Military Time - Oh How I Loathe You...

Allow me to clarify quickly: Every clock in Japan EXCEPT for analogue watches (of which there are very few) displays military time ONLY. And having grown up used to reading a 12 hour clock, looking at a 24 hour clock just throws me off. It takes me forever to read what time it is because I'm sitting there going "What's this 22:48 I see?" It's a constant frustration that I can't even read the clock on my new cell phone without having to think, "okay, what's this minus 12?" Thus, I heart my watches because they tell me what time it really is without me having to think too much.

Anyway, on to why I haven't written in a very long time... Please forgive me on the weekends--right now I am currently unable to type a long post on the weekends because if I do, I will be typing on my host family's computer, meaning I'm hogging their family computer, and typing anything takes twice as long because a) it's a Japanese keyboard and NOTHING is where it's supposed to be, and b) it's a really old computer so the spacebar is sticky and I have to mash it two or three times to get it to insert a space. I am investigating the possibility of going to a Media Cafe (I hear there's a new one in Hirakata), but until I get this all figured out, gomen nasai for not being able to write much on the weekends.

Just to clarify, a Media Cafe is different from an Internet Cafe in that a Media cafe is a little nicer, cheaper, and doesn't just give you an internet connection but allows you to rent all forms of media. Most have a huge comic book archive for you to read (sometimes they're called Manga Cafe's for this reason). Based on the description I was given, I would not be surprised if such Cafe's also rented CDs and DVDs. If not, I'm sure there's a Tsutaya (a very big CD and DVD rental chain in Japan) nearby.

Allow me to sum up the past few days. I have been exceedingly busy, so this shall be a long post. Grab a cup of coffee and sit in your favorite comfy chair, you know, the one with the leg rest...

Saturday
I woke up at about 10 in the morning so I'd arrive in Shinsaibashi by a decent hour. On the subway, Shinsaibashi is the stop just before Namba. My Dynamics teacher (whom I adore) had mentioned that there was a Sony building right by the station where you could play with applied science--i.e. new technology not out in the store yet--for absolutely free. So, the plan was to find this "tall, silver building that you can't miss" and play with the new technology for a day. However, when we arrived to Shinsaibashi, we couldn't find the building. When we finally asked, the girl who responded to us said, in English, "It's broken," and then told us where to find it. The building itself is covered in lovely white cardboard so we couldn't see the construction going on inside. We weren't allowed inside. So, from what we could see, the Sony building in Shinsaibashi was either under repairs/remodel, or it may even have been sold and was being turned into an office building. So, a little dishearten, we decided to make the trip worthwhile and explore Shinsaibashi.

Shinsaibashi has a street that is completely covered and has many many stores on either side. Some stores of note are the Hello Kitty Store (three stories filled with an overdose of cuteness), the Disney Store (that changed its entire outdoor framework to reflect Halloween), and the Engrish t-shirt store. There were also several clothing stores, a few "hippy stores" (as we called them; think romancing the stone, darkstar visuals, and passages combined into one place; I love these stores!), and even a military shop. I wish I had gotten photos of the military shop because it was fascinating from an anthropological perspective. This shop sold everything you associate with the military (excluding weapons, real and fake, because most Japanese don't own guns apparently) but there were only two military groups represented at this store, and neither of these were Japanese. The two military groups (very accurate models of their uniforms were in the windows) were the American modern soldier, and... guess what... 1940s Germany???? Complete with Nazi arm band and fake Hitler mustache.

We spent the day mostly in Shinsaibashi, but we actually walked from Shinsaibashi station all the way to Namba station and back, plus a few detours on the side. It took us all day. In Shinsaibashi, I had Subway for lunch (we found a subway shop in Japan!) where I had roast beef on sesame bread (I loves sesame bread!!!).

By the end of the evening, we'd been everywhere we wanted to go in Shinsaibashi but weren't yet tired and didn't feel like eating at Subway again, so we hopped on the subway and took it to Umeda, which is one step backwards from Yodoyabashi (Shinsaibashi is two steps forward; Yodoyabashi is the station where you can get to the subway from the Keihan train line that runs through Hirakata). In Umeda, we had a wonderful curry dinner where we got a 100yen discount for being foreigners (that's a major reason we chose said restaurant; sometimes it's good to be a foreigner), and for dinner we went one floor down to visit the sweets museum. Then, Heather and I followed Tony and Kyle around while trying this place Kyle wanted to go to--well, we never found it. So, we went back to Yodoyabashi, caught the last train to Hirakata, the last bus to Seminar House 4, and then Amanda road her bike up to Makino where she lives. The ride home is almost all downhill and I haven't had anyone even try to keep up with me yet--not even cars can keep up with me when I go down that hill! Which means, I'm on a bike going over 30 kmph, which makes my heart smile.

Sunday - Monday
On Sunday I went through the stressful process of buying a phone at Kuzuha Mall (and went shopping there whilst I was at it--I figure if I've got two hours of free parking, I'm going to spend 2 hours at Kuzuha!). The process of buying the phone was bad because at first the guy to whom I was speaking could not understand me at all. Buying a phone has specialized vocabulary and I was standing there wishing my host mother would have at least offered to come with me. Lucky for me, another employee came in and she spoke English so I was able to get a phone. I bought the cheapest plan I could get. I get 100 min per month, approximately 150 emails (Japanese phones have full blown email instead of text messages), and a free phone for signing up for a 3000yen a month plan (approx 30$). Oh, and cancellation fee (this was important to me since if I get a plan, I'll have to cancel it when I leave Japan in May) is also 3000 yen. AND calling AU phone to AU phone is 50% off (AU is not quite cingular/att&t). And the free phone is a pretty snazzy phone too. I mean, it's not an iphone, but it's so much better than my crappy little phone I had in US. On Sunday, I also went exploring while it was still a decent day and arrived home just in time to take cover from the rain. I napped during the rain.

Monday was Autumnal Equinox Day, meaning I had no class so I spent the day catching up on sleep and homework. I also watched a TV show with my host family called Doors. Apparently it is a game show that is run once every year. Contestants are faced with several challenges, in which contestants are eliminated based on how they do. One challenge was to drive a bike across a 250km long, approx 1 foot wide floating platform. If you fall in, you fail, however, if you lose the bike but you yourself don't fall in the water, you can run across to get half the points. Another challenge was a memory game. You see a series of 8 colors and you have to recall them in order. If you do not recall them in order, a bungee throws you up in the air and you hang there and wait for them to make fun of you and then let you down. The last challenge was to drop a metal ball into a basket with a hole the width of a CD, only you must do said task from the top of a cliff that's at least 5 stories tall. I really enjoyed it.

Tuesday
Tuesday was spent freaking out over the amount of assignments I have this week. I just need to make it through Friday... Tuesday afternoon, after attending the absolutely wonderful class of Dynamics, I purchased my discounted ticket to Hiroshima. I will be going to Hiroshima on October 13 (Whee!!!) and will probably spend the night there (which reminds me, I should probably check out studentuniverse for a cheap hotel). I have decided that instead of riding the bus home, I will spend the extra 30$ and buy a shinkansen ticket back home too so that I spend 1hour 30 min in traveling instead of 8 hours of traveling via bus. 30$ is worth my sanity. And if I do nothing else while I'm here this semester, I absolutely, beyond a shadow of a doubt, MUST go to Hiroshima while I am in Japan. Now that I bought the ticket, I can officially say that I am going to Hiroshima.

Today
Today has been exhausting (this whole week has been such and I've only spent two days in class!). I have so much work due tomorrow and Friday. H2P has been replaced by Japanese as the class that eats away my life. Just incase you didn't know, I have two Japanese classes. Spoken Japanese meets five days a week while Written Japanese meets three days a week, and both classes demand all my time and energy. Obviously, my writing and speaking is getting so much better, but at the same time, I always have a headache because I've been thinking so hard. For instance, I just spent 30 min recording three dialogues. The actual recording took less than two minutes. However, I'm always encouraged because I can understand most of what's being said to me now. For instance, yesterday I acted as translator for Heather (who is in the beginning level of Japanese) so she could buy a bike, and did so rather successfully (she bought the bike with no troubles). In any restaurant, I am able to order my own food and understand what they say to me. And it thrills me to no end when I see a sign written in Kanji and I can read its entirety...

Hope you have enjoyed this entry and thank you to everyone who commented here and emailed me and made sure I knew you were reading. I heart you guys, you make me feel very loved!