w00kie's ramblings

Category: japan

  • Frivole et Cocue

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    Just a photo of a shop I found in Omotesando station with a stupid french name. Cocue actually means “a cheated wife”…

  • Off to Hiroshima

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    In a couple of hours I’ll be leaving for 広島 by plane to see my girlfriend for a week. We’re planning to go to 宮島 to see the famous torii in the sea and a little one-night trip to 九州 at an onsen. Wish me good luck meeting the parents…

  • Sparkling Café

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    ¥50 at my company’s コンビニ. Tastes like diet coke with a strong and foul coffee aftertaste… I can’t believe Nescafé makes this crap, and the best part is the slogan: You can enjoy authentic coffee taste and refreshment. The guy at the shop told me some guy on the 現場 bought a whole 24-can box…

  • JLPT results

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    I received my 日本語能力試験 (otherwise known as JLPT or Japanese Language Proficiency Test) results today after more than 2 months. No surprises, I passed. Actually I got a nice 87% but it was only level 3 which is not that hard. I probably could have made level 2 with a lot of work and dedication,…

  • Office move

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    Yes, it’s been planned for 6 months. On February 13th my office will not be in small town of Kohnan-machi anymore but in the much bigger city of Kumagaya. Actually, my office isn’t moving to the city, it’s more of the city that’s moving to my office. As of 02/13/2007, Kumagaya will officially expand and…

  • Racist magazine – 外人犯罪

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    After seeing a blog post about this magazine: 外人犯罪, I knew I had to buy it before it goes out of print. So yesterday after work, I went straight to the Familymart 30 meters away from my home and purchased a copy to keep as a collector’s item. It’s a special edition magazine about foreigners…

  • Cerulean Tower – 34th floor

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    Last week, since my girlfriend was moving, we had no place to stay in Tokyo for her last night (after the movers took everything and we gave back the keys). So since she didn’t exactly looked forward to the idea of staying at my place, Saitama being far from romantic, we looked for a hotel.…

  • New year hiatus

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    Sorry for the lack of updates. I was at my girlfriend’s in Tokyo for over 2 weeks (without internet) to help her move out. She quit her job that was going nowhere and went back to her parent’s in Hiroshima. It’s going to be hard, changing from a mid-distance relationship (we saw each other only…

  • The token engrish post

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    Every blog about Japan has to have a token post about stupid engrish in t-shirts or signs: here is mine. That’s a nice specimen I’ve spotted in a diner/bar at a 忘年会 we did last week.

  • Lightopia around Tokyo Station

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    This Saturday I went to 丸の内 around Tokyo station to see the Christmas lights and, much to my girlfriend’s dismay, I took a bunch of maniac photos with my trusty Ricoh GR Digital. I had seen an advertisement for the Christmas lightings in the train. It’s an event called Lightopia. They lit up the 2…

  • No Wii for Christmas

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    Second raffle, same time, same place. This time they had 52 units up for the taking and 254 people showed up. A friend of mine had come to help me out, giving me a second chance to get one. But of course, since I’m officially cursed, they ended up calling all the numbers around our…

  • Koenji at 6am

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    Took this photo saturday morning when I came back from Shinjuku empty-handed. The sun was just coming out over the horizon behind me.

  • I’m officially cursed

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    That’s it, it’s official, the verdict has been given: I’m cursed. Today at lunch time we went out with a friend to an electronics shop deep deep in the countryside, 15 minutes away from the factory where we work, hoping to score a Wii so we could play some Wii Sports goodness for a week…

  • No Wii for me

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    So I went to Shinjuku’s BicCamera at 5am on Saturday morning (btw, it’s incredible the number of puke puddles you can find around Koenji in the early morning…) hoping to score a Wii. Here is a map of the line I found there: quickmap The line was closed, BicCamera people were watching it every 15…

  • Night at the Onsen

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    So as I told you, last weekend I went to stay the night at an onsen resort and I’m having mixed feelings on this little trip. I went to the Plaza Hotel in 鬼怒川温泉. The hotel was celebrating the 1st anniversary of its renewal, so we were hoping for something really nice. And the photos…