Hello everybody!

Sorry for not posting at all! As you all know I was away for spring vacation.
Twitter readers already know, but let me just tell you that I already got sick during my vacation and then came back home with almost 40°C of fever.
I had to go to work the next morning and that wasn't such a good idea. In the end I had to go to an emergency hospital where I got antibiotics and was told that I have a severe tonsilitis with yellow and fat swollen tonsils.
For the first time in OVER 3 years (!!!) I couldn't go to work. I lost 3 whole days! I say "lost" because I don't get paid if I don't show up at work although it's a proper full-time job. I don't have any paid sick leave which is why I usually go to work no matter how sick I am, but this time it was just too much ;___; I had to give up in the end.

Also, just as I feared, I missed the cherry blossoms. Like most of you might remember I was complaining about them being so late this year and was thinking about rearranging my trip, but didn't do it in the end. I was just hoping that I'd be lucky nevertheless, but I wasn't.
I was literally running away from the cherry blossoms! As soon as they started blooming in one place I moved on to the next one where they weren't out at all yet. That was what I was afraid of, but couldn't be changed at that point anymore (also considering that I didn't have the engery due to becoming sick).
When I finally came back home the cherry blossoms were in full bloom, but I was sick in bed as you already know.

Once I was fit enough again, they were already gone.
TIS SUCKS!

Flyjin who are slowly coming back to Japan now were all able to enjoy cherry blossoms and I who was here the whole time, wasn't. Fair world, isn't it?

Anyways I'm fit again and so here we go!
I'll post just a short preview of my photos today. By now they're all sorted out. It was around 5000 photos (unsorted) and around 500 had dirt on it (sand on the image sensor), so I had to use Photoshop and edit each photo individually which also took many many days *sigh*
On a positive note, this was by far the cheapest vacation I ever had! I only used the Shinkansen once and I also didn't buy too many souvenirs.
After visiting Kagawa (Shikoku) I only stayed in Chuugoku, so not much travel expenses in general.

( Read more... )



( And then off to Egypt or what?! )



My footprints in the sand.

( Read more... )


Thanks for reading!
Sorry for the long absence! Hope you understand.

Hello everybody!

Although quite late: HAPPY NEW YEAR
I hope you all had a great start :3
As you know I haven't had any time for a 2010 retrospect (yet) nor for a 2011 resolution thingie. Not sure if these things will come up later or not.

Anyways, I'm back from my winter vacation (well, actually I've been back since Friday night last week, but I had to work ever since then and tons of other things to do such as chores, unpacking all my stuff etc.)!!

All in all it was a great and relaxing winter vacation although it doesn't sound like it when you hear to how many places I went in those few days XD
I spent all days outside the whole time. Only 2 days with sunny weather, the rest was rainy, snowy or rainy AND snowy with cold wind, but I didn't care. I enjoyed walking the whole day outside even if it's -8°C! I'm not crazy, that's just relaxing to me
I met some interesting people, saw some unforgettable things and just enjoyed my vacation (^-^) I was busy every single second because I didn't want to miss anything and it was GREAT!!!

I also used my cellphone to tweet some photos while travelling. I also used the internet more often than usually to check train times and the weather. And that resulted in the only bad thing about my winter vacation: for 3 days of cellphone use in December my bill was 18.000yen (ca. 180$)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And for the few days in January it was already over 4000yen when I checked it last time. ABSOLUTELY FUCKING CRAZY!!! I really only used my cellphone to tweet some photos, check train times and the weather. CRAZY!! How can that skyrocket to almost 200$ in 3 days? Sometimes I really hate Softbank.
But what's done is done. Not going to think about it anymore. Will look into other plans or even another provider from now on, though (my usual bill is 1000-2000yen!).

Anyways, as you probably expected I took tons of photos again. And of course you're right!
Here's just a short preview of some of my highlights. I hope you'll be looking forward to the detailed entries that are coming soon.
Here we go:

( Read more... )

But my highlight this time was definitely this:



Snow Monkeys in Nagano Prefecture!!!

( Read more... )



( Tons of souvenirs (o_o'') ... )


And that's all for now.
I'm sorry for my quite long internet absence (over 2 weeks o_O; ...).
I'll try to post more often again, but I'm really busy and it doesn't seem to get any better which is why I won't be able to read your journals for a while. At least not every day. I hope you understand :(
Hope to read you soon again

Hidiho~

I'm back from my (far too short) summer vacation.
Actually I've been back since last Monday, but as you know a family member came (and because I don't wanna call him "family member" anymore, I decided to reveal it): my brother.　
He stayed almost 2 weeks, so I was busy until now. I've been back to work since last Monday, but had my hands full with him, too.　
It was really really nice to have a family member over here for the first time, though! (and that although I've been here in Japan for almost 3 years now!!)

( Read more... )

So how was my summer vacation? I don't wanna give you too many details as they will follow in the specific entries later, but:
　IT WAS PROBABLY THE WORST AND MOST HORRIBLE VACATION EVER!!!!!　
Looking back now and especially looking at all the photos is nice. And all in all it was a really nice vacation after all, especially because I had a great time with my brother, BUT the truth is we had SO MUCH BAD LUCK especially with the weather that it's hard to believe!!!!!

First of all, it seems that it's never ever sunny in Nagoya. Well, that's just my impression. I stayed there for a week and I've never seen the sun at all. It was couldy and/or rainy EVERY FUCKING SINGLE DAY!!!!!!!!
And almost all of my day trips were the same. One of them ended in a strong summer rainstorm that got me COMPLETELY soaked down to my underwear and that although I used a raincoat and umbrella!
My sneakers were soaked and I could wring out my socks!!!! And then I had to sit for over 2 hours in a train with super cold air conditioner. THAT WAS FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUN!!!! -______-;;



( Read more... )



( Tons of souvenirs!!! (*_*) )

I've already sorted out all of my photos. This time I mainly used my DSLR and because the weather was not so good, there were just less photos than in April, but still A LOT!!!
So I hope you're looking forward to the new travel entries.

There're other things I need/want to write about soon...
I'll be busy from now on, so please keep in mind that I won't always be able to answer right away.
There's millions of entries, comments, e-mails and stuff I still have to reply to. I ask everybody to be patient, I already try as hard as I can. Some people just don't understand that others are busy with their full-time jobs and other things, huh? *sigh*

Feels great to be back, but I'd love to go on another trip soon.
Bye-boo ヽ(〃^・^〃)ノ チュッ

Hello.

It's a very EXTREMELY rainy Sunday afternoon and I wanted to use that chance to finally catch up with my Japanese studies, especially after I finally got rid of almost ALL points on my (far too long) to-do-list and all.
BUT .... my laptop hates me!!!
Some of you might remember that I was ranting about how slow it is and all a while ago already. I'm pretty sure it's not a hardware, but a software problem. As several programs such as CCleaner, Spybot etc. can't do anything and there also seems to be no virus, I don't know what to do anymore. The only option left is to perform a formatting although I HATE DOING IT so so much! ;o;
It costs a looooo~t of time to sort and save all the data first and once the formatting is done it takes forever to reinstall all programs and stuff ... FOREVER!!! GRAH!!!!
Well, my laptop is not the youngest anymore anyways, and it would be a good idea to get a new one (I bougt mine in 2005), but I really don't have the moneyZ at the moment.
If all fails, I don't have a choice, of course :/
Seems like I'll be busy the upcoming week with burning data and stuff *le sigh*

Anyways, I wanted to post a few nice things today.
First of all, the promised photos of the souvenirs I bought during my 2-day trip to Osaka and Iga-Ueno

Well, the only "souvenir" ;P I bought in Osaka was this:



( View the rest of my souvenirs ;P )



And now that I've started uploading videos of my journeys, I thought I could continue.
I still had old videos of my previous trips. The quality is by far not as good as of the ninja vids as I still took those with my old digital cam. The audio is not very good either, but now that I've created a youtube account (well, I had it for a long time, but just forgot about it XD ...) I thought I could share more.
Nothing much, really, but I hope you enjoy them nevertheless.
Here we go:

Let's start with videos from my spring vacation in 2009.



I was able to watch this awesome Taiko performance after I took a hot bath in the famous Dogo Onsen in Matsuyama, Shikoku.
If you want to read my report with a lot of photos of this special day, go here.
I really love Taiko and I sooo would love to be able to train/learn it somewhere (^-^)>

( +7 more videos )

P.S.: It's really raining too much. I'm a little bit scared that the same as last year might happen. God, please NOOOOO!!! ;____;

Thanks for reading! (^-^)/

Wow, hello everybody!!!
It sure has been a while, huh?

Actually I came back from my spring vacation Friday night last week, fell into my bed and had to work from early morning on Saturday.
Sunday I was busy with my laundry, unpacking my luggage/souvenirs etc. The next few days I had to do something about my 5000+ (!!!!!!!!!!) photos (over 10GB!!!) .... I had to sort them out TWICE. Now I'm finally down to 3800 (^-^') .....
And that for only 9 days!!! Maybe I should mention that I took 2 cameras for the first time and thus took most scenes twice - just in case. I wasn't sure how the photos would come out of my new camera, so I also always used my old camera as well.
I think this was the best way for me to learn more about my new camera and in which situations I can use it and when it might be more difficult (or even better to use my old one).
I wanna also post some similar photos taken with both cameras to show you the differences when I have some time :)

Anyway, enough of my blabbering. Let's move on to my actual vacation. Although I already forgot most about it. I really should write down details as soon as they happen. My head is like a sieve.

( Welcome to spring paradise!! <3 )



( Read more... )



( You don't really wanna see all the souvenirs I bought, do you??? XD )

Okay, I'm glad I finally managed to post! *drinking Starbucks Espresso Truffle from 7Eleven right now*
I hope I can organize and upload all of my vacation photos soon. There's stilll quite a bunch of other things that need to be posted as well.
So many other things to do as well. Lately I've been thinking about giving up on taking N2 in summer and wait until December (x___x)
Yah, I'm a loser XD

Thanks a lot for reading and stay tuned for more. ミ★(*^▽゜)v Thanks!!★彡
ヾ(=・ω・=)o☆バイバイ

I'm back!!!

Thanks for all your nice wishes and comments to my last entry (*____*)v
I hope you all had a good start into 2010? (^-^)

I came back on Friday night, went to bed, got up, had to go to work and today I unpacked my stuff, sorted my 23426234234 photos and stuff.
I feel dizzy, but at least I managed to get rid of the chaos here XD
Saturday at work was horribly busy again, but I'm not gonna talk about work today.

It's almost midnight and I should go to bed soon, but before that I'm gonna post a brief update :)

My winter vacation was great - all over all, BUT I was quite unlucky this time. Weather, new year holidays, JR accidents and other things came into my way, so it was quite stressful, but I love love love LOVE travelling in Japan, so I love my vacations ^-^
Too bad I only have 3 weeks per year, but that makes them all the more special <3
And friends of mine are coming to visit for spring vacation and wanna check details with me soonish, so I have to prepare and plan for that like ... this week (x___X)>
That will be busy, but I'm happy nevertheless :)
I just won't have time to stick around much at LJ etc. - I already sorted my photos, and I'll start posting about my first day with tons of photos ASAP, I promise!

For now, just a short review and conclusion of my winter vacation:
Beppu Fukuoka Kobe Nara Hikone Nagahama Kyoto Osaka



Went to hell. (Hells of Beppu)
I really liked Beppu and wanna go there again, because I didn't have enough time for everything.

( more shiny photos XD )



Went to many many many shrines and temples again. Even went 3 times to Hatsumode this year XD
The weather was crazy, I had everything from sunshine to heavy snow - but it always was freezing cold.

( Souvenirs! Bought too much! WAAHHH!!! )


Anyway, I hope you're all doing fine!!
Sorry that I'm not around much lately.
More photos are coming soon. Stay tuned.



Good night! (つ∀-)ｵﾔｽﾐ

Hello everybody,

I'm finally back from my winter vacation. Well, actually I came back on January 7th, but didn't have time for anything else plus I was tired after almost 8 hours of sitting in different Shinkansen and all just to get back home ^^; .... so I just unpacked my stuff and fell into my bed. The next day I had to go to work again, but let's not talk about work right now ^^;

Hm, where to start? My first winter vacation in Japan was nice, short, but definitely not as good as my summer vacation. I doubt that any vacation can ever top my summer vaction in Kyuushuu anyway XD .....
What's more is that I was sick the whole time, but thanks to my flu drugs I managed to go on somehow. My voice is still not really back (which sucks if you're a teacher, but whatever ...).

So my vacation was from 28th of December to 7th of January. Well officially from 1st to 7th, so I had to take some extra days off which I now "owe" my boss (exactly the same for all my other coworkers btw.).
I left on Sunday early in the morning to go by Shinkansen to Tokyo which takes about 5 hours. As you guys know I spent New Year's Eve and the days before and after that with Yumi and her family. I had a lot of fun. I also got to meet her boyfriend which she will marry in March (I really hope I can go to her wedding ceremony, but I still have no idea what's going on with my visa *sigh*), I FINALLY got to know her older brother + wife and we went to a Japanese farm where we made mochi together. It was really interesting. Some other random facts about Tokyo: I bought half of Akihabara and then moved on to Shibuya, Harajuku and Ikebukuro XD
I was in front of the Tokyo Dome for the first time of my life while NEWS (!!!) was having a concert in there and you could hear a liiiiittle bit from the outside which was ... like hell XDDDDD ARGH!! Let me in please!!
I met with ame_no_uta there and we had a lot of fun together.
I jumped into the new year with the Johnnys Countdown live (only on tv though).
Of all this stuff I don't have any photos anymore because (and that's probably the crappiest part of my vacation) my new camera (or rather the memory card) decided to delete them ALL!!! ;____; .....
The worst part about it all is that I managed to take GORGEOUS GREAT FABULOUS photos of Fuji-san out of the Shinkansen. You could see him completely and he was sooo beautiful I can't describe it.
Even all the Japanese people in the Shinkansen grabbed their cameras and took photos because it's really rare to see him THAT clearly.
All gone ;_______________________; *headdesk*

Second half of my vacation I spent in Aizu-Wakamatsu (Fukushima) and Sendai (Miyagi) together with bf_nightingale.
It was cold, it was fucking cold and at least in Aizu there was a LOT of snow .... almost as much as in my hometown in Germany. One might think I'm used to the cold and everything, but in my homecountry I stay at home or use my car. This time we were wandering around the whole day. I think that's the main reason why I'm still sick, but I don't regret it at all.
We weren't able to see THAT much, but .... yeah I guess that's because it was winter and things were closing even earlier than in summer. (x___X)
At least I only lost the photos of the first day in Aizu (pretty cool photos of the castle ;__; ...), I was able to save all the photos I took after that, so I guess my second memory card is safe ^^; .....

I don't have much time at my hands right now, so I'll only show you some photos.
I still haven't posted all the photos of my summer vacation anyway (^^') ... I need to finish those at first ^^;

( Read more... )



( Yes, there are pics without snow! XD )



( And I bought too much stuff again x__X )



This time I also bought quite a few (expensive) souvenirs ^^; ............................



And ... that's it for now!
I'm back, but still busy like hell.
I'll try to answer comments later. I also need to update my sales entry asap.

I don't feel like going to work for various reasons *sigh*
I hope it'll get better (x_X)


Way to late, but:

Happy New Year!





Bye~bu (^-^)/~

Hohoho~

because some people were getting on my nerves asking when the next "fandom" related picspam will come, I thought it´s time to share photos of the stuff I´ve bought in Japan (^^;) ......
......
........
and yes I still had money when I came back from Japan XD ... and no this didn´t all fit in my luggage, I had to send 2 packages home and a 3rd one because my luggage was too heavy ^^; ...........

So here we go!~

Warning: REALLY IMAGE HEAVY!


( Are you sure you want to see it? XD )



( HOMG! I´m not sure I wanna see this! T_T )



( And it´s getting worse and worse! XD )



( Okay, we´re almost through! ;P )



( And the last cut, I promise! ^^ )



Okay ... there´s still more tiny things, but I think that´s enough and you get the main idea, right? ^^;;; ........ *runs away now*


^-^/ ~~~~~~~~~~~--------------***------->