Thank god this week is finally over. We have the day off tomorrow for a 'reading period' and it being my first reading period (Edinburgh never gives me one, although some other courses get to enjoy a nice midterm week-long break), I would love to spend it how students are supposed to spend their reading periods; getting inappropriately drunk. (or so I'm told) But unfortunately I'm probably going to spend the day in the library working, or if this cold persists, working from my bed. I have two exams next week, one on Monday and one on Tuesday and thus far I have not had the time to prepare for them due to the fact that I've had a bit of a beasty cold and exams every day this week.
Right now I'm currently in bed feeling very poorly and very sorry for myself. I finished my speaking test today and it did not go as well as I would have liked. Keigo (honorific/humble Japanese) is a complete bitch! So I came straight back and rested. I am always in two minds about sickness...I'm always either thinking 'hey, its not that bad suck it up and keep going' or 'omg I feel terrible right now, I need to get to bed and stay there until this gets better'. I'm sure everything I've been doing this week, while I've been soldiering on has gradually been making me feel more ill so now I'm going with the later approach.
ANYWAY
thats all very boring...
Last weekend, when I didn't feel like my tonsils were trying to crawl out of my throat and escape, I went to the Ghibli Museum. I know a few people who read this might not know what that is so the quickest way would be to show you...
What you just watched is a short clip from My Neighbour Totoro (となりのトトロ）in which the main character Mei finds Totoro. This is one of the most popular films made by Studio Ghibli. It was actually realised in 1988, which I was pretty surprised at. While I love Ghibli, I think The Little Mermaid (1989) is far superior in terms of animation. I always thought Totoro was a lot older until just last week. Nevertheless I have really fond memories of this film, the first time I saw it I was sat in my host family's lounge in Komatsu. I was so tired, and I remember they kept saying I could go to bed but I really wanted to finish the film.
If you didn't already know Studio Ghibli, you might now be wondering what's so great about going to the museum. Actually its pretty exclusive...
The number of tickets which allow you into the museum are limited so that the museum doesn't become too crowded and ruin your experience.
The tickets are only available to purchase at certain convenience stores using a certain machine.
Tickets must be purchased in advanced, once you have bought your ticket you will find out the designated time in which you may enter the museum. There are several times throughout the day when you may enter but if you miss your time slot, too bad.
The Ghibli Museum has a small scale movie theatre inside in which they show short films which are EXCLUSIVE to the museum.
We weren't allowed to take photos inside but here are mine from the day
Outside the Museum
Totoro admitting people to the museum. It was a lush day!
Check the sunshine!!
dont know these people...these a photo of my infront of here somewhere...
Some of the museum's buildings.
And again...
Waiting to get into the cafe...so many kids.
The Cafe
There was actually a bit of a western theme, felt like I was in beamish! lol
Wholegrain rice and katsu curry :)
Awesome plate!
This was the most amazing cake ever!
Nom!
My flags.
If I was taller this photo would have been nicer.
You can hopefully see the autumn colours in the trees in that last picture there. The trees are just starting to turn a lovely warm orange colour. Its still around 15degrees most days here...I here in England there is snow...what a shame! haha!
As promised, heres the video with footage from the Neko Cafe in Kichijoji. I tried not to make it too long as I am aware that it is just a bunch of cats, but I hope you'll be able to see how surreal the whole experience was. It still strikes me as kind of awkward that people pay to sit and play with cats for an hour but hey, thats Japan for you. Enjoy!
So on saturday I tried to go get a けいたい (keitai -mobile phone) but my alien registration form had been typed wrong and said I was leaving the country in three months so au wouldnt allow me to get a phone. So I went home and chilled out pretty much most of the day, it was pretty quiet.
On Sunday a few of us from Global House went to Kichijoji, a suburb of Mitaka. Fumika was our guide. We were planning on just going to the Cat Cafe Calico because we'd seen it on TV on Saturday but we actually ended up doing a lot more. We parked our bikes in Inokashira Park (井の頭公園), so we had a little walk around there. Theres a large lake in the middle, which I'm told people go to to break up with their significant other, this made me laugh.
Before we could go to the 猫カフェ（Cat Cafe) we had to find an ATM, so we had a casual walk around the shops looking for one. There's a lot of stuff in Kichijoi which is cheaper than Mitaka, because there's so much competition between shops. We went to Yodobashi Camera which is a huuuge department store which specialises in electronics, I'm thinking of possibly getting an electronic dictionary here soon. Then we had some time to kill before we could go to the cat cafe (we had to book because we were such a large group), so we went to one of the arcade and did プリクラ （purikura - literally translated as print club).
All the girls around the purikura machines.
This is sort of like a photobooth, and after you take the photos you customise them with all sorts of things. I think its quite popular among ギャル.
Customising our photos, the actual prints are to small to post on here, sorry!
Finally it was time for the Cat Cafe! We payed 900yen for one hour with the cats. There was the cutest corgi kitten ever!! I'm not sure if thats an actual breed but you can see why we called him that from the video I'll be posting soon.
Corgi Kitten!
They played classical music inside and half of the cats were sleeping so the atmosphere made us kinda sleepy, but other than that it was really fun. This is something I wanted to try because its kinda unique, so I was happy I went.
Afterwards we were all pretty hungry and in the mood for some Japanese food, so we headed to a Japanese fast food chain and I got to try 牛丼（Gyudon). Gyudon is basically a bowl of rice topped with seasoned beef and onions, I believe its traditionally eaten with a raw or semi cooked egg and/or ginger. I'm not a fan of ginger so I didn't go for that but I was interested in the raw egg as its in quite a lot of Japanese meals. I tried it but I didn't like it lol, so I think I'll stay away from that for now!
After our meal we cycled back to ICU, it was a good day :)
Hey! My name is Sarah. I'm 21 and I'm spending a year abroad in Japan as part of my degree. So far its been a little crazy but I hope that's just the beginning.
