Sake Drinking Ronin

Been a while since I've drawn anything so I felt the need to bust out something just for fun.  A ronin that took a little less than an hour?  I painted the face in a little bit but then got tired of it.  Shades of Toshiro Mifune, though I didn't start out with him in mind.

The signature on the lower right is something I wanted to try out.  It's my last name spelled in Korean, though I've sure my handwriting must look atrocious.  I wrestled with the idea of signing my name in Korean, but the truth is I'm not clever enough to really come up with anything original, so I'll happily appropriate another culture's writing for now.

Urban Sketching : Makati University + Japanese Restaurant

Aissa was judging Project Citizen last Saturday in the University of Makati.  I listened to some of teh student pitches then decided to take a look around the campus to see if there was anything worth sketching.  The campus itself is pretty impressive for a city university. except for the fact that mayor Binay had his paws all over it, in the form of stylized Bs on all of the staircase and window grills.  Candidate for worst epal?  Anyway this giant tree in the middle of the campus caught my attention, because it was obviously spared during the midst of constructing the University.  It's stands out beautifully, if a little lonely, in the middle of the campus.

Sundays we alternate between my folks and Aissa's.  Last weekend was at Aissa's, and I've recently taken to walking around the Aguirre street area, looking for interesting things to sketch.  The South has a surprisingly large foreign community, with many Koreans and Japanese but also Europeans as well.  This leads to very unique restauratns like this Japanese barbecue place, which wouldn't look out of place on the outskirts of Osaka or Kyoto.