cebu part I

autumn is in the air but my blog is still stranded back in summer. 

here are a few shots from our trip down to cebu island in the philippines. 
we spent the majority of our time doing absolutely nothing but swimming, taking afternoon naps and wining and dining at maribago blue water resort on mactan island; which I have to say was the perfect choice of location to chill out with an energetic 2-year old. 

the big two

last week just over a week ago kou-chan turned two (i know, two already!) so to celebrate his birthday we decided to invite his friends from the same “duckling” group at kindy and have a bit of a party/picnic at the park.

had a beautiful sunny day for it and all in all it turned out to be a great idea as the kids could run around on the grass and play on their bikes while us adults chilled out in the sun sipping our drinks and supervising.
the best thing about it was at the end of the day we didn’t have to worry about cleaning up had it been a house-party.

kiwi summer - scene 1

a couple of months ago we took the long haul flight home for a good old kiwi summer.
some random shots.

goodbye~

now i bet that title got you worried.
no, i'm not giving up this blog, but this post is probably gonna be my last one for 2011; hence the title.

i so didn't intend to disappear from sekimachihato's world for so long, but a few months back I went through a bit of a rough patch at work where I was chucked into the deep-end (that's putting it nicely) and was under too much pressure, enough to make me disappear from, here for a while.
every morning i would leave home early as kou-chan lay fast asleep in his futon only to get home late in the evening to see him tucked up fast asleep again in the same futon. this is so not what i had in mind when i moved to tokyo, i mean come on; no father in their right mind would want a life like this.

but since then things have picked up. i'm handling a project which i'm fairly passionate about, and making sure that i have a comfortable work-life balance.

it's never easy packing up your life, moving to a foreign country, and starting work at a new company (believe me, this is my blimmin 4th time!) but the initial settling-in/stressful period is over, or so i hope.

so with only just over a week to go until christmas we seem to have gatherings with friends just about every weekend.
today we had lunch gathering at our home with our guests bringing this delish cheesecake from "ginza no budo".



i've never tried a cheesecake like this one before, it's not baked or rare, but rather more like a mouse kinda cheesecake which comes tucked up in a zaru; a traditional japanese bamboo basket.
pretty cool. thank you t-san!



i had better get this post up and away as we're running out of time in getting kou-chan his christmas presents. last minute mad rush, but hey, it's all fun!

if i'm not back on here before this year's out, have a great christmas and new year. wanna hear lots of wine corks popping open over the next few weeks!
see you again in 2012!!

100 yen

has it really been that long since my last post?!

just a quickie as I'm on the subway going to work and therefore have to keep an eye on the "lucky ones"; as in the ones who got a seat and are currently in lala-land. here's hoping the the lady in front of me wearing too many clothes in this heat will get off soon so I can take her seat. if not it will have to be the guy who's asleep with his phone in his hand which seriously any minute now looks as if it will slide out of his grip and crash to the floor.

bugger. first major interchange station and nobody who was sitting down in front of me got off.

anyway, you're probably wondering what that 100 yen coin photo is.
well, yesterday when I went to collect my dry cleaning the lady said to me that they found this 100 yen coin in my pant's pocket.
now although there are a lot of honest people back home in nz I think this coin would have some how managed to roll from my pant pocket into the pocket of the person steaming my pants.

i was quite shocked that the coin was being returned to me and that it was found in my pant's pocket (i usually never put coins in my pocket, hate the jingling!)
after saying thank you for kindly returning the coin, wrapped up in a hand made paper envelope complete with "cute" sticker, I said
"wow, I didn't realize this coin would be returned",
to which she replied,
"oh yes, we will return coins even if it's only 1 yen. you'd be surprised what we find in peoples pockets".

I left the conversation there but it left me wondering about the interesting stuff they must find in peoples pockets.
I bet those dry cleaning ladies have some stories to tell, what with the goodies in our pockets and the stains on our pants...

happy 60th in kusatsu （草津）

earlier this week was chi-chi’s (my mum) 60th birthday.
happy birthday mum!!

guess how chi-chi wanted to spend this special day?
well, she and a group of close friends decided to climb mount mauao; a famous mountain beside the ocean at my home-town.
once at the top they cracked open a bottle or two of champagne which popa (my dad) carted up in his backpack and basically enjoy the amazing view and company.

I really hope you had a blast mum and didn’t get too tipsy on that champagne. the only way down is to walk or call for a rescue helli which you wouldn’t want as I’m sure it would make the front page headlines of the local newspaper!
hang on, isn't it illegal to drink on mount mauao?!?!
god, breaking the law at age 60 huh!

it sucks living so far away, especially at special occasions like this. it would be great if we could just pile on into the car, zip down the road to chi-chi and popa’s place and have a few glasses of champagne with them.
we knew that it would be impossible to be back in new zealand for chi-chi’s 60th so instead we decided to celebrate when mum's milestone when they were here in japan a couple of months back.

we took them for a weekend escape up to the small mountainous town of kusatsu in gunma prefecture (群馬県草津町) and k-chan's parents also made the trip from nagano prefecture for the celebrations.
kusatsu is world famous for its natural onsen; hot springs.
when i mentioned this to my parents I’m sure they started freaking out about having to get stark naked in front of a group of strangers and experience a real japanese onsen.

with that in mind we set out for the 4 hour drive from tokyo.

apparently there are over 100 hot springs in kusatsu with 34,000 litres of water per minute (now that’s a lot!) flowing out of the ground.
was glad to hear that this hot water is not wasted but used to heat the town’s schools in winter along with the streets, swimming pools, and many household etc.
the main attraction of the town is a huge hot spring located in the town’s center called yubatake (湯畑).
the wooden boxes you can see below are there to collect minerals which are then processed and sold as bath salts.





as we were stayed at a traditional japanese inn it didn’t take long before we were in our yukata and lounging around our spacious accommodation.
dinner was served in a private dining room and my parents were shocked at the amount of beautiful food which was served to us.
even got mum to wear the tradition red hat and cape; (akai-chanchanko) which is worn when one turns 60 and apparently starts to return to childhood.

after a few beers it was time to get naked.
seriously, onsen time.

surprisingly I wasn’t the least bit worried or embarrassed about soaking in a hot spring naked with my dad.
my dad didn’t seem too worried either but my mum on the other hand was a bit apprehensive having to go in with k-chan (she could go alone but was unfamiliar with all the ins and outs of onsen bathing).
apart from the water being a tad too hot for my parents they said that they loved it and were really glad to have experienced it.

wonder if they would do it again…?







so mum, happy 60th!
wish we could be in new zealand to celebrate with you!

ray coffee house

karuizawa (軽井沢); which is a resort town in nagano prefecture, is well known as being a cool-escape from tokyo's pavement melting summer heat.
with the temperature getting close to 35C we zipped up to nagano last weekend only to be greeted with temperatures of 32C...
i tell you what, that 3-degree drop in temperature doesn't make one feel any cooler!

while driving through the beautiful tree lined narrow roads which make karuizawa so charming, I found a simple yet relaxing cafe called "ray coffee house".
not only was the interior clean and simple, the menu was simple, as in only 2 choices of food; hayashi-rice or apple pie.
being lunch time we both went for the hayashi-rice option.
it was delish.





the man running the cafe (I guess his name is ray?) lives upstairs.
if I had enough money to get by I could so see myself living like this, maybe not running a cafe (nice thought though) but living out in the wilderness but still only a hop skip and a jump away from the trendy shops in karuizwa and only an hour or so away from tokyo by bullet train.






mmm, wonder if my company would fork out for me to commute by bullet train to the office?!




cafe info:
ray coffee house
2141-431 ohaza nagakura
karuizawa
* closed thursdays

〒389-0111
軽井沢町大字長倉2141-431

I can drive trucks

feeling really tired tonight, don't know why but I guess hump day has something to do with it.

yeah, two days to go until the weekend! ooh, and tomorrow will be the last day of my daily blog challenge.

I was given this (ugly) book all about trucks book as a sample way back when kou-chan was just a bean and seriously thought about chucking it.
I mean it's about trucks, kinda like saying boys have to like blue things, and it's got no story what so ever; pretty boring if you ask me.
by what do ya know, it's kou-chan's favorite book at the moment. he flicks through the pages going "brrrrrrooom brrroooom"; talk about bursting daddy's bubble.
but hey, if he's happy I'm delighted!

bust boiler

turns out our boiler went bust so today we got a new, a new (don't even know what this is called in english!?), a electronic bath wall controller?
anyway they are pretty common over here.

this new one is basically the same as our old one but there is a lady living in this one who talks to us.
kou-chan thinks this is hilarious and bursts out laughing when she says things like "the bath is now 41 degrees". he then gets a serious look on his face as he tries to figure out how a lady got into such a small contraption.

so glad he's not tall enough yet to fiddle with the buttons!