It's Going

I really haven't done anything too exciting recently but while sitting here not doing anything important I thought I would post about a few recent happenings. 

I bought a new purse, my first one in four years, it took a long time to decide but I found this one in a store off a side alley of Tekashita street in Harajuku.

And you can unzip the sides to make it bigger.

I think it's pretty cool...

Then I bought a fancy little cake.

Mostly because it had silver spots I thought it looked super pretty and wanted to eat it... And it was crazy delicious.

Then I don't have any pictures but I went to a Bulgarian fair and ate some Bulgarian food which was delicious and became a part of the Bulgarian Friendship Group! Haha it was fun. Also bought some Rose jam to bring home for Christmas. 

So, while I am really too busy for much free time I have been able to do a few fun things in the past month :)

Its been awhile...

Well, I never did say I was good at blogging. So a lot has happened the last few months, moved cities, changed jobs, and visited home. 

Now I'm living in Tokyo, working at the school I had studied abroad at. So far I love my office, the staff is excellent and I surprisingly really like doing office work. Outside of that though I am an RA for an exchange group from 6 different countries, and I will be an English tutor once summer break is over and school is back in session. 

The office is awesome, and almost all the exchange students are awesome except for a select few who my fellow RA and assistant director ran into some major issues with last night. It's too bad that there are students who can't see how lucky and fortunate they are to be able to have this chance of studying in a foreign country. I really hope they will learn and mature from this experience along with becoming more accepting and open minded with others.

In the meantime I'm taking a brief break from the city in Todai's lovely garden with a yummy matcha latte :)

It's good to be back in this amazing city.

Pearl Island and an Okonomiyaki party!

Well, this weekend was pretty eventful. On Saturday I went to Toba to visit Mikimoto Pearl Island and it was really interesting! First I saw the women pearl diver demonstration. 

Then I went to the museum about the science of cultivating pearls and how humans play a role in it here at pearl island. Then there is a second museum on the island about Mikimoto himself and his struggle to learn how to cultivate pearls and start his business. Overall they were really great museums with very good English explanations.

My last stop was the store.... Where I spent too much money, but they are really beautiful!! 

Then on Sunday we went to an Okonomiyaki party where we learned three different kinds of japanese games!

This one is called Mahjong and we played it the longest, it was really difficult!!! It's a strategy game and was really hard to understand especially with it only being explained to us in mostly Japanese! But it was still fun and interesting.

Then lastly I came to work Monday to be surprised by a package from Steph!!! Full of delicious Norwegian chocolate :) yum

Kumquat Jam

Having mostly adult students here at OBC I often receive gifts from students that most often are food, and it's awesome. Today, one of my students gave me a jar of homemade kumquat jam!!! It's really difficult and time consuming to make especially since kumquats have many little seeds that have to be removed to make it. So, it feels really special that she gave me some! She told me it's best with natural yogurt and even though I don't like yogurt I gave it a try and holy adjkljgfaahkk it's so good!!!!!!!

Here are some pics of this amazing jam :)

Never though Japan would make me a yogurt eater lol but this was really good!

Sweets Paradise

Well, had a successful trip to Nagoya last weekend with the main destination being Sweets Paradise... 2 hours of all you can eat desserts(they have some regular food too)

Some of the regular food to eat in prep of the sweets.

Then cakes... So many cakes, and they were pretty delicious. Felt super full afterwards but super worth it. 

When we finished at Sweets Paradise we decided to walk to Osu and do some leisurely shopping. Osu is a pretty cool place cause it's almost all thrift second hand stores and has a lot of cool stuff to look at. While walking through there we also stumbled upon this awesome little shrine.

Pretty cool, after we walked to sakae for some more shopping (I wanted to go to LOFT to get some stuff for my sisters b-day) and on the way there we came across the weirdest vending machine I've seen in Japan so far.

Those are fish inside the bottles... It's fish broth for cooking... Why in a vending machine??? I have no idea lol

Then for dinner we went to a resturant in the Oasis building and I had misokatsu.... So freakin delicious

And that was my very fun and eventful day in Nagoya :)

Hachimitsu Manju

Oh hachimitsu Manju... How I will miss you when I leave Tsu. Hachimitsu Manju or Honey Manju(Manju is kinda like a red bean filled bread donut thing) are super super delicious and the best Manju in the world... Why is it so much better then other Manju? Cause of the honey added to the breading! So delicious I wish I could send them to everyone to try but I can't cause they are best fresh. 

So this Manju place is a dangerous distance from my work... Only two blocks  and one of my favorite traditional japanese desserts. So, if your ever in the Tsu area... Get some, you won't regret it(unless you don't like red bean)

Other news, this weekend I went out to dinner with some of the JETs who live near by and it was really fun! We made plans for next weekend to go to Sweets Paradise in Nagoya... Two hours all you can eat desserts. Who can diet when places like that exist? Needless to say, I'm pretty excited. Hopefully I'll take some pics and blog about it next week :)

Lunch under the Cherry Blossoms

Cherry Blossom season is absolutely lovely. The weather is perfect and the blossoms make everywhere look beautiful. So, to make the most of this season I enjoy eating my lunch outside in Tsu Castle Park since it's close to work and my apartment. 

When I eat at the park I like to stop by the bakery near the post office for my lunch. They have the best tuna sandwiches on a walnut bread and really good mini mango chocolate pies. However, today I picked up their BLT on walnut bread(the tuna was sold out D:) their mini pesto Mediterranean pizza and their anpan(red bean filled white bread with sesame seeds on top) then I grabbed a coffee too. A pretty typical lunch for me.. I maybe go to this bakery a few times a month :) it's really delicious. 

It's nearing the end of cherry blossom season though, so many petals are falling and it is very stunning, making not only the trees beautiful to look at but the ground as well. 

Snacking at work

Asparagus bacon potato sticks... Taste exactly like asparagus and bacon... a little disturbing but super delicious. My new favorite snack lol

p.s. This is probs turning into more if a food travel blog cause it's a lot easier to make posts like this haha

Iga

Ate Ichigo Daifuku today! I have seen pictures of this online before and always wanted to try it! It is mochi with anko(red bean paste) and a strawberry inside! It was super delicious!

Setsubun!!

Well, today was Setsubun. The Japanese holiday where you drive away evil demons by throwing beans at them. While I didn't do any bean throwing... I did participate in a few of the activities, which included eating as many soybeans as your age, and having a good fortune senbe(which is apparently only a Tsu thing I think) Inside the giant triangular senbe thing was a little good luck figurine of little men. Super cute.

Other traditional things that I did not take part in is eating a rice roll(we would call it sushi in the US but its aomaki....) the reason I didnt eat this was because the line for them was insane at the super market... and I didn't have the patience... Then often times families will have the father dress up as a demon and the kids will throw beans at him as he runs away out of the house to symbolize cleansing of evil spirits. So, pretty cool holiday, however still had to work haha

Other than that nothing new, but there was a small earthquake a second ago... which is the second one I have felt since being here, and caught me a bit off guard, but it was a really small tremor... so all is good! Still working making all those old videos, so keep tuned for that!

Tsu Festival, October 13, 2013

Yay! I was productive this weekend! Here is a look at what Tsu festival was like way back in October! It was a lot of fun and the food was awesome!

Another part of Tsu Festival that is very famous is it's Yosakoi dancing, so here is a video of some of the different Yosakoi dances I saw! They kind of made me think of marching band haha

Finally, at Tsu festival I won my wonderful pet turtle Taiko!! He is still alive and doing well!! :)

Nothing much

So... I have been doing a horrible job of keeping this blog! So, I thought I would post something to let you know that I have not given up! I have tons of video footage since October of Tsu Festival, Kyoto, Nara, and Vietnam that I really hope to put together eventually and post... just editing takes a lot of time.. and my computer doesn't like to not freeze every two seconds when my editing program is running... so, I'm working on them, just its a slow process, and the videos might not come out in chronological order, but something is better than nothing right??

Life update: These last few months I have traveled around a lot, and so I have had little down time. However, now it is winter in Japan, and it is cold... not as cold as most places in the US, but cold enough that I don't want to go for a 30 min bike ride to do anything. So, these days I'm just chilling at my apartment and going to work(which hopefully means I'll be more productive on my blogs and vlog than I have been).

Last a list of some things I miss about the US in no particular order:

-central heat
-cheese/milk
-having a car
-being able to see movies when they first come out in theaters(Japan gets them usually around 3 months after the US)
-netflix/hulu
-having an oven
-having a larger group of friends to hang out with
-my painting supplies
-fruit that isn't overpriced