I woke again very early and this is what I saw outside of my window, which explains why this city is so clean!
I dressed up again to go out, but forgot to take a picture. Wasn't anything great, just an off-white frilly dress that was sleeveless. I saw other girls wearing sleeveless tops so I guess that was just a weird myth or something old-school that I read about. I had bruises on my legs from moving things, so I had to wear black tights that were very hot. It was an especially hot day, so that didn't help. At the Travel Cafe, I ate inside and got . . . a giant piece of French Toast! It had peaches on it and was very sweet! I was so glad because by this day, I was starving! I was definitely full after that and didn't feel hungry until the next morning! I did eat other things that day though, but at least I didn't feel like I was starving like on the other days. After my meal, I went to find the Rainbow Plaza, which is where foreigners go to get info about the city. My boss had circled in on the map, but my map was entirely in Japanese so it was impossible to figure out where I was! I kind of figured out which street to go down, but from there I was lost. I was hoping that the building would say "Rainbow Plaza" on it, but no . . . I went past a McDonald's and many other shops. It was so hot and I forgot to bring my umbrella again (all of the women use umbrellas to keep their skin white, and also I can see how it keeps them out of the heat!). Finally, I pulled out my map and started walking back to where I came from. I was waiting at a crosswalk when an older man came up on a bike and started speaking to me in Japanese. I kind of looked confused then just said that I don't speak Japanese. He then spoke to me in some English and asked me where I was trying to go. I told him where, and he told me to go to a building which he spelled out "IMISU" so I looked for this. He spoke well enough for me to understand him, but he said some things that I didn't understand. I just told him thank you and went off to find it. I found a building called "IMS" and went in. The building had a sign for what was on each of the 8 floors, but I couldn't figure out what it said since it was all in Japanese! I couldn't figure out where the front of the building was either, so I went in the side apparently. I went up to the second floor and found that the building was basically a shopping mall. I looked around and found a cute animal shop! I wasn't sure if I was allowed to film, but there was an adorable grey and white fuzzy guinea pig, a grey fluffy bunny, and this cute brown, fat, fluffy thing that looked like a groundhog. When I went up to it, I guess I scared it because it rolled up into a tight, round, brown ball, rolling its head into its stomach! It was too cute, but I was sorry I scared it so I backed away. I saw bird cages but no birds. There were a lot of fish. I saw another strange animal that looked like a giant brown gerbil. It had the tail of a gerbil but was the size of a small rat. It was very cute and ran around a wheel like a hamster. I then heard a beautiful sound of singing, and saw these:
After I left the building, I went around the corner to walk towards my hotel and found some large glass doors. I went through and found a huge sign in both Japanese and English. Lo and behold, there was Rainbow Plaza on the sign! It was on the 8th floor, so I reentered the mall and went to the 8th floor. I found Rainbow Plaza as well as a map of Fukuoka in English and some other brochures that were in English. The people at the counter spoke English very well so I was embarrassed after I spoke very minimal English to them because I thought they wouldn't understand. The lady looked kind of irritated and responded in perfect English . . . at least I know that now in case I ever need to go back again!
I stopped by a good-sized drug store on the way back to my hotel. It was about the size of a Walgreens but had a large make-up section with many check-out counters in the make-up area, but only one check-out area for the rest of the store. I found lots of cheap goodies there and only spent a little over $6 there! The lady was very nice and gave me some much-needed chopsticks. I had brought a pair from home, but it was nice to have another when the other pair needed washing.
Here's what I got:
Koala bear chocolates! Tim and Mum will remember these. These tasted just like ice cream, it was a new flavor! Oh, the grapefruit juice was actually from the vending machine. Very good, the same as back home :P
The panda bear candy was a little sour and very tasty. The Cheetos were surprisingly sweet! They weren't cheesy but were very sweet. The potato chips were like vinegar chips even though they were supposed to be regular flavor.
The ramen was so good! As you can see from the pic below, it had something inside that was tempura with peas and other vegetables. It was so tasty! I was very full this day! I was so happy to have good, filling food and not go to bed hungry!
As soon as I came home, I took a very nice, cold shower. I was sweating so badly after walking so far in the heat! Mcdonald's had a nice mister outside, which was a slight relief from the heat, but I was embarrassingly sweaty unless the Japanese who must've been used to it and weren't wearing thick, black tights!
I took an hour and a half nap, then decided to eat to keep me awake. After all of this food, I took another nap. The day before I had slept for a total of 5 or 6 hours! This day, I only slept for about 2 and a half. I'm trying to work up to not taking any naps despite it being 3am Memphis time when it's only 5pm here! I'm trying to stop waking up at 5:40 every morning, too, but that's been impossible to break. I'll usually study Japanese until about 8am then sleep for another hour.
I watched anime this afternoon, all in Japanese of course, but it was still cool even thought I couldn't understand it. I kind of guessed what was going on. Apparently, they are still making new Pokemon episodes, and Naruto is the most popular anime out here. It was a good day getting out, but I was so exhausted after coming home from sweating so much!
I feel asleep on and off until about midnight, which was good, except I still got up early the next morning. . .
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