catalogue shopping in tokyo part 2 - license to drill

(please note the gunshot like wound to the forehead, a result of catalogue shopping)

giddy with excitment as the boxes started to arrive one after the other, i visualised our new living and working space; how organised and modern it would be in a matter of moments. i had constructed furniture before, and was ready for the task at hand; transforming the dirty brown boxes that stood before us into delightful space saving furniture.
some say that the test of true coupledom is furniture assembly. i lept in confidently believing that this adventure would be like so many in the past - smooth sailing! ripping open the boxes and scattering cardbord, plastic and paper debris everywhere, i watched as zume hurried about cleaning and sorting the waste. no time for that kind of shenanigans i had decided, i needed to get straight to the good stuff. swiping the instructions out of the way i began to build the puzzle. zume was still carefully and silently tidying and perusing the guide. after i had joined three large pieces zume interupted me and said the instructions called for glue. i had already decided in my mind not to use the glue, seemed unnecessary just in case we needed to disassemble the pieces one day. zume calmly insisted we go by the rules. at this point i was feeling very proud of our furniture assembly efforts as a couple, obviously differing in method but complementing each other nicely. as i heaved and hoed away to dislodge a piece, zume came over to help. leaning over to inspect, the piece i was pulling on flew out at the exact same time crunching him hard in the face. zume plunged his face into his hands and crawled away. 'oh shit', i thought, 'i have poked his friggin eye out, now i really have to marry him' (my nanna always said if you poke someone's eye out you have to marry them - because no one else will) i could see the blood now and feared the worst. 'show me, show me', i screamed with overpowering terror. zume needed some time and lumbered up the stairs. in shame, i continued the assembly by myself. not long after i heard him hobbling down the stairs again, i feared the worst and braced myself for the onslaught, which i fully deserved. i waited, but not a peep, not a shout, not one profanity. as i turned around to inspect his newly deformed face, there he stood with barely a mark and a smile on his face. hugging him, but being sure not to cop any blood, i knew we would could get 10 out of 10 for this test of togetherness - zume is patience personified (and i am the luckiest girl in the world).
as a result though, he came home the next night with a new toy. they say that dog is man's best friend, but in our cosy tokyo pod it's a black and decker drill with cute accessories and nifty little carry case.

happy birthday mummy (jan 28)

its my mummy's birthday tomorrow
she is cute and i love her
happy birthday mum (i have no idea where you are and can say that i am becoming slightly frantic, will you please just call me for gods sake, you would think after almost 30 years of motherhood you would start to become a little bit more responsible! for your sake you had better be in an alcoholic stuper somewhere due to a heavy party schedule)

i still call australia home (even though i forgot its day of celebration)

please note the 3 symbols of oz - the shed, the sun and the clothes line. (when zume spotted the large wire clothes drying contraption, he starred at it long and hard, turned to my mum and asked 'do you have satellite tv?')







as an act of faith and devotion to our great land i have just bombarded you with some of our finer holiday snapshots...
i have many more, over 7000 more infact. anytime you want to come over and relive our aussie adventure you are more than welcome - i'll provide the lamingtons and anzacs

tea for two in tokyo

i had heard of clipper tea, but stupidly never made my way to their web shop and discovered their full beauty. as i was strolling dangerously around the tempting aisles of national azabu on an empty stomach this afternoon, i bumped into a display of clipper products with their sleek packaging; flashing catchy words like 'organic' and 'fairtrade'. so i could hardly resist the 20 teabags of organic indian fairtrade chai. 'how outstanding and ethical of me to make such a purchase' i thought. 'what a fine upstanding citizen of this global community i am' i affirmed to myself. ' whoo hoo i had found something displaying the fair trade sticker and i am just going to go right ahead and buy it, what i rad person i am'.
upon arriving home i hurried to find the tea site. i clicked around the clipper on line shop searching for my new tea and others like it. my earlier feelings of self pride soon disappeared. global citizen my bum, in fact i was just a plane old sucker. 20 tea bags at national azabu cost 750 yen which is almost 9 aussie dollars and double the price that it is sold for online (1.69 pounds). perhaps my purchase is guaranteeing a better deal for developing country workers, it sure as hell is guaranteeing a better deal for the owners of national azabu.
buy online! clipper teas

catalogue shopping in tokyo pt1

with apartments barely big enough to swing a cat (actually our minature aparto and its white white walls would definitely not tolerate any cat swinging), tokyoites have become masters at interior design and storage solutions (i make this sweeping comment having only been into a handful of tokyo homes, but as a highly experienced homeware shop browser). alas without ikea or a car, purchasing the cool compact coffee tables and craftily designed desks can be a wee bit toilsome. if there is a will there is a way, and when it comes to making purchases; this city always, always presents you with a way. so easy is it to have everything that you need at your fingertips, that we have redesigned our interior in a matter of days without even leaving the house. oh i tell a lie, we did leave the house, but only to stroll down to the local bookshop. yes, we found all we needed on the shelves in the magazine section.
catalogue shopping; a whole new world of delights and temptations. no need to traipse from store to store...simply flick through the pages, dog ear the corners of all the desirable pages, measure things up, decide on your purchases, type all your wishes in and they are delivered to your doorstep asap (cash on delivery of course).
we decided to purchase from two online/catalogue stores - nissen and interior book

japanese past-life

recently i have been feeling very similar to the way i felt when i no longer 'believed' in santa, but hadnt yet confirmed my theories. more accurately, no one had given me the evidence i was searching for. i knew it was out there, but i was being kept in the dark with tales of frosty white beards and lies that only the good ones got gifts. although i agree that the santa story is a fantastic behaviour mangement tool, albiet a conniving one, i always felt the collusion and goings on surrounding it. similarly i have never been one to fully swallow the whole god jesus holy spirit story either, for i always felt it was simply that; a story, not unlike the stories told by aesop or anderson that i loved but never for a second bought as the truth.
so i guess i have always been a sceptic and my untrusting mind insists on full and undeniable evidence. but recently zume has been very vocal about a book he stumbled upon. written by a japanese professor from fukushima national university. in 1996 fumihiko iida wrote a book called 'creating the value of life'. no newcomer to the self help scetion of the bookstore(i always argued that it wasnt me who was searching for 'help' i was simply interested in watching how others needed it and looked for help), i have scoured books that delve into everything from the hari krishnas stance on yoga as a lifestyle not merely a series of stretches to franciscan monks and the teachings of buddha. having studied reiki, attended countless meditation classes and retreats and encountered most things of a spiritual nature over the years(making me a a fully fledged wacko in some peoples eyes), i often feel there is nothing new to venture into, simply rehashes. but for the first time in a long time an author has put this 'stuff' so succinctly that zumes book of the month begged to be read.
no no i have not mastered japanese in under a month (but according to a new weekly e-zine that i am reading by some crazy canadian raw foodist - if i put my mind to it i certainly could have it and many other languages down pat in no time). thanks to google all i had to do was type in fumihiko iida and up popped the book already translated and ready for me to read.
i dont know what i believe but leave it to the japanese to make things so clear and simply. for such a heavy subject and one surrounded by so much scepticism and disbelief that most dont even attempt to understand it, 'creating the value of life' gives a fresh approach to all things before and after NOW.
i still havent made up my mind, but idda's theories go a long way in aiding ones now life.
for now i guess i will have to rely on the internet to tell me my past life.

snow is good

for an aussie like me - snow is good!
never mind the fact that a stroll to the supermarket for a can of coconut milk can leave you bedridden with the flu - snow is good!

never mind that cars slip, buses crash and people spill - snow is good!

never mind that one day of heavy snow in the city = countless hours of chipping away at the ice on roads, driveways and windshields - snow is good!

and if that is tokyo snow, then we have had it!
just as fickle as tokyo fashion, tokyo snow comes, puts on a performance, leaves it's mark but then disappears only with scattered traces...