The Cauldron

 

If you know me, you know how passionate I am about the Olympic. 

So here it is! 

The 2010 winter Olympic cauldron!

Capilano Suspension Bridge

My idea of a great boxing day? Is to head out as far as possible from a mall!!! So we made our way to Capilano Suspension Bridge! We had a great time!

We must have had a VERY lucky day. We had the pleasure to witness a golden eagle steal a fish from a bald eagle! Chris caught it on his cellphone camera!

Where in the world are we now?

Well, here we are in beautiful British Columbia! Actually we've been here for just over a week now! With the holidays, we have been extremely busy! So here is a little up-dates!

First off, we flew with Sunwing airlines on December 22. After a long drive to the airport and a short stay in a ditch on the side of the road... the roads were really icy. And lots of cars just slide off the road. But not us... No sir! Instead, we purposely drove straight into the ditch... Yes, that's right! lol Well the whole story is that we took the side roads because the highway was close for an accident. Tristan needed to pee so we stopped on the side of the street. We gently pulled over on what looked like a snow covered shoulder.... but it was in fact a ditch!

So we finally made it to Brampton, where we had a quick little Christmas with Great-grand-pa and Great-grand-ma. Hudson received a stuff animal (a black cat) and it was a hit! It was not left her arms since then. The poor creature is already so stinky and dirty, but she loves him SOOOOOO much! 

Then we headed up to the airport. We were early and avoided all the line up. Except the airline made a screw up so we ended up having to go through security TWICE! With a tired hungry baby!!! On the worst day of the year to fly! The airline representative give us such a bullshit explanation as to why the mistake, it sent me fuming! I highly doubt we will ever fly with then again! (I would like to take a minute and apologize to Aircanada for saying they were the worst.... they are now second worst to Sunwing!)

The flight was uneventful and Hudson slept the whole way. (Yeah!) And made it to my in-laws in Richmond!

The days that fallowed were very busy getting the last minute shopping done (Including Daiso!!!!) and sightseeing! 

   

The day we did not go to Yanai

On our way back from Nara, we saw posters of what seemed to be a very very impressive festival! The Gold Fish festival of Yanai! So the next day, we decided to head out that way. It was far about 3-4 hours from Osaka, but it really looked like it would be worth the trek. So we took a very early over packed Shinkansen... We had no seats, so we had to stand for close to 2 hours, with a baby in my boba.... Not fun.... but hey! We really wanted to go! 

We passed Hiroshima and kept on going towards Yamaguchi... and then... the rain... Not just a little bit of rain.... torrential down pour. So much rain that our connecting train stopped running because of severe track flooding. So we waited for close to 2 hours... just in hope they would reopen the seaside track. No luck... So we headed back towards Hiroshima unsure of what we would do next. Talk about a long trip for nothing.

 

In Hiroshima the weather was nicer, but by fear of getting stuck in an over crowded train in the evening, we kept on going toward Osaka... But once we got to Mihara station, a lot of people got out. We were curious... why would so many people, all stop in such a small place... so we got out as well. Turns out there was a Octopus festival on that day! So we joined in the fun and ate grill octopus arms for lunch...

Then we went back on the train and stopped in Fukuyama to take some pictures with the very nice castle...

And later that night we finally made it back to Osaka...


Not the day we had planned, but we had lots of fun still!

Nara

After our very emotion filled day in Hiroshima, we headed out to another one of my favorite city in Japan, the historical city of Nara. While planing for this trip, I was really excited by the prospect of bringing Hudson and Tristan to Nara... The city with the deers crossing at the intersection (while obeying the pedestrian signal...) But after our little mishap with the deers in Miyajima, I started to be a bit more concern about having to face hundreds if not thousands of deers in the city. So we headed out in mid-morning and got there right at lunch time.

We first grabbed lunch, and since Hudson decided she ONLY wanted to walk, it took us all afternoon to make the trek to the Daibustu temple. By the time we got there, it was closing but we managed to sneak in with the last few people. The place was so empty it gave us great opportunities to take lots of pictures. 

 

And that is pretty much the only think we saw in Nara... We had plan on temple hopping, but with an eight months old baby that only wanted to walk, it slowed us down tremendously. Still we had a blast as Hudson tried to catch deers, and even fed one.

European Mad-dash part II : Mini-fox in Paris

October has been incredibly busy... First my trip to France, then my mom's wedding, and soon Hudson's birthday followed by halloween... all this while being in grad school fulltime and taking care of my little Tuna. Ouf........... absolutly exhausting......... so you will forgive me for being a bit behind in posting. I will try to finish the Japan trip posts by the end of november, and here is the last part for my France trip!

 

I presented in Nancy as part of a conference on "Passeurs de culture et transferts culturels". It was very interesting and a great chance to meet other people working in a similar field. Now just in case you wonder... what exactly is my field of study. Well... I will do my best to offer here a proper translation but it goes along the line of... "East-asian representations (China, Korea and Japan) in french-canadian litterature : cultural and formal hybridity." I am currently doing my PHD in Francophone studies.

 

One of the bigest disapointment of the trip was the fact that Hudson was suppose tp come with me... unfortunalty I lost my babysitter over there because of conflicting work schedule and had to leave Hudson behind. To make up for it, I brought Hudson's favorite stuff animal with me (well actually I brought his twin) and took picture of Mini-Fox at all the interesting sight.

So Mini-fox visited the Eiffel tower, l'Arc de Triomphe and more...


 

 

 

 

 

European Mad-dash

 

Let's leave Japan to the side for a while, and let's head over to France! Where I am now! 

 

As a matter of fact, I am currently sitting on the floor of my hotel room. A wonderful little hotel, right in the middle of old Nancy. Walking distance from the train station. Hotel de Guise. Clean, friendly and historical! I love it!

 

So what has my days looked like since leaving... well... without Tuna around, I feel a bit like I've traveled in time and  went back to my old, full of unplanned, last minute adventurous life...

I slept for the whole flight. I got to Paris, jumped on a train after buying a baguette on the go and left for Nancy. On the train, I mostly hid in the toilet since I very very badly needed to pump!!!! Oh... I was in so much pain!  I got to Nancy and walked from the station to my hotel and took in most of the historical sites... I got to the hotel room, and pumped again! Then I went back out and went on a millefeuilles hunt! And millefeuilles I found! OMG! So good! I scored the last millefeuilles at the Boulangerie next door! It was delicious! I also bought a Pâté de la Loraine. It was also very tasty. I then went around town buying more local products. I came back with a beer, a freshmilk goat cheese, a baguette, two pâté (boar and goose) and carambars!

Then I pumped again! Do you know how sad it makes me having to throw away all this wonderful milk... Overall it was a success... I will pump one more time before going to bed!

Senbazuru for Hudson : Part III

Going to Hiroshima was a very important part of the trip. If you have been fallowing this blog for a while, you will without any doubts be familiar with the senbazuru  and Sadako’s story. Well, it was finally time for us to put a happy ending to our story. On the afternoon of August 10, we made our way to Hiroshima memorial park with not 1000 paper cranes but a suitcase full with 2500 paper cranes! With us, we had the paper crane for the baby I miscarried, but we also had 500 papercranes from the Tsunami relief fund’s fundraiser my sister organise, and another 1000 papercranes made by Ayumi’s kouhei for a Kyudou tournament. 

As it was time to say goodbye to our birds, I found myself overwhelmed by the whole situation. In a way, I was overcome with happiness, as I watched Hudson ring the bell of the monuments. But part of me was also devastated by what we had been through. We took many, many pictures. As it was finally time to hang the birds, I was having a hard time not crying. Leaving the birds behind was like saying goodbye. It was the end of a nightmare.  It was the last step I needed to come to term with the loss. 

 




There are still 2000 papercranes remaining in Hudson’s room. They are HER cranes. I hope one day, when she is older, she will make that same trip and go hang her birds. Until then, we do intend on making 1000 more for each of our kids.

I also hope, that in the future, we can, as a family, make a 1000 birds a year for the monuments, starting on October 24^th of each year. 

 

Afterall, Hudson was born at 12:53pm on October 24^th or 12:53 am on October 25^th Japanese time. October 25^th… the same day Sadako died in a Hiroshima hospital.

Please take a minute and watch this video.

A sunny morning in Miyajima!

We got up early on the morning of August 10 and took the shinkansen for Hiroshima. Upon arriving, we made our way to Miyajima first and for the first time ever, I was able to enjoy the sight, under a bright blue sky. No torrential rain, no mudslide… beautiful sunshine! We walked around for a bit and took lots of pictures. In front of the giant floating Tori, as we were taking pictures, we ran into a bunch of deer. (Yes deer just run amongst the tourists there).  What we were not expecting, was that Tristan was going to get attack by one of them… so let’s back track…

Early that morning, we got up and had breakfast (salmon, rice, miso soup)… but we were running a bit late and feared we might end up missing our train (and we did), so since Hudson was not done eating, I quickly wrapped a piece of the fish and threw it in Tristan’s pocket (without him even noticing).

Coincidentally, Tristan but both of our Japan rail pass in that same pocket and we made our way to the train station.

Fast forward back to Miyajima… The deer must have smelled the fish and dove into that pocket. I watched in horror, as the deer took a strong hold of our japan rail pass. Carrying Hudson in my Boba, I pounced on the deer and started pulling on the pass trying to get it out of its mouth. At the same time, a Chinese family from Minnesota (who were kind enough to take family pictures of us earlier) started trying to distract the deer away from the pass while two Japanese young man hold on to the back of the deer so it couldn’t take us in the mountain. A very awkward sight! Let me tell you! Tristan was just frozen there in complete surprise! He was still holding his camera and just could not even understand what had just happened! Then it struck him, if the deer suddenly let go of the pass, it could easily be flung by mistake in the ocean…  but before the deer could do anything, I finally got the pass back! What a relief!

After that incident, it was discovered that the fish was still in his pocket. We quickly got rid of it and went on visiting. We finished our morning, sitting around an okonomiyaki grill as we enjoyed a Hiroshima-fu oyster okonomiyaki!

Time to go again!

I am not done yet posting about our trip to Japan! And here I am, getting ready to take off again! This time, I am going on my own. To France. For 2 days! Yes... that's right... Back and forth! Last plane going, first plane back! I am going to Nancy, to participate in a conference in french literature. The last time I went to Nancy, I was 8 years old. It was July 14th and I had my first glass of champagne to celebrate "la prise de la bastille". It's funny. This is one of the rare day I actually remember from that trip... years ago! I remember, it was late at night and we stayed up to watch the fireworks! 

This time, there will be no time to visit or enjoy the sights! I will, however, make sure to wine and dine well ;-) After all, there will be no baby for me to breastfed!

Talking about baby.... this will be the hardest part of all! It will be my first time away from her! Even when I was sick in the hospital, back in the Philippines, I got to see her every day. This time, I will have to go 3 days without my little Tuna. Poor thing..... but I know daddy will take good care of her ;-)

So! France! Here I come! Tomorrow at this time, I will be on a plane... now I better get packing!

FTO Osaka

During all of my pregnancy, I kept telling my baby! You have to come out strong and healthy! So I can show you Osaka. Well! We did! Sadly enough, Osaka has changed. It has changed a lot. It is no where near are Funky as it use to be. It made me sad. But what made me even sadder was the fact that Hudson slept most of the time and Tristan was totally not impress by MY favorite city in the whole world. But that being said, we still managed to have an amazing time!!







We had Takoyaki at Tsutenkaku Tower!

We had Okonomiyaki in Dotombori!

And we did lot's of sightseeing! We mad-dashed Osaka in two days! We saw and we did everything the city had to offer!

MATSURI!!!! Washoi! WASHOI!!!!

I could write about the two festivals we attended in Japan on august 4 and 5 (Sosa, and Tanabata in Asahi) but it just would be too hard to explain the sight and sound. So here it is instead! Enjoy!

 


In Sosa, Chiba! Hudson's very first Matsuri!

Oh Japan! How I missed thee!

It felt great to be back! Oh Japan! How I missed thee! It all started with a great flight with JAL. We got picked up at the airport by our host and headed out for the small town of Sosa.

Unfortunately by then, Hudson was exhausted and decided it would be appropriate to scream at the top of her lung for the whole 35 minutes it took to make it to our host's house. Tristan did his best to keep her occupy while I apologized non-stop in broken Japanese. Talk about a good first impression. lol But lucky for us, they did not seem to mind at all. We arrived at Ayumi's house, and I was so glad to find it just as it was when I left 2 years ago. I was so happy to see everyone! The greetings were short and after a delicious meal, we all headed out to bed.

The next morning, we all went to visit the Kyudo dojo with Ayumi and her grand-father. Tristan tried his hands at Japanese archery while Hudson watched very attentively. We then made our way to Shimamura! We shopped A LOT! We bought jimbei for the matsuri and a lot of cool Japanese houseware.

For lunch, we traveled to the next village, Asahi, and went to my favorite sushi place! I ate more Maguro than I should and even Tristan was able to enjoy himself!

We ended the day with a trip to the local park with the coolest slide ever! It is so long! I would have just LOVED to ride it as a kid!

Tristan and Ayumi both went down in it. I did not... Hudson was in my arms... asleep....

Seriously! How cool is this! But beware!!! It really hurts your bum! And for anyone who would be interested! In Ibaraki prefecture, there is one even longer! As a matter of fact, it is the longest in Japan. I believe it is about 150 meter long!