The scoop today

So I went to class today completely un-prepared. The only studying I did for my kanji quiz was the hour train ride beforehand. It was plenty of time to cram 20 kanji in my brain for the test. I am going to try to actually "learn" them later on tonight. There was also a grammar quiz which I forgot about. Luckily the stuff that was on it was taught in Genki II way back when. It went all right hopefully.

Before Genji class I managed to read 2 chapters and answer all the questions. In class I pretty much slept the entire time. 3 hours of Genji is just too much in one day. We also watched this interesting documentary about bringing the ancient pictures of the text back to life. They did this really intense analysis of the old inks and materials that were used, and made replicas of the original colors. It was cool, but I could only understand half of what was going on.

Finally during my song class, Louvie and I played psp. Nuff said.

After class I went to Mister Donut with Vaso to check out the new Simpsons flavored donuts. The Simpsons Movie is debuting in Japan sometime this month and MisDo is running a special. They have two flavors, banana and mixed-berry. I really liked the banana, but mixed-berry had it's own flair. Honestly the selection at MisDo is really bad. The so called "limited-time" donuts are by far the best they have flavor wise. Why they don't have those all the time I don't know.

Michiyo Sensei just sent us the placements for the spring practicum. From Feburary 5th to March 4th I will be spending my time in Niigata teaching 2nd graders English! I will be completely isolated from the rest of the study abroad students (they are going to other places). It is going to be really weird to have absolutely no contact with other English speaking people for an entire month. Hopefully it will be a really good experience for me. I get to learn Japanese at a grade school level! The only thing I am not looking forward to the coldness though... There will be snow everywhere! Maybe I can go skiing...

I wanna do this everyday

So I realize that I should start blogging everyday... Hmmm... Its hard isn't it? Even the most miniscule piece of information should be important...

So over the weekend Shoichi sent me message simply stating "Are you free Monday?" I replied "Yes after 12pm." Then he told me "Meet at Takadanobaba at 12:30 Monday." That is usually how plans get started here. Text messaging is cheaper and more efficient than calling, so little messages like this get sent to and from my phone at least once every couple of hours.

Anywho, I met Shoichi and gang at Baba station at 12:40 (I don't yet understand it, but I am always late!) Shoichi, Hiromichi, Chisato, and Takako joined me in a lunch expedition. The suspect was this Thai buffet that apparently Chisato had heard about. After passing it no less than 2 times, we finally turned down the correct ally and found the place. It was a nice cozy basement filled with Chirstmas lights and giant plates of food. I was astonished that there were authentic metal plates for use instead of the normal Japanese style tiny plates. The selection of food was something to be desired, but all in all it was good. It was all nice and spicy just the way I like it. To top it off for desert we had tapioca pudding. Delicious!

After lunch the gang had to go back to study. I had a short meeting with Yamana sensei about doing some research next semester. I am still undecided, but if I had more time I would love to do something like that. Afterwards I headed to the nearest game center to kill some time. It was at the Baba Big Box and I played a game of each DDR, Guitar Freaks, Drummania, and Beatmania. I found out that my new favorite game is Drummania. Why not hit buttons when you can smack a rubber pad with a stick that does the same thing? It is amazing. I am afraid of how much money I may blow on that game alone during the course of this year.

I also learned an important lesson today. I went to Nakano then decided to return to Baba without actually going out of the gates. When I got back to Baba the gate would not let me out. So I go talk to the Eki-in and he tells me that I have to pay for the trip there and back. Great, $3 down the drain because of a change of plans. That money could have bought me a drink!

I made up my mind to go hang out with an unknown person named Nishio that I met a couple months ago. I did not recognize him at first, but he obviously recognized me first. That was all that really mattered. We ended up going to Karaoke for an hour and then to dinner. I was very impressed with the Karaoke place as most of the songs had furigana over the kanji. Every song that I sung was full of hiragana everywhere, which could be a good or a bad thing depending on what kind of level you are at. At the restarant we had some really good sashimi and other fish platters. It was really cool to talk in Japanese from lunchtime all the way through dinner. I wish I could do that every day... But at the same time, I spent a lot of money today on food and entertainment. That does not need to happen every day...

And finally, just got home a little past midnight with tons of homework left to do.

週末

今週末はゆっくりことをした。金曜日の５限の授業をサボっちゃった。飲みに行っただから。最初に家に戻って、下高井戸の町を探検した。ほかのスーパーや酒屋やいろんなおいしそうなレストランをみつけった。今晩のパーティーのためにジントニックを買っておきた。全部の町をみつけったよかった。近くのさえきというスーパーは最近閉じるようになった。残念だなー

とにかく、父さんは夕食を作ってくれた。俺は「いつもありがとう」と言ってた。後出かけた。高田馬場でリエンゾさんとヴァソ君はハングアウトしたかった。でも二人はまだ食べていなかったから俺は早くショウコウ姫の家へ行った。予定は皆さんがショコウの家で集まって、飲んで、アゲハへ行くつもりだ。俺はアゲハに行きたくなかったけれども、一緒に飲みたかった。そのことはいつも楽しいことだなー。アイダさん、キートンさん、ヴァンスさん、アダムさん、ショウコウ姫がいた。ジャスティンという人はもいる。彼はショウコウの最近の彼氏だった。彼は優しそうな人だった。

１１時ぐらい酔っ払いで家に戻った。覚えってない。

土曜日何もしなかった。勉強したり、ゲームしたり、漫画を読んだりした。一日中家にいた。

今日もパーティーだった。ホストファミリーと留学生たちは集まって、感謝祭を祝った。俺は食べ過ぎた。ターキーや色々な肉とかおかしいなどあった。すごくうまかった。

小学校

１２月６日新宿区立戸塚第二小学校に訪問した。そこで小学生達と遊んだ。みんなさんは楽しんでいた。

僕はあまり準備しなかった。レンさんとカメロンさんと２０分ぐらい簡単な自己紹介を作った。みんなの留学生は日本人と最初に会ったら自己紹介をすることになっている。それにしても上手にできる。授業中で奥原先生は同級生に準備されたけど授業の以外でぜんぜん練習しなかった。なぜかというと小学生達は４年生ので、適当な言葉を使わないのにみんなはわかる。

最初に早起きて高田馬場駅前に同級生と集まった。小学校はけっこ近い。あるいって１分ぐらい。何回も隣にあるいってわからない。外のスクールはアメリカの小学校みたいけど中はぜんぜん違う。ロッカーがないし、日本的な部屋もあるし。たくさん日本について絵がはいてある。会議室で待った。

体育館で小学生達を集まった。まず小学生達は「君をのせて」という曲を歌ってくれた。本当にきれいだった。４年生代そんなうまさができなかった。それから、僕とカメロンは説明してあげた。後留学生たちは名前とどこから来たと１つの好きなものを呼んだ。そしてレ、ンさんは日本の地図とアメリカの地図をみせた。ほとんどの子供たちは違いをもう知ってる。次はクイズをやった。だいたい適当な答えを答えた。日本の子供は日本以外ことが知ってるのでびっくりした。後で「ホットポテト」というゲームをやった。ゲームのグループはやっとホットポテトを決めた。簡単に説明してやった。子供たちは「好き」だって。

休み時間になると色々なゲームとかおもちゃなどをやることにしている。僕は面白いカードゲームをやった。何というか覚えていないけど楽しかった。ほっかの人は剣玉を使ったり、しょうぎを習ったり、チョコレートパズルをやったりした。この時間は一番楽しいと思った。終わって小学校の国語について授業を見た。小学生も同級生も言葉の使い方を習った。「とる」とか「かける」などの使い方を勉強した。一番変なことは子供は質問を答えば、「みんなさんどうですか？」と聞くことになっている。アメリカの小学校でそのことがない。ほかの授業はアメリカの英語の授業と同じぐらい。

Daft Punk

So first of all I did not bring my camera to the Daft Punk concert for fear of it getting taken away at the door. I did manage to take some pictures with my camera phone, but at the moment I have no idea how to get them on my computer.

I met up with Mike at Shinjuku and we made the hour commute to Makuhari Messe. Yes, it is the same place where CeaTec, Tokyo Game Show, and the Tokyo Motor Show was held. That huge convention center. We got there about half an hour after the show started, around 3:30pm, which was alright because the first band sucked.

The first thing we did was get a locker for out jackets, and by locker I mean plastic bag. You heard me right, they were selling plastic bags for people to put their stuff in. A number was then attached to it and the bag was set in a section alloted for 200 bags. We were 42**. There were a ton of people there. At the very least 10,000.

We scouted out the floor for a while deciding where to go when Jeremy ran into us. He introduced us to his friends and we watched the crappy band play. Once the band was over there was an intermediary DJ group on the side named Dex Pistols. They were actually pretty good. Got the crowd pumping a little bit. Once the next group came out the place really started to pick up. Tons more people filled in and the music by Ryukyudisko was amazing. Lots of drum and bass stuff.

At this point I decided that we needed to get into the crowd and as close to the front as possible. I dragged Mike to the floor and we weaved our way through the ever growing crowd. We got separated pretty early, which was alright with me. I proceeded to move away from the large group of drunk foreigners and had a good time dancing with some Japanese groups.

The band after Ryukyudisko was also good, but I don't know their name. It was a band much like the first one, but this one had no singer and the instrumentals were at least 10 times better.

Finally at 7pm Daft Punk finally came out! There was a big push to the front of the stage initially. I was a little worried that it would turn into a large mosh-pit, but soon learned that Japanese people are not about that. The concert was amazing. Daft Punk played a lot of their popular stuff mixed with their non-so-famous songs. The led's on their pyramid coupled with the lasers and flourecent lights just made the entire thing come together. I had a blast.

I will try to post pictures whenever I figure that out. Until next time!

Ageha

This week was pretty boring. I did some homework, ate some food, went to class, and maintained my routine. I did buy some more Super Famicom games which brings my collection to 25 games or so. I also got a couple more manga too. Hopefully I can start finishing some of these series off!

Yesterday I went to my special class that Yoshimoto Sensei hooked me up with. I find it very amusing that the class is about databases using SQL, and yet almost no one in the class has even done anything with html. I spent half the class explaining how to program in html to the people sitting next to me. They were in awe at how much I knew.

I went home early as my 5th period class was canceled. I proceeded to take a nap until dinnertime. For some odd reason, whenever I am sleeping and one of my parents says that food is ready, I always wake up instantly. They could say it in the faintest voice from all the way across the house, and I would still wake up. This has already happened on multiple occasions, but I never noticed it until Vaso mentioned that he experiences the same thing.

I left the house at 10pm. Met up with Brittany, Josh, Steve, and Jeremy in Shibuya. The plan was to go to Ageha all night for their special 5th anniversary event. I made up my mind to go weather or not anyone came with me. Jeremy was the only one that decided to go. Now I had no idea where this place was. It was supposed to be somewhere in Shinkiba, but when we arrived there was nothing around. It felt like we left Tokyo. After consulting with the Koban, we found the right direction.

I had a blast. As Jeremy and I were waiting for the doors to open, Rebbecca, Elena, and 4 of their friends showed up. This was unexpected, but the more the merrier I guess. Once we got inside, everyone separated and went their different ways. The party ended at 6 in the morn and we all dragged our butts back home.

Tomorrow is DAFT PUNK!

Yay for Kamakura

The group trip this Saturday was for Kamakura. We all met bright and early at 8am in front of the Big Box, Takadanobaba. Don distributed 3000 yen to all of us for transportation and lunch. We then headed off. As it turned out, Don did not know how to get us to Kamakura, so he looked to Steve and I for directions. After much debate, we finally got on the right train.

Once we arrived, the group headed for the closest temple, Tsurugaokahachimangu (鶴岡八幡営). The the group started to dissipate as everyone went their own directions. The temple was the same as it was last time, except the renovations were done. I got to see all of it this time. Later in the day we all met at the Daibutsu for a group picture (which I have yet to receive back...) Finally, we all separated again.

My group of Steve, Nikki, Austin, Wallace, and I went to Hasedara temple first. This one in particular is really cool because it is built on the side of one of the mountains. There is a beautiful view of the sea and the city. There are also a few caves that you can walk through with various praying spots along the way.

After the temple we stopped by the beach for a little bit. There were a lot of people trying to surf (both boards and windsurfers.) It was too cold to be doing that if you ask me. The beach was not very beach like. The sand was not "fluffy" and I felt that sitting down on it would be a bad idea.

For the rest of the day, we went hiking up in the mountains. We started off on the Genji trail and proceeded to get ourselves lost. It was a very pretty hike with lots of rough trails. I enjoyed myself greatly.