Now Is Forever

Thirsty Thursday, wet Wednestday...tinkle Tuesday? I don't even know if there's a name for it, but sadly enough my dinner tonight consisted of fries, a little ice cream, and much alcohol.  After work (I left before 8pm! A record!!!), I went to Shinjuku and joined some people for three hours of karaoke and drinks...ah feels good to let go after two days of hard work. 

Yesterday I was in charge of drawing the master plan for the Bali resort development.  They printed a large paper full of buildings and I had to drawn a billion trees (literally a billion) and then color in the whole damn thing- it took 10 hours straight.  By the end, my eyes were swimming and my hand was permanently dented where I had been holding the colored pencils.   Honestly I probably would've finished two hours earlier at least, but my boss thought it'd be an awesome idea to distinguish the topography as well as include geographically accurate shadows. @__@ The day finally ended at 9:30 and I set out to get some food in my very empty stomach.  I wandered into a random Korean restaurant and ordered this interesting bulgolgi hot pot dish, and by dish, I mean massive pot of food. I was worried that I'd only be able to eat half of it...but there was no need since I demolished it.  By the end, there was only a thin layer of broth left in the pot.. Recently I've noticed that my stomach has gotten really good at waiting patiently until meal times, when it then turns into a black hole.  It's actually pretty convenient...idk about healthy. Must be because of my super irregular meal times lately.

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I know my eating habits and the details of my internship are really riveting, but I'm pleasantly surprised if you are still reading this post lol. Anyway, I typed that up a week ago (surprise, not really), and since then, I've had another fun weekend! Therefor gg, this is only the halfway point of the post (maybe not even). 

So this weekend, Richard came to Tokyo to visit on his way back to Boston! I met his friend Dan who is also here for an internship (even though we technically had a class together last semester haha) On Thursday we went to Roppongi, ate kebabs, drank beer, and played pool.  It was a glorious and relaxing Thursday night. At one point, we were set on going to Hooters for dinner....but Roppongi hooters turned out looking more like a sketchy black-light bar owned by large men and no female waitresses in sight... Then on Firday, Richard wanted to go to this party called Gaitomo which literally means "foreigner friend" and we ended up meeting some girls there (yay Richard)! (Most of the guys were creepy middle-aged white dudes who were extremely touchy with the Japanese girls. Disgusting.) After a while we asked this one girl named Asaka if she wanted to grab some dinner with us.  She's in the same year as us in college and was super nice. We exchanged contact information and parted ways. I hope I will see her again this summer! It's kind of new for me to befriend absolute strangers at random events, but it's sort of nice, especially since I'm actually using Japanese and she understood me!! (A big cause for celebration, trust me.) 

Saturday was a really good day. I woke up late (good start to a good day) and made my way to Akihabara to meet up with Richard, Dan, and 8 of Dan's coworkers at... a maid cafe! There were cute girls with ginormous eyes dressed up in maid outfits playing card games, taking pictures, and serving people food (while calling them "master"). I think the best part was that every time someone's order was brought to them, the whole table had to make a heart with their hands and chant "moe moe kyunn~" while swaying the heart from side to side and ultimately blasting(?) the heart in the direction of the food. The first time it happened, I burst into hysterics, but I got accustom to it extremely quickly, and before long I was blasting love at all the food like a pro. After the maid cafe, we went to a shop that was filled with 150 different capsule machines! Each was stuffed with different character goods. It was strange to me since those machines always seems to be a sideline commercial endeavor, but here, it made up the whole format of the store. After visiting the biggest electronics store in Akiba, we settled down at an Izakaya, which is a restaurant that serves small servings of food and a lot of alcohol. IT WAS DELICIOUS. Two and a half hours later, I left with a very satisfied stomach, ready for some karaoke. As soon as Dan's coworkers sang the first note of the first song, I was blown away. Some of them were so good I felt like I was at a live concert! It was also fun (and slightly embarrassing) to try to sing some Japanese songs that I've only ever listened to before. It was pretty hard to read the lyrics, and I honestly felt like I was just making up sounds that sort of went with the melody. Kind of like a toddler lol, but they were very nice and applauded me anyway :) After an awkward group photo in the subway, I went to Shinjuku with R and D. We walked, basking in the bright lights, before hitting up an arcade (Richard went nuts over the DBZ game) and taking some Purikura. 

Sunday was Harajuku day! The streets were absolutely packed, and Cat (My roommate!!), Kristin, Jesse, and I slowly waded through the throng of people going down Takeshita Street. Harajuku is such a great place for people watching. Goth lolitas, hot pink sailor uniforms, brightly dyed hair and crazy piercings abound. And on the less intense side of the fashion spectrum, generally stylish and really good looking people. I did a lot of staring. Hopefully those people were flattered instead of creeped out. We wandered through different stores looking at all of the cute clothes, but there was so much and so many stores that I was just kind of busy trying to take it all in. Next time I go, I will actually do some hardcore money-spending on that street. We went to one of Jesse's favorite stores, Up-Start which is pretty sick.  They have a signature design that goes on most of their clothing: a little face that has a pull out tongue.  Some are small, around the size of your thumb, but some tongues can be larger than your hand. It was awesome. We then ventured into 6%dokidoki, a small store crammed with enough color for a whole neighborhood. I ended up getting this earring (in black and silver). I'm so unreasonably happy with my earlobe saying dokidoki that I don't even regret spending $24 on it. We also went into a sticker shop called B-side Label.  The walls are lined with all different designs, ranging from cute bigheaded animals to half naked women with giant boobs. Man, designing stickers all day that hordes of people flock to buy seems like living the dream. @_@

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Currently sitting in my room typing this thing up at 3:30 am.  I accidentally fell asleep, but awoke to a giant yelling match going on outside my window. I watched as an old woman angrily screamed and hit a young man while his wife tried to go between the two, ultimately getting hit instead. She's for the most part calmed down now, but is currently demanding an apology, and getting louder by the second. I really hope she doesn't lose it again, it was kind of terrifying. Speaking of terrifying, about an hour ago, the whole apartment shook back and forth for about 30 seconds. I think it was probably a mini earthquake, or maybe aftershocks from the two that apparently happened earlier today off the coast of Japan. I had thrown open the door in panic, preparing to wake up my roommate, but then it stopped so I slowly closed the door and sat back down. It seems like things have calmed down again (the fight), so I am going to sleep before they start up again. Hopefully those people sort it all out :\

Mexican lunch with a bunch of coworkers! Tsukemen, the beautiful, more mature cousin of Ramen. It's almost the same, but the broth is richer and separate from the noodles and toppings. It gives you so much control over how to eat it! At first I thought it was dumb, but once you start eating it, there's actually a difference. Also the giant bibimbop hot pot dinner I demolished single handedly. Lastly, this wonderful (and creepy) barbie mural at the Mexican place. 

Amazing omu-rice at this cute cafe called Sign. I have a coworker who goes there every day...I might join him on some days. Curry rice with egg and fried shrimp chunks. Kara-age aka fried chicken. Curry RAMEN. Two attractive men and an attractive kebab. Note book I recently bought, that will be filled with one drawing a day. Details in a future blog post lol.  

Akihabara day! I forgot what it's called, but there's this one dish where it's basically just rice soaked in green tea + toppings. Such a good way to get rid of second-day-rice. Ice cream, red bean, + mochi oh my @_@;; Lol awkward subway pic. Capsule shop. Roasting slices of stingray! Awesomely talented two-man group on the streets of Shinjuku. Selfie with the bright lights. And of course, DBZ gameesss. 

Harajuku! Dinner selfie~ mouth watering dessert we had at lunch (caramel fried toast topped with happiness). A giant panda bus that can BLINK. Green people parading the streets... Picture with the shop keepers of 6%dokidoki :D Awesome graffiti wall!