Peachy Keen

Today I spent the day with Mariko in Okayama City. We wanted to spend a couple of days in Kyoto/Osaka, but because of the last minute hotel booking and the mass exodus to the Kansai area due to the earthquake, we couldn't find a place for the 20th. We ate lunch at The Market, a cute little shop that sells *actual* sandwiches. Not the sandwich stuff you find in the conbini. Like, Panera/deli type sandwiches. Mariko was happy with it so that made me happy.

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Labels: friends, okayama, Tohoku Jishin

Being in Okayama all this time, I find it surreal at times to know that all the crazy things that have been happening: the quakes, tsunamis, the reactor explosions, all of it is happening in the same country. As much as I feel for the Japanese who are suffering, all I can think of are my fellow JETs; my FRIENDS, who are in the Kantou/Tohoku area going through all the things I can only see in the news.

For some reason I particularly feel emotionally drained today. It breaks my heart to know that while I'm in the clear, I read tweets from friends saying that they felt another quake, or they can't find what they need at the grocery store because of the shortage of supplies. I feel so helpless. I look at the AJET volunteer doc sheet to see if there's anything that can be done here in Okayama, but for now the best thing is to donate or give blood. I have donated, and I plan on donating １万 (1 man) for relief funds (Man up for Japan!)

I count myself lucky that everyone I know in the affected areas are safe though I know others have experienced otherwise. One of my friends, an exchange student at Yokohama University, actually has to return to the US.

It's so hard to concentrate on work when all this is going on. I don't want to say it's frustrating, but it's just hard to see everything/everyone here in Okayama go on while s*it's hitting the fan elsewhere in the country. I guess it hits closer to home for me since I actually know people in these areas and that it's especially worrisome for me since I'm a foreigner in a country. To have all this happen in a country you just came to is pretty freaky to me. My close friends and family, my support are miles away, although thankfully technology makes it seem closer. It would be nice right now to get a hug from my Dad or to see my girlfriends.

Ugh, this post is so scattered; it's hard to put my feelings down. I guess all I can do is continue to pray for everyone's safety and that all this ends soon and we can start again. Pray For Japan. A little quote I've seen on Twitter from people who're posting art to show their support for the victims: がんばれ日本。必ず明日来る。I watch the #newday_GEISAI to cheer myself up a bit. Here's one of my favs:

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Labels: Tohoku Jishin

I have a draft on my Hana Matsuri trip, but I just wanted to make a quick post about the earthquake.

This afternoon there was a huge earthquake in the Tohoku region of Japan. I've seen a few numbers, but it looks like it hit 8.8 on the Richter scale. Yeah. It's pretty huge. Enough that even people in Osaka were feeling the aftershocks. Then there's the 10-m tsunamis....and fires in Odaiba. And apparently flooding in Tokyo Disneyland...Geez the footage in Sendai is horrifying. Now there's a nuclear warning in Fukushima due to a cooling malfunction so now people have to evacuate.

Fortunately I live in Okayama-ken which is quite a ways away, but I've been worrying non-stop since I know people in that area. It's times like this where I praise technology because everyone was checking in via FB, or Twitter to let people know how they're doing. Of course, this also meant within the hour my family back in the US started flipping out and asking if I was okay.

As I type this there is a death count of about 60 people from the earthquake. They're still counting bodies being found after the tsunami... I just hope that it ends soon and people get out of this as safely as possible.

Here's a live blog from CNN on the earthquake and tsunami.

Japan earthquake live blog

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Labels: Tohoku Jishin

aka The Naked Man Festival in Saidaiji. Or, The Big One. In my eyes, the festival is about a bunch of dudes wearing nothing but a fundoshi (that white cloth that seems like they're wearing diapers) and beating the crap out of each other to get the 'lucky stick.' Oh the dirty jokes are too many to count...

..and the fight begins! Actually the actual event was short and pretty anti-climactic compared to the preparation for the fight. The men looked like they were grouped with their work, or some other organization (so of course the foreigners were with the foreigners). The ran around the temple several times, screaming わっしょい！and getting purified by water. So not only were they running nearly naked, but running around wet. Ah well, I bet the alcohol (which none of them were not supposed to consume before the fight), was keeping them warm. I think after they threw the stick, they turned off all the lights in the temple because about 5 minutes later the lights were on and they announced the stick was caught. Little did I know that that wasn't the end of it. Now the unlucky guy had to get that stick out of the temple gates. I thought it would be more....violent, but from my view it looked very neat. It was the most organized brawl I've ever seen. But props to the foreigners/JET members who participated! I rooted for you! I'll post more pics and video on my Flickr site soon.

After the event, Jessi and I took the train back into Okayama City to wait for the others who went there via AJET. After meeting up at McDonalds (sadly the only 24 hr place open) Jessi, Caroline, Jessica and I went for karaoke. All. Night. Of course I had a taiko concert to go to the next day and while being sick. >_>

In a short note, the taiko concert was AWESOME. The group was Ura Taiko Dan. I guess the reason I loved it so much was that they were very theatrical in their performance. Their last song, Ura, had half of them dress as priests and the other as oni and the song was more or less their 'battle.' Even the kid group had a piece about Momotaro vs. the oni. And I thought my taiko group was hard! These guys were crazy!

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Labels: friends, matsuri, okayama

Funny what you can accomplish when you're sick: a blog post! I think I'll be switching to this blog for my living-in-Japan experience, then going back over to LJ for my otaku tendencies. Hehe~

I won't cover everything I did during my holidays, but to sum it up from Dec. 17-23 I was back in the states for my sister Niki's catillion and spent Christmas weekend in Tokyo and visited friends. I'm so glad I spent a few days in Tokyo with my friends who I haven't seen in FOREVER. I think it helped me adjust to me being in Japan again and helped me lose my homesickness. I guess I didn't feel so alone? Something like that.

I tried to do a stereotypical New Years in Japan. First I spent New Years Eve by going to my first sento with Jessi (another Okayama JET), eating toshikoshi soba (end-of-the-year noodles), and watching Kouhaku Uta Gassen, or the red vs. white singing competition until the countdown.

New Years Day Jessi, Caroline and I spent the day shrine hunting for Hatsumode, or the first shrine visits in the New Year.

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Labels: friends, newyears

My cousin just came over and just got a lot of stuff from my sell list. Yay for cousins! He also has dibs on all my furniture, but since I'm here for another 3 months he'll just have to wait. I'm really glad he came by because he was asking for things I didn't even think about selling, like my various bags and whatnot. I'm really sad to see my stuff go, but it's all for a greater cause: JAPAN.

Tomorrow is picking up the car for the Las Vegas trip. I'm excited since a friend who wasn't going is now going to ditch his bike marathon and go with us. Friends Forever! (inside joke)

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You know how you're in that awkward stage as a teenager, not comfortable with yourself, and some people say to you that 'it's just a phase, that one day you'll be confident and you'll accept yourself for who you are, and everything else will fall into place?'

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Labels: emo