Week Two: Sept. 2-10, 2006
Sunday, September 3, 2006
Got up on my own (yay! No alarms!) but with my back and neck hurting from sleeping on the futon. I think I need another cushion underneath me, because just the one futon bottom still eventually feels like sleeping on the floor (which is carpeted, and then there's another carpet rug under the futon bottom). I don't understand, because at the Satos' house their futon was like sleeping on a cloud--what was different? Hopefully I can steal another futon bottom from one of the closets and Endo-san won't yell at me. I also stole a proper, non-bean-filled pillow, which is doubly bad because she told me not to do it. But whatever.
I had breakfast alone since Aly and Brette's rooms were shut, which was fine. A glass of ice water (yay, our ice tray is looking good!), MELON BREAD, and apple yogurt. Pretty good, pretty good.
Breakfast!
About an hour or so later Hyung-Hye called me telling me that she'd finally gotten a hold of Sarah and Milin (two AC graduates of this past year who are now working in Japan as English teachers. They also went on the Janterm with me), and they wanted to meet us in Ueno. So I got ready and left for Ueno. I walked to Gyotoku Station (about 30 minutes away by walking), on the Tozai Line, and with just one transfer got to Ueno just about on time. I met Hyung-Hye at Ueno Station and then we walked over to the Marui department store and found Sarah and Milin. We walked around Ueno Park for a bit; I debated getting a melon shaved ice but it was 300y so I didn't (now I wish I had, though!). We also walked around a little shrine and I got a fortune. We had fruit drinks at a café by Ueno Station, then we decided to go to Shibuya, about 30 minutes away from Ueno on the Yamanote Line (my favorite train line. It runs in a circle around the Tokyo area and hits all the good spots).
Once in Shibuya, we went to the Marui there too and Sarah looked at wallets and day planners, and then we went to Tower Records (the big 7-story music store) which was cool cause they had a whole display of Bonnie Pink stuff, though I didn't buy anything.
Then we went to get dinner, and went to this pasta place. Nothing on the menu really looked appetizing to me because it was that weird Japanese version of pasta where they put all sorts of strange things like nori (seaweed) on it, and I hate nori, so even though I tried to choose carefully, I wound up not liking what I got. D: Which was too bad, since it was 900y. Ugh, what a waste! Oh well. Everyone else really liked what they got, and we had a nice conversation about teaching English. Sarah and Milin are with AEON, which is one of the big English-teaching programs in Japan (for not just kids, but adults too; anyone who wants to learn English). Apparently the president of the company is the father of Angela Aki, the singer, which is pretty cool (even though I don't listen to her).
After that we said goodbye, and I got home on my own just fine.
Monday, September 4, 2006
First day of brush-up Japanese classes at Kanda (which last only for this week). Aly, Brette and I all left the house together and walked to the train station in the morning, and of course we got on the train that ended one stop before the one we needed to get off at, Kaihin Makuhari. Ooooh, how annoying! Then we missed the one that was going our way, and had to wait 10 minutes for the next one. We thought we were going to be really late but we still got to class just as it was beginning. There are 6 levels of classes, 6 being the hardest, that everyone was separated into based on the number of semesters they've taken. I got put in 4, and quickly realized it was way too easy for me. The classes were taught by student teachers (Japanese girls training to be teachers) and the class basically consisted of repeating sentences over and over, and being drilled on vocabulary and such. It was appalling to realize, again, how really bad some people are at Japanese. I'm sorry to just come out and say it, but they would be asked a simple question that we had gone over 5 times already and just be like "Um... uh..." and not be able to answer! Soooo frustrating. I hate how I always get slowed down in language classes because not everyone is at the same level. urrgh.
At lunch I talked with people and found out that level 5 is just as easy, so I decided it wouldn't be worth it to switch. Level 6 is apparently incredibly hard for all but a few people.
After lunch, the Kanda people had their placement test, so some of the Meikai people including me just hung around the Center, checking email and whatnot. After that I went home by myself and just chilled at home.
Tuesday, September 5, 2006
Today the Kanda and Meikai people were completely separated in their schedules, which was really sad and I hope it's not always like this! Most of the friends I've made are in Kanda (since that's also the majority of the 60 students, with only 16 of us in Meikai) so it kind of sucked to be separated from them. Anyway, in the morning we all walked to the station together and then Aly left for Kaihin Makuhari while Brette and I went to Shin Urayasu, where Meikai is (and also where my old host family lives, so I was familiar with it from living there in January), and only one stop away from our station (Ichikawa-shiohama). At the station we met up with a few IES people, like Shin-san, and the rest of the Meikai people. From there we all walked to Meikai, which is pretty close to the station. It was a hot, sunny day, though, so we were glad when we got to the building where IES has its little Meikai office. This whole Meikai thing (in which we take a more intense Japanese class, so it's called the "Language Program" as opposed to the Kanda "Society and Culture Program") is new for this year, so we're kind of the guinea pigs who get to test it out, which is also why there's only 16 of us as opposed to the Kanda majority (since it used to be everyone did Kanda).
After looking around the IES office, we went up to a classroom on the fourth floor, where we were joined by some Meikai students who were going to guide us around a campus tour. One of them was a girl who looked like a gaijin, she looked European, but she spoke Japanese like a native, with Japanese mannerisms. It was so strange! I later found out she was Iranian and her family has been living in Japan for a long time. That's so cool. Anyway, so they showed us around the campus, which is really, really nice, since it's fairly new. Casey and Matt quickly decided that it was ten thousand times better than Kanda, which they likened to a "camp." All that walking around was so tiring, though! Then we went back to that fourth floor classroom where we met some of our ePals (a program we could sign up for before we came where you're partnered with a student at your university whose job is to show you around and you both benefit from the other's company). My ePal wasn't there, though, which was kind of sad, and made me think that maybe I should have emailed here once I got to Japan. We exchanged emails before I arrived but I just completely forgot to contact her again once I got here. Oh well, I'll meet her at some point.
Then we had lunch, and we just followed our guides from the Meikai tour and ended up at the food court of a department store, and I had McDonald's. I tried the new Tsukimi burger, which Hyung-Hye had told me was really bad, but I still wanted to try it. It's a burger patty, cheese (optional), an egg, and Thousand Island dressing sauce. She said it was gross but I really wanted to try it, because I like all those things. (Tsukimi means "moon viewing" which is supposed to be represented by the yolk in the egg, or... something.) Of course she was totally wrong, and it was really good, and I was happy. McDonald's is sooooo good in Japan, it was great to get it again. :D
Then we walked around Shin Urayasu some more, seeing some places like the post office and whatnot, and then that was it for the day. Lisa texted me to come over to Kaihin Makuhari since some of the Kanda people were going to karaoke after their programming ended, so I did that (after getting my student-discount commuter pass at Shin Urayasu Station). Once there, I met a big group of people on their way to this karaoke place we hadn't been to before (but which was also cheap, which is why we went there), called "King Arthur" hahah. We got a room for 2 hours and just sang all these songs that everyone knew. By the end, we were all standing on the seats and singing "Thriller" at the top of our lungs. It was extremely, extremely fun; the best kind of karaoke to have.
After that, everyone went home; it was still before dinner, too!
Wednesday, September 8, 2006
Back to the brush-up classes. Stillll boring, but whatever. After they were over and after everyone had lunch, we all went to go register as aliens so Japanese immigration doesn't kick us out of the country. We went in groups based on the office for where we live, and my group was fairly big, about 20 people, led by Atsumi, one of the Kanda ePals, a senior English major. We actually got off at Gyotoku Station, one of the two stations closest to where we live, so that was really good for us, cause then we could just walk home. Unfortunately, once we got to the office (a sort of central hub for all your bureaucratic needs, not just alien registration, and kind of like the DMV in terms of level of red-tape frustration), they wouldn't accept my photos!! Because there wasn't space above the top of my head... ugh. So I walked over to the Seiyu department store, where they had a photo booth that took passport photos, and got different pictures taken, which they did accept, finally. So they processed all our applications and we get to come back in a couple of weeks and pick up our gaijin cards. woooohooooo!
Random Engrish spotted at a conbini:
Awww.
After that, Betsy and Atsumi came back to our apartment, since it was fairly close and no one really felt like going home. We chilled there for awhile and they had dinner with us (Endo-san told Atsumi to "teach us how to act/eat," but of course Brette and I totally understood what she said and we felt kind of insulted!!) and we watched some crazy Japanese TV. The princess was about to have her baby and all the news channels were abuzz about that (if it's a boy, it'll be the first boy born to the royal family in 40 years).
Around 8 or so we left for Shin Urayasu to meet up with Casey and Matt and then lots more other people to go do some karaoke. There were lots of people there I hadn't hung out with very often, so it was cool to get that chance.
The coolest thing happened when we were done, though, and were standing around outside the station at around 10 or 11 pm. A fellow foreigner girl was coming home and had to wheel her bicycle right through our big clump of gaijin, so as she was making her way through us, she either asked us or we asked her (I can't remember) what the other was doing there, and so we told her we were studying abroad, and when we asked her what she did, she said she played Ariel at a show at Disney Sea!! Now, when I was here in January, I went to DisneySea with my host mom and Nanase, and we saw the Little Mermaid show there. It was really interesting because Ariel lip-synched all her lines, and the songs were in English, but the dialogue was in Japanese. So, it turns out this girl has been working there since January--she is the one we saw in the show!!!
I was just blown away by that; it was so cool. The exact same performer I saw, I meet on the street months and months later! Soooo cool. She told us she was leaving in a couple weeks and that we should come and see her last show. Her bicycle looked pretty cool so I asked her if she had sold it already, and she said she had; too bad :< Thursday, September 7, 2006
Another day of brush-up classes, I think you know my opinion of those by now, then in the afternoon Kanda people had a bunch of stuff I didn't have to go to, but since I was going to go with Lisa and Anna to this Dresden Dolls show in Tokyo, I waited around for them to be done in the IES Center, which was actually very enjoyable, even though I didn't get my nap.
When they got back we left for Shibuya. We transferred at Tokyo Station (still huge!) and got on the Yamanote Line. Once we got to Shibuya it took us about 45 minutes to an hour to find the freaking venue, but eventually we did. I didn't care too much about this band and mostly went because Lisa needed people to go with her and because I wanted to go to the Tower Records in Shibuya and buy some stuff. Tickets were 5500y though, which really sucked for something I didn't care too much about (even though I did have a good time).
We got there about 15 minutes before the opening band started, which was this Japanese group of four guys. I actually really enjoyed their songs, which is more than I can say for a lot of opening acts I've seen. Then after that the Dresden Dolls came out. It's like... dark cabaret music or something, which is not exactly my cup of tea, but it wasn't terrible and I was able to enjoy it, even though I won't be bothering to get any of their music. They definitely put on a good show for being just a two-person show, and the drummer guy was absolutely hilarious in his facial expressions.
The show ended around 9 or 9:30 or so, and so we still had time to hit Tower Records, and I bought a lot more things than I should have, but I really like them and am glad I got them, so whatever. At least I have a Tower Records frequent-buyer card now too, so I can get discounts if I buy more stuff there, hahah.
Friday, September 8, 2006
Last day of brush-up classes! Oh, hallelujah. For lunch we went to the café on the 14th floor of the building IES is in, which does a very good job of having affordable yet good food, and they had vegetable croquettes filled with exactly the kind of vegetables I like and NONE of the ones I don't, which was a miracle!
This is the bike rack outside Ichikawa-Shiohama Station (okay, one tiny section of it). Love hotels in the distance.
After lunch, Kanda people had some stupid stuff to go to (and I didn't, again), so after chilling at the IES Center for a little bit, I went home to get ready to meet my old host family for a "short stay" type thing over the weekend. I walked down to the station and rode it one stop to Shin Urayasu, then found my host mom and Nanase waiting over in the taxi/car area. They have a new car! No more cute white car, now it's a blue van thing. I wonder what the need for a van is when you only have one kid, but whatever! It has a DVD player, on which Nanase was watching A Bug's Life, the Japanese dub (HILARIOUS), but with English subtitles for my benefit, ha ha. Before going to their house, we went to the grocery store to buy food that I would like (ahaha). Mmm, I love the bakery section! We got some apple juice and edamame and chicken and other good stuff. :3
Hee hee. Cute bread.
Then we drove to their house, yay nostalgia! Except things have CHANGED! The washer/dryer is now gone, replaced by a big huge washer (it makes a huge difference in the bathroom somehow!). But KORON is still the same ♥ Koron is their adorable Pomeranian dog, yay Koron!! Anyway, I gave them the presents I'd gotten them in Disneyland, which was a Disney princess coloring book for Nanase and a Tinkerbell notepad and pen for my host mom. I also brought 3 packets of Kool Aid that I just kind of took randomly cause Mom wanted to get rid of them! I made the grape Kool Aid and even though I had to make it in a smaller pitcher than I was used to and put in what they thought was a lot of sugar, it still tasted good to them in the end. :D yay.
They also asked me if I wanted to use one of their bikes to commute back and forth between Meikai and Shin Urayasu Station. !!! It was actually exactly what I'd been hoping they'd say. As soon as I got through with all the "Are you sure???" formalities, I was only too ecstatic to accept. :> It's my host dad's old bike, which he doesn't ride anymore. Apparently he slipped and hit his shoulder while riding it one time. I've also seen a motorbike that I think he uses instead now. But instead of riding it between Meikai and the station, I asked if it would be possible to keep it at my apartment and ride it to Meikai from there (which is very possible). I felt bad about making it a little more complicated, though...
Then while my host mom was making dinner, I played with Na-chan and Koron. We blew up a balloon and Koron went NUTS. He really wanted to bite that balloon, and finally he did, and then he would not stop barking at the broken pieces! We put them in the trash and he just stood in front of the trash can and barked at it! Silly Koron. But dinner was lovely, chicken (including fried chicken BONE pieces!! Unbelievable! They thought it was crazy that I was all "What is THAT?!" I tried one just to see, and it was soooo weird! All crunchy! Fried bone! whaaaat) and CORN SOUP (yummmm) and edamame, yum yum. They are so nice to me :D They think my Japanese has improved, but I don't really see how it could have, since I've only taken Conversation since they saw me last. :X I do think Nanase has matured a lot, though, in the span of eight months since I saw her last. She's 7 now, and a first-grader, and in lots of ways more grown up than she was (she also meets the height requirement for rides at Disneyland now, yay!). It's pretty cool :D
At 7 we went to Nanase's daycare because my host mom had a meeting with the people that run it and some other parents. It was my job to play with Na-chan and the other kids there in the meantime, hahaha. They were a girl named Haruka and a boy named Koutarou. Of course, he was a complete Japanese little boy, thinking he's so cool and using all the masculine language. The first thing he says when he sees me is "Aa! Gaijin da!" (Ah! A foreigner!) just like the other little boy did when he saw me in January. I was prepared this time, though, and looked right at him and said clearly "HAI, GAIJIN DESU." (YES, I AM) so I could establish right then and there that this foreigner speaks Japanese.
First Haruka (who was adorable and energetic, lots of fun), Nanase, and I folded some origami, and I actually made something pretty cool, which was a first for me. Then all of us went downstairs to this big room and the girls and I played some racquetball with a balloon, them vs me. It was hilarious when Haruka started giving her serves ATTACK NAMES. "Doburu saabu!" "Doburu smasshu!" (Double serve! Double smash!), hahaha. Then we just kind of messed around, running around and making rooms out of the cardboard boxes and things lying around. I got really bored at that point, though!! One can only take so much running around with Japanese children, and I had had a long week. I was glad when the meeting was over and we could go home.
Saturday, September 9, 2006
Woke up around 10 (so nice to sleep in), ate breakfast with the family (the bread we'd gotten the other day, yumm) and then my host mom and I got ready to go with Nanase to her tennis lesson in the park. We all rode bikes there (I rode my old host dad's, with Koron in the front basket!) and then Nanase went to her tennis lesson, and my host mom and I sat in the shade nearby on a bench and chatted. She has this English phrasebook and we looked at some of the sentences and I tried to help her with her pronunciation of some of them. Mostly the conversation was in Japanese with the help of the ever-indispensable electronic dictionary, though. I told her I went to the Grand Canyon recently, where she wants to go someday, and she asked me where the closest train station to it was. Hahaha!!!! Oh, too good. If ONLY there was a closest train station to the Grand Canyon.
When Na-chan's lesson was over, we rode back home. We had lunch (yakisoba), watched some Disney Channel (awesome!), and then took Nanase to her English lesson. While that was going on, we went over to my apartment and my old host mom talked to Endo-san about the whole bike thing. Then we picked Na-chan up, went back to their house to get the bike, loaded it in the back (good thing they have a van now!), and drove it over to my apartment. Ahhh!! Sooo much trouble! I apologized a million times and felt really bad that a casual offer of "wanna ride it back and forth from the station and Meikai?" became this HUGE ORDEAL. But she said it was okay... I hope she meant it. ahhhh!
After I got home, about thirty minutes later I hopped on the bike and rode over to Ichikawa-shiohama Station to make my way to Melissa's house, where she had invited some of us over for this dinner her host mom (who teaches English to adults) was having for some of her students. Man, it was so cool to just ride the bike over there. I have to be all careful and lock it up properly, though, there are two locks I have to do. It was a tiny bit complicated getting to Melissa's because she lives out in the boonies and you have to take one of those PRIVATE LINES to get there (which are NOT gaijin friendly, by the way! On the maps there is no romaji reading of the station names! If I didn't know kanji, I would have been screeeewed) but I did get there. Her host family's house is amazing!! They lived in Texas for five years, so their English is all perfect, and they've got UT and Texas paraphernalia everywhere, and they remodeled their house so it looks really Western. It was like being home (sniff)
Lisa and Travis arrived soon after me, and so did some of Melissa's host mom's students. I looked through Melissa's scrapbook she had brought with her--she does track and field! High jumping and shotput and all of that! sooooo cool! Her scrapbook was so cute. After some chatting (a bit awkward because us IES kids struggled with Japanese, while the Japanese adults struggled with English, but we all persevered) we sat down to dinner, which was just a buffet of different things. I took some meat and ate it only to find out it was liver!! I knew it tasted funny. At least I can say I've eaten it now. bleh!! But there was lots of good stuff, like deviled eggs and potato salad. yum, yum.
Everyone at dinner.
After dinner, Travis said he wanted to play the piano since he hadn't since we arrived, so he sat down at the piano and proceeded to sing this AMAZING SONG!! He is so good! We were all just completely blown away and sat there spellbound. Then he sang a couple more, and only after that did I find out he had written them all himself!! Oh my god! So amazing! He sounded a little like Jason Mraz, a little like Damien Rice... simply awesome. And when I said "You should have a CD!" it turns out he's already recorded one himself! And he had a copy on him, but Melissa claimed it. I'm going to get it from him sometime, though. He is so good!!
Then some other people showed off their talents, and we finally got Lisa up to the piano and she played this awesome Chopin piece, it was so good! She was all "I made so many mistakes!" but it ROCKED! wow! Everyone is so talented! We need to have an IES variety show or something so everyone can show off what they can do. I mean, I had no clue Travis was that good!!
So yeah, it was a lot of fun, and I made it safely back to my home station. From which the bike was waiting for me, safe and sound, and I could just put my bag in the basket and ride home. Bicycle, bicycle! I am so happy to have one. :D :D
Sunday, September 10, 2006
I did absolutely nothing today and it was wonderful.
All right, that's it! Don't forget to comment, if you want! The link is right there below and you don't have to be a registered member just to let me know that you read it. :D
1 comment:
It's wonderful to hear about your experiences! You put such interesting details in your stories. Did miss the pics though, you take very good ones!
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