Events

Events

The events page shows concerts, conventions, idol birthdays and pretty much anything else that is related to Japan and myself. Anyone with an account can add events to the page, but I’m not really expecting anyone to do so^^. It’s mainly there so I can keep track of things easily. It’s a work in progress and nothing special really, but maybe you’ll find it useful too. You’ll definitely find my plans there while I’m in Japan.

Japan Blogs

I made this page for you guys, I’m eventually going to remove my sidebar blogroll because let’s face it, it’s just link love, it’s not really useful and doesn’t generate a lot of clicks. Similar to austrian otaku’s Live Blogroll, I want to show your content, since that generates a lot more clicks. I didn’t want to show just a list however, I wanted images and a nice layout. And as I just a couple of days ago received an invite to a private preview from the kind people at feedly, I decided to roll with their solution. You can also see a normal blogroll below that lists all the featured blogs.

Now of course when I remove the blogroll from my sidebar, I’m going to have to put something else there. Since the space was used to show other blogs, I intend to continue to do that. I’m thinking some kind of rotation of the very same RSS feeds that are featured on this page. Perhaps daily or weekly feeds. But if you have any ideas let me know :)

About Me

The about page is a page that is always a work in progress, and this time I’ve given it a rather big update. Besides editing and adding some text to the introduction, there are five new sections on the page:

What I Do
A little more about me, what I do and what my goals are.

Guest Blogging/Collaborations
A list of blogs I am or have written for or have helped in other ways (such as designing and consulting).

Photography
Basically what I take photos of and what equipment I use.

My Mascots
A little info about my two mascots.

History of yonasu.com
A slideshow of previous designs.

You’ll also see that I’ve removed the Profile section, I have however saved my favorites which can be accessed by clicking on my picture.

This is everything I’ve had planned in terms of pages and news, so besides some minor updates to these new pages we’ll probably not see anything new in a while, except for new posts of course!

That’s right everybody, I finally get the chance to go to Tokyo! The flights are booked along with 26 nights at Grand Arc Hanzomon in Hayabusa-cho, Chiyoda-ku, right next to The Imperial Palace (see map). I’ll be there between January 11 and February 5. Originally I planned to book flights and accommodation separately and use Sakura Houses to find a good guest house or apartment, but I was really lucky and found a great package deal with a Swedish travel agency, so I decided to go with that.

When I was looking at guest houses and apartments I had a budget of approximately ¥105 000, and then another ¥105 000 for the flight tickets. But it was pretty hard to find any good places with that budget, generally we were talking about 7 to 10m2 rooms with shared bathrooms, showers and kitchens. While I don’t mind sharing, I decided to look at it differently, I’m actually on vacation after all. I rather pay a little bit extra and get a far more convenient vacation. I ended up paying ¥260 000, so ¥50 000 more than I originally planned to.

Grand Arc Hanzomon and Chiyoda-ku

As I’ve already mentioned, the hotel is at a very good location, one block away from the nearest train station (Hanzomon). On top of that, Chiyoda-ku is the least populated of the 23 special wards so hopefully I won’t be too overwhelmed by the huge population of Tokyo all the time. Good thing however is that Akihabara is in Chiyoda-ku so it’ll only be a matter of minutes between me and the maids.

I already mentioned the convenience of living at a hotel rather than a guest house, and here’s why:

In-room amenities
Shower, toilet, air conditioning, complimentary high-speed Internet access, color TV, cable television with in-room pay movies, refrigerator and mini-bar, IH server with hot water pot, Japanese tea bags, dual-line telephones (for both domestic and international direct call and data communications), letterhead papers & envelopes, alarm clock, radio, hairdryer, electric trouser presser, slippers, towels, night robes, and bathroom amenities (shampoo, body shampoo, soap, toothbrush & paste, razor, shower cap, hair comb) shoeshine paper.

And then pretty much anything else you can imagine for optional services upon request.

The hotel also has other features such as dry cleaning/laundry service, hair salon, a coffee shop and a restaurant. While I might not spend too much time in the hotel it’s still good to know that things like this exist.

Besides that, the look of the place is far more attracting than a run down guest house.

Flying

I’m going to be flying with a few different companies and I have to make 2 stops both on my way there and home. On my way there the route looks like this: Gothenburg -> Frankfurt -> Beijing -> Tokyo (Haneda). And on my way home it’s Narita instead of Haneda and Stockholm instead of Frankfurt.

Hopefully things will work out smoothly, but with 2 stops you never know what’ll happen, I payed ¥4500 for extra insurance just in case.

Traveling Plans

I really don’t have any plans yet and I’m too excited to think rationally, the only thing I know so far is that I’m going to meet up with at least one of the exchange students that I went to class with. I don’t want to plan too much however, that’s really not my thing. But I would love to get some suggestions of places to visit and things to do so I can add them to my list of potentials and must-dos. Especially if you know of any special events in this time frame, like concerts and tech/blogger events, I’d love to hear from you.

I’m definitely up for meet ups with fellow bloggers, twitterers, youtubers and readers, so I hope we can arrange something like that!

Pre-traveling Plans

Well, for starters I’m going to be studying vocabulary like never before, that’s what’s holding me back the most right now. As long as I know the words it should be fairly simple to explain myself to someone who doesn’t speak English. I’m also going to study sentences a lot, and I’ll bring a small phrase and vocabulary book just in case. But if you’ve been in Japan before, what are your favorite survival sentences and words?

Well, there’s much more to come when we get closer to the date of departure, but tips and suggestions are very much welcome!

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