It's a small world! (pt 2)

Tonight I went to a BBQ at a friend of friend's house. It turns out the host, Moto, studied at UC Davis for 3 months and then lived/worked in Williams for a year and a half!! And he'd been to Chico numerous times! Small world!! So he's a rice farmer and he said he was working for a rice farm in Williams doing ag science and quality control stuff. He brought out his laptop and showed me pictures. He had pictures of Chico's new downtown plaza thing! It was sooo weird (but cool) to be looking at pictures of Chico with an Akitan local and talk about the Thursday Night Market and Sierra Nevada.

Oh! And even mooore small world, we were both at SF JapanTown's Cherry Blossom Festival on the same day last year! Raaaandom.

That was a fun BBQ!

I've been patient...

Now I'm angry. Like, if I were a cartoon character, steam would be coming out of my ears. So, since the new modem they sent did nothing, they're going to come out and check the line again, but apparently EVERYONE is on vacation until the 6th so they're not coming until the 8th!! That is a week and a half away! and they said if that doesn't fix it, to call again... which gives me no confidence that it will. Okay, I get that it's Golden Week but seriously!!! Only Tuesday is an official holiday this week and it's not my fault they didn't get it connected right the first time OR that this should have been resolved in FEBRUARY!!!!!! before the snow melted, before the sakura, and before Golden Week!! (#^O^#)

whew. I'm just SO frustrated that this is taking so long! We're coming up on three months! There's no reason for there to be so many problems either, and it's not really anyone's fault, just a bad series of events. I try not to let it get to me (I'm calm again), but it's doubly compounded because I'm getting frustrated that people don't understand why not having internet is so upsetting. It's not because I can't read up on the latest celebrity gossip or spend hours stalking people on Facebook. I don't care about any of that frivolous time-consuming stuff anymore.

It's about losing my main links to family and friends! My email capability has been limited to the endurance of my thumbs (typing onthe cell phone like now) and with no Skype, I can't make international phone calls (and I can't find calling cards). That means I can't reach any of my support system (and by "system" I mean people), and if I were still in Berkeley, that would be okay, I could manage only talking to my mom once every two weeks. But I'm not in Berkeley, and living abroad is stressful in so many ways you probably only get if you've experienced it - that support system is a lifeline. It's a necessity! Without it, I feel so stranded, frustrated, and lonely. THAT's why I'm desperate for the internet.

Now, I should mention that I have a couple of rockstar friends who are keeping me from going over the edge by making an effort to stay connected- Sally, who email/"chat"s with me for hours everyday, Erin, who calls me from England and lets me rant about the latest internet non-developments, and Val, who leaves me crazy/long voicemails on Skype so when I check it once a week or so I have a good laugh at her latest exploits. And here in Akita, there's Christy, who lets me borrow her internet whenever I ask. I'm really grateful for them and the effort they make for me.

I'm sorry if it seems like all I do is lament this internet thing, but I hope you can understand that it's not just lack of internet- it's being cut off from my lifelines.

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Okay, I don't like being so negative, so on a more upbeat note, I'm going on a roadtrip this weekend! It's a 4-day weekend, so Christy, Paula, Ann (a city JET from S. Africa), and I are heading north! We're going over to Iwate and up through Aomori to Hirosaki and then down along the scenic Aomori/Akita coast. I'll keep you posted!

The lead story on the Akita news tonight was thatsome fish died mysteriously. They're testing the water and will have the results tomorrow. the end.

even the enterprise record (www.chicoer.com) prints bigger stories than that (sometimes)! haha

and then I turn on the TV and see Full House dubbed in Japanese. :D

think positively, right?

gimme a break, gimme a break, break me off a piece of that...

internet! okay get this in the latest episode of katie's tragic attempts to get connected, today, my supervisor can't help me, so he asks the cute young new guy in the office. After work, the guy comes over to call yahoo for me, but my dang phone is dead even though it's been on the charger for days! I think it's just old and reached the end of its life (it kept dying when i was talking to erin), but dead phone means we can't call today! GIVE ME A BREAK!! Seriously. Well, new guy stayed for a while a checked every possible thing so now we really know it's yahoo's problem.

And so, I'll get a new phone tonight and we'll try again tomorrow.

But seriously! I'm a good person, I don't drink or smoke or swear or consume caffeine, I play with little kids, I help out my friends, I always return dvds on time, I drive the speed limit, etc. I've got to have tons of good karma built up somewhere!! Why can't I get a break?? :(

life is annoying.

I left my heart in San Francisco...

...and it looks like I'll have plenty of time to get it back!

My acceptance letter for San Francisco State's graduate Japanese program came in the mail today! I actually found out online last week, but the letter makes it official. :) I only applied to this one school, so it's a good thing I got in! Actually though, they have the perfect program for what I want to do - an MA in Japanese with an emphasis in Teaching Japanese as a Foreign Language. And the fact that I get to be back in the Bay excites me to no end!

So that's the big news, otherwise... the cherry blossoms are blooming here now so it's pretty and I've been doing lots of flower viewing. Oh, I was on the news! Christy and I were at a sakura festival in Akita City walking around enjoying the flowers when this guy with a camera spotted us. He whipped around and started filming us (like "wow foreigners!") and then followed us (we were walking to meet some friends). Finally he asks us what we think about the sakura and Christy goes "tanoshii〜!" (fun!) so I say "utsukushii〜!" (beautiful!) and we walk away. The next day EVERYONE said "I saw you on the news!!" hahaha. great, I probably looked like a big dork! Well no one taped it so I'll never know. Oh well.

I posted up all my travel pics using the school's internet, but I didn't have time to caption them, so if you are partial to captions don't look at them yet.

I think I might have internet again sometime in the nearish future, but I've been thinking that for 2 months so I wouldn't trust me if I were you.

k that's all for this update! Only 3months left! Wooowzers.

Denny's!!

I forgot to write that we went to Denny's for ice cream after the park. I was sooo excited for my first Denny's in Japan (they only have them in Tokyo) and I had a chocolate sundae.

I have to say, I was rather disappointed at how Japanified the menu was! Gone were all the American classics - Grand Slam breakfast combos, burgers, milkshakes, etc. - and instead I found the typical Japanese "family restaurant" style foods like japan-flavored pastas and cheap steak meals. I'm sure the food is all good and tasty, it's just not smothered-and-covered-hash-browns-American-style-Denny's good. (seriously, Denny's with no breakfast combos is just... Gusto)

But, to be fair, I ordered an American Clubhouse Sandwich to-go and just ate it on the train. Even after carting it around for 3hrs it was still a darn good club sandwich! :) Oh and my ice cream sundae was awesome! It had what I think are called cocoa puffs in it for crunch!! Nice touch, Denny's Japan! :P

Work Hard/Play Hard!

whew! another busy day of adventure! I met Marie, found a place to store my duffle bag, and set off. Yokohama China Town (中華街 - chuukagai) has all fun shops as SF's without the huge hills, which I feel is a plus! We walked around enjoying the general splendor and then wandered down an alley to find the おもしろ水族館 (Interesting Aquarium). It was, indeed, quite interesting! They had all kinds of weird fish and even a section for "babies" (baby fish aren't called babies though, right? What are they called? Hatchlings? At some stage they're called fries, I think...) Anyway, there was a show thing for feeding the babyfish. It was really for kids, but the two guys doing it were so funny, we watched anyway. :)

We ate waaaay too much food at a (duh) Chinese restaurant - I had fried rice and pot stickers. After some more wandering and realizing all the shops were selling souvenirs (including Panda World and Hello Kitty From Japan), we decided to check out the famous Yamashita Park.

The park is right on the bay (I waved towards CA!) and really pretty. Lots of flowers and fountains and kids. We could see the landmark Yokohama ferris wheel, but didn't have time to ride it (plus I'd rather go at night).

We rode back to Tokyo and I saw Marie off. Now I'm waiting for my train to Akita! Good weekend. Good trip.

I'm exhausted. I travel hard. Love it!

Yokohama

I left Lisa's dorm around 9:30 for my next adventure - an hour and twenty min train ride to Yokohama. Surprisingly for me, I've managed both the transfers without incident AND have been able to sit down! I love Japan and its rail network - so convenient and easy!

Anyway, I'm meeting my friend Marie in Yokohama and we're going to explore its Chinatown. Lisa even found a site last night that ranks the fried rice at all the restaurants so I have the name of one of the good ones. I love fried rice!

Zoo

Giant Panda!!!

and a lot of other animals, including a few Lisa and i agreed appeared made up (look up a pic of an Okapi). But it's such a nice day! So sunny! I ate a melon snowcone - yum :)

whew!

glad to have survived that! good thing it wasn't summer, i might have died! lol good tokyo experience.

to the ueno zoo!

Claustrophobia

the train was late allowing hords of people to line up and shove onto an already packed train. sardines would feel over packed!

Earthquake!

we just felt one while eating dinner! the building swayed and everyone went "whoa!" I think it was a moderately big one... anyway everything' s fine. it was nothing for a berkeley vet like me :)

Happy Birthday, Alex!

I just rode a ride called Flying Pirates (one of those rocking boat rides) and had a great laugh when I heard someone call it "Frying Pilates"(sounded like "pilots").

That would be a very different ride indeed!

としまえん!

Today I'm doing a little hanami (flower viewing) at Toshimaen Amusement Park while I ride all kinds of rollercoasters and such. The weather here is so warm and sunny! It's a perfect day for riding rides. :) I'm with my Berk. friends Annie and Lisa and two of their friends from the dorm. tons of fun!

Hokkaido Potato: Butter and Corn flavor

I just ate butter and corn flavored potato chips. Now before I came to Japan, I would have been right there with yougoing "butter? corn? on a chip?" but after 8 months here, it seems perfectly sane. Look at this:
butter+baked potato=tasty
butter+corn on the cob=tasty
corn+baked potato=the best side dishcombo ever

therefore, it only makes sense that
potato+butter+corn=delicious snacking :)

duh. America needs to get more on board with corn. It's great. Don't we grow a very large portion of the world's corn? I've never seen a cornfield in Japan, yet they put it in everything! Like pizza - it's fantastic. I think we need to stop turning American corn into biofuel nonsense and start putting it on pizza! And potato chip flavorings. :P

Mountains

I'm on the shinkansen (bullet train) to Tokyo now, crossing the big ole mountain range that runs down the middle of northern Japan (look at a map). It's really pretty! The other times I've been through here it's been dark and/or SNOWING, so it's nice to see the pretty mountains, mostly melted snow, gushing creeks, etc. by daylight. :)

It was sprinkling when I left Akita, but I hear it's "sunny as can be" (quoting Lisa) in Tokyo so I'm looking forward to it!

Oh, and randomly, when I was on the local train to Akita City, Izumi, the adorable high school girl who comes to Christy's Eng conv class (and a lot of times i drive her), happened to get onto my car. That was a nice surprise and i got to talk to her for the rest of the ride - she's so good at English! Even when I spoke Japanese she responded in English! Good for her. :)

Anyway, the trip's off to a great start!