O Say Can You See

July 2: Last day at Hokushin
I bet you can`t guess what I did in the morning. If you said woke up, ate, and biked to school, you`re right on, good for you. Have some gold stars!
Anyway, when I got to school some students came into the teachers` lounge to give me a little momento of my week at Hokushin, which was some laminated photos that I took with the classes, and of me helping out around the school. I read some Densha Otoko in between classes, then ate lunch with the teachers and biked over to Shinjo Higashi High, Tamiya-sensei`s school, when I was done.

I got there and prepared a short introduction of myself and what high school and college life is like in America, and also printed out some pictures from prom since they don`t have prom here (kind of made me go all nolstagic). I was with a third year class that the teacher said was at a higher than normal level (but not quite advanced), so I talked about high school and college in English first, then briefly in Japanese. Then the students taught me some modern Japanese words that I wouldn`t find in a dictionary or anything (so slang, basically), and then they performed a short play in English for me about a princess that an old farmer found in some bamboo and who eventually had to go back to the moon when she grew older. It was really cute and entertaining and reminded me of our skits in Japanese class.
I biked home after that was all finished with and slept for a few hours because I was exhausted, then had dinner. It was cool out so I decide to take a walk to the station and back; luckily Mie-san had let me borrow an umbrella to take with me since it started to drizzle when I was walking back.
Same old night routine: shower and bed.

July 3
Today I walked to the train station to meet Will, Andrew, and the Takahashis, one of Andrew`s old host families, to go to Yamadera to pick cherries at a farm that some of the Takahashis` friends own. It was really fun, but really hot under all those leaves and branches! The cherries were so amazingly sweet and perfect though, so it was worth every drop of sweat. We each got a box to fill in addition to eating what we cared to eat off the branches, and I filled that up first before I started to munch on whatever cherries I could reach without having to climb a ladder (which was a lot, actually, since I could just reach up and bend a branch down to get to some of the higher ones).
Afterwards the Takahashis took us to a nearby restaurant for lunch, which was super fancy and really delicious. I don`t know what exactly I had for lunch (rice, miso soup, and an assortment of veggies), but it was really good!
After lunch we looked around at some of the gift shops, then drove to a town called Tendou to meet up with Todd-sempai. I`m so happy we got to hang out with him; I`ve been getting hit pretty hard with home sickness lately, so it always helps to be around someone from Fort Collins (or even just a native English-speaker).
First we drove to a McDonald`s so Todd could get some lunch (and Andrew and Will wanted to try one of the shakes), and then we drove around towards a huge Jusco/Toys R Us/mall-type place and talked a lot about Japan and the differences in culture and our expectations versus reality, and a lot about JET, too, which was really helpful for me. It was really good to be able to hear Todd`s story, since he gave me a lot of good advice to keep in mind for if/when I do JET next year (which I hope I get to do!).
The Jusco building we went to was in south Yamagata City and it was freaking huge; kind of reminded me of Park Meadows back home, or Cherry Creek mall, or really any big mall. It was fun and we walked around a lot. I bought a pair of basketball shorts to lounge around in at home, and Will and Andrew tried to get a Pokemon plushie out of a UFO catcher for a bit (to no avail, unfortunately). After that we went to a store called Hard Off, which is like a thrift store where they sell used stuff that they`ve bought from people. It was really cool.
Then Todd drove us to a train station as far north as he could (since it would have been way too much of a drive for him to take us all the way back to Shinjo and then have to go back to where he lives), and we said good bye with hopeful plans to meet up again in a few weeks before we go back to the States, and the three of us took the train back to Shinjo. We went by the Takahashis` place to pick up our cherries and to pay for the night bus tickets (Andrew had bought them all together) for when we go back to Tokyo to fly out. I got home and ate a late dinner, then showered and slept.

July 4
I`ve never really cared one way or another about the Fourth of July since I was a kid, but it`s still a weird feeling to know I`m in a foreign country for one of my country`s national holidays.
I got up and had breakfast, then watched some Batman in my room (which was freaking hot, oh my mother effing gawd), and then had lunch before me, Hiro, Sonomi, Chihiro, Mie and ojii-san went to visit some of their family in Sakata and go to the beach. That reminds me, I forgot to mention that ojii-san and obaa-san had been in Russia when I first moved to the Tamiyas` house, and that they got back a few days later (and even brought me my own souvenier from Russia).
Anyway, we stopped first at ojii-san`s daughter`s house since they were coming with us to the beach in their car, and they had these really yummy mochi-like treats that had black sesame paste inside and were delicious. We visited for a while, with ojii-san giving his daughter stuff from Russia and her giving him stuff for father`s day, and then we headed out to the beach.
We hung out there for a while, watching the kids play in the surf and get soaked and sandy, and I looked around for some seashells to take back with me. Then we went back, and while the kids were showering off at his daughter`s house, ojii-san took me to visit his sister and brother-in-law, about fifteen minutes away, where they gave me some yummy home-made cheesecake and we talked, and they invited me to come back any time so they could show me around Sakata. I think ojii-san is probably going to take me back on Saturday, and he invited Will and Andrew to come too but they haven`t really given me a concrete yes or no yet, so I don`t know if they`ll be coming with me. I hope they will, it`s always fun hanging with them.
Ojii-san and I went back to pick up Mie-san and the kids, then we drove back to Shinjo and had dinner. After dinner I went to meet up with Will and Andrew to do some fireworks as our own little Fourth celebration. We were originally going to meet at Nisshin Elementary, but when I got there Will told me we were going back to Andrew`s homestay family`s place (which was a restaurant just around the corner so it was fine). I got to meet Andrew`s host family (which he had been with first for a few days and had just recently moved back with), and we talked and lit off what fireworks we could there (some of them were loud so we couldn`t do those without being rude to the neighbors). I only lit off one, because when I lit it it sparked off immediately and burned my thumb pretty bad (right where I hold chopsticks and everything too, so it`s a pain the the arse to eat and write et cetera). Then me, Andrew, Will, and Daisuke, Andrew`s host brother, went to a park a bit further away from the houses and did some sparklers and the bottle rockets and some other stuff. It was really fun, and probably the most patriotic Fourth I`ve had in a few years, which is ironic.
After that we went back to the restaurant; by this time it was nearly 11, so Will and I both headed home.