I have to write more often. Sorry about that. When I don’t update my blog for long periods of time, it turns into just a list of what I’ve been doing. I want it to be more of a peek into what I’m thinking.
Warning: I am starting to be bad at being good at English.
Exciting things!
- I went on a 3 day trip to the south/Shikoku! Went to 7 different temples. It was really amazing. I did lots of chanting, incense-lighting, small-talking with grandmas [there were about 80 old ladies on the trip, a few men, and my host parents and host sister], raw-fish/ unknown substance eating, and a little bit of public bathing. Lots of new things. I could write way more, but I’m going to try not to let this post get too long.
- Class Match! 2 days of wandering around watching soccer, basketball, and table tennis interrupted only by 3 half-hour soccer games. [We lost all of them. The only point we got was scored by the other team on their own goal.] But it was still super fun, and no one really cared that we did horribly.
- Last Sunday was a lot of good things in one day. In the morning, there was an international festival. I learned a little Bengal, saw lots of people who I wanted to know, saw a Japanese Swiss horn choir thing, and wished I could’ve stayed longer. But I couldn’t because I had to go to a Rotary Orientation, which I actually kind of can’t remember… After that, I saw the temple where my host mom grew up! Super pretty! [Temple #11. I’m keeping track.] Then host mom, host aunt, and I went to Matsumoto castle. It is about 500 years old, a national treasure, and awesome. Not so good with me describing words today, sorry. Steep stairs, little windows, moon-viewing balconies, flat lawns, flowers, black wood. Rain.
Yesterday, my host mom was describing some way of doing something [I forget what] and asked if it is the same in the US. I told her how it [memory not great today!] was different in the US, and for the first time talking about the US felt like I was explaining a memory, not what I am used to doing.
I can’t decide what I think about my speaking capabilities. Sometimes I think that I’m terrible and can’t say anything, but other times I think that I am almost as good at Japanese as I am at Spanish. I think the second one is true. I don’t have hard evidence of my progress like I did when learning Spanish [test grades etc] so maybe I don’t realize I’m getting better. And I think I take the things I know for granted. Also, I’m learning everything at once. It isn’t like school-learning where you learn basic stuff, and then a new grammar trick, and then a new set of vocab. In the school-way, you have a limited set of things that you are very good at. In the immersion-way, I have a lot of things I am moderate at. I’m trying to master all of Japanese grammar at once. The rate at which I acquire things that I am super at is slow, but my breadth is great. So I can saw a lot of things incorrectly, but little-by-little more correctly. Just know, I thought of “dan-dan” before I thought of “little-by-little.” Yes!
Usually when I have something to say, I have to think of it in English and then translate it in my head, before I can say it, but there have been a few times where I just went straight to saying it. On these occasions, I assumed I must have got it wrong, because I didn’t think about it. But I didn’t.
Seasons change within 2 days here. Tuesday it was early fall, Wednesday the leaves started changing, today it is freeeeeeezing cold, like winter. I kind of wish my school had heating…
That’s all for now. In the future, I’ll do shorter, frequenter posts rather than rare monstrous posts. [I think frequenter might not be a word?]
PS I visited the mandolin/guitar club yesterday. Super nice people, super pretty sounds, super excited, gonna join.
