Sharky Travels

Photography, crochet and travels

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My latest mushroom patches. Feel like I'm starting to master this shape now.

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Taking this pattern off pinterest 👇

And creating (and finally finishing) this masterpiece 🤩

Right after finally finishing:

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Lets try with micro crochet shall we...

Let's see how this goes

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Ma fav girl (was created for a birthday prezzi)

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Taking this pattern off pinterest 👇

And creating (and finally finishing) this masterpiece 🤩

Right after finally finishing:

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Fuck

I love being a barista and thank god it was just a water flush

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Imagine just whipping this bad boy out for drinks

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Mood

I made him too 😶

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Testing myself, mainly my sewing skills

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Iconic

Actually in Ginza... luckily down the road from my hotel 🤫

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Way too busy to be out 😓

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Need a sponge?

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Japans manhole covers

One thing that is a must see in japan is actually just below your feet as you walk.

The manhole covers

Albeit it's something ordinary and maybe a little disgusting, they now have an addition dash of kawaii to them.

95% of Japan's cities have unique manhole designs. They are sometimes very colourful, but these creative designs are usually designed to depict symbols, events, and landmarks to represent the cultural identity of the particular region and/or city that they are in.

But what's the history behind these?

It started in the late 1970s and early 1980s as a public relations program to connect homes to the sewerage system. At the time, 60% of homes in Japan were connected, and the cost to modernise the sewerage/waste system would be too costly. So, to encourage the remaining households to connect to the sewage, the local governments were told to design manhole covers with a local twist.

This campaign was a roaring success, and these manhole covers bow became a part of urban artworks and are popular among the Japanese. They have even created a 'society of manhole lovers', and many people travel through Japan to find the different unique designs.

Even the Sewerage Public Relations Platform of Japan created a trading card game for the manholes.

If you're lucky to find one of these trading cards, you could get some discounts and freebies from restaurants and souvenir shops when you present the card.

So, next time you're walking around, have a look down, and you may see a unique manhole cover. This is a great pass time or another activity to run around. There could be a pokemon or even an anime character painted onto them 🤭

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White Radish Harvest

Harvesting white radishes in Japan is on a whole nother game. These radishes are huge!!

Thanks to ECU, I had the opportunity to complete an internship at a Tokyo City University affiliated elementary school and what an experience this was. Observing a class was a unique opportunity to learn how different the schooling system is in Japan compared to Japan. And one of the classes was white radish harvesting!

Like I said, the harvest is a challenge by itself. The radishes are HUGE!! A lot bigger than what we get at home 😅

The radish is called Daikon, which translates to 'big root'. This 'big root' is not exaggerated. These radish can grow between 29 to 35 cm long and can even reach 5 to 10 cm in diameter. The leaves themselves are huge!

(Some of the radishes were almost as big as the students)

These radish are sweeter compared to the little red radishes we get in Australia. It was surprising when I had a taste. It's actually quite a popular vegetable in Japan.

Pulling these radish out of the ground was also a challenge. The instructions were to gently shake the plant to loosen the root from the ground and to pull up as hard as you can to pull the radish up. Sometimes, the radish didn't want to budge, but with a little strength and some laughs, the radish gave in.

After picking all of our radishes, we picked one each with students, and we had 15 bags full of this vegetable. And these bags were heavy (and also ripped quite quickly 🤫).

Walking through the vege garden was a challenge in itself. The soil was so soft! Our shoes now need a good scrub before returning to Australia.

There were a lot of radishes to bring back to the school and it took us a while to clean them. A little bit of elbow grease and some water to scrub off all of the dirt and to clean the leaves. That then marked the time for lunch 😋

In elementary schools in Japan, the school provides lunch for the students most days. These lunches are healthy and nutritious for the students to help them grow and also to help them study. These radishes are now going to be tomorrow's lunch in a yummy soup.

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Onigiri anyone?

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EEEEEEEE Bang Chan!!!

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Day 1 success

First full day in Tokyo, and did I do a lot today. Firstly, visiting a temple. I love looking at the architecture, it's always so beautiful. And this was a special temple known as 'Luck Cat Temple', it full of little lucky cats from wishes becoming true. It's so awesome and of cause I had to buy my own.

Off to Tokyo station I went and visited the underground character street. It certainly was busy. Bit too crowded for me but I made my way through all of the shops and needing over my favourite characters (and little bit of fan girling of cause 😅). Even walking through ginza, one of the main streets were closed and so, walking on the road and having coffee in the middle of the road was an experience.

To finish the day, of cause I got to go to pokemon cafe. Were the reservations hard to get... yes. Was it worth it... YES! I even did some shopping for my friend back at home 🫢. Character cafes are always so unique, but a little expensive. The overall atmosphere of the Cafe really makes it worth it (and the cute food, I mean just look at it 🤤)

Of cause stopped by shibuya to get the obligatory photo with Shanks, my erm... husband 😶‍🌫️, at the mugiwara store. Now onwards to TCU tomorrow

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Cat at temple in japan are just the cutest