Art thou well? Methinks of olden days

So I am trying to counterbalance my gal reputation (just kidding) with something a bit different. My host family and I were watching a Japanese soap opera, something that is a bit different than the soaps of America since they are more often than not about mukashi mukasi, the days of old when samurai warriors roamed the land and everyone wore kimono and used the equivalent of what Shakespearean language is to English-speakers. "Alas! Thy barn doth purloin a century of sushi without wasabi!" So anyways, my host family has taught me how to speak Old Japanese to some extent, something I am eager to try out on teachers, friends, loved ones, street vendors, security guards, etc. I'll let you know how it goes.

This last week started on Thursday, because the time between my last blog post and finals was like Pope John XX--non-existent. To quote the web: "there has never been a Pope John XX, because the 20th pope of this name, formerly Petrus Hispanus, decided to skip the number XX and be counted as John XXI instead. He wanted to correct what in his time was believed to be an error in the counting of his predecessors John XV through XIX." But passing over popes, I took my finals (and turned in my essay) to my great rejoice, relief, rejuvenation, remarkable-ization, and so forth in that strain. My math notebook decided to get conveniently lost somewhere within a 10 foot long hallway that starts in the kitchen and goes to my room--2 days before the exam, so I elected to take the obvious choice and do as I have been doing for the last month--go to bed before 9:30 and pretend there are no exams. I actually think I did pretty well all in all--I know it wasn't perfect, but I am expecting to have done reasonably decently swell. 

Within my exam period of 2 days, I had a run-in with the law. At my school in Japan, they have a strict no-cell-phones policy that I hadn't been breaking regularly (although I won't comment about the rest of the students). I generally wasn't bringing my cell phone to school because a) I didn't need it and b) it was dangerous to have it at school--I don't want to kill my nerves wondering if it was going to start singing Phantom of the Opera like Richard Simmons in the middle of class for no reason at all, right? But for some reason, I threw it in my school bag as I went out the door. As I got to school and went to my Japanese class, it started buzzing--my exchange program head (Sakurai-sensei) was calling me. I had a convenient coughing fit so that my Japanese teacher wouldn't realize it was vibrating, but then Sakurai-sensei came in and asked if I had my cell phone. I wasn't going to lie--that would just make it worse, right?--so I told her I did, and she asked to see it--apparently it called her by itself (I obviously wasn't calling her during school with it regularly) and when I didn't answer, she thought I had been abducted or something. So, it turned out fine, no one is hurt (or abducted) and I am going to not bring my phone to school again. I felt guilty because she found out I was breaking the rules, as well as that she was so worried that I was kidnapped. It's not going to happen again. >.<>

On that same day, I went to a soba-making class with the high-school third graders, who don't take finals because they graduate and go to college. There was about 20 people and the "soba-meister." Just kidding, but the soba-head-cheese was a very intense guy who made making soba look very easy. Within a really really big mixing bowl, we mixed the soba flour with water gradually to make it as even as possible (my partner and I were getting frustrated because every 5 minutes or so the soba-dude would come look at our mixture and tell us "Just a little more." About 5 times. We finally got the soba to the right evenness, and it magically turned into a ball of soba dough-ish stuff, with a little help from Mr. Soba Master himself. From there we made it flatter than we believed humanly possible with a rolling pin about 3 feet long. After it was decently paper-thin, we folded it and using a large chopping knife, we were technically supposed to cut into strips about a millimeter wide. Due to unforeseen tactical errors that were certainly unavoidable, ours was about 3 times as wide as it was supposed to be cut, but all in all, it was delicious. 

 The next day, I went with Sakurai-sensei (awkward, right?) and Kobayashi-sensei to an outdoor architectural park of old Japanese buildings. I wasn't expecting it to be nearly as fun as it was. Before we went in the buildings' part of the park, we went around and looked at the blooming ume trees, which were so pretty. They bloom earlier than the famous sakura cherry blossom trees, but are still so beautiful! I took so many pictures. We then entered the outdoor museum part of the park. Before we started to walk around, there were free volunteer sketch artists who drew my picture. It was an--interesting likeness, but what can I say? They were volunteers, I won't complain--it was fun =P After that, we went and looked at an old train, an umbrella shop of olden times (from which I stole, no borrowed, and used an umbrella while we were within the park), an old public bath (don't tell, but we went to the boys' side, too), and old bar. An interesting thing that you maybe didn't know about the public baths of a long time ago--some chosen person would sit and supervise both sides of the baths from a raised chair, from which he/she could view both sides of the changing rooms. After that, we walked to the other side of the park and checked out an old police box, a normal house (dirt floors with a raised wooden floor--looks cold!), and a huge mansion that someone was killed in years ago. We had a Japanese dessert in this house called cream-anmitsu (that is, the dessert, not the house) which was really delicious--sweet azuki beans, fruit, and seaweed jello-like cubes (the cream is the optional ice cream that goes with the dessert--though that's not traditional...but still yummy.) All in all, I was really glad I was able to go, and it was really fun!

On Saturday, I went to see Sweeney Todd (finally, right? since my plans with my friends were cancelled) with my host mother. It was really fun, and I wasn't as disturbed as I thought I would be--it was creepy, though! And after that, I went around holding my neck in place for safe-keeping--but no harm done, I should think...

Today, I went to the neighborhood with my host father pool/track/workout area/fields to run while he swam at the pool. When we were about leave, we spotted a kyudo class, which is Japanese archery--very traditional. We watched it for about 10 minutes--very intense and cultural! But not for me--there is no kyudo club at school. If there were, though, I think it would require too much self-discipline for me to be interested in it for too long--I mean, there is a lot of waiting, posing, general silence and palpable tense, solemn energy in the air. I almost fell over when a serious-ray of focus hit me. I just like something more active--this is not to say I have no focus/self discipline! =D 

Also, I went to Keito, my host sister's old elementary school's brass band concert. We watched for 2 and 1/2 hours brass and percussion performance of varying levels of skill. By the end, I was waiting for the end--I like brass band well enough (though it is always second to orchestra! always!) but after that much time of hearing faltering brass instruments and too many renditions of "It's a Small World After All," plus the fact I had a violin lesson immediately after to practice for, I was ready to book out of there. 

My violin teacher brought her friend to my lesson today. Her friend is a Japanese violist who graduated from Yale and speaks English. I have been advancing in my lessons, but there is only so much my teacher can express, so it was nice to get 100% of what she was saying and discuss some issues (what piece to work on next, for example). I pretty much understand what she says, but there is always the occasional thing that doesn't make sense to me and she can't express in either language or on the violin. So, like I said, it was nice to understand everything, and her friend was really really nice! 

I am really looking forward to my family coming in *3* days! It will be the first time I see them all together since September--6 months.