Family, Friends, and Fellow Country Folk,

My stay in Japan is over. I was there for nearly 6 months, and the whole thing just felt so surreal. Right now, sitting in the kitchen drinking coffee and listening to the Clash, it almost seems like I had never even left the US. It's so incredibly weird. If it wasn't for my increased knowledge of Japanese and the 800 odd pictures I took while I was there, I may not even truly believe that I WAS there for six months. But then again, Asheville now seems terribly small in comparison. Does that make sense? The six months almost seem like they never happened but at the same time they seem like the most real part of my life. I guess the word for that is surreal.

Anyways, since this is one of the last posts I'm going to write about japan, I'm going to just type my thoughts on japan, things I liked, things I didn't, what i gained from this experience, etc.

Some things that I dislike about japan(in no particular order)

The buildings in japan all have a look of having been built really fast, without any thought given to architectural beauty and instead only to convience and cost. The colors are all faded and dull. Which may be why all the shops are filled with bright colors(especially pink). The traditional buildings are gorgeous, but they are far and few between. Also, there are tons and tons of apartment buildings, and they're really rather ugly. Also, they have walls built around all the freeways, and that really gets on my nerves because they are just tall grey walls that prevent me from seeing everything. Lets put it this way, Asheville is brown and warm, and Tokyo is grey and faded. That's not to say that Japan doesn't have lots of natural beauty, but i just don't like the cities...... But anyway this is just my personal opinion.

Another thing I dislike is the way that old Japanese people talk. It the most annoying thing ever to listen to. They talk and talk and talk and repeat the same thing over and over and they make assumptions and end every. single. frickin. sentience with the word `-ne?` Blah blah blah ne? blah blah blah ne? It drives me up the wall! By the way, `ne` is a post position which is like asking for the other persons confirmation. Which is like them constantly validating their own opinions. So annoying......

Well, its not really just for japan, but........I dislike how the Japanese people insist on driving such ridiculously huge cars when their streets are so narrow. It is incredibly difficult to park and there just simply isn't room. Well, Its actually the same for everything. they want to have big houses and big cars and big furniture, but japan is really small, that that stuff doesn't fit! Its like they want to live the American dream in an eighth of the space.

Another thing that irks me. Tokyo is this amazing place to shop, with cool fashion and awesome shoes etc., and peeps in the Tokyo district STILL dress like they're in the 90's in America. Why don't people realize how important fashion is in their lives? Would it kill them to spend 5 extra minutes getting dressed?

Okay, that's enough pessimistic statements. Let's move on to the positive.

I LOVE Japanese fashion. It's cool, it's unique, and right now, in japan, it's no more expensive than it is in America. It's just so much more creative than America's, high fashion excluded. I realize that a person's fashion sense varies, but Japan is my personal favorite type.

I also love J-pop magazines, incidentally.

Another of my favorite things bout japan is the food. Japanese food is so yummy, even the weird deserts. Though now that I think about it, I probably like most country's food, except Chinese. Traditional Chinese food entails eating parts of the animal that I didn't know were edible, such as pig ears, fish heads, and even jellyfish(actually the jellyfish wasn't too bad, it tasted sorta like a seaweed salad).

Even though there were hard times as well as good times I still think that every moment of the experience was worth it, and I plan to return to Japan during college.

Thank you to all the people who supported me and encouraged my home stay.

wow, its been longer than i expected from my last post. Time flies when youre on break, I guess. So, the big news is that I went to Tokyo Disney sea on Monday!!!! Oh my goodness gracious was it incredibly fun!! I went with afsers that i had met in the beginning orientation(how long ago that seems....)and we went to disney land and after we did karoaoke. I went with awesome austrians and super cool americans and one total jerk(who was, koinkidentally, the only guy). But thankfully このアホ　went to his country early due to host family problems(i feel like i shoudnt gloat, but i cant help it). But anyway, we were some of the only foreingers in the park. We were also the loudest. I was actually surprised that they didnt kick us out. Also, japanese peeps dont cheer after a show, they just clap. So everyone always stared at us. But it was really the people that i was with that made the whole experience so much fun. we swapped jokes and sang disney songs etc. Yknow, the kind of stuff awesome peeps do. I was also taught an indispensible german phrase by Mirjams, which i later posted as my status on facebook. She actually didnt tell me what the phrase meant until the end of the day, so i had no idea why they were laughing so hard. Theres not really much else to say about that, i mean, its still disney land. I went on a roller coaster and ate various things and took a pic with aladdin(who spoke english). Yup.
So on new years i wore a kimono and went to a jinja. You shouldve seen everyone stare. It was hilarious. And kimonos have so much more parts than i thought they would. all sorts of special strings and stuff. I actually really liked wearing the kimono, but then again i do like to wear fancy stuff. The only part i didnt like were the socks and shoes. They were SO small and uncomfortable. Ugh.
Monday Im going to tokyo and then i only have like 11 days of school left before i leave!!!! Ive started swapping emails with my friends and stuff. Wow, im just so excited to come back home. I mean, i love japan, but there are also things about it that i dont like, and i miss my family and friends. Im finding it really hard to concentrate on anything right now, i cant even concentrate on this blog. can u tell? Oh im never going to be able to fit all of my luggage in my suitcase, because of the packages from my family and the presents ive recieved and the things ive bought. I cant even fit all the new stuff ive recieved, much less any of the old. troublesome. Well, i gotta go. Oh but before that are there any souveineirs that any of yall want? As long as its reasonable, ill try my best to get it. :) okay, im really in a rush so im not even gonna spell check so excuse the many mistakes. laters.

Merry Christmas everyone!!!!!!!
Before I get started with this post I would like to inform you that my Christmas is not that exciting. Ill be sitting around the house today doing nothing. Well, I'm having sushi for dinner, I guess that's interesting? And I guess its still Christmas eve for y'all over there? Mind boggling. Anyways, time to start.
Exciting things that have happened to me since my last post:
I went to Harajuku!!! Finally!! Harajuku is in Tokyo, and it was awesome. Its this really crowded rather narrow street filled with stores and food and booths selling all sorts of things related to Japanese pop culture. My favorite thing was the melon pan key chains with faces. They were sooooo cute!! And scented like the real thing! But I didn't buy one. I was short on money. And after my friend and I wandered around Harajuku for several hours, we then, of course, did karaoke and purikura. We also got matching bracelets. An altogether awesome day. There was also a lot of foreigners there, probably the most that i have seen since coming here. It was so funny. I don't know why, I think it was the expressions on their faces that was so hilarious. Sort of surprised and confused and excited, all at the same time. I'm not explaining it well, but trust me, it was funny.
I also had yet another AFS meet. It was sort of an event organized for the jenesys section of AFSers, and we normal AFSers just got to tag along. The Jenesys program is just a two week home stay and its free. Which I thought was so not fair. Anyways, most of the jenesys peeps were Australian so I had the refreshing change of speaking to a native English speaker. No matter how good someone might be at English, if its not their native language there are bound to be things and expressions that they don`t understand, so I'm always careful to speak in simple English. But I didn't have to do that with the Australians, which was nice. I also met some people from orientation. It was so nostalgic. OH! Something weird. Apparently Australians don't realize they have accents! I was talking to them about America and i mentioned that they'd fit in right away because of their accents(I mean, c`mon, who DOESN'T love an Australian or British accent?)and they got all surprised and kept saying how they didn't have an accent. Weird, I know. Okay, so for what we actually did. We went and met a sumo wrestler and all got our pics taken with him. Which took all of 20 minutes. And then we went and looked at bonsai trees. Then we had a traditional Japanese lunch(yum!). And then we went and looked at a traditional Japanese doll museum. See, the Japanese have a boy festival and a girl festival once a year, and on the day, the family takes out a collection of dolls. The dolls are uber fancy and expensive, and there is one set in each family for the boys and one for the girls. I want a set. They were so gorgeous. I also want a bonsai tree and a kimono, just in case anybody cared. But all three are ridiculously high priced. A good Bonsai tree is about 2,000 dollars, kimono is 4,000 dollars, and a doll set is 3,000 dollars. I probably wont be getting any of them anytime soon.
My next exciting thing was a Christmas party. We ate pumpkin curry and played cards and went shopping and did purikura(we actually managed to fit 9 people in there) and it was a wonderful, low key Christmas party. So I guess it weren't that exciting, but still really fun.
Now here are some slightly more mundane events and observations.
So I took the Japanese proficiency test like two weeks ago, and I'm pretty sure i failed. Oh well. But I met a friend there, quite randomly. Cindy, from Germany. Have I already told you this? Cant remember. I was surprised by how few Americans there were, i mean, there were SOME, but the majority were Chinese and Hispanic. And a few Indians. And a few Africans. You know, its really rather cool that I can meet so many people from all around the world on a regular basis and its perfectly normal. Its the best thing about AFS. The worst is that they give you homework to do, even though you payed for the program. I have to write an essay about my experience IN JAPANESE. I have been studying Japanese all of three and a half months, and they want me to write an essay. I don't even know what i would say in English. If I say any of my true feelings, ill end up insulting someone, but i hate being cheesy and false. And they JUST gave it to me and they want it on the 9th of January. Darn them. BUT my Japanese is definitely improving so maybe ill be able to pull it off. I still have more things to *talk* about but my brain is fried. Laters.
Emily

WA ha ha ha ha ha!!!! Ive decided to shock you all by posting another post just a few days after the last!! Also, I have a feeling that the last post was of pretty low quality, so this is a sort of compensation. Anyways, today I took the Level 4 Japanese level proficiency test. I think I did pretty well considering that Ive only been studying Japanese for three months. Oh! I also met a friend there! It was really quite random. I hadn't known that she was taking the test in the same test as me. The person I met was.......Cindy, from Germany. Shes really nice. She has instilled within me a strong desire to go to Germany. Before I started on this little excursion, it had never even occurred to me to go to Germany. I guess I had some subconscious dislike, triggered by history lessons and period movies. Which I know isn't fair, but i didn't do it on purpose. But now I really want to go to Germany. All the people Ive met from there are really funny and nice etc. And from what they said, the country itself sounds awesome. Anyways, back to the test. So I had to get up really early for it(and on a Sunday, no less!! oh, the indignity....) and I was exhausted and then, typical of Japanese people, they had to stretch a 2 hour testing period into a 4 hour one by all of the ridiculously long breaks. Most Japanese people seem to be that way, they go really slow, and then they go really fast to make up for the time they lost. Its like that for driving, and talking, and how they schedule their day. BUT this is just my observation and it is entirely possible that I could be completely off my bonkers and they are, in fact, entirely normal.
So I should have had the next few days off for testing, but I somehow got roped into going to school Monday for flower arranging and going on some sort of trip thingy with my teacher Tuesday. I really need to learn how to say no..... Speaking of learning how to say no, my host niece and nephew came over recently to play. I ended up spending an entire day with them because i cant say no to little kids. I don't think I've ever been able to say no to them, which is why I'm not the best babysitter. Depressing. But ANYWAYS fun things are coming up! I'm meeting so-chan this weekend for shopping and the next day is an afs meet, and then next weekend a friend is having a Christmas party and i may be able to sleepover at their house! The Japanese people don't usually have sleepovers, I guess its an American thing. And after the party I have two random days of school and then its winter break!!!!!! Yay!!!! Anyways I'm typing this when I'm supposed to be taking a bath(have I told you that the Japanese people take baths every night? Crazyness!!) so Ill just spellcheck this to get rid of all those nasty little misspellings which seem to have become more and more frequent and then Ill post this and then Ill get off!!
Night!!
Emily
ps I forgot to tell you that my host parents have put up a fake Christmas tree in honor of Christmas and its not half bad. Which also reminds me that daisy will be getting all of the angel ornaments this Christmas! Dang. I guess it doesn't really matter.....and now I've been on way longer than i should`ve so laters!!!

Hello everyone. It's been a while. I've been crazy busy and whenever I've had free time I've been studying like mad for a major Japanese test I have this Sunday. I'll probably fail:) Oh well. There are more important things in life than good grades. So I wrote a list of things I want to talk about because I knew I'd forget something, but then I went and lost the list! So typical. Let me try to remember what I've been doing, and what's coming up. Umm. Well, I had to give a speech in front of my class. Wait, no, I don't want to think about that. Let's just say that I'd rather be a hermit for the rest of my life than have to give another speech. But afterwards both the boys and girls in my class played dodgeball together, and that improved my mood greatly. It was soooo funny. At first I was all serious until I realized that even if I was standing right next to a guy on the other team who had the ball they still wouldn't try to hit me. So I stopped trying to avoid them and just stood there. I later discovered that if I stood there and smiled everyone would pass me the ball, even if they were on the opposite team. Needless to say, my team won. But seriously, it was so funny, I kept cracking up and actualy missed catching the ball sometimes. :) Yup. That was my exciting dodgeball experience. Another school (not experience) thingy that I find amusing is the music they play during lunch. It's so random. (I just sort of quoted a tv show, did anyone get it?) For instance, today they played Backstreet Boys and music from the Nutcracker, as well as a traditional Japanese song. It's always such a weird mix of music.  Something that's really big in Japan is one day group travel. You pay a set amount of money and travel in a group. It's like a field trip for grown ups. Anyways, I'm telling you this because I went on one with my host parents last weekend. Which is why I didn't blog. I really couldn't see the appeal of it. It's the kind of thing that I find most annoying. I sat in a bus filled with people, and we drove hours to get to this little waterfall and to see "autumn colors" and then went and had dinner at an airport. An airpost, for cryin' out loud. But what really annoyed me was how scheduled it was. The bathroom breaks, snack breaks, everything was scheduled to a minute level. I felt like I was in preschool again. They even had a designated "nap time" in which they "recommended" that we should sleep. Yargh. But I ended up getting a "Doraemon" keychain, so it's all good.  So students at my school are testing this week, and instead of me getting any time off,  I have to ride the train for an hour to get to school, have one Japanese lesson, and then ride the train for an hour and a half back. It'll be like that Thursday, Friday, and Monday. I don't really mind, except I was planning to finally hang out with some friends those days and now I can't. Boooo. OK, now I need to discuss something positive. I have an AFS meeting next Sunday. Yup. Can't really embellish on that, I don't know any details. Oh, and winter break starts on the 23rd!!! That'll be nice. And then New Year's, which is going to be so much fun. Hrm, nothing else to talk about. My life here really isn't that exciting. Anyways, I'm going to school for an hour tomorrow, so I have to go to bed. Laters.

Here it is, people, the long awaited blog post (just humor me). Many things happened during the time I didn`t blog, the two most interesting being going to an onsen last sunday and to see Les Miserables today. I`ll discuss today first, since it`s still fresh in my mind.
So apparently my entire school goes to see a play once a year, for cultural purposes. Last year it was Elizabart, the emperor`s wife. (I probably got the title wrong, it was really hard to understand what they were saying.) This year was Les Miserables. My host parents were both busy today so I rode the train to the Imperial theater alone. I didn`t get lost, and I was very proud of myself. The only difficult part was finding the exit in the train station. The station had all these random tunnels and passage ways and ticket booths, and there werent any exit signs until you actually got to the exit, AND there were about 20 different exits! Seriously confusing. But I eventually found the exit ticket thingies and then ended up climbing this random set of stairs to get out. The stairs had about 4 flights and about 2 flights up(the station was underground) there was a barber shop. Weird huh? Wish I`d taken a picture...... Anyways once I discovered the exit I then went to the theater. The play itself was fine, with lots of special effects and a good orchestra. But since I couldn`t understand the songs it took a bit of the pleasure away. The costumes were good, though. It was fun seeing all those Japanese people in old fashioned western clothes. Also all the men had pony tails. Yay pony tails! And I mean the hairstyle, in case you`re thinking of anything weird. -_- Anyhoo, that was my experience with the play. I won`t be going to school tomorrow cause I have this Japanese proficiency test coming up in about a month and I seriously need to study. Also tomorrow my host parent`s 60 year old friends are coming over for a BBQ. So I need to mentally prepare for being told over and over and over how `kawaii` I am and how much they envy me for being young. Which is the stupidest thing to be envious over. They were young too, or have they forgotten? It`s a trial on the nerves to put up with them. Speaking of them, I nearly went crazy dealing when I went to the onsen with them. They came with me and my host mom. They DO NOT know how to use technology. A three hour car drive turned into a six hour one because they kept missing the turns that their GPS told them to make. They also COULD NOT stay concentrated. For example: Host mom`s friend A"oh look there are so many grape vines!" Host mom(while driving)"You`re right!"(HM looks around(while driving) and inadvertently steps on the brakes, causing cars to honk and swerve. HM&friends look surprised and wonder why they are being honked at)HMFA"Since their are so many grape vines, maybe there is a winery around that corner!"(The hell kinda logic is that?)HMFB"Lets look!" HM suddenly turns around the corner, causing cars to honk *surprise*HMFA "Oh, there isnt a winery" HMFB" maybe there is one around that corner!" HM" lets go see!" And so on. This continued for about 30 minutes before we found a place that sold wine(note, I didn`t say "winery" I said "place that sold wine". Then it took us a further half hour just to get back to the place where they first decided they wanted wine. But enough complaining. The onsen itself was great, it was at the foot(not literally) of mt. fuji so i got to take pictures, and it had delicious food and I got to wear a Yukata(just for pjs, though). The onsen also sold some really weird Japanese foods, which I wanted to buy but didn`t cause they were rather expensive. Well, anyway. The experience was worth it overall, if only to prove that I am pretty good at keeping my temper. HM&co. never discovered how incredibly annoyed I was. Anyways my host mom keeps looking at the clock and then at me so I figure it`s about time to get off. I`ll continue this post tomorrow, if I have time. Well, Ja ne.

Hello, People!!! So this week started off pretty bad, but then got good in the middle, and ended with bit of a negative turn. But now I have a three day weekend and I`m meeting some friends for shopping etc., so at the moment I`m preetty dang happy. So the beginning of the week was just awful. No idea why. It was just so exhausting and depressing. Mondays are always sad cause I`m short on sleep and there are my least fave classes, but this time was especially bad. And tuesday, which I normally love was pretty bad too. But then Wednesday was awesome. My school is really big on english and offers internships to americans and the like, and on wednesday a group of 12-16 year olds and some parents from america visited the school. I was asked by my japanese teacher to help her teach them some basic japanese phrases and it was SO funny and weird. I hadnt realized it since Ive been surrounded by only japanese people for the past two months, but Am. and Jap. peeps are so different. Americans are much more open and less afraid of giving offense. There were a lot of differences that I just cant put my finger on the words to describe, but the whole experience was rather enlightening. And then on that same day my teacher told me that my school was going to see Les Miserables in japanese on the 9th!! I was so excited!! They put posters up in my school and I took a pic. of one. So I was incredibly, amazingly happy, until after I got home thursday. Then I had the sense to check the calender to make sure that I was open on the 9th, and lo and behold! My host parents had planned a trip to a deluxe onsen on that same day! Needless to say, I was a bit saddened. I actually sulked in my room for a while after dinner. But I was able to wake up on friday in a relatively good mood(thanks to the afore mentioned reasons). Yeah, so that was my week.
On sunday I`m going to a flea market with my host mom. I wonder if I`ll buy anything. OH! Speaking of buying, I went shopping for a little at some point(don`t ask when, I honestly can`t remember)and I actually bought something! Just a dress and a skirt and a crepe with green tea icecream, whipped cream, green tea jelly, and some powdered sugar. (The crepe was delicious^-^) I love crepes. I also love traditional japanese sweets, especially the ones with that sweet red bean paste that I always forget the name of.
I have nothing else to write. Umm, well. Since I came to japan, ive started liking coffee. Is that sad or what? I was hoping to never like it since then I wouldnt have to run the risk of being addicted. I blame the vending machines. I was trying to buy some hot cocoa one day, but I couldnt read what the cans said(duh, it was in japanese) so I just bought one that had a picture of milk on it. It turned out to be that thing thats a mix of coffee and milk(forgot its name). I didnt really like it, but I forced my self to drink it cause I dont like to waste food. So I kept drinking it, and to my very great surprise, the more I drank, the more I liked it. So I bought another one the next day to see if the day before had just been a fluke. I still like it. And that is how I came to like coffee while in japan. Now that I look back, that was a really weird story. Oh, well.
Alrighty, so Ill just end this post and go do.......something else. (I wonder what?)
Oh, and to grandma. I have recieved the halloween pkg. I loved it. I shared some(a very little)with my friends at school. They were very surprised. :)Ive been eating the rest. Yup. Laters.