14/12/10 - 19/12/10 (I can't be imaginative. I just typed this whole post)

Okay, I'm going to start with an apology: I've been busy/lazy, and therefore have not updated this for about 2 weeks. Never fear, you won't miss anything. Just bear with me, it's gunna be a looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong post. Also, I gotta apologise coz I'm writing this while I'm watching a Hannah Montana Forever marathon, so I'm sorry if some random lyrics pop up in the middle of an I'm still good sentence.
Here goes. Good luck.

Tuesday 14/12/10

We had our first Japanese culture class today. We made Christmas cards with ahiga, traditional style paintings. It's like a really strict version of watercolour painting, which were never my favourite, but still fun =)
School finished early, coz of exams. We stopped at Mos Burger on the way home for lunch. Chicken teriyaki burger = om nom nom. The rest of the afternoon I spent blobbing under the kotatsu. Yay!
Then at about 6, I set off (on foot) with Masato to Eikun (Masumi'S brother)'s house. I thought we were just going for a feed/family get together. Turns out it was a memorial day for Ji-chan's parents. There was a traditional Korean ceremony - it involved lots of bowing (really glad I a. have new jeans that fit b. wore a long top), incense and a little chanting. I didn't understand and of it, of course, coz it was all in Korean. I was absolutely terrified that someone was going to set their tie on fire when they were leaning over the candles... eep!
Oh, and I tried sea cucumber. Nice taste (fishy, but hey), but the texture is so strange! I can't even describe it... kind of muffled crunchy, slimy, slightly chewy... I don't know.
However, on the upside I learnt how to play games on a Wii and I found the second half of the bullet train ticket I thought I'd lost. Yay!

Wednesday - 15/12/10

Started off at the primary school, with the 5th graders. There was one girl whose English was AMAZING. They were all pretty good though. Nice and quiet =)
We had a double period of koto, with lunch time in between. We learnt the really difficult part of Sakura. For some reason, I found it easier. It's faster, but it means that I don't start speeding up by accident!
At lunch time, we ate Okonomiyaki with Ms Ukida, Mr Haws, Ms Inoue and Mr Yamamoto (the primary school principal). It was, once again, very yummy, and we got a brief lesson on the history of the dish too!
School finished early again , but exams are finished now, so Rika doesn't have to study to odd hours of the night anymore. Yay!
Anywho, we caught the train to Hondori and went shopping. I was trying to look for presents, but everywhere we looked was really expensive. However, I found about 3 different pairs of shoes that I've fallen in love with. Now, I just need to get my cards working... so, after purikura (Google it) and pizza, we caught another train back to ALSOK (no idea what it stands for, so don't ask) and we saw A Chorus Line. Of course, it was all in Japanese, so I spent most of my time trying to remember the English words to the songs, or observing the dancing (which was quite good... how do the guys get so flexible? Seriously!) I bought a programme too, and don't understand a word of it. My goal for the end of 2011 is to translate all of it =)

Thursday 16/12/10

So, today I finally figured out how to rock the pigtails look. And I also found out that I can do french braid pigtails. Who knew? Anyway, at Yasuda you're not allowed to wear your hair out, ever. So, it's either pigtails or a ponytail. Very little creative license can be used... I don't think I've seen one quiff, ribbon, or coloured hairclip in the past 2 weeks.
At school today, we had an intense double period of Japanese (note top self: write out good copy of homework BEFORE class), then calligraphy, which was... interesting.
We didn't really understand the activity, though. I think we were supposed to be practising how to write kanji with (wait for it) chopsticks, straws and cardboars. Yeah, that didn't really work out so well for us... We did make some nice paintings though!
At lunch, I went to the canteen with Miwa and Chelsea and bought PEACH BREAD. I was pink, peach flavoured, and had actual peaches in the middle. I think Hiroshima is a little like heaven - you can get anything peach flavoured =P
After lunch, we had our second culture class with the alumni association. We painted haiga again - I think I'm improving a little bit. I painted some hinamatsuri dolls, and they actually looked okay!
Then, the big achievement of the day... I got home, on the bus and train, BY MYSELF.

Friday - 17/12/10

Today, after another intense double Japanese lesson, we had a PE lesson. The sports uniform is SO CUTGE - and way warmer than I was expecting. Mind you, the day wasn't as freezing as yeaterday, so I guess it just felt warmer. Anywho, we were playing soccer. Not my strong point, by any stretch of the imagination, but it was fun =P I hugged the other team's best player for about 5 minutes, so my team could win. Yeah... we lost. But in my team's downtime, we played on the bars, for the first time in AGES. I've lost any upper body strength I ever possessed. *shrug* oh well.
After lunch, we went to the tatami rooms to learn about the traditional Japanese tea ceremony - and we got to drink one lot that we made ourselves. It was the nice tasting stuff, thank goodness - like the ice cream. Nice and sweet =) Once we'd tried making macha, we ended up sitting for about an hour and talking (in mostly Japanese) with the two teachers. It proved to me that when I need to, I can discuss things in Japanese. Yay!
I caught the bus home by myself again. I'm getting pretty good at it, I think.

Saturday - 18/12/10

SCHOOL. On a SATURDAY. Whut? I feel so backwards right now. And REALLY tired. That could have something to do with the not-much-sleep thing, but we'll ignore that. Anyways, went to school for half a day. Japanese lesson (again), discussion time with Ms Donaldson, and then another culture lesson. This time, we made these really cool little origami-type umbrellas. They are AWESOME!
Then, school finished, so I went with Rika and Mika to Hondori. Technically we're not supposed to go anywhere but between school and home in our uniforms, but I'm assuming no one reading this will dob us in =P We had lunch at this cute little underground restaurant, then wandered around for a bit... THEN my first try of Mr Donut. It was SO GOOD. I think I had a strawberry flavoured thing. Not 100% sure, but hey, it tasted good, so what do I care?
For dinner, we went out to a Chinsese restaurant (me, Rika and Masumi) to have dinner with Ji-chan and 2 Korean friends who are going home tomorrow. Am I the only who finds it kinda ironic that I, a New Zealander, went to a Chinese restaurant in Japan to eat dinner with some Koreans?
I figured out whi I eat so much here though. Everything comes out as individual dihes, and you never know exactly how much you've eaten until your pants get uncomfortably tight.

Sunday - 18/12/10

It was Masato's birthday today. Masato, Masumi and I got up early (ish) and headed out for some sightseeing adventures. We drove for about an hour and a half, then stopped at this little roadside thing. I have no idea where it was, but it was cute, had lots of souvenirs, and the food in the restaurant tasted good.
After that we drove for another 20 minutes or so, and went to the ______ bridge. It's quite cool... like the Japanese footbridge interpretation of of the bridge at Balclutha.
Anyways, I took a picture of the castle at the top of the hill, which was closed so we didn't bother walking up the hill. (In actual fact, it turns out I tooka picture of someone's house, which I mistook for the castle. Whoops...) At the little township, though, we stopped for an ice cream at this little place in the town square. They had 100 different flavours. I had no clue what half of them were. Apparently, there were wasabi and curry flavoured ones. Interesting. There was also a monkey. A performing monkey, dressed in clothes (no fez, unfortunately), on a leash, sitting on a little stool, waiting for something to do. He looked so sad!
Then, we went to Miyajima. It was pretty cool. First, we tried oysters (Hiroshima is famous for them). They tasted good, but the place we bought them from looked a little bit dodgy. I'm still okay, though, so obviously it was alright =P
Anyhow, we went to see the temple, and the floating torii. It was low tide, though, so there was just a lot of green snot weed floating around, instead of nice clean water =( Even so, it was still pretty amazing!
At the temple, I got a fortune thingy. Only problem is, I can't read it. One day, I'll figure it out! Might be a bit late if it tells me I'm going to die tomorrow, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. After visiting the temple, we went back through the town to the ferry port thing - we arrived at the island quite late, so didn't have much time for any more sightseeing. However, we did have time for some souvenir shopping. I got almost everybody's gifts on Miyajima. I spent a fair bit, but I'm still (reasonably) on budget, so it's okay. Oh, and there's deer EVERYWHERE on the island. I saw one eating a paper cup.
We drove back to Hiroshima, which took about another hour and a half (I swear I know every word of that Selena Gomez CD now), and then went out for Masato's birthday dinner. It was at an AMAZING teppanyaki restaurant (there was a valet. A VALET. We took a taxi though, so it wasn't much use to us. But still. VALET.)
We walked to Heiwa no Dori (Peace Boulevard) on the way home to see the "Dreamination", more commonly referred to as "Illumination". NOT to be mistaken, as I found out, with elimination. It has nothing to do with reality TV.
Anyway, about 6 blocks are all decked up in lights, on both sides of the street. It's kinda like Fairfield and Waldronville go together, had a baby, and then fed it copious amounts of growth hormones. There's honestly NO other way of describing it. It was AH-MAY-ZING. Yes, it does require splitting one word into three. That's how cool it is. There was a pirate ship, and a merry-go-round, and a WHALE and a castle made of lights, and SO many other things. It was awesome. Then when I got home, I had a wee Skype chat with the parentals and Mark in HOLLAND. Yay! Apparently, it's quite cold there. Like, homeless people freezing on the streets cold. And snowy cold. We all know how Mum loves the snow! =P


Right. Posting this lot now. Another big, long, more than a weeks worth of stuff will be headed your way in a couple of hours. You have time to prepare your eyeballs =)

P.S. Another apology - if there's spelling mistakes, I'm sorry. I'm still not very good at using the laptop/Japanese keyboard.