First Post of the New Year

Happy New Year!

New Years is always an underwhelming holiday for me. It's really a 'meh' holiday. I've never really done anything for New Years. No parties or anything. Usually I watch some New Year's marathon on a random channel. This year, Chris and I watched a Power Puff Girls marathon on Cartoon Network Japan. They played the best episodes from noon to midnight and chattered a little about the holiday and Japanese traditions during the breaks. We are two wild and crazy kids, aren't we? Heh.

This is actually Japan's biggest holiday. They go to shrines to pray for the upcoming year (usually stuff like "I want to get into Izumo High school" instead of world peace or whatever). They have traditional meals and foods they eat. Lots of decorations are around (lots of ropes and orange things). The grocery stores have been CRAZY with people freaking out to get their holiday foods. Seriously, you know how the malls get during black Friday (day after Thanksgiving Sale day)? That's how the big supermarkets were. Crazy.

We are going to our tutor's house on Wednesday to eat one of the traditional meals and share their New Years. It should be really nice. We may go to a shrine, but I have just been informed that the estimated number of visitors to Taisha shrine is 1.3 million over the next 3 days. For you who have been here, think about the little town near the shrine and the way we got there. Now imagine 1.3 million swarming that area. Insane!

Anyways, so that means we aren't doing much of anything. I think we are going to go out in a little bit and play some pool and darts and just hang out. Just about every other ALT is gone for the season, so we will probably be doing it alone. Good thing we like each other! I suck at pool, so let's hope Chris doesn't get too cranky with me!

So thats that. Aren't I boring? To make up for boring me, I shall give you a fact I learned from the TV last night (Huzzah, Animal Planet! Huzzah!)

Elephant seals are the biggest seals in the world. This I already knew. However, when you watch nature shows, you really only ever see JUST the elephant seals. You never see a good size comparison. So you know, I figure the man elephant seals got to around 8 ft in length and the womens were like 6 ft. Sounds about right, right? Holy crap! The average Male Elephant seal is 18ft in length and weigh about 5000 lbs. The largest seal ever was 30 FT LONG! GAH! I had no idea how huge they were! Last night we were watching this TV show and they showed a man standing next to 2 fighting man seals. Holy cow are they big! Bigger than David's boat! Seriously. Enormous animals. It makes me uncomfortable to even think about. So big...who knew?

The more you now...do do do do...