another brief update of my recent life...

- it's officially WINTER! autumn was gone in like just a month!

my neighborhood on 28th Nov


the same place on 5th Dec

- studied like crazy in the week just b4 JLPT1. managed to squeeze all the grammar structures into my head but Kanjis were a killer! tried so hard to remember as many as i could, but it was impossible. think i'm most probably gonna fail the test this year... serves mi right for studying only at the last min. anyway, it was an interesting experience to take the test in Japan. i think almost all foreigners in Kobe gathered in Konan Uni that day, and i was really glad to run into Xiaofang, a chinese girl i met at the summer Japanese course but whom i had lost contact with.

my table and test voucher

- the day after JLPT, we had a Nabe Party (aka Japanese Steamboat) in my apartment. my Japanese housemate invited 3 of her frens, my colleague invited 1 of hers and i invited 2 of my frends - Inoue-san & Audrey! Audrey is my new Singaporean fren who is studying in Osaka, and whom i got to know through this blog! (hi there if you are reading this ^_^) so anyway, most of us were meeting each other for the first time, so it was kinda strange initially. but i guess eventually we managed to have a great time eating, watching tv and talking about weird languages. hee...

friends' friends friends

- worked on our school's newsletter, i.e. arranging the pages 3 & 4 and putting them up on our website.


- went for a dance concert by a well-known dance team in Osaka. they did a 2-hour show based on "Journey to the West" story and it was fantastic! clever use of props, music, formations and of cos, superb dancing! after the show, the dance team members came out to meet the audience and i plucked up courage to ask my fave KATO-san for a pic together!!! gee... he's so shuai and nice and dances so well!!! i think i was even trembling when i talked to him! hee... and in English cos i wanted him to remember mi. he can speak English pretty well!


- after the concert, i met up with Audrey and Inoue-san again, this time to go see Luminarie, the yearly lights-up event in Kobe. but b4 that, we needed to go for dinner somewhere and it happened that my colleague's church was having a Xmas party that night and she had invited boss, mi and some of our students. i was kinda reluctant to go actually but i decided to ask my 2 frens for their opinions anyway. they were both fine with it so, ok, off to the party we went. it was a small place where the English-speaking believers in Kobe go to. the first part of the party was filled with lotsa of singing... of which 90% of the songs i had no idea about, and also some "performances". i couldn't tell if my boss/students/frens were enjoying themselves or not. anyway, after about 1.5 hours it was finally food time! we chiong to the dining room, piled up our plates with various kinds of delicacies, and talked as we ate. after that, we walked over to Luminarie together. i thought it was not much difference from last year, but i was really glad to have more company this year. and an interesting thing was that we experienced the "lights off" moment at 9.30pm sharp! haha... everyone was taken by surprise and the reactions were really funny.

Xmas party


Luminarie 2007

- going to sleep at 4am and waking up at 12pm almost everyday. i dunno why i can spend so much time online every night... just browsing through people's profiles on facebook, watching silly videos on youtube, researching and planning for my winter break, blogging... and b4 i knew it, it's already 4am!

gosh... already 4.30am now!!! shall go to sleep le. gonna be expecting Tateishi-san tomorrow, who's coming from Hiroshima and staying with mi for 2 nights. and there's our school's Xmas party on sunday too. this weekend is gonna be fun! =)

(P.S. not used to my permed-hair look?? =P)