I was visiting my home-stay family (from my life 2 years ago), and it was really great! I took the Shinkansen there, which is always a cool experience. The normally 2.5-hour train ride is only 30 minutes by Shinkansen, cruising @ ~150mph. Pretty neat. The Shinkansen is incredibly punctual and run better than any other form transportation I've ever seen. The average arrival time of these trains is within 6 seconds of the scheduled time. 6 seconds! My home-stay cousin is actually in the train business, and he's going to the US to work on a high-speed rail train. It sounds like one of the most interesting jobs out there.
When I got to Okazaki, I was welcomed by my wonderful host mother and father. We went back home and ate a delicious home-cooked feast. It really hit the spot, after all of the plain rice and ramen I was used to eating! Shortly after eating, my home-stay sister came home from her part time job, and we all drank a little Shochu and had fun catching up.
The next day, I read a bunch of Dragon Ball (hilarious manga comic), while waiting for my mother to get home from her part-time job and my sister to get home from the dentist. Around noon, we went to Mos Burger ("Japanese Fine Burger and Coffee") for lunch to eat some delicious burgers. After that, we spent the day going to various second hand shops and shopping. I bought some really great glasses (the drinking kind) and a Peter Rabbit mug. Great finds! My father got home from work early, and we all went to conveyor belt sushi for dinner. Damn, that is a great idea!
At one of the second hand shops, I found a ton of great Japanese N64 games and some other comics. When I was browsing the N64 and SNES used games, I heard a voice behind me, "excuse me, lad, do you speak English?" Made friends with a 40-something Scottish video game collector, who lived in Nagoya. He was REALLY serious about his game collecting. He bought maybe $400 worth of games and VG soundtrack CDs. At ~$1.50 a game, it took about 20 minutes to ring everything up and bag it all. The whole time, we talked about what games he had found. It really was an impressive haul, actually. 2 copies of Mother 2 among others...
I also bought my first classical guitar! I'm really excited about this!! My whole life, I've regretted not playing a more orchestra-friendly instrument. I'll never forget wanting to play the oboe in 4th grade or so. Since I really loathed my piano lessons and oboes are expensive, my parents did not concede. Anyway, I know the classical guitar still isn't found in most orchestral pieces, I feel like learning it will give me a little bit more legitimacy in the concert hall world, particularly if I can attain any sort of skill. I wrote some guitar pieces for a really close friend, and I really want to be able to play these pieces for her, so I guess that is the ultimate goal. Some of the pieces are tough!
Also, my mother and sister and I went to this huge department store, where a clown performed. He was pretty ridiculous, and I felt a little strange sitting there, a 22yo white man, among a throng of excited Japanese children. Of course, being a 22yo white man, I was chosen as a volunteer for a plate-spinning demonstration, much to the delight of my mother and sister. I actually did not make a fool of myself, and I was awarded with a huge balloon flower afterwards. I felt pretty bad for this little girl who was sitting near me earlier, since she really wanted to be a volunteer (and I really did not), and she was not chosen. I gave her the big flower, and she was really excited, which made me happy. It was halloween the next day, so we bought a cool halloween cake that was shaped like a monster face.
The following day, I went with my host mother to see the ocean. We first went to a special shrine for praying for cancer. Inside, we descended deep into "hell", an unlit narrow and winding corridor under the temple. It was a pretty awesome experience. I prayed for cancer-free life for my family and friends. Afterwards, we ate a delicious seaside French restaurant. It was fancy, and the view was amazing! We walked out on the pier, and I taught my host mother about pontoons and pontoon boats. Next, we checked out a really neat ocean fossil museum. By accident, I impressed my host mother and the museum guide by teaching them about the different types of asteroids and fossils (please don't ask me how or why I know about these things...) they had in the museum. It was a pretty awesome exhibit with a lot of fossils and asteroids we could touch. I love space! We saw a really poorly done 3D movie there, and had a good laugh when we realized my host mother lost the fish and radish she had been carrying all day. Turns out, they were both in the bathroom.
I finally got home from this visit last night, and I was really tired. I still have this piano quartet to finish, so I'll be working pretty hard during the next few days on it. You can bet it will be a while before another post here. Sorry! I'll do my best, though...
I have some pictures below of the weekend. Also, the full album can be found HERE.
Oboe? REALLY?
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