Boys in Game Center

It was the second time I played this drum game (I forget the name), and even though my rhythm still bad, it did improve a load (the first time I played it was so bad that Yanagita chose Doraemon song for me, hoping I can easily match the beat - and I still missed some hits :-) ).

This time I went with Shuu, Nina, and Dito (double date? :-) ) after we had dinner in Shibuya. And like 'standard date' in game center, it was closed with taking pics at purikura. There was time that Nina and Dito went to the restroom leaving Shuu and me near the purikura machine, made us felt uncomfortable 'cause purikura is identical with girls, and it's quite peculiar to see two boys only hanging out there... :-)

Cotton Candy Project

Rachma just bought a cotton candy maker (it's actually a toy for kids) and she asked me to help her making the candy from it. It was fun, however, since it intended for kids, it can't produce much. Ninin joined later and we had a small cotton candy party.
Anyway, I won't buy my kids (if I have :-) ) that toy, for it consumes lots of electricity. I think I can found less-energy-consuming-way (why do I sound so 'textbookish'?) to make cotton candy...

Transparent Body

This picture was taken by Eden when we went to Odaiba. If you watch it closely, you will notice that my body is transparent in the picture. Eden said that the picture was a fail shot, since her camera already caught some light before my body come into view. Anyway, it resulted in cool picture, and I can brag to anyone, "Can you make your body transparent like this?" :-)

Glowing

Taken and photoshoped by Eden. I would like to put it on my profile, but I still don't have the 'feel' to do it (and have plenty of 'feel' to write this entry? :-) ). Anyway, I still like the picture in my profile, so may be I'll change it later...

The picture was taken on the highest building in Ikebukuro... It was Saturday night and the view was so great (romantic, may be? :-) ) that a lot of couples came... a little bit embarrassed... Anyway, we could act as if we were couple if we wanted to... :-)

Sleeping Traveler

Rachma was about to return to Indonesia to do survey, and since she'd been busy around the day of departure, she ended up packing the night before the flight day. Rachma wanted me to reinstall her computer, so I stay at her place that night. She lived in girl dormitory, and that was the first time I sleep at girl dormitory :-). Lucky that Ninin lived next door, so we didn't have to spend the night together in one room :-). Rachma slept almost all the way to Narita, and thus it was left to Ninin and I to keep us not to miss the station...

100 yen Shoes

There was a flea market in Koudaisai (TITech festival), and I went there without any intention of buying something - just escorting Yoshirin and Aki who were in the mood to do shopping. Out of the blue on of the seller looked at my feet and asked, "what is your feet size?"
"28" (Japanese shoes are measured in cm)
He grabbed one pairs of shoes and hand it to me.
"Try it. If it fits you, you can get it for free."
I was quite puzzled, but I tried the shoes anyway. It was a little bit large, but it suited me well.
The guy looked happy. "You can have it then"
It was a good shoes and it felt not right if I just took it like that, specially remembering that the guy was there to sell thing.
"C'mon, I can't take it just like that. Let me buy it"
The guy paused for few seconds before replying, "Okay, here is the deal. Can you do rock-scissor-paper? Lets play it. If I win you have to pay the shoes for 100 yen. If you win, you can take it free"
Seems like a good deal, so we did it - and he won.
Anyway, it was indeed a good shoes, and it's still a good deal even if I had to pay for it.
(And come to realize it, there's good person and luck waiting for you almost everywhere...:-) )

Troll in Pajama and Birthday Present

In the picture above, Pecolin (my homestay mother) wore peko-chan t-shirt that was a present from me. And, actually I got the t-shirt from Fujiko-san.

Pecolin's birthday was getting closer, and I still didn't have any idea what to give her. I then mailed Fujiko-san for some advice - for she often has good one - and lucky for me that this time she also had. She told me to visit her house, and I went the first time I had the chance.

After some 'important' chat (such as the fact that Moomin are actually trolls (Fujiko-san just came back from a trip to scandinavian countries) and that even though most of them don't wear anything in everyday life, they wear pajama when they go to bed :-) ), we started to talk about the present. I can't tell the detail here for I had promised Fujiko-chan to keep it a secret, anyway, in the end she handed me the t-shirt and told me to give it to Pecolin.

"Are you sure you don't want to give it yourself?", I asked her.
"No. It's okay. I usually just give her birthday card. Anyway, you're her son, she'll be glad to receive it from you. And told you what, I will act as if I don't know about the t-shirt at all."
So it went as we planned.

Several days after her birthday, Pecolin was wearing the t-shirt to a small party and everybody was asking about the t-shirt.
"It was a birthday present from Awan", she replied proudly.
"Really? How could you get the t-shirt? I think it should be hard to find...", the next question was addressed to me, and I just smiled full of secret.
Fujiko-san came late to the party, and when she spotted me, she frantically waved and said "Long time no see!".
Great act.
And I think I need to find Fujiko-chan a great birthday present next year... :-)

(About Peko-chan: it is the mascot of Fujiya, a cake chain-store in Japan. When Pecolin was a kid, lots of people said that she looked a lot like Peko-chan, and that's where she got her nickname).

The Ace

It was the tournament season for green sox (my baseball team), and since everybody seemed reluctant to wear no. 1 jersey, I wore it. Anyway, now I can brag to everyone that I am the ace of the team... :-)

Furuzawa's Firework

Fujiko-san invited me to see firework in her house. Actually the firework was held in Tokyo bay, while her house is in Magome (if you never been to Tokyo, the two places quite far from each other), so, in order to be able to see the firework, we went to the top of the building (Fujiko-san lives in 5-story mansion) and stand among the antenna and water tank :-).

Here is one of the pictures...

Body Fat Percentage

When my lab wants to throw solid waste from experimental room, we need to report its weight beforehand. And since our lab doesn't have balance big enough to measure in the order of few kilograms, it usually becomes a problem when the disposal season comes.

Lucky that Makii has body balance, so we use hers to measure the weight. Anyway, the body balance is quite sophisticated, and it can also measure the body fat percentage. Makii offered to measure mine, and I 'boldly' accepted the offer. And the result is... 5%.
"I think I need to add some more weight", was the first comment that came from my mouth.
"I wish I have the luxury of saying something like you have just said", commented Makii.

Birthday Pudding

UNESCO fellows threw a birthday party for me (well, not only for me actually :-) ) and because there was no birthday cake, Carmela used pudding as birthday cake...
Overall it was a great party. As far that I can remember, that was my first birthday party involving lots of karaoke :-)

Playboy in Cinema

I went to watch movie with Yoshirin and Aki at Shibuya, and that was the first time out of my hometown that I went to a cinema with free seat - the earliest you come, the best seat you can get.
And after looking around, I notice that Playboy magazine is one of the spensor of the cinema - the name of the magazine written close to the screen.
Well, at least we not went to see 'that kind' of movie... :-)

Day of the thieves

Our lab had to be the umpire for baseball tournament of chemical engineering department, and the job including bringing the equipment to the field. Since there was noone else in the lab and the time for the game was drawing near, Makii asked me to help her taking the equipment (it supposed to be the job of B4).

Quite interesting task: first we had to enter the factory building of Aida lab, and we need to enter combination key to unlock the door (it was so early that nobody's there...). Passing the 'first test', we need to search where the equipment was. Cannot find it, Makii opened the emergency door, thinking that the equipment was behind the door... and the sirens started to wail :-) (we didn't know that it will trigger the sirens...). Since the security personnel would soon be arrived, we hurried searching - and finally found it on the top floor. We quickly go out with the equipment, passing the incoming security personnel without drawing any suspicion... and completed the task :-)

Later Makii told me that it reminded her to Da Vinci Code... Well, it was indeed one cool adventure in TITech :-)

Furuzawa Scholarship

My friend often asked me how would I pay for my doctor course when they heard I planned to apply for Ph.D course, and usually I answered in jest, "I heard that you offer scholarship. May I apply?"
Most of the times my friend also reply jokingly, like Yoshizawa-san that said I already failed the test for Yoshizawa scholarship, or Yanagita that said that the Yanagita scholarship is worth 100 yen per month - barely enough to buy soft drink :-). That's why when Fujiko-san asked me the same question, I replied, "I heard that Furuzawa Scholarship (Furuzawa is Fujiko-san's family name) seeks for new scholars. May I apply?". And as always, Fujiko-san just laughed.

One day Fujiko-san had two Mexicans home-staying at her home, and she invited me to come over and have dinner with them. The dinner was fun - as usual - and since one of her guest like Uno a lot, we ended up playing Uno after the dinner finished. At that time Fujiko-san handed me five 10-yen coins. Seeing me having no clues on what I should do with the coins, Fujiko-san said, "You need it for the game. We bet."
"I can use my money then..."
"That's Furuzawa scholarship. You use it on the game, and let's see how much you can win. May be you can pay your school fee with that."
(Of course she was kidding. There's no way I can get more than 260 000 yen out of 50 yen in just one night :-). And that's why I also didn't explain to her that my religion forbid me to use money from gambling.)

The game went quite fast, and when it was close to 11 o'clock I've already multiplied my money three times :-). Actually the guest still wanted to play, but they had plan from early in the morning the next day, and I also have to go to my lab, so we stopped.

"You played well. I'll invite you again next time we play", Fujiko-san told me when I left. We think that if I can play like that every time, I might really able to pay my tuition fee with that :-).

Anyway, the guests returned to Mexico several days later, and we didn't have sparring partner anymore :-). I finally got scholarship from Itoen, however, Fujiko-san sometimes still invited me to have dinner with her friends and family - that may be part of Furuzawa scholarship :-).

Come to think of it, not only Fujiko-san, my other friends are also supportive during my stay here. May be that's one of the thing that made me decided to stay for my Ph.D. It always great to be surrounded by those kind of friends...

City Hunter

I went to Tokyo Animation Fair and found this announcement board - the one that comes out in City Hunter. Hmm, come to think of it, I should have strike a cooler pose there... :-)

Never Ending Stuff

Just helping Seada cleaned up her room - because she would return to her country - and she was half crying for the stuff seemed like never end. Seada has a habit to keep things for memories, that's why it's hard for her to sort which stuff that she should bring home and which one that she should dispose. It was finally finished anyway...

Since I had the same habit (no wonder, we're both AB :-) ), I think I need to sort my things out from now... :-)

psychiatrist needed

I think I need a real one... :-)

Place Counts

After finishing final presentation for Panasonic, Kek and Cindy asked me to spend some of our last days as panasonic scholarship scholar (we are panasonic scholarship alumni now :-) ) in Osaka. It was all fun, but there was a quite funny fact about the hotel. For the first day, Seada who chose the hotel, and as usual, her choice was great - a good hotel in a good neigbourhood with good service (including wireless internet). However, in the second day it was Kek who chose the hotel. Well, the hotel was fine, and the service also good. The problem is the place. It located near red light district :-), and the hotel around the hotel where we stay even can be classified as love hotel (where the fee is per hour, not day).
Well, anyway, there something else to look at whan we walk around the hotel :-).

Faces...

Get this collage from Ana. click on the picture to get a bigger view.
Remember all of the laughter I shared with them...
Just realized that it's easy to spend all of your blue days crying alone, while it's almost nonsense to savor your golden days without your friends to rejoice the triumph together...

Valentine Chocolate

The end of the semester is getting near, which mean there a lot of report to submit and test to take, and also thesis defense if you about to graduate. So why everyone seems to still have time to prepare valentine chocolate?

Well I'm not complaining at all. Specially when my professor's wife gave us chocolate cake for three consecutive days ("she's doing experiment with the amount of chocolate in the cake", my professor said), Seada put chocolate in my mailbox, and I found another chocolate on my desk :-). But how come, after all of these chocolates, I still couldn't gain weight?

Koukan Nikki

The second book of my koukan nikki with Makii... (the first was so thin that it finished quickly :-) )

Ein Deutscher Engel

Received season greeting from Anette with cool picture, so I post it here...
Come to think of it, I got along well with her after she knew that I keep some Alphaville songs in my mp3 player... at that time, she didn't even know that they're german group...