No time to blog the last two days, but I excused myself early today under the guise of sleeping. Yesterday, I made it back to school on my own without getting lost! Navigating the subway system is just a matter of finding the right line. It's very easy to understand, and I can always ask the people for help. Monday Morning a very nice young man helped me and even made sure I got off and waited for the right train. This kind of thing makes you realize no matter where you go, people are mostly the same. This is coming from a New Yorker, who has helped many a tourist on the train.
Me and Kyle met up with our Japanese professor from Hamilton College who had some business in Japan. I signed up for a ketai (cellphone), but since we left with Kamiya-sensei, I did not receive it until today. Anyways, it was really odd at first, seeing Kamiya-sensei because I knew that anything but Japanese would NOT fly, so I was kind of nervous. He even thought I was still jetlagged and sleepy, I was so quiet and nervous. D:
Me and Kyle in Ginza.
Yakitori. Yaki = burn/toast and Tori = chicken.
Kamiya-sensei took us to Ginza, which was AMAZING. It looks exactly like Fifth Ave, with all the brand name stores! :D We went to get Yakitori, since I hadn't had it yet and was eager to try. If you don't know what Yakitori is, I'd say you were missing out. It is various parts of the chicken, fried, on a stick. There was cartilage, skin, wing, liver, etc. My favorite part was, surprisingly, the cartilage! Nice and crunchy, and went great with beer. That's right you guys, I am in a country where I am of age to grab a drink with my professor. How awesome is that? Kamiya-sensei ordered a lot of things for me and Kyle to try, and they were all dericious. I had a "Lime Sour" which was a very girly drink, but still good. We talked a lot about different kinda of food.
Afterward, we tried looking for a ramen shop because in Japan, people usually eat ramen after drinking. We couldn't find a shop in Ginza, so settled for more window shopping and some interesting conversation about our host families, and direct style of speaking vs. distal style. We met Kamiya-sensei's colleagues and went to Akihabara (Akibara for short), and did more window shopping. It ain't called the electric city for nothing.
When I got home, I finally got to talk to the 3rd son in my host family, Yugo. He speaks Spanish better than me! He's traveled practically everywhere, including South America. We shared pictures, added each other on facebook, and talked about his travels. We also talked about homosexuality in Japan! Interesting topic, and I hear from Yugo that homosexuality in Japan is still hush hush. My host mother thought it was weird though.
AS FOR TODAY: BUS TOUR OF TOKYO!! But the two places we saw were Ginza and Akibara, which I had already seen. -____- We went to Asakusa, which is awesome with temples and lots of cool little stands to shop in for the tourist type. I also finally got my ketai today!! I had to buy a ketai strap IMMEDIATELY, of course.
Everyone wanted to take a picture of her because she + pikachu = ultimate mega level super duper kawaiiiiii cute. MOE!! She was confused. Silly Americans. "I'm too popular today," she said. :D
It's cute, ne?
I am sitting at a Kotatsu writing this. It's a table with an electric heater under it. Awesome desyoo?
***Wednesday Update: Trip to Shibuya today. Lots and lots of stores to buy from. So expensive!! Will have to go back with money. Owari~
2 Comments:
Hey dude. =) It's been a whileeee! XD
It's 4:50 AM and I'm still awake again. I was watched the whole 3 hour concert for Arashi Around Asia 2008 right now. Fucking aces dude addkhklhtljj; marry me Nino/Riidaa. Or eachother, that's cool. http://tapsilogue.livejournal.com/26831.html Caps here. XD
ANYWAY
1. Nice people? In my New York City? More likely than you'd think. :B
2. Lol Kamiya-sensee stop scaring your students. :D
3. Yakitori want.
4. Alcohol lol. Kamiya-sensee is ballin'.
5. Man I don't know spanish for shit. Anything I knew was replaced 100% by Japanese. ^^
6. Hush hush you say? Well, I'm still glad for my yaoi manga and Ohmiya SK.
7. LOL scary gaijins just snapping pictures away. :D
8. Kotatsu must be epic huh. o_o They are aren't they.
Catch you laterrrr. I may sleep or watch the concert over.. ^^
New Yorkers tried to set me on fire when I asked for directions on the subway
Sometime after breakfast, me and Otoosan went for a run next to the river! It was raining a bit, and VERY windy, but running next to the river was SUCH a good feeling. We talked a little, too. In the morning, the river is congested with joggers. I hope I can get up in the mornings to run on my own. Since I don't have a lot of my running clothes, I ran in jeans, so I must of looked a bit odd.
Sometime after that, we had lunch which was "tuki-soba" (付きそば）, probably called that because it is soba that you add other stuff to? Everyone gets a tiny bowl of a soy sauce, dashi, water mixture. You add spring onion, some other herb, and wasabi, then add from the communial soba bowl + black seasame seeds and slurp away! They encouraged me to slurp because, rather than being seen as rude, it is a sign of enjoyment. Heeh! I was more than happy to slurp away. After lunch, I reminded Okaasan about getting my Alien Registration card. For any longer than 90 days, you need one of these to stay in Japan. Once I have one, I can stop carrying around my passport.
After showering, I met Kyle at Tsunashima station. Kyle helped me buy a Pasmo card for tomorrow, since I'm going to have to commute to school on my own (scary!!!). Afterwards, we walked around for a bit to check out the area. There are many many nice places to shop. We saw some familiar "restaurants" too, like McDonalds and Subway.
Check out the special Nihon-dishes! :O
We went to Book Off! which is a store they have in New York City. It sells books/dvds/games/manga at CHEAP prices because they're (slightly) used. After that, we went to the 百円屋 (100 yen shop) and bought notebooks, and alarm clock, and a random candy. Our goal is to buy something new every time we buy candy/a drink etc. Today was black sesame gummies. Kinda weird but good! The alarm clock I bought is so ghetto but it will do the job for now. After walking around some more, Kyle came to my house for Tea and tea infused cake (good!). We talked about a lot of things. I am truly impressed by your skills, Kyle!
Kyle ended up staying for dinner and we had something that we both haven't had here yet-curry!! Oh my, SO GOOD.
The spread.
Otoosan & Okaasan!
Tomorrow, I have more Orientation things to do, plus a meet-up with Kamiya-sensei, my professor from Hamilton College who is on Spring Break here in Japan. I hope I can go hang out afterwords. I have a 10pm curfew! Aaaaack. I went from having no curfew to a rather early one. It's part of the experience, ne?
4 Comments:
I have a few points to address here. xD I appreciate a long entry.
1. Mainichi "penis butter?" Loves it. XD
You talked about the DEATH PENALTY? And OBAMA? Holy awesome. Dad is really opinionated and pretty much hates Obama right now along with Johnny. I want to give him more time myself. Oh well.
Slurp away! XD I was watching an episode of Mago Mago Arashi - Chinese Lessons and they talked about the slurping thing I think. Ok in Japan, not in China. :D I'm all for slurps.
LOL SUBWAY SAMMIES <3 They all look pretty good.... ok.. except for the egg.
Book Off!!?? Did they have a lot of awesome stuff? T^T omg.
Fun times with your ii tomodachi? :D LOL tea time... the curry looks totemo dericious.
Your host parents look interesting. :D Okaasan looks classy.
That's all for now. <3 Lovies.
I'm with Jeanine...im all for the slurps! Otoosan and Okaasan seem really cool...100 sit ups...I'm very impressed. And that is definitely some gripping morning conversation!
Running by the river sounds so tranquil and deep (i wanted to fit it in somewhere lol).
Wow, you have quite an active family ne?
Lol, and yes, you made it FINE by yourself to Jochi, I saw you there! I cannot believe that I made it home tonight!
Peanut Butter, so funny! When I hosted a french exchange student we introduced her to some "Jiffy" spread as well (are Americans the only who eat peanut butter?)
Love the blog and pics, keep it up leen-desu!! :)
LOL i'm gonna fight that curfew as soon as they start trusting me. i'm such a good girl. (bwahaha)
my otoosan totally said penis butter instead of peanut butter. LOL. man.
Today was alternating nerves and excitement ever since I woke up this morning at the Tokyo Green Palace. I was afraid we'd have to meet our families first thing in the morning, so I felt ill-prepared, especially after walking in the rain to Sophia. Yet the excitement had even more time to build towards our 3:00pm meeting with the families. Walking around the campus, we could see many of the families making their way to the buildings, but it wasn't until all the CIEE students were lines up in the front of a roomful of families (all sitting with nametags watching us), that I saw my family. I recognized them right away, and immediately my heart started beating sooooo quickly!! We all did our introductions, and you could tell the families were impressed.
Right off the bat, we talked a lot. I can tell you everything I've learned about my family, and all the things we talked about but that isn't the amazing part. Speaking to them in Japanese, no matter how skilled my sentences are, makes me soooo happy.
The area is really nice, lots of tiny stores and houses, and mansons. The streets are close together, which makes me feel rather large and awkward a lot of the times. It's a 15 minute walk form the station to home, and I don't even remember how long the train ride was since I was so engaged in speaking to my family. I get the feeling I will get very very lost very soon.
At dinner we had a special guest which made the evening even more enjoyable, though consequentially I didn't find out much of the rules and such I wanted to find out. The guest was a 30-something year old Korean woman who previously stayed with the family to learn Japanese. She was quite an adorable and endearing person! Even though she only stayed there a month, you could tell the parents were enamored by her.
I live in a house, and have my own room on the second floor. It is very spacious, and I even have my own desk. I sleep on a futon, which is exciting. I feel very Japanese right now lying down and typing this. I hope this post had coherant enough thoughts. I am tired, but the urge to blog took over. I will create posts with better flow later. For now, that's all. I'm going to bed.
6 Comments:
uwa
this sounds very exciting. mom demanded i read your blog outloud for her so i did LOL. when i came to the word "mansons" i was like wtf is this. xD *looks up* maybe mansions? lol.
your room sounds amazing. O___O take pictures. you have internet??? your family sounds pretty damn cool. did you give your gifts? *more questions*
HAVE A GOOD RESTT
oooo, are you in a homestay? I thought you could only do a dorm or an apartment?
I'm in a homestay!! I need to take a picture of my family, huh? :D Hopefully I get a phone Monday, Leina!
Jeanine, "manshon" is apartment.
Leen-desu, Picasa web albums ftw! :)
Seriously, I am loving these albums.
that's so awesome! I'm glad the family is nice! And you have a futon...i <3 futons lol
Sometime I have to stop, look around, and tell myself: You're in Nihon. It's surreal. Wandering the streets, I am surprised how normal it feels. These are people. They walk around getting to work, getting drunk, holding hands, like anyone else. At the same time, I am definitely an outsider.
I am freaking out about my Japanese placement test. Bleeeeh. Sleep now!! G'nite! Pics later, I promise.
1 Comments:
That is unbelievably cool (i think i spelled that wrong...oh well lol)!!!! Speaking to a drunken salary man in Japanese? Hell, im impressed! I'm stationed by my computer for these pics lol
:)
Top 5 Reasons I'm Going to Miss NYC (In no particular order)
5. The people. This city is full of some bat shit crazy people. Forget watching Maury or Jerry Springer--take a walk outside and it will likely earn similarly amusing results. Alternatively, it could be scary. My lovely moment on the park swing turned sour when a man ranting with a crazy look in his eye walked in and started angrily kicking around a piece metal.
4. The food. Each neighborhood has it's own taste of home which becomes the New Yorker's own unique flavor, like a chameleon of cuisine. I've already had my last Cubano and Pernil in Spanish Harlem, overpriced fro-yo in Chelsea, mama's home cookin'. Still left to do: Bubble Tea and Dumplings in Chinatown, Sushi in Jtown (I'll never get sick of it!). Does Trader Joes count? New Yorkers surely love cheap prices too.
3. The subway. It's not so much that I will miss its structure (as lovely as it is), rather I'll miss the feeling of knowing exactly what train to take where and what transfer to make. Japan's metro system is daunting. I don't know if you know this, but it's in Japanese.
2. Being walking distance from everything. And knowing how to get there. Kind of like #3.
1. MY PEOPLE. You know who you are.
Top 5 in Japan
5. See drunken salary men. Maybe it will help me understand my father a bit more. Plus, they gotta be hilarious.
4. Travel. After years of looking down on tourists, I'm ready to be one! Shrines, temples, Mt. Fuji, kabuki plays, a Japanese baseball game, shopping--I want to do it all.
3. Cultural emersion. I want to understand the Japanese ethos that has always been attractive to me. In everything they do: business, art, food, family, love...there seems to be something complete and beautiful that they give of themselves.
2. MEET ARASHI. /End fangirling.
1. EAT DERICIOUS THINGS. As my good friend would say.
I meant only to write in the blog post-departure, but I'm just so terribly excited/anxious/nervous. Maybe writing pointless things alleviates the tension in my brain.
Labels: lists, new york city, pointless, pre-departure
2 Comments:
Hope you see/experience all the stuff on this list while you're there! :) And while you're gone i'll tell all the crazy people to save all their antics for your return hahaha
I always miss New York City, and I'm just 5 hours away by Amtrak. Well, I think it's all the same when you can't go home anyway. Although it's not the same when everyone in the country you are in speaks Japan. Not to mention the continent of Asia.
But let's not get into that. You named some good NYC ones. Walking distance is probably the best. As long as you know where the train stops are, which we really do. xD
Watch out for those drunk salary men. I don't think they will mess with a Party Rican though! You should wear one of those Party Rican bandanas with the flag on it.
Lol I'm just playing.
As for Arashi- If only. Gyahhhhh. @__@
Favorite songs so far:
1. Pikanchi Double
2. Happiness
3. We Can Make it!
4. Beautiful Days
5. Sakura Sake
I could keep going with that list. T^T
In other news, check out the new layout! I spent a good couple hours working on it. Comments can be left on the tagboard on the side, so please help yourself. (:
Labels: before departure, cabin fever
5 Comments:
ninomiya approves this message
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いいな～もうすぐ日本に行く！！
そしてレイアウトきれいよ～ ^_^
oh my
nice bg for the blog & good pic too =)
