Kanagawa 2008 Part 2

Before I knew it... its my fifth day in Japan already.. can't believe time passes by so fast. I left the house a bit late because I was staying over at my friend's place that night and leaving early Sunday morning so I probably won't get to see the kids before I go. Took some pix with them:


*My homestay family minus Harris cuz he was at work.. heheee

Then off I went to Yokohama... yet again, to grab my NEX Express pass for Sunday. hah... then I headed to NTT to meet up with NTT baddy group. It felt so nostalgic to be in there again... even the security guards, the restaurant, the cafeteria... everything felt so familiar... I wanted to visit my coworkers but when I got to where Cyberspace lab used to be, it was under renovation. -_-;; BUT! I did end up finding out where they moved to..only to find that I can't go in cuz I only have a guest pass... I stood outside the door for around 5 minutes.. tried knocking... then... MIURA-san showed up and saved me!!!! XD Turns out he switched to another team who's also in the same room.. so I got really lucky there. =P Got to see all my coworkers again... I missed you guys!!! Especially Naito-kun, Taniguchi-san, Uchiyama-san.. too bad Nishioka-san already transferred somewhere else. =(


*My ex-coworkers in Japan.. damnit, who had shakey hands?


*Super hot and super nice(!) coworker.. lol Uchiyama-san.

I spent so much time visiting NTT peeps I was majorly late for the baddy group... they are holding a "Rosalynn Cup" tournament just for me (aww...). Although this group are all beginners, I really enjoy just hanging out and laughing with them.. =) I've been missing Nakajima-san's jokes and his laughter! haha.. funny old man. I was especially touched because many of the members already left the company but they had come back just for me.. aww...thank you!!!


*NTT baddy group.. the old man behind me is HILARIOUS!! hehee...

After the tourney was over, we went to Nomikai (drinking party)... haha even though I didn't drink much it was super fun hanging out with them. They presented me with a japanese fan they got during their Badminton camp.



That night I slept-over at Izumi's place with Sayaka... and I had a hot bath there!!! It was actually my first time going into a traditional japanese bath. hehee it sounds kinda gross but we took turns bathing in the same tub of super warm water (we shower b4 we go in) and it was unexpectedly.. relaxing! We had a good night of girl talk... the contents of course are gonna be secret!~ hahaha



Early the next day Nakazawa-san picked us up and we went grocery shopping for the Nabe party. We had 2 pots, one was curry Nabe (which was really good...) and the other one was Soy milk nabe (which was SUUUUUUUUUUPER GOOOD omg..).. after we finished cooking all the raw food, they added rice and cheese to the curry nabe and made this SUPERRR YUMMY gratin(? is that wat they call it)... omg..... thinking about it is making me drool. *droolz*


Soy Nabe- We should try this in Vancouver someday. =)


Curry gratin- SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO gooooooooood................

We had tons of food + junk food, played some Wii and had dessert too!! Had chestnut Mont Blanc cake... man they are stuffing me with all this food that are all irresistible.. hahaa...finally it was time to leave and it was sad to say goodbye =(

BUT... the sadness was quickly forgotten because I was meeting up with Nobichuu peeps for another NOMIKAI!!!! XD Thanks Hira for organizing this... a large group of ppl came out and we had SO MUCH FUn. hahaa...the funniest part of the night (for me, anyway), was when Me, Ishii, Hira, Oota and Nakazawa were sitting in a table... and they asked me.... "Among the 5 of us... who would you marry?" LOL.......... like I said in my previous blog entries... there's no doubt I would pick the perfect husband!!! haha that was a no brainer..... then I said Hira is the best boyfriend... Nakazawa is the best FRIEND... then Ishi was like "What about me?"
me: "You are best in badminton..."
Ishi: "So I am just a feeding machine???"
me: "......... LOL...."
Haha in the end I had to say he was the most handsome so he'd stop bugging me about "feeding machine". Another highlight is when Hara was showing us his JAPANESE Karate kick... had to emphasize that it was JAPANESE lol



*Here's a "JAPANESE karate kick" and a "JAPANESE karate punch" LOL

Man I had so much fun that night... it actually started out pretty bad because I was stuck in a table away from the ppl I'm close to (Hira, Oota, etc)... and this guy kept on asking me about how I felt about Obama and Palin.. -_-;; omg Who cares abt Obama and Palin when I'M IN JAPAN???? -_-;;; hah I was so sad that night I almost wanted to cry... but the more Ume shuu (plum wine) i drank, the happier I got lol. In the end everyone was walking around and hanging out with different ppl so I had tons of fun.... =D

We then went for Nijikai (second drinking party.. haha) and the party itself wasn't so interesting.. it was during the walk there... when they were being drunk... LOL
- Hira telling me Ishi's secret... hahaha
- Sekiguchi telling me to stay away from Hira/Ishi cuz they are drunk and saying stupid things... LOL he was treating me like a kid. >.< In reality I really wanted to hang out with Hira cuz they were more interesting. hahahaa
- Muraoka is weird because he likes making ugly faces for ANY pictures... you'll probably find him in teh group pic pretty easily


*these people is the reason I went back to Japan for...... MISS YOU GUYS SO MUCH!!! ~>.<~

That night I went home on the last train.. packed till 3am.. had 2 hours of sleep then with MUCH THANKS to Harris... he escorted me onto my NEX Express..


*Thankyou for everything Harris... I'll miss your family!!!

Japan... I'll be back a third time for sure.................. !!!!!!!!!
絶対!!!

Kanagawa 2008 Part 1

So finally... my adventures in Japan continued, this time only for a week though.
This update is like a month late... hahaa but here's it is:

Continuing from the last entry... finally, I am back here at Kanagawa.
I'm gonna skip the whole part about why I ended up staying at a homestay whom I found online... the important part is that they were AWESOME people!!! Harris & Rozita... 2 Singaporeans with their 2 kids Meira & Zetti. Their kids were sooooo adorable XD


*Here's a pic of my awesome & huge room.. =D

The first day I got there, I called Hira-san and was told that we're going to play badminton... at 7:30am the next morning (meeting him at the station at 7)!! @_@ Needless to say, if it involves badminton I'm up for it, so the next morning, I left the place at 6:30 and baddied until 12:30pm... 5 hours straight LOL. I have no idea where I got all that energy because I really should've been jet-lagging. I met a few new people there... Yasuda-san, Muraoka-san and got to play 5 hours worth of good games. The highlight of the morning was when I *almost* beat Hira-san in singles... !! Was up like 13-4... and somehow he caught up and beat me 21-19.. 0_0 After baddy, we went for ramen and then I went back home to rest up... man was it an exhausting day.

On Tuesday I headed out to Odaiba, just to find out that Miraikan is closed on tuesday and tuesdays only... !! >.< So I ended up walking around Odaiba and doing some shopping... and headed over to Shibuya to do MORE shopping. Met up with Christine for dinner... and was THIS close to getting myself stuck in Tokyo had I not caught the last train back home. -_-;; Well... lesson learnt.... I will be smarter with time management next time hah.


*Statue of Liberty @ Odaiba... the view was beautiful there


*With Christine, at Shibuya JR

On Wednesday I went to Yokohama Windsor.. to pick up all some baddy gear.. =) Got Bearz her new bag and also a new pair of shoes for myself~ I also went back for DONQ Croissants... and they were as awesome as they were 2 years ago.... mmMmmm.... I wish I had a pic to show you.
After shopping I met up with 野比中 baddy peeps... regular wednesday practices that I've been missing for 2 years!!! It was super super super fun... especially the game where it was me + Ishi vs Hira + Oota... we beat them the first set and lost the second but that was an awesome game... probably the most intense game I ever played with those guys. Hira thanked me because he got to yell "GO HOME!" at Ishii (whom he never beats) hahaha.... =P We went to Yakiniku afterwards because Family Garden (place with half price hamburg steak every wednesday) was full.. man I miss hanging out with these guys... a lot... they are the only reason I decided to come back.


*My favorite person in Japan- Hira is the one in front of me

Headed to Yokohama again on Thursday where I spent a good 3 hours inside Yodobashi camera... and ended up buying nothing but Gundam... more Gundam.... and more Gundams... lol... all for Wilson. They had a lot of cool stuff there though.. I just didn't think they were worth my money~ haha
Here's a few:

*Self-explanatory... dog that keeps doing crunches once you plug it into ur comp. I was thinking of getting one for KSo to encourage you to do your crunches! apparently, they came up with a second version of "The humping dog" now. lol


*Mouse that says "I love you" when you click on it.... errm... give it to ur gf/bf when ur sick of saying that yourself. hahaha

After that I met up with Hira again, who took half a day off work to go baddy with me with 羽魂 (Hakon, one of the baddy teams I joined in Japan). Practice was great.. they made me a "special menu" that was supposed to be extra tough hahaha I was tired though because I've been walking (or shopping) too much these few days. It was nice seeing all Hakon's members again.. and playing GIRLS DOUBS!!!! Wooot.... Ai-chan was still as strong as I remember.... Hira and I got our ass kicked in mixed though lol. After that Ken and Masa treated me to 鍋 (japanese hotpot) and in return I showed them my training schedule in Vancouver. LOL... they said they'll try to follow the schedule as well and get trained up to beat me next time. XD


*Hakon team.. I'm wearing their uniform #63!! (Stands for Ro(ku)-Sa(n))

This entry is getting too long.. so I'm splitting them into 2.

I'm back...

After 2 years I am back here in Kanagawa, Japan...
有點不可思議的感覺.
日本,我回來了. =)

Goodbye Japan.... さようなら～

This is gonna be one long post and it's gonna sum up my last 3 weeks spent in Japan.
this is also gonna be the last post on this blog as my adventure in Japan ends here.... temporarily.

So where have I left off in the last post? The JLPT exam?
On some tuesday after the exam, I had my first farewell party with the NTT badminton group. They held another handicap tournament and this time Billy (Lam) played too! haha it was quite fun... the actual playing wasn't that fun but just hanging out with the group and watching Nakajima-san the funny old man.... I will never forget him! hahahaa

And then there was the CJP AYCE Yakiniku party... mMm.. haven't had so much meat ever since I went to Japan. haha it was great... that was my last time seeing many of the CJP peeps before I left. After Yakiniku, many went clubbing but I stayed over at Lynn's place and had some great girltalk... =) It is really cool how people can become friends so easily when they are in a foreign land. Perhaps everything and everyone else is so different in a foreign country that we all cling on to the smallest bit of familiarity we can find... Anyway, it was a great night... not for some people though..... =P

*CJP Kanto RULES!

Then the next day Braz arrived to visit... we visited DisneySea on Monday together with Katie and it was SO FUN!! XD I felt like a kid again when I step foot in Disney. The ride "Journey to the center of the earth" was great... and "Tower of Terror" was not as scary as expected but still fun... the show "The Legend of Mythica" was GREAT... with Dragons, 3 headed dragons, Unicorns and also a bunch of disney characters. I fell in love with Chip and Dale after Braz won a Dale from one of the stall games... =O That was a great day... =)

*Me and Katie the mouse

*Braz and I in DisneySea

On tuesday night, Billy, Meghan, Vu, Braz and I had a Takoyaki/Pizza party... we tried out the Takoyaki machine I bought (for 1000yen) and we also ordered Pizza hut pizza. hahaa the Takoyaki turned out GREAT! mMm.. hehehe tastes almost as good as those you buy outside... and the Pizzahut delivery guy was so cute! hahaha... the pizza itself was alright... not as good as expected though. Meghan then tried out pancake batter on the takoyaki machine and they turned out humungous cuz the pancake batter expanded... XD We played the Japanese version of Game of Life (Black and Bitter version)... Meghan kept changing the rules to her advantage (just kiddin.. lol) and Billy's game reflected his real life. hahaha Brian had so much money to start off with but lost it all in the end. And whose kids stole all their money again? Was it Billy's? =P

*Takoyaki and Pizzahut pizza

*Black and Bitter Game of Life

The weekend after was the year-end trip to Chiba with my company's group (O基G）. We rode on the ferry to Chiba and spent the first day visiting temples and museums. We also visited a castle there but it was under renovations.... -_-;; . Then we returned to our ryokan and had a banquet there where I received my going-away present-- a Hagoita (羽子板）, which is a traditional Japanese badminton racket!! XD Kids play with hagoita during new years and the winner gets to draw on the loser's face.... sounds fun. hahaha... after dinner we took turns bathing in the outdoor onsen. It was great, except it would've been much more fun if there were other girls or if I was a guy so I wouldn't have to onsen alone. =( After that, we played some games and then a few people left the group to play Mahjong. After chatting with the first group for a while, I joined the second group in playing Japanese Mahjong. Since I'm a beginner, Taniguchi-san coached me for the first game (where I was the big winner XD), and Naito-san and Uchiyama-san coached me for the second game. I ended up beating our project manager (who's my boss's boss's boss) lol but he's super nice!! Now I think I know the basics of Japanese MJ.... they have special bonus tiles called "Dora" which will double your points... and they also have a lot more ways of winning. The style of playing is very different from Canto MJ, since you lose points if you "PON"(pong) or "CHI"(seung) , I was told not to take other's tiles even though I was tempted to many times. Anyway... enough about MJ. The next morning we headed to another temple and then we decided to head home because of high tides, meaning if we stay we run the risk of getting stuck in Chiba. It was such a great trip... I got to know a lot of my coworkers much better. I wish I got to stay longer...!! ~><~

*My work group... XD

My work ended on the 19th. I stayed in the office till 10pm that day trying to finish off my code, but secretly it was because I wanted to stay in the office as long as possible. Turns out a few people was STILL working after I left at 10... crazy!! Braz decided to extend his stay in Japan so we hung out around Tokyo the next few days.

On the 22nd, I visited my supervisor's home to finish up some work. His wife, Fumiko-san made me a Japaense New Year's lunch and it was sooo yummy!! I gave out christmas presents to their family and played with his kids for a while.

*My supervisor's family!! His sons are sooo cute!

After that I attended the year-end party/farewell party with 羽魂(Hakon) members. I received another going away present, which is a Hakon uniform with number 63!! XD I will wear it in Vancouver I promise. Dinner was good, and I got to meet Ray one last time before I left. I took pictures with everyone and I feel so bad for not attending practises in the past... 3 months?? I hope members of Hakon will continue to improve and upgrade their level of play... and yes I will ganbatte in Vancouver too! After the first party we went for a 二次会 (second party) at another izakaya... Shibuji-san was half drunk and was saying many funny things.. LOL... it was a fun night and I caught the last train home.

*Ray and I!!

Then on 23rd, After that I went to the yearend/farewell party with Hira-san's baddy group. That party was CRAZY FUN..hahaha probably the best yearend party ever. We ate lots and had 3 hours of nomihoudai... I gave everyone christmas cards but I misspelled Ishii-san's name as "Ishida-san" so the whole night everyone was calling him that. LOL... and Oota-san made nicknames for everyone... ダメ人間系 (Oota)、エロイ系(Seki)、石田系(Ishii)、サウスポー系(Satou)、ちょっとうまい系(Mori)、アキレス系(Yamashita) and many more....XD after a few rounds of beer, Oota-san was the first one out...and we headed for our 二次会 at an intestines yakiniku place. Vincent joined us and then we headed to our 三次会 at Karaoke!! This is the time when i really regret I didn't learn how to sing any Japanese songs... =( I tried to sing a few Japanese songs unsuccessfully, but in the end I think Vincent and I impressed them with "San woo hoi", one of my all time favorite duet songs! =)

*The NTT Tsuken baddy group... *sigh* I'll miss them the most...

*Me and hira-san, Hakon cup winner!

*Me, perfect husband and his daughter! aww his daugher is sooooo cute!!!!

On the 25th Billy and I sent Clem to the airport... then we joined Will and his friends Jessica and Lionel for dinner at Izakaya. After that... MORE karaoke!! at AYCE icecream place.... hahaha that was great. I think that was why my coughing never went away... because of many nights of consequetive AYCE icecream karaoke... ><><

*Justin and i with minnie mouse!

On the 29th, after sending Justin off on the nightbus to Kyoto, I got stranded in Tokyo cuz I missed the last train. Damn night bus... was LATE... and the whole thing was SO confusing. Grr... I ended up meeting up with Billy, Will, and his two other friends Janice and her brother. We got some food at Matsuya and then we got some Chu-hi and drank underneath Tokyo Tower in the cold, cold night. -_-;;..... hahaha OMG. After that we headed back to Janice's hotel and crashed...

On the 30th I got pissed at the AU guy who kept LYING to me telling me I couldn't pay on the day and that I couldn't stop my phone at 7pm... f-ing bastard!!! I was gonna yell at him if I wasn't in Japan.......... I also didn't pay my last water bill because the people from the waterworks did not come and collect my water bill like they said they would. Stupid liars!!! Anyhow, after completing some chores I met up with my supervisor for dinner. He took me to the red warehouse that's rebuilt into a chain of restaurants and shops in Minato-mirai. The restaurant was great!!! We chatted about a lot of things and after dinner, he took me to the ferris wheel. Ahh.. I thought I wouldn't have a chance to go on the ferris wheel but I did afterall!! It was a 15 minutes long ferris wheel ride... and I would never forget it. Yokohama at night is very beautiful.. you can see the 2 rainbow bridges that stretches from Yokohama to Chiba as well. Finally I had to go home and pack so my supervisor and I trained home. On the train ride home, he said to me "Rosalynn-san, since I don't have any sisters, I've been treating you like a little sister all along." I feel so touched.... and glad to have met such a great supervisor. Thankyou so much............. for everything!! I will never forget my supervisor.

The night of the 30th was hell. Thankyou BILLY for going through hell with me... haha... I basically spent the whole night packing and moving all my stuff and garbage to billy's place (cuz Japanese ppl don't collect garbage from the end of year till Jan4th.. -_-;;). After stuffing most of my stuff into my suitcases and an extra box to mail back home, I cleaned up the apartment and it was almost time to leave. Billy by this time has passed out already.... thankyou soooooooooo much again. We then headed to the airport and rushed and rushed to catch the airport bus so I wouldn't miss my flight. I finally got to the checkin counter at 10am for my 11:15am flight, and the attendant said "Ms. Chong, I'm afraid this flight is not the correct flight. The one you have written down is your flight from Hong kong to Narita; the flight you were supposed to take to Hong Kong departed at 10am." and I was like................... ".........shit!!". She then proceeded to tell me that I must pay $150 for flight transfer fee, and that my luggage is 10kg over the limit (the limit is 32kg) and that I must pay another $200 for the overweight baggage. Holy (*#&@(#. I thought i was quite fxxxed. Then I discussed it with Billy and he came up with the brilliant idea of mailing a package home.... and so I did, for $70 only. To my surprise, when I went to pay for the flight transfer, the attendant told me they made a mistake because my ticket can be changed anytime within a year, so my flight change is indeed free of charge. Yayy!! I rejoiced.... I ended up only having $70 from the original $350. *phew*. My flight was changed to the 5pm flight and Billy left for Nagano to spend New Years with Will. I will miss you pal.... thanks for being such a great neighbour and EATING PARTNER... haha.... see you back in Van!!

And this concludes my adventures in Japan....
these 6 months have no doubt been the best time of my life..... I'm already missing JAPAN and all the people there!!
Someday I will be back... I swear.... so long, Japan, goodbye.... for now.

こんにちは

Whoa I just realized tonight that some of my Japanese badminton friends read my blog (or see the pix at least)... just wanna say...

これを読んでいる羽魂の皆様：
こんにちは！色々なお世話になっておりました。
忘年会はすごく楽しかった！羽魂のユニフォームはとてもかっこいと思う、ありがとうございました！
この6ヶ月に羽魂の方と練習して、試合を出て、楽しい時間を過ごしました。
もう少し帰るのを思うとさみしくなりますね。。>.<
カナダに行ったらぜひ私を連絡してください！
最後に、もしよかったらコメントを書いてください！よろしくね～

Busy December

As my work term in Japan is closing to an end my life just gets busier and busier..
I have yet to blog about the KANSAI INVASION, not to mention my talk at the Database Symposium and JLPT exam in the past weekend. But before I recap the past, I'm gonna record my schedule for the next few weeks...

December:
1 - Presentation at Database Symposium DBWeb2006
3 - JLPT 2kyuu exam
5 - NTT Baddy group 送別会 (farewell party)
9 - CJP Kanto farewell party
10 - Braz arriving
11 - Disney Sea!!
12 - Farewell party with Billy, Meghan and Vu
16-17 - NTT O基G 忘年会 ＠ 千葉館山
18 - Braz leaving
19 - Last day of work at NTT
22 - 羽魂送別会＋忘年会
23 - Hira, Oota-san baddy group 送別会 (farewell party)
24 - Christmas Carols @ 横須賀?
25 - Justin arriving
31 - Departing to HK

To do:
-Write Co-op experiential report
-Buy christmas presents
-Pay all my fees
-Get Baddiholics uniform done
-Get Yokohama maps for Biu jeh
-Get Umbrella for mom
-Get Stuff for bro
-SHOPPING!!
-Throw/give away/return home appliances
-Pack...

================================
On badminton:
The Yokosuka city badminton tournament was held in the past 2 weekends, but due to kansai invasion and dbweb, I could not join any of those. On the otherhand, Ishii-san was runner up in Level 1 singles, and Ishii+Seki were runner-ups in Level 1 doubles! Other ppl did pretty well too, all of them passed first round. It just occurred to me that I am playing with a few of the top male players in the city... haha all of a sudden I feel so lucky to be able to practice with them. 帰る前に後４回! Looking forward to the year end party with them! XD

Looking forward to Winter Olympics 2010...
Went for a final round of rare hamburg steak at Family Garden with Hira-san and Nakazawa-san last night.. Hira-san treated me to chestnut Mont Blanc and it was soooo yummy.. =d Mmmm... during dinner, Hira-san told me that he might be coming to Vancouver with his wife in 2010 to watch the WO... and he'll try to ask other people as well. I told them they can all stay over at my place (well.. in the basement..)... and I'm feeling excited already! Why am I feeling excited over something that may or may not even happen 4 years later... lol... I'll definitely bring them to C2 though, if they do come. Man... it'll be sooo much fun!!!!! XD

I hate playing with people who just try to overpower people and don't think about where they're hitting the birdie to... the more I play with them the more I stop thinking about where I hit, cuz they just end up forcing it into a competition of power in the end and there's no point cuz I can't smash through them. Unsatisfied.... why do I always get stuck playing with people who don't play with their brains. Power is nothing if you don't have the skills... and obviously, there's no glory to overpower me cuz ur a bunch of guys and I'm a girl... and in the end.. they can't even smash through me so they attack my partner! WTF............... why do I appear as a weak player? People were surprised when Jenn and I beat Phyllis and Powin, but we both knew inside that it wouldn't even be close. Maybe I am too weak still.... I think its a good time for self-reflection......... I need to get stronger.

========================
On JLPT:
Lemme start with the JLPT exam... well.. its... OVER!! WOOT!!!
Part1: Vocabs and Kanji were much easier than I thought. I was pretty confident on most of the answers, and a few that I guessed I think I guessed them right.
Part2: Listening was easier than I thought as well... I screwed up on a few of the picture questions (unexpected) but I did really well in the pure listening section (also unexpected) haha..
Part3: Comprehension was alright... I think I can get 60% on comprehension Q's, but man.. the Grammar part just completely killed me. I guessed at least 60% of the questions and there were a few where I just had no clue.. couldn't even eliminate 2.
Overall: Hope that my Part1 marks made up for my Part2... and comprehension is worth more than Grammar anyway so hopefully... I'll pass... *cross my fingers*

================================
On DBWeb2006 Symposium:
First day I got there I saw a few people get grilled by this one guy who kept asking the speakers questions that they can't answer. I was hoping he would be in another hall when I give my talk the next day.
Second day when I gave my speech, I was on slide 23/28 already when the chairperson held up the sign that indicates the 15 minute mark. My talk is supposed to be 25 minutes long. -_-;; In the end, I think my talk lasted around 18-19 minutes because I started speaking reeeally slowly. Then during the questions session, the person whom I wished wasn't there WAS there... and of course he grilled me too. I attempted to recover my grounds but this is what he said "I know, but I was just making a comment." haha... there were 2 comments and 1 question in total... I think I handled them alright..!?
Finally... I am proud to announce that I received the Student Presentation Award (3 ppl out of around 25? but duno how many of them aren't students) of 5000￥ bookcard! XD Honestly I dun even know why I got the award... LOL but apparently the chairperson thought my talk was really good and he was impressed when my supervisor told him that its my first time giving a talk on a paper. Oh btw, by student I mean any student, undergrad, masters, doctors.... although I was probably the only undergrad there. =P haha I'm sorry, I just had to brag.



=====================================
On KANSAI INVASION:
Finally.. I've gotten to Kansai Invasion.... for my Vancouver friends... Kansai Invasion was a 4 day trip all the Kanto people took to Kansai, in an attempt to invade Kansai. And of course... our invasion was a SUCCESS! lol

Day1
-Shopped at Namba from 10:30 - 5:00. Holy crap there is so much to see, and a neverending street of shops selling all kinds of clothes, shoes, etc. There's also a FOOD street... with takoyaki, okonomiyaki, crepes, etc etc. Man.. I love Namba.
-Met up with other peeps in Osaka for AYCE Dimsum.. only to find that the place is closed for renovation. =( We were disappointed but we had Korean food instead.
-After dinner, we headed to JJ, Jenn and I sang K with Vincent, Victor and Kel for a bit b4 we headed home while others continued to party all night.



Day2
-Met up with Shiufai, Clem, Neil and Kel and headed towards Nara park after a filling lunch of beef&egg don. We visited Koufukuji, Toudaiji, and KasugaDaiji Jinja. We also got to see red leaves (which makes me wonder why we never consider red maple leaves something to be "viewed" in Vancouver) and had fun playing with deers.



When I was eating my senbei, a deer wanted me to feed him so much that he started nudging me and eventually, I think was so hungry that he started chewing my jeans. -_-;; haha...



-Met up with Fur and had unagi don for dinner... mMMmm that was good stuff.



-Met Ally.. a korean girl who has perfect english (that she learnt from Phillipines) and japanese
-After picking up a few drinks at the grocery shop nearby, we headed towards Anton's house for the big PARTY!!
-Party started with drinking game that Byron prepared... and who will ever forget the killer WATERFALL.... lol. Evil Boon tried to get me drunk but luckily I didn't know the rules well and avoided it unintentionally. =P
-We watched Neil's Cool Japan TV show... haha Neil's a STAR!!
-Many funny things happened... but... I think I'll leave it out in this blog or some ppl might kill me. *cough*jenn*cough* haha

Day3
-After heading back to Jenn's to take a short rest and wash up, we met up with the big group again for lunch and then to Arashiyama.





-Hiked up Arashiyama (around.. 30 mins?) and saw MONKEYS!! many many MONKEYS!! XD
-When I was trying to take a picture of a baby monkey, it suddenly jumped onto Jenn's legs and the mother monkey jumped onto my leg... haha that was quite a scare.
-Saw the monkeys get fed... I love the baby monkies!!



-Picked up some food on the way back to the station, then Jenn, Ally and I had dessert while waiting for Bonnie and Delen to arrive. We had chestnut parfait.. sooo good!!!
-Met up with Delen and Bonnie finally!!! XD Baddiholics are partially reunited. Dropped off their luggage and off we went to Kiyomizudera temple lightup.
-It was really pretty there, but way too crowded. It was also quite dark so I couldn't get a good shot of the view.



-Finally we headed home and rested

Day4
-Billy and Kelvin came and all of us went to Fushimi Inari temple with a thousand (at least?) tori gates. It was very beautiful but I got tired hiking up the temple. We stopped halfway cuz it started to rain and headed back down.



-Headed to Shijo to do some more shopping... damn I love that place as well!! Sooo many stores, with good bargains too!!!
-Had tempura Soba for dinner b4 heading onto the night bus.. right b4 getting on the bus my throat suddenly felt extremely dry..
-One hour into the bus ride, my throat was hurting and I was having trouble breathing because the friggin bus was SO STUFFY and had no oxygen!! I swear it contributed to my cold which lasted for over 10 days already...
-Finally we arrive at Yokohama at 6:30. Billy and I went home b4 going to work, and I took a one hour nap.

And that concludes the Kansai Invasion... it was tons of fun. Thanks ANTON for letting us party and crash at ur place, and sorry for disturbing ur neighbours. >< Thanks JENN for letting me stay.. =P

I started writing this post 4 days ago.... haha... finally got it done! Yay!
I will conclude this post with a panorama of the view of Kyoto City from Arashiyama

NTT Musashino R&D Badminton Camp

*warning: this entire post is about recap of badminton camp and my feelings towards it... I'm gonna ramble on and on so unless ur reeeally bored.. I wouldn't recommend u reading the whole thing =P

This is probably the most memoriable and fun trip in Japan...
I became better friends with so many people, got to meet new ppl, got to watch drunken Japanese gentlemen have fun, and most important I got to play LOTS of badminton and felt the touch coming back.... XD I LOVE badminton!! gotta steal Jessy's quote here: Love the game, love the people!!! No matter where I am. I also had 2 discoveries which caused me to think quite a bit of what I want to do with my life...
1) I found a perfect husband...... my friend Oota-san is SUPER nice, funny, cute, gentleman-like and cares a lot about his wife/children. And what ultimately made me think that he is a perfect husband is our conversation about our future dreams. The first time he said "I want my daughter to marry me when she grows up. I don't want her to like anyone else but me"... hehee I bet all dads think that... the second time, he said "I have one more dream. I hope I can play mixed doubles game with my family, me and my daughter against my wife and my son, and I win!" awwwwwww............ haha I want to marry someone who will say something like that. XD
2) I found a perfect job..... while talking to Yoshino-san, a guy who works for NTT Musashino R&D Lab, he told me there is a NTT Company team with a girls team (the one in Yokosuka doesn't have girls team). He told me to apply to NTT after I graduate, because there I can play lots of badminton while doing lots of work. When I told him I don't really like research, he said I can do development! hahah that is actually a very tempting offer... made me rethink about my decision of whether or not I want to work in Japan after I grad. But again.. I duno how true his words are given that he told me this during (the middle of) a nomikai... =P

and now I am depressed... =( After the camp I have become better friends with the NTT badminton peeps... Hira-san, Oota-san (aka dameningen), Aizawa-san, Sekiguchi-san and takahashi-san (aka coffee bean distributor)..... even tho I am missing Vancouver a lot, I will miss them soooo much after I return.... ~><~ I wish I could be at 2 places at once.......

Yoshino-san, whom I mentioned before, is actually the bronze medalist of the All Japan Masters 30+ Tournament.... THIRD in JAPAN 30+... that is so impressive. He invited me and Jenn to join the NTT team in a company tournament on Dec2nd. Unfortunately due to my stupid JLPT exam... I had to turn the offer down. =( I SO wanna play for NTT!!!!!!!! Why can't it be the week after... *cry*

I also got to meet Morita-san... who turns out to be a colleague of Shirley!! haha when i told him I went karaoke and shopping wiht Shirley he was so surprised... "wang-san desuka?" hehe... he looks a lot like Alvin he has a big nose also. LOL... and I bet you his badminton skills is not that much lower than Alvin either.

Badminton wise, I actually lost all my matches... LOL but I dun feel bad because I know I did my best. Man I got screwed over by my partner in a match cuz he kept calling the line out when it was actually in. -_-;; Anyway... the only annoying guy there was one person who kept on insisting in talkng to Jenn and I in english about American and his kids during the nomikai while everyone else was having fun.. -_-;; haha eventually Jenn and I just started ignoring him... lol.... but the worst part is he kept going "you were really good during the second set... only the second set". Almost pissed me off to the point where I wanted to say "Yeah, cuz you kept on screwing up in the other 2 sets.." GRRRrmm!!!!!!!! I had sooo much fun during the nomikai... I have a higher tolerance than I thought... drank some Hi's, some wine, some nihon shuu, then some Sake and in the end, I drank a whole bottle of 15% peach flavored sake and I was only a little high. -_-;; There are so many things I wanna blog about the nomikai.. XD
-Hira-san pretending to be a coffee bean distributor
-Hira-san imitating takahashi-san doing the hand thing... LOL
-Hira-san calling Oota-san "Dame ningen" (bad man) and Oota-san worrying that we think he is really a bad man.. XD
-Us janken-ing to see who gets to eat from the same cup noodle first
-Jenn getting drunk and start trying to get everyone else drunk
-Hira-san and his speech about badminton and turned into world peace when we started recording him
-Jenn coaxing Oota-san into chugging many glasses of alcohol... "Jennifer.. you are DEVIL!" *Jenn pours more alcohol into his cup* "No!!! Jennifer, you are ANGEL!" and finally, "I will go to hell!"
-Hira-san giving Oota-san the "hundred years of pain".... HAHAHA...
-Us piling slippers on Oota-san and taking pix pretending to step on him
-Sekiguchi-san chugging alcohol and saying "Oishii desu" *thumbs up*
-Hira-san and what he said to me during the nomikai... awww it was kinda touching... I cannot be more grateful that I have met such a great friend during my stay in Japan.

Also the talks about various things I had with Oota-san in the car while he was driving me and Jenn around... he told me a lot about himself, like how he met his wife, etc. I thought Japanese people are not so open in telling other ppl about their families, but I guess not all Japanese are like that. haha he is my "model perfect husband". Gotta find someone who is like him but does not work from 9am-11pm. hahaha... muzukashiinaa~

Pix to come...

合宿 Baddy Camp in 2 days XD

What the...
"The following message could not be delivered because you have exceeded the maximum number of messages per minute. Please try again later."
There IS such a limit to MSN?

Nothing much's been going on lately except I guess I'm concentrating on my japanese studies. I have taken notes on 100% of the kanji's, 70% of the vocabs, and 3/9 chapters for grammar. I have less than 20 days left. Come on Roz.. gotta work harder.

On a brighter note, it's MusashinoNTT Badminton camp this week which me, Jenn, Hira san and a few other friends are participating in. XD Camp will be 2 days long staying over near Tateyama in Chiba. I can't wait... there will be a banquet on saturday night too and probably Nomikai... XD The best part of it all : Jenn and I get our own room!!! Sweet!!! Hoping to take a break from studying and regain some badminton touch this weekend...