The Future

So, the polls are closed and the votes are in! I had 3 people vote (かなしい) and the verdict is 2 for Daily Life and Personal Life and 1 for Japanese Study.

I'll start with my Japanese (since it hasn't got too much better). I've still been playing this "My Japanese Coach" game - which is awesome. And it helps a lot... But I don't play it enough for me to remember what I'm learning くそ. So I'll need to step that up a little bit!!

There is less than 3 weeks until I leave and it's starting to feel like I'm going soon. Today I told my boss my last day of work will be the 2nd. I want to have a couple week days to be able to do anything I need to do (that I can't do on the weekend). He said it sounded like fun going overseas to teach, so he wasn't upset at all... I don't think haha.

And it was Hime and my 2 year anniversary on the 18th!!! Can you believe it??? 2 years hehehe. I'm sad I'm not in Japan right now though. Hime and I decided not to send each other presents in the mail (since I'm going there so soon), so we'll be exchanging presents when I get there, so probably expect some kinda update about our "anniversary" stuff around the 8th-10th of December. I hope she likes my present hehe.

Tomorrow it's supposed to rain in Penticton. I'm not looking forward to that hahaha. I guess I'll need to bring something to work that won't get so wet.

Well, that's it for today!!

大神 (Okami)

So I finally managed to find a copy of this game to buy again since my last one was never returned. I've been looking on ebay and checking all the stores but Ebay is fairly expensive and no stores have them anymore because they're not in production and the people who own them don't want to give them up haha.

So the other day I was in Electronic Boutique and there it was!!! Sitting on the wall! So I grabbed it and carried it around with me while I was looking at the other games. I was so excited to be the owner of this marvelous game once again. My heart has been pained since it's been gone haha. I probably won't have much time to play it since I'm going to Japan soon but I don't feel so guilty for losing a game my brother gave to me now (even though it's not really the same). It's also been reased for Wii (though I've heard it's better on PS2) but go give it a shot (if you can find a copy).

I also finally got my Class 5 drivers liscence so now I gotta apply for an International liscence so I can drive in Japan. I hope I can get it :) I'll be doing that after work on monday probably.

Hime and my anniversary is coming up soon too. Two days from now! This year I'm not sending anything from Canada, I'll be giving it to her when I arrive in Japan. I hope she likes it!!

Ralph Lauren

My first piece of real brand name clothing (or accessory I guess). Hime sent this to me from Japan for our anniversary. I've been using it but I always have this sense of "what if I lose it?" haha. The wallet is worth more than what I keep inside it probably lol. It's a super nice gift though and I'm glad she gave it to me hehe. It's not exactly like in the picture to the left but its the same color and a really similar style. It's really cool haha. Thanks hunnie!!!! I hope you like my present as much as I like yours ^_^

About the poll I got going on. If you read my blog, you've probably seen it (unless you read it via RSS). Anyway, please vote!! You can vote for more than 1 thing too if you'd like. I just want some kind of idea what people like reading about so I can better tailor my blog. I see right now the only vote is for "Daily Life" which I like writing about the most anyway (even though this post isn't about daily life at all hahaha).

So yeah uh.. that's it! I've been really busy lately. I'm working on something special at the moment and it's taking up quite a bit of my time. Okay, see you next post!!

Working Holiday Visa!

So, I just got back from the big town of Vancouver last night. I was applying for my Working Holiday Visa. I'm not sure how exactly it all works... but it seemed like I was going to get it, they just had to process all my info and actually make the visa for me which might take a couple weeks. So they're going to give me a call when it's all ready to go then I'm going to have to go down there again to pick it up.

It was a long weekend though. Highway 97 from Penticton to Kelowna is closed right now so the buses weren't running as often as usual, and were also taking a different route - through Princeton to Hope. I got on the bus at 8:15 Sunday morning and arrived in Vancouver at 5:00pm. REDICULOUS!!! 9 hours?! I couldn't believe how long it took. I was so greatful for the wonders of laptop computers, iPods and Nintendo DS's haha. Without those 3 things I would have gone crazy. Anyway, I went to a nice cafe with wireless internet so I could work on some stuff and get my Visa all ready to go. I got some coffee and a tasty beef wrap. The next morning I had food poisoning -_-' So far it was turning out to be an awesome trip haha.

I got everything done for my Visa though then headed on my way to go drop it off at the office and lo and behold, when I was walking up to the building was my buddy who was already supposed to be in Japan with a Working Holiday Visa. Apparently his Visa came in late and he had to change his flight. Sucks :( So, he came up to the consulate with me and sat as I finished filling out my paper work the he and I walked up to Robson together. He had to meet a friend and so did I so we parted ways and hopefully I'll see him in Japan!!

Food poisoning is a real bummer. I didn't want to eat or drink anything when I was with my friends so it was kinda lame. *sigh* But the rest of the night was alright. I stayed with my old roommates and we talked for a couple hours then played games for a bit then it was sleepy time.

When I woke up I felt a lot better so I walked with my roommate to work and got a wrap since I was pretty hungry, then we got on the skytrain together. We said bye at Stadium Skytrain (where he works) and I headed off to the Greyhound bus depot.

When I got there they told me there was no bus that left at 9:45 to Penticton. WTF!? The lady in Penticton told me specifically that there were only 2 buses... one at 6:15 and one at 9:45. Stupid. So I had to go to Westbank, then catch a bus there down to the "water taxi" then take the "water taxi" to summerland, THEN call for a ride to Penticton. In the end I got home at 8pm. So that was 10 hours and 30 minutes. So sad.

Then I had to work the next day!! (this morning) I ended up sleeping through my alarm somehow but still managed to get to work by about 7:30 thanks to my mom haha. Phew, that was a long weekend.

結構悪いやつだぜ、俺は

I just started playing a game called "Yakuza 2". I've never played the first one, but it wasn't in stock and I've heard a lot of good things about the series. It's all in Japanese with English subtitles so I figured it would be an awesome game for Japanese practice too. After I started playing I realized it might not be the best game to practice my Japanese since every character in the game are Yakuza and they all talk the part haha. I haven't really learned too much useful Japanese yet. Most of it is all Yakuza (gang) style. But it's an awesome game - I'm really enjoying it. My newest (and apparently completely useless) sentence 「結構悪いやつだぜ、俺は」 "I'm a really bad guy". I know it sounds cheesy in English, but in Japanese it does sound pretty cool and... ちょっとださい if you're not Yakuza I guess lol.

I also just bought a different game called My Japanese Coach which is absolutely amazing!! I would suggest this game to anybody who is studying Japanese whether on their own, in class, or by any other means. This game is definitely not to be used by itself though, but as a compliment to some other meathod of study. It doesn't really go very indepth into grammar or sentence structure (though, it does skim along the surface). It mainly focuses on vocabulary building through small 10 word (usually) lessons packed with an assortment of different minigames like word search, multiple choice, memory games, flash cards, sentence descrambling and a bunch of others. 10 words a day is an ideal amount for anybody to remember and if you do a lesson a day your vocabulary should increase quite fast. It has options to play all the minigames with the words you've already "mastered" as well, but you don't have the choice of which words those are. I would suggest using this game with Anki as help for memorizing those more difficult words. I've been using Anki to enter the words I think might be a little bit more difficult to remember (since Anki remembers which words I remember whereas My Japanese Coach does not). All in all, this is a wonderful study aid, and for $30 it is an invaluable tool for your Japanese.

Revert

Today I noticed I talk about the future a lot in my blogs. That is going to change. From today forward there will be no (or minimal) future-posts. Way back in the day when I first started posting I talked about all the menial and trivial things of everyday life - I'm going to start doing that again. This is the turning point of my blog! I was getting steadily offtrack, but now I'm back on. For updates on going to Japan I still might make the occasional "future" post but for the most part, trivial and menial. やっぱりつまらないブログだね。 I hope it's not quite so uninteresting as I might make it sound like it's going to be haha. I'll be going back to my roots talking about what I did, what video games I'm playing, which movies I've watched, what TV shows I'm watching, what I'm studying and even the odd purchase I've made. Let me know if the change is for the better (in the next post... possibly later today!)

It's been a while

Wow, a long while! I got a job doing labour for a landscaping company here in town so I'm getting pretty good exercise everyday :) The pay is pretty decent too, more than I thought I'd be able to get trying to find a job at such short notice. My plans of going to Japan might have been shifted a little bit too. Right now I'm deciding between late November/early December or sometime in February haha. Hime said she would come visit Canada again if I was still here in February so I guess we'll see. I haven't decided on anything yet but I'm going to have to pretty quick. I know I always say I'll update again soon and I don't... But I hope to update again soon haha. Next month is Hime and my 2 year anniversary! Time goes by like *that*!! Well, 'till next post.

P.S. Sorry for the lack of updates!

A job?

I need a job now that I'm back in Canada. I need to save up a little bit more money before I go back to Japan. Sounds easy... but is it??? I'm a slave to procrastination and for some reason I procrastinate MORE when I'm in Canada. wtf eh? Anyway, so that's where it stands. I also need to get my act together with level designing.

If you don't know, I have a website with some of my school stuff on it at www.bquaal.com but nothing is recent and I haven't really done much level designing at all since I graudated!! I taught myself the basics of Hammer but nothing came of that. I learned it then never actually made a level. Lame. So anyway, I went to EB the other day and picked me up a copy of Unreal Tournament 3 (which includes the wonderful Unreal Editor) and so I'm off to learn the UT3 editor. It's mostly the same as UT2 just 100x better in every respect. Of course it still crashes and UnrealEd3 has some buttons and menu options that really do NOTHING what-so-ever (they even explain that the buttons are completely useless and have no functionality in the tutorial vidoes) but, it's a way smarter editor. I'm liking it. I've got through the interface and kismet (introduction) and am learning particles. I already have level ideas so lets hope I can bring some to fruition and get back on track with my life as a level designer.

Now, I would like to teach English in Japan... but if it were possible, I would much rather make video games there. I just need to learn Japanese first!! If I get anything together for levels I'll be sure to update here and add it on to my website. But we'll see. I'm sorry this post is all kinda garbled together with no flow or reason to it. I'm sort of rambling haha. I just wanted to throw out an update of where I am: I need a job!! Tomorrow is Monday, time to turn over a new leaf. See you on the flip side!

Canada

So here I am again. Back in Canada. For some reason I find it so much harder to blog when I'm in Canada and I'm not really sure why haha. I think part of it had to do with the convenience of being able to blog from my phone in Japan. So I could write while I was waiting for the Subway (or riding the subway) or any number of things.

Anyway, So I'm back for a while. Right now I'm a little hurting for money so I think I'll have to work for a monthish before I go back (lame eh?) And I'm going to have to go to Vancouver to get my working holiday visa. For some reason you have to apply IN PERSON. So I can't just mail it to Vancouver, I have to actually take the bus (or drive) there to drop off a sheet of paper, then come home. LAME!

Well yeah, so, I don't have too much to say haha. My teachers (from Ai) are in Japan right now having a good time and I'm jelous hehe - good thing facebook is here for me to look at their pictures.

My Japanese is kinda coming along, but not as well as I had hoped. Learning a new language is definitely not something to take lightly I guess (not that I do).

This post is completely random and has no structure lol. My appologies. Please forgive my random story stuff. Anyway, with that said... Before I left Japan I had a sports drink that tasted like fruitloops. IMAGINE THAT!!! I'd say it was disgusting but... fruitloops aren't really that gross so I can't complain too much. My only complaint is that sports drinks should NOT taste like that.

See you next post!!

P.S. I'll be posting something in Japanese soon I think (on my Japanese blog [translated]). I have an interesting story to tell... but I'm saving it for Japanese practice. I'm not sure how interesting English people might find it so I won't bother buahaha. I'll put a link to the post here after I write it - it might take me a while.

Chilly

Tonight it was chilly for the first time. Anyone who knows me knows I always wear t-shirts. Well tonight after riding my bike 4km home my fingers were a little tingly haha.

This picture btw is of Sapporo Station North Exit(札幌駅の北出口). Pretty eh?

I recently made 2 new friends here in Sapporo. Asuko and Maccha. Both are pretty cool. Asuko Ive only talked to twice but Maccha Ive seen a few times now. We even sang karaoke together! haha. I also met another lady Ive studied with a few times now. Her name is Sachiko. She's really short haha but also pretty cool. Starting in October she's going to be a Japanese language teacher so she'll be able to help me a lot (^o^)v well, time to sleep. Go read the translated version of my other blog for different updates! 日本語のブログもよんでください。

gnight(-_-)zzz

Japanese Blog 日本語のブログ

Hey so, recently I've been studying a lot and I thought, what better practice than using what I've been learning!! So I've been posting on my Japanese Blog a lot more often (from a few days ago). I will probably be writing things more often on that blog than on this one just because I want to practice (I'm sorry all you English people, but I'll try to post on here sometimes too).

So if you are Japanese, go here to read what's new. It's also set as an RSS feed in the column on the right, under the video. (If you're not Japanese you can view the horribly translated version via google by clicking this link... you've been warned).

僕の日本語のブログはここだよ。読んで頑張ってね☆私にコメントをあげてください～☆どうも！

Street Fighter 4!

Big flatscreen LCD in the arcade! I beat the game with only one credit too! Its an awesome game too! Im not sure if its out yet but go play it if it is. Or when it comes out, go play.

P.S. this is my first post from my phone... let's see how it works (*^O^*)

Flin Flon

Last week I took a short drive out to Flin Flon, Manitoba with my dad to visit relatives. I'm going to be moving to Japan at the end of next month so I wanted to see my grandparents, especially, before I left since I'm not sure how long I'll be gone for. On the way out there I took a lot of pictures... But I won't make you suffer through them all. I did find this interesting old house on a hill near the highway though so I snapped a picture of that. Sorry, it's a little overcast but there's not too much I could do about that haha. The picture on the left is of Flin Flon as you're driving in to town through Creighton. You can see the giant smoke stack in the background puffing away 24 hours a day haha. You can see it everywhere you go. Actually I just found out it's the 7th largest building in Canada o_O it's 251.5m that's kinda interesting.

After I got there I went to see my grandparents and they're doing pretty good. I was there for 4 days and visited them 3 so I think I did pretty good haha. We went out for dinner one night too, it was nice. I haven't actually been to Flin Flon since probably 2002 so it was pretty nostalgic to see the city and all the people there. My grandparents have moved from their house I remember to a retirement center but it's a nice place and they seem pretty happy where they are :) Especially my grandpa, he kept bragging they have one of the only 2 bedroom places haha.

After that I spent some time with my uncle and dad fishing from the dock at my uncle's cabin. It was really cold and windy but we actually managed to catch one! Surprising eh? It was pretty fun though, I also haven't gone fishing since the last time I went to Flin Flon so.... like 6 years ago probably. It might have even been longer, I don't really remember. And then my aunt and I went to a club and ended up drinking quite a bit together haha. It was a pretty fun night. We were swing dancing together making fools of ourselves probably. Everyone else was grinding away around us and we were bumping into them spinning around and whatnot. I think we probably took up a quarter of the dance floor for the most part. Most people moved out of the way haha. I don't have any pictures of that though, I didn't bring my camera =/

Well after all the fun in Flin Flon it was time to head out. We stopped at a few places on the way home so I have a couple pictures to share. But first, I found where Bill Gates took his picture for Windows XP haha. That's not from Saskatchewan suprisingly, it is just out of Drumheller on the way to Calgary ^_^ Then it was off to BC!!

Our first stop was Drumheller (which is before the previous picture hehe oops). Anyway, I got my picture taken with a giant freakin' dinosaur. This thing is gigantic!! You'll probably have to click on it then find me standing on it's toe before you really notice the sheer size of this thing. I was blown away haha. For a little reference I'm 6' tall or 183cm (I'm a little taller than it's toe).

Then off to Banff to the Banff Springs Hotel for a bite to eat for lunch. Now that hotel.... is a nice hotel. It's like an old castle turned into a hotel. It's amazing and the architecture is beautiful. It's one of those places you just want to go explore for hours and hours until you get lost and have to explore your way back. The food there was a little pricey, but it was good. And it's not too often I get the chance to go eat there anyway haha. It ended up being a little over $50 for 2 sandwiches and 2 coffees haha. But what can you do right? The view was awesome. I took that picture from my seat (we sat on the patio). I just turned to the left and pointed my camera over the railing. I didn't even need to stand up haha.

After that it was a short drive to Lake Louise to see what they had to see. We didn't stay long (it started to rain) but it was pretty neat place too. I'd say Banff is much more interesting, especially since there's a city nearby and stuff to do, but I guess some people might disagree ^_^ It was nice all the same though. Other than that, it was a short drive back to Penticton so nothing interesting to report there haha.

First day on the job

Last night my brother drove me down to Princeton to start my new job this morning. It was an early start and a tiring day.

This is the first time I've done any real physical labour for any extended period of time and wow it's tough. I'm a Diamond Drill Helper. Only 2 people work a shift together. I'm actually working with my dad so it's pretty cool. He's the driller and I'm the helper. He does all the pressing buttons, pulling levers, fixing, and everything to do with running the drill in general. My job is to move everything around the drill so he can do his job as fast as possible (we get bonuses by meter drilled).

So, I'm tired. Totally pooped. I didn't even do all the work today - there's a second helper teaching me all the ins and outs today and tomorrow so, come Monday, I'll be in rough shape probably haha. I enjoy it though. It's really repetitive but I'll get the hang of it. I guess I'll have to eh haha.

Unfortunately I don't have my camera so I won't be able to upload any pictures for a few days but I'll be getting it on Saturday so check for some pictures around Monday or Tuesday probably.

I'll keep studying Japanese out here at night too when I'm not writing my blog (I don't have much time from when I get home to when I want to sleep). I get back here at about 7pm then have to eat dinner so that's about 7:30ish? And 10 is probably about the latest I want to sleep haha. So that doesn't leave too much time, but it'll be enough. Also, to any of my friends in Penticton, sorry I wasn't able to hang out before I left - it was kinda short notice ^_^

While I've Been Home

Nothing too amazing has happened but I'll attempt to highlight the interesting... or mildly interesting.

It all started out with a near-finished retirement home going up in flames on the 7th of April. This fire was started around dinner time and wow did it go up fast. The entire construction site was covered in wood and the building was, also, entirely made of wood. As you might have guessed already, it was found to be arson. Three teenagers deemed to be the culprits were arrested at the scene but only one's name was given out in the morning paper (due to the criminals' age). Damn kids nowadays eh.

A week later I expanded the garden in my mom's front yard so it would look nicer and would be easier to mow the grass. My sister and I dug out all the grass around it and dumped it into a big pile. I ended up getting pretty dirty. In the end we ended up with 850kg of sod (grass and dirt) we had to lug up to the dump. We were planning on putting down some wood chips the next day when BAM it snowed 10cm overnight. What in the hell? The past few days had been gorgeous! The average temperature was around 16 and it had even got to 22 the weekend before. Now it was -1. Good ol' Penticton - never ceases to amaze me.

My brother arrived home from College and I gave him the some of the souvenirs Hime had bought him in Japan when I was there. Most of it were random different candies and sweets. One of them being a strange honey-looking candy you have to spin up on sticks and then eat after it gets thick and full of bubbles. It's a pretty strange candy but they (my brother and sister) had a lot of fun with it.

On April 27th I went to hang out with a few of my friends I hadn't seen in a long time. We went out for dinner at Anthony's (I think), had some food and a drink then came back to my place to play video games. We played Guitar Hero III, then switched over to the classic SNES and dusted off Mortal Kombat II and Street Fighter II Turbo haha. It was a pretty fun night. It ended a little prematurely but everyone was tired and one of the guys had to work early the next morning so we called it a night.

We decided to give our dogs a bit of a grooming on the 29th because they were getting pretty scruffy haha. Hallie got the nicest job of them all - we thought it would be cool to give her a lion mane and a mohawk down her back haha. It turned out alright. We just didn't shave off anything around her head and we left a strip on her back about half way down. For all those who think this is animal cruelty - I assure you she is completely content with losing as much fur as she can since it's starting to get warm. And we're bringing them to the groomers soon anyway. And she likes her mohawk! ^_^

Yesterday I attended a Japanese Tea ceremony in Penticton at the Japanese Gardens we have here. It was pretty neat. They had one girl from Osaka that flew over here to be here for the ceremony (she doesn't actually live here) I was pretty surprised haha. I believe her name was Mutsuko. She sat there all alone on that mat waiting for water to boil and then meticulously adding and stiring the maccha. Very interesting - I don't think I'd be able to sit there that long. Atsuko was the one playing the instrument. I didn't get to hear her play much since I forgot my camera at home and had to go get it but from what I heard it was also really nice. It was a beautiful day to have a Tea Ceremony. I'm so glad I was able to go.

Return to Canada

Goodbye Japan! Home of the rising sun and the love of my life. Some day I'll be sure to return ^_^ I still don't feel like I've left. These pictures I took on my way to Narita airport.

Well I've been back since the 6th and though it's nice to be back I really miss Japan and my girlfriend. Today, we've been together for 16 months. Sadly, we're not able to spend it together. It'll be that way until I go back to Japan which will probably be in July or August. It all depends on my money situation and how soon I can find a job in Japan and get a work Visa.

This is the last picture we took together in the airport before I had to go through customs. So sad :( I made a video of what I did in Japan but I'll have to get her permission before I post in on here ^_^ Maybe I'll put it up next blog post if I get the go-ahead.

Recently I've been studying Japanese a lot since there's not really much else to do here in Penticton and I need the practice. I think I'm getting a little bit better but I still can't carry on a conversation with any sort of competence. Compare it to French-class conversations in Grade 8: "How are you?" "I'm good, and you?" "I'm good also". Stuff like that haha. But for practice I've started a Japanese blog so I'll be trying to translate these posts into Japanese after I write them in English. If you can read Japanese and notice any problems, send me an email or comment on the post and let me know! :)

When I travel to Japan next time I also hope to travel a little bit to see my friends Ayane (彩音さん), Kenji （けんじさん), Ming (フラミンゴさん） and Ryu (隆). Most of them live in Osaka (I think) except for Ryu haha. ^_^

If you want to see some information on Penticton you can go here and read some. It's also the sister city of Ikeda (池田町) in Hokkaido, Japan (click the Japanese name for the Japanese website). One day I want to visit Ikeda also ^_^ If you know someone who's coming to Canada, tell them to visit Penticton =D It's a beautiful place if you like the countryside.

お祖父さん、どうもありがとう

Today my gf's grandfather presented me with a beautiful carved wooden bear. He wrote me a message under the wood on the bottom which I'd love to put on here but it has personal information so I can't. His writing is incredibly neat and looks so cool. When I come back to Japan I will bring him something similar from Canada. He wanted me to remember Hokkaido from this bear since bears are famous in Hokkaido.

I Lost Takoyaki

I'm not sure how, but suddenly it was gone. I'll start from the beginning:

Yesterday hime and I went to Sapporo together to go shopping for souvenirs together and to enjoy our last trip there before I left but it turned out to be quite an unlucky day. Mr Murphy followed us everywhere.

In the morning she asked her dad for a ride since he was going somewhat in the general direction of the train station and her mother complained we are too dependant on them jokingly. It was the start - we felt not so good but it was already too late so we got a ride from her dad. In the car my gf noticed she had forgot her watch and bracelet so she was pretty upset since we needed to use her cellphone for the time for the rest of the day (but, whatever, right?). So it was all good after that. We went to the station and with moments to spare ran to board the train *phew*.

We chitchatted for a while (an hour and 1/2) and then we arrived in Sapporo. Time to find souvenirs. We went for food first though and it was pretty tasty. We went to a really small rice restaurant. Apparently it used to only be inside massage parlors since it's a healthy restaurant but it's popularity grew and people wanted a stand-alone one... so it was made! And that's where we went. After we left we went to get some souvenirs haha.

During our hunt downtown I made a couple videos and took some pictures of Sunday in Sapporo - it was a lot busier than the last time we came but still not so crowded. And then I saw it!!　ウサギちゃん came back to me! One time in Asahikawa I saw a bunny girl and I wanted to take a picture but I didn't think it would be very prudent but now I had found one on the other side of the street. I could take a picture without her ever knowing. Bunny girls (it's just my name for them - they don't actually wear ears or something. I just think they look like bunnies) are kinda rare I think. Most girls dress kinda weird but not very many dress like the girl in the picture. We visited a mall that was full of ギャル (gyaru) (image image) it was pretty fun but I really don't know how these girls can go outside dressed how they do but well... culture is culture I guess, and fashion is fashion.

So we bought souvenirs and then ate giant parfaits and a nice dessert restaurant. They were really good and super filling (and also they looked really nice) haha. A little on the expensive side, but it's just one time so that's fine. Just look at it! Doesn't it make you want to eat it? I know I wouldn't mind another =D Mine was ８００円 and hers was ７８０円 I beleive... more expensive than our lunch (around $15 total) but it came with a complimentary drink which is awesome since their drinks are also expensive. If we had ordered a drink seperately it would have been.. ３８０円 for my coffee (which is $3.50) and about the same for her tea. So it kinda makes it feel like it's worth it.

Anyway, after we finished our parfaits we went to go play some medal games (as usual) but we had really bad luck. (the pictures on the right are of downtown Sapporo at night - on our way to get parfaits. Same intersection looking different directions) We stocked up a couple times since we kept running out of metals. I kept saying "if we keep going, we'll have to get lucky sooner or later" (I'm the optimist in our relationship haha) but we never seemed to get lucky. There's sort of a "roulette wheel" in the middle of the game where you play "bingo" and not very often you get the chance to "spin the wheel" I guess... but 5 out of the 6 first times we did it we got the number 9. Every freakin' time! What are the odds!? Seriously!? Anyway - I'm stubborn so I didn't want to quit. Which is good because eventually we started to win and we won a lot. We won back just about all the money we spent (in metals though) so we put them into the "bank" and left. Actually her brother wanted to play pool together and Round 1 so we had to hurry home. He said "either's fine" (we come home soon or stay out) but we thought we could go home soon and play.

We stopped to buy takoyaki and then it was off to the train station. One of the subway stations is named "Pole Town"... I'm not sure who had the idea to name it such but I found it pretty hilarious. In any case, we had to take the subway because we'd miss the train if we didn't.. but we missed our stop on the subway, instead, and had to go back one stop. When we got off my gf noticed she didn't have her ticket any more either so we had to talk to the security who, luckily, let us past without having to pay extra. But all that hassle ended up causing us to miss the train by about 10 minutes so we had to wait another hour -_-' We checked the sign and it said the next train wouldn't be until 9:20 so we decided to do some more souvenir shopping. at 8:50 I said we should go back so we started on our way back. We got to the boarding station at 8:55 and the giant sign that shows the times said 9:00 so we ran.

The train was packed and sadly there were no empty seats so we had to stand between 2 trains where it was cold *lame*. After a few minutes we decided to eat our takoyaki because we were hungry and it was probably still kinda warm. But... it was gone!! We lost our takoyaki. It was in a plastic bag that I was holding. I was also holding a bag full of garbage and all our souvenirs but somehow the bag with takoyaki in it was missing. We tried to figure out where it could be - where we could have left it but I noticed something... After we bought it we never stopped and I never put the bags down. I held all 3 from when we bought it until when we boarded the train. The mystery of the missing takoyaki. My gf was angry - takoyaki is her favorite food and this takoyaki in particular is her favorite takoyaki - it's kinda expensive too. ５００円 for one takoyaki boat (8 peices). No seats and no takoyaki *sigh*. After about an hour we finally got seats and we were able to sit for about 20 minutes haha. Then we arrived in Asahikawa.

Hime emailed her mom to say we arrived but she said her brother just got home. Apparently he had been waiting at the station for us since he knew there was no 9:20 train so he had no idea when we would get there. We felt pretty bad so we decided to take the bus. We walked down to the bus station. It was 10:20 - the bus left at 10:15 and the next one was 11:00. Missed by just a few minutes again!! We decided to walk to the spa her dad goes to since he was there at the time. We hoped we could get a ride. Luckily he hadn't left yet so we got a ride home with him and she explained our whole day to him and he laughed haha.

Today I Felt Famous

So, today turned into one of the most interesting experiences I've had since coming to Japan. My gf and I walked to the nearby library to study a little bit this afternoon in a relaxing, quiet place. Recently, we go to the library to study quite often. Either the one near her place or the large Asahikawa Central library downtown. The one near her house is beside a Junior Highschool (age 13-15) so quite often we see students in the window who point at us as we walk by. It's both embarassing and flattering - even though I know the only reason they do it is because i'm 外人 (gaijin - foreign). But today was different.

At around 4:30 I was hungry - I had brought a pudding to eat because I knew I'd get hungry during studying, so I figured I'd eat it now. Outside the "study room" - the place where you're allowed to eat - there was a really stinky おたく guy who was reading Dragonball Z. He looked at me funny (gazed would probably be a better way to describe it) when we first entered the library so I wasn't so inclined to sit by him. I decided I'd just go outside to eat it. It's small so I wouldn't be too cold (at the time I just had a t-shirt on).

So I went outside to eat and was enjoying my pudding in the cold when a short おばさん (middle aged lady) came out and talked to me. 「さむくない？」 (are you cold) she asked me. I answered and we attempted to have a conversation in Japanese. She had a lot of questions from where was I from, what was I doing in Japan, where was I staying, what did I do in Canada, how old I was etc etc. It was a pretty good opportunity to practice my Japanese. Once the conversation started to get a little too difficult one of the employees of the library came out and apparently she speaks english! So the 3 of us started talking - she went to Canada and visited Edmonton and Iqualit? Nunavit? Something like that. She went cariboo hunting and stuff - so cool!

Then I heard a lot of 「外人外人」 from inside the school. There was a huge group of junior highschool students leaving the school and they were all looking at me. Being white in Japan is sometimes quite discomforting. They all walked out of the school and I attempted to keep the conversation going with the 2 girls I was originally talking to but the kids were so noisy. Suddenly one of them said "Hello" to me and stepped foreward (must be the brave one). I replied with a nice "Hi". She thought about her next sentence for a little while then tried a "Are you cold?" I tried to keep my sentence as simple as possible so I said "I'm not cold" but she looked pretty confused so I repeated "not cold" then she said 「なっと？」 (natto is fermented soy beans) - all of her other classmates burst out laughing and I tried to save her from being too embarassed by saying 「さむくない」 which resulted in a pretty resounding 「すげっ！」 (wow) and some whispered 「日本語を喋って」 (he spoke japanese). At this point I was pretty embarassed myself. The two girls I was talking to before decided they would leave and I thought I should do the same. I said bye to them and was about to say bye to the young girl I was talking to but she offered me a hand and said "nice to meet you" so I said "nice to meet you too" then went back into the library.

The library closed about 15 minutes later - I had explained the story to my gf inside the library. During the walk home we found a small group of about 6 girls that had been outside the school just minutes earlier. They were on the other side of the street and all waved at me. I waved back and started laughing. They all started a hushed conversation (since now I was with my gf). For me, I couldn't really understand anything so I just smiled and waved, but my gf didn't really like what they were talking about.. or more how they said it (in japanese there are levels of politeness and they weren't being polite) haha. They seemed quite concerned that I was laughing. My gf explained later that "are they laughing at us?" was the main point of their discussion haha.

I don't think I'll be able to experience this kind of stuff again since when I come back to Japan I'll be living in a bigger city, where foreign people are a little more commonplace. So for now I'll cherish this memory hahaha =D

Sapporo

The other day we went to Sapporo because I decided to go back to Canada earlier than I had expected and I had to speak to JAL to change my ticket and pay a little money. I'll be coming back to Canada on March 6th now (and no, we didn't break up so don't have to worry). The picture on the right is out of the train window on the way to Sapporo - I have no idea which city it is.

But before we left for Sapporo we went to the speediest noodle restaurant ever. You order your food, instead of from a menu, from, what looks like, a vending machine, at the front of the store. It prints you out a receipt, you hand it to the waitress that is running around like a crazy girl, and within minutes you have your food. My gf and her brother got their food mere moments after we found a seat and sat down. I was really suprised. It puts McDonalds to shame in every respect. It's faster, tastier, healthier, more filling, cleaner, employees are more friendly, and the price is almost the same (a "combo" I guess it would be referred to as, is about $7.00 - What I ordered was $4.50 and I was pretty full after). Iced green tea is a complimentary drink for every customer so you don't have to worry about buying a drink either.

Sapporo is a really nice city and it's downtown really feels like Japan - much more than Asahikawa. Sapporo is somewhat similar to Vancouver population wise but is more crowded. In the picture it doesn't look very crowded but I think it's mainly because it was snowing like crazy and windy to boot. Chilly chilly. But check out the cross-walks! Notice how they crisscross all over the intersection. In Japan pedestrians all walk at the same time at busy intersections and cars wait. It's kinda neat.

Japan is really... unnerving. There are call girls everywhere and advertisements for them posted all around the place. In Japan, they say "T-Back" for "G-String" so you can try reading this advertisement on the left and see if you can guess what they're trying to say. There are Japanese/English advertisements and signs everywhere also - most often they have some kind of spelling mistake or the grammar just doesn't make sense haha. Actually... I was just watching TV and found out that the highest paid "Hostesses", as they call them in Japan, get paid upwards of $10,000 a month. The highest they had on the show is paid $30,000 a month which is $360,000 a year. It kinda makes me sad that these girls, whose only job is to talk to desperate guys, have a higher salary than almost everyone who has gone to school for years and years and has, what we think, a high paying job. I'm happy this sort of work is illegal in Canada. Actually there are "Hosts" in Japan also - and you guessed it, they're males who chat to girls for a fee. Weird eh? Whatever happened to meeting people on your own? In Japan you can just buy temporary friends - saves the trouble of making real friends haha.

But besides that, Sapporo is really pretty. We changed my flight time first and then we went to this giant covered stripmall. It's 7 blocks long and has shops along both sides the entire way. Cars can't drive either - just for walking. But each block there is a cross street which cars drive along. Also each block is numbered so its easier to figure out which "mall" your favorite shops are in. First we went to sing some karaoke, as usual haha. The place we went to had a beautiful entrance but the rooms were cramped and kinda old. Also one of the microphones smelled so disgusting we couldn't even sing with it. But it was fun none-the-less =D We stayed for about 2 hours and then it was off to find something to eat. Actually we got sidetracked by an arcade and decided to play some medal games since they're so fun. They had our favorite machine but we weren't so lucky that day and our medals were depleted a lot sooner than usual but I finally have a picture of a giant medal machine!! hahaha (because I know all of you are so interested in it -_-'). There are... 12 stations I think? or 16? I can't remember. And there's a giant rotating screen in the middle and there's balls all over the place and metals flying this way and that and music and lions dancing and pounding numbers which creates more flying metals and balls. It's really fun.

For dinner we went to an "all you can eat" bbq. Each table has a hot plate in the middle of it which is used to fry your food! Who would have thought =D The table was pretty small though... so it was difficult to eat haha - but tasty! and cheap. It was １５００円 per person for all you can eat with no time limit. We ate our fair share. Both of us were pretty stuffed before we even finished our food. I wanted to drink beer for some reason so I ordered a beer. There were 3 sizes to choose from. Small, medium and large. I thought large would be fine - that it wouldn't be large... but I was wrong. I've never seen such a big mug before... nor so much beer in anything except a pitcher. I know in the picture it doesn't look that big, but trust me - it is. Compare it to my hand or to your hand. It's about 3 fists high. Make a fist, put it on the table. Make another fist and put it on top of your first. Now move your bottom one above the 2nd one and there you have it (it's about the height of a pitcher of beer).

Otaru & 15 Months

Two days ago my gf, her family and I went to Otaru to do a little sight seeing and pick up some seafood. It was a pretty cool place. The area we visited was, I think, one of the main tourist places. Most of the buildings looked so old and some were definitely historic or semi-historic at least. There was one restaurant/bar that was in an old train station. Down the middle of the building there was a hallway from one end to the other of the building with train tracks running along it and to one side there was a beautiful restaurant and to the other, a bar. Probably half of the shops were souvenir stores. Some of them were really cool. I bought some souvenirs for some of my family and friends and a couple for myself. I bought a "Kiki's Delivery Service" card holder. It's really cute and it's one of my favorite Miyazaki movies so I thought it would be a good souvenir.

My gf and I bought a 2 peice magnetic keychain with a guy's face and a girls face kissing haha. It's so cute. I think I'll bring back the girl side to Canada with me and she'll keep the guy's. And then we bought these little gems that were quite expensive. I chose 白 and my gf chose 緑色. Every color has a meaning and mine's kinda... everything. I guess they ran out of ideas or something. My color is supposed to adapt to the wearer's feelings or problems to fix them I guess. My gf's color, green, is supposed to help build a big heart and help with money I believe. They're kinda interesting... but expensive. For the 2 of them it was １７０００円 o_O but well, it's our anniversary so what can you do right? haha.

We also bought the most expensive chocolates I've ever seen hahaha. We only bought 2 because well... it was too expensive to buy more. Each peice of chocolate was ２４０円 so for 2 peices it was almost $5. We got a tiny little bag with pretty tape though. But sadly the chocolates weren't all that amazing. Sure, they were tasty, but what $5 chocolate isn't going to be tasty right? I wouldn't say it was worth $5, but maybe if I meet a chocolate fanatic I can tell them I ate Le Tao chocolate and they'll be impressed... if they know it hahaha. I believe it's only a small Japanese company since it doesn't have a link on Wikipedia and google only brings back results of Japan... Otaru specifically. It was good though.

Yesterday was our real anniversary day so we went downtown. We wanted to go for dinner but it was too early at the time so we went to an arcade to play some "metal" games. I took a picture of the one we played today the most. At this arcade there weren't really any interesting ones or big fancy ones so we decided on a cute little one that had a lot of minigames. It was really loud though and started to give us a headache after a while even with our scarfs stuffed infront of the speakers. We moved to a new one after a while but our coins disappeared pretty quick and we left haha.

We found what looked like a nice Izakaya and went in to eat. It was pretty good but nothing amazing. After dinner we went for some karaoke. I'm really starting to enjoy karaoke a lot. Maybe my singing is improving even! Still terrible, but now only... kinda terrible - I hope haha. I've been trying to sing some Japanese songs but it's hard to read Japanese so fast. But I'll keep trying =D so far my favorite song is 胸がドキドキ from the anime Detective Conan. It's fun to sing and I know the tune ^_^ Karaoke in Japan is much nicer than in Canada, as I've said before, but I have a picture to prove it now haha. In this room that we were in yesterday it's $3/h during the day and... $6/h at night. There's big flatscreen LCD TV and the karaoke machine has pretty lights (I know, completely useless, but if you like Apple computers you'll appreciate the pretty stuff like completely useless lights). You choose songs by 2 remote control LCD touch screen displays. Both English and Japanese interfaces (and Chinese too I believe... but I've never investigated the chinese button) and best of all... 2 large Bose speakers which pump out gorgeous karaoke sound. Actually the Bose speakers are kinda a pain because you realize how terrible you really are since you can't blame your terrible singing on sound quality hahaha.

Round 1 & Valentines

Round 1 is an arcade kind of place that has all sorts of stuff in it. You pay $15 and you get to stay for 3 hours and do whatever you want. They have a Tennis court, curling, batting cages, pitching practice, minigolf, volleyball, badminton, soccer, bowling, mini bowling, billiards, fishing and basketball for sports. Also there are massage chairs, manga, karaoke, rollerblading, a big arcade you can play as much as you want, a kids area with lots of balls and stuff and one of those electronic "bulls" which is in the background of the picture to the right. It's really cool. Fantastic idea and tonns of fun. For $15 you can't go wrong.

I went there one time with my gf and her brother and a few days ago I went again with her and her friend Kawa. After we played sports for a while we went to the kids area to check it out and were pleasantly suprised. There were 2 different small rooms full of balloons and fans. One had a tonn of small balloons and one had a bunch of giant balloons. The giant balloon room was a lot of fun so we took some pictures in there, as you might have noticed above ^_^. After, we went up a bunch of stairs and took a slide down into the "kids area"... and it was really staticy. I went down a big spiral-ey one first and I could see lightning bolts flying off my shoulders to the slide. It was also fairly noisy. The two girls didn't seem too inclined on going down the slide after that but I managed to convince them to go down the shorter, straight slide. My gf went first with the same result. She touched a metal railing at the bottom and got zapped pretty good haha. Her friend, I think, was a little more cautious about the railing but was overly cautious of the slide. She hugged herself and flew down it like no tomorrow, slamming into a padded wall at the bottom hahaha. The whole area was pretty full of static. We climbed through a little maze-like contraption which had metal bolts in it... 危ない。 My gf got zapped again from the bolts.

And then there were tricylces... It's been a long time since I tricylced, that's for sure. It was a tonn of fun too. We were there at around 11pm or 12pm so there were no kids so we had the whole place to ourselves haha. There was a path around the "kid area" for the trikes so we went around a couple times. It was pretty difficult for me to petal though - I think I'm a little too tall. My gf and her friend had some troubles too but they managed it easier than I, I think. Those are the massage chairs in the background of the picture of my gf and her friend. After we triked for a while we sat down to relax for a few minutes there.

We played some arcade games but didn't have very much time so we decided on a game of mini-bowling before we left. Almost every time my gf wins at bowling but for some reason today just wasn't her day. It was pretty fun though. The whole night was pretty fun. Canada should get a Round 1. I have no idea why it doesn't actually. I bet it would make a tonn of money. I think Canada's problem is they charge too much for everything. If it was cheaper, this stuff would be a lot more popular. Sucks.

For Valentines day my gf and I went to a different arcade and movie theatre and watched 28 weeks later. It was fairly mediocre. Nothing too amazing or fantastic - it was a little too busy for most of the movie. The action never ceases - never lets up - it gets a little tiring after a while. After that we played some coin games. In Japan they're a tonn of fun. In Canada it's a lot more expensive and the return is almost nil so the fun ends quite soon. We spent $20 and got 240 coins and played for 3 or 4 hours. At one point we had more than doubled our original coin count but in the end, of course, we ran out. Then it was off to Gusto. It's kinda like Denny's but a little bit tastier and a little less oily. Still expensive like Dennys but what can you do. Actually it was really cheap in the end... Actually Gusto paid me to eat there haha. I paid for our dinner with ５０００円 but the girl mistook it for １００００円 and gave me change accordingly. I actually wasn't sure myself who was at fault for a while. I also had a １００００円 bill in my wallet and a day or two previous I had 2 of them in my wallet so I had to do a little detective work to figure it out. At the time her mom was waiting for us so we had to hurry out so after we were in the car I started asking questions. I figured out that I, had, indeed, given her ５０００円.. Our dinner was ２７００円 so she gave me ７３００円 change for the ５０００円 I had given her. So in the end she more or less gave me ２３００円 to eat there which is roughly $22CAD. I feel really bad.. their register is going to be pretty off and we were already too far away to go back (it's nowhere near where she lives). Maybe some day we'll go back and buy a lot of food to kinda make up for it... or something.