Day 17

Today my host mom bought me a yukata--summer kimono--as a present. It's beautiful and I love it! I will now post many pictures of it as a pathetic excuse for a real entry:

The whole ensemble.

Bag to go with it.

Detail of obi.

Detail of fabric.

Yukata and obi together.

Day 16

6-28-08

Purikura and Karaoke. Two very important aspects to any Japanese schoolgirl’s life, and both of which I experienced today. After I had finished my strenuous classes (1)--yes, there is school on Saturday--Noriko, our friends Reona and Yuka, and myself all boarded the train and headed down to Kurume, an area in the city filled with shops, restaurants, gambling parlors and other such cosmopolitan things. We traveled first to the karaoke place, which was called Magic Kingdom or Magic Palace of something equally Disney-esque. The whole outside of the place was outfitted with that fake blue cave stuff they use at Disneyland and there were comforting Disney characters painted about, while still retaining that urban charm that makes one want to slowly back away. Instead of having to sing in front of everyone there, (which always seems the sadistic nature of karaoke), this establishment had separate group rooms--again with an adorable Disney character painted on each door--which were essentially 6x6 foot boxes equipped with a couch, a table, a television, and more song choices than I could ever begin to look through, including a large number of English songs. According to the great and magnificent tradition of karaoke (2), I mostly chose songs which I would be embarrassed to be associated with normally, but which were ridiculously fun to sing. Sadly, I was utterly and completely shown up by my karaoke-seasoned friends, who all had naturally good voices as well as having much more practice in the art of singing without being able to hear yourself.

From there, we moved on to find purikura, something that I have discovered to be one of those things you must experience to truly understand and love. The establishment we visited was divided equally between two very respectable and mature (3) pastimes: purikura, and the claw-style arcade games. I have never in my life seen that many grabby-games in one place. For those who don’t know, purikura are Japanese photo booths, with effects taken to the extreme. The first step, after feeding the machine 400 yen, is to take the photos, during which you can choose from any number of backgrounds, from basic color to wild patterns to yourself inside a sandwich. Since there were so many booths, my friends and I play chose one at random, and set about taking our photos. And yes, I did choose the sandwich background. Once the pictures have been taken, you move to another booth, with a high-tech touch screen for editing the pictures. They have sparkles and writing tools, stamps and borders, celebrity pictures and every other possible thing to make you picture look fantastic.(4) You press “Finished” and it prints out your pictures.

Which are about the size of your thumbnail, all printed on one sheet of paper, with backing that peels of so you can stick your photos to things. To be truly honest, I do not understand the point in any way whatsoever, but I love them all the same.

Purikura, pasted in my journal.

With my hand for size comparison.

After purikura, we wasted some money on the grabby-machines and then headed home. I left with a burning hatred for all grabby-machines across the globe, as I had spent (5) 300 yen on attempts to get a stupid paper fan, all of which failed horribly, and received nothing for my efforts but a tiny Winne the Pooh keychain which Noriko won and gave to me.

Dastardly, evil machine with it’s deceptively easy buttons and big grabby claw.

---------------------

(1) Free time reading
(2) Which I have just made up to excuse my song choices.
(3) Pointlessly fun.
(4) Absolutely ridiculous.
(5) Wasted

Day 15

Wake up. Eat. School. Eat. More school. Go home. Eat. Bathe. Sleep.

I love you all, now I'm going to bed.

Day 14

It occurred to me while riding the train home from school today, that my school day--that is, from the time I leave to go to school, to the time I at last return--is twelve hours long. Twelve. No joke. We leave the house at 6:30am to catch the bus (and then the train, and then the other train, and then the other bus…) and by the time that school is over and all the traveling home is done, it’s 6:30pm. No wonder Noriko and I are completely exhausted when we get home, and only want to eat, sleep and watch game shows which have “challenges” like How Many Carrots Can You Shove Into a Small Plastic Produce Bag and so forth. (Which, in case you were wondering, was 84. Though of course it depends on the size of the carrots. And possibly the temperature of the room…)

Since the majority of classes in my typical schedule for school are ones in which I don’t understand anything, and therefore don’t have to participate, I have been reading (on average) a 300-page book per day. Today was no exception. Homeroom, Classical Japanese, and math were all spent lurking in the back with my nose buried in my book, while debating whether or not listening to my headphones would be considered rude, seeing as I wasn’t expected to do anything anyway. I did, however, have P.E, which meant I joined the other girls (and only the girls--the boys were elsewhere) in the gym; me in my borrowed pants and bright orange Godzilla T-shirt, and everyone else in the white and blue matching gym clothes. I have decided that Japanese P.E. is much preferable to American gym class, because it has neither sit ups, push ups, or 10-minute runs. Instead, we ran two laps around the gym, did the Japanese Radio Exercise and spent the rest of the fifty minutes of class throwing a volleyball around and basically making fools of ourselves, while the teacher disappeared to her office for the duration of the class. For once, I actually had a good time in gym. It was like some sort of miracle.

But all those fun and games have sapped my willpower, and I am now a slave to the TV. And I really want a carrot.

Day 13

A 17-Year-Old American’s Analysis of 15 Minutes of Japanese Television:
(With the Remote Controlled by Host Sister)

8:50pm: Ending credits of an anime. Girls with impossibly long legs and so on. Ooo! Magic. Anime is now slightly less boring, but still yawn inducing because it is just the end credits. It seems most of the characters are not Asian, but Caucasian. From this, (and other references, such as looking at pictures of celebrities and such), it seems to me that the key to being beautiful/hot/cute/etc. in Japan is looking as white as possible. The less Asian you look, the better for you. Seems like all major celebrities have dyed their hair brown or blonde or red or some other non-black color, and girls perfect their pale by carrying umbrellas around when it’s sunny out. (Cannot criticize this, as I myself carry around an umbrella to hide from the sun).

8:54: Channel switch. Now watching boy band dressed in white suits and fedoras serenade live audience at some sort of event, unsure of what. Song is accompanied by intensely choreographed, impressive dance routine, and, of course, white suits are accented by contrasting color that is specific to each band member. When the song is over, band members take questions from the audience in a very anti-climatic sort of way. Conclusion: None.

8:57: Japanese variety show begins. I have come to love such shows, despite occasional utter childishness of them. This one is MC-ed by a bald man in a pink kimono, and two co-hosts, who are answering questions from the panel of (presumably) famous judges.

• 1st Act: A man wearing nothing but a black Speedo, a red towel around his neck and black knee-high boots with white laces does a comedy routine, complete with mime. Is apparently funny--don’t know as I cannot understand jokes--and after 3 minutes is swept offstage by a moving floor. Conclusion: Either people in Japan really like variety, or comedians are so bad that they can only keep up jokes for three minutes.
• 2nd Act: A drag queen and a man dressed as a young boy do a quick sketch about a mother and son, which centers around the son having a plastic water bottle stuck on his finger, and how he hides said bottle from his mother throughout the sketch. Eventually degrades into slapstick, and both comedians are swept offstage by moving sidewalk, with water bottle still firmly attached to finger.

And that was it. 15 minutes of my life and that’s all

Day 12

6-24-06

The most exciting that occurred today was that my school--yes, my entire school--went to see a Japanese musical. As my school slowly filled up the theater, I realized that I was about to see the professional theater equivalent of a Shorecrest Drama Kiddy Show. Oh boy.

The play was called (and yes, this was the provided English translation) “Japanese Lady in Hawaii.” No joke. Because I had no idea what anyone was saying, I had to rely on body language and tone to figure out the plot, but as the play turned out to be a melodrama, I had no trouble following the rough story. It was vaguely reminiscent of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, what with a group of mortals thrown into a magical land with a warring fairy couple and mischievous sprites and love potions and so on, except the love potion device disappeared after the first appearance, the fairies and mortals ended up falling in love with each other, the older guy got together with the younger girl (which was a little strange), they all did the hula, and then woke up, because it was all a dream. Needless to say, it was weird. And it only had one song, which they sang about a billion times over.

Since there was much walking and train-taking to get there, I was pretty much exhausted already when I got arrived. Following the convoluted plot, while thoroughly amusing and enjoyable, was not enough to keep me awake, so I tried to avoid sleeping by occasionally critiquing the stage crew. Y’know, that transition could have gone smoother/faster/better, why does that follow keep accidentally putting his/her light on the audience, why does that drop take eight million years to fly in, they just had to restart the music there because the transition took too long, if this were a Shorecrest show we could have had that fly in and house off in a quarter of the time… Of course, now I feel snobby and critical, but seriously, it took close to a minute to get the stupid jungle background drop in. Plus, I didn't fall asleep.

(Due to extensive travel, did not get home until 9:00, and still had to have dinner, which is my excuse as to why this entry is late. :D )

Day 11

A Day in the Life of Anna (While She's In Japan):

[And yes, most of these times are approximations]

5:30am - Wake up. Actually light out = good. Don't need alarm clock. Mad skills

6:00 - Have breakfast. Mmmm... scones that I baked for my family yesterday are tasty.

6:23 - Loiter around house getting stuff together.

6:26 - Get rushed out of the house by Noriko.

6:31 - Catch first bus. Lose track of time. Catch train. V. tired. Try to sleep.

6:47 - Notice gigantic venom-spitting hornet clinging to ceiling above my head.

6:51 - Working on breathing.

6:52 - Move slightly to the right so hornet is less likely to fall on my head.

6:55 - Keep sending shifty glances in direction of hornet. Has not moved, but is clearly not dead.

6:56 - Hope it will not die and fall on my head.

6:57 - Maybe I could skillfully dodge its attack and squish it viciously with my foot.

6:58 - When will we get to our stop?

7:25 - Phew. Get on school bus. Too many buses.

8:09 - Arrive at school. Swap nice black outdoor shoes for my only other pair: bright pink sneakers. It's a good look.

8:20 - Time for 20 minutes of tests, and for me to read my cheesy fantasy novel.

8:50 - Chem. class.

8:51 - Teacher asks if I understand. That's a joke.

8:56 - Trying to understand something involving ions and in another language is akin to having brain mashed with small wooden meat tenderizer.

8:57 - Or taking the AP Physics test.

9:40 - Am 153 pages into my book.

9:50 - Time to learn how to play the Japanese flute.

9:54 - Easier than Western style flute.

10:33 - If I have to play Do Re Mi one more time...

10:50 - Can chill in computer lab while class happens. Yay for internet.

10:55 - Check Myspace/Facebook/Email. Nothing.

10:56 - Try to listen to music on Myspace. "Error: JavaScript not enabled." Cry inside.

10:59 - Attempt to blog.

11:02 - Wah, all text turns to Hiragana. Cannot fix. Blogging is an epic failure.

11:04 - Resort to handwriting.

12:33pm - Make nifty origami things in my Japanese culture class.

12:35 - Stabbed hand with paper shuriken.

12:38 - Was chatted up by a girl from my school who had just returned from a year in London. Spoke v. good English, complete with heavy British accent.

12:40 - Exchange Girl keeps saying "Really?" in a v. English way. Quite amusing.

12:44 - Can't find Noriko. Am eating my obento alone.

12:48 - Am now eating my fishy rice and other tasty food with English Girl and her friends.

1:22 - Ran around trying to find Noriko.

1:28 - Found Noriko. Apparently she eats lunch in our classroom. Whoops. My bad.

1:32 - Have actually participated in class! Was instructed to read a bunch of stuff in English so the class could repeat after me.

1:36 - Why did they clap after I read? It's not like it's difficult for me to speak English. Am rather embarrassed.

1:37 - Oh yeah, drama diction skills at work.

2:22 - Almost done with book. Will make it last!

2:31 - Have been demoted to show-and-tell item in junior high English class. Anna-the-English-Speaking-Trained-Monkey.

2:32 - "Seattle? Oh, Mariners? Ichiro?" Every single time. Almost makes me wish I watched baseball. Feel so left out of my own culture.

2:33 -Can't lie. Am totally enjoying the spotlight.

2:46 - Book reading time. Apparently there's nothing else I can help with.

2:58 - Done with second book in two days. Need more books.

3:00 - Seven periods in one day is too many. Too short to get anything done, too. Miss block periods.

3:01 - Am hungry again.

3:02 - Every single class I've been in, the kids have gotten a test back. Am glad I don't have to take tests.

3:30 - Miss my book. Must find English bookstore before I resort to The Complete Works of Shakespeare or the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. Too heavy. (Though I have been wanting to read those again...)

3:32 - Hate waiting. Have done so quite frequently today.

3:35 - Got nifty tour of school. Cooking classrooms, sewing classrooms, bio and chem and physics labs.... this school is actually really big. And some parts are really nice and new, and some are really... ghetto.

4:10 - Spent a while chatting with one of the English teachers in the library. Have noticed my English is quickly becoming broken "I Speak Bad Engrish" English, to match my conversation partners. Must remember how to speak the mother tongue.

4:14 - Feel like exotic zoo animal. Small Japanese school children from the Junior High keep staring at me.

4:16 - Am still freaked out by the reality of venom-spitting wasp.

5:00 - Noriko had a question about math, so we're all chillin' with the teachers in the room where all the teachers' desks are.

5:30 - Bus time again. School day is way too long.

Later - Slept on the train home. Thankfully no wasps.

6:47 - Grocery shopping. Again. Every single day.

7:02 - Home after shopping.

7:59 - Dinner. Am coerced into trying fermented soybeans that smell really horrific.

8:00 - Am not the only one who finds smell repulsive. Yet they still eat them.

8:02 - Soybeans not so bad, if you don't breath through your nose. However, do not intend to have more.

9:00 - Mmmm, "manly" Pocky. Apparently, dark chocolate is for men, according to the Pocky package. "Men's Pocky. Bitter chocolate."

9:24 - Ponder the meaning of life, the universe and everything while folding laundry and watching a Japanese TV show that's like a bad soap opera mixed with the West Wing, with a healthy dash of hi-larious sound effects.

9:41 - BATH TIME. >.<

10:02 - Blog time

11:06 - Sleep.

Host Family: (apologies for the blurriness)

Day 10

I love craft stores. I love them so much. They have made this awesome day even more awesome. (Beware of redundancy!)

As is the norm for most people, I will start at the beginning. As I munched thoughtfully on my egg salad, tomato and cucumber-filled croissant, I expected nothing terribly exiting to happen today. Actually, to be perfectly honest, I was too distracted by said sandwich to think about much of anything, apart from swallowing. After breakfast, my host mom, Noriko and I went shopping at a huge, expensive department store for an obento box for me to take to school, which was uneventful aside from finding a cute red box with cats on it, and a few presents for people back home. It was on the way home, while chatting in broken English and horribly bad Japanese and admiring the patches on my crappy old jean shorts, that my host mom and I discovered that we have the same hobby: sewing. The second she found out it was all "We're going to the craft store!" which, how could I say no to that?

Needless to say, I'll be going to the bank soon to get some more money. I pretty much killed the last of my reserves at the store. Seriously, I could spend all day in one of those stores. I mean, they cater to every possible hobby--from beading to knitting to dress making to painting to fake flower arranging--and since I love most of those things, there's more than enough to keep me busy for a good, oh, 17 hours. More if I decide I'm into fake flower arranging.

If the Craft Store of Awesome wasn't enough, it turns out that my Okaasan used to make her own clothes, so as soon as we got home, she busted out these gigantic freakin' boxes of fabric (more than all those bags I have stuffed in my closet). So now I've been recruited to patch, repair, and sew a whole bunch of stuff, which suits me just fine. (Plus, now I've got knitting materials, and am making some nifty legwarmers. Without a pattern. Yeah, that's right).

Other bonus to today include sleeping in, chatting with my Okaasan's fluent-English-speaking friend, eating cheesecake, and taking two baths in one day. :D

As you may have noticed, I haven't really had any pictures in these last few post. (Beware the total change of subject!) That's because I'm trying really hard not to be a tourist, which means not bringing my camera everywhere, and not taking pictures of That Really Interesting Tree, or My Tasty Breakfast, or A Cool Piece of Lint I Found in My Pocket. I do, however, have some pictures of my house (or apartment, to be exact):

The kitchen and part of the dining room.

The tatami room.

The dining room.

My bedroom.

The view from my window.

Day 9

6-21-08

Today we went to Costco. (And yes, I'm sure there were many other important and interesting things that I did yesterday, like go to school and go to Noriko's band practice, but I would simply like to talk about the Experience of going to Costco). First off, let me express my surprise at finding out that there were Costcos in Japan at all. (It was probably equal to the surprise of my host family at finding out there were "Costocos" in America). Anyhow, my host mom said that we were going to an "American" supermarket, so I spent the very lengthy car ride there worried that the only reason we were going was to get "American" food for me. It didn't make sense, I had eaten the tuna and mayo and egg salad sandwich for breakfast, and the yogurt and the mysterious mushrooms and the grapefruit and everything else that I normally would have politely declined. I had shown no signs of wishing I could have some good ol' American food.

Luckily, my fears were relieved when my host family bought a frillion cases of sparkling water for the 7-Eleven they own, and never once asked me what food they should buy that I would actually eat. However, being in the store was seriously trippy, because it was exactly the same as back home. And I do mean exactly. Everything was located in the exact same place as it is in the Costco by my house, from the location of the entrance right down to how the food on the menu was arranged. Talk about Time/Space Continuum Warp. Not only do I hate going to big empty soulless box-stacky places like Costco normally, but after spending near a week in Japan, it made me both really homesick and full of dislike for anything American. (Except for ya’ll, of course. I’m merely discussing food here). All I wanted to do was get out as quickly as possible. I came to look fondly on the bowl of sour yogurt and the fishcake.

Sadly, I left my camera at home before we went out for dinner, so no fishcake pictures for you.

Day 8

Because my brain is too tired for elaborate communication, and simply because I like them, I've decided to make some lists.

Top 5 New Experiences:
5. Heated toilet seats and really deep bathtubs.
4. Being told I need an umbrella to walk around in the rain, despite it being like, 80 degrees out.
3. Repeating a grade. (I’ll be a sophomore at my Japanese school).
2. Having the occasional moment where I start thinking in Japanese.
1. Feeling tall. Oh yeah.

Top 3 Reasons Why I Love Japanese TV:
1. Game shows and other hi-larious programs, like “3 Japanese School Boys and their Clueless English Teacher Go On a Treasure Hunt to a Remote Island Where People Keep Mysteriously Dying Off” (which I have yet to figure out the name of).
2. Super good hi-definition quality picture.
3. The fact that you don’t have to speak Japanese to understand TV shows: most of the
plot is shown through vocal tone and sound effects.

Top 7 Hints For Japanese Food
1. Eat the warmest food first. The cold food can't get any colder, and there's a higher chance the hot food won't be slimy.
2. If you don't know what something is (and you don't have any life threatening allergies) don't ask. Just eat it.
3. Expect mayonnaise.
4. Soups are statistically more likely to be blander than other foods.
5. Japanese people eat a lot, and they eat it quickly. My suggestion: eat as quickly as possible and hope your stomach doesn't catch up with you.
6. Sometimes foods like soup come with niku, or meat. Unfortunately, the meat doesn’t come with a name.
7. MAYONNAISE! Were you expecting that?

Day 7

Today was the big day. Time for the meeting of the host family. O.M.G.

The YFU folks getting ready to leave.

Woke up feeling incredibly awake. Unfortunately, that was at about 5:30 this morning. (Pleasejetlagbeovernowmmmkthx). There was time for one last breakfast, one last hour of internet, and then it was time for goodbyes and a parting of ways. It was seriously tragic, and I really didn’t expect to be so sad to see everyone go. We’ve grown closer than possible at any summer camp, and in a shorter amount of time. Those who I feel closest with, I didn’t even start hanging out with until we were in Tokyo. It’s a whole new dynamic when you no longer are required to stick with the same group of people; new groups form, quickly made bonds un-bond just as quickly, and newer, stronger ones form. The “let’s-be-pals-because-we’ll-be-stuck-together-for-three-days-straight” bond has been replaced by the “I-actually-think-you’re-pretty-cool-and-we’ve-got-a-lot-in-common” bond.

For me, that means switching from hanging out with a bunch of girls to hanging out with a bunch of guys. Like last night after midnight, for example, when I was locked out of my room because my roommate wanted to hang out with her friends and didn’t tell me where she was going and took the key. I just sat in the lobby and chilled with James, Alex and Joe, while they used up all my internet minutes. Guys are so much easier to deal with.

Saying goodbye to my friends.

I miss them all already.

By the time we had gotten to the airport, passed security, and arrived at our gate, it was just Monica and I, the two Fukuoka people. I boarded the double-decker PokeBus, had some cranberry juice that was somewhere between apple juice and cough syrup, and an hour and a half later, I was in Fukuoka.

Oh, so you think I was kidding about the PokeBus? Check this out:

My host mom, Yoshiko, was waiting outside baggage claim with a pretty handmade sign welcoming me to Japan. Monica’s host family was there too, as were the YFU Area Representatives, and we all went to get gourmet airport food. I wasn’t hungry, so all I had was my disastrous attempt to make Milk Tea from scratch. Epic Fail.

My host mom and I.

So far, I really, really like my host family. Between Masahiko (my host dad), Yoshiko, and Noriko (my host sister), there’s enough English to make up for my broken Japanese. (Though I am really proud of myself for speaking as much Japanese as possible, instead of only saying what I know is right and grammatically correct). Needless to say, there’s been a lot of laughter and awkward silences. Yuta, my host brother, is very shy and very into video games. I don't think he's actually spoken to me once. Noriko loves punk, gothic and Lolita fashions, and she showed me all her fashion magazines and favorite boy bands.

I look forward to an awesome six more weeks!

Day 6

6-18-08

Downtown Tokyo.

After spending all of today roaming Tokyo, I have come to two conclusions: One is that, while I may be able to speak quite a bit of Japanese when I think it through in my head, I lose all comprehension of the language when faced with a living human person, and as soon as I am walking away from them, it hits me that, oh, that's how I would have said that. The second conclusion is that I have become addicted to Milk Tea.

Based on these two conclusions, I will now recount my Tokyo-in-one-day adventure through two things: people and food. (Which as you may notice, are fast becoming common themes of this blog).

Besides my awesome room number, awesome room view and awesome small-enough-to-easily-steal toiletries, my favorite thing about the Tokyo Prince hotel is the breakfast.

Tasty good food.

It’s served at 7:00, which would normally be really early for me, but since I am incredibly jet-lagged and keep waking up a 4:00 am, it’s the perfect time. Waiting for me this morning was everything I could even want, from miniature pancakes to crispy bacon to fresh fruit and, as always, a cup of tea.

Mmmm tea.

Tea, coincidentally, is a perfect segue to my next food story: Milk Tea. Because the Japanese mostly drink green and white teas, if you want black tea with cream and sugar, you have to ask for Milk Tea. Conveniently, Milk Tea is also sold chilled in almost every drink vending machine (which, when the number of vending machines is considered, means that it is available everywhere). Unfortunately, I have thus been buying it at every chance I get, and that’s a lot of chances. It’s just so tasty.

Miruku Tei.

There was a vending machine by the Imperial Palace when we all visited it today, so I got some there. Someone else bought a can of Dr. Pepper, and it was the most amazing Dr. Pepper can ever. I’m bringing one home if I can.

I don't even understand.

One of our many stops on our “Cultural Tour of Japan” was a very famous shrine. (Though apparently not famous enough since I can’t remember the name…).

Sadly nameless shrine.

It was there that I fully experienced the phenomenom of being randomly accosted by people who want to talk to you simply because you are foreign. There was one guy outside of the shrine who, in broken English, just started chatting me up, asking where I was from and why I was in Japan and for how long. Unfortunately, it turned out to be one of those times where I forgot all my Japanese, so I felt like even more of a gaijin than before, but it was still a nice conversation.

Where I was randomly accosted.

There was a place in the shrine where you could get a fortune, and after watching a few people closely, I figured out the process and got one. Of course, they were written in Japanese, so I couldn’t read them at all, but apparently mine was bad, because the old man standing next to me--who spoke no English whatsoever--grabbed it from me, made me choose another fortune, and tied the bad on to the Bad Fortune Rack thing, which was apparently what you were supposed to do. Of course, I had no idea what he was saying and I couldn’t figure out why he was taking my fortune away from me, but once I figured out what he was doing, it was really sweet, you know, save the poor gaijin girl from ignorance and so on. I’ve decided that--and here I make a sweeping generalization--I really like Japanese people.

Totally sweet palace, dude.

Along with the Imperial Palace, the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, the Edo-Tokyo Museum and the shrine, we visited the headquarters of YFU Japan, which meant 45 minutes of boring speeches and the most delicious Japanese dinner ever. It was buffet style, and every time I would attempt to return my plate and be done eating, another scrumptious looking addition had been made to the table, and I just had to keep eating. Oishi desu!

Days 4 & 5

6-16-08 & 6-17-08

Greetings from tomorrow. Are you ready? ‘Cause this is going to be epic. Get ready for the longest day of my life. Literally. I have been awake now for, oh, 24 and some odd hours. Without any night. (I guess that’s excluding the 10 or so hours of self-induced vegetative state during the plane ride, which doesn’t really count as sleeping either).

Exodus-ing.

Let’s start at the beginning, shall we? Today (or, I guess yesterday), was the great YFU exodus to Tokyo, Japan. And I think “great exodus” is the only way to describe it too. It took two of those massive Greyhound-style buses to get us to the airport. We pretty much filled up three plane flights on our own. It was a great herd of American teenage sheep. Incredibly-sleepy-because-we-all-got-up-at-6-AM-sheep. Rousted at such an early hour, I barely managed to grab a bit of breakfast and drag my stuff onto the buses before settling into my favorite “I’m-not-actually-asleep-even-though-I-look-like-I-am” doze.

On the bus with my nifty new nametag.

Luckily, I opened my eyes as we were about halfway between San Jose and San Francisco so I could witness the amazingness of driving through Sunnyvale, California. (And yes, only some of you will understand that).

Baaaaa...

Once at the airport, there was the momentous Standing In Really Long Lines To Check In, and the epic Standing Around For a Really Long Time While Waiting For People, and, my favorite, Sitting Around For Ages Waiting to Get Your Seat Assignment. Which I did eventually get, thankfully. I ended up sitting between an older woman who spent the trip reading an outdated political thriller, and a lanky, Fedora-wearing YFU boy who requested that I call him “Dante.” I came to the conclusion that he was probably an air sign. The nickname and the chattiness made me think Gemini, though the fact that he was seated by me made me think Aquarius. Taking breaks only for bad plane food, which I ate with far more tenacity than usual, and the occasional logic puzzle, I put in my headphones and tried to use as little energy as possible for the 10 hour flight.


After landing in Narita, I followed the massive sheep crowd (who, unlike me, had spent the entire flight walking around, loitering and partying) through immigration, accidentally smuggled my smoked salmon through customs, traded some dollars for yen, and took another long bus ride. This time, I didn’t doze. I spent the entire ride with my face pressed up against the glass, avidly watching as we drove into Tokyo. Took way too many pictures, too.

We’re staying in downtown Tokyo, in the Tokyo Prince hotel. It’s pretty nice, for a place where they put up a bunch of obnoxious tourist teenagers. Deep bath tub, air conditioning, convenience stores, internet access, and a bunch of nifty little toiletries in the bathroom.

My room.

We share rooms, of course, which is only slightly irritating due to the fact that there’s only one key per room, which inevitably involves someone getting locked out. Most of us are staying on the 6th floor, and I can guarantee I got the best room number of all.

Seriously? How awesome.

Best part though: Tokyo Tower, right outside my window.

Views from my window.

So much for epic. I’m about to fall asleep as I type, so I guess this will be shorter than intended.

Day 3

6-15-08

The view from my dorm room window.

Today followed in much the same vein as the one before it. Up at 7:00 sharp, run around the campus for 13 hours, and then in bed by 10:00. Thankfully less classes today, again supplemented with meals, and games that were “educational” in one way or another. The games were mundane, and the meals were barely edible at worst, and pretty tasty at best. Today’s game was called Barnga, (a name obviously designed to conceal any aspect of the game itself). It was a card game, with essentially the same rules as hearts, except you wanted to take tricks. The catch was that each table had a different trump suit and high/low cards, so when you moved tables, the rules were completely different and--bonus!--you weren’t allowed to talk.

Barnga time.

The amount of frustration, anger and general pandemonium that said catch caused was absolutely ridiculous. You’d always get a person at your table insisting that diamonds were trump and refusing to believe everyone else at the table--who had been there when the instructions were handed out--that spades were in fact trump. For myself, the second someone at my table got confused, I guessed the “different rules” catch and was ready to quickly assimilate when I managed to win a round and change tables. The truly surprising thing--and the reason why I am recounting all this uselessness--was the amount of people who could not be budged from the idea that their old rules were the way we were supposed to play the game. That people got offended, even furious over something as minute and stupid as a card game. It makes me wonder how these people are going to react to all the difference in Japan, and what they are going to insist upon there.

On an entirely unrelated note, I have remembered why I detest counting in Japanese. I rediscovered this fact while taking my Intermediate Japanese course today, which ultimately involved spending half an hour in utter confusion and frustration because I couldn’t remember is -mai was the counter for small animals or flat things.

The other confused people.

Let me explain. In Japanese, it is apparently far too simple to count everything the same was we do here--two cats, two piece of paper, two cups of water and son on. Oh no. Instead, they have different ways of counting for everything. And I do mean everything. The way you end a number--or even the way you say a number--changes depending on whether you are counting people or days or flat things or cylindrical things or electronic things or books or small animals or large animals or birds (for some reason not grouped with small animals) or liquids… the list goes on. If counting pizzas, two would be ni mai, but if counting people, two would instead by futatsu. And if that weren’t confusing enough, somethings it changes depending on the number as well, whether the ending bit starts with a p or a b or an h.

My teachers explaining that counting is “chotto muzukashi.”

So counting is a “little difficult.” Understatement of the century. When you think you at least sort of know a language, there’s really nothing like admitting that you can even count.

Lastly, food. Food is never far from my thoughts these days, and as I eat my last Cheez-It for the next six weeks, it is more prevalent than ever. I can’t really figure out if I agree with the cafeteria food they’ve been feeding us. On the one hand, they have oatmeal at breakfast, complete with nuts and brown sugar and cranberries and it is absolutely delicious. Plus, there’s tea, complete with cream and sugar, at every meal. On the other hand, we’ve had such food as “BBQ beef” the color of my favorite Argyle T-shirt, and the one time they had delicious corn muffins, they ran out before I could get one.

In line for the questionable food.

In such a way am I divided over Japanese food. For dinner tonight we had an Obento-style meal, complete with chopsticks. (It was probably to get us used to Japanese food. That or just for fun. Could be that too). Because I’m going to be stuck in a country with such food for six weeks, I went all out and tried (mostly) everything, from the neon yellow pickled radish to the weird eggy thing, right down to the pink and white processed fishcake. (What the hell is a fishcake anyway? No one could tell me. “Really processed” was about the best description I got, mostly I was just told it was “fishcake” and the explanation ended there. It didn’t even taste like anything, so I’m not really sure what the point of it was. I really should have taken a picture. I promise that if I ever have another meal with a fishcake I will take a picture). I can still taste the barley tea I had with dinner, which was unsweetened and very… earthy. So far, I’m just unsure about whether I like Japanese food or not: some of it is delicious, and some of it is, well, fishcake.

Day 2

6-14-08

I’ve just spent over 12 hours in school. With classrooms and teachers and a schedule and everything. I’m even literally in a school.

Hey look, a school!

And I’ve been having a damn fine time of it too, despite the totalitarian schedule and cafeteria meals. Re: lack of organizational skills mentioned in the last entry: I have come to the conclusion that such lack was entirely an anomaly. Since then, everything has been very scheduled, down to the last minute of Free Time in Washburn Hall or Lights Out at 10:30. It’s a lot like camp, actually, what with all the close-to-you-age Alumni Advisors or the curfew of exactly when you have to be back in your room. The classes--covering everything from Survival Japanese to Current Japan to Cultural Workshops about calligraphy or Japanese fashion--are only about 30 minutes to an hour, so that works well with my inability to stay in the same classroom for very long.

My calligraphic skills.

We spend all of our classes, except for languages, with the same group: our “kumi.” My kimi is the Pink Kumi, a color that, of course, automatically makes it the best. The fact that the orientations are beign taught by young people who went to Japan with YFU who can now impart words of comfort and hi-larious anecdotes is fantastic, and said anecdotes are quickly erasing my worries.

Classes with my kumi.

So far, besides the alumni stories, I think I like meeting the other travelers the best. I hate to use the camp metaphor again, but it’s accurate. We’ve been thrown together, and though normally you probably wouldn’t hang out with the people that you do, you just latch onto the first person you can and stick with them. There’s the girls I met at the airport: quiet and scholarly Eda from the East Coast; bubbly, swing-dancing, wire-thin Larissa; Alex, one of those fashionable, mature-seeming types; and Faith, Catholic school girl and classy Capricorn. And then there are the people in my kumi: adorable Kylie from the suburbs of Detroit, and our alumni leader Kristina who told us about her first disastrous dinner on her exchange trip to Japan last year. There’s the two girls I dorm with: bespectacled, curly-haired Tasha with her anime sweatshirt and Syndl, who has blonde streaks in her dyed black hair and flaming dragon wrap-around pants and blasts the Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack. I don’t think they could get a more diverse group of people if they tried. (Which, now that I think about, I’m sure they did).

My dorm’s rec room.

Just tonight I spent an hour playing pool in the rec room with a girl whose name I never did find out, but we got along like old friends. (And I played quite well, if I do say so myself. Five balls in a row at one point). It’s really amazing how quickly you can bond with people.

Day 1

6-13-08

I’ve always considered Friday the 13th to be a particularly awesome day, despite what other people have said. However, I’m beginning to think that maybe I was wrong. Then again, by my lateness I could have avoided some major catastrophe and not known about it.

Let me explain. The day started out normally enough. I was super excited to leave (as much as one can be base on the fact that one is both spending six weeks in Japan and leaving all one’s friends behind for said amount of time) and my plane didn’t leave until 11:45, so I even got to sleep in. Once the final touches were put on my packing and I had remembered to close my door so my cats don’t get in and throw up on my floor, we picked up Grace at school and took off for the airport.

At the airport.

Armed with cheesy teen magazines, Swedish fish, my laptop, and innumerable puzzle books, I was ready to go. I was ready to fly to California. I was ready to fight off boredom in the flying aluminum can. I was ready… to sit in the airport for over three hours while my plane failed to show up at the gate.

I would just like to take this opportunity to vent my opinions about air travel. While it may be the safest and fastest way to travel, it is also by far the most uncomfortable, possibly exceeded only by floating in the ocean in a barrel. In a storm. With another person. I do not think that a soda and a cup of ice, or the inch of space you get by reclining, or even the crappy television sitcoms that they play make up for the inability to move for an extended period of time while breathing recycled air and sitting in close proximity to someone wearing enough cologne to gag someone 500 yards away. The fact that you can’t bring your own bottle of water on or have to pay extra for a bag over 50 pounds just adds insult to injury.

Less than 50 pounds. Oh yeah.

Luckily, I experienced none of those things. My bag weighed in at an anorexic 37 pounds, the person sitting next to me was neither a fat guy, a talkative old lady, or someone wearing too much perfume, (in fact, they were a nice couple who chatted away in Spanish while we taxied down the runway and then fell asleep as soon as we took off), and the Sprite, complete with cup of ice, was fully satisfactory. The tow hour flight was the perfect amount of time to read all four of my trashy magazines--Seventeen, AstroGirl, Movie Magic and QuizFest--and get my fill of the Jonas Brothers, model, overpriced clothing, and what I should wear based on my zodiac sign. (Which, consequently, allowed me to correctly guess the sign of one of the girls I’ve met. Go AstroGirl).

One of the YFU people was waiting at the gate when we landed--the four of us from the Seattle area--who walked us to baggage claim, where we were met by a very friendly young woman and a guy who looked far too much like David Leathers for comfort. The plan was to grab the luggage and take the bus to San Jose State University, where the orientation would be held. The plan, however, did not occur. As I have previously mentioned, my plane was ridiculously late. Taking that into account, the bus that we were supposed to be taking didn’t show up until 6:30ish, and we got into the airport around 4:00. Six. Thirty.

Waiting for the bus.

Something’s got to be up with today if we’ve had so many transportation glitches.

Transportation issue aside, the extra time gave me some time to get to know some of my fellow travelers, and to write a little. We finally got the University around 8:00, and then the real fun times ensued. First, we missed dinner, and all of the orientation to our orientation, which meant I spend the rest of the day feeling rather confused about everything. I have no doubt that my experience in the actual country of Japan will be nowhere near as confusing as this oreintation is. There are room where we sleep, and different rooms across campus where we eat, with different groups of people, and then there is something about turning your room key different directions to obtain different results, and how we should only use the front door of the hall we’re staying in, and how we must follow the intensely strict schedule even though we were never given a map. I feel that YFU’s lack of organization skills--an my subsequent need to crawl out of this pit of confusion by myself--may in fact be the most influential thing is this orientation. (More so that watching Japanese television shows, which while incredibly entertaining, is not necessarily very informative. I mean, you wouldn’t want someone to watch The OC and expect an accurate portrayal of Californians. Which the Californians on my bus were only too keen to set people straight on).

Rather than talk about things that are important, I would rather discuss my current living quarters: Lucy M. Washburn Hall is the epitome of the Sketchy College Dorm…

My dorm.

…complete with the Sketchy College Dorm Room…

Sketchy College Dorm Room

…the Sketchy College Hallway…

Sketchy College Hallway

…and the Sketchy College Bathroom.

Sketchy College Bathroom.

This is not to be confused with the Sketchy Hostel, which while being equivalent in low-grade rooming, has a sort of homey, indie, backpacker feel to it. Not so much here. Of the three people staying in my room, I got there last, which meant I got the worst blanket and the bunk bed with no ladder, but also some nifty shelves to put my stuff on.

Nifty shelves to put my stuff on.

I wonder, if this place is so very sketcherific, why do I like it so much?