The End

3 September 2007 - 8:46am bedroom

Oh goshhh last full day in Japan. Means it might pass very slowly, but at least I've come up with a few things to do. Yesterday I decided to stay the whole day in Mito, despite kinda planning to come back around lunch time. Fairly glad I did, as 'twas fun. Andrea and I loafed around all morning and I worked on my novel more (I've wrote over 7,000 words in the course of TWO DAYS. If I were able to keep that pace up consistently I'd have written over twenty novels in the time it's taking me to write one). I think I can make my deadline.

Around 2:00 Hiro stopped by and we went to the park, whereat we watched the ducks and the giant fish swarming under them and had plum sherbert. Hiro had to go to work soon, so Andrea and I walked around the garden part and saw some nice bamboo and a lot of cool treees. There was an Inari shrine too. Almost justifies that paper I wrote. We walked back to the apartment, which was a considerable distance but didn't seem to take forever. Probably because we were talking the while. We chilled a while longer and then undertook the making of dinner (pasta with tomatoes and eggs being all that remained in the house). After we were still bored and since I'd decided to extend my visit we went back to the restaurant and talked and talked and had avocado salad and were amused by Hiro and Eranga. Said goodbye ... again ... and then went to the train station. I miscalculated my train time, so I had to wait an extra NINE MINUTES, but all was well.

I read Harry Potter the whole way, and in about two hours got through like 15 pages. Sigh. I was tired.

When I got home everyone was asleep so I finished my packing and dropped myself on my bed, whereat I reposed until 7:30 this morning. Got up and talked to Kayoko about Mito and Thailand and Takkyuubins and then she had to go to work earlyyy today so I dealt with the Takkyubin and if all is well my suitcase will be at the airport before I am. Alas they cannot take the cello also, but I can probably manage with a cello and one bag.


I swear I have less luggage leaving here than I brought. I don't know how that is.






3 September 2007 - 10:15pm bedroom

Today, as expected, has not passed quickly enough. Parts of it were indeed good though. I ventured back down to Kanda, able to say goodbye a second time to something I thought I'd never see again. This seems to happen to me a lot. Anyway, first I went to Carrefour and picked up a few things before I leeaveee and then I met Mai, Natsumi, and Kyohei for lunch!

Natsumi and Kyohei are taking a few Korean classes before regular school starts up again in a few weeks, and Mai came down for the same purpose as I. 'Twas fun, especially as I hadn't seen them in actually over a month!? And wasn't really sure I'd get to again. We talked about random things and they all tell me they super want to come to America. Alas, we are all broke and I don't know who will win the race---them coming to the US or me returning to Japan. They were trying to convince me to come back winter break already. I don't think so >> After about an hour they had to go back to class, so Mai and I sorosoro made our way back to this part of the prefecture. Talked and talked and talked some more. I am impressed by my improved ability to somehow keep up two hours of conversation in Japanese. Even if it's still quite imperfect. Dah. It turns out that Mai and I have the same birthdayy. I am surprised we didn't realize it until this afternoon! Especially since it passed a few weeks ago. And indeed she told me I should stay with her "when" I come back to Japan, as a substitute for Kelly, hehe.

After Makuhari adventures, I hung around the house to await the arrival of the Takkyuubin guy. He got lost and called and I was all ahhhh because I don't know the area at all well enough to give directions and no one was home. But somehow we worked it out and my bag is now comfortably chilling at the airport.

Thereafter I did a lot of nothing. Packing, repacking, pacing, figuring out entertainment for the airplane, etc. Kayoko came home after a while and she had me record my English voice for her answering machine because everyone knows what it says anyway and Eigo == kakkoii. Then we picked up Rio from after-school school and then went for Okonomiyaki. The owners of the restaurant were her friends from high school, which is kinda amusing, so they were super nice. Soo much food though. Not going to need to eat until I get home it seems. Except some of my leftovers for breakfast. Hiroshima okonomiyaki > Tokyo okonomiyaki. But it was still good.

After we came back I did more of nothing and said bye to the neighbors and am continuing to do nothing. I could sleep now, but the more I sleep tonight the less I'm going to be able to sleep on the plane. And so I debate: be bored now with freedom of movement or be bored later with restricted movement. Unfortunately, the latter wins. Because if I don't sleep tonight AND I can't sleep on the plane (highly probable), I will also be useless at doing anything, such as writing, and thus end up staring at the tray in front of me for fifteen or seventeen hours or however ridiculously long it takes. Which would be incomprehensibly awful. At least I may have a Cannon to be entertained by for the majority of the travel.

Chiba house->New Hampshire house best case scenario: 22 hours
Chiba house->New Hampshire house worst case scenario: 46 hours (if it can match last time!!)


4 September 2007 - 6:54pm (?) near Siberia

This morning I awoke at 8:15am. After more mosquito combats last night, I figured out that if I sleep with the light on they won't bug me for some reason. So that's what I did. And I remain intact.

I had leftover okonomiyaki for breakfast and then had my last shower. Kayoko had to go to work early again so she bid me goodbye around nine. Fairly painless. I did dishes and folded laundry and and whatever else I could think of for the next while. Slowest three hours ever. Played gridwars and reorganized everything on my computer. Didn't feel like working on the novel/couldn't concentrate properly.

At noon I hauled my cello and heavy carryon bag down the stairs, not one bit looking forward to having to carry my own weight in luggage the mile to the station. So I decided to hitch-hike. On a total fluke, the grandmother of one of the neighbours was on her way out and she'd stopped to talk to someone real quick. As I was walking by she looked at me, and I looked pitifully back and in as politely as I could, asked if she was going anywhere near the station. She laughed and told me to hop in. My pockets thank me for the reduction of my future chiropractic bill.

Anyway, she was really nice and we talked for a bit. Turns out she was going in the opposite direction, but she insisted she didn't mind...

I stopped by the konbini for some lunch (onigiri) and then with perfect timing got on a train to Tsudanuma. From there I had to wait a bit and I paced and paced (not literally, because I was holding my cello, but my mind was certainly pacing). Then came the train to Narita and the entrance to the airport, etc., was all quite easy to navigate. Had to walk the stretch of the terminal to pick up my suitcase, but all went smoothly.

Lines and lines and people speaking English to me and interesting self check-in machines. The cello didn't appear to be a problem. And I observed a while to make sure they were handling it nicely.

For a while I was semi-flipping out cos I couldn't find my green card. Don't need it here but definitely do to get through the US. It wasn't in its usual spot, but I'd just forgotten that I'd put it somewhere where it'd be safe from my losing it. Go figure. But I did find it.

Going through immigration, I encountered Cannon, and we've been chilling from then on. I managed to spend the rest of my money (not enough worth converting back into USD) at the airport and now have seven yen remaining. Managed to calculate things well, somehow. My cellphone also has only a minute and a half left of time on it.

So we only had to wait about half an hour and really all the waiting stuff seemed to go by quite quickly. My luck is holding up so far. Maybe trying to make up for the nightmares of my arrival. I dunno.

We switched our seats a bit on the plane, and again everything worked out well. I am next to Cannon AND I have an aisle seat (she prefers the windowww). They also had vegetarian (vegan, actually) food for me, which was semi-edible, so I'm not forced to fast like last time. It's been about 2.5 hours on the plane (8.5 til Chicago!) and 7.5 hours since I left home. If things stay smooth, I'm 1/3 of the wayyyy. Listening to Rachmaninoff. watched some Shrek 3 in Japanese ... observing some people near me writing in Thai, which is pretty funny-looking ... mahh.


4 September 2007 - 6:20pm (?) around New York

I am writing now from the past. How curious. It's been September fourth for a long time.

So the flight to Chicago was quite long and boring, but I endured it, despite doing almost nothing and getting a sum of maybe one hour of sleep. Eugh.

Once at O'Hare we had to reclaim all our luggage for another security check, which was pointless and made me panic about my short connection time. But at least I know now that my stuff made it to the country. And hopefully Boston.

Cannon and I bid farewell and then I took the train to my gate, whereat my next flight was just about to board. Called home briefly, amazed by the timeliness, and then the expected happened. One of the flight attendants was MIA and we couldn't even board without the minimum number, so they had to go find a new one. What kind of a lame excuse is that for a delay?! A new one for me, in any case. They sped super extra and we were only 10 minutes late.

Having only seven yen I could purchase nothing to drink and so for a long while I was dying of thirst until they finally belatedly and one-by-one offered us stuff on the airplane. I was close to hallucinating or vomiting. Indeed, I largely mistook the guy sitting in front of me for a character from my novel. Luckily I was smart enough not to greet him. Not good, but anyway. I appear to be OK now. Had another (last) onigiri and am now about 45 minutes from Boston.

There are lots of cool cloud paths outside my window. But I'm photography lazy today, so oh well.


4 September 2007 - 11:17pm HOME!

So everything went alright with my bags and finding my mother and driving home and remaining intact. It's nice to be home and have it be less than 60 degrees outside and be looking forward to three weeks of nothingness until classes start.

And so my blog comes to an end.

Farewell, dear readers. I'm very impressed if you've actually read the whole damn thing.

Awh.

2 September 2007 - 7:46am Andrea's apartment

Yesterday was pretty interesting. Andrea and I woke up around 8:30 and skipped breakfast in preparation for an epic morning. Or would-be epic morning. Hmm. First adventure was discovering how disgustingly rusty the bands on my watch had gotten and hacking off the metal parts over a cutting board with a knife. They are now tied together and it kind of works. I'll just need to find a better band. Then Hiro came to pick us up around 10:45 and then we met our Sri Lankan friend (Eranga) and we went out for brunch. The first place we went to didn't open until 11:30 so we pondered and pondered and had a very hard time coming up with somewhere to go, so we settled on kaitenzushi. Worked out alright. I'm always surprised by the amount of stuff I can eat at sushi restaurants.

It didn't take all that long cos none of us had 25-plate appetites like some other people I've gone with, so then we were all what should we do nowwww and suffered from an extreme case of abulia.

We finally decided something. And then we went out to the car. And Hiro's decided not to start. There were jumper cable adventures and no one but Andrea really knew what was going on, but things weren't cooperating, so Hiro's father came by and took care of the car. Andrea hadn't met him before, ahah.

And so we went to karaoke for just an hour and were well-amused. We dropped Hiro off at work and then Andrea and I came back to the apartment and did nothing for a few hours. In other words, I wrote over 4000 words (ridiculous!), did laundry, and caught up on my planning for the rest of my trip. Andrea, by default when having nothing else to do, has the fine option of studying. I am forcing myself to take a break from that. At least until the airplane.

Andrea had work at 7 so I entertained myself further and then came down to the restaurant around 10:45 for cassis sorbet and to talk to/say goodbye to everyone. Aww. I met two random girls in their twenties (one Japanese and one from who knows where) and we folded napkins and oshibori for a while and it was entertaining. Hiro was improvising magic tricks also. They weren't hard to figure out, but a good display . . . Andrea insists she's never too busy, despite the fact that the place was full, so she kept sneaking away to talk to me. Eranga actually was busy, but came over for a bit. Anddd Kurumi was there too, and she would come over and be like "how do you say __ in English!" and we had some good dictionary hunts. They're all so nice =p.

Andrea and I strolled home when she was done and deposited ourselves on our futons. And I have only 2.5 days left in Japan. I can't believe it. Part of me now wouldn't mind hanging out for another two years.

Meh?

1 September 2007 - 1:00am Andrea's bedroom

Much of today I spent again doing nothing/working on my novel. Keep in mind that working on it and working on it doesn't mean it really gets done. But there's progress.

I met Andrea at the station in the evening and we walked around a while and had things to eat and found a cool art museum with strange towers and foutains and vine curtains. We stopped by her restaurant to visit our Sri Lankan friend and talk about plans for tomorrow. We hung out there for a while and had ice cream and listened to the people behind us talk about Christianity. They were crazy. Kurumi was around too.

Got back and studied because it was midnight and we're strange people.

Also, August is now over.

More of the same

31 August 2007 - 10:50am Andrea's apartment

Yesterday I did even less than ototoi. I worked on my novel and I went out for Thai food with Natali, her boyfriend, and their other friend (Japanese). They act like 7-year-olds, but it's ok. They're very kind. Said boyfriend speaks French, English, Japanese, German, and Italian almost fluently. Ridiculous.

hwa

30 August 2007 - 9:45am Andrea's apartment

Between yesterday's entry I have done four things:
1. work on my novel
2. yoga
3. hang out with Andrea at the eki and watch crazy bikers/skateboarders
4. hang out with Andrea, Hiro, and some Sri Lankan guy at the restaurant

Yep.

Nothing.

Zzzz

29 August 2007 - 2:25pm Andrea's apartment

Things are starting to get boring now/wind down. This blog will soon be over - hurrahh. I'll go back to being a hermit and the happenings of my life will be a puzzle once again =o Anyway I might as well finish it. Only like 6 more days.

So yesterday I did nothing for a while and then we decided to go exploring, so we explored for a few hours and didn't find anything that interesting except some more Australians. Then it rained on us and we came back.

We watched the parkour video, which had a very lame plot, but was slightly cool and all the Japanese was ridiculously slang-filled so we turned on the Japanese subtitles in order to understand it. ya.

I pondered my d-plan and I think it's going to have to be revised. I pondered whether to take another math class or cello lessons next fall and I've still not come to a conclusion. Luckily there are controlling forces in the universe preventing me

Andrea had to work in the evening so I napped/did more of nothing/talked to Jerry mostly and then hung out with Natali when she got home but then left and then Andrea and I went to bed around midnight.

Such a taxing life.

I don't think I can continue like this.

I woke up at 5 and then at 6 and then at 7, got outta bed and 7 and then talked about plants with Natali's boyfriend. ... He's French but he speaks English with a British accent, which is rather amusing.

I went to class with Andrea today. It was very long - 3.5 solid hours + getting there half an hour early - and we were the only non-Asians in the class. All the other students were Korean, Chinese, and Vietnamese, and of course the class was taught entirely in Japanese. Over the course of the 3.5 hours it very much hit me how different our textbook system was. Such a different order! There were tons and tons of words I didn't know (I think a lot of the class didn't know them either ... hmm) but I was comfortable with almost all the kanji they were learning. The grammar they seemed to surpass us, but my speaking skills were better than even most of the Koreans. That said, most of the Koreans have only been studying Japanese since January. Roughly I think the level is comparable to ours. Judging by the fact that I was not lost, but still things to learn.

After class we walked around the eki and had lunch. Then I went to the music store to stare longingly at the grand pianos. Alas, they didn't have any cello sheet music and I couldn't think of what I wanted for piano so I didn't get anything. Andrea's off for more teaching and so hopefully I shall talk myself into working on my novel. Else yoga, else meditation, else go crazy.

I need to figure out what I'm doing in September.

Mito

27 August 2007 - 11:40pm Andrea's apartment

Saa. After my shower I did more of nothing and it continued to be pleasant. Then Andrea got home and we decided to go to the supermarket for groceries and things that might be practical this week. Hiro came along and we got nattou and rice and avocados and bananas and such. Enjoying the return of some independence, yes. We were talking about Okinawa and Kansai-ben for some reason, and Hiro was telling us that when he used to live in Tokyo he worked 18-20 hours a day with three days off a month, and those three days, all he'd do was go down to Okinawa and leave his phone and watch behind and just sit on the beach and stare and stare and stare, not thinking about anything, and judge the passage of time by when the sun went down or came up. Yikes.

We hung around some more and Andrea prepared her English teaching lesson and we mused over pictures and assorted songs and textbooks. Natali came home around five and I was given the option of going to watch Aikido or going with Andrea to her English-teaching. I went with the latter, but I could still go on Wednesday or Sunday to Aikido. I dunno.

Walked to the station and debated things some more. Somehow started wondering exactly where we'd be in 10 years from the very instant, and so have recorded the moment as 2007/08/27 17:59 and we'll see if I can realize what's going on, if all is well, at 2017/08/27 17:59. Er, time to vary unless I'm in Japan somehow. Who knows.



We took the train one stop to Katsuta, where Mariko's mother picked us up and we went to their house. They were super nice and the house was also pretty big. Mariko's 13/14 and speaks English very well - she was born in Japan but they lived in the US for a while and moved back here only when she was 11. What she's doing is studying for some crazy test, and so she needs to learn all kinds of vocabulary words. Like avarice and status quo and despondent and pestilence and manifest and gaiety and finagle and colossal and miniscule and so onn. They had a dog named Pal (Paru) who was super hyper and it was fairly fun. They invited us to stay for dinner, which was luckily quite vegetarian-friendly. Assorted garden vegetables cooked with sausage that I could easily avoid and basil pasta. Plus pears. There were amused by my not using forks, but so it goes. We talked about global warming (地球温暖化) and their experience in the states - I guess they lived in Boston for a while! And Mariko really wants to go back because she misses all her friends who are talking about starting high school (the one she'd be at) and she misses chocolate milk and macaroni and cheese. Aww. The six year old was also very good at piano. Eesh.

After dinner, Mariko's mother drove us to the station where Hiro met us and we went on adventures to drop off videos at the video store and walking around a pond-side park. Nothing really happened, but much amusing conversation ensued. He asked what we'd had for dinner and we said, Pasta. He said, Basil pasta is good isn't it. And I was like, "Ah you have a good nose?" "A little better than a dog's." Makes sense since he's a cook. I guess. But anyway for the rest of the night we'd ask like, "which duck smells better!" and so on. We exchanged strange bug stories, especially about cockroaches, and he told us about this 5-story house in England where the lady living alone on the top floor had been discovered dead, devoured by cockroaches. He's very good at dealing with out imperfect Japanese and explaining things in an understandable way. We made bird calls and crazy duck calls and talked about water buffalo and "de-?" and "nantyatte" and "katsuzetsu". We think that the ducks in the pond are remote controlled from one of the nearby buildings, likewise with the tulips that all close at the same time and then shrink down into the ground. Yep. Hiro told us about his oneechan (older sister) who is ridiculous at arithmetic. When she goes to the supermarket, without thinking twice, she can put everything in her basket and including all the 10%-offs and any kind of two for one deals, she knows the exact cost of her total purchase WITH tax and so while the cashier is beeping everything through she's putting exact change on the little plate thing, and always freaks out the cashiers. What a skill. Then we were talking about parkour and could not for our lives remember the name. It was driving me crazyyy and so the first thing I did when we got back to the apartment was look it upppp.

Natali came home and then we chilled and went to bed.

I had a crazy dream that I remembered in a surprising amount of detail (2000 wordsish) and I've thought about it and I still don't get the point. I don't like frightening people unnecessarily, so I won't bother posting it here. And I woke up at 10 which was nice, so I've had a few more hours to relax and enjoy the heat. I don't like how it's 90 degrees here and I look at the temperature thing on my computer and it says Hanover, NH - 58*F.