Spring Break!

I am officially on break! Hooray! We had our last class today, and we have a 4-day weekend. I'm choosing to go to Sapporo to visit some old friends. My flight is tomorrow afternoon and I get back on Sunday around noon. I'm staying with an old homestay family part of the time and spending the rest of it with a Japanese friend and his family. I know we're going to see the Snow Festival as well as Otaru (a small town not far from Sapporo), but other than that I'm leaving it up to my hosts! Should be fun.

Speaking of fun, getting to an airport in Japan is a bit of a production if you don't have a car. For example, here's my route tomorrow. I first take a shuttle bus from the hotel near JCMU to Maibara Station(it has a much larger train hub than Hikone). From Maibara, I take a train heading to Ogaki (a largish town between here and Nagoya), change trains, get off at Kanayama (another town close to Nagoya), then switch to another train to get to the airport. Total travel time from Hikone to Chubu Centrair Airport: 2 and a half hours. My flight time is only 1 and a half. XD Thankfully, there is enough time between trains that I should be able to catch them with no worries. It will be weird traveling with a suitcase, as well as by myself - it's my first trip through the subway stations on my own. I'll let you know how it turns out!

Monday was the first day of my internship at Johoku Elementary. Normally, I'm supposed to help teach English for an hour and then join in with club activities for an hour (I'm in the science club, of course). However, the English teacher was absent on Monday so I ended up just attending a science class instead. They were using little scales to find the mass of various objects. After that I went to a sort of club meeting - the older students in the school join an organization that does school service, and volunteer for that. I didn't do much besides sit and listen, though I did talk some with the teachers in the teacher's lounge. Hopefully next week it will be more exciting. :) I also got to see the after-school dismissal speech. All the students get together and get a short speech from their principal at the end of every day. It's cute. :)

I also have a conversation partner! I met her briefly on Monday - her name is Naomi Tanaka. She's from Otsu (a large town about 2 stops outside of Kyoto) and works in a department store. She also loves cooking, apparently! We'll have to cook together sometime. She's very nice, and we've agreed to have our conversations half in English and half in Japanese so we can both practice. And, thanks to her I now have a nickname! "Kelsey" is very difficult to pronounce in a language where all consonants are separated by vowels, so she just calls me "Keru-chan". I call her "Nao-chan" in return. :) I look forward to getting to know her! We have our first full meeting next week. I also met her friend Azusa, who has conversation partners as well. We'll probably end up getting together in the larger group because it's more fun that way!

And I found out about my homestay family (all in one day!). Next weekend we get to go and stay with a random family for the weekend. Mine is in a town called Kusatsu, which is a stop on the way to Kyoto. They're an old couple, the Ishisakas. I don't really know much else about them but I'll be staying with them for 2 nights. I will definitely be putting my Japanese to the test!

Yesterday was far less full of running around. I got my caramel apple bread fix from Vidal (best bread I have ever eaten, by far) and also visited the recycle shop in Maibara. It's basically a pawn shop the size of a Walmart. It's FULL of stuff! They have models, manga, music, menswear, and more (I couldn't resist the alliteration, sorry! :P). My favorite, though, was the stuffed animals section. I need to bring my camera next time to show you how full it is. But I found Chiffon!This is a picture of Chiffon. She's a friend of Cinnamoroll, a character created by Sanrio (the Hello Kitty people). And she's a cocker spaniel. So, when I found this plushie, I couldn't resist.
She's SO CUTE! And has an innertube! :3 I am a sucker for such things. My stuffed animal collection is growing more and more the longer I am here.

Anyway, the trek to Maibara was fun! Really long, though - 4 km each way. But there are a lot of things I saw along the way I'd like to go back to - a really pretty set of wedding chapels I'd like pictures of as well as a little shrine that would be fun to visit.Last night we made chicken pot pies as well! Mmmm, so delicious. Japanese food is good but sometimes American food just sounds best.

Today was pretty much an ordinary day of class, except for last period. Our normal teacher is in America for the week, so the level 1 Japanese teacher subbed in for him. She's hilarious! She came in and first asked us (in Japanese) if we preferred strict or easy-going teachers. The first student said "strict" and she said, "Oh! You are my student!" Then, the second said "easy-going", to which she responded "Wait for your normal teacher, then." XD She was hilarious, and made class a lot of fun.

Tonight we're celebrating my friend Jade's birthday! It will be a nice way to kick off the holiday and relax. So, enjoy the rest of your week, stay warm and I'll see you in Sapporo. :D