Drama Review (Episode 01): 死神君

This is turning into a J-Drama review blog isn't it...! But what can you do when the Spring season has just started and has so many promising dramas lined up. I love watching J-Dramas not only as a way to relax and take a break from real life, but also as a refreshing study method for Japanese. Whenever I don't feel like using my good old flashcards or textbooks, I just pick up a drama with no English subtitles and there I go. It's better than nothing! 

Anyway, I just checked out the first episode of Ohno Satoshi's new drama, 死神君 (Shinigami kun) which looks promising. The first episode wasn't amazing, but the show has potential.

Picture from TV Asahi

The show is about a new Shinigami recruit whose job it is to let people scheduled to die know about well.. their upcoming death. He then guides their souls to the netherworld. It's a bit similar to Bleach and Death Note I suppose, but they do give it a new spin. Ohno Satoshi as the lead is really, really good- since he's new to the job, he tends to (more or less unknowingly) break the rule from time to time and tries to help people make the most out of their remaining time on earth. Judging from the first episode though, he's got quite a scary superior girl who's not afraid to shout at him and make it clear that he's supposed to stay neutral and needn't interact with humans so much... there's some special rules for a reason after all.

At first I thought this was just going to be it- the key message of the show being, you know, live your life without regrets but then at the end of the first episode something happened which might mix things up a bit. The first episode was good anyways, the acting wasn't THAT great to be honest (minus Mr. Shinigami himself! Ohno Satoshi was great I thought.) but it's an interesting story and looks like it'll only get better from here. I'll keep watching!

Drama Review (Episode 01): ファースト・クラス

I decided to give First Class a try this spring season because it looked sort of interesting with the premise reminding me of Confessions of a Shopaholic and 13 Going on 30. I enjoy reading fashion/lifestyle magazines myself so anything that takes place in the infamous publishing industry sparks my interest by default. After having watched the first episode, I think it's safe to say this drama is a keeper for me.

I kept thinking that one of the guys in it - a photo shoot assistant - looked awfully familiar. Turns out it's KAT-TUN's Nakamura Yuichi. The cast overall seems good, I also recognised Nanao from Last Cinderella but my favourite was probably the lead female actress (Sawajiri Erika). Most people might know her from 1 Litre of Tears? But I have yet to watch that. I just really like the kind of character she plays in this. Very straight-forward and open with a good heart的ね。

The story revolves around this new intern girl (Sawajiri Erika) who, with some luck, manages to get a placement at First Class, a widely-known fashion magazine. She always dreamed of working in the fashion industry and now finally has been given the chance to prove herself in it... but she soon realises, that the industry is a lot tougher and the people working in it a lot more selfish and cruel. The first episode already proved how far one of her superiors is willing to go to make life so much harder for the new intern than it needed to be. Bullying seems to be part of the routine as part of this industry. 

I'd recommend checking out this new series. I think it looks promising! Check out a press conference with the main cast and some scenes of the first episode here (no English subtitles). 

Drama Review (Series): 私が恋愛できない理由

I finished watching another Japanese drama series last night and liked it so much I had to make a post about it. It's called watashi ga renai dekinai riyuu, originally aired in 2011 and consists of 10 ~50 minute long episodes. 

Starring: Karina, Yoshitaka Yuriko, Oshima Yuko, Inamori Izumi

I watch all of my Japanese drama series in Japanese with Japanese subtitles (in the hope I can call it studying/revision then) and I can happily declare that with this one, I understood 90-95% of the dialogue. Yay! The drama focuses on 4 different women in their early twenties to their late thirties who all have their own love-related problem. (As if you couldn't have guessed that from the title!)

The reason I enjoyed this so much was because I thought it was very well-acted (especially the character of Saki; I went to find out what else Yoshitaka Yuriko was in and might watch some more of her series now. Apparently she's also in the new NHK drama 花子とアン.

But back to this drama, it's very slice of life-ish (3 of the girls end up moving in together which ensues it some pretty funny and heart-warming scenes, making me want to 同棲 (dousei, flat-share) too) but obviously with a heavy focus on love and everything related to it. I would recommend the drama to people who don't like overly cheesy romantic dramas but rather enjoy slice of life series. I'm not sure what genre it would fall under to be honest. I wouldn't call it a romantic comedy. Maybe just a drama? Either way, it was really good so make sure you check it out! If you've already seen it, let me know what you thought of it. 

Peachy Nails and a Lovely Read

I just finished reading Milly Johnson's A Spring Affair. The past few weeks at university have been so busy that even though I felt I was tired, I found it difficult to go to sleep at night. My mind just kept racing round all the reports I had to finish, kanji to study... I needed something to help me unwind at night. Which is why I turned to chick lit. 

I always find reading to be a very relaxing activity, given I am reading something nice.  I can't read thrillers or horror; that would just have the opposite effect and not let me sleep for ages. But a nice, easy to read romance novel is, so I have discovered, perfect at night before going to sleep.

First I read I Heart New York by Lindsey Kelk which I also thoroughly enjoyed. I didn't want to jump right to the second book of the I Heart series though so I decided to shop around a little (which I love doing. I could spend hours in Waterstone's, on Amazon or even just Goodreads to find new reads) and eventually I came across Milly Johnson. I was happy to discover that it was another british chick lit novel- there's something that hits home a little about books set in the UK- and I was not disappointed.

Lou, the main character, was just lovely. I felt really drawn to her for some reason. Even though there was little I could relate to in the novel- after all I am not a wife in my mid 30s with a twat as a husband!- but I enjoyed reading Lou's story. The story had a really good pace too and as it happens, I found myself picking up the book even during the day as opposed to only at night before going to bed. Would definitely recommend it to anyone who is looking for a nice, easy romance read. I still feel all fuzzy after those last few chapters.

Inspired by Lou, I also tidied my entire room today and even hoovered our living room and hall. Suffice to say it had been time. Then I sat down and re-painted my nails, which I find oddly relaxing. I used Tanya Burr's Peaches and Cream, which I am absolutely in love with. I know everyone's been raving about her products, but they are of quite good quality. I probably prefer her lip glosses, but the colour of Peaches and Cream is just lovely. It's such a nice spring colour and just makes me happy looking at it.

The colour usually also doesn't chip for the first couple of days which is pretty good. Essie still wins when it comes to longevity I suppose (usually a full week until I get the first chip!) but Tanya's last me at least 3-4 days too. I'm happy with that!

I suppose that is all I did today, we had Indian curry for dinner because we realised too late that we were meant to be having Japanese curry with friends tomorrow. Oh well! Curry is good any day of the week. I'm also skyping with two friends of mine tomorrow, both whom I haven't seen in almost a year now. It'll be good catching up. 

The Last (And First) Report

It is currently 10:01 pm and I just handed in my last piece of coursework ever. As far as my undergraduate life is concerned, anyways.

A friend asked me if it had felt good, but in all honesty? Right now at this very moment, I'm feeling tired more than anything else. The moment I hit "Submit" I felt everything from relief, paranoia, dread and fear. I suppose excitement will wash over me once I have caught up on some much needed sleep. 

I don't have much to say for my first blog post here as today was spent typing up the remainders of my report. I attempted to re-organise my laptop today and finally, after 3 1/2 years of using one of Apple's standard wallpapers, I thought I'd switch it up today. Say Hello to Sailor Moon, my favourite series growing up.

My macbook has been showing signs of its age lately; today, randomly, it decided to tell me that I had zero bytes left on my hard drive when really, there should have been more than 60 GB available. I was advised by my housemate then that I should just try re-starting it, and ta-da, he was right. After the re-start everything seemed to be back to normal again... 

Sam (my housemate and best friend) and I also decided it was time we upp'ed our vegetable intake (what with it being now '7 A Day'... apparently) and we made our standard vegetable bake. Really, it was more Sam cooking but I do know how to make it too. Sometimes I'm just lazy and Sam spoils me.

2 whole peppers, 2 aubergines, 2 courgettes (maybe 2 1/2 actually) and a jar of delicious Loyd Grossman's Chili tomato pasta sauce. Ah and some mozzarella, of course. It was absolutely delicious!

If we weren't so cheap we probably would have bought some garlic bread as well because it would have accompanied this dish so well but alas.. Vegetables are expensive enough as they are. We were just lucky aubergines actually had been on offer today, and we discovered 3 courgettes in the reduced section. Not too bad, not too bad. I still want to try and make my own tomato pasta sauce at some point; but after my last attempt, I decided it just wasn't worth it. Loyd Grossman just makes it to easy. And they're only a quid when on offer, what more do I really want..? We used the chili one today, but all of them are really nice. My favourite would probably be the tomato & bacon one. 

I'm really enjoying using this platform to blog, I just decided. Google makes it so easy, typing almost feels comfortable. Which probably results in me rambling on for way too long, but isn't that what blogs are for anyways? Or maybe I got that wrong, it's been too long. Either way! Hereby I declare this my first (more or less) successful post. Let's see if I can keep this up.