Tokyo Orientation + Crazy (awesome) Cat Lady

Here is a video of the lady I saw with a cat on her shoulder =)

 Anyway, cat ladies aside lets begin the story of how my life in Japan is going. We landed in Narita August 5th, leaving New Zealand which was about 10 degrees Celsius the jump into 35-40 (104 Fahrenheit) and around 100% humidity was quite a shock, not to mention carrying bags too.

 Everyone was naturally excited but unfortunately we didnt get through customs and into Tokyo city till after sunset, so we couldn't see too much of the city but were greeted with a great view of the lights from the hotel. Wellington in New Zealand while the capital is a very small city with around 400,000 people, Tokyo has over 12 million so the shear size of it was very daunting.

 The people from out group were lucky enough to stay in the Keio Plaza, which is located right in Shinjuku.

 It was a shame we only were able to stay in Tokyo for 3 days, since we were busy with the orientation we only had the evenings to explore the city.

 Something that I didn't expect to see was the amount of homeless in Shinjuku, but also that the homeless were quite clean and looked just like normal people with clean clothes, just living in cardboard boxes. Apparently some of them just crack under the pressure of city life and become homeless but their families will bring them things. One of the more interesting people had 10 cats living with him, which he was feeding at the time although understandably he did not want his photo taken.

 Probably my favorite part of the city was the architecture of some of the buildings and a mix of cute restaurants like the one above and the tall office buildings with amazing designs. 

 The above being the definite favorite.

 The fun thing about wandering aimlessly around a foreign city is you tend to stumble upon things you might not otherwise see if you were headed straight to some location, and during one of my nightly wanders I found something I had always wanted to see.

Cat Cafe!

 When we walked up to try and get in we were very disappointed to hear it was closing in a few minutes, but when one of the patrons left lots of the cats ran out to greet us. Even though we missed out that time I have seen been to one which ill talk about in more detail another time.

 Sadly our three day trip was coming to an end and we all split up to go to our home prefectures. So we boarded the bullet train (shinkansen) and speed across the country to Kyoto. But the adventure had only just begun...

Much to say, here is some Penguins.

Wow looks like its been a couple Months since I posted anything. What happened? Well a bunch of stuff, first I started a really boring job to raise some money for a trip and then I went on that trip, fortunately I was able to visit Granite Island in Victor Harbour, South Australia. Which is home to one of every ones favourite animals, Penguins!

Too adorable

Granite Island is really an amazing place, its a tiny island that you can take a horse drawn tram to, and then walk around and look for those adorable little birds. 

Iv been fortunate enough to see these Little Blue Penguins around my town in New Zealand as well as in Australia. But for an unknown reason their numbers are reducing on Granite Island, when I visited as a kid 10 years ago their were over 2000 on the Island, now there is less than 100.

Hopefully when I visit next their numbers will have increased, the thought of their being no Penguins on the Island would make me a very sad man. 

 Naturally I didn't spend two months just looking at Penguins, I have also been visiting family in South Australia. It must have been over 12 years since I last saw them so it was really good to see them all again after so long. Some quality time was much overdue, and we all went to a see some more native Australian wildlife...

 (I did warn him about that Emu, but unfortunately missed the inevitable bitten finger.)

 Although I should have visited sooner, its always hard when you are a poor student, this trip was also extra special because I was attending a wedding.

Also, I heard there was free drinks.

 It was my Fathers wedding, so I now strangely find myself with a couple extra adult siblings and some extended family, but everything went really well and a good time was had by all. I cant imagine the cost of the whole thing though, bringing people over from another country. Fortunately (for the cost) it was held at my new uncles house, which is an amazingly big and breathtaking place.

The biggest piece of news is that after what may be the high score in The Waiting Game I have succeeded in landing a job over in Japan. I had been waiting and hoping I would get this job for months so naturally I am thrilled to be heading over there in less than a weeks time! I will do my best to conduct myself in a professional and dignified manner while experiencing a new side of life.

And drinking all the grog.

                                                                 Have a good one all!

Not much to say, here are some parrots

So not much to say, on the way to the gym I got mobbed by a pack of friendly Kaka.
Fortunately I was hoping to get some shots of them since I missed them when I went to the bird sanctuary the other day. Even got some vids of them.

 

 

They love getting attention so much the fight over it.

This one was the Bitey one.

Anzac Day

So today in NZ it is a public holiday for Anzac so my friend and I decided to go to the bird sanctuary that is near my house to take some photos since it was a very nice sunny day. Here are some of the photos I took.

 New Zealand Tui

 This bird was probably what we saw the most, Tui's are black songbirds with two white feathers under their chins and they sing most of the day when they aren't eating what ever these tasty tasty red mystery berries are. 

 

  

They also had some native Geckos at the start of the sanctuary, never actually seen one of these in the  wild, however I saw a lot of brown ones in Australia around my Nans place.  

 

The sanctuary was actually converted from the old water reservoir, which works out well because a lot of endangered native Teal ducks stay in there as well.

This was probably the bird I enjoyed seeing the most, a New Zealand Bellbird, they puff themselves up and become almost completely round which is very adorable to see.

  

Lastly, the reserve was also part of the old gold mining area they have kept part of the mines open and you can wander in there with a torch and hardhat to explore in around 25 metres into the hill. However when my friend and I got in there we realized the roof was covered in these Wetas. These ones were about 3-5 centimetres long. I can imagine that this would quickly turn into some nightmare if they stood up in there and became completely covered in these...

Anyone into Squidoo?

 I was just browsing the internet like I normally do and I found out about this website. It actually really caught my eye, its been around for awhile though so I guess I'm fairly slow. As a natural fan of squid related things and colorful drawing it really snagged me instantly.

Basically its like a big blog everyone submits pages to, pages can get likes from the website/facebook etc. Its interface is really simple too which helps. The interesting part of it though is that you can link in amazon products related to what ever you are writing about, and if any sell from your page (called lense) you get a small cut. 

Have a few ideas for some articles I would like to write for it, I tried making one about the Kaka(brown parrots) that live around my house if you recall my old post about them, check out my post for an example of it.

 

My Squidoo Lense about the New Zealand Kaka

 Oh if you guys already use Squidoo, leave a link and Ill check them out later =)

Why you shouldnt take break late.

So now that I have a now have a job things have been very busy for me, time seems to just go by so quickly. I have been working very hard lately, and tend to take my breaks after just finishing a current load of work, so usually this means that I start and finish my break 3-5 minutes later than the rest of my work mates, instead of pausing it and just taking it straight away.

So why shouldn't you take your breaks late? Because you'll miss the chance to meet this guy.

Seriously, all my work mates got to meet Stephen Fry! I mean, Its not like I'm a big Stephen Fry fanboy or anything, but still I cant believe I missed him by just a couple of minutes. Such is life though, being able to pay rent is cool too...I guess.

Well anyway here is a funny like video someone made about him.

 

Other stuff update:

Well if you remember that I went to a casting call for The Hobbit I actually got an email from there, basically saying "Still interested? We just want to know if you are, not saying we have anything for you to do yet.." so that's kinda cool, might still get a chance to be in it =)

Life with a job update

First week over for my new job, things are fairly relaxed and its an enjoyable way to make money for the meantime. Only real complaint is the weird hours, 8:15 to 4:45 really? 9am starts give me another 45 minutes to sleep in the morning, doesn't help that I stay up till around 1:30am every night still though. Its nice that we can go home after we finish all the work though, so I usually finish about 3 and get to spend some time in the sun (pretty rare for me actually haha). We have a big storm on atm though, but before the storm started I was able to go down the seafront and snap some pictures of this friendly sting ray.

He was just siting there for some reason, some boats scared him away but 5 minutes later...

Smaller eagle ray stole his spot, I dunno why they love it maybe its comfy there...

Weekend at the Farm.

 I love chickens

Well back from my weekend visiting my relatives, had a great time! My cousin was having his 21st, and I didn't get to see any of my family over Christmas so it was a long overdue trip. It was really great to see some faces I haven't seen in years, was only there for the weekend but we got to do a lot of stuff you cant really do in Wellington (since they live up North its really quite a lot warmer. They have a really cool property too, it has a river for swimming, room to keep horses, tracks to ride quad bikes on etc.

Waterfall too.

Really think the time out in the sun was good for me, I do spend way too much time inside but with the constant rain and wind in my town I don't feel very motivated to go outside most of the time. About the only part of the trip really was the bus ride there and back, going up was during the day and I went with my younger brother so it was fun (but 10 hours long) but the way back was really awful, I got the night bus back hoping to sleep through it but I ended up wedged between two sweaty men, and couldn't stretch out so was awake 90% of the trip, one of them got off the bus at their stop and I was able to steal their seat, but it was when we were 20 minutes away from my destination anyway.

Such is life though, all that time of the bus was well worth the trip.

Some of you might also remember that I went to The Hobbit casting call auditions, no word from that yet but on my form I put down that I was able to ride a horse, so I was pleased to see I still could. Honestly there was just so much to do there, they even had a trampoline so I made a short video of my brother, thing with my brother is he has red curly hair everyone loves so doing flips on a tramp is especially funny to watch.

Yep hes pretty good at them. 

Unfortunately all good things most come to and end, and Im back in Wellington and naturally its raining and windy all day every day again. Still, feel recharged a bit from the trip and a bit more positive day to day just holding on the memories. 

Did I mention I love Chickens?

Update on myself and recent photos of Sendai Tsunami Zone

Hi all, been a couple weeks since Iv had some free time. Been pretty busy looking for work, unfortunately still unsuccessful in that area. I did go to a interview for the JET Programme to teach English in Japan (basically what my degree was about) but a couple months till they will respond to with those that were chosen and even then doesn't start till August so still need something till then.

Had a good interview for a 6 month role which would have been idea, I was actually shocked at the interview because they mentioned the pay scale was 30-40 an hour (around twice my average).

My face when I heard 30-40 an hour.

Really disappointed I didn't get that one to be honest. Oh well life goes on, over the weekend I will be visiting some family up north (in a 10 hour bus trip) so maybe ill take some nice New Zealand scenery photos for you guys.

Also this is a really amazing set of photos from the Sendai Tsunami with then/now shoots.

Also still Youtubing, decided to try my hand at a parody video of quick scope montages you see for COD or MW3 etc, tried to make it funny but maybe its just really gay haha would be good to get some opinions on it, only 40 seconds long =) 

Although if you have never seen a no scope vid or dont like Starcraft it will probably just seem really bad to you, but its sorta meant to be like that, anyway have a good weekend all!.

Feature Film: IT CAME FROM BENETH THE SINK.

Whelp I was was drying and putting away some spoons when I saw some movement coming from the drain in my sink. A few horrifying seconds later this emerged.

 

As far as things that come out of the sink, this was pretty tame and I was relieved after seeing what it was.  This is a NZ Huhu Beetle, they live most of their lives inside trees as larvae and apparently the beetle form only lasts about 2 weeks in their lives.

 

 I recorded some footage of it then placed it outside, if you're interested here is information on the Huhu here!

New Topic: Any of my followers HP Lovecraft fans? Im a big fan of his stories myself, and thinking about playing through Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth on my Youtube Channel. I would love to do a reading of a few stories (Like Cthulhu or The Shadow over Innsmouth) although I'm not sure about the copy right for uploading readings from books onto youtube atm, anyone know?

Sup bro, just brushing your teeth.

I was just getting ready for bed when this happened, since I'm from Aus spiders dont really worry me though but its always annoying for this to happen.

This is a New Zealand White-tailed spider they aren't really harmful to adults even though they are technically the most vemonous spider in NZ. They are kinda dangerous to young / old or people with allergies but mostly just give people frights.

"White-tailed spiders wander about human dwellings (beds) and may be encountered unexpectedly" is a bit of an understatement by Wikipedia. They are hunting spiders so don't wait in webs, and have a bad habit of dropping from the ceiling. In fact about 2 months ago my friend was eating a burger on the couch, when I saw one of these directly above him ( he is terrified of spiders ) he moved to the other side of the couch, 2 minutes later we looked up and it was gone. It had dropped to were he he was sitting a moment ago, and wandering around on the cushion. Anyway, back to going to bed, sweet dreams all.

New Zealand Scenery

Went to the Southern Coast for a BBQ on the weekend, they have some hills near their house that is part of a sheep farm and took some pics for you guys. You can see the suburb we were in and some of my friends still climbing the hill in the first.

View from the top.

Down to the rocky shore.

 This tree endures so much wind it has lopped over to cover the trail. 

Looking to the south.

And of course some sheep from NZ.

Hope you guys like some pictures from this side of the world, almost Christmas so hope you have a good one guys!

Seal pup wanders into home

Iv mentioned Seals before in my NZ wildlife post however this popped up in the news yesterday, apparently this cute baby seal walked through the cat door and went to couch were it curled up and went to sleep.

The owner apparently called the SPCA and explained what was happening, however at the beginning they laughed at her and she had to exclaim she was not drunk and several times repeated that she was sure it wasn't just a stray dog, understandable considering the unusual situation.

After they caught it however the antics continued saying "At Ms Swoffer's home, the seal was put in a net and box but as it was being driven away in the Doc vehicle, it escaped and made its way up to the front of the vehicle, accidentally turning on the radio and ending up on the front seat"

 Sounds like something from a Disney movie to be honest, good thing she had her camera because no one would believe it otherwise, first time I have heard of a seal entering someones home however I have heard of Penguins entering through cat flaps in Eastborne which is near a penguin sanctuary.

This is the seal I talked about in my other posts, they seem quite common and friendly in NZ, however should always be careful around wild animals, take care guys.

Article

Cute Baby Seal

In my post about New Zealand Wildlife I posted some pics of the Seal that lives along the footpath near our city center, was just playing around with my Camera and saw it again and tried out the video tool, so here is an 11 second clip of it just being a seal =)

In other news, still looking for a job before I run out of money haha, take it easy guys.

New Zealand Vs Freedom of Protesting

With all the "Occupy" groups around the world, New Zealand had to join in on the fun. Though the amount of people doing it here are small, however after complaints in Auckland police have now forcibly removed the protesters in our country, including people chained together. You can read more about it here.

The perks of waking up early for delivery guys.

While waiting for my thrice missed package which I can only assume is the passport I have been waiting for I was able to see the sun coming up which as a person that sleeps in rarely gets to see. So here is a picture of the sun on the clouds over the harbor in Wellington New Zealand.

On Owls and Naked Men

A couple posts back I was writing about the native New Zealand Owl and other birds around my house, well I decided to try and find it again to show my friend. So we waited until around midnight when it started calling and went out to look for it with a spot light, we were under the tree and I was searching for it when I heard a voice from below me.

"Heeeeellllloooooooo" it said. I was surprised by this and aimed the torch lower, where before my eyes there was a bathtub, with scented candles around and a naked man having a soak. "Ah Hi..." I replied not sure how my bird hunt had come to this. He spoke in a voice that carried on a bit and said to me "Ahhhh you muuust be the boy that lives at that house over there, I don't think we have had a chance to meet yet". We introduced each other and I explained the situation, he was actually rather nice to talk to to. We decided to give up looking for the Owl since our conversation had scared it off, but as we were leaving he exclaimed "Youuu simply must come out for a soak some time in the night young man". >_>

Some more New Zealand wildlife.

Hey guys, been playing with my new camera a bit and thought I would share some more photos from New Zealand.

This is a native New Zealand Wood Pigeon they are larger than common pigeons and green and stick to the forests or near trees, unlike common pigeons that just make town messy.

Ok just some ducklings nothing special here haha, ducklings are just cute. Its spring here in the southern hemisphere though so we are seeing a lot of them.

Terrible photo unfortunately, since I took this at midnight. But its actually a Southern Boobook (we call them 'Morporks') Its a small owl that's a bit rare, actually first time I have seen one in the wild since they are hard to find at night. They have a distinctive call that sounds exactly like "More Pork, More Pork" hence the name. Really cute bird actually think its the only owl in this part of the world. Will try to get a better picture another day.

This cute little seal has been living on the waterfront lately, he sleeps on the break waters next to the footpath in the middle of town. So close you can actually pat him, though I wouldnt recommend it. I think tourists of the Rugby World Cup are feeding him or something because I have seen him a lot lately, first time I saw him there was a little blue penguin swimming around him, almost like one of the animated buddy movies where two animals become friends ahaha. On a more serious note there has been Orca whales in our bay recently, so I hope he is careful.

Hope you guys enjoyed these snaps from my town here in Wellington New Zealand.