Bento picnic with Japanese friends!

Tuesday, April 15

It was just an ordinary morning on the trains. I was super tired and hadn't finished my homework (I'd been planning on doing it at school once Esteban gave me his book because it was in the new book, but he ended up forgetting it. But the homework wasn't collected anyway.). At Kanayama, though, I ran into Chris (the guy who'd helped me get my train pass back in January) and he solved everything I've been stressing about these past few days! Because you know what he told me?

He bought a bike last semester when he lived in the dorms and wanted to go to the grocery store to get food. But now that he was in a host family, he didn't need it anymore. He'd left it at the dorms so one of his friends could use it, but it was still registered in his name and he was just planning on leaving it in Japan anyway after he left in May. So he said he'd give it to me!!!! Omg omg omg. I freaked out. He's so awesome

So yeah, now the only thing I'm stressing about is how to get it back to Ichinomiya since you can't take bikes on the subways or trains and I can't read Japanese maps well enough to ride it back (also that would probably take like five hours...).

But yeah, I don't have to buy a $150 bike!! I knew things would work out somehow :) Chris is like an angel coming in my time of need, I'm not even kidding!

When we got to school, Chris asked his friend if I could have the bike at the end of May when he was done using it, but his friend said he barely used it, so I could just take it now! Ahhh!!! Yay!!!

Chris and I talked about the bike for so long and then the lady who always helps me at the CJS office joined us when she came over to tell me Yuko had called yesterday (what?? Yuko never told me that!) to say I could take my time deciding about what to do about the bike. So yeah, I was almost late for class! But I made it in time, which was good because I had a vocab quiz I had actually really studied for and wanted to take.

After I aced the quiz, we started class. Kondo sensei had us play that game again where we grab the cards of the kanji she says in sentences. I lost but there weren't prizes so I didn't really care.

And then it was finally lunch time! I was excited because I'd invited Tomomi and Saki to eat lunch with Emma and me today after the Kyoto trip Saturday, since Emma and I had been planning to eat in the green area together today. 

Last night, Yasuko had messaged me on Facebook and said we should eat together sometime, so I invited her to eat with us today as well! I'd bought a bento at Seiyu this morning in preparation. It ended up being kind of expensive (over 500 yen) :/ Ah well, it was good! And then I drank the orange juice from the matsuri.

I met Yasuko in front of the fountain in the middle of the green area and we went to go sit in the shade, over where Emma usually sits. Then Tomomi found us! She was leading a huge crew of girls and asked if it was alright if they sat with us too. I said sure! It turned out they were all part of Tomomi's German class.

They all started eating, so Yasuko and I did too. I introduced Yasuko and Tomomi to each other and it was awkward because it took me a second to remember their names... I'm so bad at names!! But after that I'll never forget their names! I just played it off as me not knowing how to introduce people in Japanese, but I think they realized. I felt so bad!!

My delicious lunch! And I just realized, there're sakura petals on the ground!

My adorbs drink. I gave Miyabi the apple one and that one was cute too

Then Emma finally showed up. She'd been buying a bento from the bento lady. But she was jealous of my bento because it had sushi in it, haha! All the other girls had brought their own cute bentos they made at home. Ahh it was just like in manga, haha.

The girls were all really interested in Emma and me. They kept asking us questions, haha. I felt bad because I realized Yasuko is super shy, so she hardly said a word. I kept asking her questions, though, so she would feel included.

So anyway, the girls asked us our hobbies, so Emma and I both said we like reading. And I showed them the Japanese manga I was currently reading. They all freaked out, thinking that was awesome! They asked if I liked manga and which ones. I told them the only one I actually follow, Kimi ni Todoke, and they all squealed. Haha they were funny. I've gotten that reaction a lot because Kimi no Todoke is such a girly manga.

Then they asked what types of foods we like, and I said misokatsu and they squealed again, lol. They told Emma and I that we were really good at using chopsticks! I'm glad because when I got to Japan, I found out I was using chopsticks wrong my whole life, so I had to re-teach myself and it was really, really hard! Another thing I had to re-teach myself was writing the katana and hiragana character "ka". I always drew the slanty line going down first, but you're actually supposed to draw the weird boxy part first. That was really hard to re-learn, but I can do it now!

Hiragana ka: か

When it looked like everyone was pretty much finished, I decided to take a picture. When I said I wanted to take a picture, all the girls squealed again! Japanese girls really like squealing haha.

I managed to get everyone in! I used the trick Sara had taught me where you can press the volume switch on your iPhone to take a picture, and all the girls were so amazed! They were like "She didn't press anything! How did it take??"

So yeah, here it is!

Yasuko is to the left of me, and Tomomi and Emma are to the right. And all the other girls are behind me.

Later I put in on Facebook and wrote my ever half Japanese, half English status! (All the cool people studying Japanese always write in both languages, so I've been wanting to do it too!)

Yeaaaahh, and it's actually 31 likes now!

Afterwards, we had to rush to class. I told Yasuko that next time we should have a lunch with just her, Emma, and me, that way we'd get to talk with her more and she agreed! 

Then Emma and I headed to Hanga. We talked about how fun the lunch had been and Emma said she was glad I was there too since I talk a lot, and that way she didn't have to talk so much. Haha, she's just like my sister!

In Hanga, I spent the entire class period carving Totoro and only got about half way done. Argh, Hanga is so hard!

That morning, I'd seen Deanna post something on the CJS Facebook page about a free Kyary Pamyu Pamyu concert at Oasis 21 in Sakae today. It only started at 6 (too late for me), but beforehand she was supposedly doing some "handshake event" (whatever that means) and selling her CDs. So I'd decided I'd go check it out. I told Emma about it and she said she'd go too. I invited Minju, but she had a big paper for her literature class due Thursday, so she figured she should work on that instead.

I had to be home by 6 though, because Father John had told me he'd let me borrow his bike so I could ride a bike to school again, and I was meeting him at 6 to pick it up.

After Hanga, Emma went to fill her water bottle. I was thirsty too, but I hadn't brought my water bottle today, so I decided to get a drink from the vending machines. I saw an interesting-looking "white grape and aloe" drink, but I decided to get another that was bigger, but the same price. It looked like orange or apple or something, I wasn't sure. But I wanted to try it.

OMG! It was AMAZING!!!!! It turned out to be Asian pear flavored! And it had little pieces of Asian pear floating inside! Holy crap, it was amazing! I really want to drink it again sometime.

When we got to the station, Emma said something about her DS and I realized, crap, I'd left my DS charging in K building where I'd had Japanese class this morning!! Nooooo!

I told Emma, she should just go on ahead to Sakae and I'd go back to school to get my DS. So we planned to meet by the information booth in Oasis 21 half an hour after whenever Emma got there, since I'd probably be half an hour behind.

I ran back to school feeling like an idiot for forgetting it. When I got to K22, the room I'd left it in, it wasn't there anymore! I was freaking out. My friends have told me stories of leaving phones on trains and stuff, but finding them turned into the lost and found later, so I didn't think someone stole it, but I had no idea.
I ran to the CJS office and told the lady who's always helping me about what had happened. She told me to ask at the police box/information booth thing when you first walk into Nanzan. I asked her what I should say in Japanese and she referred to the 3DS as a game system, so I did the same thing when I got to the police box.
The lady working there was all like, "oh, a 3DS?"
And I was like "HAI! pinku"
And she pulled it out for me! It was in a baggie with my charger too. Yay! I had to fill out a form with my name and gakusei bango, and then she showed me that the game was still inside, and gave it back to me. Woohoo!

So I rushed back to the station, where I caught the train right away and then switched to the Higashiyama line, since that's on my pass now. That train came right away too. Nice! So I got to Sakae way quicker than we'd thought I would because Emma took the longer way.
Since I figured I had about twenty minutes to kill, I decided to look around Oasis 21. There were people buying Kyary Pamyu Pamyu CDs from a little table, but Kyary Pamyu Pamyu was nowhere to be seen. Weird...

So I went into the 300 yen store. There was a place where you could fill up bags with candy! But it was 300 yen for every 100g which was a total ripoff!

Look at those totes adorbs panda cookies!!

And these pieces of chocolate shaped like little cakes!! Ahhhhhh

Then I sat around outside the Information place until I saw Emma approaching in the distance. I went over to her and told her how Kyary Pamyu Pamyu wasn't here yet. Then I showed her the candy. She thought it was cute too.
I only had about 10 minutes before I had to go, so I suggested we get the cute bunny sundaes at Baskin Robbins that I've been wanting for a while. Emma agreed ice cream sounded really good right now, so we headed in.
I was all excited... until I saw the prices. The bunny sundae was just one scoop of ice cream (perfect for lactose intolerant people like me) with cookie ears. And it was 400 yen. Yeah, no.
Also, a cone with a scoop of ice cream was 300 yen. Like, seriously? Those are like a buck in the U.S.
Needless to say, we didn't stop at "Sahty-wan."
I had to leave, but Emma wanted to go to McDonald's (don't ask me why), so I left on my own.

At Ichinomiya Eki, I stopped at that mini drug store with the 71 yen chocolate and bought two more packs of the chocolate matcha on top of cookies. Help, guys, I'm addicted...
Then I found the pack of two taiyaki for 100 yen and bought one of those, as well as these oval shaped waffle things with cream inside because they were also 100 yen.

I ate the waffle things on the way to the church because I was starving. The cream was weird and gelatinous, but other than that, it tasted good! I probably won't buy it again, though.

I didn't realize it says waffle until just now...

 At the church, Father John came out to greet me. I told him a bit more about my accident and then he showed me his bike and how to lock it up and I was free to use it! He's so nice!!
It felt amazing to ride a bike again! It was taller than my bike, but it was a lot smoother, because it's newer.

When I got home, I had a package on my desk from a friend of mine back home! So I opened it right away. It had really cute colored tissue paper inside.
And first thing I saw??? CADBURY EGGS!!!!!!!! MY FAVORITE EASTER CANDY! Gosh, I love those things so much. I hadn't eaten the ones my mom sent yet, because I wanted to save them for Easter, but now that I have so many, I decided to eat one after dinner tonight. It was a chocolate crea one, which I'd never had before. But it was delicious!! The chocolate cream was more like chocolate syrup and so rich and sweet and nom.
She also sent me stuff for my bruises!! Thank you for reading my blog and thinking of me! ^^

And a game for Miya was in there too! I showed Miya and she was really excited. But we didn't get to play it because dinner was ready.
After dinner, I had Miya help me memorize my dialogue for my dialogue check tomorrow. We went over it a bunch of times and soon she had it memorized too!

The day I got hit by a car...

Tuesday, April 8

Yes, I was literally run over by a car today. My life incredibly sucks. Read on for the full story...

This morning I emailed Mitch with my words about coffee hour. He later emailed me back and told me at school that they were wonderful and he really liked them! Here it is on Facebook! :)

After that, I went in to eat breakfast with everyone. Miyabi was all excited because today was her first day back at school. She's a ninensei (second year) now! She was wondering what class number she'd be in. She wanted 4 or 5, so she'd be close to the library and she wanted to be with her best friend, Tina.

Then I headed out on my bike to go to school. I noticed how pretty the shrine by our apartment looked last week with the sakura trees in front and it still looked gorgeous today, so I took a picture! All the Japanese people kept saying the sakura only last for a week, but it's been a week and three days now and they're still going strong! Everyone was freaking out, thinking the rain would wash them away, but we actually didn't get that much rain. :)

The entrance closer to our apartment

The entrance closer to the station

Then I continued on my way. I got to a crossing that I cross every day with no problem. I slowed down a bit, because I saw a red car approaching the crosswalk. There's no light telling me to walk or not here, so usually the cars slow to let bikers go. And this car did slow, so I charged ahead. But he must have been looking the opposite direction, because as I accelerated, so did he - a lot! And bam, he slammed right into my side!

Thankfully, I realized I was falling before I hit the ground, so I put my arm out to block my fall. But I landed on my wrist and sprained it badly. The force of the fall caused me to fly off my bike and slide across the road. Thank goodness I'd worn yoga pants instead of tights today! And man, Victoria's Secret makes excellent yoga pants, because they didn't rip at all!

But my knees got completely torn up underneath. I had really bad road rash.

The guy driving got out of the car and kept going "Daijoubu? Daijoubu?"

I just nodded and said "daijoubu" while trying not to cry. Then the crossing guard came over and was like, "daijoubu?" When I said yes, he left. 

There were also a bunch of people around who witnessed the crash, but they all continued on their way, not stopping to see how I was.

The driver had run over the front tire of my bike, so he backed up his car and then helped me pick up my bike. He watched to make sure I could walk and waited until I got on my bike and rode it a little to see if it still worked. It did, so then he left.

Damn, I was so freaked out that I wasn't thinking and couldn't speak Japanese or anything. I really wanted to yell at the guy or something, but I don't know enough Japanese. It was so hard. And the lack of people around doing anything really frustrated me. Like, if this had happened in America, I'm sure someone would have offered to call the police or something!

I kept going and a police officer type of guy who'd been standing at the next corner and saw everything was all like "ki o tsukute ne" when I passed.

The bike seemed a bit wonky, but I figured something was just stuck from the fall, and whatever it was would come out. And anyway, I was almost at the station and I was able to ride it just fine.

I was really freaked about the accident the entire way to school. I met up with Esteban at the subway and told him what happened. The subway was packed again, and the doors took several tries before they could finally close.

At school, Taylor and Minju were in the CJS office and I told them what had happened and they freaked out! Minju gave me a hug, which was just what I needed! Then I told the CJS office and Mitch told me to go to the clinic. I said I would, but I was going to take my quiz first because I didn't want to get a 0 on it. 

When I got to class, I told Kondo sensei I was going to the clinic after the quiz. Everyone freaked out when I told them what had happened. I took the quiz and it was super easy, and then I left to the clinic.

The lady at the clinic was so nice! She asked me all these questions about the accident, like where it had happened and stuff. I realized then that I hadn't gotten any information about the guy like his name or cell or license plate number or anything! I was so freaked out I didn't even think of it.

But the lady gave me one of those cold square sticky things the people in manga always have on their foreheads when they have fevers, to put over my wrist. And then she disinfected my knees and put bandages over them. Then she put these weird gauze sack things over my wrist and knees. I felt much better after that.

And then I was allowed to go back to class! The cold thing on my wrist was so nice. My wrist hurt a lot for a bit after, but by the end of the day it was feeling so much better!

All bandaged up!

For second period, we had class in K buidling. I freaked out because the room looked just like the classrooms in manga, haha. And I got there first, so I stole a seat by the windows! :)

See the protagonist's seat back there?

The erasers that look like sushi!

And the colored chalk!

Ah, it was beautiful! In class, after our kanji test (which was easy), we played a kanji game where we had cards with various kanji radicals and we had to put them together to make kanji from our chapter. It was fun!
I got second place!! First was the Taiwanese girl, of course!

Sakura out the window on the stairs

At lunchtime, I went to eat misokatsu at Dagane. I sat with Josephine and Jose and this other girl who I see a lot (she's in my calligraphy class), but who's name I don't know. There were so, so many people eating lunch!
There was a girl at the table next to us who's birthday was today, and a group of her friends came in and surprised her with a cake and a present of lip gloss! It was so cute! Then they all sang "Happy Birthday" in English. For some reason, "Happy Birthday" is always sung in English in Japan...?

After lunch, I walked outside and ran into Emma. I followed her to the green area where she'd eaten lunch and we sat there for a bit. Rana, Ben, and Devon found us there and sat with us and ate the bentos they'd gotten from Valor, a grocery store nearby. I told everyone the story of my accident and they were so surprised I was so upbeat and joking around about it! The scariness had worn off and it seemed kind of funny now. I'd been hit by a car! #shitthathappensinJapan

The beautiful sakura

In hanga class, I drew Totoro! I'm excited to carve him next week. :D

After class, I had a meeting with Fukutomi sensei, my project work sensei, to make up for the class I'd missed last Friday. I went to the CJS faculty office at 3, when we were supposed to meet, and finally got up the guts to use the microphone outside the office to ask for Fukutomi sensei. Another sensei came out to tell me she was still teaching class. So I went outside the office where I ran into Yukari! She asked what I was doing and when I told her, said she thought Fukutomi sensei's office was on the 7th floor. So we went up there, but it turned out those were all offices of English senseis. Yukari asked two people up there, but they didn't know who Fukutomi sensei was. So we went back downstairs, and as we entered the CJS office, Fukutomi sensei was coming out of the faculty room. Oh, good! I said goodbye to Yukari and then explained to Fukutomi sensei what had happened. She apoligized for being late.
Then she had me practice saying my interview questions and told me to interview at least two Japanese students by Friday. Ok, I can do that!

As I was leaving, I ran into Deanna who told me Minju had told her about my accident. She asked if I was okay and gave me a hug. People here are so nice! ^^ Also, Mitch let me know one of his colleagues had called my host family (whaaaat?? I hadn't wanted to worry them! I was waiting to tell them face to face so they could see I was fine!) and Yuko had said they could take me to the hospital if needed. Oh, gosh! I didn't want this to turn into such a big deal!
I went to the library to write my blog for a bit and then headed home. As I rode my bike home, I noticed something was definitely off. Every few seconds, the front wheel would catch on something and slow me down. It turned out the wheel was tilting one way and kept rubbing against the brake pad. It took me forever to get home.
I decided something was definitely wrong with it.

When I got home, Yuko made sure I was okay. I told her I definitely didn't need to go to the hospital because I could use my arm fine, so it wasn't broken. Then I told her that I didn't think the bike was okay, so she said she'd ask Ken to look at it tomorrow.

Argh, this is turning into such a hassle!

For dinner we had fried peppers with beef inside. They were good! We had salad, soup, and rice too! It was such a big, yummy dinner that filled me up! :) Miya told me she'd gotten into class #1. I was like, "aww, not by the library?" And she was unhappy about that. I asked her what class Tina had gotten and she said 4. That was the one she had wanted! Aw, man. I felt bad for her.

Tomorrow our class is during the CJS festa, so we'll just be talking to Japanese students during class! Yay!! I'm so excited! And that means we only have to be at school at 1:30! Whoooo!!
But I had the idea in hanga today to go for lunch at Sushiro, so Minju, Emma, and I are all going to meet at 11:30 tomorrow morning to eat there. Yay, I get to sleep in! 


Also, here are the links for the pep rally movies I uploaded to YouTube (because they weren't working on my blog). Please watch them!

Shirtless football players for the ladies:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAa8McKyFNc

Cheerleaders for the guys:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kUveIgohIOw

And cheerleaders singing what I think is our school song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0T3MHFh4cA

Fat Tuesday

Interesting fact: last night at dinner when we were talking about the fact that I was watching Mononoke Hime, Yuko was asking me about other Ghibli movies and if I'd seen them (btw she and Miya haven't seen Spirited Away - whaaattt?? Yuko said it would be difficult for Miya to understand) and she brought up Grave of the Fireflies. I said I'd seen it. Gosh, that was a sad movie. Anyway, firefly in Japanese is hotaru. And she and Miyabi both saw hotaru for the first time ever last year! They come out around Gifu and in June only. And the interesting part is in Japan, you're not allowed to catch them!! It's because they're an endangered species here. I found it hard to believe since there's soooo many in America! But one landed Miya's head and then finger and people around them started glaring at them and whispering that Miya was catching the fireflies lol.

So anyway, today at school I realized something absolutely TERRIBLE!! Heather and I were talking about how today's Fat Tuesday (I completely forgot until then!) so we have to feast since Ash Wednesday is tomorrow and we can't eat much. I was like crap, I'm gonna be so hungry without my in between class snack of chocolate chip melon pan!

And theeeennnn... Heather was all "oh, and remember, we can't eat meat on Friday"

And then it sunk in...

And I realized...

I CAN'T EAT MISOKATSUDON ON FRIDAYS!!!!!!!! 

NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

Omg what am I going to do????

There is literally nothing good to eat at Nanzan that doesn't have meat in it! 

:(((((((((

Also, I wasn't planning on going to Ash Wednesday mass tomorrow because I didn't want to miss Coffee Hour or get home too late for dinner, but Heather and Cam want me to go with them to this church nearby with an English mass after coffee hour. 

Argh I'm gonna get even more stares and comments from my host family than I already do when I have blonde hair plus a black cross on my forehead lol. Whatever, idgaf.

But seriously, look how busy I am this month!!

(All the dots are events in my life :S )

At lunch I had the lunch special because you know, it's Mardi Gras and all.

(Dayum, look at all that food!)

And I actually finished it pretty quickly for once! Then I went to the lockers to get my knives with Rafa and Esteban and on they way, I was all like "Hey guys, wanna come to the vagina festival this weekend?" 

They cracked up. Rafa said he was busy, but Esteban said he'd go! I'm so excited for it! I found out about it last weekend, so I'm trying to find people to go with.

In Hanga, I kept making Minju and Emma laugh because I was failing so hard. See, first I drew Rilakkuma on the block, but then I carved the part that I'd meant to not carve and put ink on!

So I flipped the block over and redrew him. Because we cover the block with a black paper and trace over that in order to get our drawing to show up on the block, I couldn't remember how much of it I'd drawn, but I was pretty sure I got it all. So I took the paper off... And was like "shit!" I'd forgotten the eyes! Emma thought this was hilarious.

So I put the paper back on and traced the eyes, but I ended up tracing them on the wrong spot! Emma, Minju, and I were dying of laughter at this point. I was laughing so hard I was crying. I finally just drew the eyes straight on the wood.

(The outline of the eyes is the first attempt)

Ugh, Hanga is so hard! So yeah, next week I'll have to finish carving.

I walked to the subway with Emma after school today and we got to talk to each other for a long time which we haven't done in a while! It was fun. :)

Then I rode the rest of the way home. I decided to stop at Seiyu before going home because it was just before 5, so I was home early for once! And yeah, bad idea. I bought sooo much, haha!

Fat Tuesday feast, guys!

(It was kinda expensive... But I got the 6 slices of wheat bread, the pink red bean buns, and the okashi on sale!)

I saw the okashi and I was like omfggg, I want! I've always wanted to try the pink thing with the leaf, but it's ridiculously expensive. But it was on sale today, so here was my chance!

The jam and the mikan weren't on sale but whatevs, I wanted them. I'll probably end up sharing the jam with my host family but oh well. I was thinking of walking into the kitchen and being all like "oh hot damn, this is my jam!" Hahaha.

Naw, that's only funny in English... Or if you're familiar with that song...

Anyway, so Yuko was home when I got home. So I went into my room to break into my okashi!

(It says it's for hinamatsuri, so that's why it was on sale! There was a bunch of mochi there too and thousands of those pink red bean buns that I got 1 thing of)

(The inside)

First I ate the pink thing with the leaf I've been wanting to try basically my entire life. 

(Yuuuussss, it had anko inside!)

I wasn't sure if I was supposed to eat the leaf or not, so I decided to eat it. But after my first bite with the leaf, I decided it tasted too bad and peeled it off.

Then I had the giant green mochi ball.

(It was filled with anko too!)

I was kinda done with sweets at this point, so I ate a mikan. I decided to share the gray ones with pink on top with Yuko and Miya and eat the dango after dinner.

Then Miya got home and she and I sat under my kotatsu and watched the hour and twenty minutes left of Mononoke Hime. Miya seemed bored during a lot of it. I don't blame her. Out of all the Ghibli movies, this one's definitely my least favorite. But she stayed through the entire thing and nodded later when Yuko asked if it was interesting.

Then Yuko, Miya, and I ate dinner. Yuko made a big meal (perfect for Fat Tuesday! Although I told Yuko about Mardis Gras and she'd never heard of it lol). It was her first time making minced chicken with daikon (and it was delicious!), so she took pictures.

Yuko's pix:

I tasted ginger in the daikon and chicken and Yuko said there was ginger in it!

My picture of it:

After dinner, I brought in the sweets I bought to share and then Yuko made us all another small cup of tea. I asked Yuko about the pink leaf sweet (she said it's Sakura mochi) and she said you do eat the leaf, lol! Oh well. The leaf was kinda sour anyway.

Miya and Yuko said "gochisousama" and "arigatou Keito" to me! It made me so happy. :)

Ken got home after we finished eating and then I did my homework. I also ate the dango and it was a little hard, unfortunately. It wasn't as good as the one I had at Atsuko's. :/

Also, I have no idea what it's for, but Google's looking pretty snazzy here today!

(It's something about Hiroshima)

So yeah, Mardi Gras doesn't exist in Japan, so it was definitely an experience seeing absolutely nobody celebrating it. No beads, no boobs, no nothing. But at least I celebrated the "eat everything in sight" part of it haha!

I get around like sushi on a kaiten

Haha so the title is lyrics from a song on my M-Flo cd. I really like those lyrics! :)

This morning I caught the early train for once. When I got to school I had tons of time, so I did some preparation for my trip to Tokyo.

I have a bunch of friends going to this anime convention in Tokyo, so I was looking into it to see if I wanted I go too. But I'd have to stay until Saturday and I probably wouldn't recognize most of the anime there... So idk.

We had another test I didn't realize we had today. But it was kanji, so it was easy. 

We had to give presentations about our family and hometown today and then write a letter to a Japanese friend not in Nagoya. Good thing I have a lot of them! :)

At lunch, Esteban and I decided to try today's lunch special. It was mini chicken katsudon and was really good! It came with noodles too, so I chose udon. And I got to pick a side! It was soooo much food! 

We finished in just enough time to make it to hanga! And I had a mega food baby afterwards.

In hanga, I inked my woodblock with added petals. I sucked at transferring it to paper, so here's sensei's:

I also finally cut myself! I knew it would only be a matter of time until I spilled blood in hanga. I just accidentally brushed my hand over the knife and it hurt, but when I looked at my hand, it was just a scratch.

Later though, I realized I had broken the skin because it was bleeding.

(Not much but still scary if you're a hemophobe like me)

So I talked to Minju in hanga about how I want to go to the Ghibli museum while I'm in Tokyo and she told me she's going and bought the ticket last night! Ahh so we decided we'd go together and I asked her to help me buy a ticket because you have to use the konbini macjine and it's all in Japanese and stuff...

So after class, we went to the Lawson's on campus to buy my ticket. But the one for Wednesday at 12 that she had gotten was all sold out!!! Nooooo!

I tried the 10 am, but that was sold out too. So I ended up getting Wednesday at 2pm. So she's going to have to wait in the museum two hours for me. :(

But the good news is you can stay in the museum for as long as you want! 

Then Minju went to the library and I went to the Japan Plaza. There was a guy in 500 in there working on his pronunciation. Man, I wish I was at a level where I actually cared about pronunciation! Now, I'm still trying to just speak!

The guy in there wasn't really talkative but I did my homework and he checked it and corrected things for me, which was nice. Then two other people in higher levels came in and I listened to them speak while I rewrote my letter with the guy's corrections. After that I went home.

We had hashiririce for dinner tonight. It was yummy. Miya kept saying "Let It Go" at dinner because she'd heard the song "Let It Go" in an ad for Frozen, this movie that's coming out in Japan that everyone's been talking about. It came out in America in like November but I never saw it, but I apparently I should have...

After dinner I did a little homework and then looked at hostels in Tokyo. I'm sooo excited for Tokyo!!!!

Also, side note, it's gotten really warm here!! Like, this whole week's in the upper 50s! I've been unzipping my jacket in the afternoons because it feels so warm and balmy. Spring is approaching and I couldn't be more excited!

No more sleeping in my sweater with the covers over my head so my face doesn't get cold. (I'm so jealous of Rana's room with her own heater she can control. I woke up at her house sweating for the first time since I've come here!)

Anyway, おやすみ peeps!

Visiting the Rainbow House

This morning everyone was really tired. When I woke up at 6:15, Yuko and Miyabi were still sleeping. So I got dressed. I debated whether I should wake Yuko when at 6:30 she was still sleeping. But I finally heard her moving around at 6:45 and then she called me to breakfast a few minutes later, saying "gomen nasai." But hey, having breakfast that late meant we had cereal! Without salad!! We had Yuko's homemade bread with marmalade and orange slices instead. So I was really happy!

Then I went and got my raisin bread, peanut butter, and jelly mom had sent me to make peanut butter and jelly. Yuko and Miya thought the bread was awesome! I said it was small, but Miya thought it was big. I had too when I was her age. Weird.

So I gave her the end piece to eat and she liked it a lot.

Then I made two sandwiches since the bread is so small! Yuko an Miya thought the peanut butter was so awesome. After I had spread it, I opened the jelly and started spreading it on the other bread slice. Yuko was like "You're using jelly and peanut butter??" Haha I explained this was a common sandwich to make in America, although it's usually more for kids.

She asked if peanut butter was sweet or salty because I was using a lot if jelly. I told her both, but I just really like jelly.

Then I put the two slices together and Yuko and Miya were like "whooaaa!"

Hahahahaha. I guess pb&j isn't a thing in Japan! It's hard to believe that people here find this thing so amazing that is so, so common in America haha.

My lunch is so American today, and I'm loving it! :)

I did my homework on the subway, because I hadn't felt like doing it last night lol. Then at school I went to get my book from my locker. I had this amazing idea one day where I take a picture of the book pages I need for homework on my phone and then I don't have to lug my book home! I'm so smart.

I love the bathroom in the building with the lockers because it's PINK!! And it has a super long mirror where you can stand and do your makeup. If only it didn't have squatty potties. :(

Japanese class felt like it took forever today! Probs cause we had Kandou sensei and she doesn't let us out early like Mutsukawa sensei does. Ugh. I was so tired too. And it was so hot in the room. And the guy next to me smelled bad.

There was one funny part though. We had to do so much writing today, so by the last paragraph thing we had to write, I was kind of sick of it, so I decided to have some fun.

We had to write about our hometown (in Japanese) by following along with this example paragraph about Moscow. At the end, it said "Moscow is a good place. Everyone, by all means, please come to Russia."

So I wrote about Houston and at the end I said "Houston is not a good place. Everyone, please never come to Houston."

Sensei came over to read my paragraph and cracked up. So much so that she put her head down on my desk and her whole body shook. Then she said it was the most interesting paragraph she had read.

Also she gave us a kanji workbook with kanji not in our textbook! Yay!!

During class, Natalia said she and her Japanese roommate were going to be making chocolate for Valentine's Day, did we want to come?

I've always wanted to do deco chocolate like Japanese people do! And it would be fun with her Japanese roommate showing us how to do it for real.

So I decided to go. Natalia told me she'd leave a map of how to get to the house she lives in (called the Rainbow House) and the phone number of the house in my mailbox.

At lunch, I ate my sandwiches with Emma, Minju, and some other people in the cafeteria next to the gym. Ah it was so amazing eating American food! 

I really like the roof area outside the cafeteria. I hope they put tables there in the spring.

(It was raining)

Then I had Hanga. Today we had to draw a picture and then trace it onto the woodblock and carve it. So hard!

I drew Sakura flower things.

(We had to draw it on the back of the woodblock we used last time and mine was covered in ink lol)

Then I went to get the map Natalia said she'd put in my mailbox, but there was nothing there. So I walked with Esteban and Rafa to my locker to put my book and Hanga stuff in. When I went back to the CJS office, my locker was still empty. So I got a map and the number of the rainbow house from the CJS staff.

I debated just heading home (and I probably should have), but at the last minute, I got off the subway and transferred to the Tsurumai line and rode to Ueda, where the rainbow house is. 

On the way, I streetpassed someone from Hokkaido!! Omg I've been wanting someone from Hokkaido! :D

When I got off the station I was distracted by the grocery store Natalia always talks about (at least I think it was the one) and stopped to look around in there a bit. This resulted in me turning the wrong way when I came back out and I got lost. 

(I saw this cool shrine though!)

I tried asking for help at a 7-11, but the lady couldn't help much, so I just walked back to the station. Then I saw I had turned the wrong way and finally figured out which way to go.

It was a walk up a big hill, but I finally made it.

(Engrish sign)

(So cute!)

I stopped at a house that looked like it was where the rainbow house was on my map and rang the bell. No one answered, so I walked all the way around and found another door and rang that bell. 

This guy came on the intercom and was all like "who are you?" And I said I was looking for the Rainbow House. Then this lady came out and walked me over to it. It turns out they were the landlords.

Only two of the six girls were home, though, and neither was Natalia. One was this girl, Autumn, I had met a couple of times, so she knew me.

Autumn took me into the kitchen and told me she had no idea where Natalia was either. She was supposed to be back by then because they were going to make chocolate together, but she hadn't shown up.

So Autumn and I made chocolate. Autumn gave me some snacks their Japanese roommate had given them for Setsubun last night before she left to go back to her hometown. They were really good!

It was really cool seeing the rainbow house. I liked it a lot. It's fairly close to school and has good wifi and is pretty big (two bathrooms and two showers!). Autumn showed me her room, which was also really big. Autumn said last semester they were all in high levels if Japanese and thus only spoke Japanese in the house! But then one girl moved out and Natalia moved in. Since Natalia's only in 300, they speak English a lot now.

The only thing I wouldn't like about living there, though, is having to cook for myself and not getting to experience how a Japanese family lives.

I had to leave at 5:30 so I could make it home in time for dinner at 7. The chocolate wasn't done by then. :( but Autumn said she'd bring me some at school tomorrow. Then another of the girls came gone. She gave me some cookies and Ferrero Rocher that she had. Natalia never showed up.

So I walked back to the station, which took me no time now that I knew the way! All today strong, icy, Blacksburg-like winds were blowing, so it was really cold walking back to the station since it was sunset!

The bike ride home was a bitch. I jept getting buffeted by freezing winds and when I got home my nose was running and my face and hands were numb and hurting! Also, there was this black cat at one of the street corners that I almost ran over because it blended into the night!

Dinner was good! We had a lot of fried things and rice and soup and salad. Yummy yummy. Ken got home after we were finished, but we sat around and talked for a bit with him. Yuko asked me about when Rana and I were doing the nomihoudai with the two Japanese girls and told me all about the Japanese expression for "drinking till the morning" and how she used to drink till morning all the time and how fun it was haha.

She asked Ken if he did this too and he said he was always too tired. She called him a grandpa lol!

She asked me if I've ever drank till morning and I said no. I didn't tell her that I'm an old fart too basically because I always end up ptfo'ing on the couch of whoever's apartment I'm in lol.

Then I practiced kanji and went to sleep.

Pix from Facebook:

From the night Miya's friends were over for dinner:

From Obaasan's house:

(Miya, Obaasan, and me with the cake)

(Obaasan teaching me how to wash my hands at the temple)

(Me catching mochi!)

Also, here's a pic of all of us at the Illuminations way back in my first weekend in Japan!

(Lawlz I'm taller than everyone)

I like this picture a lot. It's one of those rare ones where everyone looks good. Yuko has it as her cover photo in Facebook.

Also, everyone go right now and look again at yesterday's post about Setsubun, because I added all the pictures!!