Reason for wanting to learn にほんご

From a young age, my father would always take business trips to Japan (when we lived in Scotland, he worked for the local NEC) and brought back exciting things like Japanese candy and more traditional looking sweet treats. (There were the ones that look like little birds that we absolutely adored: Hiyoko birdies! )
When we were young, he taught us how to eat with chopsticks, a couple of words in Japanese.. We practically grew up with Japanese elements in our life without even knowing it: for the longest time, I didn't quite realize that the bed I had slept in since I grew to big for my cot was a futon.
We even had little Japanese hiragana picture books for toddlers..

Kero kero keropi chopsticks. My sister has those.. I have the ones with little monkeys on them but I couldn't remember the brand... TT.TT

After four years in Singapore, I was quite acquainted with a more asian train of life: ie massive culture shock for the first year and a half or so... But I have to admit shopping in Takashimaya was a lot of fun. And now in the US, I still feel the drastic lack of selection in stationary!
A complete deprivation of cute things!
Favourite restaurant in Singapore: Sake Sushi!

When we moved to California, a korean friend soon introduced me to manga of all kinds, and then I fell in love with almost everything else.
It's not me going "aww kawaiii" (!) with everything japanese, but rather the fact that I know that I would select something japanese-made for it's quality/design/taste/general style because I like said quality(ies) better. *shrug*

And I really really love green tea <3

We spent two (absolutely amazing) weeks visiting Japan on holiday.
(I can't believe everyone was so patient and polite and so willing to go out of their way to help us over there!)

Well.. じゃ　まった！