New Semester, New People, Closer to August.

Currently listening to a stream of Japanese music while writing this post. On a scale of "How Japanese Have I Become", I am Bump of Chicken.

While browsing through Japanese music I found several songs I recognized from previous karaoke adventures with my Japanese friends, and find myself liking my friend's versions more. They're too good at singing! Its like I get treated to a private concert for 5 hours. Whenever the mike comes around I simply return it and let them sing another round. Some would say its a waste of money, but I call it a good time.

Lately when I meet up with friends to hang out its been a lot of "what should we do: Bowling, Karaoke, Pool, Dinner, Or a mix of all?"
So this is what college life is like. I like. I like very much. Takadanobaba is a great spot for general hanging out, there are so many cafes to go to (only some with wifi), and a variety of recreational activities for those feeling active. Some of which I mentioned above, and other things like batting cages, skating, and even golf. I'm also starting to take a liking to darts which can be found at the game center in Big Box.

Anyways, for the past few days I've been helping Niji with welcoming new Japanese students into the club. Although before welcoming them in, we have to reel them in with my terrible persuasion skills. Club Days at Waseda just ended yesterday, and essentially what it is is a larger than life festival of countless clubs trying to recruit students for the new school semester.

Tiffany working hard at explaining what Niji is to new exchange students.

I'm on the flyer! (to the left)

Niji printed 7000 flyers to hand out, and we managed to hang them all out. Some of which may have been dropped to the ground.....(the clean up job for this event must have been a pain)

After the club events are over and all the advertising is done with, the orientation period begins. Today was the first orientation and the turn out for this event was roughly 80 new japanese students. People waited outside for an hour and a half (including me) in first a major downpour, then hail, then thunder. I had a lot of fun talking with new students however, and I think some of the people I talked to are dead set on joining! 

Meeting new people is fun. 

Woof Woof

For the past 13, I've been WWOOFING in Okinawa doing farm work in exchange for accomodation and meals for 2 weeks. The farm I'm volunteering at is Kiyuna Farm and they have appr. 30 cows, 8 goats, 10 rabbits, countless chickens, 1 enormous pig, 2 boars, and dogs and cats. 

I can't explain how interesting of an experience this has all been for me. 7-8 am, 9-12pm, and 3-6 pm are the daily work hours for a total of 7 hours a day. After 6 when were done the nightly cow poop scooping, we also have to make our own fire to heat up the showers which takes an hour to warm up. What a contrast to my lazy life in Tokyo! 

Although the work is hard, I'm really enjoying my time here. My mind hasn't been this empty in awhile...no thinking, no stressing, just feeding and taking care of the animals. My biggest worry is keeping the rabbits in the cage so the dogs dont eat them. Or trying to avoid getting knocked over by the playful cows as I shovel their poop. Or getting bit by a poisonous habu snake as I go for a walk. Sometimes its nice to empty your mind and escape to a remote (very very remote) city, thinking about absolutely nothing. Actually, I doze off constantly in Tokyo anyways (*^^*)

I feel like although I worked for 7 hours a day doing physically challenging tasks, I may have gained a bit of weight due to all the food. Oh the food, the glorious food.

For the first few days I was here I was accompanied by 2 other Danish wwoofers, who made us this delicious danish bread thats traditionally made with marzipan but substituted with walnuts.

They also made banana cake out of mochi flour, and a raisin and walnut dessert. I love danish desserts!

Ellie and I, my Australian friend from Waseda also made lunch and dinner numerous times.

Our shephards pie and Ellie's wonderful sweet potato dish that is for sure going to be added to my recipe repertoire when I get home.

Here are some photos of the farm..

     The ocean view from the cow barn

We also held a few dinner parties with other wwoofers from the neighbour farms nearby: An Italian themed pizza dinner and a French 3 course dinner. 

First the Italian...

Toki, the Italian and Japanese half. Sanshin trainee and pizza master.

Avocado and cheese was my fave

And then the French dinner...

Made by Vico the French Guy. He cooked for 7 hours straight. おつかれ！

Vegetable soup before it was pureed

Cheese souffle with pumpkin+celery base

And beef bourgignon! Looking nice and purple-ly from the wine.

Damn it, this turned into another food post. But farming and wwoofing really comes with its perks..meeting interesting people from around the word and eating lots of food!

Today was my last morning at Kiyuna Farm. お父さん drived us out to the bus station in his pick up truck and we talked the whole way there. What a genuinely friendly man...I'm gonna miss him!

Ellie and I had a very relaxing afternoon in Nago, eating and talking and cafe hopping. 

My first Vietnamese food in Japan! Spring rolls, I missed you too.

My banana and kinako and black sesame smoothie.

And iced chai tea latte and a gateau chocolat cake warmed up and gooey in the center. Definitely the most hipster cafe I've been in since coming here. Wooden tables, high ceilings, and good music. 

Should I just make this into a food blog? 

Thanks Ellie for introducing me to WWOOFING!

An action packed Wednesday

I cant express to you how yummy this gelato is, I'm dead. Dead. 

Blueberry cheesecake on top and roasted chestnut and pumpkin on the bottom. Before handing me the gelato, she gave me one more flavour to sample, so I got some complex mix of greentea, azuki bean and kinako.

(This is at Pariya, in the basement of the Tokyu department store at Shibuya) 

I did almost nothing today as I slept through most of my morning, tired from Disneysea the night before. I lazied around for around 3 hours before getting my butt out of the dorms and here I am. At Shibuya about to go to the movies alone! Well it is Ladies Day afterall (1000 yen for women). 

Its called 抱きしめたい, a love story between a sick girl and a guy who still chooses to be with her. Criiinnngggeee, its so typical of a story. But its a Wednesday and I'm bored so give me mercy. 

Yamanashi Onsen Trip with the Peeps

Never in my life when I came here, did I think that I would actually become so close to actual Japanese students at Waseda. Many exchange students end up leaning towards people that speak the same language as them, and truth be told I do too. But because those same english speaking friends I have also make an effort to hang out with Japanese people (sometimes more than I do), I end up going out with Japanese people more and more as the semester progresses. 

In early January, I was asked if I wanted to go on an onsen trip by one of the niji guys and 4 other people. It was meant to be an onsen trip with a cozy group of 6 people, but because two of the people in that group couldnt make it and potentially some more, he ended up inviting another 8 to make a total group of 15. He spent a lot of time and effort preparing for it, and it was a really great trip. We spent one night at a ryokan in Yamanashi prefecture with a perfect view of Mt. Fuji from our room.

                   Our all girls room

Lunch: ほうとう (Houtou). Which to this day I still have no idea what it is, but essentially its thick home made udon noodles in a thick broth and lots of veggies, including pumpkin! 

We then walked to Tsutaya to grab movies for later that night and came out with Inception, an hour long special of Japanese "real" horror videos where ghosts make an appearance in home videos, and a romantic comedy-esque Japanese movie. We watched all of them including Ted, a movie that one of the guys brought. The Japanese horror clips were especially fun to watch. We crammed 15 people in one tatami room covered with futons and watched in total darkness, screaming in sync. It was also my first time watching Ted, and although it was as expected, very crude humour, I enjoyed it more than I'd like to admit. And I also enjoyed the Japanese romantic comedy movie more than I'd like to admit, inappropriate jokes included. 

Oops, skipped too far into the night. I can never blog in order...

Anyways, after Tsutaya we went to the ryokan which was a lot prettier than anyone expected. It was 8,800 per person a night, breakfast included. The onsen was also a lot more luxurious than we thought and could almost battle Oedo Onsen on the enjoyability scale. The outside bath had small bridges that connected to four different baths and it was surrounded by snow. We had a snowball fight at the onsen, which i dont think one can say quite often. I dont think I can enjoy an onsen without snow anymore...its the perfect balance of hot and cold. We could also hear screams from the guys side, and as we speculated, they were having a snowball fight also. 

Since dinner was im an hour, we only had a quick dip before meeting the guys at the dining hall. Dinner was all you can eat shabu shabu!

After dinner we were supposed to onsen again, but since we wanted to rest our stomachs before baring them again, we rented a room for an hour long ping pong match. You'd think an hour is too long for ping pong, but no no no. We all got really into it and many were actually very good. Now that I think of it, the people who went on this trip were all very open to sports and although some of the girls may look girly, they're all very adventurous and willing to do anything.

The guys were joking around and used their slippers as rackets, thinking that going against the girls team with normal ones were gonna be too easy of a match. They lost and were forced to do 15 push ups. 

After that it was onsen time again, and when we came back we all met up in one room for drinking and movies and puzzles. 1000 pieces to be exact. At first, we were like puzzles?! Really?? 

And then we proceeded with piecing them together for the next 4 hours. It may sound ridiculous, but this was also part of the fun we had that night. 

Hell yeah we finished it. The planner of the trip, receiving the honour of finishing the last piece of the puzzle. The last one piece of the one piece puzzle. 

After that we watched movies and then slept all in that one room, everyone dozing off at around 4:30-5am ish. We woke up 3 hours later for breakfast groggy eyed but ready to eat. 

Ryokan breakfast is awesome as always. Unlimited coffee and orange juice included.

You may think its a little over doing it, but we onsen-ed again, this time going to the top floor for a different onsen bath. This one had a huge window view of fuji san right by the bath and it was very picturesque. Too bad theres no pictures!

So I'll give you guys this one instead. All the girls in shower caps.

I think the guys beat us in the photo contest though...

Trying to decide what to do after we checked out, we decided on visiting a cheesecake store nearby to look for souvenirs and lounge around.

"Do a cheesecake face!"

The new york cheesecake. Not as good as my mom's, but still plenty good.

After finishing the heavy dessert, we headed out for some fun in the snow right by the lake. By "fun in the snow" I mean violently pushing each other until were all soaked and our hands and faces blushed with colour. 

Since we still had an hour to kill before the bus left for Shinjuku, we rode the ropeway up the mountain. It was the perfect day for it, blue skies and mildly warm.

Oh boys.......what are you doing. 

If you throw the plates through the ring, you'll be blessed with luck in the love realm. 

A view just like Canada.

Once we made our way down we took the bus back to Shinjuku. If you thought this trip would end with us going home straight after, you're underestimating our college student energy capacity. 

We all headed for Niji Volleyball right after, some of us actually bringing volleyball wear on the trip itself to prepare. Sporty people unite! 

This was a great ending to the trip. All the guys showed off their spiking chops and it was admittedly, very impressive. I haven't played volleyball in roughly 3-4 years and I forgot how much I loved the sport. I hope we have more of these events in the future!

As always after Niji events we headed out for Saizerya dinner where we ate for 2 hours, and although we said goodbye to most of the people there, I visited the Hoshien lounge (an international dorm) for more socializing. No drinking for me, just chatting.

I got home at 11:30 and clocked out at 12, the earliest I slept in a while..

It was a really fun trip all in all, and I'm immensly greatful for all the people I've met so far!