NEW YEAR'S

2011 turned into 2012. World had gone around the Sun again.
So New Year’s. To me it’s never been the most special event in the world, it’s more like “whoops, it’s that darn January again”-event. But at least it’s been interesting at least this time (not that the previous New Year-parties/events have been boring, this was just more different).
Nothing’s been happening, like usual, but there’s a lot more people around me than usual. And my family. It’s been awhile since I spent the holidays with them. Obviously though, like it’s a reason to be surprised, everything seemed kinda funkier. I'm in Japan and this year changing thing is HUGE here. It's not your normal "hey, let's eat sausages and potato salad, drink copious amounts of alcohol and use all our tax refunds on fireworks" with that little hint of "the worst hangover on the 1st of January and going to school on the 2nd."
… Not that I even have that kinda evenings usually but this really. I didn’t want to break from the pattern too much and I didn’t really feel like it. Just have to face the fact, I don’t stay up until 6am on New Year’s Eve, probably never have. Not my thing. Unless something REALLY awesome is going on.

Hello Tokyo

I went to Meiji Shrine in Harajuku and the Sensoji Temple in Asakusa BEFORE New Year’s rush… Or at least I thought so but still shrines and temples are pretty full during this time of the year.
But hey, what is the difference here? Two places where you clap hands inside a pretty building and thrown your 1 yen coins away. Well…Sensoji is a Buddhist temple and Meiji is a Shinto shrine. Both were very beautiful and despite being renovated time after time, they still had this feeling of something more ancient and greater (the big, red railings in Sensoji were made from metal). Despite being full of little booths selling (horrible) swag and food, especially in Asakusa, the feeling of peace still lingers on and effects you. Even if you don't believe to the place where you visit. It just feels nice there. In most places around the world this slowing down and taking it easy-aspect is not present almost at all. Kind of a nice change of pace to Finland.
Here following are some pics from Sensoji. The Meiji pictures are nowhere to be found, I don't know where those pictures went... But you'll see a Shrinto shrine in my Mt. Fuji post that comes later.

Read the sign.

Statues... Yup.

It's a big lantern. A VERY BIG LANTERN.

The name of the gate with the big lantern

If you look closely, you see people. And swag.

Some of the merchandise they sell at Asakusa

The year changed in such a nice weather

Peoplleeeee

Temple

Another lantern.. I like these.

Managed to snap a picture from an empty spot

Pagodaaaaa

On the night of the 30th and 31st, I still haven’t had the chance to taste some New Year’s food eg. mochi, long soba noodles, the fancy bento box etc. I’ve mostly been eating safe (and cheap!) food but it’s seems almost a tradition to eat fatty food during New Year’s (sausages and potato salad, yay!). And I was with my family so we had some okonomiyaki and izakaya food. It was a nice ending.

FOOOOD. Okonomiyaki really was the best one to end the year.

It’s probably more of a geek New Year’s experience but oh, it was fun. On the 29th I went to Winter Comikket with my friend. Comikket? What is this event you may ask? It’s a social gatherings of geeks, nerds, lonely people and people WHO just really like comics. Comikket is held Evert 6 months in Tokyo Big Sight, hosting thousands and thousand of mangakas (people who draw comics), original and fan comics known as doujinshi. 90% of all the comics (and products) sold are fan comics… Of mature content.

Yes, you want to know if I bought any. And yes, yes I did buy. Actually 2 of them. I wanted to maybe get something that’s related to some mangas that I read/animes that I watch but damn, the selection was just HUGE. Just before we left I happened to see some Sherlock Holmes comics… Not the from latest BBC series nor the Robert Downey Jr./Jude Law-movies. No, it was the old classic, the first Sherlock I saw, Granada Holmes. After pondering for 10 seconds I got two of them. For 500 yen that much! That’s really cheap but the small books weren’t that huge, only 15 pages or so, still I managed to make someone happy (other than myself). Some things that I saw were really hardcore (take it anyway you want) but 40% of the time behind the counter there was a middle-aged woman. No matter what they were selling, it was a woman. Very interesting when you look at the internet... But then again, I'm a woman who roams the internet on regular basis so seeing so many women wasn't in the end a surprise...
It's not surprising that outside Japan no one really knows or talks about this event. At least in positive...ish light. The most of the material is very... sensitive and just not for bigger audiences. But you know what? This was a great event. I spent a lot of my time watching how much people had put to this event... Cosplayers with their AMAZING costumes, people selling their hard work to others (and judged by thousands too, very harsh) and others browsing through, seeing friends etc. And 90% of the content is made by private people to... people just like them. Why events couldn't be more like this? Creating content in a community, sharing information and your favourite things... Yeah, there's social media but really, the medium of printed media is raelly dying. Which is a shame because there is something more real about holding a little booklet in your hand then staring at your computer screen and reading something that just seems... soulless. Maybe that is my problem, I really want to see  a mix of traditional and digital meet up more, make this combination work much better. The printed "truth" (I'm using this term very vaguely) is slowly making way to digital but it shouldn't! A bold statement but it just shouldn't! For example in Comiket everything had to be printed, no digital versions allowed. And art... Ohboyo, that would be another long post.

Sheesh, Comiket really made me think.... That's scary. And yeah!

The only thing "scary" about this experience was that I was alone. I dont know what travel guides say about that matter but being a female and a foreigner alone didn't really make me feel very comfortable. I thought I'd be more afraid though but at around 3am people don’t really feel like talking to strangers... Especially not the drunken Japanese... Or I safely assumed so. I don’t really hit that button inside a man’s brain that makes them want to talk to me… Which was great and a good safety manner until I actually I started to think. Then I realized. Oh gawd. I will be forever alone. Even in Japan. In January, after reading about random attacks against homeless and foreigners is really unnerving...

But ohwell, back to the wandering part. I saw a lot sleepier, less hectic side of Tokyo at the same time during this holidays wandering. Everything kinda slows down in a weird way, you see trash all over the place, things start to smell... Exept the few cars, Tokyo gets quiet. Ikebukuro also being quite void of big parks, the only homeless I saw were near the train station/small niches.
Also a funny thing happened: my Japanese isn’t the best one (what a shock) but I could understand when a couple walking behind me was talking about about this "kawaii Mario-chan". Apparently I looked like Mario to them (on that night I was wearing electric blue pants and a red 'n black poncho). I found it very amusing and laughedat that alone... Maybe yet again another reason why I'm left alone. That is pretty sweet.

Secret that many of us know: 24H Mcdonalds isn't really open 24/7. Here they close them around 4am-5am to.... do whatever they want really, the main point is to kick the customers out for that time period. Otherwise mcdonalds would be a very easy solution for people to sleep in. Just buy a meal, eat it superslow, do something, sleep, buy something with 100 yen, sleep, leave in the morning 30% fresh.. That sounds so easy that it's painfully dull it doesn't work like that.
But all this wandering around and seeing things concluded into mangacafe and small hotels. At least I can say that I got to sleep in a real bed between 2011-2012, waking up on the first day of 2012 from somewhere from and not smelling like tobacco. Pretty nice...

Just to be lazy and totally give this blog a rushed, sappy hypocritical ending (because I don't know what to write about) I have to say that at least the japanese understand some kind of meaning to this life. Live it to the fullest, experience new things and then when your time comes, it comes. This came to me at 3.30am at mangacafe, thinking about all the unnecessary things in live that I've just realized in Japan. If Japanese do understand something, it's the meaning of family. Because really, I was genuinely happy that I got to spend the holidays with the people I love.

Okay, until next time! C:

BEING SICK IN JAPAN

Okay, a short one. Because I've been painfully sick here in Japan. It might be the aircon, the cold flat, I might not dress up well enough etc.  ANYWHOOOO, this sickness is kinda tiring. Or it's not a sickness, more like an annoyence to me at this point. Just coughing and sneezing, throat full of goo/orwhateverforeignmaterial.

Japanese medicine. That stuff is dangerous. I have no idea what I or it did but after taking cough syrup one day (I read the instructions) and sleeping, I woke up the next night very disoriented. My balance had gone and I had to throw up the medicine. Just alll out. It wasn't a nice experience (but a very scary one) and I don't wish to repeat it anytime soon aka NEVER. I knew that Japanese medicine can be really surprising (in a negative way) and it has ingredients that can effect your body in mysterious ways... Yet still. I took some medicine. Because i had to, this cough is really, really annoying.

But yeah, a fun fact of the day: Don't take Japanese medicine.

YUP

Long posts take a lot time to conjure up and make them somewhat readable the way I write but hopefully something relevant has come out from this blog so far.

And I usually work on multiple things at the same time + talk with someone on Skype+draw+listen to music+eat+watch a video/movie.


Like while writing about Christmas I watched Blade Runner (gotta finish that) and to my food blog the soundtrack was provided by Justice and Daft Punk (kinda obvious really)

So yup, wanna see some randomly ordered pictures again from various places? No? Okay, have some anyways.

It's October. And that's a mountain/hill.

Flowers bloom here 24/7 almost. These are October flowers.

Badass trees at Mt. Fuji.

THAR SHE BLOOOWS.

You know that creepy forest they talk about? The place that's known for it's suicides? Well this is the place.

It was a bit darker that day but still... The place didn't feel right.

We waited an hour to get inside this shop at Jump Festa.

RUN PIKACHU RUN

Ohyeah, this was the theme of the Independence Party at the Embassy.

If you don't know this statue, google it. Hint: Shibuya Station.

See this amazing camera quality? I love my camera :I

I'M GONNA BE THE PIRATE KING.

November... From my flat.

All the pretty trees has pretty red leaves.

Shinjuku on Sunday.

I at least learned to do paper cranes... Somehow.

See this amazing ad that I made for our booth at the school festival? ISN'T IT BEAUTIFUL..

Guess with who we shared the tent?

I WANT TO GO HERE AGAIN AND PARTICIPATE... Someday. Luckily it's twice every year.

BIIIRDS OMG ALL THE PRETTY BIIIRDS.

I really wanted this useless bag. Because it was so cute. But it was so useless.

"Don't follow/talk to creepy strangers." Your advice is legit, carton of milk at school.

BEST. PIZZA BOX. EVER. PERIOD.

CLOOUUUDDDDS. AGAAAAIN.

CLOUDS. AGAIN. IN NOVEMBER.

Talking abou November...

Look at all that stuff.. And it's November.

Violas. In November.

This thing. In November.

Tokyo Tower. Sidewayyyyssss.

THAT ONE HUGE POST ABOUT FOOD

WARNING: IN THE FOLLOWING POST A HUGE AMOUNT OF PICTURES UNRELATED TO EACH OTHER WILL BE PRESENTED TO YOU.

In a random order I shall present to you snacks and foods I like/have an opinion about... Or really something to say in this SUPERLONG POST. Because well, who wouldn't love food (don't answer that)? Because man, I love food and it would kill me if I didn’t rant about it at least once and when I at least know something about it.. as in food in Japan. Food was/is also a very big part of my Christmas/New Year's/people visiting. To me, food makes the holiday. It's those special cuisines that make the party. Beer and barbeque during midsummer, casseroles and ham with mustard on Christmas etc... And ohyes, Christmas. Just to mention, this year I only got to eat the exquisite, fattening Finnish Christmas food at the Indepencende party at the Finnish Embassy in Hiro-o. They even had peas. PEAS, MAN, PEAS. And oh yeah, pork and liver casserole, cool story bro.

People rant a lot about Japanese food, don’t they? And after being here, it’s obvious why. Everything is either so delicious or just so fascinatingly weird/bad that you taste various things (except natto). Usually in Japanese cuisine there are a lot of vegetables, rice or noodles, a lot of seafood, meat... Also fruits everywhere. The Japanese taste in sweet things can be quite... interesting/overwhelming. You have the crepes and chocolate-filled ice cream portions and cakes but you also have mushy mochi and redpean paste and gelatine. Ohgod, the amount of gelatine in stuff ( especially in ice cream awesomeness but later about that). But well, my little food adventure post starts now. Things that I like mostly. And to get it out of your system, yes vending machines are awesome, yes they have them everywhere and yes, I will miss them more than anything else back in Finland. Thank you.

NOW PICTURES OF FOOD AND TXT (some taken by awsum VIIJA C: ):

Sushi
Yes, it’s good. It’s cheap if you go to a right kaitensushi (there’s a belt where the sushi goes around, very neat) place. They havee your basic tuma and salmon sushi and shrimp and then everything else you can basically just imagine. There's makisushi, nigiri etc. Places like Sushiro where one plate costs 105 yen is not bad at all. The worst sushi here is way better than the best ones I've had in Finland.

CIIIIRCLE OF A LIIIFEE AND ITMOVESUSALL

The most wonderful sushi ever; salmoncheesebasil... thingy.

All you need to have good sushi.

... That makes me a bit sad :C

Ohyuuuus, MEAT. Roast beef sushi also has wasabi and DAMN.... IS GOOOOD.

We named this thing "The badlycut sushi"

THE BEST SUSHI EVER... AND IT HAS AVOKADO.

Oh hello you Corn Flake filled dessert there rolling with the sushi... And only 230 yen?

Sweet potatoes. Dish that you love or hate.

Yes, it is ham. With cheese. On top of rice. I know. BUT IT WAS GOOD.

Really, the ones with only fish aren't even the best sushisin these kaitensushi places... Or well, they are GOOD but these combos are just something you cant resist tasting. I can guarantee that.

Okonomiyaki
The delicious, the most perfect hungover (if you didn't have to prepare it yourself) food that originates from Osaka/Kansai area and it’s also good here in Kanto/Chiba/in the middle of the countryside. So in reversed order... This is OKONOMIYAKIIIII... And how it kinda works.

Ready to eat... And yes, that's the grill

The pancake is the okonomiyakipancake itself, everything else is topping. The flakes are dried fish and the green...ish flakes are seaweed.

"It's always the same, always the thing..." *lalalalala*

When the pancake is cooked, you add okonomiyaki sauce (kinda like Worchester sauce)

Oh hello awkwardly positioned picture... Here you see that the pancake has to be FLIPPED.

4 different okonomiyakis with different filling

The cute little spatula is very useful when eating this thing.

So after the okonomiyaki sauce, you add mayo. And no, the mayo isn't the same as in Finland. It's... different.

Yes, the top right one has sausages in it.

This is what okonomiyaki looks BEFORE eating and preparing.

Okay, this is NOT Okonomiyaki but it originates from Kansai too.. Takoyaki aka tentacle pieces inside hot dough and incredible obnoxiously bad when cold. This dish requires some silly eating.

.... Everyone's beautiful on the inside.

There's a place I don't have any pictures from and that's yakiniku. TL;DR: you have a table with a grill in the middle and you cook your own DELICIOUS meat. It's bit pricy BUT OHMANSOGOOOOOOD. And oh, the small grill is with real flame, they use coal/gas. A lot of Japanese restaurants really depend on you preparing your own food and it's a shame that this kind of a restaurant culture is non-existent in Finland. Another good example was when me and Masae-san went to Mt.Fuji (more about that later) and had some... ate... went to a very Japanese restaurant.

Me going OMNOMNOMNOM

I've never grilled so much in my life outside of the Finnish grilling season.

The fish were fresh. I know this because the other one was still twitching. The cook came to apologize for that.

Some nabe/udon to soooothe your soul after grilling some.

Ohright, food... That includes snacks. Japanese people love them. They are everywhere in every type there is possible. The flavours are countless, the firms providing them never end and the price is usually just right: very cheap so you can buy them and get fat and then feel bad about it. Like all of then, but hey, so it goes. One day I bought Strawberry icecream daifuku and it was GOOD. I'm not kidding, the little plastic FORK that came with the ice cream just added the wonderfulness of the whole thing. The salty snack vary from your normal chips to chocolate-coated ones to wasabichili-edamame... With cheese. For some reason there's a lot of snacks in a little jar shaped like stick, usually having a salty flavour... of potato salad. But okay, some little things I've eaten/drank.

Starbucks is everywhere, even in the smallest convinience stores

Yus, it's the legendary toucan/parrot candy. In different flavours!

I TOLD YOU SO.

Aah, Pockys. So good. It's your basic equipment if you wanna be a true Finnish otaku. Kawaii ja silleen.

Kinda "meh" but cheap.

Cake inside a little chocolate button. OHYEAH.

This is taken from a store that sells snacks. Only snacks. Yes, everything has sugar in this picture. Even the baskets.

Talkijg about sweet things, I dunno if I was the only as a kid but I always thought that Japanese food culture had a void in the spot where there were supposed to be all the candy and bread and cakes and everything full of carbohydrates. Haha, yes...Sweet stuff... What about all the breads and cakes and other dessert-like things that they have in Japan? Japan. is. full. of. sweet. stuff.

I mean it.

If there's a food that exists, there's both salty and sweet version of it, no matter what it is.

NO. MATTER. WHAT.

"But oh, girls like sweet stuff."

Yes, I like to eat something that rots my teeth out and makes me feel like the Michelin man afterwards. Yes.

That is what I need.

No but really, I have nothing against it, I like trying new stuff... But I cant forgive two facts:

• Coffee is either sweet (like my sweet bby Max Coffee) and makes you all sugerhigh or it's blacker than your soul and makes you look like mopey little emo for the rest of the day... Until you have Max Coffee C:
• BREAD IS LIKE SPONGECAKE. TASTES NOTHING, LOOKS LIKE A SPONGE AND IT BREAKS WHEN YOU TRY TO BUTTER THE DAMN THING.

Ohyus, bread/cakes(/ice cream will be here too)...

You really wanna taste everything even though you know you're gonna be hugely disappointed.

Also notice the spongiest bread there on the top of the shelf there.

Your basic breakfast items all JAPANESE. And coffee too.

Curry bread (yus, Japanese curry inside a deepfried bread) with an boiled egg. OHYEAH.

Another form of bread; only the middle part (because the edges are stone compared to them) of the bread loaf with... things inside. Usually lettuce, ham and mayo.

All you can eat restaurant where 80% of the food are cakes and desserts? ...SIGN ME UP.

All this cake and only 90 minutes...

This was good. It's ice cream with fruits. Of course it's good.

Chocolate and ice cream you say? With cream puffs you say?

Chocolate, fruits AND ice creams... AND CORN FLAKES. OHYEAAAAAH.

Well all this food seems fattening and not healthy for your wallet either. Maybe I'll go to the supermarket and buy some really awesome fruits and...

Look at all this fruit!

.... wait, that's the price for that one apple.

HOMEMADE CURRY, AWAAAAAAYYYYYY.

Okay, so the food can be expensive if you go to the wrong place with the wrong budget etc etc, life happens. But really, doing groceries can be a challenge here, especially for a person who comes from a country where two big chains basically control the price of the food in the stores... Yay? But still the basic rules apply: healthy food is more expensive than the unhealthy one, imported food items have skyhigh prices compared to the products from the "local" area (in this case Asia and Oseania)

Okay, izakaya food.... Wait, Izakaya? In short, restaurant/bar where you drink. Usually a very cheap one. Or not. Depends really. But it's fun. Food in izakayas is usually something you can share with others... or it's easy to share. Again, depends. But sharing is caring so don't hog all that chicken to yourself!

No matter what I think about KFC, it's still deepfried chicken and it's still good.

Eggrolls and radish. So gooood.

Did someone say yakisoba?

The coolest drink in the world.

Oh, edamame. You always amaze me.

That's meat, some deepfried meat and edamame. Perfect.

You have no idea who good this fish is.

Noodles are really the best food after a night out.

Hadn't had enough edamames? C:

Yup, that's a lot of random food.

Even though Japanese cuisine has proven to be better than I thought, there are a lot of things that I miss here. Well, that’s a long list anyways but food-wise the list isn’t that long. In Japan, milk products are very expensive. I am very used to eating milk products back in Finland but here the price is just ridiculous or some things aren’t just available just easily. Especially sour cream that would save a lot of meals. And make a lot more interesting. Also potatoes. Yeah, it’s so horrible clichéd but I miss potatoes. Yeah, here the selection is way better but being a cheapskate that I am, I am not paying something around 50 yen for one potato. ONE POTATO, C’MON.

It’s weird that you start to miss foods that I don’t eat a lot back home. Because damn, I am eating so much rice and noodles here that I won’t be eating a lot right when I get back to Finland... (I still need to buy a rice cooker to make my life normal again.) But dishes/foods like porridge, different kind of salads, casseroles, beans, sour cream etc etc. This list can only grow and grow more I think about it. But hey, that's just awesome. Why? Because food is always relevant and it's yet again another priviledge I get to enjoy from everyday. This was a huge post so if you got here, congrats, you're probably very confused now.

Until next time C: