new beginnings

happy 2012 everyone :)

2011 was not a good blogging year for me so i decided to start a new one on tumbler since it's much easier to format pictures on there:

http://liljanyan.tumblr.com/

cheers to the new year!

<3jan

happy october!

it took me a lot longer than i thought to update this blog.. i had some entries ready to post and now i have no idea where the files went! anyways, back to square one...

FUN WITH THE ROOMIE

the past few weeks have been crazy busy for me as i've been settling down and figuring out a schedule that works for both me and my roomie. we kind of have it down except instead of being super productive on our late days, we end up sleeping in haha. we do everything together and it helps with our homesickness. she's pretty awesome.. if it wasn't for her i wouldn't have the confidence to start running and learn stick shift! also, she's a HUGE help when it comes to getting around the island. people tell me 'oh it's an island you can't get lost' well i'm pretty sure i've proved them wrong 10xs.

we haven't done much island-y stuff since school and running has taken up a majority of our time. we did, however, get a glimpse of oktoberfest in chinatown last weekend (only in hawaii would the festival be in chinatown! haha). most of our adventures are at home such as cooking, killing critters, and doing laundry/dishes. sometimes we have a few starbucks adventures like crack sightings! we've been going to starbucks for internet a lot since our neighbor put a password to their wireless acct... no more free wifi at home =(

one notable adventure is the can contest we saw at pearlridge mall! i thought it was pretty amazing how they made these sculptures out of canned goods... although we've been kinda busy we have been able to chill at the beach a few times last month. i'm hoping we'll have more lazy beach days to come since our schedule is beginning to fall into a routine. my favorite beach will always be lani kai which is a lil further down from kailua beach park.. it's a little less crowded, the water is clear, and the sand is super soft. however, ko'olina lagoon comes a close second place and probably a lot safer place to swim for a newbie like me.

KAWAII CORNER

'kawaii' means cute in japanese.. and this word is definitely written all over hawaii!

i also added my friend's doggie to my sightings mainly because he has a heart-shaped spot on the side of his body!! SOOO adorable!

there's a starbucks in pearl city where some customer always makes different kinds of balloon animals and sets up shop at the starbucks. it's pretty cool how talented she is.. she's actually a vet too!

of course, sanrio cafe in pearlridge mall had to make it to the cute corner and this random panda mailbox that belongs to a restaurant somewhere in town. haha i wish i could have a panda mailbox! of course we would only see this in hawaii.. i haven't seen this many cute stuff in washington >__<

ALOHA FRIDAY RAINBOWS

of course since it's friday i have to post my aloha friday rainbows. here's a collection of some rainbows i've seen since the last post... and also some local grinds =)

LOCAL FOOD

THE BIG MOVE

i'm here!! no longer in my lovely hometown of seattle but my new "home" in oahu. so far since the move to paradise, the theme word for me has been sickness. =( yes, why complain if i'm in hawaiiiii? let me sum up thy sickly ways:

cold sick:
this is most likely from the lack of sleep due to my last minute packing (highly do NOT recommend this...) combined with contaminated airplane air. ive spent the last few lonely nights acccompanied by some cold virus. but i think the ramen + tropical juice blends are just the remedy i needed to overcome this battle

home sick:
i came home in hawaii to an empty condo since one of my roomies is still at home (her home is my home: seattle ^__^) and the other is roaming the US for various assigned jobs. i can't say that i wasn't phased by my mom's breaking voice over the phone- hearing her sound so sad made me cry each time the first few days. i think the tears are all gone now though.

i also heard from my mom that one of my grandpas (he's my great-uncle by american lineage but in filipino lineage a grandpa is a grandpa no matter how far related!) passed away the day i left. =( my heart remains in seattle with the family. i also uploaded my very first youtube video in memory/honor of him: please watch! it is my last memory of him when i visited him in june. he was 96 then yet he was still singing and smiling.

i know when im feeling homesick the best thing to do is surround yourself with friends... well all my hawaii friends are all so busy so i havent seen much of them either =( hopefully when school starts ill be much more occupied with studies that i won't feel too homesick. also, on tuesday my seattle roomie returns, yay!

grossed out sick:
one thing i did not look forward to when arriving on the island was running into critters. mainly cockroaches *shudder*. i actually found one today and had to spray the life out of it with raid... i also had to discard the basket that it was living in because i swear last time i was here in May, i saw another cockroach in the same basket. im pretty sure it's not the same cockroach btw bc i screamed bloody murder that time and made my sister's bf kill it. anyways.. im still recovering from this mornings cockroach incident. i hate cockroaches 10x more than spiders.

ive also spotted random little black ants wandering and kill them with my finger.. mainly bc i dont want to lose sight of them if i step away. just so you little local critters know, NO ONE escapes me. i do not want any of these 'friends' to multiply..

anyways, thats the end of my sickly roundup. tomorrow i shall venture out into the real world and drive to windward side to get my student ID =) maybe monday i shall update on my cleaning craze and how everythings coming along. but for now, enjoy these pictures of some stuff ive been eating lately:

my very first homecooked meal in hawaii:
french toast with a bit of almond butter & maple syrup + a side of peaches...
and water and airborne to cure the cold!

korean bbq @ ykele bbq:
where i ended up bc i got lost going home hahah.
a mini kalbi plate with side of long rice + a side of mac salad

aaand here's my aloha friday picture of the week. if you look *really* closely there's a rainbow =)


it is now time for me to sleep and let these bleach trays work their magic for my student ID picture tomorrow. good night world!

summer arrival

YAY the sun has finally peeked his head out for the summer! it's still not ideal hot summer weather but at least some of us can fix our vitamin d deficiency.

celebrated the sun's presence by taking a quick lunch break at u-village for some red mango with my favorite toppings (also the highest cal count ones): mochi & dark chocolate chips. then felt like throwing in some raspberries since it's summer. in the words of my sister from thanh-vi on the ave, "why not?"

some of you may or may not know this but i am allergic to fish. with the exception of shellfish and things with tentacles (i *heart* calamari!). yet my coworker still offered me some fish that i couldn't refuse! it was a fish-shaped waffle with red bean inside. i can't believe i've never been introduced to this adorable and delicious snack before! this will be the only fish i eat... ever.

isn't he adorable?!.. and delectable muhaha

busy friday

FRIDAY was the last time starbucks was going to spread some love to its hometown by giving away free tickets every friday after 2pm to seattle starbucks. of course, being in hawaii made me miss free tix to mariners games and SIFF =( then i also forgot about SAM (Seattle Art Museum) tix the friday after i returned..

BUT I was able to score free tix to the aquarium & a broadway production of hardcore ballroom dancing (burn the floor)! downside to the tix that i got: aquarium tix are for youth up to ages 12 and the broadway show is playing in september-- i'm moving end of august.

i feel like this blog is hating me already!! but although starbucks may hate me, doesn't mean seattle hates me. besides, i think starbucks is just trying to redeem themselves here since they took away our super sonics..

although i didn't have free tix to the mariners game, i went on friday w/ my sis and some friends. my dad told me i was wasting monies on the mariners since they would lose again but ALAS!! mariners scored a home run and won one for me that day! it was also my sister's first baseball game ever so i'm glad we won for her too. =) i didn't score a double-headed bobblehead that night (would've been the ultimate - griffey & ichicro!) but at least i got to see what it was.. my sister and i were 10 mins too late since her directions to chinatown led me straight into pike place instead. this is also the last time i will entrust her with directions.

as for food on friday: i began my day with a croissant at west seattle's bakery nouveau and ended it with chocolate mousse at capitol hill's dilettante cafe. i wouldn't have had it any other way =)

SIFF

my favorite spring festival of seattle!! SIFF aka Seattle International Film Festival. it's the only time of year when I watch foreign and independent films and stuff my face with popcorn almost everyday. last year was my record of 11 films during SIFF season (about a month). i'm disappointed that this year i've only seen 4 films, and one film for STIFF (seattle's truly independent film festival). i'm also disappointed that the films weren't all that great. i rated almost all of them 4/4 realizing that i was setting my standards waay too low haha.

i blame most of missing the good films on being in hawaii, and although you may be thinking why blame hawaii because hawaii > SIFF but this made me sad because i'll be spending the next 2 years there missing the next 2 years of SIFF. being that this is my last SIFF for the next few years makes me sad =(

on a happier note, getting back into my workout groove since SIFF has only brought me pimples and weight. yesterday i began my hot yoga package at bikram hot yoga in redmond and today i finish my last sassyfit boot camp session... as soon as i finish my chocolate milk =)

iLEFTmyHEARTinSEATTLE

So I really suck at blogging. But I blog really good in my head, I swear. It’s just a matter of getting it out so I can save it and look back at my random moments/memories/thoughts. I was thinking about doing some sort of theme to my blog... originally was “the adventures of janyan” because of my travelling but that’s pretty limited now since my Europe trip pretty much ate my bank.

However, it dawned on me recently that I want to blog about my lovely hometown Seattle. I lovelovelove this city with all my heart and don’t see myself living elsewhere. But in August I shall be moving to “paradise” for Nursing school.

Thus my attempt to revive my blog is to theme it up with this: iLEFTmyHEARTinSEATTLE. This shall be my tribute to my birthplace and also a promise to return to this city I call home =)

Folks, prepare to be bored out of your mind by my limited vocabulary…this blog is only the beginning ^_~