Happy holidays!
Posted by: kirin on 
Dec 25th, 2008 | 
Filed under: Uncategorized
Originally, Christmas is an event that was brought from Western culture, and so it’s just like a shopping event in this country. You can see that Christmas is not even a holiday here. We have to work on that day! 
I always see how people change from Christmas to new year with cold smile. After playing Christmas songs over and over again anywhere, any shops in the city since 1st of November to 25th of December until I feel that was way toooooo much, sales clerks’ wearing Santa costume without any hesitation, and people rush to buy “Christmas cake”…
I know that they totally behave as if nothing happened on the very next day of Christmas and change decorations to new-year one. I’m kinda person who may be interested in left-over Christmas cakes, meaning where they are going. Christmas cakes being available after Christmas should value nothing. I’d buy some for discount!
Anyway, this change does change the air; from Western ways of decoration with Christmas songs in English to Japanese ways of decoration with Japanese new-year songs.
I thought I can finally have a good volume of time to maintain my blog, but what happened to me was, somehow it takes too much time these days for each action in the web. When I click to leave a comment in other blogs, I have to wait for a minute or more to have the screen opened. When I try to open another site in another tab, it takes a few minutes to have them visible. That’s so stressful and I just cannot live with that any longer! So I think I have to clean up inside the laptop in this holiday season… 
Holiday must be something fun, but as I get old, holiday is a time to concentrate on the task that I cannot do usually. I need a break. I know. I’ll take a trip in west Japan around the end January which I think I can report in the related page of this blog. 
Happy holidays!
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Comments (6) 
Tags: International fashion leader in Japan
Posted by: kirin on Dec 17th, 2008 | Filed under: Fashion, What's New?
I’ve updated Tokyo Kawaii TV page with a new video, titled “Tokyo Kawaii International”.
Please watch the show and let me hear your voice!
Personally I enjoyed the show very much.
We used to be kind of people who wear Kimono, and so, general clothes like we wear nowadays are from Western culture. Nevertheless, while we enjoy our way of dressing them, that attracts young people from U.S and Europe without knowing… And it’s interesing to know that international students from other countries come to study fashion design in Japan. What’s fascinating about Tokyo fashion? Is it exceeding London, Paris, Milan or NY in some ways? I don’t think so. Sometimes the show goes too extreme, which I am speaking about any TV shows, and this might be so.
Indeed, it’s true when I’m walking around Harajuku, I can see people dressing very uniquely.
I might be one of them if I were much younger, but I just don’t feel any negative about that. I always enjoy myself surrounded by such people whenever I go to Harajuku.
Have you been to Harajuku or do you want to be there if possible? What do you think?
Are Japanese gothic fashion or kawaii things sold in your country?
Catch the trend while waiting for the train
Posted by: kirin on Dec 14th, 2008 | Filed under: Something Interesting, What's New?
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We are used to being busy and so, the stores like this give us a good opportunity to be amused or informed even for extra 5-10 minutes until the train comes.
I have updated a new post (at Kawaii Shop page) on this unique store named “ranKing ranQueen” located inside some of the train stations in Japan. If you have come across the store while, say, you are travelling or staying in Japan, it’ll be fun to browse what’s selling best and their rankings! As is often the case, I couldn’t take any photos inside the store. It’s not permitted usually. But if you are a tourist, and you don’t speak Japanese, I believe you’ll be exceptional. |
Sliding door needs maintenance
Posted by: kirin on Dec 7th, 2008 | Filed under: Daily Life
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Japanese tatami room has paper doors, named Shoji & Fusuma. Shoji is a sliding paper door in front of windows, just like instead of curtain, while Fusuma is another kind of paper sliding door designed for closet & berween rooms.
This time my husband and I repapered Shoji doors for the first time in 6 years since they got broken & tanned. (We could have done that earlier but we just postponed dealing with this task, you know…) This time, we chose strong Shoji paper that is something like prastic sheets’ sandwiching a paper from both front side & back side. This kind of paper costs several times more expensive than ordinary paper, but is very strong against impact or shock and so, it can lasts for over 10 years. I’d be willing to pay any extra money if I don’t have to do this again in next 10 years! So, first off, we had to water Shoji doors to remove old papers. That was kinda fun! The next step was to cut the paper to the door shape. And then, we put double-stick tape along on the grids, lengthways first. It may sounds easy, but cutting the paper to fit into the door shape was not that easy as it sounds. I think that was the hardest point in the process. Finally, when adhereing the paper to the tape, we put the tape crossways. Saturday morning was totally over with this task…:( When we live in Japanese styled room, we cannot live without this kind of maintenance. I know we have to think of renewing Tatami mats because they also are damaged, especially because we live with a puppy dog. Even if she doesn’t dig the Tatami floor, she could damage it just by running around there. It was a big mistake that we located her in Tatami room. But we had no other choices when Tatami room is next to living room and was the best location for her…:(
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