The *not* winter

Yeah, I'm pretty bad at keeping this blog up, aren't I? *shrugs*

Winter here is driving me crazy. It's not winter. I mean, sure, it's cold. But it is SO NOT WINTER. It's more like the cold part of fall as it's turning into winter. And apparently it snows in Osaka every 5 years or something, so I'm definitely not seeing any until I get home. :/ This reaffirms my decision that I don't think I'd enjoy living anywhere south of Chicago. I *need* my snow and proper winter weather.

Finals are next week, so classes are wrapping up now. I have a paper I MUST finish tonight for my cinema class, and I'm about halfway done with it. Erp. I was working on it yesterday and listening to the Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack. Very very happy. :D

Japan doesn't know how to decorate, either. Granted, the percentage of Christians in Japan is in the single digits. They don't consider XMas as a family holiday or even a holiday that you really buy presents for. It's a couples' holiday. Yeah, weird.

So there's a santa up in a rotunda area, and he's supposed to look like he's next to a ladder, but he completely looks like he's crucified. AAAGHH, come on Japan. And there are about... three houses I've seen that have lights, and all THREE are utterly decked out in colorful lights.

So I am definitely not feeling the holiday-ness I want. I'm not a super holiday person, but I like at least a LITTLE bit. So I'm missing my Christmas tree and snow and holiday cheer.

I haven't done a lot of travelling lately, as I'm running low on money. But what was rather fun this weekend was on Friday night, after getting kicked out (not actually, we just can't be in there past 10pm which is SUPER LAME) of the Seminar House and not particularly tired or wanting to face the outside, we biked to McDonalds with our computer.

It was Sarah, Corbin, and I, and we each ordered a small thing, went to the second floor, and watched Donnie Darko on the laptop... in a McDonalds. And then the computer DIED AND RAN OUT OF BATTERY 15 minutes before the end. It was uber depressing. So we talked because we still weren't particularly tired, and ended up talking... for THREE more hours. XD It was so ridiculous, but it was a very good night.

The next night (sat) we made our own eggnog... and it was delicious. It was a bit too foamy (I wouldn't know, as I've never had any before) but I liked it a lot. I definitely suggest it and will do it again. The only hard part was whisking the egg whites until they "created stiff peaks" without a blender. We did it by hand with whisks, trading off. It didn't actually take too long. We were pretty proud of ourselves. A little disturbing realizing that I was drinking raw egg, but... *shrugs*

And I have 12 days left. Whoah. But I'm really anxious to be home now. I loved being here, but there are a lot of things that I miss. Food in particular. I want Chipotle REAL bad. And that I can hang out at someone's room/house for as long (reasonably) as I want, and NOT until only 10pm. I mean, really.

I'll try for one more entry before I leave!!

Beloit Classes

Oh, not relating to Japan, BUT, class schedules are out, HOORAY. And I was messing with them all weekend. I think my schedule will be thus:
3rd year Japanese, Hist: Japanese History and Culture (WITH ROB LAFLEUR, YAAAAAY), PoliSci: Democracy in East Asia, Math: Chaotic Systems, and my fifth class is... undecided. But I know I want/need to take 5 classes. The fifth will either be Math: Differential Equations, IDST: Artificial Intelligence, HIST: Medieval Manager (although I don't know if I can handle two Rob courses at once), or MATH: Abstract Algebra.

I want to take Ballroom Dancing too (since I would like to learn as I have NO knowledge whatsover of it, and I'd really like to learn), and likely with Galen, but he's already taken it (haha), so we're gonna see how that works out.

I also am going to be treasurer of AST next semester! :D Yaaay. I'm actually excited about that, believe it or not! AND AND, I *might* be able to move back into the house, when I had given up that it would even be possible since so many others who are abroad are my senior in that regard. So that would be WONDERFUL. It wouldn't be a single, obviously, but I don't know if that's possible for me to get one since it's halfway through the year. I guess we'll just wait until my senior year to get that single. That's okay. Because I'd be rooming with Anna! :D NEATO. GO ANNA.

Okie. Now that's all.

EDIT: YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY OBAMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Long time, yeah

Whoah, okay, so I realize I have not updated (and not just because you told me so on my wall, Sam! :D), but I am now... so... there?

But! Lots of things have happened, and I've gotten occupied, and blahity blaaah, yes, I'm making excuses.

God, okay. Let's see what I've done....

Kaiyukan Aquarium - a pretty traditional aquarium. But they had two whale sharks! :D They were neat. My pictures explain fairly well what was there.
Kurama no Hi Matsuri
explored Umeda (a section of downtown Osaka)
planning a trip to Hiroshima
planning a possible trip to Ise (two hours north of Kyoto, so about three hours away. DX)

The Kurama no Hi Matsuri was a Fire Festival (that's what Hi Matsuri means) on October 22... a Wednesday. But it's been on Oct 22 for years and years now, so that's not about to change.

It's one of the oldest festivals that has been untouched by commercialism (a bit sad, that). It's also freaking old. The actual town of Kurama is not very big, yet 1,000s of people go to this festival every year. So Cassidy and I decided we would be two of them. Kurama is just north of Kyoto, on one of two mountains to the north, the other being Mt. Hiei. (Which I believe I will be going to as well, but for a class trip.)

So, the traditional garb that, I would say, probably all the young men were wearing was interesting. (I'll see if I can add pics later, but they're in facebook already, so...) And they were carrying GIANT torches. Why? I'm not entirely sure. It's a fire festival! Why not. There were also smaller and larger (YES LARGER) ones as well, but this size was the most common.

All through the night the sound of "sai rei, sai ryou" was what you heard-- I don't know what it translates to, and it's very possible that the meaning has been lost. But don't trust me on that (because I really have no idea).

They carried the torches up and down the one(!) road in the town, which spanned between the upper and lower shrines. To give you an idea, the ENTIRE festival was from 6pm to probably 3-4am, but we weren't able to stay to the end. We stayed from 4:30pm - 11:30pm.

The torches were one aspect, there were also priests and whatnot as well, walking along too. Also, about 25 vans of policepeople were there, keeping the lines and guests/visitors in check. But they stayed only until about 8pm, and then they were suddenly gone.

Around 8, more musical things began happening, drums, gongs, and whatnot. I also forgot to mention that it was raining pretty constantly throughout the whole ceremony. But all the fire EVERYWHERE made it not so cold.

At 9, Cassidy and I decided to go further up to the upper shrine, and ended up at the onsen. We decided we wanted to go in it. So we did; for about an hour or so.

Onsen are hot spring baths. And you're almost always naked. (So yes, I was naked. (But separated by sex.) Galen asked me, "I though that was a bit out of your comfort zone?" And yes, it is. But I really wanted to go. So I did. And it was definitely worth it. Cassidy and I ended up being alone-- there were some other women there to begin with, but they left before we got in. It was probably the most relaxing thing I've done since I've been here.

After that, we wandered some more, and there were now these LARGE... mini-shrines?

I don't know what exactly they were, but they were shiny. And gold. And pretty. And loud (there was a taiko drum and a bell attached to the back). So we followed them up and down the mountain a couple of times.

On the way back up, they stopped momentarily, and we were treated to some free sake (rice wine) that they had opened from these HUGE JUGS. Then back on down the mountain.

It was maybe 10:45 by this point, and we were at the lower shrine now. They started preparing these really large catapult-looking torches, and the shiny gold things came back to the center. A lot of people had left by now, as trains in Japan don't run past about 12:30. Last trains are around 12:15 or so. So we knew we didn't want to stay all night, since it was 1: a Wednesday night, and 2: midterm week VERY UNFORTUNATELY. So we knew it was time to go soon.

We never got to see what they were doing with the catapult things, but I expect that was where the GIANT bonfire was supposed to be (as we'd been told by our Shinto professor).

And we were never really bored at any point- we were there for 7 hours, yet it certainly didn't feel like it. It was just too much fun.

So that was Kurama no Hi Matsuri!

Other things...

Oh, at some point (before Kurama, alas) my camera broke. AAGHH. But! It is not completely lost, since it was just the LCD screen. I can't pinpoint exactly HOW I broke it, but I think it was when I was trying to stuff too many things (like a box that contains a present for my mom or grandma and my semi-full bag) into my bike basket. Hey, that's something else I've forgotten. ALL BIKES in Japan have baskets. Don't laugh and say that's something for old people-- they're freaking useful. That way I don't have to carry my bag to school EVERY DAY on the 15-20 minute bike-ride to and from school. So, HA.

I am also realizing the backwards things about Japan- even though they may be the place for the some of the coolest technological advances, they don't seem to HAVE some of them. Like wireless. I have not found one place that has wireless. None. And they have lots of Starbucks. That one detail did not seem to come over from America. In fact, the general lack of EASY internet access in general. The public library nearby DOESN'T HAVE IT. I mean really. (I will probably never stop complaining about my lack of internet. My homestay does not have it. I can only be online at school... :/ )

And insulation. Or central heating. It isn't too cold yet, but man, knowing that there's no heating in my house is not a comfort. At the very least, the coldest it will get here (at least here in Osaka) is just above freezing. So it will likely not snow (which is sad, but okay if I wouldn't have the heat to escape into).

Sexism. Unfortunately, yes. Still prevalent here. The best example I've found so far is when my host family's son came over, and his wife introduced herself... as the wife. It wasn't until a bit later that she told me her ACTUAL NAME. ...yikes.

The other time was when we went to a club (an aside: the legal drinking age in Japan is 20, not 21) and we met up with some Japanese friends of Lauren's. One of the girls was getting... aggressively hit on by another Japanese guy. She VERY CLEARLY did not want this, and was saying "No! No! Stop!" I, seeing that it could get bad, smacked the guy's hands away telling him she didn't want him, and that he should go away. He PERSISTED, and even pulled her *physically* away from me. It was a slight game of tug of war, but I pulled her away (she was also clinging to me), and she was now saying "iya! iya! mai garu-furendo!" [no! no! my girlfriend in broken english for some reason] and after smacking him away some more, he went away.

The fact that this girl, even though she was inebriated, didn't even RESIST except in her voice (and even THEN, the guy wasn't listening) really made me angry. No *clearly* means "NO". But, I made it my duty to keep an eye on her for the rest of that night. (And the guy did try again later, and about the same dance happened again).

So those things are a bit depressing. And my lack of cheese and pasta and Mexican food. But. There are still definitely cool things here.

There! How's that for a good entry? :D

Cool things...

...in Japan so far.

Book-Off. Book-Off is the best place to get music/manga/DVDs PERIOD. I've already bought the entire series of BLAME! for about $20 (8 volumes). I got two CDs the other day for 250 yen EACH. That's less than $2.50. For FULL LENGTH cds. I also got the Moulin Rouge DVD, which unfortunately is region 2, of course, but my compy can play it. I started watching it with Japanese subtitles and the English audio track, but I couldn't read the subtitles fast enough, and the English was overpowering my reading of the Japanese, so I disabled it.

Pan. I cannot stress how yummy the bread/pastries are here. ESPECIALLY melon pan. God, it's so good. And the toast I have for breakfast. SO GOOD.

Bikes. I can't believe I've been without a bike for so long. It's so convenient! Granted, if you don't have a car, walking or biking are your only options. Plus, biking is FREE. I don't have to pay to ride my bike, unlike the trains, which are cool too, but the fees can stack up if you travel a lot. Which is also why, when people (not in Japan) ask me if I'm going to Tokyo, I'm hesitant. It's because the TRAIN fare is so expensive. Especially if you leave on the weekend. Something like $100. One way. SO. Maybe I'll go, but it's not anytime soon.

Okay, no more cool things, just random things:

My otousan always drinks with dinner. Not something I'm used to. He's got a bottle of.... something, ALWAYS, near his seat, and he pours himself, usually, two glasses. He also is missing the fingers on his left hand, and I'm very curious about it, but I don't want to ask (much less in Japanese!!) I think it's been like that a long time, because he can work around it pretty well. (It really just looks like a hand with no fingers. Just the palm.)

Another thing with drinking-- not alcoholic, either. Japanese don't seem to drink much... at all. I always down about 5 glasses (they have TINY glasses- smaller than the ones in commons. D:) of water at dinner, and sometimes more if okaasan gives me green tea. And yet, they're cool with ONE GLASS. Or none. More often, NONE. I don't get it.

Fushimi Inari

I went to Fushimi Inari this weekend with Cassidy and her friend (Kelly, I think). It was about 4 hours of walking up and down a freaking mountain. BUT it was very enjoyable nonetheless. I have a jillion photos on facebook (okay more like 120), because there were tiny shrines EVERYWHERE. Fushimi Inari was HUGE. Very orange and green. (torii and bamboo, respectively, of course.)

So, Inari is the fox god of Japan, and of course, it is Shinto. If you see those orange gates (torii)? It's Shinto. The orange is meant to scare away demons, if I remember right. And going through the gates is meant to purify. Shinto has a lot to do with purification. I'm learning a lot about it right now in class. Shinto isn't a typical religion, like say, Christianity. There is no moral code or written "law" or dogma. It's very polytheistic, too. And probably one of the few (maybe only?) religions that still in the modern world will worship animals. (Like Inari).

The reason Fushimi Inari is so huge is because what people pray to Inari for has changed over the centuries. Inari used to be, like so many other gods, prayed to for fertility-- now Inari is seen as the god to pray to for good fortune in business. So all those orange torii? They were all paid by businesses, and have inscriptions on the back of them of the company name, and I believe, the president and such. They're also REALLY expensive, as in 1000s of dollars. You can get little torii for around $50 if you want and have it painted and placed somewhere too, though.

It kind of takes away a little of the mystery to the gates, but it's still amazing to see the MASSIVE number of gates there.

It's also the place where in the Memoirs of a Geisha movie that Sayuri ran through all those torii. There's a spot near the entrance where there are two paths of torii, and they are all the same height. It was definitely there that they filmed it. (Plus, it's close to the entrance, and you don't have to hike up the whole mountain to get to it).

The day before, Cassidy and I had explored by her house at what we call the "creepy shrine", since it's really overgrown. It wasn't actually that creepy, but there wasn't anyone there, so that was a little eerie.

I've also decided that I need to go and travel somewhere every weekend otherwise I will definitely feel unfufilled. We might go to Asuka this weekend. We shall see...

Lists

Reminding everyone that again, pictures I'll be posting on facebook, since it's a LOT easier for me.

Today is going to be lists. Of observations. Or whatever I think of. It's kind of how my thoughts have been running lately.

Things I've noticed:
          * music/jingles. EVERYTHING has music. Like the washing machine. It makes a little song when you turn it off. A little song when you turn it ON.
I ride past this factory everyday and the machines play an instrumental version of the Mickey Mouse Theme. It's very cute sounding, but I can only imagine that it's very annoying now to the workers.
          * cute things. Cute = a reason to jack up prices. But really, everything is adorable. Whether it be a design, or the minisize-version. It's just CUTE. Good luck finding much that is manly in the way America sees it.
          * nothing is free. NOTHING. If we want to go out? You have to pay to eat, pay to PARK YOUR BIKE (but granted, there are a LOT of bikes. I wish I had a scooter, because those look amazingly fun to drive). Pay to ride the train. It's not a LOT, but it definitely stacks up. I've probably spent at least $70 on just transportation.
          * everyone dresses better. I feel like a bum. Seriously. Even the guys are dressing better. I actually bought my first Japanese clothes the other day, and it makes me feel a LITTLE better. I think it'll also be better once the weather gets cooler, because then I can actually layer like everyone else is and not be sweating like mad.
          * bikes- are amazing. If you don't have any other mode of transportation, and walking takes too long? Bikes are incredible. Beloit also wasn't very big, and I lived ON campus, while I'm probably biking 40-45 minutes every day (both ways total) to school. More walking/biking on the weekends for exploring or getting to wherever we/I want to go.
Biking on the roads is slightly terrifying however. Because they are much narrower (but so are the cars), it feels like you are right in the middle of the road. It's scarier at night, so I try to bike home before it gets dark. Which is about 6pm. Which means right after my 4 o'clock class. (Runs until 5:20) if I don't want to bike in the dark. My bike *does* have a light in the front that is powered by my wheels, BUT, it isn't a lot. Still scary.
          * bridges. I really like the bridge on the way to Makino-eki (Makino train station). Love it love it. It makes me think of Shadow of the Colossus, with all of the stone and greenery everywhere. Stone steps for the river, stone steps for people to walk down to the river, stone formations, etc. It's a very lush area.
          * holidays. Japan has a LOT of holidays. And I don't think it matters if you're "private" or "public". EVERYONE gets these days off. (Well okay, if you work a crappy 7/11 job or something, maybe not, but everyone else.) We've already had THREE holidays. We haven't had a full week of school yet! In fact, we have tomorrow (a Tuesday?!) off. But that's it. We have school today, Monday, but not Tuesday. *shrugs*
          * typhoons. We had a system go through Osaka this weekend. It meant for us, a lot of rain and thunder. We only got the edge of it. But if I were further south and west, I believe, it would have been a lot worse. Still kind of exciting to know that I'm experiencing a TYPHOON even though it's just a bad storm. The fact that it's a typhoon is cool. Now I just wait for the earthquakes... erp. (Though I hear that they are hardly ever that bad.)

Foods that the Japanese appear to like.... a lot.
          * eggs - including raw. AGH. I've avoided any lunch dishes with raw eggs thus far.
          * ham/pork. In any form. EXCEPT, it seems, bacon. They'll say something has "bacon" in it but it isn't really. It's a little sausage-y looking thing. Definitely not bacon.
          * melon. DELICIOUS. Melon soda, especially. (No, I'm not saying melon pop because they literally spell it as melon soda in katakana.) Or melon pan (bread). Sooooo good.

Other food observations:
          * pan. It means bread, but, it belongs in a different category of bread, I think, because it's just so different for me here. The pan I have for breakfast is most certainly white bread (which is dominant. I saw maybe one kind of wheat-ish loaf bread in the store) but it is THICK. Like, two inches thick. But it is SO GOOD if you toast it and put butter and jam on. Yum yum.
          * fruit. Is much much much juicier here. And thus, extremely good.
          * peeling/cutting off crusts. They do this to almost all fruits. Like grapes. Peeling the skin off. It's... weird. My host mother gave me some apples (I couldn't tell that's what they were!) with the skin CUT OFF. What am I, 5? But no, when I told her I always eat apples with the skin on, she responding with "honma?" [really? in Kansai-ben]. So now she doesn't peel it. Which I'm glad of. But she still peels the Asian pears. But those are so good, I don't care.
Also, if you buy some pre-made sandwiches from a pan-ya [bakery], the CRUSTS will be cut off. Completely, or only one side left. Uh. What? That I actually dislike a lot, so I've avoided buying them. (Not that I need to buy much food on my own because I'm doing homestay.)

Phew! Those are the biggest ones I can think of- more later!!

写真！

Pictures!! Yaaaay~ (these are the same as the ones on facebook-- I put more on facebook)


The adorable trucks! :D
















Our group to Kyoto, to the Kinkakuji.
L -> R [Cat, me, Ken, Tomohiro, Skye]



















The awesome Italian Street ice cream vending machine. With dancing people!





















Yay, I won the jumbo waffle!