Fukada Kyoko

If you have watched any Japanese films or drama, you may have seen this actress Kyoko Fukada.  She is about the same age as me (or older) and I’ve seen many of her dramas/films while in Japan.  Although some says bad things about her, I kind of like her.  She is cute, and I like her hair style and make-up 🙂

It was really a coincidence, but I was at Yuko‘s place to get hair cut today, and I saw a photo of Kyoko on the cover page of a Japanese fashion magazine.   Now she has short hair!

According to the magazine, this is the shortest hair that Kyoko has been with.  My image for her always had been “long hair” “brown, light color” “cute”, but now she looks like a lady.  I really love her current new looks. 🙂   Unfortunately I have no guts to cut my hair this short, but my hair is now short too.  It’s not because I saw her hair style on the magazine, I had been thinking to cut my hair to medium bob since few weeks ago.  

I love my hair style now, it’s nice and short, and easy to shampoo 🙂  I colored hair brown with few low-lights.  It’s summer!   

By the way Kyoko’s skin is so beautiful…  what does she use??

What Japanese People Do in December

Like other countries, December is the busiest month in a year in Japan.  New Year’s Day is the biggest event, followed by New Year’s Eve and Christmas.  On December, school kids start to get excited for the winter holiday, couples get excited for the romantic Christmas dates, and families get excited for a gathering with all the relatives and family.   

We have several things to get done before New Year’s Day in Japan.  One is cleaning!  We clean our houses, offices, gardens, and even public toilets.  This cleaning is called “Nenmatsu- Oh-souji” (the end of the year cleaning).  When I was a kid all my family get busy… wipe tatami mats, clean light bulbs, change paper on shoji (window made with Japanese paper and wood) , wash doggy’s house etc.  The idea of this “Nenmatsu- Oh-souji” is that we clean up all the mess we made in the year and welcome a New Year with clean and new atmosphere –  a new life.

Another one is … parties!  We do “bounen-kai” , “shinnen-kai” and sometimes Christmas party with colleagues, friends, and family.  “Bounen-kai” is a party (mostly drinking at Izakaya) before New Year’s Day, and it’s for “to forget about this year”.  Whatever you did, any mistakes and regrets in the year,  you have to forget after attending this party.  On the other hand, “Shinnen-kai” is a party after New Year’s Day.  This is just a party to welcome New Year.  Sometimes you get to attend those parties almost everyday in December, for example, with friends from high school, with friends from college, with friends from office, with office members, with kid’s play group members etc.  Very busy!  But fun 🙂

My mum emailed me saying that her company was having “Bounen-kai” lastnight, and everyone was working super fast and finished 2 hours early!  So funny…  They are so ready to drink some beer and sho-chu!

I’m having a small gathering party (kind of “Bounen-kai”) with my friends this Saturday.  This’s organised by my friend and we are gonna just relax and do nothing but eat & drink!  Can’t wait!

Other versions of Bijin

As I mentioned on my previous post here and here, bijin tokei is getting more attention across the world – 240000000 viewers a month!  They’ve made Osaka version of bijin-tokei (kiss x bijin-tokei),and now here are some new versions:

circuit tokei.

The difference between this circuit-tokei and normal bijin-tokei is that girls in circuit-tokei are all race queens!

binan-tokei,

A guy version of bijin-tokei!

av-tokei

…. I don’t know what to say about this!  Apparently this av-tokei is run by different company.  After the success of original bijin-tokei, everyone is trying to copy the system.   For example, Korean version bijin-tokei (Mi-in sigye)  was created by a Korean company after Japan started its original bijin-tokei.  I guess there are going to be more versions …

Camels vs Monkeys

Well this may be an old news, but 6,000 wild camels have invaded a small Australian town in search for water last month.  This town of Docker River, population 350, is in a drought area, which encouraged thirty camels to come into the town searching for water. (from thestar.com)  Australian authorities planed to kill those camels by gun for trampling fences, smashing tanks and contaminating supplies… I can’t agree with their decision, but I guess they had to.  In Japan sometimes wild boar attacks a small town and people have to kill it.

It seems that this news is broadcasted outside of Australia too.  My mum emailed me saying “hey are you ok?  Are camels around you?” That’s actually how I knew about this news :p

To tell the truth, I have a similar experience…  not camels, but monkeys!  It was a long time ago, when I was an elementary school student.  My school was surrounded by mountains and rice fields ( writing this makes Shiga sound like a really country side :p ) , and one day lots of monkeys started to gather up around the school!  

Because it was close to 4pm and students were about to go home, teachers told all students to remain inside of the building.  I remember seeing many monkeys in the athletic ground of the school from class room.  I didn’t feel scared at all, I rather felt excited :p  I like animals… well, of course I will be screaming if some wild monkeys come close to me though.

All students had to wait until all monkeys were gone.  I don’t remember what teachers did, but I think they called police or something.

Oh, and I also remember one day we had a dog strolled into our school.  The dog was huge (I think it was a German shepherd) and running around the school hallway vigorously.  It was scary! 

<Photos ref: Camel, monkey)

Climate in Singapore and Perth

The other day I had a visitor from Singapore.  He came to Perth on business, and said that the weather in Perth is totally opposite to Singapore’s.  What I remember about Singapore was also the humid climate.  He says it’s about 70~80% humidity… oh my gosh.  No wonder I felt my body heavier over there!

It must be terrible climate to wash clothes… he says the clothes don’t get dry for few days after washing.  In Perth it all get dried in 10 minutes in summer because of the super dry climate.  (someone said to me before that humidity in Perth during summer is 0~5%! Is it true??)  

I always loved having four seasons in a year in Japan, being able to experience many things in different seasons, and thought that I couldn’t do much of those in Perth compared with Japan.  But, according to this visitor, Singapore is worse.  Because there is no season in Singapore (always hot and humid, like other Asian countries) it’s hard to remember what he did in when and where.  I mean, for example, if you lost your passport long time ago and remember wearing half sleeve Tshirt on the day, you can at least guess that it was around summer time when you lost the passport.  If you bought a cat and there’s sakura tree in your memory, you know it was spring.  In Singapore you can’t have such sense of time, because there is nothing to compare to.  Umm I see..  I don’t think I will like living in a place which has only one season.

Bagelier Bagels

It’s been more than one year since Bagelier started its business.  Actually it wasn’t easy for the first few months…  I was surprised to know that people here don’t really like hard, dense, crusty bagels.  They prefer it soft and light. In my opinion it’s not a bagel though…  

Because of that, I had to change my recipe to match their needs.  The bagels at Bagelier were first very dense and heavy, but now they are lighter.  It’s almost impossible to make all the people love my bagels because everyone has different taste!  Ummm..  I’m happy to receive any comments or feedback of Bagelier’s bagels so that I can know the current recipe is good or bad.

Oh by the way, Wasabi & Green Tea in Victoria Park started to sell Bagelier bagels in store 🙂  If someone just wants to try out few bagels, you can buy from this shop.  I think they sell bagels frozen though… but there is no problem as bagels can be kept frozen for 3 months.  You just need to defrost, and either heat up in the microwave or toast.

Well, anyway I think I’m going to start promoting Bagelier products here on this blog.  So, please don’t feel annoyed :p

Spotlight on Black Animals

It’s been a while since vampire themed stories hit the market.  Now everywhere you turn there are vampire movies, television shows, and books.  I believe Twilight movie started this vampire boom, and it seems that many people (especially girls) are in love with this series.  Thanks to this (?), these is a merit on a cute yet poor little creature – black cats.  

At animal shelters, black cats were less likely to be chosen than their multi-coloured mates, vanishing into the shadows to become invisible to potential adopters. And sadly, during kitten season, when shelters are full, black cats are often the first to be euthanased.  

But with the release of the new Twilight movie “New Moon”, black cats started to gather up an attention of people who wants to bring a little bit of the dark into their life. Black cats, with their radiant eyes and shiny black coats not only help you get in touch with your mysterious side, but pack a punch in the perfect pet stakes, making great pets for apartment dwellers or people looking for a loving, no fuss companion.

No matter the reason, I think it’s good that this poor animal is getting an attention.  However, I strongly wish that people take care of animals very good until they leave this world.  No matter the fur color is white or black, they are still living creature and all same animals.

Massage at Home

Who doesn’t like getting massage? … well, actually I know someone. – My husband. He loves getting massage by me, but none else. :p So he doesn’t go to spa or massage places even though we have a voucher! What’s a shame..

Well, anyway… I love getting massage like other girls! My body and muscle get tired easily and are always stiff. I don’t mind getting massage every day, but of course it costs a lot here. I’ve only been to spas/massage places just 3 times since I came to Perth, I think.

Just to save little money, I normally get massage at home when I disparately need massage. There’re a few Japanese people who do mobile massage service, but I usually ask this lady (S-san) to come over to my house.

Personally I don’t like getting massage by men, nor strangers. I don’t feel comfortable… I know S-san for awhile, and she has a good skill and nice personality. She also don’t take any job from strangers either. It’s just for a security reason.

Having a skill is good, I think. You can work anywhere. One of my friend who is into beauty therapy stuff wants to start home business as well. She has already prepared massage bed, face steamer (from Japan) and other goods. I got free trial by her few times, and it was good! My face was totally different after the treatment. I hope she can officially start her own business soon. 🙂

A Touching heartwarming Japanese Song

I was in a souvenir shop in Yufuin the first time I heard this song.  I straight away fell in love with the depth of emotion in her voice, Angela Aki.  After I came back to Perth I noticed that my husband had downloaded the song to his iMac and listens to it when he works.  

  The title of this song is “手紙 ～拝啓 十五の君へ～” (A letter to me at 15 years old).  The song (lyrics) brings out the pain of a 15-year-old student struggling with life who writes a letter to his/her future self to ask for guidance.  In this lyrics there’s a letter written from a 15-year-old, and  letter written back from the future him/herself.  And, at the end of the song wishes everyone happiness.

  She wrote a letter to herself in twenty years when she was 15 years old, so this song is based on her true story.  Angela spent her teen years with an inferiority complex for being a mix of Japanese and Italian-American.  This song (and her character) captures hearts of teenagers in Japan, and gives courage and dream to the kids.

  This song heals my stress away.

 “手紙 ～拝啓 十五の君へ～”  (A letter to me at 15 years old).  

Dear you,

I wonder where you are and what you do at the time you read this letter.  As I’m just a 15-year-old I am anxious about lots of things in my life and future, but I can’t talk about it with anyone.  I’m writing this letter to myself in future because that’s the only person I could tell everything and can trust.  I feel like crying, I feel like I’m a looser, I don’t know who I should believe and trust to move on with my life.  My heart is broken and hurt, but I’m still living.

Dear you,

Thank you for your letter.  I have something that I want to tell you, a 15-year-old.   You will start to see what you are and where you should be going if you continue asking to yourself.  The seas of youth may be rough, but keep rowing your boat of dream towards the shores of tomorrow.  Don’t cry, don’t lose yourself, even when you are seemingly about to disappear. Just believe in your own voice.  Even as an adult I get hurt sometimes and have sleepless nights, but I’m still living this sweet/bitter life.

Everything you do and see, there is a meaning.  That creates your life.  So, please don’t be afraid, don’t cry, and grow your dream.  Keep on believing.

Everyone experiences sadness in their life, and you can’t avoid that.  So, keep smiling and keep going.  

Dear you,

Whoever reading this letter, I wish you are happy.

Your Dream House?

Have you ever dreamed of your future house?  I was little surprised by the fact that many people in Perth buy their own houses.  In Japan we (especially people at my age) don’t usually buy a house.  We rent an apartment room and it’s normal.    

When I was little I liked changing the interior of my room, and started to buy my own furniture at age 16.  Although I didn’t dream of a house, I dreamed of a room or some spaces for my own and wanted it to be perfect.

Now, my sister-in-law is building a house with her husband and it’s nearly finished.  I think they are going to move in there next month.  They’ve bought lots of furniture for the house, and they look so happy!  Plus they just bought a new car and also a puppy, which is going to arrive their house on Christmas day.  They have already prepared a doggy bed, water bowl and also nail foils.  I can’t also wait to play with the puppy 🙂

Seeing them been so excited makes me also want to have a house here.  I wish I had more money! (>0<)  I want to decorate my own space and pick furniture I like, but I can’t do that with this house I’m living.  I’m not sure if I can buy a house next year, but if I could, it’s like one of my dream coming true.  … I think I will start planning how I want my house to look like.  I like planning, and also it’s fun to dream about things. 🙂

St James Hair Studio

I was very excited to try this hair salon in Northbridge.  One reason is that I was dying to get hair cut, and another is that I wanted to meet this stylist “Kazu”.  I made a booking with Kazu and had a chance to chat with him on Sunday.

Kazu has been working at this St James Hair Studio for 10 years now. He was also a hair stylist in Japan, worked in Tokyo for 9 years, then moved to Perth.  Along with his job at this salon, he goes back to Japan annually to update his skill and knowledge by attending on seminars and catching up with his friends who are also hair stylists.

At the salon, I showed Kazu a sample photo of a hair style and told him how I want my hair to look like, then moved to another chair to get shampoo.  He put a steamed towel on my neck and massaged my head, it was so good.  He told me my muscle is tense – I didn’t know that there’s muscle on the head!  And, he could tell right after touching my head that my body is tired.  He is a pro!

He gave me lots of tips as well.  I asked him how I should dry my hair, naturally or by drier?  How to use hair iron and curler?  He gave me an advice on all the questions I asked, by demonstrating!  He showed me how to dry my hair: wear heat-proof conditioner on the hair first then blow dry completely with strong hair drier.  Then straighten up my fringe with iron, and curl the bottom of my hair with curler.  Wow my hair looks so different…

If you are seeking some tips or answers regards to hair, he is the one 🙂  He has many patrons here, including Japanese, Malaysian, Singapore, Australian etc.  I recommend you to book him at least 1 week in advance…  oh and he is going on holiday from 04/Jan till 24/Jan next year.

St James Hair Studio

Shop 2/218 James St, Northbridge WA 6003

Tel: 08 9228 3339

My Hospital Experiences

After busy schedule and traveling around between 3 countries, my body finally gave up… I’ve been sick since I came back from Jakarta :p Not only me, my husband too. Coughing, running nose, fever, etc. I had to go to GP and then hospital few times, and took blood test. It seems that many people around me are also sick. My friends and co-workers.

You realize how important the health is when you get sick. I always think “meh, it’s fine” even though I have symptom of sickness, and don’t really do much about it. I don’t like taking medicine, so I try to recover by eating lots of fruits and nutritious food, and take a good sleep. Sometimes it’s ok, but sometimes the things go worse and I end up going to hospital..

When I was just about to graduate cookery course in TAFE, 2005, I was so looking forward to going back to my home and stay in Japan for awhile. The course was pretty hard and I had to work night time along with the classes, plus teachers were really strict there. When I finished my last exam I was so happy thinking “I’m finally free!”. I had booked my tickets to Osaka already and was counting the day to come. … Just few days before the flight, I started to feel strange – my body felt tired all the time, headache… I thought I just had caught cold or something. At that time my oversea travel insurance had been expired already ( I didn’t renew because I was going back to Japan in few weeks and I didn’t use insurance for the whole 2 years before then) so I was going to see doctor in Japan.

Just 5 days from the flight, my face started to have something – puffy things. Plus fever, huge headache and body ache. I couldn’t even walk, and because the puffy things on my face (only on the right side of my face) was kind of covering up my right eye, I couldn’t see things properly either. I should had gone to see doctor earlier! Now things had gone worse. My husband (boyfriend that time) took me to Medical Centre and doctor immediately sent me to Royal Perth Hospital. In the end I was having “shingles” and had to stay in hospital for 4 nights.

I had to change my flight date, but the worst thing was that my visa had expired while I was in the hospital! I couldn’t get out from the hospital so my boyfriend (my husband) had to go to immigration centre for me to extend my visa. Of course it was hard and he came back to hospital few times to get some documents from the nurses. Hospital staff kindly helped us calling immigration centre to explain what happened to me as well. But still, immigration didn’t give us any good news. In the end, right after I got out the hospital I had to go to immigration centre by myself to show this terrible face with a trace of shingles. We had a chat with an officer in a private room, and he gave me a temporary visa straight away after seeing my face.

Oh, another bad news was a bill from the hospital. Because I didn’t have any insurance (no travel insurance, no Medicare – because I was just a student-) I had to pay full amount. It was a BIG number… Been covered by insurance is really important!

This time I have Medicare and also private insurance, so things went smooth. I’m feeling getting better, but I really should have gone to see doctor when I first felt something wrong with my body. Sooner is better. By the way I had to go 3 times to get blood test, and on the third time nurse couldn’t find my vein (because it was too tiny and flat) she stung me 6 times on my both arms. She still couldn’t get any flow so she moved the needle around inside of my vein… it was painful 🙁 Well, the pain is nothing compared with getting a huge bill, and also getting sick.

Rice Cooker

While in Jakarta we tried to buy a rice cooker.  You must think “can you buy it in Perth?”, but what we’re looking for was a Japanese microcomputer rice cooker with a screen, and with some functions.  

Most of rice cookers I see in shops in Perth are very simple ones, which have just 1 button.  Moving the button upward = “cook rice”, and downward = “keep warm”. We wanted more functions on our rice cooker!  Like the one I was using in my house in Japan.  I know there’re microcomputer rice cookers available in some shops around Perth, but the model is very limited.  So we thought we could buy one from Jakarta.  If we could buy from Japan it’d be easy, but the problem is the voltage: Japan is 110W, and Australia is 240W.  We chose to shop in Jakarta because the voltage is same there (240W).

As I mentioned before there are many Japanese products available in Jakarta, so it was not difficult to find Japanese rice cookers at electronic shops.  Zojirushi, Hitachi, Panasonic …  The prices were ok, and we were so excited to buy one of those…. until we talked to a sales person!

After going to several electronic shops around Jakarta and considering all the functions and prices, we decided to buy either Panasonic or Philips from Best Denki (an electronic shop) in a mall.  Philips is not a Japanese brand, but the rice cooker is microcomputer built and the price was cheap.  We walked between these rice cookers many times thinking which one we should buy.  Panasonic is Japanese and well-known brand, but little too big (18L) for us.  Philips is not Japanese brand and I don’t know if it’s as good as Panasonic, but the size was perfect.  

We asked a sales person all the questions we had, (meanwhile she kept pushing us to buy more expensive rice cooker) and in the end we decided to buy Philips.  Then, suddenly the staff told us that they only have the display one – no more stock!  We didn’t want to buy a display because it looked dirty.  The logo of “Philips” was almost faded. :p  She kept talking and told us there’s no Panasonic either!  Whatttttt!!  She knew we were considering between those two for few hours, she could mention it to us earlier.

Then, she said Zojirushi and Hitachi is 15 % off at the time.  We didn’t even consider those two brand before because they’re expensive.  We knew she was just trying to get us buy an expensive one.  But, well, Panasonic and Philips are not available, so might as well why don’t we have a look at those expensive ones.  

She told us she can give us another 5% off (total 20% off) on Hitachi if we pay by cash.  We calculated it, and the price was not too bad after all!  We started to excite again.  We can’t buy Zojirushi and Hitachi brand in Perth, and they got nice features and functions.  And, the size was perfect.  

When she saw our face, she brought up a new large size Hitachi rice cooker from the back.  She opened up the box and showed us inside.  We told her we want to buy it, but in smaller size. (the cheapest one in the brand)  Then, she told us ” sorry we do not have the small one in stock.  Only the display one.  Why don’t you buy this big one, we have this in stock.”

We were so disappointed, and so angry!  Obviously she was just trying to get a bigger sales. We didn’t want to buy anything anymore, and left the shop…

Excuse me for writing so long story, it’s just a story of me getting a doggy service 🙁

Dr Fish

While in Jakarta I had a chance to experience fish spa therapy.  Fish spa is a therapy by dipping your feet into a pool of “Dr Fish” and let these little healing creatures clean your feet and nibble away your dead skin, leaving your skin glow in health.  This fish spa treatments are growing in parts of Asia such as Japan, Korea, China, Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia.  Most of there spas employ Dr Fish species which originate from Turkey, called Garra Rufa.

Garra Rufa is a special fish with natural healing properties.  It started in Kangal, Turkey: where people discovered the fish’s ability to cure skin diseases.  Garra Rufa is a fresh water fish, and their usual habitat is in hot springs, where these fishes can withstand temperatures ranging from 0 degree Celcius up to 43 degree Celcius.  They are also known as Dr Fish, feeds only on dead and problematic areas of the skin.

 The benefits of this are natural exfoliation of dead skin, smoother and healthy blowing skin, promote blood circulation, lightning of minor scars, etc etc.

I did this just for the curiosity, but as I proceeded to the fish pool I was having a second thought.  I really didn’t want to dip my feet into those vigorously moving little fish…  Looked gross. :p  But, we have already paid for 30 mins, so no choice!  I sat down on the bench and dipped my feet slowly into the water.  !!!

Those little creatures were really really tickling for the first few minutes, and I was screaming..  but as I tried to calm down myself and ignore the fact that there are thousands of fish nibbling on my skin, I felt ok.  I dipped my feet in a pool of small fish first, and then moved to the pool of larger size fish.  Lager fish has bigger suction but less aggressive compared with the little ones.

After the therapy, my feet were very smooth, soft and moist!  I couldn’t help but touch my feet in the car on the way home 🙂  It was an interesting experience..

iPhone App – Japanese

Here are some of my favorite apps for iPhone.

<Kiss X Bijin Tokei> website

“Kiss” is the Osaka version of bijin-tokei “the beautiful woman clock” (I wrote about it before in here ) ranked the first place of the entertainment section at the “Kiss FM Kobe” release first day supported in Kansai area around Kobe by many listers.  Like original bijin-tokei, this “Kiss” is one of the popular apps for iphone.

<Wa Kingyo>

“Wa” means “Japanese” “Japan style”, and “Kingyo” means goldfish.

Pretty goldfishes drawn on the Japanese style of painting swim elegantly.  You will be surprised by their cute movement.  This is similar to “Koi Pond” (I wrote about it here )  Enjoy relaxing time…. 🙂  This app is created by a Japanese.

<Puff!>

… ummm, this is one of those crazy Japanese stuff.  In this app, you blow into your iphone or rub the screen with fingers, then the skirt of the pretty girl in the picture goes into an upskirt.   There are a few different girls on the screen to choose from and they all wear different clothes, such as yukata (Japanese casual summer kimono) and office lady type of clothes.  To me, I think it’s an obsession and I don’t like it, but this app is ranked in the top 10 and it seems many people around the world is enjoying it.  If you want to have this app on your iphone/touch, please make sure not to show to your girl!

Grand Opening of Esther’s

Again, another good news!  Esther’s, a Chinese style bakery shop in Northbridge, is opening its second shop in Winthrop Shopping Village this Friday October 30.  Esther’s in Northbridge has been there for about 1 year or so (I think) and the bread and cakes are popular among Japanese people too.  

On the opening day, you can buy the first 3 items including buns, tarts, cake slices for $1.00 each.  Sweet bread, pandan cake, savoury buns…  $1.00 each is a really good deal!  The normal retail price applies from the third item.  

This special offer is available only in the shop in Withrop village on Friday October 30.  

Shop 25 Winthrop Shopping Village (cnr Somerville Boulevard &Jackson Avenue)

OPEN 7 days, 8:30am ~ 6:00pm

Gather up for Free Donuts!

I was browsing today’s community paper just now, and I saw a ad of Dreamy Donuts (I wrote about the donuts in here) saying that they are giving away donuts for FREE!!

On October 24 the first Dreamy Donuts store in Booragoon opened its doors, and they are cerebrating by giving away free donuts for 5 minutes every hour on the hour between 10am and 2pm this Saturday, October 31!  This “Free for Five” promotion is only available in Booragoon store in Garden City shopping centre (near Wendy’s, T2 area).  

If you live somewhere around Perth, why don’t you take advantage of this offer?  Free glazed donuts … remember, it limits one donut per person.  The family with lots of kids must go to Garden City this Saturday. 🙂

Food You Like and Dislike

Since I was a kid, eating was one of my hobby and I could eat almost any food.  The common food that kids normally dislike include green capsicums (called “pi-man” in Japanese), carrots, tomatoes… basically vegetables.  Like other kids, pi-man wasn’t my favorite food either because of its bitter taste, but I started to like it since I was 10.  Now it’s one of my favorite food.

<ref: www.syokuiku.net/>

To reduce kids’ dislike food, Japan’s school including kindergarden started to take “food education” seriously and worked hard to make kids like vegetables.  Most of schools in Japan (mainly public schools)  serve lunch to students (called “kyuushoku”), and cooks prepare meals to students everyday.  Those cooks try to make the food interesting to kids, so that kids would eat them and reduce their dislike food.  They cut vegetables into shapes of stars and hearts, and create a face or some scene with those cut vegetables.     

To recall my memory, I started to like lots of food as I aged.  I hated natto (fermented soy bean), rakkyo (a kind of pickles), umeboshi (pickled plum), chili powder, wasabi, etc etc before, but I love most of them.  (now I even love eating fresh chili and sambal)   I also didn’t like beer few years ago, but now I often feel like drinking it.

There are actually three food that I still can’t eat …  and I had never been able to eat them since I was a kid.  They are raw eggs, yama-imo (yam potatoes) and okura (okra).   I think the reason is their slimy texture…  Lots of Japanese enjoy a bowl of steamed rice mixed with raw egg and soy sauce, but I hate it and watching people eating it makes me feel like vomiting.. :p

Anyway, I may be able to eat all of them eventually as I age, but I’m not sure…  I can’t think about it at this point!  Do you have any food that you never thought you could eat them but it happened to be your favorite food??  Aging changes people’s food preferences … I think so.

Burger King in Japan

Burger King Japan cerebrates the release of new Microsoft OS “Windows 7” with a limited burger – called “Windows 7 Whopper”.  As you can see on the photo above, 7 layers of 113g beef patty are stacked between a 13cm bun.  

This Windows 7 Whopper is available until 28th October at Burger King in Japan, and the first 30 customers on each day can get it for 777 yen.  (Windows “7“)  The normal price is 1450 yen.

I’m not sure if I’m brave enough to try this burger…  but it sure sounds tempting!

Fun Experience at a Chinese Restaurant

The other day I went to Hon Kong BBQ in Northbridge with my friend for dinner.  I just wanted to have a chat with her as we hadn’t seen each other since I came back from holiday.  We had so much to talk about!

It was still early when we went in, so there’s just few customers inside.  We sat down, and had a look at their menu.  Then we noticed that the menu is written in 3 languages: English, Chinese, and Japanese.  Naturally we were browsing the Japanese words, and we both couldn’t stand but laugh…  We didn’t want to be rude, but the Japanese description was really funny.  I don’t know how they translated the menu into Japanese, but if they are thinking to remake menu books maybe I can help to write Japanese for them.  All the Japanese words on the menu does make sense, but are really funny…  It was a good laugh though, not trying to make fun of them!  

BTW, Japan also do the same thing to English.  We sometimes use English for sign boards, business cards, posters etc, but some of them are wrong-spelled or totally doesn’t make sense.  Like engrish.com, people make fun of it … and I agree, it’s funny! 🙂  

At Hong Kong BBQ we ordered braised beef with oyster sauce, and Chinese vegetable with mushrooms.

They’re delicious.  With just those two dishes and steamed rice, we stayed there for 2 hours!  Then we noticed some customers were waiting for the seat, so we left the restaurant.  

We still had 30 mins until my friend’s bus, so we looked for a place to have a quick coffee… Chutney Garden – an Indian restaurant.  Unfortunately they didn’t have any coffee menu, but they offered us Masala tea.  We didn’t really have time to move to another place, so we decided to have the tea.  The restaurant was filled with some kind of spice smell …  Indian Curry?  After few minutes very polite wait staff came to our table with 2 cups of Masala tea.  The spicy tea was fragrant, delicious, and warmed up our body.  It was really nice.

Ogori Cafe – Japanese Unique Rule-

What would you feel if you get something different from what you ordered at a cafe?  You may feel confused, disappointed, and some may feel upset.  Actually, there is a cafe in Japan which has very unique rules for its customers.

At this Ogori Cafe in Kashiwa (CHIBA prefecture) in Japan, customers will not get what they order.  At this cafe, you get what the person before you ordered.  The next person gets what you ordered.

I find it very very unique, and bizarre… but very interesting.  Let’s say, even though you have something particular that you want to eat/drink , you won’t get it.  Instead, you will get something the previous customer ordered.  How unique the system is! 🙂  I wonder what the first customer on the day will get…  

I found about this cafe from someone’s blog, Cabel.  According to his story: “my friend went up to the cafe, and ordered a little bit of everything: some ice cream, some snacks, some candy, some drinks: worth about 2500yen (AUD$25) for the next lucky customer. (After his order, he received single iced coffee.)  After a while he heard an extremely excited “arigato goazimasu!! thank you so much!!” yelled in his direction, from an ecstatic mom and her equally excited young son. They truly appreciated the surprise.”  

I like this type of unique system!  And establishing the system in an actual cafe is fascinating.  The owner must be an unique person too 🙂

BTW there’re a few rules at this cafe:

Rules :  

1. Let’s treat the next person. What to treat them with is your choice.
2. Please form a single-file line when your order, and you can’t buy twice in a row.
3. Please enjoy what you get, even if you hate it.  (If you really, really hate it, let’s quietly give it to another while saying, “It’s my treat…”)
4. Let’s say “Thank You! (Gochihosama)” if you find the person with your Ogori cafe card.
5. We can’t issue a receipt.

2009 Bonsai Show

Yesterday I went down to Fremantle for annual bonsai  show.  It’s kinda funny but my hubby and I were at Bunnings on Saturday looking for some shrubs to create our own bonsai, then we noticed a tiny piece of paper at the till saying that there’s a bonsai show held at Fremantle town hall from 10~11st October.  It says annual, but we never heard of this event before.  Anyway it says there’d be a bonsai demonstration as well, so we decided to go hoping to get some tips of how to create beautiful bonsai!

There’s a number of bonsai at the town hall, and they all looked beautiful. Many bonsai have moss on its soil, and that’s what we are trying to do at the moment.  Sounds weird but we’ve been trying to collect moss for our bonsai. :p  

Bonsai is a Japanese thing, but I’ve never actually seen people who does bonsai at home in Japan.  Instead, lots of neighbors’ garden have beautifully trimmed  trees (Japanese pine tree, momiji (Japanese maple tree) etc) with some stone statues.  Someone has little pond in his garden.  I remember my husband kept taking photos of neighbors’ garden…  Bonsai is a miniaturization of trees, (or of developing woody or semi-woody plants shaped as trees) by growing them in containers.  I believe some Japanese people do enjoy these miniature trees, but there’re also people who enjoy the real size trees with beautifully trimmed shapes in their garden 🙂

Change of Lifestyle

Do you feel great everyday?? If not, you can try some of the things I do .. ↓↓↓

I’m not trying to be cocky, but I always thought I was very strong, healthy, can-do-anything person since I was a child. I started to work when I was 15 to save money for my schools, and also to come to Australia. I liked helping with my family’s rice fields, carrying heavy rice bags and driving a truck. I flew to Okinawa few times by myself when I was a teenager to get home-stay experience at an Amerian family in Okinawa base, (which I organised everything myself) and also to get scuba diving license. I’ve worked under super strict people in hotels and restaurants both in Japan and Perth, doing some heavy jobs. I didn’t usually get sick, and was always running around outside with friends, my dog, and sometimes just by myself even in a typhoon day. I was like a macho girl 🙂

“Death Note”

On the plane from Singapore to Osaka, I was watching this Japanese movie “Death Note” and “Death Note ~The Last Name~”.  This movie was made in 2006, 3 years ago, but I never had a chance to watch it although it sounded interesting to me.

“Death Note” is a Japanese manga (comics) series which had been serialized in a popular Japanese manga magazine “Weekly Shonen Jump” for almost 3 years.  The movie, in my opinion, really followed the original comic well.  I enjoyed watching it!

A brief description of the story is … The series centers on Light Yagami, a university student who discovers a supernatural notebood, the “Death Note”, dropped on Earth by a death god.  The Death Note grants its user the ability to kill anyone whose face they have seen, by writing the victim’s name in the notebook.  The story follows Light’s attempt to create and rule a world cleansed of evil using the notebook, and the complex conflict between him, his opponents and a mysterious detective known to the world only as L.  (from wikipedia) 

Together “Death Note” and “Death Note ~The Last Name~” and the third film “Death Note ~L; change the worLd”, the movies earned over $80 million in Japan and stayed at #1 at the box office not only in Japan, but also in Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Thailand. The cult hit broke into the Asian mainstream and almost got banned in China as a smattering of copycat true crimes became associated with the movie.

The actor who played Light Yagami is Tatsuya Fujiwara.  He’s been on many films, plays and tv series drama etc, but I never had any interest on him… until now!  After watching this movie I realized how cool he is :p  And, the scene where both Light and L believe themselves to be on the side of justice and the two match wits in an intricate game of cat-and-mouse is very interesting.  If you like watching Japanese films I recommend this.  Guess which one, either Light or “L”, wins in the end. 🙂

Wedding in Perth and Japan

Haunted House in Japan

Some people love listening to scary stories and going to hunted houses… well, I don’t mind doing that occasionally to have some excitement and thrills, but not everyday. 🙁 I mean, Japanese horror is really really scary! I read an article about UK film board – Britain’s film board banned the sale of a Japanese horror DVD due to its extreme violence which could cause psychological harm to audiences.

News From Japan

I talked to my brother over skype on Saturday night asking how the things are going and what’s new in Japan.  Then, he told me about the climate…

Japan has 4 seasons: spring (Mar~May), summer (June~Aug), autumn (Sep~Nov), and winter (Dec~Feb).  Usually June is the rainy season, and after it finish summer comes.  Around August the winds start to get cool and there’re typhoons around September. (typhoons indicate “it’s the end of summer)  And, around October the trees and mountains start to change its color to yellow, orange and red.  (autumn)  You get to see dragonflies, and hear some autumn insects singing.  Around the end of November ~ December the air gets cold and cold, and some places have snow.  March, you can see some buds on the ground and notice the sky is getting blue.  That’s what I know about a whole year in Japan.

So, in September I was expecting to see beautiful autumn color mountains and eat lots and lots of autumn food…  until I talked to my brother (>0<)

My bro told me that this year has been really weird.  The rainy season just finished few weeks ago (usually it’s supposed to finish around June~July) and now it is the middle of summer!  So, it’s like one month behind…  Oh no, when we go there it’s gonna be really hot and humid 🙁  I asked him if we need some jackets or coats just in case, and he said “are you crazy?” :p

… I hope I can still eat nice food there.  I’m sure I’ll be eating lots of soft serves and snow cones!  Maybe I can just wear yukata (casual kimono-like summer wear) and walk around the lake and rivers 🙂

And, a bad news (T_T).  I sent an inquiry email to Softbank (a Japanese mobile company) asking if I could rent a 3G SIM card and use it on iphone/3GS.  (I wrote about this on here.)  They said that 3G SIM card rental service for iphones is only available at Narita airport (Tokyo) at the moment…   Whaaat (>0<)  So, I can’t get SIM card rental service at Kansai airport!  Hmm…  

Now I’m thinking to buy a pre-paid mobile in Japan.  Having a pre-paid mobile in Japan is really unusual thing…  My friend, who also had a same issue as me, went back to Japan to stay for just 3 months.  She needed a mobile, but didn’t want to buy on contract.  (in Japan mobiles are usually sold on contact bases)  She went to Softbank to buy a prepaid mobile, then the shop staff asked her many times “are you sure you want to get a pre-paid mobile?!  We have a low cost plan here.”  …

These days prepaid mobiles are only available from limited companies.   Even Docomo stopped selling prepaid mobiles in 2005.  Prepaid mobiles are not popular in Japan, but i guess I will need to buy one (phone itself costs about 5000 yen).  It is really really inconvenient being in Japan without a mobile.

Kit Kat in Japan-2

I’ve wrote about Kit Kat long time ago (here) featuring the unique flavors of Japanese Kit Kat, and recently I had a chance to try few of them. A couple, friends of mine, just came back from Japan last week and brought me some Kit Kat as a souvenir. 🙂

Meiji

Meiji co. has been one of the big sweets/snack/dairy products company in Japan since 1916.  I’m sure you’ve seen some of their products before :_)

Everyone tells me that the packaging for Japanese food is very colorful and cute.  I agree…

Checking up Japan’s food companies’ websites is fun.:)   Even Mcdonald’s, Starbucks, Miter Donuts websites…  make me feel hungry!  I get excited by just looking at delicious food, and sometimes I find interesting campaign there.

Collaboration products with Meiji Yoghuret x Pokka drink…

   x   

Meiji chocolate mirror…

 x 

Meiji Xylish gum “Iki-pan-2” campaign…

 x 

I like this Xylish gams (lime flavor).  I’ll buy few of those and hopefully I win one of these panties :p (actually those are men’s underwear though.. but I don’t mind wearing as a room- wear 🙂 )

Japanese Cars

I’m dreaming…. to buy a new car!

Well, I’ve been driving my current car for just 3 years, so maybe I should keep this car for a little longer.. but I really wanna buy another Japanese car (>_<)! All my friends in Japan drive very cute/cool cars.

When I was 18~20 I was a student, and also working at Izakaya, convenience store and some Yakiniku restaurant near my house. Most of the staff there were at my age and we became close friends. We used to go out a lot 🙂 They sometimes pick me up from my house and went to karaoke, Izakaya or just for driving around Biwa-ko Lake at night. One of them had a black Odyssey, and she took all the back seats away and line with some far carpet on the floor. When my friends and I got in the car we just sit at the back area and play… it was roomy 🙂

At that time lots of my friends had “Suzuki Wagon-R” “Mitsubishi eK-wagon” “Honda Life” “Daihatsu Move” “Nissan Moco” “Suzuki Alto”… small, boxy looking car. (small cars are called “kei-car” in Japan) Those type of cars were so popular among Japanese girls, and I think they still are.  Targeting on young ~ 30th women.

I really like Nissan CUBE and Toyota BB… so cute (>v<) I like the new model Cube cubic. I wish they are available in Perth to… but unfortunately lots of Japanese cars are not sold here 🙁 I thought about importing Nissan CUBE before, but everyone said “what! It’s just CUBE, ume. You don’t wanna spend lots of money on this car just because you want to drive it in Perth.” … that’s true, it’s not worth importing it considering all the trouble I have to go through :p

Cars in Japan are very cheap compared with the prices in Perth. Ahh… I can’t believe I had to pay almost double to buy my current car here (>0<). And there are more cute cars in Japan which cost less than AUD$10000.00. Well I live here now and I know I have to accept it, but every time I go back to Japan and see my friends’ cars with cool parts and some accessories I wish I could own one of them in Perth.

While I was in Japan last year I saw lots of hybrid cars on the street: Toyota Prius, Harrier, Estima, Lexus, Honda Civic… If I live in Japan maybe I could afford hybrid Harrier too 🙂 … maybe!