I am hungry!

But I am not sure what I am in the mood for tonight for dinner... The raw fish below sure does look delicious! It looks so delicious that my mouth is watering! In case you didn`t know, I love raw fish, and sushi. My favorite food is a toss-up between sushi and steak...If I had to make a choice for my last supper, it`d be a tough choice! Concerning sushi, my favorite is yellow tail, but I will tell ya, fatty salmon and white tune(toro) ain`t so bad either! Basically though, I like it all...mackerel, eel, sea urchin, salmon roe, sea bream, scallops, shrimp...bascially, you name it, and i like (will eat)...Ok, it`s decided! Tonight is sushi!! Or on second thought...
(I`ll let ya know what I finally decided on next week...) Hope you all have a good weekend!

Strawberries!!

What is your favorite fruit? Personally, I don`t have a favorite. I like so many that I just can`t choose a favorite one. Also, fruit depends on the season. Just after a fruit is picked, fresh, is the best I think. Recently I think I want to go strawberry picking, or some-other-fruit picking. It seems fun! Have you ever been fruit picking?

Sydney, Australia-What a place!?

When I was much younger, in University, I studied abroad in Sydney, Australia. Actually, I did an internship, and worked in a yacht club. It was a dream job!

I lived in Sydney for about 4 months, then back-packed around some of Australia, Tazamania, Adelaide, Ayers Rock, Cairnes and down the Gold coast...It was my first trip to a foreign country, and boy was it an amazing experience. Australia was really different than America in many waves. Also, I will never forget scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef! There are no words to describe how beautiful it is!!

Two students will soon go to Sydney to study for about 6 months to a year. Sydney is a really cool city, with beaches, old parts of town, modern parts of town, the weather is generally really nice and sunny, the people are friendly (but speak with a little bit of a strange accent) and laid-back(they finish work after lunch on Fridays and never do any overtime...), and if you like beer, well, then you`ll be in heaven because Australians drink A LOT of beer!! A LOT!!!

The students are going at about the same time, but on different programs. I think they are both really lucky...actually I am quite jealous.............
Hope you all have a good weekend!

Roses!

One of my friends actually took my advice and went to Ustubo park to check out the roses. From the looks of the the beautiful pictures below, I don`t think he regretted his decision!

Here`s another must see! (?) Soon, maybe tomorrow or sometime this week, A BIG Women`s Beach Volleyball tournament will begin in Nakanoshima! NO, Nakanoshima is not an Island (shima=island in japanese)!! It is a business district just around the corner from here. I think the organizers of the tourney and the city officials decided on Nakanoshima because of it`s location...they thought it would be easy for many people to come and watch the games. Maybe they are right, because the beaches in the kansai area are all a little inconvenient, especially if you want to go on a weekday. Some of the games are being held on the weekdays, so I guess that many business men and woman, especially salesmen/women who can manage their own schedule and leave the office whenever they want to, or Presidents for that matter, will play hookie for work (skip work) for a few hours in the afternoon and check out the games ,or the women playing the games. Some of these women have become quite popluar as of late, like idols in some circles.

But it must have been difficult to ship in all that sand!! I wonder how many tons of sand they had to ship in?!

I like volleyball, so if I have a little time I plan to check it out!

p.s. Just a side note: In Japan, children and adults play volleyball in school, and in clubs, and it is actually quite popular. But in American, at least where I am from, we only play it in gym class for about a month every year. My image of AMERICAN Olympic volleyball athletes is the follwing: basketball players who weren`t good enough to go pro, or play ball in college, so they were recruited by the volleyball coach.

Okinawa

Last Friday, May 15th, marked the anniversary of OKinawa's return to Japan, after nearly 30 years of being under U.S. governoment control. Actually, I learned this fact for the first time when I visited Okinawa last year. I never knew that Okinawa had once been under U.S. control...I was very surprised....to be honest shocked!!!
I am very interested in Okinawa so I found the below Q&A about Okinawa very informative.
Read it if you like:http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20090512i1.html

Mascots

This is the mascot of the Hanshin Tigers. (FYI=for your information, they are really hot right now!) It`s name is "Tracky." It`s a cute little thing. My hometown baseball team, the Philadelphia Phillies, has one of the most popular/famous mascots in American sports. It`s name is the "Philly Phanatic". Philly is short for Philadelphia. Phanatic=Fanatic=to be crazy about something, or someone who is crazy about something. The Philly Phanatic is difficult to describe, but if you look it up on the net I am sure there is a picture somewhere!! Basically, it is a big green furry thing with a big nose. If you have time, why don`t you google it. "Philly Phanatic". Give it a shot and let me know what you think!

These pictures remind me...

The photos are from a while ago during the cherry blossom season, from Ms. K. It was her birthday day this week!! Happy Birthday!!!
She told me that she went out to dinner with some friends to celebrate! And, she said that she got a lot of presents! Maybe she will get one more! ;)

The cherry blossoms have already fallen off the trees, but the photos reminded me. I went to Utsubo park today for a quick breather. And, boy, was I delightfully surprised...In the center of the park, there are TONS OF roses of ALL COLORS. It is like a ROSE Paradise!! If you haven`t been to Ustubo park to see the roses, you are really missing out on something!! It is a must see, you gotta go!

That`s it for my advice for this week. Simply, if you haven`t gone to Utsubo Park to see the cherry blossoms yet, JUST GO! You won`t regret it, I promise!

Happy Birthday!

This cute girl just became 4 years old! She was lucky because her parents did a good job and took her to USJ last Saturday to celebrate! It was her second time to USJ, but she is only just 4 years old! I am 33, and I have only been to USJ once...Of course USJ, as always, was packed, and also last saturday it rained all day, but this little girl didn`t care!! You couldn`t have removed her smile from her face if you tried! She had a permanent smile on her face! And this will be her last birtday without a sibling. From now she will have to share all of her birthdays with another sibling or two, because her parents are expecting to have another child later this summer...

I think that it her father, holding the umbrella and the newspaper, in the background, but I can`t tell. She looks cute in the little red rain coat!
We could have a future artist on her hands! (She could become an artist in the future.) She drew this picture. Guess who it is? It is a picture of her father!! I was surprised at her talent! It looks exactly like him!! He has short black hair, and sometimes (when he isn`t working, which has been about half of her life because he has retired already two or three times) he has a shaggy beard too!
The below is my favorite picture. He sent it to my cell phone over the weekend, and it really made me happy! Just simply, really cute!! Thanks!!

Now, let`s talk about some other things. First, I have to apologize because the home page and blog were down for a while. Sorry for the inconveneince. Basically, there was some techinical trouble, but it was nothing for my computer technicians to tackle!! It is all better now!

On another note, there was a terrible earthquake in China recently...Now living in an area which has been affected by an earthquake in the past, I am always attentive to news alerts on tv about earthquakes (BEEP, Beep, beep...) as well as earthquake news all over the world. Let`s pray for those who have been devastated by this tragedy...

Police Barricades

Last weekend was a busy and dreary, rainy, weekend for Osaka. On Saturday and Sunday, the Chinese President, Hu Jintao, visited Osaka and the Kansai area. I don`t know the exact number, but there was a huge police presence everywhere. (See the the police in white raincoats/ponchos below setting up the barricades.) Also, for additional security measures, the subway lines around the area were stopped temporarily. And I am sure traffic was a nightmare.

Welcome Back!

Hi! I just wanted to say "Welcome back" to everybody. I received many email from people sayign they had a good and relaxing vacation. I was happy to hear that. But one person also said "I don`t want to go back to work tomorroww!! I want to escape from reality!" Maybe many people feel this way. To that person and ALL, it`s as short week this week so HANG IN THERE!

My vacation was all about R & R! =REST AND RELAXATION! I went hiking, had a BBQ, and basically just took it easy!

Below, are the rest of the pics from the Ms. M`s China trip.