January Photos

22/01 - Beethoven's 9th Concert
26/01 - Calligraphy
28/01 - Going Home

Last Lesson For a Week

Today was my last Japanese lesson for a week, due to by return to England tomorrow. I'm quite excited about seeing everyone again, even if only briefly and despite the fact that I've only been back less than three weeks. I think my dad will be able to drive me to the airport blindfolded soon (not that I'll let him, of course, nor would he ever dream of trying).

I went into Cosmos after getting back to Cambridge House this afternoon and bought four litres of umeshu. This should hopefully last the week that I am back! I've also borrowed a book from our extensive library here: John Grisham's "King of Torts." It's one of the ones that most people here seem to have read all ready. I'm thinking of writing an online, searchable database of our books here. I think I'm bored.

I've printed off my Deutsche Bank application so that I can have a brainstorming session on the plane, on the advice of Drummond. I'm now looking forward to stepping off the plane knowing that I'm all set for Friday. I should hopefully then be able to spend the entire week enjoying being home, relaxing,... and studying kanji. Joy of joys.

See you next week.

End of First Books

And so we have reached the last chapters of our textbooks. Tomorrow we have a vocabulary test on Lesson 25 and today we started the last chapter of our kanji book. Never fear, though: There are more volumes of each, there are many more kanji to learn.

政 (administration), 治 (govern), 経 (control, pass through), 済 (finish, save), 歴 (career), 史 (history), 育 (breed, raise), 化 (change, -isation), 理 (reason, ration, logic), 科 (branch, division), 数 (number, some, several), 医 (medical, doctor). Kanji count: 251.

In combination these make some more useful words:

• 政治 (seiji) - politics
• 経済 (keizai) - economics, as in Daiichi University of Economics (daiichi keisai daigaku)
• 歴史 (rekishi) - history
• 数学 (suugaku) - mathematics (my favourite)

I haven't done much else today: my first load of washing since coming back this year, and I sorted out a few things to take home on Saturday. Just been doing the endless amount of homework that we were given this evening: all three exercise books and revising for tomorrow's test. Suppose I should do that last one...

I Never Want to Be a Teacher (Sorry Mum!)

Big review test this morning, well only lessons 20-22, though it was rather long. I didn't think it was too bad, though; they're not all that important. This followed by a kanji test, though I had plenty of time to do it, so I managed to remember how to draw all those pesky things.

We had Seb's lesson in the afternoon after lunch. We worked through the Meiji Era. I love the history of Japan, it can be so funny: Japan decided to take the Liaodong Peninsula in China in 1894. After wasting the Chinese, Russia, France, and Germany stepped in and gave Japan some "friendly" advice to withdraw from the peninsula, which Russia quickly occupied. In 1904, however, Japan once again attacked the peninsula. Russia tried to reinforce her navy presence in the area, but this involved sending the fleet around the Cape of Good Hope due to ice making the northern waters impassable. By the time the ships arrived, they were in a bad state of repair and were destroyed by the Japanese fleet. Japan took back control of the peninsula in 1905. After this they annexed Korea (1910)!

I hate Linden Hall. I was made to teach the 2nd years today as I haven't been recently. One might say I've been avoiding it, but on the other hand, when I've been teaching, some one has always offered to do it instead! Oh, well. I just didn't care. They ran riot in the classroom, they ran riot in the hall. I just taught those few that I'd managed to make sit down. Spelling test, filling in the missing word, and then countdown. They seem to like playing that, but I was glad when it was over. I lifted Louis up outside, and he promptly put his muddy feet on my jumper, the little oik! I've got to wash it now!

Answers to Questions

Did you ever find out why Tokyo and Kyoto are twisted versions of each other?
Tokyo (東京) and Kyoto （京都) are not exactly the opposite of each other as they share only one kanji: 京 (kyou) meaning capital. The English versions of the names have been naturalised from the actual Tou-kyou and Kyou-to, and as you can see the "to"'s are different. Though Tokyo is now the capital of Japan, it has only been so since 1868 at the time of the Meiji Restoration (though at the time it was called Edo). Kyoto was capital from 794 until then, though it was originally named Heiankyou (平安京 - Peace Capital). When Tokyo became the capital, Kyoto was known briefly as Saikyou (西京 - Western Capital).
The "to" in Tokyo means "east", which describes its location in Japan. Thus "Eastern Capital." The "to" in Kyoto means "capital," so Kyoto means "Capital Capital."

Why are you returning back to the UK so soon after just returning to the Land of the Rising Sun?
Because companies are companies: slow-moving, stagnant dinosaurs. I am but one candidate and they're not willing to bend over backwards to fit me in when it is convinient for me. It's not just an interview I'm going to, but an "assessment day," which means that it needs organising. The main problem is the "group activity" that forces there to be many candidates present at once, to whom they have already alerted to the date.
On the plus side I get to see my girlfriend for an extra "bonus week," as well as my parents. I can bring more food back with me to Japan, plus they're paying my flights.

Happy Birthday Dad!

Today began with a Japanese lesson, as usual, though today we didn't learn anything new. We just practiced the things we have been learning recently. This includes giving direction, which is useful! Now we can tell someone that to get to the Post Office they must cross the bridge, take the second left, walk about 150m, before finding it on their right. Maybe now I'll dare to leave Cambridge House!

Because of the temporary bus timetable due to exams, we were forced to wait around an extra hour after lunch before going home. During this time I took the opportunity to read "The Essence of Style" by William Strunk, Jr., which discusses the requirements of plain English style and those rules that are most commonly violated. It was quite interesting, and not too long so it's worth reading if this sort of thing interests you.

In the evening I performed the tea ceremony mostly on my own. The first time Kaede-sensei made me drink my own tea to see how I made it: tasty or disgusting. I think I made it a little weak, and it was cold by the time I drank it as I had to eat the little okashi cake beforehand: Tasty, but crumbly. Yuu turned up about an hour in as she had overslept, performed the ceremony, and then left for dinner. I then did the ceremony again, though quicker this time as I managed to string a few movements together without constant help and prompting.

Tomorrow I have a review test as well as a kanji test on these: 練 (knead), 習 (practice), 勉 (endeavour), 強 (force, strong), 研 (grind, sharpen), 究 (to carry to extremity), 留 (stay, detain), 質 (quality, question), 問 (inquire, question), 題 (title, theme), 答 (answer), 宿 (lodging, dwelling). Kanji count: 239.

A strange collection of kanji if one ever did see them. It is only in combination that they become apparent:

• 練習 (renshyuu) - practice, lit. to practice kneading (!)
• 勉強 (benkyou) - study, lit. strong endeavour
• 研究 (kenkyuu) - research, lit. to gring to extremity (a skateboarding term?!)
• 質問 (shitsumon) - question
• 宿題 (shyukudai) - homework
  

Mystery Solved

I told Ikehara-sensei today that I am returning to England on Saturday. I strategically told her as an answer to one of her questions in class: "What did you do at the weekend?" "I booked plane tickets." After class she told me that she "would miss me, even though it's only for one week!" I worry about the effect I have on people. Maybe the American government will want to use me as a weapon?

After lunch I journied into Tenjin to pay for said plane tickets. A whopping 92,450yen! I had a little chat with the travel agent woman, Chihiko, about Italy as she is going there in the spring and I used to live there. I have to pick my tickets up at the airport as there less than a week until I fly.

On the way home I got caught in a hail storm, which I countered by putting on my Australia cap. Hail is easy to tolerate as it just bounces off you for the most part and you don't end up drenched. I decided the key to it was not letting any hit your face, as then you think it's actually a sunny day... anyway.

Linden Hall in the afternoon: I was covering for Binks (she is covering for me next week), so I taught with Brendan for the first time. He seems to have got it all down to a fine art, even coming up with multi-lesson spanning ideas: today's was acrostics with their names. Mizuki had a little trouble with her 'z', though they get to finish it next lesson.

It turns out my "Moving Castle: 1/24 Second" is actually precisely that. It is a little glass block with the film title etched into it, and within in it is a single frame of the movie. Pretty cool, eh? I bet you're all jealous.

Concert and Film

Once again, Felicity and I attended Aikido in the morning, and, as usual, it was most enjoyable with the best part being the second of the lesson. It's a little easier to understand what one is meant to be doing when you have a partner who already knows. This does give you a sense of guilt though since you suppose that they want to be practicing properly. One of the guys does though, at least on me, when he spinds me around at full pelt before throwing me to the ground (in a controlled manner, of course), all the while laughing his head off. I enjoy it though, and I laugh too.

In the afternoon I travelled with Drummond to a concert in Meinohama. It was free, and Ciarán was playing his cello in it, and James was singing in the chorus, both in the second half. The first half was taken up by an all female chorus singing Japanese songs to a piano accompaniment, followed by a mostly all female chorus singing Japanese songs to a piano accompaniment (though it was a different female pianist). I recognised about one of the songs since Fujita-san gave us the music so that we might sing it as part of our Christmas barbershop performances: it was about snow.

The second half was of the first and fourth movements of Beethoven's 9th Symphony. Also playing was Isao Fukazawa, whose concert we went to last December when he played along side Daisuke Iwasaki. Isao got Ciarán into the orchestra in the first place by recommending him, even though he'd never heard him play! He is good, though. The lady I was sitting next to said she knew lots of people who were in the concert, including the conductor from the second half. She even said bye before she left.

In the evening I spent an hour or so trying to explain to Nozomi the differences between using "What" and "How" in such sentences as "What a nice car you have!", and "How lovely this flower smells." It's much harder than you think, and I'm not even sure that I explained it properly. Open challenge: try and explain it in a brief comment here. Should be interesting.

Finally tonight, we watched "The Godfather," which is a very good film, especially when you consider when it was made and released. Sunday night is, of course, film night.

Tenjin e itta

Today I went to Tenjin in the morning. The primary aim of this trip was to reserve my flights for next week, in which I succeeded. I am flying home on the Saturday morning, and leaving the week after on Friday night, straight after my job interview. I'm not getting any more air miles though as I am flying with Korean Air via Seoul. Also, Deutsche Bank wouldn't splash out on a business class ticket for me, so I'll have to smile sweetly at the check-in and hope to get upgraded!

I pottered around for a bit afterwards and bought a few things: some stuff from a 100yen shop as well as the 3-disc edition DVD of "Howl's Moving Castle," a film by Hayao Miyazaki. I haven't watched it yet, but it also came with a little box. I've yet to open it, but it says "1/24 second" on the outside. I'm eager with anticipation. I shall let you know.

I couldn't find anywhere to have a light snack in Tenjin, so I came back via the Nishitetsu store where I bought two onigiri, and an apple. Be proud of me parents.

In the evening, we all went out with 7 JET scheme people that we've met to a place in Tenjin, where we ate and drank all we could. There was Ian, who's getting married to Joy, and there was also Jessica who writes papers on anime, and another Ian from Canada, George, Henry, and Jenni. They were all quite nice and we all seemed to get along well. Some of them stayed out for the night though most of us came home afterwards. I spent most of the night talking to Shona (Katherine's friend) about her dairy allergy and the censorship in China and how to bypass it.

LoG Film

Whilst the others went out tonight for a social, the ill James, Drummond and I stayed in and watched "The League of Gentlemen's Apocalypse." I can say without a doubt that it was one of the strangest films I have ever watched. I think it was good, though I'm not sure; it was that weird. It might have been incredibly poor. I really can't tell as my mind is clouded by strangeness. It was an experience, though.

I think I'd like to write some things about Japan, so if anybody has any questions or something they'd like to know about then please leave a comment. I'll try and write a few things soon, though I'll have to do it off my own back as I know all four of the people that read this thing.

Lazy Dayz

More kanji for all you folks out there that aren't reading this: 市 (city, market), 町 (town), 村 (village), 区 (division, section, ward), 都 (capital, big city, Tokyo), 府 (administrative prefecture), 県 (prefecture), 島 (island), 京 (capital), 様 (appearance, Mr., Mrs., Miss). Kanji count: 227.

I thought I'd make the kanji more interesting my writing some things about them. For example, using the kanji we (heh-heh) have learnt so far we can now write

• Tokyo: 東京 (toukyou) literally "east capital"
  
• Kyoto: 京都 (kyouto) literally "capital big city"
  
• Hokkaido: 北海道 (hokkaidou) literally "way of the north sea"

Slightly interesting, no? How about this: Japan is divided into 43 prefectures (ken), 2 administrative prefectures (fu), 1 "way" (dou), and 1 capital (to). Prefectures are subdivided into cities (shi), then towns (machi), and finally villages (mura). The two admin prefectures (fu) (Osaka and Kyoto) as well as Tokyo are divided into wards (ku).

Children have to learn all 47 of these prefectures of Japan in school, whereas I barely know 3 English counties. I wish I did...

"Touch Edd", again

Binks and I went over body parts again with the kids today. We let them have free reign on things they could remember, which was probably a mistake, as they eventually came up with "boobs", "titties", "willies", "tiddlies", and the such like. I was being very naïve when I assumed they didn't know those words, possibly because they took longer to come up with them than I would have expected. Anyway, Binks put pay to it with a sharp "We're not doing genitals, today."

Apart from that I haven't done much else. Mostly moped about. Maybe I'll watch some anime now or do something constructive, perish the though!

Back to Tea

I've missed my tea ceremony: that calmness about the room, the whisking, the eating of the little cakes, and, above all, the taste of that sweet tea. Well, it's more of a bitter flavour but still nice.

Yuu, Ayaka, and Erika all came along as usual, though I don't think Rushen's ever going to come again. The teacher spent a lot of the time falling around the place with grief that none of us were going to come next week, and she spent a while giving us playful pushes on the shoulders. She's an odd one! I'm probably working, though I haven't heard anything yet, and they all have exams next week.

We were supposed to be wearing kimonos this week, and the girls had all bought their accessories with them so that they could dress up. As it were, kimonos were absent and we instead rearranged to do it a week on Saturday. Should be fun.

On another note, I discovered later that I had a call from Deutsche Bank during this all. They have invited me for interview either on Friday (yeah, right!) or on 3rd February; travel costs included! So I shall once again be returning to England in a couple of weeks, hopefully business class. I get to see Hannah and my parents again hopefully, though it's going to be very rushed. Should give me some more air miles to spend, as well.

In the evening, I went out for a drink with the others at our new favourite little yakitori bar. Katherine's friend Shona has come to stay for a weeks. She's currently doing a similar thing to us in China, though not as well paid for! Also, Katie and her pilot boyfriend Rich, who are visiting for a couple of days, were there. Katie came on the scheme last year, so it was interesting to meet her. We didn't get much gossip off her, though. She tell us about Happy Cock's "Quiz Night", where you have the chance to win a free shot, or maybe a bit of money if you're lucky. It's tomorrow (every Wednesday in fact) and her last night in Fukuoka before she heads back off to Australia with Rich, where she now lives with him. I'm ont going to go, though.

Surprise

Just as we were leaving for school this morning I learnt of the impending vocabulary test that we were to be having. So I spent the 10 minutes before the lesson learning them. Think I did okay, though I know I missed a う (u) out of one of the words.

Linden Hall in the afternoon with Lauma: we played our description game again, that they just don't totally get but seem to enjoy. Then we played Grocers with some plastic Japanese coins. They seemed to like that too, probably because they had something to fiddle with. Anyway, they didn't even notice that we'd gone over in to the free play time by 10 minutes.

On another note: I hate job applications. It's so tedious writing 250 words about why you want to work for a company when all it is is a box for you to tell them how wonderful they are. Grrr.

Back to Aikido

I had a fun time at Aikido this morning, though there were an awful lot of kids in the first hour so Flick and I didn’t have much space to move. The second half was very fun: they went through some of the basics for some reason, which we then practiced one-on-one (as normal) with a black-belted person. Thus you get some good tips. There was one move which starts off with you trying to punch your opponent in the stomach and he then whips you round and onto the floor. My guy was just like: “hit me in the stomach”, which he then let me do, saying “harder, harder”. I have some aversion to just punching people, but I managed to do hit with a force of his liking a few times before he finally grabbed me and floored me at full speed. It’s quite fun, actually, and it shows you what it’s all about. You actually can’t resist against what he's doing to you, so it really is effective as a self-defense art! He was also trying to resist my moves a lot, so that I had to do it properly. It’s good when they do that, as sometimes they just give in as a matter of course. It was fun, though. I think I’m starting to get the hang of it slightly.

I didn’t do much this afternoon: I finished off watching one of my animes so I can start on one of the many other ones I have. I later pool with Nozomi, Akiko, and Hitomi before helping them write a conversation in English about “Winter Vacation” (I think it was their homework). That took two hours to do as they are so slow and just don’t keep focused. They’re always getting side tracked by their mobile phones.

This evening we shall be watching "Team America: World Police" by popular demand. Very funny film, and the reason for the puppets: Matt Stone and Trey Parker hate actors (that's also why they kill a lot of their puppet counterparts in the movie!).

Weekend

Had a relaxing day today, though I decided to stay up after breakfast instead of going back to bed. I played the organ a little and watched a lot of anime: Escaflowne.

In the evening I played a game of pool with Rushen (he won 3-1, again!). Hachi-san gave us each a little 5yen coin with a ribbon through it. It's called a otoshidama (basically "year coin") and is a practice whereby families give money to their children at New Years. Also, Hachi tellss us this interesting fact: the Japanese for 5yen is go-en (五円) but it also has the homonym ご縁 meaning "karma".

Later I went out in Futsukaichi with Drummond and a guy from university called Yoshi that we know. He brought his friend Mariko who was one of the people on his trip to England last year. We went to a restaurant called 五風 (gofuu - "five winds"). We had "all-you-can-drink" for £7, and Yoshi and Mariko had some things to eat - things I had never seen before and looked quite tasty including one dish that came in a black bowl that was piping hot and had an egg on top. We had a good time chatting in English and Japanese. I like Yoshi; I think he is my first friend who actually attends the Economics part of the university and not the welfare collge.

Un-Hawaiian Restaurant

We were all (including Kanashima-san) supposed to go out to an Hawaiian restaurant that Drummond booked yesterday to celebrate his birthday that was earlier in the holidays. When we got there however it became apparant that he had booked the place downstairs. A few people did call wondering where we were only to discover we were downstairs. Rushen even had the guy upstairs checking his reservations list, but to no avail.

Despite this the evening was very enjoyable and the food was good. We ate Chinese dumplings mostly (which the place is supposedly famous for) as well as fried rice (yakimeshi), some noodles, and chicken wings. We passed on the beef intestines and the pig trotters though. A girl called Tomoko who Drummond does a language exchange with also came as well as Brendan's Keiko and her friend (though she left early). Later two guys that were friends of Tomoko's turned up, one of which was certifiable though hilarious with it.

We played a "fruits" game, where everyone picks a fruit and you pass the turn around the ring. The catch is that you have to have your teeth covered at all times, the forfeit being to have to drink. Now, everyone managed to choose a fruit apart from Mr. Insane who decided he would be "burning rabbit". This was funny enough, though watching a Japanese person trying to say it whilst covering their teeth is a side-splitting experience. I've haven't laughed so hard since I went to see Ken Dodd! Tomoko's other friend was also funny, though normal with it, since he decided that my avacado would become "burning avacado". It's like they had no clue.

After food those of us that remained went to karaoke, which was rather enjoyable though I'm sure the Japanese didn't have a clue what was going on. We can get rather riotous under those circumstances. I believe the Japanese way is to pick a song and sing it whilst the other listen on, whereas our way is for everybody to sing each song as loud as possible; there just isn't any point in the microphones.

Flick, Drum and I split a taxi home, though Tomoko's two friends helped us to find one that quoted a reasonably cheap price. At one point Crazy Guy started trying to pay the difference from that quoted and what we were looking for. They were really helpful though; good people. In the end we got one for 5000yen, which is about £25. This is still ridiculously expensive, though (one guy did quote 8000!). Consider this: Next month I am going on a 2 hour coach trip to Nagasaki for a lantern festival, lunch included, for only 4000yen!

Naughty Sayings and Plain Practice

More kanji, these ones are all affixes: 地 (ground, base), 鉄 (iron), 工 (craft, skill, construction), 場 (place, scene), 図 (diagram, devise), 館 (mansion, hall), 公 (public, official), 園 (garden), 住 (dwell, inhabit), 所 (place, that which), 番 (number, order), 号 (call, naming, [suffix] order). Kanji count: 217.

More plain form practice today: it's starting to come easier. Then this afternoon we did "I think ~", and "He said ~". None of us actually believed that Japanese had opinions! We also did a composition about our families... again. We do have better Japanese now, though, so we could write more interesting stuff. My favourite sentence was: 毎夜母と父は一緒に少しお酒を飲むことが好きです。(maiyoru haha to chichi isshoni sukoshi osake wo nomu koto ga suki desu.) I won't say what it means, I'll leave that up to you to figure out (I'm just waiting for my parents to kill me!). Finally, Yoshimatsu gave Binks and I a New Year's card each, since we had each sent her one.

On the way back home on the crowded bus I found myself next to Lisa (actually Risa, but I'm taking liberties in translation). I managed to have 10 minutes of practice conversation, where I unleashed my newly learnt plain style upon the world. She has 4 younger sisters and it is her birthday today.

Kanji and Politics

Today saw yet another couple of tests: vocabulary and kanji. 右 (right), 左 (left), 東 (east), 西 (west), 北 (north), 南 (south), 外 (out, outer, other, foreign), 内 (inner, within, inside), 部 (department, part, section, club), 駅 (station), 社 (shrine, company, assembling), 院 (hall, house, institute). Kanji count: 205.

In the International Office things are getting strange with the revelation that Ikema has commandeered the teachers' lounge so that he can turn it into a alternative room that we can use whilst waiting for our lessons. Kanashima-san sees it as an attempt to distance us from her since her contract runs out in March and has not been renewed. We will all be sad to see her go, since she has helped us so much and is a friend to us all. To this end we presented her with a basket of gifts we had all gathered from our Christmas travels. She now has a nice new tea-pot, mug, tea towel, and a bottle of some alcohol, not to mention the Kendal mint cake.

Review Test the Third

Today's Japanese lesson was actually a big revision test (our third one so far). I think it went all right despite having hardly revised: I did quickly flick through a little vocabulary though. Hirata-sensei gave us all some little sweets afterwards since she doesn’t like them. I haven’t tried them yet but they are supposedly very sweet and are normally eaten along with tea, like at a tea ceremony.

I had ramen for lunch today! I forced myself to have something other than curry-rice (I had it twice yesterday!). After lunch we had Seb’s history lesson again today: the Meiji Restoration. This brings us up to about 1875, though I’m guessing we’re going to start covering fewer dates with each lesson from now on. It was pretty interesting again today, though I always think that; perhaps more so than usual as everyone stayed awake throughout.

I had Linden Hall with Binks and Flick in the afternoon. We took both classes together, so we had 12 kids altogether. We did parts of the body culminating in a great game called “Touch Edd.” I wasn't so keen on the concept to begin with, but it was quite fun after I removed “navel” from the list of parts they could use. Basically, two kids at a time had to touch the correct part of me after being told the name, with the fastest one gaining their team a point. We did make it quite difficult though with parts like “shin,” “thigh,” and “forearm.” That stumped a few of them. We played outside with them afterwards, which was the first time in a long time that we have. It’s been too dark and too cold the last few weeks I did it.

Back to School

I spoke to Hannah this morning like we have been used to doing. It's so hard going back to that though as I'd obviously much rather prefer being with her. I think being at home for three weeks got me used to having her back, so I'm having to come to terms with loneliness all over again.

Our Japanese lesson was pretty good today: Drummond insisted that we all changed places so as to freshen things up. Nobody could find the key for the classroom, either, so we ended up in the identical room on the floor above. Watanabe-sensei gave us all New Year's cards as well. I think some of my Japanese is coming back to me. I'm rather rusty after having not used it for so long. We have a big review test tomorrow, though, but I can't be bothered to revise. Not really sure how I would manage to either; I'm just hoping I haven't forgotten everything.

In the afternoon some of us went to a random calligraphy lesson that was being held in the university. A few of the teachers turned up as well. There were some Korean students doing it too, but they have studied it a little beforehand. I drew 希望, meaning "hope", and 夢, which means "dream". They kept my best hope one for some reason, but I took the others home. I'm going to stick them on my wall.

Return to Japan

I had a most amazingly wonderful Christmas back at home. It was really good to see Hannah, my parents, my sister, and some of my friends again. The food was also excellent: I had two roast turkey meals and three roast chicken ones in the space of two weeks. I spent some time feeling rather ill after stuffing my face too much, but I think it was worth it!

The journey back was a long and arduous one, and I returned to Cambridge House 19 hours after leaving my house. I watched only one film on the plane: "Rebound", but I did about 20 sudoku, some in the dark.

My first plane was 50 minutes leaving, so at the Osaka I rushed to make sure I caught my connection. Upon first coming to Japan we had to queue for about 30 minutes as we were foreigners, but I was overwhelmed with relief when I realised that I could walk straight up to the desk for Japanese people since I had a reentry permit. I know it's a bit strange to have felt like that, but I was pretty tired. This journey also marks my first tackling of an airport on my own!

Back at Cambridge House I found a new frog keyring on my set of keys: from where I don't know. There were some pieces of calligraphy under my door from when we went to Ciaran's family's friends' house. Also Drummond returned a few hours after me bearing gifts of "I love NY" t-shirts that we're all going to wear tomorrow.