Intrepid Model Adventure (IMA) is two years old! As we never miss an opportunity to invade the Pink Cow party space at Roppongi, to eat delicious veggie meals, to sing powerful songs and to raise money for Tohoku, well, we decided to do it all again.

In case you are a newcomer on my little blog (welcome, my friend), so you don't know yet about IMA's moto: be the change you want to see in the world. The concept is not new, but its implementation seems to be still confidential in our societies. So IMA people are trying to make it real. We want solidarity, we want passion, we want health and we want team-spirit: let's be all this, let's inspire the society. And so we go volunteering, and so we raise money to help people as far as we can, and so we share movies and songs, and so we light candles in the night to support the pro-clean energies movement. That's it. That's not going to change the world at once, but that's going to change it eventually.

(Picture credits: Yumi Nakayama, Yoshie Nakamura, Isao Kimura)

Chris, Natsu and Noemi on stage for "Man in the Mirror" (Mickael Jackson)

IMA team for our original hymn, "Beautiful Energy" by Mr. Chris Trigger

Just give me a microphone, man

"I'm starting with the man in the mirror / I'm asking him to change his ways

And no message could have been any clearer / If you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself and make the change!"

By the way: we are still there every Friday, in front of the Japanese Parliament, to support the protesters against the nukes. We light candles, and we perform our favorite songs. Feel free to come and have a look, and light a candle at your place to join the Beautiful Energy movement!

The Beautiful Energy Band

 LOVE!

Welcome to Ichihara Hiroko's free exhibit in Roppongi - Tokyo Midtown!

The concept is simple : funny, serious, light, deep, sometimes strange messages painted on the wall, black on white, big and short enough to make an impact... and to have a lot of fun with your friend Miss A. who had the nice idea to bring me there!

Istuninaku Shiawase - Especially Happy.

Kimi Ga Suki Degozaru - I Love You (in archaic, polite samourai language)

Itsudemo, Dokodemo, Dare To Demo - Anytime, Anywhere, with Anyone.

Watashi Ni Wa Hana Ga Aru - I'm Sexy (and I know it)

Bijutsu O Nichijou Suru - I Am an Artist Everyday!

In many aspects, the Japanese poetry is based on the art of striking your mind with a short, powerful, breath-taking sensorial shock. Most of the haiku are like this : a dazzking glimpe of something - a vision, a smell, a sound - that blows your mind. The "distance" with the text is created by the architecture of the kanji : the parallelisms, the graphism, the consistency in the combination of the characters leads you to a second level of reading, more intellectual, less emotional. It is very different from the French poetry (and probably European poetry in general, but I am not a specialist), where poetry is mainly based on metaphores, that is to say the undirect reference to things and concepts - words that stands for something else. And the gap between what is written and what is meant stimulates your imagination : poetry is born. In the French poetry, you are immediatly on distance with things, whereas in the Japanese poetry, you're so close to them that you take it like a fist in your face. Both experiences are so gret that it is really a pity that most of the French people will never get the chance to approach Japanese poetry; and very few Japanese will understand the French one.

I feel so lucky to navigate on both seas. (French way)

The detonation of the haiku and the echo of the alexandrin are ringing in my ear. (Japanese way)

イチハラヒロコ展「期待して当たり前なんだし。」

2013年1月15日（火）～3月24日（日）
11:00～21:00

In Japan, you don't need to be in couple to celebrate the St Valentine Day. Actually, celebrating Love just the two of you, with your partner, would be way too... intimate. So for the Japanese, Love consists in offering chocolates to everybody... or more exactly, women offer chocolate to men. All men around. The man of your life, your boss, your co-workers, your landlord, your neighbour, your gynecologist: every guy you can possibly know and meet that day. One month later, on March 14th, the so-called "White Day", men are supposed to offer chocolates back - if possible, more expensive ones. Oh, by the way, Love is also something that deals with money in Japan, because the chocolates are valued and appreciated according to their originality and their price. You can offer cheap industrial giri-choko (the chocolates of duty) to the guys you don't care about, but your darling deserves a honmei-choko, a real good chocolate, most of the time home-made, where you have put your whole heart in it. Anyway, "bref", I have made chocolates this year. Wanna have a look ?

My yummy Truffes

My crispy peanut chocolates

My pretty packages

And I forgot the tomo-choko, the sweet friendship chocolates that girls offer to girls on Valentine Day, because we rock and we love each other. Thank you, Miss A. !

Happy Valentine, everybody!

Before I open the last chapter of my wonderful stay in Thailand with stunning pictures of Koh Samui island, let me share with you a bit of my impressions about the relations between the Thai population and the foreigners.

Thailand is the second place I visit in Asia after Hong-Kong. Japan doesn't count, because I live there: I flatter myself that I have (I hope) a more accurate knowledge of this country than any other foreign country in the world, but in a certain extend, my vision is also biaised by everything I know and acknowledge about Japapn. I am used to Japan, which is not the case for the other Asian countries. In September, I was telling you how strange it was to be in Hong-Kong City and not to see many exchanges between the local people and the Westerners - except financial and commercial ones, of course. Obviously there must be higher levels of communication - exchange students, I guess; artists, free minds, and a few original individuals who had a crush on the other side's culture and mindset - but the majority of the people I have seen and met during my stay were just not interested in meeting new people and getting familiar with their world. The Chinese were there to sell. Sell, sell, sell. The white guys were there to make as much money as possible. Finance, finance, finance. Some of them were learning the basics of communication (including linguistics), but this was not for fun : it was for business. In Thailand, of course, because the level of developement is radically lower than in HK, the atmosphere is quite different. Still, I have been stricken by the common point between the two places: in Thailand also, people don't really mix with the others. I haven't seen groups of Thai and Westerners chatting together, hanging out together, talking together. I haven't seen mixed couples, except when it comes to prostitutes. I am terribly sorry that it sounds so cliche but trust me, the picture was kind of cliche too. Imagine a successions of noisy bars with big pink neons, largely opened on the street. Imagine young and less young girls wearing mini-mini dress (black, most of the time) and super high heels, crossing legs on plastic chairs in front of the shop. Imagine big-old-fat white guys, holding a long-haired lolita on their knees. According to the guidebooks, the prostitution for foreigners represents "only" 20% of the whole prostitution in Thailand, but obviously the Thai guys are more discreet, because I have seen only white-guy/Asian-girl "couples". Fortunately, no kids around, for this vision would have been fare more difficult to bear than the one of adult prostitutes - even if some of them seemed to be pretty young. Anyway, except that, almost no mixed groups, so it was very weird again. It is certainly due to the level of developement, but still. For me who is living in Japan, it's embarrassing to contemplate this wall between the shop-attendants/hotel-staff/cleaning-lady/tuk-tuk-drivers/massage-professionals on one hand; and tourists/clubbers/players on the other hand. I admire Asian people too much to spend my time bargaining on the price of their stuff and giving them tips all day long. I've heard almost no Westerners speaking Thai, even the easy sawatdiikha (hello) and kopkhunkha (thank you). Once again, there must be more sophisticated contexts where people have a genuine interest in each other, but not on the street. As a result, you can not really feel equal with the local population. In Japan, as a foreigner, you are (forever) different from the Japanese, but thanks god we are all equals. In Tokyo, you never feel like a kind of late colonist, while you sometimes really do in Thailand. As a result, despite the sun, the beach, the delicious food and the tigers, I'm not sure that I would feel great in spending a long time in Thailand. That's another reason to fully enjoy the holidays there...

And for holidays, it rocks.

Life is hard

 Varinda Garden (our hotel on the hill)

And here I realize that I didn't tell you about the food. The Food. THE FOOD.

I am not a fan of spicy food, but the thai meals are so tasteful, so rich, so delicate that even if they make me cry and sweat I just can't get enough of it. Let me give you a sample of the endless thai menu:

Coconut milk chicken soup

Fried vegetables with cashew nuts

Thai curry

Pad thai noodles

Noodle soup

Fresh fruits & muesli breakfast, with guava shake

Mango with sticky rice

Spring rolls and fried fish

Dragon fruit shake

That's all, folks! I will be back soon to share with you some new experiences, so keep in touch, and thank you for reading!

xoxo

They say that there are 300 temples in Chiang-Mai. Obviously, we have visited only a few of them, and this is a city that you can explore endlessly.

I fall in love with this old town, with its square-shaped historic center, its old walls, its palm trees, its monks walking everywhere in their orange dresses. Chiang-Mai is infinitely cleaner than Bangkok (the weather is not so wet, also), and it was a delight to get some rest after the busy capital.

The Three Kings who contributed to the creation of the city. Hot guys !

We stayed at Awana House, a charming and cheap guest house with a very sweet decoration, and a pool! The staff was helpful and charming – finally, the land of smiles!

Ok, friends, the following adventure has been the top of our trip, the most exciting moment ever. Have you ever hugged a tiger?? I mean, a REAL, BIG, ROARING TIGER?? Well, I did. And it’s so moving, so special that after this experience, you just love nature, people, yourself, and everything. You just love the whole world.

Aaaaaaw. I know.

It’s not over yet! “Absolute trip to Thailand – Part 3: Koh Samui” will be following! Thank you for reading!

Sawatdii kaa!

I am back from Thailand! God, it was amazing. The temples, the beach, the animals (just wait for it), the sun and the warmth in early February, the delicious food and fruits shakes and above all, my two absolute(e) friends from France who I joined in Bangkok. Unforgettable trip to the “land of smiles” (to be discussed then)!

Part 1 : BANGKOK.

Bangkok : a messy, noisy, dirty developing city, with bunches of loud tourists looking for an Asian Ibiza-style party place and loud local people looking for money, money, money. Unsmiling taxi drivers. Unsmiling shop attendants. Unsmiling hotel staff. Garbage on the streets. Cars, motorbikes, taxi and tuk-tuk driving madly. Rats. And… fun, fun fun! Fun everywhere! Desert streets when you avoid the touristic places, real deals when you talk to the right people, and temples shining like jewels in the sun… Check it out!

Wat Phra Kaew

Stunning Wat Phra Kaew, the temple of the Emerald Buddha and he most sacred temple in Thailand! I didn’t know exactly what to expect of the Thai architecture, and then, this… I suddenly felt so small. The buildings were so huge, the decoration so precise and rich and colorful… I have really been punched in the stomach by this pure gold on the violently blue sky. My pictures are fare below the reality. It was just like a proud and confident cathedral. I thought: “That’s a powerful country”. And I remembered these promotional posters at the airport, showing a Muay-thai box fighter, with the pitch: “Unbeatable Thailand”. Here I am…

(NB: you are supposed to dress “neatly” when you visit a thai temple. Short pants and skirts, slim jeans and light tops are forbidden – they check visitors one by one, and you have to rent a long dress if your outfit doesn’t match the criteria. Always bring a long skirt with you in Bangkok, and a sweater to cover your shoulders. Even if the weather is super warm. Just bear it!)

Palace

Wat Po

From the outside, Wat Po is more understated than Wat Phra Kaew, with its white-based walls and natural stones decorated with colorful tiles. But inside… the giant reclining Buddha is watching you between two pillars, and you feel just like an insect again. And these golden statues exhaling peace and meditation… Visual shock number 2, check!

Wat Arun

Wat Arun, the Temple of Daw, is made of darker stone. You have to cross the Chao Phraya river to the Eastern part of the city. The atmosphere is more peaceful, less busy than in the Palace area. You can hear the sound of wind around the pagodas…

Wat Saket

The main interest of climbing Wat Saket, the Golden Mount, is to embrace the 360° view on Bangkok. And to ask yourself what the hell is a “chedi”, for you can’t find any explanation in your guidebook. After a look at Wikipedia, I learned that a chedi is the thai word for the mount-shape pagoda protecting holly relics. Now I can sleep peacefully.

Khao San Road

Thanon Khao San is known to be the busiest, most touristic and noisy street of Bangkok. And we had the fantastic idea to stay there, is a casual guest-house called D&d Inn (casual, but with a roof-top pool). If your room is on the street side, no way you can sleep at night. The bars and club are spitting heavy electro-pop sound all night long, people are drunk, taxi get mad and generally speaking, everyone is as loud as possible. Walking in Khao San at midnight, with our backpacks, freshly debarked from the airport will remain one of the greatest moments of our stay. I though “Bangkok is not kidding”. After two days, we were totally addicted with this impossible street. Especially when the discovered an unexpected Absolut Bar... When you think that we have been the Absolut team since our marketing study about Absolut Vodka (Country of Sweden) at school... like, there is no coincidence, isn't it.

 Siam

The area of Siam gives a very different glimpse of Bangkok. This is a modern, commercial district with many shopping centers and public transportation. Still, I wouldn’t have traded Khao San’s crazy mess for Siam’s cleanness if I had had the choice.

Rama IX

There is something you have to be careful with in Thailand: Thai people just LOVE their King. Genuinely. The crime of “lese-majeste” still exists in Thailand: if you offence the king’s dignity, you can be legally punished. Like, they’re not joking with that. At first, the huge portraits of His Majesty Bhumibol (and sometimes his wife) just made me think of a thai-style stalinian cult of the personality, and I was feeling sorry for the Thai to worship this old guy just a bit less than Buddha itself. Then, I read a few stuff about the king, and I understand better. Thai has been politically unstable for long years, with a lot of political violence, riots, coups d’etat and so on. The politicians tend to exacerbate the latent nationalism and xenophobia because it is (everywhere) the easiest way to win elections. But Bhumibol (also known as Rama IX) is an enlightened king who has been studying in the USA and Europe, and who is especially opened to the world. He preaches cooperation with the foreign powers, democracy (yes), and tolerance in general. He’s also a big donator for the little farmers (of course, as one of the richest kings in the world, yes he can). For the Thai, he is the only stable and reasonable voice in the political field, and this is why they revere him so much. (It’s not an excuse for hanging ugly portraits everywhere, but anyway.)

And the royal palace. That we couldn't visit because you can't enter if you don't wear a skirt. Between the temples and the palace, one needs to visit Bangkok with her full wardrobe in her bag...

And a few glimpses of Bangkok…

 Fresh fruits at every corner

A temple in Chinatown

Tuk-tuk, the crazy taxi that can slalom between the cars

Bangkok, green city

Blue sky, white elephants

Karaoke in the taxi!! Even the Japanese taxis don't have it...

Wanna see more?? “Absolute trip to Thailand – Part 2 :Chiang-Mai” is coming soon! Just wait for it !

It's always a shame for me to admit that one of my favorite meal in Japan is yaki-gyoza... because gyoza are not exactly from Japan. But this Chinese dumpling got insanely popular in Japan, and you can find them in any good ramen-shop. I like it so much I could eat it everyday. So when my best Japanese friend Miss A. told me she was a gyoza goddess, we decided to have a gyoza-party at home to celebrate this little gift from heaven. May the gyoza be with you !

First step : mixing the meat and the vegetables

And now, let the gyoza take shape!

My very first gyoza

The French team, focused on the mission...

... and our poor results

Miss A.'s gyoza, so professional

But once it's baked, no one can see the difference !

My personal touch : choco cake and apple crumble

Yummyyyyyyy

Et bon appetit !

Stop kidding: that's winter after all. Oh yes, we spend a sunny December under the gingko leaves and we almost forgot that winter was coming for good... Today, there are 15 centimeters of  thick snow on the streets. Hopefully this monday was a holiday and I could cuddle at home with good food and get out only to have fun like kids with my roomate. Snow is so great when you can stay at home!

Give us a bit of snow and two grown-up adults get back to the spirit of a 5-years-old.

And to warm up : home-made pumpkin and bacon cream spaghetti ! Life is beautiful !

Go back to me.

Heal my broken heart.

Find a publisher for my novel.

Learn & practice Hope.

Love my beloved ones.

Love all the rest.

Be creative, in order to get over all this.

Happy 2013 to everybody !