~ nejibe ~

kaijie was in town recently for work. so took the opportunity to bring him to eat one of my fav restaurants in town "nejibe". has one of the best bbq chicken wings. see diagram below for the correct way to eat their chicken wings. yummy. they just launched their curry flavored chicken wings too..must go back soon again.

~ a-ya dance festival ~

was invited by my korean friend to attend this ~aya dance festival ~ held in Koenji. according to the japanese friends we met there, this is one of the biggest dance festival in tokyo and it is very well-known among the japanese. why havent i heard of this the whole time i was in japan in the past?? anyway it was great. very colorful. the dance got a little boring mid-way thro because the dance moves were similar (for a whole 2 hr). it didnt help that it was also raining. later that evening, we were brought to a very japanese restaurant to eat okonomiyaki. yummy. i didnt take any pics though..

Archery @ Komazawa Olympic Park

while i was walking cooper @ komazawa olympic park on sunday evening, i stumbled upon this really old looking stadium. when i walked in, there was, i think, a inter-varsity archery competition. unfortunately, an old lady came up to me and said that i was not allowed to hang around. she was probably afraid that i would steal stuffs. i left quickly after and continued walking around the huge park. not exactly a spectacular park but quite a relaxing place on sunday evenings.

~ gintako ~

went to the hot spring theme park @ tokyo dome ~ La Qua~. totally a great place to go to on a weekend. too bad i dont have any pic since pictures are not allowed here. will explain more in the future when i get some pictures related to the hot spring. after a 4 hr session at the hot spring, i was hungry and had (i) ramen (ko men), followed by takoyaki (gintako)..what a way to spend my saturday.

ugly dog

i havent seen such a ugly dog before. how could anyone love him? took this pic when i brought cooper to komazawa park..

chashu (roast pork) ramen

went with colleague to try out this ramen store which was featured on TV the day before. the chashu ramen was supposed to be good. well the verdict: so-so lah. no doubt the chashu was good, but the noodles and soup was only ok. over-rated. and definitely not worth the queue. i don't believe that people would actually queue up for this noodle. nor surprisingly, i did not take note of this shop's name. but i discovered a new area (asagaya) for further exploration in the future.

~azabu juban matsuri ~

summer festival right at my doorstep. the azabu juban matsuri. it was packed. didnt expect it to be so. tot there were too many of such festivals in japan that japanese would not bother to come all the way to a friendly neighbourshop festival. i was wrong, big time. went with my japanese colleague. it was fun, we had overpriced chinese dim sum takeaway, and of course i had beer. rare occasion that i cant have beer "cos i drive" since the festival is just 1 min away from my apartment. and of course, cooper could participate too!!