Parteh Pictures

Being the genius I am I finally remembered to bring my stupid iPod cord to school and as a result can delight you all with my adventures of last weekend. First parteh, then random shizzle for you.

So, this was the beginning before everyone came, after this photo was taken we had at least another 6 turn up as I think the grand total was just shy of 20. The strange little machine you see on the table is used to make takoyaki, (Octopus balls of more accurately, small pieces of octopus encased in a crispy shell. They ended up looking like this:
And this is Yuuri who is a very funny girl and dresses like a rocker bearing a plate of said takoyaki. I loved what she was wearing that day. ^_^

So, after the party got going a little and we had gorged ourselves on food, we turned to eating it in interesting ways. Mum is so right, if you can catch food in your mouth you get it for free. We had a bag of oppcorn just sitting there so Yuuri, who isn't in the photo below threw popcorn to us.

The five of us were sitting in a row and we were trying to catch popcorn in order, if someone missed one we would start again. I was sitting fourth in the line which wasn't great for me as I don't have a lot of practice catching food in my mouth and it meant that when it got to me, the pressure was on. So, after a lot of laughing, reused popcorn on tatami mats and me missing it twice we finally did it! It doesn't seem like a big deal now but it was a lot of fun at the time.

Me, Anna, Sayaka, Hitomi, Akane. Yeah, I remember people's names...

After that a bunch of people went into the other room and talked and watched television, I stayed behind and we took photos of each other being bored. As you can see I was taking a photo of a person taking a photo of Mako taking a photo. I like the added layering it gives...

Well, that is all for the party photos for now, that night I ate something considerably less apetizing than a bunch of sweets and lollies. It is the thing out of Banjo Kazooie. I don't know its name but it was gross and salty and I didn't like it. The odd, slimy ugly thing tasted like escargot without the flavouring. Straight out of the shell. Ewwww...but I tried it. You have t be proud of me for that.

But on the note of food, this is (so far) one of my favourite discoveries. Chocolate chip, melon bread. It is just fanatstic and it only costs like 115円. How awesome is that, not to mention that it is sold like 5 minutes walk away from my house. Very dangerous.

While on food and drink, look what I found in convenience stores. Yes, Fanta. Muscat flavoured fanta, it was quite nice but wow, they have a lot of flavours. Have seen: Orange, Grape, Grapefruit, Lemon, Muscat, Melon and Grape and Orange flavours with Jelly in them. Japan is big on assorted jellies in drinks, nice but they don't particularly quench your thirst, nevertheless, I had to try one.

And look: it is Sephiroth on a can. I love Japan...
This is, I don't even know what it is called but we made it in Home Ec, the only fun thing I have done in class so far. Hopefully, I will be able to ditch classes soon. I will keep pushing as sitting through half a term worth of Japanese classes that I don't understand is wearing my patience a little thin.

That is all for today, exams start soon and I get to chill (supposed to be studying) out in the teachers room. I brought my DS to school, for Kanji practice, naturally. XD

Love,

Ashley-chan

Parteh...

Ooo...you all must hate me, it has been over a span since I have posted. Naughty me. Yui didn't have club on thursday so we went home at the normal time and I had no computer over the weekend so it honestly isn't my fault.

Btw, a span is 10 days. You can blame my mother for that, sending me an awesome book and all. Thank you mother! It helped with my boredom and I will definently read it again. (Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss...I think...comes highly recommended by me.) But, thank the Lord, I have now been introduced to the Library which is only one train stop away at Kikitsu and a short walk. Next time I will be getting my own card so I can use it at my own discression.

Their english section is only small but the do have the entire Harry Potter series, some Dan Brown, Stephen King, John Grisham and a smattering of the classics. I'm am sure I can keep entertained for a little while. Currently reading: Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin. It isn't bad, nor is it great but it will keep me occupied. I have a small haunting in my brain which says that I have read it before but since I don't remember it, I'll continue.

Oh, yeah, by the way peoples, I bought a Nintendo DS Lite. Brand new, crimson-black for around $170 Australian, exchange rate included. Also bought a few games, KanKen 3 (Kanji practice game), The World Ends with You (a new SquareEnix game), Code Geass which i picked up for only 1000円, and happened to stumble upon Kingdom Hearts: Chain of memories which is a Gameboy Advance Game that was only ever released in Japan.

Oh, Kitty you are going to love me. I own all but one of Ouran Host Club and...GUESS WHAT? There is a DS game of that too, I just have to hunt it down first. >_<; Planning to buy sometime in the future: Ouran, Kuroshitsuji, Death Note and other assorted anime games that you can only get here. Don't worry mum, I am buying all my games second hand so they don't cost nearly as much as they should. I got Code Geass, World ends with you and Kingdom Hearts all for under about $60 which is pretty good if you ask me.

But, this post is about a party not nerdish books and games. So, party. Last Sunday I went to a party, it was fun. This sounds like a gradeschool essay... We all ate takoyaki and everyone brought a multitude of Japanese sweets and not wanting to pass up the opportunity to taste them all without having to actually buy them I duly sampled pretty much all of them.

No pictures today, sorry, I hadn't planned on ditching everyone at lunch to write this and thus did not bring my ipod cord on which all my photos are stored. It was quite a walk from the station to Arina's house and there was about 20 of us all in all. We took photos, watched television and played a few games. After that 6 of us went and did Purikura. The one sucky thing about not having a phone over here is having to ask everyone to send Purikura to your email which is a little costly and inconvenient for everyone... Wait, mother has come to save the day taking pictures from my email which I never received. That's odd...

"Here's some of Ash's purikura photos from the party, I stole them from her email last week but I don't know how to put them in the text. Sorry guys and Ash <3> " Don't worry, I fixed it. Thanks mum.

Just reading emails, umm...no I am still doing every bloody class, no spares, and we are coming up to midterms which I gracefully refuse to take. Death. Sorry, felt like that was necessary. Ok, I have to wrap it up now as next class it going to start soon and I don't even know what it is. Mendokusai...(It means like troublesome/bothersome) and is somewhat commonly used here. Signing off,

(Do you know train conductors in Japan salute each other as trains go past, every time. Lolz.)

Love,

Ashley-chan

Golden-ish Week

So, Golden week wasn't quite as Golden as I thought it would be. I only know of one person in my class who actually went on a trip. (Fukuoka and Hiroshima) That kind of surprised me because I thought everyone trecked around on Golden Week. The one interesting thing I did, besides staying home, watching The Little Mermaid Three, shopping and sleeping was a family visit to Unzen Onsen.

That was...weird.

I got naked with randoms...w00t...

Anyways, it was about an hour and a half from home (current home) to Unzen, it was a bloody big mountain and somehow on top of the mountain they managed to fit a whole village and a golf course, that confused me a little. I always though the tops of mountains just had the little flag planted atop the summit. However, no such luck. It was a somewhat misty day which added to the fog and cloud leaving me unable to really see anything from the top but it certainly didn't stop the cold nor the lovely scenery able to be seen on the journey up the winding mountain.

Naturally I did the logical thing on a mountaintop in the freezing cold, I ate an icecream. (^w^)

It looked like Chirin Chirin Icecream but it was a little different. After that we headed to the onsen...the onsen itself wasn't one of the super awesome outside ones as I had hoped which left me slightly disappointed but they had a shop that sold Pocky so that made up for it.

So, I put my shoes in a shoe locker and than walked around a wall and BAM! Boobs flying everywhere. I tried not to look but it was really difficult to avert your eyes without perving on another. Following Yui (very closely) to a locker I continued to strip down to well...nothing...save for the love of my life: a modesty towel. Naked as a baby, including no glasses which I was slightly thankful for, I made my way into the bath house. Don't worry, my valuables were in the locker and the key is on a nifty little band which you put around your wrist. I thought that was pretty clever.

I had to wash myself before getting in the onsen bathy thing, the room was pretty steamy and everything was blurry due to the lack of spectacles. It made me feel better too that I couldn't see people staring at me and that everyone was in the same position and no one was particularly embarassed or else they wouldn't be there. That put me at ease slightly, at first it was still kind of surreal how such modest and polite people (the adults, anyway) could just strip off with 50 other people. I just was slightly confused...still am a little...it just catches you off guard.

Anywho...I washed and got into the hot water which was nice. I may have possible made a small fool of myself when getting in. You see, the water is foggy, absolutely cannot see through it and I didn't have any idea how deep it would be. So I go to the stairs, and slowly make my way down feeling with my feet where the drop was. It was only until I sat down and kind of crept along the ground that I realised there isn't any bloody drop at all, the water is less than knee high. What are the bloody stairs for then?? To confuse and poke fun at foreigners lack of knowledge?!?!?

I guess, I should have figured it out by the people walking across the water...I just thought that everyone in Japan had Jesus-like qualities and I would be left to drown...I wasn't really paying attention, okay? Not to mention all the Gorons in Zelda: Twilight Princess are in shallow onsen, not deep. Should have thought of that...though I am not a boy nor in a wii game. Shame that.

Anyhow, washed, bathed, it was really hot, made my way to a window where there was a cool breeze flowing through. I quite enjoyed that feeling, of being able to breathe and bathe at the same time.

After about 20 minutes or so in there, I got out and went back into the changing room. I made my way to my locker and unfortunately had a little holdup. A lady was taking off her clothes and putting them into the locker under mine which left me with no access to my locker and standing there butt naked while she stripped. Slightly awkward. Finally, she moves, I get my locker back, dry myself and begin to put my clothes on. As I am putting my bra on, someone reaches into my locker and grabs my towel. I was like, "Stop! Towel fiend, what are you doing? Why would you steal my towel?" In my head, of course. It was only after when she started patting my back with it that I realised she was helping me. Then she asked me where I came from, in Japanese, and I am so gosh-darn thankful that I understood that otherwise it would have been really awkward.

So, changed and happy and with a really ridiculously red face I made my way out into the foyer and waited for everyone to finish straightening their hair. After that we had a little look around the Unzen town where the actual Onsen water came from. About 18 years ago it was a volcano that erupted...I think...don't trust my translations...and we looked around the bubbling pools of water and there was steam everywhere and the place reeked of Sulfur. Really badly, it made me want to stop breathing at one stage however that would be most hazardous to my continued livelihood so I persevered.


Oh, Saturday I went to Koto's house (my final homestay girl) and had a little play on Wii Fit (Don't ask!) and I got to meet her mother and sister who seem nice. We ate Champon at Ringer Hut, (I had Chahan and Gyoza), they seem really nice. Then we went to Baskin and Robbins which everyone here calls "31" and on Golden Week it is 31% off cause the week is Golden and all that. I had Rocky Road and Vanilla Caramel double scoop. Then we went to karaoke with Akane as well who happens to be my second homestay girl...so that was fun. I have pictures somewhere...there they are:

Today I am back at school with a Welcome Ashley party planned for Sunday. Better late than never, right?

Love,

Ashley-chan

Picture Dumping Ground

Rightio, I told you I would give you photos so here are some to keep you all appeased for a little while.

The first ones are from Yosakoi. Yosakoi is a festival of dancing with those annoying little clickity-clackety things, they look like a paddle but with smaller pieces of wood attached. You will see them in the photos, hopefully. I'm not particularly good at describing things...

So, Yosakoi was held outside Nagasaki station and my camera had a field day trying to get a decent shot, I think I did alright. (^w^)

Then we have Hansen (or Hanzen...I am not sure which) in English it is known as the Tall Ships festival.

And this is my arty photo. No touch ups, just a simple crop.
Then, just around the general Nagasaki area:

And then some random pictures to top it off:

This was today's lunch. (Not the pocky, the obento.)

That's it for now.

Until next time, whenever that may be...

Love

Ashley-chan

AIIU Newsletter

Congratulations, you guys get a preliminary look at my newsletter entry for AIIU:

25 days down. 261 to go. How on earth did that happen? I've already nearly been here for a month. I expected Japan to be an experience that would change me for life and so far, I feel pretty confident in saying that it has lived up to that expectation. The real story starts when I stepped off the airplane in Nagasaki, my host city. From Nagasaki onwards I was finally alone. No one there to translate for me or to help me when I get stuck, no English signs or announcements. It had finally hit home: I am in Japan, alone, with only myself and my own language skills to rely on. That realization was a little scary.

I was put to ease quickly enough, most of my host family were there to meet me along with two of my future host sisters. That was very considerate of them, each of them wrote me cute little notes saying how excited they were to meet me and how much they were looking forward to having me stay at their house. Cute.

I found conversation in the car, on the drive home, wasn't at all as stilted as I anticipated it to be. My family talked rambunctiously in the front and I answered the questions that I could and meagerly attempted to question them in return. The house I am currently living in is pretty cool, it is Japanese style complete with a Japanese garden, tatami floors, a shrine to Buddha and a futuristic toilet.

I did get quite a shock though on the first day of waking up on my futon, all I could see was a dragon (there is a model of one in my room), I could smell something burning and some strange chanting was being muttered under abated breath in the corner. I froze. It wasn't until later that someone explained to me that my host Grandma, who lives downstairs, was praying to Buddha. The smoke was incense and the chanting was, in fact, a prayer. It just goes to show that there are many things we don't understand. Explanation, however small and simple it may be, goes a long way into promoting acceptance.

The first week was school holidays, I embraced this time to try and get to know my host family a little better before having to trudge off to school everyday. My host sister is very outgoing and bubbly which helped any nerves I had to disappear as I settled into family life. For most of that week we did assorted activities that appealed to the youth culture of Japan: Purikura, Karaoke and Shopping.

I am equally, if not more, interested in the more traditional Japanese culture but I have no doubt that I will get around to that in time. Not to mention that I will enjoy and appreciate it more when I have lived in Nagasaki for a little while and have better comprehension of the language. Me at Megane Bashi (Glasses Bridge)

I found myself a hobby in that week. English words that aren't quite spelt right. Like "Furit Jelly", "Dog Maker" (Instead of Hot Dog Maker) and my personal favourite, "Drag Store". Think they meant Drug Store...better luck next time.
I also noticed that it is very difficult to buy clothes or, well, anything really with Japanese writing on it. Basically, it is all English. Nonsensical English at that. As amusing as it can be, I find it a little frustrating.

After that week, school started. It was a very odd feeling, returning to school. After having graduated and accepted that the schooling stage of your life is over, to pull it back out again was weird. Though, of course, school in Japan is quite different. We have single desks, 10 minute breaks between each lesson, cleaning time and most importantly, I don't understand anything said in the classes. I just copy kanji off the board and hope that in time, I will figure out what it all means. Another major difference is the people. I have found the Japanese students to be extremely friendly and welcoming towards me. Especially in the first week where nearly everyone either smiled or waved at me, not to mention the encores of "Kawaii!". It just puts a little bit of spring in your step.

My classmates and I acting dignified. (Miyuki, Sayaka, Chika and Me.)

I have found it hard so far to learn everyone's names. Everyone has eagerly memorised mine which makes me feel so much worse everytime they ask if I remember their names and I just have to shake my head and apologise. My first endeavour is to learn the names of the 39 other students in my class. Fortunately, one of the English teachers came down from high and gifted me with a name chart of every student in my class in English, blissfully adorned with accompanying pictures. That chart is going to save my life.

I have joined Sadou Bu, a.k.a Tea Ceremony Club. The practice is once a week on a Wednesday for about an hour an a half and though I have only attended an introductory meeting so far I can tell you one thing for sure: It is numbingly painful. Seiza, the Japanese art of sitting, absolutely kills. After the better part of an hour, I had trouble getting up and even then was to afraid to bend my knees out of fear they would simply give way underneath me. It was only then that I understood the meaning of the phrase "Jelly Legs". The tea was delicious, though and the procedure was frighteningly delicate. I'm not sure whether or not I will be able to master it but nevertheless, I will do my best.

My younger host sister (13) has just arrived home from school, so I better wrap things up now. In conclusion, I like Japan. It is an interesting place with fascinating culture and traditions, established history, friendly people, a multifaceted language and an atmosphere of it's own. I think that this experience is definently a worthwhile one, it will help me open my mind, learn another form of communication and let me experience things that one simply cannot experience anywhere else.

Well, that is it for me...

Love

Ashley-chan