Hey everyone...! Hisashiburi, long time no see... I'm alive and well. I've been moderately busy, but that's good cause I can get pretty bored.

 A lot of things have happened to me, but are more scattered than before. One weekend, I went to Suwa, which is a city 2 hours north, just to go to a game center and we went to a 100 Yen Shop (WHOO-HOO!), and a sushi restaurant. It was then that we felt that big earthquake, and it did a lot of damage to other parts of Japan.

 I've learned that like American Dollar Stores, 100 Yen Shops are one of the coolest places. I also frequent the nearby bookstore, that's near my school. I have a rental card, so I rent a lot of movies for cheap. It helps me catch up with certain famous Japanese movies I haven't seen yet, like Battle Royale.

 My Japanese is doing really well. I don't know if I dream in Japanese yet, cause I forget my dreams a lot, but I know I did before I left America. I try to think in Japanese cause it's good practice.

 Today, I had to get up at 5 in the morning to go to a Rotary event. We had to play Gate-Ball, which is like Croquette, but not. A lot of old people play it, but the two other exchange students and I were really happy to see it was a bunch of young people. There was lots of mirth, regardless of how freakishly cold it is.

 A lot of the higher up mountains are already snowcapped, which means it'll be our turn anytime soon. Nagano is famous for it's Alps and snow and for just being cold... I'm looking forward to snow though, because I haven't seen it. The closest I've been is looking at the snow capped mountains.

 Like I said, I woke up at 5 in the morning today, and I'm gonna have to get up at 4 tomorrow because it's my field trip to Okinawa. I'll be gone till Thursday. I'm going to go snorkeling, and do some dragonboat racing. We're also going to see some historical sites, which'll be cool.

 On another note, I'm kind of having some social problems at school. Some days are better than others... It's really hard being in a school that should just go ahead and be an all-boys' school. The guys are way too shy, and at the same time they can be jerks. I'm sad to say that American guys are more mature. The other exchange students are having trouble with boys too, and mostly have girlfriends. But, most of them are in girl dominated schools, so I guess I'm screwed.

 However, I think I've found my crack-in-the-wall. There's this one guy I've noticed that's really nice to me whenever I talk to him, and he's pretty popular too. If you remember one of my previous entries, he's the one I sang the Addam's Family theme with. All I really need are more friends. I'm more concerned with that than learning Japanese, because it's inevitable anyways.

 Well, I hope I can post some pictures of my upcoming Okinawa trip soon. Peace and good will to all...!