Easter!

Happy Easter! It's so weird to be in Japan during an American holiday that I usually celebrate -- I'm normally bombarded by Easter candy and decorations in stores starting before Christmas (basically), but I haven't seen anything similar here. I did manage to eat a Reeses today but that was the extent of my American-style celebration... Today was a pretty chill day as I woke up really not feeling well, so I slept for a while more and ended up going to a late light lunch around 4pm. We ended up at McDonalds (typical Americans?), where I had a normal chicken sandwich and then a "banana cake" mini McFlurry -- it was pretty freakin awesome. The McDonalds in our area is inside of a supermarket, so we also did some grocery shopping. I got a new box of cereal and a bunch of fruit, so I'm pretty stocked for breakfast for the next two weeks. I ended up going out for dinner later and split a delicious pasta/rice/tonkatsu (pork) dish with a friend since I wasn't that hungry. It was super oishii (delicious). We also went to a bakery to get dessert, so overall today wasn't the most healthy day for eating, but hey it's a holiday right!? I got this strawberry shortcake thing which was really yummy. I feel like I say that about everything I eat here, but it's true -- everything is so good!

Dinner! Noodles, pork, and rice with egg! Nom

Easter dessert -- packaged with easy-open box, ice pack, and individually wrapped spoon

Yesterday I hung out in the dorm most of the day because it was pouring outside for most of the day. I got some work done and it finally stopped raining around late afternoon so I left with some friends to go to Takadanobaba for dinner. I thought we were just meeting a few people but we ended up running into the giant group that was gathered for the SISEC event, so we went with upwards of 40 people to a restaurant for light food and drinks. It was an overload of Japanese but I've been trying to use more of what I know in conversation (which is still not much). After taking one semester of Japanese before coming here, I felt like I was at least a tiny bit prepared, but now getting here and being in actual social situations I feel vastly underprepared. Its really overwhelming but I learn something lots of new things every day so hopefully within the next few weeks I will start to feel better. Thankfully, I usually have about four human dictionaries with me at all times, since most everyone on my program knows more than me -- they have been really helpful :). Overall though, the SISEC event was really fun and I've made several good Japanese friends!

Friday (two days ago) was also a great day. I had Japanese in the morning and then an early lunch with some friends, and then went to a SISEC meeting which was mostly in Japanese with the occasional English translation. I'm really bad at approximating, but there were probably at least 60+ students in the classroom where the meeting was held, so it took a while for everything to get settled down. The meeting was mostly in Japanese with the important events also translated into English, so we got the information for the upcoming events for the next few weeks (ice skating, Yokohama tour, cooking party the day after my birthday!). The meeting was kind of overwhelming--they wanted all of the exchange students to sit in the front--but it was nice to see some familiar faces.

After lunch I had my anthropology class, which I still really like, but most of the learning is definitely going to take place outside of the classroom... class time has not been productive, to say the least. But, we have an interesting assignment for next week which will soon be posted on my class blog, so in all it was fine.

Friday night was a "girls' night" as we sent the guys off to do their own thing and a bunch of us girls went to Omotesando for dinner. We at at this place called Eggs 'n' Things, which is apparently a chain in Hawaii, but it had super delicious American breakfast food. I got chocolate chip pancakes, and last minute decided to add whipped cream, which turned out to be a quality decision. We spent a few hours at the dinner place and were never pressured to leave despite the line of people waiting to be seated -- thank you Japanese service. We also sat outside and it still gets pretty chilly at night, so we were all provided with an individual blanket to use at our seats. Amazing.

Whipped cream... with some pancakes on the side

After dinner we walked to Shibuya to this little alleyway lined with tiny bars on either side -- we picked one and went up to their second floor where the seven of us filled up the whole space (the ground floor was the same size). Unfortunately, my camera was dead, but it was a great traditional Japanese experience and was really relaxing. We had great conversation the whole night and it was really good company. After an hour or so we left the bar and walked around Shibuya a bit more before deciding to head back to the dorm, as we were all pretty tired from our first full week of class.

In all, I had a pretty chill weekend, mainly since I wasn't feeling well for part of it. Some of my friends visited Tokyo Tower, which is definitely at the top of my list of things to do next. My mommy mailed me an Easter package which I can pick up tomorrow -- yay thanks mom! I'm excited for some American candy :) Time for sleep -- tomorrow begins another full week of class!