this week is going sooo slow.....

Friday night was awesome, just as I expected. Me, Nick, and Richard went to a party in Osaka, sponsored by my ethics professor, who is awesome. We walked into the place and were surprised by how small it was and how fancy it was. We turned in our tickets to get a free drink and there was a live band that played american music ranging from the 60s to almost today. The one song that didn't work for them though was Lady Marmelade....maybe they should have left that one to some native american speakers, or people who can belt it out in general. It was so much fun though to just dance with my classmates and friends in the evening, but unfortunately it was done around 11pm so we could all get on the trains back home (I think the trains should run 24hrs). So I felt like the night ended way too early, since I was having a blast.

Sat. a few friends and I were supposed to go to the huge fire festival in Kyoto, but we encountered a few problems along the way. The festival started at 6pm, and it takes about 45min. or so to get to kyoto, but we wanted to leave a little early, so we left at 4pm. Big mistake. We got to Kyoto, where you have to change trains. There was a 30min. line to buy your ticket for the train, an hour wait to get shoved onto the train (and yes, by real train pushers), another 45min. on a train, and then something else was 3hours to get to the mountain.....which was blockaded by police because there were too many people. Therefore, we went out to eat instead and then to karaoke, which was still fun and we weren't out in the freezing cold all night. Although I heard some people say how great the festival was, but we would have had to have left in the late morning, to make sure we got there and all.

Sunday I did nothing but do homework and watch movies on my laptop (Mean Girls and Legally Blonde), so it was at least relaxing.

Yesterday in my Japanese class we learned "if you're happy and you know it clap your hands..." in japanese, or "shiawase nara te wo tatako". Then we had to make up our own verse, because of the verb tense we just learned (like "let's do whatever"). So my version was "if you're happy and you know it, skip class" and for some reason the professor didn't like that one very much. But we had to sing it for the class, so I sang "shiawase nara kurasu wo saboroo" and they liked it at least and I even added a final touch, yelling "ikoo!!" or "let's go!!" at the end. I kind of hoped to start a chain reaction of people getting up and leaving, haha.

Today I was kind of mad because in my asian economic integration and globalization class, we got back our papers we turned in a week or so ago. We had to take 6 videos we watched in class, and create a paper on how they relate to globalization. Mine was 8 pages, and I felt that it was pretty good, and I got an A- on it (he gave grades, not #s). I was a little disappointed, and when I read through my paper to see what he commented on, his only negative comments were that civil rights violations should have been my thesis because I talked about it a lot. Here's the problem, that WAS part of my thesis!!! So after class I showed him my paper and where he made the comment, then showed him the first paragraph in which I stated my thesis, and he's like "well you choose 3 main points, and I was just suggesting that you use the 1" And I told him that not all the videos were covered by 1 point, so I choose the 3 that fit the videos best. And he's just like "it was just a suggestion. You were one of the few papers that actually had a thesis, and your paper was very well written." UGHHH WHATEVER!!! If you're telling me the truth, you would've given me an A. I think he just doesn't like to give out A's on papers, because by the comments he made on my paper, I think my paper was pretty good! Another depressing thing is that i got out of class at 5:20 to see that it was pitch black outside already, sigh. At least the weather's not as cold as Ohio...the past week or so the temp. has dropped and it's in the low 70s, sometimes high 60s during the day. Although I swear I'm not meant for Ohio weather because this feels cold to me. Like tonight when I met my friends for dinner, I had to ride my bike to the restaurant, about 10min. and I wore a hat and scarf. I was fine going there, but on the way home, I was freezing. Oh well, I don't know how I'm going to survive this winter in Ohio, but I guess I shouldn't worry about that until I step off the plane in Dec. Well, it's getting late, and I have a bit of a headache, so I'm off to see if I have any homework.