Hannah Japana ハンナジャパナ

my sister

just so happened to run into Alexis Bledel while walking home one day….

im in Japan, what has happened to me!? hahah. im happy her new New York life is exactly what she expected!

i realized that this year i am going to miss my most favorite time of the year….the Christmas Season/holiday season because im here in Japan. I am not complaining at all, but it will be kind of weird that the day i land in America, i will experience only about 3 days of the holiday season before it is all over. they dont really celebrate it here, but they DO have christmas stuff up!

i am going to miss going to Starbucks with my sisters, fighting with them on what to get mom and dad, and driving crazily trying to find parking. i will also miss attempting to bake something new, wrapping presents in the cold front living room, and watching silly movies while sipping hot cocoa with whipped creme.

i act as though im dying, haha!

thanksgiving is this week and the sad thing is, i dont even know what day it is because they dont celebrate it here. i think it might even be today, because we have a day off..hahaha!

anyways, random post. but im going to be posting pictures soon!

something sweet

something sweet to satisfy your craving.

1. boil hot water and add one tea bag of Lipton’s Apple tea.

2. mix with 100% apple juice.

3. enjoy <3

since tea is sometimes bland and often requires sugar, adding apple juice will enhance the apple flavor and add natural sweeteners to the drink. 

it’s so simple and yummy. i want to try to mix pear juice, but i’m not sure if i can find that. adding any sort of juice to tea should have a delicious result!

it keeps you warm on the upcoming winter cold nights. <3 if you’re feeling especially sweet, add some caramel.

this is a great alternative to drinking coffee because it still contains caffiene and will keep you up if you’re staying up late burning the midnight oil.

homesick

had my first ‘bout of homesickness at approx 2 AM last night. not sure if it was due to my stress on having two tests the next day or what, but i felt like i really needed to talk to my mom. a friend gave me her calling card and i attempted to call a couple times. i called my mom’s work and her employee picked up, and talking to him wasted my precious minutes!!!! i finally got a hold of my mom <3

right when she said “i miss you,” the calling card ran out and it hung up. talk about DRAMATIC. so of course i cried a little more and moped around a bit. but now im feeling much better. thanks mom <3

ghosts again!

last night Lavinna rented a scary movie from Tsutaya. It was actually an episode from a show series where people send in pictures and videos of their encounters with ghosts.

the beginning of the show opens with a disclaimer that says: “it is not our fault if after watching this show you become harmed, followed or contacted by the supernatural world in any way.”

how scary!

so me, lavinna, shari, tomo, joseph, julia and michelle all piled into mine and lavinna’s room and watched it! we pushed our two futons together and everyone sat there, huddled around lavinna’s laptop screen. it was pretty scary.. michelle said that she watched this allll the time last semester and now she can see ghosts. tomo says that after watching this show a lot, he said one followed him home.

well, after hearing all that, i don’t think i’m going to watch that show again.

RINKA!! 梨花

Rinka is a famous Japanese model in Japan and I had the honor of seeing her yesterday!! She is known for modelling in many fashion magazines and promotes the high-end label, Cher. She is a huge role-model for young women all over Japan and around the world. There is seriously so much to say about her that I feel that I can’t say it well enough.

My younger sister, Nia and I are totally in love with her~ and I’m so happy that I had the opportunity to see her! My friend, Eri managed to snag tickets to a school festival in Kobe! It was Eri, Mitsuha, Lavinna Mayuu and I who travelled to Kobe together. The school festival was at an all girl’s school and it was on the top of a mountain. the view was breath-taking!

Rinka did a type of talk show~ a woman asked her questions and she answered them. She was seriously SO cute!!!! Her voice is much deeper in person, but it’s still cute! I could understand most of what they were saying, but Mitsuha had to translate a lot for me. GAH, this is why I wish i were fluent.

It was my first time in Kobe! We were extremely excited! We walked around what looked like Beverly Hills….it was gorgeous and the lights were all so pretty. We also stopped in China Town! I had Peking duck and the white buns filled with pork (I don’t want to embarrass myself on spelling the name).

Afterwards, we took purikura <3

pictures courtesy of Lavinna’s blog!
http://www.lessthan3inna.tumblr.com <3 

some pictures also from Rinka’s blog: http://www.smooche.jp/rinka

happy things <3

here’s my little collection of hair bows ! each bow was 105 yen, which is about $1.10. nice!




a cute little ceramic rice bowl! My friend gave it to me as a small gift from a souvenir shop at the aquarium we visited last month.

cute cell phone charms! the white tofu and pink ribbon bow are gifts from my dear friend, Lavinna!

All the international students here swear by that C.C. Lemon drink. Lately I’ve been under the weather so I decided to buy this drink yesterday because it’s packed with lots of Vitamin C. I haven’t had soda for over a month, so it kind of upset my tummy. It’s good, but not as good as I was expecting!

My other friend suggested that I buy that other drink because it contains 21 different vegetables and fruits! Kind of on the pricey side, but it doesn’t matter because it really helped me! She also made me drink 1 Liter of this blueberry/grape yogurt drink…and that helped tremendously too!

my two little white Hannari tofus!! the big tofu was a present from a good friend back home in the States. Lavinna and I managed to get our close group of friends obsessed with the Hannari tofu characters!

I never tried this drink, but I bought them because of the Rilakkuma charms! I’ve bought this drink in the green tea version, and its super delicious. Not sure what this tea tastes like yet. It was only $1!

The Rilakkuma charms actually turn out to be bottle openers! you put them on top of the lid and then turn. It’s easier for younger children to open bottles. I gave the white one to my friend Joseph because I knew that one was his favorite!

My friends went out bowling last night, but I opted to stay home due to my sickness. My friend Julia won this at one of those claw machine games on her first try! I woke up at about 2AM and found it sitting next to me! Get well presents are always the best!! love my friends <3 


here’s a House of Jill Stuart tote I got a couple months back! It came for free with the October or November? issue of CanCam magazine! The material is silky with glittery letters. I used it yesterday for the first time in a while.

こうよう

kouyou ~ the sight of the changing color of leaves during autumn season

next wednesday we have another day off, so i am off to Kyoto to witness this amazing sight! I will be going to a temple/shrine hopefully to see it! People from ALL OVER Japan go to Kyoto to see it, so I’m definitely excited!

random pictures from yesterday

cute Hello Kitty tote Lavinna surprised me with!!! i love her! <3

Shari and I at Saty

I indulged and bought hot cocoa mix…my best and favorite purchase besides ketchup haha.

Lavinna and I wore our hair ribbons today <3. Instead of “bows,” Japan calls them “ribbons”

my lunch today: green tea, water, pumpkin croquette and katsudon.

Christmas in November?

Yesterday was Cultural Day, a national holiday, which means, NO SCHOOL!

Having Tuesday as a day off is extremely random, but we all welcomed it nonetheless. My usual group of friends split up for the day, which was kind of weird, but we all met up again at night. Shari and I headed to Hirakata to do some browsing and shopping.

I showed her some stores Lavinna and I often frequent. We met up with Tomo, Sunje, Julia and Michele later on. The weather has been extremely COLD! I love it, it’s finally, FINALLY the weather I’ve been waiting for.

This weather instilled in me a strong desire to drink hot cocoa..so that’s what I did! I bought cocoa mix (so hard to find) and milk! It was my first time buying milk in Japan yesterday…and I”m not so sure if I like it. They only drink whole milk, but I managed to hunt down low-fat milk. I don’t normally drink milk in America either. So when I opened the carton and smelled it, I almost gagged. I decided to warm the milk over the stove, and it tastes much better that way anyway.

Anyways, Shari and I paid a visit to Kiddy Land, a very famous store all over Japan. It’s like a Sanrio, fashion store, accessories store all mixed in one. They have Hello Kitty, other Japanese characters, etc. Toys, Stationary, hats, boots, scarves…basically anything cute!

I was surprised to see all the Christmas decorations up!!! I got so excited. This Christmas is going to be bittersweet…..It will be a joyous reunion with my family, but also sad because I won’t be in Japan any longer…unless I get to stay next semester! It’s supposed to be extremely DIFFICULT to be accepted to stay another semester (extension). I applied, but I’m not so sure if I will get it. It’s like applying to college all over again, only it’s in a different country.

Anyways, enough rambling. I have pictures!

Their Rilakkuma (relax bear) section is HUUUGE, if you haven’t noticed.

TOILET PAPER. HOW CUTE!?

wonka bars!!

Halloween at Kansai Gaidai University (KGU)

Japan doesn’t celebrate Halloween, but since KGU is known for its international relationships, they put on a Halloween show to make the international students feel more at home. There was a costume contest with dfiferent categories (funny, creative, scary, etc). Then they had a type of fashion show, games, etc.

RA’s at my dormitory! haha, they gave us candy