Japan-Land

Hey guys, here are the blogs from the first week which I never got around to posting.

Tuesday 30^th

 

ABUNAI!!

 

…so my computer decided to work again, right as rain. O_o I blame this weird-arse country for confusing my poor baby with its crack XD Anyways, onto Tuesday!

 

After class we went to some Japanese restaurant near the train station called OOTOYA. I had a “hamburger” only to realise that hamburgers in Japan are nothing but a beef patty LOL. But I was craving red meat and I got excited because it was made with Australian beef :D It was a nice little meal and not very expensive – it came out on a hot plate, the meat patty on a bed of fried onion rings, with a side of baked potatoes eggplant and daikon raddish. I only ate the potatoes of course. I tried daikon but it tasted…not nice so I didn’t eat it. There was also some weird white garnish thing on the patty of course which I turfed off. The meal also came with a bowl of rice, miso soup and a cup of green tea. Basically, I only ate the patty and the rice but I mixed it together and poured some yummy sauce stuff over it and it was amazing!!

 

I think we pottered around the shops after lunch for a bit – I bought this cute shirt dress thingy that came with a tie that was on special, and the latest Shounen Jump. Yeah! The new Fool’s Mate was out too (Gazette cover WITH poster *flails*) which I bought coz it was 700 yen oh joy.

 

Ok, so the event planned for this day was a bowling competition with the Senshu students and the other international students at the Uni. Honestly, I have no idea what I was doing there because I cannot bowl for crap. Seriously, wth. I was in a team with a boy called Nobuto, a lovely girl called Ayumi, and another girl whose name I can’t remember |D I don’t think she was Japanese. It was ok though because NONE of us could bowl. We sucked so much it was pathetic. I was the worst bahaha. I think after 5 sets, I had three points XD I finished the first game with 54 Bahaha. After the second game my total score only JUST broke 100. I DID get a strike though. Still don’t know how that happened bahah.

 

After everyone finished, there was an awards ceremony – heaps of awards. I almost had a heart attack because MY NAME WAS CALLED OUT. WTH I STILL DON’T UNDERSTAND. Apparently, I got a prize because I for the 65^th highest score. WTH. This country makes no sense, I swear. Anyways, I won some shampoo and soap and a face towel set. Apparently it’s a pretty standard gift here and the brand is actually really expensive so yay. It might be hard to bring home though, but I’ll do my best.

 

Phyllis wanted to go shopping afterwards but she disappeared so Rach, Romy, Laura and I (probably someone else but I can’t remember D: Sarah, I think) hit the shops with Ayumi and some of her Japanese friends. They were SO lovely and hanging with them was fun. I really felt as though my Japanese improved from that experience. It got easier to talk to them and stuff. They DID have a giggle when I told them I played Gyakuten Saiban (Phoenix Wright). Still not sure why :/ We went to a book store and every manga I picked up they were all “DAME!!! ABUNAI (No, that’s dangerous!”). Apparently everything I looked at was yaoi or hentai or something haha. It was so funny. We also went to an accessory store and Romy and I bought fake eyelashes with glitter tips because we wanted to be GYARUS XDD I also got a badge that said POWER FLOWER. It has a heart and a rainbow on it. While we were in the store, this guy walked in and I SWEAR TO GOD IT WAS MIKU. It had blond hair, a lip piercing, jewellery, make up – the works. His toenails were painted with GOLD GLITTER and he was looking and lacy gloves. I…didn’t know what to think all do, so all I did was stare ahaha |D

 

The interesting WTH moment in Japan for that day was THEY HAVE DO IT YOURSELF PIERCING KITS O________O You can get a gun-needle thing for piercing your ears, lip, tongue, nose, belly button – everything. IT’S INSANE. I could not believe it. HOW is that save. Assdjasdkj WTH.  The girls then took us to the supermarket to get some dinner – I got instant yakisoba for dinner which was soo yummy – and then we headed home after that. Pretty sure that was all we got up to besides Romy and I killing ourselves laughing at random-as-hell stuff on the tv. We started betting on J DORAMAS and I won a 100 yen. YAY. But yeah, that’s it for Tuesday.

 

 

Wednesday 1^st July

 

OOKII GAIJIN*

 

*giant foreigner = more on this later.

 

Wednesday was Ghibli day!! \8D/ We finished class an hour early so we could grab some lunch before meeting at the station to head to Mitaka for the Ghibli Museum. For those that don’t know, Studio Ghibli is like the equivalent of Disney, and they made movies like Spirited Away and Howl’s Moving Castle. The uni paid for our ticket to the museum AND all our train tickets which was awesome.

 

The museum was amazing. I’m not a huge Ghibli fan (only seen Howl’s and Spirited Away) but just the layout of the place was fantastic. Unfortunately we couldn’t take photos inside the museum, so you’ll just have to take my word for it. I did get some ones outside though, so once I get my computer online I will be able to share photos! \8D/ There was a room with a GIANT Cat-Bus for children to play on. Romy tried to line up because we wanted to climb on it too, but the lady told us no kids over 12 :( Lol, some little kid waiting in line was all “ooooooh ookii gaijin” when we walked past. LOLOLOLOLOL. XDDD We pretty much are stupid gaijin so its ok.

 

Once we were done looking around, we hit the gift shop. I bought a little black fluffy thing with eyes (its from My Neighbour Totoro, which I have seen YEARS ago when a Japanese exchange teacher came to my primary school) which is hanging on my bag, chyeah. Some of us decided to hang in Mitaka to shop, but the rest of us headed back to Ikuta (which I believe is the name of the ward/suburb/whatever of where we are). Romy and I got pizza and pasta for dinner coz we were craving western something fierce, whilst the others went back to Ootoya. We decided to get cocktails with dinner because they never check ID in Japan (legal drinking age is 20 in Japan – besides if they caught us we would just plead baka gaijin) and the drinks were cheap. We had Cassis Orange, which was just Cassis Liqueur (black current/black berry or something) with orange juice. It was so very drinkable but we only had one with our meal. Haha, anyways, whilst we were eating, we happened to glance out the window and, no joke, there were two guys walking around the streets, one dressed as a panda, the other as a duck. I think they were advertising karaoke. Seriously though, people in this country have no self-respect I swear bahaha.

 

After dinner we got dessert from Mister Donut (donuts, obviously) and wandered around a music store. Romy and I practically died laughing at all the DORAMAS (tv dramas) omg so funny. Took a few stupid photos and stuff. There was one dorama we were going to buy because it just had like 239810938120 men in it and that was it. Turns out, Rach has the series on her computer and its basically Ouran Highschool Host Club in people form. You know, girl disguises self as boy to enrol in an all boy’s school. Its totally crack, wth. I’m sure I’ve mentioned that there is something wrong with this country.

 

Seriously though guys, I’m loving it here. Everything is just SO funny and just great. We’re all having a blast here in the dorm (my roommates are Lisa, Romy, Laura and Rach) and it will be kinda sad to leave them to go to homestay on Saturday. But we’ll still see each other so meh.

 

Ah, I’ve nearly caught up with blogs! :D

 

 

Thursday July 2^nd

 

ANGSTY SASUKE IS ANGSTY

 

We only had an hour of class this morning because we were having a cooking lesson. We learnt how to make okomomiyaki – the yummy pancake thing we had for dinner on Monday night. Because there are a few of us who don’t like seafood, we formed our own group and made our own sea-foodless okonomiyaki. All that was it in was cabbage, egg, spring onions, pork and noodles AND the ever awesome okonomiyaki sauce. It was heaps fun and they were pretty good. Its easy to make, so I can probably make an amended version at home with cheese and bacon and other yummy stuff like tomatoes!

 

After class, we made a dash for the station coz we decided to head to Asakusa. Asakusa is a famous temple place in Tokyo, and one of the few traditional places in the area. There are markets there and stuff, so we planned to do some shopping as well. It was a longer trip – train to Shinjuku, train to Ueno, subway to Asakusa – but it was pretty easy going. When we got there, it was raining, unfortunately, but meh, still awesome.

 

The temple grounds and entrance were just amazing. I got plenty of photos which I will show when I can. Absolutely beautiful. There were so many market stalls so I bought heaps of souvenirs for all those I planned to buy for. They’re kinda just kitchy little trinkets, but they’re from Japan none-the-less, so deal. We went into the temple and threw coins into the coin box and prayed, and paid 100yen to get our fortunes. I don’t remember mine now, but I’ve kept it.

 

Ok, the running joke for today was Sasuke and his angst. It kinda overlaps with this weird drama we’re watching. Romy’s a huge Naruto fan and Sasuke’s her favourite so we pretty much just tease Sasuke and his angst constantly. She found a little Sasuke toy at one of the market stalls so she bought it and it just fuelled the fire. We started taking photos of Sasuke playing with a mirror but I won’t go into that.

 

Anyways, we got exhausted from walking and decided to find somewhere to sit down and get food or drink or something. We were supposed to meeting the others for a trip to the onsen, but we were just too tired and decided we would do it another time. There was a Denny’s across from the temple, which I assumed to be a fast-food kinda place thing or something. Epic fail on my behalf. When we got up there it was some full-on restaurant. Wth, Denny’s is such a povo name for a restaurant! We ate there anyways – I got spag bol but the others pretty much just had desserts lol. It really wasn’t expensive, so yeah.

 

Lol, on the train on the way home, there was little kid standing next to us (it was peak hour, we were standing) was looking at us as said “ah! Gaijin!” His dad was all “Don’t look at them, don’t look!’ Bahaha we must be scary or something. :< Poor giant gaijins… When we go back we went to the Kokusei…asdkasjdkw something idk I have no idea what its called lol. Used the internet for a bit there which was good.

 

On the way home we stopped at convenience store. I bought instant noodles (WHICH WERE HORRIBLE. THEY SMELT LIKE HELL AND WHEN I ATE THEM I NEARLY VOMITED THEM BACK IN THE BOWL. EW GROSS) a SoyJoy for brekkie, some strawberry yoghurt AND A FINAL FANTASY DISSIDIA POTION YEAH 8D. It was like 200 yen. I tried to find a can with Cloud, but I only found Terra so I bought her instead. It was heaps nice – not overly sweet. Just tasted like soft-drink.

 

Had a massive rant about teachers tonight – especially linguistics – did our homework, and yeah. Just chilled. Tomorrow, being Friday as I’m actually writing this on the same day for once, Romy, Laura and I and possible other people are going to Akihabara to get our geek on. CHYEAH. Can’t wait. I think some purikura are in order. :D Friday’s actually the last day in the dorms, as we start homestay on Saturday, so we’ll all be spread all over the place. I’m pretty sure my family is out in the sticks (by which I mean, they’re closer to the city of Kawasaki) so I’m like 40 mins from the Uni by bus or train or something. OMG IM GOING TO GET LOST O______________O;;;