craziness!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

well, a little late.
sorry if it's been a bit boring on here of late, I've been enjoying my relaxing time at home, and also trying to get over my jet lag (mostly successful on that score, altho I'm still on this whole "bed at 10, up at 8" thing that's very new and weird to me. not sure how i feel about it).

got a new laptop for christmas!!!!! santa loves me! ^_^

anyway, i don't really have much to report, since i'm not in japan at the moment, but as it's friday, i thought i'd go ahead and update the video of the week anyway--also since the T&T vid seems to have suffered an unscheduled disappearance (something about copyright...lol. anyway, it got removed from youtube. so.)

new video:
Antic Cafe, "Ryuusei Rocket"

HILARIOUS!

and this will be an even busier one...

I go home for Christmas on Sunday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

OK, now that's out of my system...
Lol.

But this will probably be my last post before I go home. I'm going in to Shibuya tonight to meet Rebecca's' friend from UNC, who's in Tokyo doing research. So we're going to have dinner somewhere around there, and that should be a lot of fun.
Then, tomorrow, bright and early, I have to haul ass over to the budokan for the 月例会 monthly kyudo tournament. Since it's a morning one, it will probably last all day--I wouldn't be surprised if I don't get home until around 5pm?
Then, I'm most likely meeting Molly, Misa, and perhaps some others for an okonomiyaki dinner, and then potentially another trip to Thrash Zone?

Oh, right! I forgot! So last night (Thursday), in honor of being done with class and all the tests, I went out with Jason, Molly, Katie, Felicia, and Tim to this place Molly found near Yokohama eki called "Thrash Zone."
Molly wanted to go there because, according to the description online, it was a "thrash metal bar" with a "cozy atmosphere," wood paneling, and a plant in the corner.
.... and that appealed to her sense of humor.
It's also a microbrew place, which is fairly rare in Japan, so we were looking forward to getting the chance to try some truly yummy beers, as well. And we were not disappointed, in any respect.
Thrash Zone turned out to be this absolutely tiny place on the 2nd floor of a rundown building. It was certainly cozy though, and apart from lots of Iron Maiden-esque record covers decorating the walls and Ozzy playing (very quietly and politely) in the background, it wasn't terribly "thrashy." The place was also mostly salaryman-types--including this one 社長 who had lived in Boston and was very excited about speaking English with us. Felicia got stuck talking to him (sorry!) but Molly, Jason, and I ended up down at the other end of the bar and had a really interesting conversation with these two thirtysomething guys who seemed to be somewhat regulars. They were really nice, though, and didn't make any attempts to speak English with us, so it was good practice.

So anyway, it's been a busy several days, and will continue to be so, right up until I leave, I feel. But I'll try to post again a couple of times when I get home--though it will be break, so don't expect much.


One last thing:
this week's video!
Takky & Tsubasa, "Samurai"

not exactly "traditional" in that sense, but...
Lol.
feel the love. i know you do.

it was a busy weekend...

Karaoke!

Sunday afternoon Jason, Misa, Marshall and I got together again with the kids from HamaDai to go to karaoke and dinner. Molly was sposed to come too, but she got sick. :-(
We got to see Ai and Naoko again, as well as Jacky (the Chinese exchange student who was also one of our guides at the festival)--although Yan couldn't make it this time, which was kind of sad.
But we had a lot of fun! I even attempted a couple of Japanese songs--to varying degrees of success, lol. Although I do think I managed the Monpachi song relatively well. (I've certainly sung along to the CD in my room enough times.)

Here's a picture! (which for some reason didn't turn out all that great...oh, well). L-R is : Ai, Misa, Jacky, Naoko, Jacky's cousin (didn't speak English or Japanese, just Chinese), Marshall, and Jason.

After karaoke, we went out to dinner (minus Jacky and his cousin) at a yakiniku (literally "grilled meat") place near the station. YUM! They bring little grill-things over to each table, you order whatever kind of (raw) meat/veggies you want, and then cook it yourself at the table. In addition to being delicious, it's also a lot of fun!
Here's a photo I took of Naoko, Misa (middle), and Ai. Everyone is, of course, doing the obligatory two-fingers thing (I'm not sure if they call it a peace sign here, I don't think it has that association)--can't take a photo in Japan without one.

picspam time! (a.k.a. I'M DONE!!!!!!)

So, here's some photos and items of interest that I've been storing up lately, lol.

First off, last week I went over to the Aka Renga to do my Christmas shopping. For those of you who remember, Aka Renga where they set up the tents for Oktoberfest before. It's basically this big collection of old brick warehouses that have been turned into shops and restaurants. It's down by the harbor, in between Pacifico and 山下公園 Yamashita Park. And, in honor of Christmas, they'd set up this cute little skating rink outside, sort of like a mini-Rockefeller Center. Lol. (It really is pretty small.)

Also, Thank you, Light Fellowship!!
Haha, now that I've gotten that out of my system, Adam from the Light office came with his wife and daughter to Japan last week, doing site visits and stuff. The Yalies (me, Jason, Jeff, and Byol) met up with them in Shibuya last Saturday night, and got treated to a fabulous dinner at a restaurant called Gonpachi, which I guess is the same one the summer fellows took Dean Farley to when he came to visit back in August.
We didn't have much time to take photos (I tried to take some of the inside of the restaurant, but it was too dark), so this is my attempt at a night view of Shibuya from the 15th floor.

It's that time of the week again

New video!
みつき　「大切なもの」
Mitsuki, "Something Important"

She looks like a 12 year old boy, but has the most amazing voice.
Also, apparently this song was the theme to some movie, so the video has scenes from that.

just the weekly stuffs

so, in IJ--the book for morning class--the chapters alternate between Written and Conversation sections. which is really good cause it means you get practice in both more formal, written expressions/constructions, as well as more casual spoken styles. well, i guess that's the point.
so, we've been on the Convo section of chapter 2 this week, which means lots of focus on casual sentence patterns and getting proper intonation and stuff (ya~y! cause that's my strong point! can i just say how much i love it when we're not reading things? like when we get to do videos in afternoon class, instead of newspaper articles)
and i had kind of a nice boost on friday when Senda-sensei mentioned to me that compared with when she was my afternoon teacher 1st term, she thought that my speaking and intonation and stuff had really improved since then! XD so that totally made my day. i was sort of feeling like i'd been getting better, but it's nice to be told that by someone who can be an actual objective judge of your performance. and i firmly maintain that at least part of said improvement is thanks to my J-dorama habit. also, Senda-sensei found out that I'm going back to Raleigh for christmas, and has requested an ACC handbook as an omiyage. LoL ^.^

Friday after class was super busy but lots of fun. i took off right as soon as class got out at 3, to go over and meet Sato Masako (from my kyudo club at the budokan) at yokohama eki, because she's actually the kyudo sensei at a high school around there. the last tournament, i was talking to her about how i had done kyudo back in the states when i was in high school, and she asked if i would come over one day and talk to her students about my experiences. so i got to do that on friday! she actually wanted me to talk to them in english, since they're all learning it but never get a chance to practice speaking it. so, i did my little intro talk in english, then went back and sort of summarized it in japanese, cause i'm really not sure how much they understood. then Sato-san wanted them all to come over and introduce themselves, and talk to me a little in english. they were all sooooo embarrassed, it was actually rather cute. i tried to talk to them in english a bit, but nobody really seemed comfortable with it, and they all knew that i spoke japanese, so it mostly ended up being that. but it was still fun.
oh! and an even better thing--one of the other sensei at the high school is actually a hanshi (there's no "higher" after that) and so i got to have him correct my shooting a bit--joy! i learned a few things that i didn't even realize i'd been doing wrong, and i actually got the bow to do almost a full yugaeri! it went like halfway around, which i've *never* gotten it to do before. ちょう～嬉しい！ let's just hope i can keep it up from now on. oh, and it turns out that this hanshi sensei was actually in the States for the testing seminar in SC this past summer--so he met Dan-sensei! i swear, every time i meet a kyudo person in Japan, they know Dan-sensei, or know someone who does...it just makes me realize again how lucky I was to get to study there.

i left the high school at about 5:30 (actually had to cut out of their practice a little early) and hopped the Minato Mirai-sen right back to Queen's, because at 6 was Ari-sensei's (my advisor) "Happy Just-Married" party. she's married to a former IUC student...oooOOoohh. as is Aoki-sensei, incidentally--there was a card passed around for everyone to sign, and i saw that he had written "Welcome to AIMY--Association of International Marriages, Yokohama." LOL. oh the things we find to amuse ourselves...
anyway, there were lots of people there--Ari-sensei's family (her dad kept going around trying to shove drinks and food into people's hands--he wasn't satisfied unless everyone had a drink in each hand and, preferably, several plates on their laps), most of the IUC sensei/staff (Matsumoto-sensei was, as usual, popping out of corners, snapping awkward photos of people all evening), and all of Ari-sensei's current students and advisees. a good time was had by all.
oh, and Sano-sensei caught me at one point, to let me know she had gotten a コルティナさん、よろしく mail from Stever-sensei (my 3rd-year japanese teacher at Yale). it was kind of loud and i was totally not in the thinking-of-yale mindset, so at first i didn't realize who she was talking about. it was kind of embarrassing when i was finally like "oh, yes! Stever-sensei was my teacher at Yale!" and Sano-sensei's kind of got this "...and you forgot her already...?" expression. lol. oh, well.

oh, and saturday i went out to start my christmas shopping (managed to put a decent dent in it, i think. it's hard tho). then i met up with Matsuzawa-sensei to go to this place in Landmark that was having a kimono sale (even on sale they're expensive). and this was a for-real place, where they show you all the patterns individually, and drape things around you... i think Matsuzawa-sensei just wanted someone to go with. it was neat, but we didn't stay for long. Matsuzawa-sensei kept talking about how last time, they had other things too, like tabi for really cheap. so i think that's what she'd intended to go for.
oh, but they also had this very odd noodle promotion going on. by the desk, there were several jars of bowtie noodles, elbow macaroni, things like that--and for 20 yen you got a small bag to fill up with as many noodles as it would hold. it was great, and i'll definitely be eating them for supper sometime soon but...... I'm not really sure what noodles have to do with a kimono sale. oh well, i guess a bargain is a bargain.

and here i will end what has become rather a long post. also, it's sunday and i was therefore feeling rather lazy--so apologies for the relative lack of capitalization and appropriate punctuation in the above ramblings.

*sniff sniff*

new Video of the Week:
Orange Range, "Sayonara"

Great song from one of my favorite Japanese groups (tho this isn't exactly representative of their usual).
This video seriously made me bawl the first time I watched it.
There's some dialogue to it, but basically all you need to know, is the lines at the beginning of the video:
"October 25, 2006...I died."


(If you want to know more, drop me a line and I'll give you a rough translation, but that's all I'm putting in here for now.)

the times we live in?

I don't think I've mentioned this in the blog yet, but I decided after all to go home for Christmas (15 days to go, yay!)
Because of that, I had to go down to the Immigration Office after school today to get my 再入国許可 Re-Entry Permit, so that I could actually come back to Japan after my break is done. Lol.
While I waited for my paperwork to be processed, this video was playing on repeat, in several languages, on TV screens all around the room.

The video highlights Japan's new security policy, implemented as of Nov. 1 this year, the gist of which is that in an attempt to combat terrorism, all foreigners entering Japan will be fingerprinted and photographed. This includes not just tourists, but also foreigners resident in Japan--so in other words, when I come back to Yokohama in January, my fingerprints will be on file with the Japanese government. The beginning of the video describes the procedures for how the fingerprints will be taken, and then the bulk of the rest shows footage from the 9/11 attcks, the London Underground bombings, and various other terrorist incidents, implying that by fingerprinting all foreigners Japan will be able to protect itself from such things.

I've got to admit, it's a little bit of an unnerving thought, although from what I understand it's not all that different from the current "US Visit" system for foreigners entering the states. There hasn't been as much discussion about the policy here as you might think--other than the Tourist Office being worried that the new procedures will discourage people from traveling to Japan. But it's big news in the expat/blog community, where words like "discrimination" and "interrogation" get tossed around frequently, with other people proclaiming that the new policy has caused them to cut Japan out of their travel plans.

Having not experienced the process firsthand, I don't really know what I think yet. I wouldn't go so far to say it's a reason to stay away from Japan, but I do understand the feelings, for instance, of people who are longtime, tax-paying residents and now must have their fingerprints on file. Especially in a country where most people don't own any kind of photo identification (and aren't required to), and the most common form of ID is a Health Insurance card.

Anyway, like I said, I'm not sure what I think about all this yet, really, but I just thought I'd share.

文楽 (oh! i forgot!)

Today we got out of class at 11:30, because there was a field trip! Well, only those of use who signed up went, but.
We took the train into Tokyo to the National Japan Theater to go and see a 文楽 bunraku performance. Bunraku is Japanese puppet theater, but don't go imagining Pinocchio or muppets or anything. The style of the plays and the performances themselves take a lot from Kabuki and Noh theater, and so are very traditional in that way. Just, instead of people in masks, you have puppets performing the action. The puppets are fairly large, around 3 feet tall I'd guess, and incredibly intricate and expressive. I was really amazed how much range they could give, even down to being able to pick things up with the hands, or raising and lowering the eyebrows. Each puppet is manipulated by 3 people (that's right, 3!) who carry it around onstage. The main person operates the head/face and right hand; a second person is the left hand; and the third person is the feet/legs. The main puppeteer wears a traditional hakama and kimono, but the other two people are dressed all in black, with executioner-style black hoods so you can't even see their faces. The puppets don't actually do any talking. Instead, the dialogue and narration are sung, kabuki-style, by the narrator who sits off to the side of the stage, accompanied by a shamisen player.
The beginning part of the performance was really neat--it started off with a dance performed by two puppets, and then the puppeteers came out and gave an explanation of the various movements, and how the puppets are manipulated. That was really interesting, especially talking about the differences in movement between male and female puppets, &c. After a while, you really stop seeing them as puppets in such an obvious way.
After that, they did a famous scene from one of the bunraku plays, which was interesting but extremely difficult to understand. Like I said before, all the dialogue and narration is done speak-singing style by one person, so for starters it was hard for me to get a sense of who was talking when. The lines were projected above the stage, like what's typically done in opera, but the entire play is written in old Japanese--the same as when it was originally written however-long ago. Which means that even the Japanese in the audience had rented these headphone-devices that translated the play into modern Japanese for them. So of course I had no hope of understanding anything, though we were given an English synopsis of the play.
...I have to admit i nodded off a bit. But then, so did about half of the audience--I gather that this is rather common, if not expected, especially in Noh--so I don't feel quite so bad.

picking classes? without shopping them first!?!

This week we also found out about the plan for 3rd term, which starts up in January, after the break.
Up til now, we've been having simple morning class (grammar-focused) and afternoon class (newspaper articles, videos, current events discussion), the same every day. But apparently during 3rd and 4th term at IUC, you get to choose from a variety of elective-type classes, so the curriculum becomes more tailored to students' particular interests. So this week we got the information about the different options, and picked our top choices. There are three groups of courses plus another set of optional after-school courses that you can opt in to.
Group A (pick 1):
政治・経済　Business/Economics
美術史 Art History
文学　Literature
文化人類学　Anthropology
法律　Law
歴史学　History/Historiography

Group B (pick 1):
Reading
Listening
Speaking
Business Japanese

Group III (pick 1): [no, I don't know why it's III and not C, it just is]
現代史　Modern History
大衆文化　Popular Culture
ビジネス・社会　Business/Society

Optional Classes:
書道　Calligraphy (Shodo)
古筆 Old-style Writing
文語文法専門 Classical Japanese
ビジネス Business

So, the ones I picked were Literature (A), Business Japanese (B), and Popular Culture (III). In the optional classes, I'm continuing on with shodo, which I've been taking this semester at IUC, too (I've mentioned that, right?). I also checked the box for the optional business course, because it might be interesting; I was a little worried about whether it would be over my head, but Ari-sensei said I can just go to the first lecture and see what I think, so I figure I might as well give it a shot. I didn't really have any trouble deciding the other stuff--since I'm not in any way grad school bound, anything I do in relation to Japan after IUC would definitely be work-related, so Business Japanese was a no-brainer. And since 1) I'm interested in publishing, and 2) my reading skills could use some work--the Literature course is definitely the best thing for me out of A-group (altho the Anthropology also sounded neat).
The way the schedule will work, we'll have A-group M/Th mornings; B-group F morning; and III-group in the afternoon (except Wed when we have afternoons off, like now). Tu/W mornings, we'll be continuing on with IJ, which is the grammar textbook we're using in our current morning class, so I guess that will be pretty much the same type of deal as now.
It sounds like a lot of work on paper, but as I've mentioned before, it's supposedly easier than 2nd term, so... We'll see. I'm looking forward to the change of pace.

Asakusa + Kyudo

This past Saturday, I went with Matsuzawa-sensei to this kyudo thing in Asakusa. I still don't exactly understand what was going on, but it was for some kind of matsuri (didn't catch the details).
At any rate, it's an annual event--I guess you'd call it a tournament, although there's no "winner" in that sense. The tournament goes over 2 days, with people showing up at the dojo all day. You sign up when you arrive, they give you a number, and then when your number comes up, you get to go and shoot 4 arrows (in kyudo, called 四つ矢 yotsuya). Like in Western archery, the arrows are scored based on where on they target they hit--although this is rather unusual in kyudo, where it's usually a question of if you hit the target, not where. Then, the people with the several highest scores (I'm not sure how many, really) get some sort of prize, and you can win a kendama if you hit the bullseye.
I met Matsuzawa-sensei at Ohkurayama, on the Toyoko-sen, and we went together from there to Asakusa (cause I would've had no idea how to get there). We arrived at the dojo a little before 3pm, and were given #406 and 407, respectively. Since they were only on #300 when we got there, we didn't actually get in to shoot until a littlel after 5. I did pretty well. It was a really small dojo, and they were shooting 6 at a time, so it was more cramped than I was used to and I kept hitting the people in front of and behind me with my bow (lol), but I managed to get 10 points! The scoring went: 3pts, 5, 7, and 10 for the bullseye--I got two 5's, first and last arrows!

After we finished shooting, Matsuzawa-sensei took me to this really amazing restaurant in Asakusa to have どじょう dojou, which is apparently a bit of an Asakusa 名物 specialty, that you can only get in a few places. This restaurant is called 駒形どぜう Komagata Dozeu (dozeu being another name for dojou), and it's been around since 1801, specializing in dojou--it's actually all they serve. It's a very nostalgic-feeling restaurant, with low tables, where you sit on cushions on the straw-mat floor. And the food is nabe-style, where you cook it over a burner at the table.
Speaking of the food, I didn't really understand what dojou was (Matsuzawa-sensei kept saying that it was "like a baby eel," but I didn't understand if that meant it was a baby eel, or just looked kind of like that...). At any rate, it tastes very similar to unagi, which I LOVE, it's one of my favorite foods, so that was enough for me. For those who are curious, I've since found out (thanks to Wikipedia, both English and Japanese versions--Japanese wikipedia is just as cool, btw) that dojou is actually a type of loach, which is a small freshwater eel.
At Komagata, they bring you a small skillet filled with dojou, which you place over the burner and then cover with negi-onions, literally to the point where there's a mountain of negi on the skillet, and you can't see the fish at all. You let it cook for a while, pouring this sauce over it, and then eat! It was really good, and I'm soooooooo thankful to Matsuzawa-sensei for taking me (and treating me). She's seriously the sweetest person ever, and has really become like a second grandma to me here, always treating me to things, giving me food, checking to make sure I'm eating properly ("not just パン bread"). ^_^

We also walked by the famous Asakusa temple on our way to the restaurant, and it was huge and really beautiful. It was night by that time, so I don't have any pictures, but hopefully I'll go back sometime, and then I promise lots of photos.

Video time!

new Video of the Week~ song is "Biscuit".

And before you ask, no I don't know what the heck is going on in the video, I really don't think it's supposed to make any sort of sense. Yuki's just kind of quirky like that. But she's adorable, and has a really unique voice, which I think is fun to listen to.

So--enjoy! (or not. lol)

Yokohama Mary ヨコハマメリー

This is a preview for the documentary that we watched in class. (Don't worry, it's in English)

dropping like flies...

So, it seems I'm not the only one who's been having a little trouble keeping up with everything lately, and this week it all really just came to a head. I think it must be some combo of exhaustion and the extreme winter-ness which has become apparent in recent weeks. But whatever the reason, about half of IUC was sick this week. In my class alone, there were 2 people out every day this week (and not always the same two people); on Thursday, in Connor's morning class, he was the only one there; and yesterday afternoon, poor Aoki-sensei looked like he really would rather have been at home, in bed. So far all is well for me, but I'm seriously feeling like it's only a matter of time--we've all kind of got that "Who's going to be next?" feeling.

Speaking of Friday, tho, we did have a bit of a break in the no afternoon class sense. Instead, we had one of our periodic special lecture things, which this time was a movie showing. The movie is a documentary called "Yokohama Mary," all about this woman known as Yokohama Mary, who was always hanging around in Isezaki Mall (cf post about where I live!). She'd been a prostitute during the postwar period--which should give some idea of her age now--and would be wandering around in Isezaki every day. Add that to the fact that she always wore this very distinctive white makeup and costume-style clothing. So she became this very famous figure and sort of a symbol for Yokohama (sort of reminds me of the Flower Lady in New Haven). Then one day, in 1995, she disappeared, and for a while it was apparently very odd for people not to see her anymore, and there were all these rumors about where she'd gone and stuff.
So, this documentary about her (less about her than about the lives around her) was made a few years ago, and on Friday the director came to the Center to talk to us about it. We screened the movie and then there was time for questions. It was really interesting, and I enjoyed the movie more than I had expected (especially given the extremely thick vocab list we were given in lieu of subtitles).
But of course the best part was that the entire movie was shot in and around the area where I live, which was really neat--and which also tells you something about the area where I live. LoL. Even funnier was the map we were given, that sort of highlighted places featured in the film. So, on the map was Kotobuki-cho, the section of town right next to Isezaki, which is where the largest number of IUC students are living. It's a...well, "unique area" is a nice way to put it, although according to the map, Mary had named it 地獄 "hell." Which of course, all the kids living in Kotobuki-cho found extremely amusing. ^_^

Kyudo! 大会, &c

So, on the Thanksgiving note, I had to leave the party early, at around 5pm, because Friday night my kyudo club, the 若葉会 had their 月例会 monthly practice tournament. It's the third one I'd gotten to go to, and this one was a lot of fun, too. Tho cold cause it's definitely become winter here. See, the way kyudo dojos are constructed, is entirely open-air. There's a covered area where you shoot from, and then opposite is the target mound which is also covered, but in between that is open--cause, if you think about it, there kind of can't be a wall in between you and the target. LoL. Which means that it's brutal in the summertime and brutal in the wintertime. Ah, the sacrifices we make.
To give an idea, I'm inserting a picture of Meishin, the dojo I used to practice at in North Carolina. (Giving credit where credit is due, I stole the photo from their website, www.meishin.kyudo.com)Anyway, I'd been having a few rough weeks in practice lately. Matsuzawa-sensei switched me to a heavier bow (12.5 kilos from 11 before), and there was definitely an adjustment period while I built up the strength to draw it correctly. I'm still not quite there yet, but it's a *lot* better than before. So I managed to do decently at the tournament (hit 1 out of my 10 arrows--so, "decently" for me). And I got a prize! :-D In addition to the 1st place, 2nd place, and all that, they also give out several 特別賞, which basically means "special prize" which, I guess they just give to whoever they think deserves it, for whatever reason--explaining why I got one.

Saturday morning I also had another tournament! And by "morning" I mean I got to the budokan at 9am, and didn't get home til around 5pm. Also a very cold day. It was a tournament I'd signed up for about a month before and totally forgotten, but it turned out to be kind of a big thing. There were about 78 people entered, from 3 different kyudo clubs. We shot 10 arrows again, and this time I hit 2! And several of my others, even though they missed, were pretty decent shots. So I was happy about that.

What I was not so happy about is the fact that I seem to be something of a failure lately. I think my batteries are just running out from the grind of the semester. I remember back during orientation when all the sensei kept going on and on--with great enjoyment, I might add--about how heavy the workload would be, and how utterly wretched we were all going to feel. I think I'm beginning to see what they meant. On the upside, though, I've heard through the past-student grapevine that 2nd term is definitely the hardest. So, there's hope I suppose. Although it's a little early for me to be running out of steam if I'm sposed to make it until Christmas. At any rate, what prompted this tangent was the fact that I slept through my alarm on Saturday morning and so was almost late for the tournament. Well, rather than "slept through," I should say I set my alarm but forgot to turn my cell phone off of manner mode, thus rendering the whole setting-of-the-alarm thing rather moot, since it "went off" in total silence. Fortunately I woke up in time (about 15 minutes before I needed to be out the door), and all my stuff was still together from the tournament the night before, so the only bad thing was that I had to sacrifice my morning shower and coffee.

On the note of making it through the rest of the semester, I tried a new thing today. Brace yourself...
Instead of going straight home after class (where I would promptly begin a vicious cycle of goofing off lasting until around dinner) I went to a coffee shop for a few hours. And--shock of shocks--I was actually productive!! Crazy, I know. By the time I left around 7pm, I'd gotten about 75% of my work done, including the afternoon class homework, which lately I've been leaving until lunch break the day of.
I'm thinking I might need to make this a habit.

A Japanese Thanksgiving

A little oxymoronic, I know (oxymoronic. Is that even a word? Damn, my English is starting to go...)
Anyway, since they don't celebrate Thanksgiving as such in Japan, a bunch of the IUC students decided to do a big Thanksgiving potluck. It was held over in the house that Bridget, Travis, Connor, and Ben R. are sharing--because that's the only place big enough to hold all of us--and was a phenomenal success. I'd say 30-some people showed, which is crazy, especially considering the whole program's only like 45 or so students.
We had a huge array of food, too. I'd been wracking my brain for something I could bring that was sufficiently Thanksgiving-y, but also something I could make in my (pathetic excuse for a) kitchen. Originally I'd been thinking black bean salad, but I had to give that up upon discovering that finding black beans in Japan is like...well, I can't really think of a good analogy, but it's *hard.* At last I hit upon the brilliant idea of deviled eggs, for which all the ingredients are readily available (the Japanese L-O-V-E mayonnaise, they put it on everything--even pizza, ick). They took a while to make, cause I have one small pot and can therefore only boil about 5 eggs at a time. But eventually I got it all done, so that was good.
Amy M--bless her!--brought mashed potatoes, and there was also cranberry sauce (the good homemade kind), green bean casserole, rolls, salad... It was a success.
We had all the Thanksgiving essentials except...a turkey. We heard about a place where one could buy frozen turkeys, but the problem was that nobody has an oven, or one large enough to cook a whole turkey. So the next thought was to grab some kind of roast duck from Chinatown (fowl is fowl), but when Felicia and Aaron showed up at the house, it was with the disheartening message that roast ducks in Chinatown are quite expensive, so they brought several cartons of shumai and dumplings instead. Lol. The closest we got to a bird all day was when Marshall showed up with an 8-piece bucket from KFC.
But it was still a pretty darn good Thanksgiving. People hung around at the house for several hours, and afterwards came over to Odori Koen by my apartment--Jason having enlightened them on the joys of drinking cheap beer out in the park with all the homeless おじいさん. So there were literally about 15 gaijin drinking out in the park until about 11pm, being sufficiently rowdy and getting many stares from some very confused Japanese people.

VOW

Yes, this vid was up on the old version of my player. But I didn't have anything else in particular to put up this week.

And besides, Yamapi's totally worth it.

Song is 抱いてセニョリータ "Hold Me, Senorita."

But what was the best part of my day, you ask?

That's easy!
CPK!!!!
(as in California Pizza Kitchen)
So it turns out there's a CPK in Kawasaki (haven't been to one of those since Triangle Town Centre!), so upon hearing of this Jason, Molly, Marshall and I headed down there for dinner last night. I had Thai Chicken Pizza, which was delicious! And it was exactly the same as the regular CPKs, it was kind of scary. They even had Diet Coke with free refills! (which if you know anything at all about Japan, you'll recognize is utterly 珍しい)
The vibe was so eerily similar that Marshall actually started to place his order in English! LoL.

...sometimes you just need a little American food.

Sankeien

Wednesday we had a field trip!
I didn't really have a good idea what it was all about going in--the excuse to have a day off of class was enough for me--but it turned out to be pretty interesting (if kind of cold--which is a problem only in that cold makes me sleeeeeeepy...)
So, the Yokohama Rotary Club (I know, right) was hosted this, I guess you'd call it a cultural day, down at Sankeien Garden. Sankeien is basically this large (for Japan) cultural garden with flowers and all these old, famous buildings that some rich dude basically bought and transported here from Kyoto.
LoL.
So we all met at Negishi station at 9am (that's earlier than class usually starts! some day off...) and took taxis over to Sankeien. Some of the Rotary Club members met us there and led us over to one of the buildings (semi open-air; hence the cold) where they took turns making various 日本語らしい greetings.
The first event of the day was some gagaku, or Japanese "classical music." It was neat, lots of flutes and drums and stuff, but kind of long. The best part came after, when 3 student volunteers got to try on these craaaaazy traditional costumes that (I guess?) were worn when playing the music. Not really sure on that score, but. Anyway, here's Nick--not that you can see him, really--dressed in what was by far the coolest costume. Next on the agenda was ikebana, or flower arranging--which I'd actually done once before, at HIF (cf. the "Culture Classes" post, I think). Here's my finished product! (^-^) Then we went into another room and got to watch a sort of traditional Japanese dance. The guy explained after, that it was meant to sort of tell a story, all about these various gods and things. Once he showed what each part of the dance meant, I understood much better.
Anyway, here's a video I took of part of his dance. It got really good right after I stopped, but sadly Bazes's head kept getting in the way, so I really had to.

Next was the most fun part--for me, at least. Back when we first heard about the field trip, pretty much all they said about it was that there was going to be a part where you could try on kimonos, so of course I signed up! I figured it was going to be pretty much the same as my yukata, but it turns out this one was an actual kimono, which I'd never gotten to wear before. The process is much more involved--it took 2 people to dress me! And here's a picture of the whole group: After that, we changed back into our street clothes, bundled up, and went outside for a tour of the park. It was a nice walk, but we didn't have a whole lot of time to see things, and by that time, I think people were pretty ready to go home, so the tour part did feel a bit of a chore. But the garden was pretty: I just wish I'd been able to appreciate it more.
Oh, and as always, there are *tons* more pics from all parts of the day up at my kodakgallery.

Bowling!

So, yet again this weekend was a total blast! Jason, Molly and I (Misa was sposed to come too, but her grandma got sick) met up with some of the HamaDai kids from the festival and went bowling!
I seriously haven't been bowling in years, it was チョーなつかしい。LOL.
The participants this time were as follows:
Ai, one of our group guides from the HamaDai festival.
Naoko, one of the others that we met at HamaDai, also showed up, along with a new face--Yan, who's another Chinese exchange student at HamaDai (tho you'd never guess it, her Japanese is phenomenal). Here's a shot of Naoko (R) and Yan (L). Yan had just been showing Naoko a few pointers, cause she was actually a really awesome bowler! (I dunno, maybe bowling is more popular in China...?)
Anyway, since there were so many of us, we split up into two teams and had a face-off. p(^.^)q
It was me-Naoko-Yan vs. Jason-Molly-Ai. Of course we won! (not really any thanks to me, tho...)
Yan is an absolute hoot--I swear, she's genki enough for 3 people all by herself. She kept making fun of Naoko (who's teeny) for using a light, little-kid bowling ball, and started calling her "kids," cause that's what was written on the ball. {^0^}
Here's a picture of everybody!! (except me, cause I was taking the picture). L-R is Molly, Jason, Ai, Naoko, and Yan in the front.
By that time it was around 6 or 7 pm, so we all went to an izakaya for dinner (except for Molly, who had to go home), and ended up staying til about 11:15, just hanging out and talking and everything. Poor Jason, the only guy... LOL. It actually was pretty funny, he was getting a lot of attention. Yan kept trying to feel his hair, and then Naoko and Ai accused him first of being "meticulous," and then decided he looked like he would be a 亭主関白, which basically translates into an old-fashioned, I'm-the-ruler-of-the-house type of husband. Haha. Which Jason did not take well. (^_-)

Oh yeah, and there's more pics from Saturday uploaded to the kodakgallery.

It's Christmas! (Huh?)

Well, not really. It's not even Thanksgiving yet. But that doesn't stop the Japanese! (see, they don't have Thanksgiving here--although we still get Friday off...not sure why...)
At any rate, this is the Christmas tree in Queen's Square Mall, by IUC. It's been up since we came back from Fall Break (i.e. the first Monday in November). Wow--now that's some holiday spirit!

And now, here's some random photos that I snapped walking home from school last week.

The ferris wheel by Pacifico
(and that's the corner of the World Porter's in the right fore)

View of Landmark Tower and some of the other buildings around Pacifico.

Ferris Wheel again! And that's Pacifico in the background
(with IUC on the 5th floor!!)

It's Friday? Seriously??

Wow, this was a long week. I mean, nothing in particular happened, I was just *super* tired. Too much messing around and staying up later than I should (lol). And amazingly, that tends to catch up with you. (I know, you're shocked)
We finished up the 接続詞 conjunctions section in AM class this week. It was seriously detailed and stuff--lots of going into all these expressions that mean *almost* *exactly* the same thing, but there's one case where you can't use it. Stuff like that--the difference between それで、そこで、それから、それなら、&c. Not the most interesting, but it's definitely something that I'm grateful we went through in detail, because while I mostly knew what those expressions meant, they can be kind of confusing and I wasn't totally 詳しい on them.
Next up is "Integrated Japanese Advanced Course" (ISJ for short)--sort of the sequel textbook to ASJ that we used in the first semester. It also looks fairly scary, in terms of that it goes into serious detail about everything. But then, that's why I'm here, right. It's also going to be a little heavier in the hw department I think--like with the 接続詞 hw, there's a bunch of "complete the sentence" problems in the textbook that we have to write out separately and turn in every day, in addition to the regular readings and stuff. Hmm...

PM class is also starting a new section as of next week--seems like we're going to be doing that for the rest of the term, i.e. each week's readings will have a different theme. Which I kind of like. This past week was 文化の発信 (umm... "Transmission of Culture," I guess you could call it) and next week will be 地球温暖化 "Global Warming" (ugh--at least it's a short week).

On the fun side, tomorrow is going to be super! Jason, Misa, Molly, and I are meeting up with some of the HamaDai kids that we met over break at the festival, and we're all gonna go bowling and then to dinner or something after. :-D Should be lots of fun, so I'm definitely looking forward to that.
Also, next week we will be super-cool cause 1) we're doing a special field trip thingy Wed and therefore have no class at all; and 2) Friday is a national holiday!! (I never know what it's for, I just appreciate the break--makes a nice change from Yale....)

Oh yeah, and this week in calligraphy (Tues) we got to start making seals (stamps) with our name-kanji, so we can sign our work. It's crazy complicated--it's a stone, so you have to actually carve the kanji onto it... But more on that later.

P.S. (and I promise this is it) note the new video above! See, I'm really doing the weekly thing! It's another (fairly) new single, and I just think the video is cute, tho kind of sad.

also (e.g. technological musings)

I'm currently totally into this band, MONGOL 800 (in Japanese it's ﾓﾝｺﾞﾙ８００ which gets shortened to ﾓﾝﾊﾟﾁ--cause let's face it, the Japanese can never resist shortening a long name).
They're kind of...I guess you'd call it indie rock-style music? Guitars, drums, but very upbeat songs. The closest comparison I can think of, is that they kind of remind me of the Plain White T's. In particular, I fell in love with the song 小さな恋の歌 (translated as something like "Little Love Song"? Whatever, it sounds better in Japanese) off their album MESSAGE. It's actually an album from several years ago--I'm not even sure if the band's really active anymore. But I first heard the song cause it featured in an episode of Propose Daisakusen (LOL).
Anyway, combination of it being kind of an older album, and not super popular anymore, I wasn't able to find a good download of it (don't give me that look) so I actually went out and bought the CD (I know, right!). But I was able to find it at Book-Off (in case you're not aware, a used book-manga-CD-DVD chain and the most incredible place known to man) for about 1000￥, or a little under $10. It was a really weird feeling, tho--I was realizing, it's literally been *years* since I've bought an actual CD (rather than an iTunes download).
So at any rate, that CDs been playing on repeat on my computer since yesterday :-)


P.S. On the related music note--there've been some edits to the blog. Due to various 面倒 like videos mysteriously disappearing from my playlist, &c, I've decided to replace the large video player that I had up before, with more of a "Video of the Week" system. Whether I'll actually update it *every week* remains to be seen (I'll try tho!) but I promise I will change the videos on a somewhat regular basis. I'm envisioning a combination of new-release videos and (if there's nothing interesting that week) older vids that piqued my interest.
And to keep track of it all, I'll be keeping a list of the archived videos from past weeks. Format is Date: Artist / Track. 見 links to the video on youtube (I take no responsibility if old links go dead--you've got a computer, you can look it up yourself).

So, enjoy! (and comments always welcome)

~sarah

First week thoughts

So the first week of 二学期 2nd term is over, and on the whole it went better than I thought. Having experienced the same people in my new morning class, I think that やっぱり the main cause of my old afternoon class's supreme draggy-ness was definitely the post-lunch coma. (And perhaps also the fact that I am not remotely politically inclined, and so found the subject matter completely uninteresting)

We've been doing 接続詞, i.e. conjunctions the past week (and all next week as well) in the morning, which wasn't as boring as you might think. So, plus on that score. In the afternoon class, we're currently reading news articles to do with Japanese culture, industry, and I think we even get to read about foreigners' problems in Japan. So, while there' still the whole "I'm tired and I want to go home" aspect going on, the energy level has definitely been bumped up a notch.

I also like my new teachers a lot, too--even though I definitely miss having class with my advisor, Satou Ari-sense. New faces are Akizawa-sensei (uses his laptop hooked to the TV to write notes instead of the blackboard; also seems to have a rather serious cat-fixation); and in the afternoon Satou Tsukasa-sensei (not to be confused with my advisor and 一学期 1st term teacher Satou Ari; she seems very nice and good at keeping class discussions going), and Goto-sensei (seems nice, but I've only had her one day so far, so haven't got a good read on her teaching style yet). The one returning face is [morning] Senda-sensei, who I had last term in the afternoon--I was really glad to see her back. We bonded 1st term over the revelation that Senda-sensei actually lived in Raleigh for several years, teaching! She was totally excited to hear that I was from Raleigh too (Raleigh-ite? Raleigh-an?) and so we occasionally reminisce over street names or restaurants. ;-P

It seems like the homework level has also been upped a bit this term. Or rather, just that it's more written homework rather than "make sure you've read and understood the grammar points" type homework (i.e. work you actually have to turn in, and therefore must do all of). So it seems like more. Whatever. I'm dealing.

P.S. If you still want more

So I've been keeping an online photo gallery as well--theoretically anyway, since I haven't updated it since...umm...August.

But all that's changed--I've turned over a new leaf (the one called "posting is better than homework") and updated it.
I took *lots* more photos--especially of the shamisen parade and Meiji Jingu--than could possibly fit in a blog post, so if you're interested in seeing more of those, they're all up at my gallery.
The address is:
www.kodakgallery.com/sarah_cortina
and I'm pretty sure you don't have to be signed up or anything to view the photos.

So, enjoy!

~sarah

流鏑馬 Yabusame!!

I humbly apologize in advance for the overload of pics/video that is to follow.
これからの山ほどの写真とビデオで、大変申し訳ございません。
(see, Taigu Hyougen is useful for something!)
I apologize also for the sometimes poor quality of the pics. The lighting was really weird cause of the trees, and because it was so crowded I had to hold my camera all the way up in the air to get a shot of the target...so the shots aren't terribly clean-looking.

We were worried that we'd be late for the yabusame, which was supposed to start at 1pm, but Molly and I ended up running into the procession right as it was heading out for the shooting grounds. So, you can see the horses...and now, this is the size of the target that they're actually shooting at:
I took a video of the procession of archers and assistant-people as they enter the shooting grounds for the first time.


And here they are coming back over toward the starting point:
These guys have various ceremonial roles--retrieving the arrows, fixing the target if it falls off, confirming the hit... things like that. Oh, and here's another shot of one of the archers, you can see him a bit better here. Now, for some of the actual shooting! I wish I had been able to capture still shots of the archers, but they were just going too fast. And I don't have any fancy video editing software (or any of the skills to do it) so those also I will just kind of have to post as-is.
But first off--a hit!


The next one doesn't quite make it, but he was really close!


And another hit. I swear, the most common word I heard that afternoon was "かっこいい！" and it's true!! :-D


Here's the archers riding back down to the starting point after the first round of shooting. This is when the dudes with the hats get to hand them back their arrows.


For the next round, they switched the kind of target to a (*much*) smaller one. Sorry about the next couple pics--this is where my camera battery ran out, so I was reduced to using my keitai. So I mean, I spose for a cell phone the quality's pretty good, but...
At any rate, here's the new target: It's tiny!!! And here's an extremely poor-quality video of someone actually *hitting* that tiny target! It's a little difficult to see just from the vid that he hit it, but you can definitely tell from the cheering and flag-waving, LOL.

(Wow, in retrospect, that really *is* a poor-quality video.... Oh well, I'll keep it in).

And this is the end of my blog postings for the time being. I think I've pretty much covered everything interesting that's happened over the break--and nothing interesting's likely to happen on Sunday, cause well...I have to actually start all of the homework that was assigned over the break. Yes, homework. So I foresee a day of manic studying holed up in my room (which is part of the reason I wanted to get this blog stuff taken care of now, even if it did mean staying up a little late--altho it's nothing compared to my college days. Wow, I can actually say that, huh: "my college days"...ugh that's weird...).
Ok, so I got completely and utterly off-topic there...I blame it on the lateness of the hour. Anyway, wish me luck in my studying endeavors (and not *too much* procrastination).
That's all for now. じゃ、またね。

Here endeth the 休み

Friday was the best!!!
I met up with Molly and went into Tokyo to go to the 秋大祭 Great Autumn Festival at Meiji Jingu, which is a temple built to honor the spirits of the Meiji emperor and his wife. The emperor was born in early November, so each year around his birthday they hold a huge festival at the shrine, featuring performances and exhibitions of all sorts of traditional Japanese arts and martial arts. It was really amazing, and I know I didn't even see half of the stuff that was going on today.
There was a chrysanthemum exhibition, with chrysanthemums (of course) as well as all these little bonsai things that people had made into different shapes and stuff. Really cool! And everywhere we went, there were tons of people, and lots of Japanese people dressed not just in kimono, but in these really traditional, fancy outfits like what you'd wear to a coming of age ceremony or something. It was wonderful to see! I think one place in the temple that we passed, there was actually a wedding going on. At least, that's what it looked like: And of course there were lots of foreign tourists taking endless pictures of the kids all dressed up--they were really cute, but I felt kind of sorry for them. Speaking of cute...these kids weren't dressed up, but they were so adorable I just couldn't resist! ;-P We also passed a small stage where there were some people doing a taiko drumming performance, which we only watched for a few minutes, but it was really impressive. I took a video!


And then in various locations around the grounds there was a whole bunch of different martial arts demonstrations going on. I didn't get pictures of lots of it, cause my camera battery died--so what I don't have photographic evidence of is 1) the Iaido demonstration: sort of like kendo (Japanese swordfighting) except they use real swords instead of wooden ones, so I guess you could say it's more like Japanese fencing or something; 2) a whole bunch of other martial arts that I don't really know the names for--they were fighting with wooden swords like kendo, but without armor, and there was one where instead of swords they used really long wooden staffs, and even sometimes a staff-person vs. a sword-person.
One that I did manage to get some pics of was again, something I don't know the name of. But a bunch of guys in samurai armor came out onto the field and were doing exercises firing their muskets, and there was even a cannon that went off once. I wasn't expecting it, and the BOOM scared the crap out of me.But of course the whole reason that I wanted to come to the Meiji Jingu festival in the first place was because of kyudo (--whee!!). LOL. There were actually several different kyudo things going on, but most of them were at like 9am, which when it takes an hour to get to the temple, is a bit early. So I had to sacrifice those. But the best part was, fortunately, late enough that I could get there to see it. And that is something called Yabusame. Yabusame is kyudo done from horseback--they ride at breakneck speed toward the target, and then shoot as the horse runs past it, without stopping. I had heard about it, and seen pictures, but never thought I would actually get the chance to see it in person--so when I heard about the Meiji Jingu festival (thank you, Amy!!!) I was about as thrilled as it's possible to be.
...And as I'm writing this, and thinking about the million pictures and videos that I took today...I'm realizing that this post will get even longer than the last one. So in the name of economy, I think I'll cut this post off here, and then resume the Yabusame ecstasies in a new post. So until then... ;-D

浜大祭

Friday was something that I'd been waiting for, ever since I first heard about it--IUC arranged for us to go to the 横浜市立大学学園祭 Yokohama City University's School Festival (浜大祭 for short).
The main reason that I was looking forward to this trip so much, is that we'd been told there would be the possibility of joining some of the student clubs/teams, and I was really looking to use that as a way of making Japanese friends. That is definitely been the only major complaint I have with IUC--there's no built-in way of meeting Japanese our age, which has meant that up to now, I haven't been able to really make any Japanese friends. The friends I have made are wonderful, and I love hanging out with them, but they're all gaijin like me, which can be frustrating--sometimes to the point that I start wondering if I'm really in Japan. But I digress.
Probably around 15 IUC-ers--we met up at Yokohama station bright and early in the morning (ugh) and all headed out to the HamaDai campus together. For starters, we were broken up into groups, and met with student volunteers who would give us a tour of the campus and the festival. Outside there was a stage with student performances (dance and music); lots of tents where various clubs/organizations were selling goods or food; stalls with different Japanese fair games... you get the idea. (For those readers familiar with the 'Croft, think Fall Festival, but bigger).
I found out later that most of the other tour groups didn't fare quite as well, and people mostly ended up leaving around 1 or 2pm--so the group I got placed in was clearly the best! :-D My group was me, Jason, and Misa; and our student guides were Ai, Naoko, and Jacky (he was actually an international student as well, from China). They were all really friendly, and we had a blast!
Ironically, walking around at the festival, the first group that we got accosted by happened to be the archery club, trying to get people over to their booth where you could try and shoot a target or balloons to win prizes. I mentioned that I had been on the archery team too, so they decided to let me use a "real" bow, instead of the cheap & light ones they had for everybody else. This was great, except for 1) the bow was right-handed (when I explained I was a lefty, the response was "頑張ってください Well, please try") and 2) it was *reeeeally* heavy. So I didn't acquit myself all that well, but I did manage to hit one balloon--and win a lollipop.
We ran into another IUC group--here's Hansell-sensei getting ready to try his luck...Next we wandered inside and found out we were just in time for a screening in the film club's room. They were showing 3 short student films (about 15 mins each). The first one was a "looking back on your happy youthful days" sort of a piece, with 3 or 4 high school boys goofing around on the train platform, and then it cut to one of the boys in a suit on his way to work, and he sees the platform and remembers those days. The second film--in addition to being in Japanese--was one of those super-deep indie psychological things, so I really didn't understand it at all. The third film was my favorite--a sort of sweet love story. A girl runs into this guy who grants 3 wishes to someone--he explains that he can't go away until she's made all of her wishes, but she can't decide on the last one, and eventually as time goes on, she realizes she likes having him around. Finally the guy explains that she has until tomorrow to make her wish, or he'll disappear anyway, but she decides not to say what her last wish is, since either way he'll leave, but then at the very end he comes back, and when she asks why, he says "It's what you wished for." Aaawwww.......
After the movie, we were all pretty hungry so we went in search of food at the stalls outside. And there was a *lot* of food. Takoyaki, okonomiyaki, yakisoba, Chinese fried rice, tempura ice cream, cotton candy (which I actually got to try making! ;-D It's a lot harder than it looks)--and the list goes on. At any rate, it was yummy. Here's a view of one of the main food-stall streets.The orchestra club also had a booth nearby, where they were playing chamber music pretty much all day. I guess they traded off...?After lunch we went back inside the building cause Jacky had found this really neat room he wanted us all to see. It was the...Train Club...or something? I'm not really sure. At any rate, they had this neat train-driving simulation video game, and the controller was an actual set of train controls. You had to stop at the stations, and watch out for signals and all that stuff. Jason tried it, but I think I would have crashed or something. I'm not entirely certain that it was even *possible* in the game to crash, but I think I would have managed it. They also had a table with all these neat train parts, like those hanging handles in the cars, and different train signs. We posed! From L-R is Jason, Misa, me, and Ai. Naoko was taking the pictures, so she's not in it--and Jacky got a phone call so he ended up not being in the picture either. He was a little sad when he came back that we had done it without him. ;-P LOL.
Then, it was time for Naoko's friend's band--The Daytrippers--to go on stage outside, so we all went back to go and see their show. They seriously thought they were rock stars for real. It was pretty fun--especially when the lead singer (Naoko's friend) fell off the stage in the middle of the first song (*not* on purpose). :-O But I did snatch a video of them (post-tumble). Note the very enthusiastic fans to stage left, LOL. I only wish I'd taken more video, but しょうがないから、とりあえずenjoy what I've posted here.


Lastly (but definitely not leastly) the final event on the main stage was something called "Mr. Lady," which is basically a beauty contest for guys dressed as girls. There were 4 contestants, and they went through a series of rounds to determine who made the best woman. As Ai explained to me, "At other universities, like Keio or Waseda or wherever, they all do beauty contests and stuff, to see who's the prettiest girl, or the coolest guy--but that's boring, everybody does that. At HamaDai, we've never done those kinds of contests. Instead, we have okama contests." ;-P
Here's contestant #1: "My hobbies are shopping...and laundry..."


The next video is contestant #4, who's the one that Ai thought was the obvious winner from the get-go. And it's true, he was completely adorable! ;-) I only wish I'd taken a video of #3 (the one in the dark sweater and skirt) as well, because he had a super deep voice, and just made the most AWFUL woman I've ever seen. It was hilarious.


After that, the festival was winding down, and Jason and I had promised to meet Molly and Paul for okonomiyaki dinner, so we had to leave the festival. But we'd already exchanged contact info with Naoko, Ai, and Jacky, and they promised to get some of their friends together and call us up for izakaya, or bowling, or clubbing in Roppongi sometime soon. (Earlier in the day, Naoko or Ai would say, "yeah, we'll all have to go out together. We'll go to a club" and Jacky would excitedly jump in with "Tonight? :-D " )

Wow, this became a really long post. Sorry. Hope you enjoyed my ramblings tho!

Halloween!

So, this isn't really a post, cause I didn't actually do anything special for Halloween. There's lots of pumpkin decorations around and everything, but people in Japan don't really do the whole costumes, trick-or-treat thing on Halloween.
But I happened to be walking around 元町 Motomachi on Wed afternoon, and ran into this huge Halloween parade thing. I hadn't realized anything would be going on, but it was essentially a big parade down the Motomachi main street, with tons of little kids all dressed up, and people handing out balloons and things... There was even this giant black spider thing in the middle of the street, made all out of balloons. I think the kids were also trick or treating at the stores, or something.
Anyway, like I said, I wasn't expecting for there to be anything, so I didn't have my camera or anything on me, but the little kids were *soooo* cute so I did snap a few pics with my keitai.

A parade of what?

So, this will be the first in a series of posts about my totally amazing 秋休み。First off, is the "Quiet Shamisen Parade." And what exactly is a quiet shamisen parade?--you might be asking. I was wondering pretty much the same thing when I went to go see it.
The parade was in honor of some festival (I think?), and was held over in 祐天寺 Yutenji--Minato Mirai sen, on the way to Shibuya. 祐天寺 is apparently known for shamisen parades (or so I heard). Anyway, I went to see the parade with Paul--not an IUC student, but he's Amy L's roommate, and so has kind of become IUC by default. Paul's friend Kyoka (Japanese, but he met her in LA working at a radio station, I think?) is sort of an experimental musician/singer (I've heard her music described as "weird" or "out there") but she apparently also takes shamisen lessons--hence the parade. It was basically a whole bunch of people in kimonos and traditional Japanese dress, either playing the shamisen, singing, or doing traditional dances while they paraded down the street.
It was a really neat thing to see, and 祐天寺 is a bit of an old-fashioned sort of area so the whole thing had this really traditional, nostalgic feel to it. Made even more so by the hole in the wall ramen place that Paul and I ate dinner at after. We sat and chatted, waiting for Kyoka, and then went over with her to this sort of "after party" for the parade participants. It was held in a big room in a nearby kindergarten, which meant that we were all sitting on those preschooler-size mini chairs with our knees up in our chins, drinking beer and eating yakitori skewers. It was rather an odd experience. :-) Especially the part when the dude who was sort of in charge of the parade told me that I had "very pretty teeth." (Umm...OK.....?)

And now, for some more photos!

Paul and Kyoka.

Here's another one of Kyoka playing shamisen in the parade.

I just really liked this woman's kimono.

And now, for videos!!!


And next is one I took that lets you see a little more of the dancing.