The 4th nuclear reactor in Fukushima is not in the best shape. There's another fire there, which is never a good thing. Also, there was another quake, a little further south than the last. It was a 6 in Shizuoka prefecture, where it hit, but it was only a 3 when it reached us. That's only the second quake we've felt here in Hikone. Besides that, we've just had a bit of weird weather today! During our second hour of class today, it went from clear skies to clouds to rain to blizzard to clear again. o.0
I hope I'm not scaring anyone too much. We're still really far from Fukushima, and I have faith that the program directors would not allow us to be here if we weren't safe. For one thing, the wind direction is such that any radioactive material from Fukushima is being blown into the ocean, not south towards us. We're all still fine here - even those who were in Tokyo last weekend made it back safely. Some of the students here are starting to worry, but I'm honestly not very concerned. Hikone is pretty far inland, as well as south of all the stuff that's going on. Plus, we're surrounded by mountains. I'm fairly certain we're safe from any sort of flooding and all the quakes thusfar here are really minor. So, try not to worry too much! :)
We finally have a 3-day weekend this weekend! I was going to go up to Tokyo but that plan had to change because it's really not a safe place to be right now...at least, it's not very tourist-amenable. So, instead I'm spending the majority of my weekend here. On Friday, we're going to Nara, Japan's first capital! :) They have deer and a giant buddha there, so we're probably just going to see that and then head back. Saturday we're going to tour around somewhere in Shiga Prefecture, just to find someplace new. And the rest of the weekend I intend to relax and recharge for the last few weeks of classes. We just have 3 weeks left! Crazy.
In happier news, the swing lesson last night went really well! We had about 10-12 people show up, and I think everyone enjoyed it. I enjoyed teaching and swing dancing again...I've forgotten a lot but it's so much fun.
Today, we didn't have a lot of homework so we braved the cold weather to go to Viva City! We did the usual of hitting up the cute things store - a little more Sentimental Circus for me - and then going to the arcade and getting cream puffs. Mmm, Japanese cream puffs.
Sorry for the lack of pictures! I'll definitely have some on Friday, because we'll be in Nara. :D
Showing posts with label Earthquake. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Earthquake. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Monday, March 14, 2011
3.14159...
Happy Pi Day, everyone! I hope you're all celebrating properly...I would but I don't really have the means to make pie. That's okay, though, as the Japanese have their own holiday to celebrate! It's called White Day. White Day is like the Japanese version of Valentine's Day. Guys who received chocolate on Valentine's day from girls for whatever reason (as friends, love interests, etc.) have to reciprocate, usually with white objects. As you can see, I'm pretty much set. :) It's a Sentimental Circus lion and everything! I'm overwhelmed by the cuteness - definitely the perfect gift for me. :3 His name is Rio(and no, that is not a pun on Japanese pronounciation...that's actually his name!). Besides Rio, I also got white chocolate from 2 guys who decided that every girl needed chocolate for white day. :) How sweet!Quick update on quake aftermath...probably you can get all of this from the news back home, but I figured I'd sum up what I know here. The main problem now is the nuclear plants in Fukushima. Before you get too concerned, Fukushima is pretty far from us - over 6 hours by train unless you take a shinkansen, and even then it will take a few hours. There were 3 plants that were having trouble as a result of the earthquake. One of them got cooled down in time, but another had a hydrogen explosion over the weekend. The third just had an explosion, but I'm pretty sure it's just a hydrogen explosion as well (ie, not a meltdown). The area has been evacuated just to be safe, though!
Tokyo is picking itself up and dusting itself off now. Starting today, the Tokyo Metro has started running again completely, albeit at 20% capacity. Baby steps! Several inter-city lines are up and running again, too. The Tokaido shinkansen line (ie the way I would be getting to Tokyo) is not functional today, but I'm hoping that will change soon - they're performing blackouts in the area so trains up there are stalled for the day.
A lot of us here at JCMU want to help with something...we feel so far removed, though, that we don't know what quite to do. Thankfully, our director Mr. Morris is trying to find ways we could possibly help, so hopefully we will have something we can do soon.
Back to happier topics, shall we? Yesterday was pretty chill! I just finished up homework and then we watched a movie called Nana. The main characters are so cute - they're both named Nana (thus the title) and total opposites, but they become best friends. I liked the movie! :)
In class, we've started learning the portion of Japanese that very few students like. It's polite form! There are 3 types. The first is keigo, in which you elevate the person you're talking about. For example, if you wanted to say "My teacher's child went to the store.", normally you would say "Sensei no kodomo ha mise ni ikimashita." When using keigo, it becomes "Sensei no okosan ha mise ni irasshaimashita." Basically, you add "o" or "go" to a lot of nouns and change a few common verbs around. Simple, right? The next form we learned is "extra-modest", in which you talk about your own actions modestly. Again, you change simple verbs around. So, now for words like "are", "eat", "come", and "do", we have 3 ways to say each one! Confusing, right? And there's another form, called "humble form", in which you talk about doing things for other people and "lower" yourself in the process to elevate the other person. It's getting a little tricky to keep straight!
After class, we decided to go enjoy the beautiful weather. It's actually in the mid-50s for once, so Brad and I headed up to the shrine on the other side of the road. We also took a random mountain path that went the other way and followed it to its conclusion. There was nothing too exciting there, but it was a nice walk! And we have such a light homework load tonight we will have plenty of time for 42. Excellent day!
One more quick note before I go...happy Daylight Savings Time, all. :) Japan doesn't have Daylight Savings Time, so now I'm just 14 hours ahead of you (assuming you're in Central Time). Good to know, right?Have a good day!
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Quake-tastic.
Hi! I hope you all are well. :)
I'm sure a lot of you have heard of the lovely natural disaster that happened yesterday and has been all over the news. Let me start off by saying that the earthquake in Japan may have been huge, but here at Lake Biwa we're pretty well-protected. We're pretty far inland, way south of the epicenter, and surrounded by mountains. We've barely gotten any rain, let alone flooding, and we had a magnitude 4 aftershock in the middle of the afternoon yesterday with no harm done. So, I hope that puts you all at ease. :) My friends here are all safe, in Sapporo and otherwise, so I'm glad it was so far north of us. The greatest inconvenience the quake poses is traveling to Tokyo next weekend, which may not be a good idea considering the damage done. Other parts of Japan are not in the best shape, though. I haven't looked at too many pictures but the ones I have seen are really worrisome. Keep the people of northern Honshu in your thoughts!
I do have a funny story about the quake we did feel, though. I was actually at karaoke with a bunch of friends, and at the time of the quake we were rocking out to a K-Pop song (Korean pop). We were all dancing around to the song as we sang, and I started feeling a little dizzy, feeling like the bench underneath me was moving. And then we all stop singing and look up at each other, realizing that the building around us was moving. It's a really weird feeling, having the BUILDING you're in moving. It's like you're on a ride, but a really big one you can't get off of. I thought it was sorta fun, to be honest. :) We didn't really have anywhere to go, so we just rode it out in our room. It was a fairly long quake, though - lasted for about 3 minutes, maybe? But then things got back to normal, just in time for the next song. XD
What else happened on Friday, you ask? Well, after our exam, our "cultural activity" for the week was Naginata. :)
Naginata is the name of this weapon. Real Naginatas are long spears with metal tips, but we practiced with these wood-and-bamboo ones instead. There were 2 parts to the lesson - we learned a series of moves to practice, and then we also practiced really simple sparring. Fun, right?
There's something very empowering about wielding a spear. Here, my friends Meg and Brad are re-enacting a scene from Summer Wars. In the movie, the grandmother goes after one of her grandsons with one of these. Scary!
We also hit Sapna and rocked out at karaoke for 5 hours. I've learned something about karaoke! Picking songs you can sing with multiple people is way more fun than just finding one you personally know. So I fit in my Nightwish and Sonata Arctica fix but also do a lot of songs we all know. This time, we did Bohemian Rhapsody, Potential Breakup Song and Don't Stop Believin', among other things. And, because we were feeling silly, we finished with the Star-Spangled Banner (and yes, they did have that as a karaoke choice). I looked for the Aggie War Hymn, but no such luck. XD It was a fun afternoon, even with the crazy weather. We rode to Bell Road in the rain, experienced an earthquake while there, and rode back in the snow. The night was ended with 42, which is always a pleasure. :)
Today, I went to help another girl here with her internship - she teaches English at the children's English school JCMU hosts on Saturdays. It was the kids' last day for the semester - school ends around this time for all Japanese students and starts up again in April. So, we were giving them an English assessment! We were testing 3-7 year-olds, some of whom have never taken a test before. It was pretty simple - in most cases we would say a phrase in English and they would have to pick the picture corresponding to what they said. Most of the kids knew at least some of the answers, but some struggled a lot. It was good practice for me, though, as I gave instructions for each section in Japanese! It was simple stuff like "I'm going to read 4 sentences. Write down the number of the correct picture for each sentence." but it was still empowering. XD
This afternoon, I got to do some swing-dancing! 2 other students and I are hosting a swing dance lesson on Tuesday night, so we met up to work out details and figure out the steps we're teaching. It was fun! I'm a little rusty and not nearly as good as the other two are, but that's okay because I'm just glad to be dancing again. :) Hopefully the lesson will go well!
Have a great weekend. :D
I'm sure a lot of you have heard of the lovely natural disaster that happened yesterday and has been all over the news. Let me start off by saying that the earthquake in Japan may have been huge, but here at Lake Biwa we're pretty well-protected. We're pretty far inland, way south of the epicenter, and surrounded by mountains. We've barely gotten any rain, let alone flooding, and we had a magnitude 4 aftershock in the middle of the afternoon yesterday with no harm done. So, I hope that puts you all at ease. :) My friends here are all safe, in Sapporo and otherwise, so I'm glad it was so far north of us. The greatest inconvenience the quake poses is traveling to Tokyo next weekend, which may not be a good idea considering the damage done. Other parts of Japan are not in the best shape, though. I haven't looked at too many pictures but the ones I have seen are really worrisome. Keep the people of northern Honshu in your thoughts!
I do have a funny story about the quake we did feel, though. I was actually at karaoke with a bunch of friends, and at the time of the quake we were rocking out to a K-Pop song (Korean pop). We were all dancing around to the song as we sang, and I started feeling a little dizzy, feeling like the bench underneath me was moving. And then we all stop singing and look up at each other, realizing that the building around us was moving. It's a really weird feeling, having the BUILDING you're in moving. It's like you're on a ride, but a really big one you can't get off of. I thought it was sorta fun, to be honest. :) We didn't really have anywhere to go, so we just rode it out in our room. It was a fairly long quake, though - lasted for about 3 minutes, maybe? But then things got back to normal, just in time for the next song. XD
What else happened on Friday, you ask? Well, after our exam, our "cultural activity" for the week was Naginata. :)
Naginata is the name of this weapon. Real Naginatas are long spears with metal tips, but we practiced with these wood-and-bamboo ones instead. There were 2 parts to the lesson - we learned a series of moves to practice, and then we also practiced really simple sparring. Fun, right?
There's something very empowering about wielding a spear. Here, my friends Meg and Brad are re-enacting a scene from Summer Wars. In the movie, the grandmother goes after one of her grandsons with one of these. Scary!
We also hit Sapna and rocked out at karaoke for 5 hours. I've learned something about karaoke! Picking songs you can sing with multiple people is way more fun than just finding one you personally know. So I fit in my Nightwish and Sonata Arctica fix but also do a lot of songs we all know. This time, we did Bohemian Rhapsody, Potential Breakup Song and Don't Stop Believin', among other things. And, because we were feeling silly, we finished with the Star-Spangled Banner (and yes, they did have that as a karaoke choice). I looked for the Aggie War Hymn, but no such luck. XD It was a fun afternoon, even with the crazy weather. We rode to Bell Road in the rain, experienced an earthquake while there, and rode back in the snow. The night was ended with 42, which is always a pleasure. :)Today, I went to help another girl here with her internship - she teaches English at the children's English school JCMU hosts on Saturdays. It was the kids' last day for the semester - school ends around this time for all Japanese students and starts up again in April. So, we were giving them an English assessment! We were testing 3-7 year-olds, some of whom have never taken a test before. It was pretty simple - in most cases we would say a phrase in English and they would have to pick the picture corresponding to what they said. Most of the kids knew at least some of the answers, but some struggled a lot. It was good practice for me, though, as I gave instructions for each section in Japanese! It was simple stuff like "I'm going to read 4 sentences. Write down the number of the correct picture for each sentence." but it was still empowering. XD
This afternoon, I got to do some swing-dancing! 2 other students and I are hosting a swing dance lesson on Tuesday night, so we met up to work out details and figure out the steps we're teaching. It was fun! I'm a little rusty and not nearly as good as the other two are, but that's okay because I'm just glad to be dancing again. :) Hopefully the lesson will go well!
Have a great weekend. :D
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