Well the typhoon has come and it is rainy rainy rainy. The garden has already been flooded... I hope the house doesn't too :| Luckily I am on the second floor! The strong winds haven't come yet, just the noisy winds blowing past the house but I think it will get stronger later. Well, I have to go and make some preparations like boarding up the windows, collecting food for the next few days, making sure the roof stays on ;) But seriously, I will be leaving for the Goodbye Orientation camp at 12... so I hope the typhoon doesn't get worse when we going there!
Saturday, May 31, 2003
Thursday, May 29, 2003
As soon as we get over earthquakes, we get typhoons. In about 2 days we will be having a typhoon come near hamamatsu and so you are not able to leave the house or do anything... should be fun... but at that time I will be on a Rotary camp in Numazu.. so maybe we might have to stay an extra day there!! It also means you don't have to go to school :D
Wednesday, May 28, 2003
Well sadly it looks like my email server is going to close (rootshell.be). Can you please start sending mail to my mattbode@optusnet.com.au. Probably in a few months it will be closed and will not be able to receive email.
Thankyou.
Thankyou.
Monday, May 26, 2003
News for today:
Today I started my school club. I am in the table tennis club :D I am not doing this because there are many people I wish to beat, but I thought it would be fun... Well it was kinda fun, but wow was it tiring! We started at 4:00 and finish at 7:00. This will happen every week days and saturdays. While I was in the club at about 6:24 a big earthquake struck (not that u could feel it much in Hamamatsu.. in fact i didn't feel it at all), But apparently it was pretty big and took out the mobile phone system and phone system and some houses fell down. Luckily this is no where near me, so don't worry mum...
Well thats about it!
Today I started my school club. I am in the table tennis club :D I am not doing this because there are many people I wish to beat, but I thought it would be fun... Well it was kinda fun, but wow was it tiring! We started at 4:00 and finish at 7:00. This will happen every week days and saturdays. While I was in the club at about 6:24 a big earthquake struck (not that u could feel it much in Hamamatsu.. in fact i didn't feel it at all), But apparently it was pretty big and took out the mobile phone system and phone system and some houses fell down. Luckily this is no where near me, so don't worry mum...
Well thats about it!
Sunday, May 25, 2003
Sorry everyone!! If files are not there, then i am sorry, but optus keeps deleting them cos i am over the limit. I will fix it later tonight, but some pics and html files have been deleted!
Thursday, May 22, 2003
News to website:
- Added Thumbnails
- Added Hi-Res and Lo-Res photos for people without the bless of high speed internet.
- Updated Side Menu
- Added Thumbnails
- Added Hi-Res and Lo-Res photos for people without the bless of high speed internet.
- Updated Side Menu
Monday, May 19, 2003
I have finally added the new pictures from Carly's visit, Matt Hession's visit, Hamamatsu Festival and other new ones. I have got rid of most of the old ones, but some are still accessable at http://members.optusnet.com.au/rsjcm. If you want any that are not there anymore, just email me and I will put them back up. Enjoy!
Sunday, May 18, 2003
Friday 16th
In case you didn't know, Carly came to Hamamatsu on Friday for a business trip. There was a little bit of uncertainty about her coming to Hamamatsu as her business may not have needed her, but I think they felt sorry for her because she wanted to see her little brother. In the end after thinking she was, then not, then was, she finally came. I was supposed to meet her at the station straight after school, but I had a bit of a problem.... again another bike problem... the tyre had popped and I couldn't get home! In the end I ditched my bike at my 1st host family's house and went to meet Carly by bus. My host mums had organised a concert to go to that night and so Carly came along with us and Fernando to check it out. After the concert we went home and Carly and I watched Chicago on DVD :) (She got it from China). I had been hoping to watch Matrix 2, but each time I downloaded it, it was either 'Star Wars, Lotr or Fight Club'!. We stayed up late watching the movie and then went to bed.
Saturday 17th
Today we had nothing planned whatsoever, but I tried to find some interesting things to do in Hamamatsu. Carly and I ended up checking out Hamamatsu's Castle. The Castle is not huge, but at least I can say we have a castle! We also took some Purikura (The picture stickers) with some friends I saw at the purikura shop. Carly and I, for the first time, got to play the drum machine :D This is where it plays a song and these little face symbols scroll across and mean either, hit the side, hit the middle, hit hardly with both or whatever. It was actually a lot of fun. We still had heaps of time left and so we headed back to the station and watched some concert and wind ensemble bands playing out the front of the station. After a lot of walking and checking out the place, it was time to eat with my family at a Steak House (Asakuma). After that, Carly and I watched another movie, 'Meet Joe Black' (which was really really hard to watch) until late. My host family had planned to take us around the next day somewhere, so we had to get up at 6:30.
Sunday 18th
Well, today was a big day... and a lot of time in the car on windy roads. I felt pretty much fine on the roads (it also doesn't help the driving style of the Japanese) but Carly had to stop for a little while when the roads got really bad. My host dad also got a speeding fine on this road which ended up costing him 16,000 yen (About $213) So after that he kept his cruise control set to the right speed. We headed off, stopping every spot my host dad could, and finally came to our first destination, Tsumago.
Tsumago is a post town which is located on the old Nakasendo (lit. mid-mountain road, was one of the two main official roads from Edo (Now called Tokyo) to Kyoto). In the town it has inns for all the travellers on the long road. After eating lunch, and eating carp (coi) for the first time, we headed off again to Matsumoto (but not without stopping at lots of rest stops). At Matsumoto, we first went off to the Castle. With Carly explaining clear directions to my host dad from the satellite navigation, we ended up going around in circles because my host dad thought he was in another part of the town and didn't believe Carly (who was reading the nav) :). After taking pictures of the castle and checking out all the floors (It is an interesting castle because it has a hidden floor (no windows) to store ammunition and important things, and also has very steep and tall steps in case of enemys coming and it is also partly in a lake). I wanted to go to the Suzuki Method building (for violin) and we did, but it was closing in 15 minutes and my host dad was worrying about time for Carly's train going back and so he said something like 'Just take some pictures out the front and we will go' as he didn't understand what the building was about. We finally got in, with about 15 minutes to check out the museum in there and watch a video the man showed us. The man was suprised that we went to to the castle for so long and didn't come here sooner, but the day wasn't up to me timewise. Anyway, I will go back there another day when I actually have time. We started heading back, but this time using the freeway (which is about 4 hours quicker, but not as interesting). After travelling for a while, we got home to the station at about 8:40 and had tonkatsu for dinner and said goodbye to Carly at 9:20. We had a fun and interesting weekend, and next time I will have to go and visit Carly! Thanks for coming Carly!!
In case you didn't know, Carly came to Hamamatsu on Friday for a business trip. There was a little bit of uncertainty about her coming to Hamamatsu as her business may not have needed her, but I think they felt sorry for her because she wanted to see her little brother. In the end after thinking she was, then not, then was, she finally came. I was supposed to meet her at the station straight after school, but I had a bit of a problem.... again another bike problem... the tyre had popped and I couldn't get home! In the end I ditched my bike at my 1st host family's house and went to meet Carly by bus. My host mums had organised a concert to go to that night and so Carly came along with us and Fernando to check it out. After the concert we went home and Carly and I watched Chicago on DVD :) (She got it from China). I had been hoping to watch Matrix 2, but each time I downloaded it, it was either 'Star Wars, Lotr or Fight Club'!. We stayed up late watching the movie and then went to bed.
Saturday 17th
Today we had nothing planned whatsoever, but I tried to find some interesting things to do in Hamamatsu. Carly and I ended up checking out Hamamatsu's Castle. The Castle is not huge, but at least I can say we have a castle! We also took some Purikura (The picture stickers) with some friends I saw at the purikura shop. Carly and I, for the first time, got to play the drum machine :D This is where it plays a song and these little face symbols scroll across and mean either, hit the side, hit the middle, hit hardly with both or whatever. It was actually a lot of fun. We still had heaps of time left and so we headed back to the station and watched some concert and wind ensemble bands playing out the front of the station. After a lot of walking and checking out the place, it was time to eat with my family at a Steak House (Asakuma). After that, Carly and I watched another movie, 'Meet Joe Black' (which was really really hard to watch) until late. My host family had planned to take us around the next day somewhere, so we had to get up at 6:30.
Sunday 18th
Well, today was a big day... and a lot of time in the car on windy roads. I felt pretty much fine on the roads (it also doesn't help the driving style of the Japanese) but Carly had to stop for a little while when the roads got really bad. My host dad also got a speeding fine on this road which ended up costing him 16,000 yen (About $213) So after that he kept his cruise control set to the right speed. We headed off, stopping every spot my host dad could, and finally came to our first destination, Tsumago.
Tsumago is a post town which is located on the old Nakasendo (lit. mid-mountain road, was one of the two main official roads from Edo (Now called Tokyo) to Kyoto). In the town it has inns for all the travellers on the long road. After eating lunch, and eating carp (coi) for the first time, we headed off again to Matsumoto (but not without stopping at lots of rest stops). At Matsumoto, we first went off to the Castle. With Carly explaining clear directions to my host dad from the satellite navigation, we ended up going around in circles because my host dad thought he was in another part of the town and didn't believe Carly (who was reading the nav) :). After taking pictures of the castle and checking out all the floors (It is an interesting castle because it has a hidden floor (no windows) to store ammunition and important things, and also has very steep and tall steps in case of enemys coming and it is also partly in a lake). I wanted to go to the Suzuki Method building (for violin) and we did, but it was closing in 15 minutes and my host dad was worrying about time for Carly's train going back and so he said something like 'Just take some pictures out the front and we will go' as he didn't understand what the building was about. We finally got in, with about 15 minutes to check out the museum in there and watch a video the man showed us. The man was suprised that we went to to the castle for so long and didn't come here sooner, but the day wasn't up to me timewise. Anyway, I will go back there another day when I actually have time. We started heading back, but this time using the freeway (which is about 4 hours quicker, but not as interesting). After travelling for a while, we got home to the station at about 8:40 and had tonkatsu for dinner and said goodbye to Carly at 9:20. We had a fun and interesting weekend, and next time I will have to go and visit Carly! Thanks for coming Carly!!
Tuesday, May 13, 2003
If anyone is wishing to write to me or send me things :) Here is my address now:
Name: Kato, (Nobuyoshi (Dad) Akiko (Mum))
Address:
1-41-15 Sumiyoshi-cho
Hamamatsu-shi, Shizuoka-ken,
Japan
(The postal symbol) 430-0906
Phone: 053-471-1950
The postal symbol looks like this in case you don't know
____
____
. |
(Excuse the . it is there so it wont delete the spaces)
Name: Kato, (Nobuyoshi (Dad) Akiko (Mum))
Address:
1-41-15 Sumiyoshi-cho
Hamamatsu-shi, Shizuoka-ken,
Japan
(The postal symbol) 430-0906
Phone: 053-471-1950
The postal symbol looks like this in case you don't know
____
____
. |
(Excuse the . it is there so it wont delete the spaces)
Well I am starting to become like Ben and not updating my posts very often (but he has an excuse, I don't!)
News up to date: Carly will be coming on Friday to Hamamatsu for a 'business trip' (like she is going to Sakado on Monday for a 'business trip'). So she will be here for the weekend and I can finally show her my town. Other news: I have a new bike as I had to give back my old one which I borrowed for a few weeks (long story, I was told I could borrow it by the owner, but the grandpa said no, something happened to it another time and he was worried) So I was without a bike for a little while (which is bad in Japan, as many people use them to get everywhere), but my counsellor lent me one that they were not using, so all is well! Mother's day was on Sunday and I rang mum and chatted to her and dad for a little while! Sorry I didn't send a flower, but it would have died :) Thats about it!
News up to date: Carly will be coming on Friday to Hamamatsu for a 'business trip' (like she is going to Sakado on Monday for a 'business trip'). So she will be here for the weekend and I can finally show her my town. Other news: I have a new bike as I had to give back my old one which I borrowed for a few weeks (long story, I was told I could borrow it by the owner, but the grandpa said no, something happened to it another time and he was worried) So I was without a bike for a little while (which is bad in Japan, as many people use them to get everywhere), but my counsellor lent me one that they were not using, so all is well! Mother's day was on Sunday and I rang mum and chatted to her and dad for a little while! Sorry I didn't send a flower, but it would have died :) Thats about it!
Wednesday, May 07, 2003
Presenting microsoft's newest innovative product:
The iLoo...Microsoft is now creating toilets.
http://msn.com.com/2100-1103_2-999509.html#
The iLoo...Microsoft is now creating toilets.
http://msn.com.com/2100-1103_2-999509.html#
Tuesday, May 06, 2003
Monday 4th
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This morning Fernando and Lalo had to leave at around 6:00 to go back to their town for the festival so they left and we grunted a few goodbyes and went back to sleep. Today we had to ourselves to play around in the city, so after eating breakfast at Gusto, we went by bus to the city. We had until about 4:45 till everyone had to leave on their train home. Seeing as it was just Mark and I and there were 3 girls, they all wanted to shopping so Mark and I tagged along... boring!!! :)
(Sorry Bell went, finish this blog later)
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This morning Fernando and Lalo had to leave at around 6:00 to go back to their town for the festival so they left and we grunted a few goodbyes and went back to sleep. Today we had to ourselves to play around in the city, so after eating breakfast at Gusto, we went by bus to the city. We had until about 4:45 till everyone had to leave on their train home. Seeing as it was just Mark and I and there were 3 girls, they all wanted to shopping so Mark and I tagged along... boring!!! :)
(Sorry Bell went, finish this blog later)
Sunday 4th
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This morning was not so much an early start as yesterday was. We left around 9:00 to get to the station to meet everyone at 10:00 (all the exchange students from my district). Today we went with the town 葵東 (Aoi Higashi) with My counsellor and Ishihara san (from Ishihara supermarkets). At the start of the day we went to the kites again and after about midday we went off into the city for a long dinner (it started around 3 and ended at around 6) at a local restaurant. We had some 'interesting' food that we tasted... one of the least liked was the unagi liver (eel liver). After we went off to our new town's HQ to start the 'parade'. In the parade, we were to pull the small houses around the streets. In the houses they had girls playing drums, shamisens and flutes to a song that pretty much every house was playing. Every town in hamamatsu city had a little house pulled by people from that town. After pulling for a while we finished up and went home and went to karaoke.
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This morning was not so much an early start as yesterday was. We left around 9:00 to get to the station to meet everyone at 10:00 (all the exchange students from my district). Today we went with the town 葵東 (Aoi Higashi) with My counsellor and Ishihara san (from Ishihara supermarkets). At the start of the day we went to the kites again and after about midday we went off into the city for a long dinner (it started around 3 and ended at around 6) at a local restaurant. We had some 'interesting' food that we tasted... one of the least liked was the unagi liver (eel liver). After we went off to our new town's HQ to start the 'parade'. In the parade, we were to pull the small houses around the streets. In the houses they had girls playing drums, shamisens and flutes to a song that pretty much every house was playing. Every town in hamamatsu city had a little house pulled by people from that town. After pulling for a while we finished up and went home and went to karaoke.
Wow! I am ど?@つかれた! These past few days have been fantastic.. I will start from the beginning.
Saturday 3rd, Sunday 4th and Monday 5th were my town's matsuri (festival).
On Friday night, we picked up Takeshi Ishii (I stayed with Takeshi when I went to Itami 2 years ago with school (Osaka, Hyogo-ken) and stayed at my house when he came to my Australian school for two weeks). For those of you who want to know how Takeshi is going, he has become the Kendo Captain and is 2 dai? (Some sort of kendo level?). The next day had been all planned for us and we were to be going to Nakatajima 中田島?@to fly the huge small car sized kites with ishimizu san (A Rotarian from my club)?@and his town (Hikuma-cho). I got a bit of a tan and a red neck from staying in the sun a lot of the day, but I had a great time. I was allowed to fly the kite by myself for a few minutes, but I only lasted a few minutes because it is very tiring! You have to stand up and then site down with the string to create a kind of wind for the kite to fly while running backwards and then suddenly you run forward I think to get the kite to catch the wind and finally get up by itself in the sky. In order to do this, everyone runs around in a circle pulling the rope as they go to bring the kite up in the air. The kites are flown to celebrate the birth of a first son and each kite is dedicated to that child with their family symbol on the kite. During the child's kite's flight, they carry the child on their shoulders while everyone crowds around them and shouts 'Washoi!' with the drums, horns and whistles. After flying the kites and running around for a while we all got very tired and everything started finishing up so we went home to sleep... Not much sleep was done as we only had an hour and also the Rotarian snored like you have never heard someone snore before!! At around 6:30 p.m. we left and walked to the city's HQ where all the people going in the festival (from this part of the town) meet. Everyone from the same section of the town all where the same happi (a type of coat with the kanji of your town printed on the back (this is your ticket into the town's festival). At the night festival, we all got together at the HQ and then marched around the streets of the town. On the way throught the town we make a lot of noise (using the drums, rappa and whistle and everyone who is just marching goes 'washoi!' to the houses of the first son to eat and drink. When they get to the house they run around the flags of the town with the music and shout 'BANZAI!' a few times and then run around the flags again and then banzai and around and banzai... by the end you are so tired. We then either go to the next house or stay at that house so eat heaps and also drink heaps (not that I would drink anything as I am a Rotary exchange student) but wow can Japanese people drink at festivals! At the house where you stay for a while, the family supplies a sake (japanese alcohol) bottle with the photo of the child on it and everyone pours it into a big bowl to drink from or just drink from the bottle (as another town did when I saw it) while everyone chants 'washoi!' (or at one town they sang 'when the Saints go marching in' in Japanese.
That was about the end of it as I had to go home. The next day would be pretty big too as everyone would be coming.
Saturday 3rd, Sunday 4th and Monday 5th were my town's matsuri (festival).
On Friday night, we picked up Takeshi Ishii (I stayed with Takeshi when I went to Itami 2 years ago with school (Osaka, Hyogo-ken) and stayed at my house when he came to my Australian school for two weeks). For those of you who want to know how Takeshi is going, he has become the Kendo Captain and is 2 dai? (Some sort of kendo level?). The next day had been all planned for us and we were to be going to Nakatajima 中田島?@to fly the huge small car sized kites with ishimizu san (A Rotarian from my club)?@and his town (Hikuma-cho). I got a bit of a tan and a red neck from staying in the sun a lot of the day, but I had a great time. I was allowed to fly the kite by myself for a few minutes, but I only lasted a few minutes because it is very tiring! You have to stand up and then site down with the string to create a kind of wind for the kite to fly while running backwards and then suddenly you run forward I think to get the kite to catch the wind and finally get up by itself in the sky. In order to do this, everyone runs around in a circle pulling the rope as they go to bring the kite up in the air. The kites are flown to celebrate the birth of a first son and each kite is dedicated to that child with their family symbol on the kite. During the child's kite's flight, they carry the child on their shoulders while everyone crowds around them and shouts 'Washoi!' with the drums, horns and whistles. After flying the kites and running around for a while we all got very tired and everything started finishing up so we went home to sleep... Not much sleep was done as we only had an hour and also the Rotarian snored like you have never heard someone snore before!! At around 6:30 p.m. we left and walked to the city's HQ where all the people going in the festival (from this part of the town) meet. Everyone from the same section of the town all where the same happi (a type of coat with the kanji of your town printed on the back (this is your ticket into the town's festival). At the night festival, we all got together at the HQ and then marched around the streets of the town. On the way throught the town we make a lot of noise (using the drums, rappa and whistle and everyone who is just marching goes 'washoi!' to the houses of the first son to eat and drink. When they get to the house they run around the flags of the town with the music and shout 'BANZAI!' a few times and then run around the flags again and then banzai and around and banzai... by the end you are so tired. We then either go to the next house or stay at that house so eat heaps and also drink heaps (not that I would drink anything as I am a Rotary exchange student) but wow can Japanese people drink at festivals! At the house where you stay for a while, the family supplies a sake (japanese alcohol) bottle with the photo of the child on it and everyone pours it into a big bowl to drink from or just drink from the bottle (as another town did when I saw it) while everyone chants 'washoi!' (or at one town they sang 'when the Saints go marching in' in Japanese.
That was about the end of it as I had to go home. The next day would be pretty big too as everyone would be coming.
Thursday, May 01, 2003
Well.... Over the next few days I am going to be extremely busy! On the 3rd 4th and 5th days of this month, I have my town's festival. On the 3rd, Takeshi Ishii from Itami (I stayed with him when I went to Itami and he stayed with us when he came to Australia) will be coming down (as it is holidays for everyone) to see the festival. He will stay till the next day (4th) and go home later that day. On the 4th, all the Rotary exchange students from the district are coming down to see the festival. They will be staying until the 5th and then go home. The Rotarians in my club have organised for everyone to receive happis (the stripey coats for the festival) and that means that everyone can participate in the festival.. i think flying kites, carrying the floats, going in the night festival, and other stuff I don't know about yet! I'll have to tell you once I have done it. Thats all so far! My new host family is pretty kewl and their house is very large with a great Japanese garden. I live on the second floor in a room where everything is new including the chairs, desk and bed. They have a karaoke machine (not a real one) but a dvd player that allows you to put in normal cds and kinda block the voice and you can sing into a mic (cos there is a slot for one). You can buy karaoke dvd cds but there are not many (or any) that have english songs on them! さんねん! Well thats it for now. Bye Bye!
