Christmas! (and school)

Yeah, OK, I'm a few days late, but nothing really happened on Christmas, that made me feel like I just NEEDED to post. The exciting things were in the last posts.
So, Monday morning I didn't have to go to school. So, naturally, I stayed in bed until about 8:30 ish, talking to my family on a Discord video chat. Then, I got up for breakfast, and found Uta's present for me!
I gave them my Christmas presents on Christmas Eve, since I planned to call my family and knew that Masahiro leaves early in the mornings (He also dropped Tsumu off at school, so when I got up they were both gone), but People in Japan, just like Australia, give gifts in the morning. Utayo left a bag outside my door, with a letter "from Santa".
She got me the first 10 books of the 7 Deadly Sins manga! I still haven't opened them though... I should probably do that... But I know that they're in Japanese since the blurb is.
Anyway, after breakfast (and thanking Uta) I went back to talking to my family.
And... That's about it.
I went for a bit of a walk around the area, just listening to good old Sandcastle Kingdoms (Nathan Sharp) and may or may not have gotten a little bit... lost...
But anyway, it was nice. I finally got a few pictures of things, so check it out!

I love these cranes! I think this is a kosagi, but the pictures I've seen of them are white, and this one's grey... Maybe they get darker in winter or something. 

A nice little vegetable garden. There's a few of these around, separate from the actual crop fields, like below.

Look real close, and you can see a heap of little birds. No idea what they are, but they're pretty much everywhere here.

Yeah, to all you people that don't like crows, here's an entire FLOCK of them! There's so many! 

Anyway, that was Christmas, and yesterday. I like these walks.

School finally finished yesterday, so WINTER HOLIDAYS! 

Today we were going to see one of Tsumu's friends play in a band, but it turns out that it's a bit more expensive than we thought, so that's not happening anymore. 

Tomorrow we're apparently going hiking up one of the nearby hills or mountains, and I'm really looking forward to that! 

Then on Saturday and Sunday, we have the New Year's camp with the scouts. No idea what to expect.

After that, I'm not sure. We're going to a karaoke bar at some point soon too, and we're considering going to see Star Wars: The Last Jedi at some point. I've been warned by my family that it's not very good, compared to the other movies, but I'm the kind of person who likes to see things for myself, instead of trusting other people's opinions as fact. 

I'm sure they have other things planned for the remaining 10 days. 

Wow... 10 days...

17 days in total... Yikes...

It's a weird feeling right now. I'm looking forward to home, and my family, and my pets, and my friends, and my video games, and my books, and my bed, and everything! But at the same time, I've grown to love this family. I know that once I get on that plane, I'll miss them so much. 

I'll have to come back someday in the next few years to visit! And Tsumu's said that if she can get the money, she'll fly down to visit us. 

So, that's it right now. 

Since its now 10:32, I should probably have some breakfast... And see who's home... 

Yeah, I just woke up an hour or so ago and started on this. 

BYE!

Xmas party

What's this? Two posts in (technically) one day? What has this world come to?

So, today we had a Christmas party with the scouts at the cultural centre. I taught them to make an apple cake that mum sent me the recipe for a while ago, and the leaders make udon for lunch.
They were both delicious!

I also taught them to play Speed, which I seem to be doing a lot... And they taught me Japanese Speed! I can't wait to teach it to my unit and friends! We had a tournament and... I lost in the first round...
But anyway!
We also played a game called babanuki. It's pretty similar to Go Fish, in that you try to run out of cards by removing pairs from your hand. But you split all the cards between everyone, and don't ask people for a card. You take a random card from the hand of the person to your left, moving clockwise. You toss your pairs into a pile on the table and win by running out of cards. But, if you get the joker, you have to try to subtly get the next person to take it because if you have it you lose. There's no pair to it, so you can't ever run out of cards. It's a pretty fun game!

So, for once I'm not writing this at midnight, so I have a bit more time to write about my thoughts.
Let's start with school.
Tsumu, Utayo and the teachers have agreed that there's no point in me coming to school for next week because they're studying for next term for 4 hours a day. The teachers don't have time to let me figure out what they're talking about, and I don't want to distract anyone by asking. So, you can guess how boring it is...
I already know what school is like as a culture, and I really don't learn ANYTHING there. So, since karate is the only part of the day that I've been looking forward to for the past week, we've arranged that I'll go to school at 1:00, have lunch with the class, and go to karate, then come home with Tsumu.
I can spend the mornings sleeping in for a bit longer, and then go shopping or hang out with Utayo, and so get a much better idea of what the culture outside of school. We all think that that's a much better plan.
But while I'm at school, I'm finally feeling comfortable. I feel like I belong there now.
I think all the students finally got over the whole "OMG IT'S A FOREIGNER!" thing. That was seriously annoying.
I still get people say hello to me, but nowhere near as many. Most of the people that say hi and wave to me are classmates, like Chihiro, or Tsumu's friends that I've met. Not so many strangers. These are people waving to me because they know me. Not because I look like a zoo attraction. -_-
But I like being able to just walk out of the gym, wave goodbye to everyone from karate as they get ready to leave and just walk to the front of the school, without having girls giggle and call me cute, or compliment my hair or something. It feels a whole lot easier to talk to people now that I don't feel like they think I'm some celebrity who they're about to ask for an autograph from.
I'm happy that I've started talking to Matano more, and Chihiro is still really nice. Matsu is his usual self, where I'm not sure what he thinks of me at all, so I'll just try to be an optimist and talk to him.

I'm getting worried that, while my flexibility has skyrocketed, so that I can put my face to my knees with my legs straight out in front of me, my strength has dropped. I'm kinda concerned about how I'm going to go when I start riding again. I hope that I'll still be able to. And you may say, just do some squats and stuff to work on the muscles, but it's a bit harder than that. First off, I don't have much time or spare energy for that, with all the running around everywhere, and riding also uses weird muscles that I don't think I've really used doing anything else. To work on those muscles when I started riding, I had to do a whole workout regime every morning, including sit ups, push ups, and squats (and whatever other exercises I threw in for that week) as well as walking 2.5ish kilometres to school, and back again, AND actually riding every weekend. That was all fine in junior high, and probably will be when I get back home, but it'll take a while. I hope that, after his time at the school, Charlie will still be patient enough for me to get used to it again. (Charlie is my horse, for anyone who doesn't know)

I'm looking forward to coming home by now. By no means do I want to leave early, though. I'm having a great time, and I really feel like a part of the family here! I feel like I could be Tsumu's older sister!
But I miss my friends and family, and honestly, I am DYING to play Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild again. I still need to finish it... That, and Twilight Princess...
And I miss my birds, Kitty, Bunny, Pie, Ash and Will... and my chooks. I never even named them all... Just Meg, Honey, Maddie, Sylvia, Julia, and Sophie. There's still 2 more that I didn't name before coming here...
And Bubble and Squeak, my little quails...
And you have no idea how much I miss feeling Obsidion brush up against my leg while I eat, or climb onto my lap, just as I decide to finish whatever I'm doing and get up.
I miss going to Emma's house and coming home covered in long, white Bofie hair all over my black shirt!

So yeah, looking forward to home in 3 weeks. Only 2 more Sundays left before I head to Tokyo and get on a plane! But at the same time, I know that I'll end up missing this place when I get there. So, I'll enjoy it while it lasts!
We've still got Disney Land to go to, and I have no idea what else they have planned for me, but I bet it'll be great!
Well, dinner's ready, so this is tonight farewell.
Goodnight world.

Tokyo (again)

So, another thrilling day in Japan!

This was exhausting...

So, Tsumu and I headed off to Tokyo with her friend Miyu, and went to the Pokemon centre, Jworld and Animate.

Once again, I'm writing this at 11:10, so have some photos.

We found this just after we got off the train, on the way to the shopping centre. It was just too cute to leave out!

So, instead of just giving a list of all the places where people can't smoke, like shopping centres, near schools, restaurants, etc, there are these things which are the only places that you can smoke. Pretty smart, I think.

All the mirrors in the hallway to the "Sunshine city" (which is ironically underground) were decorated like this. Some had a lot more on them though, but this was the only picture I took. I didn't want to slow down the other two too much. 

Yup.Japan has a Pokemon centre. I swear, I really wish that someone would open a vet clinic and call it a Pokemon centre. But you know, that won't be allowed... Be cool though, wouldn't it?

I like it when people take the time to paint the walls around the escalators. 

By the time we got down to this, the water had turned off. And it's blocked off anyway, so... 

but it's a pretty sweet stage though, isn't it?

Now for the inside of the Pokemon centre. Oh boy...

So much Pikachu! Why?

It's actually kinda cute though. I wanted to buy a few of these bags and wallets here, but I didn't have the money.

This is Miyu. She's great!

This is so cute! I love them so much! They had an eevee dressed up as almost every eeveelution. Not all, but most.

Finally, some Ditto love.(There's actually a lot of stuff for ditto, including the old design of the blank face from the anime on all kinds of Pokemon. It's pretty cool.)

I want this game on my switch. 

This seems like an unfair fight...

Why do people think that Pikachu is super strong and impressive? I blame the anime.

JWORLD!!!

This is an amazing room! You can tap on the face of a character on the table below, and they come up on the screen and talk. I have no idea what they said, but it's still cool.

From what I gathered, kids can ride these little scooter things along the track and between little blocks and stuff. It's cute.

I really need to get back into Haikyu.

This is a character from an anime about samurai...

He doesn't seem to fit the description of that anime somehow...

And so, we stopped for lunch. 

Mine!

And, of course, dessert...

Before Tsumu's finished...

XD

Tsumu had the creme brulee

Miyu had the cheesecake

I had the unbaked cheesecake

OISHII!!

This may as well have been my motto for the past 3 years of assignments. Maybe even the past 5 years...

Animate. 

A wonderful sign that doesn't have the name of the shop anywhere on it.

BOOKS

BOOKS

MORE BOOKS

SOO MANY BOOKS!!!!!!

As much as I think Pikachu is overrated, I have to admit that this is adorable.

So, after over an hour on the train to come home, after an exhausting day, I wanted nothing more than to curl up in bed...

NOPE!

Time for an early Christmas party!

Some of Utayo's friends came over with their kids, and we had a good time, as tired as I am. 

Some delicious food, and I met some nice people. 

The is just a platter of Zucchini with herbs and salt, and it's delicious!

After that, I made some onigiri with Utayo, and played speed with the other kids. We messed around with Snow (the app, not actual snow) and ate some cake. 

Oh boy, today...

Tokyo is so crowded sometimes...

I swear, I almost had a panic attack in Animate with all those people. But don't worry, I didn't. I calmed down. 

The thing is, Japanese people don't seem to understand the personal space that other people need. They don't round around a person, and just brush past. No one seems to mind, but just that little thing, so frequently... It's kind of unnerving. 

So calming myself down, mixed with a full day of being in introvert hanging out with Tsumu and Miyu left me exhausted... Thankfully the others noticed that my mind wasn't up to Japanese, so they spoke English for me for most of the day, and I found even that hard...

The party kind of revived me, because I didn't need to talk much, and we just messed around and played Speed. But I really need a good sleep...

So, to wrap it up, this was an amazing day, and I had a lot of fun! It was a bit long, and there are WAY too many people in Tokyo for my comfort...
In other words, a great day that had left me ready for bed.
It's officially Sunday by 1 minute.
GOOD NIGHT