John Faciane

06:04 pm: Go listen to this song!
GO out and listen to Senkou Shojo and its english counter part put your camera down. The music is beautiful, and the lyrics get me for some reason

LYRICS BY SHIINA RINGO copyright holder
MUSIC BY TOKYO JIHEN


Put Your Camera Down

I am content with taking in this moment caught in time

I'll forget about it soon enough but I don't mind
When thoughts belong to yesterday, the saturation fades
I always am where I'm found

Today this moment derserves the ultimate intensity

I see no need to recharge for tomorrow's happenings
Mistakes we made yesterday, they blur what should be clear
Refocus close on where you are


I am shinning in this moment, frame your shot
With your senses open wide
Leave that camera at your side
The only moment that we know is ever true


This very time outshines the bygone moments of my life
I don't care if when tomorrow comes I change my mind
My pulse it pounds. My breath is near, the clarity is clear
While life is certain, why won't you...


Let my shining light illuminate your shot
When it goes out it will be lost
We use up everything we've got
Let me sparkle in this moment here with you
The only moment that we know is ever true


Even if we've met the end I'mm shine with you

11:14 pm: today was really fun.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=u4ie-JTRNC0
i went on this roller coaster. if youre ever in tokyo DO IT

09:07 pm: 日本が大好きだけど、専修大学では宿題が多い。大変ですね。。

i love it here.

i miss everyone soo much though. im looking into options for where to live when i get back, but since my tribe pays my rent i could run into difficulties...

i dont want to end up living by my self, but that just might have to be what happens.

oh and i am in desparate need of a massage right now, takuya (one of the ra's) said he would for a place to get one in shimokitazawa so hopefully soon i will be able to get one.

12:01 am: tomorrow i leave for osaka.
sorry to all for not writing in a while, ive been going through sort of a crisis, but im getting better so no one needs to worry.
ive just uploaded a bunch of photos to my computer and will be putting them on facebook shortly.

so ill try and update from osaka and kyoto so until then!

-john

10:22 pm: ive been hit with culture shock BAD.
i wanted to go home so bad this weekend.
had another panic attack.
...
better now, but still missing home and my friends in oregon.

so hope it gets better.



char, danny, (eventhough you guys dont have lj) hannah, dana, devika, hoagie, everyone i miss you all sooooooooooooooo much right now

02:31 pm: expensive
i have gone through about 650\700 dollars in 3 weeks.


aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh

expensive

11:28 pm: Nomihoudai last night was really fun, but it was insane!. when i eventually get a camera charger that works (mine broke) i will be posting the photos. After nomihoudai we went to karaoke and i stayed there until about 4am and came back to the dorm and went to bed.

today i met up with my friend Toshiki, he studied at U of O last year on exchange from Waseda University here in Japan. We went to Kamakura and went to a few Jinjas (japanese shrines) and saw the second largest buddha(sp?) in Japan at a jinja. it was amazing i love the culture and life here. Kamakura is about an hour by train from tokyo and it is just so amazing that there is an area that beautiful and green so close to the world's largest city.

after toshi and i hung out i went and got lost in Shibuya by myself for about an hour. I did this on purpose because i really have not any absolutely alone time since i have came to japan. so that is all for today.

heres a photo for you guys.

06:20 pm: 金曜日の夜
So its friday night in tokyo japan. its a 3 day weekend. we have just had two weeks of very intese classes. So what better idea than to go to nomihodai, because our RAs are taking about 50 of us to this. what is nomihodai you ask? well nomihodai or　飲み放題 written in japanese literally means Nomi= drink hodai= all you can. No this is a very foreign concept to the average american, because most if not all states have laws forbidding such an event (at least both of the states i have lived in do). we basically pay 2,000 yen each and we get anything we want for 2 hours straight. think about that... about 50 exchange students from all over the world (mostly from the us however) drinking non stop for two hours straight. Either this is going to be a glorious event or it could be disastorous. we shall see what the night holds. losts of pictures to come on facebook and some good ones will be featured here on live journal.

sayonara for now!

john

08:10 am: second week is almost over. i now have a prepaid cell phone if anyone wants to stay in contact with me, the easiest way is through email,　because is goes straight to my cell. jfaciane@softbank.ne.jp
other than that things are going great! ive been to harajuku, and wow there is a lot of shopping and fashion there, its insane.

one of the big things ive noticed since ive been here is that most of the college going generation is very well dressed and stylish. it seems as if they have a never ending supply of money to buy stylish haute couture clothing that they wear everyday. (sorry guys and girls no attending class in your PJs here.) i almost like it better that way, because people actually care about thier every day appearence (i know that sounds shallow, but its the truth. i may dress sloppily sometimes but i really do not like it)

Incorrect english is EVERYWHERE here. one of the signs in the bathroom here at the dorm says please do not blush your teeth here. Also when i opened my cell phone manual to the english section, written in english TWICE, not just once, it said press 2 3 for ENGRISH. i was on the train when i first saw this and i immediately started laughing, and showed my japanese friends from senshu they thought it was funny too. (picture of manual to come later)

my classes are going great, but they are difficult as hell, because of the one year gap between my classmates and i. I love it though, because if I had gone down a level i know i would be bored as hell, because it is all stuff i have already learned.

anyway class is about to start here so i must be going. more to come in another post!

\John

09:59 pm:

09:06 pm: minna-san konnichi wa!
Nihon (japan) is amazing. i ve only been here for a few days yet i have already done many things. i went to an izakaya the othernight with about 14 other kids from the group. an izakaya is a japanese style bar. it was amazing because it cost about 2,300 yen for two hours ALL YOU CAN DRINK!!!!!!!!! now thats about 20 dollars american. i didnt get too drunk just a little tipsy i was very composed but some of the group was a little rowdy. it was really fun and we were lucky we didnt get kicked off the train.

One of the things i have noticed is the hospitality and customer service. it is the best i have ever had, everyone is so welcoming here especially when they learn that i am studying japanese language and culture.

Sunday a group of friends and i went to the tokyo game show. it was amazing seeing all of the lights and people everywhere. the train took for ever it was about two hours away from kanagawa, in chiba prefecture. which is on the oposite side of tokyo bay from where we are. everyone else elected me the guy to talk to all of the JR workers once we got lost and i did suprisingly well.

yesterday we took the placement test and i placed into the class with people who have all taken second year, ive only taken one so im a little nervous but pleased because this means i will be in 302 when i comeback to oregon.

and yes jen, there has been a lot of funny english sayings especially when the police officers from tama-ku came to talk to our group about the snatch. we even got a paper warning us about this menace that plagues japan's vistors. (its actually bag snatching, but the paper says this and the officer even began with, today i am going to talk to you about snatch today.) it was all i could do to keep myself from laughing audibly. i will post a picture later when i am able to buy a usb cable, because i forgot mine.
anyway that is all for now, more posts and hopefully pictures to come!

-jaa ne!

03:09 pm: 日本に住んでいます
well i have made it to japan! that was the longest most boring flight EVER.
ive taken some photos but i forgot my camera cable so itll be a couple of days befor i can post any pictures anyway im kind of busy now i will try and write more later tonight

01:03 am: i love it when its 82 degrees in anchorage alaska
that is all

04:20 pm: im really not good at this whole writing in journal thingy :(
so i promised i would update a lot this summer, however life has happened. im working way tooo much just so i can be able to go on this excursion to japan!
so ive set up my youtube account for blogging but havent had the time to video a tour of anchorage, but its going to happen before i leave come hell or high water.

Family has come and gone for the summer and it was fun. i got to see my niece again, shes getting so big,l it's weird. I feel like i am getting very old very quickly, even though i am not. I like to think im still acting youthful, but i just find myself getting tired earlier and feeling like i am constantly judging my generation and their ability to become completely apathetic about everything. Maybe im just ready for Summer to be over, which i think i am.

On the lighter side my online course is going very well. I got a B on my midterm so i dont have to take the final, however ill probably only get an A- or B+ which is good i guess considering the amount of time and effort i have exerted while working a full time and a part time job simultaneously.

Im lucky still have my full time job at wildberry by the way. On friday a customer who just so happened to be from Japan asked me to take his photo while he was holding a 10 pound brick of chocolate. While we were exchanging chocolate and camera, his cannon digital camera slipped out of my hand and shattered on the rock floor. i was very upset and felt like crap about what had happened. i originally thought i would have to pay out of pocket for the camera which would have sucked because im saving for the trip. Peter, the owner of wildberry, screamed at me and made me feel even worse, then i discovered that it is illegal for him to require me to pay out of my own pocket. Thats why he has insurance on the business. so he ended up paying, and i still have a job, but i never want to repeat that incident again.

After that on friday, one of my closest friends, Cailin, got married. the wedding was really fun and free wine is always a plus. It is really weird that a lot of friends are starting to get married or engaged. I sort of feel like the ones who aren't myself included are behind. oh well, i guess thats what happenes as everyone gets older. It just seems to me that we're all still too young to be settling down. Someone told me one of my favorite sayings about marriage and youth. "Your twenties are for you, your thrities are for someone else."

anyway, that is all for now.

-JF

05:59 pm: sad, bittersweet day.
My room is almost packed up, my life is almost packed up. I feel empty inside. the last few weeks here in eugene i feel have been the best of my entire time in oregon. I am not ready to leave, because i will be gone for a long time. Alaska for the summer then tokyo from september until december. Im so scared... i shouldnt be but i am. i feel like im going to be missing out on a lot of things here, but this is an experience that i need. i need to see the world especially Japan, since one of my majors is Japanese. It never fails that when you are moving somewhere, or going away for a long time you meet people that you want to get to know better right before you fucking leave. This is my situation now. I have so many regrets and i dont want this trip to be one of them. im pretty sure this is just normal pre-trip anxiety though. I feel as if i have so many things i wanted to accomplish this year, but i didnt.
the list...
get back to my graduation weight... not accomplished
heal my fucking foot... almost accomplished
be more outgoing and meet new people... accomplished, but way too late in the year
the list goes on but those are way too personal for here.

i am very happy to be going, just the timing seems kind of weird, especially because i have no where to live when i come back to eugene in january which is kind of scary. no scratch that, really fucking frightening.
home should be good this summer, hopefully i will (i know i say this every summer) get my ass back in shape, because i need to especially before i go abroad. Most importantly i will hopefully meet new people and try new things.

im probably going to start a video portion of my livejournal via and embedded video from youtube when i get back to anchorage, because i've realized that most of my friends from school dont really know what my hometown is like, so im all about teching people. i will also be trying to do a video blog thingy while im in Japan, but you bet your ass that i will be updating on this more. So i gues thats enough of being EMO right now. I need to finish packing, to all of my old close friends, I love you all and will miss you guys a lot. To my new friends i am so glad that i had the chace to meet you all this term, and i hope that you keep in touch either through here, facebook, or adding me on aim. When i return in January i will hopefully be able to get to know you all more.

-Johnny

12:19 pm: fuck fuck fuck
i went to my check up appointment for my foot today. and they put me in a new cast for 4 to 5 more weeks. i really hate my life right now. i just want to be out of this goddamn cast, they also informed me that if it doesnt show signs of improvement from today onward i will have to get a plate in my foot, which would mean there is no way in hell i could go to japan this summer. please somebody shoot me now. there is a little bit of good in this though, i will be able to stop using the crutches in two more weeks. but still the bad outweighs the good way too much right now.

01:21 am: ow,
the rash underneath my cast is getting worse and it is driving me fucking bonkers i just want to rip off all of my skin, and i have no way to scratch it

02:24 pm: This term has been great so far. its almost over now. let's see ive been sick since big knife ended and now im finally getting better, but low and behold i landed on my foot wrong and fractured my 5th metatarcel in two places so now im going to be a little gimpy for a bit. ill find out if they are going to put it in a cast on friday hooooooray! oh well i got a parking pass and they might give me one close to the buildings until im better, i didnt want to have to do that, but there really is no other convenient way for me to get around because of the crutches. my family is being awesome though, my dad is sending me some stuff in the mail and my aunt said she would drive to eugene if i needed anything which is really cool. any way ill update later with progress, and thank you to everyone for being so helpful to me lately it is greatly appreciated.

11:13 pm: ive been sick for over two weeks now. this shit is getting really old.
on top of that im starting to worry about being accepted by the japanese host university because of the placement test, it is soooo hard and in big bold letters on the front it says please keep in mind that the final decision will be based upon this placement test. fucking great! im approved through u of o, and it stated that you only needed at least one term of japanese but this test is making a little paranoid, because i dont know what i would do if i cant go, im banking on this so i need it to happen.

11:42 pm: so wow i feel really sick. my throat hurts and im all stuffy. acting V was good today. i really opened up and the second she told me what to do for my second exercise with the monologue, and the second the words came out of my mouth i started bawling and eventhough the stuff i was reminiscing about was sad i felt like i got a load off my chest afterwords. any way actf tomorrow were leaving at 5 pm and getting into ellensbur around 10-11 ish so that should be fun anyway im a little loopy from the cold medicine right now so yeah tahts it for now