HAPPY BIRTHDAY KARA

I hope that it is so happy. :) Sorry that I am missing it but I am sure that you will have fun anyways...Here are some random pictures from my computer. Yeah, hope its a good day! Love you big sis!

June 2nd

Today I was excited to wake up to a beautiful sunny day. I woke up a lot during the night having strange dreams so that was odd, but I was rested when I woke up. My allergies were kind of bothering me too and I had to blow my nose in the middle of the night which woke my sister up. Kind of—I heard her mutter her brother’s name as if he had done it and then she went back to sleep so that was good. I had a good run though. This was the first time that I left the apartment complex. I ran down the street and enjoyed the sun. So instead of running 11 floors twice, I ran them once and around the neighborhood too. It was nice.

It was such a beautiful day and I was so excited. I wore my capris, but made sure that I brought a sweater to sit on later at the festival. I rode the densha and then met up with four of the other girls. We walk up the hill together. I originally went a different way, but this way is cheaper. No matter which way you go to the church though, it’s uphill. L We made it up and I studied more while waiting for sensei.
We started by talking about the festival and the things going on today. Today is when all the really cool stuff happens so it was bound to be way crowded. Lily and I talked about the things that we did yesterday (making the wood things, seeing the air show, etc) and others talked too. Then we had devotional and split into classes. School was fine—we switched which teacher we get first every week and so we have Tsuchiya sensei first this week. He helped us review the kanji and the grammar patterns. He is such a good teacher, perfect for us although I am sure he will be glad when he doesn’t have to deal with us anymore. ;). We then had Warnick sensei and took our test. I love class (after the quiz) because he helps us make up sentences that we would actually use and encourages us to come up with things that we want to be able to say and then helps us figure out how to say it. He is awesome.
After class Lily, Hana, Marcy, Angie, Lucy and I went down to the festival to see the air show. We lost Angie and Lucy along the way but the rest of us went to watch it. It was a letdown. There were six planes but they just kept flying over us. Two of the pilots did a heart, one did a figure eight and the coolest part, all six of them did a little circle all intertwined (like the Olympic circle) to make it look like Sakura. It was really neat but that was it. I was really disappointed. Here is a picture of the cool part.

We then headed off to a museum, the Nippon Maru. It is a ship that has been somewhat landed that you can go on. We have to go to two museums here for our culture class and this one was half off today so we opted for that one. The ship itself really wasn’t that cool because I had been on two toher boats in the last couple of days but its history has been cool. It was a training boat for all of the sailors and sailed for something like 50 years. It was full of history. There was a museum right next to it. It was relaly hot so by the time we got to the second part, the actual museum we were all dehydrated and tired. The other museum was cool but only because it had a ton of models of ships. It was really neat.

We saw a ton of foreigners too. There were Americans, and people with cool British accents and crazy looking people. It’s funny because when I see foreigners, they all kind of look at me strangely. For a while it was weird, but then I realized that I do the same thing to them. Haha. It is weird to see people other than Japanese people here, especially coming from Kyoto where there are really no foreigners.
Failing to find boats that were open, we headed on to find another part of the festival. We found it and there really wasn’t that much that was exciting and so we just walked around for a while. Then we saw kids playing in these really cool orange cars and on Sea-Doos. We didn’t know if we were allowed to, but there were no signs saying not to so we took pictures.

We went back to sit down and found Tsuchiya’s nieces and nephew sitting there too. That was fun. I played with the almost two year old for a long time and then the five year old boy found me again. He told Tsuchiya that he likes me. Haha. But he also said he wouldn’t marry me so don’t worry. ;). He came and sat by me to watch the fireworks. I was kind of nervous about the fireworks after the disappointing air show, but the Japanese did not disappoint. I took some fun pictures.

June 1st

Today I went running again. It was harder today than the other two times and will probably just get harder this week. And then next week I will get used to it and wont have anytime the following week. I do love running myself though. Although, I do think that when I listen to music it is more of a hindrance rather than a help to my Japanese. I tried today to listen to Japanese music but alas, it didn’t motivate me as well as English music does.

School was fine and we enjoyed switching teachers around so we could study kanji for a little bit longer before our quiz. We acted out the story and had a good time doing that. This story is extremely famous in Japan. It is about a crane that is caught in a trap and then rescued by an old man. Later, a beautiful woman comes to the old man and woman’s house and they let her stay for a couple of days until the snow storm that was happening died down. She weaved them a really expensive blanket made from her feathers (she was the crane that the old man saved) and gave it to them to sell. It was a story about repaying your gratitude and showing appreciation. It was a pretty good story but it was hard with all of the new kanji.

Anyway, after school we took the densha down to where the festival was happening and ate lunch down there. Lilly, Marcy, Carol and I walked around and enjoyed the free fans, fliers, and etc they were giving out for free. Lily and I made a postcard that they will send to us in one year. We are really excited about that. I addressed it to my home address as Lily lives in Taiwan and I would never see it. Haha. Anyway, our picture was on it and we wrote a message. We are excited. It came with a cup, eco friendly candles and a tower. Lily kept the tower and I kept the “I Love Yokohama” cup. We were really excited about it.
After we went and started to watch the “airplane parade” which was something like the blue angels. It was really neat but then it got cancelled because it started raining and they said it was too dangerous. That was a bummer. Later, my parents told me that today was just the practice anyway, tomorrow is the real show. And it is supposed to be sunny tomorrow so I am really excited. J YAY sun! Although, it was supposed to be sunny today but it randomly rained here and there. But it’s okay, I am sure that it will be awesome.
We then made these really cool things that are like nuts and put them on a log that we sawed off of a tree. It was really fun. We got to draw in the faces so that was amusing. J And yes, I know I look silly in the sawing picture. Sorry about that. J
After it started to rain even more so we decided to take it inside. My foot hurt really bad from wearing flip flops for the first time on Saturday. I think my toe is bruised. We went to the Snoopy store and to the Disney store and to a couple others. We had to go to Hard Rock Café to get Skagg’s mom a shirt for her quilt she is making. Then I met sensei at the station and he and his family came with me back to my house. Sensei and I went up and he gave them their money for hosting me so that was interesting. He got to see my small apartment. Haha. Anyway, I did some homework, and helped my sister with hers and then we ate dinner. It was delicious. Another kind of stir fry thing so that was interesting. It was sooo good though. I love eating here. It will be sad to go back to Provo for the lame food I have to make there. I need to learn how to make good food. Asian food—like my lumpia that I love dearly. Pretty sure that I will be eating gyoza a lot when I get home. Its like lumpia and it is sooo good. J Yeah good food. J
I did more homework and suddenly have gotten a cough and a stuffy nose. Not so good. So, I am off to bed with the hopes that it will be gone tomorrow as I am really excited for tomorrow. J Fireworks, parades, and more planes! YAY! And free stuff of course!

Sunday May 31st

Today I went to church and was sooo sore. Haha. All those kids and working out have made me extremely sore. Church was frustrating as usual but the Sunday School class with the missionaries made it somewhat better. They explain things here and there so that we can listen, but have the general sense of what is going on. I sat by Hinari and another little girl during church. The other little girl is not cute though and is obnoxious. Anywaya, church was fine. After church I talked to the missionaries and some investigators and then went home. We grabbed a quick snack and then went over to the port and went on the Mexican boat. That was funny and my little sister said Hola and Ciao to all of the men on the boat. The boat was really pretty and they were blasting Mexican music. There were a bunch of Mexican ladies there who were acting drunk and singing really loud. That was odd. After that boat we went to the Naval War boat and went on that. It was pretty much the same as any other boat that we have been on bu tit was in Japanese so that was fun. We took a lot of pictures. The Oritos have a REALLY nice camera so I need to make sure that they send me the pictures. I was exhausted by the end and ready to go to sleep. I was sooo tired. Anyway, we came home and ate a delicious meal of like stir fry and rice and then ate melon and seaweed (which we thought was melon jello) and they were both good. We watched Mr. Incredible (that’s what its called in Japanese) because I bought it and they had never seen it. We did FHE and we all talked about what we learned at church and then we sent Hinari to bed. I am going to go to bed soon because I am exhausted. YAY 9pm bedtime!

Saturday May 30th

We rode the train to Kamakura and went to a Shinto Shrine there. The pathway was really cool going in because it started really wide and then got more narrower as it went on to make enemies think that it was longer. Here was the capital of Japan for a while until one of the main guys got assassinated under a tree (don’t worry, I have pictures). They moved it thinking that his spirit would still be there. It was a perfect place to have a capital though because the only ways in are narrow channels in the hills making it hard for someone to attack with large amounts of people. But alas, it got moved. Anyway, they were doing a lot of baby blessings today so that was interesting. The moms would be in Kimonos and the dad’s dressed up and the babys in white. It was interesting. After that we walked down to these rocks. They were called crane and turtle rocks. I couldn’t figure out why though because there was nothing for either rock that looked even remotely like a crane or a turtle. However, the sign supposedly said that if you washed the rock something like a symbol would appear. We poured water on them and nothing happened. It was very disappointing. And since I was the only one who heard sensei say that, everyone then thought that I was lying. Sigh, whatever.
We then went to a grave. I wont bore you with the name but basically he killed his half brother because he was jealous of how much of a war hero his brother was. The weird thing is though, is that assassin man was the one who was the leader. Oh men and their drama. Sigh.

It was really muddy but it didn’t rain today so that was nice. We walked up to another grave of a famous man and Lyucy and I plotted on how we could get on the the top of a stone tori gate, but we couldn’t do it so we just swung on it instead. It was a lot of fun.
Then we went to the second biggest Buddha in the world. It was amazing to see and we got to go inside. A tsunami took out the building covering the Buddha but that is amzing because it is really far away from the ocean. It was like a twenty minute walk to get to the ocean. When we got to the ocean Lucy, Alyssa, Jessica and I got in and swam with Seth. It was a lot of fun and only a little bit cold. I had so much fun and was so glad that I got in.

After we went to our TAs house and made gyoza, tacoyaki, and weeded their garden. I was given the job of babysitting so that was fun but tiring. The kids were SO cute. J The dinner was amazing and I ate so much. By like 7pm though, I was ready to go to bed. The kids made me play hide and seek with them forever and then finally after cleaning we all went home. I was exhausted when I got home around ten pm.