July 31, 2006 at 4:08 pm · Filed under I am feeling...
I just spent almost the last hour of precious work time spaced out and dreamy. Maybe five minutes of writing time is due so that I can work through and out of my spaciness. Why am I being spacey? I think I feel alone today. It is weird because I don’t have much reason for feeling alone. Maybe it’s not that “nobody loves me I am alone” or being physical alone…but just one of those moments where you realize that ultimately, in your head, you will always and forever be alone. A good reason to not get stuck in your head isn’t it? I think maybe I need a hug. Heh…funny thing…the band that I am playing with for a summer festival in a few weeks…we were trying to come up with a name yesterday. I talked about this and it evolved into the idea of naming the band “Meg’s Hug” or “Hug Meg”. Yet to be confirmed but they are two possibilities at the moment. My preference leans towards to the latter as it is more suggestive though of course, in Japan it might be hard to get a hug…I don’t know. So maybe Meg’s Hug is better because it would be my license to hug people. We’ll see…
July 27, 2006 at 2:08 pm · Filed under Experiences
This feels way weird. I am writing this entry in a Word document so that it gets written. It will be transferred for viewing on your computation boxes tomorrow. This makes me think that I should set up a local version of WordPress so that I can maintain the atmosphere when I write.
I was going to talk about last Saturday, and then possibly Sunday. So – the day started with me being a little foggy given the late night before, but I was excited to meet up with a friend, in Kamakura. I went there when I first came to Japan but had not gone back since. Saturday reminded me that I should go back many times. Kamakura is great because yes, it is full of tourists, but it is not full of tourist bling (for the most part). There are plenty of places to go where you can escape the crowds and even when you are around the tourism, the city is very quaint, making it easy to not notice.
We met at the station and proceeded down Komachi-dori (the main street) to go to Tsurugaoka hachimangu shrine. It was not long before we found a yukata shop and for kicks, went in to try some on. Before this, three things made me worried about trying a yukata on: 1. going in and not fitting into a yukata and leaving quite embarassed, 2. having to strip down in front of a shop owner thus reveal the 3 or 4 bread garden muffins still kicking around my thigh area (I know it is sad and superficial but…) and leaving quite embarassed and 3. having them giggle at the 6 foot tall foreign woman and say (translate here) “oh look dear, isn’t she cute, she wants to be Japanese”. Still, I really wanted a yukata. It would make a marvellous souvenier of my adventures here.
The woman helping us was very sweet. I learned that you could try the yukata on over your clothes and that they were made quite long so, although mine would not fold up as much as on other woman, it would still get down to my feet. All my worries solved! Well, not number 3 but I know that stems completely from my own fear of people thinking that I am trying to be something that I am not. I can write about that some other time.
We both tried a yukata on and made plans to come back later if we decided to buy them. I decided to pretty much right after leaving the store and later I did go back and buy a dark purple yukata with pink flowers. Picture to come in the future, after I wear it to fireworks or a festival.
Moving on down Komachi-dori, we tested some yummy natto snacks. They were more subtle in flavour and less stinky than real natto which is a fermented soy bean dish. Then we encoutered a man trying to get people on his jinrikkisha (rickshaw). Normally I don’t go for those things but see, the jinrikkisha “drivers” are all tall younger men, fit and tanned from hauling these carts around throughout the hot summer days. They are very smiley and flirty and…heh…it sounds like I should start hitting the host clubs :P Just kidding… really, the guy talked to us in English and he actually went to highschool in Vancouver…super nice person. We accepted a ride to the (I can’t remember the Japanese name) love temple, and then to our original destination, Tsurugaoka hachimangu. I said a little prayer at the love temple and then figured, hey, if all fails I can always come back and spend my paychecks on continuous jinrikkisha rides.
By the time we got to the temple, it was getting a little late and we were due back at the station at 2pm to meet a woman and a guy from France that was homestaying at her place. The four of us went to a small café / bar off the main road called the Milk Hall. My kind of place.
Old and dark and bordering a little on the doubling-as-a-granny-antique-shop but making up for it with cool young staff. If it was called the Milk Hole instead of the Milk Hall I think it would be a favorite place. We had lunch and coffee and yummy, thick mango pudding.
I think that our plates were the biggest I’ve seen since coming here. It was weird, they were heavy and I used a knife and fork (I don’t actually own forks here) which were also heavy. Now I am worried that next spring when I get back to Canadian eating, my wrist tendonitis might start acting up again. Over lunch the woman we met told us a little about Nou (or Noh in English?) theatre. She has been studying it and we were invited to a performance by her teacher in August. I think I still need to learn a little more. I spent a lot of time brushing up on my French as the homestay guy told me about a physic in France that his mother goes to.
After lunch we went to buy my yukata and then to a piano concert of the sister of a friend from work. The concert was at a pretty posh cake house and I felt a little greasy and unsophisticated but forgot about that when things started. This woman is the most amazing pianist and she played Chopin so I love her for that.
Last of the day, but not the least, was supper. We met my friend’s husband (haha…I feel silly saying it like that if you guys are reading this but I’m always uncertain about including names in here so please excuse the titles) and he took us to a sakana-ya (fish restaurant) near Kanazawa Hakkei station (10 minutes from my station). Wow, what a way to top off the day. I tried so many new things there including:
This seaweed dish which supposedly does wonders for hangovers if you eat it before a night of drink and, from my experience, I think it works.
Yummy assorted sea things including uni or sea urchin – those yellow things to the right – my first time. Interesting flavour and the texture totally surprised me. Kind of just disintegrates in your mouth on contact with your tongue. A little weird and I can’t rave about it but I think I could eat it again.
Meat from a larger shellfish…I think tokobushi (a smaller version of the expensive awabi). The bit to the right was like a boiled egg yolk in texture but with amazing flavour.
This fish which is common here in September but not around now and supposedly it is upteen times better now than it is in September. Wow…it was amaaaazing fish. I have never eaten fish that good before.
And drumroll please……I tried fugu, the infamous poisonous blowfish. It was not very strong in flavour, very light and pleasant, and was somewhat chewy. My best comparison (and I am not quite the fish connaisseur) would be orange roughey. It is very good, but I think a lot of the hype is about eating what you can from a deadly fish, not from the flavour. Still, if you are in Japan, try it. Definitely an enjoyable experience.
Coupled with all this good food was amazing sake which I love the more and more I drink it. I am going to start keeping track of the different kinds I have (when I can…sometimes you just can’t) because there are many. On Saturday I drank Jyuyondai from Yamagata and Akishika from Osaka. Hopefully in the future I will be able to tell you more about sake than that.
We finished off dinner with comple(i?)mentary shochu and a tamago dish (I think…I was talking a lot by then so can’t remember all the food I put in my mouth). The restaurant was run by a couple and their son and I hope to maybe go back sometime but who knows…there are so many places to go here. Still, they were very nice and their food is delicious. They also make an effort to bring in hard-to-get sake so, when we were leaving we were told about a sake appreciation night. I would loooove to go but I don’t know how much I could contribute to the knowledge flow. Could be a good learning experience though…and practice!
Ahh…I hope that is not too long. Still have Sunday to talk about but it is already Wednesday night and past my bedtime. I have sleep to catch up on but the weekend is catching up on me so who knows when I will get that chance. Two more days of work, then a party Saturday, and Japanese and band practice on Sunday with studying and cleaning the apartment (trying to) in between. Oh, and I am planning my first trip to somewhere further away in Japan (will go in September). Excited about that and tempted to buy a new camera before going because mine is going to crap. I am taking any suggestions for a camera in the 200$-300$ range (yeah, I would love to buy a really expensive one but that would require more saving and I’m not up for that right now).
Hope you are all well and to those far away – I miss you!!
July 25, 2006 at 9:51 am · Filed under Random Thoughts
Yesterday I was talking to a friend on the phone and she burped nice and loudly. I laughed because I love it when she burps and then I laughed some more. Wondering why I felt like laughing so much (the burps are not a rare occurence), I realized that I had not heard someone burp in a long time. In fact, I don’t know if I have heard anyone here burp including myself.
On another note, I have been pretty busy. Really busy and needing to catch up on some sleep so when I have free moments I sort of just stare blankly into space. As a result, I’ve been doing a crap job at documenting my stay here so this week (I tell myself now) I will put extra effort towards writing (online and offline).
So, to speak of my busy-ness, this past weekend started with a work party on Friday night. It was the usually set dinner, drinks and then second party with drinks but this time there was a third party that was much needed for me. Last week I was complaining that I have not had too many late nights so I was glad to be around people until 3am. One thing became clear though: need to learn more Japanese songs for karaoke.
The next day it was a little hard to get up but I had a lot to be excited about so it gave me my needed motivation. More to come…
July 24, 2006 at 7:44 pm · Filed under Site Specific
I just upgraded my WordPress version with 2 clicks. I thought that bombs would have dropped and this site would have been scrambled but it “looks” like it all worked. Is this the quiet before the storm? Please, if you see anything buggy let me know.
Now to install a moblogging plugin (yay!).
Busy weekend.
