Life is Good

Kominn tími til, ekki satt?
Oups, sorry, I forgot I'm blogging in English. But see that 'oups'? That's French, isn't it? There are still some things that I say or do in French. Like I play with my baby sister Hekla in French, hiding my face, then showing it to her saying 'coucou!'. The Icelandic way is to hide behind some thing or another so that she can't see you, then gasp and say 'where is Hekla? Is Hekla lost?' (all in Icelandic of course), then come forward saying 'there she iiis!'.

Life is good. Do I need say more? I guess I do. So I'll say it once more: Life is good.
I'm happy. Butterflies and flowers, and Hello Kitties all over. Japan is so horribly cute and it's getting to me. There's no escaping it. There's even a Hello Kitty amusement park here, called Harmonyland, and I bought a diary for school with a picture of a pink cake and red rasperries on the cover. Sugar overdose just by looking at it. So sweet. So cute. So happy-go-lucky. ^_^kawaii!

When I talk in English, for some reason I mix Icelandic with it from time to time. I don't know if anyone notices, because it's words like 'nei' (no) and 'og' (and) and 'eða' (or), which are so short. And I think I do it most often if I am stammering in search for words, so what I am saying is all mumble jumble anyway.

So, we went to Nagasaki, didn't we. I guess I ought to tell you about that trip. It's quite interesting how things turned out. Yes, yes indeed. Facts like "takes four hours by bus from Beppu Train Station. Somewhat faster if we just go by train" turned out to be, well, not so true after all.
We woke up at seven, left the building about maybe an hour later, and were at Beppu Train Station round 9 in the morning. That's when ATM and Tourist Information hunting began. Took some time, but we found out that the bus was fully booked and the train didn't leave until 10:20 or something. We took the train. Better seats, ne? We only had to change trains once, but we only had four minutes to do that. Just try to guess if that is enough time for people who have never gone this way before, people who are going by the Japanese Railway system for the first time.
Because we missed the train, we had to wait for an hour to get the next one. And with our cheap tickets, we had no reserved seats. We stood for almost two hours on that train, crammed with Japanese people. Like some Japanese men who were touching each others' hair, talking about how soft it was and if they had hairgel or not.
We got to Nagasaki by five in the afternoon.
Our free guide was nowhere to be found (well duh, she thought we were going to be there round noon), so we had to find a hotel/motel/youth hostel/ryoukan/capsul hotel by ourselves. For those who don't know capsule hotels, here's a description: Try crawling under your bed, put a door on it so you can have privacy, and sleep there for a night. It's just a tiny space where you can sleep for one night. Just a bed with a door. For those who don't know what a ryoukan is, it's just a japanese-style hotel.
So we went to the tourist information desk, where this lovely lady informed us that Nagasaki's greatest festival was opening the day after, and all hotels were fully booked.
A good fellow Japanese student (totally European): All of them?
Tourist Info Lady: Yes.
Us: All of them?
TI Lady: Yes.
Nika: What about just Motels or Youth Hostels?
TI Lady: Oh yes, there are a few of those, but they're quite far away.
Nika: What about a ryoukan? Or a capsule hotel?
The TI Lady looks at us funny. Then gently, but with determination tells us that 'Capsule hotels are not for ladies'.
Oh.
A good fellow Japanese student (totally Scandinavian): How far away is the Motel?
Nika: What about the ryoukan?
The TI Lady shows us on the map and explains. The ryoukan is two or three tram-stops away, but the youth hostel is half an hour or more away up in the hill side. And it's just a big big room whith matresses where we would sleep with thirty other people. And there are no reservations. You just go there. And you can't leave your stuff there, you just come to sleep. Once you're inside, you don't leave unless you're checking out.
All of us: This one, the ryoukan please.
The TI Lady looks at us funny.
If I were you, she says, I would choose this one, the youth hostel.
For some reason she's looking at me and Nika.
Me: Why?
The TI Lady: If I were you I would choose this one, the youth hostel.
Me: Why?
The TI Lady: If Iwere you I would choose this one, the youth hostel.
Me: ???
And we just decide to go to the ryoukan, that is much more interesting to sleep at a real Japanese-style hotel/motel than at that youth-hostel thing. We say thank you and good bye to the TI Lady who still looks at us funny. She does not agree with our decision.
And god only knows why! That was one of the most wonderful places to stay at you could possibly imagine! True, the doors were so low that the guys (good fellow Japanese students who from now on will be called by their names, Bart and Even, because the other thing takes too long to write) had to bow down to get through, but there were tatami mats on the floors, futon to sleep on and a hot Japanese bath downstairs! We had TV (with Gundam), eacon (mmm, airconditioning...), Japanese tea waiting for us, bathrobes, and our rooms were side by side, with big sliding windows, so that we could talk with each other by hanging out of windows. It was sugeee! It was the best place ever! And I almost lost the key to the room.

Somehow we found Bart's friend in Nagasaki and she became our free guide like planned. They are both from the Netherlands and we got to see a lot of Dutch culture. I'm not kidding, the museums in Nagasaki are filled with Dutch things. It was very strange to see, a Japanese house, with sliding paper doors and tatami mats, then furnished in European style. Furniture, looking like it belonged to my grandparents sitting on tatami mats just seemed so wrong. How could they place a bed, a high table and chairs on the tatami mats? And the furniture was ugly too, my grandparents used to have the same style, just much better and more beutiful.
The reason for the Duch culture in Nagasaki is that while Japan was a closed country, the Dutch were allowed to trade with them, and they were allowed to live on this tiny island by Nagasaki. Funny, all the information they had on the Dutch there, and all that I had learned about them in History last year, and the paintings are the only ones who mention the slaves. In the pictures, the place was full of little black boys. They were everywhere. But nowhere in the books or leaflets. Why were they all kids? Where were all the adults? They were all smaller than the Japanese, who were a lot smaller than all the red-headed Dutchmen. (all the Dutch had red hair in the paintings)
Oh, and we saw Chinese drangon dance.
And non-geisha girls dancing to bless companies.
And some amazing Japanese traditional parade, or dance.
But mostly Dutch things. I've been tempted to change my blog url into japanskaedahollenska.blogspot.com. I've been hearing a lot of Dutch these last two weeks or so. Wow, it's already been over a week since I went to Nagasaki. Time flies :)
And mid-term exams are coming up. One on Monday. One 2000 words essay for Monday after that. Still don't know about the other two subjects I'm taking.
But my shoulders are aching, and it's really late. I'll have to stop now. Hope it wasn't too boring.

Main Characters
I: Solveig, an exchange student from HÍ to APU in Japan. On a journey to Nagasaki.
Nika: My classmate and also an exchange student to APU. On a journey to Nagasaki.
Bart: A good fellow Japanese student (totally European). On a journey to meet friends in Nagasaki.
Even: A good fellow Japanese student (totally Scandinavian). On a journey to Nagasaki.