I set my alarm for 10am, but my host mother kept coming up the stairs and making racket outside my door so I woke up around 9. Night before last, I kept hearing something crash against my bedroom door between 4 and 5am. I assumed it was one of the cats. I hope that's all it was.
I have to get on a bus today at 11:07. It's starting from the hotel in front of Hakodate station and making periodic stops to pick up students. I do not want to go. And after an entire week of cloudy weather, today is the day that it starts to rain. It already is as a matter of fact.
Looks like I'm leaving at 10:30. If I'm being taken by car, why are we leaving so early? Grr.
Wow, where to start? Well, the weather is shitty, the mountains are beautiful, my roommates suck.
We left the house about 40 minutes early. My host mother didn't know where to go so she stopped twice to ask directions. Then we started speeding back home at a frightening pace. When she went to the front door, she couldn't find her key. I let her use mine. She was in there for a few minutes and then we were off again. We found the waiting place and waited about 12 minutes, during which time she never turned off her car. The bus came and I got on.
We drove about 15km and were put out in a touristy area where we wandered around in rain for 2 hours, I had lunch in a little cafe with my dorky-cute guy from class. I ate chahan, which was really tasty. Sara, the Canadian, was there with some bimbos. After lunch, she apologised to me for staring (which I hadn't really noticed) because she thought my conversation had been much more interesting than at her table. She's horning in on my action, too. Now she's off with my dude at the gymnasium and they are comparing tae kwon do techniques.
The bus finally came to pick us up and brought us to a large, opulent resort hotel called Greenpia. This place is huge. It has a gymnasium, onsen, bowling alley, swimming pool (for which guests have to pay to use), several restaurants, ski slopes, game room, park golf, biking and hiking trails. It is most decidedly unfun since I have no one I am interested in hanging around with, have no loved ones present, don't care about onsen, and am not interested in walking around in rain.
The room is large, with a table, 4 chairs with no legs [these are called "zaisu" and the cushions which go with them are "zabuton"], a toilet room, 2 closets, a sink, and shower room.
God, I want to sleep in a proper bed.
Dinner was perfectly horrible. I was put at a vegetarian table in spite of the fact that I'm not vegetarian. I had tried to correct the error earlier in the week but the HIF staff assured me that I'd be at a 'no shellfish' table instead of 'no meat'. I don't know why or how they got the idea, but since I hate fish, I let it go. There was no meat at dinner save for a plate of thick chunks of beef in orange sauce. The vegetables were terrible as well. l am extremely hungry.
After dinner, it was KARAOKE TIME. Gaaah, it was horrible. I bailed after the 4th or 5th song becasue I couldn't take anymore. Some dork's belting out "Hard Day's Night" was the last straw. I came to my room and had a nice shower. Unfortunately, It's only 8:45 pm and there 's nothing to do, nothing to watch, and no one to talk to.
The hotel room is full of quirky little things. You have to put your card key in a holder just inside the door before the lights will come on. If you open the closet, a motion sensor turns on the light & turns it off again when you close it. There is a lantern-shaped lamp on the floor with built-in alarm clock. On the tv stand, there is a flashlight holder. The light comes on when you take the flashlight out because there is a tab on the holder that separates the batteries when you put it back. And, of course, there is the obligatory heated ass-washer toilet seat. There is also a doorbell in every room.
Well, I'm back in the releative comfort and quiet of my room. Last night, one of my roommates asked me if the book I was reading was good because she was interested in professional wrestling. That book was Foley Is Good. Heh heh. Big mistake. I can talk at length about pro wrestling if given a chance, so I did. I was completely caught off guard at first, because she didn't strike me as a prospective wrestling fan. She goes to Yale but is from Arkansas but has a upper midwestern accent. She'd had dinner with Diamond Dallas Paige recently, who thought that she had a self-esteem problem because she'd been making derogatory remarks about herself during the meal. He was at Yale to give some kind of motivational speech and she'd managed to get herself invited to the post speech dinner. She'd done research before he came by watching a month of wrestling shows and being "educated" by a friend.
Some other horrible female moved herself into our room since one of our roommates didn't come and then they all went out. I read and went to sleep. Since there is the one key per room in Japan, and that key was necessary to keep the lights on, everytime one of them came back, I had to wake up and open the door. What a pain in the ass. I didn't think morning would ever come.
Fortunately, we were leaving bright and early so we ate a strange breakfast and packed our things and soon were on a bus. I had breakfast with Sarah and a Chinese girl from Australia. She had a Chinese-Australian accent which was really strange to me. It was Australian while sounding vaguely Chinese at the same time. It was kinda cool. Me and Sarah talked about video games.
There were tiny bottles of milk available at the drinks table so we all got one. We were surprised when we opened them and no milk came out. There was a thick layer of heavy cream on top of the milk which some people were scooping out with chopsticks. I watched a couple of people taste the milk and they said it was really rich, so I put my unopened bottle back in the stack. I was really disappointed because the bottles were so damn cute.
We came to the hotel in 2 groups: a big bus and little bus. One of the members of the little bus group, which was my group, was missing when it was time to leave. Many minutes later, she was found and thought we were leaving at 10 rather than 9:30. Then we drove home and stopped at our respective drop off points. My mother was waiting for me and we had a frightful ride back home. When given a choice between my host mother's driving and walking, I'll take walking. It's *still* raining, by the way. I don't think it ever stopped.
If you go to or walk past fancy, upscale places in Japan, there's a good chance you'll hear music box muzak. I don't know why. In the hotel, I heard music box versions of popular songs by artists like Ayumi Hamasaki. There is a restaurant that I walk past every day that plays music box music loudly through speakers located around its huge doors. I never thought that a music box could be capable of deep bass.
Ohhh, I wanna go home. I'm so tired of eating shit that tastes bad. It's awkward for both me and my host parents. Just now she prepared me a sweet potato and brought it to me. I didn't know it was one because it wasn't orange inside. I bit into it and it was sweet after all. I didn't eat it because they make me gag. But I feel bad.
Lunch was fairly terrible. It was a salad of noodles, crab, carrots, celery and one or two other things with this brown peanutty, yeasty gravy-like sauce on it. I ate most of it until I couldn't eat any more. I didn't say I didn't like it but they sensed it anyway and gave me some bread.
Afterwards, she said they were going to the hospital to visit someone and she started getting ready. I offered to wash the dishes and she said "ok". I thought she meant "ok, I'd like that" and then I thought she meant "it's ok, don't worry about it". Then she called someone and then started washing the dishes. I was really confused because I was waiting for them to leave before starting. Was I wrong? Who knows?
Someone is here. It sounds like a man, woman and at least one child. I hope they don't make me meet them. I'm really tired of sitting politely listening to people say things I can't understand and laugh at me. I'm really tired of this whole trip actually. I'm trying to spend the day studying but it's real fucking boring.
I've already said goodnight for the evening. I didn't want to hand out any more cookies to kids. Apparently July 7th is some kind of children's treat day much like Halloween. Groups of kids come to the door, sing a song, and you give each one candy. Some children wore yukatas and sandals. Others wore regular clothes. There were some girls in yukatas that looked very pretty. They said "Thank you" when I was forced to hand them candy. My host father explained to me why they did this, but I couldn't really understand. Something about stars [July 7 is Tanabata, when two stars (Altair and Vega), which are usually separated in the nighttime sky by the Milky Way, come together. In a Chinese story, these stars represented two young lovers, a human boy and a goddess]. There are also people shooting off fireworks.
On a lighter note, dinner was fucking awesome. My host mother made curry rice for me and it was wonderful. You can get it at just about any restaurant, and I'm rather fond of the boil-in-bag-type, but that doesn't compare to the real thing. She put in pork (I don't think it was beef, but I'm not sure), carrots, potatoes, onions, and something stringy. Hell, she could have put anything in it and I wouldn't have known the difference. Except for corn. I hate kernels. And peas. Those sweet potatoes were probably in there but it doesn't matter. She fixed a huge pot of it so we'll be having lots of curry this week.
This afternoon really sucked. I stayed in my room and had a nap and tried to study but I was feeling miserable and homesick and *really* didn't want to talk to people. I counted the weeks remaining several times. Mid-terms are Wednesday after next followed by a 4 day break. Lots of people are planning on travelling but I haven't made any plans. I don't want to do anything but I also don't want to hang around here.
I haven't seen Hiroshi all day. He stayed in his room for most of it, and then he left before the brats started coming over. It sounds like he might be back. I wonder what his life is like. From what I can see, he doesn't have much of one. He doesn't seem to talk on the phone much or go out much. And he works 6 days a week at the family factory with host dad.
I was watching out of the window of my darkened room some kids playing with firecrackers in a vacant lot across the street. While I was watching, the old fart in the house below mine came out and pissed on a bush. He was almost literally underneath my second storey window. Also, my house is on higher ground than his. Then he went inside. Ewww.
All in all, it's been a fairly shitty weekend. I expect many more like this as well. I think I'll read in bed or something to try and finish this stupid day.