September came and went like the cicada's summer song.

Ziz and I both bought the same bed
and for that moment, we ruled Ikea. 

What's new? I bought a lofted bed from Ikea! It was my first Ikea experience and my plan was to get like a table or something so of course I left with a bunk bed. When I first saw the bed I was in awe, paralyzed by the endless possibilities. Lofting my bed means I have approximately 50% more apartment space since my main room is pretty small. Right now I'm sitting underneath my bed in my computer cave.

This is me feeding my cousin Lea some yakisoba. There was a festival outside my Uncle's house so we all checked it out and got some yummy festival food. Lea decided that my yakisoba was a lot yummier than her edamame, and so I spent about 15 minutes feeding her. Noodle by noodle. I treasure our bonding time. I think she knows me as the lady who feeds her yummy things because that's the extent of our relationship right now.

Go Tigers!!!

Gentaro took me to the Hanshin Tigers vs. Yakult Swallows baseball game! Everyone has these plastic tiny baseball bats that they hit together in some specific pattern that I couldn't figure out, while chanting things. It was great! Everyone somehow reacted the exact same way to what was happening on the field and would simultaneously bust out the appropriate rhythms and cheers.







As if I don't see enough of these ladies! Saki, Genny, Micah and I went for drinks after work. Since Saki was the only Japanese one, whenever any of us would make a gaijin mistake she'd say "no no we don't do that!" It was hilarious because we would be doing something pretty normal like pouring a drink, and her face would be panicked like "we don't do that!!"

Haha and of course Genny says something about how cute the waitress's trainee name tag is and the waitress (in perfect English) says "yeah, I'm in training right now." hahaa.

おでんはおいしかった。 (The Oden was yummy)
Oden is a Japanese soup which can contain various
things like daikon, omochi, egg, aburaage, meatballs,
fishballs, fishcakes, konyaku, ect. I'm usually
fairly unsure of what I'm eating especially when I
get it at 7/11 and order by saying "this one" and
"this one" and "this one" please. 

I've been doing a fair amount cooking lately. I made Oden and chocolate-coffee cookies for Genny's/Yui's birthday/Genny's going away party. Despite their identity crisis, the cookies were delicious.

As for the Oden, while it was delightful, it doesn't beat the Oden at 7/11. Which sounds so pathetic but seriously it's the bomb. 7/11 sells everything from Oden to underwear.



Lastly, today I got my first haircut in Japan! It was so ridiculous!! First off, off I really had no idea what the stylist was saying so all I could do was occasionally nod and say things in Japanese like "cut to here" and "bangs" (complete with intonation and gestures). I also got a mini massage and the best darn hairwashin I've ever had. At one point I had two stylists furiously blow drying my hair simultaneously and it was so hard not to laugh as I watched them in the mirror.