Japan

What do they do with all the snow in all the places that don’t have water running constantly through the town like a drain-river?

We just put it in the pond or down the drain and wait for it to melt.  What happens in other places?

I’m sure I’m revealing the naivity that comes from growing up in the Sunshine State, but sure.

Just to let you know what kind of rubbish you’re reading, this post is
a) a year and a half old and
b) only funny to about three people.

I was just looking through a random exercise book and found a whole bunch of funny things that people kept saying during my three months in Japan.

I know I should probably just get over it, but they’re still hilarious (to me anyway) now.

So, basically by the end of our trip, Sarah, Kara and I had virtually no English skills left. We kept saying dumb things and couldn’t spell. This explains most of these things:

Don’t trod on my dreams.
Either Sarah or Kara said this first and after that we said it whenever someone disagreed with us.

Our English has gone down way hill.
Kara. Pretty much sums up the entire situation.

And whenever I managed to form a coherant sentance:

Don’t you use your smartness on us now, Laura.

And other odd quirks of Japan:

Power in the ricefields
The literal translation for the Japanese kanji for man. The woman kanji is scarily close to cheap.

A friend of the Nishiie’s, my host family:
Is the Gold Coast near New Zealand?

Everyone:
How do you do?
How do you even respond to that???

My host-dad referred to my host-mum as Mummy whenever he was talking to me.

There is a very popular Japanese band called Porno Graffiti. They are a sickeningly goody two shoes boy band.

The room where a lot of this stupid stuff took place:

Okay, that was so much fun I’m going to do it again…

Jaa ne!

Hello

So once again it is the end of term and I’m on the computer for lack of anything better to do. These posts suck, but they are kind of inevitable.

Although today hasn’t been too bad. English I just talked to people, Maths was the biggest bludge ever and Modern History I worked on my assignment, just because it’s fun. Which is really sad, but whatever.

Our assignment is about the war on terror and whether it’s justified. It’s going to be really good next term. Our class has a tendency to argue over everything so it will be kind of funny.

It’s a year exactly today since I went to Japan for the three month stay and two years and one day since the two week. It’s sad. I really miss it.

Oh yeah, and I’m going on the Canberra trip next year. Can’t wait, it’s almost all of my modern history class. We go to the zoo and the Parliament Houses and heaps of other stuff. We’re there for ANZAC day too, which will be really good.

I can’t wait, it’s going to be awesome.

I’m working a fair bit these holidays, which kind of sucks.

Chicken gets a bit old.

But it is still kind of fun, cause everyone who works there is a nutcase to some degree, so it makes it interesting.

And then there’s always the bit at the end where whatever junior is on ends up lying upside down in the cabinet, wiping the windows.

People walk by and give you the weirdest looks
.
It’s worth doing just to see that.

I really can’t wait for the holidays though.

It’s 12.38 at the moment and we finish at 3.05, so we have….hang on, thinking…two hours and twenty seven minutes until the holidays!!!!!!

God, I hope that’s right.
Hee hee.

How dilly doodily!

Guess what? I figured out how to do pictures!!!! I’m so proud. Okay, so the big red temple one. This is Misato (my buddy) and I at Asakusa, which is a district of Tokyo. This thing is really tall, even though you can’t see the top of it in this picture.

Also, we have me in my school uniform. The skirt comes about halfway up my rib cage, and no, I am not even joking. It is a really nice uniform though.

And there’s also my awesome homeroom at my good bye party. Cutest group of people ever. I think this is because all of them look about ten, even though they’re like eighteen.

Okay, maybe positioning the photos is something I need to work on.

But whatever.

Bye.

Hello

5 days ‘til Christmas!! Yayness. We walked down to Boab Street last night to look at the Christmas lights which were great as always. I think we’re driving around to all the other ones tonight. I love looking at all the lights, it makes me feel Chistmassy.

Um, what else?

It’s been exactly 2 weeks and one hour since I got home from Japan. I started going through all of my photos, but only got through to about 280 or so out of 1100, so there’s still quite a ways to go. I might attempt to publish a couple on here later on. It’s funny going through though, cause I started going hypo looking at the photo I took when we first arrived at the school because I was just so excited I had to do SOMETHING. Yes, very exciting.

On the subject of Japan, I’m listening to SMAP at the moment. God, they’re hilarious. Simple is playing at the moment and it’s so random, all of a sudden it’ll just be all “Simple!” for no apparent reason. Except they pronounce it “shinpuru”. It’s kind of cute. In a really weird sort of way.

Good times, good times.

So, what else to say??? I’ve been reading Crime and Punishment, which is now officially disgusting. Some nutjob murdered an old lady and her little sister. And yes, plenty of graphic descriptions about exactly how he used the ax to murder them. Ew. Ew, ew, ew, ew, ew.

Gross. Okay, now I’m going to go and finish watching Titanic.

Bye.

Hello

Not much has been going on over here. Same old, same old. Except of course that in Japan same old, same old is a lot more interesting than it is in Australia. )

So. Weve just come off the school holidays. They’re majorly short, only 6 days. Which sounds especially bad when you compare it to the two weeks my (Aussie) schools just had. Which admittedly I wasnt able to partake in, but whatever.

I have now officially seen my first movie in a Japanese cinema. It was ‘The Lake House’ and thankfully in English, with Japanese subtitles. Hallelujah. LOL.

The cinema was really different than the ones in Australia .

The screen was heaps smaller and there weren’t nearly as many chairs in the cinema. And the drinks were actually pretty cheap.

I had a melon softdrink, which is the single greatest soft drink on the face of the planet. Except perhaps Sarsaparilla, but only when its made with the syrup.

And we did those really cool little Japanese photo thingys, pikura maybe? That was really scary the first time, cause the coloured backdrop came down and hit me on the noggin and it was all really fast. They look really cool though.

Except for one, where I’m pulling the most awful face out and looking like a total spaz, even though I really didnt mean to. But of course they HAD to print that one. But whatever.

Okay, should be going now.

Sayonara!

Laura

Helloo…

Eeeeeeeeeeeeee!

I’m going to Japan tomorrow! It’s come around so fast, it’s scary. Yayness.

My suitcase is packed, I’ve had my hair cut, we’re buying me yen today. I have to say it all feels alot more real and scary when you don’t have any clothes left. I had to wear one of Mum’s tops today because I didnt’ have any left.

And can I just say hi to all my friends and my brothers who are going to SCHOOL today. Suckers. I had the second half off yesturday off (hey, hairdressers appointment, you can’t mess with that! ) and all of today off.

Did you know there’s apparently a typhoon over there right abut now? Or so I’ve been told. There was a typhoon over there last time I went too, but that was off in the bay (?) somewhere. It did mean it rained alot on our Disneyland day and we weren’t even sure if we were still going to go. But we did. Yay. Although we’d been walking through the drizzle to the train station, no umbrellas or anything and our teacher says “Did you know that in Tokyo, all the rain is acid rain?” We’re all standing there in the drizzle being all “Well, thanks for that”.

Yeah.

I’m going to try and keep this up to date while I’m over there, so please if you’re one of my friends COMMENT!!!!!!!!!! Because we all know (well, I do anyway) that emailling may well be kinda … slack. Yeah.

Unless of course I prove to be such a freak I can’t even figure out how to change the imput language, which is quite probable.

Toodles.

That’s how long I spent today at Cararra Stadium watching soccer grand final’s.

8 hours. Because Haz had to get there about an hour and a half before his game, we watched a neighbour play. He won in penalty shootouts. (Go Palmy!!) Then we watched Haz play. He scored a goal and then another one in penalty shootouts. They won. It was very exciting. (Funnily enough, no, I’m not being sarcastic.) Then our over the back neighbour played and they won, but just straight out, no extra time or anything. Though he did score a penalty, but that was during our game. Finally we watched out next door neighbour play and they lost in extra time, effectively breaking our winning streak.

Eight hours.
We left home at 9 in the morning and didn’t leave Carrara until about 5.

Eight hours.

Anyway. Last night we had our final game of hockey for the year. We were playing off for 3rd and 4th, but since we all knew they were going to win anyway, we just had a fun game. It was the best game of the season. One of the coaches played goalie for the first time in her life (and still managed to do some awesome saves), we covered our faces with big blue ‘L’s and just had fun. We fell about laughing if someone missed the goal, the other team tried to set up goals for us and we fell about laughing again when she missed. The goalie ran and hid behind the goals when there were people running down the field trying to score. The umpires got in on it too, trying to rig the game, giving free hits to the wrong teams, or whenever they felt it was about time the other team had a go. We all yelled at each other and laughed at the players sitting down the other end trying to sunbake (this was a night game mind you, so I’m not sure they had much luck).

It was just so much fun and I wish it had gone longer. Most games are so one- sided, especially with this team, so it was fun to just muck around.

OH MY GOD, I CAN’T BELIEVE I MANAGED TO GO THIS LONG WITHOUT SAYING ANYTHING BUT I GO TO JAPAN ON THURSDAY AND IT IS SATURDAY NIGHT, SO WHEN I WAKE UP IN THE MORNING IT WILL ONLY BE FOUR DAYS!!! No, what are you talking about? I’m not excited in the least.

Hee hee hee.

Ooh. I don’t think I’ve written since this happened, so I’ll yabber on about it for a bit.

For my English assignment this term, we had to do this big boring movie pitch for the book ‘Dracula’. Despite how painful that sounds, it’s actually pretty funny, because she said we could transform the story a bit. So.

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, I am proud to present ‘Dracula: The Musical’. It’s also a comedy, but it doesn’t sound as good in the title.

Anyway, in the book, Dracula can transform himself into not only a bat, but also a wolf. In ‘Dracula: The Musical’ he changes into a cricket bat and a poodle. With a pink bow no less. Hee hee. I actually can’t think of anything else amusing that happens in the video, so I’m just going to go now.

Buh bye.

Haven’t I been slack lately?

Well, it’s only 34 days till I go to Japan. Not that I’m counting or anything. He he.

Three weeks ago we had a fourteen year old Japanese girl staying with us. That was so much fun. We went around Burleigh Headland and down to Currumbin rock twice I think. One time it was really cool because the waves were really big, so we climbed up onto the little rock in front of the big one and saw all the waves crashing up against the littler rocks in front.

After she’d been with us for a week, she went home and another girl came. She was seventeen and from the same school I went to in Japan last year. And, guess what?? I’m staying at her place in Japan for my three month homestay! J I’m so excited.

What else has been happening… ha! In the stupid English competition we have to do every year since about year five, I got a High Distinction! Which I think means I was in the top 1% of the state, or something. I have to say I find it very amusing, cause I guessed half the questions… it’s sad I’m happy about that, isn’t it? It’s not even like it has anything to do with anything. Hm.

Also, in our English class, we’re doing horror, so we’re reading Dracula. The best bit so far is that we had to write a 500 word horror story, not for assessment or anything, but just because we could. It has been so much fun. Mine was about a rich bloke in London yonks ago who made a hobby of murdering his household staff and eating their remains. One of my friends had a really detailed death scene in which a man killed his brother and cut him up into little pieces because he (the dead bloke) was engaged to the girl the bad brother was in love with. Then he (the bad live one) made her marry him, but on the ‘you may kiss the bride’ bit she whipped a knife out of her corset (how she fitted it down there has been a cause for dispute amoung a few of my friends) and stabbed the dude to death. I like it. That’s the beauty of level four English. We all have such repulsive imaginations.

Major cause for disgust in my grade: next year, we’re FINALLY in senior (read: no longer have to be in the same classes as brain dead year nine girls – “Does rice grow on trees like pasta?” (I’m serious, someone asked this question) – who spend the whole time fixing their hair.) But NO!!! Next year is the first year that year ten in Queensland will be a part of the senior school. They get new uniforms. Thank God they’re not coming into our classes too, but they are abolishing the whole Level Four English (not sure about Maths though…) thing and letting them come into year eleven English classes. And you can bet they’ll be coming into the OP one. It seems like my grade’s going backwards. Usually it’s only the mainstream year ten classes that have two, maybe three year nine’s tops. But now, classes like my level four one seem to be going backwards, back with the year nines, which we haven’t done since, well, ever.
Okay, feeling frustrated.

Buh Bye…v