よくできた！

there are probably kanji for that, but whatever. kanji are silly.

[i hate captioning, but since no one would have any idea what this is unless i do: to the left is the daigaku (university) where i have class. or the front of it at least. i friggin' hate those stairs.]

in any case, i feel so behind. i have so much i want to post about, but i don't want to make this epic length... i did want to talk about karaoke, though, so maybe i'll start there.

Friday, May 18th:

i can't recall off the top of my head what i was doing the first half of this day (aside from classes, at any rate) but what i do remember was all good things. i played DDR in Japan for the first time, for example. Sara and i headed to an arcade after lunch (oh, i think i talked to Jen on gmail this day! another good thing!) it was the first arcade i'd been in here, and it was, well, really noisy. (it was also like two minutes from the daigaku (university). Ross, Drew, and Arkansas-san (i can never remember his real name; he's the only one of us not from Clemson. guess where he is from. XD) were already there at the DDR machine. (because Ross is crazy-good at the game. at one point he even drew over a small crowd of admiring Japanese schoolgirls.) after a while, they let Sara and i play, and i wasn't too horrible at it. afterwards, we took a bunch of dorky pictures around the arcade and caught up with Adam to catch the next bus out to Sanjyo (downtown Kyoto--where the karaoke place was). we all met around 4 and headed in. it was...kind of surreal at first, actually. Williams-sensei let us all speak English and so we started off with a few Beatles songs, then moving on to Billy Joel and Under the Sea from the Little Mermaid--it was pretty hilarious seeing everyone sing that. we were there for...hours, really--till 7, i think, and covered everything from Sexy Back (which was incredibly awkward seeing as how Williams-sensei was there--i can't believe they picked that one) to Bohemian Rhapsody (YES) and Hotel California (that one at my suggestion). someone also picked Pat Benetar (Heartbreaker) and so Williams-sensei and Meridith-san (whose real name is Andrew but whatever) sang a duet--Williams-sensei doing this creepy high-pitched girl voice that i couldn't resist taking a video of. but i really enjoyed it; i will definitely be going back often! (especially cuz students get discounts! woo!)

afterwards, Sara had to head home, so Adam and i went to McDonald's for supper. why McDonald's? mostly because i was curious, but also because the one in question was three stories. also, each of the floors had names--Adam and i ate on Sun Floor, for example. it was painted orange. the food was...pretty identical, actually. oh, oh! but instead of a Dollar Menu, they have a 100 Yen Menu! i can't tell you how amused that made me.

oh! and i've also eaten at a KFC here. they had some...really wonky menu items, actually, and everything was really expensive, so i won't be going back there again. but we all took turns posing with the giant colonel statue outside, and that was fun. Izuno-san and i also had Domino's one time! she had it delivered, because her French class was that night (she's studying French and likes to act like a big kid about it--pretending to cry or complaining about how mean her sensei is before she leaves. she's so cute!) and she didn't have time to make supper. and let me just say: Japanese pizza is completely insane. insane. Izuno-san's favorite, for example, is Potatoes and Mayo pizza. insane. also, each medium sized pizza (practically an American personal pan sized) is like $25, and the wonkier the pizza, the more expensive it is.

but that was a lot of rambling about food. it's beacause i had to skip lunch today to practice for my presentation and am thusly starving now. oh, but speaking of! today was our first Kyoto Adventure presentation. since, well, i don't think i ever explained to anyone what those are, i shall do so now! basically, we were all divided into groups at the beginning of the trip. my group is comprised of me, Renee, and Blake, which is awesome, because the both of them speak excellent Japanese. also, since we've been spending so much time together working on this stupid thing, we've all gotten really close. in fact, the whole group has gotten pretty close in a really short amount of time. it's because of the whole foreigner thing--sometimes it feels like you're such an alien, and outsiders. and sometimes it's like you're speaking you're own secret language--like in code or something. it's really bizarre walking down the street talking and knowing probably no one knows what you're saying. so yeah: seeing another person from our group is such a relief sometimes. BUT ANYWAY. Kyoto Adventure doodads. each group is basically assigned one topic each week. this week, ours was noodles. frickin' noodles. we're supposed to go to the assigned place (this time, it was a supermarket!) and interview people there to find as much information as we can about our topic. then we put all that together and the following Monday give a 15 presentation (each of us has to speak for 5 minutes) is Japanese. it's probably one of the most stressful things i've ever had to do in my life, and we technically even cheated this week! (we just googled info on noodles instead of asking people! because we suck.) i had no idea what i was saying--it felt like i was possessed or something. we weren't the worst group to present, but we weren't the best, either. afterwards, Williams-sensei told me Yokudekita! or, "You did a good job!" and was all nice about it but i was totally the epitome of FAIL. Blake, Renee and i are determined to get our presentation done as early as possible this time, though! hopefully it'll be, well, more interesting, too, since we actually have temples to visit this time instead of frickin' noodles. (secretly, i'm looking forward to investigating said temples~)

at any rate, i should probably head down and hang out with Izuno-san for a bit, especially because i didn't let her know i was going to be up her this long--i was really just plugging in my computer to recharge the battery, as it died today during the presentation (ugh!) when i noticed i had a wireless signal and decided to use the internets while i had the chance. in any case, hope you're all doing well! and to Elizabeth and Angela in particular: thank you so much for all the comments! i need to email you guys some time to actually reply to some of those said comments, but, well, wonky internet situation and all that.

but take care, everyone! love and miss you guys!