Cherry Blossom Adventures

Taken in Okinawa in 2006.

I wish I was here. It is starting to get a little cool in Brisbane now, especially in the mornings. Two winters in one year hardly seems fair (Although 2 summers next year will probably be worse).

Today was not a good day. I had a car crash, technically my first one. I ran up the back of someone, and it was my fault and I have a sore head. But their was almost no damage to the other car, and fairly easy to fix damage on mine. In fact just some minor panel beating work…I was just a bit more in shook than anything else. Hope everyone else had a day that was better than mine…..In other news I got a haircut, and it looks cool (I think!)

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• I arrived safely in Australia last Wednesday morning! 
• I know I have been slack and haven’t blogged in awhile but hopefully wireless internet will be set up in the next couple of days at my dad’s place and then I will be able to use my own computer to do everything. I am sure my google reader is overflowing!!! I havn’t read any blogs in almost a week, but I still love you all I promise! Will be around soon!
• My dad went into hospital this morning so I have the house to myself for about 2 or 3 weeks. I am not very good at living alone so I might come and go between my dad’s place and my mum’s place!
• So much has happened since I got here. Here is a couple of things. Bought a second hand car, a corolla, to run around in for the year. I went to see a friend who work for Julia Ross temping and she found me a job starting tomorrow which will go for two months as a student advisor doing admin work at the PA and Greenslopes hospitals. Basically got to make sure the medical students complete their prac and get their timetables and stuff….good money, regular hours and easy to get to, so I am happy. Might have an interview with the Japanese consulate in a couple of weeks also for a billingual admin person which would also be great!
• Went out for Japanese food last night with my dad and it was so yummy! We went to a place at portside called Sono I think it was! Staff and food were great!!!!
• I am missing Shun a lot but we have spoken everyday since I got here and he is doing ok in Tokyo and I am doing ok here so we are ok! I get so excited when I talk to him though cos I have so much to say about what is going on….He will be here in about 7 weeks!!!!!
• This deserves its own post but on our last weekend in Tokyo, I was supposed to have a goodbye party that I thought I had organized. Turns our our friends had organized a surprise engagement party, with about 50 people including Shun’s parents, brother and his wife, and we had no idea!!! Cat and James took us to Roppongi for cocktails and then I thought we were going to meet Koki to have some photos so we jumped in a taxi and we got there and they blindfolded us and took us upstairs above a restraunt into like a courtyard where all these people were waiting for us! It was amazing, and reminded me yet again, just how fantastic our friends are. Leader, Cat, James, Mai, Junni, Erika and Panni did a great job organizing everything….they even got in contact with Shumpei’s mum to get photos of shun when he was little and James contacted my brother to get photos of me growing up and they made a slideshow *(and yes I cried!). There was speeches made by others, and me and Shun, in which Shun proposed again, properly in front of everyone. It was simply one of the best nigths of my life and I have been smiling ever since. I will put photos up once I get internet set up properly on my computer.
• That is all for now…hopefully by next weekend at the latest I will be back up online properly and I will be around to check out what everyone has been doing!!!

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• Moving is DONE! We moved to Chiba yesterday…packing and cleaning are done for now! My muscles ache from moving boxes and trying to fit everything that couldn`t go in the moving van into Shumpei`s grandmothers tiny little car. Last night I fell asleep before 8:30 and did not use the internet all day….I have made up for that today of course
• Am going out soon to meet Shumpei and his work friend and his girlfriend for dinner. Jyumpei, his workfriend and I do not always see eye to eye. He makes fun of Shumpei and I don`t like it even though he says it is all fun and games. He does not do this while his girlfriend is around (I like his girlfriend) so tonight we should not have any problems (They are the same age so this isn`t a sempai/kohai thing….which means senior/junior… but more the fact that Jyumpei thinks he is better than Shumpei….He often asks me why I am with Shumpei and I always tell him it is because he is 100 times nicer than him)
• The reason I am leaving  the house at 4pm (for dinner!) is because Shumpei`s family dog doesn`t like me. In general it doesn`t like people other than Shumpei`s parents and it barks at me if I go downstairs. Shumpei`s mum will go to work just after 4pm (for a couple hours a day she works at a hoikuen, kind of like a daycare centre) and I would need to leave before she comes back so I will leave with her otherwise the dog would go pyscho and not let me out of the house…..I had the same problem when I lived here a couple of years ago!!! So I will go to a coffee shop and drink tea (Because the coffee and alcohol ban started early….from Saturday) or juice and read my book or write in my dairy (Possibly about the psycho dog!)
• I am off to Kobe on Friday, not long now!
• It is just over two weeks until I leave for Australia….the fact that I am leaving Japan again has not yet hit me. I am sure it will once I am back in Australia (and without shun for 2 months)….I usually get pretty bad reverse culture shock!
• Thank you to everyone who commented on the last post….I replied to you all in the comments just before but I wanted to say thank you here! I really appreciate all of your encouragement, advice and everything!

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I really really hate packing….I am over it already. It really sucks. That is all I have to say on the subject!

But last week I was looking at wedding dresses online and I found a couple I liked one of them is this one…(I wouldn`t mind her body also…then if I was to wear the dress it would actually work on me!)

Blogging might return to normal at the end of the week….If I finish packing and have something more interesting to write about instead of how much I hate packing!

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Julia from Pink Moonz tagged me for the random facts meme….

Here are the rules:
1. Each player starts with 8 random facts/habits about themselves.
2. People who are tagged, write a blog post about their own 8 random things, and post these rules.
3. At the end of your post you need to tag 8 people and include their names.
4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment on their blog and tell them they’ve been tagged, and to come back and read your blog for the whole story.

I have actually done this meme before….which you can find here and also I have 100 facts about myself here but in the spirit of passing on a meme I will be happy to do it again.

1. My blood type is A+ and I only found this out recently. In Japan everybody knows their bloodtype and I had been asked so many times (Questions when you meet somebody new are usually where are you from? How old are you? When will you get married? and What is your blood type?) and a lot of people had said they thought I would be A (Yes Japanese people believe that bloodtype is like starsigns and that each bloodtype reveals a little bit about who your are!)….So there you have it I am A!
2. I have ridden in an ambulance three times…..and had one called for me one other time. All three times were because of something that had happened to me.
3. I have had three dogs, 2 birds and two fish in my lifetime! The dogs were Kelly, Abby and Sophie (Yes all female and yes they all had human sounding names), the bird were budge and bluie (Budge`s real name was seasle (sp?) be the budge) and the fish were Jo and Tilly! I have Jo to the preschool where I used to work cos I can`t take him home with me!
4. I once one a competition when I was about five for coloring in a pair of shoes in a magazine….I won canvas shoes with puffpaint designs on them (My memory is a little hazy on this? This could have been a dream…my mum would know)
5. My favourite flowers are gerberas and cherry blossoms. I can`t really have real cherry blossoms in my wedding (Even though that is the theme!) but am contemplating having gerberas!
6. When I was little I was scared of the dark (and I also thought a Native American Indian lady lived in my closet) and I slept with the light on until sometime in highschool! I still must always have the wardrobe closes when I sleep at night and prefer to have a little light coming in from somewhere!!!
7. I am not ticklish.
8. One of the most embarrasing things that ever happened to me was when I was about nine and in year four and we were having a fashion parade and I was parading togs (swimmers!) and one of the straps come down revealing one of my breasts and I didn`t notice…..Everyone in the whole class saw!

Now onto the tagging….eight people huh?! Ok here goes!

I tag Mandy, Sara, Nay, Illahee (It can be in letter form Illahee!), Guera, Paul , Amy (When you get back from Italy!) and Jo! Have fun with it guys!

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Today on the train when I got on in Shinjuku I watched three friends (2 girls, 1 boy) from Keio Elementary school ( Hard to get into private school!) hop on and sit down although as one of the girls went to sit down her seat was taken by someone else so she was standing. Almost immediately the young boy stood up and offered his seat to his female friend.

These kids were about seven. I couldn`t believe that a boy of that age would know to offer his seat to a girl!

In the kindergarten we taught the boys in our class (after quite a few pushing and running in the hallway incidents!) that if they were big strong boys that they should let girls go first! It took them a little while to get the hang of it and sometimes they still needed to be reminded but they eventually got it! Some of the mothers even mentioned that they had started to be more cooperative at home and let their sisters do things first!

Whoever that little boys parents or teachers are they are doing a great job of raising such a charming, polite little boy!

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Yes it has begun. Since I have now finished up work it means that I need to spend the next two weeks cleaning up our apartment and packing everything into boxes. Packing is by far the worst part of moving….but when you are moving overseas but know you are coming back it is even more difficult. I quite like unpacking too but I won`t technically be able to do it for more than a year! So where is the joy in packing?

I have to pack according to three (sometimes four) categories. One, stuff we want to take to Australia (Then this has two sections too- take on board and sending), chucking out/dumping and leaving in Japan. Oh not to mention the fact I am packing up a couple of boxes for cat of stuff we don`t need that she can have (So far most of this has come out of the drugs drawer under our bed….. I have numerous over the counter medicine from Australia and here….Oh and clothes and handbags etc that I can`t take with me that she can have!). All of the stuff we are leaving in Japan is going to one of two place. Most of it is going to Shumpei`s parents place somewhere on their second floor and some of it is going to Cat (Mainly big stuff like our fridge, coffee maker, washing machine, oven etc- She will keep it for the year cos she has just moved and doesn`t have any of those things)

It would be different if we were moving to Australia for good. I could just do a good clean out, sell off our big stuff and then send everything else. But nope, we have to make it difficult by only going for a year. Plus, we will live with dad and he has a fully furnished house.

Well moving date is set to the 27th of April….then I will be out in Chiba for two weeks until I leave on the 13th of May. Shumpei will be here until sometime mid July (Which means I have to pack the stuff he will need between now and then into separate boxes….)….So I now have less than two weeks to get everything in order. At the moment I am trying to tackle one big task a day (although I can`t really pack much into actual boxes yet cos we still need it) and yesterday that was the closet……two full garbage bags later or stuff to dump and two bags for charity later, three coffees and two and a half hours later I was done. It felt good to clean it all out…..I realized, yet again, that I have way to many clothes. Even what is left in there now can`t all be taken to Australia. I packed up our winter coats because we won`t be needing them in Brisbane and even packed away some clothes that are too small now but that I hope to fit into again one day.

Now, I don`t know what to do with the clothes that I want to give to charity. Any ideas from those living in Japan? Giving stuff away in Japan is actually a hard task….All of the clothes are clean and in fairly good condition and I am sure that somebody could get good use out of them. If I can`t give them to a charity of some sort I will have to dump them which seems like such a waste.

Oh and another question. I have an old laptop (4 yrs old) which still works except if you wanted to use it you`d have to plug in a keyboard because the keyboard doesn`t work anymore…..how do you dispose of these in Japan? Can you get like a 100 dollar cash back for the parts somewhere or something like that?

OK, I better go do today`s task. Which is clean out the drawers under the bed…..These drawers are used for everything we don`t know what to do with like manuals, bits of paper, shumpei`s numerous soccer clothes (WHICH HE NEVER USES…..He only uses the same two uniforms every time yet he has like a million others under the bed)……..Wish me luck!

Ps: Shun and I also packed up all the books and manga we didn`t need over the weekend because the book off people came yesterday. 260 books and manga later…..I think we read too much.

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A couple of posts ago I asked my readers to ask questions if they had any…..I only received a couple but figured I would answer them in this post….

Mandy asked…What do you consider to be the three most significant days of your life?

Um I am really bad with these types of questions…because generally I have no idea. But probably the day I started highschool, the day I arrived in Japan for the first time and the day I met Shumpei. Just because they all made me the person I am now I guess….By the time I started highschool I was so ready for it…I needed to be in highschool and after coming from a very small Catholic primary school it was all so different. The day I arrived in Japan because obviously if I had never come to Japan on exchange that year then I never would of learnt to speak Japanese, make so many friends here and decided to come back. I say the day I met Shumpei is significant because he is the man I am going to marry!

Oh and meeting you Mandy when we were 4 as well!!! hehehe!

Sara asked… Kind of a geek questions but what manga do you have?

Actually I have no manga. I never really got into the manga craze but I once read Nana (like the first 2) and another one which I think was called Peach Girl. I am more of a Japanese drama girl….my favourites being Orange Days, Boku dake no madonna, Regatta and a recent drama called Puropozo Daisakusen!

Nay asked... Just to help you out with your blog posts, here is a question from me!
Would you say that your move back to Australia is filled more with excitement of going home, or sadness for leaving Japan? How is Shun feeling about coming to Australia for 1 year, giving up his job, losing his spot in the “Japanese job market” etc?

I think that my move back to Australia is filled with both excitement and sadness…I will only be gone a year though and I know Japan will still be here when I get back. I am a little nervous about going home….for me as well as Shumpei. I am nervous for myself because it is has been 2 and a half years since I lived back in Australia and even then I was only there for 10 months while I finished uni….most of my close friends are here in Japan and most of my close friends in Australia are no longer in Brisbane bar a couple! So that will be difficult because I have such a great support network of friends here in Tokyo who I will miss so much. But my family is in Australia and I need to be with them for awhile. I am nervous for myself also because I will need to find work and I know how stressful that can be! I am nervous for Shumpei because he is leaving his job and his friends and family behind and his motivation to do this is me….that is a lot to bear. As most of you know Shumpei`s English is not great and while it is getting better all the time he can`t really hold a conversation with someone that doesn`t understand Japanese…while he understands English quite well now he finds it very difficult to respond in English. I am hoping this will get better while we are in Australia.

It took Shumpei a very long time to decide to come with me. I had decided that I would be going back for six months whether or not he came with me or not because I needed to be with my family and he understood that. I gave him the choice and said that he could come of course….when he finally told me he was coming I cried. He had been thinking about it for about three months already and I really thought he wouldn`t come. As for giving up his job I think this is what he had to think about most. As some of you know the job market here is weird….people do not change jobs willy nilly and most stay with the same company for life. While this is changing a lot more now it is almost unheard of for someone to leave a job unless they already have a job lined up. Shun`s company has actually told him that he might be able to come back to his old job after 1 year….

I think the pressure from his family about leaving his job was more the problem that his own feelings about it.

Christelle asked …I’d love to hear more about your wedding plans, I know you said you couldn’t think about much before going to Australia, but you must have some image in your mind? Traditional wedding? Garden wedding? His family going to Australia for the ceremony? Big? Small?

When people ask me about my wedding plans I never know what to say because basically I haven`t done any. I never grew up thinking `OMG at my wedding I want to do this this and this` In fact I had never really given it much thought. But we have told quite a few people we are engaged and I am ultimately always asked the `What will you do for your wedding` question.

So far we have booked a venue…I wanted a place where we could have the ceremony and reception at the same place because we will have international guests most of which would not have transport to different venues. I also wanted it to be fairly local to the area that my parents live so my mum helped me book a place that had received some good reviews and had recently been done-up. We will be having a garden wedding and the reception in one of the function wedding rooms on site. The best thing is that this place also has a motel on the grounds so international guests will have a place (super close!) to stay!!! While I am Catholic, I never really had this huge desire to get married in a church and I quite like the idea of a garden wedding!

I have asked three friends to be bridesmaids! Catherine (who is here in Tokyo), a highschool friend Clare (who lives in Mt Isa for work) and Mandy (who reads and comments on my blog) who is my best friend from primary school and she lives in London. So yes my bridesmaids live in three different countries and none of them live in Brisbane where the wedding will be (Although Mandy and Clare are from Brisbane originally!) Shumpei has asked our friend James to be best man because we thought it would be best to ask someone that spoke English! hehe….It is great because James speaks Japanese fluently also! While James is actually originally my friend him and Shun have gotten really close and it was Shumpei who suggested we ask James (Although Shumpei had no idea what a best man was as the time) Shumpei has mentioned to a couple of his friends that he will need two more friends to be groomsmen it is something we can`t really decide right now because we are not exactly sure who is coming but I think he will ask two of his university friends! Having all of the wedding party so far away will make dress fittings for bridesmaids dresses a nightmare!

As for a theme, I am actually going to steal Nay`s idea (Don`t worry I asked her) and have a cherry blossom theme…as you can tell from my blog I love them!). While the wedding is in Australia Shumpei and I met in Japan, he is Japanese and ultimately we will be living here so it is very important for me to include something from Japan. I am not exactly sure how I will work it in but am thinking of cherry blossom invitations, cake, favors and maybe some decorations! Not really sure yet though and will have to wait til I get back to Australia before I decide anything for sure. I have also heard of a tradition they do in hawaii where they fold 1001 cranes which grants you happiness in your marriage. I like this because origami cranes are Japanese and I could give some to the guests etc but again not really sure about this.

I have no idea about colours yet though, this part is difficult as I love pink! and would love my bridesmaids to wear pink and for me to have pink flowers etc but I am not 100% sure yet. So maybe pink, silver and white for colours….

The wedding is not going to be very big. Maybe about 50 people. I thought less at first but I think a lot of Shumpei and my friends here in Japan might actually make it over for the wedding which would be fantastic. Obviously Cat and James are definitely coming but some other friends have said they would love to also!!! Shun`s parents are coming and maybe his grandmother and brother too!

The next question I am sure will be about the dress but this is something I really do have no idea about!

Because we will be having the ceremony in Australia a lot of people have asked whether we will be doing a ceremony in Japan also and at this stage the answer is no. But when we return we will have a ni ji kai for our friends and probably some kind of dinner with Shumpei`s extended family!

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Dear Cherry Blossom Advenures readers…

It is hard to believe that a week has passed between posts…..so much has happened, stuff I will eventually blog about I am sure! Apparently this is the month of letters (If you are participating in NABLOPOMO) so I thought it was time I wrote a quick letter to you all!

Lets see. This Friday I finish up work at my current job….after 18 months.

I have already knocked a couple of things off my 101 things in 1001 days list but info on that will also come in another post. I am supposed to do a update at the end of the month and I hope to have at least another couple of things crossed off! Including actually adding a page to my blog with the list!

I am up to N in my encylopedia of me and I am still not sure what I will write about. N is for Names perhaps? Or maybe N for Nancy Drew……

I am spending way to much time on the internet reading blogs, playing around on entrecard and writing emails but not nearly enough time writing on my blog…..It is hard to beleive that after posting for 3 days in a row last week I thought I might be able to do NABLOPOMO this month…..and then a week went by between posts so I guess I am not ready for that yet!

We need to be out of our apartment by April 27th….I have not yet done any packing but I will eventually get to it…I have done some cleaning though and have a man coming to pick up all our books and manga on Monday to take to book off. I have also begun to clean out my closet but it is a bigger job that I first thought! I will also be leaving Japan in just over a month….This is even harder to believe and I know it really hasn`t sunk in.

You know what also hasn`t really sunk in yet? The fact that I am getting married next May (The 9th actually!)….so far I have booked a venue and that is it. I have just kind of given up on doing anything until I get back to Australia! Although Shun and I did go look at engagement rings on the weekend……

I sprained my ankle last week although it is healing ok but still a bit bruised and swollen. Get this I did it by WALKING in my apartment…..yep to the bathroom. I am such a klutz.

I am the heaviest I have ever been and that is depressing…..I know I could start doing something about it now but have decided to start afresh the day I arrive back in Australia! Will be dieting with my mum and exercising with my dad I think! He walks everyday and wants to get a puppy so that will be our motivation. Also want to get a hoop!

I am going to Kobe in a couple of weeks to meet up with Sara which is super exciting and I can not wait! I will also get to go to Nara while I am down that way and that is also awesome since I have always wanted to go!

Oh last week on my week off I went to Disney Sea…another post perhaps?! Photos also? I also did Hanami on Saturday with Shun, Sumi, Junni and James and it was a random day but so much fun! We had no plans when we woke up that morning but the day turned out brilliantly!

I revised my resume for the first time in almost 2 years……I wasn`t even sure if resumes were still done the same way.

I signed up for entrecard….am already slightly addicted although don`t think it does anything for the traffic of my site but have already discovered some other great blogs! Although this isn`t helping my internet addiction at all because it just means I spend more time on the net reading blogs and stuff than I do doing stuff on my own blog or stuff like packing! Or even reading……I feel like I haven`t done nearly enough reading of actual books lately!

Now over to you readers, do you have any questions for me? You can ask me anything and I will try my best to answer! I have seen a couple of bloggers open up comments to their readers asking the same question `Do you have any questions` and it seems like fun. So fire away….

Hope you are all having a good week,

Love Lulu xoxoxoxo

ps: I just read the above…..talk about random. I do believe a letter is incomplete with a post script.

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• I always resort to dots when I have a lot of stuff to say but not much time to say it! Or a lot of random stuff that doesn`t really warrant its own posts!
• I am starting the 101 things in 1001 days challenge on April 1st…with Mandy and Paul I think it will help get wedding plan stuff done as well as a fair bit of stuff I have on my life list! I first read about this on the blogs here and here and have loved reading about their progress! Does anybody else want to join in????
• I am almost halfway through my encyclopedia of me meme and was wondering if anybody had any ideas of things they would want to see me write about for m onwards (I have L done!)
• I have booked a flight back to Australia and my tickets have arrived…It is a one way flight leaving Japan May 13th and arriving in Brisbane early morning on May 14th…..The ticket was pretty cheap….only 60,000yen including tax (That is about 650 dollars I think?) and thank god it was cheap because I have no money! I took a lot of sick days in the last couple of months meaning my last pay check was significantly less than usual!
• I finish work on April 11th so will have two weeks to pack up the apartment (We need to be out by end of April) and then another two weeks to relax in Chiba at Shumpei`s parents place until I leave to go home. And best of all I also have a weeks holiday next week…My second last week of work will be spent having a paid holiday. I like that! I am not sure how much relaxing I will be able to do at the in-laws place….I am not usually even allowed to put my own bread in the toaster…Shumpei`s mum insists on doing it for me. Let alone allowed to wash my own plates. This is something that really bothers me because I feel like I am taking advantage even though i offer EVERY TIME. I lived at Shumpei`s parents place for two months when I was first back in Japan…
• Shumpei taught me to play Mahjong and I really liked it. It is a Chinese game that Shumpei sometimes plays with his friends at a place especially for Mahjong…Not many people know how to play it I think so chances are I will forget how to play it before I get another chance!
• I read The Kite Runner the other day and it was awesome. Everyone should read it!
• Oh by the way the two quotes that nobody got on my movie quote meme…..One was from The Blues Brothers and the other was from Moulin Rouge!!!
• Oh I almost forgot!!! I got some more blog bling from the delightful Guera!!
• I really liked this award because I love reading blogs from around the world and have been doing more of it recently. I was so happy when she passed this on to me. So I have decided to pass it onto some other ex-pats bloggers I read similar to like what Guera did!
  (I am not sure if they all read my blog or not though!) There are heaps of others I would love to pass it onto also but I am not sure how may I can pass it onto! Also I am not sure where this award originated but it is great!
  • Mandy
  • Eurotrippen
  • Illahee
  • Amy
• My next post will be L is for…..

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