Laura:s Top 15: Most Impressive Things About Japan

Hello

Okay, so maybe this was originally an activity one of our teachers had Sarah and I doing in our Japanese lesson, but whatever.

1. Vending machines. I want to pack up a couple and take them home, but I:m not sure they:d fit in my suitcase. I can:t get over how many of them and how many different flavours and stuff there are.

2. Purikura. (The little pictures you take and then draw on.) See comment for vending machines. Love them, love them, love them!!! They:re so cute and they have the added bonus that I can actually take the pictures home, just not, you know, the entire machine.

3. The totally adorable clothes people over here wear with the Japanese – English that doesn:t make any sense. I saw a T-shirt yesterday that had mushrooms on it and said ‘Let:s grow up together and become delicious.’ I laughed so hard.

4. Everyone over here is really nice. This impresses me.

5. Also it:s busy. Like, really busy. Elanora doesn:t DO busy. At least not like Japan.

6. I am quite convinced that Yokosuka Sogo High School was built for the sole purpose of making Elanora High look bad. Mission completed. Three storeys for crying out loud. Three! And it:s just all so beautiful. Everyone who knows me who:s reading this, when I get back, you will be seeing photos. Just a warning.

7. The uniform and the fact that everyone wears it over here. It:s so cool. I know I;ve described it on here before, but whatever, I:m doing it again. Long white shirt, navy blazer, tie, high checkered grey skirt (with the shirt tucked in, no less), long navy socks, black shoes. I love it so much. Our uniform back home is just…blergh compared to this.

8. The trains. They are the best, I love them so much. Probably because of the Gold Coast:s train system, or complete lack thereof. I like the fact that if I wanted to I could walk five minutes to the station and go to Yokohama or Tokyo. Well, I could if I was Japanese and therefore born with a instinctive knowledge of the public transport system, but seeing as an Australian exchange student I don:t possess this handy quality, it would probably be better if I were to limit my Yokohama – Tokyo excursions to when I have Misato or some other equally instinctive Japanese person with me.

9. Natural disasters. They rock! In the space of the two short months I have been in the country, Japan has experienced a typhoon, god knows how many earthquakes, a tornado and a tsunami. And so what if the tsunami turned out to be about ten centimeters. There was still full on warnings on TV all night. This was for my area too. Very exciting.

10. Hot cocoa. I know this probably should be under the ‘vending machine’ heading, since that is where it comes from, but it is so good it deserves section all to itself. Oishii is all I have to say here. Oishii, oishii, oishii.

11. I am still incredibly impressed by the fact that I am in Japan. I have been here for 2 months and 1 day and I still cannot get over the fact that I am not in Australia . Sad, huh? Whenever I think about it I can feel all this insane laughter welling up in my thoat.

12. The TV over here is classic. Even the ads. I love it all. So many of the TV shows have subtitles popping up all the time and everything, it:s so cute. And in large quantities of the ads, at the end they have heaps of people standing in a clump dong the same action, like flopping their heads from side to side or doing freaky things with their hands. I also love the anime they have on here. There are certain ones Misato watches every week. My favourites are ‘One Piece’ and the weird one were there:s a girl and a guy who have this special power where they can make these cbe things around the baddies and blow them up. It sounds sad, but it:s actually really, really cool.

13. Japanese music is so cute. It:s about three or four years behind Australia and America and stuff, which is funny. I have to say though, SMAP is the single most hilarious band on the face of the earth. I know quite a lot of Japanese people love them (Case in point: Okaasan. She does all the dances along with them whenever they come onto TV) but I just laugh and laugh. I am planning on buying their album, purely for it:s unintentional entertainment value.

14. My host family is so freakishly nice I am starting to get paranoid they:re secretly plotting against me. Maybe that was why I got sick. They fed something to my voodoo doll.

15. Everything.

Sarah told me we have about 18 days left. I am afraid. I am very afraid.