Travel

Game Developer’s Conference ’13

gdc13_logoEvery year I attend this conference called the Game Developer’s Conference. Basically, it’s a great chance to learn about the latest and greatest techniques in game dev, as well as drink– I mean network– with as many people as possible. The week is normally the “shortest” week of the entire year for me, and I can never see everyone I wanted to. For those of you I said “Hey! Let’s hang!” to and never got the chance, I’m sorry!! But I’ll be back in the bay area in June, so no sweat.  Continue reading

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Travel

Departure

DeparturesSo sorry for the lack of posting. I handed off my internet to a friend in my last two weeks at work, and I just couldn’t bring myself to post at dial-up speed.

Luckily, not a whole lot has happened. By that I mean the following:

A good friend of mine, Kate (from Across The Sea blog) was the parade queen in the Tokyo St. Patricks day parade! I know a real-life celebrity! The day before the parade was a fancy-pants lunch at the Park Hyatt Tokyo with the most amazing appetizer/dessert buffet I’ve seen in a long time. The view was breath-taking, as usual. After our snazzy lunch was a farewell party for those leaving at a local izakaya.  Continue reading

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Travel

The Foreseeable Plan

With a six day work week and a slew of “big girl” documents that need to be taken care of, I’ve been nothing shy of busy. To add to the pile, it’s 8 weeks left here in Ibaraki meaning it’s time to take a look at that Life Plan. So far, I’m still not 100% sure what is going on, but I’ve bought a few plane tickets so I know at least that much. So here it is, my current, temporary, tentative, foreseeable plan.
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Travel

Planes, Trains and Automobiles

Wow, what a ride. The last week and a half has been such a whirlwind! Please accept my sincerest apologies, I have not forgotten about you. Between GDC and moving to Japan, I don’t know which way is up anymore. Brace yourselves, this is going to be a long post! I promise to update more often from now on. My goal is a minimum of 2 posts per week. So, with that in mind, the only place to go is forward.

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Preparation

Things I am Going to Miss

The pin is Sakai-machi, Ibaraki. The city in the south is Tokyo!

This one has been stewing for a while. It’s a list of everything I am going to miss, and then another of things I am looking forward to. But before I get started, I have a bit of news!

For anyone who follows my twitter, Facebook, or has talked to me recently, you will know that I finally got placement! The phone call had to come on a Thursday night when I was just about to go downtown for one last girls night. We were already enjoy hard cider, but luckily, I had barely drank any of mine when a phone call from Japan came through to my cell. I guess I made a face and said a vulgar word before running off with my ringing phone. Later the girls told me that it was either something bad, or I got my placement phone call. Well, the latter was true! I’ll be living in Sakai-machi, Ibaraki. It’s a small town north of Tokyo, and it’s rural enough for me to need a car. That said, it’s exceptionally close to the big city and it’s not rural by American standards, it’s just sparsely populated for Japan. I was secretly hoping for a car, and I wanted to be close to Tokyo. Both of my wishes came true! I can’t wait! Continue reading

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