Life back in my home country

I would like to think that I’ve been spending the first two weeks of my summer break quite productively.

For the first five days, I spent my time reconnecting with my friend that’s studying abroad in the states and happened to be on her break as well. We met three days in a row, going so many places together. I also met my friends who came back home from Germany and Taiwan. It was really fun to catch up, listening to stories, and sharing experiences.

I feel really lucky to still have close connections with a number of friends from my high school times, albeit only a few. It’s always nice to have a place to go back to and friends to talk to after a stressful semester.

Then I spent the rest of my week with Mom who came back from another city after taking care of my brother who finally started his university life as a design student major. We tried a lot of new restaurants that were opened in the mall. These souffle pancakes are so soft and nice, but I still prefer traditional and chewy pancakes.

Since last weekend, I have moved into my brother’s new apartment in another and settled down. Dad said that it’s easier to commute to the office I will be interning from this place compared from home.

My brother’s apartment is essentially a shipwreck. Items are unorganized and he’s only been eating takeouts for the whole week. So Mom and I went IKEA a few days ago, bought several pieces of furniture and other accessories to make this space more ‘liveable’. We crafted them during the day and by nighttime, a lot of the apartment space has been freed up. Bless IKEA for the affordable furniture.

Birthday

Normally, Dad would take the whole family out to eat fancy steak for dinner on birthdays. But he wasn’t there for the whole week so I celebrated it a bit earlier with my friend (accidentally) when one of the waitresses in Sushi Tei (obviously a sushi restaurant, for those of who you didn’t know) asked if there will be anyone having their birthdays this week. I said yes and showed my identification card. She said she’ll serve me special birthday sushi lol. It’s essentially just normal sushi with meat floss and a slice of tuna on top. It’s still good, though.

Mom bought me a birthday cake instead of baking one like usual since we can’t really cook in the apartment. She got me my favorite tiramisu from a random bakery. I wasn’t really a fan of the mascarpone cheese on this one.

My brother refuses to eat any cake. As usual.

It’s been a nice two weeks of peacefulness. My intern program will start next Monday. I’m scared and excited at the same time to find out what kind of work I will be assigned and whether I will be able to accomplish the tasks given and actually gain some useful experiences for my future.

Wish me luck!

Fujifilm Instax Square SQ6

I finally purchased another Instax camera after seeing a great deal from Amazon during their Prime Day sale. This time I got myself a square version of it since I’ve been eyeing this one for quite some time. And sadly, my old Lomography camera is starting to break down. Every time I take pics, the results are weird and it looks like my pictures have glares when it’s not supposed to. I thought the films must’ve broken down when I brought it to Gotenba due to the extreme temperature, but when I tried it again in normal temperature, the results are still the same. 😦 I have no idea on how to fix it.

Well, before it gets boring, let’s get to the main thing.

I got the one in my most favorite color in the lineup, Rose Gold. I’ve actually seen a lot of reviews before deciding to purchase this camera. I debated whether I would get the camera or the SQ printer instead, but since the printer costs so much more (and wasn’t on sale), I decided to go for this one.

This camera is slightly heavier than the Lomography that I have. And the main reason why I bought it is not only it’s appearance, but the fact that it prints out square pictures instead of a rectangle. I find that square pictures are prettier and geometrically pleasing lol.

This is a picture that was taken during a birthday party by one of the restaurant staff. The lighting was bad, and her hands were shaking and not stable, resulting in this blurry picture lol.

The camera comes with basic functions such as auto, selfie, macro, landscape, double exposure, lighten, and darken. It also has a setting for 10 seconds timer and no flash. The tiny little frame on the bottom right displays the number of pictures you can take left with your refills.

One unfortunate thing about this camera was the scratch on the backside of it. I didn’t notice it until I looked very closely. It was disappointing, but nothing could be done with it. Oh well.

Overall impression: I like this one so much better than my previous instant camera since it looked like a toy. This one actually looks so much more sophisticated and pretty and it prints square pictures! It’s also nice to use for selfies. I think it’s nice for people who love spontaneousness. If you’re someone who likes perfection, I recommend buying the SQ printer instead since you can pick the pictures you really want and print it out.

Other notes: The set comes with a camera strap, 3 flash filters (iirc, green, orange, purple), and 2 CR2 batteries. So you only need to buy the film pack for the first time using it. I recommend getting a tripod if you like shooting in various settings since the picture gets blurry so easily when there is not enough light source.

I hope this post was helpful to you somehow. What do you think of instant cameras? Do you own one? If not, do you want to own one?

Sewing books and a classic novel

This spring, I have started a new hobby that I thought I’d never pick up. I watched random YouTube videos and was inspired by one of the people who had sewing as a hobby. I think it’s a very soothing hobby somehow. Afterwards, I went on and purchased my very first sewing machine with no basic knowledge on it lol. I plan to play a little more with my machine once I go back to my country for this summer break. But before that, I thought I’d learn more about the basics, which is why I bought a new book on sewing!

This book had the most reviews for beginner’s sewing guide. I went on and purchased it even though I knew I wouldn’t be able to read most of the kanji inside it lol. There are a lot of pictures which helps the reader’s understanding. Even someone who’s not fluent in reading like me can somewhat understand the instructions.

There aren’t a lot of detailed explanations inside sewing guide books that are sold in my home country so I thought this book could be really handy.

I spotted this book in Kinokuniya last time but was hesitant to buy it at first. But I figured out this would be a nice compliment to my sewing book if I decide to go further with this hobby.

The illustrations are really pretty and the patterns are very cute as well. I hope to use one of these patterns for my future sewing projects!

I found these two books in my university’s bookstore. To be honest, I’ve never read Le Petit Prince before but I know it’s a good book since it’s everywhere lol. I decided to challenge my own Japanese ability (it sucks, though) and gave this book a try. The kanji used are quite hard but they have hirgana readings above it so it’s easier!

The book on the right is actually a blank notebook disguised as a novel. I found it really interesting and cute so I went ahead and bought it lol.

The illustrations are basically divided into three different sections. I still don’t know what to use this notebook for or if I’m gonna use it at all. It’s too cute I’m reluctant to use it. Aaagh.

I got this bookmark as a freebie for purchasing the novels. I actually got two since I bought two books, but I gave out the other one to my friend.

It’s easy to use and cute in appearance as well. You just need to drape it over and close the book. Since it’s rubber, it’s hard to fall off so you don’t have to worry about losing it!

That is all for the book haul this time. I can’t wait to burn through all these books during summer break!

June 2019 in a nutshell

Life

June was fun yet extremely exhausting. I got to go to Osaka for holidays, but I also had to prepare for internship applications as well as keep up with my lessons.

I still haven’t gotten any updates from my internship employer. I do wish I got the job but at the same time I’m scared and nervous since I’ve never really ‘worked’ before.

I got sick for 5 days, got better for two days, and got sick again. That cycle keeps repeating recently and I’m concerned for my own health. I tried consuming medicine but I just never cure completely. Maybe it’s fatigue? I hope it gets better once my classes end in July.

Anime

Dororo just ended, so recently, I’ve been watching Kimetsu no Yaiba and Fruits Basket faithfully! I’m so glad they’re 24 episodes long. Both animes are really doing great right now and I keep wondering what’s going to happen next episode!

If you’re a fan of action, supernatural, and demon-like genre then I recommend Kimetsu no Yaiba! Ufotable’s animation on this series is just superb. The song and soundtracks are on spot as well!

Fruits Basket is doing fine, imo. There are several parts that are different from the old version and some people are upset that the new version didn’t include the Momiji song lol. The episodes are getting darker and darker each time, though. Ahhh, the excitement!

I also planned on catching up to Kono Oto Tomare! but I kept forgetting about the existence of that anime. Lol. I promise I’ll catch up to it somehow.

Hopes and things to do for July

To ace final exams
Wrap up group projects nicely
Decide whether I will write a thesis
Ace my mock interview in Japanese
Basically worry about life

That’s it for the wrap up. How’s your June? I hope you had a nice one.

Splurging on Muji products

I can’t believe I did it … but I kinda went crazy and splurged on Muji because they had a 20% sale for almost all items.

Apparently, the only branch in this small city is going for renovation, which is why Muji is selling off all of their products with huge discounts.

I actually went there twice. Once on Saturday and once on Sunday. I spent quite a lot on these aesthetically pleasing items. Here we go!

I have been eyeing on these two items for quite awhile now. When I discovered that the sale was happening, I immediately rushed to the store and bought it. More surprisingly, the towel was already 50% off and the pajamas were 30% off. When I checked out at the register, the 20% extra discount stacked with it, making my total purchase significantly cheaper!

Next we have this mat that I’m planning to use for meals. I saw that my friend had something like this and it’s pretty useful and convenient. If I spill something on the mat, I only need to wash the mat and not my entire table.

All of these three combined are below $10 and they’re just so aesthetically pleasing. It’s very light and feels really well made. I just hope mold won’t get on the wooden cutleries …

I’ve been using a kitchen timer from Daiso for a long time now, and the sound it makes is so loud and it’s hard to set up the seconds. But this timer is a dial type so it makes setting up so much quicker and easier! The sound it makes is loud but not loud enough to annoy the hell out of you.

Bought 2 new pairs of socks since my old one is wearing down. There were so many patterns and colors to choose from but the white and navy combination is the most basic and versatile for my wardrobe!

I don’t know why I bought these, to be honest. I thought I’d have some use for it. I tried hanging it in various places but it seems like they’re all too big for the hanger. This will be sitting in my storage for now …

There are other items that I purchased (but did not take a pic of) like a stainless strainer, water jug filter, and their instant chicken butter curry. Honestly, if I had more money I would’ve bought everything they had there, but … there are more important things than this crazy discount sale.

Or maybe I should’ve bought that stainless cooking pot that was discounted to 1500 yen from 5200 yen…

Oh well, until next time!

Osaka Pt. 3: Universal Studios Japan

Universal Studios Japan (USJ) was our destination for the third day. We came quite early before the gates opened since my friend wants to get into the newest attraction of Attack on Titan. We thought we’re quick enough, but nope, we’re actually quite late lol. We had to wait almost 45 minutes to get into the attraction. It was quite interesting, though. It’s basically watching a 3D movie of AoT with real live actors and titan mannequins. We visited the special merchandise store and of course, splurged quite a bit.

Our next goal was to visit the Harry Potter World! We had no map since we forgot to take one at the admission gate so we had to look around until we found that tiny Hogwarts castle lol.

The first thing I did was get in line and purchase a Butterbeer. I’ve never actually tried one before but my friend was raving about it, so I gave it a try. It’s actually pretty good, but a bit too sweet for my taste. I purchased the one with a mug souvenir so I can bring the mug home with me as a gift!

I and my friend got ourselves a Slytherin robe and scarf. I was originally planning to buy a Gryffindor scarf but then I thought it’s quite common and mainstream, so I went for Slytherin instead. They look badass lol. The robe was purely an impulsive purchase. I cried a little when I saw how much money we spent on it. Welp, it’s once in a lifetime.

We wore the robe around HP world and the store and attraction staffs always gave us special treatment. It makes us feel good lol. We took lots of pics around but unfortunately couldn’t get into any rides since most of it is not suitable for people who get nauseated easily.

Boo-hoo.

This post ends the Osaka trip post. I hope you enjoy reading it!

Osaka Pt. 2: Kyoto

We visited Kyoto and the second day of our holiday. It’s only around an hour of train ride from Osaka, so it’s not bad. Our main objectives were to visit the 3 famous temples in Kyoto: Kiyomizu, Ginkaku, and Kinkaku.

Kiyomizu-dera

As usual, there are a lot of visitors for Kiyomizu. The weather was especially hot that day. I had to purchase an extra umbrella since I left the one I brought at the hotel.

Kiyomizu temple is so big that most of the pictures in my camera are pictures of this temple. The main temple where people pray is deeper inside and no camera or videos are allowed. Moreover, it’s also dark and it makes it difficult to take any clear images.

When you purchase the entry ticket, they give you a long piece of paper which also works as a charm for your house!

Ginkakuji (Silver temple)

To me, Ginkaku is the ‘plainest’ temple within the 3 temples I mentioned. It was built to mimic Kinkaku. The paths inside the temple were mostly flat and they have a lot of paths that require you to climb or anything. So it was a fairly smooth journey, I guess? I didn’t take any appropriate picture for this temple since nothing interesting caught my eye lol.

The soba that we got just outside of Kinkaku

We missed the bus headed for Kinkakuji since we had to search for an ATM to withdraw money. While waiting, we discovered this small cafe and decided to enter. We ordered a coffee-flavored shaved ice. It was superb.

Kinkakuji

The beauty of Kinkakuji blew me away. It looks so majestic and beautiful from far away. The temple is in the middle of the lake, so no one can really go inside it. Taking this picture was a huge struggle since there were a lot of tourists lining up to get their pics as well. Once we got our spot, we took our time and shot a lot of pics lol.

Near the entrance of Kinkakuji, there’s a famous skincare / cosmetics brand named Yojiya. I saw posts about this brand all over the internet and souvenir recommendation sites so I gave several of their products a try.

Their number one bestseller is oil blotting paper.

Never would’ve thought that I’d spend almost $10 for oil blotting paper… I must be insane lol.

I also purchased a body care line of Yojiya called Mayugomori. I originally tried their body milk and the scent smells divine and lingers for quite a long time. Body soap, shampoo, and conditioner are included in this set. I can’t wait to try it out!

To be continued Pt. 3

Osaka Pt. 1: Umeda and around

My friend and I visited Osaka for our short break. It’s been 10 years since I visited last time. To be honest, I don’t even remember what it looked like a decade ago lol.

We stayed at the center of Osaka. Naturally, Umeda became our playground when it comes to shopping and exploring the city. What’s nice is, everything is connected by train. This is one of the reasons why I love Japan so much lol.

While Japan train stations tend to also be a huge ass shopping mall, it’s very crowded and it’s hard to navigate around it if you’re not familiar with it. I had my friend guide me for the whole trip. This udon restaurant, which is a 10-minute walk from the station, is the first place I was brought to after we arrived.

The soup has a peculiar taste since it’s infused with yuzu peels. I like yuzu tea but yuzu udon? Uh, not so much. The tempura’s good, though.

We got this katsudon for dinner on the first day. To be honest, it’s not the best. There’s not much taste for the katsu itself. But then again it’s cheap compared to other restaurants, so we can’t complain lol.

This gelato shop is pretty famous. There are always people eating inside even though the space is very small. The price is in the middle to high range. I would come back if I were given the chance to!

These two pictures are famous tourist spots to take memorable pics. There are a lot of shops at Dotonbori. Exploring everything didn’t take us that long, though., since there were only several shops that we were interested in. Just beware that there are a lot of people here, so people like me who hate crowded places, better avoid this one lol.

To be continued Pt. 2

Current skincare favorites

It might look like I bought a lot of products and threw my money off the window, but rest assured, most of them are cheap samples that I bought to test out lol.

Let’s jump straight into the contents!

People were raving about this toner for the longest time and I had to get my hands on them to try it out. Luckily, they had a mini version so I opted for that since I’m not sure if this will break out my skin or not. I bought mines from Yesstyle.

So far testing it, my skin has not reacted badly, and I must say that this product really lives up to its expectations! The consistency is really watery, but it feels very nourishing and hydrating on the skin. This product will be perfect for spring/fall/winter time since it adds extra hydration. I have yet to try this during summer so I will add more contents when that time comes.

Pony Effect’s Everlasting Cushion Foundation

I always see people reviewing Pony Effect’s products on Youtube but I never got to try one myself since the website I usually shop at doesn’t carry my shade and I’ve always perceived the price tag as being super expensive.

One day I browsed through Yesstyle and realized that they don’t have shade #03 as well. 😦 My current cushion was also running out at that time so I thought, why not just give it a try? There was only Nude Beige (#02) left in stock, so I tried that. Only then I realized that the price tag was high since it came with an extra refill! When the product came, I tried it out immediately, and surprisingly, it fit my skin tone! The finish was also really smooth with medium coverage and the longevity was quite good since I didn’t need to touch up until 6 hours later. Overall impressed! Will definitely repurchase this one.

Clio Kill Cover Glow Cushion in #4 Ginger

You can tell from the image that I didn’t really use this cushion since it has accumulated dust lol. I bought this before I discovered the Pony Effect cushion because the ‘glow’ trend was really big back then. However, I realized that I could only use this in winter since it’s super dewy and oily even during spring! My makeup would look so disgusting after several hours and it just offed me from using it ever again.

It’s quite unfortunate, but I guess I just need to wait for winter to come and see how it goes.

Back to skincare. To be honest … I don’t even know why I purchased these things lol. There was a 40% discount for skincare that contains rose ingredients and these products from Aromatica was on sale because of that. Now, I’ve mentioned before that I’m a sucker for discount sales, so… Yeah… You get it. Moreover, I checked reviews for these two products and most people gave them high ratings. However, I haven’t given them a try yet since I’m trying to finish up my Innisfree Green Tea Seed Serum and Pyunkang Yul toner lol. That aside, the packaging is glass! I’m sold.

That’s it for my random skincare and makeup post! Hope you enjoy the randomness as well lol.

Catching up from April 2019

Welcome back to my blog, I guess? Lol. I was finally able to get this blog running again after it went down almost two months ago. It was really hard migrating a dead blog. I almost thought that it couldn’t be salvaged anymore. Bless Ofblue.org customer service for helping me to get it up again!

Anyways, I thought I’d post some things I did in April. As usual, it’s spring and cherry blossom time. I went 花見 (hanami) with three other friends and ate pizza. The weather was really nice but still kinda chilly at that time.

Walking under the ‘tunnel’ of sakura trees

Apparently the hay fever was really bad this year. I was lucky to not be affected as much, but I’ve read somewhere that you’re more susceptible to it as you age. 😦 I hope it doesn’t happen to me in the future. It would suck having to constantly sneeze and have watery eyes because of the pollen lol.

Sakura flowers, fish flags and a glimpse of the river

I also tried taking pictures with my Polaroid camera as usual, but it seems like there’s a problem with either the film or camera since it turned kinda … dark. I don’t know what caused it and so I had to throw away lots of Polaroid refills since most of the pictures I took turned out as a failure. 😥 But I did manage to take a lot of pictures with my Sony camera, so it’s okay.

Maybe I’ll invest in a square Polaroid printer next time …