Last night was the summer festival/insane amount of Japanese kids running around extravaganza. There was a wee train that one could ride around on, games, food, absolutely no beer in sight, and humidity on a scale I've never encountered. Also, fireworks. It was pretty good - I met another foreigner who's doing the same homestay program I'm doing, so maybe we can hook up for a bit/practice Japanese together.

Lately - went to Shinjuku again on Saturday to meet up with Tomoko and Mikko, and it was a lot of fun. Ended up treating them at a Izakaya (Japanese style tavern/pub) and it was ridiculously expensive. Go figure; China and Japan, being right next door, are on two ends of the economy spectrum. I did, however, end up finding and buying Funky Forest: The First Contact - the most insane movie I have seen up to this point in my life. I couldn't find any glasses that I liked, but I think I need to find an antique shop or something. Anyway, I don't like shopping, but I couldn't come up with anything else to do. Oh yeah, we went to a crazy loud/chaotic arcade house and took some pictures in a photo booth. Afterward you can dress up the pictures, etc...and have them printed and/or sent right to your mobile phone. This is the country where toliets talk to you.

Been sleeping a bit too much lately (there's not really much to do all day). I want to start setting aside time for English lessons, but I really don't know how much I can help; other than Kaoru, the family's English is about as good as my Japanese (read: bad). I just don't want to feel like a moocher, I guess. Anyway, I suppose that's about it for now. I'm going to attempt to post pictures now, so I'll attach a link here when that happens. Laters!

Pictures:

China:  http://calvin.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2034855&l=d0d02&id=15304302 

Japan:  http://calvin.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2034856&l=b00c5&id=15304302

Wow, quite a birthday party...It has started to rain again, which is fine, I suppose...This has been the first time I celebrated my birthday in three years, so it was pretty cool. We had a good dinner and far more presents than I deserve. Hopefully tomorrow I can get up fairly early and maybe head to Shinjuku, Tokyo, to meet up with Tomoko, but I guess we'll see. The kids are in school tomorrow, and it will likely rain, so I'll probably take it easy and study or take a train somewhere.

Welp, I guess that's it. I'll try to get some pictures up on facebook as soon as I can. If you don't have facebook, I'll post a link to the pictures, otherwise, http://calvin.facebook.com/profile.php?id=15304302

Oyasumi

Hey, I'm back on Xanga (gag) in order to update people who care on my random wanderings...China was neat, but Xanga was blocked so I guess you won't hear anything about that unless you ask. I've been in Japan for about 5 days now.

My host family is pretty sweet, the kids, especially Michiru (5) are adorable. Fujino is tucked away in the mountains away from pretty much everything, and it's been raining almost constantly since I've gotten here (rainy season+typhoon coming in from the south). Only Kaoru has used any English, so I'm trying desperately to learn as much basic Japanese as I can for the next 5-6 weeks. Like everything I generally do, I didn't prepare as much as I should have in advance, but it's all good.

Yesterday the Typhoon hit this area, so we spent the day at the movies/mall. Kaoru took the kids to watch the new Pokemon movie (for which there was probably a quarter mile long line for tickets), and I saw the latest Pirates movie, which was pretty good (and really freaking long).

I think I got food poisoning last night, which was weird, and ended up sleeping way too late today, my birthday, which made me feel bad, considering the fact that Kaoru apparently made a special breakfast which I never ate. Dag. Anyway, she says her sister's family will be over later for dinner.

I've been trying to stay busy, but considering the age of the family and the town I'm more or less stuck in, there's not much to do but study and re-watch the movies I've brought along when I'm not hanging out with Kaoru and the kids. I want to look into maybe checking out Shinjuku or Tokyo by myself (two major stops on the train from here), or maybe hooking up with some kids more my age for language exchange. Tomoko says she wants to meet up, but she lives about the same distance from Tokyo as Fujino, only in the opposite direction, so I'm not sure how that will work out. Anyway, this is enough for starters, I'll try to post more as time allows.