kiko – Page 24 – d@vidb dot net

Monster Bash 2005 & More Tokyo

Monster Bash 2005 – Yes… it was pretty exciting. I got to see exciting bands such as Orange Range, Dragon Ash, rize, and Yaida Hitomi with my good friend Greg emoticon . It was a lot of fun! (I have pictures to prove it!) (and movies to! – try them!) (How was it Greg?)

For those that don’t know, I live on Shikoku. Now nothing really exciting happens on Shikoku. However, once a year, a really big musical festival comes to Mannou Park, which happens to be about 5 mins from my house. (Incidentally, mannou is the name of the town I will be living in after Chunan merges with the surrounding villages.) The venue is super beautiful and the weather was co-operative.

… too co-operative. You will be excited to learn that I had an allergic reaction to my sunblock. Stoopid ass Japanese sunblock. I didn’t realize until after I let it soak in the sun for an entire day. I now look like the Phantom of the Opera. I don’t think it will be going away anytime soon (and I have a big C on my chest for some unknown reason.) Stop the excitement.

See how beautiful the concert was…

Monster Bash

Here are some movies I took at the conert. Keep in mind that these were taken under duress as I had an angry man trying to prevent me from filming.

Orange Range 1 Orange Range 2 Dragon Ash 1 Dragon Ash 2

This last picture is Kiko, myself and my very good friends Nakanishi-san (whom some of you have met!) He is a super nice guy and took us to Jojoen, one of the best yakiniku (Korean BBQ, read: super good) places in Tokyo. It has a fabulous location overlooking Shinjuku and is fantastic… and expensive. THANK YOU!!!

Nakanishi-san

Flying Noodles

Not so much to everyone in Canada, but to our friends and neighbours in Japan, I often get asked to explain why we choose to live in Chunan, Kagawa Prefecture. (and don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t a choice to come here, rather, it was a choice to remain here.) For those of you back in Canada, it would be like a Japanese family coming from Tokyo, Japan emoticon to up and move to the-middle-of-nowhere, PEI. (think Milton, but smaller and in PEI.)

Why!?

Well, for one, my farming. Couldn’t exactly be doing that in Tokyo… and it’s cool. Secondly, flying noodles. nagashi somen is a dish where noodles are placed in a water pipe and fly down the ramp. You have to grab them from this water slide and eat them. Chris Houston and Trevor had the experience when they visited me in Japan in 2002, but I have never been lucky enough to do so… until now.

here, take a look.

Flying Somen

What made this experience absolutely fantastic was the hardcoredness emoticon of it all. One of the teachers at one of the elementary schools I go to (who’s house this was held at) went to the forest, cut his own bamboo ramp, smoothed it out, set it up, and then proceeded to make enough glasses and sauce containers for all of us. He apologized for not having enough bamboo left over to make the chopsticks, but suffice it to say it was pretty cool. Everything was homemade, and it was a lot of fun. (That and I was amazing at catching the flying noodles…)

Kiko is a knitting machine

Before we left for Tokyo, Kiko has been knitting like crazy for Baby Awesome. She asked me to put them up so everyone can see what she has been up to, but I am an idiot (emphasis added by Kiko) and forgot. So here it is… crazy good eh? emoticon (don’t mention to her that Baby Awesome now has more knitted clothes than any baby will ever need though…)

Kikos knitting

Recently…

Other than yesterday’s exciting Jet Journal news, here are a few pictures of what we have been up to the past few days.

It has been very hot, and very busy, but our very good friends from California were in Japan, and we got together in Okayama to see them for a few days. Their kids are crazy cute.

One of Kiko’s best friends, Sanae, has some very good news and is up from Tokyo to visit her boyfriends family in Takamatsu. We were really happy to be able to see them (and Kouichi for the first time!)

Finally, a very nice family, the Yamauchis, had Kiko, myself and Greg over for a great BBQ and a magic show. Don’t get me started with the magic show, the kid is amazing. I have some on video and hopefully I will start getting video up on this site.

Anyways, e-mail me and post in the ugly shoutbox already. Don’t say I don’t love you.

Also, look at the pictures already.

Oh yeah… also had a Jamaican cooking class with semi-real Jamaican food and a real Jamaican. It was actually really good. Curry chicken, rice and peas and pepper jelly. nice. I know you’re jealous.

Jamaican cooking picture

Jet Journal 2005

Now… if you have been following this site, you may have seen me refer to myself as a Camera Genius, or a Picture Taking Machine (or something like that)…

Well, it’s true. I submitted some pictures to this year’s Jet Journal (a magazine that goes out to all 6000 JET’s, and three of my pictures have been selected for publication. Take a look at the cover, and click on it to take a look at the pictures themselves. I’m super. emoticon

A few more pictures from Canada

I finally managed to pry a few more pictures off of my cellphone. This is Kiko, Chris, Franz & I celebrating Chris B’s birthday at a very good restaurant: Banzai sushi. I still owe him a present though… (not that seeing me wasn’t present enough mind you…) ps. Franz was kind of enough to treat Kiko and I to dinner. Thank you!! (my brain was not working, and I apologize, but upon reflection I could have used that as an opportunity to give Chris a birthday present and pay for his dinner. d’oh. chris, forgive me!)

Summer in Canada 2005

We are back in Chunan!!! … and have begun the process to get rid of as much jetlag as possible. We both had a fantastic time back in Canada.

I had a scholarship interview that went fantastic emoticon (I’m gonna need something to do when my contract here ends in 2006/08 or 2007/08.) and we got to see a number of really good friends. That being said, we were completely strapped for time, and for everyone that we were able to see, there were 2 more people we would have loved to but couldn’t. Between my scholarship interview in the first week, my Dad’s operation in the second (he’s ok!) and the fact that we only had 10 days in Canada, we did our best.

For those that we did see: Thank you!!! We had an amazing time. emoticon For those we didn’t: Next year, February. We miss you all, and unfortunately because of the baby, this will be our only trip to Canada back this year. Next year we will be back with Baby Awesome (or whatever he/she is named at the time.)

In the meantime, here are a few sample pictures of what we did while back in Canada, and the full gallery can be seen by clicking here.

The Big News

Why is Kiko so large-ish in the previous entry??? emoticon

Drumroll….

Both Kiko and I would obviously like to be able to give everyone the good news face to face, but since that really isn’t much of an option, we want to take this opportunity to let all of our good friends and family (and the stragglers from the internet who accidently find themselves here… i guess) know the good news…
Introducing David Jr. aka Kunio aka We don’t have a name yet! emoticon

Now accepting name submissions. There will be a vote. You can forever improve or mess-up it’s life. Make it so.

Kiko & David! & Off to Toronto

Just a quick note before we set off for Toronto. It will be a very short and action packed filled trip as we head back to Toronto for 10 days. I have a big scholarship interview but after that is done (30th) I hope to see as many people as I can in the last 4 days. Wish me luck!

See you guys soon and wish us a safe flight! …

Kiko’s New T-Shirt

No matter what she tells you, this is Kiko’s new favourite shirt. (you can tell by how happy she looks in it!!)

Another big thanks to Chris and Lianne! Everything you guys have sent has been amazing…. miss and love you guys. emoticon

kiko-and-david!1.jpg

Cherry Blossom … a sneak peak

Now that my work is blocking access to this website, and taking in to account my retardedly slow Internet access as home, the promised Cherry blossom pictures will have to wait.

That being said, they were spectacular. The peak landed right on the weekend, and we managed to catch them on Saturday, before typhoon-like windows blew them away on Sunday. Japanese people wait all year for a few days of blossoms, but its ridiculous how many of these trees are in our town.

Here’s a look!

A picture of a Sakura tree

Below is a picture of a very cute baby who loves me. His name is Kousuke, and he is the baby of a good friend at work. NOT the son of my calligraphy teacher (whom I originally thought! … oops!). Below that is our very good friends Mike and Nikki. Nikki lives in Kotonami, the town beside mine.

Saya Mike and Nikki