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Here are the names from Spring and Summer at IES. I might not know all of them…wait I probably do. Oh, and I’m only including NEW nicknames since last fall, meaning I won’t write Shadow Eyes, etc again. Add any ones I forget in comments.

Spring IES
Ass man/luggage/Friar Tuck; Balding; Bilbo Baggins; the Triad; Gunner/battle stress; 野獣/wild beast; Ugly boyfriend; DT/Defensive Tackle/that bitch is HUGE; Pete/lip ring; no nickname but Andy is sweet; Megane-ecchi; Drug/Skateboard

Summer IES
Japanese name (sucks); Jabba; National Disgrace; Molestache 2; Monkey/Gorilla/Bigfoot; Asian fetish; Goon; Wedgie/Douchie-blue; typical Korean kid; AC Slater; Smiley 2; Bitchtits; Budo; Punch you in the face/anus/naguru zo; Clingy

You know, this is probably a bad idea, but I’m doin’ it anyway. Here folks, is the complete list of the IES 2004 Fall nicknames, coined by the A-Team. I’m only including the ones I can rememeber, or that actually lasted more than a day or two (ie, Aniki is not listed for Derek; it didn’t stick) Guys: if I happened to leave one out (esp the Bekkas), feel free to Comment and add it.

IES Students:

Starey; Fat Albert/Jeff Goldblum; Shadow Eyes; Russian; Hermoine/Ugly Shadow Eyes; Otouto; Goose/FOB/Geoffrey/Giraffe/FOBulous; Dark Seth; 3-Seater/San-Seki; NL/Naughty Librarian; Kindergarten Teacher/Ari’s Ex; Fabulous/Hot Pants/Fab; 80’s Business Man; Miss Piggy/Muppet/Fluffy; Hirose’s Daughter; Kaicho/Oyabun; Terminator; Side of Beef/SOB/Gyuukaku; Googgly/Googles; Alb/Albino; Mangina; Molestache; Smithers; Uncle Hokuro/Hokuro Jiisan/Hokuro-kun/Moley; KakkoWarui Ben; Gut; Squirrly Joe; Southern Gentleman/Southern Comfort/SoCo; Smilie-kun; Harry Potter/Dirty Harry; German; Hippy Graham; Dirty Hippy/Hippy Girl; Crazy Ass Bitch; Hobbit; Splinter; Arnold; Potato Boy

(This doesn’t include people who don’t have nicknames, but still suck)

Bekkas:

The 3 Ks; Ostrich; Jafar; Urkel; T-Rex; Froggy; Antonio Banderas; Other Caleb

Well, it’s over. Officially. The semester finished up today, following my second straight day of sitting in front of a computer at the SALC, carrying 2 heavy bags with me everywhere, and in general stressing about everything. After the 2 worst days of the semester, it ended with one of the best nights.

Yeah, almost everyone is leaving tomorrow, but that’s not horrible. It will be weird, of course. No A-Team assembling, no sitting at SALC computers doing nothing, no sitting at Y’s, Saize, or IES making fun of the scabies around us. For that, it’s a little sad. Not like I’m never going to see these people ever again. In fact, I’m pretty sure I’ll see a bunch of them sometime later.

Technically I’m not done with all my school work, although I sure wish I was. Stress level definitely plummeted though, which is good otherwise I would have had to jump in front of a train. I need to go to school on Tuesday to finch up some video editing (not really editing, I need to make CDs of the class videos, blah); also I still need to finish writing my History final paper sometime soon and e-mail it to the Prof. Didn’t finish it today, nor go to class since I was in the video comp lab. Ah well, the Prof didn’t seem that mad.

I was going to write a whole bunch more here. Thought about it all the way walking home from the station. I was going to mention about how I don’t think I’ve ever been able to “enjoy” a going away party, a final party, a graduation, etc… I’m always busy with something, like videos, computers, running errands, etc. Even tonight, after the IES Video was shown, then Spiderman, it felt like such a rush for me to walk around, say goodbye to some people, and leave. I thought to myself that maybe I’ll be able to sit back and enjoy my retirement in around 30 years, but even that is doubtful.

I’m going to get some sleep now. I haven’t been doing that much these last few days. Tomorrow I have to wake up reasonably early to go see some people off at the airport. Even if I didn’t go, I guess it wouldn’t be horrible, but I suppose it would be nice. Bryan, Ari, Mikey: you guys might be reading this in a day or two after you get home. I’ll probably write more tomorrow also. It was a great semester. I really did meet a lot of awesome people (I honestly think that was my biggest worry before coming here, a bunch of dorks etc). And now it’s over. It will definitely be strange to leave here in a week.

Well it’s about 1PM, and I just got up. I love getting to catch up on sleep on the weekends. I almost forgot to write this post yesterday:

I’ve been studying Japanese for long enough now, and have seen enough Americans studying Japanese, to really have this annoy me. Now, my Japanese isn’t super great or anything, and I understand that there are people with different levels of the language. Somewhere, (I don’t think it’s taught in classes) a bunch of these kids learned ええぇぇぇと (“eeeeto”, Japanese version of “ummmm”) and started using it like there’s no tomorrow. It’s OK to try and make your Japanese more natural of course, but DON’T USE EEEEEEEETO IF YOUR JAPANESE SUCKS! Some people seriously put this between every word, and they sound like frickin morons (I’m actually going to be considerate and not name names). Stuffing your head into a book isn’t going to make your pronunciation better, and man they need to work on that.

I’m actually in a really good mood right now, but just thought I’d write that since it bugged me so much (listening to people) yesterday.

This goofy looking guy’s name is George Williams:

He is on Japanese TV, and if you ever get a chance to see him, you will agree that he is the most annoying person on television ever. He’s not even American (after about 2 minutes of research, I found out he is half British and half Japanese), but he MUST be giving Americans a horrible horrible name in this country.

I’m going to make this as short as possible, but it is bound to be long, as it is a rant. This guy has pink hair, but apparently last week it was green. He overpronounces everything (which might not be totally bad, as he is on a show to teach people English), but the main problem is the way he moves and his facial expressions. It looks like with every word, he is forcing a pumpkin out of his crotch. His Japanese is actually good (probably he was raised here), but he pulls off the “douchebag foreigner” image 100%. He is going bald, dyes his hair a new color every week I suppose, and dresses like an old man on vacation, ie flowered shirts, khaki shorts, random accessories, etc.

I am embarrassed to watch this guy on TV, same as the other 2 or 3 “main” Americans on TV shows here. Another is a guy named Patrick. Not as bad, but still annoying as hell. Anyway, just needed to vent about this George Williams guy. His show is only 15 minutes, thank goodness, but he is annoying enough to irritate you for the entire next day. Ari and Mike agree with me on this. If I ever see this guy walking around the street, I will seriously consider kicking him in the groin and laughing. End of rant.

Last week we had a meeting for the start of IES SIG groups, basically little clubs for various interests like sports, Japanese language, culture, etc. Clubs so the IES kids and Japanese students can hang out. I joined the biggest one, Movies, and became leader of it. Then, I didn’t realize that the leaders of each of the SIGs were automatically candidates for IES Student Council President. Well, that was the case, and I am now the President. Haha, funny funny.

On Monday, we were off for 老人の日 (Roujin no Hi), or “Be nice to old people day.” So what did I do? Went to the movies. Japanese movies are ridiculously expensive. 1 ticket is 1800 yen, or around $16. Student Discount is a little bit less. Me, Seth, and Bryan went to see Naruto the Movie. Mii showed up a little late, so we stubbed her in. She didn’t know this at first. I guess Japanese kids aren’t big on sneaking into movies. After that, we decided that we paid so much money, we wanted to see more than 1 movie. Luckily, when we bought our tickets, they give you a schedule of the movies playing that week. Makes it easy to figure out which movie to sneak into next. So, I watched about 20 minutes of Biohazard 2 (Resident Evil 2), then moved to watch the Dekaranger/Kamen Rider Blade double feature. Good times. Went to Outback for dinner.

Tuesday was just classes as usual, no biggie.

Wednesday, went to Harajuku to buy a man-purse, since every guy in this country has one. It’s actually just a black canvas bag with Kishidan on it. Then, me and Ari went to a restaurant that had for 1000 yen all you can eat pasta, pizza, pancakes, and hip hop. When I ever get around to putting up pictures, I will have to show the sign from this place. Then, we went to Ebisu to see the Sapporo Beer Museum. Horrible museum really, it’s just an excuse for people to try (after paying for) different kinds of Sapporo and Yebisu beer.

At night, went with Ari, Ahn-tuan, Dan, and Adam to Shinjuku. Went to 2 huge music stores, then walked around Kabukicho (the shady yakuza/triad-run area). Before we finally made it to Kabukicho, however, thanks to my awesome map-reading skills, we found where the Shinjuku gay district is. Definitely some weird stuff going on there. And also a gay park, where I guess the gay folk do their business. We were out of there as soon as we realized where we had gone.

Randomness for the rest of the night, primarily walking around aimlessly in Shibuya. Met up with Dave Heston from high school, and his friend from Germany. We walked around a lot, finally ended up in Roppongi at the famous Gas Panic (the locals call it GasPa) club. Let me make this short and sweet: ROPPONGI SUCKS. It is the dirtiest area I have seen in Japan, hilighted by the hordes of refugees/immigrants from Europe, Africa and the really poor parts of Asia. They are either in Roppongi to be hookers, to pick up Japanese guys who don’t know any better, and/or to go to dirty, crowded clubs like Gas Panic. Ah well, at least I know not to go back to Roppongi. Also note that since we were in Roppongi so late, I couldn’t even leave until 5AM. So I was trapped there for hours longer than I would have liked.