hey all,
So the test was pretty touch and go. The first section was 35 questions within 30 minutes of vocabulary, and I quickly discovered that the words I had been studying and the set of words on the test, only overlapped a little. So I had basically been studying the wrong words, or really, not the wrong words, but more likely not enough words.
The second section was a reading comprehension section, and I feel I did pretty well on that. Mostly just checking details about the reading passages, selecting appropriate words/phrases to go in the blanks, etc.
The last section was listening, and that was also touch and go. Several parts of it made me feel that it was far too easy, but other parts I just had to guess because they never repeated any of it, and they never slowed down: they just spoke at normal speed. The actual real difficult part was when they had no answers. I mean, for the new test, they have parts of the listening section where your question sheet just has a blank page for you to take notes on: the question is asked verbally, the conversation is played, and the possible answers are listed verbally, and if you miss any of it, too bad.
I'm not sure whether I passed or not, but I'm leaning towards not at the moment.
The ramen museum was pretty interesting, and some of it was quite delicious. It is very cheap to get in, but if you want to eat any of the ramen served there, it can become quite expensive. They have about 10 different regional varieties of ramen to try, and even if you only try a small bowl of each, your wallet and stomach take a hit.
In other news, it appears that A Song of Ice and Fire will be coming to HBO next April. I just saw a 10 minute "Making Of" clip on the author's livejournal page, and it looks really amazing. The production values are through the roof, and the actors all look in top form. We'll have to wait and see whether the dialogue, action, and maturity of the books have been well translated into film. No news about the long-awaited volume five yet.
My cold is getting a little bit better, but there is still almost no time to rest. Next weekend Michi is insisting on going rock climbing again so that she doesn't forget how to multi-pitch climb. Not a bad idea, but it just means that I don't really get any days to just watch anime, play video games, go see local sites, or plain old sit around and do nothing. I'd rather have an interesting life than no life at all, but relaxing is important for my sanity.
I've been hanging out with the new housemate from the Midwest, and that has been really good. Since I've kinda gotten used to not being able to go anywhere and not having anyone besides Michi to go anywhere with, I've been missing out on seeing a lot of Japan. Since he moved in, I've gotten to see some of the local things around Yokohama that otherwise I wouldn't get to see.
Cheers,
