Bonsai Blog

I’m back and Tokyo was AWESOME! Just posting this right now to let you know. Tomorrow will be the real update!

Ok, so nothing much interesting happened today. I walked around Namba for two hours alone…and really had nothing to do. It was kind of disappointing.

But I’m so excited for Tokyo tomorrow! It’s going to be awesome and we’re going to take lots of pictures and stuff!

And today I actually found the new webhost I’ll sign up with. So, yeah, that should be fun. At least they can move all my site and stuff for free from Elixant. I was about ready to sign up with a different one, but my friend suggested this one and it seems really good. So I’m kind of excited because I get more space and stuff with it than the other one with a coupon, and it comes up cheaper and stuff.

So I’ll post stuff on Monday I think about how it went! Cya!

This weekend I will be going to Tokyo, because my host family is extremely nice and decided to take me! They told me at the end of December, so I’ve been eagerly waiting to go. We’re taking a plane on Saturday and then staying Saturday and Sunday!! Whooo! The plane ride is only like 45 minutes to Tokyo, it’s like driving to St. Paul or something from my hometown, nothing bad at all. Less hassle at the airport even because it’s a domestic flight, but I still think the airport is a big time waster in the end… So many lines to get through, and waiting, and getting there early… etc etc. But at least it’s not the 6 hours to Singapore.

ESS Club finally finished the movie. It’s horrible. Since people kept messing around, we basically ran out of time and had to wrap it up…when we were only like halfway through the script. So half the action never really takes place, and someone just ‘wins’ the game. How exciting. The best part is the end, where we put down the game and got Yudai’s homeroom teacher to play along and pick it up and walk away. But he mutters two things in Japanese that are hilarious. It’s nothing English speakers would find particularly funny, but Japanese people have a different sense of humour.

Tonight ‘Identity’ was on TV. Luckily it was bilingual so I turned on the little TV and watched it in my native tongue. I found it a fairly engrossing movie, and watched it all…although I had planned to turn it off midway through because I’m tired at the moment. The English option is not censored, so there were a bunch of ‘F’ words coming out of the TV. And, of course, the rest of my family didn’t bat an eyelash, it’s kind of weird. I enjoyed the twist, because I had read a true biography about a similar REAL person who had committed a murder…or murders, I forgot the body count. I found the real case a bit disturbing though, and put it back to head back for fiction.

Lately all I’ve been reading has been about murders and crime mystery. The Patricia Cornwell books that T-kun left have all been read by me now. The main character is a Medical Examiner, so those were all about taking bodies back to the morgue and stuff. Now I’m on to Ed McBain books, which are mostly about violent murders that Police Detectives solve. I think the latter author likes stabbings. It seems to be the most common type of homocide. Both authors also have excellent research though, so it’s engrossing to read. And, just in case I want to read something other than bloody murders, Nagano High School has a book entitled ‘Tales of Erotic Horror’. I honestly wonder what foreign teacher left that. Thanks (not). But seriously, the selection at my school is basically all murder mysteries, romance, nonfiction, or translated Japanese to English books. I miss Stephen King.

Yeah, I’ve been pretty busy lately…so I haven’t updated. Sorry. My video with Yudai got an overwhelmingly good response on YouTube, and got me a lot more subscribers so that was good. And a bunch more people emailed me.

I’m just excited to go to Tokyo at the moment though!

And next week is testing for Japanese students, so each day starting Wednesday is only 2 hours long! Monday is 4 hours, and Tuesday is off…so definitely going to be nice.

I might update my blog tomorrow, depending on how interesting my day is, otherwise I’ll do a full update about my second trip to Tokyo. And PICTURES! FINALLY! So you can expect those on Monday or Tuesday.

Ok, so the ESS Club movie is going horribly. Honestly. It’s so slow getting done. We mess around a lot, and if I try to be serious, then everyone gets mad at me. So…I think it may never get finished, but at the moment, I’m getting pretty tired of typing up the script, so yeah.

As far as school goes, the year is just getting closer and closer to ending. I can’t wait for the two week break between grades. This weekend I’m doing like nothing. Going to study with Yudai on Sunday though, because he wants my help on English. Saturday I’m just going to sleep all day long. I’m so tired right now, moreso than usual… uh.

And, that last video I did seemed to go over better than I thought it would. It has garnered 156 views since Monday night when I put it up, which is much faster than blog #3 did. I also got comments like ‘You’re a really cool American’, so obviously, I’m happy. ESS Club also found the video and watched it (without me knowing). The next day, they promptly informed me that I look much cooler when I’m not at school. Thanks, I think. Ben, the foreign teacher from Texas, also watched it by just stumbling upon it 3 days ago. Sometimes I forget that it’s not just Americans who will be watching the video. Haha.

Yudai’s state is WISCONSIN! And the person who is handling finding him host parents is in MINDORO! (Near to La Crosse!) Mindoro is only 2 hours away from my house.

YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAY!

I am so unbelievably happy! My best friend is going to stay in the next state over!! Same time zone and everything! Out of a RANDOM PLACEMENT in the 48 continental states, Yudai gets a STATE that is right next to mine. And Mindoro is right next to the BORDER.

God…really must love me.

Ok, you can find my new video blog RIGHT HERE on YouTube. It’s by far the most interesting of all and Yudai (after a lot of coaxing…) participated so it’s doubly fun! Because I don’t think any of you have actually seen one of my friends except in pictures. Audio still makes voices sound ugh though.

Also, I ran out of money. Until I go to the ATM tomorrow. My cellphone bill came in at $80 and drained what I had on hand, and misc other fun activities evaporated the rest of us. Luckily I have like $30 now to cover lunch, so even if I don’t get to an ATM right away I still have cash on hand… If I didn’t have unlimited emailing/internet from my phone just that alone would have been $50. Luckily it only cost like $30 each month for unlimited. I read the Wikipedia from my phone when I’m bored so…yeah. That’s rather nerdy too. But I also must have over 1500 emails (recieved and sent) by now. There was also a $30 setup fee that won’t be there next month…

I’m so tired now. Late nights this weekend and I must get up at 5:45 tomorrow. Ugh.

Ok, so lots of stuff has been going on.  Including a going away party for Sarah (one of the Rotary students from America) because she’s going home.  Too many issues at her school apparently, so it’s too difficult for her to stay.

After the dinner I got Fall Out Boy’s new CD!  Whoo!  It has two exclusive tracks for the Japan release that aren’t on the American CD (iTunes only).  So I wanted the Japanese CD for the song GINASFS.  And yeah, so I have some new music.  Although it was $18 because Japan is so expensive.

I have the day off tomorrow.  Yudai’s coming over and is going to Co-host my next video blog with me YAY!  That will be fun to make.  And we’re also watching a movie in Japanese.

This week I will be REALLY busy with ESS club filming, since we have basically the whole movie to shoot in 4 days.  With about 1 hour each day. It’s going to be very difficult, and the weather has to be sunny each day.   And I have to keep writing the script as we go.  So I have that to look forward to…

 And my school year is also drawing to a close.  I will no longer be a second grader here, but a third grader!  The senior equivelent, top dog in school.  It’s going to a be a bit weird, because my classmates could change and my classes definitely will…so I’ll have to get used to that.  Most exchange students don’t have to go through going up a grade during their year, but Japan switches at an odd time in the Spring.  Little nervous about the changes.

And of course, HAPPY BIRTHDAY MARY!  Hope your birthday was great!!

(By the way, at the end of this month I will be opening a forum for questions and discussions on Japan and being a foreign exchange student.  It’s out of fun, and necessity because I get a LOT of emails asking the same questions everyday, mostly from my video blogs which, in total, now have over 1,000 views.  I think.  Yay.)

I injuried my foot during running yesterday, and it was painful to walk today.  So I actually had a slight limp, it really hurt to put weight on my left foot.  I had to walk a lot today to school, to Rotary, to Japanese class, back to school, back to the station, and then home…and it was not fun.

My speech actually went over very well at Rotary, and my friends also complimented me when I practiced.  One of the Rotary members actually asked for it for some reason, so obligingly, I gave it to him.  Only to realize that I have to give that speech SUNDAY too!  Wow, I’m a genius.  So I’ve rewritten what I can of it from memory and will have to fill in blanks tomorrow to flesh it out.  I didn’t memorize the whole thing.  So that’s just another thing on my workload.

Then I have to write some of the script for ESS Club, which is somewhat difficult, I’m not a fan of script writing.  I want to procrastinate on it, but I really can’t afford to tomorrow, and it’s stressing me out a bit, since it’s a different style of writing than I’m used to.

And on Sunday of course I have a District Rotary Meeting to attend… which I’m not sure what it’s about.  They call them orientations, but we don’t really learn anything new about Japan.  I think it’s just a short one or something.  But combined with the script/speech/etc it almost cancels me doing anything fun.  I am going to Shakey’s for dinner on Saturday in Osaka.  So…one fun thing I guess?  And I’m already completely worn out from this week.

To finish off the day, one of my friends and I got into an argument that did not go very well.  Everything has since been resolved, but it was not pleasant.  Then I get home and my host mom’s sick.  So I’m just hoping I don’t catch anything.

I’m tired, it’s 11:30 at night, and I’m not in a good mood.  Kind of a good mood actually I guess.  Good night.