- sleepless beast -

currently listening to - Sleepless Beauty (K.ITO + D.K)
mood - i think i have panda eyes

finally we received our UA tanka collection. we've read the poems written by students from the previous year (according to our teacher, every year the UA students will create a tanka collection). there were funny ones, but most of the poems were serious: environment, homeland, etc etc..

just wondering why our batch is so.... half-hearted? don't know what's the correct word. we just love to fool around. not that we're the worst students, since the essay teacher praised that we're the most responsible (but not so punctual) students that he ever had. though our japanese culture teacher did complain that we're the noisiest people ever.

with that i'd like to share a few poems that we made during class.

一　　今日こそは　学校に行く　私だが　漢字のテスト　終わるまで待つ
(i swear i'll go to school today. but after the kanji test ends.)

二　　淋しいな　誰かお誘い　くださいな　彼氏がほしい　彼氏がほしい
(i am so lonely. someone please seduce me. i want a boyfriend. i want a boyfriend.)

三　　どうしよう　せっかく見つけた　プレゼント　よく見てみると　非売品だよ
(what am i supposed to do? i thought i finally found a present.
but after looking at it carefully, it's actually not for sale.)

四　　クリスマス　手紙をゲット　でも実は　「十二千払え」　請求書だった
(i received a letter during christmas. but it's actually the telephone bill asking for 12k.)

五　　オンナとは　執念深い　生き物だ　一度キレたら　逃げ道はない
(women are implacable creatures. once they snap, you have nowhere to escape.)

etc etc etc.... i'm too lazy to translate all of them.

personally i love the 2nd one. man, if we showed this to the japanese culture teacher, he must think that we're crazy...

of course there are proper poems as well.. like..

火のように　始まり強く　火のように　風に吹かれて　人生終わる
(life begins intensely, just like fire. and ends just like fire when blown by wind.)

let's just hope my scholarship won't end like that as well.

*****

1) tanka - japanese short poem. it consists of 5 units, usually with the 5-7-5-7-7 mora pattern.

- todai interview day. thesis due tomorrow...!!! -

currently listening to - Jupiter (Hirahara Ayaka)
mood - headache

phrase of the day:


「くすり」を逆で読むと「リスク」

meaning.. ku-su-ri (medicine), when read backwards, it's ri-su-ku (risk). how true.

after a short vacation (?) in Tokyo, i returned to Osaka. tried to continue my thesis but my head decided to sabotage me. hence i died in the room till this morning.. the headache still plagued me when i woke up for school (listening skills classes..). well it wasn't so bad that i had to take panadol (wait, have i ever taken a panadol when i had a very bad headache...?) ........................

anyhow.

had my late lunch while watching tv. and found out that some high-school girl fell off the balcony and died.. due to the intake of oseltamivir. a kind of strong antiviral drug that's used to treat influenza viruses..? though the usage's legally approved, it's said to cause hallucinations and stuff.. and apparently in japan (since the introduction of the drug) there have been quite a few cases (more than 15?) which middle-school kids died after the intake of this drug.

scary....

*****

so people have been complaining (?) about me abandoning the blog.

no i'm not.

just had some problems posting... the "save as draft" and "post" buttons weren't working. actually they still AREN'T working but i solved the problem by using the "ctrl + d" and "ctrl + s" keys... and i've not been able to use the internet for a few days because i went to Tokyo for some personal, official business...

*****

thought of going to Tokyo on 10th (tuesday) night instead of 13th (wednesday) but i had to attend the sakubun lessons for my thesis's sake.

so i arrived at Shinjuku station, half dead. i didn't know how i did it but i made it to my senpai's apartment by following the instructions she gave me through mail. and died till noon. in fact i wouldn't have wanted to wake up if i hadn't had to go for an interview for the dormitory..

both the interviews for the dormitory (14 feb) and the university (15 feb) were held at TIT, which is at Oookayama (i'm pretty sure i didn't misspell anything accidentally coz it's おおおかやま in hiragana and it's written 大岡山 in kanji), which is near Meguro.. and for 2 days i did nothing except exploring around the campus. flat place, unlike gaidai. and i think it's much more convenient than gaidai since there's a train station, a McD outlet, a super(expensive)market and a (small) shopping street right next to the university.

the interviews were.... weird. the one for the dormitory was short (less than 15 minutes) and it's conducted to all 4 candidates at the same time (group interview). everyone was asked the same question: give a 3-minute speech about yourself and state reasons why do you want to enter the dormitory. actually the reasons are all written on the application form but i guess the invigilators wanted to do so to test our japanese speaking skills? everything went on so-so (all of us fumbled in front of the many 20 "audiences" in the interview room) when suddenly the 1st candidate (the only person who's not from our gaidai) stood up and said, in japanese,

"excuse me may i 1st have a look at the environment of the dormitory? i heard that the dirtiness of the dorm's way beyond imagination."

a few invigilators grinned.

next it was the university interview. there were 3 invigilators (the candidates before me had 5 or more) and each took turns to ask random questions. really RANDOM questions. from "why did you apply to TIT?" to "so, which building in TIT interests you most?" "what's the biggest difference between TIT and your current university?" (hint: i'm majoring in architecture). for the latter 2 questions, i said "the foreign student center, coz unlike the other buildings it looks old - oops - ANTIQUE..." and "my current university has a lot of saka (coz it's in O-saka).." respectively.

and for the "which building in Japan do you like most?" i anyhow answered "the tokyo tower". but i refrained from giving any reasons (they might have sounded lame too).

say, am i the 1st UA student to make invigilators laugh?

actually my mom laughed at me too when i told her about this. damn.

the remaining 2 days i spent my time searching for an apartment (just in case i'm disqualified for the dorm) as well as eating with friends. on friday my host-senpai (not THAT host, i meant host for accommodation) treated me an italian (?) set dinner at Shinagawa, which was fabulous. mmmmm mouth-watering.. man, that was good. by paying 3k yen you can get 2 persons worth of pasta + pizza + cake + drink. and it's not some normal-sized pasta it's BIG. the pizza was slightly thin but the entire meal was freaking filling. don't you just love senpais?

on saturday, before i took the night bus back to Osaka, i ate at a Korean BBQ restaurant with a few friends (2 who came to tokyo for todai interview, a korean friend from Denki Tsuushin University, a japanese friend who's looking for a job in Tokyo, and a Indonesian senpai). the eat-all-you-want yakiniku course. yahoo, there goes my money.... i swear that's the last expensive meal that i'll ever eat before shifting and settling down..

and i felt bad (a bit) for smelling like yakiniku when i planted my ass on the night bus's seat. my mouth must've smelled bad too.

*****

1) sakubun - essay (japanese)
2) saka - slope(s)
3) yakiniku - grilled meat

- 気がつけばもう２月だ -

currently listening to - Ayumi (Aqua Timez)
mood - bored

ねえ土方さん・・・「てとりす」っちゅうゲーム出来ますかぃ？俺・・・自分で言うのもなんなんだけど、結構強いですぜぃ。見よこのハイスコアー・・・！！

こんなキレーな点数、土方さんには取れないと思いますけど。これぁ一日で成し遂げられるもんじゃあないですぜぃ！！「ローマは一日で滅びた」っちゅうコトワザ知ってますかぃ？俺ァサボってなんかしてませんぜぃ。毎日毎日（副長の座を奪うために）この神技を磨いてるさ！！！！どっかの不真面目なマヨラーと違ってさぁ・・・

by 沖田　ザ・テトリスキング

*****

okay forget about the nonsense above. i know i said "rome wasn't destroyed in one day". it's done on purpose. just to fit Okita's (or rather Sorachi's?) style. by the way, for those who don't have a clue who the hell is the figurine on my mobile strap... he's Okita Sougo from a parody manga Gintama by Sorachi Hideaki.

*****

by the way, happy belated new year.

and also happy birthday to my dear younger sister who turned 15 today. hope you still remember how your elder sibling look like.

man, january ended so fast. and i haven't actually finished my 2006 tokyo-nagano-tokyo report. assignments piled up at a high speed... currently things i have to finish (or at least complete 4/5 of the entire thing) by next week: draft for graduation thesis, essay for japanese culture test, script for presentation test, resume for presentation test, ppt for presentation test, essay for maths test (don't ask me why essay), answers for past-year questions for university's interview, wrap and send somebody's birthday present, etc etc etc i can't remember....

how i've been spending my time.... wake up 9am unwillingly > restraining hard from skipping classes > dash down to the notice board for more information about tokodai during breaks > complain about workload > internet > assignment > sleep (around 2am during weekdays).

interesting things that happened.... one of our classmates brought durian sweets for her presentation on "introduce your country's cultural events" during japanese culture. half the class gave this unexplainable expression after smelling the distinctive "scent" of durians. to speak the truth, the remaining people in the class who didn't show funny faces were the southeast asians, and for unknown reasons, the american, who screamed "it stinks!!!... it's good....... it stinks!!!! but it's good......" in japanese while eating the sweets.

the japanese culture teacher freaked out at the smell, and for a few times, he wanted to throw up.

nothing much.... tiresome days continue.... 2 more weeks to finals and we'll be free..

*****

1) ppt - power point. that's the word our lecturers used when i was in singapore.
2) tokodai - Tokyo Institute of Technology. the university that i'm trying to enter. interview coming on 15th feb.