August 04, 2002

And thus it ends, somewhere midpoint between a whimper and a bang.

Despite staying up much too late last night watching anime and being generally nerdy I got up this morning with plenty of time to prepare for the ceremony. I ended up loosing nerve at the last moment, and wore my suit instead of my kimono (and I don't regret it that much, because although several of the girls were wearing very bright and pretty kimono, only one guy did and frankly, compared to the girls, men's kimono are very drab affairs). It proceeded as could be expected, with several of the faculty and more motivated students giving speeches after the diplomas had been handed out. Afterwards there was a social where all the students, faculty, and parents got to mingle, and a couple of students from my class sang a song they wrote (in a mix of Japanese and English) about what a cool place JCMU was, and us koto people had out performance. It went very well. I flubbed one string, but the nice thing about the koto is that your hand is always right above the strings, so I silenced it almost immediately and got back on track. Then, just to throw everyone off, I got my group (we had six people playing (but remember, only three kotos) - mine was the 'beginner' group, because we didn't have as much faith in our skills, and thus played the easier piece) I had us play a second selection (which basically was a 2/4 measure, with a variation of about five notes for the whole piece, but it sounded good). Then the senpai played their selection, and it was all good. We spent the rest of the time being asked by the various people at the party how wonderful we had sounded, and really how long had we played the koto for?

Okaasan and Otousan were there for the ceremony and the social afterwards, and I presented them with the very pretty stained glass kaleidoscope that my parents sent. Unfortunately, not even the three of us working together could figure out how the put the damned thing together. It's only two pieces, but precisely how it is supposed to placed on the stand and set up so that it works like a kaleidoscope… You see? I knew what I was talking about when I asked previously how it was supposed to be put together…

Anyway, I really appreciated my host parents putting in the effort to be there, especially given the length of the drive. They also very kindly provided me with some gifts in return, a very nice fan for myself, and a gift for Mom and Dad, and one for Elena (which naturally I have no idea what's in them). I guess I can just send Elena's when I send her the rest of her birthday gifts, and Mom and Dad's when I see Mom after I get back. I really rather wonder what they are, because they seem rather substantial… I wonder I wonder, do you know what I wonder?

I was feeling a bit melancholy after the ceremony ended and all the guests had gone, because well, it's all over now. Several of the students have already left, another large group has taken off traveling (I'm Center bound because of the depilated current condition of my finances once again I am going to be very glad to get the board refund [although it's going to be much smaller, being only a week in August, but hey, money is money]). So I wrote some, and watched more movies.

I finally got around to watching the movie that Jay sent me for my birthday a while back, Shaolin Soccer. It is one of the darn funniest things I've seen in a long time. Basic plot: a set of brothers who are all masters of rather strange kung fu arts form a soccer team and generally kick ass and take names with their might gung fu powers, until they have to face off against the Evil Team (Subtlety not being one of the movie's strong points). I think that the funniest part of the movie was when the goalie got his clothes blasted off by the whirling tornado cyclone doom soccer ball. I laughed so hard that I fell off the couch.

And now I have a Sunday coming up where all that I shall do is say good bye to people and start to ready myself for leaving…

Que sera sera.