Nothing to Say

More panoramas in the works, Nagasaki report half-done, Rotary trip report on the way.

Chat

This week my parents met up with the rest of my immediate family, who live spread throughout the country, so, naturally they wanted me to be there too. Hence we tried to get a chat in. Unfortunately they asked me to set a time, I thought I'd set a time late in in the morning to make sure they're all up. Unfortunately I didn't get their e-mail that they'd be away from a keyboard at that time. Then I realized I was calculating for Atlantic Standard time when they were in a different time zone with DLS on, which meant that I waited until three thrity in the morning to finally get an e-mail telling me that they weren't there.

Luckily I had been chating with a friend from Canada who kept me mostly sane and even gave me some music to add to the track's I've pretty much memorized on my PSP.

So, the next morning (technincally the same one), after some figuring out how how to call to Japan, we got a nice chat in. Mandy, sorry I didn't get a chance to talk to you.

Anyways, I'm not in the right frame of mind for writing, sorry about how messy this entry is. I'll write more later, hopefully the Kyushu report.

For Mike

Godgle

...Wow....O.o Google should qualify as a god, search chruch of google in google to find out why.

Currently, I'm using gmail for my emailing. It comes with everything you could want from e-mail and it works on PSP.

I'm using my Google account in blogger to make this. And I can send e-mails as posts and recieve my comments as e-mails.

I'm using webpage creater to store and organize many of my larger files.

Google automatically added all my pictures from my blog to my new Picasa account (also Google).

I can (but don't) watch anime on in Google video.

I've created maps for my PSP from google maps, and with Google Earth, I can get a sense of what the area's like (honestly, high detail pictures, three dimensional modeling for terrain and now buildings, hell, they have 片町 in it, not to mention traveling the roads).

It's moblie version is convenient for my PSP.

I read books in Reader.

Google is awe some.

Microsoft on the other hand keeps pissing me off.

Anyways, I'm writing this to tell you I'm making a Picasa account, right now it has all the same pictures as the blog, but with captions. I'll see about adding more.

The Melancholy of Geoffrey Card

Reference to Suzumia Haruhi. Except instead of wanting to play with aliens, time-travellers and espers, I'm just looking for Japanese friends. Also, neither of us follow the status quo.

Anyways, did I mention I changed host families at the end of Febuary? Well, I did, I'm now living in the 小舞子 (komaiko) section of 白山 (hakusan, white mountain). The house is traditional Japanese style with super steep stairs, small rooms, low door frames, tatami et cetera. I'm living with grandparents and, when she's home, the daughter (she has a job a works quite a bit). There's also lots of contact with the father, mother and the other daughter who live in a different section of 白山 (more a collection of small, mostly empty rural towns than a city). I'll be getting some shots of the house and the town but I need different weather for the different shots. Also, they're nice enough to let me use the computer every night for up to an hour, unfortunately, it's vista.

Just so you know, the Japanese sate things much more generally that Westerners. So when I said daughter, I meant of the father and mother, not the grand parents. The same type of thing works for time, they say at thirty minutes instead of after thirty minutes have passed. Much more objective, but still easily confusing. (Hence old people can be called grandmother/father, aunt/uncle, father/mother or brother/sister (depending on age) even if they're not related).

Next, still having trouble on the firends front, but I know the reason. It's because I'm used to improvising and the Japanese are used to schdules and routine. Asking "Can I go nowhere with you?" has little to no effect since they've already decided where they're going to go and don't expect to deviate from it. So, basically I need to make a plan ahead of time.

In other news, 肉 (niku) the new exchange student from Australia of two months is doing better than I am socially at seven. Callan, any inferiority you felt to me is less than half what I feel of him. Granted the... guy has been studying Japanese for about a year and a half, knew a lot about Japan before he came and is a really cool guy (also, he got a cellphone). I like him, and I know he is and will continue to do great in Japan, but looking at "the very model of a modern major-" ...exchange student isn't very healthy for my ego.

Continuing on, the school year is over. I'm now a 三年生 (third year) in high school, I've got two weeks free from school (bit I still have kendo), I'm going on a Rotary trip next week and... not much else.

Also, I bought a figurine of Suzumia Haruhi to add to my collection. Don't worry, it's of her in here school uniform.

Anyways, bye for now.

Following Suit

I will eventually have a report of my Nine Province trip. I know what I'm going to write, but I'm bad at writing on paper and have little computer time. Also, as some would expect of a Sony fan, I'm working on making the pictures next gen quailty, and so I'm forced to outsource. The panoramas will be made out of house, by [Terry, enter your company's name here]. It's on it's way, but like video games, expect delays.


The title refers to my name, Card and the fact that I'm following in the footsteps of the gaming industry. It may be confusing, but I like to keep my titles original.

Moving on, I'll be running a ten k next month, on the nineteenth. I'm also hoping to learn some Japanese songs for karaoke (cruel angel thesis because it's famous and slow, hare hare yukai because it's sillyness, it should go well with Friend like me). That'll probably end up being good practice for my Japanese.

The school year is ending here, so many peoples' schedules are swtiching from club to free study time, including the girls. Most people would say they'd like to tutor anatomy... I'll settle for sociology (English's popularity died with my hype).

Right now I've little else to say. I'll post again soon.
And thanks for the e-mails back.

More letter to go, but tonight was cool

This morning I packed for the day, ate breakfast, went to school via train (watching an anime on my PSP on the way), showed some girls some easy card tricks on the bus and arrived at school.

There I got info for tonight, went to class, wrote notes for my Rotary speech, helped out a little in English class, asked them who wanted to learn English (answer:0), grabbed my stuff and left.

I walked to Rotary, got bank account info to close my account at Mitsubishi (though I still have an account with Japan Post), said my speech, got a few laughs and my allowance, ate lunch and sat through the rest of the meeting.

After, I noticed a poster for a road race this weekend, closed my account, made my other account richer by two zeros, went to the rifare, sent off two more letters, met Brie, told her my plans for the night (she decided to tag along and I'm glad she did), went to class for half an hour, got my homework and study tips for my upcoming test and left.

We had a good chat on the way, arrived at vanvanv4, met my friends who sadly couldn't play tonight, and we all went in and enjoy an awesome Japanese punk rock live (concert). We talked, enjoyed the music and generally had fun. The place was small but it was nice (in a cheap rock way). The first band was young, their first song basically repeated "I know nothing nothing nothing" and was short, but their last two songs were good. They had the same sort of style as The Pillows (did the music for Fooly Cooly). The next band was okay, their non-singer guitarist was really good (maybe some Rage Against the Machine influence) and their haircut were great examples of what anime hair looks like in real life (their singer seemed like he needed the superimposed anime eyes as he had hair covering his whole face). Then the third band was awesome. The first two acted cool, trying to act like their favourite bands on stage (though they didn't over do it badly), but the third pulled it off, smiling, facing the crowd, jumping around and looking like they were having fun. Unfortunately we had to leave early, but I was invited to my friend's next live, April 19th and bought a cd on the way out.

Brie and I had a lot of fun, and talked on the way to our stops. I was a little late getting home, but my family laughed most of it off. Today was one of my favourite days here so far, and promises much more.