Imagine a little bookshop behind the liveliness of an African vegetable and fruit market. Stacks of books and papers, pencils, stamps and a Zanzibari man with obvious Arabic features behind the counter. He is shouting into the telephone he’s holding into his right hand. It’s like he’s giving orders, repeating himself over and over again, not waiting for a response on the other side of the line. After the last flow of words he ends with “Faisal Kumar, Zanzibar News”. What he was talking about was the ship that had sunken into the sea between Zanzibar and Dar es Salaam. Six people had been reported as being officially dead, many others sick and exhausted after having spent hours and hours holding onto floating soap packages while waiting to be rescued.

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On the day this sad event took place, Catherine, Dominique andI had just left Stonetown. In the dalla dalla, between crying toddlers, mango-sellersand screaming chicken we traveled to our second beach destination on the southof Zanzibar:Kizimkaze. A small town with only one long street with straw huts placed onboth sides. A very different experience from beach-sand-sun Kendwa. During ourstay in this little village mostly known for its dolphin tours, we became closewith the local people. Being the only tourists during the low-season, villagerswould come by throughout the day, for a little talk, to play a game of bao(local game with little stones) or to bring fresh fruits from their gardens. Webecame friends with the fishermen and made drawings with the children on adaily base. Of course we had to accompany one of the beachboys on his motorboatto search for dolphins and jump into the water with out flippers and goggles assoon as we had come across a group of them. I’ve never seen a dolphin from soclose, let alone swam with them. I could almost touch them when they wereplaying with each other, disappearing into the deep darkness of the oceanshortly afterwards. We left Kizimkaze after 3 days, saying goodbye thetalkative but charming Chiriundi (non-stop speaking in rapid Kiswahili, as ifwe understood a word of what he was saying…), the warm and caring Suleman (ourhost and citrus-fruit provider) and the intelligent and ambitious Omari (whohad an American girlfriend and is setting up his own bead and breakfast).

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In the next village Jambiani we first stayed in a tiny hutwith noisy gecko’s keeping us awake in the night and later moved to a big housewith own kitchen, bathroom and lounge. Both places were arranged by Mr. Cool,an innocent rastaman we met on the beach in Kizimkaze. I sincerely believe heis a good person always willing to help others and make the world a happy placeto live in, but it’s also sad to see him more or less wasting his life,spending his days smoking marihuana and drinking Konyagi. Every day of the weekis the same, and it will be in the future… Jambiani is bigger than Kizimkazi,but not as interesting and inspiring. In combination with our limited budgetand no access to an ATM we went back to Stonetown after 3 days to spend ourlast days in a hotel near the harbor.

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Stonetown remains my favorite place in Zanzibar. It’s a safe andexciting place, and once you get used to the way people sell their goods orservices to mzungu’s (foreigners) it’s easy to enjoy everything this city hasto offer. We have obtained some good African friends during the last days ofour stay, a couple of guys from Arusha who ran their own shop in one of thelittle Zanzibari streets have taken us to local parties with REAL music, wherepeople REALLY dance. The African way. We spend one of out best evenings at a reggae partyin an old building in the open air, some people playing pool, others enjoying adrink on one of the chairs on the terrace, and again others dancing in front ofthe dj, moving on the beat of bongoflava. <!– /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";}@page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;}div.Section1 {page:Section1;}–>It felt good to be among those Zanzibari youngsters whoobviously enjoyed themselves without caring about the problems they might faceduring the day. And it let us forget the life-story of a Nigerian refugee whohad come to sit next to Catherine and told her his entire life-story; about howhis family had been murdered, how he had fled the country and moved to Zanzibarwhere he is still discriminated against and harassed by the police, living alife without friends or family. Only his faith in God is keeping himalive, nothing more or less.

It’s not more than six days ago since three Dutch girls stepped onto a plane that subsequently carried them from Amsterdam to Cairo, Nairobi and final destination Zanzibar. As soon as the wheels of the plane touched the sandy ground of this exotic island north of Dar es Salaam, all three of them felt relieved. Their journey had been an adventure, but after saying goodbye to their loved ones at Schiphol Airport, being extensively scrutinized by Egyptian security guards in Cairo, arriving in midnight Nairobi meanwhile being attacked by both hordes of mosquito’s and local guides was slightly tiring. The taxi-ride from the airport to their Kendwa, their first destination after weeks of hard studying, left them in silence. The crowded streets were full of women carrying large packages of food or handicrafts on their heads and men were riding wooden wagons with donkeys running in front of it. All of public life was taking place in front of their eyes, people selling their ware on the streets, building houses, drinking tea or simply chatting with each other. Once the white Nissan in which Catherine, Dominique and Naomi were sitting left the city behind, a colorful green landscape appeared, only occasionally giving room to simple huts with children playing in front of it. After one hour of driving they finally arrived in Kendwa Rocks, the resort in the very North tip of the islands, where they would spend the next three days of their vacation.

Kendwa, with its bright light blue sea, white sand and several other travelers was a good place to start our Africa-adventure as an intermediate stage covering the gap between my comfortable life in Utrecht

and the fieldtrip organized by our university in Kenya and my internship in Tanzania. On the one hand we were far away from the “real” Africa, our resort being protected by high walls covered with pieces of glass, lying on the beach in our bikini’s, sipping our mango-juices, reading books, only standing up every now and then to go for a swim or a snorkel (we went to island Mnemba and saw colorful coral and fish while snorkeling around) or occasionally to go for a bite next door. But on the other hand, our encounters with the many papasi or “organizers”, as they call themselves, as well as the Maasai security guards, were a first introduction to the life of a Mzungu in the bigger cities of Africa. The “organizers” come to sit down with you wherever you go, starting off with smooth talk and semi-interest for you as a person, but finally coming down to selling their information about the area for money. I found it hard to guess whether they were truly trying to be nice or just wanted my money. Of course, not all people in Africa are trying to sell things, but the way westerners here are approached to buy things, whether it is a massage, a boat trip, henna-paintings or coconuts, its very different from Holland.

Another interesting phenomenon are the Maasai security guards sitting next to our resort during the day and hanging around the bar by night. In the mid 19^th century, the Maasai were East-Africa’s most dominant tribe but due to climate change and agricultural encroachment they have lost much of their cattle and moves to the larger cities for work. They put their reputation as warriors to practical use as security guards or night-watchmen in Nairobi, Dar es Salaam, Mombasa or Zanzibar. It was interesting to talk to Josh in his traditional red and blue clothing, leather sandals, with strings of white beads around his neck, wrist and ankles and heavy earrings in his largely stretched earlobes. With a coke in his hand and lady Gaga as background music we would talk about Maasai culture, Monduli (where I will do my internship) and the Maa language.

The same Josh enthusiastically greeted us two days later in Stonetown, wearing a red Billabong shirt and washed jeans, a shiny black Samsung mobile phone sticking out of his pocket.  He had come to the capital of Zanzibar to enjoy his day off. One day earlier, we had already left Kenda Rocks and caught the local “dalla dalla” to the city. With twenty mothers, babies, grandfathers and chickens in the small bus and our backpack on the roof we experienced local Zanzibari life! Every now and then the little bus stopped to let some people off and some others on while street vendors would offer us pieces of corn or cane sugar through the large openings on the sides of the bus.

Our arrival in Stonetown was overwhelming but exciting. We were dropped off in the middle of the Darajani market, in between stinky doriam fruits and large pieces of tuna and octopus. Not only the market, but the whole of the city is very much alive. The taste, the noise, the smell, all of it is very real. Arab, Indian, European and African influences are all over the place. Restaurants serve burgers and fries, curries and rice, local fish and chapatti pancakes. Most people are Muslim, hence women are mostly wearing a veil and long dress and men little hats and white dress and several mosques are spread throughout the city. At the same time, however, there are a couple of churches, and I would not say people are orthodox in any way. The people’s physical features are also a big Arab/African mix.

A couple of days ago we were invited at a local wedding, where the slightly overweight bride was dressed in bright green and mostly female guest were dancing and drinking tea. It was invaluable to be part of the event and watching the couple thanking all the guest for their presence. Another day we went to a local taarab concert in the courtyard of an old school. Amidst the locals, we were witnessing the majority of women walking to the front while shaking their behinds and waving with 1000 Tanzanian shillings in their hands. They would dance in front of the singer and ultimately leave the billet in the hand of the singer. In both cases, the women were incredibly elegant and well-dressed, very different form what I expected to see. Apparently, religion and clothes that cover your body are not necessarily manly, but can be mysterious and beautiful as well.

Tomorrow we will head down South, the two blond Dutchies and the cappuccino or milkshake, as they call me here as a fascinating object of cultural mixture. I will miss this city and its typical things, the night market with its vendors selling fresh sugar cane, lemon and ginger juice and banana/chocolate pizza’s, the games of bao we used to play near the sea with shop owner Solomon and his artistic nephew Mr. Cool, getting lost in the little streets, eating chicken “pilau” and drinking banana milkshakes in out favorite café Archipelago… but we’ll continue our travels and I’ll be back with more stories!

Kwaheri!

It has been a while since I last wrote a story on this blog, so first of all: my sincere apologies to everyone who thought I had died. So, I’m still alive, that’s the good thing. The bad thing is that it’s almost impossible to summarize what happened over the past few weeks, but I’ll try…

First of all, the messages from Sydney make me rather jealous, cause really, we can’t wear summer dresses and lie on the beaches yet! Nevertheless, we have our occasional days of sun, and it’s getting definitely better, it’s warmer than when we first arrived.

Life down here is still cool and I realize there’s so many things I can do next to uni. I don’t know whether it’s the general level of education in Australia that’s just not too high, or that UC is just crazy, but I do know that I spend not more than 5% of my usual UC study-time on studying over here! We had lots of housewarming parties in not only St Kilda, but also in the CBD, South Yarra and Prahran. Last weekend, we had a really nice brunch for one of our Swedish friends birthday, and they had such a gorgeous house! Julie (the birthday girl) has a huge room with a HUGE walk in closet (the one Carrie has in SATC the movie, a-ma-zing!). They live in a perfect apartment with the 3 of them, and they offered me to move into the garage if I couldn’t find a new room.

Cause that’s one of the less positive issues I’m facing: last week I was almost thrown out of my room in St Kilda. It seemed to be a misunderstanding in the end, but I was definitely in shock. I’m looking for a new place as me and Maite are sharing a room now, but for the longer term definitely need some privacy. Anyways, we’ll figure it out. I can stay until I’ve found a room now, so no worries anymore!

Uni is going cool too. Although the reading isn’t very challenging, it’s really what you make of it yourself. I guess I’d have to put a little more energy into my courses, but for now I’m quite excited about my assignments. Next week I have to hand in a feature article for one of my journalism courses, and I’m planning to interview a couple of prostitutes here in St Kilda. It’s quite interesting, cause every time I come back from clubbing on Chapel street, I bump into sex workers on Inkerman street, waiting for client to pick them up with their cars. Street prostitution is illegal in Victoria, so I really want to figure out how these girls deal with legal, political and social issues… Oh, and if I interview one of the clients my tutor was gonna give me a High Distinction for sure ☺

Workingwise, I’m enjoying my job at fringe, a really chill café on Acland street, right across my house. I love the people that come there for coffee, I’m a big fan of my co-workers (there’s an incredibly funny British gay guy behind the bar, so much fun to go out clubbing with him as well! He honestly becomes violent when he’s drunk!), only the pay isn’t that well… but I’ll get over that. Stopped working at the fancy restaurant club/bar that I worked at first, cause the atmosphere just wasn’t my thing…

Still playing hockey, finally have a settle team, which is cool. Instead of twice a week, I reduced training to once a week and a game in the weekend. I realized on how any parties and events I was missing out because of training & didn’t really want to spend so much time traveling to Melbourne. Although we’re not the most successful team (we lost the last 3 games, to be precise…), we’re having fun!

It’s good to have found a couple of really good friends as well! In the end, being abroad is a wonderful experience, but meeting people you can relate to well is what makes it really special! I spend a lot of time with a girl from Paris, Alya. She’s half Indian half French and a real cool chick, including tattoos and piercings. We often cook, sport and go out together. Her housemates are in a band, and we often attend their gigs as well. Last week, Alya brought me to a chique French restaurant in Prahran, and we drank French wine, fish, cheese and desert on her fathers credit card! It was so much fun! And the weird thing was that the waiter turned out to be living on the corner o the street where Alya’s family is living, ad that he actually worker for her mother!

Another good friend of mine is Brenda, an Australian girl. She introduced me to her family and many of her Auzzie friends, which is something I really enjoy. Every Monday we go for coffee in a café close to the uni with a couple of her friends. They’re all quite weird (one of them is really gay-de-la-gay, but when Maite was like: “Oh, you should come to Amsterdam! There’s so many good bars there, you know. And you can meet my brother, he’s also gay!” He looked at her, very confused: “What do you mean, “also?””) A few days ago she invited me to her friend’s birthday, which was also a good experience. Fridays seems to be “Asian night” in the city, so all clubs we went to were full of Asian people. It’s weird, cause in a sense I’m half Asian (I prefer to say Japanese though), but I didn’t really identify with all the people out there.

Right, I’m guessing that’s quite an update. I promiss the next story won’t take so long! Until then…hasta la vista, baby!

It has been a while since I last wrote a story on this blog, so first of all: my sincere apologies to everyone who thought I had died. So, I’m still alive, that’s the good thing. The bad thing is that it’s almost impossible to summarize what happened over the past few weeks, but I’ll try…

First of all, the messages from Sydney make me rather jealous, cause really, we can’t wear summer dresses and lie on the beaches yet! Nevertheless, we have our occasional days of sun, and it’s getting definitely better, it’s warmer than when we first arrived.

Life down here is still cool and I realize there’s so many things I can do next to uni. I don’t know whether it’s the general level of education in Australia that’s just not too high, or that UC is just crazy, but I do know that I spend not more than 5% of my usual UC study-time on studying over here! We had lots of housewarming parties in not only St Kilda, but also in the CBD, South Yarra and Prahran. Last weekend, we had a really nice brunch for one of our Swedish friends birthday, and they had such a gorgeous house! Julie (the birthday girl) has a huge room with a HUGE walk in closet (the one Carrie has in SATC the movie, a-ma-zing!). They live in a perfect apartment with the 3 of them, and they offered me to move into the garage if I couldn’t find a new room.

Cause that’s one of the less positive issues I’m facing: last week I was almost thrown out of my room in St Kilda. It seemed to be a misunderstanding in the end, but I was definitely in shock. I’m looking for a new place as me and Maite are sharing a room now, but for the longer term definitely need some privacy. Anyways, we’ll figure it out. I can stay until I’ve found a room now, so no worries anymore!

Uni is going cool too. Although the reading isn’t very challenging, it’s really what you make of it yourself. I guess I’d have to put a little more energy into my courses, but for now I’m quite excited about my assignments. Next week I have to hand in a feature article for one of my journalism courses, and I’m planning to interview a couple of prostitutes here in St Kilda. It’s quite interesting, cause every time I come back from clubbing on Chapel street, I bump into sex workers on Inkerman street, waiting for client to pick them up with their cars. Street prostitution is illegal in Victoria, so I really want to figure out how these girls deal with legal, political and social issues… Oh, and if I interview one of the clients my tutor was gonna give me a High Distinction for sure ☺

Workingwise, I’m enjoying my job at fringe, a really chill café on Acland street, right across my house. I love the people that come there for coffee, I’m a big fan of my co-workers (there’s an incredibly funny British gay guy behind the bar, so much fun to go out clubbing with him as well! He honestly becomes violent when he’s drunk!), only the pay isn’t that well… but I’ll get over that. Stopped working at the fancy restaurant club/bar that I worked at first, cause the atmosphere just wasn’t my thing…

Still playing hockey, finally have a settle team, which is cool. Instead of twice a week, I reduced training to once a week and a game in the weekend. I realized on how any parties and events I was missing out because of training & didn’t really want to spend so much time traveling to Melbourne. Although we’re not the most successful team (we lost the last 3 games, to be precise…), we’re having fun!

It’s good to have found a couple of really good friends as well! In the end, being abroad is a wonderful experience, but meeting people you can relate to well is what makes it really special! I spend a lot of time with a girl from Paris, Alya. She’s half Indian half French and a real cool chick, including tattoos and piercings. We often cook, sport and go out together. Her housemates are in a band, and we often attend their gigs as well. Last week, Alya brought me to a chique French restaurant in Prahran, and we drank French wine, fish, cheese and desert on her fathers credit card! It was so much fun! And the weird thing was that the waiter turned out to be living on the corner o the street where Alya’s family is living, ad that he actually worker for her mother!

Another good friend of mine is Brenda, an Australian girl. She introduced me to her family and many of her Auzzie friends, which is something I really enjoy. Every Monday we go for coffee in a café close to the uni with a couple of her friends. They’re all quite weird (one of them is really gay-de-la-gay, but when Maite was like: “Oh, you should come to Amsterdam! There’s so many good bars there, you know. And you can meet my brother, he’s also gay!” He looked at her, very confused: “What do you mean, “also?””) A few days ago she invited me to her friend’s birthday, which was also a good experience. Fridays seems to be “Asian night” in the city, so all clubs we went to were full of Asian people. It’s weird, cause in a sense I’m half Asian (I prefer to say Japanese though), but I didn’t really identify with all the people out there.

Right, I’m guessing that’s quite an update. I promiss the next story won’t take so long! Until then…hasta la vista, baby!

Just back from my first hockey match today and after a long&warm shower decided it was time to jump on the couch and make some time to answer e-mails and write another story on my blog. So far, life has been rather exciting here in Melbourne! First of all, we moved into our beautiful room in St Kilda. It’s a gorgeous house, all Art d’Eco, and it even has a porch and a garden! I went running along the beach the other day and felt so intensely happy (even though opting for my hockey shoes was a decision i regret afterwards; both my feet and shoes were ruined afterwards…). It has always been my dream to live near the beach… and it feels so good to have a warm, clean&cozy place to return to after school, sports or work.

Furthermore, we had 2 introduction weeks for the uni in which we played games (our volleybal team became first!), ran around campus, had a very classy welcomes dinner, went out in the city etc. Most importantly, however, was meeting so many new people and meeting up for dinner&going out. Although I planned to hang out with all kind of nationalities, I realize I end up with North Europeans anyways. Germans, Sweeds, English, oh, and Canadians! One of our first days here we went to a friend’s hostel where they had lady’s night, which meant the more advantaged sex could have free champaign (two crazy Americans dressed up like girls, no comment..). Going out in St Kilda is fun, close to home and you meet lots of people from all over the world. Another day we bumped into an extremely tall guy which I already considered to be the typical Australian surfdude, but he turned out to be Dutch, from Utrecht to be precise. He invited us for his farewell party in an amazing place in Fitzroy where you could get the best pizzas ever for only 4 dollars and provided us with lots of tips about how to survive in Australia.

It’s funny to be in Australia and still have quite some Dutch people around. Of course I’m living with Maite, but then we also hang out with Linda a lot (she’s also from Utrecht University and lives only one street awa from us in St Kilda). Also, one of my other friends from back home, Francien, is going to study here in melbourne. When we went for coffee the other day (I drink so many cappucini these days…) I was a little confused to talk in Dutch, being in the midst of the Australian craziness.

Life is getting a little more stable after a couple of hectic weeks. I had my first Journalism class today (very exciting, my tutor is an Australian reporter and he’s presenting a dodgy breakfast program), finished one week of hockey training & a match, and our house begins to feel like home. We had really nice housemates, but unfortunately they had to leave. They’re two Canadian chefs & obviously they can cook very well. We used to hang out quite a bit and yesterday we had dinner and watched a very bad Japanese movie (seriously, I was ashamed of 1/2 of my identity…). They moved out today and two German girls will be moving in next week. Hopefully they’ll stay a little longer…

One week ago I was still sitting behind a computer at the Uithof in Utrecht, trying to survive the last day of my oh so boring full-time job. Now I’m sitting behind a laptop instead, down under in Australia, in a place called Melbourne. Fantastic it is. It took me more than 24 hours to get here, but I’ve been spending most of my time sleeping (the combination of working and partying was rather intense) and besides, it was worth it! I arrived at Melbourne airport in the middle of the night. A taxi from Monash University came to pick me up and dropped me off at my friend’s place in Coburg. Fortunately enough Frank is a firefighter and very good in getting up and falling asleep in a split-second (I felt bad standing in front of his door at 5 am nonetheless).

The last couple of days me and Maite (Australian pronunciation is the popular "mate"), a girl from UC I only met before coming here but became really close to, have been staying at Franks place. We mostly spend our days in the CBD, getting to know the city, shopping, doing ridiculous things etc. A few days ago Fiona, another friend of mine, came over to Frank’s place. Fiona was an exchange student at UC when I was in my first semester and it’s great to see her again! We went out for dinner, together with Frank and his friend Craig. Although Frank has a giant luxurious house and he offered us to stay as long as we want, me and Maite started looking for a room in the city. After having missed all our appointments for viewing rooms on one of our first days here (I set the alarm clock but it was still on Dutch time so we only woke up at 6 pm after sleeping more than 18 hours) me and Maite still got to see a lot of houses and today we officially signed the renting contract for the prettiest room in the heart of St Kilda! It’s 50 meters to the beach, next to the shopping streets and exciting restaurants and bars, it has the best housemates and the nicest housemaster, and: it’s clean! A-ma-zing. Now we still need to wake up early to get from Coburg to the Clayton campus on the other side of the city, so it would be great if we could move into our own room this Saturday

The uni’s intro week started last Tuesday and since then I’ve been overwhelmed with flows of information and new people. There’s some great people from Sweden, some very nice girls from Holland and a crazy Japanese guy who, in contrast to his Japanese nature, is incredibly talkative and social. We’ll have another 1,5 week of getting-to-know Monash and the folks walking around here through fun activities, so we should be fine. And… next to studying for the Journalism units that I’m taking here (I haven’t done the prerequisites for the units so it was still quite an issue to get into them, but I think I finally spoke to the right person today..) and the job that I’m planning to find I’m planning on picking up on field hockey again, joining one of the uni’s sports teams over here! Who would ever dare to think I’d become sporty again!? Australia is turning me into a better person already

These last days in Japan were partly sad partly very exciting because I was overbooked everyday. My friends organized goodbye parties for me (my favourite food, favourite music, favourite games, so cool!). I`ve been shopping a lot to collect all the things my family&friends want me to take back from Japan. Yesterday I went to an exhibition with Mari&Miwako (she`s back from Switzerland!)about the human body in Kobe. VERY interesting, everybody HAS to see it. It`s all real stuff, real bodies with real organs, but conserved very carefully. I still can`t believe how everything in the human body just perfectly fits, it`s a miracle! And I decided to never start smoking, after seeing what happens to your lungs. Today I`ve been packing all day. Miwako was so cute to come over and help me pack, we had a really good time together; packing CAN be fun (but also sad, because we will not see eacht other for a long time).

I realise that during this 3 months that I could be here in Osaka, I learned so much about Japanese culture, society, people. I can read and write some basic japanese, my conversation level has probably raised and my knowledge of the vocabulary has hopefully improved as well. Although there is so much more to learn, I am very content with what I was able to learn during those 3 month. Education and knowledge is very important, however, what was even more special for me was friendship. The fact that in the time that I could stay with my grandparents I also get to know my grandfather and grandmother better. I am truly grateful that I could stay with them, in their house, receiving their care, warmth and love. Also all the wonderful people I met; Miwako, Jeff, Criss and all the girls from CHEER, Chi, Harumi, Mariko&Tomoko, Aria, Karin, Kazuko, Chinami, Paul and everybody else! You all made my stay here in Japan so special and exciting!

I can`t believe tomorrow morning at 11:50 I will be sitting in the plane, flying back to the little, mountainless country where it rains constantly and where all people speak too loud;) Anyway, I`m also looking forward to start University College in Utrecht; new people, new experiences etc.

For now this web-log will be finished, but whenever I suddenly decide to go travelling I will certainly make use of this log again.

I want to thank you all for your interest and support. LOVE YOU!

Sayonara, Naomi

HAPPY NEWYEAR EVERYBODY!!! I hope everybody had a good time celbrating New Year`s Eve, and will have even a better New Year full of experiences, truth, wisdom, love&friendship. I spent New Year`s Eve (oshogatsu) with my friends in Toyotsu; we had dinner together, counted down&went into the New Year together, played lots of funny games&watched movies. After one hour of sleep we got up to see the sun rise (we drove to Kansaidaimae, climbed one of the highest buildings of Kansai University). After standing in the cold for quite a long time we went to a bath house (onsen) to warm ourselves in diffeent baths, sauna`s etc. Fresh,Clear&Clean we started the first day of 2007. The rest of the day I spent in Kyoto with Junko (a friend of my grandmother), her husband and their two daughters (living in Tokyo&New York). Although I was very tired it was a beautiful day. The rest of the week I`ve been hanging out with friends (my really good friend Karin surprised me with coming along with her sister Aria&Aria`s husband Kalex) , visiting temples, going to concerts, studying etc. Friday I actually was supposed to work at Mission Bay, but I had promised my friends earlier to have dinner together before I would leave Japan, so fortunately my boss was kind enough to let me spent this precious time I have left in Japan with my friends. Saturday my grandmother`s sister arrived in Higashi Toyonaka. She will stay with us until Tuesday January 9th. We`ve been talking and watching my father`s homemade family-movies. Very nice. Actually it made me realise what a lucky girl I actually am having such lovely&special family and friends. Today I`ve been working on my painting for Mission Bay (Tom came to bring it back; he wants the letters bigger), and finally it`s finished. It`s totally different from my first try.

HAPPY NEWYEAR EVERYBODY!!! I hope everybody had a good time celbrating New Year`s Eve, and will have even a better New Year full of experiences, truth, wisdom, love&friendship. I spent New Year`s Eve (oshogatsu) with my friends in Toyotsu; we had dinner together, counted down&went into the New Year together, played lots of funny games&watched movies. After one hour of sleep we got up to see the sun rise (we drove to Kansaidaimae, climbed one of the highest buildings of Kansai University). After standing in the cold for quite a long time we went to a bath house (onsen) to warm ourselves in diffeent baths, sauna`s etc. Fresh,Clear&Clean we started the first day of 2007. The rest of the day I spent in Kyoto with Junko (a friend of my grandmother), her husband and their two daughters (living in Tokyo&New York). Although I was very tired it was a beautiful day. The rest of the week I`ve been hanging out with friends (my really good friend Karin surprised me with coming along with her sister Aria&Aria`s husband Kalex) , visiting temples, going to concerts, studying etc. Friday I actually was supposed to work at Mission Bay, but I had promised my friends earlier to have dinner together before I would leave Japan, so fortunately my boss was kind enough to let me spent this precious time I have left in Japan with my friends. Saturday my grandmother`s sister arrived in Higashi Toyonaka. She will stay with us until Tuesday January 9th. We`ve been talking and watching my father`s homemade family-movies. Very nice. Actually it made me realise what a lucky girl I actually am having such lovely&special family and friends. Today I`ve been working on my painting for Mission Bay (Tom came to bring it back; he wants the letters bigger), and finally it`s finished. It`s totally different from my first try.