almost there

officially done with my fall/winter semester at waseda! today i finished my final exam for my environmental policies class, and let me just say THANK JEEBUS i was able to do a debate and get half of my grade out of the way. the exam was only easy because i got to skip half of it! hahaha but YESSSSS HALFWAY DONE. all in all, i have become a very lazy worker, what with never having homework and only the occasional report. not looking forward to the shock of earlham studying load.

i leave for iiyama with brogi in two days, where i will be frolicking in giant snow igloos slash cleaning every inch of the customer's rooms and learning how to make beds like a BAMF. i'm a little nervous because this is a real job (minus the salary) and i'm gonna have to use formal japanese and all, which i have not used in ages. guess my next two days will be spent studying. guh. but hey heyyyy we get to take the bullet train out there for free! i'm glad the program is letting us go via shinkansen, because there was no way in hell i was ever gonna get to ride one with my own money. freaking expensive yo.

speaking of expensive, i am a huge failure like woah. i went to get my film from my new canon ae-1 camera (sawyer) developed, and waited for an hour while they worked on it, and spent $25 buying new film/getting the film developed etc etc...only to have them tell me that the film strip was blank. not a single picture. no lie, that was super depressing/embarrassing. but i'll figure it out; not sure what i did wrong the first time, but i'll make sure i don't do it again! and if i do...then i'll ask aaron to impart his awesome photography wisdom onto me.

anywho. halfway there also means that our one semester friends are leaving. jackson and TY are already back in america, and hannah and natalie leave this weekend. i am going to miss them all so much :( we've experienced the crazy times of japan together, and there are so many good memories: orientation, karuizawa, sexy talks, konbini lunches on SILS steps, etc etc. even though it's just postponing the inevitable, i wish we could keep our group whole for the rest of the year. all those inside jokes and support through hard times...i hope we all stay in touch for a long long time. <3


friends dressed up for japan's seijin no hi, the national holiday for when you turn 20 years old (adult, despite the fact that those sneaky japanese people continue looking young and fabulous until they're 50)

hannah and minoru, giving me awesome picture opportunities as usual!

liz may have had something in her eye, but it was really funny for some reason~

to this day i am not sure why i left the house wearing all...that

purikura with brogi, emperor jackson, and tomoki-tennou

utilizing jackson's itouch for adorable pictures of myself. cam whore.

sushi and pizza party with the group!

my japanese 3L class! i miss them already! never again shall we hear the "AHHHH WAKATTA" as ubukata-sensei writes the kanji on the board and all the chinese kids understand, or curse at each other in our different languages and have all the girls swoon when pietro speaks italian, or have everyone try the pancake juice and realize it's actually really freaking tasty. ww

y-chan enjoying barging in on me and wearing one of my mustaches~

my new baby, sawyer <3 now if i could just figure out how to work it...

ueno? ueYES.

i feel like someone has made that joke before too, but i can't remember who, so i'm gonna steal it.

on my last thursday adventure i headed over to ueno park, which is only a few stops past ikebukuro, so i relished a bit in the not having to puzzle over whether i was lost or not. however was not expecting this place to be so huge. i must've stayed there for three to four hours, but i still didn't get to see it all!

first stop was to toshogu shrine, because my main attraction in going to the park was to see the enshrined flame left over from the bombings of hiroshima and nagasaki. toshogu was supposed to be a really cool temple too, but when i got there...sad sauce: under construction D:

at least it's incentive for me to come back (not that i need it! that place was gorgeous). the weather was pretty much perfect, if albeit a little warm, and the fall leaves were workin' it.







a japanese lady (bright blue dress and i'm 99% sure i saw her at baba the next day) was standing next to me at the flame shrine, and i asked her if she could tell me the meaning behind the stone carvings nearby since i couldn't read the kanji. she was very sweet, if a little surprised i could understand her (which i am ashamed to say, but i couldn't really. simple japanese conversation i get, but peace/war/life topics are just a tad bit harder, if you know what i'm saying), and we chatted for a while. i do remember her saying that she had been to hiroshima to see the peace monuments as a high schooler, and that she hadn't really gotten the magnitude of it all (since back then it was more like "memorize what we're telling you because it'll be on your test!") until her grandmother died, and then she went back for a business trip years later and it all hit her. we stood together for a bit staring at the memorial, and then she headed to toshogu shrine to do some praying, and i headed out.



of course, then minute i saw some old men feeding stray cats, i bee-lined over. they must've seen me wavering on whether or not to ask if i could sit with them and pet the cats, and motioned me over. very sweet, and one told me i had no need to worry about the strays because tons of admirers fed them, and if it's cold or rainy, they crawl in with "the tent people" (japan's homeless). i might buy some cat food soon and see if they flock to me too~


oh man. the daibutsu. this was by far one of the best moments of my ueno adventure. i decided to head on up and see what kind of weird temple was through the trees. except there was a purifying spot. and i had no idea how to purify myself. the general idea is first hands, then mouth, then tip the handle back so the water falls out etc etc etc but i didn't know which hand to start with and i wasn't too keen on insulting buddha, so i kinda stood at the entrance and looked around without going in.

THEN. then the priest came over. oh man this guy was a charmer. walked straight up to me and said "you have very cute eyes." to which i just laughed and bowed and said thank you, and then in an attempt to break any awkwardness asked him how i should do the purifying. he grabbed my hands and pulled me over to the spot, took the water handle and splashed water over my hands, then declared me done. little fast don'cha think buddy? but i had gotten the green light, so i had a quick glance around at the giant daibutsu head (preserved after it broke off from the main statue body during an earthquake) and the shrine (stupa?), bowed in thanks to the priest, and was about to proceed out like a good little gaijin, but he grabbed me AGAIN and dragged me over to the buddha face, into the area where you are MOST DEF NOT SUPPOSED TO BE AS A TOURIST and slapped my hand onto buddha's nose. complete and utter shock was the only the i could register. i was all "AM I ALLOWED I DO THIS???" and he was all "yeah yeah douzo," so i did what any foreigner in that situation does: stood there for five minutes and petted buddha's nose. (let it be known that buddha was totally not happy, because when i threw a 10 yen coin [couldn't remember what the good coin to use for gods was] into the offering box, it got stuck in the grate above the coin holder. ho jeebus. buddha if you are reading this i am super sorry about the nose petting and the [[most likely]] wrong coin throwing) D:



i took in some more sights, and ventured by the pond with all the lilies and pretty kouyou leaves. chased some ducks down for pictures too, like the beast i am.




second favorite part of my adventure were the performers. so there's this guy. and he's a pretty cool guy. we'll call him luna (shaddup i'm in a harry potter mood). luna is half naked, covered in white paint, and acting his heart out, pretending to be a discus thrower, mona lisa, the statue of david, etc etc. and he's good too: i was laughing my ass off, especially when he would bring this sign out (camera=$) and stare at photo-takers until they dropped some yen in his box (yes, i paid up too) :D


so this one old guy standing next to me donates quite a bit, and luna insists on giving him a hug, but old man is so not having it (told him to go back to his box lolforever) and walks back to his spot next to me. so luna turns his stare to ME and i'm all "who me?" complete with the finger to nose pointing just to make sure. i must've looked skeptical because luna grabbed a towel, dusted himself off dramatically (although i still ended up with white imprints on my dark purple shirt haha) and then held out his arms waiting. and i mean, really, would you have said no? talk about fun! so i walked over and hugged him (to the applause of a crowd of japanese people highly amused at mime+gaijin antics) :D (the old man later said i had good 自信 "confidence")
of course he put on a show pretending to rob me, and moving his hands towards my ass, to which i smacked him on the back a few times and he let me go to resume his mime-ish ways.


i took in another performer and some more fall leaves, and then went home for some needed foot rest~




video is on the long side but this guy was hilarious in person. i love the part when he reaches out for the bag and his real hand pops out, and then in the song you can hear "i was under the influence." it really does explain everything :D

the day of cute kids

it's finally time for my super late update on the day of shichi-go-san! the ever helpful wiki describes it this as "a traditional rite of passage and festival day in Japan for three and seven year-old girls and three and five year-old boys, held annually on November 15. As Shichi-Go-San is not a national holiday, it is generally observed on the nearest weekend."

my host niece turned 3 years old recently, so it was her first shichi-go-san celebration, and as such, we were all pretty excited. even roberta and lana, previous host students of my family, came to see! we headed to the temple (tokugawa ieyasu's home temple: we even got to go on a tour and see all his rooms. toilet included. wut.) but ended up there super ahead of when my host niece was to arrive, so decided to stroll and take in the festival sights.







y-chan and k-tan finally show up! SO. FREAKING. CUTE.



we did some praying for y-chan (haha love her face~)

then took a quick tour in ieyasu's home area! his garden, lucky whore.

after that was the actual shichi-go-san ceremony. i wish i could've taken pictures guys YOU HAVE NO IDEA but it was forbidden inside the temple area. the priests were so kickass yo. i almost died laughing when one, looking extremely serene in his orange robes, his prayer beads in place, and calmly standing in front of tons of kids and their families, whipped a microphone out of his sleeve as if it was no big thing. which it probs wasn't, but i still found it highly amusing.
the ceremony consisted mainly of one of the priests chanting, another beating a drum, and one stoking up a large fire in front of him. i really should've posted earlier; my memory is shot without pictures D:
then all the families went up to the pot where the fire had been, and where tons of incense was smoking (incensing? ww), and one by one reached out over the sticks and pulled some of the smoke towards them, first wafting it over their body, then face, then head. it was slightly awkward to do it myself: like i was stealing their incense, or making a mockery of tradition because i had no idea the significance behind said incense wafting.
anywho. the kids all received chitose ame (which is 1000 year candy, long sticks of sweet nomliciousness that symbolize long life and good health), and then we headed out.
here is y-chan being ridic adorable with her chitose ame and cotton candy~

then we took a walk through the town (while very difficult in heels, definitely worth it because this place was full of picture goodies)






and then came the food. oh god the food. the restaurant's room wasn't big enough for all of us, so us three gaijin were bundled off to a place with chairs, and the food was brought to us. there must've been ten different courses. IT KEPT COMING. it was pretty traditional japanese cuisine, so some of the courses were a hit (that weird dumpling thing that nevertheless tasted good) and some weren't (we gaijin aren't too fond of eating things with faces still left on). after us gaijins finished our meal (so expensive holy jeebus. if i ever have shichi-go-san kids in japan, we're just getting some celebratory nikuman from 7-11 and heading home yo.) we rejoined the family and ate tasty strawberry shortcake (of course) with k-tan's face on it. i got the mouth. lolforever.

translation please

and this is what i got from my nearest book, カモメに飛ぶことを教えた猫 ("the cat who taught the seagull to fly"), and um LOLWUT.


my life is defined by a picture of cats. which, now that i think about it, sounds pretty good~ ww

in my closest ENGLISH book, Maximizing Study Abroad, i got "they do not know limits." which is pretty damn cool too.