Its been a while since my last update, mainly due to finals and papers eating up a large chunk of my time, but don't worry! I haven't been slacking in the touristy 'take lots of pictures' department by any means.

Heading way back in time, I actually FINALLY got to go to the Tsukiji Fish Market. It was quite the experience. It was a large warehouse of sorts, with vendors upon vendors selling everything you can imagine that swims in some form or another. The aisles were tiny, and the people were hustling and bustling about. One thing I would definitely suggest going to see if you ever make it to Tokyo prefecture, Japan. Just keep in mind that these people are actually working, and try to stay out of their way. Breakfast that morning was really good, too, but unfortunately my batteries died on me long before so I was unable to get a shot. It was raw tuna and rice with lil' diced scrambled egg squares...mmmm...Then I got accepted by my school with three others to go and assist in teaching English to high school girls in Niigata, a prefecture to the north. It took an hour and a half by bullet train [shinkansen] to get there, and I was quite shocked when I looked out the window at the station and found it was snowing! Apparently Niigata is a ski resort town and everyone neglected to tell me this, so I showed up in my hoodie and jeans. Luckily the hotel we were staying at was only two minutes from the station. I noticed on the driveway of the hotel they had a mini sprinkler system thing built in which was sending water cascading down the driveway in order to keep it from icing over. We arrived Friday and met with the girls from Kasukabe [kah-sue-kah-bay] Girls High School at noon, with our first class a little later that day. We split up into four groups, splitting up the girls by ability. I was with the second highest group of girls, 10 in the class. We stayed with the same girls the entire weekend, so by the end of the weekend I knew them all. The food was great! It was actually a buffet with all different types of stuff like crab legs, shrimp tempura, some sort of beef stuff and a ton of neat desserts. There was a breakfast buffet as well, with some small variety from what dinner was. Lunch was curry. There were also two hot springs [onsen] on site, and we got to wear yukata [you-kah-tah] or spring kimonos. Our room was also traditional Japanese style, with tatami mat floors and futons to sleep in. It was really nice and relaxing.

We didn't actually teach the class because there were legitimate teachers there, but we helped them out with the class. It was a great experience nonetheless.

The cherry blossoms have come and went already, but I managed some great pictures of them that I'll be posting. A group of us headed back out to Disney, but this time we went to DisneySEA. The way that they do Disney here is they split it up into two parks, with Disneyland having more of the old classics like the Haunted Mansion and the Snow White, while DisneySEA has updated rides like one based on Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull [bad movie, great ride]. It was glorious weather there [70 and sunny].

I should be updating about 70+ pictures, so keep checking back!