Wednesday, July 21, 2010

7/18

Took a small trip to this sweet shop.
It is in the country side, selling mostly dango.
Inside the same shop, there are 2 tiny cafes. One is western style, the other one is traditional style.
We picked the traditional one, and had our tea time there.
Looking out the window is the relaxing view.
Chris picked green tea parfait, and I picked green tea shaved ice :D


Friday, July 16, 2010

Saturday, June 19, 2010

6/19


This was drawn by my student.
1. The cheese was eaten by the mouse
2. The mouse was scared by the cat
3. The cat was chased by the dog
4. The dog was walked by the boy
5. The boy is loved by the girl
6. The girl is called Emi by her friends
7. Her friends were scared by a big spider
8. The big spider was killed by Matsumoto Jun
9. Matsumoto Jun was kissed by all the girls.

Kite Festival



There was this Kite Festival in Nakanoshima.
Mark invited to see the kite battle.
2 teams from each side of the river make their own kites. They have fly the kite once the kites from each side meet up in the sky, they have to try to attack each other and pull the other party's kite off the sky.

Wednesday, May 19, 2010

5/19 Devil Child

Drama happened in school today.

Taught with Kamiya at an elementary school.
One of the classes was 5th graders.
We had our lesson in the multi-purpose room.
There were stacks of chairs, tables, and 2 racks of unicycles (most Japanese kids can do unicycle).

It was one of the most horrible horrible class I have ever seen.
3 boys were running around the classroom during our lesson.
They climbed up to the tables; hid behind the chairs; unicycled around the classroom.

As we were using the portable black board as we teach, one of the bad boys hid behind the black board making funny sounds and bang on the board, dropping the chalks onto the floor…
While the rest of the students were sitting on the floor, the boy took a chair from the stack and put it in front of other students to block their view.
Towards the end, he even threw a couple unicycles on the floor and kicked them with his leg…

At the end of the class, the teacher said “If you can’t behave in class, at least do a proper good bye greeting to the teachers” So she wanted everyone to sit properly in their seats.
But the universal super bad boy refused to do it.
The teacher let out of all her anger and grabbed his wrists, dragged him, looked right into his eyes and yelled, “Now go pick up the unicycle, clean up your mess, and return to your seat”
The boy continued to struggle and refuse to…. and trying to push the teacher away, so the teacher accidentally smacked the boy’s head (which was great :] *clap clap ).
The universal super bad boy said, “Ok! Let go of me!”
The teacher did.
And then the boy dragged his arms across half of the class room wall saying, “ahh…I am infected by bacteria, she is dirty!” He finally walked towards the mess he created but stood there doing nothing.
The teacher then screamed and yelled at him a bit more.

As everything was happening, Kamiya was crying in front of the rest of the students…

God… I love dramas!

Saturday, May 15, 2010

5/13 Enchanted Palace Day

Last thing I requested: a palace & afternoon tea

So Chris took me to Kensington Palace, where Prince Diana used to live.
The garden was beautiful.
The most recent project is to restore and renovate the palace.
However, some parts are still open to the public.
The current theme for the palace tour is A Tale of the Seven Princesses--- talking about the 7 princesses whom had lived in the palace in the past.
The tour was presented in a very contemporary way. New visual art projects were set up in each room to blend in and tell the history of the old. Lighting and sound effects were used. It was a very interesting experience, it made me feel like I was stepping into a fairy tale. The fusion of the new and the old also made me want to find out more about the truth in the story telling.
Unfortunately I wasn't able to take any pictures in any of the rooms. Only the poster.

Some horrible person dropped a napkin on the ground, which made my photo imperfect :(






+

After the tour of the palace... afternoon tea time!!!
One of the princess' green house was renovated. And it was where we had the tea!
Bottom of the tiered stand were the fingered sandwitches, middle was the English scone, top were the cakes and tarts.


+

Last meal in London: home-made roast lamb
Very yummy

5/12 Leaving Paris

French weather: bad bad bad. Cloudy & rained miserably.
French air: polluted
French metro: dirty
French people: rude and snobby (it is true!)
French food: salty
French streets: still pretty
French desserts: awesome!!!!!!

Ok... pardon my generalization about French people