12/18/08; 14:10

Hello World.

Haha…flashback to junior year at Oxy…hahaha…and I’m listening to a song titled, “Flashback.”
Hahaha…yes, I am a dork. And yes, I didn’t get much sleep. :P

Why didn’t I get much sleep? Oh that’s because I was busy packing, straightening my place out and just because I was/am too excited about going home!!!
xD

Yes, that’s right. After about 5 months in Japan, I’m coming home! But, I’ll only in the LA area for a little over 2 weeks.

At this very moment, I am in Seoul, Korea. First time here! But…not much to look at. It’s an airport…with lots of shops. Most of which are waaaay over my budget.

Ah, now I remember which weekend I was referring to in my last blog. Shall we continue?

So Julia left Fukuoka on a Wednesday. That Friday was my works “bonenkai.” It’s basically an end-of-year party. Well, dinner is more like it. So after work, I went back home, changed shoes (I take my sneakers to work because I find it easier to ride my bike in them…) and then took the train to Yakuin (really near the city). On the way I bumped into another teacher! Hahaha. And then we found another teacher at the station. Hehe.

The bonenkai was held at a hotel and the food was really yummy. There was o-sashimi (raw fish), pork…can’t remember too well now… But I do remember that I was seated near the dessert table. Mahaha.

At the beginning of the night, we had to draw numbers, as though a lottery, to know where we’re supposed to sit. So it’s all randomized. And later a real lottery was held. But sadly, I didn’t win any of the special prizes. They did have little gift bags for the people that didn’t win a big prize. I was lucky to get one that had lunch tickets for the hotel! So I can come back and eat lunch there. ^^

Once it was all over (felt a little short to me…still had more teachers I wanted to talk to…) I headed back to my apartment with my co-worker. Not sure if I mentioned it before but I have one co-worker that lives at my jutaku! So basically I had a buddy to walk back home with. And of course we ran into other teachers going to the station and riding the same train. Hehe.

On Saturday, I did some cleaning and then got ready for my first Thanksgiving away from home. After I had showered and whatnot, I went over to Grace’s place and helped her prepare. Lupita and I (and later David joined too) were in charge of the ham. This was a first time for all of us but people seemed to like it so I guess we did a good job. :]
Bummer thing is that my oven smelled of honey-glazed ham for a while after that…

So yea, Grace managed to make a great traditional Thanksgiving dinner. And Carl managed to stream a football game onto the TV so it really felt like I was home…but for some reason in a tatami room…

Anyhoo, after having some food and whatnot, we all played Rock Band. For a VERY long time. Put it this way: dinner started around 7 I believe and the “party” didn’t end until about 4!!!

Here’s the real kicker though…at point during the night, through the most random twist of fate, I couldn’t find my keys. If you have never seen my keys to my dorm room, let me explain that on my keychain there is a whistle, light, broken kanji charm, silver cat, bike lock key, storage key and my apartment key. Pretty big for it to just up and disappear! Long night’s story short, after searching for an hour and calling people, I stayed the night at Carl’s and Grace’s, had Carl help me open my apartment, and eventually got an e-mail from Lupita that she found my keys in her purse.

That same weekend, on Sunday, I went to my first J-pop concert in Japan!!! It was sooooooooo much fun. I really want to go again. And they are coming back to Fukuoka in February!!! So I’m really thinking about going again…but I gotta decide soon before tickets get too expensive…

And thus concludes my second and really bizarre weekend.

Now on to the next one…