Must-have Nikes

I think that these shoes might be perfect for the tomboy-type of girl. I can't believe how many different color ways and styles are offered in this high-heeled shoe. Definitely on my need to buy list!

Oh the drama!!

Today at work, I was helping a lady with her fabric and her phone rang. Her ringtone was an SS501 song that just happened to be the theme song of the Korean drama I watched earlier this summer called "Boys Before Flowers." I was SO excited! I told her that I knew the song and that it was from that drama, and we shared a little moment of Korean drama and Korean pop discussion!

I was very excited to find out that the heart-throb in "Boys Before Flowers" is now starring in a new drama called "City Hunter." She also recommended that I watch "IRIS," which has one of my favorite band artists in the cast (TOP from Big Bang!). So now I really have to watch some more dramas! Kind of makes me wish I was trying to learn Korean right now instead of Japanese...

Here are the links to the shows if you are interested. After I watch them I'll post a little review:

City Hunter
IRIS
Boys Before Flowers

A note about "City Hunter": this show is currently going on in Korea, and isn't supposed to end until August. If you are interested in watching "Boys Before Flowers", I definitely recommend it, though the end gets a little cheesy and ridiculous (still cute though!).

And here is a photo of Lee Min Ho. This is why these dramas are so addicting :)

No News is Good News?

Hello! I'm back! I will try to catch my blog up to all of the big events that have happened this year that have been preventing me from blogging! For now though, I have a different topic on my mind.

I have heard the phrase "no news is good news" before and it seems to be a true statement. In reading back through my blog posts of this year, I came across my posting for Japan's tsunami. Isn't it funny that when this tragic event happened you couldn't go anywhere without hearing about it. The rising death toll. New satellite photos. Fukushima's nuclear disaster.

I still see the occasional "donate to Japan" on some websites (might be more frequent for a person like me who visits Asian websites...), but I don't really hear any news about what is going on. I would assume that Japan is getting on with rebuilding and turning their misfortune around.

I have made the decision to visit Japan after graduating from Oregon State next year, and with this decision comes a need to convince my parents. My mom brought up this topic of rebuilding, so I decided to see what I could find on the internet for any news.

One article stated that 7 of the 9 regions reported an up in the economy views. As I read the rest of the article, it appears that the the economies are doing a little better, but some regions are still in a severe state. With the Fukushima incident, there are several obstacles in the way of reopening and utilizing that power. Production is encouraged to go overseas, and consumers are told to limit their use of power to prevent a black out. Another article reported that the man appointed as the Disaster Reconstruction Minister has stepped down already after scolding a governor of one of Japan's regions not doing well. If you want to read either of these articles, here they are:

BOJ: 7 Out of 9 Japan Regions Up Econ Views
Matsumoto Quits as Japan Cabinet Minister

So it looks things are moving towards progress, but I don't think anyone can say it's "good news" yet. On a lighter note, here is a fun bike helmet I'm looking at, from a website that allows you to buy hard-to-find-things from Japan! (I've also added this website to my links).

For the love of shoes!

You may have noticed that I have added another friend to my blog roll. This lovely lady, is Mandi Kremer, whom I had the opportunity of dressing at Portland Fashion Week. As I found with a lot of the models, they were so much more friendly that I thought they would be. The other amazing thing about Mandi, is that she designs her own shoes. (Designing by adding things to her shoes and making them spectacular!)

Miss Grishley wrote an article for the Daily Barometer talking about her fabulous shoes after Portland Fashion Week.

She recently designed some new ones, and I am now saving up my monies to buy a pair!
Here's a bad picture of the shoes, go to Mani's blog to see them better!

Tsunami

It is amazing to me how news can travel so fast in this world. We live over 7,000 miles away from Japan, and yet, moments after a devastating incident, we know about it. It's too bad we don't have a way to prevent these things from happening. The wonderful thing that comes from our current technology, is that we can send help and aid that much faster. Even Lady Gaga is contributing by selling bracelets.

Somewhat-comforting thoughts are that of all countries to get hit with this, Japan is most prepared (at least for the earthquake part). Less people have died than could have, but that is still people who are gone and family and friends left to miss them.

As you may or may not know, I'm trying to get an internship in Japan for Fall term 2011. I know by then Japan will be up and running again, but I feel so sad for what's happened.

Here's a good article about what's happened in Japan. And I leave with the image of the Great Wave.

Asian Zippers

Hey! 3 posts this month! I'm on a roll!

If you don't know, I have an internship thing going on at the Rain Shed here in Corvallis. If you don't know what the Rain Shed is, it is a specialty fabric shop with lots of great outerwear fabrics and more!

Every I leave that place, I learn something new or am extremely inspired. A couple weeks ago, one of the ladies there introduced me to this awesome zipper company's website. I have yet to see if they sell retail, but some really fun zippers!

She thought they were a Japanese zipper company, but it turns out the headquarters on Chinese Taipei (Taiwan). The company is KCC (Keen Ching Industrial Co.). You should definitely take a look at their zippers.

I love this zipper:

Alright, that's my quick post for the night. Hope the zippers inspire you as much as they inspired me!

Year of Peace

So a couple of weekends ago, I went down to San Francisco to visit my little sister and watch the Chinese New Year Parade. The parade was awesome! I didn't realize that it would be set to be more at night, but it makes sense, because they have so many chinese lanterns and fireworks and the like. The parade started at 5:30pm and my sisters and I left at 8pm and it was still going! If we had prepared a little better for the cold, we would have stuck it out a little longer.

There were a lot of cute little kids with bunny ears (actually, lots of things with bunny ears). I also really enjoyed the tiger leaving (2010 was year of the tiger) and the rabbit coming in. Sadly, I used Kambria's camera instead of mine. Hers does not take very good pictures at night, and she has it, so I can't get any of the good pictures off of it! So enjoy the googled images!

Cassandra was saying that the year of the Hare is always a year of Peace. It comes before the year of the dragon, which can be a changing kind of year. So enjoy 2011, friends!