Kobe China town

We managed to squeeze our time doing some sightseeing while we were in Kobe. If you browse the internet for places to go in Kobe, you will probably get a long list of recommended places to go. One of the places that we visited during our limited spare time was Kobe China town.

Kobe China town or Nankinmachi provides nice Chinese atmosphere, with more then 40 shops and restaurants were seen along this area. China town in Kobe is small if you compare to that of New York. Nevertheless, the China essence was there. The streets were bustling with activity all day long. The Chinese-style buildings and colorful signs give it an exotic atmosphere.

Night life of China town

One of the many stalls selling dim sums and hawkers' food

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We decided to have our dinner at this restaurant

Xiao Lei's Tan tan noodle

Oiwa-san's Za jiang noodle

My Chinese seafood cold noodle

The explorers to Kobe China town today

After the dinner, we walked around to look for some souvenirs and found this interesting stall shown below.

Interesting t-shirts...imitating Puma, no! We are originals!

I am back again

Yeah...I am back home. This time from Kyoto.

Kyoto is a fascinating city. I have always loved the beautiful balance of the old and the new. It's the oldest city in Japan with nicely preserved shrines, buildings and temples. At the same time, the city also has lots of modern features and it reflects on the food too. Check out the food I had during the past 2 days in Kyoto.

My main purpose to Kyoto was to attend a conference. I had been busy preparing for this conference ever since I came back from Birmingham.
I was quite anxious for this conference for 2 obvious reasons.
1. The work I presented was mainly done by my Chinese friend, Lei who had graduated and gone back to her home country. So, since I was new in this, I had to do lots of studying in order to convince the audience of my findings.
2. My professor raised the hurdle by requesting me to present in Japanese. Gosh!

But I did it. All the hard work paid off. I felt quite good that I took the challenge and presented in Japanese though I was sure I could have done better with more practice. ^-^

My professor gave me 2 thumbs up and told me that I did well. Hopefully he really meant it.