写真：井の頭公園、石打丸山、新宿の月、不細工なクッキーシリーズ

上野、新潟など

１６・１２
リエさん一家とミバイオリン+ピアノニコンサートに行った。久々に生音楽を聴けなくて乾くなったような気がする
バイオリンの音は人間の声のようだ常に思う。演奏者の感情を明白に表さなければならないから、
どっちかというとやっぱり繊細なピアノが好き～
最後はメグミとタタル先生の写真を撮って、豚カツをご馳走してくれた（いつも有難うございました！）

１９－２７・１２
カレシがわたしに会いに来た。いろんな場所に足を運んだ＞
ポムのき
井の頭公園、自然動物園、ジブリ美術館、珈琲散歩、せいゆう＜これは何度も。。。
六本木ミッドタウンイルミネーション、２１－２１Ｄｅｓｉｇｎ　Ｓｉｇｈｔ、六本木ヒルズ、ＨＡＲＢＳ
東京江戸建物園、小金井公園、藪かんだ、御茶の水、表参道ヒルズ
新潟越後湯沢、石打丸山スキー場
新宿御園と新宿ショッピング
東京現代美術館、サクラカフェ、池袋
吉祥寺猫カフェ、玉子という猫がすんごいかわいい

など

東京を大満喫！
でも、なんと都内で定番のような場所に出かけるより、ゲストハウスに籠もったほうが楽しかったと思う。
新宿と池袋が嫌い。わたしはショッピングに向いていないからなあ。

渋谷、川崎

last sat night i went to a party in shibuya (Shouta the shikai told me about it). seems that people knew each other thru mixi.

people are young, and nice. but it's quite unnatural for me to know people in this way, because after exchanging factual information with each other we wont keep contact in the future.

what concerns me is someone, a gaikokujin, was talking about his experience in dealing with japanese people becuase he has been residing in tokyo for 6 years. and he said, dont be too close with japanese people, they dont treat you as friends blah blah.

i was zutto thinking about it until Monday, すっごい気になる you know. then a friend called and i kind of brought it up in the convo, he was like 'おお間違ったよ, イチゴイチエと聞いたことがあるでしょう？...etc'　

確かに聞いたことがあるけど、でもかれはわたしの語学力を買いかぶってるみたい...anyway i feel better now

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sunday, visit yoshiko san's home office in kawasaki for the whole day

too comfortable as an office, and the house is playing ed gerhard's music?!

yoshiko-san prepared food for us:

creamy corn soup (with beans, ew)

various sandwiches

orange pepper, sour cream on papurika

we made the christmas cake and cookie from mujirushi package, decorate the tree (real tree), cut leaves from tree and hand-made the xmas ornament

at the same time i got 2 christmas presents...plus a bottle of 日本酒 .Yoshiko san said i can have it with Snail next week. i did not bring anything, so sorry...

高尾山、神田、御茶ノ水、六本木、渋谷

高尾山: it's raining on Sat, and not much momiji left -_-

anyway

i like hiking and in i've hiked once in switzerland with snail, that view is stunning

Ochanomizu: Oh WOW! so many musical instruments shop! i'm as excited as the first time when i saw so many made in japan FOOD in seiyu supermarket. 1 shop only sells violin, 1 shops only sells wind instruments. whole floor sells percussion. whole shop is full of books about instrument playing/magazine.

if nz is boring for me, i can start learning guitar and occupy myself with it - not bored/lonely, no more! that's what suddenly comes to my mind when i was alone in Yasu's house playing around with his broken string guitar.

my idol ashin said, the sound of guitar comes from a seed and is amplified - a seed grows to be a tree, and we cut the tree and use the wood to make various things. (he's just a guy with these kind of 浪漫的 thoughts)

after ochanomizu i went to roppongi as a pre-trip, to prepare snail's tokyo visit. fantastic architecture as a shopping mall - but nothing particularly exciting.

then then then, yatto Monday and i had dinner with isa and greg and their 'significant others'.

(Isa and I)

i'm not sure what will happen to the 3 parties this coming weekend. majiyabai, especially the Sun night one. i'm quite shocked after knowing that i'm only 3 degree away with ashin (sharon<->circus<->mayday), and also 3 degrees away from Khalil Fong, this time...the 6 degrees of separation theory is so true.

上野動物園、アイスホッケー、六義園

yesterday y-san was flying to shanghai (finally), and m-san has already left arrived in taiwan and started her exciting wahori life in taiwan.
it's much easier to say, oh i'm leaving coz studying abroad . but these 2 are on all by themeslves and have nearly nothing paving ahead yet.
i wish them good luck in wherever shanghai/hong kong/taiwan.

last night i went to rokugien:
http://www.tokyo-park.or.jp/park/format/info031.html

there is light up until 13 dec, so people can look at the momiji at night. I want to bring Snail to see it but he’s not here til 19th
anyway I like the garden and fallen leaves. The garden is quiet at night and it looks different in the dark, more ochitsuku, more odayaka. You can only see the star-shapes of momiji if there is no lamp under the trees. it’s so quiet that you can only hear the sound of water, and ~sala sala~ when the leaves are falling when there is wind. they play some traditional Japanese(Chinese?) music to match the mood of garden though. There is a green tea/okashi tuckshop there but it’s close at 6pm. The shopkeeper is nonbiri drinking matcha and looking at the view for a long time.

This reminds me of the small park near the hk office in lan kwai. Once I was reading some novels (Japanese novels...) in the park, and the cleaning man was sweeping away yellow fallen leaves every 30 mins.
Then I said to him, why don't you just leave it there? Isn’t it beautiful.
He said, no, we have to clear it.
… (ten ten ten)

Tomorrow trying to make it to takao mountain. I planned to go last week but suddenly made some new friends (super nice people) in the shared kitchen and we went to ueno park and saw ice hockey in dydo ice rink.
Ice hockey is such a kakkoii sports. cheering girls are cute (orz).
New friends futari: shouta is a funny guy, he is similar to my another friend Dickson (now the policeman) in hk – in the way they talk and think. as he’s learning singing I wonder if he’s a singer as brilliant as D.
Hiko is a guy who likes European movies, we are anti Hollywood together laa (哼, they produce mo liu movies)

日本語クラスの皆さんはどんのような週末を過ごしいましたか？
ご一報くださいね＾＾

赤羽、川崎、吉祥寺

basically everyday work with one wonderful colleague, after work sometimes cook dinner, sometimes stay in shibuya for a bit, and since i received a bicycle from a friend i tried to practise everyday (but so lazy now...)

(my temporary bicycle)

Rie kindly asked me to have shabushabu at her home near Akabane on Friday so i went (hai yorokonde).

(Rie's dog, Shibaken, his name is Hills )

I'm surprised that her daughter is a very good 13-year old girl, maybe i'm assuming anyone who like chinese poems and bands are good people. she practise horse riding and basketball before, and she's learning violin now. As we both like Higashino Keiko, i would try to look for Onda Riku, which is another writer that she likes. the feeling of getting recommendations on books, from a girl who's so much younger than me, is kind of 不思議.

And needless to say Mr & Mrs Onuki are super duper nice people, they gave me Curry and instant soup this time (everyone gives me food here! thanks!)

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28 Nov Sat
I already knew Yoshiko-san for 3 years i believed. During work we dont chat much though - but i always imagined her to be a 穏やかな女性.

午後二時に川崎駅に待ち合わせ。Yoshiko-san and Mayumi-san came and they are in beautiful Kimono (!)(oh so sorry i was in jeans)

Yoshiko-san is an elegant and soothing lady. i think all guys would like her. Mayumi-san is a cute girl. I really like them ^^
they showed me a bit around town - we went to a temple called 川崎大師, drank amazake in a shop, and then chat a little bit in a cafe.






(cat in 川崎大師 temple, pls check out the cat on left hand side)







(the 2 ladies in Kimono )








then at night 7pm i went back to kichijyouji (due to my packed schedule, Dai Lo Chris Anderson will start calling me Paris Hilton now...) to meet another person that i worked with, Mr Richard Mort, his wife Kaori-san and their son Leo.











Leo is the cutest baby i've ever seen- sorry to other babies. he's as cute as mason moon on facebook. and he really looks bit like Maggie's girl Haley.

never cries, VERY cute, not hitomishiri, always smiling
he will grow up to be a cute samurai after 10 years

Inokashira Koen

when I walked out of home heading to the station on Sunday I passed the park
WOW coz I love parks this one is amazing! I'm sure Roy san has the same feeling too
Ducks swimming in the river, trees are super tall, many leaves turn into red already.

横浜、原宿、渋谷

今週は仕事忙しいから、夜に遊ぶ時間が作れなくて残念。

ただし、なんとなく木曜にイザベラとリエと食事してた、横浜にある和食レストランに。
話にほんとうに夢中になって、気が付くともう夜十二時。。。赤坂への終電に間に合わなかった（泣）。

イザベラがうちに泊まればっ？て言ってくれたけど、結局渋谷でタクシーを拾って無事にホテルまで戻りました。

そして今日はハッピーなホテルライフを終わり、井の頭公園のゲストハウスに移り。

朝引越手続きを済ませた後、ヤスは東京に遊びに来て、８年ぶりの原宿竹下通りへ行きたいから、ちょっとだけそこに遊んでた。それから渋谷に、わたしは無理やりヤスをパチンコにさせた（ゴメンな！）。でも自分でこう一やってもパチンコは何か面白いかわかんない。。。
そしてしゃぶしゃぶ食べ放題でした。

ロイさんは高尾山をすすめたから、明日行きたいけど無理かもしれない。さっき天気が崩れる予報が出たから。

それではまた、おやすみ＾＾

Italian dinner with Rie Onuki san

Seafood dish, in a pizza restaurant called Sabatini (in Aoyama? went there by a car not sure where it is...)

having "dolce"

Rie Onuki san is a funny, talkative and nice person. We talked about everything in general, from work to family, recipes and books (and people will look down on you if you hold a car number plate which shows a non tokyo district?!). I'm surprised that she likes classical music and recently is obsessed with Prokofiev ^^ She kindly asked me to go to a piano/violin duet in Dec.

it's also good to talk to people who are not japanese teacher, coz teachers are alert and tend to speak in an easy-to-understand way. although Sazaki sensei denied totally that she has chosen words/phrase when speaking to students.

saa... I'm not sure it will be that easy for me to travel without friends' help like what I am receiving here. In NZ I have 1 and the only kiwi friend -Caption Cook, who's physically in HK. So it will be harder for me. Anyway, it's hard so that's why it's fun !

office building

Chiba, Omotesando Hills

omodesanto hills

such a big house!

kirakira river in the park

and I got an email reply from my honorable "friend" from hokkaido.

follow and study japanese monkeys in snow mountain in Aomori sounds great, but I'm not sure if i have the time to join...

First entry

Saturday afternoon my friend Yasu picked me up at the airport and we went to Aeon to have crepe and coffee, it's been a while that we haven't seen each other.

And then I visited his family in Sammu, Chiba. The house is so big...so many rooms, with pine tree in round shape. They have a rice and vegetable field, garage, dog's home, store room for new rice for sale, and a small dark room, which if you did something wrong as a kid you will be put in there overnight (I called it the 反省room)

The family prepared yakiniku and beer to welcome me (-_- feel so 申し訳ない). After yakiniku we chat a little bit with legs in kotatsu, like about farming, New York, the cold lemon tea phenomena in hk. Also "interpret" on the phone JP<>Cantonese for Yasu about his work.

Next day after the breakfast I played with their pet – a big dog called Terry. He's a well behaved dog. We were giving him dog biscuit and played the 'matte-yoshi' game. It understands both 'matte' and 'yoshi' *amazing*

After that I strolled along the fields and the park nearby. The park is really big, ducks are sunbathing, kids are having soccer competition, basketball competition, elderly are playing 'old style' golf, there is a river running along, a large piece of grassland, kids were playing on the swing and samazama na facilities - ok the park itself is like the telford garden + amoy plaza.

I went back and the super kind family stuffed me lots of snacks and a letter before I went to the train station. Then I took the train to Tokyo and reached the hotel Rie booked for me.
Again it’s so orz and申し訳ない, the hotel is a big one, with a green and red Christmas tree light decoration on the wall. 5 mins walk to the office.

The office is a nice building, with small but well equipped service office.
And now I’m sitting in the same room with Isa, she’s selling jobs on the call.