The Mitch Chronicles Part 3 – Christmas Eve and Christmas Day!

Christmas this year was certainly very different to usual!! For starters I had a presentation to do in class on Christmas Eve!! So at 4pm I moseyed over to m lecture building to deliver a speech on some Japanese Mythology; specifically ‘tsukumogami’ if anyone is interested – they’re household items that have been around 100 years and gained a soul… cool eh?!

Anyway, I came home expecting just Mitch, but clever Bekah had found her own way inside the building as we had planned to spend the night doing silly Christmas things and for her to stay over so we at least had some kind of family Christmas morning going on. So much for my hall’s ‘no one but residents allowed’ policy if Bekah can waltz in so easily! Christmas Eve consisted of going out for a meal in a curry place in Musashi-Sakai, watching the film Wolverine (and cringing horribly – it’s set in Japan so not only did we recognise loads of the places but we had to sit through the awful clichés!), drinking and falling asleep in a diagonal heap. How we fit 3 of us on my single bed I do not know. But when we woke up we did presents and had a sweet little morning. Bekah even made us stockings 🙂

Bekah and I doing Christmas things!

These guys are advertising their special Christmas cake; loads of places sell them but this tiny tiny convenience store went all out!

Yum! Our Christmas Eve meal

Christmas day itself was so so different to how it usually is. Instead of waking up at home with family, stuffing ourselves silly after panicking about the timing of the meat and the oven breaking, opening lots of shiny things together, watching the film Mum bought me and wearing my new purple shirt, we went outside! We went to KFC in Musashi-Sakai with Amy and Bekah and confused every person there with mini crackers Bekah’s mum had managed to get through customs! It was very odd; the whole place was open as normal and people were working and acting as normal… the only people outside on Christmas day in England are moody teens who have had a fight with their parents or parents that have had a fight with each other! A Japanese Christmas was so weird; they get really really into it with all the decorations and things for sale, but they really miss the heart of it which makes the whole thing seem really cold and shallow. But anyway, we went to KFC and had a roaring time stuffing chicken and cake in our faces and then went for a wander to Kichijouji, a place near where I live that’s good for shopping. We had a mooch around some big shops and then found an amazing pet shop called ‘Dog-Wiz’ which induced fits of hysteria for some time and the locals who looking were at us laughing at a pet store thinking we were missing a few screws. We went inside and fell in love… tiny puppies!!! It was really sad and adorable all at once; they were in these tiny tiny clear cages and were clearly bored out of their minds and covered in their own wee which was awful but they were still so cute. Dogs just love no matter how bad things get… I feel like there’s a lesson there…? After we cooed at the tiny puppies for ages we sat in Starbucks and had some nice downtime to just chat. And then we went purikura hunting!! Oh yes, it was that time again! I knew there was one in Kichijouji as I’d done one there before with Sayuri, but the place in which I remembered it being wasn’t where I thought it was. How rude of it, to just up and change like that! Despite it’s unthoughtfulness we carried on searching for a while and eventually found it by accident and I still couldn’t tell you where it is!

The Christmas bucket comes with a plate!

At the table 🙂

We stuck we cracker stickers EVERYWHERE

Amy and I shopped for each other in the same place!

The gorgeous mug Amy bought me

Cake

Less cake

The bucket itself

DOG-WIZ!!

So cute… so confined 😦

Want

He was very playful

At Starbucks!

The decorations were really the only thing that reminded you it was actually Christmas day!

A sleeping pokemon that Bekah got me as a silly

I love it when Starbucks gives you free samples!

Random but cool; this is just stuck in the middle of a busy shopping street

Decorating out purikura

Yay! Christmas themed!

Sadly that was were we called it a day, but Mitch and I went home and made more of those amazing crazy sweeties!! I’ll also post you some photos of my presents 🙂

First we made this! We had no idea what it would be but it turned out to be a fizzy mousse thingy with crystal candy stuff

mix the blue with the purple…

mix some more

dip!

eeeeaaaatttt

mmmmmm

Next was this one! By far my favourite; you make sushi 😀

all the bits

first make the rice

then the egg and salmon toppings

you have to stretch out this stuff to make the seaweed

it gives you a size guide on the packet

making the tiny balls!

done! Complete with sweet soy sauce.

Some of the things I got; thank you all 🙂

Mum got me 2 diaries; this one is for night time musings when you can’t sleep so that night I wrote this in an attempt to wind down. It’s very cheesy.

Mum also got me this! It’s a twist on the 5 year diaries, you answer a new question ever day for 5 years instead of writing a line about your day and I think it’s awesome.

Part 4 coming soon!

The Mitch Chronicles Part 1 – Arrival!!

The most exciting day of the term so far!! At 9.30am – ish on December 19th 2013, Mitch finally came to Japan! I got some pictures from him the night before when he was in Heathrow, so I went to bed feeling like it was already Christmas that night!

Mitch and my Mum at the airport!

I got up at 6am – ish to leave for the 6.52am train from Tama. Not only was it crazy busy with the salaryman rush-hour but somehow I managed to sit next to all the ridiculously smelly ones. I found out that the Japanese even have a word for the smell because it affects so many middle-aged men! More here: kareishuu .

So after making my way across Tokyo to Narita Airport (with more than one mistake!) I finally got to the arrivals bit. This is where a lot happened that I wasn’t expecting! Firstly, after standing at the A gate for 25 minutes, I went to check if the plane was actually shoving people out there, and it turned out there was, in fact, a gate B as well. So feeling rather foolish I went to stand at B hoping that Mitch hadn’t already arrived and was sitting waiting for me. I couldn’t see him so I was pretty relieved, but that rapidly turned to worry as it crept closer to 10.30 and I hadn’t seen him at all when his flight came in just before 9.30. I was worried that he’d been stopped in customs for the ridiculous amount of food he was bringing me or something! But he finally made it out; turns out his bags just took a while and so did getting off the plane etc… Anyway! He wheeled his trolley over and we stood in everyone’s way and hugged for the first time in months and I felt right again. It was odd really; I didn’t feel like he’d arrived, or relieved or anything, I just felt as though my world was now proper again. So we went and sat down on a bench for a minute while I scoffed a croissant for lunch and then made our way back to the trains. This is where the funny happened, we got stopped by a team with a camera and my first though was “oh no, what do they want…” but it turned out to be some random interview show with foreigners and their first moments in Japan so we agreed to an interview. They asked us what we were doing in Japanese so I got my first chance to practice my interpretation skills, but it turned out they had an interpreter too so I didn’t get to do much 😛 They asked what we were doing and the usuals but when they asked about the suitcases and why there were 2 giant ones for one Mitch, I was made to cover my ears for ages while he explained the Christmas presents, food and (I suspected) the ring! So I stood in front of a camera for a good 3 minutes humming to myself; not looking forward to watching that if they air it!

Mitch’s flight, second from the top!

A pretty display at the gate

First selfie of the trip 🙂

We had a great day planned that we’d agreed on a few weeks before; get home, watch New Girl all day and buy Dominos Pizza! It rocked. A day lying in bed, doing nothing but eating and watching TV 😀

My Pizza

Mitch’s Pizza

Webcam photo to pop on Facebook to show everyone Mitch had arrived safe and sound

Mitch brought all the potato pancakes Tescos had; it was awesome!

I’m not sure why, but I decided to fit into this plastic bag.

Mitch had brought me plenty of things from England, some where Christmas presents and a lot were from my Mum 🙂 It felt so great to have some luxuries from home, Mitch, good food and good deodorant and my day was made!

Our Christmas cards!

I even got an Advent calendar 🙂 I was quite sad I didn’t have one as my mum always buys me one, but then when this came I was very happy 🙂

A selection of the food!

Soooooooo many body washes!

After many episodes of New Girl, loads of pizza and more eating, Mitch finally gave in to jet lag about 7pm. He did a good job to last nearly all day and I tried to push him past 8pm but when I turned round and his eyes were totally unfocused I just let him sleep!

It was so lovely to finally have Mitch back, that day was so great! Look out for part two soon!

Roppongi Illumination

It’s just a wee bit late, but on the 5th of December I went to Roppongi with Bekah and Sam to see the illumination! Roppongi is a super rich part of Tokyo so as long as you don’t get tempted by too much buyable stuff you’re ok! I did sort of feel like money was osmosising out of me somehow though; there were so many posh shops and people!

We all decided to meet in Roppongi itself which sort of failed; I got lost in an underground maze, Sam got on a train the wrong way for a few stops so poor Bekah was just waiting for us on her tod! Here’s what I saw just as I finally made it to Roppongi:

A waterfall wall; I was later to discover that the whole building seems to be redirecting a river for arty purposes!

A fancy looking rock thing

Bekah and I went for a wonder while we waited for Sam and ended up going to the ‘Roof Garden’ which was mostly just a bridge over the pretty lit up trees below; but it was still rather fantastic!

Some pretty shinies on the way to the bridge

The ‘roof garden’!

View from the bridge

Some more shinies and indoor bamboo just for kicks

A dog salon. This pet shop took their customers very seriously!! That salon looks better that most human ones…

Once we met up with Sam, had a bit more of a wonder on the bridge and decided that we were hungry, we went in search of food 🙂 We had a look around most of the mall and ended up going to the place we saw first! Always the way eh? But we did see some fantastic things on our food adventure, let me shower you with expensive things that I took pictures of:

So much shiny!

These are white strawberries. They cost about 7000yen/£41. Yep; well done Japan.

Although you can’t really tell in the picture, these apples are about as big as my face.

These melons cost 10/12,000yen. Did I want to spend £65/£75 on a melon to find out if it tasted any different to the £2 Tesco’s ones? Yes. Did I? Sadly I’m a student… 😛

A cute little Christmas stall

More shiny stuff!!

The place we chose to eat was an ‘American style’ bar but once we got inside it was actually very very posh. I was really surprised at how expensive the food was until I remembered that it was only expensive by Japanese standards where you can get a whole meal out for about £3! By British standards it was actually on the cheap side at about £12 for nachos, mash and grilled veggies and all of it was delicious; definitely taking Mitch there this Christmas!

mmmm

And finally it was Illumination time! We went out to see the main illumination and then wandered around the park a little.

The main illumination! Check the bottom of this post for a link to the video I took 🙂

The park next to the main event

More shiny park trees

A very very tall building that disappeared into the clouds!

Pretty bokeh tree 🙂 It’s really hard to get an iPhone to UNfocus!

A supposedly very old tree

Another pretty tree!

We headed back inside again and came across this little shop/art gallery! It had a cat theme and I took some photos of my favorite bits 🙂 I also found a Christmas present and some adorable sweetie plates I couldn’t justify buying for myself but really really wanted!!

Aren’t they amazing? So many types of lucky cats!

There were little minimalist plaques with short ditties on them and these are some of my favorites. This one says “while yawning, (the cat) meows” I ca just hear the funny little sound!

“dot, dot, dot, the cat’s beard”

This was Sam’s favorite; “Left and right differ, odd eyes”

These are the adorable plates!!

And finally we took a mosey to the roof to see more decorations and have a Starbucks! it was a lovely evening filled with sparkle and fun and good food :] Can’t ask for much more!

Above our heads as we walked around the shopping centre

More of the redirected river above heads!

Scary.

Also scary.

Sorry for the blur, but here is the outside shot of the river!

The disappearing building!!

Cheers y’all!

Oh and you can find the video of the fantastic light show here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJDuDOvJCuQ&feature=youtu.be

Long distance relationships and chocolate

But mostly about chocolate!! Basically, a while ago I started craving chocolate like nobodies business and they don’t really do good chocolate over here. I have been surviving by supplementing my diet with Nutella on toast for a couple of weeks but I eventually had to call for back-up! Mitch came to my aid in a spectacular show of understanding and sent me a care package. Now, he sent it last Thursday so I had steeled myself for another week of munching Nutella on toast and wishing it were different but to my surprise (and secret wishing) this afternoon there was the telltale slip of paper sticky-taped to my postbox telling me I had a package!! So please try and imagine my joy when I looked upon this tiny piece of paper’s wonderful message:

It was a glorious moment. Now despite being on the way to class, I couldn’t resist picking up my treasure chest at that very second! I got a few curious looks when I turned up to mythology with a big ol’ brown box of mystery! I was pretty darn happy when class ended 10 minutes early; 10 minutes closer to scoffing chocolate!! So I got back to my room and stuffed a Lindor and some Milka in my face as soon as I could 😛 What a glorious moment it was! Then I took some pretty photos for you all to see just how wonderful a box of goodies this is 😀

First look

What a glorious haul! The conditioner and body wash are because I don’t like the ones I find here 😛

Just so I knew who it was from 😀

Yep, that about sums it up!

So basically, the moral of the story is I’m a very happy bunny, and despite being very VERY far away from Mitch, he is still lovely enough to send me presents 🙂

And now a quick ramble about the long distance part, just because I want to tell someone, and hey, the whole internet sounds like enough people! So feel free to just stop reading now if you can’t be bothered with it 😛 Not that I intend to gush mushy sentiments!

So I think before I came out of the difficult things that I knew were approaching this, and adjusting to the food shopping, were the things I was worried about the most. While I knew time would fly past I also knew that it would be 3 months before I saw Mitch again and the longest we had spent apart in our 3 and a half years so far was about 2 and a half weeks. So I wasn’t looking forward to the prospect of not being able to share all the amazing things I was doing with the person I had shared everything with for over 3 years! The first few days were odd, I could handle those. I felt as though I had just gone away for a few days and would see him again soon. About 3 weeks in was hardest I think. This was the point were I felt my holiday in Japan was over and it was time to go home! So every time I realised that wasn’t happening I felt a little tug of sadness. And it happened quite a lot. But after a while, maybe 5 weeks in I was sat on a train and I realised that I had a feeling that was a blessing in some ways and repulsive in others. I was used to Mitch not being around. Now that sounds callous and cold to me and I don’t like the idea of just being used to him not being with me, but I guess it was the inevitable feeling; a way to stop feeling down or lonely. A blessing in that I don’t feel too sad when I remember how far away he is anymore, but still odd. And now, 8 weeks in I’m looking forward to Christmas, where he’ll be here for 3 weeks! It’s good to be over the half way point and looking forward to something, rather than lamenting something I no longer have. It was really great to get this package today, mostly because it makes the world feel a little smaller when you can just post stuff across it 😛 But as for the mushy stuff for those who might be curious; I don’t feel like anything has changed; I still love him a stupid amount and I’m still very happy that he is all mine. I never thought going to Japan would change anything between us other than me being happier to go to the shops alone (I generally dislike going places alone; it’s boring! But now I have to), despite what those who made (probably unintentionally) doubtful comments had to say and I’m happy to say that I don’t think it has. We chat everyday on Line or Skype so thanks to modern tech, we are still able to pretty much chat whenever we want and even the time difference isn’t too much of a pain! So If anyone is planning on a year abroad and is in a relationship, obviously it will vary from person to person, but this is my experience so far so don’t fret too much 😛

 

And if you read this far, congratulations and thanks for making it through! Now I’m off to put more chocolate in my gob… bye!