The irresistable tulip...

You wake up on a Sunday morning, strongly feeling like going somewhere...and tulips are in season now...

But, weather forecast says rain and strong wind, up to 40kph...

What do you do? Do you give in to your stubborn feelings of wanting to go out to look at tulips despite the weather? or do you do the right thing, heed the weather forecast and stay at home, enjoying a cup of hot cocoa while it's cold outside??
I tried calling a few of my friends if they want to go, but all gave the same answer, "Are you nuts?"...

The answer is obvious, isn't it?

Head out to see the tulips!!


BUT...like all my stories, none of it is "normal".

Managed to borrow a car from a friend of mine, drove about 10 minutes to the park. And just as I stepped out of the car, strong gusts of wind buffeted my body...wind was so strong it was like 'He' had a lot to complain about and tried to tell it all in one blow.

So, how strong was the wind? Here's a brief explanation..

Man fights with wind...


Man's ass got kicked...

I was also forced to pay 710 yen for parking and entrance fee...not to mention that rain is starting to fall now. But never mind that. Headed for the main entrance full of optimism...


But as soon as I stepped in, I was greeted by the sight of people leaving the park...oh, how encouraging. Come on!! I just paid 710 yen and have only been in here for 2 minutes!!

But then again, Randy's not the kind of guy to let small things, like strong winds and rain falling sideways, to hamper his spirits, right?? And so I walked on, looking for the tulip grounds..


Ahh...bright, contrasting colours calling me onwards to them.

And guess what? The wind and rain is starting to let...my day might not be so bad after all!! So, armed with with trusted vid-cam, loaded with freshly charged batteries, I marched to the grounds....and got the biggest laugh of my life!!


It just cracks me up to look at these up close...hahaha. Every tulip in sight was bent at a funny angle!!




Bent to the will of the winds..

Of course not all flowers were this way...there were a few brave souls who defied the wind.




They were destroyed and became "the tulip that was". Never say no to the wind...

By now, the rain started to fall again...so I took off to exploring the rest of the park. Found this fountain which was playing on along with one of Beethoven's..


The wind started to pick up again...blowing stronger than before. And as you can see in the photo, the wind was adding unnecessary exaggerations to the fountain display. Somewhat cool though..

The weather really started to suck big time...but lucky me there was some parasol shelter where I was, so I decided to sit the symphony out. It played two classical songs, then went dead...time to go I guess...


Being far away from the main building and having no other options, I headed out into the grumpy weather once again to explore...

But I'll be damn, the weather proofs to be in a mood worse than a teenage girl suffering PMS. After my humble umbrella turned inside out for the third time, I decided that enough is enough...so I ran to the nearest shelter, a toilet sitting in the deepest part of the park.

While I was taking photos of mangled tulips moments ago, I was thinking "Hey, it's not everyday when you get to take pictures of tulips shape like this, right?!! *laughs*".

But, now that I am stuck at the toilet alone for about 30 minutes, soaked through my socks, shivering from the relentless cold, stomach reminding me that I haven't had lunch, holding an umbrella which committed suicide....I'm REALLY starting to lose my humour and good mood.

While I was shaking all over from the cold, alone and feeling angry....a shuttle bus appeared right in front of me, asking if I need a ride to the main building! According to the driver, he was making the last round and going to stop the shuttle service. I almost cried at his kindness...

My luck's started taking on a good run now..

When I reached the main bulding, I thanked the driver profusely and immediately headed to one of the restaurants. Ordered a pizza for late lunch...


This one is straight from the hearth...


It turns out that I was the only patron there, so the baker gave me extra cheese for the topping. She later treated me a cup of coffee....on the house. How nice...^^

Having finished lunch, and not exactly eager to head out to the wind again, I visited another area of the building selling souvenirs.


This is made using Japanese paper. One piece(the round one) costs 850 yen. A bit expensive...but it was beautiful...and I DID go through all the trouble with the wind and rain...I decided to buy one. The lady who sold me this liked my smile...said that it is very nice to see someone who was totally messed up by the wind, smile brightly like that. So she gave me another piece free of charge...hehe.

Two good things just happened to me, I was feeling very happy and decided to call it a day and head back home. But as I was heading to the exit, it occurred to me that I have not seen all of the building, so I went round exploring again...

I met a bunch of Malaysians sitting around...being in a good mood, I went to greet them. Turns out they were having lunch and asked me to sit with them. They had with them THE most delicious rendang, nasi briani and mee goreng....and not forgetting the warmest hospitality.


Sigh...how can such a bad decision turn to be a good one?!!

So, the next time you REALLY feel like doing something, go for it!! Even if it's going to see ugly tulips bullied by wind.

Good things always happen when unexpected.


PS: I do have some decent pictures taken. Posted on Facebook.

Fall of a celebrity : Kusanagi Tsuyoshi

Yesterday, Japan witnessed the fall of a celebrity....

Ex-SMAP member Kusanagi Tsuyoshi was found drunk and hollering around at a park. Nothing wrong for a celeb to get drunk, right? Right, except that he was butt naked while he was at that!!

For those who don't know who the hell he is, here's a pic of him.



This guy could very well be the most famous guy in the whole of Japan. Well, after the recent scandal of his, he IS the most famous guy in Japan. Anyway, a brief introduction...

He is one of the 5 members of SMAP, a very popular group in Japan. So famous that not one self-respecting Japanese kid can't sing their hit songs. Other than singing, he's involved in various kinds of TV shows and also in advertisement, like the one above. He is also well versed in Korean and have done quite a few work there. He is well known for his easy going character...well liked by everyone, on and off the industry...

So, now you know that he is a very important figure in Japan. But last night, after a couple of beers and shochu, he got drunk...very drunk. Where the legal limit of alcohol for drivers is 0.15mg, his was tested to be 0.8mg!! He was so wasted that he stripped off his clothes and started shouting in Korean at a public park at 3 a.m. And he was violent too...at least I think he was, news reports that he resisted arrest and that they had to wrap him up in a vinyl sheet and shipped him to the station!!



Following the embarrassing arrest, advertising agencies and TV stations start canceling his shows and commercials. His career was over before he could pull down his pants.

Now, what interests me is that how eager Japan was to crucify this guy...especially one so famous like him. This is so different than America where you can be exposed for the skankiest scandal ever, and still smile for the camera the next day. Leak a sex tape...whatever, you'll get a bigger paycheck yet.

But here in Japan, where every must follow a certain rule...this one involves the rule where all famous people have the responsibility to portray a good image for the young generation to follow. Break it and you'll get the front page news.

So, learn from his mistake!!

If you ever want to go out drinking, make sure you drink A LOT till' you pass out completely! That way, you won't end up doing stupid things...such as a career suicide.

Snack it!!

Stopped by the convenience store on my way to lab this morning to grab some vegetable juice(yes, we have that in packets here)...was going to start my healthy morning when I saw this..


What you see here is a packet of Cheetos, "siu mai" flavor...

Now, my understanding of this world leads me to believe that cheetos is some kind of cheese flavored snack, right?

Now, since when do people eat dumplings with cheese?!!! Have mankind evolved so far as to forcefully assimilate asian and western food? Do people actually eat this?

So far, we have, spicy/salty/buttered chips, pizza/roast beef doritos....and now this one.
I have known Japanese people to be crazy, but not this crazy...

Will buy one packet and let you know tonight.....

UPDATE:
*Chokes...

What the hell? This thing only taste of light soy sauce and mustard!! Where's the dumpling taste?? Where did the "siu mai" go?!!!

Sigh...what a way to waste 103 Yen...

The spider with big dreams...

Today I saw a young spider, still green in colour..so young but born with great dreams...

Where spiders normally would build a web of just the right size, this young one wanted build a huge one...about one meter across. Too large for one so young. As tough as it could be for a spiderling to build one so big, it nonetheless worked hard for it...fighting against the wind and gravity to realize its dream....

All our lives, our mentors, parents and elders have advised us to dream, to aim high....but none ever gave those advise seriously. They forget that we all have different strength and qualities in us which affects our "dreams". Looking at the spider, it dawn upon me that we always need to know the difference between "what we want" and "what we can get".

It is always good to aim high, but we have make sure we don't waste time and effort to chase the impossible.

An excellent idea, if premature, is a lousy one...

Getting drunk with the flowers...

Once again, the all famous sakura trees...




And along with the flowers, we have the season-limited sakura sake!!! Sweet tasting and very nice fragrance..


The shoes with colourful laces are mine...

When it comes to Japanese, they all will have a picnic, which they call hanami or flower viewing. Hanami in University is usually accompanied with booze and barbecue!!


The mandatory cheers before the feast..



It's all food and fun...and everyone does this. Hanami among lab members, among club members, among Malaysians(no booze in this one), among foreign students, among....and the list goes on.

I can be considered to quite active around uni...joining various groups and clubs. And that means many hanami sessions, so I'm practically drunk every night and wakes up with a hangover-special headache for the pass week.








Ahh....a few lecturers called me over to join them for drinks. I don't really know them, but then again that's the joy of being a foreign student...you get invited everywhere. I drank so much I could hardly walk straight and had to ask a friend of mine send me back.

I enjoyed the flowers on the first two days...but after that, I somehow forgotten that the flowers were there and just concentrated on getting drunk...haha

Man's greatest invention is definitely liquor.

Time allocation imbalances...

Last year have been a hectic one.

Classes, exams, lab projects, MSAJ(Malaysian Students Association Japan) projects, japanese drum events...so much to do with so little time. There wasn't one day that didn't go by without me wishing I had more time.

I have never really believed in god, but I think I do now as my prayers have been answered....I have sooo much time off!!

So little to do with so much time in hand....

I had spent last year taking up almost all classes as my course, mechanical engineering in my Uni can be quite tough...but to my surprised, I passed them all!! So technically, I cleared most credits needed to graduate. Only need to attend compulsory classes now...which is like, only 2 classes to a week. As the student's equation says...

No classes = 24 hrs - 2 classes - ( sleeping + eating ) = shitload of free time!!

Last year had been spent researching info and drafting out my plans on how to proceed with my lab work. During that process, I proved that one project was theoratically impossible(pity my senior, but he managed to graduate anyway), and got entrusted another project....and this year...well, I still don't know how to use the machine and the only one who knows is busy with other things!! As lab researchers' equation says...

Stalled work = Wasted time - blogging - lunch= shitload of free time!!

Last year had also been spent going to and back from Tokyo as I was involved in the student's association. Had a lot of fun growling at people who arrive late to a meeting, not obeying the schedule...you know, handling problems the way gangsters should. But alas, they thought I'm too expensive and too far away to maintain(Half of the yearly spendings on transportation is from me). So I got kicked out of the committee....what a sad thing to happen. Thought of being more agressive in creating new projects and events...but...oh what the hell....

Sigh...

Can't life be more balanced? How about an ideal lifestyle of being busy but free enough to do fun stuff? Is that too much to ask? IS THAT TOO MUCH TO ASK?? Boredom is eating me from the inside...

or maybe I should stop blaming the holy forces and start planning my life a little wiser next time...

Yozakura...the night sakura

I've been spending a lot of my time getting fat sitting on my ass. So much time that my eyes are starting to complain being kept within a prison of 19 inches of liquid crystal...

And it is springtime, it's about time I give my pair of balls....ehem, eyeballs a fair treat.

So, I joined in a trip to Takada Park to see yozakura, the night sakura...

The trip started out horrible. Did I mention that this place is famous? Well, it is...and like famous places, almost everyone in 100km radius will visit. Japanese people are suckers for the word "famous". And since I am located within that 100km radius, AND since half of my body is Japanese-ly mutated, I am obligated by community norm and by law to visit this place.

Oh my GAWD the traffic was horrible!! Even a 87 year old lady can walk faster than the car I'm in. And, utilizing modern technology, you could probably find needle in a haystack faster than you can park your car in a maze of metal on tires...

After staring at another car's backlight for 2 hours, I finally reached my destination...ahh...Takada Park at last...


The lights beyond look very very promising....


They even have these cute little pink lanterns to guide you to the center of the park...how convenient.


This oh-so romantically beautiful bridge laid before me....the park itself must be very very beautiful. Boy, I can't wait to get to it!!!

And, suddenly......


BAM!! This mass of meat and nylon greeted me....What the hell are all these stalls doing here!!


Can't even get a decent picture as there are various kinds of stalls blocking the view. This one says takoyaki, which means octopus in a ball of dough. And, like all octopuses, they don't like to die easily...so they leave behind a distinctive smell that fills the air, choking off the sweet scent of cherry blossom. And there's about...10 maybe 20 stalls selling this stinking 8 legged little monsters...

Wait a minute here...I thought I came here to look at cherry trees!!! Damn these shops...and damn japanese who open these shops. I'm totally fine with shops for refreshments...but every which way?? Leave some areas for the trees to bloom!!!

And so I embarked on a sacred journey to find serene, unmolested ground of trees with no shops around...


And this became my precious piece as this one contain NO shops in sight....ahh...night sakuras....
Something about these tree gets me...I prefer sakura viewing in the day time, but night viewing is not bad...not bad at all..


And also these trees along the bank of the lake...it's hard to see but there are rented boats about..you can hire one, row out to the edges, escaping the stalls and noise. How romantic...


This looks kinda nice too...the lights have that firefly-like effect on them...

Me and my friends decided to leave at about 10 plus...and once again...

Oh my GAWD, the traffic is horrible!!! Just like all the suckers who decide to leave at 10, we all got to watch each others car's tail light....reached home at 12.30.

Night sakura is so...exhausting...

The Birthday that was...

I would like to start this entry by saying special thanks to my housemate, Lai Chee Wei for he remembered my birthday and went as far as secretly buying a birthday cake for me. Complete with candles and all....and what a nice chocolate cake that was.

Also, to my fellow juniors, Calvin and Joann who treated me dinner at a barbeque buffet. We ended up ordering half a cow and a flock of birds...deliberately or mistakenly I don't know, but damn, that was a lot of meat. Thanks to Joann's uncanny talent to lose at scissors-rock-paper game, we somehow managed to finish all that meat.

This time around, definitely was a lot better than my previous birthdays...

The last good one I had was the one before I came to Japan. Wasn't held on April 1st itself(I had to fly on the 31st) but...wouldn't complain about an early Birthday, would I? Anyway, I got lured into playing basketball that day...and a couple rounds of pool with a few buddies. Then I headed back home to find a bunch of people screaming at my face...took me a minute or two to realize they were actually shouting "Happy Birthday"!! It was so sweet of everyone to have done that for me...me, the guy who would talk nonstop till you are forced to laugh at my jokes just to shut me up....
One guy, Lim Kian Min, came all the way from Subang..he had to leave the party early as to catch the bus back. One guy, Egbert, came in such a rush that he accidentally drove his car into a drain and one of his tires got stuck in. We had to all help with lifting his car directly after blowing the fire off the stick of wax....hahaha. One girl, Sueann presented me a scarf that she knitted herself for about a month....most certainly the most beautiful moment in my life so far...

That one must have been to prepare me for the next few un-memorable ones...

My real birthday arrived but we were all in the plane tied down by the annoying "belt light" and grumpy looking, tired stewardess....if I remembered correctly, people were wishing me, then plopped back into their seat and continued sleeping. Hmm...so much for celebrating my birthday 10000 feet above sea level. Well, at least friends were wishing...hehe...

The next one was me busy preparing for lectures as the year starts in April in Japan, not January. Buying books and cleaning room....had a full plastic bag full of dustmites celebrating with me.

And the next one was spent alone in the cold, eating TV dinner!! you see, I graduated from college and had to move to my Uni which is far far away...and since the year starts in April, I had to settle my Visa and register myself with the local municipal. Then I had to settle the paper works in order to move into my new apartment. Had to deal with this fat annoying bitch(now nicknamed FAB, will do your laundry but brings tears to your eyes if you get it in.) who couldn't bothered to be helpful. Had to use my gangster-like looks and get into a staring competition with that FAB just to get a key chain for the keys to my apartment.

I sincerely thought that I had graduated from birthday blues after flying to Japan, and also occasional words of wisdom from my dad, "The best day is pay-day"...which I suppose many workers out there would agree. BUT...

Only after blowing out the candles on the chocolate cake my housemate secretly bought for me, that I discovered that I still have a soft spot in me...

I'm not a cold blooded monster after all...

Spring is in the air...

I have been absent from writing this blog for...I don't know how long.

"Where have I been????"

Well, as you know, some mammals...like the polar bear, we go into hibernation. Going into seclusion and deep sleep...reserving energy where food is scarce and emerging only when spring arrives.

Yes!! Spring has arrived!! Spring is in the air...every bouncing here and there, stretching and contracting to the hearts content. And like most mammals, here I am too...blogging yet again.

Actually...no, of course I didn't go into hibernation. Unlike polar bears, I have access to convenience stores and the Internet...the INTERNET. Can you imagine if the polar bears had Internet?? God knows what kind of twisted site they would come up with....

Anyway, the reason I was on hiatus for so long is the usual excuse...exams. But exams was 3 and a half months ago...but right after exams was the Malaysian Night event held in Tokyo. Being one of the committee member, I was busy doing the committee thing, ya know..more arguing than actions done. It didn't turn out as well as I wished it would. I guess it can't be help, there were 2 factions with 2 contradicting ideas...me against the rest of the group...haha, yes there are hints of exaggeration and show off here, but you get my point. Anyway, things can always be improved this year...I hope.

And directly after Malaysian Night was New Year!! So...like all self respecting party go-er, I crashed 2 places...one where all the big boys go to, and after that the ones kids like me go to. If you are thinking pubs or disco bar....no, I was at my friends houses. Let me tell you how Japan's New Year is like(not including night clubs). Most people go to the shrine, to pray for good fortune, to pray for cute girlfriends, to pray for the sake of praying...to take pictures of people praying for the sake of praying...so, you can imagine the mass of meat and heat of that overcrowded place they call a shrine. Takes a few hour just to reach the shrine, only to be enveloped by smoke...and don't forget that you HAVE to go through all the meat once again to get out!! Me? I'd rather chill and drink liquor at my friends place.
Btw, New Year at a night club here is...well, everyday is a New Year at a night club...

After that was a one week ski trip at 2 places...4 days at Joetsu International and 3 days at Myoko Suginohara. Boy...I H-A-D FUN!! Skied so hard that I had cramps on both my thigh and suffered the subsequent muscle pain...but that still didn't stop me from doing jumps and skiing like crazy for a week...

And after ski was going back Malaysia!! Boy, do I feel like a tourist back at home...Melaka changed so much!! And it was very, very nice getting to meet old schoolmates back again...ahhh, the old days....everyone else did most of the talking anyway. Spent so much time trying to explain why am I speaking so slowly and the crap-less content of my speech. Come on...I have been away for a long time from the fun and crazy people I'd call friends.

During my trip back, I've had the chance to go to Penang to meet up with a few friends...and along the way, I've me a few new friends...one of them a special one. Truly, I have never met anyone of that character before...*smiles and start reminiscing*

One and a half months pass, and I found myself once again taking flight towards the North-East. To put it frankly, after not blogging for 3 months...I sincerely lost all sense of blogging. Quite a few times when I logged on to blogger.com when I suddenly went blank headed, and decided to watch some cute Japanese anime instead....may sound wrong coming from me but, cute 2D girls interests me too..

So..there you go!! That's why I took such a long break from blogging. The longest lame excuse ever...and the shortest summary of my 3 months of life!!