All the Fun at School

今日の日本語の言葉: tanoshii (楽しい) - fun

This word was brought to you by class today, which was the funnest class I've had in Japan so far, and the first class that wasn't boring.

I woke up today to find about forty emails in my inbox, which isn't the largest amount I've found when I've logged in ever, but it's the most I've found in one day. And then after deleting mail from subscriptions and stuff, there was still about twenty-five left behind. About twelve of them pertained to the chapter I posted yesterday, some of them were from some of my teachers wishing me well and checking in, a few were from family, and a few were from various friends sending me pictures from their own lives. It was a wonderful way to start off the morning as I waited for Anna to survive the beginnings of the hurricane and get back to her house and get on Skype. It's nice to know that people care so much, you know? It's sort of why I keep going with this blog; whenever I talk to people, they reference it, and I know they read it. So then it gives me reason to write~ A good circle, I'd say.

So after I replied to all of that stuff and had some nice email chats with people from around the world who read my story, Anna came along and we do what we always do: write. If this trip is about discovering myself and my interests, I think it's going quite well, don't you? xD

After breakfast, I got ready for school, wrote a little more, and then left. When I got on the train, I finally had a clear enough picture to show you what has surprised me quite a bit for the past days I've been here. Everything on the train is so clean! I mean, everywhere is so clean, but I've never ever seen any part of the train defiled or damaged. There is absolutely no litter. Even when people forget things and leave things on the ground, other people pick it up and put it on the rack or something. People are so caring. No one writes on the ads, as far as I've seen, and everything is spotless. Not like Boston, where there's "SWAGGG" scratched onto every surface, or a moustache on every expression. *sigh*

When I got to school, I dropped in at Vie de France to try another pastry of theirs. This time it was some apple pastry, which was very soft and very hot. Inside was filled with a gooey warm sweet cheese filling and apple chunks. I describe it as something very delicious, yet it ended up being way too sweet for me, and I couldn't finish the whole thing. Alas, my lack of a sweet tooth!

Across from my school building, I also saw all of these bikes. They're here every day, and none of them are ever locked up. I see bikes in other places that are just left around like this too. They're so trusting, and I find it very nice. You would never see this anywhere in Boston or something. And it's not even that Boston is distrustful of others; the fact of the matter is that if this existed in Boston, all the bikes would be stolen in a matter of hours. It's just a difference of... street-wise acceptability?

Class today was so damn fun! I don't know how to begin to describe to you how it was. Yoneyama-sensei was teaching today, and as I've told you before, I like him a lot. He's got a wonderful sense of humor, and he really knows how to make learning fun. We were learning today about when to use "ha" and when to use "mo," which is something I already knew. I was liable to be bored quickly, and Yoneyama-sensei knew the class was too easy for me, so he challenged me. Out of nowhere, he would turn to me and ask me a ridiculous question in Japanese, like "Two days ago last week, what was the first thing you ate for breakfast?" Then I'd have to think. Then he'd ask me if I ate this, or that, and I'd have to answer using "ha" or "mo" or neither as the right particle. It kept me on guard, and it was actually quite fun. He has this way of teasing you when you're wrong that makes everybody laugh, but makes you laugh too. It was just such a good time.

Yoneyama-sensei also is wonderful at sarcasm. He's got that down to an art. Someone would say by accident something like, 「レストランを食べました。」which literally means "I ate a restaurant." Yoneyama-sensei would reply with something like, "You do? Funny. I haven't done that in a couple of days. The mood just hasn't struck me recently." We'd all crack up laughing, because the fun thing about our class is that the majority of us are on the same Japanese level. We're all bored with the current material. But at least we all can understand enough more complex Japanese to get it when Yoneyama-sensei makes a comment like that.

I did draw in class though. No matter how interesting class is, I always can find time to write and to draw. And the mood struck me today to draw... guess who?... Alexei and Mikhail! Alexei's on the left, and Mikhail's on the right. Alexei loves his coffee, and has about three cups every morning. Mikhail is posing with some things he's stolen recently: a painting of Catherine the Great, a goblet (well, two, actually), a bottle of wine, etc. I just love them so dearly! <3

After class, I walked to the station with Saya, my classmate from Sweden. She's a wonderful and very interesting person, and is the best English speaker in the class. We also both love BL very much, and naturally migrated together because of those two reasons. We've already talked a lot, and we went out to dinner on Friday. She's very quiet, but she's highly intelligent. She seems to be just as bored as I am with class, though we both stave off boredom by exchanging names of good books and dramas. =]

Cats on her backpack! So cute! 

We went to 7/11 together on our way back to Akihabara station, and I got this odd thing that I wanted to try out. I love salmon, so I figured it couldn't be bad. It's difficult to mess up salmon and rice. And it actually turned out to be pretty good! It's sushi rice, with cooked salmon on top. So it's like a massive aburi salmon nigiri (cooked salmon) the size of my palm. What's there not to like?

I also found some shampoo and conditioner in a bag, which I guess saves on hard plastic, but I've never seen such before. Is there some benefit or something? Why doesn't America have it if there is one? It's just fun to see some of the fundamental differences between the things Japanese people are used to, and the things Americans are used to. I found this bagged shampoo weird, while other people found it weird that I was taking a picture of something so ordinary. xD

For dinner, we had chicken katsu, which is delicious as always. We also had pumpkin, which I've grown to love! I don't think I still like any other pumpkin, but Yoshiko-san's pumpkins are absolutely wonderful. I could eat them all day (this is why her children are so well behaved, I think; they eat so many, many vegetables).

I encountered wasabi powder for my first time today, though. This made me think immediately of dad, who would get a kick out of this. The left is a powder of wasabi and soy sauce. How do you make soy sauce into a powder? Does it just become... soy? o.o
The right one is wasabi and salt, which I find just as interesting. It tastes like it advertises it should, and it makes everything taste better, I have to say. It's sort of like the deep-fry effect: if you like something already, and then you deep fry it, it 99% of the time tastes better (though it's totally worse for your health). You have to like it already first, though. Thus, since I don't like twinkies, deep friend twinkies would probably make me gag twice as much. So I guess deep-frying amplifies whatever feeling you already have toward the food.

That's all for today, folks! Hopefully tomorrow's class will hold to be as much fun as today (though I think it's Seshime sensei tomorrow, who always seems surprised when we know something and actually understand Japanese; thus, it might not be as fun...). It was also nice to talk to Janet today, who was chatting with me on Facebook as I was writing this. Sometimes I don't realize just how much I miss you guys until I get a chance to talk to you again; and then my heart gets just a little bit homesick.

I miss you guys tonnes (I've been writing a fic about someone British, so, in honor of it being done, "tons" is "tonnes" for the day)!
マギー

P.S. I also want to wish my beloved god-brother, Corbin, a happy birthday today! It's been your birthday all day for me already, but it's only just started for you! Hope it's a magnificent day! I miss you lots! XOXO