Well that was interesting.
I've been spending much of my time lately playing Ragnarok Online, which for those of you who aren't already addicted is a (currently) free mmorpg made by this Korean company and they also have it now in Japan and USA. I'd been playing the US version for a while, but just the other day they shut down the US servers for what will be 3 months, for repairs and such. So today I decided to try playing the Japanese version. This has so far worked out okay. I decided that this time I'd made a female character since my character on the US server is a male. Being a female definitely has its advantages. People let you have items and stuff. So, I was walking around fighting stuff, and I saw this guy saying (in Japanese) that he was sad for some reason or another. I said I was sad too 'cause I was dumped, and I forget exactly what happened after that but this guy started hitting on me. I played along 'cause I figured it'd be good Japanese practice. So I went along with him, and I don't *think* he ever figured out that I'm not Japanese. I guess my Japanese is good enough to be mistaken for shoddy internet Japanese. He tanked for me, meaning he distracted harder monsters than I could normally handle, while letting me kill them and get lots of exp. That was really helpful because I was working towards being a mage and it's really hard early on for mages because you have really low physical strength. Again, very advantageous to be a girl in Ragnarok. He also gave me a cute bow for my hair. So by tanking for me he was able to help me become a mage, and I spent several hours hanging around and talking...as much as I could...with his party who were all nice people. I don't think they know that I'm not Japanese either, but I did almost blow my cover at one point. Some American came by while we were sitting around talking and asked, in English, for money. The leader of the party, Jessica Emily, told him off really well in English. Then she said something about the guy being a gaijin, which I mistook for her saying that she was a gaijin. So I said to her in a private message "Actually, I am too ^^;; But you speak much better Japanese than me" then she was all "Huh? I'm Japanese" And then I realized how I mistook what she said before, and said to her in Japanese "eep...don't mind me. my English is terrible. I was just mistaken" and she said nothing about it after that. So she might be suspicious of me..but none of the other people seem to be. A bit before I left they invited me into their party, and I accepted. Soon after I became a mage (much more quickly than I would've without them) I noticed that it *must* be late when I member of my party said she had to go eat dinner. So I said I had "something to do" and left. So that's how I joined a Japanese Ragnarok party. Maybe even we can become a guild sometime. I dunno. But I guess I'll return and keep hanging around with those guys. They're the first Japanese friends I've made...in some way or another. I just wish I understood more than +/-70% of what they say.