Yep, the time has gone to say goodbye to Japan. Henry left on July 5th and I'm going on August 6th, 1 month earlier than expected. Seeing as it was Henry's last weeks in Japan we did alot of fun things, and I wasnt able to blog for a bit, but now I have heaps fo time.
Before Henry came to Japan, I was able to have fun on my own, but now without him it is sooooo boring! I have no one to talk to, go out with, shop with, kiss ect... Ahhhhh I'm looking forward to seeing him again soon. I think being here has deffinatly made us closer, especially due to the wedding. It was so much fun. Its sad that our time here is over, but I'm ready to go home, even though I made that angry rant about hating Australia, it is home and I do miss it.
Ok so the last few weeks we did alot of "touristy" things. The 1st was we went to the new The National Art Center gallery in Roppongi. The outside of the building is actually very impressive, and the inside foyer is cool too. But the gallery's are soooo pokey and poorly designed. The architect is Kisho Kurokawa, the same guy that did the original Melbourne Central and also KL international airport in Malaysia. He is a Japanese architect interested in primary shapes, like cones, circles, rectangles ect...so the building kinda looked like melb central with a glass cone roof area and glass cone pedastools for restaurants (hard to explain).
Anyway Henry had free tickets to see the Monet exhibition because hsi student is a curator there. So we saw that, it was very very crowded, and it was a monday! The exhibition didnt have the huge waterlily painting we saw at the MOMA in NYC but it did have an impressive array of paintings. I'm not too interested in Monet's work, he is an easy artist to like, but its funny to think his paintings which are very accessible for the masses lead to contempory art and abstraction that most everyday people hate. So yeah it was nice to see some famous art, but we had already seen the best ones in New York. There was also another exhibition on at the time about Fashion and Architecture and the similarities between the 2. It was interesting to see how some designers like Comme Des Garcon and Vivien Westwoods work is similar to Architecture....like pleating or deconstution. I have no images from the exhibition, but it was very cool, with the manequins next to architecure models and drawings. Henry loved it, but he loves Architecture more than me, and I also hate the kind of Fashion that was displayed. Its very Architectural, structured and grey whereas I like free fowing colourful clothes.
After the exhibition we went outside to walk to the new shopping mall in Roppongi called Midtown. However once outside the gallery we saw this neet bicycle taxi thingy and it was only 300yen each to have a ride so we thought why the hell not. Its very fun, everyone stares at you.
Midtown was disapointing, just very expensive desginer stores like chloe that I cant afford. BUT there was a very yummy bagel shop so that was fun.
We also went to Odaiba to go to "Puppy the world" which is a store that you can hire a puppy for 1 hour. However in summer the dogs get "air exhaustion" and cant be walked. Well I was a little annoyed as we had come all this way to play with puppies. Luckily Henry notices a place nearby called "Kitty Living" where for $15 for 2 people you can go into a cattery full of cats and play with them. They give you some food to give the cats and a warning piece of paper that says
"Here inside be Careful of the Following Things: Cats are basically free creatures. They get angry if they get woken up while they sleep, if they are molested or taken by surprise"
What the....molested???
There was lots of other Engrish, but that was the best one.
Henry and Fluffy
Me out the front
Im very excited to see a cat
What you doing there?
After molesting a few cats we made our way to Muscle Park, a new themepark that is kinda like, well like nothing I have ever seen before. There are no rides, just like brain/body tests to test your reflexes to catch a ball, how good your balance is standing on a ball, how good your concerntration is to hit a ball through a moving obstacle course...so its kinda like giant computer games but for people. We didnt do any because it seemed kinda boring and was very expensive. $10 per game...bahhhh
Then we went to Megaweb. Toyota's mega showroom or "car themepark" as they call it. There are lots of attractions in this futuristic building, such as the driverless car that Hen and I went on. For about $3 each we went on this twisting circuit through the building with the car being directed by circular sensors on the road. So the car drove it self...it was kinda freaky, the steering wheel jerking about on its own. They also have a free "cinemotion" type thing of a car race...its really lame, you just feel turning curners slowly and breaking alot...kinda like being in traffic! Fun..not! They also have a museum of old cars that was kinda fun, especially as they had the back to the future car which Henry is obsessed with! I'm not usually into cars, but all this was free so it was my kinda fun.
Henry poses with his dream car
Megaweb is super futuristic. This is the path the unmanned car drives along
In the driverless car yay
Megaweb is attached to Palette Town, which we went to just before xmas with Jackie...Its just like timezone, and we played some funny games, there is one where you are on a treadmill walking your dog. I played a game where I was the tram driver of the tram in Kamakura, it lasted about 10 seconds because I think I killed a passenger (all the instructions were in Japanese).
Strange walk the dog game
We also had last days together in our fave places like Harajuku and Koenji and also a "Goodbye Henry Karaoke and Izakaya Party!" with the Spank! girls. Sooooo cute. We had unlimited drinks for 2 hours, so I got plastered, while the Spank! girls didnt drink at all basically. But sooo much fun singing Aqua hits and Sclub7, ohhhh finally I met people that share my backward taste in music...which is no taste, I just love silly bad stuff. They also did some cool Jpop songs like my fave Yuki, Joy (look it up on youtube). It was such a FUN night!
Kawaii, Saki, Maya and Yuki having some Karaoke good times
FUNNNN (who said I'm a mike hog?)
OH and before that party we had a party with Gallermic and EVERYOBE which started at Yoyogi Park drinking chu-hi with 15 people, then moved onto a nightclub opening in Shibuya that Kim's friend ran. To get there we had to walk past all these Ganguro kids practising para para, sooooo funny! The nightclub was 100% tacky, but we got in FREE and it was FREE unlimited DRINKS>>>so I got wasted! Somehow we ended up at a karaoke booth, me and Gallermic stole some bottles from the counter, then I kept leaving our karaoke booth to annoy people in other rooms, till they sent security up to tell me off! People got very angry at me, but what do you expect if you give me free booze all night? Plus Gallermic stole the bottles too but everyone blamed me...and now no one is speaking to me....So I'm kinda angry cos Ive dealt with Kim being very drunk, and Gallermic and i didnt get so angry. Poooo to them!
OHHH and the last English lesson with Spank! that Henry came to was a bit sad. Henry gave each of the spank! girls a pink flower which was sweet, and they gave him a HUGE badge that says DORK! sooo cool.
Last lesson for Henry
KG wore a funny t-shirt to the last lesson
So
Happy
Ive
Turned 40
Happy
Ive
Turned 40
So yeah I took Henry to the airport, and we said our teary goodbyes and now I really really miss him :<
When I spoke to him the next day he had a funny story. On the plane he wore a crazy nu-rave style outfit of giant pink keith harring print shirt with skinny black jeans and his glow in the dark nike high top sneakers. So there were these teens on the plane that came to japan from some country aussie town for a sport thing, and they thought Henry was a rock star. So they dared one of the boys to go sit next to Henry and talk to him and see if he was a rock star. So this greasy pimply long haired 15 year old boy sits next to Henry and starts talking a mile a minute, which for Henry was really confusing cos he hadnt heard much English in a long time. The kid asked Hen alot of questions, and Henry found out alot about the kid, I think he had a band, his bestfriend was the other guy with long hair and he hates his home town....ahhhh soo funny. Henry the Rock Star!!!
The night after Henry left I went to Sweet Dreams, a party in Shibuya. It was really cool, very nu-rave with loads of cool fashion, but I was SUPER BORED without Henry, like dying. Its fun to talk to Jap people, but you cant really talk more than saying "Kawaiiiii" and "fun music" sooo its not exactly in depth...still I had fun looking a the clothes and seeing my J friends!
Poppy, ??? and Kaori. I love ???'s nu-rave style kimmono.
Rave style
Gallermic and Rory dj...but I'm mad at Galler
Dance floor madness
I forget his name, but he was also at the crazy too drunk and people angry at me night...very fashionable!
The design team from Chapter (they make the clothes they are wearing) I forget all their names but they are super super fun and nice.
Pretty much since then I've stayed at home because its been raining (we had a typhoon, and then a big earthquake) BUT I have dont ALOT of shopping which I will post soon. I got soooo many goodies I cant wait to share them all with you.
OH and This weekend is shaping up to be my best ever! I'm going on a road trip with the Spank! girls, going to a super fun party, Mt fuji and also Fuji-Q Highlands amusement park with Hilary. YAY I cant wait...and maybe there will be some photos of me in a Yukata (summer kimmono)
Sayonara xxx (ummmm Actually I think saying "Bye bye" is more common in Japan then Sayonare, its too formal, but bye bye is used EVERYWHERE!)
2 comments:
LOL, I thought that's what those puppy places were, weird.
I think you should stay in Tokyo, not come home early. I know it gets lonely and boring but what if you end up regreting it because you didn't finish it. Plus it's freezing here at the moment.
Oh well whenever you come home, I hope you have a safe trip and see you soon.
Hey Hayley! I found your site randomly and I really love it! You look like you're having the best time in every picture. I think you have great style and your blog is really entertaining.
I have one too, www.julieinjapan.com and I just posted something about your site because I like your blog so much. I hope you don't mind, and please let me know if that isn't ok. You have a great eye for fashion!
See you,
Julie
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