The Home Stretch!

I have less than a month left in Japan. In three weeks and three days, I'll be on a plane bound for SFO!

School's ending this week for me. I have one exam for Japanese left, as well as a short 5 page dissertation for my Japanese theater class. Which, by the way, I can just send via email to my professor. ;D

My friends and I are planning to hit up the Kansai region this weekend. I'm super excited! Kantou is all modern and what not-- the Kansai region is more Japanese-y. I'm also going to go to Hokkaido on the 26th-28th with a friend from UCLA and a friend I met in my Japanese theater class who, by the way, is a regular 4 year student at ICU. The Hokkaido trip kind of ballooned from the three of us just wanting to hang out. When Jessi (the girl from UCLA) and I joked around, saying that we should go to Hokkaido to hang out, Yuri (the regular 4 year student) immediately said, "Ok!" We thought that she was kidding but she wasn't. o_o;; So I'm going to Hokkaido, folks! And it really helps to have a native Japanese speaker with us!

I'm not sure what I'm going to be doing in between all of that, though. I'll probably have to extend my lease with the Weekly Mansion. In comparison to how much it costs to stay in hostels and what not, it's actually kind of cheap to stay here. I'ts roughly 30 bucks a night at the Mansion.

I'm excited! Nearly three weeks of travel! I finally won't be tied down to having to commute 2.5 hours every day. :) I'll be sure to take lots and lots of pictures! Please pray for traveling mercies! I'll be taking the overnight bus, the train, flying... all sorts of modes of transportation. :)

Can't wait to finally venture out of Tokyo! And can't wait to go home!

Oh my!

Oh my!!!! I'm leaving Denmark in 2 months!!!! And for about 2 weeks out of 8 weeks, I'm going to travel! Haha wow...

Schedule:
- October 28th to November 1st: London with my suitemate from freshman and sophomore year in college, Loan Luu!
- November 12th: Mediasociology paper due. Booo....Gonna write about Joel Osteen. Haha gross huh?
- November 22nd: UC Thanksgiving Dinner in Lund, Sweden with UC students from Sweden! Sweden is just a bridge away! :)
- November 25th to December 1st: Hyan is visiting Copenhagen!
- November 27th to November 30th: Poland!
- December 14th: FIBC's Christmas Concert - "Forever Gloria! We Worship the Christ of Christmas"
- December 15th - 21st: Maybe Romania? My good friend Sylva is gonna go back home and she really wants me to come back with her! :) Maybe....
- December 22nd: FLIGHT HOME! :D

I can't wait to give everyone a FAT hug!

It's going by really fast!!! I'm gonna miss this place. For SURE, I'm gonna come back to Copenhagen some day...

News from Tucumán!

Hola Grace,mi oveja gringa...(ja,ja) que alegria recibir un mail tuyo,te extrañamos en la campaña de Julio,esperabamos verte en Tucumán,pero por lo visto ya te robaron el corazón esos ¨chilenos¨,pero no importa, lo mismo te amamos y si nos gustaría mucho que vengas en Diciembre porque esta es tu casa y no necesitas invitación. La campaña con la IBM de Bs.As. será del 09 al 17,la idea principal es hacer un campamento para niños los primeros 4 dias y luego enfocarnos en los barrios.

Avisame lo mas pronto posible acerca de tus planes y si estamos incluidos en tu visita...Les diré a Norma y Josué, les dará mucha alegria saber de tí.

Te amamos mucho,un beso grandote para vos---------JORGE

Translation: Hello Grace, my gringa sheep (because I called Pastor Jorge "my Argentine pastor"), how great it was to receive an email from you, we missed you in the campaign in July, we were expecting to you see but apparently "the Chileans" stole your heart (JAJAJAJA, Pastor Jorge seems like he's still bitter) but it doesn't matter. We love you the same. And yes, we would love it very much if you came in December because this is your house and you don't need an invitation. The campaign with the other IBM from Buenos Aires will be from the 9th to 17th, which we mainly want to do a camp for the children the first 4 days and after focus on the neighborhoods.

Let me know ASAP about your plans and if we are included in your visit (OF COURRRRRSEEE!!). I will tell Norma and Josue. They will be very happy to hear about you. We love you very much, a huge kiss for "vos" (the Argentine way of saying "you." I love it.) -Jorge

@_@

I haven't written in a while, I am aware. I promised a couple of people an entry soon but I'm sorry to say that I haven't worked on it yet. I have yet to scope out places that I want to visit in Japan. I need to do a little research before that, though. I do know that I want to go to Hokkaido, while dropping by Aomori along the way.

I, too, will write a money post to let y'all know what you're getting into if you apply for my specific program. The dollar's all weaksauce now. If I were to get $2000 back in yen, I would get 203 107.545 yen back. That means that I'll be losing 30 bucks. Doesn't sound like a big deal perhaps but dang yo, I need to buy food everyday to eat. T_T I never thought that I'd say this but I miss meal points.

I've asked Mike Hasegawa & Pastor John about churches in Japan and they said that they'd ask the pastors that they know in Japan for me. :) I've tried looking around and spent an entire night listening to sermons and stuff. It's really frustrating because none of them seem to be solid. "/

And what am I doing up at this obscenely late hour? Why, I'm writing a short story. I guess that I'm more a flash fiction kinda girl but I do need to write a story that's somewhere from 2500 to 5000 words long. It's kind of painful 'cause I didn't have time to work on it until today.

So, the word of the day?

遅い。 (おそい = osoi) It means late. It can be that one's tardy but it can also mean something like late into the night.

遅くまで話を書いています。
Osoku made hanashi wo kaite imasu.
I’ve been writing a story until this late.

T_T

Oyasumi nasai~