Day 2???

The Japanese are so concerned about conservation, especially of water (shorter showers are required), yet their toilets use like 20 gallons for each flush. It makes me feel bad to go to the bathroom! I have only used the Western toilets so far.... I'm sure I'll get brave enough to use the squat toilets soon.

My teacher always told me, "HUG JYA NAI" (no hugs!) in Japan, but yesterday, a Japanese student from Kanda University hugged me before I even knew her name! I told her that hugs were supposed to be nonexistent in Japan but she said, "Noooo, I love hugs, I ask for hugs every day." She was adorable. :D

Last night we met our friends from KUIS (Kanda University of International Studies, I think) and they are AWESOME. The awesomest of all is Shiho, who took us to get alcohol at the supermarket and then we all went to the beach. It's cool being the drinking age here. :) I got a wonderful peach drink that was only about $1. The beach was really neat at night, and it smells sandy and salty just like Wilmington's beachy air. There were Japanese school kids still in their uniforms shooting fireworks at each other. I asked them if they had an extra sparkler but they lied and told me no, haha. We saw them later with sparklers. ;) Oh well, I am a stranger anyway. Shiho told us that she got drunk the night before and went to the beach with fireworks too. I guess it's a pastime here! We walked out on the pier and looked at all the water. I think we could see Tokyo from there.
< ---the Aeon grocery store, or as Robert calls it "Target on crack", serves everything including tons of kinds of alcohol. In this picture you can see Yogurt Alcohol.

I chatted with a friend on the IES trip about how we are accustomed to seeing the Japanese schoolgirl outfits only in a romantic/sexual context, usually in anime. It feels so wrong to see girls of all different ages in the clothes that we are used to seeing in the US as a purely attractive thing for adults, because obviously these are normal outfits for them. It's a part of Japanese culture too, though; "sexy" manga starring young-looking girls in their schoolgirl outfits. Anyway, it's an interesting thing to think about why we make those associations.
This picture is a good example of how eye-catching those skirts and socks are

The people here are very attractive, men and women; and children are cuter than American children. It's not true that "all Asians look the same"; Japanese individuals look distinct for the most part. Last night I kept asking the same student for her name, and I felt bad because I forgot that I did actually know her name but I couldn't recognize her face. However, that has only happened with one person.

By the time I went to sleep last night, I was totally exhausted and my bed felt so nice. The pillows were so crazy though!! They had little, possibly foamy, balls in them and it made the pillow very firm. I ended up flipping the pillow over because I didn't want the rough texture pressing into my head.

Breakfast was amazing. I haven't eaten one bad/unappetizing thing in Japan yet, with the possible exception of natto. It was okay, but the person who described it to me as "a stinky, sticky bean" was correct. It is REALLY stinky and sticky. Slimy too. The yogurt is different here; more milky/watery. I failed at being Japanese this morning because I couldn't figure out how to get the green tea machine to work, and I forgot soy sauce and my chopsticks. Oh well, the nice lady at the cash register helped me.

This morning was orientation, and we learned about our host families and how to interact with them, the expectations for the school program, and how to commute to our new homes. We will meet our host families on Saturday. My family looks AMAZING. The parents are in their thirties and there is one boy who is 8. Take a look at this awesome photo. The form said they had hosted a student from UNC before and had a great experience. The little boy likes Pokemon cards and I BROUGHT HIM ENGLISH POKEMON CARDS OH YEAH! My commute to my house will probably take 70 minutes: 15 walking to the station, 35 on the train (subway then JR train, and sometimes a transfer), and 20 walking to the IES Center. The good news is that my station, Toyo-cho, is REALLY close to the main Tokyo Station, much closer than any of the other students in my class. The bad news is the long commute, although 1 hour is standard for Japan. The mom in my host family has a job in a financial company, which is unusual (housewife=most common thing for mothers). The dad is a systems engineer. I seriously can't wait to meet them; they seem ideal as a host family.

After orientation, I went back to my room to find the tiny trashcan had been emptied and I had received a new tube of baby toothpaste and new toiletries. For a society so concerned about conservation, they throw out so much stuff that could be reusable, like the razors and toothbrushes.

<------- I SAW AN INDIAN GUY IN JAPAN. He was working at an Indian restaurant in the mall and speaking Japanese. It was CUH-RAZY. I took pictures of him, haha. I didn't buy Indian food, though, instead I bought udon! That is Japanese soup with super-fat noodles. It was really good.

Between the time orientation ended and the time when we rode the trains to dinner (for the first time), some friends and I walked through a park and explored around some apartment complexes. There were cute children everywhere! We walked past an elementary school and I really wanted to play with the children, but my friends didn't. So I stared longingly at the playground while my friends walked on...but then I was able to convince them to go back! So we played soccer and catch with this cool 11-year-old whose name I could never understand, sadly. But he was so friendly without words, though we were able to talk to him a little bit. The other kids didn't want to play with him or us, but we didn't care because we were having a lot of fun. I got all sweaty, haha.

The train system is really complicated. We have to buy a train pass with our host families on Saturday, which hopefully will make things less complicated. Unfortunately, the train pass only works for one route (home-to-school) and all other routes cost the regular price, which is a lot when it adds up. But my route is so close to Tokyo station. :D

I got lost in the mall after dinner! The group just left without me while I was refilling my water bottle. I started walking one way, and then I remembered in the Girl Scouts that we are always supposed to stay in the last place where other people saw us, so I hung out in the food court while I frantically called people in my group. The third person picked up and came back to get me. Meanwhile I was nervously looking all around and for the first time, everything seemed really foreign and not necessarily welcoming. I was scared, wondering if the group would even notice I wasn't there before getting on the train home. That was discouraging, because they did make it all the way to the train before I was able to call the leader, Mariko.

<---- There are bikes EVERYWHERE in Chiba. I can't believe that people have to pay for parking their bikes, up to $7 for a whole day. I thought biking would be free. :( This is a bike parking lot in front of a grocery store that we saw while we were walking to one of the two train stations near our school. Thankfully, I will go to the nearer station of the two and my walk will be about ~15 minutes instead of 25.

We saw an old dog on the way there, and I asked in Japanese if I could pet it. The owner said yes but the dog looked in bad shape. It was such a sad sight: he didn't want to get up off the ground because he was so old and in pain, and he was losing tufts of hair. The two boys with me didn't seem to know how to approach stray/unknown/potentially angry dogs because they got all up in his face and he tried to bite them. I don't blame him, but I almost cried at how he wouldn't get up off the ground even when his owner wanted to leave. :( Poor baby. Another thing I have noticed: people have smaller dogs here, and they love to dress up their dogs in shirts or dresses.

Also, I figured out why Chiba is so neat and unpopulated compared to what I have seen of Tokyo: Chiba used to be underwater and is an artificial island-type of thing. So all the buildings are new and most people don't live here, it's mostly big buildings and schools that people commute to. It's a great place but I can't wait to go to actual Tokyo, or Koto-ku where I will live.

I was a little embarrassed on the train because our group was obviously American and wasn't blending into the Japanese crowd at all; we were so much louder. Hopefully that will change.

Did you realize that you can click on any of these photos to see them full-size? I just realized that! Here's a cool one, demonstrating how ridiculously colorful the grocery stores are. I got a whole lot of samples tonight, and for dinner I decided to buy things without knowing what they were made of. It was a good strategy. :)

One more thing before I go to bed: almost everything in Japan in English is either "happy" or "friendly". It's so cute to see kids or adults wearing shirts that say, "We have happy life!" or "Shiny happy day" or other fun English things. Here's "Friendly Airport Limousine", which is actually a bus.

This blog entry is too long. Gomen nasai!