Guess Who's Back, Back Again

Guess who's back, guess who.....

Okay, enough with the Slim Shady metaphor. However, unlike Mr. Mathers I made a comeback, but to Japan of course and not to the world of white rappers. Though, when I think about it, is rap still alive? Rap seems to have turned more towards hip hop these days. Give me old school Dr. Dre or Snoop Dog any day.

Music aside, I am indeed back after my extended tour in the United States. For those of you keeping up with the blog I returned stateside early March. I extended my stay two weeks over so I could spend a little extra time with family and friends.

As far as what I did stateside I can't really say much. Mainly I spent time (yes I'll say it again) family and friends. I cooked a few meals for my fam which they seemed to enjoy, or were lying through their teeth. Most of my time was spent playing Resident Evil 5 which came out about a month ago, and has sold nearly 1.5 million copies to date. Tyler (one of my closest buds) and I spent quite some time playing through the game and getting all the achievements. Yes I bought it for Xbox and not my PS3, the NPD also backed up my thoughts the 360 would indeed be the better seller by outselling the PS3 version by 350,000 copies.

Aside from Resident Evil I didn't do much else. This was a nice break though. My life in Japan is usually a little busier and time off was definitely needed/wanted. I'm back now though and I had to hit the road running. I was a few days late for the prelim on signing up for classes. So, this past Monday I met with my adviser, Morita (森田)-sensei, in order to figure out what classes I'm going to take this semester. To my dismay last semester we found they would not have the next Japanese language class for me to take. So I skipped ahead and am still taking three language classes. One is designed for reading, another is for grammar and speech, and lastly there's a supplemental class I'm taking for review (extra study time). This of course left me with three more classes I needed to take. The teachers I have suggest that it's better to take art or sports classes due to the fact that you don't necessarily need to know what's being said in order to participate in the class. So I took said advice (since I might as well have fun with these classes seeing as I have a college degree already) and took some artsy fartsy classes. So my schedule is as follows (because I know you all are aching to get a hold of me so here's my timetable):

Monday: Drawing (where you...well...draw things, mainly pencil and charcoal)

Tuesday: Painting (where you...ok I'm not gonna use the same joke twice, but you paint things. First still life then we can do our own thing)

Wednesday: I did have a class but it got changed to Friday, which is awesome because now I have Wednesday off for now. For now meaning my supplement class begins next month.

Thursday: HELL (no this isn't a class but that's what this day feels like to me). First, I have Japanese in the morning. After lunch I have a class Morita-sensei helped me pick out. It's a class on Ernest Hemingway, for those uncivilized folks reading this he was an American writer/journalist. I've not read any of his works but the timing of this class couldn't have been more impeccable seeing as I've dove head first back into literature. This class is also great because we read, well in English! However, I'm sure I'll be acting as more of a tutor seeing as I'm the only English speaker in the class. Lastly, I have calligraphy! I said in a previous post we did a special class on this last semester, but that was just one class. Now I take the class every week. This should hopefully help me learn more kanji and have a better understanding of what/where the symbols are derived from.

Friday: I did have a clay sculpting class, but as I said I needed only 7 classes, this would have made 8 so I decided to drop it seeing as I don't really need any more undergraduate credits. So the Japanese class I should have had on Wednesday is now on Friday.

So far classes have been really cool. After being polluted by the horrible asshole filled American mindset I'd forgotten how nice people and helpful people are in this country. I made a new friend, Akimoto, who is Lydia's (from the UK) tutor. He helped me sign up for most of these classes. Signing up for classes isn't as easy as EKU or other US universities where you can just sign up online after having some sort of guidance or receiving a RAC number. In Japan you have to actually meet with the teacher and discuss with them about the class and get their stamp. *CULTURAL NOTE* For those who don't understand Japan does not use signatures, they use a "hanko" which is a specially made stamp that takes the place of a signature. Although, one would think it would be easier to forge a stamp rather than one's John Hancock.

My language class went from four people to a massive 18 people. As far as people I knew going into the class there were about four, Harrison (UK), Lydia, Stephan (Germany), and Rinsan who was in my class last semester. The other fourteen can easily be split down the middle seven people from Malaysia and the other seven from China. A lot of the girls from Malaysia all watch anime and every time one of them would bring a show up they liked Okumura-sensei (my teacher from last semester) would turn to me to ask me if I knew said series. Of course, sadly enough, I knew them all.

I've also failed to mention the fact that we did get new students this semester. The old Aussie's left and new ones came in. All of them seem very cool (3 girls and 2 guys). The women are über cute but being on the downward slope to 30 (albeit a few years away still yet) I feel much older than these kids seeing as well...they look like kids (save for one).

So needless to say I should have a very interesting time before I come back stateside for good. Yes, if I've not mentioned it yet I've decided to make my living in the USA rather than staying here for more than the original year. I love Japan, and I'll always have the opportunity to come back now. However, I really need to get my hands back on cameras, it's what I want to do and love to do and the more I delay that the likelihood of my chances of making something of myself in the "biz" fades away.

Now, for the part of my blog that discusses books! I recently finished Invisible Monsters by Palahniuk. I really hand it to him and his twist endings. It's possible to guess some of the ending but never all of it. Now I've moved on to a book I ordered off of Amazon (Japanese Amazon that is) called "House of Leaves". I've not read too far into it but it's already very interesting and is sucking me in. This is mainly due to the fact that the book is written in an very interesting way. I'm not a literature analyst nor do I critique it all too often, so I suggest if you're interested in it then look it up on the ole Wikipedia.

Can't say much for movies this time around seeing as I saw "Watchmen" in theaters the first weekend I was in and was utterly disappointed. If you liked this movie, then you're either an idiot or you didn't read the graphic novel. Or, I guess it could be both. Pop, pop, fizz, fizz, what a wonder feeling it is. This is how I'd describe the visuals, I'd get more feeling off an antacid. I can only fear movies will be pretty shitastic this year as they were last (Slumdog was not that good people) seeing as less projects are being green lit due to the stagnant economy.

Lastly, I would like to take time and say that although I don't really understand the need for religion I do indeed have enough respect for those who practice religion to not criticize. Unfortunately, my tolerance is wavering. For the last week I've been woken up as early as 4:30 AM by my Malaysian neighbour who finds the need to pray so loudly I can hear him through the wall. I don't have anything against the praying itself, but when it keeps me up that's another story. This person is also in one of my classes so it makes it hard to say anything to him as I will have to deal with him more than just living next to him. I've tried blasting music from my laptop at him through the wall but he did not falter, I guess I have to give him props for being able to pray through the rather unbearable Street Fighter IV opening "Indestructible".

P.S. Sorry there aren't any pics, haven't really gone anywhere or done anything to warrant me taking out my camera. Although I have to say when I re-entered Japan I was treated to some rather beautiful cherry blossom trees. It was like it was snowing pink petals, quite the site.