Yesterday I finished my undergrad at the University of Michigan. Bill Clinton was our commencement speaker, which was incredibly awesome. The weather also finally got nice just as the ceremony started (albeit 30 minutes late).
In 3 days I’m leaving for a 3-week stay in Europe. I’ll be hitting Paris, Venice, London and Dublin. I will be blogging about it, hopefully to the same degree as when I was blogging in Japan. Stay tubed.
Finals are coming, grad school aps are almost due, and I’m about to take the GRE. No time for blogging. Expect a site overhaul sometime in January, at which time hopefully I will continue blogging on a regular basis……
There only 2 days and like 20 hours left until the big Michigan-Ohio State football match-up. The buzz on campus is getting louder and louder as the day approaches. Just about the only thing that I overhear people talking about is the game, whos gonna win, and where they’re gonna be when its ok. For the record, I’m gonna be camping out in line probably 2 hours early to get into BW3 to watch the game. Sounds kinda crazy, I know, but I’m sure there will be a line. So if anyone wants to join me, 3:30pm on Saturday at BW3.
GO BLUE!!!
….Geordi!
Yeah, I’ve actually had her for over a month now, and haven’t written about it. I actually haven’t writen about much of everything. I could say I’ve been really busy with classes, or midterms are killing me, but the truth is that I’m lazy. 
But seriously, another reason that I haven’t written about her yet, is she hasn’t really had a name until now. In fact, I can’t even say for certain that her current name will remain her permanent name (though I’m trying really hard to make it stick). See, first her name was Frida (after Frida Kahlo), which I kinda liked but after maybe 2 weeks of calling her that, I was more liable to call her ‘Black Pig’ than Frida. So it was then changed to Fudge, but once we started calling her Fudgie, it sounded just like Fuji, so that was scraped as well. Next her name was suggested as Lucy, but I didn’t really care for it. Since I’ve had a guinea pig with a Lord of the Rings character name, I pondered maybe a Star Trek name for this new one (yeah I know, I’m a geek). So first came Darmok (which I’m not gonna even bother to explain, if you know what I am referring to then just say to yourself in your head “Darmok and Fuji….at the waterbottle”), but now we’ve settled on Geordi, and so far it seems to be fitting.
Some interesting info on Geordi, this is the first guinea pig that I’ve bough from a breeder. I drove down to Plymouth, MI to the house of a woman who raises guinea pigs for show, and who happened to have a male and a female all black American short haired, a variety of guinea pig that I’ve been wanting to buy for quite a while. When I bought her, she was 7 weeks old, and when I got to their house I was informed that her birthday was July 31! So yes, I think it must have been fate… So far she and Fuji are getting along great, despite a week of Fuji acting like the dominant pig towards Geordi, who still tears around the tank when you try to pick her up, but is starting to calm down a little bit. Her nails are still insanely sharp though!!
A few weeks ago, I noticed that Samwise was starting to look a bit thin. I started weighing her on an almost daily basis only to find that she was gradually losing weight. After a week and losing about 100g (she went from around 920g to 818g), I finally took her to the vet, who wasn’t really sure what was going on with her, but gave me several medications to try to see if they helped. She seemed to be perking up a bit, but then late Sunday afternoon she stopped eating. Because I had class on Monday morning, my mom had to take her to see my vet, who told her that she had just kind of given up and that her gut was essentially dead. She then had to be put to sleep. This condition, called gut stasis, where their guts just seem to stop working for no apparent reason, has happened to a number of my guinea pigs, including Samwise some years ago, but usually with swift medical treatment and forced feeding for several days, they snap out of it. Sometimes this works, and on a few occasions it hasn’t. Sadly, this was one of those times.
Samwise had a great personality, and she and Fuji got along so well together. Any time I would bring treats over to their cage, rustle a plastic bag, or even just walk by, Samwise would run over to the side and stand up on her back legs, while squeaking at my loudly so that I would come and give her pets for feed her. She lived a pretty long life for a guinea pig, but I had hoped it would have been much longer than this…..she is missed.
Here are a few of my favorite pictures of her:
Also thanks to everyone who sent me email or messages of condolences. If I didn’t reply, I apologize, but I appreciated it.
I’m taking time out of my busy day of procrastinating from my homework (who else waits till Sunday to do it all? I bet most of you..) to finally get caught up on recent events.
Close to a month ago, someone that I met in Japan, who was now spending a few months studying in Toronto, rode down to meet me. Or, I should say, took the Greyhound bus from Toronto to Detroit, where they then missed the bus from Detroit to Ann Arbor due to someone taking a long time in customs, and Greyhound in Detroit told the some 20 people who were then stranded that they were SOL because it was the last bus for the night. Driving down in the pouring rain, my mom and I went to pick up Megumi. I met Megumi at Kyoto Women’s University, when I went for a party with some other JCMUers to meet all the students who were English majors. Her English was pretty good when I had seen her a year ago, and it was really good now. For the next two days we had fun driving around Ann Arbor, walking around campus, grilling steaks in the backyard, and going to Cabellas. The time ended with visiting the Greyhound station in Ann Arbor only to find that the bus was more than an hour late, and would never get there in time for Megumi to make her connection in Detroit to get to Toronto. Since I had to go to a meeting for job #2, my mom drove her all the way back to Detroit. She emailed me later to say that the bus from Ann Arbor never came, and if she had waited for it she wouldn’t have made it to Toronto until the next day. Way to go, mass transportation in the US, you failed twice and made me feel ashamed to be an American showing a Japanese around the place.
Dead animals at Cabellas!
About ~3 weeks ago classes at U of M finally started up again. I was excited and dreading it at the same time. The first thing that I had to do, was take a placement test for Japanese class, on Labor day of all things (good thing I didn’t have any exciting plans). I studied a little bit…I figured that since it would essentially be a test of my ability to know second-year material, that’s what I focused my study on. What I found out, was the test was more like a test of everything from the last two chapters of the textbook Genki II, the textbook used by U of M. Every grammar pattern and kanji from those chapters was in it. Naturally, that was like the only thing I hadn’t focused my study on and the particular grammar patterns were ones that I was never that good at. Needless to say, going the next day to check my score I found that they listed me under the “you should try taking the test for level 2 second semester”. I walked right into the new building housing the Asian Languages & Cultures department on Thayer St. (which is originally named the ‘Thayer Building’), and found the teacher for third-year Japanese where I proceeded to beg my way into the third-year class. She wasn’t even going to let me until I told her that I was a Senior until she told me “oh, I understand” and told me to try it out for two weeks to see how I did. She even told me that the Japanese classes at JCMU were “too easy” which started to make me really worried, and I started doubting if I was even as good at Japanese as I thought I was.
Its now 3 weeks later, and I’ve been doing great in Japanese class. It’s incredibly easy and fun. I hardly have to prepare for class (which is only 3 times a week), and there’s never a day that we have homework and a quiz on the same days (which, if we compare to JCMU, where in 3rd year I routinely had AT LEAST 3 hours worth of homework to do a night, and had anywhere from 1-3 quizzes a day). When I had to turn in a homework assignment after class one day, the teacher even told me that I’ve been doing well and that I’m encouraging people in class due to my random utterings of words/phrases that I know in class. So, yippie, she doesn’t hate me after all. 
Once school started up again, I also started another job. Not unlike my job in the med school where I sit at a help desk and wait for students to come ask me questions and also monitor a computer lab, job #2 is working in the school of education for media services, where I sit at a desk and wait for students to come ask me questions and also to check out A/V equipment. Both jobs are pretty nice since I get to sit there and surf the net or work on my homework if I want to.
In order news, I finally have gotten my hands on a white PSP from Japan. It took me almost a month and three tries, but I finally have one. Now, if you aren’t familiar with PSPs, they are a hand held gaming system, not unlike a GameBoy, only nicer, with a big screen that is perfect for watching movies or maybe some anime episodes. Since its the Japanese version of the PSP, and Japan doesn’t really like to export video games/consoles that are made in Japan, I had to buy it from an importer in Hong Kong. (And the reason I got a Japanese PSP? Because the white one isn’t available in the US, and its from Japan, so I get bragging rights. ) Well, I found a few websites that were selling them, and settled on one that I had heard good things about. The only thing that stopped me from buying was the fact that they charged $27 for shipping. Ugh. So, doing some more research, I found another importer that operated through ebay. They were also in Hong Kong, and their price was a couple bucks cheaper than the other online store that I had found. They also promised shipping within 1-3 days, and had something like 15,000+ positive feedbacks. So, feeling confident, I ordered one. Waiting about a week, I finally get a box from Hong Kong…..only to find that they sent me a Chinese PSP. Now, this might not seem like a big difference to you, but China and Japan are both in seperate DVD region codes, China being in Region 3 and Japan in Region 2. A PSP can play mini-DVD’s (called UMD’s), but only UMD’s from the region code that is allowed by the PSP. Since I highly doubt that I’d ever buy a UMD of a US movie, and would more likely buy a Japanese one (mostly because Japanese DVD prices are generally around $60 a piece, while Japanese UMD’s are usually $20 or less). So, I can’t play a Japanese UMD on a Chinese PSP. Very unhappy, I send the seller an email about my order, in which they say they are very sorry and will send me a replacement right away, as long as I would send the other PSP back to them at my own expense (which they promised they would refund me via Paypal). Shipping back to Hong Kong cost me $18, but I was feeling confident that they would correct the mistake.
I had to wait another week for the next package to arrive, and when I got home that day after failing my Japanese placement test and getting a speeding ticket the night before, I opened the box only to find….IT WAS ANOTHER CHINESE PSP!! I was pissed. An email was sent out immediately, demanding a refund of the money spent on the PSP, along with the $18 I had already spent, and the $18 it would cost to send PSP #2 back. (Know that the Chinese PSP’s also came with AC adaptors with plugs meant for Europe, so I couldn’t use it even if I wanted to.) Going back through their list of items for sale, they list only Japanese PSPs, they didn’t even officially have any Chinese PSP’s for sale. Add this to the fact that a person who bought the same item I did, in the same auction I did, also received a Chinese PSP from them, and I was starting to think that they didn’t actually have any Japanese PSP’s for sale, and were in fact scamming their customers who probably wouldn’t even notice the difference. Eventually I got an email from the seller, saying that they would only refund me after I sent the PSP back to them. Well, I wasn’t really going to trust them to refund me almost $250 when I still hadn’t gotten the $18 that was promised to me. Luckily, I did have place to turn to get help: Visa. Yes, all that money they’ve been sucking out of me in the form of interest finally was put to good use, as I was able to call up a customer service agent at Visa, who helped me to file a dispute to get my money back. After I gave them all of my info, the guy told me that my money would be refunded to me within 2 business days, and that unless there was some other problem, it was a done deal. So, more than two business days later, I now have my money back minus $18, and a Chinese PSP. I did eventually order a Japanese one, from the site that I had originally intended to use, and have been playing games and watching videos on it at home and school. The Chinese PSP is still sitting here, since I don’t want to do anything to it incase Visa wants me to send it back. And I would send it back, if the ebay seller would refund my $18 and pay for the shipping back to them. I really don’t want to steal stuff from them, and was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt that they made a mistake…. They haven’t emailed me back about the issue so I guess I’ll leave it at that. My sister now wants the PSP really bad, so I have to decide if I want to sell it on ebay for $200+ or half sell half give it to her. Its not going anywhere though until I know for sure that the seller isn’t going to demand it back…
Isn’t it purdy?
Today was a very fun day. Cassidy came over this morning and the four of us piled into the car and drove to Novi, where our first stop was ‘Pastry House Hippo’, a very cool Japanese bakery that I have visited a few times before. We bought red bean rolls, pig shaped buns, and tasty Japanese square bread. While we munched, we traversed over to Twelve Oaks mall (why 12? Not sure.) For the next two hours or so we wandered the mall in search of moderately priced, yet trendy clothing for the fall season. Since I literally threw away most of my long-sleeved shirts when I was packing to leave Japan (I still had to throw out old clothing and other stuff that didn’t fit into my three suitcases + 2 boxes that I sent back through the mail), my mission of the day was to secure a few turtlenecks, at the very least. Two hours later, we had circled the mall and picked up a few new goodies (there was one store that had 3 t-shirts for sale with kanji on them…..I think this is probably more than they sell in all of Japan).
After stopping for lunch to get some BBQ at a nearby Famous Dave’s (we don’t have any in Ann Arbor 
), we drove home and made an impromptu decision to stop by Cassidy’s apartment to grab her scrapbooking items. We then spent the next ~5 hours sitting in the living room, working on our Japan scrapbooks, and watching Michigan absolutely trash Notre Dame 47-21 (best moment: watching two players empty a 5-gal. bucket of ice water down the back of LLoyd Carr). After we got tired of scrapbooking, we made a quick run to McDonalds and came back and enjoyed an episode of Law and Order: SVU.
Coming up tomorrow, a new member of the family will be introduced if all goes well. Hopefully I can make the time tomorrow to write about that, as well as catch up on the last 2+ weeks: school starting, job #2, Megumi’s stay, PSP woes, and some news on the piggy front. Stay tuned…
If you read my Japan blog, you might recall the time that I went to a party at Kyoto Women’s Univeristy. They had invited a few people from JCMU to come to a party to speak in English to their English majors. While I was there I met a girl named Megumi (you can see her on the very left of this picture), and after I went back to JCMU we continued to email back and forth, until we met up again with her and her friend, and Cassidy came along to visit Kinkakuji, Ginkakuji, and Kiyomizu one freezing cold day where it was pouring rain for most of it. Well, now Megumi is staying with a host family in Toronto until the beginning of September, and since we’re so close, she’s going to come and visit me for 2.5 days next week! Somehow I’m going to get the day off of work and we will have fun on U of M’s campus and do whatever else she wants to do.
So last Friday I attempted to gather a bunch of JCMUers for a little reunion/Snakes on a Plane viewing party. Well, of the 20 some people that I invited, I heard back from 4 of them, and 3 of them emailed me saying that they couldn’t come. But luckily Brian, who had been reminding me about SoaP for about 4 months, did come as promised, so it was a party of 4 people. We had some Snakes on a Plane cake that my sister spent the whole day working on, while playing Taiko Drum Master and Guitar Hero on the PS2 and looking at what I’ve gotten to so far on my Japan scrapbook. Around 9:15pm we headed out to the theater for the 9:40pm showing. We went really early because we figured that the theater would be packed, but sadly there turned out to be only about 20 of us that showed up for that showing. Those 20, however, were incredibly enthusiastic and vocal, with one girl even coming in with a plushy snake around her neck. The movie turned out to be incredibly entertaining, with about 25% of the entertainment value coming from the other people in the theater laughing and interacting with the movie. I was very sad to learn that it only made $15 million its opening weekend, but it lived up to the hype!!
And here are some pics of the Snakes on a Cake. It turned out awesome.
Yeah so I’ve been slacking on the blog. Face it, nothing I do in Ann Arbor will be as exciting as my adventures in Japan. However, once school starts up I will attempt to be as faithful to my regular life blog as I was to my Japan life blog, if there is anyone out there that is actually reading. I might also be changing the design on this one because the temple is starting to bore me a bit…(maybe I’ll be really boring and just modify the theme from my Japan blog with a new picture and some different colors…). Anyway, faithful readers, don’t despair, my blog will make a comeback…sooner rather than later.
