A little something.. From Claire: 12th to 14th Feb 2008: Days to a lonely Valentine

Thursday 14 February 2008

12th to 14th Feb 2008: Days to a lonely Valentine

12th Feb 2008: Akiko's return from Fukuyama

Akiko went to Fukuyama for the weekend. And she bought me this cute omiyage.. Its actually this sweet mochi, individually wrapped. You see that big round face on that card? Its about this boy called kibidanko. He gathered a dog, a bird, a pig and a friend? and they killed some monster.. The End. Well, its a much longer story, but i just shortened it. But Akiko was so sweet to buy me and Choon Fei each one omiyage. And mind you these things are expensive! So I shared my cream puff from Maison Rabelais with her. You can see the rejected macarons i brought back. Rasberry and lemon flavour! There were quiche too!

13th Jan 2008: Snow in Hiroshima

I woke up to find the playground near my apartment covered in snow. Apparently in snowed the night before and we found many parts of Hiroshima blanketed with snow.

The bottom six pictures show the Genbaku Dome which is also known as the Atomic Bomb. This building was preserved to remind the Japanese the pain of using the first nuclear weapon in the world and how important peace was. This building was one of the rare buildings dat remain standing after the A bomb was dropped in Hiroshima, just a few km in the air away from the Genbaku Dome.

And dearest sweet Akiko asked me out for Lunch!!! She brought me to this really nice Irish bar. And no, I have yet to like beer. I'm holding a pen holder. :P AND YES!! AKIKO-CHAN TREATED ME AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was served cheese and potato chicken gratin. It was so good!!! The cheese was fantastically good.. I love cheese!!! :D

14th February: Valentine's Day in Japan

Valentine's Day is quite a big thing in Japan. Its mainly about getting chocolate for the person you like or you could just give any guy. And if the guy likes you in return, they would give you something on White Day, March 14th. But usually you would get Ogiri chocolate, also known as obligation chocolate. Its just a little something they buy to return your kindness, since the Japanese culture is alot about givin and receiving. I spent quite sometime helping out at Maison Rabelais preparing for V-day. So I managed to get a Chocolate coated Baum in a nice orange box for Akiko-chan. Sorry.. No photos.. :P But I got a box of chocolate from Akiko-chan too!!! This was one of the best chocolate.. Its Nougative Lait. Really good!!

I didn't join the Fordwalker during Lunchtime today. Instead, I pulled Choon along to check out the Valentine's day products. But i thought these cakes and tarts look tastier than chocolates, maybe because of their colours. But some of them are plastic. Could you tell?

The bottom left two pictures are bread from Anderson. We ran into Kiyori-san, top right in the photo below. She treated me and Choon Fei each to a bread. I got myself an apple pie bread. It was really good! its 189 yen.. Choon Fei got the strawberry tart which was like 289 yen.. Kinda ex right? But Anderon bread is really good!!