One Year Anniversary & Visitors: Part 1

Today marks one year since I moved to Kyoto. I’ve had an amazing time here and feel that I’ve been very fortunate and blessed. Trying to encapsulate all my thoughts, feelings and reflections into a blog post is nigh on impossible to do. But now it is time for me to start thinking about what…

Spring and Strange Ice-cream

It seemed like winter would never end. But spring has started to show its face, with a variety of trees blossoming white and pink flowers. This is the first time I’ve been in Japan during the cherry blossom season. After I finished up at Sfera, I went exploring nearby. These trees line one side of…

Another Cafe and More Dogs

Yesterday I rambled on a little bit about peaks and valleys. Today’s peak is brought to you by an experience at another cafe. This cafe is on the first floor of the Sfera Building in Kyoto. Here’s what the building looks like from the outside. So it’s a little worn for wear now. This building…

A Cafe and Some Snacks

My weekend (Monday and Tuesday) was a series of peaks and valleys. It’s hard to explain exactly why, but one recent situation has come to an end and the knock-on effect from one door closing led me to accept that other situations here may be coming to a close too. Yet there are always more…

Winter is Going

Slowly but surely, winter is coming to a close in Kyoto. The thing is, I actually like the cold. Any being as hairy as I would have to at least be partial to the cold, because even with 0 or minus degrees centigrade temperatures, I still manage to find a way to sweat. The train…

Tired

I’m feeling quite fatigued today, even though I was responsible enough to go to bed at a reasonable time. That’s something that doesn’t make sense about getting older. You start to make these minor changes in the hope that you will, in fact, preserve energy or feel better than you would had you decided to…

Bacchus, Sumo and Time

This post is another one of those situations where time has just flown by and I can’t really account for it or recall why I hadn’t written anything earlier than this exact moment. At this exact moment, I’m training it to Osaka to watch 12 Years a Slave with a friend. Here’s a blow-by-blow account of…

Movies, Freestyle Rap and Shoe Theft

Movie talk! Thor: The Dark World This film felt like a relatively weak effort compared to what has come before it. There was still a number of elements about this film that were enjoyable, though. The action was decent enough and I liked that the kept the minor comedic elements that made the first film…

All The Things, All The Time

It’s kind of hard to put the last two weeks into words, but I’ll give it my darndest. I wrote an article you can read over at Taste of Cinema – 20 Great Asian Movies You Probably Haven’t Seen I’ve received a lot of good feedback on that piece. Now I need to find more…

Hello from a toilet, Nabe Season and Other Things

Lately I’ve had the pleasure of catching up with various friends during their various visits here. I’ve been very fortunate that schedules have matched up nicely enough to give me enough time to show them around Kyoto at various points.  It’s hard to know what to follow up an emotionally charged entry with. So I’ll…