i have a stomach ache

So its been about a week since my last post...and I believe that I left off saying that I had a presentation in my lab...

well... i origonally wrote an entire post recalling the events that transpired that night.. but i have decided that I will not post it. If you "just gotta know!!!1!1!!" all the details of that night, let me know and I'll email you a copy of it. But for all those content with just knowing the short version, I will not go into detail here...

My post doc told me I had a presentation. He told me short notice. I had a week to make a presentation. I did not know what exactly a "presentation" consisted of...at ALL. I asked him for help. Repeadily. He started avoiding me. In the end, I made a horrible excuse for a presentation. What else was I suposed to do? I presented. It was awful. I made a fool of my self infront of my lab group. The post doc got upset and started lecturing me in front of everyone about how bad my presentation was, and how I needed to study more on my topic and other things. I knew before hand that he would do this. I had suspected that he had just set me up for failure.

I told him off in front of the lab. And then I went to my professor's office explained the situation and quit. My professor understood completely and said that he had not realized the situation I had been in for the past few months (ie doing way too much work and having to stay in the lab 8+ hours a day...everyday)

He offered to put me in a new lab with better hours. I think I will do this...next quarter. I desperatly need a break, and a chance to focus on my actual classes (which I was close to failing at the time). I think I'll be ok in my japanese classes...probably not As though... its too late for getting As. I think I'm barely going to be able to bring them up to Bs...if that.. Like I said before...lab consumed almost every waking moment before.

The day after I quit I was really confused. Did I just destroy my only good reason for being in Japan? What should I be doing now? I felt SO idle...

but since then,　things have gotten alot better. I had time to...enjoy myself... I'm finding myself once again caring about learning Japanese and making friends... I'm finding that after only 7 hours of sleep I'm completly refreshed (before I could sleep 9 and still be tired). A side note.. but after being with the lab kids who never sleep, I feel stupid saying "ONLY 7 hours of sleep and I'm not tired!!!" in my lab this is twice the amount of their daily sleep

So in the past week I've been reading more... playing my guitar again... enjoying the sunshine outside.

I don't have internet in my room atm, so the only time I can check emails and such is at the International Student Center.

In other news... it snowed the other day! It was fun! I went outside and played ..a little.. there wasnt TOO much snow..and none of my friends were as amazed by the snow as I was and therefore wouldn't play with me :[

I don't have much else to say. I have a headache and stomach ache right now... I started feeling not so great around yesterday... hopefully I'm not getting sick...

I also just bought my plane ticket to come home for a few weeks in March. I know it seems dumb that I'm coming home AGAIN... BUT in my defense. I've travelled Japan..twice... I'm going to korea in a few weeks, and then I'm going up north for a field study class for about a week.

After that I had litterally a month off school. I don't have the money to travel in Japan. I can't even afford to go to Tokyo more than once a week (about 30 dollars worth of trains round trip plus how ever much money it takes to actually have FUN in tokyo..). Theres nothing to do in my college town. All my friends here at Tsukuba Univ are graduating at the end of Feb. And my fellow californian friends ...well, one will go spend the month with his family (has uncles and aunts and cousins in Japan) and the other will play video games all month. They too don't have money to travel and would rather sit inside than do anything...
And most importantly...my Mommy is paying for my ticket..so its free! :D

I'll be home from March 16th -April 9th. Last time I came home I was insanely busy...but... this time I just plan to relax. So if you want to do something, let me know. I'm not going to try to seek out everyone to plan haning out. If you wanna hang out, its up to you :p

Since I have to use the public comp, I have no way of putting up photos for the time being... but i will slove this problem soon!

Well I need to go to the store and buy food. And my head is killing me. AND I have nothing else to say.

thanks again for reading! Sorry if it was boring =/

Liza