GOLDEN WEEK: and what I did.

Golden Week = AWESOME WEEK
all you need to know.

Golden week was the most busy, and lazy, I have been in the shortest period of time in a very long time. I am usually a nice balance of busy and lazy every day. But Golden Week, there were some days where I was every where, and other days when I was just staying in bed all day. No days where it was half and half.

Thursday I ended up in Setagaya for the last have of the day trying to get my alien registration card, which I did get. But the commute there and back to so long that I didn't really do anything else for the rest of the day, I tried to make aikido, but ended up coming at the wrong time. Which was very embarrassing and upset me quite a lot. I don't like missing aikido, it is important to my sanity as a way to releave stress. Every time I miss it or don't go I get a touch more touched, not good. I did however exercise in the gym for a good hour, did a lot of running, was very sore, felt good. I had made the trek to the school, figured I might as well work out.

Friday was also a bit of a fiasco. I ended up kind of accidently sleeping through my classes. Apparently my phones alarm (which is what I have been using) has a setting where it turns my alarm off during holidays. Thus I did not wake up till around 11. Also very upsetting. I think I ended up cleaning most of the rest of the day.

Saturday was a big day for me. I was very happy, we got to go to TOKYO DISNEY!! It was great, almost exactly like Disney in Orlando. Except Tokyo Disney seems to have a strange obsession with certain characters, namely; Lilo and Stich (which I never saw and have no interest in), Monsters Inc. (which was cute and I liked it but by no means the best Disney movie), and Micky and Mini (which will of course be big in Disney World.) The thing that upset me and my friends was the distinct lack of any of the princesses. None of them were any where. It was all Lilo and Stich and Monsters paprphinalia. The Monsters thing I can understand, they just opened a new Monsters Inc. ride, and they are probably milking it for all it is worth, but really, no Princesses? I was a little disappointed at that.

I kind of pigged out at Disney, but it's okay because your allowed to do that at amusement parks, it's a law some where. The first thing we rode was the little space ship thing the lifts you high off the ground, it was pretty fun. I also rode Space Mountain three times. I never rode it in Orlando, but it was a lot of fun. I got a picture with Captain Hook (great guy, I like his hat) and the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland (also a great guy, and he said he liked my hat and we exchanged witty comments.) I rode The Haunted Mansion, which I love, I kind of want to live there. That ride makes me giggle, though the line was painfully long and probably the root cause of the horendous sun burn I developed about 5 hours into the stay at the park. Also rode a flight simulator called Star Tours (yes, we were supposed to be going to one of the Star Wars planets but ended up facing off against Emperial Cruisers and the Death Star, good times all around.

Also rode the Caracel and Alices Tea Party. I love the Tea Cups, they make me very happy. Dad always spun me really fast on those, so I put the guns to work and spun the our tea cup as fast I think they can go, with the help of Meaghan of course. It was a lot of fun. Another of my favorite rides from the trip was Splash Mountain. Some of the big flume rides scare the... whatever... out of me. But this one was very tame and the only really LONG ride, besides maybe the Haunted Mansion. You went into all the little places in the Briare Rabbit story, and there were two drops on the inside of the building (they were pleasently sized drops too.) And then came the big drop on the outside of the ride. It was a lot of fun and I didn't even get that wet, just a pleasent damp across the face.

We also went on a train ride I want to say was called Thunder Ridge or some such. It was one of the little roller coaster train rides. The drops weren't that big, though they kind of looked like they might be, but it was a very tame ride, I was a little disappointed. I look forward to maybe going to another amusement park in the near future, one with bigger and bader rides. Disney was a lot of fun though. I really enjoyed it. One thing that probably made it so nice was that we had fast passes, so we could get a fast pass and then go ride a ride while we waited for our turn. It is a pleasent system.

I even got to see a bit of the light show parade at the end of the day and got an adorable Cheshier Cat-bell-phone-charm for only about $5. I love it, I jinggle when I walk now. I also rode one of the best rides. The Pirates of the Carabien ride is of course always awesome. From what I remember a bit from the one I rode in Orlando when I was little, long before the movie, they added a part with Barbarosa attacking the jail, and a bunch of Jack Sparrows popping up in random places. It was a lot of fun, I enjoyed it a lot. And no, they didn't sing the pirate song in Japanese, though I do believe the skull that says good luck in the beginning was speaking in Japanese. It was awesome, and we even got to see Mr. Sparrow outside of the ride. I felt kind of bad for him, he was being attacked by a gaggle of little Japanese girls (girls being like people my age.) I didn't try to attack him like SOME people did, and kind of let him run. I feel kind of sorry for whoever plays him, doing that day after day. Though the guy did make an excelent Jack Sparrow and probably would have been hot out of costume too.

All in all, except for the ridiculous sunburn, which has finally led to the peeling it promised it would when my skin burned and turned waxy, Disney World was awesome! I'm glad I got to go, but it makes me want to go to the one in Orlando again. Also I want to go to Disney Sea, which is another part of the park but requiers another ticket, but supposedly has the better rides. Like the Tower of Terror. Maybe if I get a job.

I have indeed applied for a job on findstudents.net, which introduces Americans in Japan to people who want to learn English. As people can see from my many spelling mistakes, I may not be the best person for the job, but for conversation I am good, and I am actually pretty good at essays, as long as I have a spell check. I am hoping to get some people soon. If I can get a few usual customers I can stay here for another semester. So I really hope I get at least some people. I'll let you know, but they haven't give me a conformation yet, so we will have to see.

Sunday was also fun. Woke up early again (did I mention the day at Disney was a 6 to 9 day?) and went to Asakus for a class project. One of our teachers has devided us into groups of about 2 or 3 ISP students and one Japanese student and told us to go explore places in Tokyo and come back and do a presentation on what we found. We chose Asakusa (pronounced a-saw-ksa) because it is kind of an old styled street market connected to a shrine. I didn't really know what to expect but I am glad we picked it, it was absolutely awesome. All manner of food and wears were sold in the old styled market, most of the food was really cheap too. A lot of the wears though were meant for tourists, and not very Japanese. Some of them were authentic though. And the food was definitely authentic, and smelled delicious.

The shrine too was amazing. And exspansive. I kind of felt like I had finally come to my church. It would have been nice though if it hadn't been so crowded. I hope to go back soon on a day when it won't be so crowded, some time during the week. The buildings were awesome and it was really cool to see the temples. I was a little sad that they were doing reconstruction on the main building, made it hard to see how pretty it would be other wise. I enjoyed learning about the different kannon and budavistas from our buddy. I actually got a compliment from a Japanese man who over heard me talking about them. He said I knew more than a lot of Japanese people did about Buddhism, I felt very proud. I wish I knew more. There are so many different dieties, it is hard to keep them all straight.

I like the Zodiac temple best. It had the different budavistas of the zodiac animals. Mine is the snake and the kannon that goes with it is Fugen Botsatsu. He (or she, many of the kannon look very androgenic and it is hard to tell, though I susspect that might be the point, but I am pretty sure Fugen is a he) rode and elephant. I thought it was pretty cool, and really worked hard on praying.

There are places all around the temple where you can get your fortune for the year told. You give 100 Yen and shake this metal hexagonal can, tip it upside down and jiggle it a few times and a stick comes out. You match the numbers on the stick with the rows of small drawers and pick a piece of paper from your drawer. My fortune wasn't so good. But there is a remedy for this. Tie your fortune onto one of the racks that are scattered about and you will have a much better fortune.

Then we went to a cool old resturant from the 1800's. It was pretty cool and the food was good. I enjoyed my self. The other nice thing was that the day ended a lot faster than the trip to Disney had, and we were back in the dorm by 4. I even got Ice Cream at the baskin Robbins out side the resturant. But it was a very educational day. I learned a lot about Buddhist religion, and went to my first major shrine. I really had a could time and felt very good after words.

Monday I don't thik much happened. So much had been going on the two days before that that I didn't really want to do much. I have been reading a lot. Nothing Japanese, just for fun. I find that I am becoming a little withdrawn. I like being alone a lot of the time but it gets boring after a while. I kind of have been catching up on my sleep the last few days. On Tuesday I made the walk/train ride to school in the rain so I could go to aikido. I had a lot of fun at Aikido tough. We did mostly Ukemi, which are rolls that are very important to getting away once you are tossed. it was a lot of fun but my back hurts a lot now.

Today I had planned on going running and the back to Asakusa. But I didn't feel very good last night and slept through running and then decided to just get my rest. I think it was a good idea. I feel quite a bit better now. I also got all of my homework done. So I am ready for school and aikido tomorrow. I'm kind of planning on running tomorrow morning. Running is great exercise, I always feel better after running. Also I feel the need to repent for my poor eating habits at Disney. Though today I have eaten very little. I am considering eating some bread with peanut butter now, just to have a bit more food than the tiny quesadilla I ate a few hours ago as my only form of food.

If I do that I am going to put on one of the Kabuki dvds we got from our teacher, we have to write a critique on those too, though I do not know if I will finish it tonight. I might try and take notes in bullet, or write as I watch. I will tell you what happens later.

Really very little has happened. One thing I am happy about is that we no longer have Japanese 4 times a week, only 2. I feel like I have been regressing in my Japanese proficiency level for the past week and a half. I Don't know if it is because my mind is on over load or if I am just tired. I feel like too much is trying to be shoved in my brain at the same time and I can't deal with it anymore. But I am hoping this will no longer be the case now that our class time is cut down. I will certainly get more sleep now. Though depending on when I meet my prospective students, that could change quickly. With aikido, I am still kind of busy, even with fewer classes. I am sensing a lot of morning visits, but I may try to keep them afternoon.

Anyways, off to be more productive. Happy Golden Week.
~Eve