Sunday, August 27, 2006
It’s amazing these horrible waves of stress and anxiety over nothing that usually follows such complete happiness.
I stayed the night over at the Shinozaki’s house (ex boyfriend’s family) I really do love them. They love me too (^u^)
They live right next to my second school…about 40 minutes away. They live closer to the school than the bus stop that I get dropped off at! Maybe I’ll sleep over at their place every Sunday night so I don’t have to get up so early on Monday…hmmmm
Okaachan (mother) sells bento lunches to most of the teachers at that school so she told me that she would make mine too. Ahhhhh! She’s totally my Japanese mom! I’ve confirmed a stereotype though: everyone says that you have to beg to actually be able to help someone. They were usually talking about school work but when I was at the Shinozaki’s place I kept asking to help and it was always the same “no no, ok desu!” I’ll break her down though.
Their family isn’t westernized but it’s not typical Japanese as far as I can tell. Okaasan calls her husband “shinji-kun” which is his given name and a not so honorific name. It’s usually the term that is used to talk to a young boy. Usually wives call their husbands either Otoosan (father) or name-san which is like Mr. or Mrs.
I noticed that he would sit at the table while she was cooking and she would make his meals a little different depending on what he liked. I think most people would see this as a completely sexist situation. But to tell you the truth, I know that my mom does the same thing. My dad usually helps but their kitchen only holds about 1 ½ people. So…I can understand why he doesn’t help….though I think that is a little sexist. But only a little! My mom will still do special nice things for my dad and vise versa so I’m not surprised to see the Shinozaki Family do the same thing.
So, I stayed in their guest house desperately wanting to help cook or clean something. It makes me feel less useless. I helped Wakako with her English homework. Wakako is the only girl and as far as I can remember she’s….9? I don’t remember. She’s super cute and if I bring someone with me back to
…..right, so I was at the Shinozaki’s house. Neither one of us speaks a whole lot of the others language but we managed pretty well and they understand me and I understand them as people. Okaasan took me shopping and I was thrilled! I got some big things that were too much for my bike like a laundry basket and I also picked up my Canon Wordtank C50!!! (electronic dictionary) I figured out how to change the language to English super fast and bought it instantly. I’ve had my eye on it for over a year now. But I was sadly disappointed when I realized after the fact that all the Japanese is in Kanji and I can’t read jack crap. Story of my life.
As for the title, ichigo is Japanese for strawberry and I have never seen so many strawberry flavored things. I’ve never been a big fan but the Japanese really know how to do it. I love about half the strawberry stuff. The other half is just sugary crap.
Oh, I also told the Shinozaki’s about the Cow Piss drink. We all had a hardy laugh. Good times :)
I find comfort in unpredictable things. Wakako started playing some popular Japanese music and I think because I’ve always liked some pretty annoying songs I really got into them! It was refreshing because it gave me a change to sing Japanese without caring what I was saying and it flowed very nicely which was a step in the right direction compared to my typical choppy sentences.
On the other hand, I hate coming home after hanging out with people unless it’s late at night and it’s time to go to bed. I just hate the feeling of coming home to an empty house and having nothing to do but clean. It gives me horrible anxiety. I hate anxiety. But how do you tell your body to stop worrying about nothing?! I always find a cure though. I might be living alone but that doesn’t mean I am alone. ねぇぇぇ(^_^)v
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