december in kobe

you're not experiencing december in kobe unless you experience the beauty that is the Kobe Luminarie. the beautiful light displays were set up in kobe to commemorate the Great Hanshin Earthquake which occured in January, 1995. although visually stunning, one can't help but feel the sombre atmosphere which accompanies the lights.

during the luminarie period, kobe sees a huge influx of people and in order to view the lights, you have to wait in a massive line for at least half an hour. as a friend put it, walking towards the luminarie in a huge crowd pretty much feels like a scene from War of the Worlds.

on a more light-hearted note, erika and jaimie visited me from brisbane last weekend! it was nice to get a dose of home and "feel" brisbane again and i hope they had a fun time. special mention goes out to erika "flammable" bellingham for managing to set her hair on fire during one night out in town. she probably would have been up in flames for real had jaimie not noticed.

i guess in exchange for me letting the two crash in my tiny room on Port Island, erika was nice enough to decorate my room with christmas lights and tinsel and jaimie was un-nice enough to cover my walls with underwear and bizarre lingerie that came in an underwear gift pack she bought. they also spent an afternoon making me Ikea-bought gingerbread house which I am still nibbling through. unfortunately the house kept toppling over thanks to pyjama girl and her meat cleaver... (pyjama girl is worthy of a blog devoted solely to her.)

on yet another pointless note, my pink bike Babs seems to be under the weather as she has now started squeaking every time i brake and this makes me a little sad.

fyi, this is babs and the tall mysterious man hug-violating me is thomas.