....And I'm Off!

I know you've all seen this pic, but it just fit too well :) I am off to China! I leave tomorrow morning bright and early at 4:30am (leaving the house that is). Our flight leaves at 9am and we are headed to Hong Kong first. My friend Kristan is on a plane at this very moment (probably panicking, but hopefully sleeping) and we probably won't get to my house until 8pm tonight at which point I still need to throw my stuff in a bag, shave my legs (oh so important), do the dishes, and any other last minute things.

So we will be meeting Brian in Hong Kong traveling all around there for a few days, and then Kristan and I will continue on to Beijing without Brian... definitely wish he could be there, but no way that's gonna stop me from having a blast! I am SO excited to see the Great Wall. So excited. Not to worry (those of you who do) my brother-in-law's cousin lives in Beijing (though I just found this out a day ago), but we at least have a contact there in case Kristan falls off the Great Wall :)

We will have no internet (both our laptops are too old and retarded to be worth bringing) so there will be no updates or contact of any sort to any person. BUT please look forward to some great pictures coming your way! Farewell! And as they say in China... Adios!... wait... I don't know what they say in China :( So much to learn...

Yabusame!!

Check this out!!! The saddle I thought was VERY interesting. Almost looks like an endurance saddle, and the stirrups are just something else. This is by far the COOLEST thing I have (and probably will) photograph the entire time we have been in Japan! I have never watched horseback archery before and definitely never seen Samurai horseback archery (Yabusame). It was really cool. Of course it only made me want to tackle one of those little Japanese people and jump on their horse to try it myself, but I thought better of it. Seriously though, it was awesome! And apparently Santa Claus is in Japan, he was trying to hide behind that flag though... Melody, this guy is giving your dad a run for his money :)
How cool is that Bridal and reins??
The samurai!
This I thought was awesome! Reminds me of MXC, and I can just hear the voice over... "Charge!"
Yes, even chicks are Samurai :) This might be my favorite... great colors. And look at her hat... it is tied on like a freakin' halter. Weird...
This guy looks like he is running with the horse... if he moves his arms like that the horse goes faster too :) Hahaa!

great details. I want those chaps. I bet dad would wear them too :)


This horse looks so nice and collected, but that is the trickery of a camera... he was actually limping on his front right. He was limping significantly (though I am sure it was worse because of the deep sand) but I was still surprised that they rode him.


This is me, Kahori, and Ryo... somehow my face looks fat. And they make me look really red... and not just my hair.

Of course though this horse looks nothing like Almond aside from the color, he still reminded me of him.... Almond! For all you in the states... be warned that I will be spending much of my time in March with my horse... though all are welcome to come along :)
Couldn't pass this up. The guy on the right actually spoke great English!
And Kahori... we are both officially samurai now :)
The end... that was my Sunday. It was cold, but SOOOO worth it. I would have gone in my bathing suit and got frost bite if I had to... it was cool.

Adventures!

So much going on! I should be posting pictures of some sort, but I am posting from work... *Shhhh... don't tell!* Soooo, the latest is that I have been wonderfully busy with my job and photography work. If you don't follow my photography blog (shame on you) but I have been having a lot of shoots every weekend for that last month. It is definitely portrait season and I am SO happy for the first time in my life to feel like I am actually doing photography as a business :D I have never had so many photography gigs and it is really awesome. I know that it will taper off in January, but I am wondering what the spring will hold. If I continue to get as much work as I am (and more) I will probably have to quit my day job. I definitely would not have time to do everything if Brian were home now, so yay for perfect timing on the deployment!

On the horizon we have CHINA! Woohoo! Brian is going to be in Hong Kong for a bit and I am going to visit! I am SO excited! My beloved friend Kristan is flying out here to come along. We will be flying to Hong Kong to be with Brian for a few days and then we will be heading to Beijing for a few days. Lots to see and do. In Hong Kong there will be hiking, shopping, beaches, city, night photography and so much more! In Beijing we will have The Great Wall, The Forbidden City, Tienanmen Square, Hutongs, rickshaws, and again glorious photography! Kristan and I depart for this wondrous adventure on Thanksgiving! Great way to celebrate, AND I will be able to enjoy Thanksgiving with Brian in a foreign country :)... not like we aren't already in a foreign country, but it will be a new foreign country! We plan to go have a bird cooked Christmas Story style with the head still intact :) Should be fun!

Also, on the horizon are many more adventures, but we will have to wait and post pics of those things as they come :) I am excited for this weekend and hope to be able to gather everything I need for the trip and get any and all shoots from Saturday up online before we head out Thursday!

For those of you who like to read... a good story for you:

I got to work on Tuesday morning and my boss asks me, "Joy, are you taking a psychology class?" I instantly get slightly worried cause I had just signed up for this class while at work on Monday and printed my syllabus here (which I am not supposed to do really, they say I can print a few personal things though so I should be fine)... So I say, "Yeeeeaaaaah, why?" Tom- "Well, your stuff printed out to the Fiery printer on Tyvak..." Ah! The fiery printer is the one we use for BANNERS! and Tyvak is nice paper that is for the outdoors! I go over and say, "Hmmm, well, that's embarrassing..." as I quickly snatched up my seven feet of syllabus to roll up and throw in the trash... I realized I sent it to the Fiery on accident, but I thought that I had canceled the job. It was the end of the day, so clearly I was not there to do anything about it. Oops.

Vietnam

So Brian emailed me some pics to post for him... This is from his time in Vietnam. He said it was pretty much like a 3rd world country. Took lots of pictures... here are a few to look at. I have no idea what he did other than playing a soccer game one day. He doesn't always send the most detailed emails... anyway, so here are the pics. Sorry they have not been color corrected or anything... I figured he would rather have them up fast than wait a few days (or even a week) for me to color correct. Not that it takes me that long to do, I just know I wouldn't "get around to it" for a while :) Enjoy!


These fish are disgusting with their ugly little mouths...


Doesn't he look like he's having fun!??

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRIAN!!!!

Today Brian turns 33... HOLY CRAP!... I mean, Wow, Brian is SO young :) Well, for your birthday Brian, Shugo and I are celebrating even though you are not here. The pictures uploaded out of order, but as you can see he is getting his special extra large bone and it's not even the weekend :) Needless to say, he is happy. The picture above is Brian on the ship. This is his normal everyday attire :) No, not really. He was trying to be a frog, but had a bad face painter and no green clothes.... oh well, at least he looks super buff right?!! His face looks weird, but if you scroll down and chop off his head I think he looks pretty hot :)

Anyway, an ode to Brian... Brian you are not a frog, but that is good cause frogs are ugly and slimy. I think they live with mushrooms sometimes and that would definitely not be good for you. You are very simple and laid back. Always the LAST person to complain... unless of course there is nothing to complain about (you are just backwards like that). You can be friends with anyone and are always the "nice guy" and you are also just a nice guy :) You are the most humble and patient person I know (aside from the Japanese cause they are pretty humble...). You suck at telling stories, but it is great when you have a crowd listening cause it just makes me laugh. You are very giving and always willing to help out anyone. Never speak bad of people (even when it is due). Always seek to follow the Lord with everything. Your dedicated, hard working, always have a good attitude, content anywhere, adaptable, and SUUUUUPER!

Seriously, We've been through a lot of changes and done a lot together and we have MANY more years together, but so far Brian is pretty cool :) In case any of you haven't figured that out yet. I could go on and on about the great things that are Brian, but there is just too much. So, let me just give one favorite memory here... ok, this is hard to think of... there are too many... I am realizing that most of the funny memories are at my expense...

One time (when we lived in Santa Barbara) Brian was working late at Zodo's. His normal schedule was, start at 8-9pm and finish at 2-3am. So, let me lay out the scene for you. I was home, it was about 11pm and I was working on some images for class. I had just got off the phone with Lindsey and it was silent. Dead silent. Talented me, I can't do too many things at once and having music, telephone, and editing happening is just too much. So again, it's silent. The desk was in the closet ( I know, weird) so I am facing the wall and the front door (which is glass) is to the right. All of a sudden it swings open. My heart instantly stopped beating. I quickly thought, "Eh! How did that open?! Was it not closed all the way? Did it blow open? It can't blow open... is there an animal out there? Someone is there? What do I have to defend myself... nothing. Great. Where's the bat? The gun? A tripod!? Anything!?! Ok, if I go really quick I can close it and no harm will be done..." So I get up, I have to step outside to get the door to close it and as I stepped outside I saw someone crouching in the shadows on the steps. I wanted to yell, scream, attack, ask politely who it was, but as all this went through my head in an instant all I got out was, "Bleahhhhaaaah!" right as Brian jumped out of the darkness to scare me. The nerve. He got off work extra early and thought it would be fun to park the truck down the street (before I hear or see it) and come scare me. I was so freaked out (cause this all happened in about 3 minutes of time). It was enough time to get me so worked up that I was shaking and of course I punched him, but at that point there was no force in me to even come close to knocking the wind out of him. Terrible.

So there you have it folks, the lovely Brian Barker...

I got a Piano!

This is me with my digital piano :) For those of you who do not know, I took piano lessons as a child. I loved it at first and I even think I remember being the one who wanted to learn initially. However, not long after starting I quickly lost interest... but mom thought it best to force me to continue for the next 8 years (literally). It is embarrassing to admit how long I took lessons cause I really suck, but seriously I don't think there is a person out there who applied themselves less. I would only practice for five minutes before each lesson (in a rushed attempt to memorize one measly measure. Seriously, it was bad. So now I wished I had tried harder cause I would love to be able to read music. So I am taking lessons on base and have bought this digital piano. I know digital pianos are usually a fortune, but someone was selling this little gem on base for $300 bucks and I jumped on it :) Maybe someday I will post a video of me playing... but first I will practice more :)

This is just a Test

I am just testing something for myself.... sizing stuff adn how it looks online.

Officially ONE YEAR!

So we have officially been here in Japan for one year... kinda crazy. I have not stepped on US soil for ONE YEAR. These are some pics from our long day to get here. It was a really long flight and I definitely do not look forward to doing it again... someday though I will. My favorite part on the plane was that near the end (about the third meal in) we started getting sushi... yikes!

Brian, guarding our bags... with that face who would wanna mess with him?
Me once we arrived in Japan... I don't exactly do well on little sleep, so this is my "I'm tired leave me alone" smile :)
The day after we arrived, we ventured out to see Japan. We didn't get far cause we didn't get any yen and were so starving we had to head back to base where we could use our American dollars...

So... you might ask yourself... what have I learned being in Japan for one year? Am I fluent in Japanese? Let me tell you a few things that I have learned being here in Japan:

- Japanese people are very nice and polite
-They don't like confrontation, but once in a while you will see them honk their car horn (I make it my goal to drive obnoxiously to see how much it takes... no, not really)
-personal space is just not something they understand
-very artistic people in general
-extremely tidy/clean... they freaking sweep their gutters regularly, their gutters people!
-If you are slightly off in saying something (or if the English word is very similar, and you say it in English) they still won't understand you.
-They love dogs, but fear Shugo (in general that is... there are many people who LOVE Shugo).
-Though personal space is unknown here, shaking hands, hugging, and any public affection is rarely seen.
- They will always say they don't speak English (especially if you ask them in Japanese)
-They go out of their way to help when asked (which is sometimes awkward cause if it's not a big deal and they are still trying to help... and I just want to move on with my life...)

Anyway, there is so much more, but I must go. I know I have been slacking here. I have been really busy with work, Brian being home, and photography shoots. Now Brian is gone, and I can focus my energy into getting things done. I have no balance in life. When he is here, everything hits that back burner, and when he is gone, I overload to not be bored (which makes for a lot of stuff hitting the back burner while he is here). Has anyone out there found balance in life? Ever? Is it possible? I am still searching and someday hope to find it...