Living Space

First of all I want to wish you all a merry Christmas :) And while I'm at it, happy new year (since my next post will probably be next year XD).

I'm happy to tell you that I finally have news about what kind of apartment I'm going to live in during my stay in Japan :D Last week we got quite a few emails about a few different kinds of apartments and single person rooms. Eventually it was decided on three 3 person apartments in the same building. In total there are nine persons from my year going to Matsumoto, of which three persons are classmates and good friends of mine. Unfortunately we had to split up since it's a three person apartment and we're 4 people in total. But one of them offered to go with two people from the other class, so it's all settled ^_^

Of course the people from the real estate agency sent us quite a few photos of the apartment, so I'm going to share them with you :)

This is the entrance.

The bathroom.

One of the 3 bedrooms in traditional Japanese style, with futons (which will be there when we move in) <3

I'm really looking forward to it <3 Just three more months and then I'll be leaving. My flight leaves on March 28 and the return flight is on August 25, which also means I'm going to celebrate my 22nd birthday in Japan ^w^

But before I'm leaving for Japan I first have to make my last exams of this semester, which will start one week after the Christmas vacations. After that I don't have any classes anymore, but I do have my part time job at the supermarket until the end of February (I'm definitely going to need a lot of money while in Japan, considering all that I want to buy XD). The countdown has begun!

Well, this is it for now, see you next time :3

~Marlies / マーリス

Preparations

As the months progress my study trip to Japan is getting closer and closer. Last Sunday I finally received the forms I have to fill in (and let others fill in) by email. I need to fill in a motivation form (why did you choose for Shinshu University?, what do you wish to learn? etc), and a general information form with all my data and stuff. Next to that I need to have a doctor fill in a Certificate of Health, get a statement from the bank to prove I have enough money, get a statement of enrollment from my current university and make a copy of my passport.

All of the above forms have to be handed in by the 24th of November so that my teacher can send them to Shinshu University, where I'll be studying. So far everything is going well, my Certificate of Health is almost complete (just waiting for the blood test results to come in), the statement from my bank is on its way and tomorrow I can pick up the statement of enrollment at school ^^ After that I can fill in the motivation form and the general info form and Ill be done way before the deadline :3

You know, I sometimes still can't believe I'm going to Japan for 5 months. But by filling in all these forms it does get more real, and I hope I can post photo's of my apartment in Matsumoto soon :D At the moment it's not really sure what kind of room I get in Japan, my teacher is still searching for available apartments in the area around the school. He is trying to get us 2DK (= 2 bedrooms, dining, kitchen) apartments, because we have to share the apartment with another person. But it will probably become a 1DK for the reason that 2DK apartments are very popular and the ones close to the university mostly unavailable. But as soon as I know more (around the end of November hopefully) I'll let you guys know ^w^

Since I'm supposed to be studying Marketing Communication for my exam tomorrow is this where I end it for now (^_^;) Wish me luck!

 勉強はだめ。。。T_T

~Marlies / マーリス

Colored Lenses

A while ago I ordered my first pair of colored lenses at eyecandylens.com. But I always forgot to take pictures of me wearing them and now that I received my second pair in the mail on Friday I finally took the time and made some :)

This photo is of both the pairs I own at the moment in their box (you get one for free for every pair of lenses you order). The pair on top is my newest pair called Dolly Eye Cat Eyes Smoky Pearl Grey and the one on the bottom is the first pair I ordered called Angel Violet.

They are both very comfortable to wear, although I'm quite used to lenses, since I wear hard lenses every day. So I'm not sure how these would feel to people who have never worn lenses before.

On this photo I'm wearing the Cat Eyes. When I first got them I was a little disappointed since I was hoping they would be a bit more grey. But because my own eyes are blue they blend really well to create a very natural look. They make my eyes a lot prettier and I can probably even wear them to work (I work part-time at a supermarket as a cashier).

On this one I'm wearing the Angel Violet lenses. They are a bit more purple in brighter light, but I had to make do with the lamp light on my room since it's already dark outside. They make my eyes look like they came directly from an anime, which I really like ^_^

All I can say is that I've fallen in love with colored lenses and eyecandylens.com is a awesome site. They're not too expensive, have regular discount offers (usually related to holidays and such, I ordered the Cat Eyes with a 10% discount because they were moving the head office somewhere else) and the shipment is also good (and free :D).

The next lenses on my wishlist are Sunflower Green and Candy Magic Big Size Red which I'm probably going to order around Christmas (I hope they'll have another discount around that time XD)

That was all for this time, until next post :3

~Marlies / マーリス

Glitter

As some of you might know I'm quite the nail polish (art) fan, so I wanted to share a few new nail polishes I bought the other day. Lately I've become a big fan of glitter nail polish, especially the ones with big flakes. The only downside is that they are a pain to remove from your nails :(

I found these gorgeous nail polishes at Kruidvat (a Dutch drugstore). From left to right: 08 Troy, 75 Gleam in Blue, 06 Edward and 02 Hello Halo, all by Essence.

I already own 07 Blair (a black-ish glitter with small holo glitter and big silver flakes) from the Essence nail art twins, and after I layered it over my black nail polish I wanted more glitters from this serie. I also wanted Bella, the base coat for the Edward glitter, but unfortunately it was sold out :(

This is 07 Blair layered over Essence's black nail polish (20 Fatal) (in case you haven't noticed, I'm a bit of an Essence fan), and I really love it <3 At the moment I have 02 Hello Halo on my toenails, and it's really sparkly and pretty in the sun <3

The only pair of nail art twins that I don't own is 02 Romeo and Julia (Romeo being a light grey base color and Julia being a clear glitter with big and small silver flakes). All the nail art twins are named after popular couples; Romeo and Juliet, Troy and Gabriella, Chuck and Blair and Bella and Edward :)

This was it for this time, until the next post!

~Marlies / マーリス

Nail polish give-away

I've been interested in nail art for a while now (most blogs I follow are about nail art XD) and via a friend's blog I read about the Essie summer collection give away by Kayla Shevonne. So I thought, why not give it a try :) you can enter here if you are also interested; http://kaylashevonnebeauty.blogspot.com/2011/08/giveaway-essie-braziliant-collection.html

I really like all the nail art that she makes, there is so much inspiration for my own nails :D

So everyone, please follow her blog too if you are interested in gorgeous nail art!

The End of This Vacation

Next week I'm going back to school again ^_^ I'm now a third year student Japanese, and this is going to be an awesome school year. Because I'm a third year now, I'm allowed to go study abroad in Japan in March 2012. Ever since I started my Japanese study I have looked forward to it. Of course it's not a vacation, because I still have to go to school there, but just the idea that I can go to the country that is so close to my heart gives me goosebumps. When I'm in Japan I'm going to try to keep a blog as well, so I can keep everyone at home updated. Since I live in the Netherlands I'm going to make another blog written in only Dutch, and this blog will have all the updates in English.

But back to my summer vacation. I had so many fun things to do ^w^ I stayed over at friends of my parents' house for about a week. The highlight of that week for me was definitely the trip to the zoo. I really love animals, and the zoo I went to had all kinds of animals. For the Dutch people reading this blog, I went to Emmen Zoo.

This is a photo of me sitting in the mouth of a hippo near the entrance to the zoo. Luckily the weather was really nice that day (the next day it was raining a lot). First we went to the butterfly garden, and there were so many butterflies fluttering around, and really close as well, you could almost touch them. I also saw a hummingbird there, it was so cute :3

Then we went to see the sharks and other aquatic animals, like puffer fish and such. After we left that part we went to see the rest of the animals like elephants, lions, flamingos, tigers (although the only one I could see was sleeping on a high part with its back to me), hippos and all sorts of reptiles. They had this really cute gecko <3

See, isn't it cute? ^w^

The week after that Tessa, the thirteen year old daughter of those friends, came to stay over at my house (well, technically speaking my parents' house XD) and that was also fun.

But the absolute highlight of this year's summer vacation was the concert of YELLOW FRIED CHICKENz on July 26th in Amsterdam. Gackt was so awesome! Especially when they played Vanilla, the whole crowd went crazy. At one point I think I had eye contact with Chachamaru *_* Even though he is 52 (or around 52 XD) he is still really handsome ^_^ One of the staff members of the Melkweg handed out a few big posters of YELLOW FRIED CHICKENz and we could have them for free because of how long we had been sitting there (some of the people spent the night in front of the Melkweg :O I was there since 8.15 a.m.). So now it's on my door ^_^

This is the poster I got. There was also a different version, but I liked this one better. The poster above Gackt is from Dio~Distraught Overlord~ ^_^

On the 25th of August I went to Schiphol Airport together with Janneke (a friend/classmate) to welcome back Kayleigh, who came back from a study abroad in Japan (she is now a fourth year student at the same school as me). And then last Tuesday she held her birthday party since her birthday was in Japan. She also had some presents for me, Janneke, Elena and Danine. I got the August 2011 editions of Shoxx and Fool's Mate (both are Japanese music magazines) and a post card of Suzumi Shio, a Takarazuka Revue actress :D :D I keep staring at the magazines and postcard <3 Fool's Mate has Gackt on the cover, and Shoxx has SuG and ViViD on it. And even though Suzumi Shio is a woman, she looks really awesome in her role as Benvolio (Romeo & Juliet musical). Thank you Kayleigh <3

And now it's back to school next week, though I still don't have the necessary books yet, even though one of the companies I ordered at said that they would deliver at least one week before school starts again. One other book is coming from Japan, so I'm not really expecting it yet. The earliest will probably be next week if I'm lucky f^_^; But I'm really looking forward to seeing my friends/classmates again :D

Well, I think this is it for this time. Until next post!

~Marlies / マーリス

Good things and Bad things

Hi guys! I know it has been a while, but I'm really bad at regularly updating stuff (I tend to procrastinate a lot f^_^;).

So, what have I been up to lately? Well, quite a few things happened actually. First of all, I found out that I am able to go to Gackt's concert in the Melkweg, Amsterdam on July 26, so I am really happy ^_^

Secondly, I bought a new laptop (my old one was four years old and had quite a few problems). It's a black Dell Inspiron 15, and it's awesome, I'm super happy with it.

Thirdly I bought these awesome pair of colored lenses at eyecandylens.com. It's called Angel Violet and I could even choose the power for each of my eyes (my right eye is -3.5 and my left eye -4.0). It also came with a free lens box and the shipping was also free ^_^ The price was also very good. I wish I could show you guys what they look like when I wear them, but when I wanted to take a photo the battery of my camera was empty so I'll post a photo later on, okay?

And last but not least; after the summer vacation I'm officially a third year student Japanese :D and that means that I will be leaving to Matsumoto, Japan in March 2012 for about 5 months as an exchange student. I really can't wait *_*

But with all things in life there are also bad things. Now some of you might not care, but the first Japanese Visual Kei band that I ever became a fan of has disbanded after 11 years of activity T^T Perhaps some of you might know them; the name of the band is D'espairsRay. A comforting thought though, is that they didn't disband because of arguments or stuff like that. Hizumi, the singer of the band, has been suffering a rare throat condition that eventually made it impossible for him to sing. I guess I sort of saw it coming when they went on hiatus to give Hizumi a chance to recover, but it still hit me hard :S

The other bad thing happened yesterday evening. I arrived at the train station of the town that I live in after an awesome surprise party we organized for a friend, only to find out that someone stole my bike... Which I really don't get, since it's 8 years old, there is rust on the brake cables, the front and back light are wonky at best, and the plastic coat protector is cracked in different places... I even secured my bike to a lamp post with an extra chain. There were also plenty of other nice looking bikes at the train station that weren't as well secured as mine, and in a much better shape too. So now I have to buy a new one, since I really need it. And because my bike was stolen I had to walk home from the train station in nothing but a dress and high heels (13 centimeter) since I didn't bring a coat nor an umbrella. The weather was really nice when I left for the party, or else I would've brought them with me.

But enough ranting on my side. I still have fun stuff to look forward to (the Gackt concert and summer vacation), and I hope you enjoyed reading my post. Oh, and if you are interested in buying colored lenses you should really check out eyecandylens.com. They offer world wide free shipping, good quality and a lot of lenses to choose from. Quite a few of them can be ordered with the desired prescription for your eyes as well ^_^

That's all for this time, see you guys later! またね～

~Marlies / マーリス 

Awesome D Concert ^w^

Well, I guess this is a great way to start my blogging XD Two days ago, on Sunday May 8, I went to a concert of the awesome Japanese Visual Kei band called D. The name of the tour is Vampire Saga Europe Tour ~Path of the Rose~. It's my second Visual Kei concert, Versailles being my first. I went together with two friends, and met with 2 classmates and my lovely kouhai (for those unknown to the term, "kouhai" refers to someone who is your junior at school) at the venue.

This is my ticket:

Around 5 pm we arrived at the venue (de Melkweg, in Amsterdam), and to my surprise, there weren't that many people yet. Unlike last year when I went to see Versailles, when it was already packed by 3 pm.

To give you an impression:

When we were waiting for the doors to open, a few crew members came outside and asked us if we wanted to say anything to the band. If I heard it correctly they were going to put it on a dvd ^_^ So me and Sanne (my lovely kouhai <3) thanked the band for the concert in Japanese.

The notice for the D concert (the big D on the right XD):

Then, a little after 7 pm, a crew member asked us to form a neat line, and around 7.30 pm we could enter. When we entered there was a noticed posted. Apparently there was going to be signing session (original merchandise only) at 11.15 pm! My night couldn't be any better, and the concert hadn't even started. 

Before the concert started I bought a photo set for the signing session, and their latest album called Vampire Saga. Then I deposited my bag at the designated counter and went over to the stage. I was standing third row, on the right side of the stage. Right in front of Ruiza, one of the guitarists ^_^

Around 8.30 pm they started. And it was totally awesome. I don't remember all songs that they played, but the ones I do remember are: In the Name of Justice,  Black Swan, Desert Warrior, Yami no Kuni no Arisu, Tsuki to Umi no Seiyaku, Der König der Dunkelheit, Yami Yori Kurai Doukoku no Acapella to Bara Yori Akai Jounetsu no Aria and Nightship D. Nightship D was really cool, since we did the thingy with the flags. And I'm really happy that they played my favorite song (Der König) ^w^

Their outfits for the concert:

From left to right: Hide-Zou (guitar), Tsunehito (Bass), Asagi (vocals), Ruiza (guitar) and Hiroki (drums).

The concert ended around 10.10 pm, so we had to wait an hour before the signing session. Luckily it started at 11 pm instead of 11.15, so we didn't have to wait that long (even though D is totally worth it <3)

Unfortunately the signing session was a little rushed, but I did get to thank them for the concert and tell them it was fun in Japanese. Asagi said he was glad to hear that <3 So now I have all 5 of their autographs on their respective photos. As soon as I can find a good photo frame to put them in I'll make a photo ^_^

We managed to make it to the last train home, and around 3 am I was asleep. It was an awesome day, and I still can't believe I met them and talked to them <3 I wish them good luck for the rest of the tour, and please be safe!

Dの皆さん、楽しいコンサート、ありがとうございます！

Until next time~

~Marlies / マーリス