July 30, 2010

Today was a pretty good day. We were supposed to go to an amusement park but the weather was horrible. We instead went to an aquarium that was indoors. Omg, it was so so much better than taking the kids through the amusement parks. The kids loved it, they weren’t running and screaming and chasing birds, and they were quiet because they were looking at cool ocean stuff. Perfect. Wish we could do that every time. The lucky kinders get to. Oh well. What ever. Tomorrow I leave for Tokyo. Should be a super fun weekend, but I am up really late getting directions to different things. Its like midnight now. Sigh! I need to go to sleep. Sorry this isn’t longer. Oh, Nikolas actually went an entire day without crying and whining. I have no idea what happened, but it was awesome. I actually let him go up and say his name and pick a song for closing because I don’t know when it will ever happen again. But kieth, the new kid sucks. Probably the worst kid ever. But that’s what I thought about Robert and now I adore him. Oh well we’ll see. Night!!!!

July 28, 2010

Today was such a good day! My watch broke again today so I had to take it apart and fix it. Bleh. I hope that doesn’t happen again. Note to self, don’t ever ever get a watch from wal mart ever again. Although I probably will just because they are cheap and then at least it doesn’t matter as much if it breaks or something. My voice hurts and I am not happy with it. In my attempt to be more authoritative I think that I have been using it a little too much. I need to reel it in a little bit because I don’t want to wear it out or even worse lose it! I wish I had a stronger voice and it didn’t get sore and horse so easily. I’m always jealous of those people who can like scream and scream and still be fine the next second. I haven’t screamed in years, but last time I did my voice hurt for like a week. Oh well. Probably better not even to have the option to abuse my voice. Robert today, who used to be one of my least favorite kids but has grown on me tons, lost all of his clothes again. I don’t even know how that happens every single time we go to the pool, especially since we have been checking and stuff if he has it when he gets to the pool and stuff. I was like dude, didn’t you zip it when I told you to? He was like, my bag was zipped but I think the clothes shrunk up and slipped out and then grew back to normal size when they got out. Ha ha. Kids say the darnest things. So cute. Tomorrow is yet another amusement park. That should be interesting. Hopefully we don’t run out of water like last week. Tonight I’m going to dinner with one of the Youth center staff who invited us over so she could make us dinner. So nice! Can’t wait.

July 27, 2010

Today was a pretty good day. Didn’t lose any kids so already an improvement from Yesterday. The day absolutely flew by, and I really enjoyed myself for the most part. I did have to raise my voice more than I would have liked to, but its like with the extra kids all the classes have from now on everyone is crazy. And the new ones aren’t even in my class except for one! But oh well. Its not the funnest thing ever having Kioshi back this week. I think that’s why Jaquin turned into an angel, is because Kioshi wasn’t there. Now that Kioshi is back and Jaquin and he are bffs, they cause mischief a lot. Not Jaquin as much intentionally, they just don’t know how to stay calm and have safe controlled fun. Ah kids. But oh well. Jaquin is still adorable and I love him. We played telephone with the kids today and it went all right. Robert tried whispering and it was so quiet that the person beside him couldn’t even hear it. Lol. I had him come tell me what he was passing onto her and it was ridiculous. The first time I couldn’t even hear it, and then after I told him to be louder it sounded like hmbadababre. Like gibberish. I was like dude. Talk like you talk normally just softer. So cute that he didn’t really understand the concept of whispering. Although he is six, so maybe it shouldn’t be cute at that point. The pool was nice. Good to cool off. Definitely have been in the pool more in Japan than I ever have in my life. Not the biggest fan of all the water stuff, but I just can’t help it when it is so darn hot all the time. Two kids crapped their pants today. New record here. Bleh. So incredibly glad that neither of them were in my room. We actually haven’t had any accidents at all. Less than the kids a year and two years older than my kids. Holla! I just think they know I’d be not a happy camper if that happened so they control themselves. After work a guy at Single Sailors who was Japanese helped me order Lion King Tickets!!!! Yay!!!! So it is officially on like Donkey Kong this weekend!

July 26, 2010

Well, Today was pretty interesting. The kids I felt are absolutely crazy this week, even though we only ended up getting one new kid in our room. There are a bunch of new kids in camp though and I feel it created some chaos. Altogether though the day was going by really quick with going to the gym and the library even though it was crazy hot. I thought. This isn’t bad for a Monday. And then of course it started sucking because Julie and I freaking left a dumb kid at the library. The only time out of ever we don’t do a stupid head count and that is the time a kid chooses to wander off to the bathroom for like 20 minutes without telling us. So he comes meandering out I guess after our group and another group had left. At least the leaders were still there or they went back to get him. I’m not exactly sure. Totally our bad and we felt/still feel aweful. I mean how horrible of leader are we, totally forgetting a kid. I really dislike Chandler even more than I kind of did before though now. He is just really annoying and doesn’t ever listen so it doesn’t surprise me that he would pull something like this. I don’t know. It just sucked in general. But I guess it could have been worse. Like if he was lost for good or something. Whatever. Never letting that kid do anything ever again. The rest of the day was pretty uneventful until after work. I tried to get tickets for Lion King this sat, but all the tickets at Lawsons that I wanted were sold out, and I still can’t figure out how to order them online. So I need to do that like tomorrow or fork out an extra 30 dollars to go see lion king, which is what I will probably end up doing. Sigh. But my hostel for this weekend is all booked so I get to stay in Tokyo no matter what holla! Paige’s mom adopted all of us counselors for dinner today and made us Lasagna. It was amazing! Lasagna with cheesy garlic bread, root beer, and cream pie for dessert. What could possibly be better??? Paige is so cute, although a little creepily attached to Mr. Buzz. She told me today that she wishes Buzz and I could take her to a far away land like California where we could have a big swimming pool and I could be the mommy and he could be the daddy. She actually called me mama a couple of times today and I was like woah dude. Need to call me Jasmine. She is so sweet though. She was telling Lauren that she wouldn’t want to be in any other room because she thought I was the best and she would cry if they tried to move her to a different room because she loved me and wanted me to be her friend. I definitely teared up and Lauren and Jenny laughed at me a little bit lol. But being with Paige tonight outside of the center setting just made me want to have a little girl of my own. She showed me her room and we played barbies for a little bit while the others looked at her sister Kayla’s wii. Such a good night. Although near the end it started to pour more than I have ever seen it rain ever anywhere. Absolutely crazy coming down in sheets and sheets! In the 2, 3 block walk home I was completely drenched from head to toe and on the walk home I was walking through some huge puddles up to my knees almost and had to take my flip flops off so they wouldn’t slip away. I also had to wipe my eyes every few seconds so I could see where I was going. On top of that, it was the first cold rain I’ve experience while here. Felt kind of nice, but not in the quantity that it was rapidly falling on top of my poor wet head. The lightening and thunder was crazy close and scary though. In Kyoto this last weekend I know a bolt of lightening literally struck the ground right inbetween Tanner and Ryan. That is just so scary. When Karly and Tanner met us in Osaka they were like freaking out about it. Nuts!!! Glad that didn’t happen, but still scary. Praying for no scary dreams tonight!

July 24-25 aka Nara and Osaka!!!!!

Ok, so this weekend was crazy amazing! We left to catch an overnight bus to Nara (and some of the group Kyoto) on Friday night. We left at eight so that we could get to the Shinagawa station in Tokyo by ten forty. Of course it doesn't take near that long to get there, but we wanted to make extra sure that we had time to check in and find out where we were going. We ended up finding it no problem which was really nice so we didn ' t have to stress about anything and we could just sit and relax and stand around for a little while before we had to leave. Finally when the bus got there we got all our stuff and got settled in our seats. There wasn't much leg room, but I don't mind much since it was about the same size as the busses we would take to Mexico for missions' trips every year. I just put my headphones in on my ipod, put my sweatshirt hood over my head and put my knees on the seat close in front of me and passed out. I didn't even realize we stopped during the night at all for like reststops because I slept straight through til morning. So did Julie which was handy since we sat together and no one had to wake us up to get out or anything. In the morning I finally woke up around six something when Karly and Tanner got dropped off at Kyoto. We didn't get to Nara until Eight something, which wasn't bad. It was kind of perfect since Osaka was where both groups were meeting that night and it was in the middle of both Nara and Kyoto. When we got let off of the bus we were near the Prefecture Government building or something which was right next to the park . The nice thing about Nara, where we were this weekend, and Nikko, where Randi and I went last weekend, is that everything that is worth seeing is all located in one park, and so it isn't hard to find or get to . Holla. The first thing we did was find a building where we could change and stuff. This one office like building we found wasn't technically open yet but we were able to find a bathroom and turn the lights on and use it. At least no one else was there so we had free reign of the bathroom. We just changed, refreshed a little, and put sunscreen on so we could not fry like on Fuji last weekend. It was so incredibly hot. So glad I finally have my sweat towel cleaned from Fuji so I could use it, although now it is just crazy nasty again from this weekend so I will have to wash it again. Oh my gosh, my backpack was way too heavy. I thought I only packed the essentials, but it all added up way too much. I'm definitely going to pack way way smarter when I go to Hiroshima and Kyoto on the seventh and eighth. I am thinking that I am going to try and go to Kobe for a little while too . That's where Tammy Swailes lived for a while and she said there is an Open Bible church there. That would be crazy amazing to see. I mean my church branch in a different country. How fricken awesome! Plus its supposed to be beautiful. After we were all refreshed, we started walking towards the main things, which to us were the Todaiji Temple and the Kasuga Taisha shrine. Right when we got into the park there were tons and tons of deer all over the place. It was insane. I live in Washington so there are tons and tons of deer, but I have definitely never ever seen deer like this. They were walking up to people and walking in the streets and just chilling everywhere. They were tame and not afraid of people at all. Julie and I split some Deer crackers that tons of venders were selling on the sides of the sidewalks and fed them to the deer. It was absolutely crazy! So incredibly much fun! I can't believe that the deer were just like walking up to us and eating out of our hands. The male deer were pushy with their antlers, but not in like a mean way, just like they wanted to get out attention. The deer were cool also because when you pet them they seemed like dogs where they would like nuzzle up to your hand and stuff. If you made eye contact with them at all they would like follow you also. Oh also , Deer chew like cows. I didn't know that. But they were all just chilling in the grass chewing sideways like cows do. So incredibly cool! Definitely had to purrel the crap out of our hands after that though. Next we went to the Kasuga Taisha shrine, which was pretty cool. The outside of it was pretty awesome, but very similar to many of the other shrines we have seen. While we were walking to the next thing, Todaiji, we were on this like out of the way path going through trees and stuff. It was absolutely beautiful. However, the beauty of Nara was temporarily overshadowed by a horrifying image that should not have happened. Lol. Randi, Julie, and I were walking down the path and we see this guy sitting on a bike with what looks like a nude colored fanny pack from far away. As we get closer, we see that it is not a fanny pack, not at all. Instead it is this dude with his thing hanging out sitting on a bike just peeing in the middle of the pack. I'm pretty sure that that was something I definitely did not wish to view as I was walking to see a beautiful temple / the big Buddha. Ugh. Not socially acceptable in America, and definitely not in the more conservative Japan. Bleh. Anyways, we shook that image out of our heads and kept trecking on. Finally we got to Todaiji, which is basically the whole reason to come to Nara. It is absolutely beautiful. You walk in and can see this huge building that houses the biggest Buddha in Japan. It is really neat to be able to say that I have now seen the largest and the second largest Buddhas in Japan! Woot Woot! I couldn't believe that this Buddha was like inside a temple thing though. It looked crazy big, but I guess it would have to be to house the largest Buddha. The funny thing is that from first glance the Buddha actually looked smaller than the one in Kamakura. We decided that it was probably due to the fact that this one was raised off the ground so it didn't even start until a certain amount up and it looked smaller. But then walking around it you could definitely tell how stinking massive it was. Absolutely amazing to see. The Todaiji was also crazy amazing because it was kind of like a museum too. The huge Buddha had two other golden buddhas around it, and then there was other stuff on display, like a couple of warrior heads, other large statues, and stuff. Very worth the 500 yen to get into the temple. That was the last thing we did in Nara because we wanted to get to Osaka, and we figured there were always more temples and shrines we could go see. The Buddha was the main thing, and for me the deer. Awesome. On our way out we stopped at a couple of the stores and I ended up finding a couple of sweet shirts. One of them has Kangi on it, and the other one says I heart Japan. Woot! I have been looking everywhere for those but for some reason it is impossible to find smalls of the souvenir tees anywhere. It is probably because the Japanese people don’t think there are any small Americans or something lol. But anyways, I found them and was able to check that off my list of things to get. The train to Osaka was very easy to figure out and it only took us like 45 mins at the very most to get there. Very convenient that the two cities were so incredibly close together. We got dropped of a the Osaka Namba station, which was right in the middle of some of the stuff that was on our list of things to do, which was really cool. The downside was that Osaka was like way hotter than Nara was. Bleh. Again, so glad for that sweat towel. A breeze sure would have been nice though. The first thing we saw, which was literally right outside our station was Namba Parks. It is this huge office building that has a garden attached to it. The garden is built in this like cool way with these swirly paths built into it. It is way cooler from aerial shots, but it was an office building so we couldn’t get up to the top. We did however just figure out how to get up onto the eighth floor and went beside one of the offices and took pictures out the window. Success! After that we wandered around a little. Namba is in the Minami district, which is the southern I think district in Osaka. It is really well known for shopping and stuff like that. We saw tons and tons of stores in the Shinsaibashi-Suji Shopping Street. It was tons of streets and were covered on the top. So it wasn’t indoors, but it was a covered walking area. It made it nice walking through because you could feel the air conditioning from all the stores coming out. There were so many streets in this thing that there were stoplights inbetween. Which thinking about it I’m not sure why there were streetlights when there were no cars and it was just hoards of people walking through this outdoor mall kind of thing. I saw one store that had these fricken awesome heels for ten dollars. How could I not stop there. They were on sale from like 40. I ended up getting two pairs, which for 20 dollars, well I guess 2000 yen is like the best deal ever!!!! My size is LL, which is the biggest size they have. At first I didn’t fit into one of the pairs I really wanted and was bummed, but then ha I remembered I was wearing two pairs of socks so my feet wouldn’t blister. Problem solved and I got two amazing hot pairs of heels. I’m so excited to wear them with basically anything. Although it was kind of a hassle carrying around two pairs of shoes in bag for the rest of the trip since they definitely didn’t fit into my heavy full backpack. Speaking of backpack, I could barely fit into that tiny shoe store. I kept forgetting how big my bag was and running into people. Definitely got some dirty looks from some Japanese folks. Also I was carrying around my awesome crepe I got. This one was a tropical crepe. Even though I don’t really like Bananas, I really enjoyed it in this. It was an ice cream cone with a frozen banana in it, and then it was wrapped in a fresh crepe with three scoops of different fruit flavored sorbet with peach on top. Oh my gosh it was like the best thing ever. I love Japan. We also saw Americamura which is kind of like Harajuku but more Americanized stores. That was a little bit of a disappointment because in the pictures there is this huge clown head on one of the stores, but it wasn’t there anymore and they had this little tiny one instead. Oh well. Still fun to explore. Dotombori, which is the center of Minami had this huge cool looking lobster thing on it. We also found this huge underground shopping mall called Crysta Nagahori. Stinking awesome. Best idea ever especially since it is so hot. Much better underground.But the construction of it and everything was absolutely beautiful. After that we headed to the Umeda Sky building, which is this massive building with the Floating Garden Observatory uptop. It was amazing to go up into and look down. The best part was that the observatory, which was 173 meters high, didn't have any glass, just these huge bars and so we could take crazy clear pictures! We stopped and rested there for a little while because we were overheating, but it was nice to just sit and look out on the amazing city. After we finished basking in the glory that was Japan from up high we headed to the Osaka Castle, which is basically the main reason to come to Osaka. We got off at this one station which was at the base of the castle grounds, and then we walked to the castle. When we finally got there like 20 minutes later even though we were drenched in sweat it was amazing! The castle was absolutely beautiful. It had a place where there was supposed to be a moat around it, but the moat was now called the Dry Moat and it had moss all up in everywhere. It looked amazing though. And the castle. Man that thing was just gorgeous. We went inside of it, and it was cool to see some of the historical stuff inside of it, but the outside was definitely where it was at. The very top we were able to go out and take pictures of the grounds and stuff. The sun was just starting to set when we were up there so it was perfect lighting for pictures. The sun when its up super high sometimes makes our pictures too bright. By the time we were done there we headed to Hotel Taiyo, which was our hostel for the night. It was literally like a 30 second walk from a subway stop so it was really easy to find, although at first we were headed the wrong direction. Karly and Tanner, who had been in Osaka, met us there and we all checked in together. We had two double rooms and one single room. It was Japanese style, which was actually kind of cool to experience so they were these mat things rolled out on the floor with these like bean filled pillows instead of actual bedding. But hey, part of the culture, there was air conditioning, And running water. For only 1500 yen I was totally down. The funny thing about this hostel was how little the doors were. It was so funny. Tanner was definitely too big to fit into his room without like crazy bending over. I didn 'T end up taking a shower that night because the shower rooms had divided hours where girls could go or boys could go, but it was like a community shower. I'm just not comfortable with it, even though I know that's kind of what they do here. So I wet down a towel and washed myself off without jumping naked in the shower like everyone else and then washed my hair in the sink. I still felt very clean and refreshed. That night after we all ate and rested for a little bit we all went out to see the Tsutenkaku tower at night. It looked beautiful. In fact, That whole area just looked amazing. Right under the tower there was this whole strip of restaurants that were called kashi kushi restaurants. Basically, everything was deepfired and amazing. Like deepfried banana, strawberry, (which the one with that closed so I didn 'T get to try it!!! !!!!) Potato, all kinds of meats, etc. Best idea for restaurants ever right. Holla. We went to two different ones, and the waiters were outside like trying to get people to come into their restaurants. It was super hilarious. The one across the street from where we ate did this like snake dance trying to get us to come. We went to the one we were at, but promised to come by after. Mostly we chose the one we went to because it had beer for 180 yen. Crazy cheap. My reasoning, the deep fried ice cream was 50 yen cheaper.: P. Although I did try the beer. It was actually really good, and went perfectly with the deep fried food. We took note of the competitiveness of the waiters and decided to do the Iggle Wiggle song from camp with them before going to the restaurant across the street. It is basically this song where two groups are competing for who can do moves better . We recorded it on my camera, and it was crazy hilarious to have the waiters try and do it with us. I realized as we were doing all this that that night was the first time we had really been out in a city during the night . Every other time we are just sleeping, on base, or on a bus. Not like going out to see stuff at night. Cities are so pretty at night with all the lights and stuff. Randi, Julie, and I woke up at around six thirty the next day to try and see Tennoji park. We get there and of course it doesn't open til nine thirty. It was still pretty from the outside though, although there were these crazy bugs that make the most loudest noise ever and there were probably millions of them down this one path. I just wanted to shoot either myself or all of them. Ah. When we were sitting for a little bit before going to catch a train to our bus to go home this Japanese guy (who was kind of a creeper) offered me a seat and then sat for like ten minutes talking to me. After I wasn 'T responding and looked at him for a while like huh he was like Japanese? Japanese? You Japanese? Awesome. A Japanese guy thought I was Japanese. Have fun with that one Braden and Daddy: p.;). Finally I was like shrugging and saying no Japanese over and over until his friend was like American! And yelling at this dude. I turned away and was just looking at a map for a little while and then I heard him start singing. I couldn't understand it because it was in Japanese, but then I recognized the tune. He was definitely singing it to me, because I looked at him and he was staring at me. Then he got to the chorus. "Kirring me softry wich his rove." I about died. It was adorable. I loved how the chorus was the only part in English. Oh Japan. But thankfully we left the creepy guy who was professing his love to me and headed to find our bus home. It left at 10:10, which is early, but much much cheaper than trying to figure out the trains or doing the bullet train. This bus, Which was through the JR, was a bit roomier, but I found it harder to sleep in because I couldn't put my legs on the seat in front of me. The cool thing about it was that it was a double decker bus. Always wanted to travel on one of those. It is weird to me that driving like across the whole of Japan is like driving to Seattle or maybe a little further from Spokane. After like a seven and a half hour bus ride we got dropped off on the side of the highway and had to walk to a station to take back to our station, Sagamino. Very eventful trip, didn 't get really burned, had a lot of fun, and definitely know I'm not going to take so much to Hiroshima. My back is killing me! But a very successful and fun weekend!

July 23, 2010

Today was pretty good, although I am crazy tired. I only got like four hours of sleep last night because I was packing and getting food and info ready for nara and Osaka. It is going to be weird basically being gone for a full two days. This will be the longest trip we’ve gone on. I am extremely excited. In nara I know we will be able to pet tame deer. What could be cooler than that? Today the kids were wild. Although this might be the last week with my kids. Some of the kids have to switch rooms because we had to add rooms since the enrollment went up by almost forty kids for the coming weeks. That is insane. I hope Nikolas is still in my room or I will honestly probably cry. And Jaquin. They are my little buddies and even though Nikolas is ridiculous and hard to handle I can’t imagine my time here without him. I am not sad today, and I’m in a much better mood and less homesick. I got to talk to my mommy this morning. I found out today that red flag days are when the temp is between 105 and 130. The last three days have been red flag days, and I guess its supposed to be hotter where we are traveling. The ride there is going to be long, but I got my ipod all charged up and I can’t wait to go! Next blog will be on Sunday night after I get back! Talk to yall later.

July 22, 2010

Today went pretty ok. Everything was just eh. We had yet another field trip at an amusement park, but this one was way harder to deal with because it was so hot. Yesterday was 108, and today was even hotter! If you can even imagine lol. The amusement park was cute, but after like five minutes of walking around I was literally dripping beads and beads of sweat off of my face. The kids drank all the water bottles we had before we even had lunch which has never ever happened before so it was kind of interesting. We had our kids keep their water bottles and keep refilling them in the water fountains. We also kept pouring water over the kids’ heads and having them like go to the bathroom and splash water on their faces so they wouldn’t overheat. I was overheating, so I can’t even imagine them all running around and stuff. Craziness. We found this little park that was in the shade that the kids ate up. It was pretty intense, and it kept them out of the sun for a little while. The kids were just really hard to control today though. But Ms. Wendy had to suddenly return to the states to take care of her daughter or something so it was less stressful especially for the directors that she is gone basically until we are done. I was kind of glad when that field trip was over. And the fact that I didn’t have to watch Cars on the bus!!!!!!!!!!! Best thing ever. Lol. Although Mr. MgGorium’s Wonder Emporium is not much better. That is a weird movie. Later after work in the lounge we had Christmas in July. It was kind of a bummer because my parents didn’t get the email from my directors so I didn’t get a package. One other girl’s parents didn’t get the email either, but they sent her a package anyways so the director saved it. My parents just sent me one also not for this, but of course it hasn’t come yet. Lauren went out and got me some stuff for a package from my camp A family, but I was still really disappointed. I got really homesick when all the others were reading their letters and care packages from home. I was just sitting there munching on candy and trying not to cry. I’m better now cuz I’ve had time to calm down. I know my mommy and daddy would have sent me the world in like five seconds if they would have gotten the email. And I talk to them all the time, so I’m ok. It just made me really homesick and cry for a little while. But then again sometimes I just need a good cry. Mommy and Daddy, I know you’ll read this and I don’t want you to feel bad, because its not your fault at all they didn’t have the right email. If anything its probably mine for writing it down wrong in the contact stuff. I tend to do that. But if you could send me letters from home I would love it. I have officially decided now even more that I am going to do a winter Camp A camp in Germany. It will be awesome, even though it will be weird being away from home for Christmas. I’m so tired. Tomorrow I’m leaving on an overnight bus to go to Nara and Osaka. I won’t be able to blog for a couple of days, but my next one will be really long and have cool pictures!!!!

July 21, 2010 aka CATS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today was pretty much the best thing ever. It started out well in general probably because we only got up to 18 kids, but for most of the day we had 16. Love them all to death, but it is definitely a lot faster when there are less of them. I got up early this morning to French braid my hair so that it wouldn't look all nasty when I was done watching the kids for the day since I had to go to Cats! The day also went by really fast . For the most part the kids behaved until the pool and it was pretty uneventful. Potato stamping in clubs was interesting. The kids had a lot of trouble figuring out how to make them, but they liked the whole concept of cutting up a potato. The pool went well also. I just sat and watched the kids and got wet every once in a while. It was like 94 degrees today, but Sarah said that after the humidity it was 108. That is intense. It is still only a red flag, so it means the weather will probably get worse. Just walking from the center to the pool I am like drenched in sweat. But whatever. It happens I guess. I like booked it home after work so I could change and move some of my stuff before I had to go, which was about twenty minutes worth of time. I met Frankie after he was done with aquatics, and one of his kids' mom's offered to drive us to the station. So nice. Once we got to Yokahama it was like exactly six thirty which is when the show was supposed to start. We were like freaking out that they wouldn't let us be seated, so we hopped in a cab and they took us to the theater. The theater is called Canon Cats Theater, and this entire theater is dedicated to this particular show. Crazy right? We got in and they did let us be seated even though it had just started, which was awesome! The entire inside of the theater was decked out all cats like . I have never seen anything like it. Usually its just the stage that has everything all themed and stuff, but this was like surrounding and wow. It reminded me of Disney Sea how everything was absolutely over the top. Frankie and I were just in awe the entire time, and he doesn't even like Cats normally. Hearing memory in Japanese was so cool, since that's the song I know the best. It was just so cool to like recognize what was going on even though I couldn't understand a word they were saying. Except for cats. They did say that sometimes. The dancing and singing was amazing, but all the stuff they did was spectacular. Like they had the stage floor polished so they slid everywhere and then had this like thing rising from the stage with smoke at the end. Definatley risked getting in trouble to take a stinking awesome picture of the production. I can't believe it turned out such good quality. All in all, I was completely floored and I can't wait to try and figure out when Frankie and I can go see Lion King. I imagine it will be amazing as well. The curtain call at the end was interesting. They came back out probably like ten times, but the audience never stood or whooted and hollered. Just not part of the culture. Everything is so subdued. Frankie and I stood anyways even though we probably looked dumb. On our way out they gave us Cats fans. For FREE!!!! I love Japan.

July 20, 2010

Today was a pretty good day. For me it started out kind of rough. Even though I got like nine hours of sleep I was extremely tired today and I felt a little grumpy at the beginning. But the kids ended up brightening my day by being all adorable and stuff, plus everything at the pool went better than it normally does. Today during clubs we did thumb print art which was cool. I made one too which was fun. I like getting to do little art projects probably as much as those kids do lol. This one new girl, Alana, is like the sweetest person ever this week. She has already like latched onto me and always wants to hold my hand and just comes up and talks to me all the time. Today while we were walking back from the pool I was humming and she started singing We Wish You a Merry Christmas. Fricken adorable. She told me that singing is a great thing to do when your mouth isn’t doing anything else. Cute right? I mean I just love these kids. Nikolas hasn’t been at all as bad this week as he normally is. It is like using his middle name has made him into this slightly less whiny person who is quiet faster. He still throws tons of fits, but at least he calms down faster. Tonight I went to see Despicable Me. It was really cute and hilarious, but definitely not anything compared to Toy Story 3. That was way way more awesome. Also had to pack up tonight since tomorrow they are moving us all across the hall and into single rooms so that they can renovate our current rooms. It is going to suck being moved in general because it is half way through and I am already used to the way everything is set up. On the other hand a single room will be nice because I can use the Ethernet whenever I want and not worry about when I get up or go to bed. On the other other hand having a single room is going to be kind of lonely. Not used to that now that I’ve had a roommate in my actual room for about a month and a half now. Weird. But Cats is tomorrow! Hopefully I will be able to sneak a Picture of the stage or even the show if all goes well. Lol. Ttyl!

July 19, 2010

Today was a pretty good day. Went a little bit slow for a Monday, but it wasn’t bad at all. This weeks theme is Alice in Wonderland, so I wore my gold sparkly crown I got from Michael’s. I love that I brought so many costume things. It is fun to dress to the themes. Anyways, when we started walking to the center in the morning even though it was super early in the morning, it was crazy hot. Like, I can’t even believe how hot it was today. Absolutely miserable to be out in, which we walked outside a lot today so that made it worse. We had a few less kids than last week, only 19. So not too shabby. We got Jarin back this week, I think his dad got back last week so he didn’t come. Missed that kid. He is sure a sweetie. We don’t have Ryu this week, which is a shame because he is so sweet. The kids were for some reason way way better behaved than last week, which I’m just not going to question and roll with it. Nikolas of course was a handful during clubs I guess, but ha. He didn’t choose the club I was in so I didn’t have to deal with it. We went to both the library and the gym today, which was nice, but a lot of walking to get there. All the kids were dragging along because they were getting tired out in the heat and stuff. Nikolas threw a fit at both places because he wanted a ball and wanted a nap. Lol. So glad I figured out using his middle name. It has helped so much. He still is throwing quite a few fits, but I can get him to stop a lot faster. Forgot my whistle though, and that sucked. Lol. Ooh, Lunch today was amazing. It was like cooked chicken with noodles and stuff. I was like what the heck! Why can’t we have this all the time! I took a bunch home so I can eat it for the next few meals. Yum. Also we watched Meet the Robinsons. I’ve never seen it before and absolutely loved it. Definitely teared up at the end when the Disney quote came on lol. I gave Paige my crown at the end of the day. It was so cute. She said she was like a princess. Gosh, I love camp.

July 18, 2010 aka Nikko

Well, definitely got up at 4am this morning to get ready to go to Nikko! It was totally worth it, and I was much more awake and alert than I thought I was going to be since I only got like three hours of sleep that night and I did just climb a fricken mountain yesterday. Anyways, Randi and I were the only ones who wanted to go cuz everyone else wanted to either rest and recover from Fuji or just take the day off for somereason. But I was definitely glad I found someone else to go with me! We boarded the first train at like five forty five after reloading our pasmos with money and had to transfer 3 times. It ended up taking four almost five hours to get there. I am so incredibly glad that I charged my ipod last night and brought it with me. It made the trip go by so much faster on the trains. That and the fact that there was absolutely no one else on the trains so I was passed out sleeping the whole time. Benefit to taking the early trains. When we finally got there it was like almost eleven o clock. Right before we boarded our last train to Nikko we saw these Nikko tourguide info people. It was really nice because we didn't have a map and the Japanese lady who spoke really good English gave us a map and circled where we should go and told us how to avoid paying more at the temples and shrines. Some of the shrines cost like 1300 yen and some like 800 yen, but if you bought a pass to the shrines when you got in it was only 1000 yen for six of them, which its like why wouldn't you just do that. In the last train on the way there we met these guys who looked like they were Indian from England but spoke with an American accent. I guess they used to live in Minnesota or something. But anyways, they were trying to hit Nikko in a day and were asking some of the Japanese people how to best do that. They were hilarious and were like 6 brothers all traveling together. Wish we could have traveled with them, cuz that would be a hoot, but they ended up starting in a different place than us. The first thing we did was go to the Shinkyo bridge that is right at the front of the park that is called the World Heritage thing. That is where the most famous shrines and temples were located. This red bridge was absolutely gorgeous and had a river running under it. The temples were so cool. I don't know exactly which was which , But all of them were Rinno-ji Temple, Toshogu Temple, and Futarasan Shrine and a couple of others. One of the temples, I think it was the first Rinno-ji one, (there were two with the same name but a little different ending) had these three huge buddhas in it made of gold. Absolutley beautiful. I illegally snapped a pic of the side of it. Another temple, I think the Toshogu, had a ton of monkey stuff. Like the hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil stuff. All the temples also had these Buddha like figures guarding it, and then all these old lantern like things inside. Everything was just so gorgeous and beautiful. It was amazing thinking about how old all of that stuff is. The only thing that kind of sucked was that a lot of the temples you had to climb up staircase after staircase to get to. Randi and I were like, owe. Owe. Owe. Going up the stairs wasn't even the worst part. Going down the stairs was killer since we are so sore from hiking yesterday. My hips, knees, bottom muscles, calves, and hamstrings are the worst. Oh and of course there is always my lovely sunburn from yesterday that got worse today even after applying buckets of sunscreen. So now my nose is blistering and peeling. Bleh. But altogether it was definitely worth everything. Even the blistering (And not just because of my nose) heat that had me literally dripping beads of sweat from my face. And I didn't have my sweat towel cuz its dirty still from climbing Fuji. Totally understand why absolutely everyone in Japan carries those things around . We stayed there for about three hours looking around at everything and taking in the sites, and then we peaced out. I wanted to go to some of the waterfalls that are near there, but either you had to hike to them for like 2 hours , Or take a bus for 2 hours to get to the other closest one. If not for Fuji just yesterday I would have been totally down. But it was nice to get back early and have time to write out this blog and still get to bed at a decent hour. We left at two and got back on base by seven. When I got home I ate so much food. I was just crazy hungry all day today. I think its because I burned so many calories on Fuji yesterday. My body misses them a ton. And by a lot I mean a burrito, bacon, sausage, candy, cheese slices, Cake, rolls, crackers, etc. I haven't binged like that in a long time lol. Gotta go do some stretching before bed so I'm ready to go for tomorrow. I can't imagine how sore I would be tomorrow if not for actually getting moving today and walking around. I would be so incredibly stiff. Peace out!

July 17, 2010 aka MT FUJI!!!!

I cannot even describe how amazing today was. I for reals climbed to the top of Mt. Fuji! When we first got there after the two and a half hour ride, I wasn't even tired despite my lack of sleep because of my adrenaline . I was so incredibly pumped. The night before I didn't sleep well even though I went to bed at like eight forty five. I just kept having really weird dreams. But still. For having to be ready to leave at 4am, I got a pretty sufficient amount of sleep. When we first got there we all bought walking sticks. Because we went through the Single Sailor program, the six of us camp A people who went got a free walking stick. What could be cooler than that! ? It saved me like twelve dollars. The walking stick was made of wood, and then I chose one with a Japanese flag / picture of Mt. Fuji on it. It looks pretty cool, I think I'm going to hang it on my wall at home. Finally after everyone used the restroom and we had our sticks we all headed out. I'm glad I used the restroom on the bus before we left because at all the restrooms actually at Fuji, you had to pay like 200 yen (2 dollars) to use it. Pretty lame, but I guess its like a respect thing or something. Idk. So the trail at station 5 where we were starts out pretty ok. It wasn't terribly steep at first, and I was like, Ya ok. I can totally do this. But then of course after we actually got to station six and got our maps and stuff everything changed. There wasn't really a like cut out path at a lot of places. It was awesome ! There were just tons of huge huge rocks you had to climb up over and step up on top of. That part of it was my favorite part. I liked it a lot better than when there was a path or steps because one, how BA is climbing up a stinking rock, and 2, steps are super hard on my leg. Would much rather step up a rock than a lame old step. Thank goodness for my walking stick though, because there is no way I would have been able to keep balance on everything without it. About when we got to the rocks, the rest of my group of six wasn't going as fast as I wanted and they were going at their own pace, so I peaced out. I was pretty much booking it up that mountain. I was just so excited! I totally left everyone else behind. At one point they started catching up a little, and I thought to myself no. Rock this mountain Caryssa, be the first one up. (That's me, always competitive even when its just with myself) At each of the stations, and at some places in between the stations, you can get stamps for your walking stick. These aren't normal sticky stamps, they are like stamps that are burned into the wood so they never come off. Coolest thing ever. I got every single one! My favorite one is one that looks like a cute baby tiger. But my plan was to pretty much keep going and not really stop and take breaks except for at the stations while I was waiting for my stamps. The stamp places were the longest I stopped, which was for like a minute maybe, grab some water, grab a granola bar, and go. I am so glad I brought so much water with me, because they charged like 5 dollars a bottle at the stations on the way up. That would have cost me so much money. I drank six water bottles on the way up, two around the crater, and one on the way down. Pretty much just sweated it all away though. Anyways, inbetween each of the stations, I only stopped if I absolutely had to in order to catch my breath, and that was only for about ten seconds each time. So I made really really good time and was feeling awesome. Then off course station eight hit. After station eight, there weren't as many rocks to climb up and it was all paths with loose rocks. On top of that, it was getting really high up the mountain so the air was getting thinner and thinner. It super sucked that each time I would take about two steps it was only really the equivalent of one because of all the loose falling little rocks. The altitude thing was definitely killer though. It was so hard to catch my breath, and my heart would start beating really really fast, and I couldn't do anything except stop for a little while to make it slow down. Plus if I went for too long I would get light headed. The last two stations, 9 and the top, took way way longer than the rest of the climb because my body was moving slower and because I had to stop more often. At least it wasn't just that way with me though. It was like that for everyone. But despite being incredibly tired and worn out I just said, Caryssa, you can do it! You are almost there! So I would pick myself up and keep going no matter what. The feeling when I saw the gates at the top though was one I will definitely never ever forget. It was like wow. I have just climbed a mountain, but not just any mountain, Mt. Fugi! In 4 hours and 45 minutes. Wow, wow, wow. The stamp they give you at the very top gives the altitude and proves you were one the top of the mountain, so none of ya'll can question my awesomeness in this matter.: p. When I was at the top I was exhausted so I ate lunch that I brought and looked around at the shops for a little while. I sat next to these two Japanese guys and they shared their chocolate candy with me. Yum. I'm glad they were nice. Also, and this is more odd, some random Japanese guy who really really didn't speak English tapped me on the shoulder and gave me his email address. It was weird and I'm not quite sure what that was about. After I felt rested I started trekking around the crater. The top of Mt. Fuji is not an actual top, but a crater since it was once an active volcano. It took me an hour and 20 minutes to get around it, which isn't bad. It was a lot of uphill and downhill climbs, but I'm so glad I did it. There were some of the most beautiful views I've ever seen, there were shrines everywhere, and the best views into the entirety of the crater. The weather tower that had the observation deck though was hard to get to. There was an extremely steep climb up. I was like, awe man. I thought I was done with all this climbing business. But it was still awesome and very worth it. After the tower, I tried to go the rest of the way around the crater, but the path was closed due to snow. Some people were still doing it at their own risk so I joined them. That was probably the scariest thing of my life. It was like no path, and a bunch of us just trekking through other people's footprints on a sort of slanted not really path thing. I thought for sure I was going to slide down into the center of the crater, and if it wasn't for my walking stick I probably would have. But because I did it I got to go actually all the way legitimately around the crater. Totally worth the risk! Glad the big guy was watching out for me. After I went all the way around and took tons of pictures and just reflected on how awesome it was, an old guy tapped me on the shoulder and pointed to another walking stick that was like 10 feet off the path on the mountain. He spoke English pretty well and told me to go get it. I was like, I can have this? And he said for me to take it. I was like ok. So now I have two free walking sticks! Woot!!!! It was nice to have two walking sticks for going down the mountain because I basically skied on the dirt the whole way down . I was booking it. It usually takes 3 hours and I did it in two! I ended up passing Randi on the way down who had started back before me because she didn't go all the way around the crater. She laughed at me as I continued skiing through the dirt. That sure hurt my knees though. If it wasn't so fun, it definitely probably would have been a good idea to stop. I did a number on my shoes though. They are dirty, and there were rocks stuck everywhere in them. Not to mention in my socks. I wore two pairs of socks so I wouldn't get blisters, and they were both incredibly dirty and my feet were like black. Worth it though completely. When I finally got back down I just felt so accomplished and awesome. I still can't believe that I was blessed enough to climb up Mt. Fuji! Best day ever! The thing is too, I would totally go back tomorrow and do it, even though I can barely walk because my joints hurt in my hips, knees, hands, feet, etc. That's how awesome it was!

July 16, 2010

Today was such a good Friday! We did the stuff we normally do I guess, but I don’t know. It just had a good vibe to it. We tried giving our kids more free time today, which worked out really well. I also tried to be a little more mean to the kids. Well not mean, I guess stern is the right word. I had my midterm evaluations by my director and coordinator last night, and it went really well! They said they loved my positive energy and how I related to the kids. I just needed to work a little on being more stern and I guess vocal with the kids. I have been doing all I can not to raise my voice at them, because I really don’t want to lose my voice this summer. One of my goals. But I worked hard today to find more of a balance. I thought I did a pretty good job. Today I got Nikolas a little more figured out. He has been listening to me a little more. Today I asked him what his middle name was, and of course not knowing why I wanted to know he told me. When he started misbehaving I said Nikolas, Middle name, Last name. You need to sit in the corner right now and not talk for five minutes. Rather than screaming and crying like he normally does, he gave me the meanest face he could muster and marched his way over to the corner. Ha ha. His mean face is even cute. I did it again throughout the day, and it seemed to work. He just gave me an angry face every time and then did what I asked. It must be what his parents call him when he is in trouble, which is why it works with him or something. I got creamed today by one of my kids during pie the counselor. It was super disgusting. It’s the first time I’ve actually been really pied. I smelled like rotting milk on the walk home. The crazy heat/humidity today only made it that much better. Lol. I’m currently packing to go to Fuji. I’m so scared/excited/nervous to climb Fuji tomorrow. Its something I’ve always wanted to do, but never once in my life imagined I would actually get the opportunity to do. And yet here I am about to finish packing and go to sleep, and then wake up and check something off my bucket list. Unreal. I am so utterly and completely blessed. If you are reading this, please pray for me! Can’t wait to take pics of the views!!!! Oh! Almost forgot. My kids performed the Michael Jackson Thriller dance I taught them today. It was the most adorable thing ever. They did such a good job!!!! They were all excited to put the facepaint on all Zombie like, and the adults were so impressed with it.

July 15, 2010

Today was amazing!!!!! We went on a fieldtrip to Fugi Safari Park, which was pretty much the most incredible thing ever. Before we left, there were issues with the busses though. The last couple of weeks we have had less kids than this week, so there were way more kids, and then the same amount of busses. There were two busses, and way too many kids. I guess here it is legal to sit three to a seat when there were not enough seats. So two groups of our kids had to sit three to a seat because there were not enough seats. I think that was extremely poor planning and it was dumb, but at least they let all of us ggo this week unlike last week. I gave the kids who sat three to a seat little prizes so that they wouldn’t feel bad for having to sit like that. But the park was extremely amazing. We got in these huge busses that were animal themed and had cages on the side. That way the animals could come up to us and stuff. It was incredible. The zoo was like a literal safari. We drove through and the animals were coming literally up to the bus. I got some crazy incredible pictures. The best part of the field trip was that it was about an hour and a half that the kids were caged in and sitting down so I didn’t have to constantly run after them and chase them. It was incredible. It was really interesting seeing deer in a zoo. They are so common near where I live, that it never even occurred to me that they wouldn’t be common here and would be in a zoo. The kids were so incredibly amazing with everything that was in the park. The coolest picture I got was probably this awesome one of a tiger yawning. I think that is going to end up being the background on my computer. Another great thing about the cage was that it was easy to take awesome pictures through unlike when it is through glass and stuff. One super unique thing was that we got to feed the camels while we were on the bus. We put in into this little slot thing and then tipped it and the camels came right up to the bus. I didn’t know that camel heads were so huge! After we did that all of us had lunch, which was when Wendy, the new Ted basically chose to throw a hissy fit and be very unprofessional. She lectured Karly in front of the kids and was rude to everyone and took the food away before the kids had gotten a chance to get seconds. It was kind of annoying, but I was having an extremely good day, and so I didn’t really pay attention to it. It got so bad today with Wendy that we are currently having a staff meeting about it as I am writing this blog. I just had such a great day though. Ok, so when we first left on the bus within five minutes Justin was crying. He couldn’t undo his seatbelt or something to go to the bathroom, and so rather than asking, he sat and cried and wouldn’t talk to us for like fifteen minutes. Immediately after that, Paige was going to the bathroom and shut her had in the door. It actually looked really bad and so she was freaking out and bleeding. I was like, sigh. This is going to be an extremely long day. But it really wasn’t like that at all. On the bus on the way here another thing that really surprised me was that one kid, Roo who is nine ended up on the bus with all of our younger, room 2 kids. He was asking me if I had watched Nightmare on Elm Street. What parents would let their nine year old kid watch that kind of stuff. I asked him to make sure, and then he started talking about other violent and inappropriate movies like that. It’s like no wonder these kids are so unbehaved. Or unwell behaved. I’m not sure how that word would be. Whatever it is, it is definitely how it is. After we ate lunch, our kids went to try and find the petting zoo and other animal stuff. There wasn’t really a petting zoo and stuff that we ended up getting to, but we did get to pet kangaroos. That was probably like the coolest thing of my life. The fur of it was so soft, and I loved it. When I was petting this one kangaroo, he started eating my map of the park that I was holding. Lol. We didn’t get to do much more than that because all of our kids had to go to the bathroom at once of course, and so we spent like half an hour at the bathroom. Nikolas of course threw quite a few fits. One of them was really bad and I ended up getting him to calm down eventually. I made him eat the final snack before we left alone and then walk up and apologize to a couple of the counselors and Ryan. Take that little Nikky. Cute sad fake crying Nikky. Oh and almost forgot that on the way there on the bus guess what movie I had to watch for a fourth week in a row…..Cars! Ah. For goodness sake. I definitely don’t ever want to see that movie again. It is like the best movie ever, but I really don’t want to see it again anytime soon. The kids ewe at the same part every single stinking time lol. The other movie we watched was Bee Movie, which is stinking awesome. I’ve always wanted to see it. Tonight after work Karly, Julie, and I walked to the Daiei, which is a brand of the 100 yen store. It was AMAZING! This was the biggest one we’ve been to and I completely went to town there. I mean everything was amazing. I got stuff for friends, family, myself, etc. I just don’t even understand how everything is always so awesome in Japan. They just know where its at man. The 100 yen store was on the third floor of the building, the second floor was a clothing store, and the first floor was a market. The market and the clothing store weren’t a 100 yen store. At the clothing store, I got this really cute shirt/scarf/sweater set. I love how here everything that comes together isn’t attached. That’s the way it should be in the US. In the market the Hi-Chu’s which are these amazing candies, were only 88 yen, and so we were like heck yeah, lets get some. Also when we were in the market, we found sake bottles for only 265 yen, and it ended up coming with a sake glass. How cool is that! The one Juanita bought without the glass was about 12 dollars at that spa, so I felt like it was an amazing deal! Definitely going to end up getting that for some people for souvenirs. I also got while I was there a cocktail in a can, since that is like the coolest thing ever, and I haven’t had anything alcoholic in weeks, so its not bad that I wanted something. It was crazy. Like a peach mixed drink for 88 cents in a can. Cool. It is totally socially acceptable to drink while walking down the streets in Japan. But anyways. I’m not a drunk or anything, I just had a yummy peach drink. Woot! Great day!!!!! Almost totally forgot. On the way home, this one girl, Thara, was sitting behind me, and I heard her talking about God to Nilanie. I asked her what she was talking about and she told me that her mom told her to talk to people about God whenever they didn't know him. I was so blessed by that. And she kept talking about how Jesus made people new when they were in heaven and stuff. I couldn't believe it. I started crying I was so moved by this little six year old girl. Anyways, peace out.

July 14, 2010

Today was a pretty amazing day! Had 21 kids again, but it wasn’t raining so we got to go to the pool. It was really nice because it took up lots of time. In our room this week, even though we’ve had lots of new kids and they seem to always be multiplying, some of the kids have improved and some of them seem to have gotten worse. Like Jaquin was this awful bully the first couple of weeks, and then this week he has been an absolute angel. He is this big six year old kid who looks like he could be seven, and he came up to me today and asked me if he could hold my hand while we were walking. It was the cutest thing ever. I absolutely love that kid. But Justin has gotten way worse these last couple of weeks. He is the same one who locked himself in the bathroom earlier this week. Nikolas of course has pretty much stayed exactly the same. Surprise today he didn’t get to use the pool the entire time because I had to kick him out. He was like screaming and crying for ten seconds because he couldn’t find the ball in the school or something, but then he turned around and found it and cutely said, oh there it is with a smile. He is the biggest fake crier I have ever seen. I was like, dude. You can’t do that. If you cry and whine like that again you are going to have to sit out. He kept playing and stuff, and then he did the exact same thing. I told him he had to sit out for six minutes since he was six years old and shouldn’t throw fits like that. He freaked the heck out and started stomping his feet on the bottom of the kiddie pool, which looked like stomping in slow motion since he had to go through the water. And screaming, and yelling at me. I was like sit down now and I’ll let you back in, keep doing this and you’re done. Of course he kept going and I told him to get out. He stomped all the way back to Mr. Buzz and the tables where the SAC staff was. Oh Nikolas. I don’t understand how he is so fricken adorable. No matter what he does I can’t stay mad at him, and its all I can do not to laugh hysterically when he throws his ridiculous fits. So cute. We have this new kid this week Ryu who is the most adorable kid ever. When we were in the kiddie pool he was swimming to the bottom of the pool and tickling my feet and stuff. And when he’s not in the pool he has these huge super thick glasses on his tiny little head. So adorable. His dad came to the pool for a little bit to check on him, and I talked with him for a couple of minutes. I guess Ryu only started learning Japanese this last year, which is crazy because I couldn’t tell at all. All of these half Japanese kids are so adorable. I can barely stand it. So today I finally figured out the Cats tickets! Hooray! I asked the MWR travel office people on base who speak Japanese to help me. They were like, you know this show is in Japanese right? Well of course it is. I just want to see it! But I walked to a convenient store about ten minutes walk off base and then the clerk helped me order the tickets on this ticket ordering machine. Why in the world do we not have those in America? It is the coolest thing ever and way more convenient than trying to order online and get stuff mailed or picked up because after I ordered them through this machine the convenient store, Lawsons, literally printed them out for me. So now my tickets are not only paid for, but I have them actually in my hand. Woot! Next Wednesday is going to be incredibly amazing because of this show. Also today some of us figured out tickets and hotel situation for Osaka and nara the weekend after Fuji. Its going to be an intense couple of weeks. Fuji this Sat, Nikko leaving at 5am on Sun, Cats that Wed, and then Osaka and Nara that next weekend including an overnight bus. I am trying to squeeze in as much as possible, despite the costs and amount of travel. Yes I will be tired, but I can sleep through my classes and stuff when I get back. Jk. I will just take a weekend to recoup when I get home. I mean I don’t understand why you wouldn’t cram as much as possible in since when the heck am I ever going to be able to go to Japan for basically free. Some of the people are like taking weekends off to just relax, and it just boggles my mind. I would 1 be bored out of my mind knowing I’m in Japan, and 2 I don’t want to leave wishing I would have done something. So excited for the weeks to come. Tomorrow’s field trip to Safari Park will be amazing!

July 13, 2010

Today was a pretty interesting day. The kids went pretty insane, not going to lie. We had twenty one today, which is a new record. They were definitely a little out of hand, but with that many kids, even with all of them whispering when they don’t listen, the sound adds up and it ends up getting really really loud. And on top of that we didn’t go to the pool because it started raining. That left a lot of time that the kids didn’t have anything scheduled to do and we had to free style it. We tried going to the library with the kids today, and it was insane. We couldn’t get them to be quiet, and out of all the classes, ours is the only one that Ryan is not letting go back. That’s how awful my kids are. Lol. When we had them all sit down and I was reading them a story, I chose to read Aladdin, and when I opened the book, since I am miss Jasmine, Kenta chose to point out the fact that I can’t really be Jasmine because I’m not dark. Thanks Kenta. Lol. Mr. Jim bothered me today also because Nikolas was doing so much better before he came near the end of the day. I just don’t understand. All my kids have now started doing the thing Nikolas does where they come up and squeeze my hand when they are upset rather than exploding. It is pretty awesome. They are doing so much better with whining and yelling because of that.

July 12, 2010

Today was a super awesome day. Of course the kids were kind of awful sometimes, but altogether I think it went really well. We taught them quite a few new games today that they actually understood, so that was exciting. I got to eat mud pie, which is the pudding with crushed oreos and gummy worms. Such great stuff. Even with more kids, things went pretty smoothly. For example, we had like nineteen kids. Which is five more than we normally had. Complete insanity. It was almost impossible to get all of them quiet for any amount of time. We started this new thing today with the help of Mr. Buzz where there are three different smiley faces on the wall. The smiley face is for when they are doing good, the medium face is for when they are being ok, and then the sad face is for when they are being bad. I think it is a good idea, because we have them move their names themselves when they go to different faces, so its like a visual of how they are doing I guess. Idk. Nikolas though was all the way off on the negative side really fast though ha ha. Like, it was really ridiculous. Lol. He was so whiney and adorable. I told him today again that if he ever felt like he was going to explode with anger and sadness that he had to come up and squeeze my hand and squeeze away all his frustration. We’ll see if that works if I keep that up. It was nice today that the child psychologist guy Jim came up to me and complimented me on how well I worked with Nikolas. (Nikolas of course being one of the troubled kids that he keeps an eye on). I told him it was probably because I was the same way when I was younger lol. Although I’m pretty sure I was less flat out whiney and more defiant. Still a problem though. I just had a blast today with the kids though and kept thinking about how awesome it was that I got to take care of such adorable kids all day long. Even with the problems we had. The worst today was probably when Justin ran into the empty room next to us and locked himself in the bathroom for like half an hour. None of us could even get him to respond to us, which was kind of frustrating. I mean at least answer us so you know we’re ok dude. None of the directors could get him out either. Eventually he did come out, and he was in huge trouble, but oh well. So tonight we started playing the assassin game with our counselor group. Each person draws the name of someone to kill, and then assassinates them by hitting them with a camp A sock. But no one else can be in the room when people are assassinated. Once you are assassinated, you tell the person who killed you who you had so that the chain can continue. So fricken awesome. I actually just got out, but I love this game. People are getting pissy though that some of us used manipulation to get people alone, but come on. It’s a game like Survivor or Big Brother. Lying is just part of it, and you have to go with the flow. Lying and manipulation should be a given. So awesome. I did get outsmarted though, and only got to kill two people before I died. I was on my way to kill the third when I was hit. I hope we play again, but I doubt we will since people aren’t being chill about it. Woot though.

July 10-11, 2010 aka DISNEYLAND

Just going to warn that this is going to be an extremely long blog because it is covering a massive amount of events that took place over the last two days. Well, the last two days I spent in Tokyo Disneyland! It was such a great choice for a weekend trip, and it was one of the things on my to do list, so check. The two day pass cost only 10000 yen, which is equivalent to 100 dollars. Not bad at all, considering it is usually more in the US . The first day we chose to go to the normal Disneyland park, and the second day we went to Disney Sea. The setup of the park was basically the same as it is in normal Disneyland, so there is Tomorrowland, Fantasyland, Adventureland, etc . Except that some of the main rides like Indiana Jones and Tower of Terror weren't in this park but instead were in Disney Sea. We walked into the park, and were in Tomorrowland. They had some stuff the normal Disney has, and some different stuff. Like they have a Buzz blasters thing and Captain EO, and Monsters Inc. (which is a brand new ride). The very first thing we saw in the park besides the castle, which was a different castle from California Disney, was 2 characters just walking around. It was amazing! In my first few minutes in Disneyland I got the autographs of Prince John and Friar Tucker from Robin Hood. It was really interesting to me because they are two characters who I don't think you would ever see in Disneyland in the states. A lot of the characters that are popular in Japan are defiantely not very popular in the states. Chip n 'Dale are two of the most popular characters after Mickey and Minnie Mouse. Which I find really odd, because no one even pays attention to them in US Disney. Also, Stich, Daisy Duck, the Aristocats, and Bambi are probably the most popular Disney characters after that. So they are like really obscure ones that I wouldn't have expected to be the most popular. Another thing that was kind of odd was that the Disney Princesses were very unpopular. They sold barely any princess stuff at all. The most advertised out of all the princesses was probably Ariel, and that is only because she has her own land in Disney Sea. I had so much trouble finding anything that had Jasmine on it, since she is my favorite Disney character. After Jenny and I ran over and got those two signatures and pictures with the characters, we all as a huge 10 person group went over to the USA Rocket ride. It was a kiddie ride, but it was a fun one, and it passed time until we could use our fast pass for Space Mountain. (our group had ten in it which included nine of us from Camp A and one Japanese lifeguard some of the people from the aquatics staff knew). Space Mountain was our first like legit ride. I thought it was absolutely amazing! It was way more intense and tricked out than the one in Cali is! Like everything here in general was just way more over the top. After that we got a fast pass for the Haunted Mansion. That one was awesome as usual. Still everything was newer and stuff than it was in Cali, and everything was more based off of the movie rather than the old ride. It was still amazing though, and much less different than Space Mountain was. For lunch as we were walking around we had so much trouble finding food that was edible for us. They had pizza and stuff, but they put nastiness like fish and other weird stuff on the pizzas, and then there were hotdogs, but they definitely weren't hot dogs. I ended up getting a hot dog that was supposed to be "all American." Definitely had like a crunchy outside to it. It didn't taste bad, but the texture of the outside was almost too much for me to handle. Jenny and I were the ones who got the hot dogs though and we were dying of hunger by that time because the rest of the group had already eaten turkey legs. Then as we were going back to tomorrow land we passed the mid-day parade. It was so cool to walk by, although the rest of the group kept stopping. I had wanted to watch the whole parade originally, but no one else would. Oh well. Neither here nor there. I definitely was way more chill on this trip than I have been on probably any other trip like this before. That has been one of my goals this summer. To chill out and remain positive no matter what, and so far its been working out really well. Frankie and I watched this Disney show that we couldn't get into from the outskirts while everyone else went to try and get on Monster's inc. Earlier that day we had gotten in line to go on Peter Pan, but the ride broke so we got these super special admittance passes that would allow us a free priority pass on the ride of our choice. While most of the group went to Monster's Inc, Frankie and I went to Captain EO. Ok, so when we were in line for Peter Pan, (we being six of us because the group split) these two Japanese girls kept passing us in line as the hidden lines in Disney always curve around, and they would look at me and point and smile, and then laugh and stuff. So when we got in line to go to Haunted Mansion after that, they ended up behind us still, even though it was a different ride. I think they thought it was super cute that an American was wearing the Minnie ears I was wearing or something, because they kept saying Kawaii, which is the Japanese word for cute. But I ended up asking them to take a picture with me and they like freaked out and were super excited. Anyways, back to the show Frankie and I saw. Even though we could barely see, it was worth watching. It was like Disney through time, and it started in black and white costumes and progressed up until modern movies. I loved it so much, and it was the best Disney show I had seen up until that point. We weren't able to get actual tickets because they were unreservable and they were chosen by a random lottery when you put your tickets through a machine on whether or not you could see it. I thought it was stupid, but whatever. At least I got to see it. I'm all about the shows at Disney. Right before the show we had all been in Toon Town at some point also and been on the Roger Rabbit ride. I love how this tune town, like the one in Cali, had the fake jail bars and the fake weights. Made for some cute pics. Oh yeah, they had like statues of UP, which is like a brand new movie. Japan is so much more up to date than the normal Disneyland. After Frankie and I saw that show, we went to see Captain EO, which is an old Michael Jackson / George Lucas 3D movie from way back when that they brought back after Michael Jackson died. The Japanese people are all about Michael. We used our priority passes we had gotten for that because it saved us waiting like two hours, and the fast passes were all gone for it for that day. We ended up waiting a total of like ten mintues, and then got to see the show. It was really amazing, and I'm glad I got a chance to see it. Pirates here was amazing too. It was pretty different from the one in Cali, although its been redone since I've last been there. The Johnny Depp on the ride, well Jack Sparrow looked so much like Johnny Depp. Ridiculous. And oh, who could forget It's a Small World lol. It was super adorable and significantly less creepy than the one in Cali, probably because it wasn't built so so long ago. I really enjoyed it, and I liked hearing it all in Japanese after we were done going through the worlds. We ended that day with the Electric Light Parade, which was fantastic. I got some really good pictures of it. There were more floats than there were in the Cali one, but there were no fireworks, which was kind of sad. After everything that night, we all piled into a Sheraton Hotel in Tokyo about an hour from the park. It was really interesting sneaking so many of us into a hotel so late at night and then having two of us per double bed, one on the couch, and four on the floor. Tight squeeze, but we did pretty well.

Day two, we went to Disney Sea. When I first heard about it, I thought it was going to be a sea life park or something, but I was definitely wrong. It is just like California Adventure, but way different. Meaning that it is Japan's themed Disney Park I guess. Every last detail of this place was thought out. I couldn't even believe like the scenery and stuff. I mean Disney is always detailed, but this was absolutely over the top. I can't even describe how real everything looked. Like Indiana Jones's Temple looked like it could have been the actual temple from the movie. And the Sultan from Aladdin's palace, looked like the one from the movie, but in real life. So unreal. The thing I really liked about this park was that every part of it was based of a movie rather than different things like in the other / more main park. For example, Little Mermaid had Mermaid Lagoon, and Aladdin had Arabian Coast. It was amazing. Right when we walked in after stepping off the monorail from the other train station was this giant world in the middle of this huge fountain. Amazing! The first thing we did was get a fast pass for the Tower of Terror, which is one of the most popular rides . I had never been on it before because for some reason it is always closed when I have gone, even though I've been there many a time. Well we go these at almost ten and we had to wait until four to ride it with the Fastpass. That's how crazy popular this ride is. Also Disney Sea in general was more popular than the regular park because it is I guess more intense. Then Jenny and I split from the rest of the group and went on the Indiana Jones ride. It was a pretty long wait, but we didn't care. Couldn't get another fastpass for a while and it is amazing. This one was based off of the new movie about the crystal skull, but it still had the huge boulder rolling at the end, as is classic. I wish it would have had fire like the one in normal Disney, but it is definitely still my favorite Disney ride as it was before. In the Arabian Coast as we were walking to stuff, we just happened to see Minnie and Daisy walking dressed in Arabian clothes, and then Jafar. We got picture and autographed with Jafar and Minnie, but decided to skip Daisy. Jafar was a hilarious character and he was like pointing his finger at Jenny's goofy belt strap and acting like he was annoyed with it and stuff. We were cracking up. After that we went to the Aladdin 3D show. It was the most unique thing ever. Genie was up on the screen and was in 3D, while there were actual actors on stage interacting with him on screen. It was a mix between a movie and a live performance. It was soooo cool. We also went to Sinbad Storybook in the Arabian land, which is something I've never seen before. I'm not sure if it's a Japanese movie or something, but I've never seen the characters before. It was a super cute ride. The Mermaid Lagoon was next on our stop. This place was incredible. The outside looked like a huge seashell castle like is in the movie Little Mermaid, and then inside of it is this huge kids playland with all sorts of stuff. We were completely in awe of how cool everything looked. Like, I'm still in awe. We went to Little Mermaid Theater and watched the show . It was absolutely incredible. Everyone was suspended from the ceiling as the story was going so they were like swimming in the air, and then Ursula came out and was this huge huge thing. I can't even describe it like literally. I was so happy I for reals was choked up after the first song. So amazing. Then we went to this kind of lame coaster called Raging Spirits. It had a 360 turn, but that was like the only cool part. It was too tame. But the layout of it was amazing. There was smoke and fire with water under it. Amazing, amazing, amazing. Jenny and I walked back to look at some shops before our Tower of Terror time, and happened to catch this like sea show as we got to the front part of the park. We thought everyone was putting ponchos on because it had kind of started to rain, definitely not the case. They started singing this song, and Chip n 'Dale, Goofy, and Mickey were all apart of Chip n 'Dale's Daily Cooldown Service. They started spraying more water than I've ever seen on the crowd. Jenny and I were soaked in like five seconds. We ran for cover, but the show just kept going and going. And then even the workers who were on the land and not in the boats on the water started spraying also. Water everywhere for a good like fifteen minutes. Seeing everyone jumping and singing with it was adorable. On our way after shopping to Tower of Terror, we just happened to catch the Big Band show in the Broadway Theater on the American Waterfront. That show was about half an hour long, and it was incredible. Everyone had amazing voices and it was like big band stuff from the twenties through the forties, with classics like Chattanooga Choo Choo, It Don't Mean A Thing if it Aint Got That Swing, Tuxedo Junction, etc. It was awesome too, because in the midst of all the dancing and singing, the characters would make special appearances. So Mickey, Minnie, Daisy, and the little Aristocat all had a song. Ending the day with that was amazing. I was doing my best to contain myself and not to sing very loud or start dancing. We ended up running into our whole entire group after that when we went to Tower of Terror, which was a huge coincidence since we had all split up hours ago. I have to say that Tower of Terror was a disappointment. Everyone built it up so much, I was expecting something way more intense. Although I still had fun. I was so tired on the ride home I had blisters on my feet and I fell asleep. What a long and wonderful weekend. I spent so much money, although only about thirteen of it was on food. I got like 10 granola bars, trail mix, and water bottle into the park so I could spend more money on souvenirs. I got the Minnie ears, which are way cooler than any of the ones that are in the States, and this pass holder, which is ingenious because you don't have to keep reaching around to your wallet to pull out your park pass or the fast passes. It is like a lanyard that holds all of it. Japan just knows whats going on man. All of the stuff in general here is just way more cutesy than it is in the states. And more flowery. One thing that was odd in the shops is that they had rows and rows of character underwear. They don't have that in the states at all. They had very few pins, no spoons, and no shotglasses, which is also really big in the states. They had millions of the little phone charms since absolutely everyone has those. One other thing that was very unique to Japan is Duffy the Disney Bear. I think it might have been a Disney Sea thing actually. But it looks like this super adorable teddy bear and not like a Disney character at all. But everyone, and I mean everyone (boys, girls of every age) had these bears. And then once you bought the bear you could get little themed clothes for it. I almost wish I would have gotten one now, but forty dollars is a lot for a teddy bear. Everyone also carried around umbrellas, because no one likes getting the sun on them . It was so cute when I saw a grown Japanese man fall asleep on the sidewalk with a cute umbrella holding a little Duffy bear. The image thing is so different here than in the States. I know I'm forgetting stuff, but I ' m so tired, and I need to go to bed. It was an incredibly magical weekend, and I'm so glad I got to experience it and actually sleep away from the base for a night.