Running up that hill

I had a busy day yesterday!

I was woken up at 8:30am by my mom so we could go for a walk to keep me occupied before work. I went into Dr. Kristin's office at 10am, got an adjustment, then did some work for her. We got to talking while she was fixing my neck and hips... I told her how I went to an 20-somethings church group Thursday night with my friend Erin (a friend from high school swimming! gasp!!). How I met Erin again was me going to the high school swimming parent meeting for my sister. I went instead of my parents because my mom was working and my dad doesn't like those things. Erin's parents were there because they have a younger daughter who swims with my sister now and they invited me out to dinner at Noodles and Co (I had a Thai yellow curry soup with rice noodles, very delish). It was SO nice. So I went to the 20-somethings church group the following night with Erin and told Dr. Kristin about it. We agreed that it was too bad that I never got to stay somewhere and settle down for very long. It is very hard to make friendships. Dr. Kristin really surprised me by saying, "Yeah, that's too bad! John (her husband) and I were talking and I was just saying how cute you and Dr. Brent looked together!" I blushed. Let me introduce Dr. Brent DeShaw. He's the new chiropractor (just graduated from chiropractor school) who is working in Dr. Kristin's office and he is very very good-looking. I came in to get something to work on from Dr. Kristin one day and he was setting up his new office. He came over and asked me for a second opinion on hanging pictures in his office. Very cute. I felt a stab of sadness because what hurts me the most about moving around so much is the pain of losing the opportunity to get to know someone.

Okay, so I did that, came home, then kept myself busy again by putting my new bible tabs on my new bible that I got as a gift from my dad. I had to distract myself from eating or drinking anything because I had to fast. I couldn't eat anything past 12midnight the night before and couldn't drink anything from 8:30am. Bletch. My dad then drove me to the Minnesota Gastroenterology clinic so I could have an upper endoscopy.

Got there, they wrist-tagged me, took all my vitals several times (low everything, as usual!), put an IV in me, then I went to the operating room. The doctor took a look at my heart rate and said, "You must be an athlete or something because your heart rate is really low." I have a resting heart rate of 45. Eheh. I asked her to go easy on the sedation because I'm a lightweight when it comes to these things and I guess they affect me a lot. She gave me the dosage and I don't even remember falling asleep. They stuck a camera down my esophagus to look at my stomach and took a few tissue samples to test. I don't remember a thing. The first thing I remember is a voice asking me if I wanted them to call my mom. (You are not allowed to drive after the procedure, so beforehand I had written down her name and number as my designated driver.) I said yes. My mom was waiting in the lobby and came right in to sit with me while I was coming out of it. My blood pressure was freakishly low. She asked me if I could start moving around and getting dressed. I put my shirts back on and sat up, but the nurse and my mom just stared at me, kept asking me if I was okay. Apparently my face was as white as my teeth. They kept on taking my blood pressure a million times and each time it got lower. So she had me lie down again and hooked my IV up to a gallon of water/saline solution. It felt really weird and cold having the water go into me. But that helped a lot and a bit of the color went back into my face, or so I am told. I walked slowly to the car and finally got to eat something at home at 4pm.

I still wasn't feeling 100%, but I had promised my brother that we would see Tropic Thunder. So we went and I was feeling a little nauseous towards the end with all the explosions and whatnot. It was quite a silly movie, but not really "good-silly" like Zoolander or Dodgeball. Came home (told my brother to "Drive carefully or I'll puke!"), took some tylenol on the couch, and got myself up to making dinner for myself, my mom, and my sister. We had green tea soba noodles, tempura, and brown rice sushi. It was really good.

Anyways, I need to take a nap because I am really tired... so I'll catch up on more things later. The conclusion is that everything looked fine from the doctor's point of view (with the camera and everything), but I'll know about the tissue samples on Wednesday or so. This is basically just to rule out Celiac, so even if I did have it, it wouldn't be all that serious. We'll see how it goes. I went for a 45 minute swim this morning and felt really great in the water, so I'm pretty much back to normal! (Aside from being sleepy. Zzzzzzz....)

I definitely just turned on my computer for the first time in several days. It's been languishing underneath the coffee table for a while. Oops!

What have I been up to? Well, it's been surprisingly not difficult adjusting back to American life. I haven't really had problems with it, save for the one night where I really missed my friends. My brother wanted to go out, my sister preferred being on the computer, and I had only my parents to talk to. I don't have friends here, so I haven't been around too many people other than my family members and the people I babysit for.

About my brother: Seeing him again was really cool. He was at a tennis tournament in Waco when I got home, so I had to wait until Sunday to pick him up. My mom and dad asked me to pick him up from the airport because they honestly didn't want to see him. They said he is just too rude and inconsiderate towards them. But I went in there without any prejudices and picked him up with a smile. He got home and the arguments resumed. Between him and my parents, I mean. It bothers me how he treats them like dirt. And, to a lesser degree, it bothers me how my dad now automatically assumes Justin is going to insult him/be rude to him every time Justin opens his mouth. Those two are always on the offensive. Justin has been going out every single night (except two so far) and now he's at a friend's cabin for four days. I hardly see him. He comes home after I usually go to bed and I have to stay up until all hours in order to see him. This past Sunday night he bugged my family to hurry up and get dinner ready so he could eat and go out. On a Sunday, which is usually family day. And then Kristin didn't want to watch Grease with me after I asked her to watch it with me for two days. I asked her the day before and she said "Tomorrow." Well, tomorrow came and she just went downstairs by herself to play on the computer. But back to Justin. He just stood there and complained until my parents told him to go. I just felt depressed and "boring." Apparently spending time at home with me is that terrible. He just can't bear it, I guess. I cried a little. Justin left after bargaining that he would stay home tomorrow night (Monday). Then on Monday he asked me to come watch him at a tennis tournament so we could ride home together. I went, watched a 2.5 hour match, and then his friends showed up. He turned to me and said, "I'm gonna go with them." I felt... sad. Discarded. He was just going to be miserable if I took him home, so I said "Fine," futilely reminding him of his promise to my mom to stay home. He said: "That's dumb." Well, I ended up waiting 20 minutes for him at the tennis center because he lost his wallet and phone, which fortunately turned up at the lost and found. His friends had left by then, so I took him home. He and I ate dinner, I went to the bathroom, and he was gone before I came out. So much for that. The following night he put up a large fuss about staying home, but this time my parents stuck with it and made him stay home. He sounded miserable. We went to the movie store to pick up a couple movies to keep he and I entertained. We watched 21 and Step Up 2, which was actually very fun. Then on Wednesday I woke up at 6am in order to go to Lifetime Fitness with him so he could do tennis clinic and I could work out. We also went out to lunch, immediately after which he went to go meet his friends. I mean, we were sitting down eating and he called his friend, saying, "Yeah, I'll be at your house in like 15-20." IT HURTS MY FEELINGS.

Okay, enough about my brother. Oh look, the sun finally came up. How nice. I've been up since 5am... couldn't really fall back to sleep.

Being with my sister is usually a ton better than spending time with my brother. For example, we went to a joint-personal training session at Lifetime on Friday together. We both rode our bikes there, talking about things, and worked out pretty hard with my sister's trainer, Mandy. (Side note: I have no muscles!! They are gone!! Need to remedy this somehow.) After the session, we jumped in the pool to get some yardage in and loosen up. I can't tell you how awesome it felt. I have swam my entire life, wondering what it would be like to swim with a friend who I could actually talk to. I've been on swim teams, watching everyone else joke and laugh, wishing I could be a part of it. But I was always on the outside, never inside the groups of friends that made up the team. Now I love swimming with my sister. We can work hard, joke, laugh, splash around... It felt so good. It made me wish I was four or five years younger so I could re-do high school swimming and swim with her. But I guess I'll take what I can get. Actually, the first time I got back in the water was last last Wednesday when I took my sister to her club swim team practice at 5:30am. It was at a long-course pool in Bloomington/Richfield, the weather was gorgeous, it was sunny... I felt perfect.

In other news, I think I may have Celiac Disease. I had a doctor's appointment last Monday with my GP and I did a fasting blood test (you don't eat for 12 or so hours before they draw your blood). My weight, despite not exercising in forever and eating whatever I wanted my last month in Japan, was stupidly low. Gr. I was mad and thought their scale was wrong. It should have been higher. But anyways, about the blood tests. It was so funny... It took about 45 minutes to get all the blood they needed from me. They poked me a total of five times, four in my arms/hands and the final time in my foot. They couldn't find any good veins in my arms/hands and my feet just happen to be veiny, so it worked out. The blood tests came out pretty normal and my hormones are normal (but I'm still not getting my period, how does that work?). But just the other day my doctor told me that I have one positive antibody for celiac sprue, so she wants me to see a gastroenterologist. I don't know enough about Celiac disease to explain it, but basically it means you are allergic to all things containing gluten. I'll just copy this from the website I did research on: "In people with Celiac Disease, eating certain types of protein, called gluten, sets off an autoimmune response that causes damage to the small intestine. This, in turn, causes the small intestine to lose its ability to absorb the nutrients found in food, leading to malnutrition and a variety of other complications. The offending protein, gluten, is found in wheat, barley, rye, and to a lesser extent, oats." I won't go on forever about it yet, but we'll see. I'm kind of hoping that is what is wrong with me so I can get healthy again.

Off to church!

This is going to be quick and not the catch-up entry I've been meaning to write... (Oh yeah, I'm back home in the U.S.A. by the way... Haha. Might be good to mention that.)

Jobs. I hate thinking about money, but it looks like I will be making some money this month. I made $110 in cash today from babysitting 1-10pm. It was long, so long. But hey, cash money for school. I have to have money in order to not worry about it. And I've got several other jobs lined up in the coming weeks, so I could end up making a tidy sum. This makes me feel... well, I have mixed feelings I guess. Having money does not make me happy and I would rather spend time loafing around at home with my sister/family, but then again if I do loaf around it would put a future strain on my parents. Which is not good considering that my dad doesn't have a job yet.

Oh, but about babysitting today. I babysat my chiropractor's little boy, Grant. My only complaint is that he was a little whiny/fussy around mealtimes/sleepy times. But other than that, I was amazed. I have never had a child say please when asking me for water and then say THANK YOU. I was thanked by a child who can't even form complete sentences yet. Just for getting him water. He is less than three years old. There is hope for humanity. And then he started crying when I left. That has never happened before.

This morning was absolutely perfect. I woke up at 5am like, "OK LETS GO" and was ready to take my sister to swim practice, but realized that my alarm was for 5:30. Oh well. I had originally intended to hop on over to the gym while my sister swam, but threw my swimsuit in at the last minute. I decided to go ahead and swim with her team at 6am. I was so incredibly nervous, having not swam with a team since... February 2007. I almost didn't swim. But oh I am so glad I did. The weather was gorgeous, the sun was shining, the people were friendly (and didn't care that I was slow), and best of all, I was with my sister. I wished I were five years younger so that we could be more the same age and swim together. And share more of those experiences. Sigh. But it was wonderful nonetheless. After swimming we drove over to the gym, sat in the spa/hot tub, took showers and got cleaned up for breakfast. I took my sister out to brunch at French Meadow, an organic foods restaurant on Lyndale avenue. She had the breakfast burrito and I had the BBQ tempeh wrap. Both were fantastic. After our splendid meal, we walked down to the Wedge Co-op for some grocery shopping and Oatscreme soft serve. Oh yeah. You know you're jealous. It hit the spot. When we got home we watched What Not To Wear and made six dozen cookies before I had to go babysit. It is so much more awesome being home now because my sister is her own person and we can actually talk about things.

I really need to blog about this first week in America's happenings, but it would take forever and I need to go to bed if I am waking up at 5:30am again tomorrow. Tis late.

Oh, and also today: I booked my flight for school via statravel.com. It was nearly a full $300 cheaper than Northwest airlines (I chose Frontier). I am absolutely ecstatic that I got a round trip from MN to OR for $399. I leave for school at 6:45am on August 31st and get back for Christmas break on December 17th. I have December 17th through January 19th OFF. It is going to be the best (coldest) winter break ever.

According to my certificate, I have now successfully "completed the One-Year Program at the School of International Liberal Studies, Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan, on this nineteenth day of July in the year Two Thousand and Eight."

The ceremony itself was pretty cool. It started a little after 10am and ran late until 11:30am. I got to walk across the stage, shake hands with the dean, and everything like a normal graduation ceremony. Corey even cheered my name when I was called. Hee. There were speeches, most of them quite good. After the ceremony was over I went upstairs for a bit and took pictures with a couple people, ate some of the food, and had to leave.

You see, I had asked Kana if we could hang out on Saturday afternoon but never told her that I had the graduation ceremony until 11:30pm. She bought tickets for our movie, 崖の上のポニョ (Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea), for 12:10pm in Roppongi, so that was a little difficult. But I told myself not to stress and get there as fast as I could. I ended up taking the subway in the wrong direction and delayed myself by yet another 10 minutes. We ended up missing the first 30-40 minutes, but I ended up loving the movie anyway. In case you didn't know, Ponyo is Miyazaki Hayao's new movie. It has a very Totoro-feeling to it, but is a cross between Little Mermaid and Howl's Moving Castle, character-wise. I really enjoyed it and want to see it again. I had the song stuck in my head aaaaaaall day. After the movie we walked around Roppongi Hills and Roppongi Midtown, taking purikura, visiting Kana's sunglasses shop, and doing karaoke. So happy. SO fun! Then we went on our way to go back to her family's house for dinner.

I love hanging out with her family. How can I not? They are such wonderful people. First we chatted for a little bit, and then all sat down for dinner. We sang a song from the hymnal, read a bible reading, and prayed. Kana's mom made so many wonderful dishes. It was beautiful. Simply beautiful. Ingen-mame, somen, kabocha, edamame, sashimi, sea veggies/wakame salad, nama-tofu, kiriboshi daikon, shisou drinks (which we mixed with sparkling water), this chicken-eggplant dish, gohan... I never have difficulty eating at their house. There is always something that is both vegetarian and tastes out of this world. I would eat her cooking every single day if given the choice. Oh, and that wasn't all. We had tea with dessert- the family had a fruit-garnished cake and I was quite happy with some yomogi-mochi and a plum. After dinner they all surprised me with gifts!!! I received a pretty bracelet from Chieko, a cute white-and-silver bag-purse from Kana, and a fan (I want to put it on my wall!!) from her mother. There also was a card in there with a picture of us from the last time I visited, with a Bible verse:

わたしの目には、あなたは高価で尊い。
わたしはあなたを愛している。
イザヤ四十三―四
Since you are precious and honored in my sight, I love you.
Isaiah 43:4

Everything was unforgettable. I am loved. I am blessed. Kana's father drove me back to 神尺時駅 and I gave Kana one last big hug. I went to the platform, nicely asked the train conductor a question, and then waited for the express train. Once I got on the train, I sat down, held my head in my hands, and cried. I finally just let go and cried out of happiness. I let myself be overcome with emotion and let it pour out. I didn't care who was watching. Thank you, God, for giving me these experiences and allowing me to meet such amazing people in my life. Not just in Japan, but I am supremely blessed for having the people in my life who love me, influence me, help me, teach me...

I have too many blessings to count.　感謝しています。

( It's my body, I live in it. )

FYI: I am writing this instead of working on my paper.

But okay, I've already done a ton today, like getting some essential errands out of the way. I have no more money. It all got spent today. お金がない！！ I canceled my bank account, paid my last rent (￥26,800), paid this month's cell phone bill (￥4,602), sent my heaviest-non-rolly bag to the airport via 宅配便 (￥2,100), bought some miscellaneous souvenirs (Waseda tea mug, Waseda University 4 colors-in-1 pen, 玄米茶, ほうじ茶, 黒豆せんべい...￥2000) All very light, save for the mug. And I got to do the bank thing with Michael, so it was cool that I got to help him with the stuff. I was annoyed because the woman started trying to talk in simple English and I had to ask her to speak to me in Japanese. But once she started speaking Japanese, things went much more smoothly. Oh, and we got "presents" from the bank, cute little eco-bags. I also got ￥238 from the bazillion 1 yen coins I was gifted from Corey.

Yesterday was my last day of classes. Well, class in the singular. I went to Japanese, took a kanji quiz (how lame is it to have a quiz on the last day of class? She did that just so we would not skip.), and then went to the teacher's house in Higashi-Ikebukuro 東池袋. She had an amazing apartment on the 29th floor. The kind of place I can only dream of living in. After that was over I just hopped on the Yamanote 山手線 to spend the rest of the day with Zandra. We went first to Harajuku to do our usual, take purikura, walk down 竹下通り Takeshita-dori, drink bubble tea, and do a couple hours of karaoke カラオケ. Our last karaoke was pretty epic and we did a ton of amazing songs. Plus we discovered the joy that is キラキラ kira-kira purikura. After that we got hungry and Zandra obliged me by going to the kaitenzushi (conveyor-belt sushi) place in Shinagawa. That place is amazing! I had so much. I don't remember being that full on sushi ever! Mmm. After that we ambled and wandered around Shinagawa for a couple hours, just chatting and enjoying each other's company. I'm going to miss that. We parted a little after 9pm and went our separate ways. I got home intending to finish my paper, but packed instead. Packing is so much more fun than writing a paper, even if you stay up till 2:30am doing it.

I've been meaning to write about Kyoto, but that will require a separate, much much longer post and I don't know if I should spare the time to write it right now. =.=;; In short, it was amazing and I wouldn't have rather spent that weekend any other way.

Tonight I am riding my bike to Komagome to hopefully sell my bike for $40 USD. I was happy to find someone who could just pay me in USD so I wouldn't have to mess with the exchange rate. I hope things will go well.

Well, it's been a week since I last posted. I know things are getting more and more crazy, but I need to keep up with this. I shipped off my box of stuff today. It was a whopping 14.2 kg (31 lbs) and cost ￥8500 to send it, but the guy said it would only take about a month to get it to Portland. I thought it would be more like two, but hey, a month is pretty great. So it'll already be there by the time I get to school at the end of August. Now all I have to do is worry about my two suitcases and my carry-ons. But my flight is direct, so I can load my carry-ons as much as I want (and try not to break my back). Today was Thursday, the end of my week. I went to class and came back for lunch, then took an impromptu nap. Zzzz... So sleep-deprived. I am SO looking forward to the days where I can go home and go to bed at 10pm if I want. MY OWN ROOM. Aaaah. But I still have about 12 days left in Japan, so I am going to enjoy the heck out of them all! Gotta make each day count.

Last week Romy came to Japan! I met her on Thursday around 1pm at Takadanobaba (I got through the station guard by asking if I could meet a friend who didn't speak Japanese on the platform) and took her to the Toyama campus cafeteria. She tried the shoyu ramen and a inari-zushi while I had my usual salad bar and extra veggies. I even tried the grainy rice they had just started selling this semester. Mm. We walked around Waseda a little bit before I took her on an adventure through the west Yamanote area. We walked from Waseda to Ikebukuro, stopping at a ton of little temples and shrines along the way. My goal was to show her the little bits of traditional Japan mixed within the city. ^^ We got to Ikebukuro, went to Sunshine City, and waited for Zandra to arrive from her grueling day of classes. We got there, had a nice meal at an okonomiyaki joint (the kind of place where you cook it yourself!), and headed off to Zandra's place. We caught exactly the right train and got there in no time (we even sat down!). After some hanging out, eating popcorn and watching The Fifth Element, we were all ready for bed. Romy and I shared the futon on the floor while Zandra took the bed.

I woke up at what I thought was 11am, but really was 9am. My watch had still been on timer mode from last night so it had actually been 11 hours since I had used it to time the popcorn. We relaxed, had breakfast, and got ready for our day in Kamakura & Yokohama. I was really looking forward to my last time in Kamakura. We did the usual big shrine, shopping road, eating, etc, etc. I had a shiro-an dango and a sembei right off the street. Oh, and an onigiri that Zandra had so lovingly made! We also went to the beach and hung out over a bridge, watching the ocean. Mm. We made it back to the train just in time to go to Yokohama, where Zandra had to teach a lesson (she works for Gaba) while Romy and I went sightseeing. Being the serial walker that I am, I refused to use the trains and showed Romy the way from Yokohama station to the aka-renga/Red Brick District. We saw lots of cool things, but the best thing was walking around by the ocean at sunset. We made it on Oosanbashi pier just as the sun was setting and that made me really happy. We had just sat down when Zandra called to say that she was done with work! We met at Nihon-odori station so we could go eat at the nice soba place my mom and I had eaten at while we stayed in Yokohama. Yuuuuuuuuummy soba. It was pretty nostalgic going back there and made me think of my mother and father. By the end of the day, we were all plum-tuckered-out. I wanted to go back with them and have another sleepover, but I needed to get back home and work on a project. I took the Tokyu Toyoko line and the new Fukutoshin line home.

Saturday was Harajuku and Shibuya time! We did the usual (sans karaoke because it was a Saturday and too darn expensive) and had dinner at my fave Samrat Curry Plaza. (Zandra, on our fantastic day together you can pick the restaurant!!) Had pumpkin masala yet again. But oh-so-good. I went home that evening to find that my roommate was off climbing Mt. Fuji (during the night so you can catch the sunrise on the top). Had some peace to myself, so that was nice. I left Sunday morning before she had returned for Asakusa with Zandra and Romy. We had a really good time there and I think I will be happy if that is the last time I go. I love the atmosphere there and the people are nice!! Much more relaxed. There was just this one creepy old guy who got in my personal space and made a kissy-face with his lips at me. That was disgusting. And I got the same "足長いいい ashi nagaiii" that I usually get when we go to touristy places. Oh, and we actually crossed the River Sumida. After Asakusa was Akihabara, which included linner (a late lunch) and shopping. I bought a manga-ified Japanese version of the story of Jesus (for reading practice at home) and Middlesex for the plane. I stayed up till 3am that night working on that stupid project. I hate doing other people's work. I mean, I didn't do too much of it, but I had to at least make it presentable. Grr.

The first part of Monday was a blur. Lack of sleep made my head feel a little woozy/dizzy and I was pretty dead by the time I met Zandra and Romy in Harajuku. However, a bubble tea fixed me right up and I felt better/more energetic after that. The three of us did karaoke in Shin-Okubo (aka Korea Town) which was oh-so-fun and went off to find dinner after that. Everything was pretty expensive and the one place that was cheap didn't have my Korean staple that I always get. So I was afraid. I don't want to talk about what happened, but it all turned out in the end and the waitstaff were really nice in giving me a new meal sans meat. We had Korean dessert at Iceberry and then, not wanting to part just then, walked to Shinjuku together. We did purikura two more times in kabuki-cho and parted ways at Shinjuku station. I walked my exhausted feet back home, feeling so-so-so thankful for wonderful friends in my life.

Tuesday was a blur and I tried hard not to fall asleep in class. Wednesday was super-fun because I went to Nekorobi (a neko cafe in Ikebukuro, NOT Nekobukuro tho. just around the corner from it) with Asako and Saa. You pay ￥1000 for one hour in the room with tons of cute kitties. It's all you can drink tea, coffee, cocoa, etc and you can take as many pictures as you like. I'm not a real cat fanatic, but I can appreciate how cute they are and enjoy them for an hour at least! Mrrrow. After that we had Indian food and talked a lot. I love those girls and I will be really sad to leave them. Today was just class, mailing my package, gym, and dinner with Yukiko from the cult-group. That was certainly interesting. But we were friends before so I didn't see why I should deny her request to meet me just one last time. We went to Big Boy and had the OH SO WONDERFUL salad bar which was only ￥640 for all you can eat. It was beautiful. It was awkward talking to her a bit, but I of course didn't feel like I was in danger. She tried to change my mind about hearing the last lesson, but I've made my mind up. I bought some wagashi on the way home and also had to have a Clif bar because I know my body needed more than the salad bar to recover from my workout.

Oh, and GUESS WHAT? I'm going to Kyoto this weekend!! With Asako!! We're staying at a hostel in Gion, doing sightseeing (Kyomizu, Arashiyama, Shijou, Fushimi-inari, etc), eating great food, and also... getting maiko-san makeovers!（笑）We leave by shinkansen at 7:07am from Shinagawa station, arrive around 9:30am. We get back to Tokyo on Monday morning via night bus (oh boy...), when I will go directly to my first period Japanese class for a test. Hahaha. It's going to be so hard to take but I don't care. I'm more concerned with having a great experience with one of my best Japanese friends. I'm so excited and it is going to be amazing. She also said she would ride on the train with me to the airport so I won't be lonely. Things are coming together perfectly and I couldn't ask for more.

Wow. I am amazed at myself. I did some serious packing and throwing away stuff.... I know it sounds crazy, but I could be ready to leave the country on Friday if needed. Yeah, I packed THAT much. My desk is pretty much empty, there are only the essentials on my bookshelf, and most all the stuff that's being shipped is in a box. It is incredibly refreshing to have things like this. It also gives me confidence and eases my worries about fitting everything into my suitcases. Actually, I have no worries about fitting everything. It will be absolutely fine.

So in case you couldn't tell, someone heard my prayer yesterday and gave me a break. Today was great. Still not sleeping so well, but it is easier to deal with now.

It started off not-so-great because I woke up at 6am for no reason. I made the best of it by watching 27 Dresses on surfthechannel. It was such a cute movie and I really would recommend it to anyone who is not really into chick-flicks (I'm not) and wants a light-hearted drama. It easily goes on the list of "good wedding-theme movies." So thank you to Sarah, for recommending it to me! She saw it in Japan with Chihiro and gushed about it, so naturally I was curious. Anyways, the movie put me in a good mood and I went to class from 9-10:30am.

After class I got right on my bike and rode to the ward office, full of dread but giving myself some mental pep talk for my challenge ahead. The Shinjuku Ward Office is just like I imagine purgatory would be. But thankfully an angel with a shining halo (read: younger Japanese office worker/assistant) came up to me, explained the forms plainly, and circled which blanks I should fill out. So simple. I sat in a chair for close to 2 hours, waiting for my number 57 to come up. When it finally did, the woman who helped me was very hospitable and helpful. She got what I needed to get done, charged me the right amount (2767 yen), and sent me on my way. Cha-ching! There's that out of the way!

After the national health insurance business was out of the way, I rode to the new Higashi-Shinjuku station where the sparkling-new Fukutoshin subway line passed through. Boy let me tell you, that line is really down down down underground. I am not kidding! You go down like three escalators and some stairs just to get to the train. Wowza. I took it to Harajuku, where I went straight to the new food court on Takeshita dori to get me some bubble tea. Double the pearls, oh yeah. I was able to sit and sip for a few minutes before heading off to find the OTA Memorial Museum of Art, famous for its ukiyo-e. Met my professor there, checked my name off the attendance sheet, and went inside to take a look around. I learned a couple interesting things from a few paintings. First, I was confused at the pieces featuring Daruma and courtesans. Wasn't he a monk? Then why is he having a courtesan clean his ears so... intimately? Then I had no idea that they made "artificial Mt. Fuji's" in Edo for people who were not allowed/could not climb the actual mountain.

Once I was done with the field trip, I headed home. First thing was a shower (I make it a habit to shower before seeing Zandra. :P Ha-ha). Then I got right to cleaning up my bookshelf and desk for an hour or so. I was hungry, but got so caught up in cleaning that I forgot. I turned in another housing form at the office down the road, then made a lovely dinner of a salad and kabocha pumpkin. Studied a bit for my quiz tomorrow too. I still wasn't quite full, so I had watermelon and three little mochi things from Santoku. Mmm. Then I cleaned/packed some more. I feel ready to go home now, but I can't forget about a few schoolish things: Two papers, a presentation Monday, two more kanji quizzes...

Oh!!! My brother is at Bollettieri Tennis Academy's summer camp in Florida right now and having the time of this life. It is regarded as the best tennis camp in the US and he is in the top group of the camp. Plus, my dad just told me that since he made the top-10 for his age group in Minnesota, he gets an endorsement from Babolat. The same brand that endorses Rafael Nadal, one of my favorite players. *grins* I'm so proud. Oh, and one more thing... My brother tans really easily (even more so than me!) and since he's been playing 5+ hours of tennis outside in Florida, he told my dad during a phone call that he was "black." I can just picture him in my head now, with hispanic-like skin. I'm going to call him Jose or Paco or something. :3 He is going to get such a big hug from me when I get home, whether he likes it or not.

Whew. One powerpoint presentation down, one more to go. However, the next one is in Japanese. Yikes. But I'm so glad to be done with my Southeast Asian project. We were put into groups of five, expected to read an article, and do a presentation explaining the article. There was one other girl who had really fluent English, a Singaporean. First we set a date&time to meet, but two people didn't show up. I made the powerpoint by myself and the other group members emailed me their notes (which weren't much). The Singaporean girl helped and had more input than the others, who basically showed up on the presentation day and read slides. They prepared for their parts while other groups were presenting. It sucks because I don't like doing it all by myself, but I know that if I don't take on the work, it won't get done. I was really worried, but it turned out alright in class today. Bah. Now I just have to write a short paper on the subject.

... I need to watch something mind-numbing. Lets watch the 2007 MTV Movie Awards. Thank you, surfthechannel.com.

Okay. A lot of time has elapsed since I started this entry with that first paragraph. A lot of things happened, unfortunately. I felt pretty good until I went to the "Return Orientation" this evening and it was downright depressing. I knew I had to cancel my cell phone account, but I also have to go to the bank and close that account. That's normal, though. I started freaking out and crying, however, when they announced about the national health insurance I was made to enroll in at the beginning of the year. I paid 6,000 yen at the beginning of the year for what I thought was one full year at the student discount rate. I thought it would last for a year and then expire like my normal student travel insurance. The dorm caretaker said that I could return to the US without doing anything about it. Then last month I get a bill for about $350 US for April, May, June, July, August, September... and so on. Basically billing me for the rest of the year. Apparently the 6,000 yen I paid was only until the end of the JAPANESE year, which ends in March. When the Japanese fiscal year ended, I was automatically RE-ENROLLED in the national health insurance without my knowledge. But not at the student rate of 1,000 yen per month, but at the normal person rate that is 3,600 yen per month. I have two possibilities:
1. I go to the ward office and plead for them to cancel my subscription because I am leaving in three weeks and pay a 3,000 yen (?) cancellation fee.
2. I go to the ward office, re-enroll in the student discount rate program, and wait for them to bill me for the rest of the year at the student rate. Then I go back to the ward office a second time after I've paid (with my receipt) and get refunded somehow.
I was told that Scenario 1 will most likely never happen, so Scenario 2 is what I am preparing for.
I am not kidding with this. I am not making any of this up. It is the most amazing piece of CRAP Japanese bureaucracy/red tape I have encountered thus far. This is exactly what I did NOT need three weeks before I leave. I just had to sit there, dumbfounded. My stomach started to churn and twist. There went my temporary freedom from anxiety. My stomach/food has already been ruling my emotions too much this week. I left the meeting, called Zandra, got myself some fruit and a daifuku, crawled into bed with my computer, and began to zone out.

I have never wanted to go home so badly. I just wanted to run from that building, get on a train to Narita, and fly home. What a roller coaster. I just have to hang in there and try to live/survive with the stress. Romy is coming, so that will be a lovely distraction from all this. Friend time is what I need. I also can't wait to go back to Harajuku, Asakusa, Shibuya, etc.

The good thing is that I was able to talk to my parents (yes, both of them! mostly my mom though!) and talk it through. They told me not to stress out and just take it easy. I can try. But I have to go to the ward office as soon as possible, which will probably be between classes tomorrow morning... a time when I usually chill out or go to the gym. But I have to go tomorrow because I will be busy with Romy and Zandra the rest of the week. Must stay calm.

I guess... I guess I'm not freaking out, persay... I already did that. I'm just so weary of everything. And not looking forward to going to the ward office tomorrow. Someone give me a break soon.

When bad things turn out good... it is cause for happiness! I've been meaning to mention this. Since my dad has been out of work, he's been home more often and available to talk to me. So he and I have been keeping each other company and it's been really nice getting to speak with him so much. But on the other hand, my mom is seemingly always busy. She's either running around, teaching yoga classes, going to yoga class, practicing yoga herself, cooking, etc... You get my drift. Busy. Too busy to talk to me. I really miss talking to my mom, you know? What girl doesn't? So this week she was leaving to go to a four-day yoga conference in Wisconsin and I obviously wanted to have some time to talk to her before she left.. because it had already been a long while since we had spoken. So she suggested the next day and specified a time, which I agreed to. That time comes, I call, and she lets me know that unfortunately, she decided to not go to yoga class the night before and had to go that morning, at the time she told me we could talk. So we had ten minutes to talk. And then my mic didn't work. And then I got more disappointed. We ended up not talking too long at all and I was pretty much feeling down the rest of the evening.

The next evening I came back from eating dinner to see this from my mom: "I am getting ready to leave for WI and didn't like the way we hung up yesterday. I would love to see your smiling face and talk for a few minutes before I leave so if you're there, try to Skype me." I was just like.... infused with happiness! I thought to myself: She does care! She does want to make time for me! Something depressing turned out happy in the end, so that was wonderful.

I sent my sister a few postcards recently, so I hope she got them at camp! ^.^ I is being a good big sister.

This week was pretty awesome on the whole. I went bowling with Justin and LC people on Monday night. Asako found out that she got the job she wanted! And then Asako's birthday was on Wednesday so I treated her and Sayumi to tea and wagashi at the wagashi cafe. I can't for the life of me remember what I did on Thursday. What the heck did I do? I probably just took a nap after class, talked to my mom, and ate. On Friday I went to Jiyugaoka with Justin. We saw Anne! And trekked around, seeing temples and other such nature-y things. Then we went to Futako-tamagawa, where Justin and I had dinner at Takashimaya. I didn't have enough money so Justin was really nice and paid for me. We were both so starving that we would've eaten anywhere and didn't have time to look around for a cheaper place (there weren't any cheap places in the vicinity). I went to youth group in the evening, had fun, and came home late. On Saturday I woke up, went to a BBQ fellowship at Cat's friend's house. They were so nice and made veggie skewers for me, plus a salad. They had lime and regular tostitos with salsa there, so I went crazy. Overboard. Oh, and American grapes. So good. I had so much that I was not hungry until the next day. I went to church in the evening to hear my friend sing, then got home late again.

Last night I had a rough night of sleep. I was bored/down (because of overeating at the party), so I went to bed at 11pm. Slept until 3am, went the bathroom, and back to bed. Woke up at 6:30am, went to the bathroom, and then back to bed. Finally woke up at 9am and said, "Screw it, I'm tired of waking up at 3-hour increments." The weather was bad, so there was no incentive to go outside. The upside of the morning was that my dorm friend Corey gave me a whole head of broccoli and three bananas as a gift for giving him food and looking after him. ^-^ That gave me warm fuzzies. Did the interwebz, went to the gym, then rushed over to Kanako's house for a dinner with her family, her dad's boss/superior/coworker Mrs. Gordon and her son. They were from Texas Instruments (TI) over in Dallas. Yay fellow Texas people! The meal was fantastic and so was the company. I got back around 10:30pm.

My stomach has been hurting on and off for the last 3 or 4 hours, but it just got bad in the last 30 minutes. It feels stress/anxiety-ish, but I don't know what my body could be worrying about. Gr. I guess I'll try to lie in bed and ignore it. It is almost 2am anyways. My mood icon portrays it well.

Romy comes in three days! You probably already know this, Romy, but on Thursday you're coming to see me on my part 'o town and I'm going to give you the tour grande! :D

As per my friend's suggestion, I am now watching the pilot of Fringe, a new TV show by J.J. Abrams (same guy who did Lost and Alias, apparently). He also happens to have my last name, hee-hee. [Okay, I must interrupt this update to say that my chair is the most uncomfortable thing in the world. I guess I could remedy this problem by not sitting so long, buuuuut...] But back to Fringe. Haha, I almost wrote Fringer. The pilot is pretty cool and hasn't bored me yet, so that is a very good sign. Pretty exciting! There's about ten more minutes to go, so we'll see what more exciting things can happen. The only thing that is really bothering me is the appearance of snow in the scenes. It's summer! I don't need to be watching winter-y things. Then again, the premiere of Fringe is not until the fall, so I suppose it will be seasonally relevant in the fall.

I know this is pretty weird, but I've discovered something. I used to crave nuts and nut butters all the time, but the cravings have pretty much disappeared now. This is pretty awesome because I always chalked my cravings for nuts (fats) as me being underfat and needing to up my body fat percentage. So now the cravings are gone. It is also good because I ran out of nuts/nut butter a little while ago. And maybe my body fat percentage went up! More yayness! Maybe my taste for nuts will come back later, but it won't be the oh-my-gosh-first-thing-in-the-morning-must-have-fat-or-else. Sweet.

Sam told me about what she's getting her brother for his birthday and she linked me to Skullcandy and their headphones. I had never even heard of them before. Wow. Just wow. Some of them put the Japanese huge ones to shame-shame-shame. They have pink fuzzy ones! But they just happen to be horridly expensive. These look amazing too, no? My head/ears are actually aching right now wearing my current computer headphones. And my day-to-day /workout pair are foam-less, the plastic is ripped... My CD-MP3 player has been a bit on the fritz lately. Probably because I've had it since freshman year of high school. o.o;;

Yeeeah. I've been thinking about a new pair of headphones for the past few months with all the cool Japanese ones here, but then again... I've been thinking about lots of new things lately. Nintendo DS, iPod... Eeesh, it makes me feel like I'm getting materialistic or something. Maybe it's just my mindset about returning to the US. My parents are like, we're going to the cell phone store riiiiight when you get home because the whole family needs new cell phones! But I guess the thing now that I'm older is that I have my own money (or so I hope) that I don't want to ask my parents for a DS or iPod. I mean, it would be nice to receive something (when is it not?) but I feel like I don't want to burden them or ask for material things.

Anyways! Enough about stuff. Tomorrow I'm going to hang out with Justin! Then I am doing something with friends on Saturday, but I haven't figured it out yet. Sunday I'm going to dinner at Kanako's house with her family and her dad's coworker that they're hosting for a few days. It is a woman and her 12 year-old son from TI in Texas. That's the weekend there. And then.... Romy is coming!! Things are still pretty exciting here in Tokyo.. I have a feeling it will continue to be like this from here on out.

Just a post of randomness.

I always write my entries with the html input, not the "Rich text" version.

iTunes tells me that as of now I have listened to The Call by Regina Spektor 95 times since Sunday. It was at the end of Prince Caspian (which I loved) and I am obsessed. So obsessed. It started out as a feeling, which then grew into a hope... You'll come back when it's over, no need to say goodbye.

Simple things make me smile. Like someone calling me up just to ask how my day went. For example... Justin (the Justin from LC who is not my brother-Justin) called me up about an hour ago and we ended up spending half an hour on the phone just talking about things. I'm nowhere near as awkward as I used to be with talking on the phone. I'm still afraid to answer sometimes, but the talking bit is much improved. As I am thankful for each and every one of my friends, I am thankful for Justin. He, Sarah, Maiko, and Asako were often my sources of sunshine during the darker times at Lewis and Clark.

On Monday I went to go see a Noh performance with my Japanese class at the National Noh Theatre in Sendagaya. It was pretty cool, aside from the occasional sleepy part. I loved the costumes. Then at 7pm I went to go bowling with Justin and all the Waseda kids (who could make it) from LC. We played two rounds and it was easily my first time bowling in... 5 years? 6? A long time. I didn't break 100, but 89 was pretty good for me. I had a ton of fun.

What else? I had a really good conversation with my dad last night for about an hour and a half. I talked out a lot of my issues with him and he told me about his Cursillo experiences (our Texas churchs' adult retreat). I really value being able to share these kinds of things with my dad. They make me wish I was home already. I find myself wishing I could just skip the whole "getting ready to leave" part, since it is the most painful. It would be a lot easier if I could teleport or wave a wand.

Tomorrow is Asako's birthday... she turns 22! Well. I guess her birthday is already today, since it's kind of late. She just found out on Monday that she got the job she wanted, so I'm ecstatic for her. She did job-hunting for SO long... I'm so relieved that she made it through the hellish Japanese job-hunting process victorious. She was often busy or stressed and unable to do things, but in the end, it was her future on the line so I didn't mind. It is a happy ending(/beginning?) now!

I suppose that's it for random post #38432089. I have 29 days left in Japan.

I got this via Skype today. There were no words for the amount of my disgust. Well... There were words, but they were words I would never actually say aloud.



Men like this can go away somewhere and never come back.

I have been sleeping horribly the past couple weeks or so, falling asleep in class, sleeping in the afternoon, all sorts of bad things. So here's me eating at 11pm in hopes that I can finally sleep through the night. The other night I had a dream where I was starving and woke up absolutely famished two hours before my alarm, so there must be a problem somewhere. I'm trying to eat more earlier during the day so I don't get hungry at night. I'm making efforts to try and fix it.

Okay, now to continue with what's been going on! Last-last Saturday after I took a nap, I headed to Nishi-Ogikubo to meet Asako and Saa (Sayumi) for our okonomiyaki party at Asako's house. They were really nice about my okonomiyaki requests (lots of veggies and soba noodles- haha, weird I know) and there were two other girls I didn't know. But they were of course very nice and we all had a fun time cooking together and watching men's volleyball. We watched the Japanese team beat the Argentinian team, which meant that the Japanese team was going to the Olympics for the first time in 16 years. I even got a little teary-eyed because of all the emotion going on! Grown men crying and stuff. I got back late, tired, etc.

Then I met up with Zandra and Bree once again for one last go around Tokyo. We met up in Asakusa and had a wonderful time there, as always. I think I could move there. Well. Maybe that would be a bad idea, because all I would eat is sweets, haha. I blogged about the day's events leading to us arriving in Akihabara two hours after the murders. Yikes. We had lunch in that awesome noodle place on top of Yodabashi-Camera once again and it was awesome. I left a little after 5pm because I had a quiz to study for, so Bree and I said goodbye. I'd never spent this much time with her before, but I'm really glad that I got the chance to get to know her more!

Announcement: The last two songs on my playlist have been from a Victoria's Secret fashion show. Oh yeah. I'm stylin' now.

I don't remember what happened Monday through Thursday. It's like a blur... I of course went to class. I did a little homework. I must have studied a little. The usual. But then on Thursday I got to hang out with Zandra, Nik, and Lorene at Harajuku and Shibuya. :9 I hadn't seen Zandra's brother in absolutely forever and he's grown up so much! I was SO surprised! (And happy too. It gave me hope for my brother to maybe grow up into a mature guy... We'll see.) We went to Kiddy Land and had dinner at Ootoya (haha), and just generally bummed around, basking in the Tokyo-ness of it all. We spent a long time in Loft and I was tempted to buy many things, but resisted. Oh, and I also grabbed an abandoned umbrella and claimed it as my own, seeing as I have had TWO nice umbrellas stolen from me lately. Gr. Anyways, I left around 9pm, feeling zonked. Didn't sleep well, didn't do much Friday, except go to youth group in Daikanyama for the second time. It was awesome and I made a freaking huge breakthrough regarding my mental health. I am serious. It was huge and I am so thankful.

I got home, stayed up too late, and woke up feeling like absolute crepe. (No, that is not a typo. I can use food metaphors!) I was supposed to go meet Zandra, Nik, Minsi and crew in Akihabara that afternoon, but I really wasn't feeling up to it. Plus my host mom mailed to say that yes, she was expecting me after all! I went there, stopping in Akasaka along the way to see the "Tale of Genji and Japanese Confectionery" free exhibition at TORAYA. I was in awe. I wanted to spend so much money there, but I resisted and went on my way to Koenji. My host mom greeted me with a hug, a new tank-top t-shirt (she likes to buy me clothes), and a cheery "おなかすいた？ご飯出来たよ！" (Are you hungry? Dinner is ready!) Oh bless her heart. She made her awesome Japanese curry with tons of veggies. The rice was amazing and I am still in awe over how good some Japanese sticky rice can be. Plus my host sister had just returned from a scuba-diving trip to Okinawa, so I got to try the pineapple she brought back. They called it Peach-Pineapple. It was small, and the insides were not that bright pineapple-yellow. It was more white-peach+yellow colored. The taste was not as tangy/citrus-y, but really like it had been crossed with a peach. It made me crave peaches, even though they are not my favorite. Too bad I don't want to pay $5 a peach right now. *grumble-grumble* Anyways, I was still really exhausted and started falling asleep on the couch around 9:30pm. But my host sister went out while my host mom and I watched the premiere of "Young Furuhata," which was absolutely adorable. Cute, young detective Furuhata! I would totally watch it every wee if I could. After the young Furuhata was an episode of the old show, but towards the end was when I started falling asleep. Zzzz...

I usually sleep in till at least 9am at my host family's, but for some reason I only managed to sleep till 8am. Darn my current sleep issues. So I just hung around, watched some news about the recent earthquakes up north (all those poor people), and felt really sad that some people had to lose their fathers on Father's Day of all days. I had curry again for breakfast, lounged some more, then got going around 12pm. I walked to Nogata to do some shopping (bought some fruit and a brown-rice-anpan from my favorite bakery there) then home. Talked to Sam for a while and made my dad this for Father's Day: ( click for image ) My dad really appreciated it and I loved putting a smile on his face. I know it is hard for him to feel like a responsible father when he is out of work right now, but I feel better knowing that I helped make his Father's Day a special one.

So! This week! Not much happened. Although... I met Cris for the first time since I decided I had had enough of the "bible study" cult group and the meeting was interesting. I can't really put it into words, but basically I know they're not truly bad people. What kind of person would I be if I hated them for wanting to share their version of the truth? Cris saw how badly in need of a change in my life at the beginning of the year, so she just wanted to share with me how she changed her own life. She thought what helped her could help me. That's all. (And I have changed!) I trust her more than any other members of that group, so I agreed to meet her. We agreed that we would be friends no matter what I believed. She told me to forget all about "that Korean guy" and just focus on my faith and relationship with God, which really put me at ease. And besides, I can't go on living holding a grudge against all of them. If I hated them, that would just leave them with some degree of control over me. I don't want that on my conscience/heart, so I forgive them. We'll see how things will go from here.

This weekend is looking busy, but it's a good kind of busy. Waseda International Festival, handing out flyers, youth group, meeting up with Zandra, sleepover at Kanako's house, church with Kanako... I just wish this fatigue that is plaguing me would just pack its bags and leave! Alright, it is bedtime for me. Night, everyone!

Wow, how did it get to be 11:15pm already? My time flies when you're having fun. I just finished watching Space Jam, hehe.

I've been meaning to do this forever, but I really need to write about last last Friday. The awesome Bree was in town, first visiting with her friend Anna. We met up earlier in the week to do Harajuku and Shibuya, which was fuuuuun fun. ^^ Purikura, karaoke, bubble tea, crepes, loveliness, fun, the usual. Her friend Anna left on Thursday and Bree, Zandra, and Bree's other friend had planned to go to a ryokan in/on(?) Izu on Friday. I had other plans. Then suddenly Bree's friend dropped out and they needed to invite another person, so they invited me. I apologized profusely to the people I had plans with and traveled the long way from Takadanobaba to Rendaiji station.

Turns out Bree made reservations at Seiryuso, the most amazing, extravagant, elegant hotel/ryokan I will ever stay in my life. We had a several-room suite for the three of us with a private rotenburo outside. Words cannot explain this place and I thank Bree from the bottom of my heart! After the initial shock of how awesome our suite was, we had tea, wagashi, and a type of citrus fruit. Then it was right to the baths! They had women's and men's baths (which switched at midnight so you could experience both). After the baths we tried the "THERMARIVM," the Japanese version of Roman baths. Then I dove right in the pool, swam a couple laps, then we tried the wooden-dry-sauna-log-cabin-thing. It was full of relaxing, relaxing, and more relaxing. Juuuuuuuust what I needed. Before long it was dinnertime. We came back from the baths and saw they laid out a few dishes on the table. I was a little confused because there was no rice or usual ryokan fare, but thought that maybe this was just how they did things. Then the food just kept on coming. And coming. And coming. We sat there in our room being served and eating for TWO AND A HALF HOURS. The meal was EPIC. It started with a small glass of ume-shu and ended with a mango-ume dessert. I swear that meal was perfectly crafted by some serious professionals. After our stomachs had somewhat settled, we went to get clean again while they put down our futon. We even tried out our rotenburo for a while... Yay for walking around wet and naked! I have no shame. Or modesty. ...which happens to work out well in Japanese public baths! We got settled and down in our futon pretty early, but I had a horrible night sleep. I woke up at like 2am, 4am, 5am, 6am, etc etc. Pretty much like every couple hours. I did feel a little better after a morning bath and an extravagant Japanese breakfast. That super-charged me enough for the check-out and long train-ride home. Got really tired again towards the end and we parted ways at Shinagawa! What an amazing couple days. What an experience. I am so thankful.

I bought some crazy daifuku (blueberry, black sesame, edamame) at a stand in Shinagawa station, then trudged home to take a nap. Zzzz... (What I did after my nap shall be saved for another entry!)