malaysiatojapan

What I played in my childhood.

Today most young children can play games of pc. ( personal computer ). In my case I played outside more than inside the house. Till primary age we lived in a place where there was a river. I could cat

2024/04/29 00:07

How to cook fried cutlet.

Ingredients. A pack of steak beef, an egg, breadcrumbs, flour and oil and hand made sauce. (half onion, ketchup and mayonnaise and red wine) Cut the beef into small size. Hit the beef using the blunt

2024/04/10 04:45

How to make goreng pisang.

In my hometown JB. we have goreng pisang for breakfast. All you have to prepare is 4 bananas, half cup of flour and one third of sugar. Prepare a bowl. Peel 4 bananas and mash them. Add in flour and s

2024/04/05 10:18

Suffering from some allergies.

I once checked in a clinic what causes me, running nose, sneezing and so on. I was said house dust, cedar and pollen caused me and every year between Wnter and Spring I was very careful to get eye dro

2024/04/04 06:18

What we want to start with.

April is the best month to start new things in Japan. If I were to be asked, I would answer, I want to write a book of my life. I want to leave it for my decendants to know where I was born, how I was

2024/04/01 16:43

How to make drink of mushroom.

Buy a pack of dry mushroom. Prepare a medium size saucepan. Open the pack of 10 mushrooms. Fill up the pan with water. Keep boiling until the water becomes one third of the pan. Stop the heat. Drink o

2024/03/31 23:56

How to cook minced meat with eggplant.

Ingredients, 2 eggplants,  100 gram of minced meat, one tablespoon of cornstarch and seasoning. Wash eggplants. Cut the top of egg plant and cut into half and then cut into 4 long pieces. Prepare a sa

2024/03/28 20:20

New fiscal year starts.

In Japan fiscal year starts on first of April. All new employees of all kinds of jobs start on this day. I believe all new workers are nervous. Hope they get used to their new lives soon.

2024/03/27 00:10

How to cook rolled cabbage.

Ingredients, 200grams minced meat( mixed beef and pork) half onion, 5 big sheets of cabbages and one cube of kosome and a little salt. Cut the hard part of cabbages. Boil them for a short time. Put th

2024/03/25 14:52

Graduated from University.

The school system over here in Japan is 6 years in Elementary, 3 years in Junior and 3 years in  Senior High School. In those days many students would graduate and start working. or entered Junior Col

2024/03/18 03:07

Fairy Tales.

Last Sunday we had a holiday so we decided to visit our sisters-in-law. My husband has two sisters. They live near each other. Firstly we visited the first sister--in-law. She lives alone and she has

2024/03/06 01:35

How to cook French toast.

Ingredients, 2 slices of bread. An egg, half cup of milk. Prepare a bowl. Cut the side of bread. Cut into two. Pour the milk in the bowl. Break the egg in the bowl. Beat it up. Add in the bread. Prepa

2024/03/02 03:19

Part 4

From there we started to exchange both cultures between Japan and Malaysia. We also exchanged photos. In those days we wrote by hands and letters. Whenever I received the letter from my pen pal I repl

2023/11/22 10:49

Part 4

From there we started to exchange both cultures between Japan and Malaysia. We also exchanged photos. In those days we wrote by hands and letters. Whenever I received the letter from my pen pal I repl

2023/11/22 10:48

Part 3

One day one of my friends gave me an address of a Japanese guy. He said if you would like to know the culture and customs more you could be a friend of him. I was very happy to get the address from my

2023/11/08 18:43

Part 2.

My friend had so many friends because she published on a column, she welcomed friends who wanted to correspond with her. She passed me a friend who lived quite near to my hometown. We started to corre

2023/11/07 08:06

How I became to be interested in other cultures.

I was very interested in exchanging cultures with foreigners. I belonged to the correspondence club in school days. I requested someone and they introduced a girl who lived in New Zealand. She lived i

2023/10/31 18:31

I decided not to have friends but.

When I first came to Japan I had no friends. I tried to make friends because friends are best friends if we are in need. One day when my children started to go to kindergarten I had a good friend. My

2023/10/30 02:15

No communication at home.

What on earth has the world changed? In those days when I was a young child, our family back home usually gathered in the living room and our family always chatted. See today even young kids are busy

2023/10/28 06:48

My love for Kojiro.

Whenever I am free, I would like to visit him. Maybe he was too close to me. Time flies, Kojiro had passed away for nearly a year. Actually he passed away in December. Now I can imagine him when I clo

2023/10/22 15:52

Did I have difficulty when I do shopping?

For not knowing Japanese so well, I usually went to the supermarket. I didn't have to speak when I did shopping. I took a cart, put what I wanted to buy and I had a big note of 10000 yen in my wallet

2023/10/20 03:50

Being introduced to our neighbors.

In our neighborhood there live many families. Our family belonged to second group. There were 12 families. They make a community and they choose one person of each group and once a while they held a m

2023/10/14 04:15

My two families.

I have two families. One was before marriage and one was after marriage. I think I am lucky. I was loved by them. Of course it was so sad losing lives of members of families. I decided to be happy all

2023/10/09 16:29

Work hard Party hard

The last time we held a sayonara party was 4 years ago. Actually we used to hold a party twice in a year at a delicious and nice atmosphere with our students. This time I happened to find a very nice

2023/10/06 05:13

The happening occurred to our home.

One day while I was taking a nap, a loud sound was heard from outside. I quickly opened the window to check. I saw a car parking in front. I tried to remember the number plate. At the same time a car

2023/09/17 14:39

My misunderstanding.

In those days street vendors came to sell something in our neighborhood by mini trucks. One of the vendors spoke with a speaker. Saudake, Saudake. Saudake is a pole for laundry but I understood dake.

2023/09/14 16:34

Honne and Tatemae

We foreigners have to be careful when we speak with Japanese. My character is more like honne. When I first came to Japan my hubby told me that his friend would like to invite us for sukiyaki. I thoug

2023/09/13 17:39

Celebrating birthdays.

In my hometown, most people's birthdays are celebrated in the restaurants. When I first attended my mother's birthday at the restaurant in those days, I was surprised to see cake put in front of my mo

2023/07/31 06:17

We have similar things between two countries.

If we visit a temple here, we pray and put the joss sticks in the pot and if we have bad parts of body or hands and legs, we try to gather the smoke of joss sticks on to our bad parts of body and so o

2023/07/26 19:57

Japanese Crusine of chawan mushi. ( steamed eggs)

Ingredients. Gingko, chicken, mushrooms and eggs. Crack the  shells of ginkgo.. Buy chicken of breast. Cut into small pieces. Use fresh mushrooms. Cut 4 or 5 fresh mushrooms. Beat up 4 eggs. Prepare a

2023/07/25 23:51

Japanese Crusine of somen.

Ingredients 4 stalks of somen. ( noodle ). Boil 4 stalks of somen. Wash it and put in a plastic bowl. Cool it in the refrigerator. Break two eggs. Beat it and use a square pan. Fry it thinly and place

2023/07/23 22:34

A sleepless night.

Is it because I use the air conditioner all night?   A week ago I felt a sharp pain on my right back arm. Whenever I get up to go to the rest room I felt very painful. If it continues longer I can't w

2023/07/17 03:36

Japanese miso soup.

Ingredients, miso paste, soya bean curd and dashimoto. Prepare a small sauce pan. Fill half pan of water. Cut soya bean curd in small square shape. After the water is boiled add in one tablespoon of m

2023/07/16 20:17

Japanese Crusine of grilled fish.

Ingredients. Buri ( yellow tail. ). Buy sliced buri. Soak buri in soya sauce for a short time. Grill buri in a griller. Soak one more time and grill again. Place on a plate. Next is salmon. Buy fresh

2023/07/15 05:27

From now I am going to introduce some Japanese food.

Tempura will be my first introduction Japanese Cuisine. What we need for ingredients. Shrimps, mongol cuttlefish or usual cuttlefish, fish, sweet potatoes, onions, kakiage, pumpkin, long beans. Let's

2023/07/14 16:06

For a change, I would like to talk about frozen shoulders.

When I was in 40s suddenly my hands couldn't be raised up. The joint of arms and body stuck tightly. I needed to see a surgeon in a plastic surgery department. I had three injections around the joint.

2023/07/10 18:21

It is bad having stress. Part 2.

If you have these symptoms of being afraid to get on a trains or planes or afraid to enter a mall or powerless of legs, it is better to consult with doctors. The earlier the better. I suffered for mor

2023/07/10 00:47

It is bad for health if you have much stress.

Through my experience I had many troubles dealing with health. Stress is made up atomically. We have to get rid of it if not it will cause depression. Before depression you have to cure it. To tell th

2023/07/09 05:03

The love story of Hikoboshi and Olihime.

I read a story book about it. Hikoboshi was born in a farmer's family and Olihime was a weaver.  After Hikoboshi's parents passed away leaving some property for the children, Hikoboshi was given an ol

2023/07/07 02:42

Don’t think I am speaking foolish things.

If I were to recall it Kojiro came to say goodbye to me that night. I regretted for not hugging him.  A week ago it was very hot even at night. I sometimes slept in the living where there was an air-c

2023/07/03 09:44

Summer is here.

Some people like Summer but I prefer to Spring. Why? It is comfortable and we can see many kinds of flowers. From today is July. Half a year has gone. According to what elderly says July 25th is the h

2023/07/01 07:16

My younger brother 49 day.

Since I live far away and more over I am working I can't attend your important day. Brother here I would like to apologize to you. Surely you fiorgive me. Brother Tong Wai.  Sorry , I can't attend the

2023/06/29 07:23

Typical Japanese breakfast.

In those days Japanese ate more rice to bread.  Japanese breakfast usually goes with miso soup, a raw egg, a pack of dried seaweed, grilled fish and a bowl of rice with pickles. As for me I prefer bre

2023/06/22 23:47

Forget and keep old good memories.

Recently I lost two important things. One was our dog Kojiro and my younger brother. Even today I visit Kojiro place if I feel lonely. Now I am back to normal life after 6 months had passed. I said to

2023/06/20 08:19

A Happy Family.

I decided to get together at least once a year. The Japanese rooms are smaller so we have no  rooms to invite guests. Moreover we are busy everyday. Getting together in a restaurant maybe a good idea.

2023/06/19 22:21

I am back like before.

How nice to be greeted Happy Birthday. I felt comfortable. 3 or 4 years ago, my life was just dark and I had to be careful not to be infected by virus of Corona. Finally it was announced that today Co

2023/06/17 23:18

We need something to be healed.

I am lucky to be healed by many things. Firstly listening to Teochew Opera. Going singing and our dog Kojiro. Lately I don't go singing but I go to arcade. You may thing I am silly but I can be refres

2023/06/16 05:32

Match makers of marriages.

In those days, the company of men's bosses usually were the newly wed couples match makers. In our case my hubby's cousin couple were our match makers. A week ago the wife of cousin passed away. 20 ye

2023/06/11 03:55

だきまくら ( long pillows)

When babies sleeps, sometimes they were surprised that's why young mothers put a light pillow on the chest for the babies to hold. From there long pillows were used even for adults when they sleep. Th

2023/06/03 03:08

Siblings of five.

I had two brothers and two sisters. When we got together we could feel happy, joke and so on. Few years ago I lost older brother and two weeks ago I lost our younger brother. Now I have only two older

2023/06/01 01:33

Sad news.

I have 2 brothers and two sisters. My older brother passed away a few years ago. All of a sudden I was informed by my oldest sister that my younger brother had passed at 7 in the morning on 15th of th

2023/05/24 23:11

Traditional Custom.

When having meals, they say  itadakimasu  and after finishing meals they say gochisosama. When someone is going out he says itekimasu and the family member says okairi. When passing owners stores the

2023/05/06 04:01

Happy to be healed.

The first thing that healed me was the Teochew Opera. Next was my favorite singer of Terasa Teng, Our dogs Potato and Kojiro. I used to go to a Karaoke for singing but now I don't feel fun. The last b

2023/05/04 07:46

Appreciation to our mother and mother-in-law.

May 7 th is Mother's Day. Women are very strong. I really appreciated my mother and mother-in-law. If they had not been in this world, we wouldn't have been born. Both mother's characters are calm and

2023/05/02 23:25

Children’s Day.

For girls we have Hina dolls festivals . It is on March 3rd. In those days and even now parents of wives side give a set of Hina dolls. Most families decorate them in tokonoma ( tatami room ) and they

2023/04/30 01:28

Being a foreigner.

There was a merit if you were a foreigner in Japan. By the name of Tan Lan Kwee, I was asked to be a one day nurse, I was asked to teach some games to children what I played in my childhood, I was ask

2023/04/23 21:41

The role of parents.

Parents back home were strict because they wanted their children to behave well. My memory of my father was he used flip flop to hit my legs if I behaved badly and my mother would use canes to hit me.

2023/04/17 16:31

What are passenger’s reading?

I commute to work by train everyday. I am curious at people in the train. Everyone is looking at the cell phones. In my case I decided not to do anything when I am with my hubby. In those days especia

2023/04/16 02:26

Why my husband doesn’t help in anything?

Since we got married I usually serve my husband everything. I have been doing all these like preparing meals, getting seasoning he wants and clearing the table of what he uses for years. Maybe not onl

2023/04/09 06:19

Whole day raining.

Yesterday it rained the whole day. I am afraid the petals of Sakura will be blown away. After all it bloomed so beautifully. In those days when my father-in -law saw the Sakura he said, Could I see it

2023/04/08 09:20

Being introduced at the opening ceremony.

Every year I was introduced to the new students at the opening ceremony. I always prepare a short speech. At first I was going to say Congratulations. Welcome to the hairstylist institute. Let's enjoy

2023/04/04 23:32

I got 3 presents from our daughter.

We have an old saying. Maybe it is a kind of superstition but it is true. If we were given 2 presents there would be the third one. One day our daughter gave me a tablet of pc. Next a stuffed animal l

2023/04/03 03:26

I was a member of Red Crescent and a brass band .

In my Secondary years in school I joined an activity. What made me join it? It was the uniform and beret cap with a badge of Red Crescent . In those days we called Red Cross. I studied how to apply fi

2023/03/31 06:36

Visiting family graves.

Many families are visiting their families' graves. According to the lunar calendar this coming Sunday is the day where many families visit the graves once in a year. Over here we can visit anytime we

2023/03/30 23:31

Happy Times.

In foreign countries, they use the year like 2023. Over here we use both like Japanese and English year. Now we use Reiwa 5 or 2023. In those days we had Showa, Heisei and now Reiwa. I came to Japan i

2023/03/28 10:21

In my school days.

When my mother enrolled me in my school I was pretty happy. In my primary first grade she bought new text books, a brief bag, a small black board and a box of chalk for writing. I usually hung on the

2023/03/27 08:49

My kind request.

As I know my husband like the concert I requested him to see again. Actually the concert was held from April 18 th to 23rd. Since 21st was a public holiday both of us went to see again. The seats for

2023/03/22 15:56

Amazing Concert.

Last Sunday my husband and I went to see a concert. After the concert we had dinner at a restaurant. Since Corona we had to be careful not to be infected. For these 3 or 4 years we stayed home except

2023/03/22 03:25

We enjoyed our day.

Finally the concert of our favorite singer appeared on stage. Actually my husband has been looking forward to seeing his concert. I usually followed him and I also become one of his fans. During Coron

2023/03/19 23:33

The place where I haven’t been.

Yesterday my husband and I visited a city hall for some reasons. If we drove there the place would be easy to get there but we took a train. We had to change to another train. It was quite a complicat

2023/03/17 04:40

My good eye-sight.

Since I was young my eye sight was pretty good. People said if your eye sight was too good you would be far sighted at a younger age. That's right. I became far sighted in my early age. One day I happ

2023/03/15 10:52

Good time to start something.

April is a good month to start something new. Many people over here like starting a new hobby.   Studying a new language, a new sport, a new instrument and so on. As for me my job is concerning to tea

2023/03/13 16:49

Spring is the busiest starting term.

In Japan Spring is the term for starting everything. Children start going to kindergartens. Students start new grades. People start new jobs. I love Spring best. All bulky clothes are put away. I feel

2023/03/06 07:01

Winter is ending.

To tell the truth I suffered from cold climate for years. When I first came to Japan I wore a coat when I got up to brush my teeth. In those days we lived together with our in laws. It was lucky that

2023/03/02 11:17

Cold climate.

Recently one of my best friend passed away. Two months ago our dog passed away. Yesterday I knew a neighbor, II knew her in a tea room passed away. It is rather sad losing someone who I knew. Lately b

2023/02/23 11:36

Two months had passed.

Our dog Kojiro had passed away two months ago. I sometimes went to pray. The very first time, entering the hall with no one there was quite scared for me. But after visiting several times, I am used t

2023/02/18 00:13

Public Bath.

What is public bath? It is a bath where Japanese bathe in a public bath. There are divided for men and women. In those days when Japanese hadn't a bath at home, they enjoyed it in a public bath. In a

2023/02/13 12:36

Winter is the coldest.

Every year Winter season is very cold. It lasts for 3 months. From February I started to count, how many days left would we have cold days. After February the weather will get warmer but my mother-in-

2023/02/10 22:11

The best way of my toast.

In my hometown, kopitiam is popular. Kopi means coffee and tiam means shop. Early morning many people gather here to have breakfast. Some ordered coffeeo or teo. O means with milk. In those days they

2023/02/09 07:16

It is my fault.

The other day the weather was pretty cold. I went to a nearby ATM nearby to deposit money. Lately they don't prepare a litter box so people threw cans, plastic bottles or receipt of unwanted paper her

2023/02/03 07:11

Tropical vensus 4 seasonal countries.

I am lucky that I can experience two different types of countries. Tne average temperature in tropical country like my hometown is 28 degree C. In the daytime it gets hotter and hotter. Most people wo

2023/02/01 15:43

My experience of asking for discounts.

I came from a place where we could negotiate the cost for example taking a taxi or buying clothes. Usually the price listed buy 1 get 1 for free or 3 for .......When I first came to this country I tho

2023/01/31 04:08

Addressing people

Our culture back home was more difficult to call people. Usually for men, we call uncle and for women we call auntie. Let say the dialect of Teochew( a kind of dialect  Chinese) aunt's side of relativ

2023/01/30 13:49

Japanese has same culture.

When I was a little girl, my mother asked my two older sisters to help her milling rice. In those days we had a kind of round big double separated stones and a handle and a bigger size hole to put ric

2023/01/29 04:23

Addressing someone.

We have a custom calling someone over here. For example married couples. In my generation husbands call the wives ooi, choto or names. As for wives anata or names. When they have children they changed

2023/01/28 05:35

Not only English Language.

Today most people can speak multilingual. Japanese, Mandarin and so on. Of course for communication English, Mandarin and other languages are important. The company might want to employ people who can

2023/01/26 23:48

Setsubun Day

In Japan Setsubun Day falls on Feb 3rd.We have the similiar celebration like back home. Back home we eat dumplings milled from rice. In those days we children were asked by our mother to help rolling

2023/01/24 17:50

Celebrating New Year,

I have experienced two different  ways of celebrating New Year, One is in Japan and the other is in my home town, Athough both countries celebrate New Year but both countries celebrate differently. In

2023/01/23 13:57

Japanese are punctual and well-mannered.

Talking about being punctual Japanese are punctual. Not only people tranportation like  trains, buses are also punctual. If the trains or buses are delayed according to the schedule they usually apolo

2023/01/18 15:52

How sad it was to lose a pet who was so close.

Last month our pet dog named Kojiro suddenly passed away. It was with our family for more than 14 years. We knew sometimes he coughed but it  recovered soon. So we didn't take it seriously. There are

2023/01/17 16:34

Appreciation to the performers of lion and dragon dances.

Recently our family lost our pet dog. How sad I was! And so as the members in our family. No one said but surely they are sad because I am sad.. I tried to forget but our mind automatically can't forg

2023/01/16 03:46

Don’t be afraid of making mistakes.

Japanese Language isn't my mother's tongue. My mother's tongue is Teochew. I progress my Japanese by watching Japanese TV dramas. I've been in Japan for ages but to tell the truth I still make mistake

2023/01/14 05:34

Greeting Cards.

We have greeting cards like Christmas cards, New cards and so. Most countries start sending greeting cards earlier but as for Japanese New cards if they want the cards to arrive on the first day, they

2023/01/12 13:44

It is time to say goodbye.

Today our family was free so we went to visit Kojiro. I brought along what Kojiro loved. It is hard to say goodbye but I decided to say goodbye to Kojiro and I only think good memories of him for thes

2023/01/08 21:21

Winter and Summer.

I am sorry to say but I feel difficult to live in these two seasons. If there aren't these two seasons I could enjoy more here. As in Winter it is pretty cold and in Summer it is pretty hot. Luckily w

2023/01/06 07:12

January 9th

5 decades have passed. It was the day I left my country for the present place I am now in. I was sent by my mother, siblings, nieces and nephew at the  Changi airport. I arrived in Japan at night and

2023/01/04 12:48

Ebisan( the business of Osaka)

We have Ebisan in Osaka. It is the town of businesses. It falls on Jan 9th 10th and 11th. Usually people who are doing their own businesses visit the shrine and they buy stalk of bamboo with many deco

2023/01/04 03:46

Porridge of Nanakusa (7 kinds of veggies)

We have a custom of boiling 7 kinds of veggies to eat. In those days we just gathered 7 kinds of veggies but now we can get them in a plastic pack. Why do we have this custom? During New Year we had g

2023/01/03 00:53

Porridge of Nanakuma (7 kinds of veggies)

We have a custom of boiling 7 kinds of veggies to eat. In those days we just gathered 7 kinds of veggies but now we can get them in a plastic pack. Why do we have this custom? During New Year we had g

2023/01/03 00:49

明けましておめでとう.

Japanese has a custom of visiting shrines from New Year Eve. There are many stalls to enjoy so young people enjoy buying food like grilled maize, cotton candy and so on. Although it is cold but young

2022/12/31 22:29