Final Brief

Well this is the last entry and i did do a lot of things, but im kinda running out of time (gotta be at the airport in a few hours) so I`ll just list them. I went to Harajuku, brought a cheap ring and ordered two products in japanese, went to Shinjuku and brought a hat, trained to Nami`s work and borrowed her phone, talked to my family, went back to shinjuku, brought a drawing book and discovered a graffiti book section (they are heaps cheaper than in nz) and lastly i brought a scarf. I came home, packed a little, went to the trainstation and met Nami, ate Nakau, played games, nearly lost everything then hit the jackpot and got $30 worth of coins back (that Nami and Aki will use sometime), dyed my hair and yeah.. Now im here.. I still gotta put away a few things but i just wanted to conclude in a paragraph or so..

To those that have been stopping by every now and again and those who check nearly everyday, THanx!! I did get a little behind towards the last week as you can read up, i was pretty busy.. This blog was fun to write and a good way to keep a record of the things i did and the days in which i did them on.. I was suppose to treat it like a diary but due to the fact that i left out most emotions it evolved into more of an event calander...

Im off to thailand to see my boys for 10 days and to recieve some brotherly company as i get quite guttered when i leave. It`ll be fun but i wont be accessing the internet. So i here by close this blog on my tokyo experience. I will prehaps add a proper entry for this date at some later time so do check back.. Thanx a lot for reading...

FINAL... PEACE!!!

ps; btw No one entered the graffiti competition which was kinda sad, i was hoping i would spark some interaction but hey, it was fun trying it out.. Anyway the word said "Choke"... As for the meaning of 24?!..... 24 applies to the 24th letter of the alphebet. Now for those who dont know the importance of that letter... well thats another story.. until the next blog.. ... thats all folks!!

DTB fo LifE

We pretty much repeated the same morning routine as yesterday except instead of sending a parcel we did a bank transfer. (it was amazing we sent it at 10.30am and they receieved it by lunch). Oh and we had starbucks!.. I had to get AzUki one more time before i left, and the aircon in there was so strong, i was planning on sitting there for a while after Nami had gone to work but it was so cold i couldnt stand it..

I came home and sussed out yet another game plan. This time i went to Shinjuku to look for a cd requested by one of my boys.. I came out the south exit and rode the escolator 8 floors to get to tower records... Then i spent a further 30 mins trying to find the artist (it was a Japanese cd and their ordering system is heaps different). I finally found it, and they didnt have the one was after so i left.. I then went to Tokyu hands with the intention of buying some little toys for me and nami. But they were out of the ones for Nami and the ones i chose were the same as the ones i had (its kinda like a kinda suprise) So I decided to play some games and before i could finish it, it was time for me to meet Nami in Roppongi.. (seems to happen alot in japan). So i get there rite, and im waiting 20 mins ahead of time .. 10 mins after the meeting time i realise im in the wrong spot (we met in ther intersection and i was in the wrong corner).

So i rushed along and found her waiting with her workmate.. We said hello and then called the DTB crew and found out they werent too far away. SO we jumped on a couple of trains and ended up in Gaien-mae. Rio came down to meet us at 7/11 (as they had just finished watching the baseball and were based in a japanese pub). WE arrived, ate a little and drunk a little, discussing love stories, marriage etc.. They also situated me in the middle of the table, Nami couldnt be the one translating everything but it was nice of Rio to try and talk to me lots.. We concluded with me saying a little speech (amazingly they could understand it) and .... THey paid for me... ALL my drinks.. I felt speical. hehe..

We then set up the self timer and striked a baseball pose....

Then as a whole group wondered our way down to the train station where we parted ways.. Youske and Youhei came the same way as us so we rode together to Shinjuku.. Took some crazy photos and came home.. Its my last sleeping nite in Tokyo for a while so Im going to leave this here and lie in bed for a while.. Nitenite... Peacies

the last Youtube day

There is going to be another short entry. Havent really done much today, Nami had work so she got up before me and started getting ready then i woke up and we went to the station together to send a parcel. The line moved really quickly, i hope it reaches nz ok. After that we got some coffee and "melon" pan which is a kinda chestnut bread that i love (i think i`ve mentioned that already) but i have yet to take a photo of it.. After our food, Nami went to work and i looked around at teh cd shop for a little while and came home..

I did a quick budget and plan and wrote out yet another wish list. Then watched "how i met your mother" and before i knew it, it was time to meet Nami.. We went out for dinner and then hit the game centre where we got 100 coins free (about $10 worth coz we have been so loyal to them) and we played with that, we actually doubled the coins and put it back for next time..

Came home, its sooo hot and the air con wont go any colder so im going to have a cold shower.. thats all from me.. Peace

Rats in the Kitchen!

Man today started off so rocky!!... We had a stack load of things to do such as; sending a parcel, buying shoes, disman, headphones and getting cash out. On top of that we had an arranged meeting time of 3pm to see Saori (Nami`s friend she met in nz and the girl i hung out with most friday nites when Nami was at work).

We didnt realise the time and before we knew it we were still sitting at home and it was 20 to 3.. We rushed off flagged most of our plans got to the meeting place and recieved a text from Saori saying she would be 20 mins late. Which worked out fine, Nami and i grabbed some mcdonalds. THe layout was real cool, one big line that broke off into 5 or 6 counters.

After our food we met Saori, went to the movie place got our pre ordered tickets and went outside for a walk. It was sooo Hot, we decided to go grab some ice coffee.. On our way i found a shop that was selling pens.. Brought some more markers and we went to tullys.. There werent many seats and these nice young girls gave up their sofa chair for us. We drew pictures and talked then jetted to the movies.

This place was wicked, kinda like a super new zealand style movie place.. Usually in japan there are several little movie places (with like two screens etc) and you buy your tickets from the shopping centre then find out where the movie place is. So this was a nice change.

We got Pop corn, dougnuts and chips served on a tray which we were allowed to take into the movies.. We saw Remys delicious Restruant (english name: ratoull or something?!) It was real cool, as always with a disney/pixar movie the characters were cute, the story funny and always has a nice ending. (although when the movie ended we were forced to sit thru all the credits as they didnt turn on the lights and no one got out of their seats!!)

After that we went to Shinjuku trainstasion shopping centre and went to "ducky duck" and italian resturant. Then saori left us and Nami and i went around looking at shoes.. NOthing looked cool so we decided to get the discman.

We came home and i found out the instructions for the discman was all in japanese, we packaged the parcel only to find i had forgotten to put the hair dye in and.... thats all.. hehe.. so while today didnt go as smoothly as we wanted nor did we get to do all that we had planned it was none the less a fun day and was good to catch up with Saori.. cheers EPAEC

Planned Action

I talked to Sam for a little while before i set out on my plan. I couldnt sleep last nite, so i wrote down the places i wanted to go and the best possible order that i could do it in, to get the most out of my time..

My first step was to go to Harajuku.. When i got to our trainstation i realised there was a festival going on, so i jumped accross the road and went down the strip. There were heaps of little food stores, lanterns, music etc.. Food smelt great, everyone looked happy but i was so squashed after 15 mins of it, i decided to gap it.

When i got to Harajuku i pulled out my shopping list and went about collecting the items on the list. I brought two braclets (one for my friend), two earrings (skull and a loop one), hat (bennie like, but the materials breathable) and sun glasses (cheap black NWA kinda ones). I got lost on the way to one of the stores, but i manaaged to find my way back. The store i was after was actually alot closer than i thought it was. hehe

Then we went on to the second part of the plan which was to meet Nami at her work for dinner. I made it on time and found the right spot which was quite amazing as i havent gone there by myself before and it involves riding the subway.. =)

The main reason for coming to Nami`s work was because i loved their vietnamese spring rolls that they sell in Tokyo Mid town. So we got there, had a look around the mega shopping centre (pic left) took a stack of photos, (they had a celling with swirling water) and proceeded to the food court.

The vietnamese place said they didnt have any more soup to make noodles (which meant they were closed) i was a little guttered but it was alright, we then looked at the other food court (pic right) and picked out a few items.. I really wanted the spring rolls so i made Nami go back and ask if we could get the spring rolls to take away... Some of the chiefs remembered us and said they can make up some soup just for us.. It was nice of them, but we kindly declined.. i know what its like to be there with those last minute orders when you`re trying to clean up. But they were happy to make the spring rolls. THey said they dont usually make it for takeaways.. but from their way of packaging it, i think they`ve done it before...

We took the spring rolls back to the food court, picked a candle lit table, ordered garlilc prawns and a hamber steak, grabbed some water and quietly munched away at our food. I love the atmosphere of this place. Although most of the shops are like labelled shops therse plenty to see, just enjoy the architectural design of the joint. So guys, when your Misses wants to go shopping take her here and you dont have to look like you are just sitting around waiting for her, you can actually look and enjoy the peaceful water fountains and bamboo plants..

Anyway, before heading home we grabbed some green tea drinks from a speical green tea shop. We drunk it, talked and came home.. Peace.... ARGH its hot.... 32 degrees and climbing!!

3rd Year Pyro

Today was the main reason why I am in tokyo during AUgust.. Seeing as i missed Nami`s birthday and didnt make it in time for the cherry blossoms, i had to be here for the fireworks..

Anyway from the begining... We talked with Aki and ended up training trogether to Shinjuku where we departed ways.. I was on a hunt for headphones and a discman.. Nami had a card that had accumulated enough points to equal the value of 6000yen and she said i could use it. So after looking around i decided the best place was the one where i saw the discman yesterday. Unfortunatly when we arrived i had miss read the sign and it wasnt as cheap as i thought.

I decided to give it a miss and i couldnt make up my mind on the headphones so we`re just going to have to save that for another day.. Anyhoo, we grabbed some tullys coffee and some snacks to eat then made our way to the trainstation. On the way there, a huge crowd gathered around and a girl was singing in the middle. I thought she was good (although we only heard the last part of her last song) and i asked Nami to help me buy her cd. We did and she even signed it.. WHOO HOO too bad its only a single but hey, shes awesome enough to make it big..

Back to the fireworks stuff, Nami had a rough idea where it was held but wasnt sure, so we followed people who were wearing Yukkata (summer version of a kimino kinda) and jumped on the same train. We continued to watch them, until the train annoucer said the next two stops are going to be busy due to fireworks display.. Yay we made it..

So we decided to get off on the second stop thinking it was going to be less crowded but ended up transfering back to the first. It was pretty packed and it was nearly set off time. The train announcer kindly suggested that we buy our returning ticket now as on the way home everyone will be buying.. So we did..

It was only suppose to take 15 mins to get to the bank to watch the show,but due to the mass amount of people it took much longer. But it didnt seem long tho, there were heaps of little stores selling drinks etc. We decided to buy a couple of beers and some noodles..

The fireworks started going off as we were walking, but we could still see them. When we finally got to the spot, we made a nice little area on the bank side and watched the fireworks.. The camera so doesnt cature the beauty of their fireworks.. They were huge, colourful, loud and shapely.. They had star ones, bright flashes, etc.. We took heaps of videos so I`ll show you guys some time.. It was awesome, the weather was great!! We opened our beers cheered to our 3rd year aniversary and watched in amazement..

After the 1hr 20 min show we jumped back into the crowd and made our way home. Along the way, i forgot to get my ticket back after the machine, we jumped on the wrong train that lead us much further from our station and the trains were super busy. But hey, in the end we got to our station, got KFC, brought a few cds and enjoyed the great nite.. WICked stuff.. im outtie.. Pe BooM bOOm ace.

Hitting da Streetz

I woke up the same time as Nami and decided to go with her half way to her work. We were a little too late to get breakfast so we grabbed a quick coffee and jumped on the train. I got off in Shinjuku where i played Time crisis. I looked around at the prices of Discmans (Im not good with ipods, they dont more than 6 months even when i look after them heaps!) and then jumped onto another train to Harajuku. I got off at the wrong exit and ended up having to walk down a street packed with teenagers and "visual Kei" kids. Crazy.. But i love the crowdedness..

I then found a nice little seat (metal bar along the road) and sat there and drew for an hour or so. Which resulted in...

I havent been able to buy any drawing books since ive been here so i have just been going over the same cover of my rhyme book. I love the pens they have here. They are paint ones which go over anything and are so much cheaper than the ones in nz... No wonder their shoplifting is so lower here than nz.. note: the princess was drawn by Nami and the fruit by Saori and Nami.

This is the inside of my book. THeres also another princess by Saori.. Drawings awesome it works as a time line. Hey I discovered something about myself.. Due to my graffiti "street art" upbringing, I learnt to get the bulk of the task done fast, overall looking farly good but by no way perfect. This has then been applied to my way of doing things.. No wonder i never got a "A" at uni.. I`ve do things fast, last minute get good enough, but could never go over it with a fine tooth comb.. Hmm i wonder now that i realise this, i can prehaps change it.. of course i can... If i want too that is.. hehe

anyway back to my day.. I went and brought two shorts that i saw a few days back, they were about $10 each. Ones army like and the other dark green.. Both good enough for the price..

I then came home, tried on the shorts realised one was way too big and one was perfect.. We`ll see if that ratio changes once they`ve been washed..

I met Nami at the usual time and we had Nakau.. Played coin games. Broke even and came home again.. Now i gotta transfer some music.. P lower case e-a-c-e!

Go fiSh

This is going to be pretty short, not much really happened today. Nami left early and was set for a long day as she had to stock take, so i got all confortable at home watching the internet etc, then when i started doing the washing Nami walked in.. She had finished work early and had emailed me, but as i wasnt expecting to get a message till 10pm i didnt check. She was cool with it tho. So we walked back to the trainstation and got italian then went a played some games.

This is a screen shot of the fishing game. You put coins in the left and right side and it shoots out nets, the aim is to catch fish and along the way you get mini sub games which give you the chance to get more coins..

The game centres are just like casinos except you dont win any "money" back. You pay money and in return get coins i..e 1000yen into the machine 100 coins out.. When you`ve finished playing, you place the coins into a little weighing thing and it adds up how many coins you have and logs it into your account.. Another cool thing, is the account.. You type in your pin number then have to go through a finger print id!! cool huh!! coz you know.. you dont want people stealing your coins!!..

hehe but we had a pretty bad day, we used some coins we had left over, lost, got more coins to try and win it back, lost, got more coins and lost again.. Addictive just like gambling.. I wonder if i could start up a loan shark coin business.. hmmm...

well thats all from me,.. peace out yalliez

Cave Man

I havent cut my hair for 10 months (except for a little trim-ish on Chinese New year eve) so today was the day that I had been waiting for (Nami too, my hair got pretty messy). So we woke up pretty early considering it was her day off and trained to Ebitsu where we went to "Nicola`s" (naoyan`s work). I sat with Naoyan and flicked through a hair colour book and picked out a "red" colour (unfortunatly they didnt have the products to do Bright red and Nami didnt want me making it blonde). So i jumped in the chair and got my hair bleeched... THey had this cool heating thing that spins around above your head.. While we waited for the bleech to kick in, Naoyan worked on Nami`s hair. This process repeated several times. THen the red dye came in and naoyan tidied up my hair.. I didnt like the red at first, as it didnt come out how i expected and my haircut didnt change much. But it grew on me. Naoyan styled it in a way i could never repeat. hehe Nami looked cool, her hair style was cool and a nice natural brown colour..

After our haircut we walked to Daikanyama, we looked around at a few shops and Nami told me the toliet where she lost her ring and the shops she use to go to with her sister (when they use to share clothes). We found this cute little pathway leading up hill and tucked half way up was a little waffle house. We ducked in there and ordered.

Nami had ice cream, bananas and cream waffles and i had the grilled chicken panini. The atmosphere was cool (apart from the mozzies), we decided to sit outside (looked pretty crowded inside). THe sun slowly set and waether cooled down a little.

We then walked to SHibuya (along the train side) and then walked to harajuku. Its quite a walk, but there were heaps of things to see and so many poeple rushing around time went by real fast. We decided that we didnt need anything in Harajuku and decided to go back home and eat Nakau. I had the usual Katsucurry (I`ll take a photo one of these days).

Then we came home. Gotta do some photo transfering so i`ll leave it here. Peace yall..