Mall time!

2nd visit to Omagari included another visit to the mall. It felt like I spent my whole weekend shopping. Well mostly window shopping. I did buy some awesome stuff from Daiso and other hundred yen stores :). I also made my first purchase from the second hand store. It's so cheap! I also had fun playing the basketball arcade game thing :). I met this cute character at the mall that I took a picture with.

But the most of my money has gone to food and drink. I want to try everything but it's leaving a hole in my wallet. Last night we ate sushi at Lei's favorite conveyor belt sushi restaurant. All the plates are 100 yen except for the large plates are 500 yen. It's not no commercialized Genki Sushi. It's like a mom and pops one. I had to try the large plate of fried fish heads and collars. It was delicious :). I love this picture of the tamago nigiri because the tamago is ten times the size of the rice! With all these yummy restaurants I want to eat at, saving up for a car will be quite difficult.

Bento

I don't have a car yet so my supervisor, Kimura san, has been giving me rides to and from school. I don't think he has to but he has. Since I've dipped my feet into the world of bento making with my mystery Onigiri, I wanted to delve a bit further with my first unofficial bento. I thought it would be perfect to give my first bento to Kimura san.

So I wake up early Friday morning to cook rice and prepare. Make my star musubi, tako hotdogs and wash my tomatoes. Tada! First bento. Secure it with rubber bands ready to go! A minute later I get a phone call that Kimura san won't be able to pick me up today :(. In the end I couldn't give him the bento and I had to walk to school.

On the flipside, I took some pretty sakura pictures, talked with some students on the way home and found a shortcut :)

Rainy, cold and sick

Today is a rainy day. I'm exhausted from a mixture of lack of sleep, actual teaching and leisure activities. That is a recipe for getting sick. Don't forget about the chilly weather and coughing co-workers. Yup it's inevitable that I'll get sick. Thank goodness for Golden Week!

This picture is of the bridge I have to cross to go into the 'city'. This picture was not taken today because now its cloudy and raining. Which is why I will not be crossing the bridge today. I will break my 7 day streak of going into town. It's all for the best so that I can cook, rest and clean in preparation of possibly another weeklong streak of crossing that bridge.

Oh yeah, update on last post about the Hallyu wave. Did my self intro with a third year class today and a boy literally yelped/screamed when I mentioned 2NE1. It was hilarious! The teacher next door walked to check if everything was okay. He also got really excited when I mentioned Coffee Prince. I know we'll be best friends (^_-)

Hallyu wave in Japan

This picture was taken in Omagari at the second hand store (forgot its name >_<). There was a section just for Kdramas. One of the famous being, Winter Sonata.

At class today I presented my self intro lesson. Of course I mentioned my love for Korea and one student asked if I liked Winter Sonata. I was rather surprised because its an older drama. A good amount of students knew and like Big Bang which made me happy. I guess even in the inaka (countryside) people old and young are riding the Hallyu wave.

Mystery Onigiri

Yes, I'm totally biting from the King of Kaukau's idea of their 30 something different flavor malasadas. This time instead of the filings being encased in sugary dough, it's wrapped up nori and rice :). Unfortunately, I only had 6 fillings (umeboshi, salted kelp, takuan, natto, miso saba and kimchi).

Like the malasadas, half the fun is watching people's expressions when they bite into the onigiri to discover the yummy goodness. Lee had one of the funnier (and a little scary) expressions when he discovered he had ume filling. He won't let it go that I made him eat a 'rock' which was really the ume pit :p

First night in Tokyo.  Didn't take many pictures and for some reason took a picture of this snack in 7-11.  Unfortunately this wasn't the picture I wanted to post but I can't figure out how to delete it because everything is in Japanese.  So this will be my first picture of Japan :p

I wonder what this snack tastes like....anyone tried it?

What's this all about?

Hi family and friends (and apparently the world)!  I started this blog mainly for my ginko-biloba-less self.  I can't remember things that happened yesterday, let alone a year ago.  This blog will be my memory book of my year in Japan.

When I was living in Korea I saw someone's blog which documented her stay in Korea with a picture.  Everyday she posted a picture of random things that happened in her life.  I thought the idea was brilliant and now I'm biting.  Thank you to whomever thought of the idea.

Naturally I'm a lazy person who is motivated by mostly just a deadline (sometimes not even that).  I'm hoping that I will be able to post one picture every day (maybe more if I won't have internet access the day before or next).  I think it'll help me become more responsible ^-^

This blog will not only be for me...it can be for you too!  If by some small chance you're wondering how I'm doing and what I'm doing, stop by and take a look!  Or if you're wondering about what Japan looks like aside from Tokyo (hehe).  And...if I'm feeling really genki then you can request me to check something out (food, drink, facilities, places etc) and I could be your personal investigator ^_-  But...you gotta catch me in a really genki mood.  And lastly, yes, I'll have lots of comparisons to Korea (ㅋㅋㅋ) but I can't help it because I love Korea too!

9 more days for the 365 memories of 日本 to commence!