Tuesday 5th May – children’s day – band concert
So off to school again, this time for an 8is start! way to early, I know I know I had 7am starts every week for choir in Australia but in Australia I had a lot more energy than I ever seen to have here, in that I’m constantly feeling tired here. And b I didn’t have to ride to school, and when its less than 20 degrees at the warmest part of the day, riding that early in the morning, especially when you are riding against the wind, and wearing a skirt is somewhat fun (can you feel the sarcasm there) but none the less I got to school nice and early! And we spent the morning rehearsing the finer parts of the concert, i.e. getting on and off the stage, the changeover of conductors, and the songs which had fancy lighting so that the techy people could practise that.
For lunch today the ichi-nen-seis (first year students) had to provide lunch for the ni- nen- seis and the san-nen-seis in their section, the flutes joined with the double reeds for this. But that was a fun experience, topped by the fact that they were shocked … again … that I don’t know my blood type… this mattered because they had different chopsticks depending on what blood type you are. From what I understand they somewhat use blood types like the west has horoscopes.
After that it was the concert. And boy it surprised even me, at the length of it … actually I seemed to be the only one surprised by that, it was 2.5 hours with 20minutes worth of intervals in there, so basically we had about 2 hours of music… now for a high school band that is a little insane. Yes? Also the baseball team were there, I think they must have been forced to come!
As this was the last thing for the san- nen- seis the dressing rooms were filled with lots of tears after the concert, and I can thoroughly appreciate that feeling, I was sad by the fact at my last band performance in Australia, is hard to separate that from graduation as they were the same time, but performing arts in general was as you all know a huge part of my life in Australia and the performing arts at Grace was my second family, I don’t by any means get that feeling here, I feel quite the opposite in fact, especially in that the different groups, seem to have nothing to do with each other… which I find quiet strange. Lots of flowers were exchanged. I even got some! And lots of photos taken, I got sick of hearing “neri-chan, ishiyon ni shyashin tote desuka”( I actually don’t think that’s proper Japanese, but they do that they speak differently so that I understand them… though I understand the normal stuff.) “Nelly can we have a photo together?” or something very similar. This I just found annoying coz half the people that asked for photos I have seriously never talked to, so I just seemed like they were taking photos coz they can then say "hey look I’m friends with the foreigner", I have seriously had people at school come up to me say hey, so I’m polite and say konnichawa back, and then they go of saying to their friends see that the foreigner girl spoke to me, did you see? Did you see? (Yes I have taken to replying in Japanese if they just say hello or something similar to me in English. If it’s a question I will usually talk back in English, but once you start in English they assume that you don’t know Japanese.) After that was all said and done I headed home to finish the packing process. In some ways it’s really sad to see everything of mine packed into a cardboard box (all souvenirs, both Australian yet to be given away and the stuff I have collected so far that I can’t attach to my blazer!), my suitcase, backpack and my handbag but then again I know that living with only that amount of stuff has made me appreciate it all so much more. I have at times thought I’m looking forward to going home and having a gazillion t-shirts to chose from (even though even then I know I will just wear the same 5 or so very repeatedly) yet I have what *goes and counts. Well opens the draw from where she is sitting and counts* 11 here … I actually didn’t realize I had that many here, 1 is my formal uniform shirt from school, which I wore travelling to Japan and haven’t since, and another is my formal one I would wear if I ever went to rotary and I wasn’t in my school uniform. 3 others I have gained while here, one with the town mascot, one with Sakura (cherry blossoms) – Japan’s national flower and the other being my band shirt (says Takaoka　(yes in romaji… i.e. exactly what I just typed not たかおか(hiragana) or 高岡(kanji) in the shape of a music note!)　anyway that’s enough about my clothes, point is I appreciate more than ever how much I do have, even if it does all fit in my suitcase, because I know it’s a lot more than some people have ever had. Also I must say I was very surprised it all fitted in so easily this time… as I couldn’t vacuum pack anything…. My hosts don’t have a vacuum cleaner… they don’t have carpet; the entire house is either wooden floors or Tatami. (Traditional woven flooring)

Wednesday 6th May – Tonami tulip fair and changing host families
So this morning my host family did precise what they always do and went “hey Sharnelle has free time… let take her somewhere!” (don’t get me wrong I appreciate this, but I do also miss having my free time actually being free time) so this morning it was off to tonami (still in Toyama ken but on the other side of the prefecture if my geography of Toyama ken is at all decent … don’t trust it though...its shaped kinda like Australia which I think is cool!) anyway tonami has a tulip fair, I had previously been to Tonami’s tulip museum, but the fair wasn’t on at the time. It was really pretty and what not and then we went into the museum there, not the best art I’ve seen, and I have seen a lot this year. I love living in such a cultured culture! After that it was out to lunch then back home and I did actually have some spare time but it was very boring spare time because all my stuff, books that I have now read about 5 times over, my knitting, even my origami paper! Just as a decent movie had come onto the TV, and I was getting into it, it was time to head off to my next host family! So into the car goes all my stuff and we drive to Imizu, to my next host family. Imizu is another suburb, but still very close (Takaoka à Imizu = similar distance ect as Morayfield à Redcliffe or there about) so I am now with Yoshi’s family (for some of you that will mean nothing and that’s ok) and here I have a host grandma, grandad, mum and currently an older sister, later in my stay Yoshi will come home from his exchange in Australia and then I will also have him as an older brother.
A few things I’ve noticed about this family/ house already, first of all the house is huge, ok well not all that huge compared to houses in Australia in fact I would guess it’s about the same size as my house and considering 5 people live here that’s not a big house, but you’ve got to remember it’s in Japan. And yes in general the houses in this area of Japan are not what you would think, this area is not overpopulated like Tokyo but in that saying that the house is the same size as mine its 2 stories, you would never see a house the same size and only one story. They always build up not out!
The house also shows the irony that fills Japan. Where you have the traditional and the very modern right next to each other living in my house now the first of these that I noticed is that we have the traditional dining area with the low table on Tatami, (this is actually raised in this house so that it has traditional heating under it) but then standing right next to this is a massage chair (like the ones we have in shops that you generally pay $2 for 5 min on) In front of a huge TV.

Thursday 7th May
So school today! So I guess this is where I inform you of my new way of getting to school! I catch a train! Well 2 but that’s beside the point. Which I think completes my different ways possible for getting to school, car for primary school, bus for high school… with the occasional car trip for early mornings or late afternoons, then walking from my first family, riding a bike from my second and now the train. I get driven to our closest train station (about a 10 min drive) catch the first train one stop to Takaoka station change trains go one more stop and then walk the couple of 100 meters to school, but seriously there are enough of us on the train you don’t even have to think about what your doing you just get swept up in the mass movement into school. This morning my host sister came with me until I got onto my second train to make sure I knew what I was doing but I came home on the trains by my self today. Had to ask for help changing trains coz I didn’t know which one to get on... I was right in what I had guessed but I wanted to be sure. When they picked me up this afternoon we bought a 3 month pass so that I don’t have to buy tickets everyday but I figured out it’s the same price as 27 days! Much cheaper as well.

Friday 8th May
School, nothing to exciting to note,I actally had a very boring day, because the classes were all changed around and the ones I would normally attend were then duting my Japanese lesson time so I ddnt do much at all today. We went out for dinner at a Chinese place though.

Saturday 9th May
Had a real lazy day today which I enjoyed imensly. Was home with just my hsot grandma and so talked to her a bit, but I find her increadibly hard to understand. She talks rerally fast, uses dialect! But I read a few of the English books I found in my room. And caught up on sleep it was just a really nice day.

Sunday 10th May
Went out for lunch with my host mum and then on to a special art display in Toyama it was amazing there was one painting in particular that I loved, I bought the postcard with its picture but of corse the picture doesn’t do the painting justice but I will try and get that picture up soon.

Monday 11th
School, had a nice chat with some ichi-nen-seis at lunch today they seemed really nice and told me that they have joined the English speaking club so I’m sure I will be seeing more of them… one of them lived in America for 2 years! But I think the highlight of my day was the walk with my host mum and sister after dinner.