oo-oo-oo!

ソカルから来たので、冬はあまり好きじゃない。でも今年、本当に好きになった。二週間前、ジョイクラスと一緒に金剛山でハイキングをしました。それはとたも楽しかったです。山道でアイスが沢山あったから、靴でスパイクスをしないといけなかった。その時に何かを分かりました、冬は本当にきれいになれる。この写真を見てください。ナルニアみたい。

樋川よしやはメディテーションをしていない。実は鳥を待っています。
あの寺の前で雪合戦をしました。とても楽しかったです！

これはグループショットです。

坂口、ゆかり、千晴、えちゃん、あちゃん、わちのぞみ、と僕、７人でぐちゃんの車でフェリーを乗った。フェリーが６：００に出てると僕らは５：５７に乗った！その１4時間船旅行の中に何をしたらいいかなぁ？４時間ハリーポッターウノしましたよ！すごい面白かったです！でも、時々一人一人はちょっといじわるになった、へへ。



もちろん、鹿児島に行く時は世界の一つブラウンローサンにいかなくちゃいけません。僕のポーズは手話でブラウンだ。


I don't have time to continue butchering the Japanese language in my attempt to explain our adventures, so I'll just do it in English. We just barely made it onto the ferry by three minutes. It took 14 hours and we played Harry Potter Uno for 4! It was so funn!!! (I need an extra 'n' to write about it!) But people got a little vicious at times, hehe, but all in good fun.

Of course, when you go to Kagoshima, you have to pay a visit to the world's only brown Lawson's Station. The pose I am doing means "brown" in JSL.

The next pictures are kinda self-explanatory. I had planned on leaving Wednesday night after the wedding by night bus, but it turns out that a plane ticket was not much more, so Kondo sensei worked his travel magic (with his assistant, Jun) and they helped me exchange the bus ticket and buy a plane ticket so I could leave Thursday morning instead. It was SO much fun to stay that extra night. I got to stay at Jun's house again. It's like my home in Japan, hehe. That night the group of us went to the onsen- Tanuki Yu. It was somehow THE BEST time at an onsen I have ever had! I felt like a million bucks (or hyaku-man-en) by the time I was done. Then we went on to eat THE BEST ramen I have ever eaten! It had black pork in it ( a Kagoshima specialty!). It was like ramen heaven. Ramen will never be the same again, not even in Winter (which is the best time to eat it, in my opinion, but I like it all year round).

先週の木曜日は多分僕の日本にいる一番恥ずかしい時だったよ！日比野こうへいとのりこが僕の誕生日の為に僕を本町のハードロックカフェに連れて行きました。そこで４０ぐらいテレビがあった。バスデイをアナウンス時にバスデイの人にビデオカメラをかけて、その人は5分ぐらいにレストランの全部のテレビで見えるよ！恥ずかしかった！でもとても楽しかった！

今日前山信吾が僕と吉澤言ちゃん(カレッジスタフ）と一緒に会って、ご飯を食べたかった。言ちゃんの誕生日も今週から僕らにご飯を．．．ご馳走．．．した（言葉を忘れた）。でも、すごいおいしかった焼肉を食べた！多分一番僕が食べた焼肉でした。信吾先生も一回ご馳走様でした！

Now one more time, with more detail, in English, for those of you who followed the link from my xanga and can't read my bad Japanese. (Sorry Japan for butchering your language!)

Last Thursday had what was probably the most embarrassing moment I've yet experienced in Japan! Kohay Hibino took me to and a girl named Norkio, who goes to HBC and to the same accupuncture school as Kohay, to the Hard Rock Cafe in Hommachi (2 stops past Nanba) for my birthday. There are about 40 TV screens in the restaurant, most of which are the size of your average computer monitor, but some of which are quite large. They constantly play music videos...until someone has a birthday, in which case they turn a camera on that person and project them live on to every screen for about 5 minutes! It was a VERY long five minutes and I had no idea how to react to the whole restaurant suddenly looking at me all at once. Kohay said I looked like a Japanese person when they are embarrassed, hehe- not knowing what to do.

Tonight Shingo wanted to have a college staff meeting with Gen and me. Since both of our birthdays are this week, he took us out for dinner- to the most amazing yaki-niku I've ever tasted! You know how good beef should be marbleized with white stripes of fat? Well, this was like thin slices of fat marbleized with red stripes of beef. It was amazing. And he kept it coming til I thought it was gonna slide up and out of my greazy throat. It was so good! Thanks again Shingo!