Byouki :(

Hey all!
Sorry I haven't posted for a bit. I've been sick :(. I got some kind of cold or something and I just can't seem to kick it. I even missed two days of midterms at school cause the doctor said I should really rest. Blech. I've still got a cough and I'm really exhausted. No fun at all.

But, in other news, the ryuugakusei are having a Halloween party on Friday! Japanese people don't really do Halloween, so we're planning on frightening them all by wearing our costumes to school :). Should be fun!
I didn't want to spend $50 (the cheapest one I could find!) on a costume for ONE DAY so I bought some cheap little horns and a pitchfork and I'm going to wear a red dress I brought from home. Voila - devil! I'll take pictures! My friend is planning on going as Pikachu. It will definitely be an amusing Halloween. :)

Also, recently I've discovered the wonderful world of Disney in Japanese! I even translated the song "Once Upon a Dream" from the Japanese version back to English, subtitled the video, and put it on Youtube. It was really fun! I've been listening to all my favorite Disney songs in Japanese. I even bought the Japanese version of Aladdin! Good practice, if nothing else :)

This Sunday I went with a friend and his host dad to the Akashi Kohashi Bridge, the longest bridge in the world! It was awesome! They gave us hard hats and special vests and ear pieces. Then they gave us a presentation on how the bridge was built and showed us exhibits about the materials. The presentation was a little hard to understand because they spoke really quickly, but the visual aids helped :). We got to walk half the bridge underneath where the cars were driving. It was kind of scary - above you there are cars and trucks whizzing on the bridge and below you there are boats and freighters sailing on the ocean and all that separates you from these things is an iron grid. Slightly unsettling. But really interesting!
We took an elevator up to the 98th floor of the bridge's first suspension rigging tower. It was so pretty up there! Even though it was raining and cloudy, you could still see INCREDIBLY far. On the one side is the mainland and on the other side is Awajishima, an island that's famous for its museum about the Great Hanshin Earthquake 10 years ago. From the top of the bridge, I could even see a Kofun! Kofun are these ancient tombs from around 200-550 AD. Yeah, really old. They're keyhole shaped and gigantic, so really the only way you can see them fully is from above. I was looking out over the mainland city and suddenly I noticed one and pulled my friend over shouting "Look! It's a Kofun!". We just learned about them in my Art History class, so I was pretty excited to get to see one from the right angle.
It was really fun!

Alright, I'm off to bed because I'm still sick and I really want to get better soon. I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired! :)

Love and miss you all!

Love,
Christy