An incredibly long-overdue update

Yes, I know I have been gone a long while, and I am sorry. I genuinely have much less time/opportunities to provide the content-filled updates that meet my standards of quality, plus occasionally when I do have time, I go "mehhh" and then don't update. So, yeah. Gomennasai (figure that one out on your own). Obviously, in a 8 days time I have accumulated much to write about, enough at least that I definitely won't remember it all right now. But I will do my best.

MINNA NO NIHONGO: BOOK 1 COMPLETE

"Minna no Nihongo" (Japanese for Everyone) is the main textbook that we use in the SILAC program at Yamasa. It is divided into two separate books of 25 chapters each. On Wednesday, we finished Book 1. Now, you are all likely familiar with how difficult it has been to learn Japanese, though I persevere. Well, in Book 2, they crank it up to 11. I'd say we average 2 times the amount of vocabulary a night, and we are starting to occasionally hit multiple lessons a day, jumping around and skipping chapters, whereas we did one chapter a day in Book 1 straight through, with some review days snuck in there. So, everyday is now a nuclear explosion to the brain, and every night is filled with renshuu (practice) and more memorizing. That said, this is noticeably helping, as day-to-day I feel more confident in my abilities with improvements measuring much greater than in Book 1. So, hurray! It also helps that there are 2 australian girls better than everyone else in the class, and I have to try and keep up with them. Speaking of which:

AUSSIE INVASION

As noted in my last entry, there are a bunch of girls running around Yamasa now, 2 of whom are in my class. Previously, I noted that they had been allowed into Yamasa because their previously scheduled exchange program didn't happen because "someone died." The full story is less exciting than I would have hoped. They were scheduled to stay in Japanese high schools for the winter (Australia's summer), but the director of the program bought the farm, and the program dissolved 2 weeks before it was scheduled to begin. This would have been seriously disastrous to the girls' summer plans, so what remained of the program's administration struck a deal with Yamasa, and here they are.

THINGS ARE EXPENSIVE

I've noted before how my diet, alternatively known as Eating Japanese Food Always, is making me lose large amounts of weight, even if I don't have a scale to tell. But my jeans and belt don't lie, so I set out Friday after classes for Nagoya, where I could find a far better selection of clothes than in Okazaki (at least in the places I had found). The Australian girls had the same plan in mind, so we ran into each other at the train station and basically stuck together as far as the makeup section of Mitsukoshi (the oldest department store in the world, having opened its first location in 1673). At this point, I found my way to the sole men's clothes floor, where I waited to long to examine the price tags. After spending quite a bit of time with a friendly salesman (who I can communicate with on a higher-than-primitive level!), I found a couple pairs of damn good jeans, and then saw the price, which was more than I wanted it to be. I had forgotten that things are expensive in Japan, especially when compared to America. However, I really did not just want to say no, plus the jeans ruled, so I bought them, parting ways with most of the cash I had brought with me on the day. The rest of what I got was less expensive for sure, but due to lack of cash will show up on my credit card bill. So that's what those charges are, Dad.

KARAOKE

When I departed America, the word "karaoke" invoked images in my head of bars and parties, with a television screen displaying scrolling lyrics and some probably-drunk sucker making a fool of him/herself in front of many snickering onlookers. But Enter the Japanese. Here, karaoke is immensely popular, and rightfully so. Instead of making a fool of your drunk self in front of a whole bar, you make a fool of your drunk self in a private room filled only with other drunk people doing, or about to do, exactly the same thing. Of course, that's not the real reason it's popular. In truth, everyone does Karaoke because you can show up at 8 or 9 at night, reserve a room till 6 the next morning for 3000 yen a person, and it's free drinks the whole night. And with the amount of alcohol asians ingest, they can almost always put back more than 3000 yen worth of beer or sake over the course of 8 or so hours. Since I'm not one to partake in such outlandishly unhealthy indulgences, I just tag along, have a couple glasses of Kirin, just enough to be happy, and then the mood of the room is enough to make the night completely entertaining.

WHY IS THE MOVIE THEATER 40 MINUTES AWAY AND IN A SMALLER TOWN?

There are movies that have come out in America out that I really want to see, namely The Departed, The Prestige, and Casino Royale, and they tend to see a subtitled release in Japan within a couple of weeks. But the movie theater is sooo far away and no one ever seems to have the time to go. Ugh.

ON AN UNRELATED NOTE, APPARENTLY GERMANY IS A PORTAL TO A COMPLETELY ISOLATED DIMENSION

Since Chris, my german friend, had not heard of an iPod before last week, or iTunes, ever in his life. Huh?

OTHER STORIES FROM NAGOYA THAT I JUST REMEMBERED

We had lunch in Nagoya last friday, at one of the many local restaurants famous for fried pork with miso sauce. Miso sauce, of course, being the sauce form of Miso Soup. I'm not sure how this is accomplished, but the result is defiinitely something to write home about, seing as I have done just that with this sentence. Also worth noting from that restaurant is that have of my tray was occupied by six small saucers with various salts inside. The presentation made them seem Important, but seeing as there was only a small serving of each of the six salts, and given that my meal was already delicious, I tried non of them, and then farted in the face Cultural Exposure.

Sakae is the central part of Nagoya, and is almost directly equatable with the Magnificent Mile, only probably more expensive since it is in Japan. This is where Mitsukoshi was, where Skatie will most want to come if she visits (hint: come visit, Skatie, and anyone else, for that matter), and also where I found a Gap. One of the things that I liked about Gap was that it was familiar, although many of the brands within the other department stores were as well, and also that their Japanese Advertisements actually featured japanese models, whereas most advertisements in Japan are plastered with Western faces, often notable western faces (i.e. Tommy Lee Jones as noted in one of my first entries, and Cameron Diaz, the face of the SoftBank cellphone store franchise). Fitting that an American company would reverse the trend. Also, inside of this Gap was an employee who like generally white and not asian, which was weird because it is notoriously difficult to get a non-teaching job as a gaijin. Close observation revealed a Japanese nametag, as well as extremely limited english with a thick japanese accent, so I guess she will just remain an ethnic question mark.

The train ride on the way home was so insanely crowded that there was a formal line for each door to get into the train, and then once you were there you had exactly negative three centimeters of space to occupy. When the train stopped, if you did not aggressively act otherwise, you would be swept off the train by the general flow of bodies. Craziness.

COMING SOON

This week is the most important week of my entire tenure in Japan, because tomorrow and friday I am seeing the Mars Volta live, tomorrow's show being in that mystical, magical wonderland known as Tokyo (which should technically be spelled Toukyou). My trusty Digital Camera shall accompany me, and since tomorrow is review in class, I have decided to take the whole day off in order to get to Tokyo earlier. Apparently, it will be easy to switch my reserved Shinkansen tickets. This will give me ample time to find the venue, as well as check out the neighborhood it's in, Odaiba, which is supposed to be the most popular area for my age group. Also worth checking out is Akihibara, which is basically all electronic stores, and 90% of the reason why people view Japan as technologically in the future.

I promise to blog about all of that in at least some capacity.