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Hirakata, Osaka: October 30, Thursday For some reason, Kansai Gaidai students treat the 30th as Halloween instead of the 31st. I think maybe they had the 31st off to prepare for the culture festival? Anyway, so people came today in costume, and there was a party. I neither had a costume nor attended the party, unfortunately, which was weird-- I'm so used to having my Harry Potter costume, and to being told that I dress a little oddly sometimes, that it was bizarre to NOT be running around in cosplay. Anyway. Classes were nondescript. I skipped club to go online, though, since Jen was online, so I was able to chat with her until about 7 PM my time/3 AM her time. Fun-fun. ^__^ I also got back on Gaia Online for the first time in ages. O_o So I finally set up an aquarium (not that I'll be able to consistently tend to it) and played the Halloween game this year. (It's oddly fun-- you choose a faction [human, vampire, zombie, dark elf] and go around certain areas of the game forum attacking those of a different species and getting points to level up. As you level, at certain levels, you get certain items.) Because I didn't want to work on my research paper, I played those games for a bit longer than I probably should have, because there were certain items I wanted. So, I got all of the dark elf items because the one item I most wanted was the very last level. ~_~; So I ended up with a dagger, an elven aura, a circlet, elven armour, and a staff. Playing the vampire, I got the bloodred moon, the victim, the bleeding fangs, and the swarm of bats-- I didn't bother getting the coffin. And then as a zombie, I played to get a brain on a platter and a t-shirt for Jen, and the zombie soul for myself. Also, Jen is a wonderful person and during my extended absence from Gaia, she acquired a few items for me. *_* Like, she got the Corallus Egg from her aquarium, so she gave that to me so my avatar can have a snake wound around it. ^_^ And the Dionaesil plant, which I'm REALLY looking forward to because in its final evolution there's a reall cool door backdrop that I want... XD And of course, vines crawling all over me. *_* And the Summoning Tomb. O__________O So cool~~~ So... yes. Jen, you were wrong-- I don't look like a zoo exploded. I look like nature exploded. XD I have a Venus flytrap coming out of my Wonderland top hat now, even. ^^; Anyway. Yeah, that's pretty much it. Did some 'research' (looking up some information regarding the anime Paranoia Agent, so that I can compare it to gekiga for my research paper), and went home. Hirakata + Yawata: October 31, Friday Today was.... sort of odd. Japanese class was whatever-- I skipped the usual coffee break to prepare for my Japanese vocab quiz that I was completely unprepared for. (I ended up doing fine. Thank god for cramming.) After class, I... don't remember what I did. O_o; But I do remember going home fairly late-ish, because it was dark as I was walking home. I recall this very distinctly, because as I walked across the street, there were two men in front of me-- one in a business suit, and one just in regular sweatpants and a windbreaker. Well... they were quite a bit ahead of me, and I paid no attention. But when I turned the corner at the end of the street, there they were... standing by the bushes... and the man in the sweats was peeing into the bushes as the businessman stood guard, watching him. That was very... um, odd. At least they weren't trying to flash me or anything, though-- some other girls got flashed earlier in the term, near the seminar houses. I headed on home and had dinner. Then, at night, at about midnight... I got a phone call from Korea. O_o It was my dad, and he was drunk. ~_~; He was with the younger of my mom's older brothers, and they'd had some... I assume soju, although I guess it might have been beer. Dad gets really oddly nosy and imposing when he drinks, apparently, as mom has had bad experiences with this as well. This time, dad just called to tell me that I shouldn't be afraid of using Korean with my relativse because they're family, and I can at least communicate. I just responded with noncommittal "Mm... yes, dad... okay, dad..." answers. And then he told me to hold on. In the distance on his head, I heard a [as translated from Korean] "What am I supopsed to say?" from a familiar younger male voice. A few moments later, one of my cousins was speaking into the phone, "Hello?" I responded in kind, and there was an awkward silence. I told him I didn't know what to talk about, and he said the same before giving the phone back to my dad. Then dad said hold on again before I could speak, and gave the phone to someone else. A little kid then called, "이모, 안녕!" ("Hi, biological-aunt-on-mom's-side!") I said hi back, and the random kid (I think it was a boy?) called hi again. I said hi again, and then his mom took over the phone. This cousin, whoever she was, asked [conversation as translated from Korean], "Hi! Where are you?" "I'm in Japan." "You're in Osaka, right?" "No, I live in Kyoto. My school is in Osaka." "Oh, okay. Well, come visit sometime!" "Um... we'll see." "Okay, well, here's your dad." She gave the phone back to dad, who slurred something about staying in touch with family because they're all I have in the world, and then said he was going to sleep. ~_~; "Um. Okay, dad. Bye." "Bye." Click. Shinsaibashi, Osaka: November 01, Saturday Today, Huey and I intended to go to Shisaibashi, a shopping district we'd come to with Nami and Hiroko and some other people a couple of weeks back. Well, we got to Shinsaibashi without a problem... but then went in the opposite direction that we were supposed to go. O_o So instead of going into the part of Shinsaibashi that has the modern stores and youth-oriented areas, we entered a more casual, less psychotically crowded area of Shinsaibashi that was home to used clothing, older people, household products and the like. This was fine, though. Huey and I both got a few things. We'd intended to do Purikura, though (short for 'print club'; also known as 'sticker pictures' in the U.S.), and that plan got botched because there was nowhere to do it. O_o I think the most rewarding part of the day might be the bag I got, though. Since getting my purse, I've been lacking a bag to carry my textbooks in, as they're a larger size than in the U.S. At Shinsaibashi, there was this bizarre bag for only $5. O_o It's black and white, and it says 'HAPPY LOVE CLOVER.' There's a picture of a smilng green clover next to an orange mushroom, and the name is there again. Above the pocket on its left, it says 'How are you? Happy every day.' It's bizarre, and bizarrely cute. Shinsaibashi, Osaka: November 02, Sunday Neither Huey nor I felt like going to Kyoto, so we went to Shinsaibashi again-- this time, to try and find the right place. No problem-- Huey's excellent sense of navigation got us there fine while I stared around in lost confusion, because my spatial sense is terrible. ^_^; We got crêpes! We bought one crêpe from a vendor outside of the Sega game center, and split it. It was gooood. We also got ice-cream from the vending machine outside the same game center. ^_^ And then we stumbled upon a 315-yen shop. O_o (Although it's 330 after taxes.) What a random amount. So we went in there, and got a variety of stuff. I got myself two neckties, got Jen a necktie and amusing sticker, and... yeah, that's all. Huey got a hat, because she's been bundling up out of pure terror for spending winter here. ^_^; Since she's from Singapore, where it's basically summer all year 'round, she's never really experienced a cold winter. Then we found the purikura place-- yay! So we took a set of purikura pictures, which made me really, really happy. The only other time I've done purikura, there were so many people crammed into the small space that we look like insects. >_> This time, since it was only Huey and myself, we could see ourselves clearly~ (Okaasan says that with the way we're dressed and how we stand, we look like a couple-- with her as the boy, since she's taller and all-around leaner in her turtleneck, and I was dressed very femininely. The funny thing is, Huey's the one who goes gaga over cute and girly things MUCH more than I do.) The reason I wanted to do purikura so badly is that the purikura here is very different from the purikura in the U.S. It's like a game here. O_o Basically... In America, the purikura is a tiny machine where you stand inside and pose in front of a single camera. It takes a variety of pictures to go with a select assortment of frames, and you can do a few minor adjustments afterward-- such as stamping the date on somewhere, or tinting the entire picture a certain colour. It's $3, and you print it, and you're done. Here, the purikura is about $4. However, the booths are bigger so you can fit more people, the frames are more diverse, the camera moves up and down to do different angles, and there are lights on various sides so that everybody is clearly lit rather than hidden by shadows. Afterward, you go to a different booth and get a large assortment of picture stamps to choose from-- and you can adjust the sizes-- to stamp or write whatever you want all over the pictures. If there are other people who want to do purikura from that same machine (and as such, the photos are edited from the same booth), it becomes a race-- the machine gives you a timer to finish scribbling/writing/selecting everything. You print it, and then you're done. So we don't look like insects, the pictures are completely customized with little pictures and writing, and they turned out really cute! It's easily the best purikura experience I've ever had. ♥ In the U.S., my cousin and I did purikura a few times when I was in middle/high school... Jen and I did it like, once. I don't think I've done purikura with anybody else, ever. O_o Anyway. We browsed around some more, went to the subway shops of NanNan (Namba XD), and ate lunch at Mos Burger. Then we walked back to Shinsaibashi and went home. At home, I suddenly got (as Huey would put it) a maggot in my brain to draw characters doing purikura. So I spent far too much time creating a set of frames (that look nothing like real purikura, to be honest XD) for it. Yawata, Kyoto: November 03, Monday Because Huey and I both had papers due, we opted to not go out again. Not that I worked on my paper anyway. I worked on the purikura for a bit before going downstairs, with my laptop, for lunch. Okaasan did kanji crosswords while I played music and drew. Then Oniisan-- Okaasan's oldest son-- showed up to switch our tables-- my work table with the dining table-- so that we could set up a kotatsu. We talked a bit about music, and he let me copy two music albums that he had with him, by Journey. (It was a double-disc album, "Revelation.") Then he left, we had dinner, and I went back to my room. I'm... not quite sure what I did for the rest of the evening. O_o But I woke up in bed, so apparently I was aware enough of my surroundings to turn the lights off and go to bed, even though I wasn't aware enough to shut off the computer first. ~_~;
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