Calligraphy Class

July 13, 2011

Typically calligraphy class is for first years, but since Spencer and I are exchange students each week we get to skip a class and take calligraphy with the first years.

They look like they are having so much fun.

They are all so sweet and so cute!!!

But anyway, today was extra special in calligraphy class because Spencer and I got to make our own stamps! We literally carved our names in Japanese into stone. Except mine was being annoying and one part of it wouldn't let me carve it so I had to pick it up later from the teacher.

Carve...

The paste for the stamp...

And voila! We have our own stamps!

I still have mine!

☆

Careful!

July 12, 2011

Today was so much fun hanging out with everyone! The JET came and joined us for lunch, so we all had fun playing with his iPhone and making everyone look old. My guy friends were messing with the other exchange student, making him say things in Japanese that neither he nor I understand. They were supposed to be puns or something, nothing I understood.

They're always too embarrassed to look at camera!

After lunch we were waiting outside the classroom for the teacher, when someone's notebook got pushed out the window! There's a cement ledge under the window, so my friend jumped out and grabbed it. Pretty darn cool, I must say.

At the end of the day my friend, host sister and I decided to pop on over to McDonald's. I didn't get anything, but I must say Japanese McDonald's look much healthier than American. Granted I've only been to an American one once in my life...

ANYWAY we were just hanging out there when a couple of our classmates came in too! My host sister and I got scolded when we got home for being out so late.

It was so fun though!

Here Comes the Rainbow

July 11, 2011

Today a student returned from studying abroad in the Netherlands for a year! She is super sweet and nice, and we became friends immediately! My guy friend also borrowed my camera and took a bunch of extremely blurry pictures..with a few gems in there.

Me and my gal friends :)

After school I met a JET (Japan Exchange and Teaching Program) teacher who works at my school, and he and I had a nice long talk in English. But I guess because of my Japanese-esque appearance whenever students who didn't know me walked by they all had such a confused look on their face. Sometimes it feels good to be a native English speaker!

Anyway on the way home my friends and I decided to stop my a shaved ice cart, where a couple of them bought ぜんざい (zenzai, an Okinawan shaved ice treat with azuki beans and sometimes milky cream!), another friend who studied abroad in Thailand got "Thai curry," and I got strawberry milk shaved ice!

We were all eating and enjoying ourselves when lo and behold a rainbow appeared!

Think it's a magical sign for how much I love this place? ♡

Churaumi Aquarium

July 10, 2011

Today was so long...my legs hurt. But it was amazing, I got to visit Okinawa's famous Churaumi Aquarium! 

We got to see the typical dolphin show, hundreds of different exhibits of fish, turtles, manatees, and others, and even the carcass of a Giant Squid!!

The exhibits were incredible! And I knew the main exhibit was supposed to be big but it was absolutely huge. Pictures do not give it any justice.

The thing about Churaumi is that it is one not only of the world's most incredible aquariums (yes I'm biased), but it is on one of the world's most beautiful islands. Okinawa is absolutely gorgeous. So not only is the inside of the aquarium breathtaking, but just walking around the outside is amazing too!

People, if you go to Okinawa, Churaumi is a must-go!!

Tanabata (七夕）

July 7, 2011

After school is really the fun time! That's when we all hang out <3
Today is Tanabata, which is the day supposedly when the two stars which are lovers can meet for that one day every year. We all get to make wishes, and so what we do is write our wishes on colored paper and then tie it to bamboo.

Unfortunately for us, it was SUPER windy! During class we could hear the bamboo whipping around and then we would go outside to check on our wishes. Some people's flew away, but luckily mine stayed <3

I can't tell you what it is! Then it won't come true! (Or maybe that's just an American superstition...)

Haha it was so windy when we girls were walking through the hallways we had to cling onto our skirts so there wouldn't be any *ahem* unnecessary views and we would yell to each other "スカート危ない！" (Watch out for the skirts!)

After everybody went to sports and clubs Tama, Saya and I went to go watch the tennis club! One of my friends (the captain of the club) yelled "That's my friend! She's from America!" I thought it was absolutely adorable heehee

And that was the duration of my Tanabata :)

Till next time!

Normal Day...?

Sorry for not updating for practically a year! My mind has been other places...luckily I kept a journal while I was in Japan and updated it every day! So while I may not remember everything, I have it in writing! (But these posts are paraphrased)


-June 29, 2011


I went to school by myself this morning! My host sister had to go with a couple other students to get something done, so when I was dropped off, I headed out to find my classroom. Unfortunately, I did not know the school well enough, so I managed to get lost. Luckily I found another student in my grade and asked her to show me where the room was! She was super nice about it. Nothing particularly exciting happened because exams start tomorrow so everyone was busy studying. But today we did do Home Ec. for the first time. Everyone does it, and apparently they were already in the middle of a project when we got to Okinawa. They were sewing bags!

Yes, the guys did it too.

Spencer and I had to start from the beginning, which made it very confusing since our teacher had to help other students and didn't speak English, but a couple students were already done with their bags and took time to show us. Since Spencer and I had so little time, we made a compilation bag (haha).

P.S. Spencer really wasn't THAT much taller than most of the guys (ok maybe he was), but his feet were big enough that he could barely get his toes in! It was hysterical, he tried finding excuses to not wear them.

On another note, I decided to buy lunch today! My school's system for buying lunch was TOTALLY different from America's. People from restaurants would pack up food and set up little stalls where we could buy it. It was cheap too! Only about $3.

My lunch - fried rice and juice

The day went by smoothly - soon it was the end of the day. I was tired so I fell asleep on my desk for a little while. When I woke up my friend said to me in English, "Good morning." I replied "morning," to which he said 「じゃないよ」(it's not) and so I said "I know."

I hung out a little outside after that and waved to my classmates who were on sport teams until お母さん (Mom) came to pick us up. Not a particularly exciting day, but a fun one nonetheless!

Hangman in Japanese?

I would put that down as "difficult."


There way more Japanese characters than English letters (in Hiragana alone)!
At least my classmates new a good amount of English vocabulary, so it wasn't too hard for them.


But starting from the beginning of the day, the morning was pretty boring.
When we headed to P.E., which is mandatory by the way (we had it every Monday and Tuesday), we got changed and headed out.
I'm not sure if it's like this all the time, but while I was there the boys and the girls had separate P.E. The boys got to swim, while the girls had a choice of either volleyball or basketball.


I stuck out with volleyball, and what happens is we have a few drills such as having some time to practice passing, volleying, etc. After that we have a few games.


In one of the games, the other team hit the ball and I volleyed it...right into my face.
Amazingly, we were able to get the ball and score a point!


Anyway, later in the day we were headed to math, and the teacher wasn't there that day so we got a free period! Unfortunately, because the teacher wasn't there, we also didn't have the key into the classroom.

Eventually, we got the teacher next door to let us in.

When we got inside, Spencer suggested we play hangman! No one knew what it was, so we had to teach them.

First we did English hangman, but then switched to Japanese.

The last period of the day was English, but for some reason that day we weren't doing much. Therefore, Hiroki, Shuji and Hirotomo decided to create Spencer's name in Kanji! They were actually able to do it, and the meaning ended up something like "needed bear on the top level of the left side of Kanji." Makes sense, if you think really hard about it!

And at the end of the day, during clean-up time, Spencer and I decided to join Nikki with taking out the trash.

Outside, near the place where we toss the trash, was a group of other second years from a different class!

They challenged me and Spencer to rock-paper-scissors to let the losers take out the trash, and I ended up winning every time so they made me switch with Spencer haha!