So I haven't posted here in a while.  But I haven't posted on mixi in a while either, so it balances out, I guess.  Then again, I never used this as much as I used Mixi, so whatever.  I really only got a livejournal back when I liked Walter, and now no one ever writes/reads this besides Acey, anyway.  Hi Acey!

Anyway, other than finals coming up lately, there's not TOO much to talk about.  I finished my finals for half of my classes.  Two more to go.  One of them is a 6 page essay thing (two essays at 3 pages each), and the other is my written Chinese final.  Oh how I hope I did well enough in my ED/SPAN classes to student teach next semester, because I already got accepted into Student Teaching, and I'd rather not get kicked back out T_T.  I'm going to be student teaching at Kelvyn Park High School which is...uninspiring.  Oh well.  I hear it's a lot of work, and I'm not very creative, so...

My JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) is tomorrow.  I'm nervous, but I don't know why.  I'm only taking level three, which is literally so easy they should be paying ME to take it.  Level 2 was just too scary for me, lol.  And it wasn't even the Kanji section!  I'm sure if I had tried hard enough I could have learned the extra 3-400 Kanji I needed to know for it (I'm at around 700 and you need 1000), but the vocab section was just kicking my ass.  And don't get me started on grammar...Which is why I REALLY wanted to get "An Integrated Approach to Intermediate Japanese [revised edition]."  It's a text book by the same company which essentially makes all the good textbooks for Chinese/Japanese, and though it isn't meant to be, it's often used as the next step after Genki.  Since Genki 2 is supposed to get you through Level 3 of the JLPT, and I'm about to pass that without having completed Genki (though I DO have Genki II at home since I tutor at UIC and that's the book the're using), I figured I should really, REALLY get that book.  I even looked at the official website, which has a 40 page sample preview of what the book is like, and it looked fantaastic.  However, the official site says the book is out of stock, and it's not on Amazon or Ebay...though I DID find it on Amazon UK and Amazon Japan...the latter of which frankly makes no sense.  And no, it's not at Mitsuwa.  Mitsuwa's selection is pretty crappy, actually.  Was a lot better 3 years ago.  ANyway, it looks like I won't be getting that book, lol.

In other news, I've been watching more dramas this semester.  This semester alone, I ended up watching Hana Kimi, Hachimitsu to Clover, Zettai Kareshi, Orange Days, Maou, Last Friends, and...I think there was one more I forgot.  I'm currently watching 美少女戦士セーラームーン、, the Tokusatsu series.  Honestly, I'm about 9 episodes from the end of the series, and I like it a whole lot more than that piece of shit they tried to pass off as a good anime,  Seriously, how do you have an anime that's almost 100% filler, and still be successful?  Seriously, I need to know, so I can make an anime about a lamp that falls over every day.  I think it'd be more exciting than season1, at least, that's for sure. 

Yes, I know there's a lot of stupid changes in the Live action, like Luna and Artemis being plush toys (which actually they're not, since Artemis once says "Its hard pretending to be a stuffed animal"), but seriously, what did you want, a REAL talking cat?  People complained that the girls all have black hair until they transform.  Oh no!  God forbid they make it realistic, since NO (see: 0) Japanese girls have naturally blue hair (because lets face it, Mercury was the LAST one who would be dyeing her hair).  It also explains why everyone in Japan in blind and unable to realize who they are when they transform.  And admit it; Sailor Moon's wig looks FANTASTIC.

Another complaint is that Luna turns into a little girl.  I pointed out that she turns into a humanin the manga, too, and the response was "but not an annoying little girl!"  Oh get over it, yeah she's annoying, but not nearly as much as Usagi in the anime, so get over it.  The Sailor Moon in the Live Action knows how to do more than just cry, sorry if that ruins your childhood image of a very useless, unattractive girl who can't do anything by herself. 

The thing I like MOST about the live action, is that unlike the anime, there's an actual STORYLINE!  Yeah, yeah, there was a storyline in the anime, too, but it was frankly uninteresting, and destroyed by at least 31 episodes of filler in a season that only had 46 episodes.  Literally almost every episode in the anime could be categorized into this VERY INTERESTING [/sarcasm] format:

1.  A youma appears almost directly in front of the Sailor Scouts.
2.  Sailor Moon transforms, and then ends up running away and crying, because, she's unable to actually fight, and is too stupid to use her ONLY attack (see number 6 )
3.  The sailor scouts appear (except in the first episode, where she defeats the Youma BY CRYING AT IT), and though the Sailor Scouts are clearly more competent than Sailor Moon in every possible way, their attacks have no effect on the Youma (but do on its underlings).
4.  Sailor Moon is about to die, because at this point, she forgets how to walk, and therefore is unable to move out of the way of the enemy's very slow attacks.
5.  Tuxedo Mask throws a rose, and says "セーラームーン！しっかりしろ！" (Get it together Sailor Moon!).
6.  Sailor Moon finally uses her only attack, which oh by the way, is an AUTOMATIC INSTANT KILL SPELL THAT NEVER MISSES.  WHy she doesn't start off the fight like that?  I don't know. She's an idiot.

I pointed this out to my friend, and he said "It's a fantasy show, get over it."  Which was when I stabbed him in the face with a spoon and said "exactly, it's a fantasy, get over Luna being a plush toy."  Then he made some idiotic claim about the anime having depth.  For anyone who thinks it does, refer to points 1-6 above.  


THe Live Action on the other hand, is a little different.  That is, what happens when the scouts are in their normal forms is actually important to the story!  It's NOT just the same boring shit over and over, and even though the fights still usually end up with SM killing it, they're still more interesting, due to a lack of crying and incomptence.  The Live Action focuses a lot more on the girl's human lives, and how these are affected by their past lives.  Which makes it infinitely more interesting than the anime, in which they had no lives to focus on.  

My friend said he couldn't enjoy the live action, because it shits on his favorite childhood series.  But honestly, the anime shits on itself with mediocrity and a lack of unoriginality.  No joke. 


ANyway, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go play Persona 2: Innocent Sin in anticipation of Persona 4, which comes out December 9th!!!!
 

At 5:35 this morning, Kaoru Hattori left Chicago.  At around 10:30am or so on Tuesday, Yohei Uchida will also leave Chicago.  Two days later, Asumi Tsuchiya will go back as well. 

Yesterday was Yohei's birthday, and two days before that, Hatto's birthday.  Two days ago, we went to Karaoke with them.  We went out to eat first, and then spent 3 hours in our own private room, singing songs we haven't heard in while with people we won't see for an even longer while.  By the time we left it was Yohei's birthday.  I was not able to sleep very well that night, thinking out their upcoming departures.  Yesterday we had a going away/birthday party for them at Hatto' house.  I gave Hatto a sterling silver necklace and a handmade card featuring one of her favorite characters on it, and Yohei got The Wizard of Oz and Alice in Wonderland/Through the Looking Glass from me.  A lot of people came that we haven't seen in a while, like Dan, Ilhye, Jim and Kotaro.  The best thing was that all of us made it.  Maga spent the night all over Jim instead of Yohei this time, and Matt did not hide himself in the corner.  There was a general lack of sexual inappropriateness, and Oscar did not throw up this time.  Ashley got drunk with us for the first time.  Yohei and Hatto passed around books for us to sign and leave messages for them.  I feel my message to Hatto was inadequate.  Anna and I refused to sign Yohei's, because it was too hard at the moment and we knew we would see him again before he left.  Anna and I also passed around our own books for the exchange students to sign.  Mystery vomit ended up in the sink, and no one knows where it came from.  I opened Maga's bedroom door to find Ashley just waking up from sleeping on the bed, with Anna crying uncontrollably on Yohei's shoulder, telling him how much she would miss him.  I go to find Hatto, and bring her into the room with us so we can all hug.  Anna's incessant crying gets to me, and I can help but cry myself.  Hatto and I had just recently started getting close, too.  Danielle got fed up of waiting for me, and went home without me (she was supposed to give me a ride).  Anna and I stop crying, and go into Hatto's room to pick up our things.  We see a paper that Hatto was writing; her onigiri recipe, that Anna and I had asked for, in her adorably grammatically incorrect English.  We cry again.  Hatto gives me and Anna little cell phone straps as little goodbye gifts from her.  That certainly doesn't help the crying.  At 2am, everyone leaves for the airport.  Unfortunately, I had to help mom in the morning, so I could not go.  I said my last goodbye to Hatto, and Asumi (who was only in town for the weekend, and then will go back to Milwaukee where she's exchanging), and got a ride home with Matt and Leigh, during which I fell in and out of sleep.  I woke up this morning, realizing how ridiculously sudden Hatto's last day was, how quickly a year goes by, and how unceremoniously the whole thing went, despite the fun.  It's still hard to take in that she's gone, and almost back to Japan already, and that Yohei and Asumi are leaving in just a few short days.  It's unbelievable how much your life can change in a year, and how in such a short time,  you can grow to love and care so much for people who live all the way on the other side of the world, where Reese's Peanut butter cups don't exist, and self-warming toilet seats do. 

There's just so much we still wanted to do with her/them, and there was no way there would ever be enough time for it.  Especially Hatto, who we really didn't start to get to know until February, after Steve left.  It's really the most horrible aspect of studying abroad.  And I miss Hatto so much already, with her lack of using articles in English, and her everlasting chipperness, her selfless campaigning for AIDS Orphans in Africa through the NGO PLAS, her volunteering to build shelters and houses for Native Americans during Spring Break instead of vacationing and partying, her incredible faces whenever we explained things like Strawberry Shortcake to her, and her sympathy and compassion for people who were depressed or upset.  I hope we keep in touch, and I hope that in 4 of 5 years, when I might actually have the money to go to Japan, that I'll be able to look her up and find her the same old Hatto that I've gotten to somewhat know over the year, as we sit in the schoolboy cafe and talk about the cute waiters. 


I never got to show her my parapara. :(

Still haven't talked.  Getting annoyed.

So I'm talking to Yohei.  It's not going well.  After 5 days, he still doesn't know what to say to me.  Except that he thinks I'm selfish for not even considering his feelings.  It's literally been almost 10 minutes of silence because he just doesn't know what to say.  and when we started talking, he opened with "what did you want to talk about?"  What did YOU want to talk about?  He's the one that said he wanted to talk to me yesterday!  And he's the one who had Hatto and Rin-Chan over and talked with them for hours about how he felt about everything, but now he can't think of a single thing except how selfish I am. 

This is horrible, I don't think things are going to be okay.  I don't think I am going to be okay.



Okay, finally after 12 mintues, he said he can't believe that I did this to him, because it's unfair that I told "everyone" while he had no one he could consult with.  Um, I'm sorry but wtf?  Of course I consulted with people beforehand, and obviously, he can't consult with them BEFORE I tell him.  And, he DID consult with people!  The same people I did!  Without even knowing they all knew!  He's saying he had the whole weekend with no one to ask for help from, but that's because he fucking went to Milwaukee so no one was around!  And when he got back he invited them over last night to talk about it!  AND, his friend from japan, the ONLY person I asked him not to tell (aside from his gf, obviously), heard it from him the same day I told him!  And that was WITH him thinking I said not to tell anyone.  What. the. fuck.


EDIT:  Now that I pointed that out to him, it's been 31 minutes since he's said anything.  I guess that's it then.  I'm selfish and consulted with other people before him.  If after 5 days of thinking and 2 and a half hours of "talking" to me, that's all he has to say, then I'm done. 

Kind of scared.  Yohei gets out of class in 14 minutes, and we're supposed to meet so we can talk about what I told him last week.  I know he still wants to be friends with me, but I'm scared all the same.  I hate talking about this kind of shit in person, but my carpal tunnel has gotten worse lately and I don't hink I can do it online like I wanted to.  Plus, I want to see him, even though I'd rather not be talking about this face to face.  These things are always so awkward/uncomfortable...

It doesn't help that Ilhye called him last night to yell at him because apparently it's his fault that he should have known I liked him (even though Ilhye herself didn't).  It especially doesn't help because I'd talked to her earlier that night and made her promise NOT to say anything to him, because he was embarassed that anyone knew about it to begin with, so since he didn't know Ilhye knew about it, I was hoping she wouldn't say anything.  But no.

Great. 



Ugh, he's out in two minutes now.  I hope it goes well.

So, Yohei and I made up.  It was very nice and sweet.  Unlike SOME people who've offended me in the past, Yohei really knows how to apologize.  It was one of those apologies where there really was no doubt that he was sorry, and it was so clear that he felt bad about it that I in turn felt bad for having making him felt that way.  Like...he actually cried because he was afraid that he'd offended me to the point that I wouldn't ever talk to him again.  Like, literally, we were on the train station and he cried while apologizing to me.  It was the saddest, and cutest thing I'd ever seen.  He hugged me goodbye that day.  It was actually the first time he'd ever done so.


Anyway, also unlike some people who've apologized for offending me but never do anything to change it, Yohei actually seems to ahve meant it.  There hasn't been a second since then where I've felt that he felt uncomfortable around me, in fact it's been kind of the opposite.  I've even felt comfortable enough to sort of tell him I like him.  Well, at least I've told him that he's more or less my type, and that if he were gay or bi...But since he's straight, there really is no point in pursuing anything.  And he has a girlfriend whom he loves very much.  So, unlike the other times where I've said I was happy for someone and really wasn't, I'm actually happy for him.  Kind of, because he has his own problems and all, lol. 

He told me I was his best friend here, and that's why he was so upset at having offended me.  In any case, recently, I talked to him on MSN with more questions about my homosexuality, and sexuality in general.  At some point, we switched to talking about him, and a problem he's been having recently.  It's kind of...awesome?  Well, maybe that's not the right word, cause it's a decently shitty problem, but I'm pretty sure he hasn't told anyone else about it, here or in Japan (well, except for one of the others involved), so I guess I feel kind of special.  It's nice knowing he trusts me with this.  Today, we went back to his house with Anna, but she uncharacteristically had to go home right away, leavig me with Yohei for a few hours.  I'd sent him a long response to a long message he'd sent me about his problem, so it gave us time to talk through it.  Despite a lot of personal questions and a lot of talks about things I would have thought would have made a straight guy with no other gay acquaintances uncomfortable, it was a really nice, comfortable conversation.  I hope he gets his problem sorted out soon.

...I don't know how to finish that sentence.  The other day, Yohei said "I can't suck a dick," and I had to explain to him at length why he should have used the subjunctive mood instead of the indicative.  Anyway,, me being curious, I asked him what Japan's societal views on gays were, and also if he had any personal questions he wanted answered.  I kind of wish I hadn't asked, lol. 

Apparently, in addition to never having met a gay person in Japan, he's never talked about it with anyone either, so he can't answer me about Japanese society, but for him personally, bisexual makes more sense to him, because then you have "more options," and at least you would still like girls.  He asked if being gay was a preference comparable to "I like people older/younger than me,"; though I'm not really sure how to tell him "I like people with dicks" is kind of different than "I like blondes." lol. 

So, he brought up our friend Ilhye, who likes older guys, but is now dating a guy 5 years younger than her that looks like he's 12 (on an unrelated note, they haven't had sex yet...wonder if there's a connection?); so he asked if my preference would change and if I would date a girl someday like Ilhye's dating this toddler. 



In a surprisingly open minded statement, he briefly explored tthe possibility that he's only straight because of societal pressures/expectations, but said he would probably only go so far as bisexual, and not gay (but then again, how many bisexual people have I known that at one point or another just went completely gay?  Umm...all of them, lol.  Except one, but she just cvame out, sot here's time.  Not saying there ARE no bisexuals, just that I haven't meant one that isn't gay and lying.)



Then he said that since I'm so picky with everything, I probably will end up alone and lonely.  THANKS YOHEI, that's what I wanna hear, lol.  You should be telling me the opposite! 

Anyway, in possibly the most offensive thing I've heard all year, he told me that maybe if I were bi, I wouldn't end up lonely because I'd have more options, so I should try dating girls. 















....what sagely wisdom we have here, lol.  I can't say that I'm particularly mad, or offended.  I mean, i AM, but at the same time, I know it isn't his fault, that most of the time, gays in Japan remain in the closet to prevent ostracism (though anti-violence is rare, an outed gay wouldn't be fired, but would likely never be promoted either), so Yohei's knowledge on the subject would be...probably Hard Gay and that's about it, if he even watches that, so I guess I can't blame him.  But yeah...it's an odd topic.  I think I'll just wait for his gf to break up with him, then tell him to start dating men in order to increase his options :-P.







Now I wonder what Hatto thinks...lol.  She's supposed to be the "very liberal" one, but who knows WHAT that means when it relates to Japanese liberalism? lol.

So, I've been feeling like shit lately, but yay!  I've finally started to get better.  So, we've rescheduled Sweeney Todd for either Thursday or Sunday, still waiting to hear from a few people. 

I started playing Okami recently, since I just got it for my birthday a few days ago, and it's pretty fantastic.  Not enough save points I'd say, but meh.  Mario Party DS is great.  Obviously more fun on multiplayer, and not on storymode where you have to come in first every time (which is hard to do since the game cheats in every possible way to make you lose), but it's nice.  I finally got a new ipod (2gig nano again [sigh] ) but meh.  I gotta head over to the neighbor's to set it up until school starts, cause, my computer's too shitty to run itunes >_<+. 

Anyway, it's January 8th, and that means it's a veeeeeeeeeery special someone's birthday!  I haven't had a real conversation with them for a little bit, but since it is their birthday and all, and I try not to forget something like that when it's someone special/important, I figure I"ll say it here, as well as facebook.






That's right, it's Sara Stubblefield's birthday!  Met her...a year ago maybe?  No, it's gotta be two, cause I believe I met her around winter, but before acen 06...Well, we used to play DDR a lot, she came with me to see RENT (even though it was more or less the day we met), and we had a little bit of drama with our friend Al (whose birthday is the 10th, so small world to that, lol).  Sara doesn't even have lj, but meh, happy birthday!

Also, Toshi's birthday was a day after mine, as was Dan's, Al's is the 10th, and Ilhye's is...the 25th I believe.  Lotta January birthdays this year, lol.

I'm sick.  Which is sad, cause we were going to go see Sweeney Todd today T_T.  On the bright side, everyone was pretty cool about it, and is okay with rescheduling until we all feel better (Yohei, Ilhye and Rin-chan are also sick, lol). 


So, I more or less have my schedule for next semester (which starts the week after next, so there you go, lol).  It's...


Monday:  History 497 from 1-4; SPED 410 from 5-8
Tuesday:  SPAN 449 from 5-8
Wednesday:  JPN 196 from 2-3


History 497 is some kind of Asian History class
SPED 410 is characteristics of students with learning disabilities (or something similar)
SPAN 449 is Second language literacy
Jpn 196 is Japanese independent study.



I'm not really looking forward to having several 3 hour classes T_T.

This is late, cause it's reposted from well, everywhere, lol.

メリークリスマス、皆！僕のもらったプレゼントを知りたい人がいるの場合には、「デグラーシ:ザ・ネクスト・ジェネレーション」の四番目のシーズン(DVD)と日本語の名前を知らない映画だった。そして、 「ザ・シンプソンズ・ゲーム」(ニンテンドDS)と「すばらしきこのせかい」と言うDSゲーム。 「すばらしき」 は日本から輸入したんだ。マニュアルの中で、ふりがながあるけど、ゲームでないから、超分かりにくいだ T_T。でも本質をほぼ分かるって思う。ゲームプレイは複雑にになったら、分かればいいのに。。。