End of Year Parties

The Japanese tradition of the End of Year Party (忘年会) is held throughout December. My lab's one was a couple of days ago, and I forgot to bring my camera - so just a couple of not-very-good shots from my phone camera.

Some old student or something, he was more than a little drunk, and was playing a recorder. I dont know why he had one.

LOTS of food. :D :D :D

interesting india pics 2

Indians, kings of overloading.


Highly INflamable?


Shoes anyone?


Trinklets anyone?


Authentic Rajahstani food


Breakfast of this flour dough coated in syrup. Super addictive.


Move overloading.


Camels walking on the 'highway'


At the Taj again


at some fort, intricately carved stone from sandstone.

India 1

Shan't bore you all with the conference details...hehe... go stright to the sightseeing!
The pictures are in no order. Dont know how this server upload them so messy. After the conference was over, I went to all these places with a few friends from KL who were at the same conference. Hired a van to bring us to the different places.


Agra fort


Hawa Mahal "Wind Palace". For 'atas' women to look down at the bazaar below.


Fatehpuri Sikri in Agra. There is a mosque inside, a palace for the queen and some meeting halls. Oh, also got a tomb but I dont remember who.


Red Fort New Delhi. Administrative center of the Mughals.


Some tomb at the Lodi Gardens.


Taj Mahal in Agra. Tomb of Shah Jahan's wife. He's the 5th ruler.


Srikanda in Agra, also a tomb; of Akbar the 3rd Mughal ruler. Built by his son the 4th ruler.


Delhi Gate. To remember those who died for India's independence

Mr.J's chocolates

A package, and its still weeks from Christmas!


Ho Ho Ho!


Chocolate with liquor dripping from the inside. Yummy.


60% of cocoa. The pink strawberry one was nicer. And the cacao 72% was nicer than the 86% one. But any chocolate anyday is good :p

Back

I'm back and trying to reorganize my life to start work on Monday (tomorrow!). This is what you get when you are on leave for 3 weeks. Let me try to organize my 3Gb of pics, then I'll start posting. Thanks for waiting.

Hiking

Took a bit of a trek up that Daimonji hill to the clearing where they have the big Chinese character (大). Trail was quite quiet with hardly anyone around, but everyone I met had a big greeting.

Final stretch up to the clearing

View from the top, autumn leaves with the city in backdrop

Part of the "大" word.

Central Kyoto

Northern bit of the city

Looks so pro, this shot.

Labor Thanksgiving Day

Holiday today, so cleaned up the cave and went for a walk. Lots of people around since my place is a tourist spot, but stuck to the quieter areas. Saw a brown praying mantis stumbling around a bit. He must have been cold too.

Gate to someone's house. The Matsui residence.

Red, green-yellow and orange Japanese maples. The small dark entrance is the start of a forest trekking trail. I went in for a bit, but it's supposed to be a 3 hour affair so will do it next time.

The trail would bring me right to the border of the next prefecture (Shiga). The board gives information on the wildlife (birds and animals) that you might see on the trek. There are apparently deer, racoons, and wild boar. Lucky no bears since I live next to the forest.

Insomnia

Rained last night.

First light over Daimonji mountain.

After the shops open, this road will be really filled with tourists later in the day.

Noisy bird.

Cold.

Camera skills not enough to get the real colour. Its much redder and more vivid.

Red maples.

Dinner at Kiteya

This is becoming one of my favourite shops, just a tad pricey. It's a shop specializing in chicken (you hear this TTTT???), they get free-range chicken deliveries daily. It's so fresh they have chicken tataki, where they lightly grill the outside of some chicken and the inside is basically raw. I tried it once, it's not bad but not something I can bring myself to eat often. Their karaage (fried chicken) is amazing.

"Free" starter, sometimes it's egg salad, sometimes homemade kimchi, today it was mushroom and togarashi (non-spicy pepper) thing. Very yummy.

Minced chicken with cheese.

Kiteya don - shop speciality of grilled chicken topped with rice and Kyoto pickles.

Radish salad.

Grilled Shiitake mushrooms

Random!

Christmas tree in Kobe. Cruise ship in the background hosting a wedding. $$$$!


















Blurry pic of a chef slicing up some Kobe beef. Also atas.



















Another ship in the harbour shot - got a lot of these lah.


















Kobe tower with some boat thing. Cloudy day.


















Sculpture with church bells inside the holes.


















The entrance of my apartment! My cave is further back though, so can't see it here. This one not atas.


















Autumn sunset






















Powerful beam of light shot into the sky as part of autumn festivals. It looks ghostly here but is extremely bright and lights up the clouds.


















Spirited Away.

















And because it is me, the mandatory food shot - mushroom garlic butter rice cooked in stone pot, so its crispy at the bottom like claypot rice.