Japan Trip 2019-2020 Day 1: First Full Day December 28th, 2019

Due to jet lag, I had a pretty early start. The first thing my mom and I did was go to a cafe to have breakfast in Akihabara. I don't remember the name of the cafe but it is a franchise and a place my mom had been interested in going. It was a little disappointing since it smelled like cigarettes and had an intimidating atmosphere. But the food seemed pretty good. I got a warm strawberry milk while my mom got a breakfast menu with bread and coffee.

After eating, we went to Asakusa to take some pictures and explore. My mom wanted to get some instagram worthy pictures. Since it's not as crowded in the morning, we were able to get some good shots. After taking some pictures, we explore Nakamise dori and got ichigo daifuku. The ichigo daifuku was very good. On the way back, we took a taxi back to the hostel since we realized that it was a bit far. The taxi driver talked about how Sumo is the main thing people go see when they come to Asakusa other than the Nakamise dori area but other than that, there's nothing else.

 

After going back to the hostel, we took a quick break before I went to go get my haircut. By then, my roommates were already awake. Having roommates was an interesting experience. Majority of them were Chinese and they were pretty nice. I did feel different from them however because I'm not someone who tends to care much about appearance while most of my roommates spent hours doing their hair and makeup in which I had to go up a different floor when I wanted to brush my teeth or just wash my face.

So I left, I believe a little bit before 11am since that was when my mom scheduled my appointment. The salon itself was a bit run down but overall, I had an good experience. However, when I went go get my haircut in March of this year, my hairdresser was very surprised about the way the hairdresser that I went to in Japan cut my hair. It was just very different from the way she cuts people's hair from what I have been told. The haircut took probably about an hour and I really liked how my hair looked. 

After getting my haircut, we went to Tokyo Dome in order to know where everything was. For lunch, we had sushi. It was quite big so I wasn't able to finish it all unfortunately and I was also feeling a bit sick. 

  After we had lunch, I went to line up to get some concert goods. I lined up for a good hour or so. It went by pretty smoothly. One thing I liked is that there were stands specifically for those to pay with debit/credit cards. There were not as many people lined up there so it went by a lot faster. When I finished buying these goods, I tried to look for my mom but it took forever to do so. She wasn't very specific about where she was so I had a very hard time trying to find to her. While I was looking for her, I saw this girl who I believe is Fuwameru(ふわめる). For those who don't know her, she is a well known Yamada Ryosuke fan. She writes very obsessive tweets and instagram stories about him such as how much she loves him, how he looks in almost every picture and has been obsessing about what he looked like when he was younger. Basically, she's pretty controversial especially when she posted on her instagram story of Yamada's previous address although she did not disclose in full detail by putting circles and triangles. In summary, she is a crazy/obsessive Yamada fan. From what I saw, she was very small and didn't seem that much taller than I am. 

When I finally found my mom, she was very excited to see what I bought. I showed her the things I bought and then she made me take pictures with my Yamada uchiwa that I just bought. It was very awkward to do so because I don't like to show that I am a fan. I didn't realize what my mom was making do was something a lot of fans do when they take pictures. After this, we parted ways since my mom had to start heading to Osaka while I went back to the hostel to rest a bit. 

Around 4:30pm, I headed to Akihabara to go to the Hello! Project store. I was surprised that there was quite a few people there. It's normally quite empty so I wonder if it was just because of the time I went there or because it was getting close to New Years. I thought this was cute so I decided to take a picture of this. 

I regret not buying this since my hair was short at the time and I believe that these stuff were a bit pricey. After this, I went to Don Quixote to buy a towel since I did not bring one and the one I rented was taken away by the cleaning lady. It was quite hard to find where everything was since it's so big. For dinner I went had McDonald's because for some reason, I was craving it. I got a Filet-O-Fish, fries and the Sankaku Choco pie. For my drink, I got a Fanta grape. For the Filet-O-Fish, I noticed that it was less oily compared to the one in the United States. Also, I'm sure the size of the drink would most likely be a small here as well. Overall, it was good.

After having my dinner, I went home to rest for the big day ahead. That is it. I will try to have the next post out on next Saturday.

Black Friday Haul 2019(I know, I'm super late)

 I was initially planning on making this post as soon as winter break began but didn't have the time to do so(aka being lazy about it). Since I finally have some time, I will be showing the the clothes I bought on Black Friday. 

I will start off with my purchases from Adidas. 

 

I got this crewneck long sleeve shirt. I first bought this in pink and also wanted to get a black one after seeing it at Macy's. It was originally $60 but got it for $36. 

 The second and last thing I got from Adidas is a hoodie. The size for it is XS, however it is still very big on me but it's nice to wear it oversized. It definitely came a lot bigger than expected so the next I get a hoodie from Adidas, I shall order one from the kids section. 

Next, are the purchases from Levi's. 

I got these two shirts for I think $10-$20. I can't remember whether it was $10 for each shirt or 2 for $10. I got these in size small in which I thought were a little too big. I was debating whether or not I should get them in XS but these fit pretty well. A little big but more comfortable this way. 

 

Lastly, I got this long sleeve. I just like how simple it is and it's very comfortable to wear. I don't remember the price for but I think it was around $20. 

These are the things that I got. I know it's not much and I regret not posting this much earlier since I would've remember the prices more.

September

 It is already September in which I cannot believe. This crazy year is already going by super fast. I honestly do wish everything will go back to normal eventually, however it looks there is still a long way to go. It's weird how we were all so afraid at first but I think many of us are getting used to the new normal. I do also wish that I can travel again. When the pandemic settles down, it would be nice to go to Japan again and do the things that I was not able to do the last time I went there. Lately, I have been watching a lot of past travel vlogs, food vlogs and packing videos. I think this is a perfect time to plan any future travels and find places to go and things to do. 

I finally finished my summer course. It was a very stressful term. Although I only took one class, it was still tough. The class itself was very unorganized and I think my professor got lazy with it in the end. But I got through it and that's what it matters. 

Growing up Japanese in the United States(Oregon/California)

Introduction 

So I thought it would be interesting to talk about my experience growing up in Oregon and what it is like being Japanese here as well as talking about my experience in California(I honestly don't remember much about living there but I will explain just what I remember). I originally moved to the United States when I was 5 years old where I first lived in California at a small college town. We moved here because my dad wanted to continue his education. It was a fairly diverse place and everyone was nice and helpful. Then I was 8 years old, I moved to Oregon after my dad got a job here. It was very different. The town I grew up at in Oregon is not diverse at all. I was one of probably four Asian kids in my school and I kept on getting mistaken as the other Asian girl as well as one older kid making fun of my lunch because it looked "different". Everyone expect my dad had a hard time adjusting. It was honestly like a huge culture shock. This included the weather, environment and the people. I moved in the winter so it was very cold and rain which was something I was not used to because of living in Southern California for 3 years. There was nothing to do so I ended up just staying inside. This caused me to prefer being indoors more than being outside. When I lived in California, I was a very active child. I loved to play outside and try new things. For some reason in Oregon, I refused to try to do anything because the environment was so different. At that time, I did not realize that I was depressed due to my parents getting mad at me if I was not smiling all the time. Also, I was starting to go through puberty so I was hungry a lot. I would eat tons of snacks after dinner and even sleep with a banana at night in case I got hungry. At the time, I thought I was simply gaining weight because my dad told me that I was fat and need to lose weight. So, I tried to eat less but my eating habits got in the way.
 

School

I struggled quite a bit academically after starting the third grade. The second grade class that I transferred to did not assign any homework and we barely did anything other just play. I was not used to this so I wanted to study, however I thought I had to wait for my teacher to assign me homework so I just waited for an entire semester to study. This did not happen. When I was in the third grade, my teacher suddenly assigned us tons of homework and everything went by a lot faster. For math, my teacher would only focus on each unit for a few days, giving me no time to actually process what we were currently learning in class. Because I did not understand anything I was learning, I cried on a weekly basis when my parents tried to help me due to them yelling at me for not understanding the materials. Looking back, I wished I was able to get some sort of help by trying to ask my teacher or going to a learning center. However, I wasn't taught much common sense so I didn't realize at the time that I should be getting extra help for schoolwork. Meanwhile, the school I went to in California started assigning homework in kindergarten. It was, however quite simple such as some math homework and to read for about half an hour each day. However, I do remember not understanding one of the assignments most likely due to not being fully fluent in English and ended not getting a full score. So I guess I have been struggling with school since the beginning and the lack of homework just made it worse than it already was.

 

Japanese stores/restaurants  

As for resources such as Japanese grocery stores, the only Japanese grocery store is 45 minutes away so we were only able to go there once a month. This was my only excitement because I was able to get out of the town that I lived in. Now, we are able to go more often(before the pandemic) and stop by more places such as the Washington Square Mall and such. But when I first moved here, we did not go to the mall and such for unknown reasons. When I lived in California, we went once a week because it was a little more closer. Looking back, I was super lucky to live in a town close to Los Angeles and the amount of stores that my mom was able to get Japanese food at, although we only went to one. I thought there were nothing Japanese in LA due to not going to the city very often. Now, there are more options for Japanese food in Portland which I'm very happy about, however it is still very far from the varieties that California has. 

Interaction with other Japanese people
My interaction with people changed drastically. I had some Japanese friends because of the connections my mom made when I lived in California and I would also play with some of the Japanese/Hapa kids during my first few years living in Oregon. However, for the first year or two in Oregon, I did not talk to almost any Japanese people here because of the lack of resources to do so and there really isn't as many in the town I grew up in compared to the area I lived in California. I only used Japanese to my parents and grandparents when they came here to visit due to this. This caused my Japanese to deteriorate quite a bit. Because I did not have anyone else to use Japanese with, I did not realize how bad it was. My parents understood what I was saying so I thought my Japanese was quite decent. I did not realize how bad it was until I started to talk to a girl who went to Saturday Japanese school and had tons of Japanese friends. Her Japanese was ten times better than mine and I was surprised to meet someone who spoke better Japanese than myself. At the time, I was still used to playing with my Asian friends so I would tell my mom that I wanted to play with them. However, she was not happy with this because they all lived in the other side of town or a town nearby and it was snowing. She wanted me to play with kids from school who I did not feel comfortable inviting over because of my heritage. But my parents who had no understanding of this continued to yell at me for not playing with kids who lived close by. Other than the few kids that I knew, the only other "young" Japanese people were the exchange students that came each year. Each year, around 100 Japanese exchange students come to study at the sister university of their university in Japan. The first time I was exposed to the exchange students was when I went to a Japanese day camp. When I heard their English, my brother and I made fun of them due to not understanding that they were still learning the language. The only non-English speakers we were exposed to were my parents so it felt weird hearing other Japanese people not speaking fluent English. 

 

Overall, losing the chance to interact with other Japanese-Americans has affected me in a negative way. Although I have a diverse group of friends, I still feel lonely at times because of not having a friend that came from a similar background. I regret not joining a club in college to make friends that look like me but what happened is what happened. Because of this, it did give me quite a bit of anxiety when talking to Japanese people, specifically those who grew up there. I don't really know how to talk to these people despite knowing the language. 

 

Conclusion: 

Although there might be more things to explain that I cannot remember right now, this is basically it for now. Overall,I do miss living in California but I fully understand that it has it's own ups and downs as well. I do just want to say that this is my own experience and everyone's experiences is different, even if you live in the same city or state so please do not assume that everyone's experiences are the same.