Winter Holiday in Tohoku Region - 30th Dec 2011 (Morioka盛岡)

Woke up early for apple onsen. After that, had to give up breakfast from the hotel because we needed to catch a 6.57am bus to Morioka 盛岡. The snow was so heavy and we were worried that the bus would be cancelled. What a relief when we saw that bus. I slept all the way until Morioka because I woke up too early and the scene from the bus window was nothing actually, just white snow. One of the specialty of Morioka is Wanko Soba. Since our appointment was on 11am, and there was no any tourist spots near the Morioka Station, we just loitered around the station. The snow was soft. However, the wind was so strong, and the only feeling I felt was 'so freezing cold'!

around Morioka Station 盛岡駅の近く

Around Kumamoto City in One Day 31/03/2012

My welcome passport (given after register to the city council) for the Kumamoto City attractions was expiring. So, I decided to wake up one Saturday morning (the last day of the pass) to go to all these places. Coincidently, the one day pass I bought expiry date was that day.

One day Pass for Kumamoto City Tram and  Bus

Welcome Passport (Kumamoto)

 Kengunmachi 健軍町

the final stop for the city tram

Winter Holiday in Tohoku Region - 29th Dec 2011 (Aomori青森)

From 29th Dec 2011 to 4th Jan 2012 were the winter holiday for our company. Since this was the first winter for me, I joint my colleagues to Tohoku region (Aomori 青森, Morioka 盛岡, Tazawako 田沢湖, Yamagata山形) for holiday. This was a snowboarding and onsen trip. Everything was so expensive even for the budget airline tickets because this was the peak season.

I think this was funny, the snow just coagulated inside the basket.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

This was the book that I have been yearning for some time. Before this, I don't even know Neil Gaiman. After I knew of this book existence from a newspaper column, I tried to find this book in the book stores around Kuala Lumpur, however I could not find it. One thing about book stores in Malaysia was that they just keep the best sellers. Some lesser known or specific titles are hard to find. Unlike in Japan, the books were of huge variety. Anyway, at the end, I bought this book from Amazon Japan. There were 2 kinds of cover, actually I spent a great deal of time deciding which one to buy. Then, I decided to buy the darker tone version. 

The Graveyard Book

The title itself could attract one's attention. A boy raised by residents of graveyard after his parents and a sister were killed by a killer named Jack. After the folks of the graveyard decided to keep him, they argued about his name, then 'nobody' popped out and he was named as 'Nobody Owens'. His adopted parents were Mr. and Mrs. Owens. All called the boy 'BOD', short for nobody. And he had a god father, named Silas, a figure neither human or ghost who secured him all the necessary items needed for a human survival.

Cook "Chilli Prawn"

7th February 2012

I saw some Indonesian prawns selling at around 200 yen per pack at the supermarket yesterday. It have been a while since I last eat spicy prawn, so I bought it. The head have been removed, but I still think that with the shell, it would be a mess while eating, so I removed all the shell before I cook it.

the sauces!

Another reason was that my Thai Chilli Sauce was going to expire soon. So, I decided to cook "chilli prawn". I on-lined to find a recipe, and chose the easiest one, just fried all the spice first, then cooked with the prawn. 

I had carrot, tomato, onion, cili padi, I cut all of that into all slices, then added the "Thai Chilli Sauce", hot sauce and pasta sauce, then water. I just boiled everything up, I added too much water. After boiled, I added the prawns and bring to boil. Hahaha, talking about cooking skill!

just boiled up everything!

and add everything on top of the rice, ready to be eaten!

My "Chilli prawn" was quite spicy. I ate the cili padi's seed accidentally, and although the room temperature was quite low, I felt very hot! However, I did not manage to finish up my "Thai Chilli Sauce", need to find another to thing to cook to finish it.