You just have to know when to laugh at yourself. And it’s ok cause I did this in Japan.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kC97s_myPGM
AN:To whoever (if anyone) has been reading this journal,
I would like to apologize for not updating my journal recently. I have been writing this in a Word document first (Thank God for spellcheck) and then Crtl C/Crtl V onto the site. I kept writing but then I didn’t upload them. Recently my computer has been having problems with the internet and usually when I get finished writing late at night I’m too tired to fight with it so I kept falling in to the standard trap “I’ll just do it in the morning.” Yeah…that cake is always a lie. I’m deeply sorry and now that my computer has been fixed I’ll make an effort to upload more often. Again my sincerest apologies. And I included a short animated film about my mornings. ENJoy!!
12/5
The first of our winter exams as today. My Oral and N5 grammar classes are without a doubt my most challenging courses. I’m glad to get at least the Oral exam out of the way. It was structured just like the previous one where we have to memorize five passages with three to five paragraphs per section. It took so long to get through everyone that we only had twenty minutes of our N5 class so she let us go early. Both Oral and N5 are taught back to back by the same sensei and almost everyone is in both classes. I think that I did better this time but we won’t find out until later. Still have four more exams to get through…sigh.
12/6
It has been freezing here lately but today offered a last glimpse of summer. So Kim and I decided to take a quick break from studying for exams and take a bike ride and go exploring. Naturally, we got lost. What was supposed to be a quick hour long ride turned into three and a half hours of riding around trying to find our way back home. It turned out that we just took the really long way around the mountain. We actually end up lost in Japan often. It doesn’t help that when we ask for directions we usually can’t understand them anyway or read road signs. But I never really feel threatened or in real danger when we get lost. Generally I’m just tired and cranky. This time we didn’t go very far and I finally got to see Aichi Daigaku which is a neighboring college. I often meet students who attend but I had never seen the campus up close. But I still have more studying…taihen desu.
12/8
NUFS University hosed a Christmas party for both the foreign and native students. The set up booths of different countries and had a stamp game for everyone with prizes. There was also a tea ceremony section and several live performances. It was a lot of good fun. What was really scary was when the food was served. It was like watching a pack of wolves go hunting on the discovery channel. There were four big tables where the food was placed and people just fell on it like they were starving to death. I didn’t even get a plate until the second wave of food came. Japanese people can be really brutal when it comes to food.
It just occurred to me today that I’m going to spend my first Christmas without my family. It kind of made me regret deciding to stay over the break. I’m glad that I came to Japan and that I can have this experience. It is the best thing that has ever happened to me. But I didn’t think that I would miss home this much. Also with my mom getting married while I was gone it feels a bit like I’m missing everything there. It seems that I’m getting my first taste of homesickness and I don’t like it one bit. And I have Kanji in the morning.
