できる！

Oops!!!  I haven't written anything in a long time!

Today I discovered I am only a short walk away from a Shinto shrine.

Now that it isnt way too hot anymore, Im going to go on walks all the time.  There is a lot of Komagane I have yet to explore.

There are so many interconnectednesses in this town.  Its just like being at home :]  Everyone knows everyone, and Im starting to recognize lots of people when I walk around town.

I dont know where the apostrophe key is on this keyboard.

Japanese is going well.  I can talk with my host family, and write, and understand basic kanji.  Im not able to understand almost anything at school, but Im making progress.  I can often understand little bits of conversations between other people...　not enough to fully follow along, but enough to know the general topic.

I might be doing something [I dont know exactly what] to help out at a Toy Story-themed country line dance party for 8 hours.  I really dont understand at all what this is, but it seems amusing.

I did an experiment in Chemistry.  As far as I can tell, all we accomplished was measuring different amounts of water into variuos beakers and contraptions [many of which I had never seen before].  One of them is like a big straw with a bubble in the middle that you suck water into.

I chose my classes for next year... [the school year ends in March, so Ill be a 2nd year high schooler for a while].  Im going along the English/Art track.  So Ill have those classes and also Japanese History and some others.

I saw an opera recital.  It was half in Japanese, half Italian.  The singer graduated from my high school 20 years ago.  At the end of the recital, everyone sang the Nagano song.  I will have to learn it!  It is really long, so it might take me a while.  All I could understand of it was "うさぎおいしい”　"delicious rabbit."

There is a big shrine festival tomorrow.  I saw them practicing today.  Its a really slow parade involving little kids with big umbrellas and little kids with fake swords and adults playing flute and drum and lifting big sticks with streamers on them in the air.

Thats all for now.