INTEGRATED WITH DIVERSE SKILLS IN SPECIAL OPERATIONS AND CUTTING EDGE MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, GLOBAL TERRORIST AND CRIMINALS FACE A NEW THREAT---THE INTER CONTINENTAL PARAMILITARY UNIT (ICPU)
When a military convoy transporting army-grade weapons in South Korea was ambushed leaving no survivors, the South Korean government is thrown into turmoil. Knowing that the fire arms are in the wrong hands is alarming, but imagining the consequences of it being used is a nightmare for South Korean national security. To make matter worst, a double agent within the ranks of South Korean Interpol is keeping those who are responsible for the ambush one step ahead of the authorities. Despite the emergence of chaos, hope once again shine when ICPU intelligence analysts manage to discover the location of the stolen weapons to a mansion on one of the Korean islands which belong to a familiar adversary. Once again, Commander Moaz and his team of elite Inter Continental Paramilitary Unit commandos are required to go deep behind enemy lines to destroy the stolen weapons that cost innocent lives. The commandos are ready to pay a surprise visit to the enemy's mansion and they are bringing war and a lesson on treachery as their house gift.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Sunday, August 16, 2009
SAS Survival Guide: Zombie Crisis
I was trying to look for any free online horror first-person shooter games yesterday afternoon, but luck was not on my side as no one has created one yet or my internet browsing skill is just simply horrible. However, I managed to come across a list of online horror games in the form of flash-games. Knowing that flash-games are low budget online games that doesn't have a rich content of game play and story, I thought of passing it on until I came across an interesting one from the list of horror flash-games available; it was called SAS: Zombie Assault . For those of you all who are familiar with my personal interest, it would be very obvious to you that I am a sucker for anything that relates to the Special Forces or SWAT team despite how bad it might be. So seeing this was something to do with Her Majesty's elite Special Air Service, I thought I should give it a go. To my surprise, this flash-game actually presented a simple yet steady gameplay which somehow makes the game fun and later slightly addictive. On the other hand, in terms of story, nothing much can be knowned about the game except for the obvious impression that you are a SAS commando who has to defend himself from the overwhelming hordes of zombies hungry for your flesh and brains. Nevertheless, a flash-game like SAS: Zombie Assault should be worth your time not to mention it should at least keep you occupied especially if you got nothing better else to do.
As mentioned earlier, the game itself does not present any solid storyline as to what trigger the uprising of the dead or how was the lone SAS commando involve in this unspeakable nightmare; afterall its just a flash-game. Nevertheless, if you are the kind of person who needs a solid story platform to motivate you to play the game (like me...), let me simply create one which hopefully might entice your "appetite" to play the game. So here goes:
A viral outbreak somewhere in the outskirts of the United Kingdom caused by a top-secret government project mishap, infected those who were involved turning them into flesh-eating zombies. Of course the British government tried to contain the situation by authorizing a total lockdown on the science facility where the top-secret project took place. The government's lockdown plan involved sending in several teams of highly trained SAS commandos into the facility to eliminate everyone (or every"thing") in the hope of not only containing the situation but to erase any trace or evidence that could illustrate the goverment's screwed-up project. Just like what the government had carefully planned, the SAS commandos were deployed into the facility and it wasn't long before they started engaging with the flesh-eating hosts of the facility. There were problems though; the commandos were outnumbered by their hungry hosts and it seemed that they won't die easily. To make matter worst, those who were bitten by the zombies if not violently mutilated and eaten up alive, would soon become one of them in a matter of minutes. Slowly one by one, the commandos were either eaten up alive or transformed into what they were shooting at earlier on; such containment plan was a total failure. On the contrary, the government did not give up just yet and in fact, they had plan B up their sleeves: to nuke the facility and have the story covered up on BBC with lies of Al-Qeada cells in United Kingdom responsible for such devastation. Despite heavy casualties among the commandos, only one SAS operative is still alive and he just found out about the government's Plan B through his trusty information officer who is always updating him with the mission objectives few hundred miles from his position. Left for dead and betrayed by the government he served, this SAS commando is not going to go down without a fight. He has recorded the massacre in the facility and he intends to let the public know the truth...that is if he can leave the facility before the bombs hit the ground. With the recorded evidence in one hand and a machine-gun in the other, the lone SAS commando must fight his way through the onslaught of flesh eating-zombies and race against the countdown of the air strike of his demise. His information officer has secretly designated an extraction point for him next to a fortified house a few clicks from the facility. Barely escaping the zombie-infested facility, the SAS commando finally reached the house and he patiently waits for his extraction helicopter. However, it seems that the hosts at the science facility are not ready to let their guest return home just yet as they persistenly pursue the commando to the house. Now surrounded by overwhelming hordes of hungry zombies, the SAS commando must fend of the flesh-eating cannibals with whatever he has until extraction arrives. Escaping the zombie-infested facility was only the beginning...
As mentioned earlier on, the gameplay itself is simple yet intresting. The game is a bird-view-third-person-shooter which closely resembles Grand Theft Auto 2. The controls are simple, easy to apprehend and steady (most of the time...although there's a bit of glitches here and then). The game pits the player to survive the almost never-ending waves of incoming zombies eager to break in to feed on his or her flesh. Every zombie a player kills presents cash in his or her wallet allowing him or her to access a menu where he or she can purchase a variety of weapons ranging from shotguns to machine guns where each of them have their respective attributes in terms of damage inflcited and range of attack. In addition to the array of firearms on the "menu", additional support hardware like reinforced barriers, sentry guns and proximity mines are also available to help players survive the endless zombie onslaught for a little longer. There are also a variety of zombies ranging from the normal ones, infected SAS commandos to unidentified creatures which are harder to kill compared to the usual zombies. Practically, the gameplay itself is above average which makes it fun to play.
The presentation of SAS: Zombie Assault is surprisingly good given the fact that the game is just a flash-game. The gun fire sounds are convincing and so are the constant moans of the zombies. Furthermore, the game's graphics is similar to Grand Theft Auto 2 which is actually amazing for a flash-game.
To sum it up, SAS: Zombie Assault receives an 8 out of 10 instead a full score as the game ocassionaly has a few glitches and there is no solid story plot (which I had to come up one myself). Nevertheless, the game is definitelty worth playing. I have posted the game here for your convinience, so give it a try. I'm sure you'll come back for more "zombie assault".
As mentioned earlier, the game itself does not present any solid storyline as to what trigger the uprising of the dead or how was the lone SAS commando involve in this unspeakable nightmare; afterall its just a flash-game. Nevertheless, if you are the kind of person who needs a solid story platform to motivate you to play the game (like me...), let me simply create one which hopefully might entice your "appetite" to play the game. So here goes:
A viral outbreak somewhere in the outskirts of the United Kingdom caused by a top-secret government project mishap, infected those who were involved turning them into flesh-eating zombies. Of course the British government tried to contain the situation by authorizing a total lockdown on the science facility where the top-secret project took place. The government's lockdown plan involved sending in several teams of highly trained SAS commandos into the facility to eliminate everyone (or every"thing") in the hope of not only containing the situation but to erase any trace or evidence that could illustrate the goverment's screwed-up project. Just like what the government had carefully planned, the SAS commandos were deployed into the facility and it wasn't long before they started engaging with the flesh-eating hosts of the facility. There were problems though; the commandos were outnumbered by their hungry hosts and it seemed that they won't die easily. To make matter worst, those who were bitten by the zombies if not violently mutilated and eaten up alive, would soon become one of them in a matter of minutes. Slowly one by one, the commandos were either eaten up alive or transformed into what they were shooting at earlier on; such containment plan was a total failure. On the contrary, the government did not give up just yet and in fact, they had plan B up their sleeves: to nuke the facility and have the story covered up on BBC with lies of Al-Qeada cells in United Kingdom responsible for such devastation. Despite heavy casualties among the commandos, only one SAS operative is still alive and he just found out about the government's Plan B through his trusty information officer who is always updating him with the mission objectives few hundred miles from his position. Left for dead and betrayed by the government he served, this SAS commando is not going to go down without a fight. He has recorded the massacre in the facility and he intends to let the public know the truth...that is if he can leave the facility before the bombs hit the ground. With the recorded evidence in one hand and a machine-gun in the other, the lone SAS commando must fight his way through the onslaught of flesh eating-zombies and race against the countdown of the air strike of his demise. His information officer has secretly designated an extraction point for him next to a fortified house a few clicks from the facility. Barely escaping the zombie-infested facility, the SAS commando finally reached the house and he patiently waits for his extraction helicopter. However, it seems that the hosts at the science facility are not ready to let their guest return home just yet as they persistenly pursue the commando to the house. Now surrounded by overwhelming hordes of hungry zombies, the SAS commando must fend of the flesh-eating cannibals with whatever he has until extraction arrives. Escaping the zombie-infested facility was only the beginning...
As mentioned earlier on, the gameplay itself is simple yet intresting. The game is a bird-view-third-person-shooter which closely resembles Grand Theft Auto 2. The controls are simple, easy to apprehend and steady (most of the time...although there's a bit of glitches here and then). The game pits the player to survive the almost never-ending waves of incoming zombies eager to break in to feed on his or her flesh. Every zombie a player kills presents cash in his or her wallet allowing him or her to access a menu where he or she can purchase a variety of weapons ranging from shotguns to machine guns where each of them have their respective attributes in terms of damage inflcited and range of attack. In addition to the array of firearms on the "menu", additional support hardware like reinforced barriers, sentry guns and proximity mines are also available to help players survive the endless zombie onslaught for a little longer. There are also a variety of zombies ranging from the normal ones, infected SAS commandos to unidentified creatures which are harder to kill compared to the usual zombies. Practically, the gameplay itself is above average which makes it fun to play.
The presentation of SAS: Zombie Assault is surprisingly good given the fact that the game is just a flash-game. The gun fire sounds are convincing and so are the constant moans of the zombies. Furthermore, the game's graphics is similar to Grand Theft Auto 2 which is actually amazing for a flash-game.
To sum it up, SAS: Zombie Assault receives an 8 out of 10 instead a full score as the game ocassionaly has a few glitches and there is no solid story plot (which I had to come up one myself). Nevertheless, the game is definitelty worth playing. I have posted the game here for your convinience, so give it a try. I'm sure you'll come back for more "zombie assault".
Friday, July 17, 2009
Blockbuster Preview: Красная шапочка (Krasnaya Shapochka aka. Little Red Hat)
REVENGE KNOWS NO NATIONAL BOUNDARIES
Scared for life after witnessing hundreds of innocents and his colleagues mutilated by a bio-weapon released by a local fanatical cult, Agent Lim is thrown into great depression and sorrow. However within his sorrows, the hunger for utter redemption slowly grows and Agent Lim intends to serve it cold to the ones responsible for the lost of his loved ones. When he learned that a Russian player by the name of Galina Makarov, is responsible for supplying the cult with the modern-day "Pandora Box", Agent Lim expands his scope of vengeance beyond the national borders. After receiving intelligence regarding Galina's intention to sell the same dreadful bio-weapon to a right-wing Japanese terrorist cell in Japan, the vengeful Interpol agent is given the opportunity for redemption when he is assigned to lead the case to apprehend the Russian bio-weapons dealer. In addition to that, Agent Lim prioritizes his intentions to fulfill his blood lust for redemption over Japan's national security. Relying on his animosity, vengeance and obsession at the same time leaving his ethics behind, the agent with a huge vendetta begins his hunt for his Russian prey in the urban jungles of Tokyo and he intends to paint it red if he has to.
Krasnaya Shapochka or also known as Little Red Hat in Russian, is a modern day tale of bio-terrorism inspired by the fairy tale of Little Red Riding Hood. It explores how one man's vengeance forces him to lose his ethics in his line of duty, forcing him to resort to cunning and questionable methods of achieving his goals similar to the wolf in the famous fairy tale.
Scared for life after witnessing hundreds of innocents and his colleagues mutilated by a bio-weapon released by a local fanatical cult, Agent Lim is thrown into great depression and sorrow. However within his sorrows, the hunger for utter redemption slowly grows and Agent Lim intends to serve it cold to the ones responsible for the lost of his loved ones. When he learned that a Russian player by the name of Galina Makarov, is responsible for supplying the cult with the modern-day "Pandora Box", Agent Lim expands his scope of vengeance beyond the national borders. After receiving intelligence regarding Galina's intention to sell the same dreadful bio-weapon to a right-wing Japanese terrorist cell in Japan, the vengeful Interpol agent is given the opportunity for redemption when he is assigned to lead the case to apprehend the Russian bio-weapons dealer. In addition to that, Agent Lim prioritizes his intentions to fulfill his blood lust for redemption over Japan's national security. Relying on his animosity, vengeance and obsession at the same time leaving his ethics behind, the agent with a huge vendetta begins his hunt for his Russian prey in the urban jungles of Tokyo and he intends to paint it red if he has to.
Krasnaya Shapochka or also known as Little Red Hat in Russian, is a modern day tale of bio-terrorism inspired by the fairy tale of Little Red Riding Hood. It explores how one man's vengeance forces him to lose his ethics in his line of duty, forcing him to resort to cunning and questionable methods of achieving his goals similar to the wolf in the famous fairy tale.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
Красная шапочка (Krasnya Shapochka aka Little Red Hat)
"To protect the sheep, you gotta kill the wolf. And it takes a wolf to kill a wolf"
Tokyo, Japan
2230pm
Present Day
The darkness of the night barely shadows the sleepless town of Kabukicho as the countless neon commercial billboards illuminate throughout the night. Despite its late hour of the day, the red light district of Shinjuku is swarmed with sleepless youngsters and office workers, enjoying the remaining of the day wildly in the variety of pubs, host bars and brothels Kabukicho has to offer. Among the crowded entertainment district filled with people hoping to have a great time, a handful of triad members and Yakuza thugs station themselves around the key points of Kabukicho keeping a close eye for their criminal rivals and the police. On one of the sidewalks of the district, a parked black BMW houses two suspicious and mysterious individuals; one of them was a rugged man in his early thirties with a rough and sharp goatee who bears a visible scar next to his left eye which houses a nightmarish memory that continues to haunt him until today. Riding shot gun next to him was a Japanese woman who shares the similar age but looks a decade younger than him; with long straight hair and eyes of a fox with tanned yet soft skin, she is the exact opposite of the man sitting quietly in the car next to her. The mysterious partners had been resting their eyes on one of the hostess bar in the red light district for hours. Their persistent observation was interrupted for a moment when a patrol officer knocked on the sedan's window. The Japanese women in the car winded down the window and smile before the officer addressed his suspicion. "You've been in this spot for more than the permitted time. I'm going to have to ask you for your license and registration, ma'am" the police man politely asked. The rugged man who was next to her immediately flashed his Interpol badge with a threatening glare at the policeman. "Interpol!" Fuck off!" the rugged man warned. The police man immediately stepped away from the vehicle with a brief apology before he hurried away. The edgy rugged man than slid his badge back into his coat before he continued observing. "Agent Lim, I guess this case is pushing you over the edge huh?" the Japanese woman wondered. "Who wouldn't be if they knew that a lethal viral weapon capable of stripping human flesh in seconds is on the loose? How can you expect me to be calm when I actually witnessed my colleagues mutilated slowly by this fucking viral weapon in my own country?" Agent Lim replied as he was reminded of the tragic incident in Malaysia where a flesh eating viral weapon was released in the Kuala Lumpur Twin Towers by a fanatical cult which cost the lives of more than a hundred innocent people and his colleagues who happened to be his friends.
Ever since the unforgettable massacre, he was engulfed with rage and hatred for the ones responsible. Moreover, he hungered redemption like a starved beast and he actually got it when he managed to nail the leader of the fanatical cult during a dramatic and daring jungle raid on the cult's main hideout in one of the remote forests in Malaysia. CNN described the raid as a controversial take-no-prisoner commando raid that left every cult members dead even the women and children. Unlike his followers, the leader of the cult was the only survivor to the vicious raid which he later dreaded for not dying together with his followers when he was later subjected to CIA style interrogation and torture methods which were personally carried out by the vengeful Agent Lim. His hatred later went beyond the cult leader when he learned that a Russian arms dealer was responsible for supplying the viral weapon that caused the nightmarish tragedy at the Kuala Lumpur Twin Towers. The figure responsible for the man-made Pandora Box was no other than a beautiful Russian vixen by the name of Galina Makarov. She was a tall lady in her mid thirty's with long curled blond hair and had ocean blue eyes of an innocent girl; many could not believe that a goddess like her would deliver so much pain and suffering. Agent Lim, on the other hand thought of her as a hideous demon bitch masquerading within the flesh of a beautiful mortal that he personally wishes to strip. His hateful redemption was later rewarded as he was appointed by his Interpol superiors to apprehend Galina Makarov who is believed to be in Tokyo supplying a Japanese right wing terrorist group. Agent Lim's superiors did not have to think twice to exclude him from this case given his personal vendetta, nevertheless they were choiceless as he was the only Interpol agent who was the most knowledgeable about the viral weapon given his dreadful experience not to mention the Russian target, who he has been obsessed with recently. The mission to apprehend Galina was a joint operation between Malaysian and Japanese Interpol which later landed Agent Lim in Japan.
"Once we nail Galina, the innocents and your friends' death will not be in vain..." the Japanese woman reassured the agitated Malaysian agent. "Damn right it will!" Agent Lim replied. A while later, a group of shady Yakuza thugs came out from the hostess bar whom caught the attention of the partners; one of them looked wealthier than the others not to mention that he dressed differently from his company who were all in black suits and slacks. It was Miyamoto, a local agent for Galina Makarov who has been scooping interested customers for the Russain bio weapons supplier; the Interpol recently received intelligence regarding his connection to Galina and his whereabouts in Japan. "Agent Goto, that's Miyamoto!" Agent Lim alerted. "He knows where Galina is. I'm calling back up!" Agent Goto replied hastily. "Fuck that! Let's go after him now!" Agent Lim disagreed immediately. Miyamoto and his goons later entered into a white Audi sedan car before they left the district. Agent Lim immediately started the car and tried to tail Miyamoto's car but he was slowed down by the overwhelming crowd; he immediately hit the car's horn repeatedly and yelled rudely, telling everyone to move aside before he speed off. The Interpol agents tailed Miyamoto to a dark secluded road. Agent Lim then accelerated his car before slamming it violently into the rear of Miyamoto's car. Agent Goto grabbed onto the safety handle of the car nervously as Agent Lim slammed his BMW to one of the rear side tires of Miyamoto's car. As one of the tires of Miyamoto's car burst, his car flipped and crashed violently into the sidewalk of the road. Agent Lim then brought his car to a halt before he and Agent Goto drew their Glock side arm. As they cocked their pistol, they exited the car; Agent Goto took cover behind the opened door of the BMW to provide cover while her partner walked casually to the crashed car. As the passengers of the crashed car crawled out, they started to draw their guns but they were shot dead by the Interpol agent before they could pull the trigger.
Miyamoto shattered in fear as he saw his bodyguards taken out viciously by the ruthless agent. Agent Lim smiled sinisterly at Miyamoto before he grabbed the Yakuza up and rest the hollow tip of his gun on Miyamoto's head.
"Where is Galina!?" he demanded. "I...I don't know..." Miyamoto sobbed in fear as he started crying for his life. Agent Goto watched the interrogation helplessly: although she never approved police brutality, she made this time an exception as she realize that she needed to reach Galina before she sells the viral weapon. Agent Lim then laid the hollow tip of his Glock on one of Miyamoto's eye. "Look into the gun! Look in it! Do you see the bullet!?" Agent Lim asked furiously. Miyamoto continued stammering in fear. "Where the fuck is Galina!?" the impatient agent asked again. " I...don't know...please..." Miyamoto cried desperately. Agent Lim then turned to his partner and demanded, "Toss me your cuffs, Goto!" . Agent Goto was confused before she asked, "What!?". "I said toss me your fucking cuffs!". Agent Lim screamed before his partner threw her hand cuffs over. The second he caught his partner's hand cuffs, he dragged Miyamoto harshly to his crashed Audi before throwing him onto the hood of the car. Miyamoto grunted in pain before each of his wrists were cuffed to the side mirrors of the car. "What the fuck are you doing!?" he asked frantically as Agent Lim went into the Audi and slowly reversed it from the sidewalk. He then drove the car closely to the edge of a cliff which was not far away before he got out. "You crazy motherfucker! Stop it!" Miyamoto pleaded desperately. Agent Goto just stood by and tried to stomach the horrors that were about to begin. "Last chance, asshole! Where the fuck is Galina!?" Agent Lim shouted as he prepared to release the brakes of the car which will send the vehicle over the cliff. "A safe house in a nightclub in Shibuya! Uhh..." Miyamoto finally spat Galina's whereabouts. "There are plenty of clubs in Shibuya! Which one!?" Agent Lim continued angrily. "Ice Blade! It's called Ice Blade! Now let me fucking go, you maniac!" Miyamoto demanded. "Okay..." Agent Lim chuckled before he released the brake sending the car over the cliff. Miyamoto's screams echoed as the car headed down into the darkness shortly before it reached the ground with a big explosion.
Agent Goto who was shocked by the unexpected behavior of her partner then screamed, "What the fuck is wrong with you!? Why did you do that!?". "He told me to let him go and I did..." Agent Lim replied. "Freeze, you son of a bitch!" Agent Goto aimed her sidearm at Agent Lim. "I'm booking you for police brutality! Drop your gun!"Agent Goto demanded. "Arrest me!? Are you fucking out of your mind, you bitch!?" the angered agent then pointed his gun back at his partner. "Don't make me pull the trigger, asshole!"Agent Goto warned. "If he was left alive, he would have alerted Galina and we can kiss this case good bye!" Agent Lim asserted some sense into Agent Goto furiously. Before he continued, he lowered his weapon and approached his car. "We now know where Galina is and I'm going to apprehend her. Either join me or shoot me right now. That's your call, Agent Goto" Agent Lim said. Agent Goto paused for awhile before she lowered her weapon and rejoined her partner. "Let's go! This time, I'm driving!" Agent Goto suggested as she took the driver's seat of the BMW. The Interpol agent than left the scene and they headed for Shibuya without wasting anymore time.
As the agents drove under the silence and darkness of the night, they gave a big thought into the case. "You know, we won't find the viral weapon at her safe house" Agent Goto warned. Agent Lim who was reloading his side arm then paused for a moment; he looked at his partner before she continued. "It's not like as if she's stupid enough to keep the weapon with her. If we arrest her right now, we won't have the evidence to prosecute her."Agent Goto speculated. "Then I guess, we'll just have to beat the shit out of her until she speaks" Agent Lim replied. "By the time we manage to get her to say a word or two, that weapon would have been detonated somewhere in the capital." Agent Goto said. Her partner was speechless as he knew that she was right; he couldn't think of any other way to solve the issue at hand. "Any ideas?" Agent Lim asked as he gave up figuring a way. "I got one..." his partner replied confidently.
Meanwhile at a small apartment somewhere in Tokyo, a Japanese woman in her late thirties with short hair is sitting on a sofa in the living room alone. On her hands was a twenty by fourteen photo frame which housed a warm and happy family photo of herself, her five year old son and Agent Lim. She has been holding the photo frame looking at it for quite a while however, she never gets bored of it at all. Shortly after that, a five year old boy with short hair, small eyes and rosy cheeks approached her; he climbed on her lap before she placed the photo frame aside and squeezed him with love. "Why aren't you sleeping yet, sweety?" the woman asked her son. "I'm waiting for daddy." the son replied. "Daddy won't be back early tonight. You should sleep first" she later suggested. "But I want to see daddy while he is still here... It's not like he comes to Japan every time to see us" the son resisted. "Why doesn't daddy stay with us?" he continued. "Well, that's because he is busy working in Malaysia" the woman replied with a smile. "I miss him a lot. I wanna see him tonight!" the son further insisted. "Daddy will be still here tomorrow, don't worry. You should sleep now so that you will be fully rested tomorrow to play with daddy" she continued as she patted her son's head. "Okay..." the son eventually agreed. "How about a bedtime story for mummy's little prince?" she generously offered. Her son didn't have to think twice to say, "yes". "She later brought her son to his bedroom and laid him on his bed before she went to the bookshelf to pick a storybook. "So what shall it be for tonight, sweety?" she asked. "Little Red Hat" he replied. She then removed the book from the shelf and sat next to her son on the bed before she started the story:
Once upon a time, there was a little girl who hadn't seen her mother in seven years. She was forced to dress in iron clothes and was told "When you wear out those clothes, you can go back to your mother". The girl rubbed her clothes on the wall trying desperately to tear them. When she finally torn them, she got some milk and bread as well as a little cheese and butter and set out for her mother's house. In the woods, she met a wolf who asked her what she was carrying. "Milk and bread...and a little cheese and butter," she answered. When the wolf asked for some, the girl said no, saying it was a present for her mother. The wolf asked whether she'd be taking the path of pins or the path of needles.
As the agents arrived at the night club, they went into an alley which led them to the back of the club. Waiting there were huge mean looking Russians equipped with AK47s and Uzis which they secretly hid behind their winter coat. "Remember to smile and keep it cool" Agent Goto reminded her vengeful partner. "I'll try my best" her partner joked. "I'm serious! Don't fuck this up!" Agent Goto angrily whispered. "Can I help you?" one of the Russian brute asked in Japanese with his thick Russian accent. "We're here to see Miss Makarov" Agent Goto said. "There is no Makarov here" the other Russian man said. "Miyamoto send us" Agent Goto replied nervously as she tried her best to not blow her cover. The Russian looked a bit surprised; he then whispered into his comrade's ear. "Okay...this way..." the Russian brute said before he escorted the undercover agents to the front of Galina's safe house door. "Hands up, please" the other Russian thug requested as he was ready to search the undercover agents for any weapons. After a thorough search on the agents where no weapons were found, the Russian thug let them in. As they entered the cozy safe house, Galina's man invited them to have a seat and make themselves at home. The small and cozy safe house was not fully furnished; it had only a couple of chairs and a wooden table in the living room. The walls were dirt black and the floor was dusty. A woman then appeared out from another room in the safe house; she wore a long red winter coat with a hood. It was Galina; she gave a warm smile and a friendly welcome to the undercover agents. "How is Miyamoto and his family?" she wondered. "They're all fine, Miss Makarov" Agent Goto tried her best to lied when she remembered what her partner did to Miyamoto a while ago. "That's good. So, what brings you here?" Galina started getting down to business as she ordered her men to bring her a bottle of vodka and a couple of cups from the kitchen. "Miyamoto wants to know when and where will you be selling the viral weapon to the right-wing terrorists?" Agent Goto asked. Galina then paused for a moment as she began to fell suspicious. As she opened the bottle of vodka and filled the cups with a little, she curiously asked, "And why would Mr. Miyamoto wants to know?". "He doesn't trust the right-wing terrorists. They usually come in huge numbers to any dealings and it has not been the first time that they actually rubbed out the other party at the deal. He is concerned about the safety of you and your men and he insists that his men should back you up." Agent Goto explained. The Russian vixen then served the vodka to her guest before she continued, "That is what I like about your boss. He knows how to take good care of his customers. Indeed, I am short of men and I have thought about the terrorists' treachery a couple of times. Tell Mr. Miyamoto that I accept his help. The deal will take place in Warehouse number 13 at Kokoji's Shipping and Storage, 2 hours from now". "Understood, Miss Makarov. I will immediately inform my boss and we will ensure the safety of you and your men during the weapons deal." Agent Goto reassured. "Very well, let's drink to our success!" Galina and her guest raised their cups before they chugged down the strong Russian vodka together.
When the girl said she was going to take the path of pins, the wolf hurried down the path of needles and ate up the little girl's mother.
As the agents drove off, they immediately wasted no time in commencing the next phase of their plan. Agent Lim drew his cellphone out and dialed the Interpol Head Quarters in Japan. "We've got a fix on the location of the weapons deal. The deal is going on at warehouse number 13 at Kokoji's Shipping and Storage in 2 hours time! We strongly believe that the viral weapon will be there" Agent Lim reported hastily. "I need you to scramble two ICPU (Inter Continental Paramilitary Unit) teams to the designated location immediately. Get them to recon the warehouse and stand by for my further orders. I want them to report to me." he continued before he hung up. Half an hour later, Agent Lim received a call; it was from one of the ICPU teams. "Bravo team reporting, sir!" the Bravo team leader reported. "Our recon indicated twenty to thirty right-wing terrorists appearing at the warehouse. They're all heavily armed." the ICPU team leader continued. "Copy that. Good job Bravo Team" Agent Lim complimented. "Patch me through the second ICPU team" he ordered. "Alpha reporting, sir!" the other ICPU team leader reported. "Alpha, have your men ready to storm the target! Take no prisoners!" Agent Lim barked his orders. "Sir yes sir! We're moving to position". the Alpha team leader acknowledged as he ordered his men to move out. "Bravo team, continue your observation. I'll rendezvous with you ETA 20 minutes." Agent Lim continued. Shortly after that, Alpha team reported, "Alpha team approaching the target....getting into position...Alpha team in position" the ICPU team leader reported. "Hit it!" Agent Lim ordered. "Go!Go!Go!" the Alpha team leader shouted before he and his men stormed the warehouse and empty their machine guns on the unsuspecting occupants. The rattling sounds of the machine gun and screams of death echoed Agent Lim's cellphone. "Clear!" the ICPU team leader reported. "Outstanding job, Alpha Team!" Agent Lim complimented. "Time to role play, Alpha team. Put on the terrorists' long coat and dump their bodies." the agent continued. Shortly after that, both Agent Goto and Agent Lim arrived at the observation post of the ICPU commandos which was not far away from the warehouse. As they entered the observation post, the ICPU commandos of Bravo team saluted the Interpol agents before giving them a detail report on their mission. Both the Interpol agents were impressed with the outstanding performance of the ICPU commandos. "The Russians should be here in thirty minutes time. Bravo team, I need you to take key positions outside the warehouse which is ideal for an ambush." Agent Lim ordered. "Considered that done, sir!" the Bravo team leader acknowledged before he and his men moved out. Agent Lim then picked up the walkie talkie and radioed for Alpha team, "Alpha, what's your status?" the Interpol agent asked. "We're all dressed up, sir." the Alpha team leader replied. "Copy that. Hold your position and wait for further orders." Agent Lim continued.
The girl finally reached the mother's house.
Half an hour later, Galina and her men met up with the undercover agents half a click from the warehouse; as they got out from their car, they were greeted by the undercover agents. "My men are in position. They have remained hidden to maintain an element of surprise which will give us an advantage should anything goes wrong." Agent Goto reported to Galina. "Very well. I suppose the both of you will be accompanying me and my men to the deal." Galina requested. "Of course. It will be our pleasure, Miss Makarov" Agent Lim acknowledged sinisterly as he was excited for redemption. "That must be the infamous viral weapon" Agent Goto commented as she looked at a small machine that housed a glass container filled with green gas, which was lying in the back seat of the car. "Yes indeed. This is going to make me rich tonight. Of course, Mr. Miyamoto's initiative and effort will not go unnoticed. He will be rewarded handsomely for it." Galina assured the undercover agents with a grateful smile. "Then let's not waste anymore time. Your buyer are waiting eagerly at the warehouse, Miss Makarov." Agent Goto replied before she ushered Galina back to her car. The motorcade then proceeded to the warehouse which was later welcomed by the ICPU commandos masquerading as the right-wing terrorists.
"Mother, open the door," she said. "Push on the door. It's not locked," answered the wolf. But the door still wouldn't open. So the girl crept in through a hole into the house.
A couple of masqueraded ICPU commandos approached the dealing table and placed a couple of briefcase loaded with money while Galina and her men exited their car. The undercover agent who was escorting them got out from their car as well before they took a brief peeked around the warehouse. "I believe you have what we want" the Alpha team leader started. "Only if you can pay for it, my friend" Galina replied as she removed the viral weapon from her car. The Alpha Team leader ordered his men to opened the briefcases full of cash before he continued, "Eight million US dollars in total. Four in each briefcase just as you wanted". "Here's the viral weapon which you so strongly believe that will assist in your organization's cause" Galina presented the weapon on the table for the ICPU team leader to inspect. "Outstanding! This weapon will make the 1995 Sarin subway gas attack look like a cream puff." the Alpha team leader inspected with amaze.
"I'm very hungry, mother," she said. "Have some meat in the cupboard," answered the wolf. It was the flesh of her mother killed by the wolf. A big cat jumped up onto the cupboard and said, "That's your mother's flesh you're eating." "Mother, there is a cat on the cupboard and it's saying that I'm eating your flesh" she said. "That's a lie of course, throw a shoe at the cat,"the wolf replied. The little girl having eaten the meat, was thirsty. "Mother, I'm thirsty". she said. "Drink some wine from the pot, answered the wolf". When she did a little bird, came flying in and perched on the chimney stack. "That's your mother's blood you're drinking" the bird said. "Mother, there's a bird perched on the chimney stack and it's saying that I'm drinking your blood" she said. "Throw your cloak at the bird" the wolf said. Having eaten the meat and drunk the blood, the little girl turned to her mother and said 'Mother, I'm feeling very sleepy". "Come over here and get some rest" the wolf said.
One of Galina's men then noticed something strange as he witnessed several blood stains on the floors and walls of the warehouse. "I thought this was supposed to be a warehouse...not a slaughterhouse" one of Galina's men chuckled nervously as he looked around the slightly bloody warehouse. Galina couldn't help but to notice the bullet holes on the winter coats of her buyers which had a little blood stain on them. "Your organization should maybe think about getting their men proper clean coats first before spending so much on weapons like this. After all, how can an organization succeed without high morale?" she joked as she approached the ICPU team leader before she dusted off his dirty coat. "This is a setup!" she later screamed in Russian before she took the Alpha team leader hostage. Galina's men then withdrew their assault rifles and sub machine guns out before they pointed them at the buyers. The masqueraded commandos then pointed their machine guns at the Russians and they demanded them to drop their weapons. "You drop your fucking weapons or I'll blow his fucking head off" Galina threatened violently as she rested her Desert Eagle on her hostage's head. "Wait! Stay cool! Don't do anything yet!" Agent Lim whispered quietly to his partner, telling her not to blow her cover yet. "Bravo team reporting in!" the Bravo team leader tried reaching Agent Lim secretly through the agent's concealed ear piece; the extra ICPU team were getting ready to conduct an assault on the warehouse at the bark of the agent's order. "Hold...hold..."Agent Lim whispered quietly ordering the Bravo team to do nothing yet. "You're not the terrorists. You're all fucking cops!" Galina continued as she waved her gun around. "You've been surrounded! Drop your weapons!" another ICPU commando of the Alpha team warned, as she pointed her rifle at Galina. "I'm not going to tell you again, pigs! Drop your weapons or Tempura over here gets it." Galina further threatened as she rested her gun on her Japanese ICPU hostage. As she noticed that the commandos still had their weapons raised, she shot off her hostage's right ear lobe, forcing her helpless hostage to scream in pain. "Ahh!!! You fucking bitch! I'll kill you! Fuck it team! Just shoot her! Just shoot the fucking bitch!" the wounded Alpha team leader cried in pain as his right ear poured crimson water. "Can it, Tempura! Or the next one goes right in your fucking head! Drop your weapons now, you fucking pigs! I'm not going to ask you again" Galina continued warning the ICPU commandos to disarm themselves. The commandos eventually dropped their weapons and raised their arms submitting defeat to the Russians as they did not want their team leader to suffer further. "What the fuck are you guys doing!? Shoot her! Shoot her! Goddammit!" the Alpha team leader ordered. "The both of you! Get the money and the viral weapon. We're out of here!" Galina ordered the undercover agents. "Bravo team, hit it!" Agent Lim ordered as he knew now it was the time to have his back up to come in seeing that Galina and her men were about to leave. A couple of stun grenades were tossed into the warehouse by the invading Bravo team; Agent Goto and her partner quickly rolled into cover to avoid the stunned grenades. As the the stunned grenades exploded, the Russians were stunned and both the agents opened fire on their disoriented adversaries. The commandos from the Alpha team rearmed themselves and fired upon the Russians. A sniper from Bravo team who was located twenty meters from the warehouse shot Galina's gun wielding arm; she screamed in pain before she dropped her gun. The wounded ICPU Alpha team leader elbowed her in her stomach before he dropped and kick her away. The Alpha team leader than ran to safety where he was later retrieved by his teammates. Several ICPU commandos from the Bravo team fast roped through the warehouse's windows before the opened fire; within minutes Galina's men were all shot dead. The wounded Russian vixen was all alone, surrounded by her enemies. Agent Lim and Agent Goto then appeared in front of her with their guns pointed at her. "Miss Makarov, you're under arrest" Agent Goto said while she aimed her Glock pistol at Galina. "You can either come with us peacefully or you can die here and join your friend, Miyamoto" Agent Lim said. "So it was you who set me up...and it was you... who killed Miyamoto..."Galina cried in disbelief as she learned the harsh fate that she now faced. Tears rolled down her cheeks as she was saddened by the death of her men and her friend, Miyamoto. "Take her away!" Agent Lim ordered the ICPU commandos before he holstered his sidearm, turned away and walked off. "I'll fucking kill you! You bastard!" Galina then quickly drew a Walter PPK from her coat and aimed the small pistol at Agent Lim. However, before she could pull the trigger, the Alpha team leader shot her in her head killing her instantly. Agent Lim was a little stunned but he knew he was safe thanks to his trustworthy ICPU commandos. Galina fell to the ground and she laid motionlessly on the floor with blood pouring out from her head; the Russian vixen was dead.
Then the wolf ate up Little Red Riding Hood.
As the Japanese woman finished the last page of the story book, her son was almost asleep; she then covered him with a blanket. Before the little boy slept, he whispered something into his mother's ear which slightly surprised her. After wishing him goodnight, she switched off the lights in his bedroom before she exited his room. Back at the living room, the Japanese woman picked up the photo frame which she was looking at earlier on, and she placed it back neatly at the original place. She gave out a brief sigh hoping that the man in the picture standing next to her will come home safe. Shortly after that, the front door of her apartment was unlocked and a figure then entered her home; it was Agent Lim. "Okaeri! (Welcome home)" the Japanese woman wished him with joy as she was happy that her man returned home safely in one piece. "Tadaima (I'm home)" Agent Lim replied before he ran to the woman and hugged her tightly. "Is he already asleep?" Agent Lim asked the woman with a smile. "Yes" she replied with a warm smile. Later that night, both Agent Lim and the woman were at the apartment's balcony looking up at the dark skies gazing for stars. The woman was wrapped around Agent Lim's arm. "So what did the both of you do earlier on?" Agent Lim asked curiously as he continued holding her tightly. "I was reading him Little Red Riding Hood" she chuckled. "Ha, that's cute" Agent Lim laughed. "Before he slept, our son whispered something funny into my ear" she continued. "Really? What was that?" Agent Lim asked with interest. "He told me that you reminded him of the wolf in the story" she laughed. "Is that so?" Agent Lim paused for a moment. As he reflected on his job earlier on, especially with what he did to Miyamoto, he said "Maybe he is right..."
-The End-
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
While I was Away for a Long Time...(Part 2)
New Arrivals from the Land of the Rising Sun
As summer approached, the snow and ice in Kamloops started to melt away slowly. Like the snow and ice that pass by, the same could be said for some of my Japanese friends; Eiji, Pamella and Yasutaka returned to Japan for their summer holidays. Knowing that great guys like them were not here to accompany the remaining of us here in Canada, we knew that summer would be slightly quiet than usual. Conversely, when Yoshitaka received "intelligence" stating that sixteen new students from Japan would be coming to Thompson Rivers University for the summer, all was not lost as this could mean possible expansion of my social network. On top of that, Yoshitaka reported that all of the new Japanese students were apparently girls. Like the rest of my Japanese guy friends, I thought that this would be interesting. Yoshitaka and Teppei volunteered for the university's orientation program of the new Japanese students, for some obvious reasons. The orientation lasted for two days and on one warm morning, I had the opportunity to have a conversation with them in front of the Campus Activity Center building, where we sat on the soft green grasses (which we hoped had no dog shit on it) and talked about their orientation experience. Teppei and Yoshitaka had a guest with them who apparently participated in the orientation as well; her name was Ran and she was from Japan as well. Like most of my friends, she usually hangs out at my "pub" every Saturday night in the previous semester but I never talked to her back then due to my shy behavior. However, that day she initiated a conversation with me and the next thing I knew, we were already talking. The three of them informed me about a lunch to welcome the new students that will occur a couple of days from now; in addition to that, they extended the invitation to me which I thought was generous of them. According to them, the lunch would be held in an Indian restaurant in downtown. I had mixed opinion on their decision to organize the welcome lunch in an Indian restaurant.I can see the robust idea behind allowing the new Japanese students to try something new. On the other hand, I was worried about whether they could handle the spiciness of the Indian cuisine since most of my Japanese friends whom I know is unable to eat spicy food. Initially I wanted to raise my concern but since I was not the one who participated in the orientation or the one who helped in organizing the lunch, I thought it would be wise for me to shut up.
Japanese in Taj Mahal
On the day of the lunch, I took a bus ride with Yoshitaka from Thompson Rivers University to the main bus stop in downtown; once we reached there, we rendezvous with Ran and Teppei. It wasn't long before all sixteen new Japanese students arrived and it was then I finally saw them with my own eyes. Of course I did not approach them and introduce myself immediately to them seeing that I was a nervous wreck and a shy guy. You might be wondering what's the point of attending the lunch if I don't talk to any of the new students; let's just said that I wanted to spend more time with Teppei, Yoshitaka and Ran. Getting to know the new students would be a bonus for me which I didn't expect. After the new students exchanged greetings with one another, Teppei, Ran and Yoshitaka coordinated the group and before we knew it, we were on our way to the Indian restaurant. Once we reached the Indian restaurant (which I vaguely remember the name...), we had a problem welcoming us at the doorstep of the restaurant; it was a full house and there were not enough seats for all of us. We decided to wait and after patiently waiting for five or six minutes, several of the restaurant's patrons left and we had empty seats coming in. Soon after that, we had seats for everyone and lunch commenced shortly after that; the Indian restaurant that day were serving buffet and boy was I lucky to be there. With just fifteen dollars, I could eat all I can which wasn't any problem for me seeing that I am a veteran when it comes to eating spicy food unlike my Japanese friends (which I was worried...). During lunch, conversations in Japanese echoed throughout the restaurant and instead of joining in the conversation (seeing that I can't speak Japanese fluently), I listened carefully to them and identified the Japanese vocabulary that I've learned in my introductory Japanese class last semester. The only time I decided to join in the conversation was when someone mentions my name and when I asked either Yoshitaka, Teppei or Ran about what they said about me (it's not like as if I'll get an honest answer all the time...). It so happened that I wasn't the only non Japanese at the buffet as there was also this girl from Thailand who joined us as well. She was Ran's roommate and her name was Kwahnchanok; she appeared to be very quiet which I wasn't surprised given her similar state as mine. Although, the both of us could have talked together since we were the only non Japanese speaking students, I decided to pass on that thought and continue remaining quiet seeing that I'm not very keen of initiating a conversation. After 2 hours of buffet, the most of us knew we reached our limit and anything beyond that would have us throwing up or changing for new underwear. Each of us paid our bill separately before we left the restaurant. Before we dispersed, Teppei came up with another interesting plan later that day; he informed everyone that there would be a drinking party at his place and he invited everyone to come. However, only three of the new students could make it while the rest had their plans of their own later that day; I thought three was good enough...better compared to nothing. Shortly after that, everyone wished each other goodbye and they went home. Yoshitaka and Teppei followed me back to the New Residence after lunch as we received a call from Maaya who needed our help to move her stuff out (Maaya was also living in the New Residence).
Heavy Duty
The second the three of us arrived at Maaya's doorstep, we were welcomed with a load of work waiting for us for the remaining afternoon (you know how girls have lots of stuff with them...). Without wasting anymore time, we began working knowing that the sooner we start the earlier we get the job done. Maaya was supposed to move from the eight floor down to the 3rd floor and given the nature of the amount and weight of her stuff, we knew it was going to be a long and tiring afternoon which we will end (if we were lucky...) with back aches and muscle sores. Nevertheless, instead of thinking negatively, I told myself this would be a good workout for me, not to mention this would be an excellent way to test my gym training all this while. We carried and unload her stuff from top to bottom and it took us a total of four hours to transport all her stuff. It took 4 guys to transfer Maaya's stuff from one room to another approximately 4 hours; I just couldn't imagine how long would it take if it was just me helping her out. Anyway, it was great to know that Teppei and Yoshitaka could help out and I was grateful for their assistance. Moreover, I was pretty sure that Maaya was even more grateful than me seeing that she would have been in a world of suffering moving her stuff on her own if we decided to decline her request for assistance. As the afternoon ended, the evening in Kamloops for summer that day had another plans for the three of us; it was time to go and get some beer and ignite the party at Teppei's house. Shortly after leaving Maaya's place, the three of us took the bus to downtown before we marched towards the liquor store under the scorching sun.
A drink with the Japanese
After getting two dozens of Budweiser and a bottle of Kahlua from the liquor store, we headed for the bus roundabout to rendezvous with Ran and the other Japanese students. While waiting for the correct bus to come, we were chatting with one another in order to get rid of the boredom that usually came along the ever late bus services. As the bus arrived later than usual (as always...) we hopped on the bus and headed for Teppei's "crib". After a five minutes bus ride and an eight minutes walk, we were already at Teppei's place and we were impatient to get the party started. We were welcomed by Eiji's dog, Jack (Eiji, Pamella and Teppei are roommates) which were always excited of visitors; of course everyone especially the new Japanese students were excited as well to meet the cute fury canine. The canine wasn't the only one who welcomed all of us as Teppei's Japanese roommate and her Japanese friends gave us a warm welcome. Seeing that all of us were already here, we immediately kick started the party and we let fun took over the remaining of the evening. Apart from having cans of beer and snacks, Yoshi made us his home made pasta which I really had to say was delicious. We snapped a couple of photos together and everyone was happily chatting to one another except me as I was the only non Japanese who couldn't really speak any Japanese. Instead, I just sat down and watched TV with the company of Jack who some how seems to like me a lot. Yoshitaka and Teppei whom noticed how isolated am I, then told me to get up and talk the new Japanese students. Knowing that now was a great time to practice my eight months of Japanese classes, I took the courage and confronted the new Japanese students with a greeting in Japanese. The new Japanese students were shocked to hear me speak Japanese nevertheless our following conversation continued in Japanese. As everyone heard me speaking Japanese, they were surprised and they started asking me questions in Japanese which I could somehow answered back; next thing I knew, I was in the center of the party's spotlight unlike a moment ago when I was totally isolated and invisible to others. The party lasted until nine thirty at night and by then we all had to leave; we were planning to party all night long but since most of us had to take the bus home (last bus in Kamloops was at eleven pm that night)we had no choice but to end the party early. Despite the party was shorter than expected, everyone had a great time that night.
Last day of fun before school starts again
A day before the summer semester started, I received a call from one of my Indonesian friends in the morning while I was still sleeping. According to my Indonesian friend, he and his group of Indonesian friends were planning to go to Paul's Lake for fishing and picnicking; he later extended the invitation to me which I couldn't resist since I've never done either of those in my life before. Consequently, I said "yes" right on the spot without hesitating or thinking twice. However, it didn't take me long before I realized that I promised Yoshitaka that I would hang out with him on the same day. Quickly, I called my Indonesian friend and asked him whether was it okay if I could bring Yoshitaka along. My Indonesian friend was excited for Yoshitaka to join us; nevertheless, he had only space for me in his car for transportation to Paul's Lake as the rest of his friends had occupied the available space. Knowing that it would not be nice to shatter my promise to Yoshitaka, I reluctantly told my Indonesian friend that I would not be joining him and his friends for the trip. Realizing that I missed my chance to actually go fishing and picnicking, I was a bit disappointed. On the contrary, after being persuaded by my insistent desire to have a picnic, I told myself that if I can't join a picnic, I'll just have to make my own.
The picnic
The problems were where would be the ideal place to picnic and who will join me for it. Finding out the ideal place to picnic wasn't a difficult task as I noticed that Riverside Park in downtown Kamloops is a common spot for Canadians to picnic. The difficult and challenging task was who would even bother joining me for my picnic. Yoshitaka, was the first one to raise his hand since we were suppose to hang out together. However, it would feel awkward if it was just the two of us having a picnic together unless Yoshitaka was a sizzling hot Japanese babe like Hamasaki Ayumi, then it would suffice (in fact, I'll immediately close and restrict the invitation to just her...ah, I mean him...No! I mean if he was a she). Seeing that Yoshitaka isn't a hot babe like Hamasaki Ayumi in reality, it was compulsory for me to extend the invitation. Knowing that I usually hang out with Teppei as well, I thought he would like to join us for the picnic. Consequently, I gave him a called and told him about the picnic and just as I thought, he wanted to join us. However, our picnic required more participants...preferably girls this time just to make it look well-rounded (*ahem*). Yoshitaka shared the same opinion as great minds think alike so it didn't take us long to come up with a list of girls we can invite. Yoshitaka had several girls in mind and he immediately started making calls. He told me to call Ran and invite her for our picnic while he called Yuuki; the second he told me to make that call I was a nervous wreck. Extending invitation to girls through e-mail is already hard enough for me given my shy nature what more extending it orally through phone. Not to mention, I just knew Ran back then so I thought that asking her to join me for a picnic would freak her out. Nevertheless, seeing that if I don't do it, our picnic is going to be an all guy picnic only; therefore, I sucked it up and gave Ran a call. The second her phone was ringing I was worried that I would freeze or stutter so before she picked up, I quickly rehearsed what I wanted to say. When she picked up and said hi in Japanese, I was stunned for a couple of seconds. However, I quickly got myself back together and told her about my picnic invitation to her. I was ready to get rejected with whatever excuse she can come up with just to get rid of me, consequently I braced for impact. But instead, she asked me who else is coming. I replied by saying Teppei and Yoshitaka would be joining us as well. Unexpectedly, she said she would like to come and she asked me whether was it okay for her to bring her Thai roommate, Kwahnchanok which I immediately replied, "of course" before she could finished her question. After telling her the place and time of rendezvous, we exchanged good byes and hung up on each other. I immediately reported the great news to Yoshitaka and later asked how was things on his side. Like me, he had good news and we later exchanged high fives in joy before we got ourselves ready for the picnic. We were all suppose to meet at the main bus stop in downtown. Yoshitaka was at my place earlier when we were deciding who to invite for the picnic, consequently we had to travel together to our rendezvous point by bus. The bus service was late and we knew everyone was already at the rendezvous point waiting for us. Yuuki called Yoshitaka wondering where were we. After Yoshitaka explained our unfortunate situation, Yuuki informed us a new rendezvous point at Frank's Coffee, a cafe in downtown. Everyone who were waiting for us wanted to sit down and have a drink which explains why they changed our rendezvous point. Half an hour later, the damn bus finally came and the both of us were on the way to downtown. Once we reached downtown, the both of us immediately dashed to Frank's Coffee as we did not want to let the others wait for us any longer. The moment we met up with Teppei, Ran, Yuuki and Kwanchanok, we were welcomed with a warm greeting...and also a reminder that we were later than expected. Since everyone already started drinking, Yoshi and I thought we should order something to drink as well. Knowing that I was late, I decided to make it up to them by treating them to a chocolate cake from the cafe. Everyone like the cake more than me as I thought the cake was too sweet and I wasn't really into chocolate. Ran seemed to like the cake the most compared to all of us given her sweet tooth for chocolate. Apart from having casual conversations with one another and snacking on the food and drinks we ordered, we snapped a couple of photos together. After spending an hour at the cafe, we decided to carry on with our picnic as we planned from the beginning.
Plan A
Riverside Park was just a stone's throw from Frank's Coffee; it was just a 5 minute stroll from the coffee house we were at earlier on. On our way to Riverside Park, Yoshitaka (who's our usual photographer) decided to snap a couple of photos of us with his two thousand dollars state-of-the-art camera (which I always believe was the one usually used by the CIA for intelligence gathering and espionage purposes). In addition to that, he took several photos of the scenery along the way to our designated picnic spot. Teppei brought Jack along with him and seeing that the hyper active Jack Russel Terrier was wearing him out, I decided to help him walk the dog. Initially, I wondered how could a small puppy like Jack can drag someone like Teppei into submission; however, it didn't take me long to finally understand it once I've experience walking the puppy. Jack's fondness for running off and wondering into restricted places where I had to constantly pull him away wasn't as easy as it looks. Even with my gym training, I had to say that walking a dog like Jack was challenging. Just before we realized it, we were already at Riverside park; there were a number of people at the park that day seeing that it was on a weekend. Nevertheless, we were fortunate enough to secure ourselves a nice spot for our picnic. As we settled down, Ran rolled out the snacks she bought for our picnic which mostly comprise chocolate cookies and candies (since she is a big chocolate lover). Fortunately for me, there were a couple of bag of chips as well seeing that I wasn't really fond with chocolate. We were enjoying the beautiful scenery of Thompson Rivers compliments of the nice spot we got at Riverside Park for our picnic. As usual, our picnic was accompanied by casual conversations among one another. Seeing that the conversation was in Japanese most of the time, I told myself to take this as a learning experience for my Japanese language instead of dreading and complaining about feeling outcasted. Over at the park, Yoshitaka decided to take more photos while Teppei had to walk Jack who couldn't bear the boredom of sitting still. Ocassionally, Teppei will hand me over Jack's leash when he is tired of walking the energetic puppy; it's not a bad thing at all as I'm actually working out at the same walking the strong and hyperactive puppy. After spending three to four hours of picnicking, we thought it was time to leave. On the other hand, we didn't want to call it a day as we thought we should spend more time together seeing that today was the last day of our holidays before the summer semester began. Consequently, we had a "group meeting" to establish our following plan for the day before we left the park. After half an hour of discussing and brain storming, we concluded our Plan B was to have coffee again; only this time at a different place.
Plan B
This time we went to another coffee place called Jack's...or something like that...Everyone ordered a mocha, cappuccino or a latte while I was the only one who ordered a vegetable cocktail. It wasn't long for my choice of drink to raise everyone's eye brown. Like chocolate, I wasn't really a big fan of coffee or latte. In fact during our earlier visit to Frank's Coffee, I had juice instead of coffee or latte. In the middle of our chit-chat at the coffee house, Yuuki handed me a small envelope. According to her, it was from Yuka, my Japanese instructor's assistant. As I opened the envelope, I saw a short purple string which I thought was cute. On the contrary, I had no idea what was the purple string for. Yoshitaka then explained that according to Japanese culture, this string is suppose to be something like a bracelet where if the wearer wears it until it is snapped, his or her wish will come true. I thought it was a sweet gift from Yuka but I regretted for not being able to thank her in person for this nice gift as she already returned to Japan for good, a couple of days ago. After spending hours in the coffee house, the day was getting darker however, the most of us thought that the night was still young. Consequently, we thought of having plan C instead of going home. Seeing that I was the one who came up with "Operation Riverside Picnic", everyone shifted the responsibility of coming up with Plan C to me. As there was nothing else to do for the day, not to mention the lack of variety of things we can do over here in "Silent Hill", I just came up with a simple plan to have dinner together. Everyone thought it was a good idea except for Teppei as his roommate had already make dinner for him, therefore Teppei could not join us for Plan C. The next question was whether to dine in or dine out; given the nature that dining in was cheaper than dining out not to mention that most of us had been dining out the passed few days in a row, we thought dining in would be ideal for our soon-to-be-empty wallets. After agreeing on Plan C, we wasted no time and we left the coffee house, excited for our next plan.
Plan C
We took a 45 minute walk back to Yoshitaka's house instead of taking the bus as there were no more bus services that day. Walking back wasn't a problem for any of us; instead, the problem was that it was cold and windy that evening despite it was already summer and non of us wore extra clothes as we did not anticipate the unexpected change of weather. Nevertheless, if it wasn't for the sense of companionship that accompanied us during our walk back, this walk would be miserable and hellish for us. As we drew closer to Yohistaka's home, we immediately rushed to his place quicker than a mouse after a bit of cheese. The second we reached Yoshitaka's home, we were so relief as the warmth of his house never felt so great. After taking a five minutes rest, we did an "inventory check" on Yoshitaka's kitchen to determine if we had the availabe ingredients for what we wanted to cook for dinner. Yoshitaka thought about making pasta while Yuuki decided to make some kind of stew. Kwahnchanok on the other hand, wanted to prepare her country's cuisine, Tom Yum Goong. Knowing that there wasn't enough ingredients at Yoshitaka's place to cook, we had no choice but to make a visit to Superstore under the harsh weather which was getting worse by the hour; thankfully, Superstore was not that far away from Yoshitaka's place. Everyone went on their own to get their respective ingredients for the dish they were going to prepare that night, the minute we reached Superstore. Seeing that Ran and I were the only one not preparing anything for dinner that night, Ran was assigned to help Kwahnchanok carry her ingredients of her choice while I was in charge of deciding dessert. Knowing that ice cream was the only dessert I can think of, I thought about visiting the ice cream aisle to take a peek at the variety of choices available. The Oreo ice cream box initially look tempting, however Yoshitaka and Yuuki thought it was not worth the price for its size. Instead they suggested an alternate brand of ice cream (which I couldn't remember) which was twice the size and half the price of the Oreo ice cream box. Knowing that the their suggestion would allow us to save more money, I didn't have to think twice before I went for what they've suggetsted. Less than half an hour in Superstore, we were done with our ingredients collecting and we were ready to return to Yoshitaka's home. We did not waste anytime preparing dinner the second we reached Yoshitaka's home as we were all starving. Everyone was busy preparing dinner in the kitchen except for me as I hardly have any experience when it comes to kitchen work. Realizing that I was the only one not doing anything, I started feeling guilty. Consequently, I volunteered to clean the dishes after dinner. Almost an hour later, dinner was ready and we were impatient to "tuck in" as we grew hungrier from time to time that evening. Everyone's dishes tasted great and on top of it, it was also cheaper for our wallets as we shared the cost of our grocery shopping earlier. As dinner ended, everyone laid back lazily except for me as I had dishes to wash. After taking care of the dishes, everyone called me over to join them for dessert. We had the ice cream we bought from Superstore and despite its affordable price, the ice cream still tasted good. In the middle of our dessert, Ran suggested that we come up with plan D. I thought she was just joking as it was already twelve in the morning and everyone would have class in eight hours time (except for Yoshitaka,Yuuki and me). On the contrary after witnessing how eager she was for plan D, I knew she wasn't joking. I then asked her what can we do at this hour of the day as I realized that almost everyshop in "Silent Hill" closed 6 hours ago. Yoshi than suggested that we could go for karaoke as he thought it was still opened at this hour of the day. Initially, I was doubtful about Plan D as I was worried Ran would not be able to wake up the next morning for her classes. Ran on the other hand, informed everyone that she intend not to sleep and she insist that we visit the karaoke lounge. Yoshi and Yuuki had no problem with it as they were not taking any classes for the summer semester. As for me, seeing that I had no classes in eight hours time, I had no problem joining them for karaoke. Besides, knowing that it was fun hanging out with them "yesterday", I would be an idiot to miss out another oppurtunity to have fun with them again. Ran telephoned Teppei to join us for karaoke. Initially, Teppei immediately said no thinking that Ran was out of her mind but for some mysterious reason, Ran eventually managed to persuade Teppei to join us for karaoke. Ran later informed us that Teppei would take a taxi from his place and meet us at the Greyhound bus station which was on the way to our karaoke lounge. As Plan D was decided, it was time to execute it without wasting anymore time.
Plan D
The four of us started walking to the Greyhound bus station under the cold weather of the early morning. After ten minutes of walking, we finally reached Greyhound and Teppei was there waiting for us. After having Teppei rejoining our party, our next task was to locate the karaoke lounge. It has been ages since all of us last visited the karaoke lounge and because of that, we weren't too sure about the place. Consequently, it didn't take us long before we took the wrong turn and ended up being lost a couple of times. We even debated with one another regarding the correct way to the karaoke lounge and we took almost an hour before we actually discovered the correct way to the karaoke lounge. By the time we were there, the karaoke lounge was closed and dissapointement were written all over our face, especially for Teppei who spend more than ten dollars on taxi coming up here for no reason. Seeing that everyone was really dissapointed, I thought I had to come up with Plan E to made sure nobody walked all the way here under the cold weather for no reason. Realizing that Mc Donalds was just a stone's throw away from where we were and since it was opened twenty four hours, I suggested that we should go there and have coffee...again. Although it wasn't a new idea, we had no choice as Mc Donalds was the only place opened that early morning; therefore, we all decided to go with my plan .
Plan E
At Mc Donalds, everyone was with a cup of coffee and tea. I had more than a cup of tea as I ordered a cheeseburger to everyone's disbelief as I was hungry again later that early morning. As usual, we had our usual casual conversation together and as usual, they were in Japanese most of the time. This time, I was too tired to pay attention and learn more Japanese from their conversation as it had been a long day for me. I nearly fell asleep until Kwahnchanok started talking to me; it was just the two of us who were talking in English while the rest were conversing in Japanese. Our coffee chat stretched till five in the morning that day and seeing Mc Donalds were serving breakfast at that hour, we all decided to just have breakfast there. After our breakfast at Mc Donalds, it was already six thirty in the morning that day and we thought it was time to leave as both Ran and Teppei will have classes in two hours time. I accompanied Yuuki, Teppei and Ran back to the Old Main while Kwahnchanok and Yoshitaka decided to go home as they were overwhelmed with fatigue. The second we reached Old Main, the four of us went to the computer lab to kill some time. I was almost "dead" but I tried my best to stay awake as I promised my Japanese friends that I would accompany them until seven thirty. While we were at the computer lab, we were surfing the internet and seeing that I was nearly asleep, I tried to keep myself awake by browsing for horror movies on YouTube. I randomly picked a Japanese horror movie called Suicide Club and the opening scene of that movie where a group of high school students commited mass suicide by jumping in front of an incoming monorail train was sufficient to keep me awake on my toes. As the clock struck seven thirty morning, I knew I had fulfilled my promise to accompany my friends and I was free to return home. After wishing everyone "good morning", I left Old Main and headed back to my apartment. I then took a nice hot shower and immediately threw myself on the bed before I hibernated for God knows how long.
To be continued...
A group photo at Teppei's drinking party
A photo with Kenji at the party
The new exchange students I met at Teppei's party. Mai and Sayaka
Our pre-picnic at Frank's Coffee
Chocolate cake compliments of me...for being late...
Its just coffee but we're still enjoying ourselves
On our way to Riverside Park
Pretending to be models...
Trying to keep up with Jack...
Our group photo at Riverside Park...
The little hyperactive puppy
Big Smiles!
Our post picnic coffee
Yoshitaka's kitchen work I think...
Dinner compliments of Ran, Kwahnchanok, Yuuki and Yoshitaka
The dishwasher
Plan E: Breakfast at Mc Donalds 5 in the morning
As summer approached, the snow and ice in Kamloops started to melt away slowly. Like the snow and ice that pass by, the same could be said for some of my Japanese friends; Eiji, Pamella and Yasutaka returned to Japan for their summer holidays. Knowing that great guys like them were not here to accompany the remaining of us here in Canada, we knew that summer would be slightly quiet than usual. Conversely, when Yoshitaka received "intelligence" stating that sixteen new students from Japan would be coming to Thompson Rivers University for the summer, all was not lost as this could mean possible expansion of my social network. On top of that, Yoshitaka reported that all of the new Japanese students were apparently girls. Like the rest of my Japanese guy friends, I thought that this would be interesting. Yoshitaka and Teppei volunteered for the university's orientation program of the new Japanese students, for some obvious reasons. The orientation lasted for two days and on one warm morning, I had the opportunity to have a conversation with them in front of the Campus Activity Center building, where we sat on the soft green grasses (which we hoped had no dog shit on it) and talked about their orientation experience. Teppei and Yoshitaka had a guest with them who apparently participated in the orientation as well; her name was Ran and she was from Japan as well. Like most of my friends, she usually hangs out at my "pub" every Saturday night in the previous semester but I never talked to her back then due to my shy behavior. However, that day she initiated a conversation with me and the next thing I knew, we were already talking. The three of them informed me about a lunch to welcome the new students that will occur a couple of days from now; in addition to that, they extended the invitation to me which I thought was generous of them. According to them, the lunch would be held in an Indian restaurant in downtown. I had mixed opinion on their decision to organize the welcome lunch in an Indian restaurant.I can see the robust idea behind allowing the new Japanese students to try something new. On the other hand, I was worried about whether they could handle the spiciness of the Indian cuisine since most of my Japanese friends whom I know is unable to eat spicy food. Initially I wanted to raise my concern but since I was not the one who participated in the orientation or the one who helped in organizing the lunch, I thought it would be wise for me to shut up.
Japanese in Taj Mahal
On the day of the lunch, I took a bus ride with Yoshitaka from Thompson Rivers University to the main bus stop in downtown; once we reached there, we rendezvous with Ran and Teppei. It wasn't long before all sixteen new Japanese students arrived and it was then I finally saw them with my own eyes. Of course I did not approach them and introduce myself immediately to them seeing that I was a nervous wreck and a shy guy. You might be wondering what's the point of attending the lunch if I don't talk to any of the new students; let's just said that I wanted to spend more time with Teppei, Yoshitaka and Ran. Getting to know the new students would be a bonus for me which I didn't expect. After the new students exchanged greetings with one another, Teppei, Ran and Yoshitaka coordinated the group and before we knew it, we were on our way to the Indian restaurant. Once we reached the Indian restaurant (which I vaguely remember the name...), we had a problem welcoming us at the doorstep of the restaurant; it was a full house and there were not enough seats for all of us. We decided to wait and after patiently waiting for five or six minutes, several of the restaurant's patrons left and we had empty seats coming in. Soon after that, we had seats for everyone and lunch commenced shortly after that; the Indian restaurant that day were serving buffet and boy was I lucky to be there. With just fifteen dollars, I could eat all I can which wasn't any problem for me seeing that I am a veteran when it comes to eating spicy food unlike my Japanese friends (which I was worried...). During lunch, conversations in Japanese echoed throughout the restaurant and instead of joining in the conversation (seeing that I can't speak Japanese fluently), I listened carefully to them and identified the Japanese vocabulary that I've learned in my introductory Japanese class last semester. The only time I decided to join in the conversation was when someone mentions my name and when I asked either Yoshitaka, Teppei or Ran about what they said about me (it's not like as if I'll get an honest answer all the time...). It so happened that I wasn't the only non Japanese at the buffet as there was also this girl from Thailand who joined us as well. She was Ran's roommate and her name was Kwahnchanok; she appeared to be very quiet which I wasn't surprised given her similar state as mine. Although, the both of us could have talked together since we were the only non Japanese speaking students, I decided to pass on that thought and continue remaining quiet seeing that I'm not very keen of initiating a conversation. After 2 hours of buffet, the most of us knew we reached our limit and anything beyond that would have us throwing up or changing for new underwear. Each of us paid our bill separately before we left the restaurant. Before we dispersed, Teppei came up with another interesting plan later that day; he informed everyone that there would be a drinking party at his place and he invited everyone to come. However, only three of the new students could make it while the rest had their plans of their own later that day; I thought three was good enough...better compared to nothing. Shortly after that, everyone wished each other goodbye and they went home. Yoshitaka and Teppei followed me back to the New Residence after lunch as we received a call from Maaya who needed our help to move her stuff out (Maaya was also living in the New Residence).
Heavy Duty
The second the three of us arrived at Maaya's doorstep, we were welcomed with a load of work waiting for us for the remaining afternoon (you know how girls have lots of stuff with them...). Without wasting anymore time, we began working knowing that the sooner we start the earlier we get the job done. Maaya was supposed to move from the eight floor down to the 3rd floor and given the nature of the amount and weight of her stuff, we knew it was going to be a long and tiring afternoon which we will end (if we were lucky...) with back aches and muscle sores. Nevertheless, instead of thinking negatively, I told myself this would be a good workout for me, not to mention this would be an excellent way to test my gym training all this while. We carried and unload her stuff from top to bottom and it took us a total of four hours to transport all her stuff. It took 4 guys to transfer Maaya's stuff from one room to another approximately 4 hours; I just couldn't imagine how long would it take if it was just me helping her out. Anyway, it was great to know that Teppei and Yoshitaka could help out and I was grateful for their assistance. Moreover, I was pretty sure that Maaya was even more grateful than me seeing that she would have been in a world of suffering moving her stuff on her own if we decided to decline her request for assistance. As the afternoon ended, the evening in Kamloops for summer that day had another plans for the three of us; it was time to go and get some beer and ignite the party at Teppei's house. Shortly after leaving Maaya's place, the three of us took the bus to downtown before we marched towards the liquor store under the scorching sun.
A drink with the Japanese
After getting two dozens of Budweiser and a bottle of Kahlua from the liquor store, we headed for the bus roundabout to rendezvous with Ran and the other Japanese students. While waiting for the correct bus to come, we were chatting with one another in order to get rid of the boredom that usually came along the ever late bus services. As the bus arrived later than usual (as always...) we hopped on the bus and headed for Teppei's "crib". After a five minutes bus ride and an eight minutes walk, we were already at Teppei's place and we were impatient to get the party started. We were welcomed by Eiji's dog, Jack (Eiji, Pamella and Teppei are roommates) which were always excited of visitors; of course everyone especially the new Japanese students were excited as well to meet the cute fury canine. The canine wasn't the only one who welcomed all of us as Teppei's Japanese roommate and her Japanese friends gave us a warm welcome. Seeing that all of us were already here, we immediately kick started the party and we let fun took over the remaining of the evening. Apart from having cans of beer and snacks, Yoshi made us his home made pasta which I really had to say was delicious. We snapped a couple of photos together and everyone was happily chatting to one another except me as I was the only non Japanese who couldn't really speak any Japanese. Instead, I just sat down and watched TV with the company of Jack who some how seems to like me a lot. Yoshitaka and Teppei whom noticed how isolated am I, then told me to get up and talk the new Japanese students. Knowing that now was a great time to practice my eight months of Japanese classes, I took the courage and confronted the new Japanese students with a greeting in Japanese. The new Japanese students were shocked to hear me speak Japanese nevertheless our following conversation continued in Japanese. As everyone heard me speaking Japanese, they were surprised and they started asking me questions in Japanese which I could somehow answered back; next thing I knew, I was in the center of the party's spotlight unlike a moment ago when I was totally isolated and invisible to others. The party lasted until nine thirty at night and by then we all had to leave; we were planning to party all night long but since most of us had to take the bus home (last bus in Kamloops was at eleven pm that night)we had no choice but to end the party early. Despite the party was shorter than expected, everyone had a great time that night.
Last day of fun before school starts again
A day before the summer semester started, I received a call from one of my Indonesian friends in the morning while I was still sleeping. According to my Indonesian friend, he and his group of Indonesian friends were planning to go to Paul's Lake for fishing and picnicking; he later extended the invitation to me which I couldn't resist since I've never done either of those in my life before. Consequently, I said "yes" right on the spot without hesitating or thinking twice. However, it didn't take me long before I realized that I promised Yoshitaka that I would hang out with him on the same day. Quickly, I called my Indonesian friend and asked him whether was it okay if I could bring Yoshitaka along. My Indonesian friend was excited for Yoshitaka to join us; nevertheless, he had only space for me in his car for transportation to Paul's Lake as the rest of his friends had occupied the available space. Knowing that it would not be nice to shatter my promise to Yoshitaka, I reluctantly told my Indonesian friend that I would not be joining him and his friends for the trip. Realizing that I missed my chance to actually go fishing and picnicking, I was a bit disappointed. On the contrary, after being persuaded by my insistent desire to have a picnic, I told myself that if I can't join a picnic, I'll just have to make my own.
The picnic
The problems were where would be the ideal place to picnic and who will join me for it. Finding out the ideal place to picnic wasn't a difficult task as I noticed that Riverside Park in downtown Kamloops is a common spot for Canadians to picnic. The difficult and challenging task was who would even bother joining me for my picnic. Yoshitaka, was the first one to raise his hand since we were suppose to hang out together. However, it would feel awkward if it was just the two of us having a picnic together unless Yoshitaka was a sizzling hot Japanese babe like Hamasaki Ayumi, then it would suffice (in fact, I'll immediately close and restrict the invitation to just her...ah, I mean him...No! I mean if he was a she). Seeing that Yoshitaka isn't a hot babe like Hamasaki Ayumi in reality, it was compulsory for me to extend the invitation. Knowing that I usually hang out with Teppei as well, I thought he would like to join us for the picnic. Consequently, I gave him a called and told him about the picnic and just as I thought, he wanted to join us. However, our picnic required more participants...preferably girls this time just to make it look well-rounded (*ahem*). Yoshitaka shared the same opinion as great minds think alike so it didn't take us long to come up with a list of girls we can invite. Yoshitaka had several girls in mind and he immediately started making calls. He told me to call Ran and invite her for our picnic while he called Yuuki; the second he told me to make that call I was a nervous wreck. Extending invitation to girls through e-mail is already hard enough for me given my shy nature what more extending it orally through phone. Not to mention, I just knew Ran back then so I thought that asking her to join me for a picnic would freak her out. Nevertheless, seeing that if I don't do it, our picnic is going to be an all guy picnic only; therefore, I sucked it up and gave Ran a call. The second her phone was ringing I was worried that I would freeze or stutter so before she picked up, I quickly rehearsed what I wanted to say. When she picked up and said hi in Japanese, I was stunned for a couple of seconds. However, I quickly got myself back together and told her about my picnic invitation to her. I was ready to get rejected with whatever excuse she can come up with just to get rid of me, consequently I braced for impact. But instead, she asked me who else is coming. I replied by saying Teppei and Yoshitaka would be joining us as well. Unexpectedly, she said she would like to come and she asked me whether was it okay for her to bring her Thai roommate, Kwahnchanok which I immediately replied, "of course" before she could finished her question. After telling her the place and time of rendezvous, we exchanged good byes and hung up on each other. I immediately reported the great news to Yoshitaka and later asked how was things on his side. Like me, he had good news and we later exchanged high fives in joy before we got ourselves ready for the picnic. We were all suppose to meet at the main bus stop in downtown. Yoshitaka was at my place earlier when we were deciding who to invite for the picnic, consequently we had to travel together to our rendezvous point by bus. The bus service was late and we knew everyone was already at the rendezvous point waiting for us. Yuuki called Yoshitaka wondering where were we. After Yoshitaka explained our unfortunate situation, Yuuki informed us a new rendezvous point at Frank's Coffee, a cafe in downtown. Everyone who were waiting for us wanted to sit down and have a drink which explains why they changed our rendezvous point. Half an hour later, the damn bus finally came and the both of us were on the way to downtown. Once we reached downtown, the both of us immediately dashed to Frank's Coffee as we did not want to let the others wait for us any longer. The moment we met up with Teppei, Ran, Yuuki and Kwanchanok, we were welcomed with a warm greeting...and also a reminder that we were later than expected. Since everyone already started drinking, Yoshi and I thought we should order something to drink as well. Knowing that I was late, I decided to make it up to them by treating them to a chocolate cake from the cafe. Everyone like the cake more than me as I thought the cake was too sweet and I wasn't really into chocolate. Ran seemed to like the cake the most compared to all of us given her sweet tooth for chocolate. Apart from having casual conversations with one another and snacking on the food and drinks we ordered, we snapped a couple of photos together. After spending an hour at the cafe, we decided to carry on with our picnic as we planned from the beginning.
Plan A
Riverside Park was just a stone's throw from Frank's Coffee; it was just a 5 minute stroll from the coffee house we were at earlier on. On our way to Riverside Park, Yoshitaka (who's our usual photographer) decided to snap a couple of photos of us with his two thousand dollars state-of-the-art camera (which I always believe was the one usually used by the CIA for intelligence gathering and espionage purposes). In addition to that, he took several photos of the scenery along the way to our designated picnic spot. Teppei brought Jack along with him and seeing that the hyper active Jack Russel Terrier was wearing him out, I decided to help him walk the dog. Initially, I wondered how could a small puppy like Jack can drag someone like Teppei into submission; however, it didn't take me long to finally understand it once I've experience walking the puppy. Jack's fondness for running off and wondering into restricted places where I had to constantly pull him away wasn't as easy as it looks. Even with my gym training, I had to say that walking a dog like Jack was challenging. Just before we realized it, we were already at Riverside park; there were a number of people at the park that day seeing that it was on a weekend. Nevertheless, we were fortunate enough to secure ourselves a nice spot for our picnic. As we settled down, Ran rolled out the snacks she bought for our picnic which mostly comprise chocolate cookies and candies (since she is a big chocolate lover). Fortunately for me, there were a couple of bag of chips as well seeing that I wasn't really fond with chocolate. We were enjoying the beautiful scenery of Thompson Rivers compliments of the nice spot we got at Riverside Park for our picnic. As usual, our picnic was accompanied by casual conversations among one another. Seeing that the conversation was in Japanese most of the time, I told myself to take this as a learning experience for my Japanese language instead of dreading and complaining about feeling outcasted. Over at the park, Yoshitaka decided to take more photos while Teppei had to walk Jack who couldn't bear the boredom of sitting still. Ocassionally, Teppei will hand me over Jack's leash when he is tired of walking the energetic puppy; it's not a bad thing at all as I'm actually working out at the same walking the strong and hyperactive puppy. After spending three to four hours of picnicking, we thought it was time to leave. On the other hand, we didn't want to call it a day as we thought we should spend more time together seeing that today was the last day of our holidays before the summer semester began. Consequently, we had a "group meeting" to establish our following plan for the day before we left the park. After half an hour of discussing and brain storming, we concluded our Plan B was to have coffee again; only this time at a different place.
Plan B
This time we went to another coffee place called Jack's...or something like that...Everyone ordered a mocha, cappuccino or a latte while I was the only one who ordered a vegetable cocktail. It wasn't long for my choice of drink to raise everyone's eye brown. Like chocolate, I wasn't really a big fan of coffee or latte. In fact during our earlier visit to Frank's Coffee, I had juice instead of coffee or latte. In the middle of our chit-chat at the coffee house, Yuuki handed me a small envelope. According to her, it was from Yuka, my Japanese instructor's assistant. As I opened the envelope, I saw a short purple string which I thought was cute. On the contrary, I had no idea what was the purple string for. Yoshitaka then explained that according to Japanese culture, this string is suppose to be something like a bracelet where if the wearer wears it until it is snapped, his or her wish will come true. I thought it was a sweet gift from Yuka but I regretted for not being able to thank her in person for this nice gift as she already returned to Japan for good, a couple of days ago. After spending hours in the coffee house, the day was getting darker however, the most of us thought that the night was still young. Consequently, we thought of having plan C instead of going home. Seeing that I was the one who came up with "Operation Riverside Picnic", everyone shifted the responsibility of coming up with Plan C to me. As there was nothing else to do for the day, not to mention the lack of variety of things we can do over here in "Silent Hill", I just came up with a simple plan to have dinner together. Everyone thought it was a good idea except for Teppei as his roommate had already make dinner for him, therefore Teppei could not join us for Plan C. The next question was whether to dine in or dine out; given the nature that dining in was cheaper than dining out not to mention that most of us had been dining out the passed few days in a row, we thought dining in would be ideal for our soon-to-be-empty wallets. After agreeing on Plan C, we wasted no time and we left the coffee house, excited for our next plan.
Plan C
We took a 45 minute walk back to Yoshitaka's house instead of taking the bus as there were no more bus services that day. Walking back wasn't a problem for any of us; instead, the problem was that it was cold and windy that evening despite it was already summer and non of us wore extra clothes as we did not anticipate the unexpected change of weather. Nevertheless, if it wasn't for the sense of companionship that accompanied us during our walk back, this walk would be miserable and hellish for us. As we drew closer to Yohistaka's home, we immediately rushed to his place quicker than a mouse after a bit of cheese. The second we reached Yoshitaka's home, we were so relief as the warmth of his house never felt so great. After taking a five minutes rest, we did an "inventory check" on Yoshitaka's kitchen to determine if we had the availabe ingredients for what we wanted to cook for dinner. Yoshitaka thought about making pasta while Yuuki decided to make some kind of stew. Kwahnchanok on the other hand, wanted to prepare her country's cuisine, Tom Yum Goong. Knowing that there wasn't enough ingredients at Yoshitaka's place to cook, we had no choice but to make a visit to Superstore under the harsh weather which was getting worse by the hour; thankfully, Superstore was not that far away from Yoshitaka's place. Everyone went on their own to get their respective ingredients for the dish they were going to prepare that night, the minute we reached Superstore. Seeing that Ran and I were the only one not preparing anything for dinner that night, Ran was assigned to help Kwahnchanok carry her ingredients of her choice while I was in charge of deciding dessert. Knowing that ice cream was the only dessert I can think of, I thought about visiting the ice cream aisle to take a peek at the variety of choices available. The Oreo ice cream box initially look tempting, however Yoshitaka and Yuuki thought it was not worth the price for its size. Instead they suggested an alternate brand of ice cream (which I couldn't remember) which was twice the size and half the price of the Oreo ice cream box. Knowing that the their suggestion would allow us to save more money, I didn't have to think twice before I went for what they've suggetsted. Less than half an hour in Superstore, we were done with our ingredients collecting and we were ready to return to Yoshitaka's home. We did not waste anytime preparing dinner the second we reached Yoshitaka's home as we were all starving. Everyone was busy preparing dinner in the kitchen except for me as I hardly have any experience when it comes to kitchen work. Realizing that I was the only one not doing anything, I started feeling guilty. Consequently, I volunteered to clean the dishes after dinner. Almost an hour later, dinner was ready and we were impatient to "tuck in" as we grew hungrier from time to time that evening. Everyone's dishes tasted great and on top of it, it was also cheaper for our wallets as we shared the cost of our grocery shopping earlier. As dinner ended, everyone laid back lazily except for me as I had dishes to wash. After taking care of the dishes, everyone called me over to join them for dessert. We had the ice cream we bought from Superstore and despite its affordable price, the ice cream still tasted good. In the middle of our dessert, Ran suggested that we come up with plan D. I thought she was just joking as it was already twelve in the morning and everyone would have class in eight hours time (except for Yoshitaka,Yuuki and me). On the contrary after witnessing how eager she was for plan D, I knew she wasn't joking. I then asked her what can we do at this hour of the day as I realized that almost everyshop in "Silent Hill" closed 6 hours ago. Yoshi than suggested that we could go for karaoke as he thought it was still opened at this hour of the day. Initially, I was doubtful about Plan D as I was worried Ran would not be able to wake up the next morning for her classes. Ran on the other hand, informed everyone that she intend not to sleep and she insist that we visit the karaoke lounge. Yoshi and Yuuki had no problem with it as they were not taking any classes for the summer semester. As for me, seeing that I had no classes in eight hours time, I had no problem joining them for karaoke. Besides, knowing that it was fun hanging out with them "yesterday", I would be an idiot to miss out another oppurtunity to have fun with them again. Ran telephoned Teppei to join us for karaoke. Initially, Teppei immediately said no thinking that Ran was out of her mind but for some mysterious reason, Ran eventually managed to persuade Teppei to join us for karaoke. Ran later informed us that Teppei would take a taxi from his place and meet us at the Greyhound bus station which was on the way to our karaoke lounge. As Plan D was decided, it was time to execute it without wasting anymore time.
Plan D
The four of us started walking to the Greyhound bus station under the cold weather of the early morning. After ten minutes of walking, we finally reached Greyhound and Teppei was there waiting for us. After having Teppei rejoining our party, our next task was to locate the karaoke lounge. It has been ages since all of us last visited the karaoke lounge and because of that, we weren't too sure about the place. Consequently, it didn't take us long before we took the wrong turn and ended up being lost a couple of times. We even debated with one another regarding the correct way to the karaoke lounge and we took almost an hour before we actually discovered the correct way to the karaoke lounge. By the time we were there, the karaoke lounge was closed and dissapointement were written all over our face, especially for Teppei who spend more than ten dollars on taxi coming up here for no reason. Seeing that everyone was really dissapointed, I thought I had to come up with Plan E to made sure nobody walked all the way here under the cold weather for no reason. Realizing that Mc Donalds was just a stone's throw away from where we were and since it was opened twenty four hours, I suggested that we should go there and have coffee...again. Although it wasn't a new idea, we had no choice as Mc Donalds was the only place opened that early morning; therefore, we all decided to go with my plan .
Plan E
At Mc Donalds, everyone was with a cup of coffee and tea. I had more than a cup of tea as I ordered a cheeseburger to everyone's disbelief as I was hungry again later that early morning. As usual, we had our usual casual conversation together and as usual, they were in Japanese most of the time. This time, I was too tired to pay attention and learn more Japanese from their conversation as it had been a long day for me. I nearly fell asleep until Kwahnchanok started talking to me; it was just the two of us who were talking in English while the rest were conversing in Japanese. Our coffee chat stretched till five in the morning that day and seeing Mc Donalds were serving breakfast at that hour, we all decided to just have breakfast there. After our breakfast at Mc Donalds, it was already six thirty in the morning that day and we thought it was time to leave as both Ran and Teppei will have classes in two hours time. I accompanied Yuuki, Teppei and Ran back to the Old Main while Kwahnchanok and Yoshitaka decided to go home as they were overwhelmed with fatigue. The second we reached Old Main, the four of us went to the computer lab to kill some time. I was almost "dead" but I tried my best to stay awake as I promised my Japanese friends that I would accompany them until seven thirty. While we were at the computer lab, we were surfing the internet and seeing that I was nearly asleep, I tried to keep myself awake by browsing for horror movies on YouTube. I randomly picked a Japanese horror movie called Suicide Club and the opening scene of that movie where a group of high school students commited mass suicide by jumping in front of an incoming monorail train was sufficient to keep me awake on my toes. As the clock struck seven thirty morning, I knew I had fulfilled my promise to accompany my friends and I was free to return home. After wishing everyone "good morning", I left Old Main and headed back to my apartment. I then took a nice hot shower and immediately threw myself on the bed before I hibernated for God knows how long.
To be continued...
A group photo at Teppei's drinking party
A photo with Kenji at the party
The new exchange students I met at Teppei's party. Mai and Sayaka
Our pre-picnic at Frank's Coffee
Chocolate cake compliments of me...for being late...
Its just coffee but we're still enjoying ourselves
On our way to Riverside Park
Pretending to be models...
Trying to keep up with Jack...
Our group photo at Riverside Park...
The little hyperactive puppy
Big Smiles!
Our post picnic coffee
Yoshitaka's kitchen work I think...
Dinner compliments of Ran, Kwahnchanok, Yuuki and Yoshitaka
The dishwasher
Plan E: Breakfast at Mc Donalds 5 in the morning
Sunday, May 31, 2009
While I was Away For a Long Time...
Revival
Just yesterday when I was talking to one of Japanese friends online, she told me that she saw my blog. The second she mentioned about my blog, I finally discovered what was the missing link to my life all this while; it was my blog! By looking at the date of my last posting, it's been quite a while (half a year to be exact...) since I updated my blog. As ridiculous as it may sound and as embarrassing as it is to know, I can't believe I totally forgotten about my blog for six months. My sincere apology to all those who have been following my blog all these while for giving you a false impression that What's on Shenji's Mind has reached its "season finale" at the last posting; I wouldn't be surprise if any of you wondered if I ended up brain dead all this moment since there were nothing new on my "mind" for the past six months; anyway, rest assure that your good ol'Shenji is back with his constant postings of what he finds interesting which he hopes that will be your source of online easy reading and comical entertainment. I've also just realized one more thing; What's on Shenji's Mind is already three years old...well more than 3 years old, I believe. Anyway, for today's posting I will briefly summarize what happened to me for the past 6 months while I was absent from the blogging community. To start it off briefly, rest assure that I'm doing fine (surprisingly) and I'm still in one piece; in fact, things are getting better over here in Canada for me. For the past 6 months, what thought to be a dull and boring year in Canada turns out the opposite.
Heavy Load
During the winter semester of last year, I started my third year in my Bachelor Of Business Administration. Given the fact that the courses for third year business students were more interesting not to mention the courses' time table were perfectly fitted in my university week, I decided to take five course (the full load for every students here in Thompson Rivers University) for my fall semester. Initially, I thought it was an act of suicide seeing that the last time I took five courses per semester two years ago, nearly left me dead in the gutter of failure. On the contrary, given the constant reminder from my parents that it would be a waste of money not to take five courses per semester (seeing that international students like me pay six to seven thousand dollars a semester regardless of how many courses we take), I decided to suck it up like a man and deal with my fear of doing badly in university. The courses I took last semester were Introduction to Human Resource Management, International Business (my favorite), Operations Management, Business in Society (another interesting one...) and Introduction to Japanese 2; I was lucky enough to have great instructors for all my courses last semester and in addition to that, I enjoyed most of the courses unlike the previous semesters.
New Friends
Social life for me in Canada was surprisingly better than before. At the beginning, I was expecting that the only person I would be hanging out with most of the time back then was me, myself and I. You might be wondering about the platoon of Indonesian students over here who celebrated my twenty first birthday with me last year; however, as unfortunate as it may sound, the majority of them returned to their country and the remaining are not very close to me, except for a few of them. I wasn't really bothered about the fact that I will be alone for the rest of my winter semester of 2009 since I was so used to being alone; however with God's graciousness, he blessed me with loads of new friends from the land of the rising sun. Talk about miracles happening when I least expected it. It all happened when Yoshitaka, my good friend from Japan invited me to join he and his Japanese friends for a friendly Counter Strike match which was illegally organized at the university's computer lab on one late evening. There, I was reunited with another good friend of mine from Japan, Teppei Sakuma, who skipped the fall semester of 2008 due to his student visa problems. In addition to that, Teppei and Yoshitaka introduced me to their Japanese friend whom I've never met; he was Eiji Hayashi. He was a big guy and because of that, I was a little intimidated; on the other hand, it turned out that he was a nice and friendly guy. We did have fun together at our illegal Counter Strike tournament (despite losing the game badly...) and I knew that the probability of expanding my social network was high. Later on that night at a dinner with Yoshitaka and Teppei, I decided to throw a drinking party at my place on the following night and I asked Teppei and Yoshitaka to invite Eiji to join us. Both Yoshitaka and Teppei thought it was a great idea but they also thought that I should invite some girls to my party as well. Initially I had difficulties facilitating Teppei's and Yoshitaka's request since I did not know many new girls; nevertheless, the second I remembered Maaya and Yuka (the new Japanese instructor's assistant from Japan), I knew that my problem was solved. Maaya was an old friend of mine in the university, however, Yuka on the other hand was someone I recently knew at my Japanese class last semester. As mentioned before, Yuka was my Japanese instructor's assistant from Japan; the both of us share something in common which I like to believe was one of the reasons that made us friends: our mum. If you were thinking that she is my long lost sister from my mum's ex-Japanese husband who's her father, I hate to disappoint you but you are wrong! I know you wish it was that dramatic but what I meant from saying that we have something in common in terms of our mum is that both of our mums are from Malaysia. So back to the drinking party story:Eventually, I had my drinking party on the following night with my Japanese friends and although some of us ended up drunk and unconscious ( I was one of them) on the remaining night, we still had plenty of fun. From that point on, I knew it was the beginning to a good relationship with the Japanese students...as well as more drinking party at my place.
The Pub.
It was inevitable that more drinking party were thrown at my place every Saturday night and my place was soon transformed from a living dormitory to a make shift pub (which gave me the idea to open my own pub later on when I'm old). I happened to know a couple more Japanese students thanks to Teppei's birthday party which I attended in the middle of the winter semester this year. Seeing that they were nice people, I decided to extend the invitation to the new Japanese students I met at the party, to drink at my place every Saturday night. Of course it didn't take long for us to became closer especially when we had a couple of beers and vodka to help extend the friendship. Unlike my previous years in university, I drank a lot this year until the extent of getting drunk at almost every party and making my friends and family worried about my drinking habits. Of course I wasn't worried about it at all seeing that I strictly adhere to one of my personal principals which goes by "work hard and play hard"; since all of us had been working hard throughout the week with five courses on our hands for that semester, we should enjoy ourselves once a week to balance our lifestyle.
Operation Final Winter
It wasn't long before the final exams for the winter semester arrived; time passes so fast especially when you're having fun. Moments like these are the most dreadful experience any student can have seeing that burning the midnight oil and spending more time at the library becomes compulsory rather than optional. To make matter worst, with five courses to prepare for, my level of anxiety increases day by day as time draws closer to my examination's date. Despite having a tactical plan easily devised for the preparation of every subjects, the execution of the plan which involves strict compliance to the preparation schedule is not an easy task. Nevertheless, deviating from the plan was not an option for me or I would have risk a chaotic preparation which would eventually lead to my academic demise. To sum it up, it was extra work and less sleeping hours for me that time of the semester. Nevertheless, my "pub" still opened every Saturday night as usual; the only difference about it was there were not many "customers" as usual seeing that they were all busy preparing for their exam. Eiji and his girlfriend Pamella (who's also from Japan) continued to be my "regulars" during the final exam season.
We've got a man down!
I still remember there was one night after a long day of studying, Eiji, Pamella and I were drinking together as usual. We had a card game of "high low" where the loser will have to drink a shot of vodka and guess who was the biggest loser that night? Yes, you guessed it right; it was me. Consequently, I ended up finishing most of the bottle of Russian vodka and it wasn't long before I was wasted. That night didn't end despite I was dead drunk; Eiji and Pamella asked me to accompany them to MAX, a dance club in downtown Kamloops to spend the remaining of the night. Seeing that I always try my best to please my friends in any way possible, I decided to follow them in my drunken state. When I reached the dance club I could barely walked straight and both Eiji and Pamella had to keep a close eye on me. Instead of dancing and having fun in the club, I spend most of the time in the men's toilet puking; it was so bad until one of the bouncer noticed it and he kicked me out from the club. That night, I was outside the club sitting on the sidewalk trying to straighten myself out while both Eiji and Pamella were in there partying. However, it wasn't long before they noticed I was outside the club therefore, they decided to take me home. As they were carrying me to their car, I vomited more and I immediately dropped to the ground before vomiting more. The second Eiji mentioned something about changing the place to Thirsty Dog which was another dance club, I panicked frantically seeing that I couldn't continued with my current state or misery. According to Pamella (which I doubt she was telling the truth...) she said I started screaming for my mum saying how much I miss her and I wanted to go home so badly. She even said that I tried to walk home and she had to bring me back from wondering the streets aimlessly. Eventually they all brought me home and the second I reached home, I started to puking more again. I was puking in the toilet bowl and my worried roommate had to made sure I didn't hurt myself. Eiji carried me to my room but just before we reach the room I needed to puked more so I immediately rushed to my room's kitchen sink to throw up more. Pamella was patting my back while I was puking and after I finished unleashing the entire 3 course meal for the day from my stomach, the both of them tucked me into my bed. That was one hell of a day but I was so grateful that I had good friends like Eiji and Pamella to watch my back when things took a disastrous turn for me.
Operation Final Winter pt. 2
Despite getting wasted a day before, the preparation for the final exam continued as usual. As the days grew closer to the final exams, so was the completion of my preparation. Despite that, I felt the lack of confidence mostly because I was afraid that I might not be able to remember what I studied. More over, there were a couple of courses which I did not get A for my midterm exams therefore, to achieve at least an A- for the overall course would require an A+ for the final exam. The problem was what were the chances of me pulling an A+ for the final exams? Not good, I thought. My Operations Management was the first course to come back with an overall grade; to my surprise, I did horribly wrong and I only got a C+ for the overall course. Devastated and sorrowed, I knew that was the end of my academic for the semester. I was so demotivated to perform well for the other courses; I knew that it was going to be difficult to score at least an A- for the remaining subjects. When all means fail, the only last resort is the act of God; I then prayed so hard that God will be merciful to me and bless my remaining courses with at least an A-. I eventually sat for the remaining exam and I did my best for them; the rest was up to God. Several weeks after the exam, the results were back and I was a nervous wreck the moment I checked my results online. To my biggest surprise, I scored A for the remaining courses and my GPA increased. I was filled with utmost joy; I remembered throwing my right arm in the air, gaving a loud victorious cry and thanking the Lord for his miracles. The war on the final exam was won and I was glad to know I did a great job. Mission accomplished!
To be continued...
My first few customers at my "pub"
(From left to right) Teppei and Pamella
Yasutaka Okabe
(From left to right): Eiji, Yasutaka and Pamella
Dinner at Yoshi's place one evening
(From left to right): Kazutaka and Scott
Another night in the "pub"
A full house in the "pub"
Just yesterday when I was talking to one of Japanese friends online, she told me that she saw my blog. The second she mentioned about my blog, I finally discovered what was the missing link to my life all this while; it was my blog! By looking at the date of my last posting, it's been quite a while (half a year to be exact...) since I updated my blog. As ridiculous as it may sound and as embarrassing as it is to know, I can't believe I totally forgotten about my blog for six months. My sincere apology to all those who have been following my blog all these while for giving you a false impression that What's on Shenji's Mind has reached its "season finale" at the last posting; I wouldn't be surprise if any of you wondered if I ended up brain dead all this moment since there were nothing new on my "mind" for the past six months; anyway, rest assure that your good ol'Shenji is back with his constant postings of what he finds interesting which he hopes that will be your source of online easy reading and comical entertainment. I've also just realized one more thing; What's on Shenji's Mind is already three years old...well more than 3 years old, I believe. Anyway, for today's posting I will briefly summarize what happened to me for the past 6 months while I was absent from the blogging community. To start it off briefly, rest assure that I'm doing fine (surprisingly) and I'm still in one piece; in fact, things are getting better over here in Canada for me. For the past 6 months, what thought to be a dull and boring year in Canada turns out the opposite.
Heavy Load
During the winter semester of last year, I started my third year in my Bachelor Of Business Administration. Given the fact that the courses for third year business students were more interesting not to mention the courses' time table were perfectly fitted in my university week, I decided to take five course (the full load for every students here in Thompson Rivers University) for my fall semester. Initially, I thought it was an act of suicide seeing that the last time I took five courses per semester two years ago, nearly left me dead in the gutter of failure. On the contrary, given the constant reminder from my parents that it would be a waste of money not to take five courses per semester (seeing that international students like me pay six to seven thousand dollars a semester regardless of how many courses we take), I decided to suck it up like a man and deal with my fear of doing badly in university. The courses I took last semester were Introduction to Human Resource Management, International Business (my favorite), Operations Management, Business in Society (another interesting one...) and Introduction to Japanese 2; I was lucky enough to have great instructors for all my courses last semester and in addition to that, I enjoyed most of the courses unlike the previous semesters.
New Friends
Social life for me in Canada was surprisingly better than before. At the beginning, I was expecting that the only person I would be hanging out with most of the time back then was me, myself and I. You might be wondering about the platoon of Indonesian students over here who celebrated my twenty first birthday with me last year; however, as unfortunate as it may sound, the majority of them returned to their country and the remaining are not very close to me, except for a few of them. I wasn't really bothered about the fact that I will be alone for the rest of my winter semester of 2009 since I was so used to being alone; however with God's graciousness, he blessed me with loads of new friends from the land of the rising sun. Talk about miracles happening when I least expected it. It all happened when Yoshitaka, my good friend from Japan invited me to join he and his Japanese friends for a friendly Counter Strike match which was illegally organized at the university's computer lab on one late evening. There, I was reunited with another good friend of mine from Japan, Teppei Sakuma, who skipped the fall semester of 2008 due to his student visa problems. In addition to that, Teppei and Yoshitaka introduced me to their Japanese friend whom I've never met; he was Eiji Hayashi. He was a big guy and because of that, I was a little intimidated; on the other hand, it turned out that he was a nice and friendly guy. We did have fun together at our illegal Counter Strike tournament (despite losing the game badly...) and I knew that the probability of expanding my social network was high. Later on that night at a dinner with Yoshitaka and Teppei, I decided to throw a drinking party at my place on the following night and I asked Teppei and Yoshitaka to invite Eiji to join us. Both Yoshitaka and Teppei thought it was a great idea but they also thought that I should invite some girls to my party as well. Initially I had difficulties facilitating Teppei's and Yoshitaka's request since I did not know many new girls; nevertheless, the second I remembered Maaya and Yuka (the new Japanese instructor's assistant from Japan), I knew that my problem was solved. Maaya was an old friend of mine in the university, however, Yuka on the other hand was someone I recently knew at my Japanese class last semester. As mentioned before, Yuka was my Japanese instructor's assistant from Japan; the both of us share something in common which I like to believe was one of the reasons that made us friends: our mum. If you were thinking that she is my long lost sister from my mum's ex-Japanese husband who's her father, I hate to disappoint you but you are wrong! I know you wish it was that dramatic but what I meant from saying that we have something in common in terms of our mum is that both of our mums are from Malaysia. So back to the drinking party story:Eventually, I had my drinking party on the following night with my Japanese friends and although some of us ended up drunk and unconscious ( I was one of them) on the remaining night, we still had plenty of fun. From that point on, I knew it was the beginning to a good relationship with the Japanese students...as well as more drinking party at my place.
The Pub.
It was inevitable that more drinking party were thrown at my place every Saturday night and my place was soon transformed from a living dormitory to a make shift pub (which gave me the idea to open my own pub later on when I'm old). I happened to know a couple more Japanese students thanks to Teppei's birthday party which I attended in the middle of the winter semester this year. Seeing that they were nice people, I decided to extend the invitation to the new Japanese students I met at the party, to drink at my place every Saturday night. Of course it didn't take long for us to became closer especially when we had a couple of beers and vodka to help extend the friendship. Unlike my previous years in university, I drank a lot this year until the extent of getting drunk at almost every party and making my friends and family worried about my drinking habits. Of course I wasn't worried about it at all seeing that I strictly adhere to one of my personal principals which goes by "work hard and play hard"; since all of us had been working hard throughout the week with five courses on our hands for that semester, we should enjoy ourselves once a week to balance our lifestyle.
Operation Final Winter
It wasn't long before the final exams for the winter semester arrived; time passes so fast especially when you're having fun. Moments like these are the most dreadful experience any student can have seeing that burning the midnight oil and spending more time at the library becomes compulsory rather than optional. To make matter worst, with five courses to prepare for, my level of anxiety increases day by day as time draws closer to my examination's date. Despite having a tactical plan easily devised for the preparation of every subjects, the execution of the plan which involves strict compliance to the preparation schedule is not an easy task. Nevertheless, deviating from the plan was not an option for me or I would have risk a chaotic preparation which would eventually lead to my academic demise. To sum it up, it was extra work and less sleeping hours for me that time of the semester. Nevertheless, my "pub" still opened every Saturday night as usual; the only difference about it was there were not many "customers" as usual seeing that they were all busy preparing for their exam. Eiji and his girlfriend Pamella (who's also from Japan) continued to be my "regulars" during the final exam season.
We've got a man down!
I still remember there was one night after a long day of studying, Eiji, Pamella and I were drinking together as usual. We had a card game of "high low" where the loser will have to drink a shot of vodka and guess who was the biggest loser that night? Yes, you guessed it right; it was me. Consequently, I ended up finishing most of the bottle of Russian vodka and it wasn't long before I was wasted. That night didn't end despite I was dead drunk; Eiji and Pamella asked me to accompany them to MAX, a dance club in downtown Kamloops to spend the remaining of the night. Seeing that I always try my best to please my friends in any way possible, I decided to follow them in my drunken state. When I reached the dance club I could barely walked straight and both Eiji and Pamella had to keep a close eye on me. Instead of dancing and having fun in the club, I spend most of the time in the men's toilet puking; it was so bad until one of the bouncer noticed it and he kicked me out from the club. That night, I was outside the club sitting on the sidewalk trying to straighten myself out while both Eiji and Pamella were in there partying. However, it wasn't long before they noticed I was outside the club therefore, they decided to take me home. As they were carrying me to their car, I vomited more and I immediately dropped to the ground before vomiting more. The second Eiji mentioned something about changing the place to Thirsty Dog which was another dance club, I panicked frantically seeing that I couldn't continued with my current state or misery. According to Pamella (which I doubt she was telling the truth...) she said I started screaming for my mum saying how much I miss her and I wanted to go home so badly. She even said that I tried to walk home and she had to bring me back from wondering the streets aimlessly. Eventually they all brought me home and the second I reached home, I started to puking more again. I was puking in the toilet bowl and my worried roommate had to made sure I didn't hurt myself. Eiji carried me to my room but just before we reach the room I needed to puked more so I immediately rushed to my room's kitchen sink to throw up more. Pamella was patting my back while I was puking and after I finished unleashing the entire 3 course meal for the day from my stomach, the both of them tucked me into my bed. That was one hell of a day but I was so grateful that I had good friends like Eiji and Pamella to watch my back when things took a disastrous turn for me.
Operation Final Winter pt. 2
Despite getting wasted a day before, the preparation for the final exam continued as usual. As the days grew closer to the final exams, so was the completion of my preparation. Despite that, I felt the lack of confidence mostly because I was afraid that I might not be able to remember what I studied. More over, there were a couple of courses which I did not get A for my midterm exams therefore, to achieve at least an A- for the overall course would require an A+ for the final exam. The problem was what were the chances of me pulling an A+ for the final exams? Not good, I thought. My Operations Management was the first course to come back with an overall grade; to my surprise, I did horribly wrong and I only got a C+ for the overall course. Devastated and sorrowed, I knew that was the end of my academic for the semester. I was so demotivated to perform well for the other courses; I knew that it was going to be difficult to score at least an A- for the remaining subjects. When all means fail, the only last resort is the act of God; I then prayed so hard that God will be merciful to me and bless my remaining courses with at least an A-. I eventually sat for the remaining exam and I did my best for them; the rest was up to God. Several weeks after the exam, the results were back and I was a nervous wreck the moment I checked my results online. To my biggest surprise, I scored A for the remaining courses and my GPA increased. I was filled with utmost joy; I remembered throwing my right arm in the air, gaving a loud victorious cry and thanking the Lord for his miracles. The war on the final exam was won and I was glad to know I did a great job. Mission accomplished!
To be continued...
My first few customers at my "pub"
(From left to right) Teppei and Pamella
Yasutaka Okabe
(From left to right): Eiji, Yasutaka and Pamella
Dinner at Yoshi's place one evening
(From left to right): Kazutaka and Scott
Another night in the "pub"
A full house in the "pub"
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