Well, it’s been nearly a year since my last post. Yes I’ve been busy, but I have had time to post, but just haven’t. Hopefully I can get back into a normal posting routine.

Anywho, this post is about the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka. I went there several months ago with a friend who came to visit me. The adventure began when we found out we had to buy tickets before hand. People online had suggested getting them anywhere from 1-2 months in advance. We were trying to get them less than a week in advance. I found out that to get them you had to go to a Lawson convenience store, and purchase them through the computer there, “Loppi”, which is used to purchase tickets for a variety of events.

A few months ago i went to Odaiba. It was an interesting place witch quite a lot of history behind it. From what i remember, it is one of seven man-made islands in Tokyo. I know that it originally had several cannons on it, but now there are only two.

There are several places of interest that i went to in Odaiba. The first is a replica Statue of Liberty. I don’t quite know the history behind it, but it’s basically a mini version of the one in New York.

Two weekends ago i met up with some family in Kamakura. It is a very quaint old town. I heard some of the history from them. Basically Kamakura was once the capitol of japan, it marked an end to one era and the start of another. When i first got there there were not many people around. It was far from being dead, but i thought it would be a very touristy place.

So i finally went to Kagaya in Shimbashi, and i am speechless. While using Stumble Upon about 2 months ago i stumbled upon this page: http://gaijintonic.com/2007/02/08/kagaya-maddest-bar-in-tokyo/ . It looked very interesting and i told myself that i needed to go sometime. Well time past and i found myself looking for something to do one weekend. I had already talked to Cheung, and called him again to see if he wanted to go out for dinner and drinks.

So two weekends ago I went to Kaihinmakuhari, the main purpose of this trip (other than getting out on the weekend) was to visit a Carrefours. Carrefours is a french supermarket. I went with Cheung who is french (now can you see why?). We first visited the supermarket, but then decided to not buy much and go out exploring.

We went to a nearby park on the bay. This is on the opposite side of the bay of Yokohama. We walked down past the stadium where the Chiba Lotte Marines play. Then we ventured to the beach. The beach, like the rest of the park, was rather run down, almost forgotten. When we went back to the park we found that it was an old rundown amusement park of some sorts.

So it’s been over 5 months that i’ve been in Japan. I know your thinking, well thats not that long. And while that may be true, i’ve been without my favorite beer for that long.

So i decided to go on a hunt for some george killians irish red here in japan. my search brought me to tanakaya in mejiro which is known as being one of the stores with the most foreign beer stock. While they didn’t have killians, i tried 5 amber ales to find something that was close.
Below is an account of my finds.

Saturday morning i went to the Oktoberfest (German Festival) in Hibiya-Koen. I must say i had a blast. It was good eats and good food, not to mention MANY japanese having a good time.

Hibiya-Koen is very near where i work, though i have never been there. I transfer at Kasumigaseki every time i come or go to work, yet i had never exited there till Saturday. It was a very nice, beautiful, and spacious park. I dont know how often they hold festivals, but if they had another one there you could count me in!

So Friday night I went to a yakiniku tabehodai (all you can eat yakiniku) and nomihodai (all you can drink) in Shibuya. It was about 5 minutes or so from the station, and i dont think i was told the name of the place, but if i was i cant remember for the life of me.

We got there around 8pm (8:05 to be exact), and we were seated very shortly. The place was packed with japanese enjoying themselves. From the moment we sat down we were given 2 hours (that’s how i knew it was 8:05 that we came in).

So i tried the open beta of Aion yesterday. I used http://www.mobiusxp.com/?p=101 to join the chinese beta. I also had to hunt down enu.pak from http://bass-ackwards.net/ftp/AION/ENU.pak. After this though, the game was fully installed in english and i had a chance to play. Below you can see a variety of screenshots i took during my first few hours.

The game itself is beautiful and runs very smoothly. I enjoyed myself quite a bit and am about to load it up again.

it’s been a while. i’ve been busy at work so here are some odd/funny pictures i’ve found in the last few months.