Barstools

I really wanted barstools. Our house has this wonderful built in counter/bar that was begging for stools. The problem is, it is high! You need at least 29 inch barstools. And in Japan every thing is teeny tiny. The other problem is that no one ships furniture to Japan. So we had to find them here. Our choices were to scour the Internet for which furniture stores to shop at or hope someone was gonna sell them on the local okinawa craigslist (bookoo) site. After two weeks of no hits on bookoo and knowing we needed 4, we opted for a furniture store.

We ended up checking out Nitori today, a shop on the way to Naha and bought 4 barstools, they were not what I had in mind and almost twice as much as I was hoping to spend for four barstools. But they all matched and they had them, so I was sold at that point.

We got them and they were so easy to build and look wonderful. I just wish we had had them this weekend when we had some friends over for the afternoon. Drat! Next time!

We also went to A and W, which is everywhere out here. For my Californians, I am sure you remember them. They are amazing and have the greatest rootbeer on the planet. We used to eat there as kids, at the one in Mentone. I also remember stopping at one in Parker (I think) on the way home from Havasu, awesome. And it is only 3 blocks away. Amazingly, Aj had never been, though we only drink A&W in this house. No Mug or Bargs to be seen.

I am headed back to the states tomorrow to pick up my beloved Jenner and spend a little time catching up with people. But I'm excited to get Jenner and get back home to Aj and really start life out here without something looming!

unaccompanied baggage

Today we received our unaccompanied baggage which was fun. Because, my stuff! 

It consisted of almost all of our kitchen (minus decor and the microwave.....kicking myself over the microwave). All of our clothing except formal wear. Lots of towels, shoes, pillows and blankets. Also our bedroom tv, accompanying surround system and AJs PS3. And our entire movie and video game collection. Which I spent weeks transferring from cases to cd binders, to save space and weight in our move. Little did we know we would be moving into an apartment with 500 more square feet than our last place....and our shipment was like 1200 lbs under. But such is life!

I washed all of the fabric (clothes, towels, blankets and pillows) as well as every kitchen object that was washable. All total I did about a bazillion loads of dishes and a gazillion loads of laundry ( really like 8 and 15).

But it's okay because the keurig is here and there's coffee. Also if I stand at a very specific angle in my kitchen, it looks like life is normal and we are not still mid-move, 2 months later. =)

Yakisoba in a bookstore

On Wednesday we went for dinner at a little coffee shop/ bookstore and ordered some fairly decent Yakisoba.

The atmosphere was awesome and at first we thought the tables were awesome. They were made from old arcade games, the kind you had to sit at like PAC man. For my redlanders, similar to the games they had at round table pizza when it was still in the mall.

It got uncomfortable after a bit because there was kind of nowhere to put your legs.

Still fun!

Also fancy Japanese Bon bons that come with a toothpick so you can eat without getting your fingers dirty. They are called pinos but I call them pin pins. 

I don't have a picture but Aj and I have found the best ramen house on the island and I defy anyone to tell me otherwise! It is about two blocks from our place, pretty cheap and super delicious and we've eaten there two days in a row. I fear it won't be long before we are regulars. 

Been a while

It's been a while since I updated all of my lovely blog followers, which I'm pretty sure is like 10 people. Hi!

Aj and I moved out of the hotel and are in our very spacious 3 bedroom apartment. Very spacious....so spacious......much space. Why? Oh because we have nothing! We have some loaner furniture: a double bed, some chairs and a couch. But that's about it.

Oh but we do have our lovely entertainment center that we bought our first day on the island. It fits all the criteria we ever wanted in an entertainment center, it just has nothing upon which to center entertainment.

Our unaccompanied baggage comes Saturday though, and our bedroom tv is in there, so we can have entertainment! As well as our entire kitchen, yay! But also sad face. Now I will be expected to cook when all I really want to do in life is eat ramen.

We have made some strides out here though. Aj is at work, so I am back to doing nothing. Although I did apply for 8 jobs today, let's hope the job market is significantly better than it was in San Diego. 

We also bought a dining room table off of bookoo. I know I know, I said I was gonna use the loaner table for 3 years but honestly if it looks anything like these chairs then it is ugly! And also huge for only having 4 chairs. So I have been searching bookoo and a lovely little 4 seater table became available today for 100 bucks. And the people have asked to keep it through July 1st, and I said sure I will pay upon pick up and it doesn't matter anyway since I don't have stuff to use a table.

That might be all that is going on right now. Aj bought a remote control boat for far too much money. So we  will see how that works out.

Also I found these chips, they tasted like bacon grease mixed with spicy mustard granuals and I am ashamed to say I liked it.

Also look at this hilarious ketchup, this is how they serve it to you at our local burger place. Awesome.

Not from real pandas, jeez guys.

Kind of addicted

So I've posted on several occasions how amazing the daiso is, and it is. Alison and I went again yesterday to pick up some stuff for her new house. And we found magical bandana headbands. Which make wearing a bandana crazy easy, especially when one is having a bad hair day. Between the two of us we bought all the colors they had, which was only 4, but still. Another awesome daiso win.

A quest for noodles

Aj and I had a hankering for noodles and despite the facts that we found the cheapest Yakisoba place ever, we sought out noodles.

We ended up at a ramen house and ate deliciously warm ramen. Afterwards we ended up at a Japanese version of 7-11 called Family Mart. Where we got some pretty delicious ice cream for only 80 yen.

Aj had chocolate ice cream surrounded by dark chocolate shell.

I had strawberry mint ice cream surrounded by a crunchy milk chocolate shell. Yummiest!

If I do say so myself

I think Aj and I are adjusting to the island pretty well. Today we both had to run errands at Camp Foster but we needed both cars for the errands, so we set out solo at different times and both managed to make it to foster unscathed! And navigate the base. Aj finished checking in and I was able to get my re entry stamp so that I can leave the country. 

We also had our housing appointment today and we were told we can't move in until the tenth and worse, our stuff is all over the place. Some on its way, some in Sacramento and some in San Diego. So they don't think we will get our things until the end of the month or July. Mega bummer.

After getting our crappy news we went and registered for a po box, so now we have a mailing address. Then on the way home we stopped for a late lunch at a Japanese restaurant. The cool thing about Courtney is that it is a little deeper into Okinawa so they are less likely to have people who speak English or have English posted.

Through our charming smiles, hand motions and aj's very broken college Japanese, we were able to order a delicious lunch. Success!

Then we missed our turn back onto kadena and instead of continuing until we found a spot for a legal u-turn, few and far between here, Aj whipped out his iPhone and navigated me through some back allies. I am a great driver out here and Aj can read the crap out of Japanese maps. Teamwork!

To further treat our bad moods we went for ice cream in American village then to ride the Ferris wheel.

Tomorrow our hotel is doing construction on our building so we wont have water. So we've decided to go to the beach and exploring!

100 yen store

Depending upon the exchange rate 100 yen is basically a dollar. In the states we have dollar stores but they aren't great.and sometimes they are downright horrendous. In japan 100 yen stores are bits of heaven dropped from the sky. They sell E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G. Every move I go to the mcx or target and buy all the stuff you need when you move: mops, brooms, trash cans, sponges, spices, and everything. And it always sets us back a couple of hundred dollars. But in japan you can find all of that and more at a 100 yen store. You can buy giant plastic tubs for storage or chargers for an iPhone. It's amazing and today I went to 6 of them. So much awesome.