It is impossible to add photos at the net cafe right now BUT soon I will have a laptop and you can see all the fun things I have been doing!!! I miss you Henry....I love you

konichiwa from tokyo

I am in TOKYO as iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiwite this....the comp is hard to use....i am just goimg to say _I LOVE IT HERE and i w upload photos next week when i get my own laptop

sayanara!

Goodbye Party

My party was AMAZING!!!! Well my work dress up day wasnt that good seeing as I was the only one who dressed up...

My PARTY on the otherhand everyone dressed up crazy HOT and we sang Karaoke and danced untill the police came due to dirt being thrown from our window onto Brunswick Street and landing on cars....Oppps

Here are some photos from the party...I get more and more drunk...








Today is my last day in Melbourne and I have alot of packing to do so I cant write much right now...

Sayonara!

1 week to go

http://www.expat-blog.com/en/directory/asia/japan/
I have been added to expat blog so hopefully now people can find my blog YAY!!!

There is only 1 week to go untill I will be writing this from Japan. I am so excited. It has come so quicky. I only have 4 more days of work, the last day being Dress up Japanese day. Then on Saturday night I am having a dress up Japanese and Karaoke Party.


Last Saturday night was my friend Rochelles 22nd birthday. We went out dancing at click click till 3am. I'm still recovering 2 days latter!

This is Me, Rochelle and Henry.

Fashion...(She is wearing really high heels)

I think I finally have enough tights for working as a teacher at Nova in japan. (You have to wear tights/pantyhose of you wear a skirt....and seeing as I only wear skirts because I dont believe in casual fashion I have to stock up on tights now because Japanese tights DONT fit me!)

OH and I also finally got a suit Jacket. I have been looking and looking for months and months for one that will fit my fat arms and small waist. I decided to try Bridge Road again (Factory outlet street in Melbourne) and walked up and down the whole day. I didnt find anything I liked and I was getting annoyed. The last shop I was going to visit was Charlie Brown (an Australian fashion designer) and I found 4 or 5 suit jackets that worked for me. So I had to narrow it down to 2, one that was more expensive but was more professional and one that was more "me" as in it had a few quirky design features such as puffy arms and a cool giant button. I decided to go with the more "me" suit jacket a bonus being it was $130 cheaper than the other one I was thinking about getting. YAY now I am going to look like a professional and there wont be a chance of me being sent home! (NOVA are really strict with the dress code)

I have also been a bit worried that I dress like a "Cartoon". In the last few weeks I have been dresssing more conservatly trying to practise my Japanese work clothes. A new guy at work told me I look like the Town Bikes (a dance troop)


He didnt know who they were he just cut a photo out of the newspaper...

AND I met all these Japanese guys on a CRAZY drunken night out with Rochelle. (It was an afterwork drinks thing...I got very drunk infront of my team leader, the "corporate" guys and all my colegues....It was hilarious...I told my Team Leader his band sounds like vomit...) Anywayz me and Rochelle were going up to people and asking if they were Japanese...we ended up finding a whole heap. I become friends with 2 Satashi and Itchi...I went out to another bar with them and kissed Satashi...oppps I have a boyfriend/fiance. Satashi actually slept over at me and Henrys house....oppps how crazy is that.... Satashi and I met up a week latter so he could teach me Japanese and I could teach him English. He sent me a very funny text message:

"Please no clothes like cartoon"

What the? I really didnt think I dressed that out there... I mean in Japan you have people who dress like cartoon all the time...its called Cosplay and Fruits magazine showcases all the crazy things people wear in Harajuku! I thought a Japanese person would understand...

OH my aim is to get a photo taken of me in Harajuku for FRUiTS magazine...stay tuned on that front!

In my next post I will have photos of the dress up Japanses parties...



Sayonara!

Madonna Tickets

These are what my beautiful Madonna Tickets look like! I am so excited about this concert. I got to meet Harry the Japanese student who lives with my sister in Bendigo at the dorm who bought my ticket for me. I gave him a very "Aussie" presant of VB beer, a VB beer mug oh and some Japanese chocolates that he wouldnt be able to get in the country!


I cant wait to see the concert, I have watched clips on youtube. It is soooo amazing. I love how she does controversal things...its HOT.


In other news I didnt go to work today, I slept in. Its not like I really need the money either. So today I am going to clean up my bedroom (Its like bomb went of in there) so I can find what I need to pack more easily. Only 13 days till I go now. WOW OMG this is CrAzY!!!

Ok got to clean up now

Sayonara!

2 weeks to go

There is now only 2 weeks untill I get on the plane to go to Tokyo. I am definatly getting nervous now and I only have 8 days left at work, its the 1st job I have ever had job satisfaction at, its weird to be leaving it so soon (I only started 5 months ago).

This is my week so far:

My sisters birthday in Bendigo went well (That is a photo of my family, my sister next to me, my grandfather and my nana with my mum on the end) Ebony loved the ipod! It was exhausting though, we didnt get into the city untill 8pm and we had to go to Henry's parents for fathers day dinner...fun (not) I dont like Henrys mum, she isnt very nice to me...doesnt respect me and what I have done for Henry and Bridie. (I helped them grow up, move out of home and be independant...but mostly I helped Henry overcome extreme social anxiety)
This is Ebony and Henry carrying the picnic basket, they look so fashionable!


On Saturday I went to the local costume shop and hired a Geisha costume (Kimono, obi, parasol, fan) for my 2 days of goodbye celebrations starting September 15! I have to get on the tram dressed like a Geisha and go to work, embarrasing!

I am getting really stressed about the last minute shopping I need to do but I have finally found some tights at BigW. They have a cheap and good selection of tights so I'm going to go back closer to when Im leaving..

This is a list of things I still need:

1 Pillow
Opaque black tights x10 pairs
Opaque white tights x2 pairs
Sheer tights in beige, white and black x15 pairs
3x roll on deoderant
1 suit blazer
3 or 4 summer work shirts
1 black cardigan (maybe)

Im really really sleepy right now

Sayonara

How did I get the job in Japan?

It is my sisters birthday tomorrow, she is turning 20. Ebony lives in Bendigo (a country town in Victoria) as she goes to uni there. She lives in a College dorm and it is just like those USA teen movies with Frat parties, nude runs and general obnoxious behaviour! Anyway tomorrow we are all driving down to Bendigo (by we I mean my mum, nanna and pa and Henry) for a special Birthday picnic. It is going to be the last time I visit Bendigo for at least a year, and I get to meet Harry the Japanese guy who helped buy me my Madonna Confessions tour concert tickets for Tokyo Dome September 21. I was so lucky to find him because it was impossible to buy the tickets unless you can read Japanese as the only website to buy the tickets from was only in Japanese. I also get to pick up the tickets as they got sent over from his parents house to him (you also needed a Japanese address for the tickets to be sent to)....I have to get him a thankyou present today. Speaking of presents I got my sister an ipod nano 4gb. Well me, mum and Henry got it for her...I'm not that genorous!



I have always wanted to teach English in Japan. I first found out about it when I was in Brisbane staying at a backpackers there were flyers around everywhere. At the time I was too young and didnt have enough experience to be able to do it. In order to tach part time you need to have succesfully completed 1 year of a degree, to teach full time you need to have completed a BA in anything. I have completed 1 year of a fine art photography degree at The Victorian College of the Arts. I quit that half way through 2nd year due to the insanity of the place (art school students are CRAZY) and have been working full time at various call centre jobs for Telstra and travelling to Japan, NZ, Tahiti and NYC. When I returned from NYC in January I started a new job for Telstra in credit management. It is actually a really good shit job because the hours are set instead of working a 24/7 roster and the money is amazing!


But I started to get bored and restless. Then the Madonna Confessions tour dates were announced and she wasnt coming to Australia, but she was going to Tokyo. As I had promissed myself that if she tours this album I would go no matter how much it costs I decided that I would take 2 weeks leave to go to Tokyo for the concert with Henry. However as Henry had uni he didnt have any time to save for the trip I decided to go alone, but what was the point of going for just 2 weeks when I could live and work there for a year? Thats when I decided to apply through AACE to teach English in Japan.


I was really nervous for the interview as you had to do an English grammar and spelling test, but it all went fine. You also have to do a role play exercise where the interviewer pretends to be a student. That was actually really fun and made me excited about the job not just the fact that it is in Japan.

When I found out I had the job I danced around the office I was so excited. Now the date I leave is getting closer and closer (17 days and counting) I cant believe it is happening. It is too good to be true! I am going to live and work in Tokyo and see MADONNA in concert! It all feels like a dream. The only sad thing is Henry wont be there to share the experience, but at least he will visit for 2 months, and it might do him some good to live alone for a while and see how much I do for him.

Anywayz I have to go and get a thankyou pressy for Harry, some picnic food for my sisters birthday and go to the Costume hire shop to look for a Geisha costume.

Sayonara!

My first post

This is the 1st of hopefully many posts I will be making about my year in Japan. I currently live in Melbourne, Australia in a suburb called Fitzroy. I live on Brunswick Street, above a cafe. Living on Brunswick Street is similar to living on Bedford Avenue in Williamsburg NYC...Its TOTALY COOL!!! I am really going to miss the creative community vibe of living here, bumping into old housemates at Bimbos ($4 gourmet pizzas yummmm), visiting galleries and hanging out with my fiance. Henry (my fiance) is staying in Melbourne to finish his interior design degree while I go and teach English in Tokyo, Japan for 1 year. I am really going to miss him. Lucky for me he is going to visit me for 2 months around xmas....not so lucky for my 2 new housemates in Japan, lol. The company (Nova...yes I know they are really bad ect but I currently work for Telstra and it really cant be much worse) orgainises your accomodation, sets you up in an appartment with 2 other teachers of the same sex. If the housemates wont let Henry stay for 2 months I dont know what I'm going to do.


I leave in 18 days, but I'm not that scared because I have been to Tokyo before and I know what I'm in for. I loved Japan last time, I love the many different faces of Tokyo, the tradiontional aspects mixed with the extremely modern. At the top of this post are some of my fave photos from that trip. I found out yesterday exactly where I will be living in Tokyo. It is suburb called Fuchu, 25 mins from Shinjuku. Fuchu has an estimated population of 236,491 and a population density of 8,060.36 persons per km². The total area is 29.34 km². The city of Yarra (the district I live in, in Australia which includes many suburbs such as Fitzroy, Richmond, Abbortsford) has approx 68,000 residents and has an area of 20.0 square kilometres. I cant believe how small Australia is. In Tokyo the streets are always full of people, here it is like we live in a small country town when we walk through the city at night. I cant wait to leave, but saying that there is alot I will miss about Melbourne. I will miss trams, but not the time you wait for one to arrive (Trains in Tokyo come every minute, here its every 20 minutes) I will miss my family and friends, I will miss shopping and being able to fit into clothes, I will miss my lovely house, I will miss Brunswick Street, I will miss the food (cheese, bread, pizza, pasta...Japanese versions really suck).


I need more work clothes for Japan because I wont be able to buy anything in Japan unless I dont eat for a year, lol. Nova are really strict about the dress code and I am getting a little bit stressed about it and trying to do some last minute shopping. So far though it has been unsuccesful. I need some white short sleeve (NOT sleveless) shirts, a black suit blazer and like a million pairs of tights as you HAVE to wear them if you wear a skirt. As it is becoming summer here it is impossible to find tights and I am going crazy. I have given instuctions to everyone I know to send me tights when they see some for sale.


On my last day at my current work we are having a Japanese themed dress up day. I am going to hire a Geisha costume and do the Geisha whole makeup thing. I cant wait its going to be fun. My team leader is going to come dressed in Karate gear. After work we are going to this bar in the city that has those Sumo Wrestler suits you can wear and fight in. Hilarious! And then we are going to do Karaoke...and all this in our costumes, I cant wait!!!! I will post photos! Its not for 2 weeks though.

Ok enough for my 1st entry, I can explain more another night.

Sayonara!