July2008

The last month has been one of those times when I'm extremely busy, but it feels like nothing is really happening. I suppose this is really the best I could ask for since a good number of my friends left for their home countries.
Anyway, moving on (for now), since I last updated I did some Japanese stuff. On Saturday, July 19th, I went to a festival in Emma's city and watched people carry an umekoshi (portable shrine thing). This is different from the usual festival experience due to the fact that I was supposed to be helping to carry it. However shooting pains down my arm from holding it above my head for long periods of time (I wasn't even carrying the thing since I'm short) prevented me from actually participating.
(I'm still angry with the driver who hit me a month and a half ago. I wasn't having nearly as many shoulder issues before I fell on it after they hit me. In other bike accident related news, my office is apparently convinced that I was listening to my iPod while riding my bike to work and, due to that, I was hit by a car. Okay, ridiculous for a number of reasons. 1) They never asked me if I was listening to music. 2) The police never asked me if I was listening to music. 3) They told the other AETs in my city that I was listening to music, so it was my fault I was in an accident. 4) I wasn't listening to music. Of course, all this is topped off by the fact that the car hit me from behind so there was really nothing I could do.)

So yeah. Frustration. Anyway, after the festival, I met up with Liz and Laura in Shinjuku for some all-night dancing. It was a lot of fun, except for the part when this guy was hitting on Laura when she was making it quite clear that she wanted nothing to do with him. We took him to a gay bar in an attempt to scare him away, but it didn't work. Finally, we got angry and the nice bouncers got rid of him for us. Then we went back to the club where some random person stepped on my foot, apologized, and then started hitting on me with the line "wow, your English is really good." The night/early morning was finished off with curry and naan. Yum...
As you may or may not know, I have weird eye problems every summer. It varies in intensity and duration, but I've had issues for the past 4 summers. In the past it's lasted for a week where pain was minimal but light-sensitivity was super high. This year's annual eye weirdness happened in 18 hours, from 4pm on Sunday to about 8am on Monday. I woke up mostly refreshed after sleeping the day away (after dancing all night), with the exception of my hugely swollen right eye. It was like someone shoved a needle into my eyeball and shot it up with jello. This came with horrible pain, light sensitivity, and blinking issues (of course, my eye was no longer spherical). I ultimately decided that if the swelling didn't go down by the time I woke up the next morning, I'd go to the doctor. My reasoning was that prices are obscenely high on Sunday evening, the hospital is a $20 cab ride away, and I really wasn't in the mood to explain that I had been dancing all night in Shinjuku the night before. Luckily, with some ice and sleep, I was mostly fine when I woke up the next morning.

The following weekend was the start of the week of Last Parties. This started with fireworks in Asakusa. We got there at 1pm (fireworks started in the evening) with hopes that we would get a good seat. Umm, no. People were apparently camped out from early that morning. It also didn't help that we didn't really know where the fireworks were coming from. Ultimately it didn't matter since most of us were too drunk to care that we couldn't see the fireworks. Sunday night, Farewell Party at the George. Wednesday night, Goodbye Party at Saizeriya and Riki's. Lots of goodbyes. It sucked.

Jen and Jordon came on the 31st. Jen is my oldest friend in the sense that her father likes to tell the story of how little Jen came home after her first day of Kindergarten and said "I made a new friend! Her name is Krystle!" And Jordon is her boyfriend. We met at Shibuya at the famous Hachiko statue, had some Starbucks overlooking the huge pedestrian crossing, Jen bought a turquoise purse, and we had lunch. Then we headed out to Odaiba for a day of truly random science stuff. Jen insisted on seeing the center for development or something at Miraiken (future building). Jen put together a brain and I played teddy bear air hockey. Then we went to Pastel Town and the Toyota Showcase. Jordon liked the car part, but I liked the section with the weird chairs. We also saw Toyota's iReal and iFoot, two people movers that look like something out of a movie. Jen and I jumped at the opportunity to drive/ride the iReal, but were foiled in our attempt. The only instruction in English was "you must be able to understand Japanese in order to drive the iReal." I thought, well, ultimately, it's forward, back, left, right, pull, and push, right? I continued to read down the Japanese (which I understood, hooray me!) until I hit the part that said you must have a valid Japanese driving license. Curses! Anyway, we rode on the huge Ferris Wheel (minor consolation in my mind). then went home.
The next day was AWESOME!!! We met up in the Happiest Place in Japan: Tokyo Disneyland. Well, technically, DisneySea. Which is technically in Chiba. Anyway, it was great! I got there about 40 minutes before Jen and Jordon, so I wandered around Mediterranean Harbor and saw "Chip and Dale's Cool Service" which was basically the two chipmunks meets Stomp! plus a couple huge water cannons on a boat. I also love the "cast members" at Tokyo Disneyland. There was one guy who spent five minutes coaxing a kid to go closer to the railing so he would get sprayed with water. The kid was kinda mock protesting, but you could tell he really wanted to go. Finally with complete seriousness, the kid gave his felt Indy Jones hat to the cast member (because, no joke, "the hat didn't want to get wet"), walked up to the railing, got sprayed, and loved it. Meanwhile, the cast member took a few huge steps back (out of spray range) and grinned when the kid got soaked. It was great. Other highlights include "Raging Spirits" a really short roller coaster that has a 360degree loop, Tower of Terror (although the one in Florida is way better), and the Sinbad ride which is basically It's a Small World with way better animatronics and a different story. The Indy Jones ride was fun, but the best part may have been that one of the cast members had the same family name as me and we had a few seconds of amazing connection before the line started piling up behind us.
No trip to a Disney park is complete without a ridiculously over the top show. While I mostly enjoyed the Little Mermaid show (the entire thing was lip-synched, songs were in English, dialogue in Japanese, the puppetry was great, but it was very obvious Ariel had legs under her fin when she kicked) and the Aladdin show was silly fun, they were definitely forgotten when the huge fire dragon came out of the water in the Mediterranean Harbor. We stayed around until the last BonFIRE Dance show, which was also great. I was greatly amused to see the odori(dance) section dancing with Mickey, Minnie, white Aladdin, and Indian Jasmine. Especially because the parents all had to carry their stuff while dancing. Ultimately, I had a great time.

I slept in (finally!) the next day, and went to yet another good-bye party. We feasted on homemade curry (thanks Em!) and Sangria. Liz and I ended up spending the night (whoops) and going home the next morning. I went home, dropped off my stuff, changed clothes, then left to meet with Jen and Jordon in Harajuku. Unfortunately, the Harajuku cosplayers weren't out in full-force and the famous gate on the other side of the bridge was under construction. However, we did get crepes (Jordon had kakigori, the Japanese (and I believe, far inferior) version of Shave Ice). Then I went home and slept early. Jen and Jordon left the next day, and I saw them off at their hotel. I then went up to Borman's (first time ever) for dinner and my second to last (and perhaps hardest) goodbye party.

Thursday and Friday were our annual eigo de asobo (Let's play in English!). I enjoy teaching the elementary school kids, but it was incredibly tiring. Plus I got kicked far too many times, and some of the boys thought it would be a fun game to crawl up my skirt. I'm glad it's only (six classes) once a year.

Ultimately, what got me through was the knowledge that on Saturday I would see Wicked! I met with Katie and Chika for lunch, then we trekked out to Shinbashi for the show. It was strikingly similar to the English version (costumes, staging, choreography, set design), but the personality of the two main characters was different. I suppose character portrayal is something that will vary from performer to performer, but I feel the differences between the two Glindas I saw were very obvious. The first Glinda (touring in America, saw in Seattle), as Elphaba says in "What is this Feeling?" is "Blonde." She's ditzy, flouncy, and, of course, obsessed with what other people think of her, but she's no idiot. In the Japanese version, Elphaba describes her new roommate as "baka" (stupid). The second Glinda seems to be less scheming than the first Glinda, especially in the second act. American Glinda's betrayal of her friend reeks of malice and revenge, while in the Japanese version, the same exact act seems to be driven more by her new loyalty to the Wizard than anger towards Elphaba. I'm probably over analyzing it, but whatever. We also clapped at the end for a ridiculously long time. So long, in fact, that the cast waved "bye" as if to say "go home." Overall, the show was great. It was nice that I knew the story, but I think I would have enjoyed it more if my Japanese was better.

In other news, Kevin is living with me. More on that later.