Karaoke, Rehearsal, and Swing Dancing - Dancing and Singing all Day!

Saturday, October 14

After I finished work on Saturday night, my husband came to meet me, and went to karaoke after a longish time of not going. You can set it up where it rates how well you do a song and gives you a percentage, along with showing your previous percentage to compare (if you have an account login). I often get 90 and up, never 100 because it's pretty strict, particularly DAM. Anyway, all of my songs were worse than last time and it bothered me! Singing is one of the only things I truly feel confident that I am good at, but I just wasn't that night. So instead of revisiting old favorites, I tried to learn a new song and technique, a Japanese enka song called "Tsugaru Kaikyou Fuyugeshiki". The Japanese itself is hard enough, but to sing enka, there's this type of technique called kobushi in Japanese, and the closest I could find to what it is in English is either warbling, melisma, or tremolo. I found that none of these seemed to truly directly translate to kobushi. Anyway, I couldn't do it, but I improved a little, and I'm glad to have a singing technique to practice and a new song to learn!

 Sunday, October 15th

This morning began with Midsummer rehearsal. This is not meant to be a musical, but we have some songs and dances, especially for the fairies (which includes me). Lately these dance we've had to learn for the play, I feel like I'm doing sub-par. I mean I always felt like I wasn't that great at dancing when I was young and taking lessons, but I'm with other people who also haven't taken lessons and dance isn't like their main focus, but they get the dances quickly and I feel like I'm struggling and just ungraceful. It's probably not actually that bad, but I feel like it is. I'm just feel like I'm old and I've gained a bit of weight and feel blah about it. And I don't wanna, so I need to work harder! I want to make my body stronger.

This morning, we went straight into the finale song and dance. Oh that's another thing, singing and dancing at the same time WHILE wearing a mask, I feel like I can't breathe, and I either forget to sing or mess up the dance in the process. But anyway, I totally messed up everything and felt awful. Later when practicing the more difficult Lullaby song and dance (mostly focussing on the dance though) I felt like I was a little better. 

After rehearsal, I had to quickly catch a train and head to a swing dance event located between Yoga and Futakotamagawa stations. I went to this one before, and it was really chill and lots of fun! This time there weren't so many people and about an equal number of leads and follows, so I was dancing non-stop for a while. One guy came who I guess used to come often, but hadn't for a while. I've found that (me included) a lot of the long time swing crew and slowly trickling back into dance after covid. We chatted for a bit because he knew English well and lived in both the US and Australia.

Then I went to meet my friend in Kawagoe for a festival, but that will be in a separate blog post because I took so many pictures!

Another Pittsburgh Trip

It was another double date, but this time with Misaki and Joe about a month ago!

First we went to the Ross Park Mall so I could show it to Misaki, and in the makeup section of Macy's (I think that was where we were) a Japanese lady who worked there came up to Misaki and started talking to her! She seemed excited to be meeting other Japanese people, and to be able to speak her own language while she was at work. She and another girl who worked there complemented my Japanese inspired style (I was wearing a cute Gunne Sax dress)

After that, there was this fancy chocolate stand, and they were giving out free samples of whatever you wanted to try, and the lady gave a small piece and was advertising how you only need a small piece to fully appreciate the flavor of this chocolate, so I jokingly said, 'Oh, I bet I could still eat the whole thing!' cuz I'm a fatty who loves sweet things too much, and she said that I should just go eat a Snickers...whatever pretentious chocolate lady, I was just trying to make conversation and joke a bit XD It was good, but I didn't want to buy any after that...

Sooooo we went to Sweets From Heaven and got a bunch of candy there! They had all kinda of different gummies, and a whole section with different Japanese candy.

And then we went to the Ramen Bar! Someday I will try the other restaurants on that street...

Gyoza! Their dipping sauce was wrong though DX

Curry ramen

Ajo (garlic) ramen

We did go to a cute Korean bakery in the same area called Pink Box because I always want macarons and they were open late on Sunday XD They actually said that I couldn't take pictures, and I didn't realize, but then they said it was ok.

Then we ended the night with a trip to the Mt. Washington Overlook

Blog: Pittsburgh Double Date Shopping and Places

Later, we went to the Ross Park Mall, because I wanted to go to Lush! I'll post more details about the Lush stuff and my experience there separately =]

After that, we wandered a bit around the mall

*Edit* I almost forgot to post about the Avalon Exchange! It's a super cool secondhand store with lots of designer and non designer stuff for good prices! I've even found Japanese, Chinese and Korean brands there. It's right next to one of the food places I always go in Pittsburgh, the Ramen Bar.

And then Karaoke!! As far as I know, this is the nearest and only Asian style karaoke place here. They had a lot of Japanese songs, though not as many as I wanted XD Not bad for so nearby though! Oh, I just found the website with a list of songs! I wish I had found this before to prepare, but I'll totally use this next time [Kbox website] We're planning another karaoke trip soon =3

Then we went to this place where you can see an amazing view of the city!

Next is all of the food places and food porn!

Blog: My little taste of Seoul, South Korea

On the way back to America from my study abroad in Japan, I specifically picked a flight with a 14 hour layover in Seoul, Korea starting at 10pm.  I fell asleep on the train back to the airport and missed the sun rising though!  I'm not one to regret things, but I regret not seeing the tiny bit of daytime in Korea that I had the chance to see.  It's definitely true that the biggest word people use in saying what they regret is "not"!

Very first impression, it was kind of muggy and smoggy.  Maybe it's always like that, or maybe just that night?  You can kind of see it in the pictures.

So we went to Myeongdong, and I started with some fast shopping, as everything was closing within the hour.  Something really cool I noticed was how in every shop we went in, the shop workers would greet everyone who came in in their own languages!  I heard greetings in English to us, Korean, Japanese, and Chinese!  And of course I was super excited to see Etude House, even though I had gone to one in Japan.  These ones were so cute! And I counted like 6 all within short walking distance of each other.  I also got to see other Korean makeup brand stores

I just noticed this, but in the upper right corner is my favorite Degas painting!

After all of the shops closed, we wandered, and went to eat Korean BBQ and it was sooooo amazing!

Finally we went to karaoke, because we didn't really know what else to do or where to go that late.  It was definitely different than karaoke in Japan.  They didn't have as many songs, and I had trouble navigating the machine thingy, but then again, I don't know any Korean.  I think they had less songs too.

This definitely isn't really a good clear picture of Seoul, but it was my first little taste!  Not too bad for the last hour of shops being open, and a bit of the night life.  I really wish I would have taken more pictures!  I can't wait to go back in the future and see more!

Thanksgiving Weekend

This was such an amazing weekend!! These are all cell phone pix cuz I knew I would be out and about quite a bit and I didn't wanna carry my camera all around or risk losing/breaking it, plus it's a bit bulky and slower at taking pix than my phone is. Plus, my phone actually takes really good pictures for a phone. Sorry this is a bit late, I've been feeling kinda meh about things for a while. I just need a break....luckily Christmas break is soon! We're actually having a potluck party on the 17th, and I'm gonna make eggnog :]

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Friday, November 29th

Me and Emily waited until this day to watch the Doctor who 50th so we could watch it with my friend who's also from WVU and studying at Aichi Shukutoku University. It was exciting to see some of the school that Jer spent his time when he studied abroad, and even meet one of his friends :) Doctor Who was amazing as usual <3 I love how the possibilities are endless for that show. Like, you can make guesses, but there could be so many completely different and ridiculous outcomes that can somehow work in the end. It's impossible to guess exactly what will happen next because anything is possible.

Anyway, after that, (we lost track of time and missed the last train, soooo we planned to just stay out all night and I needed to be in Sakae early in the morning to meet Jer anyway) we were gonna go to a club called I.D. with some people, but it ended up just being me and 2 others, so we went to a place called Gens 2nd (I think) in Sakae. I finally got to use my id to get in somewhere! XD There were a bunch of other foreigners there, and 2 really pretty drag queens in awesome costumes, and before we left, me and Emily got pulled up to dance on stage!! I wish I had pictures of that! After a few hours of dancing, We left to do karaoke till morning! At about 4am though, they both fell asleep, and I couldn't sleep, so I just waited until about 5:30.

Pretty shiny wallpaper at the karaoke place. They're always so pretty inside!

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Saturday November 30th

Soooo I met up with Jer after he got to Nagoya at about 6 am, and since we hadn't seen each other for longer than a month, and he was going to be staying with friends, we decided to try a love hotel <3 =] OMG, it was soooo pretty and so much fun!! It was very private; you don't have to deal with people at all. It was so romantic <3 Seriously, if you're ever in Japan with a significant other, you must do this! We got one of the cheapest rooms (with room service and everything it came to about 8000 yen and that was from 8am till 3pm. It was either 3 hours or until 3 for the same price and we got there really early). The room alone was 5900 yen. And they have all kinds of other fancy things and rooms available!

Hairdryer and straightener!

Everything you could possibly want to put on your face

Pretty wallpaper

More pretty wallpaper

This little vending machine thing had vibrators, lube, and cigarettes!

The bathtub even had a little light in in

Too many fancy toilets in Japan! It's scary when your toilet lid opens by itself, and sometimes makes noises. And the warm toilet seats feel like someone was just sitting on it >_< It's better than a freezing cold seat though

Control thing for all of the lights, and chargers for all kinds of devices, and you could play your own music over the speakers!

They even had karaoke!

Thingy that you put your payment in when you're ready to leave

Little computer area in the lobby

Where you pick your room. And there's a phone if you need help, so you don't deal with people

Then after that, we went over to Jer's old place and made Thanksgiving dinner together! It was amazing celebrating it with people from different countries who don't normally celebrate it. I made chicken, Jer made eggnog, and everyone helped with everything else. <3 Way better than the lonely chicken dinner I made myself on Thanksgiving! And I'll get to see my Jer on Christmas too, so I won't be lonely then either <3

Such a warm and happy Thanksgiving <3

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  Sunday, December 1st

The first half of the day we just laid around and watched tv. Then we went to Kanayama for karaoke!

We actually randomly saw on TV earlier that day how they made these decorations!

I finally was able to give him the little matching key chain charm thingy I got in Takayama <3