Cultural activities

Hello~ It's been a while! I haven't had the time to upload my pictures lately, (I've been feeling a cold coming and freaking out, taking as much vitamin c as possible so I don't catch anything, etc etc...) so I'll do that briefly now.

2 weeks ago, I went to a cultural event sponsored by Keio University where a small group got together and got to see how soba noodles are made. For those who don't know, soba noodles are made out of buckwheat and are very healthy. I asked how the flour is different from pasta noodles for example. Apparently, they're very different. Soba flour is very light and actually slightly sticky. It is first sifted into a bowl and mixed with water.

 It then takes a lot of strength to make a dough. This is why soba noodles are always made by men. Apparently, it takes even more strength to make udon noodles (fat japanese noodles). These are made by a combination of arm AND leg power.

 The dough then turns out like this. It's so perfect! Japanese really are perfectionists.

 The dough is then rolled out into a square.

 It actually fit onto the whole table! An amazingly perfect square!

 This square is then folded like a cloth so it turns out as you can see below. The soba dough is on top of a rectangle cutting board here.

 This is the knife used to cut soba. It's super huge! It's probably super sharp as well in order to cut precisely.

 Here the soba is being cut. A wooden board is used to cut the noodles evenly.

 And thus they turn out like this! They are nice and flimsy but still uncooked.

 This is a soup made from soba (buckwheat) seeds and mixed with tiny mushrooms. It has a very light flavor but very warm.

 And these are the final soba noodle product. They are cooked and rinsed with cool water in order to make cold noodles. Soba comes in two varieties: First, there is soup soba, which comes warm in a broth and mixed with vegetables or green onions. Second, there is cold soba, which comes just as the noodles and mixed with a fish sauce and topped with green onions. It was a really great experience to see soba made right in front of me. Something that would usually be super expensive, was only 200yen. These definitely tasted differently than regular soba from the grocery store, etc. You could really taste the texture of the buckwheat. It was great.

 After the soba making, I had a field trip with my art class to make wind chimes. This is my chime. I got to blow the glass myself even! And then, I painted the picture on the inside, which was so tough! This is so, if you put it outside, the paint won't come off. The chime place is actually a really popular place and lots of famous people had been there like Aiba Masaki from Arashi, Kinki Kids, Fujiwara Tatsuya...That was kinda cool.

 Last Friday, I walked around Shibuya and had dinner at a famous ramen place. The ramen was really salty though. I even prefer the ramen in the school cafeteria. My favorite ramen is still Aika's mom's homemade ramen.

 Last Saturday, I went to the long awaited Sukima Switch concert! It....was....amazing. At first, it was kinda lonely being all by myself...but it was fine once the concert started. I was so absorbed in Sukima Switch!♥

 First, there was an opening act by this band no one knew. They were really loud and abnoxious and the singer sounded like he was high...but one of their songs was kind of amusing. The singer said that he went out with this really cute girl in high school, but he was dumped after two weeks. Recently, they saw each other and started talking. She asked him what he was up to so he said "Oh, I'm just in this super cool band like X-Japan level" (an obvious lie...). In reply, she said she had just gotten married...to a Keio boy. And so the singer got kinda pissed and decided to make a song called "I want to be a Keio boy".

By the way, the term "Keio boy" is used for the stereotypical boy that attends Keio. Apparently, they're really popular among girls because they're supposed to be good looking, fashionable, smart, and rich on top of that. Keio is actually a really prestigious school so...there are lots of rich people as I said before. And so, it's every girl's dream to marry a Keio boy. By the way, Sukima Switch themselves brought this up during their MC portion of the concert, but there is no term "Keio girl". I don't know why...Sukima Switch made a joke and used the term "Keio gyaru" instead, which was funny because the term "gyaru" sounds like "girl" but it's actually used to describe girls with lots of make up, super skimpy clothing, dyed hair, and are usually walking around Shibuya. Like this:

Gyaru aren't usually very smart though, so I don't know if they would get into Keio...

But anyways, Sukima's concert was amazing! During the opening act, everyone remained in their seats, but as soon as Sukima Switch got on stage, everyone got to their feet and remained that way the whole concert. There were like 3000 people in the hall apparently. Also, I knew almost all of their songs, they played my favorite song even though it's kind of old (so I was so happy and got to sing along♪), their MCing was so funny, the main singer has the most amazing voice, and they made the concert really interactive getting the audience involved with singing a few times. At one point in the concert, I was so moved by their lyrics and at the same time so happy to be there to experience them live, that I cried. Lives are really something else...

Then, today, I had plans to visit Ikebukuro with Stephanie, but it was raining, so we decided to go to somewhere indoors. We went to this huge mall which really made me feel at home because it was the first U.S.-like mall that I had been to in a while. Rather than a shopping center, it was really like Tyson's Mall if I had to compare it to anything. Stephanie and I ate at a Chinese restaurant, and then walked around. I've kind of given up on buying clothes in Japan, though. They're way too expensive. But, I had to buy this magazine from the most famous bookstore in Japan--Kinokuniya--because it had...this folder that came with it...Niina! (dies) I'm really so pathetic...

Anyways, tomorrow, I participate in my school festival, which as a result, there is a week off from school. During this break, my horoscope recommends that I study a lot because my mind is open for knowledge! Of course, I have planned to do that, but I also want to go around Tokyo some to see lots of things. That's part of studying as well, right?