Well, hello.
Been a little while, eh? Apologies, Deepa. ^_~ So let's see, what has happened since my last post...?
Su 14 May I tried unsuccessfully to study for my Tuesday midterm and write the Intro of the final paper due in Writing class Wednesday.
M 15 May I gave up on the Intro (which I'd written about three sentences of) and finally buckled down for the midterm: grammar, kanji compound readings, and reading comprehension. Well, I sort of buckled down... not really... until about 10pm.
T 16 May was the midterm. It was really terrible. The kanji reading was easy enough. I'd memorized them all the night before and was unsure about maybe 5. I didn't think the grammar was particularly hard or unreasonable (though everyone else seemed to). What killed me, what killed *everyone* was the reading comprehension. First we were tested on three readings we'd done in class. Some of the questions we hadn't gone over in class, and we had to come up with answers in our own words, and the true or false was a pain. I'm just not quite up to the level of trick questions in Japanese. And then there was a reading we'd never seen before but had to answer questions about... 3 pages of questions! I had 15 minutes. I didn't even bother to read the thing, and I didn't finish all the questions. Stupid thing. After that I lunched with Ripley. We complained about the test and I got her advice on writing my Intro. As most of you know, I'm rewriting the final paper for my post-poop class in Japanese so I can submit a good Japanese version to the Foundation in September. It's giving me a lot of trouble because what I think flows in English doesn't seem to fit easily into the format Sato-sensei gave us. I went home to write it at a leisurely pace and finished at 4am on
W 17 May. After 4.5 hrs of sleep I went to school to print my Intro, went to class, handed it in, then Ripley and I spent the afternoon together. We met some other people during the lunch break (Actually, Hideto even called me and we met up and chatted for a bit... it was like his third time on campus this term. I sure hope he graduates.) and got into a discussion about John Stewart and the dismal state of American "news." After Christina and Hannah returned to class and we parted with Eri who had to go to a part-time job (and we gave her one of our umbrellas as hers had been stolen, or taken mistakenly), Ripley and I went to Gutara, a local ramen shop for lunch. I was *stuffed* because lunch comes with rice and meat, and the ramen is a lot as it is. After that we met up with Christina, stopped by apartment to drop off my bike, then took the bus to Chofu Eki where we had Kaiten Sushi, aka conveyor belt Sushi, for dinner. It was really really yummy and cheap. I wish I'd had more room. From Chofu we took the train to Fuchu for a 6:30pm showing of "Good Night and Good Luck." The movie was great, seemed so short. I really wish there had been more to it.
Th 18 May was a long painful day of class. Religion is even worse now because the prof has decided to make us spend the second hour of each class session in discussion groups. It is so hard to get Japanese students to talk... I think it's the combination of it being an English class and also that we just have such different takes on things. For instance our group brought up how religion serves as a moral guide in the Western countries represented, but there's nothing like that in Japan, so we didn't really know how to "discuss" it. I spent the other parts of the class reading a manga Ripley lent me about a school with its own host club. It's very bizarre and a little disturbing but fun nonetheless... like many things Japanese.
F 19 May I awoke with a start. I'd forgotten to turn my alarm on (though I'd set it) and was supposed to meet Ripley, Christina, and Eri in Shibuya at 11. So I hopped in the shower and high-tailed it out of here. I ended up being the first to arrive. :-P The first place we went was HMV. I'd been wanting to get the new Tool album, so Ripley and I had a chance to browse while we waited for the others to arrive. From there we went to an all-you-can-eat pasta and dessert place called "Sweets Paradise." The decor was great. *All* the customers were girls. We talked about names and growing up being teased about it, confused Eri (who is Japanese) to no end, and joked about Ganguro/Gyaru. Then, as we came out of the restaurant, we saw the most amazing gyaru I had ever seen. One had purple hair, the other orange, they had sickly tans and multiple facial piercings, and were wearing skirts much too tight and short for them. Ripley had her camera and wanted a picture, so I asked them if we could take a picture together and they turned me down flat. Eri guessed that they were from the country/visiting Tokyo because they had rolling suitcases with Disney characters on them. After that failure we headed to a game parlor where we played UFO (those machines with the claws that you try to grab a toy with and drop it into the hole). Ripley is really good at it. She won a SpongeBob for Eri, and then she and Christina managed to win four little Monokuro Boo keychains with only two tries. With our loot we went for PuriKura (little sticker pictures) then wandered back in the direction of 109 (aka "maru kyuu") for shopping. On the way, Eri asked to stop in a shoe store. But she didn't buy anything. Instead the rest of us did. I bought a cute pair of black heels. Well, they're not exactly "cute." I can't seem to break out of my "black sexy" thing no matter how hard I try. Oh well. If it ain't broke, right?
S 20 May I had dance class again. More successful than last Friday when I nearly fainted. My shoulder and neck still aren't perfect, but I got a good work out. Am learning a Jathiswaram in raga mallika, which I like. It seems so short and slow! :-P
Su 21 May There was dance class out in Ichikawa again, but going all the way out there for class and back takes up the entire day. I still have work to do, so I decided not to go. Today I've written my Religion prof about a paper topic, written the Foundation about the email I sent them two weeks ago, and started my statement for post-bacc applications. Now I will eat dinner and go to Phil's for a film. He hasn't seen "The Iron Giant" or "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" or a lot of my favourite movies, so maybe I'll make him do that.
Su 14 May I tried unsuccessfully to study for my Tuesday midterm and write the Intro of the final paper due in Writing class Wednesday.
M 15 May I gave up on the Intro (which I'd written about three sentences of) and finally buckled down for the midterm: grammar, kanji compound readings, and reading comprehension. Well, I sort of buckled down... not really... until about 10pm.
T 16 May was the midterm. It was really terrible. The kanji reading was easy enough. I'd memorized them all the night before and was unsure about maybe 5. I didn't think the grammar was particularly hard or unreasonable (though everyone else seemed to). What killed me, what killed *everyone* was the reading comprehension. First we were tested on three readings we'd done in class. Some of the questions we hadn't gone over in class, and we had to come up with answers in our own words, and the true or false was a pain. I'm just not quite up to the level of trick questions in Japanese. And then there was a reading we'd never seen before but had to answer questions about... 3 pages of questions! I had 15 minutes. I didn't even bother to read the thing, and I didn't finish all the questions. Stupid thing. After that I lunched with Ripley. We complained about the test and I got her advice on writing my Intro. As most of you know, I'm rewriting the final paper for my post-poop class in Japanese so I can submit a good Japanese version to the Foundation in September. It's giving me a lot of trouble because what I think flows in English doesn't seem to fit easily into the format Sato-sensei gave us. I went home to write it at a leisurely pace and finished at 4am on
W 17 May. After 4.5 hrs of sleep I went to school to print my Intro, went to class, handed it in, then Ripley and I spent the afternoon together. We met some other people during the lunch break (Actually, Hideto even called me and we met up and chatted for a bit... it was like his third time on campus this term. I sure hope he graduates.) and got into a discussion about John Stewart and the dismal state of American "news." After Christina and Hannah returned to class and we parted with Eri who had to go to a part-time job (and we gave her one of our umbrellas as hers had been stolen, or taken mistakenly), Ripley and I went to Gutara, a local ramen shop for lunch. I was *stuffed* because lunch comes with rice and meat, and the ramen is a lot as it is. After that we met up with Christina, stopped by apartment to drop off my bike, then took the bus to Chofu Eki where we had Kaiten Sushi, aka conveyor belt Sushi, for dinner. It was really really yummy and cheap. I wish I'd had more room. From Chofu we took the train to Fuchu for a 6:30pm showing of "Good Night and Good Luck." The movie was great, seemed so short. I really wish there had been more to it.
Th 18 May was a long painful day of class. Religion is even worse now because the prof has decided to make us spend the second hour of each class session in discussion groups. It is so hard to get Japanese students to talk... I think it's the combination of it being an English class and also that we just have such different takes on things. For instance our group brought up how religion serves as a moral guide in the Western countries represented, but there's nothing like that in Japan, so we didn't really know how to "discuss" it. I spent the other parts of the class reading a manga Ripley lent me about a school with its own host club. It's very bizarre and a little disturbing but fun nonetheless... like many things Japanese.
F 19 May I awoke with a start. I'd forgotten to turn my alarm on (though I'd set it) and was supposed to meet Ripley, Christina, and Eri in Shibuya at 11. So I hopped in the shower and high-tailed it out of here. I ended up being the first to arrive. :-P The first place we went was HMV. I'd been wanting to get the new Tool album, so Ripley and I had a chance to browse while we waited for the others to arrive. From there we went to an all-you-can-eat pasta and dessert place called "Sweets Paradise." The decor was great. *All* the customers were girls. We talked about names and growing up being teased about it, confused Eri (who is Japanese) to no end, and joked about Ganguro/Gyaru. Then, as we came out of the restaurant, we saw the most amazing gyaru I had ever seen. One had purple hair, the other orange, they had sickly tans and multiple facial piercings, and were wearing skirts much too tight and short for them. Ripley had her camera and wanted a picture, so I asked them if we could take a picture together and they turned me down flat. Eri guessed that they were from the country/visiting Tokyo because they had rolling suitcases with Disney characters on them. After that failure we headed to a game parlor where we played UFO (those machines with the claws that you try to grab a toy with and drop it into the hole). Ripley is really good at it. She won a SpongeBob for Eri, and then she and Christina managed to win four little Monokuro Boo keychains with only two tries. With our loot we went for PuriKura (little sticker pictures) then wandered back in the direction of 109 (aka "maru kyuu") for shopping. On the way, Eri asked to stop in a shoe store. But she didn't buy anything. Instead the rest of us did. I bought a cute pair of black heels. Well, they're not exactly "cute." I can't seem to break out of my "black sexy" thing no matter how hard I try. Oh well. If it ain't broke, right?
S 20 May I had dance class again. More successful than last Friday when I nearly fainted. My shoulder and neck still aren't perfect, but I got a good work out. Am learning a Jathiswaram in raga mallika, which I like. It seems so short and slow! :-P
Su 21 May There was dance class out in Ichikawa again, but going all the way out there for class and back takes up the entire day. I still have work to do, so I decided not to go. Today I've written my Religion prof about a paper topic, written the Foundation about the email I sent them two weeks ago, and started my statement for post-bacc applications. Now I will eat dinner and go to Phil's for a film. He hasn't seen "The Iron Giant" or "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" or a lot of my favourite movies, so maybe I'll make him do that.
posted by Bibhatsu at 06:42
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home