Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Gomen
I apologise for the serious lack of updates. I wasn't updating because I was busy, and then I wasn't updating because I was finally sleeping, and now I'm not updating because I had a kanji test yesterday and I have a super-serious speech exam tomorrow where I will be judged for my tones even though Japanese is ostensibly not a tonal language. Anyways, I plan to have updates up by Friday morning. There's a lot to say!!
Monday, February 18, 2008
Friday, February 15, 2008
Bowling
The screens showed amusing animations vaguely related to the plays when something happened. It wasn't only for strikes and spares, but also for "gutter" and "miss".
Afterwards we went to a restaurant and talked for a long time. The three Japanese boys knew some English, one was almost fluent, but we mostly tried to speak in Japanese. It became impossible when we started talking about relationships, though. We've never learned that kind of vocabulary :)
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Yotei
Here, for my organization and your tantilization, is my schedule from the vacation:
Tuesday night: Bowling and cultural exchange with a bunch of Japanese boys.
Wednesday: First day of the vacation; I met up with Ksenia and Nathalie at Nagoya Eki around noon and took the bus to Kyoto. Checked in at J-Hoppers tte iu youth hostel; met with the other three at the Kyoto Cultural Museum, had dinner and went out for puri and karaoke.
Thursday: Woke up in Kyoto in my cave. Lots of things including Nijojo Castle and wandering around outside Kinkakuji. A decent dinner at Mr. Young Men tte iu restaurant (okonomiyaki!) and early to bed.
Friday: Fushimi Inari and Kiyomizudera. Also sento (public bath) in the evening! That was cute. Old Japanese ladies put shampoo on our heads.
Saturday: Tried to return to Nagoya in a bus in the middle of a blizzard. Also, Takurazuka. Slept in my own bed for the only time this break.
Sunday: Woke up to Miki calling me; left asap for Saitama. The shinkansen was thrilling. Took about forty minutes (!!) to find her in the station because of communication difficulties. There also seemed to be a duplicate station somehow. I am not sure. Had lunch, went back to her house, went grocery shopping and made nikujaga (literally "meat and potatoes", pretty much like stew. Which is apparently not "stuu" but "shichuu"). Some interesting episodes involving escaping vegetables.
Monday: Shopping in Omiya! We went around the giant mall in the train station and had Starbucks for lunch. Also went to the shrine in the area, which was very nice. In the evening I attempted to show her how to make spaghetti carbonara, although the bacon was pretty weird.
Tuesday: It was raining and grey, so we stayed in for most of the day. For breakfast I made her pancakes, including an M for Miki. Then we spent most of the day making truffles for Valentine's day and watching "Pretty Woman". Then we left for the takoyaki party! I'm not sure if we have one word for riding two to a bicycle, but the Japanese do, and it's an extremely fun activity. Takoyaki was also awesome, there was a ton of food and it was fun to make and we just sat around and ate and watched boys play videogames. We fell asleep as they played Super Smash Brothers from around midnight straight til 8 in the morning.
Wednesday: It was super windy today. I wanted to know how schoolgirls feel in winter so I wore a skirt. What happens is your legs go completely numb and then it's bearable. Miki showed me around Saitama Daigaku, which is much prettier than Nanzan. Right now I'm waiting for her to get back from her job so we can go to dinner. I also fell asleep in the kotatsu, which I highly recommend, especially for freezing schoolgirls.
Thursday: Tomorrow's plan is to leave early and meet up with Nathalie and Hiroe at noon for shopping. I hope it works, it would be cool.
Friday: First day of classes.
Tuesday night: Bowling and cultural exchange with a bunch of Japanese boys.
Wednesday: First day of the vacation; I met up with Ksenia and Nathalie at Nagoya Eki around noon and took the bus to Kyoto. Checked in at J-Hoppers tte iu youth hostel; met with the other three at the Kyoto Cultural Museum, had dinner and went out for puri and karaoke.
Thursday: Woke up in Kyoto in my cave. Lots of things including Nijojo Castle and wandering around outside Kinkakuji. A decent dinner at Mr. Young Men tte iu restaurant (okonomiyaki!) and early to bed.
Friday: Fushimi Inari and Kiyomizudera. Also sento (public bath) in the evening! That was cute. Old Japanese ladies put shampoo on our heads.
Saturday: Tried to return to Nagoya in a bus in the middle of a blizzard. Also, Takurazuka. Slept in my own bed for the only time this break.
Sunday: Woke up to Miki calling me; left asap for Saitama. The shinkansen was thrilling. Took about forty minutes (!!) to find her in the station because of communication difficulties. There also seemed to be a duplicate station somehow. I am not sure. Had lunch, went back to her house, went grocery shopping and made nikujaga (literally "meat and potatoes", pretty much like stew. Which is apparently not "stuu" but "shichuu"). Some interesting episodes involving escaping vegetables.
Monday: Shopping in Omiya! We went around the giant mall in the train station and had Starbucks for lunch. Also went to the shrine in the area, which was very nice. In the evening I attempted to show her how to make spaghetti carbonara, although the bacon was pretty weird.
Tuesday: It was raining and grey, so we stayed in for most of the day. For breakfast I made her pancakes, including an M for Miki. Then we spent most of the day making truffles for Valentine's day and watching "Pretty Woman". Then we left for the takoyaki party! I'm not sure if we have one word for riding two to a bicycle, but the Japanese do, and it's an extremely fun activity. Takoyaki was also awesome, there was a ton of food and it was fun to make and we just sat around and ate and watched boys play videogames. We fell asleep as they played Super Smash Brothers from around midnight straight til 8 in the morning.
Wednesday: It was super windy today. I wanted to know how schoolgirls feel in winter so I wore a skirt. What happens is your legs go completely numb and then it's bearable. Miki showed me around Saitama Daigaku, which is much prettier than Nanzan. Right now I'm waiting for her to get back from her job so we can go to dinner. I also fell asleep in the kotatsu, which I highly recommend, especially for freezing schoolgirls.
Thursday: Tomorrow's plan is to leave early and meet up with Nathalie and Hiroe at noon for shopping. I hope it works, it would be cool.
Friday: First day of classes.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Yasumi
For those who didn't know, I've had break from last Wednesday til this Friday. From Wednesday to Saturday I was in Kyoto, and then on Sunday I left for Saitama, where I am now, with Miki!! It's really great. But the difficult thing is when I have to write blog entries for everything I've been doing!! So expect some sporadic updates starting my Friday morning, I think.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
映画館 (February 2, 2008)
The two main differences between a Japanese cinema and an American one are that the seats vibrate and that everyone is completely silent, even through the final credits. No one got up to leave until the lights were back on.
Yesterday was surprisingly fun. I thought that an outing to watch "Bridge to Terabithia" (someone must someday help me with the spelling) with my host mom and sister would be kind of boring, but we had a lot of fun, and I appreciated the movie more than I expected. It was about kids, yes, but it was not childish. It was about what it's like to be a kid, at least somewhere outside of New York City. Jess' house reminded me of Vermont, but it could have been rural Pennsylvania or something. And I appreciated the emphasis on drawing and writing. My host mom and sister were completely shocked when Leslie died. I had of course read the book in elementary school or whenever, so I knew that the story wasn't just play and it was a bit 悲しい, but I didn't want to give away the ending so I didn't tell them anything besides that. But I honestly liked it. I thought Leslie's character was unrealistic for that age - she looked and thought like a small teenager, not a middle-schooler - but Jess was very much like a small boy, and the school dynamics were only on the edge of being overdone instead of drowning in it. Also, Leslie was such a pixie that it made up for anything else to be able to watch her.
My host mother said she liked it a lot. I know Reiko was crying, but I hope she liked it too. I think Kaori liked it for that; I think - though mistranslations are rampant - that she was surprised by how moved she was. For me, it was that weird nostalgia again, for places I have no memories of. Maybe the Japanese have a better word for that. But probably I will have to take up another language.
After the movie we went down to an arcade that was in the movie theater (!!) and took プリクラ! Reiko says that her friends just call them "プリ". I believe I have explained how they work already. Anyways, I had trouble smiling, but we still got a couple cute ones. And they're sparkly!!
Anyways.
Today I think I'm going to Osu (surprise surprise) with Ksenia and Kate to look for electronic dictionaries and get a flash drive so I don't have to cart my hard drive around with me and worry about it. Should be useful. If I had an electronic dictionary it would be a lot easier to be on my own. Things like going off to visit Miki by myself...if I got lost it would get pretty difficult if there were signs I couldn't read. Contrary to popular belief, this country is not that English-friendly, at least this section of it. Most extremely important signs (like "airport") are in English, but if you're not going to the airport, you'll be pretty confused by which way you're supposed to go from the train station or what the toilet is telling you to do. And I haven't encountered a single Japanese person wanting to speak to me in English yet, although that's said to be common. At this point, I had more experiences with that in rural China.
Postscript:
悲しい (kanashii) - sad
プリクラ (purikura) - purikura, short for "print club", photo stickers.
Yesterday was surprisingly fun. I thought that an outing to watch "Bridge to Terabithia" (someone must someday help me with the spelling) with my host mom and sister would be kind of boring, but we had a lot of fun, and I appreciated the movie more than I expected. It was about kids, yes, but it was not childish. It was about what it's like to be a kid, at least somewhere outside of New York City. Jess' house reminded me of Vermont, but it could have been rural Pennsylvania or something. And I appreciated the emphasis on drawing and writing. My host mom and sister were completely shocked when Leslie died. I had of course read the book in elementary school or whenever, so I knew that the story wasn't just play and it was a bit 悲しい, but I didn't want to give away the ending so I didn't tell them anything besides that. But I honestly liked it. I thought Leslie's character was unrealistic for that age - she looked and thought like a small teenager, not a middle-schooler - but Jess was very much like a small boy, and the school dynamics were only on the edge of being overdone instead of drowning in it. Also, Leslie was such a pixie that it made up for anything else to be able to watch her.
My host mother said she liked it a lot. I know Reiko was crying, but I hope she liked it too. I think Kaori liked it for that; I think - though mistranslations are rampant - that she was surprised by how moved she was. For me, it was that weird nostalgia again, for places I have no memories of. Maybe the Japanese have a better word for that. But probably I will have to take up another language.
After the movie we went down to an arcade that was in the movie theater (!!) and took プリクラ! Reiko says that her friends just call them "プリ". I believe I have explained how they work already. Anyways, I had trouble smiling, but we still got a couple cute ones. And they're sparkly!!
Anyways.
Today I think I'm going to Osu (surprise surprise) with Ksenia and Kate to look for electronic dictionaries and get a flash drive so I don't have to cart my hard drive around with me and worry about it. Should be useful. If I had an electronic dictionary it would be a lot easier to be on my own. Things like going off to visit Miki by myself...if I got lost it would get pretty difficult if there were signs I couldn't read. Contrary to popular belief, this country is not that English-friendly, at least this section of it. Most extremely important signs (like "airport") are in English, but if you're not going to the airport, you'll be pretty confused by which way you're supposed to go from the train station or what the toilet is telling you to do. And I haven't encountered a single Japanese person wanting to speak to me in English yet, although that's said to be common. At this point, I had more experiences with that in rural China.
Postscript:
悲しい (kanashii) - sad
プリクラ (purikura) - purikura, short for "print club", photo stickers.
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