Travel memories Tuesday - Robot Museum!

Last week I read Lara's post about her visit to the Ayashii Shone Museum she visited on her recent trip to Japan and it made me think of the many "pop culture" style museums I visited when we lived in Korea. One of these was the Robot Museum, which is exactly what the title suggests. A museum of robots! There was a big focus on robots in pop culture - like to amazing robots in Metropolis. But also more modern robots as well, like the robot that could "teach" English. I think he was trying to steal our jobs. If you like robots, weird stuff or pop culture and you're in Seoul you should visit the robot museum. I would LOVE to go again.

Dr Grordbort's Exceptional Exhibition

At the moment we have a completely awesome exhibition happening on Cuba Street - in fact its so awesome I've been twice already. Once with Emi on opening night and once with Rich last weekend.

One thing that makes me a little sad is empty shops in the central city - so I was pretty excited when I heard that Dr Grordbort's Exceptional Exhibition was moving into one of the empty stores in upper Cuba Street. Even if its only going to be here until January - its a great use of what would otherwise be an empty space.

The exhibition itself is the brainchild of Greg Broadmore - one of the guys behind Weta Workshop. Weta Workshop is pretty much iconic in Wellington and perhaps even throughout New Zealand. If you've see any of the Lord of the Rings movies, King Kong, The Chronicles of Narnia or Tintin then you've seen the work of Weta Workshop.

The work at the exhibition was a mix of sculpture and painting (although I suspect the paintings were more digital are than traditional painting).

Every part of the exhibition was delightfully steampunk - I love the robots, even the evil ones. ESPECIALLY the evil ones!

If you happen to be in Wellington in December/January I really recommend this exhibition, its absolutely amazing. If you can't make it to Wellington then you should really check out some more about Dr. Grordbort here.

Wednesday Wardrobe Challenge:1970's

Today is Wednesday Wardrobe Challenge number two from CB at Citybirds nest - today's challenge was 1970's, which can only mean one thing - POLYESTER! 

Luckily I LOVE polyester!

Rich currently has lectures on Wednesday nights, so I bought a wee tripod to see if I could take some photos myself - but I have to admit they are pretty rubbish compared to the ones Rich usually takes.

Also I've decided after looking at the photos I took with the tripod that our apartment may be slightly lop-sided. These pictures turned out so wonky!

I guess that's what you get for living in an "old" art deco apartment!

Here's a close up of the fabric of this dress - which I love so much! This dress comes with a wee story actually, I seen a dress identical to this in one of the "vintage" stores in town, I LOVED the print, but the price they were asking just seemed silly. So I decided we weren't meant to be together!

Then a few weeks ago I was op shopping at opportunity for animals and they had the EXACT same dress for $7 and it fit me perfectly - I bought it straight away and left with a smile on my face.

Turns out I even have the perfect tights to wear with this dress - I haven't worn these tights for a long time as they are a bit breezy for winter.

But now its spring so they are just perfect.

I haven't worn this guy for a LONG time - so I thought I'd wear him today. Rich made him for me out of fimo (polymer clay) YEARS ago.

Here's an up close photo of me not smiling - yes, sometimes I'm actually NOT smiling - hard to believe I know.

Finally - here's a close up of the animal friends that came with me to work today - a giraffe and a deer.

So I was hoping by now that Wednesday Wardrobe Challenge would be back up and running - but it doesn't seem to be the case. So if you have any ideas for a wardrobe challenge do let me know and I'll add them to the list.

Next week I'll be taking up Helga's challenge - 'attire to be worn whilst beating off cannibals' (I'm thinking "bad ass chic" for this one).

I also still have challenges to complete from Sarah, Mary and Curtise.

So if you have any ideas - no matter how simple (for example wear green) or how weird - let me know and I'll see if I can complete them all.

Finally - before I sign off I thought I'd show you my swipe card seen as I usually seem to be wearing it in my outfit posts. At work we get the standard office swipe card with our name on it. I decided to pimp mine out with Hello Kitty - because I'm TOTALLY a grown up.

OUTFIT DEETS:

Shoes - The Big Shwop

Tights - Glassons

Dress - Opportunity for Animals, Kilbirnie

Belt - From another dress

Brooch - Made by Rich

Bracelet - Gift from my globe trotting friends Lisa & Aaris

Ring - Clothes Swap

Necklace - Diva

AWOL

Hello All - I have been AWOL for a while now, I didn't mean for this to happen at all. Rich and I moved apartments (we quite literally moved across the road) and it took FOREVER to get our internet connected and now it is thankfully all sorted.

I do have a lot to tell you about - but I decided to keep my return to blogging short and sweet.

I have noticed lately that a lot of bloggers have been doing "collection" type posts. Now we have some decent shelves to display some of our collections I thought I'd share them with you all.

First is the craft book collection:



This first collection is solely due to me - I love craft books and just can't get enough of them. This isn't even all of my craft books a whole lot of them are still at my parents. Also in the corner you can see a few of my notebooks as well.

The Hello Kitty shelf - We bought the skull Hello Kitty at this big toy store in Tokyo - isn't it amazing, the kind of cave dwelling primal looking Hello Kitties I bought from the Hello Kitty store in Uijeongbu, South Korea. The Kitty that looks like she's about to take off on a long haul flight was given to me by my friend Nat when she returned from a recent trip to Hong Kong/Malaysia, the bigh round ball Kitty is a gift from my frien Germany and the tiny pink Kitty I recieved in a swap. The two guys at the back are obviously nothing to do with Hello Kitty but they suited this shelf best - I gave them to Rich for a birthday gift a few years back.

The Robot Shelf - the robots share their shelf with our modem. All of these robots are made by Rich. The Russian robots he upcycled from a set of Russian dolls that the paint was flaking off, the softie at the back is called "Meekie" and the little guy is made from polymer clay. The picture in the background is of a puzzle I bought Rich for Christmas last year and is a crazy pixelated version of Tokyo. We really need to get the picture framed and hang it up as its AMAZING!

The Creepy Shelf - A selection of creepy toys - At the back is a crochet Leatherface made by my friend Vany and he is with his zombie girlfriend that I got in a craft swap, they are hanging out with a mini living dead doll that I bought in Tokyo and a little crochet zombie that my friend Schyler gave me, off to the left the green thing you can see is a zombie candle holder which is also made by my friend Vany, the blue guy is "Siberian Cave Munny" and he is another of Rich's creatures, the little bat is called "Love Bat" and Rich made him for me as a valentines present a few years ago and finally is my full size living dead doll and her "pet".

The Softies shelf - The stripey sock monkey is called Burton and I recieved him in a craft swap, the big monkey next to him we just call "Monkey" Rich bought him from Daiso when we were teaching to help teach some of his younger students, in the front row we have a little sleepy monkey which I made for Rich just before he left Taipei, next to that we have a big scary shark (I think sleepy monkey should be scared!) that Rich made during the Christmas/New Years holidays last year, then is a little mushroom that I needle felted and finally - yes that monkey on the end is me!! I had it made when we lived in Korea at a "make yourself into a soft toy" photo booth at the building where our local cinema was in.

Everything Else - This shelf has a bit of everything we weren't sure where else to put it! A few of the books we have, although most are still at my parents (note the Phuket & KL guidebooks - planning for my summer trip!), Kuromi is at the back and is my favourite character in the Hello Kitty "universe" - I bought this particular softie at the Hello Kitty Store in Uijeongbu, South Korea. The little owl I made with a softie kit I bought while living in Taipei and the little cupcake I bought recently at a market I went to with my friend Ria.

Well thats enough of our collections for now - I will be back again soon - promise!

Also - I realise whilst this post may be sweet, it certainly is not short.

Robotic Giveaway

It helps when you are a crafty girl to be with a crafty boy - my partner Rich is extremely talented in every creative area he tries. A few years ago I introduced him to cross-stitch (he likes it because he says it reminds him of computer pixels) here's a few designs he has come up with and stitched over the years.




The space invaders were actually a joint project we made for our friend Ross for his birthday (they are fridge magnets) but everything else is all Rich.

As you may have guessed from some of the cross-stitches above - Rich loves robots and has thought a lot about making a book of robot stitched crafts.

He's decided to start out a little smaller with an esty store called Robot Soon where he is selling a whole bunch of cute patterns. Here's a couple of his designs to date.

First up is "Peace, Love and Pi".

Second is "Santabot"wishing you a Merry Christmas.

Now I've shown you the designs it's time for my first ever GIVEAWAY on this blog! If you'd like to win either of these patterns just leave a comment below stating which pattern you prefer and why you love robots. Rich will choose the winners and e-mail them a copy of the pattern so that they can get stitching.

Giveaway entries close on 30 November so you've got a whole heap of time to think of a great answer. Rich will decide the winners on 1 Decemeber and send out the patterns via e-mail.

Green Plugged Music Festival

Last Friday it was Budda's Birthday and our friend Joseph suggested that we all go along to the Green Plugged music festival in Seoul, we didn't really know many of the bands but hadn't been to a music festival in a long time so figured we should go and check it out.

The music festival was held in Seoul in a big park that used to be a golf course.

When we first arrived at the festival, we came across the TV stall and Val, Rich and I all fell in love with the festival t-shirts. So we all bought one!
Here's a photo of our posse for the day (well actually Joseph and Val's friend Dana joined us later in the day so there were five of us).
Here's a few photo's from earlier in the day, the first band is called Eloise, we have seen them before in Hongdae and they remind me of a Korean version of The Strokes. The second band is called "Cheesy Stereo" (I think).

In the photo's you can see a bunny on a stick - I kept seeing the girl with the bunny on the stick all day. I think the bunny was used to ensure that a group of friends didn't lose each other, or maybe it was actually a tour group. Who knows but nobody rocks like bunny on a stick!

There was also an information area, which had all sorts of tents with interesting things. For a while we considered zorbing, but the zorbing meant being pushed around some rather flat ground rather than being pushed down a big hill like in Rotorua so we decided against it. It just seemed kind of lame.

Just for fun, here's one of the many Konglish t-shirts of the day, we actually seen this couple again later and they both had this t-shirt on - couple set!After lunch, we went to check out a band called "GoGo Star" at Joseph's suggestion. The band had the most amazing show! The lead singer came out wearing black angel wings and part way through the song he was able to make the whole crowd sit down and then jump back up again on his command. The keyboard player also had an amazing KISS inspired look going on. It was the best show I've seen in forever.


Here's one of their songs "Angry Puppet Show" - I'm hoping we will make it to one of their shows in Hongdae this weekend.


I nearly forgot to say, for lunch we had burrito's (which was kind of unexpected). Here's a view of Seoul taken near where we had lunch and a cocktail robot just for fun.

Later on Rich and I decided to have a look at some of the stalls, the festival had an environmental message so there was some art work made from recycled items. I really liked the squid coke and beer can creation. There was also a merchandise stand, I really wish I bought a GoGo Star t-shirt.



Also, here's a random couple photo taken at some point in the day! Another great show we saw was W&Whale, Joseph really loves this band (he even got Whale's autograph during the festival). The show was really great and I'd really like to see these guys again They also did covers of Beyonce's "All the single ladies" and the Ting Ting's "Shut up and let me go". It was awesome. Bunny on a stick was at their show as well, nobody rocks like bunny on a stick!





Here's one of the W&Whale song's I really like, it's called R.P.G (rock and pop generation). Whale (the female lead singer) is pretty cool, but I have no idea why she chose Whale for her stage name!

Our final band of the night was Cuba, I couldn't find any video's of them online. I'm not sure if I like the lead singer in this band much but the lead guitarist is amazing!