well well well, there has been some slacking and serious ball dropping here but im back and since the last update, ive had cousins visit, parents visit, we climbed mount fuji (awesome, not at all the torture i thought but 15 overnight hours of challenge none the less), two more visits to my loves, erin and laine in gifu, good bye parties galore, and then poof im back, a canadian resident once again. and it was touch and go for awhile- a little bit of upset, other bits of happy, relief, back to sad but a relaxing month of gainful unemployment and now im a christmas gift basket elf, hating the fact i have to work, but loving my job. and now that im settling in, im also wondering how excited i really am to be moving to vancouver to pursue my so called dream of becoming a chocolatier. but i have a job all lined up, an apartment lining up and a friend there already so it won't be moving to a whole new place and starting new yet again. and im sure once i get there, i'll be happy as grass beside grass. smiling happy, thats what. but anyway, not the point. the point is im going to try not to be a neglectful mother with this puppy and i'll put up some pictures just to entice myself to continue...

surrounded by mountains and friends, i became happy feelings

This whole time living in mishima, i was all up on my high horse thinking it was such a beautiful place, believing no other city could compare. Well, it is a beautiful city, and i love it, but i went to visit erin and laine in seki, gifu, and it certainly gave my city a run for its money. Its a tiny city, a touch more quaint and surrounded everywhere by beautiful mountains and beautiful skies (although that could have just been good timing). i really didnt want to leave, and not only because im sick of living without my best friends.
after arriving at night on friday, we hit up the closest izakaya and then took the party to their apartment. and it was like a real apartment- full size fridge and everything. i nearly pooped my pants when i saw that. here is a little haiku i wrote for the the feeling i had upon seeing such a rare commodity:
i laid eyes on the big fridge
jealousy took me
i want to take it back home

not bad for my second one ever, huh? hehe
the next day we day-tripped into gifu to see the two hour firework display that was stunning and gorgeous and the festival was full of yukata-clad people and lined with food stands. we had edamame, a baked potato, candied mini apples and octopus balls. not too be confused with octopus testicles, because thats not at all what they are. mostly theyre like puffed up breaded octopus. kind of.
the next day we went to the washi (handmade paper) museum and it was all so beautiful and then we got to make our own paper. it was so rad. and much less time consuming and expensive than i thought it would be. i was thoroughly impressed and now i have my own piece of paper made by my own hands. wonderful!

the neglectful blogger

alright, so i know ive been slacking pretty hard with this thing, but there has just been far too much fun to be had. between a crazy weekend in tokyo (sorry, melissa has all those pictures), spanish night at colin and claudia's, picnic at the beach (which i only went to for about an hour, but hey), and just general fun i just haven't had the time or inclination. but last week erin and laine came down for a visit and i got some good pictures. needless to say there was partying and friend love to spare. during their visit there was sake, beer, walks, cameras, games, partying, good eating, purikura and oh so much good feeling to be shared. but too much to share here. so here are a few pictures. enjoy!

Dear Andrew Bell

I'm writing this here because there's really no way to contact you. I heard you got in a car accident. I heard youre comatose and i heard you have 12 months to live. it doesn't seem real and maybe that's why im not as upset as i thought id be. i couldnt even cry. but i do get flashes of your face and then it fades out, like the light of a camera or something.
we went to high school together and we worked together. you were floor, and i was prep and we took lunch together sometimes and i had a huge crush on you, but you knew that. i think you were too cool for me. we hung out once or twice.
i dont know what you wanted out of life and i dont know if you got it, but i hope you were happy. you were a happy, smiley person when i knew you. man, this is sad. i dont really know what to say. maybe its stupid to hope that youll recover, but its happened before hasnt it?
i went for a long walk by the river last night, thinking of you until finally i ran out of thoughts and i wasn't as sad. or maybe it was shocked.
anyway, this is for you andrew, but you'll never read it.

the sun is shining, the garden is growing and life is just...nice. so nice. melissa, matt and i decided to go in a portable gas burner together and have weekly dinner parties. our first dinner party came after a day at an onsen park (what other country has a park dedicated solely to different kinds of baths?) it was a fantastic day of soaking in coffee baths, red wine baths, charcoal baths, etc. plus of course the water slide and the cave-like baths underneath that looked like a disco. it was just one big sigh of happiness. then we came home and our nabe party began. nabe is basically a 'whatever you want' soup- roger knows how good this is. made with soy milk, water, soy sauce and miso, you add vegetables and meat (if youre not veggie- tofu if you are) and noodles as you go along, making it a long, enjoyable process. most of the foods here are like that- theres isnt the rush. its little-by-little eating and goes well with good conversation, a card game or a movie.
our next dinner party was 'tempura night', last saturday. we ended up with an insane amount of food were still frantically trying to eat before it turns. it was a nice night of talking, drinking beer, and plopping any of the pumpkin, sweet potato, carrots, tofu, asparagus, five types of mushrooms, peppers, shiso leaves, etc. into the hot oil. we had planned on tempura-ing bananas and apples for dessert but we were all oiled out by then and just ate them fresh.
next is the gyoza challenge (challenge because were going to make it with tofu instead of meat and who knows how that will turn out). wish us luck!

the motanai movement

i learned this word, motanai, a couple of months ago and fell in love with it. it's like a kind of 'don't waste' motto and i realize i've been somewhat obsessed with this concept since coming here. i've been crazy about trying to appreciate this country and my experience here, so that when i'm not doing it have this horrible guilty feeling because i'm only here for so long. i should be soaking in japan through my pores. well, it's bloody exhausting, this appreciation business. I do appreciate, but i need to relax my focus a bit. i'm mostly just doing normal living and i have to accept that. there. that feels better.
this all came about, this realization, when i came home early from vacation and have been spending my days just relaxing instead of taking day trips and seeing all i could see in this time off from work. i had planned on going to yokohama, maybe even take my first trip into tokyo. i was semi-excited about these ideas. my first day off i did some gardening and then when one of my tools broke, i called it a day and took the train into gotemba for a couple of hours.
the thing is, that i'm happier just sitting in the dirt out back, ripping out the rampant weeds, reading my book, taking long baths, watching movies and just doing crafty things. basically, doing things of no real importance except for what i place on them. but isn't that what vacation is all about? doing things you want to do? relaxing? so what if i'm not seeing different places here. i've travelled. i've seen places. and i'll see more. but right now im finding my happiness right where i am, and i think that's more important.
before, my conception of 'motanai' was running around and experiencing all i could experience. that or feeling guilt for not doing that. i've changed my outlook. it now means to me that i shouldn't be wasting my happiness. do what makes me happy. sure im in japan. but ill experience it the way i want to. afterall, its just living isnt it? i'm motanai-ing my life.

the visual before the story

the first picture is just hilarious, if possibly offensive to some. this would be rob, feeling rather insignificant next to the almighty buddha. but look how pleased the buddha is! hehe
the next picture is of fuji-san (look, no wires! something that is virtually impossible to capture from my normal viewpoint. a definate bonus when it comes to picture taking and overall appreciation.)
the third picture is of the Narusawa taisha we discovered while on a little walk after we first arrived. it was tucked away in this tiny street and up on a hill.
then, on that same tiny, behind-everything street is an old lady working the field (fields here are measured in tatami sizes as opposed to acres. probably because theyre so small, but still, the numbers must get pretty high). i don't see many old ladies working the fields in mishima, because there arent many fields, but i do see the women, who are recognizable because they are bent at a 90 degree angle, thus making them child-size. its really quite sad.
then theres the opening to the ice caves, directly followed by rob, sam (a british guy we met there, whos trying to put ice down my shirt) and me. the blocks there look like they were imported. hmm... then of course, the ICE. hehe.

the golden week drag

So maybe i built this place up too much or maybe i wasn't as open minded as i should have been, but i was so, so excited to go to this place in yamanashi-ken for golden week. it was all organic and they had horse back riding and the ice caves were within walking distance and they built treehouses and had breadbaking and...and...it just wasn't like that really. the horse back riding wasn't a part of their place. the breadbaking wasn't until the summer or something. i was paying 3,000yen a night to sleep in a tiny room with rob where there was just enough room for both of us and our bags at the foot of the futon and we had to shut the door at all times because we were right next to the indoor port-o-potty that, based on the smell, must have been in use and unchanged or untouched since this place opened five years ago. the cafe didn't even have any cozy chairs. and i could have built that treehouse when i was in high school. okay, maybe im being too hard on the place. its run by hippies. i get that. but still, i mean, theyre running a business, no? so i left early. i mean, it was alright, but i wasn't gonna stay longer than i did and im much happier back in mishima, working on my garden and just not working.
there were perks, though, and im glad i went.
perk #1: the onsen. oh god, the onsen. it was fantastic. so many different kinds of baths and it was just gorgeous. i was debating staying just to keep going there. fantastic. truly.
perk #2: the ice caves. they weren't very big and didn't take very long to get through, but i loved them. i don't think ive ever been in a real cave before and it was awesome.
perk #3: the hike rob and i took up the mountain behind us, then down the other side of it to lake saiko (one of fuji's five lakes) and then back up and back down again. good god im out of shape, but it felt good. once it was done that is. hehe...
perk #4: the view of mt. fuji. okay, sure, i see it everyday the weather is clear in mishima, but, well, we were closer. so it looked even better. plus, you can never get tired of something so beautiful or monumental. well, i dont think so anyway.
perk #5: just getting out so it felt like a vacation. that was nice.
there you go. five perks. and thats not bad. plus im thinking of going to yokohama and stroll around china town. today i went to gotemba to hit up the outlet malls for some cheap summer work clothes. but everything was so insanely expensive because the stores were all fancy (the cheapest thing was the gap, and it reminded me of mike. hi mike. i miss you.) and it reminded me a lot of canada's wonderland except without the rides and, you konw, shopping instead. hard to explain.
and i started working weeding the garden below me but after two hours only a tiny patch was done because im trying to be really good about it and actually get the roots and its just choked with green. its crazy down there and i wish i hadnt procrastinated so much. gah. hehe. anyway, the moral of this story is that iwas disappointed but im still appreciating my golden week.