Football Game/Food Photos/Miscellaneous Thoughts

To sum up my latest spree of writing blog posts, this one will be dedicated to some miscellaneous things that do not have enough content for an entire post on its own, but should not be skipped nonetheless.

First, I want to post some pictures and write some thoughts on a football game I attended!
Ironically, the first football game I have ever attended was in Japan, even though it's an American sport. Apparently, the school that I attend has been consistently number one in its league for American football, so my friends and I wanted to go watch a game to see what the hype was all about.

The stadium was huge!

We have a giant KGU football jersey in the audience

The team before the game

The opponent's side was a lot more empty than our side...lol. I didn't take a picture of the audience on our side, but it was pretty filled! To my surprise, a lot of the people that were there were not college students, but simply football fans. A lot of people who were just regular football fans were decked out in our school's gear such as jackets, tshirts, hats, etc.

It was all of our first football game!

The cheerleaders were adorable

I took a lot of pictures of the cheerleaders because they were so cute and enthusiastic. I couldn't resist :')

This was really cute! They arranged their pom poms to spell out KGU

 The whole thing seemed very...American, yet very different. It was just like your average rowdy football game, with the cheerleaders and a school band and everything. However, their traditions are a little different. For example, every time after the cheerleaders finished a cheer, they would thank the audience. And after the game ended, a few players from our football team ran to the other side and bowed to the other team. Then, the whole team turned around to face the audience and bowed to thank us for coming.

The players lined up at the end of the game

My friends and I were super hyped after the game and wanted to go to more. So later on, we got a whole bunch of our friends who were interested in going and all bought tickets for more games.


Since this is a compilation of random things blog post, I will abruptly move on to the next thing - a photo dump of various foods I've had here that I've gotten pictures of.

A tofu soup set from the mall. SO much food!

My first Subway sandwich in Japan. It's hard to see in the photo, but it had smoked salmon. It was a lot better than American Subway, but also a little more expensive.

The first time I ever made cotton candy by myself! Taken at a little buffet at a mall.

Ramen and spicy fried rice - the essentials to my life

I went to the gyudon restaurant on campus and bought all this for around $5. I couldn't even finish it all.

The food here is so delicious, and I can't get enough of it. One thing that nobody seems to ever get tired of eating is beef gyudon - which is pretty much just cooked slices of beef and onions over rice. It's so simple yet so delicious. Also, the ramen here is so good and so much cheaper than ramen in Las Vegas. I'm gonna miss the food so much when I have to go back. One thing I really do miss from America that they don't have here is Chipotle...I miss Chipotle. Also, I miss Takis and carne asada fries a lot. When I go back, those are the first things I'm going to eat. While I looove Japanese food, the lack of Mexican food here is a huge problem in my diet. I love Mexican food too much. I think back in Vegas, all I really ate was Japanese, Taiwanese, Chinese, Korean, and Mexican food (sometimes Greek as well), so the only thing that I'm missing here is Mexican. American food is meh, so I don't really miss that at all, hah.

Onto the next abruptly shifted topic: fall is here in the Kansai region!

A panorama of our campus on a foggy day

The differences in the colors of the leaves in one part of the campus

The weather is unstable, the colors of the leaves are unstable, and when the wind blows, I constantly see leaves fly up in the air along with the wind. Fall is here!
However, the changing of the seasons reminds me of another thing....fall is here. It's mid-November. I leave in mid-January. I have two months left in Japan. Two months. TWO MONTHS!
I am SO not ready to leave Japan yet. There is still so many places I haven't gone to and so much Japanese I haven't learned. It's really hard to balance trying to go everywhere I want to go and trying to study Japanese as much as I can, and I really just wish I had more time here. Plus, I especially am not ready to leave all the friends I've made here. I've met so many wonderful, precious human beings and it makes me so sad that I can't just take them all home with me. That's the thing about studying abroad - it's cool that you make friends all over the world, but at the same time, they're all over the world. Which means, it would be very hard to see them again. I'm gonna miss all the exchange students and Japanese students I've met here. When I first got here, I didn't know how I would be with meeting all these new people, and whether or not I would get along with them. But after a couple of months, I feel like I've met some people that are best friend material, some of the most open-minded and fun people I've ever met. I'm also going to miss my host family! They've been nothing but kind to me, and even though we encounter a lot of differences in culture and daily routine (they are super structured, morning people. I'm a free spirit who hates having a set schedule, and I'm a night person), they're so nice to me, and I'm really gonna miss having them around too.
It's hitting me super hard that I have to leave Japan soon and possibly not return for a very long time. Also, I may possibly never see many of the people I've met here ever again...which makes me so sad :( I wish I had the time and money to study abroad here for the whole year instead of one semester. Time really goes by SO FAST here because I always have something to do whether it be homework, self-study, going out with friends, exploring, or just sitting at school talking to friends. Which is also why I rarely ever have time to update this blog (sorry!).

On a more positive note, even though the semester is coming to a close soon, I'm really excited to winter break! My winter break plans are finalized - I'm going to be visiting Tokyo for 3 days with my boyfriend Austin, my friend who is also flying here from Vegas, and 2 of my friends that are also exchange students here. There are a ton of places I wanna go to in Tokyo, and I wanna stay for longer, but...after Tokyo Austin and I are going to fly to Taipei for the next 6 days. I'm super stoked about that as well. For the past 6 months or so, I've been randomly really homesick for Taipei, so I cannot wait to back again. And it'll be even better this time because it's Austin's first time going out of America (!!), and I get to show him around Tokyo, Taipei, Osaka, and Kobe. For a first time experience of going out of country, those are super cool locations to visit in my opinion. I have a ton of places I wanna visit and a ton of foods I wanna eat in all those places, and I can't wait to share the experience with everyone that I'm going with. Also, since I haven't seen Austin in 2 months when we used to hang out just about everyday, I'm so excited to see him again!! Japan has been great but also somewhat lonely without him :( P.S. Austin if you're reading this, I'm so excited for you to visit!!

After my winter break vacation, it'll be finals week at KGU, then back to the reality of returning to Vegas and going to spring semester at UNLV. Even though it's still two months away, I'm already a little bummed out about going back, because I know that these next two months are going to fly by. Sigh.

Anyway, I hope that I will find the time to update this blog more often, and I apologize once again for writing so infrequently! I hope everyone enjoyed reading my last few posts about life in Japan.