Not-so-known Japan: Premium Outlets!

My first experience of outlet malls were in Northern California, practically 20 years ago already. I remember US$1.00 GAP t-shirts and what not. Not having that much money then though, I think I just settled for a GAP cap (I love owning GAP caps) and I think a belt and maybe one or two shirts. It might have all cost me just under US$20. This is 20 years ago, though. During that time maybe those GAP shirts were selling for like $5 to $7? Unfortunately, that's what I look for still - shirts for a steal. Nowadays, GAP shirts are like $10 to $20 or more, and I'm happy to find $5 shirts at outlet stores or on clearance sale racks.

I also look for shoes at outlet stores, and I'd usually go for $40 shoes (that were previously as high as $150 maybe), and if there's something I really want I can go for as much as $60 on shoes. Any more than those prices, no way. I might have bought watches, too, and maybe I would have $40 to $60 upper limits on watches as well.

I've had outlet mall experiences in other parts of California, as well as in New Jersey where I think there's no tax on wearable items. I've had some outlet store experiences in the Philippines as well. But basically, I have my $5 and $40 limit on shirts and shoes and watches as I mentioned. Now when I heard about the Premium Outlets in Japan, I got sort of excited.

But that excitement didn't last very long. The nearest one is in Gotemba. It's at least an hour and a half from my place. Too far. That's the one problem with these outlet malls, though. They're in far away places because they need the really low real estate values so that they can still realize profits. However, a couple of good friends visited Japan, and they wanted to tour the Fuji-Hakone area. They found out about the Gotemba Premium Outlets, and wanted to go make a side trip there as well. As you might know, I already posted my Odawara-Hakone-Gotemba-Fuji video a few weeks back, and to the Premium Outlets we went indeed.

Guess what stuff I found and bought? Nada! Everything was still way expensive. The cheapest shirts I can find were $10. And these are plain, meant-as-undershirts kind of stuff! Anyway, even the restaurants there, except for McDonald's maybe, are a bit on the expensive side as well, and we just settled for Tully's Coffee hotdog sandwiches, which we could find all around Kanagawa and Tokyo as well.

So we went home with nothing except... And this is the best part. And you've probably seen this already in my O-Ha-Go-Fu video: The best views of Mt. Fuji! I think with the trip to the Premium Outlets practically "free" since it was just a side trip for our Hakone Area tour which was already paid for, I think it was worth it. Unfortunately we did get there when there were more clouds in the sky already and so it wasn't the most optimal sighting of Mt. Fuji. But it felt great nonetheless. Imagine, (window) shopping with Mt. Fuji in the background.

From carbonaramara.com

Anyway, if you wish to go to the Gotemba Premium Outlets from the Kanto (Tokyo/Kanagawa/Saitama/Chiba) area, check out their website by clicking this ad-supported link. Or just take the Odakyu Line express or rapid express train bound for Odawara, get off at Shin-Matsuda Station, walk towards the JR Matsuda station and take the JR Gotemba Line for Gotemba. At Gotemba, there are free shuttle buses to/from the outlet mall. The last bus from the outlet mall going back to Gotemba Station is around 7pm, so make sure to catch that or else you will need to take a taxi. From Tokyo, Saitama, or Chiba, just go to Shinjuku Station to get to the Odakyu Line. UPDATE: If you are taking the Odakyu Hakone Free Pass like we did, it's a free ride around Hakone as well as to the Gotemba Premium Outlets as well.

Odawara-Hakone-Gotemba-Fuji

I had a couple of friends visit over from Singapore and the original plan was to visit Hakone to get a good view of Mt. Fuji. We bought the Hakone Free Pass so that we can go around the Hakone area freely.

We first made a pitstop though at the Odawara Castle. And then we went on the Hakone Sightseeing Cruise on Lake Ashi (also known as Hakone Lake), the Hakone Ropeway (i.e. cable car / cable-suspended gondolas similar to the one connecting mainland Singapore and Sentosa), and Hakone Tozan Cable Car (i.e. train being pulled by cables, like San Francisco's cable cars or the Peak Tram going to Victoria Peak in Hong Kong).

Finally, we went out of our way to the Gotemba Premium Outlets in Gotemba, only to find the best views of Fuji-san for this day trip. From Gotemba Premium Outlets, it took us 3.5 hours to get home inclusive of all the waiting for the infrequent night time trains. Had I known earlier, we could've gotten home an hour and a half earlier if only we had spent around 500 yen more each and used a different route. But anyway, we had a blast.

Harajuku+Yoyogi 2

I visited the Harajuku/Omotesando/Yoyogi area for the 4th time this year, this time by myself though. And this is my second video around the place, but this time I videoed some new stuff. Check it out:



You can view the video directly on YouTube at this link: The Japan! Japan! Video Blog Episode #11.  This and the last 2 episodes are all available in HD. :-D

I also have two new basketball videos.  Wala lang.
The Japan! Japan! Video Blog Sideline #01
The Japan! Japan! Video Blog Sideline #02

Very Weekling

It has been 10 days since my last post.  I am calling Japan Blog 2.0 quits.  I am just too busy nowadays I think.  And I think it will be this way until the end of my 3-years here in Japan.  I've been here just 4.5 months so far.

But this don't mean I ain't posting nothing no more.  I'll still be here.  Just not regularly anymore.  Certainly not daily, but no, I can't promise weekly posts.  My intention also is to post more photos.  Or do a videoblog.  But I can't promise anything.

And, as you can see, I've been blogging on practically a daily basis for my 1st 4 months here.  That is a world record.  4 straight months of daily updates!

Unfortunately, like for most part-time bloggers, and now, the end is near, for daily blogging.  I do not have anything in mind yet for Japan Blog 3.0.  But I do know that I plan to gather together all my Japan posts into this one blog, which means my posts for my Japan Blog 1.0 (from 2005) will also be found here in the near future.

Anyways, just to let you know, I finished two papers the past week.  I had been delaying it because I thought it would be easy enough - supposedly I have the materials to write them.  But, no, it wasn't easy.  I was just too busy last Thursday and Friday, and then Saturday - Microsoft Word crashed on me!  Well I was doing structural analysis and other stuff in the background so that might have added to it.  What happened though was that I was already 90% finished on my first paper and boom, I went back down to probably 70% finished.  I just thought, 70% is better than 0%.  Thank you (or not) for those Auto-Recovery functions of Word.  Anyways, I was so on a roll those two days, but when that happened, I just went blank.  I just didn't wanna do it anymore.  I spent just two hours or less on it during the weekend.

But that is so also because we went to this eat-all-you-can/tabehodai place called "Carnival Buffet."  Western food?  Nope.  It's "Western."  (Emphasis on the quotation marks.)  It is actually Japanese-style Western food.  There's a salad bar, a drinks bar, your choice of ramen, udon, or soba noodles.  There are 4 kinds of pizza - two are more like Indian-style pizza.  There is curry.  Japanese love curry.  There was roast beef for a little while.  There are these small hamburgers that you heat on a teppanyaki grill yourself.  And hotcake mix for making hotcakes for yourself.  There was fried chicken and sausages, and pizza - did I already say there was pizza?  I ate mostly the fried chicken, the sausages, and the pizza.  I have been craving for real pizza.  Or the taste of cheese.  It was good enough.  The fried chicken tastes a lot better (more Western-tasting maybe?) than the fried chicken at the cafeterias here in school.  Then there was a salad bar where I had me a medley of fruits and an ice cream.  Then "ka-ching!"  I thought, I could have a float as well. So I made a Coke (Zero) Float.  Yum.  I was already "wa chun la" (200% full) just before eating dessert.  I was "wa chuns la" (so full, I'm almost like dead) after the float.  It was a good ending to a 1500 yen meal.

And then we rode our bikes back home.  It was quite a long ride, and then I checked using Google Maps how long our trip was.  It was 6.4 km each way!  By the time we got back to the apartment, we were back to "wa pao la" (100% full) again.

Anyways, it was probably that long bicycle ride, maybe 40 minutes each way, that got to me.  I was so dead tired on Sunday.  It was a no-day.  I was just at home.  But I did find the need to go the grocery store.  But I just can't ride the bike again.  No sir, not yet.  So I took the bus.  And then, lo and behold.  The supermarket was probably nearly half empty of groceries!  I saw two of my fellow students and they confirmed, we should just come back another day.  Anyways, I did go back the next day, and it was still probably close to half empty.  But there were a number of employees putting some stocks back on the racks.  It is so weird.  I noticed then that apparently the furniture outlet store right beside it is closed.  Is something going on?  I really don't know.  I wasn't able to find some of the stuff I needed so I went to the nearby grocery store #2, "Coop."  It was my first time ever to visit a Coop grocery store.  My friend told me about it already but I forgot - you have to pay a hefty amount for plastic bags.  Anyways, it was a good thing I had extra plastic bags.

On Wednesday night, I feasted on sweet, sweet Tacos.  12 of them. :-D  And then just today, I finalized probably 3 dishes: tokwa't baboy, postek, and sinuglaw.  It was my first time ever to prepare tokwa't baboy - not a problem actually.  But it was my first time ever to prepare kinilaw na tuna.  I wondered how come my kinilaw at first didn't look at all like the ones I order from most restaurants.  I think, based on what I read, that kinilaw actually has coconut milk or something.  Anyways, I bought so much pork, I converted the kinilaw into sinuglaw, a mix of sinugba and kinilaw.  Sinugba of course is Bisaya for inihaw.  For the tokwa, I used Japanese tofu, of course. :-)

Wait, Ronjie, you bought so much pork??????  Yes, I bought them last Sunday but because I felt so tired that day, I was able to cook them all only now.  It's not that I eat pork only.  The last couple of days, I've been eating beef.  I had tapsilog the last two days, and Tacos (ground beef) last night.  My tapsilog looked better than ever.  It is because this time I was able to buy a cut of beef that was more appropriate for tapa.  It tasted great as well.  Recipe was from my mom.  I didn't use patis though.

Last Sunday, my engineering mentor, Doc Benny, arrived here in Tokyo for a 3-day conference and so we met up Tuesday night, together with my former thesis adviser, Prof Fer.  We went to the Imperial Palace and the Asakusa area.  I didn't realize that the walk to the Imperial Palace was that long.  Actually, we did a lot of walking, even just for getting to/from the train stations and transferring between stations.  Anyway, the Palace grounds was just so huge a place.  Sunset actually caught us there.

When we got to Asakusa, most shops were closed.  The good thing was, there were very few people.  I didn't think the Sensoji Temple would look so much better in the evening.  And then, we had dinner at this ramen and gyoza resto wherein they serve...  just one kind of ramen, and gyoza!  Their specialty, apparently.  Not the greatest, but pretty good.  Not so salty ramen.  They had beer and Japanese sake (or rice wine; beer is also sake, actually because sake literally translates to alcoholic beverage.) as well; we had a cup each of sake.  Pretty strong.  And overall, a pretty good dinner: the ambience, the company, the food.  It was a fun evening and it was nice to meet up with fellow Filipinos and chat in Tagalog.  Doc Benny, who probably spent 6 or more years here in Japan for his PhD and associate professorship back in the 80s, still had very good Nihongo.  But he wisely chose when to use it and when not.

So, well, that's it.  Back to the books.  Stay tuned for updates here and there.  God bless, everyone!

3776

It's difficult to tell the whole story in words. At some point, we thought we had left behind one of our trip buddies. At some stretches, I was all by myself. I fell once, it hurt, and I had to bring myself back up. On my trip to the top, it was all mental; you had to push and tell yourself you can, but at the same time you had to be smart and stop and rest if your body says so.

After this trip has exhausted my physical and mental faculties, it was my emotional side that had to show. I was only very thankful to God because he brought me, an inexperienced mountain climber, to the top of one of his glorious creations, and back down and home safely and practically without a scratch. I was also thinking all the while of Mara, and how I love her. I had to climb up and be back home safely and in one piece so that I will be there with her on December 27th this year.

Well, a picture says a thousands words, they say. So a video of ~38 minutes in length, and at 30 frames per second, would then be around 35 billion words.

Let this (two-part) video just speak for itself:
Part 1. http://wwwronjiecom.multiply.com/video/item/10/3776
Part 2. http://wwwronjiecom.multiply.com/video/item/11/3776_22

Friday the 13th!

So what?  I don't believe in superstitions, because I believe only in God.  I hadn't actually realized it was Friday the 13th until I wrote this blog post (which is actually two days later).

Anyways, last night before going to sleep, I watched another movie online and...  5am came and I still can't sleep.  I fell asleep at 7am already!  Yikes!  And then I woke up (because I had to) by 11am to prepare.  But actually, I got up at 12pm already.  Oh by the way, yesterday, I packed everything already for today's trip.  So, a cold shower first.  Then, my supposedly spaghetti-and-gratin lunch turned into a salty chow mein dish and not as yummy doria.  It wasn't a very pleasant eating experience.  Nonetheless, it was still carbohydrates - my source of energy - and so I had to finish it all up.  Thankfully I had banana which was the best dish of my 3-dish lunch.  Then, final preps, and 2pm came and I was ready to go.  Save for the lack of sleep.

Gratin, by the way, is like baked ziti but it doesn't resemble the baked-mac-looking baked ziti I have tried at some "Italian" places in the Philippines.

2pm came and my two trip buddies slash next-door neighbours were not yet so ready-to-go just yet, and so I double checked the bus schedule at the bus stop.  Per my "research" online, we could take the 2:15pm bus, so that we could be at the train station by ~2:35pm to meet up with our two other trip buddies, and then we could take the 3:03pm train to get to Shinjuku by 4pm.  Guess what.  The next bus was not until 2:37pm.  Uh-oh, we're going to be late!  And we didn't have oxygen cans yet - we still had to buy them in Shinjuku!

Anyways, so we can't do anything about it except inform our two trip buddies who might be early to arrive at Hon-Atsugi.  It was so hot today by the way.  And I was already wearing one thermal.  My mountain climbing bag was already 12kg, with 4L of fluids (2L of water, 2L of sports drink) and 7 additional layers of clothes.  I haven't ever been in less than 10 degree weather for more than 30 minutes before - usually if I'm in 10 degree weather or worse, I would go indoors already after no more than 30 minutes.  So anyways, I took all necessary precautions.  Like the fluids.  The cost of these 4L of fluids is just under 200 yen.  If I buy them at Mt Fuji it might cost me 4000 yen!  I also brought knee and ankle braces.  A walking stick.  Some Biogesic (paracetamol) medicine.  A low stool (because it's difficult for me to stand up from a squat or sit-on-the-floor position).  An umbrella in case it rains on the way between home and the starting point of the Mt Fuji climb.  A scarf, a pair of gloves, two knit headgear (bonnets/beanies), and a cap.  Two hankies for covering my ears and sunglasses for my eyes in case it becomes sunny.  A face towel to wipe away sweat.  6 packs of granola bars.  12 chocolate-covered macadamia nuts.  9 macadamia nut choco cookies.  An extra pair of shoes - because my Nike running shoes was "smiling" already.  I glued it up but who knows, what if it gives in!  Better to carry an extra half kilo of insurance than walk up and/or down a 1.4km climb without any shoes at all!  I also brought my wallet, of course.  And my two cellphones (Japan and Philippine numbers).  And my Palm TX - which functions as my English-Japanese dictionary, and my movie player.  And maybe a couple other things.

Anyways, better to be safe than sorry.  Better to carry all that weight and make it to the top, than having to go down because I am not prepared to complete the whole trip.

So, we got to Hon-Atsugi at around 3:05pm already, two minutes too late for the 3:03pm train.  Surprisingly, the train was late and so we were still able to get on the train.  We got to Shinjuku just around 4pm.  We met up with Kim-san, the trip organizer, and we met his girlfriend and also his cousin, both for the first time.  Then a little later Dr. Kim arrived.  Then there we were, 9 of us, trip buddies for this Fuji climb.  We hurried first to find oxygen cans for bringing up to Fuji.  But we didn't have enough time anymore and we weren't able to buy our dinner!  So we had to buy dinner at the 5th station of Mt Fuji, where our climb starts.  Off to the bus station we went and then somebody shouted "Ronj!"

It was Coy, my friend from the Philippine, who is about to graduate from her masteral degree this August/September.  This is only the 2nd time I've seen her during my Japan trip, and whoah, this was a big coincidence.  I found out she was going to Mt Fuji as well.  I told her we were late for our bus already and that we should just catch each other at Mt Fuji.

On the bus, I planned to either sleep the whole time, or watch a movie.  I attempted both but didn't really get to finish either one of them.  Oh well, I hope my staggered sleep last night (6pm to 10pm and 7am to 11am) was enough.  On the bus we checked the hour-by-hour weather forecast, and it said sunny!  Great!

Our bus left at 4:50pm.  We arrived at the 5th station at around 7pm.  And so we split up to look for, buy, and eat dinner.  We ended up eating at the restaurant where they have hot meals.  Two guys got kare-raisu (curry rice) which was 950 yen but was probably just 1/3 of that, 2.3km below.  I had tempura-udon which was only around 650 yen.  It was yummy.  But actually, it wasn't enough.  But, ah, we were in a hurry.  We must be at the summit by 4 or 4:30am to catch the sunrise, and back here before 11am to catch our bus trip back to Shinjuku.

After some group photos, minus one (the person taking the photos), we started our climb at 7:45pm.  After about two hours we were already past the 7th station.  I thought that was fast. After the 7th station, there's the 8th and 9th station.  So supposedly we were 1/4 of our way up.  Then, the climb became harder and harder as we got closer and closer.  Ah, one of life's many lessons.

Fuji-san!

Today I had to wake up really early because we had to be at the meeting point near Hon-Atsugi by 8:45am, for our TPU-organized field trip to the Fuji-Hakone area.  So that meant we (PhD students) had to leave from our apartment at 8:00am.

But alas, I had a hard time sleeping yet again (maybe 4am?) and so I woke up only around 7:50am - if not for a phone call from one of my fellow PhD students.  My alarm clock which I set for 7am did not work for me at all. :(

Anyways, so obviously no more shower or breakfast or the "2nd thing" you should do after waking up, and then off by bicycle we went to Hon-Atsugi.  We probably left around 8:10am already, and we arrived at the meeting point at just before 8:45am.  Right on time.

And so the 2 hour bus trip, first to this place called "Fuji Harness," which is a guide dog training facility.  http://www.fuji-harness.net/  The dogs of course are very cute and very adorable.  Unfortunately no baby dogs, which are even cuter.  The purpose of this trip is actually to admire the beautiful architecture, which has no less than Mt Fuji in the backdrop.  The complex is a very nice piece of architecture indeed.  There was a demo show to show us what the guide dogs are trained for.  It is funny that the show's host was speaking to all of us in Japanese but he spoke in English to the dog!  But other than that, it wasn't really an entertaining show.  No acrobatic acts like running through rings of fire or somersaults.  The host was just showing that the dogs would guide blind people:
1. given a choice between two doors/paths, the dog will choose the wider one so that he (or she) can guide the blind person continuously through the door/path;
2. away from obstacles that the blind person could bump his/her head into;
3. away from obstacles that the blind person might trip on; and
4. safely up and down stairs, protecting the blind person from falling over from the stairs if there are no rails.

We had lunch at the cafeteria, a pre-packed bento and a small aluminum bottle of green tea.  There were so many stuff in the lunch: two kinds of fried chicken (one is a katsu or cutlet), fish, fish balls, rice of course, a tofu roll with veggies inside, other veggies and mushrooms, a pork cutlet ("tonkatsu"), siomai (dimsum with pork), and I forgot what else.  Our non-pork and non-beef eating fellow students of course didn't have the pork stuff.

After lunch and some "snaps," as one Indian PhD student would call "taking photos," we went again on the bus for maybe a 30 minute or so ride to the Hakone area to go to the POLA Museum of Art.  http://www.polamuseum.or.jp/english/  It was very interesting architecture, yet again, and this time this one has a special engineering feature: base isolation.  Base isolation protects the building from earthquake forces by "isolating" it from the ground which shakes violently during an earthquake.  By the way, architects here are engineers as well - but only of buildings.  Civil engineers are engineers of bridges, usually, and other "civil" structures.  In the Philippines, architects are building designers, and civil engineers perform the engineering design for buildings, bridges, and other civil structures.

Anyways, first stop was a short lecture given by one of the museum staff to give a brief introduction to the feature exhibits currently on display, which is collectively called "Nihon-ga" which means Japanese paintings, as well as to other exhibits around the whole facility.  Very interesting.  There were also Claude Monet and Pablo Picasso paintings there.  I wonder if they were the real thing!  There were also boring displays of old perfume bottles and something else that was too boring to remember.  We also spent a little bit of time at the museum shop where there were more interesting items than in those two boring exhibits.

And then another 2 hour bus trip back to Hon-Atsugi.  We estimated that we probably spent half this trip (5 hours) on the bus!

When we got to Hon-Atsugi, I wasn't feeling like coming home to Nilagang Baboy and Nilagang Chicken just yet, and so I joined two of my colleagues for a gyudon dinner at Matsuya, a competitor of Yoshinoya and Sukiya.  Filipinos in the Philippines might be more familiar with Yoshinoya.  Anyways, gyudon as you know is just (apparently boiled) beef rice topping with egg.  Apparently, the egg is raw and you put it directly in the rice and beef.  Maybe it is supposed to cook in there but apparently not really.  I guess this is the Japanese version of Tapsilog.  The set meal was not bad; 490 yen for that big gyudon bowl, with miso soup and a side salad.  And, all-you-can-drink iced water.  :-)

And then after that, a 30-minute bike ride back home in this still very hot summer early evening.  I got home with all my clothes drenched in sweat.  I changed first and then went back to the office to do some work and upload photos as well.

Hakone! and Filipino Food

As mentioned today's trip was to start at 9am sharp, or else they can leave without you.  So that meant the latest I should leave home is 8:30am.  Thank God I woke up to my alarm at around 7:15am, and was ready to go at a little past 8:00am.

So I decided to go with the other PhD students who are going there by bike.  Yikes!  After Friday's intense basketball (it was a total of 45 points, not 40 as I previously mentioned) game, I regret having to do this, except for the sort of bonding with the other students.  Anyways, as mentioned before, going to Hon-Atsugi station from TPU or my apartment is not a problem because it is downhill.  Going back was the problem - you're tired from whatever you did and then it is uphill.  Of course we just walk the bike, but still it's more effort.

The good news though is, I saved 260 pesos (around $5.20) today by riding the bike, for a 4 km (3 mile) total round trip journey.  Yay!

Anyways, we got to the meeting place at 8:40am - better early than late, of course.  And then the organizers told us that we were leaving at 9:30am because they had to wait for someone.  What?  I thought the idea was to leave at 9:00am sharp and that we won't wait for latecomers?  Oh well.  Not everyone is on time; nope, not in Japan.

Actually because we left late we had very little time to go around by ourselves around Hakone later during our "free time."

We got there around 10:30am and the first activity was doing this traditional "wood curving" (that's what it said on our invitation letter - not "wood carving" and not pottery as I said in an earlier blog post)...  Actually the more appropriate term is wood mosaic pattern making, I think called YosegiZaiku.  So we have these different colored wood tiles, from different types of wood, and they are either diamond-shaped or triangular (each being one-half of the diamond-shaped ones), and then you make a pattern, for beginners it's usually to make a coaster (one you put your beer mug on) or something.  Interesting.   Then once you've decided on your pattern, you glue your tiles together and then clean it up with wet tissues and sandpaper and voila.  For more advanced wood mosaic pattern makers, or whatever they're called, they make box decorations and stuff.  Check this out: http://ginkgraph.net/articles/products/hakone-yosegi-zaiku.html.  The boxes themselves are way too expensive (like many things here).  The cheapest, smallest one would be more than 2000 yen ($20, PhP 1000).

Anyways, right after that was barbecue lunch!  Basically there's this big basket of food - veggies and meat - and we were to cook them on the hot plate.  It is practically like fried, more than grilled - we used oil a lot.  But basically we all ate a lot.  Two or three in our group do not eat beef, so they only ate the lamb and shrimp (probably there was just one shrimp per person), and then one doesn't eat pork.  And so I had lots of beef and pork.  Ehehehe.  And veggies, of course.  There was pumpkin, eggplant, and lots and lots of cabbage.  There was also soba - by "barbecuing" it, of course it became yakisoba.  Yum.  There was one palmful of rice for each of us, but it didn't matter. :-D

Anyways, right after lunch, we all went outside and noticed there were stilts which many of tried to maneuver but it was more difficult than it looked!  Then after that at around 2:05pm there was this part called "Communication class."  And, well within our own groups, we tried to practice communication.  YUP.  One of the organizers warned us saying something like, "We will have this communication class because the Japanese are not very good at communicating their opinion, so if you have something bad to say don't say it." So...  Anyways, it would be great if we were mixed with the other groups.  Anyways, our group were the only graduate students.  The rest are freshmen college students.  Half of them are Chinese and half of them are Korean.  There was this one guy from Malaysia and I think at least one girl from Taiwan, but the guy is Chinese-Malaysian and they both speak Mandarin as well.  Other nationalities there include 1 Filipino/me, 2 Indians, 1 Bangladeshi/Bengal, and 1 Italian - all from our group.

Anyways, the first activity was talking more about our own names.  Well, okay, it was interesting to hear of the other guys' names' origin.  Of course I told them "Aquino" is a Spanish word, which I think means "hero," and that it is quite common in the Philippines - we now have 2 presidents with the same name.

The second activity was to pick 3 letters from our names, and then write some phrases which could be good advice for maintaining good interpersonal relationships.  One local suggested "Wake up early everyday."  Yup, that is very important for good relationships.  Wake up early.

And then next activity was bouncing a newspaper (crumpled) ball on a newspaper "net" which we control ourselves.  Very fun.  Yup, very very fun.  Anyways, we had very little time to go around Lake Ashi (or Ashinoko).  We were near the northern tip and, well the lake is huge and we were not able to explore much of it.  Actually to do that, it would be nice to take a boat ride or this duck-shaped, pedal-driven gondola.

By the way, the official title of the trip is "2010 Foreign Students cultural exchange workshop."

Anyways, I think we got back to Hon-Atsugi around 6pm.  We got our bikes and made a pit stop at Atsugi Trellis.  I bought me a "wok pan" - sort of an in-between a wok and a frying pan.  Worked well for me.

I got home maybe around 7pm.  And started boiling the pork at around 7:30pm.  I finished cooking at 10:30pm.  "It took that long????" you might ask.  Yup, it took that long to cook 4 dishes.

I made Nilagang Baboy, Postek Tagalog (hehe, I just invented that word for Pork Steak, to parallel with Bistek Tagalog for Beef Steak), Picadillo, and Taplog (Tapa and Itlog - no sinangag).  I also cooked rice, of course.  Anyways, I was so full from the tabehodai (eat-all-you-can) barbecue lunch, I wasn't yet so hungry until I finished cooking.  I just had one small pizza (frozen) for dinner.  After cleaning up, I slept right away.  I didn't pass by the school at all this day.  I was so dead tired, and my knee is feeling it the most.

Rain, Rain, Go Away

After a very nice day, here comes the rain.  And the cold.  No colds though, thank God!

Off to Tokyo again, this time by public transport all the way, to visit JAXA, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. More details here: www.jaxa.jp/index_e.html.  As usual I went to Hon-Atsugi, which was also our meeting place.  There was probably 12 of us from the school, both PhD students and senior researchers, and only 2 are Japanese.  We went all the way to the end of the Odakyu-Odawara Line train route, to Shinjuku, probably the busiest train station in Tokyo and all of Japan.  Then from there we took the Chuo line to go to Mitaka, then we took the bus to the Mitaka City Office, then a 10-minute walk to JAXA.  All trains we took were Rapid Express trains which skipped a lot of stations - great!  Then vice versa.

And, that's about it.  Nothing so great about today...  I took photos at JAXA, and hopefully I will be able to upload my photos really, really soon.

Did I say it was very cold today?  Ranges from 8 to 15 degrees.

No wait, there was a "flight simulator" at JAXA and I volunteered to be a pilot.  It wasn't so engaging though.  We almost crashed, but we didn't.  There were two of us pilots actually, so it wouldn't have been all my fault! :-D  If it were real, we would've been saved by the autopilot.  And we were safe, of course, because it was not real.  No twists and turns and all that, no advanced controls and all that.  It was...  not engaging at all.  It is interesting though that they have an agency such as this; they plan to have hypersonic (i.e. very fast) airplanes in the near future, and even space planes!

And that was it.  Rainy.  Cold.  Hungry.  I'm off to my favorite food place: the convenience store at the corner. :-D

"Good Morning, Japan!"

I started today very early, woke up very early - 6am (thanks Mara!) - but slept a little again and then woke up around 6:50am, one hour before the meet-up time at the school for today's technical tours.  Surprisingly I was able to do all that I need to do - including taking breakfast and taking a shower, among others - and I got to the meet-up place on time.  It helped that I bought ready-to-heat-then-eat breakfast food, a kind of hotdog embedded in some bread.  Nope, it wasn't really like a hotdog sandwich.  Anyways, it was good.  The hotdog here is a little different from the usual ones we in the Philippines or in the US know - you can still see some chunks of pork fat inside.  It's almost more like a sausage, like longganiza, but it looks like a hotdog from the outside.  It appears that it's the usual type of hotdog here, much like the red, Tender Juicy hotdogs we have back at home is the usual there.

Anyways, so off we went to Tokyo on a rented mini-bus that sits probably 15 or more people comfortably, with reclining chairs and all that.  I saw a 3rd McDonald's here in Atsugi, as well as a Denny's.  And then, surprise, surprise.

MT. FUJI, appearing with a white tuque (bonnet/beanie) of snow, suddenly appeared in the background behind the dark/green Mt. Ooyama that stands guard on Atsugi, as if saying "Good Morning, Japan!" and thus, this blog entry's title.  I thought I would've entitled this "First Tokyo Tour, Day 1," but after seeing the glorious heavenly creation that is "Fuji-san" (that's what they call it here; "san" also means mountain), I could've also entitled this blog post as "Surprise, Japan!"  And it was indeed a pleasant surprise.  Of course I took some photos.  :-P

Now, I could've also entitled this blog post as "Where's the rain?"  And that was the other surprise of today.  Two days ago, the forecast for today was rainy and cool, with day-time temperatures below 20 degrees, and night time temperature below 10 degrees.  The forecast yesterday for today, was cloudy, but pretty much the same temperature range as previously forecasted.  Today went and passed and guess what - it was a very fine day, with temperatures reaching 23 degrees in Atsugi and in Tokyo.  And it was clear skies here in Atsugi, thus the surprising view of Mt. Fuji.  This is the first time I saw Mt. Fuji from a distance; I "climbed" Mt. Fuji up to the tourist center, by car, 5 years ago, and it was freezing cold then, at least for me, although it was still springtime, with temperature below 10 degrees and quite breezy weather.

To give you an idea of what I saw, you can check this link out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Skyscrapers_of_Shinjuku_2009_January.jpg

Anyways, first stop on the tour was Shimizu Corporation's Open Institute of Technology.  The top 5 Japanese construction companies here are high on R&D, and Shimizu is one of them.  They have plenty of laboraties, including a wind tunnel testing laboratory, a vibration (shaking table) testing laboratory, an acoustics lab, a geotechnical centrifuge lab, and so on, and they have introduced plenty of building services technologies.  They also have built "green" spaces, which attract plenty types of insects and urban birds, and are actually host to some fish, ducks, and one bird that looks like a crane.

Where are the photos?  My camera lost battery (I didn't charge it last night), and I left my spare battery at home.  *sigh*  And then my phone camera - oh what a problem it usually is - it "requests for 5Mb space" - on the main storage system.  I have plenty of space on my mini-SD card inside my phone (like around 8Gb) - but it does not recognize it!  I think it's a Windows Mobile issue.  I don't like, and I don't recommend Windows Mobile.  Mine is Version 6.1, by the way.  I do have some photos, including of Mt Fuji, and I requested some of my fellow students and colleagues to take some photos of me, and share their other photos with me.  Hope I can get those soon.  I still haven't uploaded any of my photos!  Let's see if I can do that later tonight.

Anyways, one of the highlights of today was...  We got to be "tested" in one of Shimizu's wind tunnels.  As in, "We."  Basically, we, 4 at a time, can step on platform, and then we get to feel what it is like in very high winds with speeds up to 30 m/s (108 kph).  WOW.  And that's not a gust speed, it was the mean speed, so it was 30 m/s continuously for a few seconds to a minute.  It was quite uncomfortable, of course, and actually I found it difficult to face the wind itself continuously.  The photos we had were funny.  I hope I can upload them very soon!

Anyways, next stop was... lunch at Shimizu.  We had authentic bento box lunch, I think taken from Shimizu's canteen, but courtesy of TPU.  It had shrimp, duck, chicken, and fish, as well as the usual sides of veggies, mushrooms, some shabu-shabu-type of food, and of course, rice.  Yum.  And we had green tea in a bottle with the meal.

Next stop was the Tokyo Sky Tree construction site.  Actually we're not allowed to go into the construction site, so we just viewed the whole thing from about 100m away.  The Tokyo Sky Tree is a communication/broadcast/antenna lattice tower that is intended to be 634m tall, with a triangular base, but circular top, made almost entirely of steel.  It is currently 349m tall.  You can see how tall it is currently because they have a sign posted just outside of the construction site.  You can read more information at www.tokyo-skytree.jp/english/.

Next stop is Japan's currently tallest completed structure, the Tokyo Tower.  It is also a broadcast tower much like the Sky Tree, and its shape is more traditional, like the Eiffel Tower.  It is 333m high.  It is taller than Japan's tallest building, the Yokohama Landmark Tower, which is just nearly 300m high.  You can read more information at www.tokyotower.co.jp/english/.

It was my first time to go up Tokyo Tower, while previously I just took pictures of it from a distance.  The tickets cost more than 800 yen, I think, and that is probably one reason why I didn't go up the last time.  That ticket is the cost to go up the first observation deck at 150m height, which has two floors.  You need to pay an extra 500 yen, I think, to go up the higher "special observation deck."  Anyways, one of the features at the first observation deck is looking down the tower through "lookdown window" - not really so scary, each was just probably 0.6m x 1.5m in area, so unless maybe more than two people step on the glass, something might happen.  Generally, people were scared to step on the lookdown window.  Even people much lighter than me.  You wouldn't feel height-sickness at all, because the tower itself is enclosed, so you don't feel the lower pressure and stronger winds that you would normally experience at altitude.

When we were up Tokyo Tower, the Tokyo skies were quite cloudy already, and so we didn't get to see Mt Fuji from Tokyo Tower.  Likewise, it wasn't worth it to go up toe the "special" observation deck.

On the bus trip, I saw two Pepper Lunch restaurants - not like the ones in the Philippines in size; they are just small restaurants.  I would think the food tastes are the same here as in the Philippines.  We'll see.  The food at the Yoshinoya chain of restaurants, by the way, doesn't taste the same here and in the Philippines.  I tried Yoshinoya the last time I was here.

And that was it.  Back to Atsugi we went, and surprisingly the trip was just an hour.  Traffic only met us in Atsugi itself as it was already around 5pm then, nearly after office hours already.  So apparently, even here in Japan where the trains are very efficient, it is faster to go by car (or in our case, private bus).  Of course, it is a different scenario in Tokyo itself, where, like New York, parking might be a problem.

Near Atsugi, I think I saw Mt Fuji again but because it was getting dark, it didn't look as white as it was during the day time and you don't really know that it's Mt Fuji except for its shape.

What a day!  Love it. :-)

The Trip Back to Atsugi

Here we go again.  Last time I did this, I got lost while dragging my 35 kg luggage around Shinjuku.  From Narita (the airport I'm headed for) there is supposedly a bus that goes straight to Atsugi, but because of the schedule of flights from Manila, I missed it.  So there I was, in Shinjuku, but thanks to helpful people I was able to make it to Atsugi - except that I wasn't able to contact the person I was going to meet.  So it was past 12 midnight, the place was deserted, and I was there by myself, getting lost for a while, but I didn't know if the person I was going to meet was going to find me.  Unfortunately my phone was not useable in Japan (it is a GSM-only phone; Japan's cellphone networks use CDMA), so I cannot make a phone call to my picker upper. I tried using the payphones but they were speaking in Japanese, I didn't understand what the instructions were as to how much coins I should put in.  I think I didn't even have enough coins, or that I lost some of them already trying to make a call.  And then, she showed up.  I left my Manila home at around 10:00am.  I got to my Atsugi apartment at around 1:00am.

Looking at the positive side, it was nice weather in Atsugi then, the perfect spring weather, like nature's own natural air-conditioning system was on.  And my free baggage allowance was just 20kg, but thanks to my connections, I was allowed 35kg without charge!  (This was not Philippine Airlines, by the way.)

So this time around, I'm a been there, done that.  Only problem is, since I was staying longer in Japan this time, my checked and handcarry luggage totaled 54kg!  And on paper, the allowable weight was only 37kg.  Thankfully the guy at the check-in counter said he will let me go with just a 10kg excess baggage.  Goodbye hundred-something dollars.  This is Philippine Airlines, by the way.  That's about all the trouble I had at the Manila airport.  Oh no, wait, I had to pay the Philippine Travel Tax of PhP 1620 - they say it applies to all tickets purchased online.  The inconvenience of going online!  What an irony.  And you wonder how come the Philippines is... nevermind.  I flew business class by the way, to get the heavier check-in baggage allowance.

And PAL's business class was spankin' hot!  Fully reclining seats, and 19-inch touch-screen LCD panels?  Wow.  I had a choice between a Japanese meal and a Western meal.  I chose the Japanese meal of course.  Yum.  Well, that's what you get for paying an extra...  $3.  Yup, I bought my ticket online, and it is just a one-way ticket because I don't intend on flying business class again soon, and the difference is just $3 (~PhP 150).  If I bought roundtrip tickets, the difference would have been around $200~$400, I think.

The plane take-off queue was so long at Manila, it took us probably more than 30 minutes from departure time before our plane actually departed, but like airlines do, we landed in Narita around 20 minutes ahead of schedule.  That would be around 7:35pm local time.  The straight bus to Hon-Atsugi (the main train station in Atsugi) leaves at 8:20pm.  I could make it in time!

Alas, when I got to the immigration counter, there was a problem with my visa.  It says "precollege (undergraduate) student" when in fact it should say "college (graduate) student"!  So they had to change it, blah blah blah.  Point is, I could've made it in time for the straight bus to Hon-Atsugi, but I didn't.  This time around, I was able to get on a bus to Sagami-Ono, which is just 5 stations away from Hon-Atsugi - no more Shinjuku!  That was so much pleasant a journey.  I got to Hon-Atsugi around 11:30pm, I think.

Actually, it wasn't so pleasant when I got to Sagami-Ono.  The bus stop was on the ground floor and the train station was on the second floor, so I had to go up one level.  Where we passengers got down from the bus, there seemed no option for elevators - just a long, 5- or 6-meter high staircase.  And then it was raining.  And very cold.  As in, around 5 degrees (celsius) cold.  Add some wind chill.  It felt practically freezing.  Quite literally.  No way I was going to take those stairs!

I actually noticed the elevator on the other side of the road, but there was a 2-foot high fence obstacle.  I chose to just carry my 42kg luggage over this 2-foot high fence and then take the elevator (and this is all protected from rain), than carry it under the rain 0.2m (stair thread height) at a time 30 times (number of steps)!

But when I got out of the elevator,  the problem was still there.  The rain and the wind chill factor.  My umbrella was deep inside my 42kg checked baggage.  And even if I was able to get it I would only be able to shield myself from the rain, not any of my bags.  Oh no, my electronics.  And if I still had to look for my umbrella, how long would that push me back?  Under that weather, all I wanted to do was get home.

Anyway, I just hurried to get to the station and nevermind the rain.  When I got to Hon-Atsugi, I needed to take a taxi to the school.  The last time, that someone who picked me up had a car to take me to my then apartment, and there was no rain!  And the rain and the wind chill I think rode with me on the train from Sagami-Ono to Hon-Atsugi.  Big problem.  Nothing else could go wrong?  Try this, there was a 20-party queue for the taxi.  Guess what.  In the rain.  I had no choice.

So finally I got to TPU at just a little past 12 midnight, the person who was to meet me, met up with me.  He introduced me to some of the researchers at the school, and then off to the apartment we go.  On foot.  Thankfully they lent me an umbrella.  When we got to the apartment, I forgot that my apartment was on the 2nd floor.  Have I told you I have a 42kg bag?  Well at least there were 2 of us this time to carry the bag one level up.  Obviously there aren't any elevators or escalators.

Anyway, finally I was in my apartment already.  maybe around 12:15am.  Everything is fine now; time to sleep.

NOT.

I forgot to ask my new friends how to operate the heater.  The controls were in Japanese!  I tried to figure it out but to no avail.  So I slept in 5-degree weather.  I wore a thermal underwear, two layers of sweater, I had a towel-like blanket (that's what they gave me), and a comforter/quilt.  I had difficulty sleeping at first.  I haven't eaten anything yet since that in-flight meal!  And it was soooooo very cold.  Last time I slept at around 2:30am.  This time though, I was too tired, and clocked out at around 1:30am.

Overall, except for the excess baggage (a.k.a. unplanned expense), visa issue, the rain, the rain, and the rain, and the really cold weather, everything was better this time around.  I was able to exchange text messages with my fiancée.  Yup, my phone is CDMA-capable!

One night only so far, this looks like an interesting 3 years.  Not to mention, my wife-to-be will be with me here witnessing one of my dreams coming true.  Of course, her becoming my wife this December is another dream I do not want to wake up from for eternity.  Ah, I am very sleepy now.  Good night to you all.