yvelle's Journal

Day 2 : 10 Dec 2003
today i awoke to a wonderful aroma of eggs and sausages. my 'okaasan', yuppyi, prepared a sumptuous breakfast for me. i had sausages, salad, aloe vera yoghurt which was supposed to be really good for the skin, corn cream, strawberries, and tamagoyaki, which are all damn good. i can't remember the last time anyone ever pampered me with such a spread for breakfast. i've never seen prettier strawberries. they were blood-red and really sweet. god thinking back about that spread just makes my mouth water. i was never really a yoghurt person but after sampling the aloe vera one, i totally fell in love with it. it was also the first time i tried tamagoyaki, which was a thick layer of eggs which was pleasantly sweet and skilfully rolled up. they sell for about SGD8 per piece in supermarkets. one piece consists of 3 eggs. pity i din get to learn it.

today we went to the mazda museum. yuppyi drove me to the meeting place. i kinda felt like a burden cos to send me out she had to bring along her 2 children, cos she couldn't possibly leave them alone at home.

at mazda, we were given a deck of cards as a keepsake. i'm not too much of a car fanatic so it din really interest me much, plus i was dead tired so i guess i didn't really enjoy myself that much at this museum. i was very awed by the RX-8 though, it was such a beaut. i also liked the pioneer cars which had only 3 wheels. the vintage cars were really quaint and interesting, and i learnt that mazda used to manufacture cars but had to sell them under mitsubishi cos they could't sell it under their own name yet then or something like that.

on our way to the mazda museum i was amazed by the area the mazda empire spans. there was a beautiful long bridge used for transportation of the cars and the area was actually big enough to require an internal bus service. we were also told that cars that were ready for sale were stored in car parks parked by professional valets who will park the cars exactly 30 cm apart front-to-back and 15 cm apart side-to-side. whoa.

it didn't exactly help that i had taken ill. the cold weather was getting to me and i felt quite terrible. yet i was determined not to waste any time there so i tried to make the best outta everything.

after the mazda visit, we headed down to HIC, Hiroshima International Centre, if i didn't recall wrongly. if i am wrong someone please correct me. there we split into 2 classes, ikebana and sado. i thought that the sado class was not thorough enough, cos i din feel that i actually learnt the art of sado nor exactly felt the sanctity of it, but the tea perked me up and i felt healthier somewhat. the okashi was really good too, although everyone said it was too sweet, i tihnk my blocked nose helped me make it taste just heavenly. =) after the okashi we had to turn the cup clockwise twice in modesty, then drink the tea. i had my try at whisking the tea, but apparently i lacked wrist strength and no bubbles appeared no matter how hard i whisked it! i gave up and so did the sensei and she helped me get it done. we also learnt how to fold the hanky used to clean the sado utensils, it was so feminine and seemingly complicated.

after the sado lesson we went in to look for our counterparts who did the ikebana. quite impressive!! except that they couldn't bring their work back as it was since the vase did not belong to them. they wrapped up the flowers in newspapers. we had a nice short chat with the ikebana sensei and learnt that she used to work in singapore once. it feels really nice when i speak to a native japanese in their native tongue and they actually understand what i am saying. =)

after the cultural activity class a few of us tried to walk around but there wasn't actually anywhere we could shop. we went to a combini where some of us (me excluded!) needed to buy porn magazines back for their male friends. we were kinda appalled by the type of stuff we saw but giggled anyway. they decided to buy the magazines later in tokyo. jay, grace, lorna and i had a party to attend so we tried to make our way back to jay's place. we kinda got lost along the way but this group of really helpful japanese schoolgirls led the way. how sweet! i have a very good impression of the japanese, because they have proved to be very warm and helpful throughout my stay.

jay's host's house was a big and nice place. my host's place was slightly smaller, a mansion. somewhat like a condo or a flat in singapore, but it was cosy. jay's place was more like a house, so i guess the host was pretty well-to-do. we took some time to settle down and played a bit with the 2 pretty little girls, eriko and yumiko (jay please correct me if i got their names wrong). there were alot of children and the house was bustling with activity. we had a nice chat with all the hosts, introducing ourselves and conversing with the occasional help of the dictionary.
we helped

-innari
-hermes

Current Mood: sleepy

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