Hachiko, a Japanese dog has become a real trademark of Shibuya. Its name was also adopted as the nickname of Shibuya community bus. The bus runs 3 lines: Jingumae to Sendagaya, Honmachi to Sasazuka and Ebisu to Daikanyama. The are very easy to access. And I particularly like the route from Ebisu to Daikanyama.
Tuesday, 30 November 2010
Monday, 29 November 2010
GPS for tracking own routes
Nike Flagship, Omotesando
In its nearly 40-year history, Nike had become the undisputed leader in sportswear industry. Though I rarely enter its flagship at Omotesando even though their windows displays are always fancy. I'm not that excited for sportswear mainly because it doesn't keep up with ready-to-wear fashion trends. My clothes aren't co-ordinated with their sport shoes easily.
When I first heard the phrase 'Nike+ GPS', I wasn't impressed. Fashion hardly links to high technology, even though we always speak of functional wear which maybe contains 2-ways or 3-ways features or outstanding fabrication by using innovative materials. The old device called Nike+ iPop has the function that user could measures and records the distance and pace of a walk or run. I wonder why we need GPS for shoes? Why we have to keep recording our own routes?
Speaking of Nike+ GPS App itself, it's surely better than Nike+iPop Sport Kit which includes a separate shoe sensor that you no longer need it for Nike+ GPS App. It seems many runners welcome the new design and feel fun to have the new app that includes some social network features connecting with twitter or facebook.
Anyway back to the point of GPS, it's hard to imagine having it with other fashion brands, such as Chanel, Doir or Prada. What I want to say is appeal industry typically is about fashion trends for colors, patterns or materials, but not engage high-tech features.
From what I see, more people use the App and Nikeplus.com, Nike can collect more data about the runners' habits for developing better products in the future. But as a runner, does he really need GPS to record the run routes besides tracking of distance, speed, altitude and time?
Sunday, 28 November 2010
Wine Chocolate
Recently Lotte has come up with a new chocolate by combining chocolate and French red wine. This chocolate costs only 169 yen. I like liquor chocolate so much. This chocolate contains 3.3% alcohol. I definitely love it and enjoy the rich aroma of red wine spreading in my mouth.
Saturday, 27 November 2010
Friday, 26 November 2010
'The World is filled with love.'
'Allan' from the monologue 'Sadness'
Exhibition examines social issues common all over the world. AIDS is one of the social issues and many artists try to express their thought over this issue in art form. Though it's easily to have prejudice or discrimination regarded on the issues of AIDS or homosexuality. It's difficult to bring up these subjects in a conversation because of culture that is existing. People has just not really willing to talk about it. 'love’s body-art in the age of AIDS' is rather a special exhibition that presents issue of aids and sexuality.
There are eight artists present works in this exhibition. The most impressive one is a series of photography plus monologue by Australian William Yang. His work in 1992 called 'Sadness' which consists of photographs with handwritten note of his ex-lover, Allan, whom was HIV positive. This collection is famous among Yang's collections as he said he was the only one would tell this story. Indeed, it's very impressive. Story begun when he visited his friend in St Vincent's Hospital after an interval of four years. This powerful documentary provides visitors a chance to read and see about AIDS directly.
The last artwork I look at is a video which delivers a message 'But don't forget. For all that, the world is filled with love.' The whole exhibition is a very straightforward, not that difficult to understand, but what they want to deliver is a very heavy topic. This exhibition will only last until next Sunday (5th Decemeber) at Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography. I highly recommend it.
Thursday, 25 November 2010
Tokyo Sky Tree reaches 497 meters
Tokyo Sky Tree was designed to be world tallest free-standing tower in the world. Right now it has already reached 497 meters. When completed, the tower will have a height of 634 meters.


Wednesday, 24 November 2010
秋色 代々木公園

Yoyogi Park is not far to Meiji Shrine. It's always a nice spot after visiting Meiji Shrine.

Volunteers from Musasino Rose Society look after rose garden at Yoyogi park. They have workshop at Yoyogi Park monthly. Anyway thanks to them, we can see many beautiful roses there. Although certain roses do not function well in cold weather, roses at the park are still strong now!
Tuesday, 23 November 2010
Christmas illuminations - Omodesando Hills


Eight meters tall Christmas tree with 250,000 Swarovski elements and mirrored balls.
They give off a brilliant display of lights along with music!
Monday, 22 November 2010
Japanese gardening

Kiyosumi Teien
Daimyo (大名) refers to powerful feudal lords in the Edo Period (from 1603 - 1867). The gardens built at their estate in Edo (Tokyo) or in the castle town of his domain in that period called Daimyo Garden (大名庭園). More or less, these gardens implied peace and prosperity in Edo Period, as well as political and social influence of the feudal lords.
Kiyosumi Teien (清澄庭園) is one of the daimyo gardens (大名庭園) in Tokyo. It integrates various styles of dry landscapes ("karesansui", 枯山水), symbolically represent the natural landscapes, along a path circling a pond. Thus, it's also known as scroll gardens ("kaiyūshiki teien", 廻遊式庭園).
Kiyosumi Teien features stone arrangements. Though crossing the stepping stones in dark at the garden would be an adventure. I like visiting Japanese garden not just because of its highly sophisticated form of landscape design, but also its profound implications for Edo-period cultural history.
Sunday, 21 November 2010
I'm wondering...
Location: Ginza
Have you noticed that there are number of foreigners acting in the drama which I mentioned in the last post? In fact, there are quite a number of foreigners living in Tokyo. Hong Kong used to be a multi-culture society with mixed culture. On the contrary, Japan used to be a country isolated from the rest of the world for most of her history. It mainly because she is an island where is difficult to access. However, Japan is now moving towards becoming a multi-cultural society with the increasing number of foreign residents, especially at the time Japan is facing the problem of aging and low-birth rate.
You may have an impression that there is a lack of English information in Japan. However, it has been changed in these few years. Obviously English is becoming the language of globalization. Many Japanese companies are going to change their official language to English. For instance, Rakuten (the biggest online shopping website in Japan) and Uniqlo (the sixth largest fashion retailer in the world) are attempting to make English their official language, even in their domestic offices. Hong Kong used to be a bilingual society, we used both languages at work, although Cantonese is still dominant. I wonder if Japan should adopt the bilingual apporach, instead of a dramatic change from Japanese to English.
Saturday, 20 November 2010
「日本人の知らない日本語」
Japanese dramas are very popular in Hong Kong, Taiwan or Korea. This year, I found a drama called 「日本人の知らない日本語」very interesting. Of course, one reason is that my friend, Seba, acted in this drama!
This drama has been broadcasted a while ago. Today I mention it because the Dvds has just released! Its story is about some foreigners who study Japanese in Japan. For those wanna brush up Japanese, I highly recommend it because it talks about Japanese culture and language in a very hilarious way. Surprisingly it's a very popular drama among foreigners who live in Japan too!
Friday, 19 November 2010
Christmas Illuminations - Tokyo Dome City (Video)
Period: 10 November, 2010 - 14 February, 2011
Venue: Tokyo Dome City
Christmas Illuminations - Tokyo Dome City


Period: 10 November, 2010 - 14 February, 2011
Venue: Tokyo Dome City
Thursday, 18 November 2010
Installation - PET STAR
There are still many artwork on site where next to Takashimaya.
PET STAR
Period: Wednesday,10 November - Saturday, 25 December, 2010
Venue: Shinjuku Southern Terrance
Wednesday, 17 November 2010
Tuesday, 16 November 2010
Christmas Illumination - Shinjuku Southern Terrnance


Same as the past few years, there are illumination of Suica Penguin.
This year, the illuminations is not limited in blue color, but also in yellow color.
Venue: Shinjuku Southern Terrance
Boxed meal
Umaimon, boxed meal store, at Tokyo Station
Boxed meals
Boxed meals used to be my "racket-lunch" in Hong Kong, though I don't like it at all. How about you? Have you ever tried "Ekiben" (駅弁), boxed meals sold at train stations in Japan. Of course dishes are not just put into a white plastic box as those in Hong Kong. Instead, there are many different types of containers which are wrapped beautifully with colorful paper depicting the scenery of the particular town.
They are very popular not just because of their packaging, but their tastes. Boxed meals usually fill with dishes unique to their regions. Most of the ingredients are locally grown, so you can try the exclusive taste of different prefectures.
Umaimon (旨囲門) specializes in popular boxed meals. Its chain stores located in Tokyo, Ueno and Omiya stations. If you will drop by these stations, you absolutely have to dig one for your journey.
For more information of Umaimon, please read the link below:
Christmas illumination on a rainy day
Some people walk in the rain, others just get wet.
Location: Ginza
Soon that Tokyo will be filled with holiday illuminations!
The art of Chrysanthemum - Ogiku
Another day, I’ve talked about Ozukuri (大作り菊). Besides that, there are some other ways of growing chrysanthemum. One of them called Ogiku.
Ogiku (大菊) refers to single perfect bloom balanced on the top of the plant. Mostly Ogiku are precisely arranged in Tazuna-ue style (horse bridle), in which flowers are set in diagonal lines of white, pink and yellow which traditionally are the colors used in the emperor's horse bridle.
Exhibition Information
It's time to explore different forms of "human"
Period: Friday, October 29, 2010 – Sunday, January 30, 2011
Venue: Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo (MOT)
Monday, 15 November 2010
The art of Chrysanthemum - Ozukuri
Chrysanthemum, the official flower of Japan, represents longevity, power, dignity and nobility. Many exhibitions of chrysanthemum are held at the Japanese Gardens in Japan every year.
I've been to several gardens already this month for various exhibitions. Of course, the most impressive display is always Ozukuri (大作り), literally means "make it big". For those who understand the growing techniques of chrysanthemum possibly could appreciate the art of chrysanthemum more.
Ozukuri is a highly complex technique to grow a single chrysanthemum to produces hundreds of simultaneous blossoms in a huge dome-shaped array. In order words, there are hundreds of branches grow from a single plant, and only one bud grows from each branch. Normally it will end up with around 200 to 300 blossoms.
This year, I saw some displays which were up to 590 blossoms. That was amazing that they would grow to blossom all at the same time!
Sunday, 14 November 2010
Saturday, 13 November 2010
Friday, 12 November 2010
Thursday, 11 November 2010
Shichi-go-san (七五三)
Two girls at age of 5 and 7 in kimono are carrying Chitose Ame.
Good luck charms for Shichi-go-san.
There is an event called "Shichi-go-san" (七五三) for children at ages of 3, 5 and 7 in Japan. It's generally observed in November. Originally a Shinto ceremony celebrating the health of boys (who celebrate Shichi-go-san at the age of 5) and girls (who do it twice, at the ages of 3 and 7).
Chitose Ame (千歳飴), literally "thousand year candy", is given to children on Shichi-go-san. Chitose Ame is long, thin, red and white candy, which symbolizes healthy growth and longevity. It is given in a bag with a crane and a turtle on it, which represent long life in Japan. The two girls in the photos are carrying Chitose Ame.
Wednesday, 10 November 2010
Tuesday, 9 November 2010
D-K lights up Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building


Tokyo Metropolitan Government building
before and after
Digital-Kakejiku light are often projected to beautiful nature surface or old architecture as an art. It is widely used in fashion shows and concerts too. From November 6 to November 9, there is Digital-Kakejiku Light Projection Art at Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building. Here is the photos of the last day event.
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