Brain Popping Mucus Causing School

School has started~! 
Wait, let me rephrase that. 
SCHOOL HAS STARTED!!!!!!!!! DDDDDDD: 


Yes, Kira is SCREWED to the max! SCREWED OVER BIG TIME?!?! WHY?!??!
I bit off more than I can chew again! Its amazing how when faced with the situation, one always thinks: 
"Why, yes. Of course I can take 3 science classes. Why it doesn't even matter that they're all intermediate level with long ass hour labs. Free time? Who needs free time, I'mma be studioussss."
Yeah, I fucked that one up. Yeah, I'm rethinking my future, one of those: "Why am I such dumb dipshit? Why can't I do this? Maybe I should just be a hobo or prostitute on the street?" Type of moment. 
But I CANT drop any of the classes, cause then MY POOR SUFFERING GPA will SUFFER SOME MOREEEE. 
SO I will ENDURE this SOCIALLESS HELL, TRY to blog as much as I can (You'll probably hear more from Sunny) and keep my sanity in check all by May!
Why couldn't the sky just rain food? Then I wouldn't have to study... ah well


~Kira

Long time no post!! annndddd a random recipe

Hello readerss

I know I haven't posted anything new in ages which most people probably haven't noticed or give a care in the world because this blog doesn't get very many views BUT none the less I will give an explanation:

Kira and I have started our Spring semester in college!  So there's been a lot of fixing our sleeping routines, club stuff, getting homework done on time, and for me, work.  Yes a major difference from winter break D:  but you know what? I will do my best and work hard.  As corny as it sounds, the amount of effort I put forth now will most likely decide the course of my future, so no slacking for me b/c I would rather work my butt off for a few years to obtain 70+ years of a comfort, fun, retirement, and a career I love (yes I plan on living past 90).  In addition to writing my resolve, I hope I have rekindled a fire in whoever has stopped by to read SparkleyEyes.

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Now that i'm done with my public service stuff... lets get down to my next topic: a random recipe.

So this isnt going to be a weekly thing or anything, I just happened to cook an unorthodox gyoza today that was VERY yummy.  Its simple and cheap so anyone can make it.  I forgot to take pictures so use your asian cooking instincts and imagination. :D

Sho, today I made fried tuna gyoza - gyoza, for the non-ethnic ppl, is a pot sticker- basically, you need canned tuna, onion, mayo, and mozzarella cheese (optional).  If you haven't noticed, these are the ingredients to the filling of a tuna sandwich :) OH and you need gyoza skin duh.

Start by draining the liquid from the canned tuna.  Then mince the onion, and put the two in a bowl with a random amount of mayo. Mix the conjecture together aaannddd make ur gyoza! dont forget to put a bit of cheese on the skin before or after the tuna goes in.  If you dont know how to fold the skin or make dumplings.. please go look it up, I'm not a cookbook, just introducing a different filling for gyoza.  Kay but I advise you not to boil the gyoza b/c with these ingredients it tastes a lot better fried.

mkay bon appetite <3

<SuNNy>

Hiking Adventure!

Last night, Kira called me and said, "Lets go hiking tomorrow, be ready by 6."  Me being a late sleeper got into bed at 3 (which is pretty early for me) and laid there till 5 am. Yep, I didnt sleep.  So Kira sorta slept in a little, and she picked me up at like 7ish and off we went.

Where? Mount Wilson.

Mount Wilson is located in the San Gabriel Mountain range which was like a 30 minute drive - freeway included. The mountain is known for its observatory and has a very easy trail. Even though the trail was pretty easy, I was scared out of my mind.  It was very dry, crumbly, and very sandy so it was a bit slippery.  I treaded with extreme caution while Kira pranced ahead.  Not sure how she did it and what kind of psyche she has being able to do such a daring thing.  What amazed me even more were the runners and mountain bikers who were zooming downhill on the trail... I could never do what they were doing.  They were insane.

On the trail, not everything was "ahhhh the beauty of nature. zipadeedodah" -no sir.- Stupid Sunny saw an interesting looking tree and tried climbing it.  "Take a picture KiraaAHHH!"  That was when my hand met a pathway of ants, and let me tell you... ants are always bigger outside of the city.  They were all over me.  Thankfully, Kira helped me get them off.

Oh there were also these two dogs that were hiking with their owner.  Kira and I saw them when we were crossing a stream.  The first dog just sloshed through the cold water like a boss and the second one tried to jump from rock to rock.  That didnt work out so well; it got stranded on one rock and avoided the water like the plague.  The owner was like "come on :)" and the dog... "hell no."  It was cute.  Ultimately, the dog walked through the water.  Kira said that dog was chubbier lol.

kay well here are some photographs from the hike.  

Enjoy :)

 Panorama O.O

 I really like this picture :)

winding paths 8)

My favorite picture of the lot 

We hiked around 9 miles i think and it took us maybe a total of 3.5 hours.  I had so much fun and it was my first hike in i think over 6 years.  Surprisingly I'm not sore which I'm thankful for because tomorrow I'm doing like a test trial thing at a possible part time job. I'm waitressing so hopefully the soreness wont hit me out of the blue.  Wish me luck.

So with this, I'm on my way to completing two of my new years resolutions; exercise and getting a part time job. Definitely, I have not finished them, but I hope to continue exercising and get a part time job.

Japanese style new year

Hey all!  If you haven't guessed already, I'm a Japanese... or my ethnicity is... my nationality is Japanese American... second gernation.  Although my family lives in America, we still try to adhere to our lineage, so one way we do so is celebrating New Year Japanese style. We call New Year, "oshogatsu," and there are a variety of things Japanese people do, however, living in America, my family sticks to only a few of the traditions.

TOSHIKOSHI SOBA

The first thing on our to do list is eat "toshikoshi soba" which means year end soba and is basically soba you eat on New Year's Eve.  Soba is a type of noodle made from buckwheat.  It can be served hot with broth or cold with memmi (salty soup base).  Toshikoshi soba is served hot.  I'm not sure if there is something that distinguishes it from normal soba besides when we eat it, but in my family, we eat it with toppings we would include any other day.  The reason why we eat toshikoshi soba is because the noodles are long and thin which represents longevity.

KOHAKU UTA GASSEN

So my family eats toshikoshi soba for dinner normally and we eat it while doing another traditional activity which is watching Kohaku Uta Gassen, usually shortened to "Kohaku".  Kohaku Uta Gassen means "Red and White Song Competition" as a red team of noted singers and a white team of singers compete for a panel of judges' votes. It is a fairly new tradition being only 62 years old.  Of course 62 years is a long time but i'm pretty sure the other New Year traditions have been around for a longer period of time.  Kohaku lasts about 4 hours and ends a little before midnight.  Fortunately my family can take part in this tradition because the rerun is shown on the Japanese TV channel on American time being that there is a time lag between America and Japan.  

We watch it every year, but I'm actually not a big fan of it.  Kohaku only invites singers that have a distinguished musical career; many are to the taste of the older generation with Enka n stuff which all sound the same to me After the tenth Enka artist = boring.  The artists that appeal to the younger generation ALWAYS sing songs that are peppy and happy to the max and as xiaxue said "rainbows and unicorns."  Also, a characteristic of the competition is that its extremely extravagant.  I would be more into it if they had artists like Miliyah Kato or Daichi Miura....... or SOULJAAA XD.  But that's never going to happen because none of them are happy or peppy.  Kay back to reality..the competition has a bunch of back up dancers, huge props, crazy costumes just a lot of enthusiasm n craze which is cool n all but i would like it more if it was done more tastefully.  I think they look TOO ridiculous.  I totally sound like a depressed hater but the music gets old real quick and the outfits are mostly ugly.  Basically I'm sitting there for the food, n when its gone, I'm gone :)

OSECHI

So on the morning of New Years, we eat something called "osechi."  Osechi is not a single dish, but a name that umbrellas many dishes.  Since the food takes a lot of time to prepare, it is prepared before New Years.  My mom started cooking 4 days before @_@ she is truly a super woman.  Kay but don't freak out, she took so many days because she was working on all 4 of em so she was only able to make a few dishes per day. 'Neways, since its made beforehand, it is served cold.

First, appetizers are served with sake.

These three are always a must.  The fish is is called Tazukuri.  They are sugar and soy sauce glazed dried sardines.  These fish are traditionally used as fertilizer so the dish represents a good harvest.  The beans are called Kuro-mame meaning black beans.  "Mame" can mean both "bean" and "health" so they represent good health.  Lastly, the herring roe is called Kazunoko.  "Kazu" means "number" and "ko" means "child" so Kazunoko symbolizes fertility.  In addition, kazunoko come from the fish "nishin" which can also mean two parents, soooooo adding one plus one... having fertility from two parents. Wow what a symbolic fish so much depth and deliciousness.

So, as you can tell, osechi has a lot of symbolic meaning which goes for the rest of the food, however its a bit tedious to explain them all and I myself don't remember everything so here's a link.

http://blog.japantwo.com/2011/02/02/3097

Each plate contains foods that are cooked similarly.  This one has boiled foods I think. BTW there are meatballs, but I doubt they're traditional hehe.  

An interesting thing about this bowl is that it has been passed down my mother's father's side.  It is a little under 300 years old and from the Edo period HOLY alkjdfoakjefoailaksjdf!!!!  My friend pointed out that its older than the United States haha.  This bowl has a "tenyo"  painted on it (where the konyaku is on the top right in red) which is some kind of goddess meaning this bowl is for celebrations.  The bowl has a large crack in it which inadvertently proved to have been a good thing because my ancestors who owned this bowl had many more that were very valuable, but my great great great grandfather, who was a very practical man, decided to sell all of them except this one because of the crack.  Soon after, WW2 began and a lot of things were destroyed or lost but this bowl survived.  If he kept the other bowls they may have been lost but it was a good thing he got money out of them before that haha.

Here are some things that were in the bowl.

This is the konyaku I mentioned.  It has zero calories so it is used as a diet food.  I think it is made from yams.

The shape represents a rope which means something that i forgot. soweeee

 This is a carrot sliced like a cherry blossom.  meaning.. unknown... probably just a decoration

This nextplate has things that are pickled in vinegar.  The china it is in is not worth anywhere near as much as the other bowl.  One way to know is to look underneath the bowl and see if there is a handwritten symbol or signature by the craftsman. If so, it is worth more.  If there is just a stamp or something that's not handwritten, then it is probably mass produced and not very valuable.

This plate has pickled turnips, lotus root, and kohada (fish).  My two favorite osechi foods are on this plate; the lotus root and kohada.

Here's the lotus root.  The holes are naturally there as compartments for air but the shape of the outside is cut to look like pine.  You're probably thinking, "I don't see the pine," nd that's because it looks like pine from traditional Japanese art.

 This is radish with a bit of chili in the center.  Its supposed to look like a chrysanthemum. Pretty!

Next is the grilled foods plate, and if you're wondering, this plate isn't worth much either.

There's fish on the right, gobo wrapped in beef (i think) in the back, and hidden under the leaves, there's shrimp glazed with egg yolk.  I helped my mom make the shrimp.  It was the first time we had it in our osechi. It seemed fairly simple on the recipe, so we decided to make it but it was freaking tedious.  First you have to slice the back of the shrimp and open it up.  Next you skewer them so the shape stays nice when they are grilled.  Then as you grill them, you have to paint on layers of egg yolk.  When you cook the yolk, you have to grill them as if your drying the yolk.  Sounds easy, but it took me like 40 minutes to grill five at once.  In the end, we discovered its easier to broil them in the oven and paint on the yolk every 30 seconds.

Kay so the last thing that is served is the Ozoni.

 Ozoni is different from family to family and region to region.  Ours is a little different every year so we don't apply, but whatever.  This year we put kamaboko (fish cake), watercress, lemon peel, and mochi all in broth. Its the only thing served warm so it is nice to have as a closing item.

This is the soup bowl it was in.  This bowl is very valuable.  My father's mother gave them to us.  It is wooden and very light weight.  The red and black color is from natural lacquer, and on the bottom, there is a signature.      My mom told me that this style of plates and bowls are called "japan" just as ceramic plates are called "china."  Japan are (I think) all handmade because they are carved wood.  There are other japan soup bowls at my house but my mom said the difference between those and this bowl is one zero on its value.

The last thing we ate was dessert.

The things in the back are called "datemaki" and they are made from eggs.  The egg is first cooked into a flat sheet which is then rolled up and sliced.  Because it is rolled, it looks like a scroll which represents knowledge.  Its actually not a dessert and it was supposed to be on one of the other plates, but the kurikinton, the dessert my mom was going to make the next day, was obviously not done yet.  Datemaki is a little sweet so my mom just put it there as an improv.  The dessert in the forefront is pineapple kanten which is also probably not a traditional food because it has pineapple in it.  However, kanten is basically agar and is a recently popular Asian food (I think haha).  Neways, my mom said that the pineapple looks like a fan and fans are a good symbol.  I think she got this recipe from our Osechi recipe book.  Although it was in the Osechi book, its still probably a new thing.

Osechi is something I enjoy so much.  It tastes good but not in the way most people would call "good."  I think the dishes are more about enhancing and enjoying the seasonal ingredients so they are each very simple and unmasked by seasoning.  It is also intriguing finding out each special meaning.  Osechi is definitely not something you scarf down.  It is, I suppose, "depth over breadth" with a lot of attention to presentation and details.  When I eat it, I feel all of my mom's hard work and hopes for a blessed year. hmm and maybe my own too.. I helped her cook and clean.

cleaning was a bitch.

I just bombed the moment. 

sorry it was getting cheesy... barf

I totally forgot I wrote about Kohaku and soba haha those are cool too.  I got too into the osechi part.

Okays.  I hope you all found that interesting.  I know it was insanely long so sorry about that, but I hope it conveyed my Japanese New Year.

<SuNNt>

Y2K12 Resolution

Hey awesome people! Today is the beginning of a new year! 

I didn't do much today except help my mom cook new year food, but apparently people in my neighborhood were going all out.  I could hear fireworks that sounded like thunder.  I went out to see them, but there was a super thick fog which made me wonder if the people shooting their fireworks could even see them.  I bet they just looked like a glow in the sky.  I mean I didn't see any fireworks let anything beyond 30 feet ahead of me. 

 SHO today is the day everyone declares their "new year resolutions."  Things like, "lose 15 pounds," or "Stop spending all my money on drugs." Lol well that's all BS.  "Resolutions" is just a euphony for "empty promises."  I mean, 99% of people don't even follow through with their resolutions! JK i made that up, but I'm probably not too far off.  What I mean is that there are the rare few who requite their resolutions, but definitely the majority of people don't.  The 1% who pull through and reach their goals are praiseworthy and like deserve an award.  Good job, your amazing.  Those who still remember their resolutions at the end of the year, well props to you too b/c its not as bad as completely forgetting what you promised yourself.  I, for one, don't remember mine at all so I get an F.  However, knowing myself, my resolution was probably along the lines of, "Get all As in school" or "Stop being nocturnal".  Yeahhhh none of that happened. HEE HEE.

Kay so I decided that I shall record mine on this blog so I won't forget.

I actually haven't thought of any resolutions yet even as I write this post, but here are some I've just thought of:

                   「

Get straight As

Exercise

Find a part time job

Triple the SparkleyEye's monthly blog views

Beautify the SparkleyEyes blog

                                                                      」

The first three are pretty basic, and the last two are just my hopes of having followers, readers and comments on this blog.  This blog is my baby and I want it to grow into the greatest thing ever :D

I've also been wanting to beautify the blog because it is so plain right now.  I mean it looks decent but boring nothing original or eye catching... maybe I'll work on a skin tonight.  Oh and one more thing that has been overdue and very necessary is photos of Kira and I.  Kira and I are very close yet we never take pictures together.  Kira is a bit of a camera dodger and we always just hang out and never have an occasion to use the camera so look forward to seeing our faces!

Although my resolutions lack excitement, I really hope to complete all of them.  Look forward to my post next new years eve where I tell you the results!

Hopefully I remember I that I said I would write a post haha.

<SuNNy>

Another Wishful Year?

It's 2012! HAPPY NEW YEARS! What does that mean? The world is going to end! -save meeeee- and the Wii U and Play Station Vita will be released -yayyy!-

  

I hope Nintendo and Sony don't cancel their plans cause the world really does end D: I'm playing those games till I die man. DIE! .. and Pray of course. I want to go to heaven. (not joking D:<)


Yes, its a new year and that is what I'm worrying about! Did I ever tell you guys that Kira loves to play games? She does :D Gamers rejoice! I'm hella fun of a gamer! (Wow that's hard to say out loud!)


But I have some problems too. Amazon has failed me as my trust for it grew, and my caution decreased. What does that mean? I got a crappy textbook when I paid in full for a new one, and that a game that was supposed to be Very Good quality came so scratched up it didn't work! Bummer. But when I emailed and filed my.. complaint (very nicely, Kira is never rude to people... or tries not to be) BOTH ignored me. I'm fuming!

To top it off, I woke up this morning with my parents trying to give away my childhood memory keepsake, and found out that they had actually thrown away some of my other ones. (I found out later that they didn't, and they let me keep the child hood keepsake they were going to give away). What are these things? The first they were trying to give away was a violin. I played the violin since I was around six, and have a lot of memories with that torture instrument. And the things I thought they threw away was my lifetime collection of dolls that were given to me (mostly) and I bought myself (like two or three). 

here's the violin they were trying to give it away. one string is missing, the bridge is misplaced and its waaay out of tune but its my darling.. sorta

But honestly, I've been a bitch lately. I've become very self-absorbed, abandoned some things that were very core to my being, and turned on my friends verbally. (Gossip~! *gasp*) So in the end, Karma came and bit my sorry ass and I've learned my lesson. That's one good thing for the New Year!


Now I could rant on and on about all these New Year's resolution, but I don't think anyone really gives a shit. Most of them are repetivie but never get anywhere (like doing better in school). 

But I have one requirement I MUST fill. LOSE WEIGHT! I want to visit Korea this summer, and there is this thing where Asians are extremely skinny as hell! I'm already dark-skinned so I stand out, but I don't want to be a fat ass too on top of that! What does that mean? Minimal yummy foods -sobs-, more exercise -wah- and eating healthier a lot more often! -just kill me now-. Oh, and not blowing off hundreds on Video Games without thought. (It'll be my ruin I swear).  

Well, there you have it guys. My New Year's post. Honestly, I had something REALLY interesting to tell you guys, but I went ahead and forgot it! I need to seriously start recording my thoughts down. I think I have like.. teen Alzheimer or something. -sigh-


Maybe if it hits me again, I'll rush back and write it. Maybe not. I'm terribly lazy this year... another thing to fix, but its not the New Year's yet! -evil laugh-

~Kira