Pulling Strings

2002-10-13T21:38:00.000-07:00

How do you decribe Japan? The fact is that you can't, it is impossible. This is a world that had been turned inside out and upside down and then shaken, yet not stirred. Sounds like a James Bond movie, doesn't it? Well, it is pretty close. You have to play the part of the secret agent, every man for himself, to survive life here.

I get up at 5:45am mainichi (everyday) to go to school. My commute is a whopping two hours each way and by the time I get home, I eat, take a bath, and die from exhaustion in bed by ten.�@Weekends are not much better, with cleaning and sightseeing and studiying. Thank god for national holidays (today!) or I would never survive.

2002-10-13T21:31:00.000-07:00

God... it's been a long time. 2 weeks zipped by in a flash and I don't know where to start. Summarize? No. How can you summarize so much in so little time?

Start from scratch? That's pushing it. I think it is just best to talk about the quirks, things that are so amazing here because it is so different. But where to start? Karaoke, trains, school? I suppose I'll just have to pick one and start.

2002-09-25T13:27:00.000-07:00

Well, how do I explain my emotions right now? Nervous, anticipation, yes, but it is mostly fear. I am so scared that I've been shaking all day. I'm scared of leaving Canada, my family, everything. Yet I am being drawn towards my goal with every passing second. I have to wait, my hands are shaking as I type. Couldn't touch type even if I wanted to. It's not just my hands, it's me in general.

Will have steak tonight. Funny, because I don't really care for it right now, even though I love this meal, and I most likely will not see a decent peice of beef that size until I return.

It takes me a while to think up stuff. Mindless activities, preferably ones that prevent me from thinking too much :p keep me occupied even though I should be paking some more. I wish I could just shove my room as is into my bag to save me the trouble, but that's not possible at the time. And where would I put it? I hope my week of intrusion before Kanako comes here doesn't both my host family too much.

Another worry of mine is how I will address my host family, I imagine I will be calling Yumiko "Yumiko-chan", but would it be "Kondo-san" or "Masayo-san", "Shintaro-san". I don't know which is better. I suppose I will see when I arrive. I am also looking forward to meeting the grandparents, although I will be so afriad of insulting them. I worry like that.

16 hours. wow. I am so mortified from fear of leaving. It's not like camp, where I leave for three weeks to a place that keeps me so busy that I don't have time to worry. It's a whole new country to me, that's my adventure. I'll become a Japanese school girl, but will many less renditions of "lucky" and other english nonsense. If I want to talk in English, I'll speak English, not just random words. Ok, so that's a slight chance, but I can try :p

2002-09-24T20:48:00.000-07:00

All's well that ends well. I don't know why, but this little quote really does explain the past month. It's really scary for me to be thinking of how long until my departure in hours. As of right now: 32 and 2/3rd hours. *laughing* I love to be precise.

I might as well explain just why I named my journal "Pulling Strings" now. My father has said many times throughout this experience that I must of had been pulling strings (I think he implies that it is the "strings of fate") to get this to work out the way I wanted it. Not to mention the horseshoes stuffed up my.... er, wrong turn.

Anyways, I think that pulling strings of fate is a neat idea. How true, that we as people, do things in order to get events to occur in a way that pleases us. We are influencing, and changing our futures constantly. That's maybe why time travel to the future would never be possible. Your actions now may change what happens later, so you can never know how it would be affected.

I'm going off to bed now, and I'll try to think more of this.

2002-09-23T11:37:00.000-07:00

Well, I am now done CALM. Yea! I still have to do a wuick quiz, and a test, but that should take little time, so I am happy. This has been a long month for me, and I leave for the adventure of my life in.... 3 days! I am so nervous that it is bugging me constantly, yet so excited in many more ways.

Tami & Meagan, who are my mother's co-worker and her doughter/co-techie, gave me a card yesterday. Much to my surprise, there was 2000 yen in it! That's around 25$ (Canadian) and I can't believe that they did that.... and it isn't as if I can exactly just give it back. I really appreciate the gesture, but they really didn't need to do this for me.

So after I was horrified last night, I started writing up the million and a half thank you & goodbye cards for friends, family, etc.... I just hope they don't decide to all flood my mailbox in return!

2002-09-22T17:03:00.000-07:00

Well, I went to tech today. I didn't really do much except help with a few projects. I also took a big box of rice krispie squares with me, and once again, saw it being devoured in front of me. Atleast people enjoyed them, so I'm not mad.

My bags are starting to get packed... and this makes me think of all the things I'm leaving behind. I hardly ever go anywhere without my many books. Reading is really my passion, and it annoys me how I am leaving so many of my favorites behind. I suppose I can always buy a whole load of manga (I hope to collect many of my favorite titles - and anything that CALMP has put out, that is always good) that can help make me feel better.

I will miss my English reading though :p

2002-09-21T20:15:00.000-07:00

Well... I'm back.

Ok, I should of been arriving around 10-11pm last night, but we had the wrong bus times. In other words, I missed my bus. Fortunetly, I had met up with my aunt and uncle from Sherwood Park (a suburb) for supper, and ended up staying the night. Netherless, my parents were not all that happy (more angry at themselves than anything). Well, I had a nice visit with my relatives, but I still didn't get what I went to Edmonton for.

I had visited the Japanese Consulate and applied for my visa, but they couldn't get it to me in 24 hours. So, now I may have to return to Edmonton for another visit (with the right bus times) to pick it up before Thursday.

I'm really tired (I only got back six hours ago...) so I'm not really going to rant on and on about this... just not worth my time, or your's. Just remember: check travel times! Ok?

2002-09-19T15:50:00.000-07:00

Good news! I am heading down to Edmonton tommorow to get my student visa made. I have to take the bus though... so it will be a long trip.

Anyhow, I'll finally meet my co-ordinator face-to-face, so it will be interesting. And, it means Downtown Edmonton by myself. Woohoo! I know I am going to Japan on my own, but my parents are still scared of me going to the safe, clean, and 100% navigationble (spelling?) Edmonton.... atleast it doesn't use the chome system.... I still don't understand it.

Oh! And I got my kanji dictionary! It is really nice, and I know how to use it's SKIP System. It uses kanji layout and stroke counts to classify characters in a way that I can easily look up a character without knowing the On or Kun reading, nor do I need to know radicals (although radicals are part of the dictionary lookup) so this is a methos that's really quick. But you can also look up characters through other methods so even my future Japanese classmates can use it (I think). It even has stroke order diagrams.

So, now I get to study more kanji!

2002-09-19T11:06:00.000-07:00

Well..... I don't have much to say, to be honest. I didn't have much to say yesterday either. I haven't been doing much, but I have cadets tonight. This should be fun. I hope that I get to sit into a class, maybe level 2 or 3. I don't really want to start the tedious task of level four this year unless my CO insists. Netherless, it will be a whole week from now that I'll be gone.

I am nervous, to say the least. I've started to doubt my choice a long time ago, but how do I tell me parents that? I don't, that is the simple answer. I've never been really comfortble eating fish - I think I have been in Alberta for too long!

2002-09-18T20:04:00.000-07:00

Oh! The archives work - Now I hope to edit just one or two settings.....

2002-09-18T20:00:00.000-07:00

Eeeeee. Kiyo-san from KEC Journal featured yesterday's post on his journal. Well... thank you! Anyways, I changed the template from my "site" (the archive didn't work so I tried this) to this new design. It looks so clean!

Well, I got 100% on module 4 for CALM, so I am relieved. Only one more to go! In art, we are doing abstract designs in clay. I hope I get to complete mine in time! French is not really interesting - there is so little to do.

2002-09-17T11:51:00.000-07:00

I don't have to suffer alone. I think I now know of about ten people, including my younger brother, who now has this head cold. Hehehehehehe..... no sympathy from me. I looked up "head cold" in my Japanese dictionary and got hanakaze, which uses the kanji for "nose"+"wind" (also used for "a cold")+"wicked/injustice". I laughed so hard about this. The Japanese really have some neat compound words like that. For example, the Japanese word for crisis, consists of the kanji for danger followed by the kanji for opportunity. Other examples are vampire ("suck"+"blood"+"evil spirit") and lawyer ("suck"+"blood"+"evil spirit"... oh, sorry... "eloquence"+"protect"+"expert"). (BTW, thank you oh mysterious webmaster of Kanji Site.com for this little tidbit!)

Now that I've indulged you in that :p we shall move on. Well, Ritsumeikan (the school that I will soon be attending) has really goofed things up. They forgot to send a really really important letter for us to send off to get my student visa. Now I may have to go out of town to sign this thing and maybe, just maybe, get my precious visa in time for my departure. I /do/ need it to get into the country after all. So.... now that this is all in limbo, my Dad will also be draggin me accross town to get info for the "This is my country, my province and my city" speech/presentation that I will required to give several times while in Japan. I don't want to go, really, but my dad insists that I get some info on here. I really don't see the point. I don't have space to take posters or anything like that anyhow.

But I gotta do what must be done, including my bedroom. Blah.

2002-09-16T11:03:00.000-07:00

Well, I now have a full blown cold. I knew that digging up the "flu bug" was bad luck. We have this annoying stuffed thingy that goes "achoo" when you squeeze it, and we give it to whoever has a cold. So this damn thing is most likely the most contamiated object in the house and it was pretty much right when I found in in a box that I started sniffling. Fun.

Anyhow, more and more and more CALM. I'm on the down hill strech by now, so that's nice and Ms. Price is bringing me another box of kleenex, yay! (I emptied her's in first block) So now just for a few more questions, more journal entries, and I'm done!

I have to go with Dad after school today to change my PIN for the visa card my parents gave me to buy shampoo and things like that. I suspect that there won't be much on the card for a while, we bought a ton of bulk toiletries, but I suspect that I'll need a couple things fairly early. I still have to buy a few things there that we can't get here. Oh well.

Well, back to CALM.

2002-09-15T20:29:00.000-07:00

But tommorow, will be my "10 days to go"!! Yea! And it also means that I can start trying to figure out what sort of weather I will be dealing with there.

I go to this one site on Kansai (the collective name for the area where I am going to) that has a lot of things, inclusing a really good weather page featuring info from what looks like news weather reports. I've gotten good enough to read everything on that page, including the typhoon reports. I checked up on typhoon Ruso all the time as it got closer and closer to Korea. It's kinda neat.

But I really hope that it is not storming for my first few days. I don't handle humidity that well (I am Albertan, after all) so rain will not be the nicest thing to do to my poor lungs. But I am anxious. Really anxious. But not as much as my room is messy. Speaking of the devil, gotta go pack some more. Ja!

2002-09-15T20:23:00.000-07:00

I almost missed today's blog, sorry everyone. I was packing (more and more and more and more....), went to tech (where I painted a few boards and then instructed a herd of grade 9 girls how to clean paint rollers) and then to a Air Cadet senior's meeting where I did nothing, yes nothing. Anyhow.... I then came home, ate a quick steak dinner (yum!) and dashed off to see "My Big Fat Greek Wedding".

To make this simple: it was hilarious! This movie was bades on a set of comedy routines turned theatrical play turned movie, about this Greek woman, her family, and falling in love. Filled with a ton of clichés and really funny bits, I was laughing really hard.... If this movie ever comes to Japan while I'm there, I hope to show it to my host family, although I'm not sure if they would understand many of the jokes. Just don't think that Windex is really a cure-all, and you'll be fine.

2002-09-13T21:48:00.000-07:00

Er... hello ^^

Back to reality, now I am. I just watch Amélie. It's a french movie that has become quite well known over here. It is actually quite cute. weird, but cute. Although I am very much fluent in French, even I had a hard time understanding the fast dialougue except enough to know that the subtitles were very much loosely translated. Oh well....

Kiyo-san, so here's the Air Cadet site. Just..... read.

2002-09-13T06:37:00.000-07:00

Aaah, I've been so lazy *wah* about posting..... Sorry everyone. Yes, to you viewers (however few there may be :p ), thank to reading this.... This is really short.

Last night was the first night back of cadets.... that was the biggest waste of time ever. I have (another) senior cadet meeting this sunday, while I am supposed to be at Theatre Tech!

Oh, I'm out of time, but I'll explain cadets later, ok?

2002-09-11T07:36:00.000-07:00

Today is "9/11". I am not going to rant on and on about how horrible it is, I'm not that type. The WTC collasp was a horrific event. Over 3000 people were killed. Some were Canadian, but that is not the focus of this rant either.

I don't know whether I can really say that the Americans had it coming - most developed nations may be in the same position at any time. I can't say that the "all evil" Taliban, as some people put it, was that way at all. Sure, they suported terrorism, and women were suppressed in society to a point where I was surprised that the UN didn't do more. But does anyone remember who trained and put that same political group in power?

The Americans have had a long list of political boo-boos in it's history. A few words changed in a treaty between the US and Japan caused resentment that eventually led to Pearl Harbor. A faux pas caused the Americans to be beaten by the Canadians around 300 years ago during their quest for land.

Hey, Canada's reccord may not be squeaky clean - we've commited enough of those faux pas ourselves - but the Americans have this "Who me?" approch to laying blame when a disaster happens. Pearl Harbor was a direct attack on American Freedom - the WTC collasped because the Taliban maliciously attacked them because of democracy! Helloooo? Wake up Mr. Bush! You and your nation has continually placed the equivilant to a big bulls eye on the US because you don't have the foresight to realize that you set yourself up!

Ok, ok, now I am getting a tad bit carried away. Back to the WTC. My main pet peeve about all of this is that the first thing you do after this is go over to Afganistan and proceed to destroy the puppet government you put in place. In the process, killing several thousand civilians while you are at it. Civilians.

And you complain that only 3 thousand of yours were killed?

The US, when it comes to military always has a "act first, think later" approch to defending themselves. Willing to shoot anything in their way that seems to be a threat, they kill many people. Both Civilians and Soldiers. Fratricide (the military uses this term to refer to killing a soldier on your own side) is a major cause of senseless deaths among soldiers. And who says that the Americans, who bring peace, freedom and democracy, are incapable of such things.

2002-09-10T14:50:00.000-07:00

Well, just got back from school. Nothing much. Finished CALM module #2, read #3, might finish that tommorow.

Tonight will be the first night for theatre tech. I am really looking forward to it. This year, the play is "Les Miserables" (sans accents :p ) but even though I can only do a little bit of work, Mrs Towsley, our director, said that anything will help. So off to tech I go!

I've been trying to download anime, so I signed up for streamload. But I can't download ANYTHING!!!!!! Free users can only download 50 megs a week, 10 megs at a time. 10 MEGs? Arrrrg!

The worse part is, that I need 5$ USD and a credit card to upgrade the account. 5$ can be arranged. Credit card I can arrange. But to do that, I will need to go through my parents. Why do I even bother? They don't understand this sort of thing but I really really want to get this anime, and this is one of the more popular methods of sending it to people. Maybe I can ask Leanne-sama. She has a credit card and would most likely be willing to accept the equivilant of 5$ USD and help me, but I don't want to be a pain. And it takes a while to send money to people, and it's expensive. *pouts* And I don't have the time nor the extra money.

2002-09-09T15:42:00.000-07:00

Ok, now on to today. CALM, CALM, ever more CALM. I got module 1 completely done, will finish #2 tommorow. #3 by the end of the week. #4 if I'm lucky. But for my extra module, I'm to do a journal. Hehehehe..... e-a-s-y! Basically, I hope to just edit this one. All I need is 25 entries so it won't be too bad.

French is becomming a joke, but I will sereously sit down and actually read my novel at lunch for the rest of the week. I have no idea what I'll do after that but it's not my main concern at this point. So far the book is pretty stupid. A bunch of Boy Scouts (not entirely sure because of the language barrier, but it makes sense to me anyways) are out on a hiking trip and find a tame wolf in the woods and decide to take care of it.

For some odd reason, it almost seems like a bad translation that I'm reading, but it is "Quebecois" enough to make it possible that it is a french novel. Has enough lack of plot to be one.

My art project is turning out well, as I started printing with these big rubber blocks that I carved on to "stressed" and dyed watercolor paper today. Tommorow I'll use my last block and plaint something onto it with my watercolor paints. I hate using acrylic paint so I refuse to use their poor excuse for professional paints to work on my composition. I'll make sure to atleast take a photo of it for you all.

2002-09-09T15:32:00.000-07:00

Well, yesterday was interesting. I did pretty much nothing until I got a phone call from Chris (from Air Cadets) about a senior's meeting. So I went down, threw a BIG wrench in my commanding officer's plans by reminding her of my exchange. Or I should of said a big wrench in the CO's kid (Chris)'s plan. He's Sqn. Commander (lucky brat) this year. Well, anything's better than Neil, last year's Sqn. Idiot, er, Commander.

But besides causing a tad bit of chaos that way, the meeting went on as normal. Lots said, nothing done. Got a ride home with the speed demon a.k.a. Dave. 120 kmph going up the steep valley road is just plain stupid, especially when the max. speed limit is 60 kmph!

2002-09-07T19:15:00.000-07:00

Sorry for missing a day - but I didn't really have anything to say yesterday.

Anyhow, I am happy - I got a digital camera today! I'll add photos later, but I haven't really taken any good ones (except one of myself :p ) and it takes me a while to shrink them to a web-friendly size and upload them. But it is really easy to use, and it even does 20 seconds of video. That doesn't seem like much, but it is really more than I need to show a lot of things off.

And it is a Fujifilm camera - a great company that gives good service in both Canada and Japan.

2002-09-05T19:51:00.000-07:00

So, do you like this? This is the same design as my site so it will eventually be hosted there as well. Once I figure out why it won't connect to my FTP that is. I hate using public servers but this works for the meanwhile. The main annoyance is the banner. Almost worth playing around with graphics and putting it directly "under" my corner layout. CCS will allow my banner to remain on top and it will hide the banner ad. But that is for another night.

2002-09-05T19:07:00.000-07:00

Today marks the "three weeks to Japan" point in my preparations. I am in school, doing the CALM work of doom, and at the surrent rate of only two days per unit, I'll be done the course in no time. Next week, both Art Club and Air Cadets will start up, and I hope to squeaze as much fun (and maybe even a promotion) in to this while getting ready. 20 days isn't much to gut my room, pack bags, write a wish list for my birthday (it's not too long after getting in Japan, and even air mail takes a while....).

I'm not getting a laptop, but I want something so I can have computer dictionaries for my studies. Palm Pilot, anyone?

2002-09-04T15:33:00.000-07:00

I hate CALM. I really hate CALM. I'm not sure the fact that I am 1/6th done now is reassuring - I think that the fact that there is still 5/6ths left to go is what bugs me the most. Why do we honestly need CALM? I spent two days talking all about me! The really annoying thing is that you basically do this course four times disguised as different things - health, career prep, CALM and all the junk the counseling office demands of you. Why can't we just do it once and for all!

But this is all typical of our government, here in Alberta, Canada. The government levels spend so much time in in-fighting and bickering that they each give us students what is essentially the same course over and over again. CALM is common sense (although "common sense isn't always common and doesn't always make sense" applies here too) and that should be realized by someone other than the students. Most of us know how to use a bank, a post office, and work in society as a whole without taking a "by the book" course that doesn't truly apply to the real world. Most of us even have jobs! Do you think we could honestly now be in the position of young adults without knowing most of these things since we were ten!

So why must I take the "basket weaving" kind of course from hell?

2002-09-03T16:31:00.000-07:00

Ah. The pitter patter of little feet running through the halls of school brings back so many memories. Gentle voices gossiping about the summer's events to old friends and the joys of new faces searching for classrooms. Yep. School is back.

This is my third year at Westwood High, yet the fact that I am leaving in a month means that I shall return to a scene like this for an extra year. I am leaving for a student exchange soon. To Japan.

For my unfortunate month that I still have to attend, I've chosen to cram "Career and Life Management 20" into my scheduel. A whole half of my day is dedicated to this "CALM" still amazes me. French and Art, my other two subjects, are to preserve my sanity until my butt leaves this country and I am "off for the adventure of my life".