At home...

It has been a day over a week since I got into Jakarta. It has been rather relaxing visiting my parents and at the same time a bit productive since I have been working on my music while I sit around in my room. So, since my parents no longer live in an apartment provided by the hotel, they live in the hotel. They have a suite in the building and it is very nice but being in a suite, I no longer have my own room, so I am staying in my own room across the hallway. Privacy is a plus and a bliss... I think a lot will change if I didn't have this. As I always think to myself. As long as I eat, sleep, watch TV, have Internet and practice singing. I can continue my general living. Only problem is that I don't have the use of cell phone here. So that would leave me no contact over the phone. I have not had the chance going out to buy a phone card so no connection via phone to people, well actually Ashlee.

Like I mentioned above, things are quite nice here. Not too bad of a weather, other than the fact that it is the rainy season right now. But it usually rain, hard, for a while but before you know it the sun is shining again. I rarely leave the hotel so I barely notice the fact that it is raining outside. That's one thing about living in a hotel. Everything is right there so you really don't have to leave the building. Which I have no problem doing... :-p Occasionally we do go 'out' to eat instead of using the facilities here. In fact my parents took me and Mona, our family friend from India. We went to a very fancy Japanese restaurant called "Koh". Now, the cuisine here is very traditional Japanese cuisine. The meal we had for dinner that night was in a style of "Kaiseki" which is a course meal where many different dishes are presented with such art and work in a manner that it is too beautiful to eat it. It is delicious to boot! These type of meals are created upon what is available during that season. Since everything that the owner/chef gets are from Japan, it is very fresh and good. The theme of the meal that night was New Year's so we got to have some special dishes. The specialty that the chef prepared for us was a congee(porridge) with red beans. Also, we had "Blow Fish" sashimi. That was a rare opportunity to have that outside of Japan. It's so hard to come by. Needless to say that dinner was AMAZING!!!

Today, Sunday January 28th, I actually spent the day with my father. I thought it would be nice to do a father-son activity. So what do we do? My father's favorite sport, Golf. Now, I mentioned couple days ago that maybe I'll go golfing with my father. So he set up to go today. Well, the last time I went out golfing was over seven years ago! So of course my father wasn't sure if I was ready to get out on the course. We got to the golf course around little after 8:00am. I got up at 5:00am, by 6:30am I had breakfast... This RARELY happens. Anyhow, we got to the course and we both head to the driving range. I need practice. I end of hitting two buckets of balls, most of them not very promising... The future looks grim. But actually at the end, I did pretty well. Now, usually if you go around 18 holes and score 133, that's nothing you want to broadcast. For those who play regularly! Yet for my case, over seven years of absence from any golf action, that was pretty damn good. Of course my hands, forearms, back are in pain and also got a nice burn on my face, neck, arms and legs from the nice warm sun of Indonesia. The best part of it was that I actually got to have fun. Who knows, maybe I'll pick it up when I get back to Chicago. Of course I got to wait for another four months or so until the ice melts...

As I enjoy my days here, I look forward to visiting Tokyo with my mother. We got some family business to do. My grandmother's, my mother side, first death anniversary is coming up on February 3rd. So we will be visiting her grave and give her our prayers and after that we have dinner with all our relatives. Now it will be great to visit Tokyo for the 10 days we are going to be there. Since I'll be going with my mother, without my father, we don't need to get another room. Which means that my mother and I will be sharing a room for TEN DAYS!!! I think it will be okay but then again, who knows... It will be interesting.

Before you know it, I will be getting on a plane to come back to Chicago...
Back to the freezing weather.

For now, I'm enjoying the tropical weather, mainly in an air-conditioned indoor! :-p

Eddie Izzard - Big Tits

He is awesome. I thought to share this with you all.

Off to Jakarta and Tokyo!

I am off to visit my parents in Jakarta from tomorrow until the end of the month. Then after that I will be off to Tokyo with my mother and we get to spend the following 10 days in Japan TOGETHER! I don't think I have spent this much time with my family since I lived with them... Which makes it close to a decade.

I am looking forward to visiting my parents. It would be nice to get away and visit somewhere that is warm. Also to Tokyo and get some good food. That is always a plus. I got an opera to memorize so I have a little work to do out there.

I will be updating my stay in Jakarta and also in Japan through this so stay tuned!

For those who are in a cold climate, enjoy the freezing weather suckers! I'm off to Indonesia where it's warm.
If you are already at a warm climate, well... Enjoy the weather!

I guess I spoke too soon...

As I stated on my last blog, of how mild and cool weather we have been having here in Chicago. Well not anymore~!
We are looking at some snow/slush fall this coming weekend. I am planning to go to Cleveland with Ashlee to visit my American family out there but unfortunately the weather out there does not look so hot either. Damn lake effects!!!
It really got cold very quickly. I was recently talking to my friend Jen, who lives in L.A., of their dry warm days of reaching 80s. Yeah, that's nice... Even though the weather gets so cold here in Chicago, I still love living here. Growing up in few different places, starting out in Japan where there are four seasons, then moving to Guam, where it's hot and humid all year long(with the typical Super-Typhoon that comes through once or twice or sometimes thrice over the summer...). Then to change the scene I moved to Connecticut to go to my highschool. I actually had a choice of attending a boarding school in Austin, TX called St. Stephen's or Kent school in Kent, CT. I ended up going to Kent because I didn't score high enough on my English proficiency exam for St. Stephen's. Damn language diffculties!!! But the time my family and I visited Austin, I was tired of the always tropical weather. I wanted the change in seasons. My parents, on the other hand, loved the tropical weather... It didn't matter at the end. I went on to Kent, my parents moved to Mexico City for my father's job so afterall, they got their wish of staying somewhere that stays warm most of the time.

I must say that, I do miss some snow(I know I'm asking for it now...). It's just not the same to feel the hellish chill of winter here in Chicago without the freezing cold wind from the lake and instant freezing ice on the ground from the fallen-snow. Actually, the freezing cold wind is here already...

I hope everyone is enjoying their own way of winter living. For us in Chicago, the winter just started, and have not seen the worst of it yet.

First blog of 2007!

I hope everyone had a lovely holiday and brought on a New Year with your family and love ones. I had a great time visiting Ashlee's family in Arkansas. Which at first, I was expecting a rather warm Southern holidays but unfortunately that was not true. It was actually rather chilly for the first few days over Christmas. There were several warm days but overall, it was cold and rainy down South where I was.
I thought once we got back to Chicago I will see some snow but what is going on? It's been rather mild here for the past several months. I guess there were few days where it snowed a bit in Chicago but I missed it completely since I spent most of the time of November and half of December in New York City doing some auditions, where the weather was freakishly mild and had so much warm days... After all, it never looked a lot like Christmas this winter.
But now that the new year has started I had all sorts of things in mind to re-evaluate in my life. I should work out, eat better, learn more music and also put together a recital to do. Well, I know better to set too many goals... So far, I have not started on any of them. Which is fine since I hate to create a resolution for my New Year. I say get things done one at a time, work on things one day at a time.
I do have a project that I need to get done which is to memorize my next gig, Don Giovanni. I know that the rehearsal does not start until mid-April but I really want to get down into this role. I have been wanting to tackle this role for a long while. Hence I want to do some studying on this character. We all know of Don Giovanni, or Don Juan. But was he really as bad as he claimed to be? I want to get to know the real man behind the women he conquered in so many different countries. I always want to make the character real. Or at least real enough for me to understand so that I can be that character on stage.
Anyhow, Don Giovanni is my first big project for the year 2007. Hopefully there will be lots more to come.

Get back on the whole weather here in Chicago.
I mean really. What is happening?
I have watched some weather related shows. i.e. Global Warming.
I wonder what would happen in the next decade. In fact there was a show on Northern Alaska where the land is this thing called "permafill"(or I think that is how it's spelled in my mind) which creates this land fill in a freezing temp. like a concrete. But since the whole 'Global Warming' is in effect, these lands are being taken away in the ocean little by little. Scientists are afraid that there will be no Northern Alaska in the next ten years or so.
I am not usually a big one on the whole "save the nature" and what not. But this seems to happen in the very near future. Not that I have an answer or a propaganda of what we should do but I rarely watch any news around the world so when I do watch these changing occurrence in the world I feel the need to consider the fact. It's something different from my usual work stuff.

I hope that this mild weather will continue for a while. But we all know that soon the cold blistering winter will arrive here in Chicago as well. If not then it will never be a true winter here.
It does not really matter though, I will be leaving for Jakarta to visit my parents where it's quite warm. Then off to Japan to visit my relatives where it's cold but probably not as cold as here. By the time I return to Chicago, perhaps we will have some white stuff on the ground...

Meanwhile, I enjoy the nice weather we have been having. I hope you are too.