hi, i'm jenn

yesterday was the last day on my rail pass. today is the first on my new one!
depart for Fukuoka this evening, and tomorrow at 6AM it’s onwards to tokyo and the christine that awaits us!

when we went to get tickets yesterday. to get from hakata to tokyo, you take two trains: one from hakata to osaka, and the other from osaka to tokyo.

we tried to get seats on the 6AM train from hakata to osaka but were told the reserved seats were full. we ended up with tickets on the 9AM train, since the 7AM was also full. okay. fine.

we got back in line because we wanted to get our return tickets for monday too.

i decided to ask about getting tickets for the train from osaka to tokyo that meets the 6AM hakata osaka train (we could always try and get un-reserved seats). anyway, the woman handed us reserved seats for both trains – the 6AM one too! she said they’re not together though (um, we’re in the same row on either aisle). so we figure that the first guy didn’t know how to say “no seats together” so just said “no seats” instead. hrmph.

this blog entry is very confusing. i’m very tired. i’m sure tomorrow’s 6AM train ride will perk me right up!

Last weekend I was in Sanda visiting the Hori family. It had been almost 2 years since I saw them last. The girls have grown so much and it was amazing to get to play with them. I arrived at shin-kobe late Wednesday night to be greeted by Masao. We got home to Mika and Akari waiting up. After a round of gift giving and snacks of apples and strawberries, went to sleep.

  

Thursday Hi-chan (who was sleeping when I got there) had a “tummy-ache” (yeah right) so stayed home from school. Fortunately she wasn’t feeling that sick so we took a field trip to my favourite 100 Yen store, and to Toys R Us. Thursday night Hichan put on a fantastic welcome show with the help of akari.

   

Friday Hi-chan returned to school, so I spent the day just relaxing with Mika and Akari. Akari loves to eat. She eats anything she can get her hands on. She also likes to “help out” in the kitchen which, as far as i can tell, is really a way for her to get more food. Friday she decided the cake she was eating was in need of salmon pieces. Yum. She also tried to make apple juice when they ran out.

  

Masao took a half day from work Friday (which meant he got home at THREE!). When Hichan got home from school, we packed up and went to the photo studio. Now, I didn’t pack for family portraits, so the nicest clothes I have here is a pair of pinstriped pants and a sweater. That’s what I wore. Mika wore a dress, and Masao a skirt. The kids were in their normal clothes. But not for long. Studio Alice is a kid’s dream come true. There are costumes galore to chose from. Heck, you can be a Disney Princess or Winny the Pooh. It’s amazing!

The kids each picked a dress, and the helpful staff helped them to change. Then it was time for hair styles — you picked off of a sheet of different hairstyles. The hairstyles involved putting your hair back into a pony, or up in pig tails, and then adding some fake hair. I couldn’t believe it! I told Mika I was jealous of the girls’ tiaras, so next thing I knew, I had my hair up with cascading curls and a beautiful tiara too! Pretty scary!

As you can imagine, it was super fun. We took 2 rounds of pics – the first with the girls in dresses and a normal background. The second with the girls in Kimonos in front of hina dolls. It was great. So now I get Japanese family portraits! Well, Akari does call me “Hori Jenn”.

   

After pictures we went to a tofu buffet for dinner. They call buffets vikings. While the restaraunt featured tofu, it was definitely not veggie. Just a random observation.

  

Saturday we went to lunch at a steak restaraunt called Sanday. There’s a few different branches, but we went to the main one. It was stunning. The back garden has a Noh theatre. While there wasn’t a performance while we were there, but there was live music inside. The steak was great. Kobe beef baby!

     

Saturday afternoon we headed over to the fruit and flower park to catch the Kobe Monkey’s Show. I love punctuation. Monkeys are fun. So are fake Monkeys, which we saw afterwards when we went shoping.

   

Saturday night back home for a small dinner, and more chilling.

Sunday woke up, and went to the Hyogo prefecture museum of Nature and the Environment. There were cool things to look at, but all of it was Japanese.

   

Then we went for lunch at a kaiten sushi place. When we left the house, Mika gave me a Bento she had made me (for the train). Akari was jealous and insisted in bringing her own too. Only Akari brought her’s into the restaurant, and proceeded to eat it there. Don’t worry, she ate sushi too.

    

Saying goodbye is so sad. Fortunately, Akari was BAWLING which made us all laugh. When she realized I was leaving despite her very noble effort, she turned to me, said “BAKKA!” (stupid) and then refused to do so much as look at me. And my bento, in all of its hello kitty glory, rocked. It even had a note!

BUT I am sure I will see them all again soon. The Hori family RULES. Words can’t convey just how much I adore them! And next time I hope they will come and visit me in Toronto!!

we got a lot to catch up on. on the 11th i spent the day with Rie and her lovely family. They brough me to Fukuoka for the day. we did a lot of siteseeing, and a little bit of shopping. We saw the Yahoo! Dome, and ate lunch at Hard Rock Cafe. It was weird to see a menu with American food on it. I ordered a cobb salad – it was huge! Man, coming home will be weird. It was also the first time I’ve seen yellow mustard since arriving. And the most popular kind of ketchup here is Kagome – to have Heinz was such a luxury. Though, come to think of it, I really don’t have ketchup that much at all. Nevertheless, I was excited.

Rie and her husband wanted to know what is the most popular item on the menu in Canada. They ended up with some BBQed sandwich, and a “Irish Club Sandwich” — something off the St. Paddy’s day special menu. It was interesting explaining that while this is a restaraunt at home, the only people who eat there are tourists. Hm…

Anyway, the afternoon was jam packed with shopping at Canal City. Finally, we headed back home with a quick stop for sushi on the way! It’s sad, though, that I don’t think I’ll see them again before I go home. It’s amazing how time flies.

Pictures below.

     

The number of women in Canadian engineering schools dropped by 20 per cent between 1999 and 2004, according to the Canadian Council of Professional Engineers.

The most dramatic drop was in first-year enrolment, the society said.

The decline followed a decade in which a record number of Canadian women broke into the male-dominated world of engineering.

From the CBC news.

Those stats aren’t new (at least not to me). The last statement, however, is. I wonder how they define “[breaking] into the male-dominated world of engineering.” Cause as far as I can tell, there’s still a long way to go before we get to that point.

on saturday my host mom kumiko dressed me in a kimono. it took a long time and there were lots of layers and things to tie. then she and akira took me outside and we took lots of pictures. it was fun. but i don’t like most of them, and only posted a few. enjoy.

   

yes, i’m off to visit the old host family tomorrow (tonight, i guess)!
i can’t wait to see them all – especially the little girls.
i’ll be back sunday night.

I’ve had at least 3 people email to rub in Toronto’s fantastic weather.
Don’t get so smug. Last week it was over 20 here and we were running around in T-shirts.
So, yeah!

it’s my first picture with my new digicam. see more here! Can’t promise there’s anything exciting… yet. Well, there was snow tonight. But that’s only exciting if you want to snicker at the Canadian who thought she was going to escape winter by moving to the one of the southernmost islands of japan and instead is freezing…

i got a Canon IXY Digital 60 (i think it’s equivalent to an SD450)

after lots of soul searching and talking with friends i decided to stick with canon. i know we’ll have a long and happy life together.

i nearly delayed a few more days*, but Amanda helped me make the plunge. her slogan should be “Just Buy It”. In fact, I think I’ll make a bracelet that says WWAD for times like these.

hm, what am i going to use all my Yamada Denki points on… The 2 of the other interns ordered Play Station 2s and Final Fantasy 12s. It’s a package that comes bundled with the game and a PS2 with the logo etched on it. That’s something I don’t want to buy.

and no pics yet — i need to get some work done today, so left my mac at home.

*yes, the IXY 70 is out this week, but bottom line is i don’t need any of the features in the upgrade.

i was looking at some weather sites, trying to find one that told me what i wanted to hear about tomorrow’s weather, when i noticed this:

   

these are images from the JAL website. i find the 1st and 4th pretty clear, but i’m not sure what distinguishes between needing a folding umbrella and a regular one. how i love this country.