- My pupils can be great sometimes - a girl suddenly blew soap bubbles in class and a boy gave me chocolate on HIS birthday. Can't complain.
- Petting the tiny dog in front of the supermarket.
- Going out with Susi, Eva and Claudia. Four tequila shots with Susi, my first time at Nachtgalerie, cheap Zombies, awesome 90s music, dancing and making out with a 22-year-old in a striped shirt at 4am. Taking a photo of the sunrise.
- The moment right before kissing someone for the first time.
- Whenever I wear my pink t-shirt to a party I always end up making out with someone. Lucky charm!
- Spontaneously walking into a hair salon and talking about getting extensions with the hair stylist.
- After-swim-playtime in the kiddie pool with Claudia.
- By the way, one thing I admire about her is that she is backing herself all the way. She does what she wants and if someone else has something against it she won't have it. I mean, that kind of behaviour causes some problems, too, but I could really learn from that... #insecure
- Spending an afternoon with Kilian and Ashley at the Japanese spring festival in Augsburg's botanical garden. Calligraphy, cosplayers, ice-cream, beautiful flowers and summer weather.
- Another trip to IKEA on Friday and spending the weekend painting Claudia's balcony with nerdy TV show quotes and laying out garden tiles. She has a great view over Munich and the Alps from her balcony!
- Vietnamese food at Vietha.
- I got a soap bubble laser sword!
- Planting different kinds of tomatoes and an eggplant on my balcony.
- A chat with the neighbours.
- Apparently dragonflies like my new plants as well - one paid me a visit the other day!
- Tonsilitis sucks but being at home on weekday morning lets me get so much stuff done! Yes!
- Surrendering to the SUN BED. It's ugly, it's too big, I thought I'd hate it but nope, I can't believe how relaxed I felt lying on my balcony in the bright sunshine. This is gonna be my spot this summer. Cold drink, a book, nothing more.
- Dinner at Charlie with the Educational Lady Warriors.
- Pink shoes, pink lips, heavily lined cat eyes. 60's? Meow!
- The right thing to do
- Glass jars with a handle, a lid and a straw. Perfect for cold drinks as well as tea.
- Getting a visit from Becky! She didn't only bring stuff from work but she also got me a sunflower, a princess bag and "unicorn farts"! If it was always like that I might consider getting sick more often.
- Living in a semi-clean apartment again.
- Getting some work done outside on the balcony. So much nicer!
- The Boomerang app - such fun!
- Alnatura Lemon Poppy Seed chocolate. It tastes exactly like the Rose Bakery lemon cake I love making (and need to bake again ASAP).
- After not hearing from each other for about three months Moni told me today that she was pregnant!!! Wow, big news. She's the first of my friends to become pregnant, I'm kinda excited. Auntie Kathi... I hope it's a girl. I'm gonna glitterbake and unicorncraft and storypaint everything with the little one. I'm pretty good with kids (as long as I can hand them over to their parents after a few hours).
- ALSO we are planning on spending almost two weeks together in August! I'm either going to visit her or we're going on a roadtrip together. Pregnant lady on a road trip? Eh, well, more drinks for me.
- DRILLING HOLES. After waiting half a year for Frank to do it (because he promised) I simply borrowed my neighbour's tools and installed my lamp all by myself. And because I already had the drill I made some more holes for a fruit basket and a flower pot. Who needs men? Ladies, I highly recommend relying on yourself for the most part...
- This video about one of Picasso's paintings reminds me so much of the Picasso museum in Antibes and my summers at the Mediterranean.
- Watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer #6.07 Once More, with Feeling with Claudia (and knowing all the lyrics by heart even though the episode is 15 years old).
- Receiving handwritten "get well soon" cards from my pupils.
- Waiting in line for what seemed like an eternity at the Finnair check-in counter. Talking to a headmaster from Günzburg behind me. He was headed to a school meeting in Helsinki and on the plane I met my headmistress from last year, going there as well - so I introduced them to each other. Coincidences, eh.
- Getting two seats all for myself during the flight from Helsinki to Tokio.
- Goldfish in an outdoor aquarium on the street. Welcome to Japan.
- The fact that people create their own little gardens by filling up every little surface with flower pots in front of their entrance doors (most people don't have actual gardens because everything is so small and tight when it comes to living space in Tokyo).
- Diamond-shaped street signs on the roads.
- Cantaloupe Melon frappé. Matcha frappé (optional: with cream and brownie pieces). Strawberry frappés.
- More food: Ippudo ramen, everything I ate in Nagasaki (incredibly tender gyozas, the best sushi in town, steamy dumplings, soft cheeseburgers with shiso leaves and lemon ramen), matcha ice-cream and sweets (they even have matcha KitKat and Oreos), the traditional Japanese dinner and breakfast in Hakone, umeboshi crisps, onigiri, salted litchi drinks and fizzy litchi lemonade, melon and black sesame ice-cream, avocado burgers and truffle fries, crackly birthday cake ice cream (...)
- The convenience stores at every corner (selling 100yen onigiri, the perfect snack in my opinion).
- Making selfies and little videos at Shibuya crossing.
- Lexi's photo lovestory with the drink vending machines (they're everywhere).
- My fabulous birthday in Tokyo: Lexi and Lena made breakfast for me (complete with onigiri, matcha cream cake and Zootopia-themed mini donuts) and then I decided what I wanted to do: KiddyLand! We spent about three hours in this crazy toy store. They play Beatles music all day and you think you're about to go insane every two minutes because Japanese toys are mindblowing (also: kawaii attack!). Architectural models, tiny Lego-kits, kittens with funnels (and sushi cats), Studio Ghibli EVERYTHING, tiny chicks in a basket, Gelli Baff (turns your bath water into a swamp), very realistic Star Wars figures, Sailor Moon lashes, capsule toys (...) Then we went to a cat café in Ikebukuro. It was a little weird (of course, it's Japan and it's a CAT CAFÉ...) - everyone sat around on the floor taking pictures of the cats until an employee tried to tell us that it was one of the cat's (Satsuki's) birthday (mine, too!!!) and they were having a party for her. So they held her, made a circle around her, sang a song and she even got a new bed and a lot of presents. Oh my god. My favourite was the black and white baby kitten, although I had to play with it while it was still in its cage. Afterwards we had some sushi and while we were eating the booth suddenly started to shake and an alarm went off. We didn't realise what it was at first but then the Japanese guys in front of us jumped up - my first earthquake!! It was over after a few seconds though and nothing happened. Phew. Next: SEGA arcade. I tried to win a Pikachu with an ufo catcher but no luck, of course. Then stayed on the purikura machine floor until midnight. I'm seriously addicted, taking purikura photos (and decorating them) is hilarious. I wish we had one of those in Munich. Afterwards we went into a bar and sang karaoke under a chandelier (first song choice: SIA's Chandelier, obviously) until 3 or 4am. There's no metro service in Tokyo until 5am so we went to a 24h ramen place for some noodle soup and got breakfast at a supermarket. Thanks to the time difference we weren't even THAT tired when we got back to the apartment in the early morning. What an awesome day.
- Moving shadow plays at the Watari art museum.
- Taking a walk through the outskirt of the Harajuku neighbourhood (hipster stores in a residential area - perfect).
- Handing in an ironic Dear Santa, wishlist at the Meiji shrine.
- Watching the sunset from one of the largest skyscrapers in town. You could even make out Mount Fuji from the distance.
- Walking through the Gion neighbourhood in Kyoto (and following a genuine Geisha).
- More (fake) geishas (in rental kimonos) at the Kiyomizu temple in Kyoto. Also: watching school classes having their portrait taken. Very efficient, those Japanese.
- I loved the trees everywhere with what looked like star-shaped acorn leaves. So pretty. And the Japanese's obsession with Hydrangeas.
- Going to Nagasaki on my own. 5 hours on the Shinkansen. Could be worse. I read Ready Player One all the time (I actually read the whole book during my trip to Japan and I'm a huge fan. Well done, Mr Cline). I met Fabi (who worked at the hospital there) at the train station and we had Japanese craft beer at the port. Then we started our little (delicious) food tour and had drinks (Shochu!) at the standing bar where we met some internationals (Mel from London, a very gay dude from New Zealand with a golden backpack and very white shorts and some others) and went to Nagasaki's only night club. The next morning, we had soy latte at Fabi's favourite coffee shop (coldbrew it the thing, you know) and met some of his colleagues for lemon ramen and a quick tour around the city. I even managed to find some free Japanese records and Nagasaki's "cat demon".
- Our tiny balcony in the Shinkuku apartment. Smoking a menthol cigarette late at night, watching the lights in the skyscrapers go out.
- That night at the hotel in Hakone: wearing yukatas, having a long geisha-style selfie session, then seeing each other naked for the first time and climbing into the onsen / hot bath together. Taking it one step further and getting some whiskey drinks from the vending machine. Drinking them in the onsen like a boss. Taking photos of Lexi's mermaiding.
- The fact that Japanese gully covers usually have flowers on them. Colourful flowers. They're everywhere.
- Taking the ropeway near lake Ashi. A little boat tour (unfortunately not the pink swan boats), eating ice-cream, seeing a whole field with tiny wild strawberries. Oh, and riding a panda.
- Uniqlo. What a great store. If the only had a more generous sizing policy... ahem.
- Visiting the owl café on my own. Chatting with the employée, taking pictures with the birds. FLUFFY. Ah. I kinda liked them even more than the cats.
- Tokyu Hands is the best store ever. They're all about "creative living" and I made me spend a fortune on art and office supplies, stickers, a bike chain, a pink backpack, kitchen tools, cosmetics and so on. I loved all of the things I bought in Tokyo. And it's so crazy to have a look at all of the products, you could spend hours just walking through that store.
- Some heavy flirting with a German was in Tokyo at the same time as me. Too bad it never worked out.
- Singing at Karaoke Kan, the same karaoke tower that featured in Lost in Translation. Bright lights, an amazing view of Shinjuku - I loved it.
- Japanese children. Sorry, but Japanese mothers really invented the definition of cute. And the clothes they're wearing aren't helping either.
- Also: Sandra's Tokyo guide / and Jayne Wayne's guide, too - for the foodies.
- Meeting Nightwish at Helsinki airport - they flew to Munich with us because they played at Rockavaria the next day.
- When I came home from the airport, I found a bouquet of pink flowers on my kitchen table as well as a card with a unicorn print. It said: Sharpen your claws / Wrinkle your nose / Stretch your paws / Peel your eyes / You'll need all of those / for the unicorn prize. There was also a (pretty obvious) drawing of a little streetmap and in the fridge I found cheese, bread and Milchschnitte. So I went to the secret place on Friday and Claudia, Frank and Fabi were waiting for me with a pink pony mask and the Unicorn Challege! I got a piece of paper with nine random song lyric lines as hints and I had to hunt down my presents. It was so nice. I got a lot of fun stuff like yoyos, glitter stickers, gin from Munich, a Fear Street book, fizzy strawberry lollies, water bombs (...) and Frank even remembered to get me a plum coloured bed sheet. Awesome. We spent the whole night at the kitchen table, Claudia got really drunk fell asleep. So I snuggled up with Frank and we fell asleep holding hands again, talking. His hair smells so good.
- Doughey, wheaty, soft wraps from the Turkish market. Bought on a busy Saturday afternoon along with some eggplants and coriander.
- My brother recorded a Japan-inspired happy birthday song for me!!
- A very English birthday present from Becky: a Cath Kidston hand cream set and a huge Cadbury chocolate bar.
- The first elegant red poppy flower on the balcony. Such a pretty colour.
- Ripe Cantaloupe melon.
may 3 2016 ∞
jun 14 2016 +