Day 21

Oops... I guess it's still August 24th for you readers in America ^-^; Anyway, today marks exactly 3 weeks in Japan! It’s Sunday. I love my Sundays because, so far, they’ve been very relaxed. Sundays seem to be the only days that I get to sleep as late as I want and then have the entire day to myself. I usually clean, sort trash, run errands, do laundry and organize things. It’s just really relaxing and low-energy.

Today, I woke up to rain which was very refreshing. It’s the first time I’ve seen the rain since I came to Japan. I absolutely love rain so I’m in a really good mood! It feels much better too... I don’t even have the aircon on today. I felt like making breakfast, so I decided to tackle my first real cooking encounter since coming here (I’ve been eating out A LOT).

First, I cooked an egg on my gas stove. It was the first time I’ve ever had/used a gas stove! I got to use the heart-shaped cut-out that I bought to fry eggs in. It came out pretty well! I also wanted toast with my egg. The bread in Japan is different, though... It’s really thick. Each slice is about as thick as 2 slices of American loaf bread. So, I cut one piece in half to make 2 slimmer slices. I don’t have a bread toaster so I cooked the bread in my little toaster oven. I put butter on the toast. Even the butter is different in Japan! It’s in one big block as opposed to the sticks that I’m accustomed to. For one of the slices of toast, I added some caramel cinnamon sugar toast powder that I picked up at my grocery store. It was yummy !! I got a bunch of different flavors of this toast powder--chocolate, strawberry, vanilla, apple, etc. At first, I didn’t realize that it was meant for toast and I planned on adding it to my tea. I think I might still try that! I also had iced coffee for breakfast. I got to use the new glass that I bought from Daiso that has little pink flowers on it. For the coffee, I actually have some in my refrigerator in a bottle that is meant to be served cold. I added individually packaged cups of cream and liquid sugar. It seems so different from how it’s usually made in America, but maybe it’s just because I’ve never seen that stuff there. To the coffee, I added some tiny heart-shaped ice cubes that I made. I thought they would be a nice touch for when guests come over but I couldn’t help using some myself. The breakfast was pretty tasty and I even ate it with a fork that has a heart cut-out on the handle! My predecessor left a set of these cute utensils which I’m excited about.

♡ my first time making breakfast in Japan ♡

Day 10

I arrived in Japan on Sunday, August 4, 2013. The first thing I remember seeing as our plane prepared to land at Narita Airport was the landscape of Japan from thousands of feet in the air. I was lucky enough to have been seated next to the same girl who I was coincidentally seated next to at my interview for the JET Program, back in late February. She and I giggled about how Japanese the houses looked, the mountains... We were in Japan. The acknowledgment of how surreal it all felt was a recurring topic between us for the entire 12 hour flight. We thought everything would finally “hit us” once we landed but even then, we just couldn’t believe it.