It finally happened, I finally fell into that moat on the side of the road that goes past the Palace Gardens. It hurt, but not that much. To be fair, I was attempting to swerve to avoid an elderly gentleman and went too far, and got a surprised look for my trouble. But the cheeky ojiisan didn't have to go back to get around the metal barriers between the pavement and the road, ans walk past me on the road itself like I was some kind of contagion. That stung. My DS lite, however, was completely unscratched, despite flying a few feet onto the roadside. Bless its little heart.
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In case you don't know, I turn 21 in... 3 hours and 10 minutes. I've been trying to make a big thing about this fact, as I'd rather such a momentous number did not pass by unheeded. So now you know. Current plans for tomorrow are to eat dinner, go bowling and eat parfait after lunch, though what order they occur in and when they occur at all is still a little up in the air.I'd also like to take this opportunity to thank God that my birthday landed on a half day, which is one off being a free day, and so a good day to have a birthday. Do have a small kanji test on Wednesday but... Nah, I'm beyond caring. I won't have that test until I turn 21, after all.
So, things that have happened. There are a lot, I have to say, as I have been slacking a little in the writing of the blog and current events backlog to a very eventful weekend-before-last.
So as the videos you may have seen on Facebook show, Friday night was a trip to an izakaya down on Sanjo for a drink as part of Level 3 - class 52. I didn't end up mentioning that I was in class 51, and nobody seemed to mind, so that was good. Good food and drink on offer, too. Can't remember the place's name, though.
I'd like to remind Fumi that cannibalism is outlawed in pretty much every country.
Then it was the weekend, and a trip to the busting trade city of Osaka, as of then unvisited. The party consisted of myself, Mark, Steph, Angela, Ben, and guest-starred Ben's friend Billy. After an early meeting down at the station, we all kintetsu'd our way to the central station (about 45 minutes) and started to search. We were searching for our first sight of the day: the Osaka Pokemon Center.
And what a beautiful haven that place is.
Unfortunately the video, for some daft reason, doubled up on itself, and so extends beyond the Facebook upload limit, and the video also contains stupidly added footage of me buying Louise's Christmas present. You'll have to take my word for it, I think. I'm going to be in the Tokyo one early January, so I'll be sure to get pictures.
And then it was off to explore the rest of Osaka. For those who don't know what it looks like:
So, things that have happened. There are a lot, I have to say, as I have been slacking a little in the writing of the blog and current events backlog to a very eventful weekend-before-last.
So as the videos you may have seen on Facebook show, Friday night was a trip to an izakaya down on Sanjo for a drink as part of Level 3 - class 52. I didn't end up mentioning that I was in class 51, and nobody seemed to mind, so that was good. Good food and drink on offer, too. Can't remember the place's name, though.
I'd like to remind Fumi that cannibalism is outlawed in pretty much every country.
Then it was the weekend, and a trip to the busting trade city of Osaka, as of then unvisited. The party consisted of myself, Mark, Steph, Angela, Ben, and guest-starred Ben's friend Billy. After an early meeting down at the station, we all kintetsu'd our way to the central station (about 45 minutes) and started to search. We were searching for our first sight of the day: the Osaka Pokemon Center.
And what a beautiful haven that place is.
Unfortunately the video, for some daft reason, doubled up on itself, and so extends beyond the Facebook upload limit, and the video also contains stupidly added footage of me buying Louise's Christmas present. You'll have to take my word for it, I think. I'm going to be in the Tokyo one early January, so I'll be sure to get pictures.
And then it was off to explore the rest of Osaka. For those who don't know what it looks like:
This was taken inside a ferris wheel that was place precariously at the top of a shopping center, and I think offers a great view of the city. It's all buildings, to put it simply, but it's very nice.
Other places of note were another shopping center with a superb roof garden*, a river surrounded by towering neon skyscrapers...
...and The Lockup.
Now, when you think of prison, you don't immediately think of good food and fine service, I'm sure, but this is what The Lockup, a prison-themed restaurant, was offering. The izakaya-style tables were each in little cells with bar doors, and the waitresses all wore police outfits or stripped uniforms. The food was similarly themed with jelly eyeballs on offer, takoyaki that come in batches of 6 with the catch being that one of them is 'poisoned' (i.e. really, really spicy). Oh, and there's a show, too; a show that a gleeful Angela told us was really, really scary, and all the Satoshi hats (which, by the way, look immense on me**) in the world could not defend me from my own cowardice.
When the zombie santas started fighting in the corridor I knew it wasn't as scary as perhaps it had been advertised. But it was outrageously funny.
Anyway, having missed the last train home thanks to lingering too long on desert and paying the bills, I made my way home on a borrowed bike and got a well-deserved rest. No, I did not have any nightmares.
What's next?
Okay, making a huge, uneventful leap forward to the following weekend (i.e. last one), we went off on another magical journey, this time back to Nara to meet up with Laura who was there visiting with her friends from Sophia Uni in Tokyo. Being a much soggier day than before the deers were taking shelter beneath trees, but we still have an ace time. We did, after all, finally get a chance to see Todaiji:
That place is huge!
Also wandered around Nara Park some more, seeing a Celebi shrine that did NOT take Laura forward in time, and then I got my hair cut. And then we went home, with the promise of seeing Laura the next day as she travelled to see Kyoto.
The next day arrived, and Laura came to Kyoto. Church in the morning, which was about the importance of cooperation, and then off on a whistle-stop tour of good things to see in Kyoto.
Well...
We saw SOME of them.
...
We went to the Manga Museum for the day...
But that place is great! Though they didn't have the elusive manga to the video game Baroque, they did seem to have everything else, including an exhibition on the ongoing rivalry between weekly magazines Shounen Magazine (School Rumble, Negima?!, Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei to name three) and Shounen Sunday (Urusei Yatsura, Cyborg 009, Ranma 1/2 to do likewise) which was pretty interesting even if my lack of knowledge on earlier mangas made me feel like something of a pretender. We also got our caricatures done by a training manga artist, and wow:
Special kudos to Mark's picture, which looks so much like him it is in-SANE! To even manage to get our clothes right! We were all massively impressed!
Then we had an infinite cake buffet in a VERY posh hotel just opposite the station, and spent the rest of the afternoon in SofMap, where I may well be returning tomorrow to pick up an iPod nano (Green).
After bidding goodbye to Laura at the station, we started on our next big adventure: the last chance to see the Kobe Illumination before it ends for the year. Meeting up with Stephanie where we parted ways with Laura, we took the underground to Karasuma, then the Hankyu to Umeda, then the Kintetsu to Kobe. And by this time it was nearly time for the lights to go off, which we have previously Wikipedia'd as 10pm. So, a hasty dinner of tempura and raw egg (...) and off to the streets of Kobe, where we happened upon Deus Ex Akka who guided us the rest of the way. Then we saw the lights... I advise you watch to the end of this one, if none other, as it's quite funny what happens:
Curse you, Wikipedia!
Anyway, we got back at very late o'clock, and then it was off to bed for me.
And now it's... 2 hours and 20 minutes to my birthday.
I'm glad I've caught up, that's a big pressure of my mind. Now all that's left in exam season, Society essay and Linguistics dissertation...
Good job getting so far! Thanks for reading!
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じゃ、何を書きたいかな？
えーとっ。
ああ！アニメ！
今シーリーズを３つ楽しんでいる。「てがみバチ」はファンタシーの郵便局についてアニメで、心の銃があって、すごく面白いだよ！ギーシュは特に面白い！それで、「空中ブランコ」は偏心な精神科医についてだ。ちょ現実離れしたけど、素晴らしいアニメだ！最後は「戦う司書」で、魂の本を守る司書についてアニメだ。アックションはすげえ！
えーとっ。
ああ！アニメ！
今シーリーズを３つ楽しんでいる。「てがみバチ」はファンタシーの郵便局についてアニメで、心の銃があって、すごく面白いだよ！ギーシュは特に面白い！それで、「空中ブランコ」は偏心な精神科医についてだ。ちょ現実離れしたけど、素晴らしいアニメだ！最後は「戦う司書」で、魂の本を守る司書についてアニメだ。アックションはすげえ！
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