from Crocodile Farm Street...

catsitting in switzerland #2

2010-11-17T08:31:00.000-08:00

several days after my mother left, my friend, A from Germany joined me here in the Zurich house. we've been good friends since our school (Art Center, CA). we spent so much time together those days in classes and also outside of classes; talking, drawing, drinking, and eating. while she was here last week, it became just like the same way we used to be doing.

one day while we were strolling around the lake of Zurich in the nice weather, we found a 'wine expo' being held on the ten large ships at the lake harbor. the sign said "free entrance between noon and 1pm" (after 1pm, it's 20sfr) it didn't take so much time for us to decide the next day's plan since we both love wines!

we ended up spending the whole two days in those ships. it was so fun! there were all kinds of wines from all over the world. first we started several kinds of malbec, then moved to Shiraz, and then pinotage and some others. we both found some wonderful pinotage wines there. south african wines are amazing!

each booth looks like this. there were hundreds of booths on the ships.

A and me.

A talking to a wine maker.

when we left the ships, it was already dark. there were more people coming in in the evening.

as A had some sketch deadline approaching, we also stayed at home and worked in the living room. when it was raining, we opened wine already in the afternoon and made fire in the fireplace with some nice music..

whole one week, we kept eating, drinking, and talking. here is our high light; fondue night with very nice Swiss white wine.

...and luxemburgerli from sprüngli and a glass of Scotch. :-P

we also had an opportunity to talk with our another close friend　from school, K(with her baby girl) on skype one night. as we've been separated in the three different countries, it was a very nice gathering again.

thanks so much for coming, A! i will be looking forward to spending time with you again, probably next time in London!

catsitting in switzerland #1

2010-11-17T07:11:00.000-08:00

currently, my mother-in-law is taking care of my cats in Zurich until next march. (for the quarantine issue in England) while she is traveling abroad in oct/nov, i'm here at her house living with my three cats for three weeks. three weeks by myself is a little too long (Dan is staying in London), so i asked my mother in Japan to visit me here. and, she did.

october in Zurich was very nice. it was very warm, the sky was blue and high, and the leaves on the trees were in beautiful colors. after spending several days in Zurich, my mother and i decided to visit Bern just for one day. she is a fan of Albert Einstein, and we found there was his museum there. here are some photos from Bern trip:

the city of Bern

"Historisches Museum Bern". Einstein Museum is in this building.

the entrance hall. with lots of mirrors, it creates an interesting endless effect there. can you see me and my mother in the staircase?

we also visited the apartment in the old town where Einstein used to be living. it was a cozy, beautiful room. he found his theories in this room!

we were walking quite a lot. my mother was collecting beautiful leaves on the road..

..and, her favorite roasted chestnuts

after Bern trip, we spent some more relaxing time in Zurich. my cats definitely loved their new warm bed...

Frieze Art Fair in London (oct.14-17))

2010-11-07T05:03:00.000-08:00

one day in october, my friend M sent me an email saying, "i'll be in London in october for Frienze Art Fair. can we have coffee together in London?" she is my friend from Art Center (Pasadena, CA) and has been working for an art gallery in Japan. i wrote her back, "of course!"

i checked online then where Frieze was happening, and in a few minutes i found it was going to be in Regent's Park, only a few minutes away from my house.

on a sunny but a bit chilly day, we met in the park and visited the art fair together. even though i recently often hear that the art industry is not doing as well as it used to be, there were amazing number of visitors there. by the time in the late afternoon, all the hallways and the cafes in the fair were packed by people! here are some art works we saw on the day:

after the fair, we went to pub at night. Dan also joined us.

if you happen to come to London, please drop us a note. we will love to take you to our favorite pubs!

september 2010. we moved to...

2010-10-02T07:04:00.000-07:00

...London! we are now enjoying experiencing such interesting contrasts between Bangkok and London especially in terms of culture and nature. hard to say which is better- obviously there are good things and bad things in both places. one thing i have to say is, though, that the parks in London are just amazing!

i guess i missed so much of these things; trees and flowers, walking on soil, feeling of seasons. in Thailand, strong heat and humidity kept me always staying inside of the rooms with ACs. i was always avoiding going outside under the sun and heat while i was there even though there must have been lots of beautiful nature out there.

anyhow, Dan and i are walking outside here a lot since we moved to London. our favorite place so far is Regent's Park. our flat is located 100m away from this amazing park, and we often take a short walk there. Dan even comes back from work walking through the park and tells me how amazing the trees and flowers were in the evening sunlight.

i hope i will have a little bit more time from now on to post some new things in our new place!

Happy Holidays! (Dec 2009)

2009-12-26T04:07:00.000-08:00

yoko's mother in thailand (1)

2009-07-07T08:42:00.001-07:00

it was in May when my brother called me saying, "i'm wondering what i can give my mother for her birthday..". we usually only take her for dinner or give some roses, but it seems he wanted to do something more this time, which i also had been thinking about. we made several skype conversations and finally decided to give her a 10 days thailand trip. basically, my brother payed most of the airplane fee, and i arranged the small trips here in and around bangkok.

it was her first time visit to thailand. although it was in the rainy season, and although we were really wishing to have cloudy days (because it's much cooler!), those 10 days became completely hot and sunny days...

here are some photos from our 2 days trip to Ayutaya with her. it was a beautiful place surrounded by rivers with lots of historic ruins of the world heritage.

one of the most beautiful and well-remained temples. you can climb up to the middle of the building and enjoy the view of Ayutaya city from there

beautiful stupas..

Dan and my mother at the feet of the reclining buddha

..and, here he is.

the famous buddha's head in a bodhi tree

some details remained. breathtaking beauty..

Ayutaya's famous river prawn with the long arms...

we went to a bar at night. an old man was singing and playing the guitar. (probably a traveler as well) he was actually VERY good and my mother enjoyed listening to his singing.. we had crepe, beer, and watermelon shake there. :-)

the next day, we rode on an elephant..

in thailand, most of the elephants are well kept and loved by the people. they are also treated as sacred animals. they cannot survive in the wild nature by themselves anymore so this is the only way that they can live...

yoko's mother in thailand (2)

2009-07-07T08:41:00.000-07:00

have you ever tried the fruit, durian? it has very strong smell even before you peel off the skin. while we were walking in ayutaya, Dan found a cart selling durian on the street. he asked my mother "would you like to try it?!", and with her cats' level curiosity, she immediately answered "Yes!". we bought one package of already-peeled-off durian and went to a nearby park...

Dan opens the package. mmm..., i wonder if my mother can deal with this strong smell.

she smiles with a piece of durian. says "it's not so bad smell...". in the back, one big piece is already in Dan's mouth.

she starts trying a small piece

look at this complicated expression! (..and Dan's curious smile!)

all of sudden, she burst into laugh! what's so funny, mother!? :-O

she had some more small bites after that, but then gave the piece to me saying, "yoko, you are not having any. it's all yours". it was good, but the smell of the fruit stayed in my mouth for the next 3 hours or so.......

yoko's mother in thailand (3)

2009-07-06T04:57:00.001-07:00

while my mother was here, Dan requested her to make some japanese dishes. i also cook it sometimes, but he already notices that my cooking is not as authentic as hers. it was 9 years ago when i left my country, and i had few opportunities to eat good japanese food or my mother's dishes. i was curious how much i remembered the taste of her dishes.

i asked her to make something very simple. she made simple but most traditional dishes. they were:

"chawan-mushi" (egg dish with lots of ingredients), "kayaku-gohan"(seasoned and cooked rice with various ingredients), and "osuimono"(clear bonito-flavored soup). she also made a small tofu dish and a veggie dish. yes, they look somewhat wrong-- it's because we don't have any japanese style tableware here..

she talks about the dishes with Dan

***

cats loved being with her. she talks so gently and moves slowly, which cats generally love.

with Turi

with Zinfandel. he was visiting her bed every morning!

***

she also had a chance to visit our house in the countryside. because of the rainy season, the garden looked like a jungle! if you would like to compare, here is the photo of the garden one and half years ago:
http://crocodilefarmstreet.blogspot.com/2007/12/
some-recent-photos.html

***

we also went to see a thai traditional puppet show in bangkok. it had live singing and playing the music instruments. i saw lots of similarities with japanese "ningyo joruri", and it was interesting.

for the final night, she took us to a nice french restaurant for our marriage celebration. i think we definitely gained our weights in the last 10 days!!! :-o

Panini and Turi

2009-05-31T05:17:00.000-07:00

oops, i was writing about only Zinfandel these days! it's just because his asthma makes us pay more attention to him. Panini (the other beige color cat) and Turi are doing well and give us lots of smiles and laughs everyday.

whenever Panini finds us, he quickly lies down and shows his stomach. we have to give him 3 minutes massage then. he closes his eyes and looks sooo happy while we pet his stomach. he is such a "baby" cat and will be forever like that..

Panini with his favorite bed

Turi is very kind and independent. she is always cleaning the bodies of the other two. (we sometimes call her "cleaning lady") she still has a cute high voice and we love to hear that. she is the same age as other two, but she weighs only about half of Panini now.

Zinfandel and his asthma

2009-05-31T04:34:00.000-07:00

it's so hard to see small animals like cats coughing and suffering for asthma. it was a year ago when Zinfandel started coughing especially at night. when the weather changes suddenly, he coughs even more, and we have to give him some medications. we give steroid pills, which works very well, but we don't really want to do it too much, so we started using the nebulizer at the same time.

this device gives him the medication by mist so that it works directly in his lung. it will dramatically reduce the amount of chemical he has to take. it also works so quickly.

first he didn't like the mist (probably it smells bad for him) and tried to escape in the middle. after several days, he understood it helped his breathing, and now he doesn't hate it any more. whenever we give it to him, he is sitting quiet and sometimes half sleeping. he gets it once in the morning (by Dan) and once at night. (by me)

i hear people say that the cats with a crooked tail will bring you fortune or good luck. Zinfandel is the one who has it, but it seems he is spending the most amount of our money among all our cats although he is giving us lots of happiness.... :-)

Zinfandel relaxing in my studio..

his crooked tail (a bit hard to see in this angle)

sunset view from my studio

2009-04-28T13:42:00.000-07:00

about two weeks after son kran (thai new year, mid april), the rainy season is finally arriving here. in thailand, the rainy season is kind of nice. there is a strong squall for a short time everyday, normally about one hour or so in the evening time. the sky shows beautfiul clouds and sunset in this season. this day, my studio was completely dyed in red...

"near equal" in Bangkok

2009-04-18T04:25:00.000-07:00

it is famous that there are so many nice restaurants in bangkok. here is one we've just found the other day. it's called "near equal", a small hidden place behind busy streets. the interior of the restaurant is very beautiful and cozy along with their annex shop.

here are the dishes we had the other day:

banana flower salad (this was amazing!)

seafood salad (good as usual)

pad-thai (very authentic and nice)

Thai style chicken stew (super tender meat!)

dessert, aloe vera and coconut ice cream (de--li--cious)

their shop is also very nice. they sell beautiful crafts from southeast asian countries. walking around in the shop, we found something unusual. is it for sale!?! ....of course, not. but, she was completely sleeping in the basket for sale.
:-)

one more thing... on the way out to the gate, we found a glass cage sitting on a stool, in which something small was moving restlessly. it was another pet of theirs: a hedgehog!

Zinfandel and his friend

2009-04-07T03:51:00.001-07:00

"hay. ...hay you. what are you thinking?"

"...you are boring. i'm getting sleepy..."

"can i hold your... foot? thanks. i feel safe in this way."

our new place

2009-01-14T12:05:00.000-08:00

we moved to Bangkok in the summer of 2008. we are now living in a charming antique town house in the city. and, our house in the countryside is on lease..

this house is so old that we had to take care of so many things at the beginning. (electricity, gas, water, toilette, etc, etc) Dan did a great job, and i wish i could show you all the process on this blog, but my work unfortunately kept me too busy to do that for the last half year. although we are already here for 6 months, it still looks very empty.

but!

we got some new furniture in our house today! we had ordered these items before we left for switzerland. the store made all of them in 3 weeks. not bad.

here, the sofa and the ottomans.

in a few minutes, the sofa became a bed for our three cats..

and, the table. (not the real saarinen) we even don't have good chairs yet...

oh, no! Panini! ...we shouldn't get any expensive furniture while we have these 3 gangsters..

***

i cannot wait for this spring, when my current job will be over. i will finally have some time to relax and arrange the interior of this new place!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

2009-01-05T04:24:00.000-08:00

it was my strong wish to spend the end of the year and the new year outside of Thailand. after living in Thailand for one year, what i was missing the most was "four seasons". yes, Thailand also has three seasons, which are... "hot", "hotter", and "hottest". those were not what i meant!

it was a nice surprise when Dan and i saw snow falling when we arrived at Zurich airport two weeks ago. we arrived in white Switzerland. after December 29th, we spent at his family's mountain house outskirts of Zurich with our guests, Daveed and Heidi.

on the new year eve, we had lots of snowfall. it was quiet and peaceful. and, that gave us the beautiful new year day. on the brand-new snow ground, we had a long walk in the forest under the completely blue sky. here are some photos from that morning:

new year sunrise

walking through the forest

beautiful trees

found a cute "Teepe"

Heidi's "angel"!

hot chocolate after a nice walk...

***
here are some more photos from the trip:

neighbor cat, "Zuukly". she everyday visited us and stayed with us almost all day. we played with her a lot.

Zuukly wants food from kitchen.

fondue, of course.. :-P

"swiss organization"

we also visited a local new year event in the city called Urnash near Appenzell. it was very impressive, which i had never seen or imagined... i will post another article about the event, hopefully very soon!

Bangkok Bicycle Tour

2008-08-28T02:11:00.000-07:00

i'm very sorry that i didn't update my blog for.... more than 2 months!! i was traveling abroad for a month and just came back home last week. i cannot believe august is almost over...

just before i left for my travel in july, i experienced something very special. it is a bicycle tour called "Recreational Bangkok Biking". it's basically a bike tour going around in bangkok.
http://www.bangkokbiking.com

it was more than half year ago when Dan's mother found this project online and joined it with Dan. they came back home and said to me, "this is really good. someday you have to try this out as well".
so, i did.

it was amazing. i hope any of you can visit us in bangkok someday and try this out. this is not the one that you probably imagine in your mind. it's very different because...

the first place we visited was a kindergarten school in the middle of a slum.
(the left photo: the people who joined the bike tour)

the school looked pretty organized and the children looked very happy, singing and dancing. i realized later that the bike tour owner, Andre (a Dutch), donates big portion of his income to this school. i was very happy to find out that i was indirectly helping these children. (if you would like, please read more in his site. click "charity" on the left bar)
http://www.bangkokbiking.com

after getting out of the slum, what's waiting for us was a boat ride. a boat ride with bicycles? how?? just see the photos...

our bikes left first...

waiting for a boat for us

here we go!

after arriving on the other side of the river, we started bicycling in the tropical beautiful nature...

(this photo was from some other website. i couldn't take any photos on this road. if i tried i would have fallen in the water!)

a break in the park (the person in the middle is Andre)

and lunch time. how delicious this simple pad thai was after riding bicycle for a few hours!

some more visits to places..

an old temple,

and cats,

finally it's time to go back to the other side of the river... on a bigger boat this time, with our bicycles together. the wind was so nice and wiping our sweat away...

***

i was able to see many different sides of bangkok by joining this tour. these places we visited this day would never been seen unless we join a tour like this. i also learned about a good charity system from this tour. the tour took us to the places our donation was actually going to. we were on bicycles on those narrow roads in the slum welcomed by thai people's beautiful smiles. it was very inspiring to me.

***

in a few days, though, my body cried. i didn't do any exercise those days... all my muscles had strong pains and i couldn't even walk normally. i guess what i learned from this trip most was not about the charity but that i needed more daily exercise...
:-(

Cute Hotel in Bangkok

2008-06-22T01:59:00.001-07:00

one of the main industries in Thailand is tourism. obviously, there are numerous number of hotels everywhere. not only five star hotels, you can also find many nice and unique hotels with less stars. Dan and i have to go to Bangkok about every other week lately, and we found a cute hotel last month!

it was in a quiet residential area and very hard to find. without a GPS, i don't know how we could find the place! surrounded by many trees, the hotel building was hiding behind the tall, nicely decorated iron gate.

as soon as we got inside, we were welcomed by the staffs' big smiles. one staff brought us cold lemon grass tea. we were sitting on a bench being amazed how beautifully the lobby, garden, bar, and everything there were designed.

we were soon led to our room in the second floor. the room was amazing. the wall was painted with leaves and flowers in nice pastel colors. we started checking out things in the room. the furniture, cushions, bed covers, the shower room, etc.. everything was nicely decorated.

it took a long time for us to remember we had some destinations to head to. it was too comfortable to leave the hotel...

a staff with her cute and very friendly parrots

in our room

nice decoration at the bar counter

a part of the courtyard garden. birds singing all the time

an artist was painting the coffee table. koi fish swimming on the table.. so cool!

Turi and Zinfandel! what are you guys doing here!?

you are the next one to visit. someday... :-)

here is the hotel site:
http://www.phranakorn-nornlen.com/

Reunion with our old friends J

2008-06-12T10:02:00.000-07:00

J used to be our old neighbor in Pasadena. we were all art school students back then and working on our projects all day and night.. we often had meals together. we cooked and shared. tea time and shopping together.. well, i shouldn't start writing about it because i wouldn't be able to stop it anymore as we have too many fun memories together.

anyhow, J visited us with her sister A. we had a great one week together.

at crazy Kaosan Road..

bbq in our garden. O, another artcenter grad, joined us. a very talented film directer.

making tarte tatin together. this reminds me of our chatting in the kitchen.. and, here it is! :-)

A and i were crazy about "iberry". it's an unbelievably good gelato/sorbet store in thailand. their bests are watermelon, coconuts, lychee, mango, taro, passion fruits, and more! it's super fresh and so juicy...

O took us to a hidden oasis of Kaosan Road... actually, it was a starbucks coffee shop! they rent out the whole old western house with old furniture. each room has different decoration. it's very nice and cozy. good place to escape from the outside noise!

fish tank

2008-05-29T21:49:00.000-07:00

the workers from the fish tank shop visit us once a month or so to check if the fish and grass are doing fine. i didn't know how the landscape in the fish tank was arranged. they trim the grasses one by one by scissors! it also looked interesting to see the tattoo in the fish tank.

Who did this?

2008-05-18T12:13:00.000-07:00

One evening, we came back home and saw something horrible happened on our bed. two of our favorite ugly-dolls got injured on their feet! WHO DID THIS!?

the suspect #1 mr.Zinfandel: he is always hungry. he sometimes bites.(lightly, though)

the suspect #2 ms.Turi: she is a tomboy! she loves playing with toys. and, most athletic.

the suspect #3 mr.Panini: he gets lonely easily. we've once seen him playing with one of the ugly-dolls..

***

well, all i could do was fixing them. i had to change the design of their feet a bit.

*********
soon we found it was Panini who ate the dolls. he started doing more and more to any kinds of fabric in the house..

"Songkran" Thai New Year Celebration

2008-04-20T00:46:00.000-07:00

It was the Thai new year last week. people celebrate the new year by throwing water at each other. (it's the hottest period now in a year) i’d never seen it before, so i asked Dan to drive me down to the nearest town to see the celebration, which took us two or three times more time than usual because all the streets were just like this....

and, of course they came to us too.

they often put baby powder in the water. some people looked like zombies

a little zombie

"no country for old men"

see all these happy faces!

we stayed inside of the car this time, but next year we might join them throwing water, drinking and eating outside, and dancing with fun music!!

to get to know more about Songkran, please visit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thai_New_Year

Dan's latte

2008-04-06T01:26:00.000-07:00

one of the things i missed while i was in LA last month was a cup of latte Dan made every morning. he learned so much about coffee (espresso) last year, and now i have to say his latte is.. great. it tastes even better in these beautiful black cups, gifted by our friend, Jessica. Thanks, Jessica!

another thing i missed was playing with our cute gangsters. i bought many cat toys at Petco and brought them back here. it seems this one is their most favorite. especially it's good for Zinfandel. he needs a bit more exercise..

back from LA

2008-03-31T03:01:00.000-07:00

it was a wonderful trip back to LA! my show went well, and i got together with many of my old good friends in LA. thank you very much for all of you sharing your precious time. i had a great time with you all!

photos from top/left:
-talk with the students of Otis college
-with Ana Bagayan and Judith Schaechter
-my works in the gallery
-driving in LA, which i missed a lot!
-Dan's and my favorite sushi place in marina del ray
-BCAM at Lacma. a wonderful collection of contemporary art in a wonderful architecture by Renzo Piano

for viewing BCAM:
http://www.lacma.org/transformflash/index.html
for viewing my works:
http://billyshirefinearts.com/08Tanaka/index.html

***

it's very hot and humid here in thailand. it seems the hottest season approaching.. i hope i will get used to it soon. (i was spoiled by the weather in LA!) now that i finished the tight schedule with many deadlines, i will have a bit more life from now on. i'm also already excited at my next new projects in my mind.. :-)

working hard

2008-02-23T01:41:00.000-08:00

i have been working all day and night for the show in march in LA. i finished all the smaller size works and now working on the biggest one. i have only 10 more days before i leave for LA!! i'm happy about this piece so far, though, and you can see that a bit on my face. the second photo is my studio building from outside.

Dan is also making art. this is something i really cannot do. making 3D works with machines.. i will cut off all my fingers before i finish anything.

it's always so nice to have cats' visits while we are working! :-)

the final banana report

2008-02-05T12:19:00.000-08:00

i believe some of you remember about "these" bananas. i wrote about it on september 26th first saying "first crop might be soon". then, we waited, waited and waited because it didn't look right yet. i wrote "the second report" on november 6th only looking up the bananas on the tree.

one day at the end of december, even though the bananas looked still green, we had to crop them because the whole branch fell. it seems it was too heavy and there was some rain before the night.

the bananas look still not ripened yet. it was green and hard. (the top photo) we thought we couldn't eat it any of them. BUT. the next day, we found some bananas wore yellow color.(the second photo) then, the next day the whole bananas became yellow! it became very soft and sweet just in a few days after we cropped them. this means... we COULD have cropped them MUCH earlier... it seems we just waited unnecessarily longer.. for too long time.

anyway, we immediately put all those 50 bananas in the cold storage. even though they were small ones, it wasn't very easy to eat them every day and night.. (it tastes so, so sweet and great, though!!!)

i tried to make banana chips by microwaving them. i thought that was a great idea but wasn't. after being microwaved for 10 minutes, the slices of bananas were still wet. then, the slices got completely stuck on the plate afterwards, which we didnt' know how to peel off any more.. oh, i don't want to remember about this. it was just a disaster!

then, Dan's mother challenged making banana jam. it was a great idea! she made it with some lemon juice, and it's so delicious! (the last photo) those 3 bottles of jam are now in our fridge, and we eat it at breakfast every day. :-)

cats

2008-01-23T03:27:00.000-08:00

one day we found Tury sitting on a shallow basket, which we forgot to put away from the top of our "egg house". it was quite high to get there and the basket wasn't stable to sit there but it seems it was a good place for her to be. she looked so cute on there that i took these photos.

while later, we found Panini on the tray as well. wow, it was good that the tray didn't fall.

now where is Zinfandel? he was outside taking a nap on the most comfortable couch. of course. he wouldn't have even tried to get up on the basket because he was getting even lazier and heavier these days..

Happy New Year!

2008-01-03T08:58:00.001-08:00

hope everyone is having a wonderful new year! :-)

i was spending most of the time at home and working. it's hot here like early summer and is anyway hard to feel it's the new year day. i finished almost all the jobs for the books and i'm now concentrated on the show in march in LA. i wish i have a bit more time, but i'll do my best..

***

for change of pace, i joined visiting Bangkok when Dan took G to show him around at the end of the year. then i could finally visit "Grand Palace". it used to not only be the kings' palace but also have many government offices as well as the renowned temple. (now the king's residence and the offices are somewhere else) the buildings here were so interesting that i took many pictures.

from far, it looked like typical thai architecture. when i got closer, i was surprised to see several interesting art on the buildings --- look at these cute tiles on the walls and soldiers paintings on the door! they use pink, orange, yellow, and pastel blue! 1782 is quite old to show these "pop art", isn't it? anyway, i liked them a lot.

it was also impressive to find how religious the people were here. see the photos at the bottom --- the mother looks serious to teach her son how to pray. in the long lines to get into the temple, a boy was already putting his palms together even before he entered the temple. a man was holding lots of flowers and candles to leave them at the altar.

***

finally, i could write something about outside of my house! this might be the only one for the next 2 moths, though... :-P

meow meow meow

2007-12-29T00:15:00.000-08:00

it's about a month since our triplets had surgeries. they look now happy and relaxed. they often sleep next each other on one cushion like this. :-)

the fat one on the left is Zinfandel, who is the laziest one. he is lazy even to run or jump. the middle one is Panini, who still acts like a baby. he wants to lick everyone's arms. the dark one on the right is Turi (from truffle), who is the smallest of all and the leader of the team. she is the best hunter. she jumps the highest. she sometimes tries to "talk" like humans, saying like "a--aaa, a, a?" in her high voice.

i hope i can finally write something from outside of our house next time..

G's cooking

2007-12-27T22:48:00.001-08:00

our second guest to this house was G. he is Dan's old friend from switzerland, and we are spending christmas and the new year here together. although i don't have much time to go around with them, it's very nice to have guests in this house hearing their talking and laughing sometimes.

the other day, G made a delicious dinner for us. i've heard from Dan many times that G was a very good cook. it was true! both dishes he made were delicious. he made the chicken sauté with port wine and mango soup. mango soup? i'm sure not many people have heard of it. it was from his recipes, half thai and half french, very nice fusion soup. it had mango, coconut milk, cream, ginger, pepper, chicken stock, mango chutney, etc...

the next day, G and Dan left for the island near here. Dan's mother and i enjoyed the mango soup again for our dinner. it was still very good!

Dan's lasagne

2007-12-24T01:06:00.000-08:00

Dan's family often cooks italian food, and that's why he is good at it. since he got his kitchenaid machine, he makes pasta very often, which makes me so happy because i love italian food..

lasagne wasn't, though, my most favorite dish before because it was sometimes too greasy and heavy for me. but..., good lasagne is not greasy! since i had his lasagne, it's one of my most favorite dishes.

M and Dan's cooking session

2007-12-22T22:22:00.000-08:00

it's been almost two weeks since M visited us. time passes so quickly.. it was really fun to have her here with us. we did many things together, but one of the most fun moments was Dan and M's cooking session together like our old days in pasadena. they were making gnocchi this day, and it came out really great. it was spinach and ricotta cheese gnocchi with blue cheese sauce. it's one of my most favorite pastas.

family photos

2007-12-13T08:46:00.001-08:00

(the top photo: with Dan's mother, visiting us from switzerland)

we got married!

2007-12-02T21:47:00.000-08:00

on november 29th, we officially got married. thank you very much for everyone who is reading this right now for being good friends with us and supporting us. we always appreciate your friendship. we are now a little far from most of you, but we will be traveling around, and who knows, someday we might be living next to you!

on the night of our marriage, Dan's mother celebrated us at the dinner saying us, "please have a wonderful life together", and it was very touching. the next morning she gave us these wonderful indian paintings as a marriage gift. she was traveling in india last month, and she found these beautiful works painted on the antique book papers. breathtaking to see it. they are painted so in detail, even the elephants have texture on their backs..

the X-day has come

2007-11-27T02:19:00.000-08:00

i'm sorry for not updating my blog for a while. i was a "painting machine", working all the time. now, i'm back here because i've just cleared one deadline. :-)

this month our three cats became 7 months old, and we had to send them to the vet for their surgeries. the boys were big enough but Tury was still small and we had to wait until the doctor says it's ready for her.

and, they all had surgery together today! they couldn't eat and drink for the last 12 hours from last night. at 10am today we took them to the vet and they were already back at 1pm!

i was almost crying when i saw them for the first time after they came back. they look tired and miserable,. looked sad. the boys are getting better hour by hour, but.... poor Turi, she has to wear this plastic collar for 10 more days. her meowing sounds so sad as if she says, "yoko, why do you do that to me....?" i feel sorry for her and try to pet her as much time as i have. i cannot wait for the day when all the three cats will again run around happily in our garden soon.

ps: the last photo -- even though Turi was still very drowsy under anesthesia, she managed to walk to her toillet and did pee in there. such a good girl...

the second banana report

2007-11-06T01:45:00.000-08:00

my friends did some research for us when we should actually crop the fruits. according to them, we can pick them while they are still in green color but after the edges of the fruits get a bit rounder. waiting and waiting, i'm now very surprised how slow it grows! it's still green and pointy. hmmm, i wonder when we will be finally able to eat them. please look forward to my third banana report. hope it's not too much of waiting..

Tina's visit

2007-10-30T08:53:00.000-07:00

our three cats were formerly street cats, but they were taken care by a german restaurant near our house since their mother was killed by a car accident. it was only two weeks after she gave birth of the triplets. Tina, the daughter of the restaurant's owner took care of the kittens until her father soon started looking for someone to give the cats to because the restaurant couldn't keep animals.

One night Dan was eating dinner at the restaurant with his friends. one of the kittens approached him and knocked on his foot. i guess it hit his heart too, and now those three are at our place.

the other day we invited Tina to visit our house to see her old friends. we enjoyed seeing her having a good time with the kittens. it seemed they also remembered her very well..

beautiful hills in hua hin

2007-10-23T02:41:00.000-07:00

hua hin is a city, which is located 2.5 hours driving from Bangkok towards southwest. we met this beautiful landscape in the suburb of hua hin a few weeks ago. first we didnt' know what these plants were, then we found out it was a huge pinapple plantation! those were ALL pineapple fields!

relaxing zinfandel

2007-10-20T05:45:00.000-07:00

he doesn't care any noises. he sleeps, sleeps, sleeps, eats, and sleeps. naturally he is the fattest among the three, and we started calling him "square cat" instead of zinfandel. (doesn't he really look like that?) he was sleeping behind me while i was painting all afternoon today with his stomach exposed as usual..

dan's kitchen --- ravioli making

2007-10-18T03:37:00.001-07:00

we once tried to make ravioli by ourselves when we were in LA. back then we didn't have tools to make it and took an enormous time to do it. in our new kitchen here, we have a KitchenAide and cutting tools for ravioli, which Dan acquired in europe this spring. (for our last experience, visit: http://favini.blogspot.com/2006_02_01_archive.html
and scroll down to february 15, 2006 "The Ravioli Experience")

it was fun to watch! KitchenAide made the dough thinner and thinner so quickly using different levels of thinness. then he sandwitched the ingredients in dough sheets and cut it out with the cutting tools. this stamp-looking tool really worked well! even though Dan said it was just a trial this time, the dish came out really nicely.

my birthday dinner

2007-10-17T00:32:00.000-07:00

it was my birthday last week, the first one in thailand. Dan cooked nice dinner for me that night. the lamb was surprisingly tender and delicious, the risotto with roquefort cheese was very nice, and the souffle cake came out wonderfully. unfortunately, the rosemary sauce for the cake was separated when reheated just before being served.. it still tasted amazing, though! :-)

climbing is easy

2007-10-09T10:47:00.000-07:00

Panini was on the tree today! he looked so proud of himself at least at the beginning, until he found he didn't know how to go down. Dan and i could help him, but we didn't. he has to learn it by himself.. after several minutes, he finally managed to go back to the ground. these days they are getting more and more adventurous!

my "things" arrived!

2007-10-06T07:29:00.000-07:00

"is that all?" that's what i felt when i saw the package on the truck. i had more than 60 big boxes. when i shipped out those boxes from Pasadena last month, it looked so much more. i guess my room there was much smaller compared to this huge land here.. anyway, i'm very happy finally to get all my belongings and art materials here safely, nothing was missing or broken. my monitor, printer, and scanner all work fine. :-)

"bbq Dan" in thailand

2007-10-02T11:16:00.000-07:00

when we were back in artcenter, our friend J called him "bbq Dan" because he was kind of obssessed with grilling meat. (she even made a great comic about him) since we came here, he does fish as often as meat. it tastes so wonderful when he stuffs them with some lemonglass, cilantro, kaffir lime leaves, and chilies. maybe, it's time "dan's kitchen" (his cooking blog) starts again...

Zinfandel fell into the water!

2007-09-29T19:04:00.000-07:00

Zinfandel is growing up the fastest among the three, but he was a bit too adventurous this morning! it seems he was walking on the thin edge of the big water pot in the garden and fell in it. luckily, he crawled out of the pot by himself and came back to the kitchen completely wet. how miserable and sad he looked! he just sat on the ground quietly not knowing what to do...

so, we gave him the first 'bath'! well, in the outside pool. we expected he would scream back in the water again, but he was quite obedient and let Dan do whatever. it wouldn't have been fun for him at all, but it made us smile because he actually looked SO cute when he was drenched. i of course brought out my camera and started taking photos of him while Dan was washing his body.

then, the next new experience for him was a dryer! but again, he wasn't scared of the sound or the blowing air from the dryer at all!

as soon as he found his body was dried and normal, he started playing and biting our hands and fingers. i guess that's the way he says 'thank you'.....

another news from the garden

2007-09-28T03:15:00.000-07:00

the first flower of gardenia has bloomed! i love the smell. it feels more intense here than in LA because of the humidity...

first crop might be soon

2007-09-26T22:09:00.000-07:00

one of the banana trees in our garden is having fruits! i've never seen banana flower (huge!) and the fruits together. very interesting to see them grow... :-)

setting up my studio...

2007-09-25T06:42:00.001-07:00

people came to install curtains in my studio today. my studio has glass windows on three sides --- it's very nice and bright, but i need curtains especially when the sun is too strong or when i need to concentrate on work..

my lunch today..

2007-09-22T00:42:00.000-07:00

shrimp fried rice and som tam (green papaya salad). i cannot believe how delicious these simple dishes are here.. i love fried rice in thai way the most among all asian versions.

Crocodile Farm Street actually looks like this

2007-09-21T06:54:00.000-07:00

this is just in front of our house. at least we have electricity and a phone line...

our new family members

2007-09-18T23:42:00.001-07:00

they are sleeping for 18 hours a day...