2nd/3rd Days of School

I am already starting to get lazy with my posts! Luckily, I forced myself to write this last night. ^^

On Tuesday we went to class as usual. We had foundation from 9:30 until 11:20 and then we have an hour break for lunch. We went shopping and bought some really cute bento boxes. After shopping, we were almost late for class and didn't have enough time for lunch so we bought soda from one of the vending machines along the way (there were at least 6). Unfortunately, in our hurry to get back to school, we turned at the wrong street. We ended up being 10 minutes late.

After our second block of foundation, we have culture classes on Tues, Wed and Thurs. Tuesday was calligraphy. I am really bad at calligraphy, so my name stamp looks kind of awful at the top. I got better by the end, so the last character in my name is nearly perfect.

We also painted the kanji for dream--after practicing a dozen times--on really nice paper. But first we had to make the ink, which is a long process of scraping an ash stick thing around in water. Shelly and I both put the kanji off-center, but our sensei told us that it was okay because where we signed our name and put our stamp fixes it. It is not a word, but a work of art.

Then we went home, and had dinner in the cafeteria with the other girls. No one talked to us, but one student in particular kept smiling at us. Unfortunately, we didn't know that you are supposed to use a card when you go in there--and no one was brave enough to tell us. So we got in trouble with the dorm lady, who is actually quite scary.

After that we were going to give the dorm lady a present when I fell asleep. Shelly came into my room and scared me half to death, and then I didn't wake up until 6.

Today, we went to school, weren't late at all and learned tons! We had Wendy's and crepes for lunch. It was delicious but quite expensive, so we won't do that again. We also signed up to go to the Shabu Shabu party on Friday--which was also expensive--but I am sure that it will be well worth it.

Culture class today was pottery. We went to a pottery master's home where he taught us that pottery is a fun art, unlike kendo and judo which requires "serious students." We won't get our cups until next month though, so maybe Maki-sensei (the teacher in charge of planning the culture classes) will have to mail them to us in America.

After getting home we made our first meal--onigiri (rice balls) with sake (salmon) in the middle, scrambled eggs and chopped carrots. It doesn't actually sound that good, but before we put everything in the bento boxes (and totally smashed our huge onigiri) it tasted quite good. I'm rather excited to show Mai-san (the receptionist at Genki JACS) our awesome, however untraditional, bentos.

Then we made friends with one of the other dorm girls. Her name is Ayumi (she specifically asked us not to use any honorifics with her, which you only do with good friends in Japan). She is studying American/English Literature at Kyuushu University. She was quite excited to meet us and she even complimented our Japanese (obiviously flattery as we are completely horrible!!).

Now we are getting ready for bed, even though it's only 8. Changing time zones is actually very difficult, especially without any sleeping aids (beyond benadryl).