Boiled coke and ginger lemon for cough

This post has nothing to do with Japan, except that I have the tendency to fall sick during long Japanese holidays like year end and golden week. So with weak Japanese medicine not working, and even with kiwis and lemon honey drink all failing, I resorted to my friend's advice: coke and ginger.

It sounded unusual so I googled and found the recipe. Amazingly, many people swear that it works wonder to cure their coughs and sore throats, so I decided to try out of desperation because I had already been coughing for four days and four nights.

Preparation:
Put a can of coke (around 350ml) and sliced ginger into a pot and bring to boil, simmer for 10 mins. You can either add lemon when it was simmering or squeezed lemon juice after you pour into your mug.
*I couldn't get old ginger from my Japanese supermarket so I used young ginger that was not so spicy.

Verdict:
I couldn't believe it, but it tasted rather good! Even my friend who disliked ginger said this remedy tasted great! There was a tingling burning sensation down my throat and warmed up my body. I drank it at 9pm and it did clear my sinus and throat immediately, until I woke up at 3am coughing out phlegm and clearing my reservoir of mucus in my mouth. So I decided to try again for the next two days just before I sleep. It sorta helped my sinus and coughing, but my pharmaceutical friend warned me that coke contains advance glycation end products that promotes aging and inflammation, so it is better not to drink so much, moreover one can of coke contains nearly 10 sugar cubes!!! No wonder it tasted so sweet :P~

I would recommend this if your cold, sore throat and cough is due to catching a cold/chill. I am not sure if it will cure heaty cough (for example, caused by eating too much fried food or late nights). For heaty cough, I would recommend loquat (pipagao in Chinese).

Replacement:
I guess nobody expected the miracle drink to not cure the sick by its third dose, so I changed to ginger honey drink. I sliced the ginger thinly this time in hope of increasing its potency. Preparation is the same, boil water, put in the ginger slices, and continue boiling for 10mins. Then add lemon juice and/or honey to taste. It certainly didn't taste as good as coke ginger, and the burning sensation rather dampened down. But I think it works almost as well.

Also try:
Lemon Ginger Honey Drink
Lemon Ginger Honey (in a jar)

If you have a good cold remedy to share, feel free to let me know too!!!

Golden Week in Japan 2013

Golden Week is when four Japanese festivals and weekends form a continuous long national holiday. This year is divided into the first half (27~29/4) and second half (3~6/5), so a lot of Japanese chose domestic travel over overseas travel. For me, I'd stayed at home to recuperate from my cough that had persisted for five days. Sadly, I have a tendency to fall sick whenever Japan has a long holiday season, like new year, when all clinics are closed... so iSleep.

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Japanese Toilets

I will definitely miss the Japanese toilets when I go to other countries. It's said that bidets are more environmentally friendly than using toilet paper, but I'm still used to the old way~

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Traditional Japanese Wedding ceremony and gift preparation

Gift Money Preparation

Preparing for a Japanese wedding can be quite challenging. The notes have to be brand new by changing at a bank, the facing of the notes into the envelope has to be proper and the way to fold has to be according to occasion. It is so complex that you need to refer to the attached instructions of the envelope to make sure. Even the number of notes has to be an odd number, symbolically meaning that the couple cannot be divided.

The "market price" for women seems to be at least 30,000yen and guys at 40,000yen (10,000yen note x3 + 5,000yen note x2). This depends on the seniority of the attendee and the location of the ceremony. Women usually pay less because we have to buy a nice dress or pay for professional make-up and hairdo. But all these didn't deter my excitement in attending my friend's wedding reception last year on 13th Oct 2012!!!

A Day at Shibuya 在澀谷的一天

I must say... Japanese girls really love to wear high heels or platform shoes. It's always amazing how well they could balance themselves on them.
在澀谷的一天～真是大開眼界... ... ...日本女生真的超愛高跟！

Japanese seldom complain

I guess we're born to complain! On the other hand, I notice that Japanese seldom complain openly about terrible food or service. Instead, they quietly go online somewhere to vent their frustration.

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Interesting Pollen allergy products in Japan

My nose and eyes were becoming allergic to pollen at the beginning of March, so I did what a normal Japanese would, go shop for some innovative Japanese products that deals with the problem. For example, the facial spray above claimed that its substance will magically trap pollen around you. At 1680yen, I would rather not risk having any breakouts.

Lucas Singapore closing sooner than expected

Some of us already knew it wasn't a good move for our government to "invest" so much money for Lucas to setup in Singapore. What they setup here is just another factory that can be easily relocated or closed down, like what is happening now.

Although, many argued that it was a good experience to let Singaporean talents be exposed to world-class studio and work ethics, but I believe that Lucas would eventually close down its Singapore operations sooner or later, and relocate to a more attractive city like Hong Kong or Seoul once incentives for them runs out. Unfortunately, I didn't expect that they would be bought by Disney and their game division to be shut down completely.

The major flaw of this "investment" is that there is no original title developed in Singapore nor by Singaporeans. The IP, which is the most valuable, eventually do not belong to us. IP generation is not easy but I believe it can be developed from small ideas, or seed projects that does not require big money. For example, children's picture books, novels, storybooks, short films, animated short films, social games and of course comics, can all be seed projects and given by government grants to passionate individuals or small teams. Get the big fruit without growing these seeds and you will get Lucas, no plants to grow new fruits.

But at least LucasFilm Singapore's feature animation and visual effects productions survives (for now):
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/business/layoffs-in-singapore-after-dis/627382.html

How to look Japanese 如何變身成日本人

No make up required, because the mask will cover it (￣∀￣) 

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