For the record: I dislike sport and I like Sadou bu （茶道部）Tea Ceremony Club, though those that know me would already know that, right?
I apologize. I am a liar again. This weekend is not called Taikasai, it is called Kousoutai. Taikasai is later in the year in which everyone competes, marches, and does the embarrassing Isahaya prefecture dance known as Nonoka. Nonoka is more commonly known as the Dish Dance, as everyone holds two small plates in each hand and brings them together to make a happy little sound as we dance.
Yes, I can do it. It took me a while, but I can do it now. Me and Obaa, (Nickname, apparently she looks like a grandma, Obaasan. Real name: Fumiko) were like the only ones that couldn't do it. Considering everyone had learnt it last year and I just had to pick it up, I think I did pretty well to be able to do it after four lessons.
I'll take pictures at Taikasai, though it'll be hard cause I have to dance like everybody else.
So, Kousoutai was meh...basically it runs over three days in Nagasaki, those days (Sat, Sun, Mon) you either go wherever you like to the events but you have to hand in your card or you go to school and hand it in. Saturday, Yui, Hikari and I went to track and field. Both Hikari and I weren't particularly interested so we talked for an hour or two and I got a little sunburnt. All in all, it wasn't too bad. The funniest thing that happened was seeing Aniki on someone's bag.
Okay, story. Aniki is a stuffed duck which Kosaka has introduced to our classroom. Aniki from an anime-style shop in Kikitsu where I bought my Code Geass Game. Aniki, is named after some guy in the shop who is a fully grown man but called Aniki which is apparently an unsuitable name or something. So, the duck became Aniki and he is now pinned up in the classroom, our Aniki has no legs. Kosaka didn't like them so he ripped them off, he was also recently hit in the head with a baseball which could have caused temporary delusion.
This is our Aniki:
Anyway, on the way to Kousoutai, at the bus stop we spotted another Aniki but with legs. We thought it was really funny even though, you guys probably won't. Sorry for wasting your time.
So, today. Yui is at Track and Field again, I didn't want to go so I am taking advantage of the ample time to catch up on stuff and download anime while I can. I know, I'm pathetic.
At Track and Field there was only one person I knew that I saw race, which is Miyuki from my class. I cropped it for you, so you can see her. Aren't I nice. She came second. ^_^ Yay.
We were also trying to do some candid photography we were so bored.
So, now. Things I like asides from Johnny Depp, Severus Snape, anime and books.Sadou. Tea Ceremony.
I haven't taken any pictures as of yet as I am too busy trying to remember everything without the benefit of understanding the instructions. I am alright, the summer uniform makes it much easier to stand up from Seiza as it isn't as long. Seiza, is the Japanese sitting position and it killed at first but I am getting better. I can sit like that for around 20 minutes before getting pins and needles. It is much better to be serving the tea and sweets than to receive them as that way you can get up and down without your legs leaving the land of the living.
A few rules of Sadou:
<>Always enter tatami mats with your left foot.
<>Walking is a combination of 3 steps and 6 steps depending on the length of the mat.
<>Enter and exit straight on, not on an angle.
<>When bowing whilst kneeling the hands are to be placed on the floor and touch at the thumbs and the pointer fingers.
<>No laughing.
<>Don't step on God. (Kami-sama has his own little square which no one is allowed to step on.)
<>You must be positioned 16 tatami lines back when receiving tea.
<>Standing is horribly hard, you have to do that rocking thing and stand up whilst holding things without using your hands. That is my biggest problem.
We are slowly learning how to make tea without really touching the materials, just some of the processes. I have been lumped along with the first years as a result of me knowing nothing about Tea Ceremony even though I am in second year and older than most of the third years. Makes sense.
It is funny though because I muck around with the kohai (the first years) and talk with the (Sempai) as equals but they don't know how to talk to me. I talk to the Sempai's using plain speech which is usually frowned upon but they don't seem to mind as I am the same age. The kohai's are a little confused due to my age and grade how to speak to me. I speak to them in plain too but they usually use formal back. I don't really care for the whole Sempai-Kohai division though. It's very stilted and promotes and us-them mentality which I don't favour.
Sadou is hard but it is fun. I've made some good friends in there and am trying to remeber people's names. My closest friend in Sadou is Kana. We usually go home together as we take the same train and talk. We did Purikura but unfortunately it didn't have a phone port so I had to take photos of it on my camera and try to crop it in paint. The school doesn't have decent programs so sorry about the poor quality.
This one is my favourite, printed on a shirt in three different colours at Shimamura:
I am going to be quiet now as I think this post has probably become quite long. I am going to go home in another hour and shall google stuff. Googling is always fun.
Love,
Ashley-chan.
P.s: I have stopped using my other tag due to the stupid asian computer not accepting or otherwise closing it as a html tag.
Oh, and how is this, I got a letter from JFIE (host company peoples) saying that if the whole swine flu thing gets any worse and takes over Japan or something, they may have to send us all home early. ZOMFGODZORZ. Lolz. Fail in Japanese is 失敗。（しっぱい）I have been using that.
After that we headed on down to Cocowalk, did some Purikura which I don't yet have a copy of and I learnt how dangerous game arcades can be (spent 1000 yen trying to get a figurine of Haruhi Suzumiya) and have thus banned myself from them. I also met a giant Pikachu. 
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. ^_^
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...
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.
