Portland Scrapbook

The two years I spent in Portland was the most brilliant term in my life.

The last two week after Chie came was pretty fun and busy but still slow.
It was sunny throughout the two weeks, that's so rare in winter of Portland.
The sunshine was the gift from the god for me.



We went to some American breakfast places.


I think Portland has more unique breakfast places than the other cities.
My favorite is Juniors, Cricket cafe, and Genies.
Mmmmmm bisckets and gravy!!
I like the American culture which value the breakfast.
Having breakfast together is more meaningful than having a drink at the bar.
I can have a drink with straingers but I don't wanna have a breakfast togehter unless I know them well and like them because morning is a innocent time of a day.


Compound is definetelly my important part of my Portland life.


Coltong, his smile and hug is worth million doller.


Dell, he is very shy and cute boy.


Matt, I worked as his assistant, but he is not just my boss, he is like my uncle.


And Chris and Aira.
It was very precious time to work with the gallery and Compound crew.
I met many people through the work, and I absorbed so many things.


I really appriciate to Katsu who gave me the key to open the door of where I had never been to.
I don't even know how I can express my thanks; words are not enough...
I will be back there someday and I wanna hang out with them again!



You can't explain much about Portland without the bridges.
Willamett river and the histrical bridges connecting the West side and the East side.


Howthorne bridge.



Old town in downtown.



Bike.
He is my best partner.
I went everywhere with him.


I liked to go down to the water front and sat down on the bench doing anything special just thinking.



Danny, he is the sweetest guy I've ever known.
He is very social and always with the nice circle of friends because of his personality.
When i met him for the first time, he was Danny, and now he is Neo G Yo, the hiphop musician!
I can't wait he is coming to visit to Japan.


German, Brandon, Echo.


Artisit, Jer drew my mastache face.
Jer is one of my best friend in Portland.
She is always cheerful and thoughtful.
Love you, Jer.


Johnney is the Portland skateboard boy also the filmmaker, he is so sweet despite of his coolness.
Jer and Johnney is my ideal couple.


Jake, he is funny always and I liked to hang out with him.
Win and Lose. It's so obvious in this photo! lol
We played wii tennis.



Nightlife.
I liked to go to see the shows more than going to a movie, house parties, or drinking at bars.


My last show in Portland was Metromy from London.
I enjoyed dancing with cool hip kids.

80% of the shows I went to were the local bands'.
Now Portland indie music sence is so up and coming.
They woke me up to the indie rock music.


DJ Beyonda, she was the coolest DJ in the town.
Soul night, every second Thursday was my most favorite event.
Not only the DJing, but also the presence of her was so handsome.



I liked to go to the thrift shop to find something cool cheaply.


I also like the vintage clothes!



My bedroom.
I was not crying.
I was just blowing my nose.
I miss this vintage apartment in Ladd so much.


My last roommate in Portland.
She is my roommate, but not just a roommate for me.
She is like a universe and out of my control that makes me into her.
Tomochan, how have you been since then?



Coffee,
One cup of coffee a day was my lifeline especially when it was raining.
I came back to Japan, and I notice how tastey the Portland coffee is.


Also I like the time to spend at the cafe.
This is Stumptown at Ace, which is located in on my way to school, so I often stopped by there and do homework with the coffee.
There was my favorite hip barista, who has the cute smile and the master-hand of making the soy latte.



One day I was walking to home with Chie and I saw this beautiful sunset.
The silhouette of everything in my vision was emphasized clearly.
It was like the shadow picture with the orange backlight.
I will never forget the winter evening.


Keep Portland Weird.

Thanks PDX!!

Accept?

ちえっぱ選手と公園で待ち合わせした。
その日は太陽がみかんみたいに黄色い午後。
トロトロに溶けながらともちゃんに葉書書いてて思った。
あたしが今見てる太陽は数時間後にポートランドに昇るのよね。
だって太陽って一個だし、地球は丸いし。
そっか、同じ太陽の下にいるのか。
その気があれば飛んでいけちゃいそう。

日本でもっと窮屈に感じるのかなって思ってたけど、実際はそうでもなかったな。
無感情になってしまったせいかなって思ってたけど、それはたぶん違う。
きっと受け入れることを覚えたんだと思う。
それにすごい救われてる今日この頃。



I took the train to Nagoya to see Chie.
Between nagoya and gifu is so rural and nobody was in the train.
i thought many things with listening starfucker.

I wanted to be in the train forever.
If i didn't took off the train, it took me to the pacific ocean.

i thought i could have felt more uncomfortable in japan.
Of course i miss portland to death but it's different things from how i'm feeling about japan.
i'm doing ok here.
Here is not the perfect place for me but i accept everything.
I learned how to accept.
"Accept" doesn't mean compromise, but i understand how things go in a good way.
Change is good, one day my friend Peter told me so.

For now I'm excited to move to tokyo.
As the first step of my new life, i will go to Tokyo next week to find the apartment which is gonna be the second place for me and Beth.
I hope I can find the good one.
Wish me luck!



I met up with chie and she took me to the jazz cafe.
I helped Chie making the scrapbook of portland.
She is always creative and dedicated for everything.
Meanwhile, I am a very rough and easy going person so we work so well i think.





Also I'm always laughing so hard with chie because she is ultra funny.
That day we were laughing a lot as usual looking the bunch of photos we took in portland.
Then, the owner came to us and said, "please not laughing with clapping your hands... we are playing the jazz record..."
Hahaha, sorry!
Anyway, i'm so luckey to have the good friends in japan i can share about portland with.
I will do my scrapbook of Portland in this blog sometime soon hopefully.




Btw, finally Wii came to my house.
I had so much fun playing wii at jer's in portland.
I will turn to be a nard playing Wii for the next few days.
Friends! Take me out from my parent house!

I am in Japan

Here this is Japan.
Since I came back, it has been good days in Japan.



View from my house.
There is the big park in front of my house.
Nobody was there today.



My sleepy dog.
Watching his sleeping face is worth that I came back to Japan.

Besides my dog, the good things about Japan is food!



I baked the rice cake on the stove.
It's very oldfashion.

The next day I arrived here, I got the flu and I had to stay in my bad for a week, which was not fun.
Finally I get over the flu and I went out.



I went to lunch with my parent.
They are always fun to talk with.
My parent is interested in opening the cafe and they go to many cafes in this town to check them.

The cafe we came today was ridicurous...
Guess how much is the coffee on the table?
It was 500yen! (500yen is about 5 dollers)
It was just coffee, not espresso drink and smaller than small size in Portland and more expensive than large size in Portland.
Taste?
Less than any coffee in Portland....

It's big problem for me not to have good and affordable coffee in Japan.
But I'm doing ok so far because I brought back Stumptown bean and vintage grinder.
I'm drinking tasty coffee at home.



This is not Willamette rive.
This is Nagara river in my hometown.
It's beautiful and this river reminds me Portland.....

Why am I in Japan?
I don't know.....
fuck... I miss Portland...