All Souls' Day

Taking a moment to remember and say a little prayer for our departed loved ones.

Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon them. May they rest in peace. Amen.

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insect bites

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One thing I do not like about summer: all the bugs and creepy crawlies which start coming out! >:(

An insect (mosquito?) feasted on my wrist just recently, while I was having my afternoon nap, and left a constellation of bites. They're really itchy! Haay!

Anyway, I'm just thankful that I'm in Manila now and do not have to deal with irritating cicadas or cockroaches while alone in the apartment in Japan. Hope the husband doesn't have to deal with so much of the summer pests over there this year though. :D

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FreeCell update! Finished game 787 today. :)

wind engineering

Sometime late last year, I got to visit the wind engineering laboratory in my husband's school. Ronjie toured me around the lab, showed me his experiment model (not posting photos of it here, though - sikreto pa muna yon - until Ronjie's dissertation is published) and explained the functions of the various testing machines, etc. It was a different, cool experience!

My husband is studying wind engineering, the structural field of wind engineering. To explain more about wind engineering, I was supposed to link you to this article in Malaya (a local newspaper) where a representative of RWDI (the top wind engineering firm in the world) was interviewed, but when I checked the link, I found it inaccessible. :( Should have saved a screenshot of the page or should not have procrastinated in writing this entry. (Almost a year! Hehe.) Still, here's the link to the Malaya article:  http://www.malaya.com.ph/aug26/envi1.html - I hope it goes up again soon.

To make up for the lost link, here's another link instead... to my husband's blog post (which was also my source of the Malaya article), where he has a short introduction to wind engineering and where he also writes about its importance and relevance in the Philippine setting. Check it out, here!

Oh, and enjoy the photos! :)

one end of a small wind tunnel

the other end of the wind tunnel

a small wind tunnel

earthquake simulator?

tornado simulator

Cool stuff, huh?

By the way, it's my husband's birthday today, June 20. Happy birthday, dear! :) I'm so proud of you. :)

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Unlike Calvin, our son is lucky - his dad knows how to correctly answer the load limit determination query. :D

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I wonder what crazy ideas our son will have. :)

back in Atsugi

I'm back in Japan! Got back last week and I'm still trying to get used to the much colder weather over here.

I took the Cathay Pacific flight from Manila to Haneda (layover in Hong Kong for an hour or two). Was lucky enough to get upgraded to business class for the MNL-HKG leg. (Thank you, Cathay Pacific!) Whee! I've always flown economy class; this was my first time to fly business class. Loved the service and extra legroom! :)

CX900 - MNL-HKG

Ronjie and I walked around downtown last weekend. Brrrr! It's really cold here! Single digit temperature most days; I usually wear 4 layers of clothes. (Missing Manila already!) The weather is good for sleeping in and staying at home. Not many people on the streets these days.

This is the now-leafless batibot tree in Cheerful Park. Looks kinda gloomy without any green.

Sidewalk flowers! These look like cabbages. (I wonder that they are.) I'm also starting to see pansies all over the place again. :) Photos of those in upcoming blog posts.

Woke up late last Saturday (plus, I forgot to set the alarm) so I missed Nihongo class. :D I'm blaming the weather. Sarap matulog! At nakakatamad lumabas ng bahay. This Saturday, papasok na talaga ako. And I'll tell you about it. :) Hope I didn't miss much.

A few more weeks of winter to go! Already looking forward to spring!

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Bousai no Oka Park

Last Sunday, we biked to nearby (30 minutes) Bousai no Oka Park for 11:00am mass with other church community members from our neighboring Kanagawa parishes. The mass was concelebrated by 6 priests (or 8?) from the Atsugi, Yamato, etc. churches.

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Glee and more

Prior to coming to Japan, I had not seen a single episode of 'Glee' (except for a few minutes of Season 2's 1st episode, where Charice debuted, just because a clip of it was shown the the local evening news). Now I'm hooked! Season 3 starts in a couple of months. Looking forward to that! :)

Since coming here, watching videos has been one of my pastimes (along with reading the newspaper, online window-shopping, and origami, among others). Our next order from Amazon will include books (I miss old-fashioned reading) as the bookstores here (the ones I've been to) don't carry English ones.

Leaving you with the other day's Calvin and Hobbes strip:

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Have a good Friday!

P.S. I hear there's a typhoon in Metro Manila now. Praying that the rains stop already and that the situation doesn't reach Ondoy level. I hope everyone's dry and safe there.

Happy Birthday, Ronjie! ♥

Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you!
Happy birthdaay, happy biirthdaaay,
haappy biiirthdaaaay tooo yoouuu! 

you can have your cake and eat it too

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Happy birthday, love! :-*

Japan, Day 2

(May 14)

Started the day with Nihongo class at 9:30am. It's nice that the city offers free classes. I took the bus to class downtown and was back in the apartment by lunchtime.

a neighbor's house has dolls by the window :)

a happy sight as I walked past it on my way to the bus stop

after lunch I hung out in the student lounge at Ronjie's school

I got to nap a bit and awoke to music - there was an ongoing jazz session thing

cool!

I spent the rest of the afternoon in Ronjie's old apartment. Caught some pretty wildflowers (weeds?) while walking in the neighborhood.

By around 5, Ronjie passed for me - we biked to a nearby techie mall (a couple of his colleagues accompanied us) to apply for internet connection for our apartment. That took about an hour and a half, by the time we were done, we were all dinner-hungry. We biked around and decided to eat at a shabu-shabu eat-all-you-can (JPY2,000 for 90 minutes). I ordered a la carte and had tempura and some noodles. For dessert I had this:

plain ice cream with green tea mousse and black jelly

it also came with molasses (?) which could be drizzled over the ice cream

The bike ride home was a bit tiring. The route was uphill and it was really cold already then; I also wasn't really comfortable with the borrowed bike I was using. Pero, kayang-kaya. Will be getting my own bike soon. It was a good day. :)

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Calvin and Hobbes for today:

April 7

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How are you feeling today? Ngiti naman dyan!

How are you feeling today?

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Ronjie and I have enjoyed this video^ thoroughly. (Subukan niyo siya gayahin while on a Skype-date... HAHAHA!) Super funny - mega-laughter talaga EVERY TIME we watch it, walang kasawa-sawa! This komikero guy is the best!

looking forward to Tuesday!

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silvanas and ice cream

My sister went diving in Dumaguete and brought home pasalubong! :)

YUM. :9

silvanas from Sans Rival Cakes & Pastries - thanks, Mela! =)

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:D

Happy birthday, Kendy! :)