Cooking day!

KCJS always has random events organized on some weekends. This weekend was a cooking class with your host fam day.

Even though I have no skill whatsoever in the kitchen it was a blast and I managed to make things nonetheless. The place we went to was a super cool state of the art (...I guess it was some sort of...) cooking school. Anyways we had a little orientation type thing in one big room where an instructor showed us how to make the dishes Emeril style (they had TV monitor things with the camera on zoomed in on what the guy was making...twas awesome...and a little intimidating).


A good amount of people showed up and it looked like everyone had a really good time.
And did I mention the food was amazingly delicious and super good and that I made it (well some of it ;D).


State of the art!

Me makin some tempura...Emeril Style!...BAM!

Finished meal...it was so good!


Also...I think Ive finally been integrated into my host family. Today my host mom kept going on telling people how adorable I looked and how nice I was and what have you and I was like...oh my, you're talking about me like my actual mom does....weird.


Oh and at the end of the day, they gave us omiyage (gifts). We got some cookbooks, some soup stock and a vial of msg. YUM!

Shabu Shabu party!!!

So last night we had a shabu shabu party! It was amazing!!! The restaurant we ate at was tabehoudai (all you can eat) and all I have to say is it was a blast (thanks to Kay-chan for making the reservations and being an all around awesome human being :D).


The kids at KCJS who organized this did this last semester too as a way to hang out and bond with everyone and what a better way to get to know one another than by stuffing our faces full of delicious all you can eat food.



The way it works is you dump veggies and meat into the pot and cook the food yourself. Your there for an alloted time so you can keep on ordering as much as you want (as soon as our plates of meat and veggies were finished we'd ask for another round XD). You can also ask for all kinds of noodles and rice and tofu to dump in the pot as well.



Lets just say I hadnt been this full in quite sometime.
It was amazing...I wish we had something like this back in the states.

Tea Ceremony

My host mom took me to tea ceremony at her friends house. A lot more complicated than just eating a snack and drinking tea. You have to bow while kneeling at the front door of the tea room before you enter, then bow to the flower arrangement, the tea kettle, the little table thing holding the implements.

After all that you kneel seated while the person makes your tea. While she's making it you eat some sweet dessert stuff (I had some mochi like stuff and then some sugar candies). After you get your tea place it to the person next to you and bow saying osaki ni...literally the word for previous, meaning you'll be drinking your tea now. You then proceed to turn the tea cup three times in your hand clockwise and then you drink it. This goes on until everyone has had tea and then you bow and thank the person who made it.
...And this is just the process of being the guest and drinking the tea...its a whole 'nother ball game when you make the tea.

I learned that its really painful to sit like a Japanese person...I cant do it for such an extended period of time cause my feet start hurting, and then my legs start cramping. It wasn’t all bad, they let me sit cross legged when I couldn’t take the pain…gah!

But yeah…twas fun, and complicated. And apparently Im a very fast learner. Everyone was impressed at how quickly I picked up what to do (though I dont think it was that bad. I just kinda copied what everyone else and bowed to everything in that room...haha). After the tea ceremony we got some bento lunch boxes and had tons of delicious yummy food and then at the end, the tea sensei brought in presents which she gave away in a raffle-esque type style. I won me some tea powder…other people won tea cups and bowls and stuff.

(P.S. Didnt take those pictures...they're off the internet. This was my first tea ceremony and I didnt know if Id be able to take pictures so I didnt take my camera...it turns out I could...the sensei kept taking pictures of everyone)

And now you're all caught up :D

Today has been a rather chill day. I was really tired from karaoke yesterday so I slept in till noon...host mom made me breakfast...she went somewhere...i cleaned my room and organized my school stuff (I was supposed to get some homework done today but I ended up procrastinating and thought It'd be better time well spent catching up on my blogging) :D.

Karaoke and books!!!! XD

I went karaoke-ing yesterday...twas awesome. But as usual I dont have my camera at opportune moments so I failed to get any pics. It was really cool...this was one of the things Ive been wanting to do since Ive gotten to Japan, hit up a real karaoke bar. We ended up getting a room for about 2 hours and jammed. Nothing like some Utada Hikaru, Ulfuls, Michael Jackson and the song Mr. Roboto...It was great!

Ooh! Also, I managed to find the shosetsu (Japanese short novels) Ive been dying to get since like forever that night. For anyone who hasn't seen the anime ova R.O.D (Read or Die) its set in a parallel present where Great Britain has remained all powerful and has colonized a good half the world. The story is about a secret agent woman named Yomiko Readman whose working for the organization known as the British Library...she's a huge bookworm and a paper master (she has the ability to manipulate paper...she can block bullets with a single sheet and make razor sharp swords and other weapons/things out of paper). The OVA is pretty good but ever since I learned that it was actually a book first (and one that the author has yet to finish cause of writers block Id been wanting to get them. So yeah, I went to explore Book Off before meeting with people for Karaoke yesterday and I went to the shosetsu floor. I didnt think Id find it since I cant read half the characters on the shelves and I didnt know the publisher or author, but I wandered over to the fantasy section anyways to try. I found one of the volumes almost instantly and after asking for help, found the rest. I only managed to find 5 of the 11 books but I was still really happy to have found them at all...and for so cheap, about 300 yen each. I figured itd be a good investment and great way to improve my Japanese! Hopefully I'll find the rest while Im here XD.

Here's the show I was talkin bout'


This should help me improve my Japanese...


...but vol 1 will prob last me all semester while Im here XD



On another note, I really do think I have an awesome host family but Im a little bummed out that they havent really taken me sight seeing. I had hoped that from the beginning theyd take me to see places every other weekend (one of my friend's family does this for him). But yeah, I havent really seen any temples/sights so I guess Ill have to do most of my exploring of my own accord :P

Well...I guess its not too bad, tomorrow my host mom is taking me to her friend's house for tea ceremony stuff...but I still really want to see some temples ;D

...Stuff thus far.

So yeah, I thought Id update with all thats happened this week. Classes started this Tuesday...survived my first week.

Every Wednesday we have KCJS group activities/trips and this week we had a "scavenger hunt." Groups were given a location to visit and explore and then we were all to meet back at some restaurant and present stuff while we ate. Lots of people actually got to visit temples and shrines. My group got the more boring one...find movie theaters in Kyoto :P. Yeah, since my group was made up of kids from the fall semester we found the theaters fairly quickly and then proceeded to a donut shop that sold yummy soy donuts!


New Bleach movie


New Bond movie will be coming out sometime soon here.

Before we started our adventure we ended up visit a bookstore called Book Off. Its amazing!!!
For all you manga lovers out there this place is perfect for you! There are just bookshelves upon book shelves of manga and the best part is its so cheap! Manga usually sells for around 300 yen...about 3 dollars. The older manga (stuff like Death Note, Ruroni Kenshin, Inuyasha, etc.) is all about 105 yen (about $1).


So many manga!

\


Ruroni Kenshin!


Yeah, Id been meaning to get into new series while Im here so I bought myself the first volume to G.T.O (great teacher onizuka...its about an ex-yakuza who wants to become a teacher..ive heard good things about it). I also got the first volume to a manga by the guy who made Death note. All and all I made 210 yen...about 2 dollars...back in the states each book probably would have cost me around $8-12 each. Yeah, its amazing how cheap things are when the industry so well supported by society. Everyone reads manga (even my host mom has several volumes of ojiwaru basan about a grandma whose a trickster and is always pranking people). They also made this into a TV show that I watched with my host mom the first night.




After our "scavenger hunting" we met up at a restaurant called Ganko. It was amazing (and looked super expensive). It used to be the house of the first general of the imperial army of Japan during the Meiji era. So its super fancy and it has a huge amazing garden!!!!



Fancy!





Gorgeous! One of the reasons I came to Kyoto



Also...everyone always says Japan is so expensive but you can find so many places with really good food for so little (a huge bowl of ramen at the school cafeteria goes for about 300-400 yen).


Here's what I usually eat....gyoza ramen (fried dumpling ramen) with a side of kimchi and a salad.

All of this food at the Rene's: 600 yen
A happy and full Enrique: Priceless


...yup...so thats been my first week and a half in Japan thus far. Im having a blast (and prob gaining weight XD :P)!

Day 3 -Fri Jan 9

Had a language interview test thing on this day and also went wandering at one of the random 100 yen shops ($1 store). The Japanese like to put English on everything...even when it isnt necessary. Its kind of the equivalent of people who buy shirts or random things b/c they have Asian characters that look cool even though they dont know what it means.

So yeah, this leads to some pretty interesting merchandise.

This bag, it carries!


I am what I am...a bag with random English thrown in.


I also got to meet my host family on this day. They matched me perfectly interest wise...half the family is an architect (host dad, host brother, host brother's wife and his friend), my mom is a piano teacher and she's learning the koto. Also, the mom is really nice and took me to all the places I had to go (alien registration, etc.). Not only that but my host mom has all the connections. She got me free koto lessons from her sensei (it usually costs $300 per lesson...all I had to pay for were the nails :D). She also knows like half the other families doing hosting from both KCJS and AKP (Doshisha) so a lot of the times students will already know who I am since she talks to all the other hosts moms about me. So yeah...Ive been told she;s super sweet and amazing but a friend warned me not to get on her bad side. Apparently the girl living here last semester pissed her off a little bit towards the end and had cold meals for a week....so yeah...Ive been trying to be on my best behavior and not be out too late at night. I like warm food.


Host fam: Dad (name I keep forgetting) host mom (Noriko Kawasaki), host brother (Kenta).
I also have a host sister with two kids: Riko-chan (she's in kindergarten) and Mako-chan (currently at Doshisha elementary) and an older host brother who I've yet to meet since he's off being an architect on his own somewhere.

My family loves the Zumbyes (an acappella group at my school). Apparently Mako-chan met them when they came to Doshisha to do a show...she met Chris Gilliyard and Pat Savage and little Mako-chan is going to visit Amherst next year on a class trip in June...but yeah, it was a little surreal being in Japan and listening to the Zumbyes album during my first dinner with my entire host family...haha. :D


But yeah, host fam is awesome!


Im learning this!!!! :D


What my house looks like...tis tiny. My room is the one with the balconies.


My room


View from my balcony thing...JR train in the background.