JamieJakov Blog

きゃりーぱみゅぱみゅ LIVE in Sydney 2014

March 25th, 2014

Kyari

Kyaaaaaaaryyyyyyyyy, one of the most ‘unusual‘ J-Pop idols visited Sydney last weekend, and how better to celebrate your 6 month anniversary with your girlfriend, then by visiting this concert! It is the first time that Kyari visited Australia, and it seems that she rather likes it here! This one and a half hour concert featured all of her most popular songs, as well as some new and less famous ones. It was a very nice way to spend one of my last days in Sydney for 2014; together with my friends like Seb, Ruben, Clara, etc. I managed to take a lot of photos with Amy’s iPhone and she posted them all up: here.

Kyari is continuing her world tour now, and hopefully she will come to Sydney again next year! Better quality photos of the concert: here.

Numbers and Budgets

March 18th, 2014

Numbers

My new years resolution was to be more organised and get more control over my money. And the one thing that helped me achieve this goal was the App – Numbers.

Even though I masterly avoided using any Microsoft software throughout university so far, ever since I started working, I was required to use Word, Excel and Powerpoint. Mainly when dealing with numbers and calculations, I was told to use Excel, even though I have never used it in my life (never had the need so to say). Well That help me get an understanding of how spreadsheets work, but to be honest, it wasn’t a very pleasant experience. Of course many people will argue that the functionality of Excel is all that matters, but alas no, if the design is bad, then I don’t feel I want to use the application any more then I have to.

Day 6++ Sokha Beach

March 15th, 2014

Borei Angkor

(above image is from our previous hotel: Borei Angkor)

Now we have reached our final destination – Sokha Beach hotel in Sihanoukville. Here we will be spending 6 days just relaxing on the beach and eating fresh fruit. But I will be posting up more photos from the hotel and stuff later on (by the end of the trip).

For now, have some from our previous hotel:

Day 5 – Kampong Phulk: City on Water

March 14th, 2014

FloatingCity

You know Venice right? A city which lives on water. The photo above is not from Venice, far from it, it is from a small city (housing 10,000 people) on the Tonle Sap Lake in Cmabodia. People have lived on this lake for generations and will continue doing so, but one thing that separates this town from any other town is that during summer all you can see are poles, thousands and thousands of poles (and I do not mean people from Poland). Then, during rainy season, the water goes up 9 meters and floods everything in sight. Thats why these people had to build houses on such huge pikes as a foundation for their homes. Its an amazing sight, which you wont be able to see anywhere in the world.

After that we had a very nice spa massage and cocktails while looking at the sunset. This is the life.

Photos:

Day 3 & 4 – Siem Reap

March 13th, 2014

Angkor Wat

Yesterday, on the 3rd day we took a 1 hour flight from Ho Chi Minh city in Vietnam to Siem Reap in the neighboring country of Cambodia. Once we arrived in Siem Reap and got to our hotel, we were in for a little surprise. Apparently my dad’s agent booked us rooms in the so called Privilege Floor of the hotel Borei Angkor. What this means is that we get our own reception on the floor, free minibar refills, a bathtub in our bathroom, complimentary champagne in our bedroom and free access to the Damnak Lounge where we can have free cocktails while watching the sunset. Well basically we are living in a 5 ☆ hotel with like extra service. Even my dad was like: “I did not pay this much!” All the photos are on my flickr~

Today, we went on a tour of the Angkor temples. These buildings were built in the 12th century and are still mostly standing in tact! Seeing them left us speechless. We were constantly asking our tour guide: “How did they build them so well in those ancient times?!” There were a lot of tourists all over the place, which is understandable as this is THE most famous place in all of Cambodia. But even so there was enough space for all of us, that just goes to show how grand these temples are! Also it was scorching out there, around 35° C so we had to drink a lot of water and cover our heads. That didn’t help us from being drenched in sweat.

Photos here:

Day 2 – Mekong River

March 11th, 2014

Mekong

Today we had a boat tour of the Mekong river and various markets and factories on it. These included a candy factory, various rice plants and loading facilities, and other interesting places. Most of the day was just spent on the nice little boat, looking around at the houses and slums of the people living there and taking photos of pretty flowers.

It was a good tour and we got to see and experience the life of normal vietnamese people.

More photos on my:

Day 1 – Saigon

March 10th, 2014

Saigon Palace

The city of Saigon, or as it is currently known: Ho Chi Minh City is one of the largest cities in Vietnam and has a long history of occupation, war and freedom. Today we had our tour around the most famous parts of the city, such as the Independence Palace, Chinatown, and the War Remnants Museum (you can check my Foursquare for the exact locations of the places we visit).

A New Journey

March 8th, 2014

vietnam

From today till the 22nd of March, my family and me will be visiting the mysterious lands of Vietnam and Cambodia. We have decided to embark on this journey not only to experience the culture and traditions that these countries keep hidden, but also to relax and enjoy our long overdue vacation.

The trip schedule is as following:

8th March – 11th March: tours in Ho Chi Minh city.
11th March – 14th March: Seam Reap, Ankgkor Wat and Tonle Sap Lake
14th March – 21st March: Sihanoukville, time to sunbathe and relax on the beaches of Cambodia

I will be uploading photos and writing up our experiences from this holiday.

(above photo from Google)

Twitch Plays Pokemon

February 28th, 2014

Twitch Plays Pokemon

If you don’t know what this is, I think it is time to climb from under the rock you have been hiding for the past 2 weeks and start watching & participating! This is not just Pokemon, oh no, this is much more. As Wikipedia put it, Twitch Plays Pokemon (TPP) is a social experiment, I’d say it has become a social phenomenon. Basically what TPP is, it is a stream of a Pokemon Blue game modified to accept the commands typed into the chat of the stream by the people who are watching, thus making them the players. As this idea is new and original, the concept became super popular and thus amassed over 70,000 people to play at a time (though it has died down and only 30,000 are playing at the moment, but still!).

Preparations for Japan – Packing

February 27th, 2014

packing

Yesterday I started putting away all the figures that have made my shelves their home. Now they are back in their cramped up boxes and those boxes are in another box (Yo DAWG~). Now my shelves are so empty and soon my whole room will be as well. It is sad to leave the place that you called home for over 3 years now, but I must look ahead and welcome my new place in Japan!

Today I must start sorting though my endless pile of clothes to pick what I can give back to my parents to take back to Latvia, what to leave in Sydney and what I need to take with me to Japan for my ICS. This will be tough task, but somebody’s gotta do it!