I have some catching up to do! Toyota Bon Odori!

Well lets get to the dirt shall we! It is long overdue!

Great intro huh?

So in the middle of Obon Vacation, I took a trip to a small village near Toyota, where Sayaka's friend Sayuri lives, and we went to a Bon Odori dance festival. This was probably my 3rd one this summer, but definitely the most memorable.

I got to see Sayaka in her yukata for the first time and she was amazingly beautiful! I wore my jinbei because I didn't want to struggle with my own yukata that day.

We headed on the subway from Tsurumai to the nearest station where we were picked up by Sayuri after she got off from work.

When we arrived to Sayuri's house, their friend Miyo was waiting for us. We all entered the house and the girls changed into their yukata, and Sayuri's mother helped Sayaka fix her obi (cloth that wraps around the waist). Sayuri's mom was sooo sweet and polite to me, as she likes foreigners and even hosts exchange students or people doing homestays there, so I felt super comfy being there.

We went to the festival, and saw that Sayuri's brother, who is very good with English might I add, was the leader of this year's festival (I think he is every year though haha). Not only that but Sayuri is in charge of the dancing, so she gets to go up on stage and dance all night!

Sayaka and I kicked back and ate free kakigori (think snow cone in a cup), drank free beer, and watched everyone have a ton of fun!

Some old man came to me and pretty much forced me to go down and dance and Sayaka joined me. While he escorted us he said I should give a speech and started laughing and whisked away! Uh oh...

Before we even made a complete circle, the man was back, to grab my arm and take me to a microphone! What!?!?! Was he serious?!?!? I watched the probably 100 or so people at this festival and then the music stopped and all eyes were up on the stage area. The man gave an intro in Japanese, gave me the mic and said in his best english "For Los Angeles!". Wait, how did he know I was from near there?!?

I can't remember what I said, but everyone clapped and cheered at my horrid Japanese speech. After that, I was asked to give a speech in English too! All I know is, Sayaka said my Japanese speech was MUCH better. Oh god...

After my speech, the village elders (for lack of a better term) scurried to me to give me some of their sake they had ( presented in a white bag, kinda like how people brown bag it back home). They even had some appetizers from their plates that they shared with me. LUCKY!

Then it came time for the games! We had to pass out fans, with numbers on them. They would draw numbers, and whoever's number was called, would win a prize. Prizes ranged from Nintendo DSs, air conditioners, down to a 24 pack of soda or Pocari Sweat! I was asked to help hand out flyers, since I was a friend of Sayuri's and when I grabbed a handful of fans, I literally had about 80% of the people there form a line in front of ME, when there were at LEAST 9 other people passing out fans! I had people screaming "Tommy-chan!" with their hands out stretched to get a fan from me. Now I know what a celebrity feels like!

After the drawing and all of the prizes were handed out, it was time to clean up and start the nomikai (drinking party!!!)!!!

All of the young people involved, met up after changing into some regular clothes, at a huge room near where the festival was held, and we had ourselves a fine nomikai! Sayuri, Sayaka, and I made a trip to the conbini to buy some more alcohol, and food for me (since I can't eat the fish!). When we arrived, there were maybe, 16 people there. We did our initial compai (cheers) and started eating and drinking. This was pretty much all in Japanese, and if there was any troubles, Sayaka became a translator. I hade someone (Hyde-kun) show me some Japanese jokes, that I only laughed at one. I made a fool out of myself with some chocolate covered strawberry candy, that made everyone laugh (Oh Pink! You had to be there...)and we made initial plans for our NINIKU TOUR! (Garlic Tour!). Hyde went to somewhere in the Gifu prefecture, that has garlic everything on their menu, and I am a HUGE fan of garlic (ask Sayaka, haha...).

This party started around 10PM or so, where I even got a call from my mom near the beginning (I was still sober!), and it ended around, hell I don't know! All I know is I couldn't stay awake much longer, and the last time I saw the clock, it was 5:50AM! Someone woke us up at 7AM to start cleaning the mess, and that took around 20 minutes or so! Afterwards, we said our goodbyes and we were off on our own ways!

Sayuri drove Sayaka and I to the station again, and we made our long sleepy train ride back to Shin-Moriyama station, where we walked back to our apartment. I seriously think we slept about 14 hours after that, but it was much needed after such a great day (2 days?)!


Sayaka "dancing" by herself!


Sayaka and I waiting for the train to the village!


Getting the special stash of sake from the village elders!


The only thing better than kakigori, is FREE kakigori!


Haha! Sayuri's mom wanted to take a pic with me!

I've been quiet, but I am alive, well and happy!

Bought tickets to California last week, going to a wedding party tomorrow, Mexican food tonight, Turkish food 2 nights ago, life is just great as usual! I promise something more interesting. I have quite a bit on my backlog to write about...

It's official! I got the days off for California!

Short and sweet. Days are official from my company, and we just need to buy tix to Cali. 2 more months!!! This will come quick!

A day at the beach, onsen, then Toyota Oiden Matsuri (a summer festival)

Now I am about to be extra lazy and paste this from my mixi diary, so I apologize in advance for anything that doesn't make sense!

So yeah my first journal is about my day at Shiomi beach in Shizuoka with Sayaka, Naomi, and Maki! Sorry, it is in English!

I woke up at 5AM in the morning so I could leave Shin Moriyama at 6AM, to get to Akaike by 7. When I arrived, I was picked up by Maki, Naomi, and Sayaka, after a short wait.

We went to the conbini to pick up something to eat and drink, and headed on our way to the beach!

The drive didn't seem too long because it was a very fun and INTERESTING drive, which made the time just FLY!

Upon arriving at the beach, we didn't see too many waves, which we needed for body boarding, but we did see many people in the water with surfboards! This was interesting to me, because in California, if there aren't any waves, no one even tries to get in the water. Things are different here. People would wait for the tiniest wave to ride it, for a few seconds, then go back out into the water. Weird...

While watching the girls body board, I took the chance to snap some pics of the beach and them while the rode the waves. Oh yeah, which reminds me, the water was very shallow here. When it was my turn to body board, without flippers mind you, I would go out as far as them, and when I would try to kick, without flippers again, my knees would touch bottom! I am too tall, or the beach is WAY too shallow!

When Sayaka came back from bodyboarding, her and I decided to play and walk on the beach, when I saw something interesting on the ground. I instantly recognized it as the weirdest, largest jellyfish I have seen with my bare eyes! It was a weird blue color and definitely still breathing! I took pics to compare it to Sayaka's feet, because it was definitely large! (hmmm not saying her feet are large at all!). We wrote "Kurage desu yo!" in the sand and an arrow pointing to it with some sticks we got, but I skipped a very important part before this.

Sayaka had to relieve some aggression with the sticks we found. She was stabbing the hell out of the poor fish as it lied stranded on the beach! But karma got her back, and she got a splinter that I had to operate on for a while. She said she learned her lesson though!

After operating on her finger, we went back to the water and played around for a bit before returning to the car to head to an onsen to wash up and relax after the beach! That will be in another diary!

Enjoy the pics!

To continue the line of "Went to the/a/an" from this weekend, I went to my first onsen after going to the beach.

We were all covered in sea salt, and sand, and saw an onsen on our way to the beach, that we said we would go to, so we did!

This was my first onsen experience, so I didn't know what to expect.

We bought our tickets, just 550 yen, and headed to the changing rooms. I realized I left my towel in the car, and had to go get some rental towels to use, 150 yen lost!

I went to the changing room, the remove all the crap (aka, clothing) on me, and headed to go wash myself. This was incredibly interesting to say the LEAST. Bathing in front of other bathing older men, interesting...

After a quick shower, I headed to a bath with jets like a jacuzzi, that was around 39.4 degrees. I stayed there until 1:30PM, around 20 minutes, knowing we planned to all meet at 1:30, but also knowing the girls wouldn't get out at 1:30 themselves. I was right. When I got out I put in 300\ for a massage chair, and didn't see Sayaka until I was about 10 minutes into it.

When everyone arrived, we drank some juice, and coffee, then ate the onsen's food. Everything we ate was VERY good, but the naan curry I got, everyone said, looked like microwaveable food. Sooo sad!

There are no pictures of this event, but expect some for the Toyota Oiden Matsuri fireworks! Coming soon!

After the onsen, we dropped Naomi off, and Maki drove us to meet Sayaka's mom at a conbini, where we put our stuff into her car and drove near Toyota station.

When we parked, we headed to a place that I believe is famous for kakigori, and ate some. It was SOOOOO good! There, I saw the cutest old lady, who was working so hard to clean the tables, take orders, and take people's food to their tables! I wanted to take pictures with her, but she told Sayaka "30 years ago she would have done it" Haha!

After kakigori, we went to look for a place to sit and watch the fireworks. We walked sooo far, and Sayaka's mom was soooo fast, but we finally caught up with her and started turning left to find that perfect spot.

After a while, and not far from where we ended up watching, Krystin, who works with me, ran up and said hi to Sayaka, her mom, and I. Apparently her friend said "Hey there is a foreigner, do you know him?" and she was surprised to find out she did know me! What were the chances?

We were getting hungry so we saw a place that had okonomiyaki (DAISUKI!!!) and yakisoba! We went inside and ordered beer and tea for mama, and then ordered our okonomiyaki! Unfortunately though, the grill was so small, we couldn't have okonomiyaki, because everyone was getting yakisoba! GRRR! So we ate yakisoba, and Sayaka and I agreed, we can make better stuff at home! Thanks to mama for the food and drinks! ご馳走様でした！(maybe that is the right kanji...分からん！）

After eating and drinking, we went outside to watch another great year of Toyota's fireworks.

We began to leave early so we can ditch the crowds, and not get stuck waiting at the station, and we drove to the station, where her mom dropped us off.

We got lucky and boarded the first train and made it all the way to Tsurmai, then Shin Moriyama, but we were SOOOO tired!!!

Such a great day!

Went to a local school Summer festival!

By local, I mean across from my apartment complex!

Sayaka and I saw a bunch of kids in yukata when we walked to go get lunch, so we realized there was a festival going on at the elementary school across from me.

After our great Saizeriya lunch (cheap and delicious!) we headed home quick, so I could grab my camera and take pics of the event.

When we got there I wanted to just walk around and scope out what was going on there.

There were games for kids, food stands, and a lot of people doing Bon Odori around a stage in the center. I decided to pull my camera out once the lighting was right, and got several beautiful shots at night of the events.

There isn't much to be said, than to be seen, so please, enjoy the pictures!







For more check here!

Today is the day I met Sayaka's parents...

I mentioned it in yesterday's blog, but today was D-day for meeting her parents.

She wanted me to meet her parents because she wants them to know how much she cares about me, and wants her parents to know we are serious (I am the first boyfriend to be introduced. And I am a foreigner! Oh noes!)!

It started out as just her mom and us, but her dad joined the itinerary last week. Sayaka got super nervous, I remained calm. She never had a good relationship with her dad and this news was a shock to her, that he wanted to join. I kept telling her he wants to do it because he loves her, and after today, I can see that.

We were late (as usual) to getting to the meeting place between Shin Moriyama and Toyota (Akaike), but when we arrived her parents were already waiting for us in their car. For what will be the most hilarious first comment I have ever received from anyone, her mom shouted "His face is small!". Mind you, every bit of conversation during this meeting, was in Japanese, unless between Sayaka and I.

We drove to Pastel, which is a Japanese Italian restaurant, where we KIND of planned to eat, I think. When we got there, Sayaka's mom, Sayaka, and I exited the car, so her dad could park, and we put our names down to be seated. It was a short wait, and all of us were seated to begin ordering.

We started with drinks. Sayaka and her mom, tea, Sayaka's dad and I, beer. We ordered our food, which came with all you can eat pizza (and majorly AWESOME pizza if I may add), and our drinks came and we did our compai cheers and began drinking. Our first pizza came and I was amazed at how good it was. Soon after, the cesar salad I ordered (yeah, I eat veggies now! Thank Sayaka for that!), and then the pasta. Now that the food came, it was time for what should have been awkward, the during meal conversation... DUN DUN DUN!!!

The conversation ranged from many things, mostly her father asking me a ton of questions, and her mom making a lot of funny comments. I was asked how long I plan on staying in Japan, if Sayaka could cook, am I happy with Sayaka living with me, did I have any problems with work with her living with me, can Sayaka REALLY cook, what do I need if I travel outside of Japan (?) and a few other questions. One funny moment came when I told them I love Japanese sports cars, and owned a 300ZX (I had to say Fairlady Zeto though), and her dad asked me if I used to drive my girlfriend in it. Her mom then jumped in and said I drove my grandma in it, then did an action of what it would look like for an old woman to be in a fast car, and then she just said, in English "Heaven! Heaven!", which seriously made me laugh my ass off! I don't know if it was the beer and being drunk, or what, but that was just hilarious to me!

It was funny during the meal, because I got full, and her mom and dad kept wanting me to eat and drink beer, and Sayaka was saying they want me to keep going because they don't like me, and they both kept correcting her and saying they liked me. This made me feel completely good and comfortable being there with their family. They seemed to really like me, and I could see it in Sayaka's face for the rest of the day, that she was insanely happy with the lunch date.

After eating, we went to pay, but I had to go to the bathroom first, you know, all the beer. When I came out though, Sayaka was waiting for me at the table, and her mom and dad went to go pay! Not only that, but her dad bought us some cake and pudding! Score, I am sooo in now!

Afterwards, her dad was too drunk to drive, so her mom drove us to the nearest station, and that became the official end of our lunch date.

I keep telling Sayaka how important it was for me to meet her family, and they both made me feel soooo great, regardless of the language and culture difference. They really made me feel comfortable, and I never felt awkward at all, not even when Sayaka went to go to the restroom. Interestingly, she told me it was silent whenever I would go to the bathroom! Too funny!

Just another notch on the ladder of my amazing life, that I am soooo thankful for. Thanks to Sayaka, her mom and father for such a great day. I am still smiling because of that!

Typhoon fever!

So last night a typhoon came through Aichi and Nagoya, and right over little old Shin-Moriyama!

The winds were HARD! The rain was constant! People everywhere stayed in their homes.

Sayaka and I did too!

We were supposed to have plans today, to go meet her parents (my first time meeting them!), but because of the rain we decided to cancel our plans and change the day until Monday instead.

Last night we went to 7-11 and saw a Nintendo DS on a display case and Sayaka mentioned she wanted one. So we came home and started looking on many websites, to find one for her AND I. I wanted a blue one (of course) and she wanted a pink one (of course). We found out buying one in Japan would be MUCH cheaper and quicker than ordering one from the US. I thought the Nintendo DS shortage was still going on here. To my surprise, we found a LOT of them online, but we had to get them in colors we ma not have liked. So I told her we would check the nearest department store, Apita, tomorrow and see if we can find one for us. She wants to use it so we can both study English, Japanese, and kanji together. Me too, but I also want to play some Mario and Final Fantasy games!

So today we go to Apita, around noon to find the DS, and we see they have them in every color and a lot in stock! We are definitely getting our DSs today! Or are we?

Sayaka reads a sign that says they have the Nintendo Wii in stock. I am shocked because there has been a shortage of Wii in Japan as well. I think nothing of it and we look at DS games. While we are looking at the DS games, Sayaka mentioned we could get a Wii instead, for both of us! S we go look at the games for the Wii, and realize it would be a LITTLE more getting a Wii and games, than 2 DSs and games. We can't decide and we decide to go walk around and look at different things before making a decision.

We make our way back to Apita after 30 minutes or so, buy some new bed sheets and pillow cases, buy some White Zinfandel and plum wine, and yes, we did, bought our Nintendo Wii together! We got Wii Sports and Hajimete Wii (Which comes with a controller) and we also got two remote cases to we know which one belongs to who?

So now, not only do I own all next gen systems AGAIN, I have a Nintendo Wii to play with my girlfriend whenever we have free time! Which interestingly enough will be all day today, and tomorrow night!

Maybe I will update on how that goes and maybe add some pictures later!

Oh yeah for those interested in how much weight I have lost. I weighted myself today and found out I weigh 84 kg which translates to 185lbs for my friends in america. I weight around 225 or so when I got here, so here I am 40lbs LESS than I was when I got here. Gotta love the Japan diet plan!

My birthday in Tokyo!!! part 3

Part 3 concludes the great weekend I had in Tokyo last week for my bday and it will be a quick highlight of a day at Disney Sea with Sayaka.

-Seeing her soooo happy to be there made me happy. She was like a kid smiling ALL day long. Nothing could take the happiness away from her on this day.

-We saw soooo many kids, and we both LOVE kids, so it was a very good day to enjoy all of the kids smiling and having a great time like us. We also made it interesting by saying "Chance!" to each other when we saw a baby or child wasn't being too well guarded by their parent, followed by a katakana Englished "Geto!" if we realized we could have gotten away with the chance at the baby. Weird, I know...

-Flavored popcorn. Anyone who has been to Disney Sea recently knows about this. We did black pepper, caramel, and strawberry, ranked in order of preference. We also bought a souvenir cup for it!

-Sayaka's reaction to Journey to the Center of the Earth after we went on it. She was totally loving the slow pace, then it got scary looking, then it went fast! I felt kind of bad for not setting it up properly because I don't think she expected all of that...

-Sayaka's reaction to Tower of Terror. This was just great. She said she didn't want to go on it, but because she loves me and wanted me to go on it, she went. After the intro, she got a bit scared and contemplated backing out, but like a trooper, stuck it out until the end! It took a while to get her out of her seat, and the look of her when we saw the picture was great. I was super proud of her for forgetting her fear and going on this and KIND of enjoying it, haha!

-Her and I rode the gondolas for our first time and it was fun! Both of the men on the boat were funny to watch or listen to, and we had great timing for the volcano to do it's thing and kind of delay the boat ride, because we couldn't hear anything else!

-This "parade" they had on the water at the front of the park was AMAZING. It is like a boat floating on the water, with beautiful lights and water spouts! Then a mechanical dragonish thing comes out and shoots fire in a beautiful way. Then they "fight" for lack of a better term, and it all ends in a great finale! Sayaka and I were floored by this show and all of the effects it had to offer!

-The ride home was scary! Luckily Sayaka was able to sleep through most of it, but I got ZERO sleep! The driver drove sooo fast and what felt, recklessly, and it was RAINING! I couldn't sleep much anyway, but I really couldn't sleep in this weather!

Overall this was a great weekend and I started my new year of life off in many great ways! I could spend my first birthday in Japan with an amazing woman! I ate 4 salads in the 3 day span. 4 more salads than I have eaten in my life. True story...

Too much fun, and I await Sayaka's bday and both of ours for next year. Thanks to Sayaka for making it a great weekend and planning things ahead of time, making our trip easy and convenient!

Until next time!

My birthday in Tokyo!!! part 2

So the trip to Krispy Kreme...

We find the way to Krispy Kreme but since it is too early, the easy way through the department stores are all closed off now, so we have to go a bit out of the way to reach our destination,but who cares, we are eating Krispy Kreme!!! Or are we...?

We get to Krispy Kreme and Sayaka can see a few people already in line, and I tell her, this will be normal, maybe we will wait 30 minutes or so to get to the front. MAYBE... So yeah, I will kill any suspense I could build and say, the wait was an HOUR AND A HALF and we decided to KILL that thought! We got some pictures of the wait time sign, and some sad faces from Sayaka.

When this was a bust, we took the train to Shimbashi, then the tram monorail thingy to Odaiba. On Odaiba, we went to my favorite burger place Kua'Aina, where Sayaka ate a burger bigger than her face, but mine was a bit larger. We sat and enjoyed the view and the food, and shared several laughs while we ate. Afterwards we checked out a few shops and I had to get a Cinnabon after that. I have been to Tokyo and Odaiba 4 times now, and I NEVER get Cinnabon, but this time I did, and it was great! The only thing is, it tasted like the frosting was kept inside of a plastic tube instead of being made fresh like in America. Oh well though!

Afterwards we went to the Fuji TV building, after postponing our check-in time for our hotel in Otsuka (my fav hotel to stay at in Tokyo, because it is big and cheap), and had a great quick tour of the place. We took some silly pictures (as always) and saw a show being filmed live, which was pretty exciting!

After the quick trip we made an even quicker trip to Venus Fort, but were distracted in front of it, when we saw little kids jumping on this bungee/trampoline combo, it was too cute to pass up! The kids kept getting smaller and smaller, and braver than the kid before them! We seriously watched them for a good 25 - 30 minutes before we finally entered Venus Fort.

When we got inside we did a quick tour of the place, and looked at some place to have a pretty cool small, intimate wedding, for friends and family. Ceremony and party included, and it was pretty affordable! Hmmmm...

We finished Venus Fort, and headed to Otsuka to check in, shower, and rest before our birthday dinner plans at TGIFridays. We kind of overslept and had to rush to Shibuya to find TGIFridays and I was relying on my SINGLE trip to there long ago to find the place, but I lead us right to there like I have been there a hundred times. Thank my photographic memory! We got there and ordered our drinks and food super quick and took pictures with some candles that said "26" that Sayaka bought (though I held them wrong once, and it said 62...). When the drinks and food came, her and I began enjoying a ton of amazing food! We had chicken quesadillas, which Sayaka fell in love with, blackened chicken cesar salad, which was AMAZING, and fried mozzarella! We ordered our second drinks and were definitely barely drunk, and we also got a order of chicken alfredo, that we HARDLY ate because we were STUFFED. By the time we finished our second drinks, we were past drunk and just taking a lot of interesting pictures and videos of us at our table... So of course I ordered a pina colada for us to share. After embarrassing ourselves to the people who sang happy birthday to me, we had to go to Shinjuku to try to find the bus that dropped us off in Tokyo, because I left a bag with presents ands cards from my office and a couple of students!

The guy on the bus luckily called us and said we left something, but that he also couldn't explain to us where he would be. Sayaka said we should walk up the road he dropped us off, but it went off in 2 directions, so I was wondering where we would go. She guessed right, and what would you know, we found him in the bus, and he gave us my stuff! It was funny though, he would not accept our money as a token of thanks, and just told us to use his bus again the next time we go to Tokyo. I think we just might!

We returned to the hotel after an amazingly fun, drunk, lucky night and slept it off until the next morning to check-out, and go to Disney Sea!

My birthday in Tokyo!!! part 1

My first birthday in Japan will go down in history as the best birthday of my life!

Got Saturday off of work so Sayaka and I can take an overnighter bus to Tokyo!
all of my classes went soooo fast and sooner than later, I was changing my clothes in the storage room of our office and running to the subway to meet Sayaka in Nagoya!

We found each other near the clock in Takashimaya and went to go buy chu-hai and McDonalds. The McDonalds purchase, became my first experience with Chicken Cesar salads, which I am officially in love with, You see, before Sayaka I would NEVER eat vegetables, but here I am eating chicken cesar salad, from McDonalds!!! Cho Oishikatta!

We boarded the bus after following our group and we both started drinking so we could fall asleep. It worked for Sayaka but not me! I could not sleep for some reason. When we got to the first rest stop, we went to the bathroom, and some strange man asked me where I was from, while I was going to the bathroom. I told him I was from Nagoya, even though I know he wanted to hear America, which I told him also. I also told him it was my birthday, since it was around 12:10 AM or so on the 30th of June! After making a new friend, Sayaka and I ate some rest stop food {soft cream, Sayaka's favorite, and an American dog, which is pretty much a corn dog) and re boarded the bus.

After 4 more hours of Sayaka being able to sleep and me not, we made it to Tokyo alive. 4:15AM.

Now this is Japan, and summer, so that means sun is up and bright, and since it is Tokyo, there are tons of people out and about in business suits walking the streets of Shinjuku. But they aren't going to work or getting off work. After a Yoshinoya breakfast, Saaka and I just stopped to watch these people and they ALL looked DRUNK! Yes, they were getting done from a night of drinking/karaoke or who knows what, and were DRUNK! This was highly amusing, but not enough to keep us awake! We headed to a nearby manga kiss (internet cafe) and got a room for us to sleep in for 2 hours, so we could wake up and go to Krispy Kreme!

Find out about the Krispy Kreme trip and the rest of the first day in Tokyo with my next post. Time to clean up after dinner and head to sleep, or drink more beer... not sure what we are about to do!