konbanwa! (that means good evening)

Hello everyone. Sorry i haven't posted a new blog sooner, not much has happened the past couple of days. Last night Noemi and I went to a fireworks festival with my host parents, but it started raining and I was the only one who had an umbrella. I offered it to my otoosan and okaasan, but they refused and used newspapers instead, haha. At least I got some funny pictures out of it. Tonight I went to an ikibana, or traditional flower arrangement, class. It is a class thatmy okaasan and her friends take, and it was hosted at the same house as the tea ceremony. When you first walk in the house there is a bucket that has bundles of flowers wrapped in newspaper, one for each person. Then you are to mae a flower arrangement and get graded on it by the sensee, and then draw your work. It was interesting. I got to make one too but with less fancy stuff, and mine wasn't that good, haha.

Since I don't have much new news I thought I could tell a couple funny things that have happened while I have been here. When I first arrived in Japan, the stress and travel and climate changes made me break out. My second night here my host parents pointed at my face and said, "What's that?" and i said, "Acne." Since they weren't familiar with the word acne, they looked in up in the small computerized dictionary in the kitchen. Once they figured out what it was they were like, "Ohh acne, I see," and I figured that was the end of it. But I didn't realize that whenever they would introduce me to their friends they would say, "This is Audrey. SHe has acne." I swear they introduced me to at least 3 people that way! I kept thinking, "Is that really the only quality that I have worth mentioning the first time my family introduces me to someone??" Haha. I don't think that they realize that that is rude and embarrassing. Maybe it was just odd to see since almost every Japanese person I have met has had perfect skin (lucky!). Thankfully my face cleared up after a week and they stopped introducing me like that.

Another thing that I think is funny is dinner time. The way to say "time for dinner," in Japanese is, "gohan desu yo." But my host dad likes to say, "Audrey, come and get it!" It's hilarious. My host mom prefers to say it in Japanese, but my host dad just loves yelling "come and get it."

The way my name is pronounced here is so cute. They literally say, "O-DO-REE." When Noemi and I went to a big dance festival in Kurume, the announcers kept saying "odori," before every act. And I kept wonder why they were saying my name? I learned a week later that "odori" means "dance." Another funny thing about my name is there is currently a male commedian who is very popular among young people in Japan. So when I went to the middle school earlier this week and I was wearing a name tag, all the kids there thought it was hilarious that my name is Audrey.

Tomorrow I am going to see Harry Potter at the movie theatre (in English with Japanese subtitles... haha), Saturday my family is having a barbeque, Sunday I am going to Space Workd (an amusement park) with my host brother Yuichi and his friend, and Monday I should be going to Kumamoto Castle and a big fireworks festival. So I will have a long blog coming in a few days. :) Only 5 days left of Japanese language school, and then a five minute speech in Japanese!

Audrey