Getting ready to leave for China the next week, I spent a lot of time just goofing off. Monday, I went for karaoke in Shibuya with Cambria, Kim, and Sana. I ended up with a really weird combination of “Love Forever” (a Japanese pop song) and “Tik Tok” stuck in my head. (Even if you don’t know the title, you’ve probably heard it somewhere – unless you’ve been living under a rock – too bad I don’t know how to include music clips on this blog!). After that, I went for dinner at sukiyaki restaurant with Cambria, Galaxy, Kim, Omair and Tina. Tina regaled us with tales of her salaryman student (she tutors English) and all the fabulous meals he treats her and her friends to!

Tuesday I was sick, so I slept pretty much all day!

Wednesday, I went to the Yokohama Regional Immigration Bureau to get my re-entry permit. I got temporarily freaked out when the woman at the desk said I needed a letter from Jyochi to get the permit. Fortunately, she was wrong, and my student ID sufficed. I don’t know what I would have done otherwise! I also met up with my Mum’s friend Akisa and we had tea and sweets at an Indian restaurant in Yokohama. It was very good, and fairly cheap… now, if only I can remember the name or location! It was real chai, too! Later that evening, I got an unpleasant shock from my parents when my mother said that I needed to get several vaccinations before going to China (not that they did much good – but more on that later…).

On Thursday, I frantically searched for some place to get vaccinations. I called my family’s doctor, and he didn’t do vaccinations. I tried the travel clinics at Narita and Haneda airports, but no dice. Eventually, I called my aunt Machiko to tell her that I might not be able to visit. She suggested I call the ward office. And it worked! I talked to a woman who spoke English, explained my problem, and she said she’d call me back. I didn’t get my hopes too high, but she called back with the info for a clinic in Harajuku that dealt with foreigners.  I called and immediately secured an afternoon appointment. When I got there, it was a clinic right next to the Condomania (hard to miss) and everybody in the office spoke English! What a relief! Thank you, aunt Machiko! (And note to self: government offices in Japan are much friendlier than government offices in the States!)

So this weekend, I came to visit, taking the bus from Tokyo to Kakegawa (the closest big city). It took about 3 1/2 hours, but, even better, I got a gakuwari (student discount – “gaku” means “school” and “wari” is an abbreviation of “waribiki” aka “discount”).  Unfortunately, it only works for the bus, and if I want to get a discount on the trains, I need an official letter from my university.

Anyway, on Friday, my aunt met me at the bus stop and we went for tea and cake at a charming little tea shop in Kakegawa. It was located in a house, and unless you knew to look for it, you’d never know it was there! After that, we went back to their house, my uncle returned home, and we made dinner (fried trout, tofu with sesame – must steal recipe! – and shrimp and lotus root salad). My cousin Noriko didn’t get back from work until 8:30 or so. We all watched the Olympics together, particularly men’s singles figure skating.

On Saturday, we all went for lunch to Fiorentina, this lovely Italian restaurant in Kakegawa that I went to with both my cousins, Noriko and Sawako last time I was here. This time, it was me, my aunt, uncle, and Noriko. We all shared some pasta and divided up three pizzas (lots of mushrooms – yeah!). After that, we dropped off my uncle at a local library where he conducts a poetry workshop once a month. The participants are mostly middle-aged women, according to my aunt. Anyway, while he was at the library, my aunt and Noriko and I went to a shop selling konyaku (which is somewhat hard to describe – it’s a type of yam, pulverized and congealed into a crunchy gelatinous grey substance that is calorie-free and supposedly quite good for you – doesn’t sound very appetizing, I know, but I like it!). After that, we went to the local temple (Okuni jinja – a Buddhist temple), went and rang the bell there for good luck (you throw some coins into a bin, ring the bell, bow, and clap your hands together and pray – the order and number of which action I still can’t remember!). We also got some icecream (green tea – my favorite – I’m going to miss it when I’m back in the States! Although I suppose that green tea icecream is just as rare in the US as Mexican food is here, meaning it is possible to find – with effort.).  After that, we went grocery shopping, bought some milk and sushi. The milk was for somewhat experimental cooking – I was trying to make tapioca milk tea. I accidentally dumped all the coconut juice in at once, instead of only half, but it turned out OK. Now I get to experiment on my cousins in Yokohama! wahahahaha (evil laugh).

After that, we made dinner, which consisted of sushi, Chinese-style beef and mushroom and broccoli, tomato/cabbage/radish salad, seaweed soup, hijiki (another form of seaweed), and more tofu with sesame. It was a good meal. After that, we watched more Olympics, this time, curling. The Japanese women’s curling team is quite good this year, so I have been watching more curling than I care to see! It’s an interesting sport once you get used to it (it has been likened to “chess on ice”), but it’s very slow-moving, so the best way to watch it is to watch the highlight clips. I seriously wonder who thought this up, and how drunk they were at the time! Those wacky Scots! Also, supposedly, the originators of golf. Thereby blessing the world with two of the most boring-to-watch sports ever. And whiskey, too, I guess. Perhaps to make watching curling and golf bearable?

Sunday, we went for lunch to an okonomiyaki place in Kakegawa. We had sushi and prepared our own okonomiyaki pancakes. It was delicious! After that, we went to Nemunoki Village, a residential village for people with disabilities, created by a famous (now-deceased) actress called Miyagi Mariko (in English, Mariko Miyagi). There were several museums with artwork created by the residents, so we saw that, then saw her now-deceased husband’s house. That seems to be a popular thing to do here – going into people’s houses - but it tells you a lot about a person. It wasn’t too exciting, but the view was lovely. Then we went home, driving down the windy and narrow roads of the mountainside. We had another nice dinner, then I took the express train to Shin-yokohama, then home from there.

Engrish sign at Hokkaido bakery

Monday, I went to Yokohama for a doctor’s appointment. There, I finally figured my way around and was therefore very impressed with myself. (This was with a lot of help from a map from Akisa!) I also had my favorite – a tofu burger from Freshness Burger. Burger places here have more “vegequarian” options than in the States – usually there’s something made out of prawn or fish. Vegan items are fairly common, too, like the “kimpira burger” (which is root vegetables served on a rice bun) at Mos Burger, or the tofu or portobello mushroom burgers at Freshness Burger.

Tuesday, I went for kaiten sushi and karaoke with Cambria and Monique. We found a fabulous and very cheap kaiten sushi restaurant. Then we hit up a karaoke-kan (karaoke club). They sang a lot of stuff I didn’t know. I sometimes feel a bit behind the times surrounded by all these “young’uns.” In another incident of the “small world” theme, I saw someone else I know while I was waiting at Shibuya! She was a friend of a friend at Sophia – this makes the 4th person or group of people that I’ve seen in Shibuya – in a huge city of Tokyo – it’s ridiculous!

Wednesday, I went to the Chinese embassy. I got there at 11:50am, and the offices close at noon (meaning, thankfully, that anyone already inside the building at that time is assured of being processed). I found that I was the absolute *last* person in line! But thank goodness I made it – they were closed on Thursday, open again on Friday, then closed for 3 more days (Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday) the next week! I would have been royally screwed if I came on Friday and hoped to get my visa in time for leaving on the 23rd! I almost gave up on finding it, too, since I got a bit disoriented getting there.

After my trip to the embassy, I met up with Cambria, Galaxy (yes, that’s his real name), and Monique. We went for monjyai-yaki and okonomi-yaki (basically, savory pancakes with all sort of ingredients). We ordered clam chowder and oyster and onion monjyai-yaki and onion okonomi-yaki. Monjyai-yaki is sort of like the runnier version of okonomi-yaki. At the restaurant, it’s sort of a “do-it-yourself” kind of thing – I think the waitress took pity on us and made the first one for us! I guess that’s a fairly common thing for Japanese restaurants, this whole DIY cooking theme!

Thursday noon-time I went to Jyochi (Sophia U) to get tickets for a free concert and to get a form for my “gakuwari” (student discount). I was much upfed (as my father would say) to find that the campus was open, but the office I needed was closed, as was the library, and the gakuwari document machines were off. Argh. I felt bad because I was planning to go to the concert with Kim. It was a completely pointless trip to campus! Thursday afternoon, I had the munchies and I found myself eating a very Japanese snack: mochi (sticky rice cake) with soy sauce and nori (dried seaweed). Thus we have the holy trinity of Japanese foods: rice (mochi), soybeans (soy sauce) and seaweed (nori).

Friday, I went to the Chinese embassy again, this time a little earlier! They were surprisingly friendly, too. I have found that most bureaucracies are a little impersonal, but the woman at the counter and one of the security guards were really nice. When I forgot to get my change from the ticket machine, the security guard helped me by asking one of the people at the windows to give me the change. Anyways, I now have my Chinese visa, so I can get into China! The problem may be getting OUT of China, or, to be more accurate, getting back INTO Japan. I have to go get a re-entry permit on Wednesday in Yokohama. Why I need a re-entry visa when I have a student visa, I don’t know, but I also need to extend my visa anyways. In fact, the Tokyo Study Center staff told us a horror story about someone who neglected to get an extension and was put in detention, even though he only overstayed his visa by a few days! He had the UCTC folks call his family and make up a story about why he wasn’t coming home yet, so that they wouldn’t worry about him!

Saturday, I went to lunch with Cambria and Omair at an Indian restaurant in Roppongi (the same place with the Chinese embassy – there are a lot of foreigners in the area). It wasn’t too expensive (1000Y for a lunch set), and it was so nice to have spicy food again! Ah, I’ve missed it – most Japanese food is not bland, but definitely not spicy! And it came with chai, too. Yum. ;9 Afterwards, I returned home and watched the Winter Olympics opening ceremony. That wasn’t too exciting, but it was nice to chill with my grandma, especially since I’ll be gone for a while – Thursday to Sunday at my cousins’ in Morimachi, then Tuesday onwards in China.

Sunday, I did laundry, and felt rather sorry for myself because I was coming down with a cold. Which gave me a good excuse to nap! Then I ate dinner with the family – this time, me, my grandmother, my aunt and my cousin Hanako – all the female members. We had oden, which is, I think, a winter food – it’s one of those wonderful “one pot wonder” Japanese dishes, made with fish cakes, radish, boiled eggs, and things that I don’t know the names of. It’s often eaten with yellow mustard, and damn, is that stuff hot! Picture wasabi, but yellow. I showed them my pictures from Hokkaido. I asked if there was anything they wanted from China, but got no answer. When I asked Cambria, she said she wanted a panda! I’ll see what I can do… (actually, her wish is almost fufilled – China sent Japan two pandas on loan!)

One more thing I love about Japan: trains! At least in metropolitan regions, almost everyone rides the trains. This makes for great people-watching.　There are the little old ladies and the little old granpas, the cute little gradeschoolers, the too-cool-for-school high schoolers going to school even on the weekends, the women putting on makeup, the salarymen reading their mangas or playing with their DSs, and more. And there are the perverts, too, the guys who like to grope women, although, thankfully, I have never had to deal with that!

I also have a love/hate relationship with Japanese toilets and lavatories in general. For such a hygiene-conscious nation (people with colds wear masks on the subways), a lot of public lavatories have neither soap nor toilet paper. This can be most inconvenient, so it is advised to carry tissues, hand sanitizer, and a handkerchief when using public facilities. On the other hand, every once in a while you’ll come across a heated toilet seat with the accompanying bells and whistles (such as a bidet function and/or a dryer). I wonder what Chinese toilets are going to be like!

From left: Monique, Cambria, Monica, CJ & Diana

First off, the boring stuff: Monday I slept a lot, wrote a lot about the theme of “redemption” in medieval and early modern lit, and plugged away at a few grad school apps. Tuesday, I worked on my Northwestern application, which was due by midnight, and got it done at exactly 11:59:37 EST! Then I finished off my lit paper, which was due by 5pm – so I turned it in at, yes, you might have guessed – 4:45pm! Yeah for procrastination! After that, I went home, ate dinner, then headed off to Lalaport in Yokohama to buy boots for my trip to Hokkaido.

Wednesday, when I was leaving for Hokkaido, I walked to the train station with my cousin Hanako. Fortunately, the train was a few minutes late, because we were a little late, and I would have felt awful if I was the reason that my cousin was late to work! Anyway, I took the train to Shibuya, then took the Yamanote line to Hamamatsucho, where I took the Haneda airport monorail, getting there almost exactly at 9:30am, which is when we were supposed to meet. I’ve been lucky with my timing this past week!

I met up with our group at 9:30am: me, Cambria, CJ (the only guy), Diana, Monica, and Monique. It was nice going through Japanese airport security – no need to take off shoes! Once there, Monique and I got bentos (lunch boxes). The flight to Chitose was approx 1 and 1/2 hours. We could actually see what the pilots saw on our TV screens! That was pretty cool. Cambria and Monique and I all swapped books for the trip – I got Monique’s “Howl’s Moving Castle,” Monique got Cambria’s “Good Omens,” and Cambria got my “The Private Patient” (PD James mystery). Having finished it, I can now say that “Howl’s” was not very good, in my opinion. The writing and the plot were rather incoherent. Does anyone have another opinion?

Once we landed, we took the bus to our hotel, which was also in Chitose. The airport is located in Chitose, which is about 45 minutes away by train from the main city, Sapporo (you’ve probably heard of it because of the beer), where the Snow Festival was being held. We settled into our hotel, and Monique and I took naps while the others went to buy gloves for Cambria and Diana. CJ, Diana, and Monica went to a game center, where we met them before dinner. We had dinner at a kaiten sushi restaurant (where sushi comes around on a little conveyor belt – Hokkaido is well-known for its seafood). We also saw a young woman walking around in little less than hot pants, tights, and sky-high booties! I am guessing that she was from the area and accustomed to the cold. It was quite funny, actually, being with a group of Californians, since there was a lot of whining about the cold (wimps! Hokkaido has nothing on a Chicago winter!).

Thursday, when I woke up, I found that I sang in my sleep, according to Cambria. Now, I’ve been known to talk in my sleep, but no singing until now! Anyway, we set off for Sapporo to go to the Shiroi Koibito (trans, “white sweethearts”) chocolate factory. Transportation was crazy – 810 yen (approx 8 dollars) one way to Sapporo. The factory was interesting, and we got to see how the cookies are made. In fact, one of the conveyor belts was broken, meaning that a worker had to keep on loading cookies into a tray and replace each tray as they got full. In the meantime, several cookies fell down into another tray, from which I assume that the cookies were going to be thrown away. As Cambria said, we would willingly take those “mistake” cookies off of their hands! Another funny thing about the store there is that the cookies are actually cheaper at other stores than they are at the factory! Not sure what the economics of that is. After that, we went to Book-Off, a chain of cheap bookstores, where I found a Destiny’s Child album for 500 yen. Then we went for miso ramen, which is supposed to be a Hokkaido specialty. I just tried not to think about the fact that the broth was probably prepared with lard!

Friday, we all went to the Hokkaido village, which is an outdoor recreation of historical buildings that you can walk around. Most of the houses were actually authentic, having been relocated from their original locations. We saw a school, some houses, a church, a fish-processing facility, where 60 employees slept, each on one tatami mat, and a farm. We also tried our hands at traditional Japanese games, like ohajiki (sort of like marbles), juggling, and the toy where you try to catch a wooden ball on a stick (not a very good explanation, sorry!). We got out early, but not early enough to go to the beer museum (and beer garden), so we went to the sake museum in Sapporo (which has some history, but is really more like a sake tasting room). We also had shabu-shabu tabehodai (hot pot all-you-can-eat) near the Sapporo train station. Shabu-shabu is a Japanese “do-it-yourself” hot pot – you get a pot of boiling water placed on a burner in the middle of the table, then add various ingredients as you like. We also had yakiniku, too – which is like shabu-shabu, except it’s more like frying and uses a sweet liquid and oil to cook with. I didn’t eat any meat, of course, but I loaded up on tofu and mushrooms – yummy!

Saturday, we went to the official snow festival – ice sculptures downtown and then to the Tsutome dome site, where there were snow slides outside and booths set up inside. However, it was really cold once we got to Tsutome, so we just walked around inside the arena there. The ice-sculptures were pretty cool – there was one that was made to look like a building, except there were fish and crabs frozen in the ice “walls.” We also took photos in a ice “car” and talked to a few American tourists.

Sunday, we were to leave that evening, so we debated going to Sapporo, especially since it costs more than $8 each way! Eventually, Cambria, me, and Monique decided to go, since the snow festival was our reason for going after all. We looked at snow sculptures and walked around a bit. I got my required food-on-a-stick – squid – yummy! I then fell down walking on an icy sidewalk, then Monique did, too. How graceful! Then we all ate kaiten sushi again – yummy!

Finally, we returned back to Chitose, got our bags, and headed to the airport. We got there with about 1 hour to spare. We wanted to sit together, so the ticket agent put us all in the emergency exit rows. Then we went to get dinner. By the time we found a restaurant, we only had 30 minutes to spare! We all sorted out the money, payed in advance, then had to scarf down our food to get to the plane in time. We literally ran up to the gate just as the last 5 people were getting on! Yipes! I suppose they might have had to wait for us if we were the emergency exit people, or at least til they found someone else, but, still, it was a little alarming! We made it back to Tokyo problem-free and I returned home to Ichigao tired and happy.

Adventures with costumes!

That’s a takoyaki (octopus dumpling) hat, and the red thing protruding out of my head is an octopus tentacle!

In cinema, we watched “Cat Soup” (a really trippy cat cartoon), “Samurai Champloo” (samurai anime drama with a hiphop soundtrack), and “Cowboy Bebop” (another anime). We also watched “Sukiyaki Western Django.” (“Sukiyaki western” is a play on “spaghetti western,” and “django” is the name of a western film.) I liked it, but almost everyone else I know hated it. It was really weird – sort of John Wayne meets John Woo – but I definitely suggest watching it. Just as a hint of its weirdness, the opening scene is of Quentin Tarantino in a cowboy outfit eating noodles with chopsticks with a background of an ukiyo-e print of Mt. Fuji. It includes references to the Genpei War (one of the Japanese civil wars), the War of the Roses (English history), and, of course, the conventions of the western film (the dusty town, the loner, the long-standing feud).

I went for pancakes in Yokohama at Covent Garden, which is located in a department store. Cambria, Monique and Omair and I went and spent a long time browsing the department store, particularly the costume department, and I have the pictures to prove it! heheheheh

At one of the GLNet lunchtime salons, a Japanese guy student tried to tell me that there are no gay people in Japan. I said that could not be possible, with the tradition, in early modern times, of what would now probably be called pedophilia. I said that perhaps nowadays homosexuality is not as common as it was then, to which he responded “good.” That is the first time I’ve ever heard that particular sentiment from any Japanese person. In fact, there are very few openly gay people here. There is a “gay” district in Tokyo, but I’ve never been there, and homosexuality is pretty much ignored or unknown. On the other hand, I hear a disturbing amount of “that’s so gay” and “that’s so retarded” from other (non-Japanese) students, so much so that I wonder how to respond. I actually heard a male UC student, when talking to another UC student, say not just “that’s so gay” but also “your friend is a f****t (derogatory word for a gay man).” I was really shocked. I actually did say something to him about it later, and felt much better as a result. But I still don’t know how to respond to the frequent “that’s so gay” and “that’s so retarded” used in everyday speech – any thoughts, readers? My cinema teacher even used “retarded” when speaking, although I discovered that I am older than she is!

This past week, I studied a lot for finals, as well as finishing several applications for grad school. One Saturday, I studied for History with Chelsea and Katheryn and one of Katheryn’s friends, Yoshi. After that, I met up with my literature class to see Sengakuji Temple, where the 47 loyal retainers were buried. (The story of “Chushingura,” or “The Treasury of Loyal Retainers,” is a tale of samurai honor, loyalty, and revenge. It’s very popular here, so much so that it is frequently made over.) After visiting the graves, we all went for bagels. The professor said they were the best in Tokyo, and they were pretty good. (But not so good that I would travel all the way there again!) After that, I studied for literature with Monique. Then the next day, I studied with Paula, although our “studying” mainly consisted of using wikipedia to search for information about the key terms the professor gave us for the exam. (Wikipedia is often more helpful than the professor.)

And then, there were finals. Monday was a review day, then:
Tuesday AM: Japanese listening, kanji, and essay
Tuesday PM: History (pretty easy, actually)
More studying for cinema with Monique, Saad, and Sana

Wednesday: More studying for cinema with Monique and Sana (although we watched rather too many five minute movie synopsis videos – if you can find it on-line, check out the mini-movie for “Brokeback Mountain”). Saad was the one who wanted to meet at 9am to study, then he got sick. Argh. So Monique ended up by herself for a good hour and a half, since I got there late, too. Argh.

Thursday AM: Japanese particles, grammar, and reading (first two were OK, the last was really hard)
Thursday PM: Cinema final
(I told the teacher after the midterm that people cheated on the midterm (I heard people talking about it afterward, but I didn’t tell her who), so she created assigned seating for the final. Some people weren’t very happy – particularly those who cheated on the midterm. Otherwise, the final was OK, but, as I am taking all of my classes pass/fail, I didn’t study all that hard.)

Friday, I caught up on sleep, and went to a “shinnenkai” (New Year’s party with some friends. Saturday, I slept some more, and Sunday I did some laundry and got back to writing my literature paper, which was due on Tuesday.

In film class, we watched the Japanese horror film, Kairo, which was re-made in the US as “Pulse.” The Japanese film was definitely creepy, although it really turned out more depressing than scary. The American version, on the other hand, was so bad it was funny. The combination of bad writing and bad acting made me laugh during some “serious” parts. And the answer to zombie invasions turns out to be… red duct tape! It was *bad*.

On Saturday, I went to school for a cinema class extra credit session. We watched “Yotsuya Kaidan”, which basically means “Yotsuya ghost story.” Jyochi is located in Yotsuya, and the parties involved were buried there, until the graves were relocated to make space for the rail lines. It was a little creepy. In fact, I felt worse after that movie than after the Japanese and American horror movies we watched earlier!

Sunday, I made my way to the Shibaura Institute of Technology to take an English-language mathematics exam. It was a lot harder than I expected! But I got 3000yen out of it, so I have no complaints. After that, I meet with my Japanese presentation group. Our presentation was the following Tuesday morning. Our group was: me, Jason, Jennifer, Scott, and Susan. We were doing a presentation on Japanese students who have studied abroad. We were supposed to each interview 4 people, for a grand total of 20 people, but not everybody managed to find 4 people, so Scott made up a few people when he was compiling the results! It was actually a somewhat pointless meeting, since not everybody could attend.

It’s been an uneventful week – lots of sleeping…

I’m not even going to go into detail about my activities. Suffice to say that I managed to catch up on sleep, studying, and grad school applications. I made a few brief trips: to Yokohama, including Motomachi Street; Shibuya, including the Tokyu department store there; and Shimachu (Ichigao’s version of Walmart).

I am steadily learning more and more Japanese. What I am beginning to understand, though, is that it’s not really the vocabulary that’s the problem (although there is still a lot I don’t know). It’s that there are a lot of peculiar expressions used in Japanese conversation that I’ve heard often, but never understood. For instance, I just learned “waza waza” (purposely), “jodan janai” (not a joke), and “kono mama” (like this/in this condition). (Japanese people really seem to like repetitious/rhyming words, and the Japanese language contains a lot of them – eg “waza waza,” “toki doki” (sometimes), “pera pera” (fluently), and “zenzen” (entirely).)

The Japanese don’t really get in the commercial Christmas spirit, as much as merchandisers try to create one. Although I did see an old lady on the train with green hair! In Japan, Christmas is somewhat akin to Valentine’s Day, in that people buy gifts for their sweethearts, but not necessarily for their families or other people. New Year’s is the big holiday, and a rather quiet one at that. Most people just stay home, although some go out to temples on New Year’s Eve, New Year’s Day, or the second day of the New Year. On New Year’s Eve, people stay home and eat “toshikoshi soba” (New Year’s noodle). The idea is that the noodles are thin and long and thus represent a long life. On New Year’s Day, people eat traditional foods, with various meanings. For instance, sweet black beans symbolize trying one’s best (based on a pun that I don’t quite understand), and carrots mixed with daikon (white radish) represents the lucky colors of red and white. New Year food is quite complicated to make, so my aunt and my grandmother both bought things from the grocery store. Actually, they seem to have duplicated their efforts, because my grandmother bought stuff, and then my aunt invited us to eat with them, so grandma and I will have a lot of stuff to eat!

On New Year’s Eve, I ate toshikoshi soba with the fam, and the next door neighbor, seemingly somewhat intoxicated, came by to complain about the dog barking. (A month or so ago I was the one who answered the door. I listened to what he had to say and got the general idea that he was angry about the dog. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), I did not understand the rest of what he was saying, but I don’t think that was his point anyways.) We also watched a TV program rehashing music from the year. The contestants are divided up according to gender, with the men in white and the women in red. Watching Japanese pop music being performed reminds me why people from other countries don’t listen to Japanese music! As I said in one of my earlier blogs, Japanese pop music is crap. Seriously. Plus they add in random English words which make no sense. It’s painful to watch, even more painful when one realizes that people actually like this stuff!

On New Year’s Day, I ate breakfast/brunch with the family, took a nice long nap, played cards with my cousins, lost miserably, and then ate dinner with the family again. We watched a Japanese game show, a lot like that American show “Wipeout.” In fact, many American shows are rip-offs of Japanese game shows. Better that than Japanese pop music! (Sorry, do I sound negative? But it *is* crap!)

On January 2nd, I went shopping with my family, meaning my aunt, uncle and both cousins. We went to Lalaport (funny name), a big shopping center in Yokohama. It was super crowded! It had three different levels and over 300 stores! Inside, it somewhat resembles the interior of the Sophia University chapel – it even has an organ – perhaps it is a church for commercialism? Anyway, I spent far too much time and money! We almost got Coldstone icecream, too – that would have made the indulgence complete.

On Tuesday evening, some of us went out to celebrate the fact that school was over for the year! (Over for the year, in that, unlike in America, where the semester starts in August and ends in December, classes here start in September and end in late January, so there is still school after break, then a two-month vacation in February and March.) Cambria, Kim, Monique & Nina and I went out for karaoke to a place in Shibuya. But not until after getting some icecream at Coldstone Creamery! We were there until midnight-ish, so we all had to sprint to the station to make sure that we didn’t miss our trains!

On Wednesday, I slept in, enjoying the fact that I had no classes. In the afternoon/evening, I went to Roppongi with Mami & Nick, both from GLNet, to see the “illumination” (holiday light display) there. Initially, we went to the same area as the movie theater that I went to last weekend to watch “Up” but there wasn’t much to see there. We got some dinner (bagels & soup) then found our way to the real display, aka “midtown illumination.” Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, so I will have to wait for Mami and Nick to upload theirs! I will have to try to describe it in words! It was really nice, though – a path lined with lit trees, a lawn with blue lights and racing white light stripes, and a gospel choir singing “Oh Happy Day” (my favorite gospel song). On our way back, we decided to get icecream – so I got my second dose of Coldstone icecream in two days! Yum. (This is why I avoid scales!)

On Thursday, Christmas Eve, I slept in (again), then went to Christmas mass at Sophia with Kim, Monique, and their friend Katheryn. Like I had expected, it was really really crowded – I heard that people come from all over Japan to attend Mass at Sophia. The funny part is that of the four of us, only Kim is actually a Catholic. My father was born a Catholic and my mother attended Catholic schools growing up, but that’s the full extent of my Catholicism. And while we were waiting, we were talking, and Monique kept on swearing! I reminded her that we were in a church, for goodness’ sake! When we finally got into the chapel, it was quite pretty. This was my first time in the school chapel. The service was nice – very well-organized. We each got a booklet with the content of the service, and the music for the songs. Singing “Silent Night” in Japanese was a bit odd, though. When it was time to take communion, the other three went up. I didn’t, because I thought that only true Catholics should do so. Katheryn said that the priest nearly took back the host from her! (Perhaps he could tell that she’s not a proper Catholic!)

Friday, I slept in, again (notice a theme?). I went to exchange money at a bank in Shibuya. I asked for directions to SMBC bank, but the police officer said he’d never heard of it – even though I’d been there before! He was very not-helpful. And I did eventually find it on my own, but you’d think he would at least know that it existed! I also saw one of my classmates from my horrible history class while I was there. I saw another Jyochi student near Hachiko (the dog statue in Shibuya) the other day, too. Small world!

After that, I met up with Katheryn & Monique in Roppongi to watch “Avatar” in 3D at the movie theater there. It was pretty good, but I fell asleep for a good 10 minutes or so, and I don’t think I missed much! It was impressive mainly for its special effects. One of the odd things about the movie was that, although it was in English with Japanese subtitles, when the aliens were speaking, the subtitles were in Japanese, not English, so I had no idea what they were saying! (Judging from the plot, though, I doubt I missed much.)

On Saturday, my uncle and my grandmother and I went to a nearby clinic for my grandmother to see the doctor. A clinic open on a weekend? That would never happen in the States! Afterwards, we had dinner and played gin rummy. I won, but I think we were a little confused about each other’s rules!

On Sunday, I actually woke up really early, earlier than even during the school year, took out the recycling, and went back to bed. I did laundry, then did a whole lot of nothing until dinner with the family (my aunt, uncle, grandmother, and cousin Yuta – Hanako was out). It was nice.

When it comes to learning Japanese, it seems that I know a bunch of random stuff. For instance, I somehow knew the word for “fire engine” (shobosha), but just learned the word for “free” (muryo) last week! But it’s a good feeling when you’re on the train and you can actually read a poster! (OK, so it was only one poster, but I got that warm fuzzy feeling of accomplishment anyways).