shiny shiny SHINY :D

So. It's saturday, and there's a typhoon coming? so what shall we do? how about walking around Tokyo in the typoony wind and rain trying to find a non-existent kimono and get a new phone?

...yeah, well... I thought it was a good plan...

We wondered around Harajuku in the down pour looking for some possible ideas for halloween costumes (we were thinking of going to the Yamaote line train party: something like the Circle Line...but MUCH bigger...where they have a yearly halloween party in one of the carriages). Anyway, we eventually got to the cool shop, where they sell very very sexy Kimonos...only to find they didn't have any left! grrrrrrr...well... more of a *sniff sniff*. I was sad. No cool and sexy kimono for wayway :( and they won't get any more stock until DECEMBER! Waaaaaaaaaaaa!

So, I sulk away... we have a coffee to warm ourselves up (because our shoes and socks are completely soaked, added to the fact that our trousers have become friends with precipitation and been getting on swimmingly with the whole concept of capillary action). Whilst still feeling unbeliveably sorry for myself about a kimono, or lack there of, I decided that the best way to deal with my current issues was to buy a pair of wellies.

But not just *any* wellies... these are special, magical, wellies. I had been eyeing them up since early this year well before any mention of Glastonbury... and considering the excessive efforts of the typhoon, they were possibly the only thing which would keep my feet vaguely dry....well, from getting any more wet.

ta-da! a pair of cool wellies.

So, the magical boots made me happy again... so happy, I decided the best thing to do was to torture myself with the Japanese language and try to cancel my current phone contract and sign up to a new one, with out the help of a fluent Japanese/English speaker... Hmmmmm! FUN! I think not.

Thus, we head off to try and find an AU shop, to cancel said phone...which involved chasing a very small goose, but we got there in the end...the whole canceling thing was nice and easy. I even got hold of my MNP number (which was effective immediately) for a small handling charge...taking one step closer to shiny shiny.

'That wasn't too bad!' I thought...

HA!

Back into the rain to find the huge Softbank shop of shiny-ness...the whole shop was shiny. mmmmmmmmmm shiny. With in a minute of us setting our now sodden-squishy feet in there we were approached by an eager shop assistant...who quickly discovered that my Japanese was utter tripe. But she kept smiling and being overly helpful. She guided us through the phones... with some great use of universal sign language to get across things like: 'has TV, no international roaming' and 'has no TV but International roaming'. Most of this was pointless, because I was hearing: 'this phone is shiny and new, and this phone is shiny, new, and looks pretty. This phone resembles the common brick because it carries an amazing camera and 3x optical zoom, while this phone is a very cool colour and very shiny' ... etcetera etcetera. After seeing more shiny things than my brain can usually cope with in a day, I chose a セクシー shiny camera by samsung....possibly because it came in a funky colour. The turquoise blue was practically irresistible...

It is most definitely a sexy phone. And I forfeited the ability to do international roaming with the thing, in favour of having a TV (thought it might improve my Japanese - failing that, I can use the antenna to duel with people in the street).

After finally choosing the damn phone I wanted...it got steadily worse. The explanation of contract agreements and special offers is complex enough in your own language, let alone in a foreign one. So, yeah, it took a while.

Greg was patiently sitting beside me (still soaking wet from the knees down, with his shoes making a lovely squelchy sound everytime he put his foot on some thing solid) and translating things about contracts, that I seemed incapable of understanding...It was all very tiring... and it was past 8pm by the time we had exhausted the whole contract business...which was kinda sad, as we were kinda thinking of trying to head for the Yamanote line party thingy..definitely no time to head home and change...and we weren't really in much of a going out state after our little open air shower...

The sales lady had pottered off to get the contract sorted... and came back with some 'presents' for us... I got some weird magnet clippy things...a stainless-steel mug - tiny but cute...and best of all a free 1gb microSD...and some promise of 5000yen cashback after I slay a dragon...or something like that...haven't quite figured it out yet...I'm sure it will be fine.

After the humungus effort of getting my new shiny toy, we gave up on the idea of the Yamanote line party (maybe next year eh?) and opted for dinner...which was nice - the company was excellent, as always...then went home to dry off... which all turned out rather well actually. Greg found out later that this years Yamanote line party was a bit pants... on the account of the gaijins (the people who went to the party, aka. foreigners) acting like dicks... They apparently managed to get the train stopped at Shibuya station for about 20mins because they were busy pouring beer on the natives...hmmmm well done there.

The upside down fish

My aunt has 3 fish tanks... with various fish in them...but there is one fish which I find fascinating: and that is the 'upside-down fish'.

Normal fish

The 'upside-down fish'

At first I thought he was dead. He/she/it was lying motionless at the bottom of the tank (strange), belly-up (can't be good). But then it twitched....flapping it's little fins...as if to say hello. So, everytime I came back from somewhere I'd have a look in on the upside-down fish. He sometimes moves himself around the bottom of the tank and one day I actually saw him make a break for the top....which was weird to watch, as he swam, upside-down, in a flurry of activity to get to the top and then quickly sank back down again. From time to time the other fishes in the tank say hello to him... I came back one time, to most of the fish huddling around him.

An unusually productive day...

Unlike the rest of my life, I've been rather productive today! hurray!
SO, what did I do?

Morning...I slept through it , and yes, that's productive. Considering the silly get-up time I had yesterday. So, eventually got up at 9 something to get changed for breakfast with 婆婆 (grandma) DIMSUM! Then came back to mope about a bit, before going out again to buy stuff. We went to the market to get some Gula Melaka (coconut sugar), fresh coconut creme, 酒 餅 (basically yeast cakes), 豆腐花 (a lovely soft dessert made from soya beans - tofu fua)...

Stall in the indoor market selling stuff made from dried coconuts...the guy on the left is smelling the coconuts before grinding them to death...and the product goes into the machine on the right...which squeezes out the coconut creme...nice.

豆腐花 stall (tofu fua)

We dropped some of the stuff back at 婆婆 (Grandmas) house, and then went back to Aunties to have lunch.

For a moment my day got a bit more complex. We were kind of planning to go to 婆婆 (grandmas) house to make Kaya and rice wine, but as I had been cutting some Pandan leaves from behind aunties house, my mum started chatting to her neighbour, who also said that she knew how to make Kaya. So, mum thought it would be better to make the Kaya at aunties house.

Anyway, I started pounding down the pandan leaves in the stone pestle and mortar to make the flavouring for the Kaya. Ani (the indonesian maid) very kindly strained everything out for me while I turned my back :)

The process had begun.

We started breaking the eggs into a pan and whisking them...at that point everyone decided that they'd come into the kitchen and watch. Which led to everyone else deciding that they knew best how to make Kaya...I had 4 different people telling me to do completely different things... which was fun. Anyhoo, eventually all but one (my mum) of the 'cooks' left me to it... so we were there stirring, and stirring, and stirring...more stirring... and then some more stirring...the stirring continued for a while... we added the coconut and the stirring continued some more. Mum took over the stirring while i went to get ready for swimming, and by the time I came back down she'd already added all the (melted) gula melaka, the pandan essence and had finished making the kaya. Nini (my cousin) had already vouched for it's niceness.

With the Kaya done, we headed off to the Hyatt for their swimming pool. The swimming pool actually looked out over the beach, which was very clean, shelly and sandy. We thought we'd by-pass the pool and head for the beach. The sea was lovely and warm...with gentle waves lapping the beach...after drinking enough of the sea water, we went back to the pool for some less salty and sandy swimming. Spent most of the time pushing my little cousin around the pool in his rubber ring...and loosing swimming races.



We washed and then went back to aunties house then went out again for dinner...which was an array of crab, fresh fish, and other delicious goodies.

After dinner we went back to 婆婆 's house to try and make some rice wine...which everyone else (three of my little cousins, my aunt, and mum, wanted to watch too...then we had some exercises with 姨婆 (my great aunt)...which was hilarious.

...and now I have to pack to get down to KL

Post 101

Wow... reached post 101...nice

a quick one.... might add to this later... but about to leave to send my brother off to Singapore for a short visit.

Got up at 4:30AM this morning *craziness* to climbing some hill in Sungai Lembing...for the sunrise. up early, physical exercise and NO BREAKFAST... Quan was a little cranky (no coffee = death!). We nearly started our decent because we thought the actual sun wasn't going to make a photogenic appearence (it was already light and not sign of the big yellow thing) when it popped up. Which resulted in lots of shouting from my mum and aunts to make sure that a good enough photo was taken of the occasion.

If this sharp climb wasn't enough we went to Panching to a Karst cave to have a little look at a buddha. This involved lots of stairs, but wasn't half as bad as the one we did in the dark for the sunrise. after the cave we took a little detour up to a little view point higher up...where we got to glimpse some monkeys! hurray! I made a good attempt at tryin to coax them closer for a decent photo. Quan and I spent a good length of time trying to take a decent photo, much to the annoyance of all 5 people who were waiting for us at the bottom. In an attempt, I can only presume, to make a faster decent, Quan, cunningly, to take the 'faster' slimy green route down from the thing that we scrambled on to...the route I had made a point of avoiding on the account that Quan had just witnessed me slip on some of the stuff about 2 mins earlier.
[Okay... sent Quan off now...and back at aunties place]
Where was I? hmmm...slimy green slide. yeah...so, he'd done this lovely fall...well slip, and he'd obviously very quickly managed to make the whole slipping thing stop. But was now in an awkward position where he couldn't really go back up because it was too slippery and couldn't go down without sliding. So he slid...down the lovely slide. I found it hilarious.

Somewhere in between we managed to pack in a museum and a suspension bridge thing...oh yeah. And finally Breakfast!

But that wasn't the end of the day... we went shopping for stuff. and then had dinner with my aunts and uncles again (yes, stressful, I know! such a hard life...) sent Quan off to Singapore (not before saying goodbye to everyone).


Tomorrow, hopefully, will spend some time with 婆婆 (well technically 外婆...but hey...) . Quan spent some quality time with her today, and she went on about him needing to find a wife. Apparently, 28 is a good age to be married. :P hahahahahahaaaa poor Quan! She also said that he should get married in KuanTan (she'd even consider travelling to KL if pushed) because she ain't going over to England for no wedding...

Chinese Doctor, Kuan Tan

In the midst of our hardcore shopping mission today we managed to pop over to the Chinese doctors. Last time I was here, it was over 5 years ago... my aunt took me here on my mothers orders and she translated my epidemiological issues to the old man sitting behind a big wooden desk in a cold, dark walled room, covered with photos of University degrees and framed certificates. He asks vague questions about what is wrong with me externally and takes my pulse...while he's chatting away to my mum, my eyes gaze around the room. I notice a small TV monitor on his desk. I can see my brother and aunt on the screen, showing them waiting in the shop... looking at various 'wonder cures' which adorn the shop.

After taking my pulse, he takes a up a pen sitting at the front of his desk, held up-right in it's pen rest, dips it into one ink well, then the other. He pauses momentarily, with the pen poised above the white and red-lined prescription paper. With a flourish of his hand stroke, he writes my prescription. Each stroke is beautifully written, with the pen held just like we were taught in calligraphy class at Chinese school. Each stroke was perfectly and expertly placed. When he'd finished, it looked like a work of art.

He'd prescribed me enough for 4 days, while they concoct the rest of my prescription. Instead of the usual bag of herbs (it looks like organised compost material) that I take away and boil for hours, they now give me a concentrated liquid dosage and some weird plastic capsules... which is much less hassle that the method I'm used to.

We come out of the consultancy room, to find my aunt and brother looking at some weird 'cure-all' miracle thing, some kind of fungus which infects caterpillars which usually burrow into the ground to metamorphise...But the fungus kills them and uses the energy from breaking down said caterpillar to help it to grow. So, in then end you get some fungus which has filled the space of a caterpillar that it killed and some shoot growing where the head would have been... Lovely! Anyway, it cures everything and makes you live longer. Poor little caterpillar.

Malaysian Mosquitos

I seem to be better at exterminating Malaysian mosquitos than Japanese ones...4 died today...May they tremble in my presence...