The Glorious Has Happened
...Norton works. With Japanese internet! *dances, cheers, etc*
So I can do normal quote marks! ...now I sorta half wish I hadn't boughten the flash drive. But it's too late now, and I like having something even more portable, too.
May 10th, 2006 (Wednesday); Asuka’s room, Fukuyama House, Kyoto, Japan; 2:30 p.m.
It seems that once I get one good habit down, or at least start in on it, I fail at another. But maybe now I’ll be able to juggle a few good habits amongst my bad ones. I still don’t get to bed when I should, but I do get up early enough for school, just perhaps not as early as I’d like. Though if I’m good and do my homework in the daytime after class then perhaps I won’t need to scramble and cram in more in the morning after. Go figure, huh?
Yesterday I was very productive, though I really wish I could’ve been even more so. It’s just the problem of me being so good at procrastinating that it’s going to take me the rest of this week to properly catch up. And then I’ll only have a week left before our travel week and then I’ll be in Yokohama. Wow. This is going by fast. Especially when I put it in terms of weeks - then I’m breezing through it.
May 9th, 2006 (Tuesday)
We got out of class relatively early yesterday, but we were expected to go out and sightsee in little groups. I went with Meghan, Ricardo, and Matt on bikes, heading out to eat lunch at a park and then finally to Ginkakuji. Ricardo rides really fast and is much better than the rest of us, though Matt is a pretty fair rider, too. Meghan and I have been away from bikes for a long time - despite bringing mine to Provo with me - and so it was a constant game of seeing how far Ricardo could get ahead and how well you can dodge Japanese people and sudden changes in the road. They’re generally very nice, but when I’m still not capable of riding with only one hand on the handlebars? Oh dear. (Believe me, it’s a good thing I’ve realized this inability - last time I tried to take a hand off I nearly crashed.) We got to Ginkakuji (silver plated pavilion) way before the other group who was heading there by bus. We were already riding our bikes from the church when they were going to buy lunch at the nearby Konbini “Lawson’s”.
We parked the bikes and hiked up the hill past all the cute little shops and wow, were there a lot of students there. It’s obviously a normal school field trip location, but I think we may have picked a very busy time. Though it got busier after we left, I think. The pavilion was right at the beginning and never got silver plated, so it wasn’t half as impressive as I would’ve hoped. Two stories tall, got gorgeous greenery around it, and some rock thing a little ways from it, but I wasn’t sure what it was all about. Ginkakuji - the actual building - is much older than Kinkakuji, so it also didn’t look as well cared for either. Granted, Kinkakuji is three stories tall, rebuilt around 1995 (because a fanatic monk burned it down) and gold plated, but…yeah. Both are pretty. There. And! Ginkakuji has a display of the different mosses. “Moss, the Interrupter”, “The Inhabitants of Kinkakuji” and “V.I.P. Moss”. Warnick-Sensei had told us about these and we worked hard to find them - Meghan and I were both very amused. And took many pictures.
But we all felt up for more, so we headed out to the Gion district. It was pretty. Took a ton of pictures there, too, though I think we found some random smaller temple and some old wooden buildings that I don’t know the name of either. And Ricardo asked some old man to take a group picture for us. Very amusing. I wish there had been some kinds of signs or a better documentation of different sights, but perhaps Gion isn’t so much about the “this Geisha was here” as much as just the feel of old Japan. It was very cool, though I wish there hadn’t been so many cars there. I got a couple shots down empty alleys and streets, but they always had a car there. Very irritating.
We all were good to go still - though it was blazing hot - and took the challenging ride (mostly because it was slightly uphill, Ricardo is in the lead and insanely fast) towards Kiyomizudera. Meghan and I matched with rolled up jeans (mine started out full length, but bikes and my pants don’t seem to mesh well) and blue t-shirts and she commented on it afterwards. I hadn’t even noticed. I’m a terrible girl - I can’t do hand clapping/patting whatever games, either. This was proven in Tuesday’s class with Oshima-Sensei. Yeah, me and hand-eye coordination? Not so much. But, back to Kiyomizudera! We weren’t exactly sure how to get there, but found a really pretty huge orange Tora gate entrance to another shrine and parked our bikes there, then wandered in the hopes of finding it. And we did.
Oh. My.
I was so infuriated that my camera battery was going to die, especially because Meghan took probably close to oh, one hundred pictures. Yes, I’m materialistic. But it was gorgeous! It’s the temple of pure water and while some of the water didn’t quite fit the title, it is utsukushii! (You guessed it, gorgeous.) It’s built into a mountainside in southern Kyoto and is huge. There are enormous stilts holding up part of it and I can definitely see this as a great hide away. Though I have to admit people could probably break into it pretty easily, since it’s not a castle. The architecture was gorgeous, the entrance fee was cheap (only 300 yen!) and there were so many different shrines and things to look at. Meghan and I took every possible route we could find - including two into gulches that are far less traveled - and it was amazing! Matt and Ricardo got separated from us and ended up waiting a bit. We felt a little bad making them wait, but it was so worth it for all of the gorgeous sights. It truly felt like “Old Japan”, y’know? Little random statues with aprons on them dotting hillsides and greenery everywhere.
I wish it was next door, I’d probably go there to study and just…yeah. There were moments if I wondered if I was in Japan or some of my favorite forested areas in Washington. It was much hotter here, but the same feelings of awe and just love of the area were there.
The ride home was long, but I managed it with only one slightly wrong turn (at one intersection I can not remember which way is the one I want to take) and was quickly hustled into the shower. The ofuro (bath) was empty and I was way too hot to want to go in anyway, so all was well. Shizuka’s younger brother was here, so after that I talked to him for a little while and showed him pictures of Tacoma from the picture book I brought. (That was a great idea, Mom, by the by. Thank you!)
Dinner scared me for a second, but I survived with flying colors. We had flat fish - it’s really good when you don’t have to see the two eyes side by side and staring at you - and a daikon and clam “salad” and some tofu with toppings (too much ginger for me, though) and I tried some brown rice. The texture is a little different, but it seems all right. Shizuka is on a brown rice diet, so I’m sure I’ll see a lot more of it.
Got help with my kanji and Haruyo sympathized with how difficult the article was. We had a quiz the next day and so I tried to study for that frantically, still haven’t really properly read today’s article. (The tenses get confusing when you write about the past and then the present. Yeesh.)
I fully intended on getting online yesterday, but that didn’t happen as I was doing kanji and the like until about 11 p.m. and still had a lot to do. Plus I didn’t want to tie up the room where the internet is - I’m not entirely sure who sleeps there now, but I still don’t want to get in the way. So I didn’t get on, sorry everyone!
May 10th, 2006. (Wednesday)
Today wasn’t nearly so exciting, though the weather forecast was all blue with little open umbrellas. That was pretty amusing to look at as Oshima-sensei told us the weather today. We talked about how we’re going to carve red peppers tomorrow afternoon and NHK will most likely be there and we are to be on our best behavior - not that he doubts us. I think Meghan’s Mom will probably tape it, if we’re on, you know, but Haruyo gets excited whenever I tell her about my plans. Flashes victory signs and all, it’s hilarious.
I did pretty well on today’s quiz (8.5 out of 10!) and managed to read most of a small article without help (there were a handful of kanji neither I nor Travis knew) when Oshima-sensei had us find a random article and tell the class about it. Got home early again - no afternoon class again - and everyone had umbrellas out. Oshima-sensei said “Ame desu yo” and I put out my hands into it and scoffed. It was sprinkling. I laughed and told him as much, then headed out home on my bike. And cursed being a girl. But that’s normal, especially when I have a boy’s bike to ride.
We don’t have a quiz tomorrow and I have a lot of the afternoon still ahead of me, so with any luck, I can catch up quickly and be ready for class from now on. I sure don’t want to keep screwing up anymore - I don’t have time for it and I’m tired of it.
And my body hurts. But we all know the reason for that - stupid hard bike seat.
Much love and luck to everybody,
bel/bobo
But! Another quick update/question:
kilerkki asked about dango and mochi? Well, dango are the little balls that I've seen in white, green, and pink. Green is usually tea flavored, so be warned. Sooooo good. And mochi is white (usually?) and larger. Shaped sorta like a biscuit where I've seen it, and very good too. When I find a good chance, I'll try to take a picture. Ne?
And here's the really cool announcement. Shizuka told me that she knows of a kimono shop where I can get the whole deal for like...30 bucks. Yeah. I could be wrong, but here's your chance to figure out a way to pay me in advance or something, or swear your first born child to me if you don't pay. I don't know how many I could reasonably get and mail home or pack home, but...yeah. Requests, anyone?
-bel/bobo
So I can do normal quote marks! ...now I sorta half wish I hadn't boughten the flash drive. But it's too late now, and I like having something even more portable, too.
May 10th, 2006 (Wednesday); Asuka’s room, Fukuyama House, Kyoto, Japan; 2:30 p.m.
It seems that once I get one good habit down, or at least start in on it, I fail at another. But maybe now I’ll be able to juggle a few good habits amongst my bad ones. I still don’t get to bed when I should, but I do get up early enough for school, just perhaps not as early as I’d like. Though if I’m good and do my homework in the daytime after class then perhaps I won’t need to scramble and cram in more in the morning after. Go figure, huh?
Yesterday I was very productive, though I really wish I could’ve been even more so. It’s just the problem of me being so good at procrastinating that it’s going to take me the rest of this week to properly catch up. And then I’ll only have a week left before our travel week and then I’ll be in Yokohama. Wow. This is going by fast. Especially when I put it in terms of weeks - then I’m breezing through it.
May 9th, 2006 (Tuesday)
We got out of class relatively early yesterday, but we were expected to go out and sightsee in little groups. I went with Meghan, Ricardo, and Matt on bikes, heading out to eat lunch at a park and then finally to Ginkakuji. Ricardo rides really fast and is much better than the rest of us, though Matt is a pretty fair rider, too. Meghan and I have been away from bikes for a long time - despite bringing mine to Provo with me - and so it was a constant game of seeing how far Ricardo could get ahead and how well you can dodge Japanese people and sudden changes in the road. They’re generally very nice, but when I’m still not capable of riding with only one hand on the handlebars? Oh dear. (Believe me, it’s a good thing I’ve realized this inability - last time I tried to take a hand off I nearly crashed.) We got to Ginkakuji (silver plated pavilion) way before the other group who was heading there by bus. We were already riding our bikes from the church when they were going to buy lunch at the nearby Konbini “Lawson’s”.
We parked the bikes and hiked up the hill past all the cute little shops and wow, were there a lot of students there. It’s obviously a normal school field trip location, but I think we may have picked a very busy time. Though it got busier after we left, I think. The pavilion was right at the beginning and never got silver plated, so it wasn’t half as impressive as I would’ve hoped. Two stories tall, got gorgeous greenery around it, and some rock thing a little ways from it, but I wasn’t sure what it was all about. Ginkakuji - the actual building - is much older than Kinkakuji, so it also didn’t look as well cared for either. Granted, Kinkakuji is three stories tall, rebuilt around 1995 (because a fanatic monk burned it down) and gold plated, but…yeah. Both are pretty. There. And! Ginkakuji has a display of the different mosses. “Moss, the Interrupter”, “The Inhabitants of Kinkakuji” and “V.I.P. Moss”. Warnick-Sensei had told us about these and we worked hard to find them - Meghan and I were both very amused. And took many pictures.
But we all felt up for more, so we headed out to the Gion district. It was pretty. Took a ton of pictures there, too, though I think we found some random smaller temple and some old wooden buildings that I don’t know the name of either. And Ricardo asked some old man to take a group picture for us. Very amusing. I wish there had been some kinds of signs or a better documentation of different sights, but perhaps Gion isn’t so much about the “this Geisha was here” as much as just the feel of old Japan. It was very cool, though I wish there hadn’t been so many cars there. I got a couple shots down empty alleys and streets, but they always had a car there. Very irritating.
We all were good to go still - though it was blazing hot - and took the challenging ride (mostly because it was slightly uphill, Ricardo is in the lead and insanely fast) towards Kiyomizudera. Meghan and I matched with rolled up jeans (mine started out full length, but bikes and my pants don’t seem to mesh well) and blue t-shirts and she commented on it afterwards. I hadn’t even noticed. I’m a terrible girl - I can’t do hand clapping/patting whatever games, either. This was proven in Tuesday’s class with Oshima-Sensei. Yeah, me and hand-eye coordination? Not so much. But, back to Kiyomizudera! We weren’t exactly sure how to get there, but found a really pretty huge orange Tora gate entrance to another shrine and parked our bikes there, then wandered in the hopes of finding it. And we did.
Oh. My.
I was so infuriated that my camera battery was going to die, especially because Meghan took probably close to oh, one hundred pictures. Yes, I’m materialistic. But it was gorgeous! It’s the temple of pure water and while some of the water didn’t quite fit the title, it is utsukushii! (You guessed it, gorgeous.) It’s built into a mountainside in southern Kyoto and is huge. There are enormous stilts holding up part of it and I can definitely see this as a great hide away. Though I have to admit people could probably break into it pretty easily, since it’s not a castle. The architecture was gorgeous, the entrance fee was cheap (only 300 yen!) and there were so many different shrines and things to look at. Meghan and I took every possible route we could find - including two into gulches that are far less traveled - and it was amazing! Matt and Ricardo got separated from us and ended up waiting a bit. We felt a little bad making them wait, but it was so worth it for all of the gorgeous sights. It truly felt like “Old Japan”, y’know? Little random statues with aprons on them dotting hillsides and greenery everywhere.
I wish it was next door, I’d probably go there to study and just…yeah. There were moments if I wondered if I was in Japan or some of my favorite forested areas in Washington. It was much hotter here, but the same feelings of awe and just love of the area were there.
The ride home was long, but I managed it with only one slightly wrong turn (at one intersection I can not remember which way is the one I want to take) and was quickly hustled into the shower. The ofuro (bath) was empty and I was way too hot to want to go in anyway, so all was well. Shizuka’s younger brother was here, so after that I talked to him for a little while and showed him pictures of Tacoma from the picture book I brought. (That was a great idea, Mom, by the by. Thank you!)
Dinner scared me for a second, but I survived with flying colors. We had flat fish - it’s really good when you don’t have to see the two eyes side by side and staring at you - and a daikon and clam “salad” and some tofu with toppings (too much ginger for me, though) and I tried some brown rice. The texture is a little different, but it seems all right. Shizuka is on a brown rice diet, so I’m sure I’ll see a lot more of it.
Got help with my kanji and Haruyo sympathized with how difficult the article was. We had a quiz the next day and so I tried to study for that frantically, still haven’t really properly read today’s article. (The tenses get confusing when you write about the past and then the present. Yeesh.)
I fully intended on getting online yesterday, but that didn’t happen as I was doing kanji and the like until about 11 p.m. and still had a lot to do. Plus I didn’t want to tie up the room where the internet is - I’m not entirely sure who sleeps there now, but I still don’t want to get in the way. So I didn’t get on, sorry everyone!
May 10th, 2006. (Wednesday)
Today wasn’t nearly so exciting, though the weather forecast was all blue with little open umbrellas. That was pretty amusing to look at as Oshima-sensei told us the weather today. We talked about how we’re going to carve red peppers tomorrow afternoon and NHK will most likely be there and we are to be on our best behavior - not that he doubts us. I think Meghan’s Mom will probably tape it, if we’re on, you know, but Haruyo gets excited whenever I tell her about my plans. Flashes victory signs and all, it’s hilarious.
I did pretty well on today’s quiz (8.5 out of 10!) and managed to read most of a small article without help (there were a handful of kanji neither I nor Travis knew) when Oshima-sensei had us find a random article and tell the class about it. Got home early again - no afternoon class again - and everyone had umbrellas out. Oshima-sensei said “Ame desu yo” and I put out my hands into it and scoffed. It was sprinkling. I laughed and told him as much, then headed out home on my bike. And cursed being a girl. But that’s normal, especially when I have a boy’s bike to ride.
We don’t have a quiz tomorrow and I have a lot of the afternoon still ahead of me, so with any luck, I can catch up quickly and be ready for class from now on. I sure don’t want to keep screwing up anymore - I don’t have time for it and I’m tired of it.
And my body hurts. But we all know the reason for that - stupid hard bike seat.
Much love and luck to everybody,
bel/bobo
But! Another quick update/question:
kilerkki asked about dango and mochi? Well, dango are the little balls that I've seen in white, green, and pink. Green is usually tea flavored, so be warned. Sooooo good. And mochi is white (usually?) and larger. Shaped sorta like a biscuit where I've seen it, and very good too. When I find a good chance, I'll try to take a picture. Ne?
And here's the really cool announcement. Shizuka told me that she knows of a kimono shop where I can get the whole deal for like...30 bucks. Yeah. I could be wrong, but here's your chance to figure out a way to pay me in advance or something, or swear your first born child to me if you don't pay. I don't know how many I could reasonably get and mail home or pack home, but...yeah. Requests, anyone?
-bel/bobo