01/13/10 room, night - I woke up at 6 and we left at 7:25 to catch the bus. IT WAS SNOWING!!!! :D :D :D I love snow! My host mom told me to use an umbrella. So I tried it but I didn’t like it at all. My hands froze even with gloves. I always put them in my pockets so the wind can’t get them. Can’t do that if you’re trying to keep the wind from blowing your umbrella away. At the bus stop, while we were waiting, I tried to hold it between my shoulder and face so I could put my hands in my pockets. But before I knew it I was chasing it down the sidewalk. Caught it though. We waited for Kai san but she didn’t come so we went ahead onto the train. I said bye to my host mom at the subway exit and walked to the north gate by myself. A whole bunch of Nanzan students were headed there as well. To get to the north gate you have to go up this big hill. I looked up at it as I approached and saw a sea of pastel bobbing up the hill. It was all the umbrellas of the students (all female students in a swarm.) I wasn’t using an umbrella. I just let those snow flakes blow into my face and eyes and didn’t mind one bit. ^_^

We were in orientation meetings until lunch. At one point I had to go in another building to make a copy of something. On the way out of the building I was currently in, I saw Naoko san walking up the steps going into the building. She saw me and called my name. I told her good morning and smiled. When she got up to me she held out her bare hands. Without really thinking about it I took them with my gloved hands and started rubbing them. She rubbed them against my hands too trying to warm them up. She asked where I was going and I told her. She said she’d see me later and we smiled and waved goodbye. It was only after I was walking away did I realize how intimate a gesture we had shared. I met her yesterday but she smiled widely at me and treated me like a close friend. I had unconsciously reciprocated. I marveled at this. This would NEVER happen in America (at least not in my experience). It would take months, even years for two people to act that way toward each other. A lot of people seem to think that since the Japanese bow and act formally that they are cold and distant. But I find American culture to be far more so. Americans become awkward so easily but I didn’t feel uncomfortable at all with Naoko san. I connected more with her in about 5 seconds than I have ever connected with 99.9% of the Americans I know. While this isn’t true across the map, so many Americans isolate themselves emotionally. It’s epidemic; I do it too. I came to Japan knowing that I would gain the ability to see things about my own country that I wouldn’t be able to otherwise. This is revelation number one. It may seem strange but those 5 seconds with Naoko san made it all worth it. If nothing else goes right this entire trip I will still never regret it, because of that one moment. I hope I can somehow carry this ability to let people in back with me to America.

At lunchtime, I ate the bread that my host mom had given me and the egg salad sandwiches I had taken from the free food party the day before. :d I ate with Erin san. Her host mom had packed her a huge sandwich and a thermos of milk tea. We swapped stories about our host moms. Erin’s teaches piano lesson and runs a temple. My host mom continues to be so thoughtful always giving me stuff (like folders, a thing to hold my commuters' tickets, and four pack of tissues). After we ate we walked around exploring for a while. Then it was class registration time! I ran into Kai san and she said she’d been late this morning because her bus was moving slowly in the snow. I tested into Intensive Japanese 300. In addition I am taking Japanese religions, a class that focuses on learning kanji (Chinese characters), Sadou (way of tea), and the history of sadou. I filled out the sheet in pencil at first, like a dolt and had to trace over everything before I could hand it in. XP

I met my host mom at 2:30 at the north gate and we went and got me commuter’s tickets (basically allow you to pay for a certain route in advance and then use the card each time instead of buying a ticket). Then we went back to her house and I don’t know what happened but I opened the door like I knew what I was doing! I finally learned its secret. Then my host mom drove me to do my alien registration. So I’m legal now and in no danger of being deported! Well minimal danger anyway. Then my host mom took us out for dinner. We ate at a Japanese restaurant in a shopping center. She paid again. Then she showed me a hundred yen store. Then we went grocery shopping. A guy working there was giving out free samples of veggie burgers and trying to sell them. He called out to me “oi, ne-san!”. It means sister literally but in Japan any young female can be called “Onesan” and it isn’t impolite. I have heard it countless times in anime so when I, myself, got called “ne-san” it was so cool!! He offered me a free sample and of course I took it, because 1. Food and 2. Free. :3 Those are a few of my favorite things. I said thank you (in Japanese) and he asked if I knew Japanese. I said “a little”. We (he, my host mom, and I) talked for a little bit about his veggie burgers, my studies here, how old I was, and junk like that. My host mom bought a package of the burgers for me (I had had three samples of them b/c the guy kept doling them out). And we went on our way. Back at the house it was rub a dub dub time for me and then I came up here to write this lovely entry. Now I am exhausted. Sleepy time. 23:08 (J time)