Weird conversations...

Edit: remembered and added another one! (02.22)

Teacher: Geibun! There's been a lot of candy paper lying around lately... You might be peckish, I know you dance a lot, but bringing candy to school is a no-no!

Class: ...

Teacher: If I find sweets in the classroom again, I will take them! ...so please, bring candy to school! I'll be very happy!

Girl in class: (mumbling) ...you'll be taking a lot home, then won't you? Like, a bag...

Other people: *pffft!* ...you'll get fat!

Teacher: That's OK, I'll go on a banana diet!

...well. Apparently, the banana diet is the new It here in Japan. (At least it must be pretty popular, since even I've heard of it. And I'm busy stuffing my mouth with karage, yakisoba, onigiri, takoyaki, tofu... you get the picture. :P Not too much, though. Wouldn't want to start eating bananas, now would we?)
I think it works like this: One banana in the morning... And then eat regularly. Does it work? I have no idea! :P

Momo: (staring at my nose) Your nose is really big!

Helene: ... I know. (-.-);; I want to have a small nose like the Japanese. It's cute...

Momo: I want to have a big nose!

Helene: ...why?

Momo: well... because with a big nose you can draw in lots of air! Right? :D

Helene: ...um, I guess...?

Location: Japan!
Mood: tired! Must sleep! (Or watch anime...? It's saturday! XD )
Listening to: music on my mp3
Eating: ...not enough bananas! XP
Drinking: water. Or green tea... can't decide.

Sotsugyo Kouen

I DID IT!! :D

Valentine's Day, Saturday, was the big day. 卒業公演 sotsugyou kouen. "Graduation public performance". The final performance with all the third years at our high school before they graduate. Francesco and I joined in performing Japanese dance, aerobics and a fast hip hop dance called "Matsuri", which was nerve wrecking and a lot of fun! And I made it!! XD

When I started the dancing lessons at this school here, I thought it would be hard - except for Japanese dance, with the first years, we always trained with our class. Meaning they had been training dance for a minimum of two years. "Well," I thought, "It'll be OK as long as I try, right?" I didn't know they'd be expecting me to perform those dances with everybody else in front of the whole school!

Seno and Wada posing!

Well, what can I say... from the moment I knew that we'd be performing this, and that Francesco would be coming to train once a week, I decided that I'd do my best and train too. So every Tuesday I'd show up at the dance club. Mai, Tsuru, Wada... basically everyone in our class did an amazing job teaching us the dances! (Mai basically taught me the entire aerobic one afternoon with the dancing club.) Matsuri was the one I had the most trouble with, and also the one I was most nervous about. (My mom knows all about this, haha!) There were lots of "no, wrong, do it again" and "yes, you did it! High five!" - so it was actually a lot of fun training for it! I got to know people in my class better as well, and it was fun working and making something together.

Tsuru and me. I'm wearing a yukata, and Tsuru a kimono.

Posing in the changing room!

Before the 14th, we'd been practicing for a week at Ijuin bunkakan, the place where we'd be holding the performance. Once the day finally arrived, we were all pretty stressed and excited. Our Japanese dance involved throwing and catching our fans - the catching part was what had us all worried. All the first years were stressing about it, while our teacher kept saying "it's going to be fine, so don't worry!". I wub my Japanese dance teachers. <3>

The Japanese dancing teachers and us!

Us and all the third years

We had two performances, one during the day and one in the evening. Before each one we'd all gather in a big room and the third year boy that Francesco and I have simply dubbed "Cool Guy" held a small speech, saying "since this is the last time for us third years, let's all do our best!" "Ei, ei, oo!" to which we'd all shout back "EI, EI, OO!". At the evening performance he called Hamasaki, a boy from our class, over and they did it together. It was great to lift the spirits and get us all "fit for fight". Also, right before going on stage, we all gathered in a big circle, put our arms around each other's shoulders, stuck out our right foot (since we couldn't raise our fists) and whispered "ei, ei, oo!". Great! XD I think it worked - I didn't drop my fan either time! What I did do, however, was slip in the middle of the aerobic during the day! We were supposed to do a turn, and my shoes (that I'd never worn on a rehearsal - lesson learnt, mom...) slipped. So while everyone else were turning and doing the next step, I was staggering sideways in the middle of the stage waving my arms, trying desperately not to fall. I managed to stay on my feet and jumped in a few steps later. "The show must go on", right? XD Dazey said he didn't see it, so maybe it wasn't that noticeable. A shame, really - I bet it would have been really funny to see! I know I laughed. :P Matsuri went pretty well - a few misses, but considerably better than any practice session I ever did. ^^

In the pause we were interviewed for a live radio show by a guy that called himself "Smiley". It was really fun being interviewed with all our Japanese classmates, and my second time on Japanese radio. I got a little stuffed bear - the radio's mascot - as a keepsake when it was over. He's wearing a seat belt and "does not allow drunk driving". I love my bear! XD

Reading manga in a kimono - true Japanese culture! XD

Random pictures, go!!

The evening performances went very well! I didn't slip this time, and except for a step that I did a little early, I managed Matsuri too! Yay~! At the end, we're all doing what looks like a karate punch and scream "HA!" before the stage goes dark. My definite favourite move! Okaasan commented it too: "I figured! I saw it and thought "Oh, I bet Helen likes that one!"" She knows me well! ;)

Receiving the applause afterwards was great! Once we all got out on stage and bowed... it was wonderful. I was so happy and relieved that I'd done it, that I'd made it after months of work. Whoo~! At the same time it was kind of sad that it was over, and all the third years were now finished. (The only time they'll be back is for the official ceremony.) Once the curtain had gone down people started crying. Heck, it even made me tear up! I could relate to it too - all my friends back in Norway will be graduating this year, too. And I know the feeling. But I'm super happy I get to do this! :)

Hamasaki and Francesco

Great random memories:

- Singing Avril Lavigne's "Why" and "Sk8r boi" backstage with Shun playing the guitar - wearing hakama! XD

- Tsuru being coached by Francesco on how to be a gaijin from a Spanish speaking country, followed by some pricelessly funny Tsuru moments of immitating and acting.

- Cool guy was fixing his hair in front of the mirror, so I walked up and fixed the hair on his dancing prop. Spontanious jokes relieves stress. ^^

- Taking random photos with everyone

- The dance teacher eagerly explaining to me how much Wada resembles a kangaroo and Hirase looks like the character Ganguro tamago-chan. "Right?! Right?! She does!!"

Me and the singing teacher

Cool guy, first year boy and a girl from our class

Hamasaki playing "Hama-chan". XP

Location: Japan
Mood: Tired
Watching: Dexter! :D

Mamemaki

Note: the red label reads "fuku mame" - luck beans

On the 3rd of February Febuary! The dictionary's wrong! I joined in on the annual Mamemaki (bean scattering). What it is is basically a ritual to cleanse the house of demons and bad luck and bring fortune and good luck instead. Momo had drawn oni (demons) on pieces of paper that we hung outside, and we threw beans at them while yelling "鬼は外！福は内！" ("oni wa soto! fuku wa uchi!" lit. demon is outside! luck is inside!") After that we threw small bags of the same beans around the house - "福は内！" "福は内！" - to bring luck. (These were gathered later.)

Next we all gathered in my room, turned off the light and sat waiting with big plastic bags, and okaasan came in the room with a heap of candy that she threw into the room one handful at a time. Mayhem and joy ensued: "Itte! Itte!" ("Ouch! Ouch!") "Gaaaaaah!" "Iyaaaaah!"

...and then we ate some roasted beans. (Delicious, I might add!) We ate one bean for each year of our lives, and then one for good luck. So I got to eat 19 beans! ^^ Yum, yum!

A very flattering picture of self with an oni bag of beans.
(Which explaines my highly fearful expression of dramaticness.)

Location: Japan~
Mood: "soon swimming! Yay!"
Watching: a Doraemon movie!
Eating: mame!
Drinking: C.C. Lemon

In need of a cardboard box

Take an exchange student who also happens to love Japanese sub-culture and j-pop/rock. Take her to Japan for a year. Place her in a Japanese music store. Watch her go crazy. Now place her in a second hand music/game store where everything is much cheaper. Watch her go insane. Let her do this sporadically for about 5 months.

Watch the stack of CD's grow...and grow.... and you end up with something like this:

...I put my DS in there for comparison.

I need a big box to send things home in. Now. Haha! p(^_^;;)q

On a different note, my kyudo club is nearly extinct. People hardly ever come to training, and as it is now it's Kuramura and me training outside. He' left the school's dormitory, and it now takes him 2 hours to go home... so naturally there'll be times when he can't come either. And we're trainig outside where it's cold. The other's won't show up until we start training in the dojo again, but that might take some time. And they all joined the student's council...

I don't know anymore. I'll keep trying for some time and see. It'll get better when it gets warmer too.

I've had this week off, because there were tests at our school for junior high schoolers wanting to get in to Josei. I've been doing basically nothing, so I've been a little bored. I don't get to move much, and I've come to realize I really am a sports freak. I love moving and learning how to do new, physical things. So sitting around all day makes me a dull girl. XD

I did, however, sing karaoke for 4 hours straight with my host sister Sayaka. Couldn't speak very well afterwards, but it was a lot of fun! I also discovered some new songs that are a lot of fun to sing; Ikomonogakari's "Sakura" and Aya Matsuuras "Ne~e". A lot of fun! (...and you can't beat the theme song from "Bokusatsu Tenshi Dokuro-chan"! XD Pipirupirupirupipirupiiii~!

...random posts? Me? Never! ....

Location: Japan
Mood: kind of bored (but swimming soon! Yay!)
Listening to: MTV (in the living room with my family)
Eating: -
Drinking: -

Tokyo!

From Thursday (29th) to Saturday (31st) last week, Francesco, Jessa and I went on a trip with Mrs. Kamikawa to Tokyo. It was great! It's not often that you get to travel half across the world to see these things in real life! I'd hoped that, upon coming to Japan, I might be able to see Tokyo. I always thought it'd be a shame coming to Japan for a year and not seeing the capital once. Goal accomplished! ^^ I can't be bothered to write it all out again, seeing as I'm currently writing three rotary reports (Two in Japanese and one in English), so I'm copy-pasting a bit.

The first day (29th) we met up with the Kamikawas at Chuo eki and were driven to the airport where we took a plane to Tokyo. Once in Tokyo, we got on a sightseeing bus that took us to see first the Emperor’s palace, the Sensoji temple and then the Tokyo tower. In the Tokyo tower they had small windows in the floor that you could look down through. Awesome! :D

Tokyo was so big! From the tower it looked like one of those clattered children rooms where you won't put your feet down in fear of stepping on (and possibly destroying) something. Except here those "somethings" were buildings. A lot of them.

In the evening we went to our hotel that was located in the middle of Shinjuku, right by the station (which was huge!). The hotel, too, was enormous – the reception was at the 20th floor! At the hotel we ate at an Italian restaurant that served delicious food. Francesco went crazy and ate tons, as did the rest of us I think, haha!

On the 30th we woke up around 8 AM and ate breakfast at the hotel before we all went out to look around and shop. We went around Shinjuku and to Shibuya and Harajuku, which was a lot of fun! Harajuku was a lot smaller than I'd thought, with only one line going to the station, but that just added to the appeal I think. It made it kind of...intimate. And yes, there were lots of people in cute clothes! :D Also - so many places and shops I’d never seen before! It was really interesting! And I found Closet Child, a shop selling second-hand lolita clothes from brands like "Baby, the Stars Shine Bright", "Angelic Pretty", "Metamorphose temps de fille" and "Moi-même-Moitié". Heaven!

The third and last day we had some time before we had to leave for the airport, so we spent some more time shopping and looking around. It was a lot of fun! At about 2 o’clock we went to the airport, where we bought omiyage (Rotary club, host family and classmates) before going home.

In short: great trip! I'd love to come back to Tokyo one day...

Tokyo Tower

All three

Tokyo - AKA. don't step on anything!

Tokyo by night

The famous temple in Tokyo

Location: Japan, Kagoshima
Mood: hungry...
Listening to: Kanon Wakeshima (Still Doll and Suna no Oshiro) She'll be releasing in Europe! OMG! :D
Eating: No~
Drinking: Water