Going to Tokyo during Golden Week

In Japan there is a holiday at the beginning of May called "Golden Week", which isn't necessarily a week long (mine was only four days), and during this holiday people take the time to travel and so did I!

Lucky for me I got a friend to go with me too =)

We went to a bunch of different places including Akihabara, Harajuku, Ginza, Kawagoe and Nagatoro in Saitama etc etc

This is from the first place we went to, the imperial palace.But it wasn't very interesting. It was more like a park than a palace.. =P

I think you can understand that this picture and all the others like it are from Akihabara, lol.

I first saw this ad online, and now I have seen it in real life. The boobs are not flat, but made to stand out from the billboard to look round..

I don't know who thought of this but it "proves" Japans weirdness. Miku: "Please spin it gently"

Found this full sized Miku as well, very cool!

Buildings in Akiba

Birdman is actually standing above the banner o.o

Hello.. Kitty.. ?

When walking around we accidentally ran into a Cinco De Mayo event in Yoyogi(?) Park. It was really fun!

On our second day we went on a boat ride in Kawagoe

After going to Kawagoe we went to Nagatoro to check out "Little Edo" which is supposed to look like a normal town from the Edo period. I found this a very nice place to visit!

They had a bunch of cute and weird animal statues in Nagatoro.

We went to a maid cafe xD it was weird but the food was cute

The last day we went to "Miraikan" (The future institute(?)) which I thought would be a really cool place because of it's name, but it was actually quite boring. But they had a special part you could pay extra to enter and that part was very cool!

This is not from the "special part" of the museum, but I thought it was cool anyway. It is a robot but looks just like a human.

Entering the special exibition! Full of colors and sounds and interactive art

This weird thing is from Harajuku, which is where we went last. Kinda sums up the feel of the place!

Pictures from Mount Koya

Excuse my bad camera, but here are some pictures on Mount Koya.

This mountain is a 2 hour trip by train (and cable car) away from Osaka. It holds a lot of temples and old style houses etc. I highly recommend anyone interested in traditional Japanese buildings and such to go visit.

For some reason at one place there were these things that didn't really quite fit in with the old style of the place. Turns out a bunch of companies had their fair share of statues here.

This one was a bit freaky..

Here are a bunch of statues that you are supposed to throw water on

I don't even know what this is but it's kinda cool

Studying manga in Japan - my lessons/classes

Hello! It's been a while now since I started school and even though I'm not used to things quite yet and haven't memorised the schedual etc yet, I thought I could tell you what kind of classes I have going through the week.

One class is 3 hours.

I have one class where we get to use the special pen you use a lot when you draw manga (you know, the one people used to use back in the old days). So far we have only been drawing different lines and stuff (because manga has a lot of lines, so called shuuchuusen etc.) and I am not really enjoying it.. I mean, it's difficult!

We also have a class in "basic drawing"(?) where we get to draw faces in different angles, and we will soon move on to hands, legs and full bodies etc. It's a fun class and I am really looking forward to what we are going to learn next because there are a lot of things I suck at.

Another class is "manga research" where the teacher goes through the history of manga etc. Sometimes it's interesting but sometimes not so much.

Probably my favourite class of all is where we get to use the computer to draw and color characters. That's the only class I would like to extend from 3 hours to double or more xD.

There is also a class called "illustration" but so far it's just coloring with watercolors, which is pretty fun but I think there will be a lot more than that to this class so I am looking forward to what's next.

Apart from that we have a class called "dessan" which google translate just translated as "drawing" >.<! But I think this is the class where you get something too look at, like a bowl of fruit, and you are supposed to draw it. We haven't gotten that far yet, though. Until now we've been drawing cubes and stuff..

Yet another class we have is "croquis" where we are supposed to look at something real, like a person, and draw it. Right now we are mostly drawing our own heads though.

Lastly, we have our "manga class" which has so far been 3 hours where we are supposed to draw our own manga (right now we have to do one of 16 pages). It is difficult for me because they haven't told us anything about how to go about it for an actual complete page with all the stages leading up to it. I hope it will come soon.

So there you have it, what I am learning studying manga. I know that since I am still a newbie at this school I can't tell you much but I hope this is good for now! 

Starting school

Finally started school. I was really looking forward to it before it happened but now I don't really know anymore. Nothing wrong with the school, ofc! And we've only had 2 normal days so far so we haven't really gotten into a lot yet.

Yet I already feel nervous! Why?

Well, I am not exactly good at talking to people, ya know? If you don't come up and talk to me I probably wont say a word. And even if you start talking to me and ask me questions I might not be able to ask you questions just yet.

I mean, it's fine when I have acutally become friends with someone, then I can talk all I want if I'd like to. But with someone I don't really know my head just goes blank. That's why I am already wondering if I will be able to make any friends or not.

Some people seem to already have hit it off with each other, while a few others, like me, are still lonely and quiet.

I really wish I could talk to people and be outgoing and stuff, but it aint that easy! I just have to wait and see if you can actually get friends by being super introvert and unable to start a conversation!

Another thing that's bothering me a little is that all the people whose drawings I've seen are super awesome and compared to them I can't draw anything. Of course it's great to be around people that can draw, because you get to see a lot of good drawings, but it also is kind of embarrassing for me who cannot draw. I see their drawings, then look at mine and just ask myself; "what am I doing here?!".

Beautiful park in Japan!

Tsurumiryokuchi park is a gigant park in Japan. Didn't get to see the whole thing but I will be back, probably with my family because I think they'd like to go too.

There were a lot of photographers there (which kinda was expected), but also a lot of cosplayers, which I didn't expect, but after seeing more and more of the park I understood why they gathered here. There are so many different settings and backgrounds so you can make it look like you are in Spain, Korea, Greece etc etc just by going to a single park!

The weather was warm, the sakura was in bloom, and it was a good day.

There were A LOT of cosplayers there

A little bit of Spain

Windmill

Owl cafe in Japan

Had planned to go to an owl cafe for quite some time but kept forgetting about it. Until one day when I was bored and decided to look it up again and it turned out there was one only a 4 minute walk from my apartment.

Some were really tiny and some quite big, and they were all awesome. Actually liked it better than I thought I would and I think most people would like coming here. Though, the drinks were aweful.

Cost: 1000 yen (but I think they have now increased it to 1500 yen) + not very tasty drink.

Hairy feet =)

xD