Well hello again people - and I do once again apologise for my poor English skills last night, that post is making me cringe, but, due to time constraints (I’m not lazy honest) - I have decided to leave it….

So today is the first day of 2006 and it’s time to have a look at everything and see where we need to go from here…

Firstly, I should say a massive thank you to Mum + Dad for continuing to look after me, even after I have flown far, far away. I’m sure customs are wondering quite why so many toiletries are sent over, but the truth is, THE ONEs HERE SUCK!
English hair-gel definately rocks over anything you can get here, despite the fact everyone here seems obsessed with their looks. And shaving gel, don’t get me started.

It seems funny, that now I am used to the place, there is less of a lonely feeling when I’ve nothing to do, it’s more of a “oh well, there is nothing to do”, rather than “I wish I was at home”.

If nothing else, my time her has certainly made me a lot more independant, though I’m not so sure I like this. It’s now at the point where I actually prefer to be on my own, becoming a bit like a hermit as it were - just me and my computer.

So on second thoughts, maybe this is a bad thing!!!
Of course this will proably all crumble when I get back and realise what I am missing out on, but - I must stay strong!!!
As far as new years resolutions go, the main one is to study a lot more, and try to be more confident in speaking out. I have made an oath that I will not come back to England until I can speak enough Japanese to make spending £2k on lessons worth it. Of course, this amount is subjective, but basically - I want to know enough so I can come back and converse with Japanese people at an intermediate level. The rest I can pick up as I go along.

The other side of my mind says things like - “I want to come back to see Gowry” - so maybe this could be my inspiration to study harder!

I’m also thinking it’s pretty cool, that Japan is likely to become my “holiday place” . You know how everyone has somewhere they always go, well, Japan can be mine Yearly visits, something to look forward to - so I won’t be leaving my friends forever, just for extended periods. Plane tickets can drop as low as £240 - so it won’t even be a massive strain on the old bank balance.

So there you go, enough of the deep stuff - on with today.

I might have explained before, but if not, i will now. New years is very important to the Japanese, as it’s a time to reflect on the year past and make plans for the new year.

It is therefore usual to go to a Shrine or Temple on the first (or at least round it) and to pray to the gods. So, this is what we did today (a little later than planned ;)) - first stop was a local Shrinto Temple.

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Where we got in line, then went up to the main “praying place” to say our dues… it went something like this.

Bow Twice
Throw money in the well
Ring the bell
Clap twice
Pray for something
Bow again

I’m a bit sceiptical that the gods actually get the money, but it was only 5p, so not too much of a loss lol…

After this, it was time to go to the main temple in Tokyo, Meijing Temple (I think that’s its name) - which was slightly more impressive. You also couldn’t get to the front and pray individually like in the first place, so you just had to get as near as you could and would be able to throw the coin over everyone’s heads!!!

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The coin throwing place, though hard to see is the area in the background where the people all stop, but some people were throwing the money from so far away!!

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It was actually a really nice experience and I’m glad we did it. It made a change to the normal stuff that has been going on and quite a sight
Shimpei was then telling me about the Shinto religion, and it actually sounded quite good. I will have to check all this out, but basically, there are no rules, no books to follow and nothing to teach. The religion is basically the belief that there is a god in everything and that we should just try and get on with each other. Also, unlike Christianity and such like, heaven and hell don’t exist, so the belief is - if you are bad, at the end there is nothing anyway….

The thought of there maybe being a god in something, but not having any of the religious mumbo jumbo that goes with it was quite appealing. At the temple, it was nice to think someone was up there listening to what I have to say…. usually it’s just the voices in my head
Tonight is early to bed, both for the reasons that I am quite sleepy after all the walking around, but also, we are going to see the emporer say “Hi” to everyone from the balcony of his palace tomorrow at 11am. So we have to leave our house at 9am - bed in 20 mins or so after a call to Gowry and I “should” be ok for it
After, I think they were talking about Karaoke, which again, should be quite good fun…..

Ingredients for a fantastic new year:

1) Go to a far away country full of happy people.
2) Go to the busiest part of that country.
3) Add a few thousand Japanese people.
4) Take a huge nightclub and fill it with these people
5) Play all your favourite tunes

Mix it all together, get there 50 minutes before midnight, wait patiently in the queue until you get to the front….

….. and then find out your friend has forgotten her ID so you can’t get it
So I’m at home - and my new year was spent standing dejectedly in the street whilst everyone else was drunk and happy …..

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On the optimistic side, I hope this is a “things can only get better” moment, rather than a “the rest of the year will be the same” ….. ho hum …. seems like I get quite a lot of bad luck here - my good old flukeyness skills are not working so well…

Anyway, enough of tonite - that’s just too depressing…..

So! Last night, a friday, so usually spent at home - however this time as I didn’t have work, it meant I wasn’t tired come the evening, so wanted to go out.

I was to meet Seiko at 12 in Roppongi (oh joy), so duly arrived the obligatory 20 minutes late We weren’t going to the strip this time though, but to a club quite some walk away (where Seiko already was) - so off I set, stopping at the local AM/PM on the way to buy a little “pocket sized” bottle of Jacobs Creek (£3)

Joining us tonite was Ayako, Seiko’s friend (the one who had been trying to sell her a fat reducing machine for the last god nows how long) - we met outside the club - MUSE (the same one we went with Arnaud) - which wasn’t ideal, but the wine had seemed to hit quite quickly, so I wasn’t *that* bothered.

2000 for me to get in (only guys pay - ahah, so this is why Seiko chose Muse! ;)) - though this does include 2 drinks, so it kinda evens itself out.

Inside it was a lot less busy than last time and really nicely decorated, so I was actually pretty happy we went here…..

Being the sensible chap I am, I decided it wouldn’t be such a good idea to get a drink straight away due to the recent bottle of wine, though for some reason this logic didn’t seem to stick for very long, as soon I had ordered a Smirnoff ice….

We then found some chairs and sat around talking for quite some time, during which I seem to remember a glass of white wine and a tequila being added to my drinks list….

From this point onwards, I am not sure what happened, though the photos seem to indicate we were all in a pretty similiar state, I do remember meeting a German guy called Alex though….

Say hello!!!

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Another thing that is quite interesting is the following photo. It was supposed to be of Seiko, but if you look in the background …. …. i assure you the whole place wasn’t like that !!!
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Of course, the night wouldn’t be complete without one special thing….. of course by about 5am, Seiko had fallen asleep again and we couldn’t wake her, so were ejected from the club….
Bring on some more memory loss, and then roll on this morning….

….. mmmmm …. all nice and warm …. i barely manage to open my eyes, i feel awful - so i stretch out….

Something’s not right, for one my bed seems to have grown in size and two I’ve just banged my arm on someone else..?!? Confused, I focus and realise I am in bed with Ayako in a strange room - slight panic sets in - have I gone back to her house?!?

A quick check and I am wearing all my clothes still, phew, but the mystery is still not solved - however the power of sleep is all too much for me, and back i go….

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A few hours later, I’m woken up by my dear friends And the situation is explained to me, at the club we met one of Seikos friends:

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Who after we left the club, invited us back to his - which we accepted, so Taxi’d it back to his apartment in Roppongi, before falling asleep in the spare room.

Bizarre, I can’t remember any of it lol…. Helen, you must be so proud of me
So lucky Friday happened I suppose, otherwise this weekend would have been a complete disaster. Nevermind, we can try again next week - it would have just been really nice to be in a packed club for the countdown… (Stop dwelling, STOP DWELLING :))

Apologies for the disjointedness of this post and the incredibly bad English, but I feel dreadful, but just wanted to get it all down before my memory goes again… lol

Well, only a few days late anyway Yes family, you will be pleased to know your parcel finally got here, and was met with quite a great deal of excitement (probably more by the girls! they found is very imteresting!! :D)

w00t! So we now have some decorations up - I was also tempted to take the time to turn my table box into a christmas tree - but seeing the cost of paint, it was then time to change my mind… lol…

So here you go, Christmas in Japan
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That was the front room - my camera doesn’t seem to do a very wide angle, so couldn’t get it all in, but my bedroom didn’t escape the chrimbo treatment either …

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With even Usagi getting into the sprit with his own little red tree
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So THANK YOU MUM AND DAD - I might even leave it up for the whole year - it looks kinda cool in here… hurrah!

So what else, well basically been doing loads of work over the last day or so, getting the new server secured and some crazyness with DNS and anonymous name servers sorted. Then the rest of the time programming Gowry’s school reunion site, which is FINALLY done… but I won’t post the URL until she has added her bits and things…

Yesterday Shimpei was around to do our talk about room changes - but it was a kinda pointless thing as no one really wanted to do it - so it went like this:

Shimpei (to Seiko) - Would you change room.
Seiko (to Shimpei) - Not if I still have to pay £500 a month

And that was it, we didn’t talk about the frontroom or anything. But to be honest, at the moment I’m happy as I like looking out the window when I work (which I couldn’t do in her room) and as the schools are on holiday there is no noise in the morning…

As for the privacy thing, well, maybe now things will change - the TV is now in Seikos room and I always have my music on, so maybe it’s just pretty obvious. I don’t want to rock the boat at the moment, as we are all getting on quite well - so I think for now, let’s just let it go…

Of course, if it all goes pear shaped a bit later down the line, we can have our talk then - at least we know there is an issue now - so maybe people will see the light
Well excuse me ladies and gents, but now I feel like some food (I was working so hard yesterday I missed all my meals :eek:) so I shall bid ye farewell….

Huzzah!

For the first time in months I have actually opened my curtains hehe… so now I am sitting at my desk, but looking right out the window —– AND I LOVE IT….

Doh!

Maybe I can put up with the rest?!?! hmmm……

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Hehe… I write to you now as once again Yumi has fallen asleep on my bed, and I don’t have the heart to wake her up just yet and send her back into the cold (its freeeezing outside) - I figured I might as well come back on here and write something, rather than just waste a load of time doing nothing.

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So what did I do today, well, most of the day was spent updating the iNETFX site and working on the new server. I’m happy to say all is now complete - the main focus of my work today was to build a “server status” page, which updated with live information….. and all done
Click here to see it in action

So what does it do, well, just basically connects to all the server services and makes sure they are working. Also allows me to update the “urgent news” page in real time. The whole point is, this is a seperate machine to my normal one, so if there is trouble with machine one, it can be posted up here (machine 2) - without this method, any problems and people would just be left wondering … “whats happened!!!”.

So that took me quite a lot of the day, the rest of the time was spent planning Gowry’s new website and watching episodes of Family Guy.

I’ve now also managed to grab the whole of the movie “Kokurisan” - a supposed really scary J-Horror, so I might watch that tomorrow.

Also spent an hour or so on the phone to Gowry, who wasn’t in the best of moods, however this time - i wasn’t to blame So in a funny way it was really nice, just her letting off steam to me - made me feel like I had some worth again I miss her telling me everything, though she has promised to start calling me more - w00t!

An unfortunate side effect of things going right - something didn’t like my skin and I seem to have some nasty and painful spots on my neck - grrrrr….. i wonder if it’s the washing powder … hmm… hopefully they will be clear in a day or two though, so not too much of a worry….

Well, it seems Yumi isn’t going to budge as she has now wrapped herself up in the covers - so it’s the matteress in the front room for me … doh! It’s so cold, and we only had a little spare rug thing…. plus of course she is getting up at 6:00 to go catch her plane, thats 3 hours sleep then before I can get back in my own bed …. hurrah!

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Reminds me (though I’m not sure why) - I really need to call Helen, miss her antics (though I now have two Japanese replacements - they’re about the same size too) - except actually, Helen never falls asleep - which is a shame as I think she would stay out of so much trouble if she did haha….

I’ve been waiting up all night for the call from home, but I think it’s got a bit late now - no one loves me - so sorry Uncle Jack that I didn’t get to say hello, but I need to get some sleep …..

Until next time - hey - be careful out there