Tag Archives: Kizuna

Inspiring, Travel

Ohaiyo Japan (5) Tokyo Senso Temple & Asakusa

June 24, 2013 Ena Teo 1 Comment

Ohai~~~~

It’s the last installment of my Japan trip blog series!

Without further a do~

DAY 9

Our breakfast at Tokyo Grand Hotel. It’s buffet as usual, and here’s what I picked out. ^^

I find myself fascinated when staffs are suited up! So… classic and professional. 🙂

Our Lasalle table, where we are busy filling in our thoughts and remarks about the last 8 days of Kizuna project.

Our final day began with an art exhibition commemorating the earthquake and tsunami disaster in an art gallery 3331.

I was curious what 3331 mean and the staff explained that it is the rhythm or claps that Japanese traditionally end their meetings.

It goes:

Clap x3, Clap x3, Clap x3 and Clap! Thus 3331. Cool huh! 🙂

It’s an art gallery housed in an old elementary school.

We were introduced to the current exhibition titled “Making as Living” which talks about how artists began socially enterprising businesses and artworks post disaster. It’s when the Japanese began to realize that when there’s nothing else you can do, you begin to make the best of what you have, you make, like how they start to make use of the wood from broken houses to rebuild things and thus Making as Living. It’s very inspiring.

A huge wall cover of a scene of Tokyo from the birds eye view. Very organized town planning as you can see, in a grid system.

This art work is a series of 3 long panels which showed the number of artworks, songs, shows. documentary about earthquakes and tsunamis since the 1950s or even before.

Then we came to this Indian restaurant for lunch near the Asakusa area! It’s very interesting eating Indian flavoured cuisine with Japanese ingredients like vegetables grown in Japan. Very fresh, unique taste. No photos but the food was good, tasty and authentic.

A pretty flower along the streets!

We came to visit the famous temple at Asakusa.

It’s said that the smoke gives you good blessing.

And so is the water from this fountain from what seems like a warrior from the olden days. 🙂

A sneak photo of Japanese ladies decked out in their traditional kimonos. Very pretty! 🙂

Another sneak picture of more Japanese girls. Sorry I am so sneaky but I don’t dare know know how to approach them to ask for a photo. >.<

The food stalls with very Japanese style lanterns and banners.

Cute bags of cotton candy with cartoons which I like, Hello Kitty and Marie! 🙂

Des, Calli and Ying looking, choosing Choc-coated Bananas. 🙂

Grego feeding Des? Heh.

Happy Des.

Cute dog along the road! Japanese dogs are so pretty! 🙂

Not sure why I was giving such a spastic face! And it was really hot here, like almost 30degrees! We were perspiring…

With Yings! 🙂

With the whole super gang!!! ^^ So much love.<3 <3 <3

Cute cartoons on vending machine.

Ice cream dispensers!

Amazing rickshaw pulley who is soooo skinny. >.<

Cute Yings with a sign that says “Get down the horse” kekeke.

Our dinner bento before we left for the airport!

Here’s a pic w our Super leader Ginette. 😀 She posted on FB saying she travelled to HK and Jpn with me. So blessed! :’)

A farewell pic with some of our fave people from the trip! Jacq, Beatrice, Dylan, Dominique , Myself and Ying. 🙂

We bought Tokyo bananas from the airport. Here’s the giraffe patterned, caramel flavour, its better than the original! 😀

And my goodies loot which I bought back for self, family and friends. 🙂

I am super thankful for the chance to travel to and experience the beautiful country of Japan. It was an awesome cultural experience and I love that the Lasalle group of us had so much fun together and even got together to finish the Kizuna10 project! May God bless the country and people of Japan! We love you Japan! Lots of Love from Singapore! 🙂

Ena

Ohaiyo Japan (4) Isohara Seaside & Tokyo Tower (enabalista.wordpress.com)
Ohaiyo Japan~ (3) Traditional House Tour and Glass Frosting Workshop (enabalista.wordpress.com)
Ohaiyo Japan~ (2) (enabalista.wordpress.com)
Ohaiyo Japan! (1) (enabalista.wordpress.com)
What’s Kizuna 10? (enabalista.wordpress.com)
Asakusa Day Out! (cosmiccheeseburger.wordpress.com)

Inspiring, Travel

Ohaiyo Japan~ (2)

June 18, 2013 Ena Teo 7 Comments

Hello~

And YAY! For ROUND 2 of updates from my Kizuna Japan trip! ^^v

Ready or not, here we go~!

DAY 3

I left off after we checked in and spent a night at Hotel Omoide Roman-kan, Daigo Town, Ibaraki Prefecture.

This is just round 1 of my breakfast serving! It’s an international breakfast spread with traditional japanese food like porridge and side dishes which I took in round 2 but not pictured! 😛

We woke up to this BEAUTIFUL scenery. After breakfast, Ying, Greg and I decided to go for a quick walk and snap some #OOTD (means outfit of the day, for the uninitiated).

Cute plants, what do you call this? ^^

A candid photo of Greg shooting Ying’s #OOTD, using my camera’s miniature mode.

Our lunch bento box!

After lunch we also went for a walk around our hotel! 🙂

And we saw little birds lined up on the cables/wires. How cute!

We also saw red berries along the way… Not sure if they were edible or not! 😛

The view of Daigo Town, just behind our hotel! Lots of restaurants that seem to thrive from the tourists and also visitors that drive along the road.

A closer look, the poster seems to say that the noodles are 100% handmade! 🙂

After lunch, we headed to Oku-kuji Recreation Forest area where we made wooden planters to show support for the reconstruction of the affected areas, as our wooden planters will be used in the elementary school which we were visiting later during our trip. 🙂

Materials for our wooden planter! Pieces of wood, nails wrapped in the newspaper and wooden hammer.

A quick shot of our Lasalle team ^^ You can also see the place where we were, it’s all made of wood and a very beautifully constructed place!

My buddy Ying very focused in putting the planter together! We took turns to hammer the nails in. 🙂

Us with our constructed planter! ^^ And pardon our frizzy hair-dos that got all frizzed up in the high static environment, heh!

Now you see us, now you don’t! >.<

We also wrote encouraging messages on our planter! 🙂

A shot of work that is still underway around the Oku-kuji forest area, taken from the coach, hence the blurry effect.

Then we came to Fukuroda Falls! It’s one of the top 3 falls in Japan, with a different look each season. 🙂

Us again! This time in our coats as it was pretty cold! 🙂

There, thought you’d like to see the view of Fukuroda Falls in the 4 seasons as I do! ^^ Ok I think it’s just Summer/Spring, Autumn, Winter and then a view of the lake during summer/spring.

Sadly it’s end of winter so there was only a hint of green and not a very welcoming view but nonetheless you can see the the falls!

Another view of the falls, this time with the top of the valley in sight.

And another! heh.

Me and what seems like the mascot of Fukuroda falls! SO CUTE RIGHT. (Mascot, not me, in case you think I’m praising myself, HAHA) I just noticed the falls is pictured on his hat! Mad cute! Basically it says 大子町 on the hat, which is the Japanese name of Daigo and the apple and fish are produces that the town is famous for. Cool huh! 🙂

A beautiful shot of the group while we walked down from the falls… 🙂

At the base of the falls were a slew of souvenir shops and as were early in the trip, we didn’t shop intently for souvenirs but we sure did try out the snacks! Here’s a caramel mochi (japanese for rice cake) which is sticky sweet!

This is the pretty amazing little stall that was barbecuing the rice mochis.

Then the ice cream booth caught our eyes! Many flavours but only apple and chocolate left by the time we bought.

Shot of my apple ice cream! I cannot emphasize how delicious it was, it has apple bits in it that I LOVE. Why can’t Singapore have this? >.<

Our ice cream and our thoroughly satisfied faces! ^^v

Day 4

After breakfast, we made our way to Kami No Sato a local craft workshop for a class on handmade Japanese paper, known as Washi.

This is our workshop tutor, pictured with the frame where he sieved the fibre from the pool of fibre in front of him.

He then showed us how to make markings on the Washi in the frame.

And quickly proceeded to fill the markings in with coloured fibre, in this case, red for the apple and brown of the stem.

The various buckets of coloured Washi fibre where we scooped from for our artwork! 🙂

We didn’t have to do the sieving of the Washi fibre, so we just made the markings and filling in of the colours.

My completed Washi paper decoration! Our works would be sold in the paper shop and funds would go to supporting Kizuna project, which creates awareness of the reconstruction efforts in Japan since the major disaster happened in 2011.

Close up of my Washi paper, inspired by Japanese patterns and the produces of Daigo town, which is red apple and green tea. 🙂

The lovely ladies at the paper shop where we bought ready Washi from! Can you see the beautiful paddle pop coloured papers which were used to wrap the items? Gotta love Japanese packaging! 🙂

“色即是空” Japan is a largely buddhist country and this is a famous buddhist saying that means what is visible is empty, but an illusion. I don’t subscribed to buddhist teachings, but I find it interesting as it explains the Zen concept which Japan is famous for. You can also see a bit of the ceiling of the paper shop, which is entirely plastered with writings!

How the shop front looks like.

How the Kami No Sato paper shop looks like. It also has a small area for a museum of antique Japanese paper and books. Washi-making is a dying art and I am thankful we could experience something so uniquely Japan and culturally enriching.

Shot of the road along the paper shop and workshops and a photo-ception with SJ in the picture!

Activity 2 for the day, which we were very excited about, visiting Setsuko’s strawberry farm to pick and eat strawberries!!! ^^V

Mr Setsuko, the farmer and host telling us his experience of the disaster 2 years ago. He lost many customers as they stopped buying strawberries from him because of harmful rumours and they feared radiation but his produces have been certified to be healthy and fit for consumption. Thankfully his business has began to pick up and has reached 70% of customer support since the disaster struck. 🙂

We took a walk through his tomato farm. The greenhouse technology is imported from Netherlands and Mr Setsuko expressed thankfulness that the structure and glass was very strong and withstood the severe earthquakes then.

A happy looking tomato! ^^

The greenhouse under the beautiful skies.

Plum flowers along the road outside the farm.

And a picture of us Lasalle girls, from left, Ade, Xav, me and Ying with the flowers! Credits to Xav’s from her FB ^^.

We then arrived at our final destination of the day, which is the next hotel for the trip!

ISOHARA SEASIDE HOTEL. *Mad love*

2550 Futatsujima Isohara-machi, Kitaibaraki-shi,
Ibaraki 319-1541 JAPAN
TEL:0293-42-0213 / ( from overseas 81-293-42-0213 )
FAX:0293-42-0536 / ( from overseas 81-293-42-0536 )

Website: http://www.isohara.co.jp/lang/English1.htm

This time I shared a room with Adeline and Xav. 🙂 The view of the pretty room from the entrance.

The beds.

THE VIEW of the seaside! SO NICE. *faints*

The toilet!

That’s all for now, till the next post!

Ena

P.S. Haze in Singapore is getting REAL BAD. Please take care guys! <3

Ohaiyo Japan! (1) (enabalista.wordpress.com)
What’s Kizuna 10? (enabalista.wordpress.com)

Art & Design, Inspiring, Travel

Ohaiyo Japan! (1)

June 11, 2013 Ena Teo 6 Comments

Ohaiyo!

Ohaiyo is the informal way of saying Good Morning in Japanese, the short form of Ohaiyo Gozaimasu. I won’t be teaching Japanese on my blog here, as I only know of a few casual phrases myself. ^^

Have you checked out our Kizuna 10 FB page? Check it out and LIKE it here if you have not!!!

Over this week, I’ll be uploading photos from the 10 day trip that my school mates and I took back in March. We were very generously sponsored and invited by Japan to be part of the Kizuna (Bond) project as part of 100 Singaporean students and tutors to visit and indulge in the rich Japanese culture and heritage! You can check out more of the Kizuna project here.

Without further ado, here are some photos from the 1st 2 days of the 10 day trip that my school mates and I took back in March! 🙂

Japan Kizuna Trip 11th March – 19th March 2013 (Arriving back to Singapore on the 20th March)

Pre-flight, with my lovely travel buddy Ying! 🙂

The view from the plane as we were about to land in Japan… It was the end of winter and early Spring, thus the brown fields.

As we near nearing, we can begin to see the plane’s shadow! So cute right? ^^

This is how they unload the cargo from the plane! Yes, I had a very good view from where I was seating. ^^

Our plane landed at about 4pm and we were scheduled to reach the hotel by coach at about 6.30pm but due to peak period traffic, we reach only about 7.30pm! 😮

Finally got the keys to our room in Tokyo Grand Hotel! I love how vintage the room keys are. ^^ The yellow book is our very detailed and informative handbook for the trip! My schoolmates and I were part of Group A with other students from Temasek Poly and Raffles Design Institute.

How the hotel room looks like! Small but well equipped. Beds were very comfy. Japanese style robes were laid on the beds for occupants to change into. The view from our room shows the office opposite and at 7.30pm we still saw office workers working away!

The toilet is clean and well equipped.

As we reached pretty late, dinner was prepared in very dainty lunch boxes. It was far too much rice for us to consume… Heh.

Post dinner, our first night’s activity began with convenient shops shopping! HAH. There were 3 convenient shops around our hotel and pretty much nothing else. We would soon realize that’s pretty much all the shopping we could do during this except for the last day at Tokyo. 😛 Here you see MUJI stuff at their convenient store! In Singapore MUJI shop has its stand alone boutiques in town, Orchard. The prices are definitely cheaper in Japan, almost 50%! ^^

This, my dear friends, is one of my favourite food in Japan. It’s sold in the convenient store and you pick out what you want and place them in the containers provided, pour a little soup in and pay up. I bought the sausage and vermicelli and they were AWESOME. Super tasty! ^^v

We were told that Tokyo Tower was a 10 min walk away, so the Lasalle group decided to take a walk out together! We came across a subway station and decided to take a look and “recee” for our last night when we get back to Tokyo. 😛

We made our way back to the convenient shops again! Check out the cup noodles from the land of Nissin! 🙂 Totally reminded me of my JC PW (for the uninitiated, stands for Junior College Project Work) where my group mates and I researched and presented on Momofuku Ando, the founder of Nissin cup noodles!

My supper for the night! Tasty sweet courn noodles with dessert!

Day 2~!

My outfit for day 2~

Selca with cutie Ying~

Candid of Lasalle peeps, Xav, Adeline, Alex and SJ, during our morning walk around our hotel! 🙂

Even the dogs in Tokyo are cute!

This photo commemorates our Lasalle hero, Alex who wore shorts out in the cool weather of below 15 degrees. *thumbs up* 😛

Our resident cutie Desmond, with his ice cream and Alex photo bombing. HAHA.

Billboard along the streets of real life Japanese criminal hunt list. :O It’s scary!

The use of order, pattern and symmetry is found practically everywhere on the streets of Japan.

Even the office workers smoke in an orderly fashion!

The flowers along the roads are happy. ^^

The waterworks covers are too cute! This one’s self explanatory, is for fire hydrant hoses in case of fire.

We had to attend a talk back in the hotel on Earthquakes in Japan, but I won’t be going into details about that. 😛

Our sushi packed lunch, rice and egg and seaweed.

After lunch on day 2, we had some free time so we took a walk around the hotel and we discovered this! The REAL Yakiniku (Japanese barbeque) which we often see in Singaporean malls!

Our brave tutor/supervisor/”SUPER leader” Ginette took the first plunge. HAHA. AND boy it was GOOD. 😀 So we all took turns to buy one stick and shared with each other. ^^

Here’s a random shot of Ying all happy and cute. ^^

Look, Ma! Penang restaurant in Japan! 😛

My buys of the day from convenient store shopping. HEH. Coffee, gums and sugarrr.

After attending the afternoon talk, we packed up and moved out on coach for our next destination for the next few days!

We stopped at a pit stop during the coach ride and LOOK WHAT I FOUND. A basket of cuties!!!

I simply couldn’t resist. So I brought one with me. ^^ It costs about S$6. And it has beans in the tummy! It’s happily on my desk now.

We arrived! At Hotel Omoide Roman-kan, Daigo Town, Ibaraki Prefecture! It’s a Japanese traditional type of hotel stay.

This is how the room looked like when we first got our bags in and trying to get them sorted~.

The balcony area.

The toilet area.

And I realize in Japan, the exit is called “非常阶段“ which when translated it means “not the usual steps” cool huh! 🙂

In case you were wondering, I can read and understand chinese characters and traditional Japanese characters use chinese characters. 🙂

We quickly got things sorted and went down for dinner! 😀

LOOK AT THE SPREAD YO. This one’s dessert cakes and the super yummy greek style yogurt in the steel bowl! ^^v

Tomato pasta!!!

Super yummy Japanese tempura (fried) sticks! An assorted choices of fishes and vegetables with the descriptions, if you can read, on the end of the sticks! <3

Along the walkway you’ll find many pressed floral art like this! So pretty! 🙂

When we got back to our room… IT WAS TRANSFORMED! 😀

We decided to try the tidbit offered in the room! It was complimentary. this one’s plum flavored soft pastry. Super nice, I bought 2 boxes back home before we left. 🙂

That’s all for today! Come back soon for my next update!

<3,

Ena

Art & Design, Inspiring, Travel

What’s Kizuna 10?

June 11, 2013 Ena Teo 4 Comments

Hi!

Check out this little video which I’m in, here!

With that, I’d like to introduce to you the latest project that my friends and I are working on! It’s called Kizuna 10!

Kizuna 10 – The Kizuna Experience

Today marks the first day of our project! It follows the day we flew to the land of the rising sun.

You must be wondering. What’s Kizuna 10 about? Read on!

From our FB info page here:

ABOUT: Hi! 10: The Kizuna Experience is the Facebook companion to the 10-day social media project of the same name. We’re a bunch of students from Singapore hoping to do some good with a little bit of our creativity, so why not check us out? 😀

DESCRIPTION: Hi, we are a group of student delegates from Singapore (3rd batch) who went on a Japan exchange programme – KIZUNA BOND PROJECT – from March 11-20, 2012. The Kizuna Bond Project is a youth-exchange programme launched by the Japanese government as part of its reconstruction plans after the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011.This platform is an initiative to reach out to the mass on the understanding of Japan’s revival efforts through recreating our 10-day KIZUNA experience. Day by day, hour-by-hour, we will update the site real-time, so that you, our viewer, will be able to walk with us through Japan.

Check out our tumblr page here!

I’ll be taking part in this project, but will also be posting my own set of photos on my blog, combining 2 days into 1 post. I’ll update my own blog post links here when I’m done. 🙂

That’s all for now, I’ll see on you FB and make sure you like our page here ya!

Ena

Credits to Callison Neo for the designs and Xaveria for the video!

Ohaiyo Japan Day 1 & 2

Ena Teo | Enabalista

Tag Archives: Kizuna

Ohaiyo Japan (5) Tokyo Senso Temple & Asakusa

Ohaiyo Japan~ (2)

Ohaiyo Japan! (1)

Day 2~!

What’s Kizuna 10?

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