went on the outing). So a lot of the time I was left out of the conversation or someone would remember me and translate a bit. I'm used to it by now I guess. We did go to the Onsen (hot spring). I forgot to mention in my last post that the baths are separated by gender. In the end it was not uncomfortable to be naked in front of female coworkers. After all it's just the human form and we all have the same body parts. No one is there to stare. The Onsen was great, very relaxing. Back in Tokyo we were joined by some other coworkers for a dinner outing. We had our own private room and a huge feast of a variety of beef we cooked on the grills at the table. The beer, wine and sake was flowing like nobody's business and typical Japanese business style we got toasty and went to Karaoke. It was great fun and I got to get to know my coworkers much better. Today has been spent sleeping and recovering. :)

What do i blog about today?

I've been posting to my blog regularly. I'm back in it to win it... Okay, I'm a dork.

This has been the longest slowest week. I'm not quite sure why. I think it might be because I'm looking so forward to going home for Christmas and the new chapter that begins after Kenn and I return to Japan.

Tomorrow is our office outing. We are going to an amusement park outside of Tokyo somewhere and also possibly to an Onsen (hot spring). You have to be naked at Onsens and I'm not sure how I feel about being naked in front of coworkers. It's not the nudity that I have a problem with really but naked with coworkers?? Kinda weird. Oh well, when in Rome I guess...

Man, I am bored today.

10 days...

...until i head back to NY. Interesting work stuff has been going on but I can't mention it here. But I like change, I've always seen change as a positive thing. You know what they say "out of chaos, is opportunity". Some people like status quo but I get bored easily. :)

My DVD player seems to not want to play some DVDs. It will play for awhile then suddenly get all blurry. I wonder if it is because it won't read pirated copies. Anyway it took me 3 days to watch Bend It Like Beckham because of this. Once it gets blurry, you can stop it and then play it again later and it clears up for awhile. Good movie. For some reason I thought I had seen it already but I hadn't.

I have done most of my Christmas shopping online this year. I love Christmas shopping. Tonight is my building's Christmas party. I'm not used to saying "Christmas" parties anymore but they're not holiday parties here because not many people celebrate anything else. They most likely don't celebrate Christmas either except in a very secular, commercial way. They love Commercial Christmas here actually. It's a big date night, you're supposed to take your honey out on a date.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Eric Mabius

I read Livia's comment and I couldn't resist ;) I really enjoyed Ugly Betty and thought Eric was pretty cute too. I am a little surprised Livia likes him because he is way past her age preference - he's 36! He definitely does not look 36, I wouldn't have thought that. Btw, he also just got engaged this year to his gf of 5 years. In my search for pics, I found that he is actually not that good looking after all. It took me some time to find these 2 decent ones that I liked. He is pretty dorky looking in most. I think it takes just the right angle...

Taipei pics

Here are a few pics from Taipei. For all, visit my Kodak Gallery link. Below are of/from Taipei 101 building:





Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall:



Night Market:




Was a rainy Saturday in Tokyo. My brother found me this great url that has links to streamed TV shows (including current!) that I can watch from Japan! Totally great. I watched all episodes of Ugly Betty yesterday. I also managed to get out and meet up with Lauren. We tried to go to her friend's friend's house party but either got the address or day wrong or something because no one answered the doorbell. We went for dinner in Meguro and dessert in Ebisu instead. Sunday was spent working out, doing laundry and cleaning up the apartment. A perfect Sunday if you ask me. :)

Taipei Part 2

My second presentation was a bit better I think, I tried to speak slower. I still got a lot of blank stares and no questions but I can't say that was abnormal. I had the late afternoon and evening free and went to the Taipei 101 building which was very cool. I was impressed and thought they made a typical tall building tourist attraction pretty interesting. Free audio tour, bits of information about the building, and a big exposed wind damper - a really big ball that helps prevent building vibration or something.



Then I hit up another night market. Night markets were really cool. Lots of locals eating at food stalls. Lots of weird things to eat that I didn't attempt. But did get a fried dough with chicken thingy, delicious pastries, and hand-rolled egg rolls. I had Thursday morning free before my flight back so I went to the National Palace Museum. I really liked it, interesting exhibits of lots of really old stuff. ;) Pottery, jade, bronze buddha statues, paintings and calligraphy... I took the time to read a lot of the explanations so learned quite a bit. It sparked a new interest to learn more about Chinese history which I may or may not follow through on. All in all, cool museum though. It was actually recently redesigned and renovated. I quite enjoyed Taipei. Maybe I'll get to go back sometime with a travel companion or someone who knows more about where to go.

I flew China Airlines which I have to say is one of my new favorites. Large plane with really spacious seating in Economy. Decent meal service including wine. And a lot of polite flight attendants to help out, more per person than on other airlines. Temperature was also at a decent level. The only bad thing was the entertainment. Movie on the way to Taipei was Flickr, some horse movie, which I didn't bother to watch. No movie on the return flight because it was much shorter I guess.

I'm back at the Tokyo office today but being Friday makes it a lot easier. When I get back to Tokyo after travelling from another Asian city (ok, I've only done it twice so far), I am finding a feeling a relief. Or that feeling of comfort to come home. I thought that was interesting. I'm comfortable in Tokyo now, at least in comparison to other cities. I keep realizing how easy it really is to live here.

I'll post pics from Taipei soon.

Taipei

My first day in Taipei has been pretty good. Taipei seems like a pretty cool city. Last time I was here for work I literally spent less than 24 hours here. This time I have a little time to see a bit but not much. I arrived yesterday early afternoon. The company had a driver pick me up at the airport but there were sooo many drivers with signs at arrivals it took me awhile to find my driver, that kinda sucked. The hotel they put me up in is sort of a low budget business hotel but it works. Weather is actually a little chilly, windy and rainy unfortunately. I ventured out to the National Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall after settling in and ate at a food booth there, I had some fried fish thingy. Then I walked down to the Tunghua Night Market. That was pretty cool. I walked around there a bit and bought some dumplings at a stand.

Today's presentation went ok. My presentation was the only one in English and I think I spoke a little too fast for the crowd so will have to slow down the pace for tomorrow's audience. Then coworkers took me out to dinner, a famous/popular dumpling place. Delicious. Then a famous/popular dessert place. Yum.

I will have the late afternoon free tomorrow and also Thursday morning. I'll try to hit the 101 building and maybe Chiang Kai-shek memorial hall or a museum or something. But so far, my impression of Taipei is a good one.

2 1/2 weeks til I'm back in NY :)

New pics

50% of my blog readers are my friends from outside of work. Ok fine, so my total sample is 10 people...

So I've been travelling and have had visitors and am going to Taipei for work next week. I'll actually be speaking at a small client seminar. That should be interesting, a first for me. I will have a little time to see Taipei too, at the very least get some good meals in. With all going on I haven't been much in the mood to go out in Tokyo. Been laying low, staying in, and watching a whole lot of Grey's Anatomy. I have a serious addiction to that show. I won't even get into how bad my addiction is, it will sound really pathetic. Hehe. Thanks to Greg, Jenn, Kent and Girish for the movies and DVDs. I am doing a bit of damage on some of those also. I've started on Buffy and Arrested Development and watched a bunch of movies.

I have decided to come back for Christmas and New Year's. I wasn't going to because I was just home but it will be too depressing to be here by myself. Plus I have a lot of days off, Japan has 7 days off during those 2 weeks. I hope I get the chance to see a lot of people, email me and let's set up some dates! I am not sure when I will be back to NY again. Kenn is coming to Toyko with me in January! YAY! Finally, I am so excited!! I think we're going to have a great time here together.

I have uploaded all my new Tokyo pics to my Kodak Gallery link. They start from picture 137. If you don't have the link anymore or never got it, let me know and I'll send it to ya. Here is a taste including some from the Design Festa I went to today. Design Festa is a freestyle International Art Event open to all artists, both professional and non-professional from all over the world to exhibit their creative talent. Cool stuff. Enjoy.


Jenn and Larry eating Udon :)



Jenn and I at Park Hyatt (where 'Lost in Translation' was filmed). Check out the awesome view of Mt Fuji!!



We walked in the rain to find The Sad Cafe and spent the rest of the rainy afternoon drinking beer



Live music stage at the Design Festa



Live painting



One artist's booth display



I don't even know what they are supposed to be.