A bento morning and London, Japan and Korea all in one day!
Finally, I have a fun bento to offer. Someone (you know who you are!) gave my mum a set of four animal food boxes which I've been eyeing up since Christmas, so, when she needed a packed lunch for a day's chair-bashing (my term for her upholstery class), I was in there with the animals!
And then in the afternoon I went to London for a visit to the Japan Centre and for a Korean film starring the watchable Lee Byung Hun.
The bento boxes were done in a bit of a hurry so the layout is not pristine. However, the contents were sure colourful and healthy! From right to left we have:
- a tiny box of baby (er - premature baby from the size!) beetroot and cut red radish (not flowers though as I didn't have time to make roses)
- a larger blue box of French quiche and, in shiny clingfilm, Italian sun-dried tomato, mozzarella and oregano slice (both bought in)
- a small box of crudites (yellow and red tomato, carrot slices on lettuce and a pile of cucumber sticks)
- a large red box of fresh fruit pieces (red plum, nectarine, red grapes and strawberry)
The coach trip to London wasn't great. The snow made the journey slow at the Oxford end and police crowd control (not sure what was going on but there were a lot of NZ sports fans on the tube - metro, subway, MTR for some people) made the journey slow at the London end. Once arrived, I headed for the Japan Centre in Piccadilly to search for poetry (failed to find what I wanted), anything useful for Japan trip (couldn't see anything more useful than the guides which I already have and which I haven't fulled absorbed yet) and - naturally - Gackt.
Gackt was a success! I scooped up the last copy of the Arena 37 issue (gothic brooding in chair with many candles, chainsaw, training session with black punchbag) and the second to last copy of the March issue of Fools Mate (major cyborg edition!). Sorry for the flash on the picture but these things are SHINY!
As if that wasn't enough excitement, I met up with a couple of friends for cocktails, after which we went to see The Good The Bad The Weird starring the taekwando trained Lee Byung Hun (I tend to file everybody by their martial arts style!).
It's hard to describe the film but it's that Asian mishmash of slightly incoherent mayhem (think Jackie Chan's Project A), expertly choreographed live action and slapstick comedy meshed with high quantities of body count, bullets and blood - and all in Wild West style. The plot is not the point and the actors tend to strut cyphers rather than offer any emotional depth in the acting - which is fine cos the piece doesn't call for emotional depth, they do the strutting d*mn well and we all know that they can act properly anyway!
Japan returned on the way home as I picked up some onigiri and maki from the excellent Wasabi food chain (which stays open till 11pm - heroes!). Given that the friends and I had already shovelled down beef yaki udon and gyoza in a restaurant you'd be forgiven for thinking that I was just feeling greedy but - ha! not so - I'm interested in trying to make sushi at home again and was inspecting the selection for the reverse engineering potential on their techniques! I now have some more neat ideas to try ;)
And then in the afternoon I went to London for a visit to the Japan Centre and for a Korean film starring the watchable Lee Byung Hun.
The bento boxes were done in a bit of a hurry so the layout is not pristine. However, the contents were sure colourful and healthy! From right to left we have:
- a tiny box of baby (er - premature baby from the size!) beetroot and cut red radish (not flowers though as I didn't have time to make roses)
- a larger blue box of French quiche and, in shiny clingfilm, Italian sun-dried tomato, mozzarella and oregano slice (both bought in)
- a small box of crudites (yellow and red tomato, carrot slices on lettuce and a pile of cucumber sticks)
- a large red box of fresh fruit pieces (red plum, nectarine, red grapes and strawberry)
The coach trip to London wasn't great. The snow made the journey slow at the Oxford end and police crowd control (not sure what was going on but there were a lot of NZ sports fans on the tube - metro, subway, MTR for some people) made the journey slow at the London end. Once arrived, I headed for the Japan Centre in Piccadilly to search for poetry (failed to find what I wanted), anything useful for Japan trip (couldn't see anything more useful than the guides which I already have and which I haven't fulled absorbed yet) and - naturally - Gackt.
Gackt was a success! I scooped up the last copy of the Arena 37 issue (gothic brooding in chair with many candles, chainsaw, training session with black punchbag) and the second to last copy of the March issue of Fools Mate (major cyborg edition!). Sorry for the flash on the picture but these things are SHINY!
As if that wasn't enough excitement, I met up with a couple of friends for cocktails, after which we went to see The Good The Bad The Weird starring the taekwando trained Lee Byung Hun (I tend to file everybody by their martial arts style!).
It's hard to describe the film but it's that Asian mishmash of slightly incoherent mayhem (think Jackie Chan's Project A), expertly choreographed live action and slapstick comedy meshed with high quantities of body count, bullets and blood - and all in Wild West style. The plot is not the point and the actors tend to strut cyphers rather than offer any emotional depth in the acting - which is fine cos the piece doesn't call for emotional depth, they do the strutting d*mn well and we all know that they can act properly anyway!
Japan returned on the way home as I picked up some onigiri and maki from the excellent Wasabi food chain (which stays open till 11pm - heroes!). Given that the friends and I had already shovelled down beef yaki udon and gyoza in a restaurant you'd be forgiven for thinking that I was just feeling greedy but - ha! not so - I'm interested in trying to make sushi at home again and was inspecting the selection for the reverse engineering potential on their techniques! I now have some more neat ideas to try ;)