Happy Birthday to me!

Hola! 久しぶり！ I am alive!!

Ok, guys I just want to warn you before hand that this is probably going to be a pretty looooong post because there are a few fun things I want to tell you about that have been happening ;-) Also I seem to have developed a recent addiction to Justin T's the 20/20 experience album which I am listening to as we speak, just in case you were interested :D


So sometime in the last 2 weeks (I have lost track of time and space here, half the time I don't even know what day it is) some of us went to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building to sneak a free view over Tokyo. The Building is in Shinjuku and if you go to the top floor there is an observatory deck and also a restaurant that I really want to eat in; probably if/when Mum comes over 'cause it looked expensive haha.  The view was pretty awesome! Also for all Lost in Translation fans: the rooftop bar in one of the towers is the exact one from the film, apparently it costs about 30 £ just to get up there!

It has 48 floors!! :-O

I love this picture cause you can see Tokyo
sprawling into the horizon

My lovely Tokyo, now my home :)

Sadly, because it was a bit cloudy we couldn't see Fuji san at all! But I intend to climb Fuji at some point next may so at latest I will see her (him? what gender is a mountain?) then!

Because this was the last week before classes started at Rikkyo i.e. our last week before becoming slaves again, we made the most of it and had a few little excursions planned. The next one was a trip to Akihabara. Akihabara is one of the 'electronic' districts and also the Otaku centre of Tokyo = paradise for all the manga/anime fans out there. There were sooo many arcades and bright lights; we went during the day but at night it must be something else!

Akihabara and blue skies

It was such a fun day! The sun was shining, the birds were singing and what was the first thing we did? ... We went to KFC. In Japan. Now, I know I vowed not to eat fast food in a country with such culinary deliciousness but the burger in there was actually really good - but Japan-style, the burger was about the size of a coin and everyone got roughly 5 chips.

After that we visited an arcade. Now, just let me give you a little bit of advice: if you are in any way hungover (which thank God I wasn't), do not go in an arcade! Every game machine is blaring out music and all the lights confuse even sober people at the best of times. But it was really fun and I even played a music game (and lost); I swear there were some people in there that hadn't seen daylight for quite a few days :D

Some games, there were so many!!

Philin fulfilling her life long dream
of playing Pachinko

So, yeah Aihabara was really fun but we didn't manage to visit a maid cafe so that is on my list for the next time I go there.

So a few days after this ( I am still guessing about the dates) a club at Uni called JOINUS, which plans excursions for exchange students and Japanese students planned a trip to visit Asakusa to see the shrines. I really enjoyed this because up until now most of the things I have seen have been 'modern' Tokyo so it was nice to visit a complex that was so spiritual and old. We did loads of stuff, like test our fortune (and i got GOOD FORTUNE! whoooop) and burn incense. It was a beautiful day. So, I will spare you my words and upload some pictures which can explain it better ;)

there was a market leading up to the temple
selling absolutely delicious food that we tried

Me looking happy eating たい焼き
(biscuit filled with red bean paste yummm)

the shrine, absolutely stunning

You can throw in 5 yen here and
make a wish

After visiting the shrine, we got interviewed... for FUJI TV (equivalent of BBC) and they even asked Wendy and I questions in Japanese that we answered (whilst panicking - a lot!). That was another new experience. 

And what better way to finish off the day? By heading back to Shiki and ordering a big selection of　焼き鳥 (fried chicken skewers) in a cute little restaurant next to out dorm. 

美味しい焼き鳥！so good!

On Friday last week - finally I know a date - Wendy and I met up with some of our friends from Manchester who are all spending their year abroad in Tokyo as well. We spent quite a bit of time  trying to decide where to eat and finally, more by accident, found an Izakaya hidden on the top floor of a building near the main crossing in Shibuya. It was so lovely and and the food was insanely cheap! It was really interesting to hear about what people have been up to at different Tokyo Universities and it was then that I decided I wanted to go out to a club called Womb for my birthday - but more about that in a second!

マンチェスタの皆さん　 - stole this off Estella, hope you
don't mind!:)

Whoooo and finally I can tell you about MY BIRTHDAY! birthday birthday birthday birthday birthday... ok from this you can probably see that everyone around here has most likely come to hate the word after I wouldn't shut up about it for the two weeks leading up to the event. My Birthday always falls on a kind of awkward time because you have just met everybody and you don't really know where you stand, so I made a point to invite everyone I talked to haha

So, I was dying to go clubbing in Tokyo and we hadn't had the chance yet so after asking around a bit, I found out (well - from my friends Ruadhan and Sam actually, so thanks guys!) that one of the most renowned clubs in Asia called Womb, which normally charges about 12647484 £ entry was doing a student promotion for September where students get in for free so whooop whooooop. Veryone was super motivated to get out and dance (and drink a lot) and it was great!

We went to an Izakaya in Shibuya for an all you can drink special (nomihoudai) for two hours and then walked to Womb. So many people turned up! Once again - THANK YOU FOR COMING GUYS! I was so unbelievably happy to see so many faces I knew and I had a really good night! I love you all!

Right, now some less emotional and more interesting facts kind of stuff: Has anyone has ever seen the film Babel (the one with Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett)? The club scene set in Tokyo is actually in Womb! Very very cool indeed. Here it is for those who want to see a little of the inside: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WgSqCf6rafA

But here are a few pictures I stole of the internet, meaning I obviously don't own them. Womb has an amazing interior and laser show (not that I can remember that much haha):

Amazing!!! (photo: www.bestourism.com )

Another one to make you jealous
(photo: www.djsets.co.uk  )

The puns were flowing this evening as you can only imagine (entering/leaving the womb etc etc).

We took the first train back in the morning and I slept for 3/4 of my actual birthday but it was so worth it! I can't wait to check out the other of millions of clubs around Tokyo.

Here is (a part of) the fantastic group:

I am a serious fan of all these people,
you are wonderful!

So, the hungover me was not expecting much the next day because everyone coming out to celebrate with me was already such a gift but little did I know that there were some surprises in store for me. 

- But not until I had slept till like 5! 

Anyway, Wendy successfully tricked me into going to the supermarket to get some food and in that time everybody hid in Wendy's room and when we got back - BOOM! I was bombarded with balloons and everybody was there with a cake. I must say, I very very nearly cried; it has to be in the top 10 best moments in my life. Surprise parties are great! But, that wasn't just it, there was a beautiful card full of Photos and messages from everyone and best of all: a mirror, a furry mirror! Maybe I should take the hint? Nooo joking, it was really because I wanted a full length mirror for my room and was moaning about not having one for weeks (well, I hope that's the reason).  Thank you everyone, I really can't say thank you enough. It was a beautiful weekend thanks to you. God, I'm getting emotional just thinking about it! And especially thank you to Wendy, the birthday planner, you are a wonderfully thoughtful person! x

Me and my fabulous gifts!:)

My delicious cake (before everyone
peer pressured me into eating a
plastic panda)

Ahhh I feel so blessed to be where I am with the people I am with. I am a very lucky girl.

Ok, so I promise this is almost the end of the novel, there are just too many fun things to talk about.

For one, I got my hair permanently straightened 2 days ago. 'I LOVE IT' is an understatement. For anyone coming to Japan and toying with the idea of sleeking out their hair - go for it! I can only recommend a hair salon called 'Watanabe' in Harajuku. It is very foreigner friendly and they did a fabulous job. It took 5 hours, I could see the light in my hairdressers eyes slowly dying as time went on haha but finally I exited the salon feeling like a new person; sorry Dad, I know you like my curls but they will grow back again so don't worry!

This is where it is, super easy to find

It's so soft and shinyyyyy

Right, I am done now I promise. Finished. Finito. I hope you haven't grown a big grey beard by the time you have finished reading this post - can you even call it that? I am sure this is not how blogs work but I prefer updating once in a while and bombarding you with information;) 

I hope you all have a great week! I, for one, have a 9 o'clock start every day and a quiz on Monday. Can't wait!

Ahh, and if you are having a bad day, here is a picture of my friend Oisin with a plastic bag on his head.

Hope he doesn't kill me for this:
'こんばんは’ - what a good moment

CIAO xx

p.s: it actually took me 4 days to write this post - I had to keep coming back to it. no lies!

Of Salads, Typhoons and giant bugs

Ok, so today something kind of bad happened.

But first, I would like to tell you a little about something that seems to be impossible in Japan: Salads! Or, actually, finding healthy food in a supermarket in general.
I am not impressed. Everyday, I set out on a mission to find something that looks at least a little like lettuce and doesn't cost me the earth and I come back, instead, with carrots and bean sprouts and no idea what to do with them.
Whats especially mean are the ones that look like "salads" and turn out to be a (very thin) layer of lettuce and underneath, invisible to the naked eye, loads of cooked spaghetti. Just spaghetti, no sauce. Who does that? (yes, I know the answer; it was a rhetorical question...duh)
In the end, though, I found a small lettuce in Lawson's, a convenience store at our corner and I made myself a salad for dinner! Here is a picture, you would never believe how much of a challenge this little green meal was!

ok doesn't look so green here but it's the healthiest meal I have had so far, mhhm eggs :)

Ok, rant over! Went to Karaoke for the first time in Japan on saturday. It was fun but on the way back we got caught out in the Typhoon. For all those who haven't come across this, have a little read here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon ... basically it's a lot of wind and rain. But nothing Manchester couldn't prepare me for ;-)

Yes and this brings me to the bad thing that happened. It started of with a big laundry fail on my behalf.
Now, anyone who knows me at home will know that house hold chores aren't my forte (yes, Mum, I can see you shake your head at that) and that there is nothing I am less interested in than laundry and especially ironing. Ah, I got sidetracked again. Well, what happened was I decided to chance it and hang my washing outside over night but the Typhoon got it and when I woke up in the morning it was all scattered around my balcony and drenched (Oh - who could have anticipated that? I am an idiot). When I went to collect it this morning I found a bug the size of a small bird amongst my clothes. I hate bugs, I hate them more than ironing and thats saying a lot. Whats more, it was (and still is) stuck to a pair of my knickers. THE WORST PAIR! Which means I can't even ask someone to come and help me remove it! The shame! Oh well, the two of them will just have to stay on my balcony for the rest of the year because I will not be going anywhere near them. Here is a picture (excuse the knickers):

Oh God, I feel sick looking at it!

Maybe I should give my new pet a name? Any ideas?

Thats it from me today, hope you have a nice week! 

x

Seh 10.000 Farben, bin so schön verstrahlt

So, tomorrow I will have been here a week and I have only just found time to write another blog entry! I am way to lazy/busy for this blog stuff.

But, here it comes: a summary of what I have been up to (lots and lots).
In a way I feel like I have been here a long time and yet I sometimes still have little moments of realisation that I am living on the other side of the world!!

We started our orientation on the 10th, so I thought I would upload some pictures of the campus. Its SO beautiful I still can't believe it's in the middle of the city!

It has a perfect English lawn (we saw it  actually get trimmed with scissors)

the front gate

I can't get over how pretty its is (this photo doesn't even do it justice)

the outside cafeteria bit (awesome food)

(Let's just skip the whole placement test thing, this blog is for non-depressing topics only!) Here a group picture with me trying out the whole "paint me like one of your french girls' thing - didn't work, I need some more practise. I look like I'm having a nap instead.

皆さん　<3

Soooo, where was I? Basically we have been drinking a lot of beer, having some really noisy but equally fun room parties and the group just keeps growing and growing, it's seriously fun and I wish we could have free time here forever. It's my birthday next week on Sunday so I intend to go check out the club scene in Tokyo!!! the word excited doesn't even cut it! I literally can't wait!

Also, today we decided to go do something fun after the interview so we headed to Shibuya. I hadn't been anywhere except Ikebukuro, so this was really exciting. my first thoughts? BUSY! IT WAS SO BUSY! I know everyone always says this but the amount of people crossing the street was unbelievable (oh yeah and you better believe the thing about the trains, they get pretty full).

First view of Shibuya

SHOPPING HEAVEN

this huuuuge department store; all the clothes here are
 made for babies (needless to say we came out feeling like a size 150)

Afterwards, we walked to Harajuku, the more fashionable and young part of Tokyo where we wanted to go to the upstairs rooftop cafe in the Tokyo Plaza but we were so hungry we got sidetracked into a Tonkatsu restaurant and then went back home cause we were so sleep... oh well, we have a year to go find the rooftop cafe).

Tonkatsu (like Schnitzel but BETTER)

Harajuku at night

so many crazy shops!

Hmmm what else is there to tell? TOO MUCH! we have been doing so many fun things that I think my brain would explode if I tried to tell you about them on this blog (plus, I don't think the word count would be enough!) But we plan to go to Karaoke on Saturday, so I will report back on that because I am quite intrigues - and also hoping they have it in combination with a beer flat rate ;-) I am also going to return home weighing a ton with all this beer I am drinking, it has replaced everything in my diet (but don't worry, I googled it: beer has vitamins, so all is well ;-) )

Ah and a little extra for all my German fans (a.k.a friends):

Hier ein kleiner, (sehr) böser Witz -> In letzter Zeit höre ich ganz gerne Musik von Marteria, aber es hat ganze 2 Tage gedauert bis ich gemerkt hab, dass mein Lieblingslied "Verstrahlt" ist. Zufall? :D hahaha 

Aber es kommt mir tatsächlich dauerhaft so vor als wäre ich verstrahlt von den vielen Menschen, Farben etc hier in Japan, ist also gar nicht so falsch ;-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzOrzJ1dNQk (natürlich ist das nicht mein Video, copyright blablabla

Ok, i promise this is the end. ahhh what a long post but I hope you enjoy it!
Love you all x x x
PEACE

JAPAN

Ok, finally I have to time make a little post about my first 2 days here in Shiki (even though I am so tired I'll probably fall asleep mid blog post, so forgive me about the mistakes).

Journey wise everything went surprisingly well! I thought I would get lost straight away and I would run away crying if anybody spoke to me in Japanese. Luckily, this was not the case. I was surprised that even at the airport, people weren't really able to speak English and when I sent my suitcases off, I wasn't even sure where they were going! First Japanese food was at a Ramen place in Shiki and it was absolutely delicious! In the evening we went drinking at this more traditional japanese place and it was very amusing :) (sorry i feel like I'm just listing stuff but I am honestly too tired to form a coherent text)

Louise, Philin and me

Drew

Eva and Angela

anyway, since arriving I have been so busy I haven't even had time to unpack my bags, Which is a good thing, I think :) Everyone here is so nice and so interesting and international! Basically beer has substituted most meals since arriving and I have to say that even though I am not a big beer drinker at home, I really like japanese beer!

Today was the first day I got the train into Tokyo and I LOVE THIS CITY! It's so bustling and clean! I could walk around taking photos for ever. Anyway, after we got the mobile phones (which took about 4 hours by the way) we went to this Indian place to eat something and it had the most AMAZING deal! 1 curry, 1 naan or rice, lasso and iced coffee for about 7 euros! insane and super おいしい！(delicious) So, after this amazing meal we had a look around campus which was absolutely beautiful! I can't wait to start on tuesday! after that more beer drinking in the "park" (more like a plaza made of stones with like 2 trees), so fun!

Rikkyo Uni <3

Dining hall

This boy band we were watching!

皆さん！

Ahh this was possibly the worst blog entry ever but so much has happened and I am so tired so bear with me ;-) I am going to bed (to sleep on a pillow made of beans by the way; not comfy, need to buy a new one A.S.A.P)

じゃあ、またね。

Take 2

Ok, so because I am a bit of an idiot and have managed to log myself out of my first blog knowing neither my email address or password, it is time for take 2 (this time I have noted them down).

Just a quick introduction and summary of the happenings of the past few months:

My name is Lauren and I study Japanese at Manchester University in England. Finally (actually tomorrow!!) it is time to leave Germany - where I live, I know this is getting complicated - and move to Japan to spend a year studying at Rikkyo University in Tokyo. Tokyo? No big deal. It's not like it is the biggest city in the world or something.



What has proven to be a little bit more of a big deal, though, is the amount of paper work involved in getting a visa etc. and the number of injections needed to enter the goddamn country. And I thought Germany was bad for bureaucracy!

So, by some miracle my disorganised self has managed to obtain these important documents and has packed two suitcases that are probably full of
rubbish but oh well.


my japanese yen


I would like to use this blog so that my parents and friends can see what I have been up to and drool over the delicious food I will (hopefully) be eating (Yes, Anna - I know this is the main reason you will be reading this blog
;-) )

And so, wish me luck tomorrow and that I don't get lost.

Good night, Peace x

p.s.: I am also really bad at blogs