Well, this is it. I’m leaving tomorrow and Japan will be left behind. A lot of stuff has happened over the past two years that I never really got to write about on this blog, but pretty much no one reads it anyway, so yeah 
I never really thought I would be this sad to to leave but here I am wishing for just a bit more time. Still, at the same time I’m eager to get back to my wonderful life back home where everything is good and right (in my world). So all in all, it was one incredible experience but I’m happy to go home now.
Thankyou everyone <3
rubyrox
xoxo
Posted by admin on Jan 1, 2012 in
Bad thing!!!,
Holidays,
Japan Hey guys! Happy New Year!
My first day of 2012 was spent climbing a mountain at 6 o’clock in the morning. It was supposedly to see the sun rise but the sun was behind the clouds so it was kinda pointless. ;( Ah well, it was a good experience! (….)
Man, I’m tired now. Excuse me while I go sleep.
xo
Tags: 2012, new years day
Posted by admin on Dec 20, 2011 in
Bad thing!!!,
Holidays,
Japan Man, all this packing is doing my head in!!!!! D:
We have to put pretty much the entire house into boxes. I’m sooooo tired after a long day at work sorting.
On Thursday we’re going away to Tokyo and Nagano for a week of sightseeing and skiing!!!! WOOOOOHOO can’t wait 
Will post updates soon!
xoxo
今日で、日本の最後の学校だったｗｗ
まぢで超寂しいッ
帰り道ぶち泣きょったｗ
こんなにつらいとゎ思わんかったし…
四中きびしいし決まり多いし、１年の時ゎ全然楽しくなくて、向こうに帰りたい しかずっと考えてなかった↓↓
でも２年になってからどんどん楽しくなってきて、最後やっぱすっごく寂しかった(泣)(泣)(泣)
といっても、わけあって学校でゎ本当の性格と違う”インキャ”だったから、あまりみんなと仲良く出来んかったのがいつまでも後悔 かな(-_-;)
まぁでもいい経験になったし★
みんなせーんきゅッ❤
また会おうねｗｗｗ♪
see you!!! ＼(^o^)／
Well, hello again everyone. Long time no blog! It’s been, what, four months? No…NO. It can’t be. Not four whole months!!!
Unfortunately it seems so. Sorry, guys. OK, so let’s get into my late latest blog, “Appendicitis”!
So I kind of gave it away there, but yes, I did get appendicitis. Severe apeendicitis actually. It all started on the night after my school sports day on Sunday the 12th. (More on that in my next post!) I had a really sore stomach, but that happens a lot to me so I didn’t think it was anything special. We went out to dinner with some friends; it really hurt so we headed home quickly. It didn’t get better and a threw up, like, seven times during the night. 
(Too much information? Sorry.) I was sick that day, which was a bummer ’cause we actually got Monday and Tuesday off, because we had school on Saturday and the sports day on the Sunday. And now my two free days were gonna be spent in bed sick!! Anyway, that night a new kind of pain infiltrated my stomach. I managed to sleep (kind of), but in the morning we went to the local Sunami hospital.
The Sunami hospital is this really cute new “general” hospital that’s a 10-minute walk away. In Japan, instead of a clinic where you can go for any sickness, you either go to an eye hospital or a leg hospital or a back hospital or whatever. So there aren’t many general hospitals around. Luckily the the people at Sunami hospital are really nice and see you for lots of things, which is handy as dad can’t be bothered driving into town to go to a hospital there. 
Soooooo I go there and they prod and poke and it REALLY HURTS and then I go through all these strange machines and x-rays (at a GENERAL hospital! I know, right?! I was shocked). Also, as I haven’t eaten for two days due to sickness, my fluid level is low, so they put a needle in my arm and start pumping a big bag of watery stuff into it. All this is really painful! In the end I am notified that………………..I have appendicitis!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Then I am whisked off to a hospital in a city called Onomichi in an AMBULANCE! Which was really cool, or would have been if I was in a better mood. Appparently we went through all the red lights and went on the other side of the road an stuff. =D (Yes, I am aware I just changed from writing in present to past tense. I’m such a grammatical rebel, you know.) Mum came with me in the ambulance. Dad drove behind, having to stop at all the lights and stuff. Poor Simon-san.
When we arrived, there were more blood testy-measury-circulaty thingys, which included needles in my arm, hand and ear! The bag of water-fluid was still pumping into my poor arm. I was wheeled into lots of different rooms and talked with the people who would do my operation, if I had to get an operation. After more scans and tests with various machines, it was decided that I had severe appendicitis and therefore had to have an operation: have my appendix removed.
The operation was at about 4pm (still on Tuesday). They gave me painkillers, also injected through a needle in my hand, and before long I was asleep, which was when they did the operation. They did it through my belly button, which means no scar. Still trying to figure out if that’s good or bad. Apparently, the went down first with a camera, then a rod or something, then some scissors, and literally just cut the appendix off. Freaky. Dad got to see the appendix, and claimed he had grown quite attached to the slimy, sausage-like thing. Hmmm, I doubt that somehow.
After the operation I came to and it really hurt. ;( Felix had come to visit me. I remember (and was reminded of) being really cranky. I spent the night in the post-operation room. The next day I was moved to an all-girls room, with a really cute bed and a TV and shelves and stuff! Adorable I tell you. (l) I read and played on my iPod and listened to music and stuff. The first day there the hospital food wasn’t so nice; the rice was this horrible porridgy stuff. But the next day it was better food. I had to have some pain-killers onWednesday, but by Thursday I was a bit better and didn’t really need them, as it still hurt a lot. An annoying thing was, I’d goten appendicitis right when I had a cough, so it was EXTREMELY HORRIBLY POOISHLY painful coughing, which I did a lot. Pain-killers didn’t help much. I’m still coughing as I write.
I had pretty good nights sleep; I read books called Eragon and a book in the Nightingale Floor series (thanks to the Kennewells!)…Unfortunately no internet . Ah, well. About the sleeps, well, actually, on Thursday night the old grannies in my room WOULD NOT stop talking for aaaages into the night! It was infuriating!!! So maybe not that good a sleep.
On Friday I was out of the hospital and home!! Where I now potter around, moaning and complaining and constantly informing people around the house that, You know, I just got my appendix out. (With strong implications.) OK, slight exaggeration, but I’m still not 100%. At least now I can say that I went to hospital, had an OPERATION due to SEVERE appendicitis…and got to miss a whole nother week of school! YAY!
So, thanks for bearing with me, folks. My next post about the sports day will be coming soon, so stay tuned! Keep reading! Love you all,
RubyRoxoxo
(How cool is that?!?!)
Posted by rubyrox on May 15, 2010 in
Bad thing!!!,
Japan,
School Hello everyone,
As you probably know, yes, I have joined the school brass band, as part of the whole compulsory pick-an-activity-and-do-it-every-day-til-6 thing. And whaddaya know, I do it every day until 6! (Well, actually, I don’t go for the last hour on Wednesdays, or at all on Fridays or Saturdays, which is probably a national record for unattendance, but still.)
I mean, look, it’s alright. It’s quite fun, actually. But I’d MUCH rather be at home blogging and Skyping people and playing on my shiny iPod (dad’s line). Ah, well.
Anyway, the main point of this post was to inform you that because this is actually a brass band, the other members, and our teacher, desperately want me to learn a brass instrument. Now, the only reason I joined the silly band was so I could play the sax! Dad even called up the school and asked and stuff from Australia last year and they all said it was fine…Well, you can’t really blame them; they’re doing it half for my sake – I can’t compete in a lot of things on my saxophone. Luckily, though, I can for the big yearly Hiroshima school band comp (our school is so small that we team up with another small high school, who do have saxes, which is handy. And may I mention, last year dad told me they’d came in a big state competition, at which I got really excited. Turns out the top, like, 20 teams get a gold medal, OK teams silver, and the bad ones a bronze, aka “third” place. Dammit), but not in some random important “Ensemble” thingy in February.
So, you may think, what am I going to do? Quit the band? (I wish. Jokes.) Not participate? Well, the answer is NOT that dramatic. I probably should have wrote about this before (maybe I did?), but I actually am learning the trumpet as well. The original plan (when I was in a slight trumpet craze) was that I could play my saxophone some days, and at the same time practice my trumpet a few days as well. That way I could play trumpet in some songs, and sax in the rest. Perfectomonto! Bravissima! Etc.
No. The thing is, this has made them all think I’m gonna play trumpet full-time. So for all the videos and practices and stuff I have to play trumpet, which REALLY PISSES ME OFF because the only reason I joined the stupid band was so I could play my saxophone, and with me I even inspired 3 of my friends to join too and now they don’t want me to play sax?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! WELL TOO BAD SAXOHPHONE IS MY PRIMARY INSTRUMENT I HATE TRUMPET I AM PLAYING SAX SHUT UP OR I’M QUITTING.
Ok calm, calm, cool it, Ruby. Breeeeeathe. Ah, that’s better. Sorry about that, folks. Just had to let out a bit of bottled up anger, which I have to contain for 10 hours a day at a school where you just sit on your bum all day and do nothing and they see you as a box that needs to be filled with information NOT A REAL PERSON WHO ACTUALLY WANTS TO LEARN REAL STUFF…
Woops. OK, all good! (What I said was true, though. Everyone always goes on about how GREAT the Japanese eduacation system is, and how slack the Australian one is…but actually, it’s not that good at all. It’s very old fashioned, as I casually mentioned before the just see your brain as an empty box they need to fill until it bursts with information. I mean, they only have blackboards, and by February 2011 all we will have learned in IT is how to turn a computer on and off and create a Word document!! (Yes, that latter there has caused me a lot of pain and stress.) I actually think Australian teaching, with its way of letting you decide what you want to learn, and giving you freedom and choices and independence and making learning really interesting, is far better. You can tell the difference here; kids are nowhere near as creative, their work is generally boring and plain, and they don’t…think like we do. Think outside the box, they they encourage you do back home. And everyone says how smart Asian people are (not meaning to sound racist there, but it is what everyone says), how hard they work, but you know, kids go to school at least 2 hours less a day in Australia, and in my opinion we’re just as smart. And about the hard-working, well, how could they not be, with all the stuff they make you do here! Educational expert R. M. Capp says,
“Give the Kids a Bit o’ Freedom, Mate!”
ANYWAY………hopefully the brass band will go well and people will come to realise that I’m a sax lover at heart.
Okay, I really have to go now!
Goodbye for now, my friends.
Ruby xoxoxoxo
Tags: bad, band, brass, bukatsudo, Japan, School, suisougakubu
Posted by rubyrox on Apr 28, 2010 in
Bad thing!!!,
Japan,
School Yes, well, you’ve probably guessed by now that they have English classes at my school. And, yes, I have to participate in them.
OK well it is SOOOOOOOO ridiculously boring. It is just so degrading having to repeat the alphabet three times a week. I almost fall asleep I’m so bored. And you know what? The good old Japanese “no-expections” motto ensures I have to endure every single class. It SUCKSSS real bad.
Ah, well. This is part of the whole experience, right……right?
Even worse, I have to do all the homework! Which is a lot! AKA writing out letters! And words! Like “you”!!! And about 20 pages’ worth, too.
You know what? I’m going to REFUSE. Yes, that’s right my young ones an oldies, I shall outright refuse. Muahhahahahaha I can’t wait. :p That probably won’t go down too well, but really. This is ridiculous!
So, in conclusion, three 50-minute periods a week my brain is beingf tortured. AND I have the official World’s Worst Homework. This is where I need YOU trusty readers to help me out.
Sunami Girl signing off
SG xxx lurv yas 
Tags: class, classes, english, homework, Japan, School
OK, so here’s the deal in Japanese middle schools:
In Japanese, it’s called bukatsudo. Basically, your middle school offers a range of programs, like sports, school bands etc. You pick one…and you do it every day. For hours. Until it’s dark. On weekends too. It sucks real bad. Why? Because it basically stops you form doing any other out-of-school activities becasue you have this stupid thing on every day! It’s pretty sad that you can only really manage one thing. And the thing is, you’d get really good at whatever sport, instrument or skill you’re learning, having been doing it for hours every day, but once you reach high high school (aka years 10, 11, 12), you don’t continue whatever you picked because you’re too busy studying. So all those years intensively doing this hobby and all your skill goes to waste.
At my little 80-student middle school, they offer five programs – baseball, volleyball (girls only), athletics, table tennis and brass band. As you probably would have guessed, I’m in for the brass band. It’d be prefect for me, bacause I can knock off a hobby-in-waiting by playing my saxophone in it (though technically, saxohpones aren’t a brass instrument, but still). I’d decided ages ago,the delighted band was expecting me and it was perfect. Even better, a lot of my friends are going to do it too!
Anyway, last week us year 6s went up to our middle school (did I mention that we all go to the same middle school? And just us) for our bukastudo orientation day. Unfortunately, we were only allowed to try out the program we’d alreasy selected, whereas if they had this stupid thing in Australia (thank goodness they don’t), I bet you’d be able to experience all of them, not just one. Ah, well, the Japanese have a lot to learn.
So, my 3 friends and I went. And experienced the brass band. A bit about it: it’s all girls, seven altogether, but a few are graduating from the school. They play at all the school events. Perfect! Great! What’s the fuss, what’s the Glee title about?
To put it bluntly, the brass band is not cool. It clearly the group of girls who aren’t any good at sport, so had to resort to this. I’m the sportiest girl in my class, and I can’t really imagine sitting down, not being active for such a long time. I really feel like I should be doing a sport. I’d love to do baseball, but that just wouldn’t work; besides, girls aren’t even allowed to play in the matches, which sucks. Anyway, here’s where the Glee metaphor pitches in.
You know how in all the movies and stuff, you’ve got the cheerleaders and the jocks, the really popular kids? Here, that’s volleyball and baseball. Then athletics and table tennis are kind of in the middle. And if you know Glee club, the show choir, you’ll know that it’s super uncool. The club for misfits, retards. AKA…the brass band! Instead of the guy in the wheelchair we have the girl with the learning disabilities who plays the maraccas. And in the show, some popular kids join Glee club and make it cool. Same here with my friends and I. Pretty cool, right? Sunami Height’s very own Glee club!!! So, maybe it’s not so bad. It won’t exactly boost my reputation, but it’ll be really fun. The girls are really good at their instruments, too (though how could you not be what with the amount you’d play it?!).
Anyway, so I guess it’s the brass band for me! Anyway, if I turn into a retard, I can just return to Australia, where I have a real LIFE.
Sunami Girl singing off.
<3
Posted by rubyrox on Mar 27, 2010 in
Bad thing!!!,
Breaking news,
Japan,
School The Japanese doesn’t see extra-curricular activities (out-of-school hobbies like sports and instruments) the way countries like Australia and America do. Back home most kids I knew would do at least one sport and instrument, and many did a lot more. Some might drop off when they reached high school, but mostly, they were fun, long-lasting hobbies, for lack of a better explanation. And more to the point, they’d be doing lots of them at the same time.
However, over here it’s a completely different story. Most kids, even in primary school, don’t even do any activities like that. A few of them do, but the sad thing is, almost all of them give it up when they hit middle school. So you can see how it’s pretty hard for me, wanting to continue with my soccer, karate, piano and saxophone. (I had to ditch karate.) For example, in soccer, I had just started to get to know all the guys in my team, then of course we graduate and go to middle school, and All in all…it’s really sad.
You want to know why almost all the hobbies drop off as soon as you start middle school? Check out this informative post! (Actually, hold on until I actually write it.)
I love you fans! Keep on reading!
Ruby XXXX
Yes, in case you didn’t know…I’m graduating. Again.
You see, Aussie school years finish in December, so I graduated, then did the last term here. Yup, everyone’ll be crying (they’re a very emotional bunch, those Japanese) and I’ll be like, “Yeah, that was a pretty fun few weeks, can we go now?” 
)
Now, there’s something you must know before we go any further. Japanese graduations are not at all like Australian ones. They’re just on a completely different level. In Australia, they’re laughing, happy celebrations where people stuff up, jokes fly everywhere, and just really relaxed and informal. Over here? Complete opposite end of the scale.
For a start, they have a graduation uniform: blouse, pleated skirt, jacket, black shoes etc. So ewww compared to my previous fashionable get-up (click here for a photo). And more to the point, they are abominably formal. You see, Japan is just a really formal country – you have to announce your name and grade and ask permission to enter every time you enter the school office, class periods are officially announced and closed, and you have to bow before basically everything you do, which is annoying…the list goes on. You just have a lot of respect for your elders, and everyone around you, I guess. And graduations are the absolute worst.
At our very first graduation practice, we spent 45 minutes practicing how to walk, sit up, sit back down again, and bow, which also included things like how to place your fingers while bowing, and the exact position of your head etc. My teacher even came round and felt all our backs while we were sitting on our chairs to make check we had the correct posture. I know, right?! You have to get up and sit down so many times, it’s just ridiculous. For example, you have to stand up the exact moment a speaker sets foot on the stage, and when they they’re finished and step back you have to bow in time, and then the second they’re off the stage you sit down….
B.O.R.I.N.G.
10 times worse than my fantastic graduation at Ripponlea. ;( Ah, well. I can relish in dissecting the experience like so.
You also sing songs and stuff; naturally they’re all brilliant singers too, and I don’t know a word. Not even the Japanese national anthem! My poor teacher’s like, “You’ve heard this at the Olympics, right?” Well, sorry I have no interest in your national anthem!!! (Sorry, Anthem.) It’s a very slow, haunting melody at that; not at all like our cheerful Aussie sing-a-long.
Anyway, that’s on the 24th, so it’s coming up in…11 days! And, look, before you completely write off this country as a mini prison centre, it’s actually not that bad as I just made it out to be. Yeah, it’s strict but it’ll sure be an experience! And after the ceremony we all go have luch at the Italian restaurant nearby, so it can’t be all bad.
Ruby
xoxo
Tags: ceremony, graduating, graduation, Japan, School