Summer Fun

July 18
Happy 19th birthday to my little sis!
Anyway, Misaki came to visit again today from Yamagata. She got back at a little bit after 11, so we hung out for a while and ate lunch, and then I helped her study some English. Her textbooks for her English class are really interesting; in the one for listening and dictation, there are songs from like Mariah Carey and the Backstreet Boys, which is really funny because not only do the worksheets have the students fill in the missing words to the lyrics, they actually have them analyze them as well.
After a while the two of us went out on our bikes and did a little shopping, Misaki buying a new wallet, and then we went to the library, where Misaki studied some more while I watched Nausicaa and The Nightmare Before Christmas in Japanese. It makes me want to go find and buy a copy of the latter movie, just so I can have the Japanese version since the way they translated the songs was amusing.

At about 5:30 we went and met up with Misaki's friend Sayaka, and the three of us had dinner at a place called Coco's, which has kind of like an Applebee's/Chili's feel to it. I only got a small salad since I didn't feel like eating any of the other stuff on the menu since it was all mostly meat, but that was fine since after we were done eating we went to the train station and got some handmade ice cream from the shop there. I got black sesame flavor, which was delicious and totally worth not hardly having dinner. Oh, and just as we were finishing eating, another customer came up and said hi to me, not 'cause she knew me or anything, but because she noticed I was foreign and wanted to welcome me to Shinjo. Cool.
Misaki and Sayaka went off to Sayaka's house for something and I came back and played some Wizard 101, which I just recently signed up for. It's slow and takes forever to load up because the internet connection at the Konta's is slow, but that's fine with me, since it gives me something to do outside of Facebook and solitaire. I stayed up pretty late playing and got to bed around midnight.


July 19
Today is a national holiday called Umi no Hi (Day of the Ocean), so there's no school and a lot of people have it off from work, including Papa-chan. Misaki woke me up about an hour before we were planning on leaving to go to Sakata and chill at the beach, so I ate breakfast and got ready, then Papa-chan, Mama-chan, Misaki, Misato and I all packed into the car and headed out for Sakata.
We got to the beach a little after 10, since we stopped along the way at a 7-11 for drinks and gum. Papa-chan had wanted to take me fishing, but from the other people there we could tell the fish weren't really biting, so we walked around the small island off the shore for a while and dipped our feet in the ocean for a bit before heading back to Tsuruoka and getting kaitenzushi for lunch. We went to the restaurant that Tamiya jii-san's brother-in-law (T-san, remember?) tried to take me, Will and Andrew to the last time we went to Sakata. It was freaking amazing. I had the freshest, most delicious unagi (eel) I've ever tasted. I ordered it straight from the chef instead of waiting for it to come around on the conveyer, so I got it as fresh as you could possibly hope for. I didn't expect it to taste so good, which is why I'm going on and on about it. I've been ruined for unagi from anywhere else, but it was totally worth the mouth-gasm.
Anyway, after lunch we went to an aquarium and looked at the fish there. I found myself oddly fascinated by the jelly fish, and Misato, Misaki and I spent a majority of the time looking at all the different species of those guys. They look so cute and fluffy!
Afterwards we got a little bit of ice cream from the shop at the aquarium. I didn't know what flavor to get so I asked the server what her recommendation was, and she said for a girl either blueberry or a murasaki something, which I think was lavender. Anyway, I got the lavender-something, which was actually perfect for the mood I was in (and didn't even realize it). We headed back to Shinjo after the aquarium, then I went back upstairs and played more Wizard 101 till Misaki had to leave, so I said goodbye and then ate dinner--salad and some pineapple, which was perfect since I was actually still kind of full from the sushi. After that I played more Wizard 101 till the shower was free.
We've only got three more actual days left helping out at schools, and I'm at middle schools again for them so I'm really looking forward to it. I'm also looking forward to seeing Misaki again next weekend; I thought this would be the last time, but it turns out she's coming back again to visit. I need to ask her and Misato their favorite colors so I can send them some cool fashion sunglasses--they always remark on how nifty mine are, so I figure that'd be a good gift to send. Among other things, of course.