Our cultural event this Tuesday was an Ikebana (flower arranging) class. I had a blast (figuratively speaking). Does that really surprise anyone, that I enjoyed sitting quietly while making a nice floral arrangement? Watch out, I just may become the most sedate person in existence yet.

While we were not inducted to the dark and eldritch secrets of the art, we were shown the basics in terms of balance, composition, and style. I got a few pictures from a fellow arranger, who had a digital camera, so once I get those uploaded to my computer, I'll include them in my journal entry. I thought they all turned out rather well, and our sensei was suitably impressed with our efforts. She said that she couldn't believe that this was our first time doing ikebana. This could be a perfect example of the stifling of imagination that contemporary Japanese schooling inflicts on its citizens, meaning that they have to learn how to do something as intrinsically creative as making aesthetically pleasing floral arrangements, or maybe our teacher was just being polite (although the fact that after we finished she went through and corrected our arrangements, which usually just consisted of snipping a few stray leaves, seems to speak for the former[or I could just be venting at Shogun's Ghost again, after having talked with some more perfectly happy, functional school children]). I have before and after photos of mine, of which the corrections consisted mostly of moving one flower that I jammed in the back because I didn't know where else to put it, to the front. I think part of why I enjoyed it so much is that arranging things into something visually pleasing just appeals to me on several levels (I'm sure my genetic predisposition to efficient packing ties in somehow too). Just because I can't draw doesn't mean I'm completely creatively sterile.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, I got my host stay assignment this morning. I'll be staying with the Kicha family, which, along with the usual number of parents, also has two sons, a daughter, and a dog. The mother likes volleyball, the sons, baseball. Their home is a half-hour train ride from Hikone, and I shall meet them all in two weeks. I'm really looking forward to it.

English quote of the day: Watch out! Try to eat!! It's nice, isn't!? Gravel Choco (from a bag of candy whose big selling point is that it looks like a rocks)