Day 209 - 27th of March

11:31pm　セミナーハウス

天気：晴れ

I’ve just finished watching Totoro with Rachael, Rachel, Ash, and Katie. Julie came in about mid-way, and Rebecca and Jazz caught the last few minutes; such a good movie. Meanwhile in the computer room, Biancha and Yuji were practicing their manzai performance for tomorrow’s music party; it’s going to be great. I also got some koto practice in, so today was at least semi-productive… I got up at about 9:30, and for the first time all week, had cereal for breakfast; that was very satisfying. I spent the rest of the morning working on my blog, going to Sanko for groceries a bit after 12. After putting on some rice, I got my interview prepared; no I just have to find an interviewee. I met Rachel in the kitchen for lunch, and we sat for about 2 hours, catching up and hearing what each had done this part week; it sounds like she had a great time in Tokyo. She also gave me the name of the hostel she stayed at, and said it was really good; checking it out now, it looks like it is right in the centre of everything, and it’s reasonably close to the airport too.

After that, I spent some more time on my blog, and then had a good long practice on the koto. I decided I’m going to just play hanagoromo and sandan tomorrow; I think people will enjoy it no matter what I play anyway. Soon after that, it was time for dinner, and I decided to make stew; I had to use the last of the potatoes as they were starting to sprout. I let the stew cook for a while, sitting with Rachel and watching “The World’s Strongest Man” competition on TV; as you can imagine, it was all disgustingly bulky men doing things like pulling planes by their waists. At about 8:30, we went up to Ash and Katie’s room, with the intention of asking them if they wanted to watch a movie, and ended up getting completely side-tracked. We got comfy, and then just talked for an hour, before finally expressing our want to watch a movie. Rachel and I were good with anything, so when Ash suggested Totoro, it was perfect; Both Rach(a)els had never seen it before. I find it amazing that every time we watch a movie, there’s always at least one, or more often than not, two people who have never seen it; getting together like this is great for broadening people’s repertoire. Hugo’s just good back from his long day in Wakayama city in Wakayama prefecture, south of Osaka. Anyway, time for bed now; hopefully the weather stays fine, not that I’ll be doing much tomorrow…

Day 86 - 24th of November

11:54pm　セミナーハウス
天気：雨天
The rain continues to dampen our spirits (no pun intended... well, maybe). Time has escaped me so I'll keep it short. I woke up at about 8:30, had breakfast, did some stretching (really need to do that more often), showered and then freaked out that I didn't have my script done for Japanese speaking. I quickly rushed off to uni at 10:30 with what I had, and hoped I'd meet Rachael beforehand. It was after my classroom came into view that I realised I didn't have class until 12. So, I went back down to the CIE lounge, bumped into Rachael, and spent the next hour working on the script. We still didn't have it done by the time 12 came round but we were getting there. Got in and got our last lesson test done. It was pretty good actually; hopefully my results reflect my confidence. After that, Rachael and I went to the cafeteria and I ate while working on the skit more. We got it pretty much done before I had to go to History; I left her typing the rest out, before handing it into sensei.

In History we watched a really old (well, from the 70's) Japanese Movie, "Ran". It was very confusing, and a little boring, and the SFX were very sketchy. Our professor was very kind to make us lots of popcorn though. We have to write a short reaction paper on it, but unfortunately I didn't get to watch it all since I had koto at 4:30; it went for about 3 hours I think. Oh well, I might borrow it out and watch the ending... maybe. Koto was good. Since the sensei didn't come, we didn't have to clean, and got straight into playing. We got new music today, including a piece from Totoro; yay!!! For this piece, we had to tune the koto in a new way (much like a piano), and that took a while. It also has three parts; koto 1 and 2, and the 17 string (bass) koto. I don't know if we have a bass koto; Mark said there was one upstairs? Koto 1 has the melody for the first bit, and then it goes to Koto 2, and then they come together in the last bit (melody and harmony).

We're going to have another small concert before the end of the year, and I hope we can perform the piece for that. We spent the last half having a meeting, trying to find another date to go out together before people return home. Every time a date was suggested, some one had some thing to do; it was a little frustrating. Finally, we decided on the 17th of Dec, but even that is tentative. By this time it was raining, and I was really glad I brought my umbrella. I went grocery shopping before returning home. It wasn't a very pleasant walk but, I had my music so it was bearable. Made yakisoba for dinner, and ate an apple that wasn't as crunchy as I would have liked. Unsatisfied, I swiped one of Diego's ice creams. Spent the rest of the night enjoying the fact that I don't have anymore homework for the rest of the semester, for Japanese speaking at least; soooo good. We're talking with the Gaidai students tomorrow in class. That should be... interesting. Anyway, enough, time for sleep