Let's see if I still know how to write in English!

Never fear! I haven’t neglected my blog, for too long. Things got real busy last week. I didn’t get to have a day off! We had school on Saturday and then I got pulled into writing and memorizing a speech in Japanese (in only two days) so that I could come to school Sunday to give it. Let’s just say the speech was written, but definitely NOT memorized. But most people here are pleased with anything a foreigner can say in Japanese. But people who know me know I don’t like making mistakes, so it was kind of frustrating. But my mistakes were still worth 5 pieces of AMERICAN candy as a thank you. It was funny, because the Australian exchange student was asking me what Butterfingers and 3 Musketeer Bars were. And then someone behind me was telling her ‘one is honey comb and the other is strawberry chocolate’. I still can’t let the strawberry thing go, it’s fluffy chocolate, no fruit! I’m hoping there won’t be any more school on Sunday for me lurking in the near future. But I did have a lot of fun on Saturday with my host family. It was my host grandma and grandpa’s 50th wedding anniversary. One of my host sisters was sick (but we got to eat her portion of dessert at the party ;P). We all met at my host grandparent’s house and took a mini charter bus to a hotel. The hotel was near my 3rd host family’s house. It was kind of weird driving by places I thought I wouldn’t see again. At the hotel we took a family portrait. Since it was being professionally done we all had to dress nice, i.e. school uniforms. If you look at some of the pictures I’ve posted below you can see the differences in the uniforms. My second youngest host sister is in a public high school. She can wear whatever kind of sweater or socks she likes. However they aren’t so lenient in the hair department, they still got made when she dyed her hair brown (they made her dye it back to black right away). And my youngest host sister is in middle school. She’s in the blue uniform with the long skirt. You won’t see ANY middle school kids here with their school skirt rolled up short (just their casual skirts). I guess it’s like a coming of age thing, ha! Skirt rolling! And of course there is my uniform, the private school one. Lately girls have been getting in trouble at my school for talking guys into buying them guy sweaters, they ride lower. And then there are a handful of third year girls that change into other ‘unapproved’ sweaters while waiting for the bus or train. Girls who are ‘artistic’ with their uniforms are called ‘gals’, not usually a nice thing to call someone. It’s a whole other fashion world and most kids like it though. We talked about in English class once, if people would like coming to school in normal clothes or not. The general consensus was ‘no! that’s too expensive’. (I won’t say that their blazers cost almost $300). Anyway! Back to the anniversary! After portraits we ate a fancy dinner while singing karaoke. I’m so glad I had the western meal. I can deal with most Japanese food, even raw fish, but sometimes you just have to pass. I sang YMCA during karaoke time. On the way home my host grandma was doing the dance to it saying, ‘oh I used to do this when I was young’!! It was really cute. And so now it’s Wednesday, a day off (FINALLY) and almost time for Turkey Day in the states. I’ll be thinking of all you people with pie, well… I’ll be thinking of the pie at least! Eat up!

Random pictures in front of random Christmas trees, yay!

I can actually see this ferris wheel from my classroom at school.

My host brother. He doesn't think I'm crazy, I promise!

My class, 2年4組, second year class four!

Nonononovember!

Happy November everyone! Time to boycott uniforms and take the SAT subject tests and go to amusement parks! Well I didn’t do that first one, but I swear, making students wear skirts in the winter is a health hazard. And so is cleaning the school. I had the worst assignment for this months ‘big cleaning’. The girl’s bathroom. I think my teacher is out to get me. One of the toilets in there had been stalled for three weeks. Imagine what three weeks would do to milk or a sandwich, or even worse, what I pulled out of the pipe! Since they have toilets on the floor the plunger wouldn’t work right. It kept folding in on itself and, yes, splashing me. So I used these ancient looking rusty salad tong things to remove the uh problem along with other things you might find stuck in a jammed toilet… Needless to say I am now a toilet hero and of course never found without my hand sanitizer. (I think I might have mentioned once they don’t have soap in the bathrooms) Anyway that was how I ended my Friday before running home early to get rested up for the SAT II. I got up at 4 am the next day to go with my host mom to the testing center which was eons away. It was being held at the American School in Japan. I think I suffered from overload of American teenagerness. They were everywhere, and pretty much all of them went to the school. So it was all intimidating and weird, especially understanding all the side conversations going on. I made it through with all my limbs intact though! I took the Japanese with listening test. I think I nailed the listening part, seriously. I’m probably un-nailing it by writing it down, but that’s okay (not really). One poor girl sitting in front of me had her CD player break half way through and there was nothing that could be done! Ouch. Anyway, I was really glad to get out of there. When you’ve been a foreigner in Japan a long time you really start to get that weird feeling when you see other foreigners. It’s like ‘hello yes I know you’re there but I’m just gonna go on my own little foreign way and you can go on yours’. But this was more awkward because all these kids had their own little groups and they all knew each other. It was funny, on the way home this girl got on the train and was so busy staring at me she stepped on my foot. And completely unrelated, there was this guy that sat down across from me. He sat down really fast and wacked his head really hard on the window. He sat for like 10 minutes cradling his head like he dislodged something serious. People are strange! But I did have a really great time on Thursday. I went to Yomiuri Land (I still can’t say it right) with the 2nd year Judo girls. Two of us road everything there, except for the rides for 3-7 years old. Bummer! Below are pictures from our day.

'Crazy Stooon', the name alone just strikes fear into the bravest of men!!

Oh yeah!

We got to ride the amusement park's mascot, 'Land Dog'.

Cute little stray hanging out by the ice cream stand in Yomiuri Land. Come home with me kitty!! =^_^=