Watashi wa totemo isogashii desu!!

Translation: "I am very busy!!"

It's been a while since I updated this blog, so I'll try to recap some of what's been going on this past week. It seems like we've settled into a routine, which is nice for a while. They keep us very busy with classes and activities with some of the IC English major students.

Last Friday we had a Karate demonstration during our lunch time, which was really cool. They did some things as a group and a couple individual shows breaking Japanese clay shingles or cinder blocks. That night we stayed the night on campus for an English seminar put together by Jim Batten, a professor at IC. We ate traditional Japanese barbeque and played games that emphasized the importance of understanding different cultures. I think the hardest part for our group was when we went to bed, sleeping on thin mats on the floor with rice pillows.

Sunday I went to the Mito Church of Christ where many of the graduated OC students attend if they come over as Assistant English Teachers. The Japanese government will pay native English speakers to come over to teach in elementary schools, so it was really fun to see them again and for them to see familiar American faces. The rest of the day I spent walking around Mito, shopping and enjoying a day to relax. That evening OC had a reunion in Mito that doubles as a recruiting meeting for IC students. I also received my iPod Touch from OC that night, so I was really excited about having my music to listen to again! (For those of you not familiar with OC, we are a wireless campus, and every incoming freshman receives an Apple Macbook. Apple also gives every student an iPod Touch with their laptop, but I wasn't able to get mine before I left)

Monday was a holiday for us! No...not for Columbus Day, Haha! It was National Health-Sports Day. It was also my host sister, Megumi's birthday! I put a whole bunch of Reese's in a gift bag for her and told her I hoped she liked American candy. She LOVED it! For lunch we went to my host mom's...mom's house. So, I got to meet my host grandma! Haha! She made some great food for us and invited me to come back again before I leave. Megumi's brother, Hiroki, was also in town for the weekend. He is 21 and goes to university in Tokyo. He also spent 2 months in Australia earlier this year, so he was very handy to have around with the grandma talking to me only in Japanese. She would ramble off in Japanese to me while I smiled at her hoping someone was planning to translate then look at Hiroki who would condense 2 minutes of Japanese into, "Do you want some of that?" So I'd look at the dish and recognize it as something I had tried before and really, really didn't like. So I'd ask him, "Do you like that?" and he'd laugh and yell, "I HATE IT!" So, I'd kindly (I hope) decline through him. Her food was delicious, but if you've ever eaten nato or...some kind of mashed up flower dish...you'll understand.

Tuesday we had class like normal, and was an overall uneventful day -- comparatively speaking.

Wednesday we did not have classes, but we left from IC at 8:45 to go to Ushiku to see the World's largest Buddha. Let me just say...it was big. I got dizzy staring up at the top from the base. There was a miniature head nearby that was about the same height as I am, and the sign next to it said it was 1/1000th the size of the head of the statue in front of us. Inside was an elevator so we went up to about the chest level and all the way down saw hundreds of smaller Buddha's. It was quite an experience seeing all of those idols and people worshiping them and offering money to these statues. I think seeing those things plants the urgency of telling the world about God. It was quite fitting that we finished off our night with another devotional at IC with more Let's Start Talking lessons. It's so foreign to all of us to tell people about the life of Jesus who have no idea about it. Stories that have become so second nature to us take on a whole new light again when you explain the miracles to someone for the first time.

Yesterday, Thursday, we had class like normal and afterwards I went with my host mom to a Japanese concert! I really had no idea what to expect, but she explained in the car on the way there that these artists were popular about 30 years ago. My host mom laughed when we got there and told me, "Everyone here is...um...old." :) It reminded me of my own Mom who went to see The Police last summer. "Sting was so old!" Haha!

Today, is business as usual again. Japanese language class this morning, and after a long break for lunch and computer time we'll have a Japanese culture class in a few minutes. I'm not sure what the plan is for this weekend, but I'm sure my host mom has something planned. I should get going so I'm not late to class. I'll try to upload some more pictures soon, and I miss you all!

Amy