Day One

Edit: I actually posted this the 1st morning because I fell asleep before a roommate was done with the internet, but whatever---off to the airport now, bye!

What’s going through my brain right now as I’m sitting in Japan a bajllion miles away from home? Well you see, my suitemates and I share the exceedingly useful ability to recite practically the entire dialogue of Disney’s Mulan among the four of us (complete with epic renditions of “Be a man, you must be swift as a raging fiiiire!”). What does Mulan have to do with Japan? Absolutely nothing. I’ve merely bestowed the (completely original) title of “Day One” on this gripping description of my first day in Japan, and I just have this reoccurring image of the scene in Mulan whereChi-Fu (sp?) grins at Chang right after threatening to send reports to the general about how the training of the new troops progresses, and Chi-Fu holds up his stylus/papyrus/whatever and says “Day One” in this really snide voice. Yes. Blame my rambling and Mulan stories on the jetlag exhaustion if you will. Also, now I have Jamie Foxx’s “Blame It” stuck in my head. Thanks a lot.

In more relevant news, Japan!!!1!!1one!! It’s growing one me, at least a little. In all honesty, I spent most of today being terrified out of my mind about everything, because the one thing I hate more than spiders is traveling. Do not want. Trying to work the public telephones in Chicago was bad enough (fail), and I hadn’t even left the States yet. Once in Japan, getting through quarantine, immigration, and customs wasn’t actually all that bad, and only took as long as it did due to my inability to decipher the Japanese instructions for everything. It really hit me how limited my ability to communicate is when despite the numerous applicable dialogues which we memorized and recited in class, the only Japanese I’ve managed to nervously squeeze out has been “Excuse me” and “Thank you very much.” Oh, and of course, “Do you have orange juice?”

Anyway, all the other inane details of today will go in my Light blog once I have time to actually think back on the past 24 hours (although since I’m in Japan, i.e. in the future, you could argue that it’s been more than 24 hours). I’m sure Elliot’s pictures speak volumes about Japan anyway, haha. The pajamas are indeed pretty cool, although mine goes completely down to my toes and I’m not sure I would want to be seen in public wearing it. Sadly, I think my camera may be dead (or just failing fantastically at the moment) so it may very well be that I’ll be mooching pictures from other people to post in the future.

Also, I SAW JOHN GREENAWALT TODAY. Granted, it was only for about 5 minutes when I got off the elevator on the 17th floor of our hotel to find him standing outside my room after I facebooked him our hotel and my room number. This whole not having a cell phone/reliable means of communication thing is also a real pain, although I’ll be renting one which should arrive next Wednesday. Anyway, I’m hoping that when HIF has our mid-semester break John can come up to Sapporo and party with Elliot and me! Anyway, that’s it for now. I should study for the 5+ hour long placement test of doom that we’ll be taking shortly after we get off our plane from Tokyo to Hakodate...for which we have to get up at 4:45 am. Gah. おやすみなさい！