During my stay in Hong Kong with Ivan, his dad and the two of us decided to venture out of the city for a bit and visit the island of Macau. We ended up traveling in a group of 5 as Ivan’s badminton-friend Edith and her cousin came along to add to the fun. Shame [...]
Dear faithful reader. It seems that the blue moon is out today, as I have decided to write a blog entry. To those of you checking often - I apologize for the delay (as usual). On the bright side, the big breaks ensure that every entry is full of interesting information .. or so I [...]
This was one of those grandiose treks that came on a whim - the best kind. Take the local trains to northern Japan just to see what happens!! Why not? After all you can do it for cheap using the Seishun 18 ticket - a ticket that lets you ride local JR trains for 5 [...]
“Yea, yea, complain all you want. I can procrastinate as much as i want here, it is my blog after all.” - Anonymous
Once upon a time, in a land far far away, lived a young man with a passion for drums. Of course his drums were in another land, far away from the land in [...]
Hey everyone. I am a horrible person. I’m sorry. I havent updated my blog in much too long. I dont actually plan to write much in this entry, but hopefully it will break the ice and force me to write more soon. Quite a bit has happened since the last time I wrote and I [...]
Updates. I have no computer because the motherboard on my X40 has decided to die, so i sent it back for repairs/replacement. Furthermore i still have no internet because the Japanese phone company screwed up my application. Conveniently enough for them, i still pay for internet during the time they switch it from my old [...]
…and we’re rolling.
If you’ve been keeping up with my recent escapades, you’re probably wondering “So what is that crazy Russian-Canadian fellow in Tokyo up to these days?”, assuming you use the term ‘fellow’ in your daily speech. Well, I might just have some answers for you, ‘ere mate. Week 2 at my new job is [...]
Some of you already know, some of you don’t. I got laid off from work, and then found another job within 2 days. Its finally time to let the rest of the story loose..
I returned from Taiwan feeling happy, rested, and relaxed. My sleeping patterns were messed up due to the 8am flight, so I [...]
Finally, a conclusion to my awesome Taiwan experience. A grand conclusion.
On the Wednesday, a day before the flight back to Tokyo, Joe decided to take us to the beautiful mountains of Taiwan. In the morning (read: 2pm) we took a train to a rural part of Taipei and continued on foot from there. The first [...]
Now that you’ve heard my first impressions, time to get to the meat of the trip. Stories from around Taipei. And so it begins..
We went to Chiang Kai Shek memorial hall on our first full day here - a memorial to the man who fathered Taiwan, so they say. In front of this hall is [...]
Well here i am, in Taipei, Taiwan - updating my blog. How did i get here? a bit of a story..
I was under the impression that all of the co-ops are doing something together for “golden week” - the series of holidays that just happen to be in the end of April. I was wrong. [...]
Guess its time to talk about the whole reason I got ‘exported’ into this country - my co-op job. I work at this small-to-midsize IT company called “Invio.Inc”. At least I think that I work at Invio, I could be wrong - there are 3 companies owned by an umbrella company “Cube-C” and they occasionally [...]
As if the Friday wasn’t enough for us, we all up rather early to begin “shopping, part 1″. I think the fact that our apartments were lacking EVERYTHING was a strong motivator. We went to the Gatharia - a mall closeby the office, about a 15 minute walk from the appartments. Most of this mall is [...]
On the Friday morning, we went to immigration with Akagi-san to get some papers taken care of. I now have a document which has about 8 long words in the title: “gaikokujintourokugempyoukisaishoumeisho“, in the end just an “alien registration form”. On the way there we got to experience some Tokyo subway rushhour. You know the [...]
One of the coolest things about my visit to Japan, is that the company provided all of us co-ops with separate appartments, within a 15 minute walk from the office: pretty much in the heart of Tokyo. Ivan, Annabelle and I got to be neighbours on the 10th floor of a brand-spanking-new bulding, while Jesse [...]
So after saying all the goodbyes at the airport, I went through U.S. security (which was surprisingly painless) and headed to the Chicago O’Hare airport. In the waiting area I met up with Jesse, Ivan, and Annabelle, the other co-ops coming along on this lovely journey. Haven’t flown in a plane for a while, so [...]
As some of you know, a Mr. Artem Avdacev recently headed out on his long awaited journey to Japan, to work at Invio Inc as a software developer, for co-op. This person is me. I’m not one to write many blogs, so bear with me as I try to organize my thoughts and share them [...]