Happy Christmas!

We're feeling a lack of Xmas mood here...

To bring our Xmas spirits up, we went to Osaka for the Xmas shopping and light ups!

In front of one of the building, we saw the first nice Xmas deco in this city! It had a running train in side as well.

After shopping in the huge crowd of people we were tired and hungry.

must be the time for dinner!

We went to Tonkatsu(fried pork cutlet restaurant) and this is what I had.The set of fried pork cutlet and vegi mix with rice,cabbege,and miso soup.

Viz is grinding up sesami in a little bowl for sauce.

His meal was set with pork and prawn!

After we finished our meal, we went for Xmas lights walk.
We came to this street called "Mido-suji".
Roadside trees were covered with so many lights!


It looked beautifu...!
We walked for about 20minutes in the lights. They started this illumination a few years ago to bring more people to Osaka.

And along the street, there were few light up objects too.

A ginkgo leaf,

Wave

There were few more pretty one too.

After a long walk, we got to the another spot of Xmas lights.

This place had food stalls too..... of course we had to eat something!

(we had sausages and some crapes with backwheet flour)

and then we walked around to see more lights.

These are some of the photos.

Peter rabbits in a wood

a dressed up snowman

penguin family


A wall picture changes colour.

And beautiful one!

A horse-drawn carriage!

Merry Christmas to you all! XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

A Cabaret Universe!

A cabaret in Japan is where men go to have a drink being entertained by hostes-girls, and this one is biggest in its size in Osaka.

There was a pole dance show I wanted to watch, so I had a night out in a big city on my own!

An hour and fifteen minutes later with my hand written map in hand, I was there.

And it was so gorgeously naff!!

With so many bright lights, door men in black suits, hostes girls in pretty dresses waiting in a line , anouncements of arrival of new custamers and table numbers with microphone and the pattern on the sofas...

It was like the place we used to see on TV....!

Looking towards entrance from my seat. Loads of chandeliers in entrance hall.

A Huge stage/dance floor. A little stage with steps in a middle is a moving stage and it comes out when it gets used! After the show, they had a Karaoke, and when a man goes on a stage, two girls go with him and have to crap there hands next to him!

A plate of food which was set with a bottle of beer. It was drink as much as you like, and seemed to open one bottle of beer for each person. The waiter brings it out and opened it with out asking. It`s a big bottle, I only had a half small glass, such a waste. but these sweets doesn`t go with beer.. must be for girls.

After the first show, my pole teacher(this was her show) intruduced me to the girs(not the working ones! other custmer came to watch her show!) so I can have company.

And we were hungly......

We asked for some food and waiter said he will bring something out.......

He brought lots of tiny dishes of foods... all wraped in clingfilm! It wasn`t enough for three of us so we asked more food, and he brought out - same stuff but twice as much, all still in clingfilm! We sat there with more than 20 small dishes in front of us unwrapping each one.....

The show was WoW! Some sexy, but more funny... it was really good.

lovely Shu-sensei.

My phone battery went dead...!!! buu!

I`ve never seen real one before! The one I knew came in a tube already grounded.

This weird looking thing is a WASABI! A green hot paste come with Sushi.

I found this in a super market where I nomaly don`t go, so had to buy one. It was about 350 yen , 2 ~ 3 pound.

When it`s grounded, it is less hot than the one in a tube, but has stronger wasabi smell.

OK, Dinner time...!

A bowl of rice

Green beans with sesami paste

sliced beef simmered with potato and carrots

nori-sea wead

Avocado salad with WASABI and mayonase

Grilled cariflower with brown sauce

Wasabi & mayo ... nice!

by the way, when you eat avocado with soy sauce and wasabi, avocado taste like tuna fish! try it!

The fun at the school

The event of winter fair was taken place at the school. It was called Mochi(sticky rice cake)-tsuki(pounding) festival. Mochi is a very syticky rice cake and it is made by pounding steamed rice (very sticky!) into the dough and we eat them a lot around new year.

There were 4 big steamer in the school ground. Rice is being steamed.

The steamed rice was put in a bowl made of stone and pounded with big wooden hammer. The lady quickly knead it between the pounding. It`s very hot!

When it`s all smooth, it is rolled in to the ball.

One was plain and another one had sweet beans paste in it.

After we`ve eaten, we went to have a look around for the games. There were plates spinning and other few games like hoopes or ball games were placed in a gym hall.

oops, Viz's plates went flying.

After played few games, we went to craft corner. There, people were making "new year wreath". This wreath is a protection from evil spirits and been placed on the front door of houses, front of cars and sacred places.

3bundles of straw were being twisted in to the place. Then We made it into a circle and tied it with the ear of rice.

Then we decorated them. Hunny was working with her friends.

Finished! a joint work!

A sticky rice cake in a hot sweet aduki bean soup.
The things in a small dish is seasoned kelp. We like this saltiness after the sweetness of bean soup!

Shiawase~!!! such a joy!

interesting objects....

sculputure?




When kids are off school, I need to entertain them so they don`t run around wild in a house...!

As I search for some nice place, I found a site of field athletic which kids can have plenty of exersise! and was located where we can go by 20min of bus ride!

We got off the bus and walked 5minutes and we saw the sign.... I was in a bit of doubt...

We went up the hill and got to the reception..... I thought " oh my god, what kind of place is this? this was a bad idea.....!" Because Everything in there looked so shabby!!! There were few huts for reception, tools and equipments(I presume), and few tables and chairs. They all looked so old and tattered and toilet had no flush.....

We payed our money and they explained about the courses and also gave us warning of some obstacles.

There were two courses and we started from shorter one.

There were hard one to use lots of arm muscle power,

high one with not many places to hold on,








fun one to do,







and dangerous one to flip you over!!!

This was the one we were given caution of. It doesn`t feel going so fast but when it comes to stop,it will stop so suddenly so our body gets fliped up really hard. I went on and I felt my body was upside down and my legs came off the log and slamed back on to it. Unfortunately, Hunny`s legs came off completely as she was thrown to the air and as she come back down, she banged her head on the log......ouch....!

The photo of her going upside down is on my sis's camera and we spent a long time analysing how it happened!!

This one looked very easy. Just wack the log out of way as you go through with the big stick like a samurai....!

But as you can see, there is the edge on the ground on the right side of Hunny. It was a meter of steep hill (just the hill with bush,some plants and stones not bark chips), and this was placed on the edge of it(and we didn`t realise that it was so close to the edge because of all the fallen leaves etc.) . Viz went first and as he did it, he went zigzag to aboid the log coming back to him after hit it, then suddenly disappeared! He went rolling down the hill, but didnt get hurt.

We examined there and found the edgeing log on the ground has lots of scuffmarks, so we thought many people must went down there...!

Each courses had a different stories, and each obstacle had a sign which tell you the story and what to do.

This one says "a wild boar was pushed down the hill after it got caught" and we had to roll down the net. But the net was really rough and the knots really dig in, so we couldn`t do it!

Oops,

it`s me~! being very cautious with each step!

and the last was the bamboo bridge. very wobbly!

It was hard work. Even didn`t go through obstacles and walked pass, the walking it self wasn`t easy as ground was quite rough and lots of steps were almost 2feet high and slops were very slippery with fallen leaves and also trippy roots were hidden underneath. If this was in UK, helmets will be compulsory??

But the day was quite warm and place was beautiful.

If I knew this place before, then I took my hubby there during his stay.... hehehe! ; )

Now it`s -3 degree and snowing in UK, but here in Japan we are having a quite mild Autum/Winter so far.

The spring is the cherry blossom season, and now in Autum ,we have beautiful "Kouyou (coloured leaves)" season.

There are many maple-tree(and others) viewing spots. We made some lunch box and we went to Arashiyama in Kyoto. Very beautiful place with the river and very popular from foreigners too.

We visited one of the temples called Tenryu-ji.

We took many beautiful photos!

With kids request, we went on a boat ride.

Viz, my Dad and I went on together and Hunny went with my Mum and Sis.
We had an hour to be on a boat but my Mum didn`t like it at all, so they didn`t go far at all. Infact they got off the boat after 2omin... Hunny wasn`t happy but she did force my Mum to be on it... so, oh well...

My dad had fun rowing with Viz, so we went far up till river get bit rocky.

On the other side of river bank, there was a food stall , and also there were boats selling hot food like grilled squids, sticky rice cake called "dango" and drinks, too.

After sitting in a boat for a long time (or waiting at the bank for a long time for Hunny team) we were so cold, we couldn`t have our cold picnics!

So we went to have something warm instead to near by shop.

We had Udon noodles and Japanese curry with rice. I didn`t remember to take photos till we finish eating!



After our lunch, we went back to the temple to see more.

my Dad,Sis and Mum

When we got to Arashiyama, we booked for the train ride. This was the old train track running along the river and re-opened for this view ride.The train is a diesel train and is very nostalgic.

As it`s Kouyou season, they had a special light up show.

Red and Yellow leaves were lit up anf looked magical...

Inside of train... the light is dark and looks like eraly 1900`, befor the W.W

One of the station, these Tanuki (racoons) well come people. They look very coquettish in a day light, but in the dark lit by light.... they look spooky......

It feels like went in a Giburi world "spirited away".

The way to go back to normal world was 10mins of nallow path next to the rice field.

We couldn`t believe how dark it gets and there aren`t any shops etc. as that is one of very big tourist spots!!

After we came back to the normal world and rode on normal train back to Takatsuki, we went to have dinner. We had pasta and pizza, again no photos! Here in Japan, we don`t always eat sushi and tempura, we have so many variety!!　The lunch we took.... that became a snack before bed and break fast for next day!

a charming Hunny ; )