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  • Kimberly Hula 11:38 pm on April 28, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: 9/52,   

    Found In Translation 

    Let’s say I was offered one wish.  And that the wish had to be temporal, gluttonous.  It had to be something I could otherwise not likely have that could not be preserved.  It could be considered wasteful.

    If this offer ever surfaced I would know my response before the genie could even intone a question: I would go to my Japanese hair salon in Fuchutown Hiroshima for a haircut from Kazuo.

    But to better justify my choice I’d like to set the scene of a small suburban town outside of the city center of Hiroshima, Japan.  The shop is located around the corner from the Hondori Gochomae bus stop and kitty corner to the Mon Cheri bakery.  When the 7-11 convenient shop across the street closed down, for two days to renovate, the hair salon purchased flowers from it’s neighboring flower shop, Kana, to present the 7-11 with an enormous bouquet in congratulations.  They are that kind of shop.

    The most novel aspect of this less trafficked street in sleepytown Fuchutown is the inordinate number of Hair Salons all within 3 blocks of one another.  There was “Birth” directly adjacent to the school I taught at.  “Snob” was located under my apartment complex.  “White Hair Salon Boutique and Dental Clinic” was stationed near the grocery store I shopped at daily and “Strand” shared a parking garage with the Mon Cheri bakery keeping it in direct line of sight of our hair salon that sends renovation flowers and has one element that sets it apart from every other hair salon on the block.

    If Hair has a dog.

    (More …)

     

    • cupcakeemergency 11:10 am on April 29, 2010 Permalink

      I love this one! It is a very, very sweet post.

    • yearof52adventures 12:25 pm on April 29, 2010 Permalink

      Thank you darling! Should you ever find yourself in Fuchutown Japan, visit my boys at If Hair.

  • AG 9:24 am on April 18, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , 9/52   

    Adventures #9, #10, and #11: Island Biking, Mountain Hiking, and Shellfish Eating 

    PhotobucketI just got back from a bike trip on Seonyudo Island. There are 3 small islands connected by bridges and you can ride to and through all 3, so I did. I went with a tour group and some friends. We got to the island via Ferry and biked for about 4 hours hitting up all the islands. I had not been on a bike in at least 10 years and possibly even longer. So I was a little shaky at first but once I got my groove going it was enjoyable.

    On day 2 of the trip, I opted to go on a morning hike. I assumed this would be a leisurely hike that would be short and sweet. I was wrong. We ended up hiking a mountain! I have never ever hiked up a mountain before. Number one, I am afraid of heights. And second, I probably would not have joined the hiking group had I known what I was in for. This so called hike turn into mountain climbing! I made it really far up and ended up far behind the group. Photobucket I started to get dizzy and almost euphoric because I was standing alone on a mountain! I’ve never experienced a feeling like this before in my life! It was a true test. I passed it though because I was able to make it back down alone and followed the same trail. At times, I got really freaked and thought I heard hissing in the bushes. I’ve heard that there are many snakes in the mountains in Korea. I began talking to myself out loud as a way to block the sounds around me. And I actually said to myself, “If you can do this you can do anything.” I felt quite empowered when I reached the bottom.

    Following this unexpected and very very scary adventure, I walked to the beach where people were digging for shellfish. They were using shovels and poking holes in the sand. Then they poured salt into the holes and the shellfish came through. It was very cool. After gathering a bucket full, we headed back to the hotel and boiled them. See pictures below. I ate one! It was quite delicious! (More …)

     

  • Stephanie 8:22 pm on April 6, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: 9/52   

    Adventure #9 – Forgiveness (a love story) 

    February 13, 2010

    I started off 2010 with an email from an ex-boyfriend I hadn’t spoken to in 7 years – not since he married some chick while we were in (what I thought) was a long distance relationship.  The marriage was bad enough, but to make matters worse he neglected to ever inform me of the event (or break up with me), so I had to find out from my best friend who had heard it through the grapevine.  During our tumultuous 4-year on and off again relationship, I lovingly nicknamed him my “Krytonite” because I knew he would eventually destroy me but I couldn’t stay away from him.   Fitting, wouldn’t you agree?

    Needless to say, his New Year’s email caught me off guard, and then of course, brought back a maelstrom of emotions.   I was angry yet intrigued.  What could he possibly want after all this time?  I was in turmoil for weeks trying to figure out what he wanted from me.

    What he wanted was to meet up with me next time I visited home and have dinner.  I was torn between shutting him out forever (you had your chance loser!) or taking the opportunity to get closure and possibly get some of my questions answered.  For instance, why was I out of the loop about your wedding?  I probably should have been the first to know, don’t you think?  Do you realize you never broke up with me, so does that technically mean we’re still together?

    I decided to go ahead with the dinner, and I have to say it’s a night I’ll never forget.  My beloved Kryptonite allowed me to look him in the eye to tell him how much pain he had caused me and how my life had never been the same since.   He apologized and accepted responsibility, but explained his side of the story.  I actually walked away feeling like he did me a favor by marrying that other girl.  What I viewed as the most disrespectful and hurtful thing that someone had ever done to me was actually him having so much respect for me and my dreams to not drag me into a life he knew I would hate.  He said that the driving force behind why he didn’t choose me was that he truly believed I didn’t need him and that I would be better off without him.  I told him he probably could have told me that 7 years ago, so I didn’t waste so much energy despising him!  He seemed proud of the person I became and I felt he had a lot of respect for what I’ve done with my life.

    Thank you, Kryptonite, for seeing the possibilities of what my life could become without you in it, even when I couldn’t see that for myself.   Thank you for empowering me with independence and courage to journey through life solo, making my own choices and forging my own way.  Maybe  I should change your nickname to Red Bull, since you gave me wings!  😉

     

    • Kelly Smith 2:31 pm on April 10, 2010 Permalink

      if you want to try something different with this I suggest:
      leaving off the buttercream frosting. When cupcakes cool slice the top off to make a “sandwich” make some homemade whip cream and mix in fresh strawberries. layer the whip cream on top of bottom half of cupcake and sandiwch with the top half.

      I do this with vanilla cupcakes and raspberry whipped cream or blueberries.

    • yearof52adventures 10:05 pm on April 12, 2010 Permalink

      this is beautifully touching. I want what you’re drinking (Red Bull). What a great story of flight!

    • goldtang 1:57 pm on April 19, 2010 Permalink

      This has so inspired me, as my boyfriend left me two weeks ago, saying I was better off without him (which meant he wanted someone else and got her that night!) He wanted “more experiences” in life but has actualy taught me that even a good thing that has been useful to us becomes an unnecessary burden when we no longer need it to.

  • eatveggiesdrinkwine 7:35 am on March 27, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: 9/52, birthday   

    9/52: Documenting Birthday No. 37 

    My initial draft of ideas for 52 adventures included “Document a day and its adventures in photos and reflections.” I decided my 37th birthday would be a good day to try.

    I enjoyed taking pictures–I felt like I was on a mission–but adding them into my blog was exhausting (I’m not all that tech-savvy) and diminished my desire to reflect on the day.

    Adventure completed, lesson learned. You can read about my day on my other blog.

    Those beautiful flowers were a birthday gift from my mother- and sister-in-law. Fresh flowers in my  house make me oh-so-happy!

     

  • jeindeer 1:39 pm on March 22, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: 9/52, brattle theater, ,   

    #9: See James Ivory at the Brattle Theater 

    After having so much fun during the classic horror movie marathon at Brattle Theatre, I kept looking for an adventurous reason to go back.  That opportunity arose when they hosted a Q&A session with James Ivory from Merchant Ivory Productions.  James Ivory directed the movie versions of both The Remains of the Day and Howards End.  I’m not totally familiar with the process of making a film–I’m more of a book girl–so the talk was really informative.

    A few highlights:

    • Everyone (myself–until recently–included) assumes he’s English, but he’s not.  He finds this hilarious.  Personally, I’d also like to live my life so that people assume I’m from England.
    • He loved The Fantastic Mr. Fox, which reminded him of Ingmar Bergman’s The Magic Flute.
    • He feels that small historical details can give a movie the richness and atmosphere it needs, and mentioned a fact he learned while doing research for Jefferson in Paris: whenever anyone paid a call to the court of Louis XIV and mentioned his name, all men present had to take off their hats… including Louis XIV.

    It’s always inspiring to be the presence of someone who is great at and passionate about their craft.  Merchant Ivory Productions was headed up by a group of friends (a director, a producer, and a writer) who lived on different floors in the same apartment building, always ate breakfast together, and fought about and filmed great movies.  Hearing him speak about that communal creative process was quite inspiring.  I’ll definitely watch more of his films in the future.

     

  • adrienne 8:09 pm on March 21, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , , , 9/52   

    A Quick and Dirty Catch-up… 

    8th Adventure – getting a haiku accepted into Sidelines, Simmons lit. magazine.  Not a big adventure, but nice to get a poem in the mag two years running (two last year, I’m slipping). 🙂

    9th – Going to Boston Beerworks for the first time on 12 March.  I decided it was no longer fair that I wasn’t supposed to drink at all (thanks to issues from a brain tumor I didn’t ask for), and so after nearly 12 years of nothing more than a couple of  sips of alcohol, I drank two beers and a little vodka (over the course of the entire evening).  I’m not going to go crazy, of course, because that would be stupid, but I’m not always going to say no.  A defiant adventure, it was.  Although the Beerworks is nice, and it was a fun evening with friends.

    10th – I joined Haiku a Day on Facebook, and will test my mettle with the poetry style I love writing. I reserve the right, however, to fall back on my older stash, and I firmly believe that haiku poems can be in two parts, like chapters. Themed haiku.

    11th – Friday 19 March I tried JPLicks ice cream for the first time – kahlua.  Yummy, but definitely get a cup because it is drippy!

     

  • kimkin85 11:02 am on March 5, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: 9/52, racquetball   

    Week 9 – Racquetball 

    I never thought of racquetball as inherently dangerous, and I never intended it to be my adventure for the week. But as things turned out, it was certainly the most exciting part of my week. I haven’t been exercising since my oral surgery because I was told not to. It was easy to tell why, since even after I stepped down off the heavy pain meds and could walk without feeling dizzy the surgery site would throb at the slightest increase in my heart rate. But a friend wanted to learn how to play, so another friend and I agreed to show him how. I figured that as long as I didn’t push myself too hard I would be alright–after all, my mouth was feeling much better and I was able to take the stairs again without my mouth hurting, which is a definite step in the right direction! So four of us headed to the court Wednesday night to play. I took a conservative approach to the game and didn’t run around as much as I usually would and thought I was doing a pretty good job of protecting myself from myself when I was quite suddenly reminded of the true dangers of the game. As I turned to watch my friend return my serve, the ball was coming at my face too quickly for me to even duck. Miraculously, it hit me in the safest place possible–the middle of my forehead. Considering I had glasses perched on my nose and stitches in my mouth, pretty much any other point of impact would have spelled disaster, so my first response was to laugh with relief, which unfortunately for my friends probably looked like crying since the impact had made my eyes water. They offered to let me quit, but I’m too stubborn for that. We played another 15 minutes, until Christina, the one who had hit me, had to go to a meeting. I fully intend to play again next week in spite of this tendency of mine to be a magnet for sports balls of all kinds (the last serious incident was a volleyball in the back of the head back in high school gym class). I won’t let a little thing like fear of bodily harm keep me from having fun, though I’ll probably want to work on honing my reflexes so I can continue to protect my mouth while the surgical site heals.

    Oh, and sorry about the improper numbering on my last post. I think I’ve got it straightened out now, and we should be good to go for the rest of the year!

     

    • Affinity 9:12 pm on May 2, 2011 Permalink

      Thanks for sharing. Alayws good to find a real expert.

  • Berton 2:19 am on March 5, 2010 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: 9/52   

    Week 9 – Adventure Fail 

    Well, this week I did have a pretty exciting evening out with some friends.  We went to this AWESOME restaurant called Chino Latino for a friend’s birthday.  About 20 people or so there, and the main course was a roasted pig.  As in, they roasted the ENTIRE pig.  I tried some pig cheek, skin, lots of weird parts.  It was very delicious.

    But that isn’t what I consider my adventure for the week to be.  Nope, my adventure this week was all about failing.

    For the past nearly three years, I have been a teacher without a license.  I have taught English as a second language in Japan for a year, and for close to two years I have been a preschool teacher for 3 and 4 year olds.  But my desire has been to go back to school (or alternate license program) and get my teaching license in elementary education.  This year, I applied to a variety of graduate programs, Teach for America, and St. Paul Teaching Fellows, all with the desire being to further my career in one of my dream jobs.  And it just so happened that this week, I would hear back from every program I applied to.

    I didn’t get accepted into a single one.

    School always came easy to me.  Theater was something I excelled at and that drove me.  I love playing board games, video games, etc.  And I am damn good at those things too.  So failure is a hard thing for me to swallow.  Not really at sports (since I suck at them in general, I accept losing in that regard).  Maybe it is because I have two older brothers who always won when I was younger.  Maybe it is my stubborn nature.  But success has usually a part of my life.  I am not trying to talk myself up or anything.  There are many areas of life where I suck (again, look at sports).  But in the aspects of life where I tried to achieve success, I usually did.  So to have a multitude of programs all tell me that I am not good enough at the moment to move forward with this dream of mine, that fucking kills.

    But after talking about these events with my fiance, and thinking about it, I can’t change their minds.  At least, not at this moment.  All I can do is keep moving forward.  One step at a time.  Maybe take a few more classes in college to bulk up my educational experience.  Volunteer at an elementary school, or try to get into substitute teaching.  Maybe next year, apply to twice as many programs.  All I know is that I can’t give up on my dream.  I need to keep reaching.  One day, I WILL be an elementary school teacher.  And the moment I walk into my classroom for the first time, that feeling of euphoria for me will make all of this hardship worth it.

    Now, just cause I have a positive outlook doesn’t mean I am ok with their decisions, haha.  I am pretty pissed off at the world right now.  But that is what friends (and beer) are for.  And Spider-man…and my fiance Becky.  And a few more things…like snow boarding, heavy metal music, the Nintendo Wii…man, there are lots of things at my fingertips that can cheer me up.  I think I will go do some of those things.

     

    • yearof52adventures 3:15 am on March 5, 2010 Permalink

      I don’t want to call this an adventure in failing. Instead, let’s think of it as a foray into new possibilities. I don’t always subscribe to the adage that things happen for a reason, but knowing you I know good-great-best things are forthcoming. And I’d like to celebrate that.

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