Birthdays and Bowling

kateyfaber

Feb 24, 20194 min read

02/24/2019

This past week was Alex and my birthday week! Mine was on Tuesday and his was Friday! It was my first birthday away from home, so it was a little challenging for me. I got very frustrated at work because they ran out of salads, so all I could eat was rice and yogurt. I was already in a pretty bad mood because it was storming fairly bad in the morning and I just felt a little lonely. During my lunch break, I legitimately cried in the bathroom like a kid that has no friends at lunch...which is not completely false, but it's getting better, don't worry. When I came back upstairs, one of my workers (Rama san, he is from Albania) sat down and talked with me. He was very kind and comforting, admitting he had a ton of culture shock when he first moved here. He said it was very difficult because he didn't know when he was going to come back to Albania. He also doesn't really like Japanese food, so that made me feel a little better. We talked for about 10 minutes and I felt more encouraged afterwards. He mentioned that I do have an end date, and I should use this as an awesome opportunity, especially because I was the only American selected for a research position. The past few days have been much better and I like Japan more now than I did when I first arrived. Rama san also asked the interns to take me out to dinner, so we went to an udon place (think thick white noodle shop) because that has been my favorite Japanese entree so far. The rest of my night was nice, as I just talked to Alex and ate a piece of chocolate cake that Terry bought me. Work has been a little dull lately, but I am at least making progress on my program. I don't know that I would enjoy programming everyday for the rest of my career, but at least I am learning that now!

On Friday, one of my co-workers, Denny, invited Terry, Nakano, and I to go to a game bar in Kyoto. It was pretty neat! It wasn't like an arcade place like the typical ones in America. It had an assortment of old and new video games. They had a few Nintendo 64's and a Nintendo switch, along with other game systems that are either too new or too old for me to know. We played Mario Cart, Mario Tennis, and Supersmash brothers. I tried Japanese whiskey while I was there, called Suntory (I think). It is so difficult to remember all of the Japanese names, so don't quote me on that. This bar specifically charges you 500 yen ($5.00) for the games and any snacks that you want. This was great because I was able to try close to 10 different types of Japanese snack food. However, my stomach did not enjoy this. I had a huge stomach ache that woke me up in the middle of the night, which was absolutely miserable. I don't even know what possibly could have caused it because half of the snacks are made of rice and air. The ice cream was good though! I left the bar on my own around 9:15 because I wanted to get home to call Alex, as it was his birthday. I also didn't want to miss the last bus because buses become much more sparse after 9 pm and it is a 45 minute walk back from the train station to my dormitory. Kyoto is also about a 46 minute train ride, so I thought it would be best to get back sooner rather than later.

On Saturday I woke up early to talk to Alex, so that we could have a video date! It was still his birthday at this point so we only watched about half the movie, Roma. I finished it today. It was interesting, but really sad. I don't know that many people would enjoy it because it is kinda depressing and the entire movie is in Spanish. Alex thinks it will be nominated for an Oscar, which is why we watched it. After our date, I headed to Shintanabe to meet up with Masako! She invited me to go bowling with three other Japanese families and their children. I had a lot of fun, even though I did horribly. My first round I scored a 37, I think the ball ended up in the gutter 5 times in a row. However, my second round was much better, a 72 (I know this is still horrible, but I had fun okay?). It was nice to talk with the parents because a lot of them go to the same church and I was able to familiarize myself with a couple more faces. Around 2:30 pm, we finished bowling and I met Terry at the train station to head to Kyoto. It was Nakano's last day in this area before he had to go back to school, so we wanted to meet up with him and Lorentz. We just walked around the Kyoto area looking at Japanese temples. I like the architecture of them, but I don't really like the purpose behind them. It is sad how prevalent idolatry is here in Japan. When it started getting late, we decided to stop for dinner at Kyoto station. Everything was so expensive, so we ended up just getting pizza. FINALLY, the pizza was actually decent. I miss thick crust though. It doesn't exist here. We started to head back, but stopped in a gift shop to pick up some treats for some of the ladies at work. A few times a week they give us chocolates for a snack, so Terry picked them up a sweet dough ball and I bought them some matcha chocolate. Hopefully, they like them!

After travelling to Kyoto two days in a row, I just wanted to relax today. I went to church and walked around Shintanabe because it was 60 degrees and gorgeous out. I did some laundry, went on a run, and cleaned my apartment! It was nice to lounge around for a little while before I start the work week!! Enjoy some pictures from this weekend!