June, 13th>

I spent a lot of my first week in Canadian Farms just trying to learn how things are done and made a decent amount of mistakes along the way. First thing I think was Bokemaru (Bo-K-Mah-Ru), he's the dog around here, I'm not a stranger to dogs so I knew not to be too friendly with a new dog. My caution came in handy when Bokemaru tried to bite me after I'd called his name lol. He's a small dog about the size of my dog Milo but he's got some "shyness" issues, that's what they tell me anyways. My goal for before I leave Japan is to befriend the Bokemeister.

Some of my other goals are learning Japanese while I'm here and making a lot of new friends and contacts. Learning Japanese so far has been pretty interesting and at times not so easy... most the time not so easy. I've made quite a few good friends so far. I hope that they can come and visit me when I get back to the states. I'm starting to miss some of the food we have in the states that they either don't have here or they do have but isn't as good as the real thing like pizza for example, don't eat it here. Of course sushi, udon, rice, sweet potatoes (I prefer Japanese sweet potatoes now), various kinds of pickled things and so many more foods are way better here. Things in Japan haven't changed too much that I can tell, still have all the bizarre things I loved the first time only now I understand things better. There are these hilarious Boss commercials with Tommy Lee Jones in them for whatever reason. Boss is a kind of drink made by Suntory.

The first work I had at Canadian Farms was sweeping up maple seeds which seemed like it would take forever especially since a few hundred new ones fell everyday. Turned out it didn't take forever and now there are no more maple seeds falling. At some point during the week Haseyan and I went to the rice paddy and we planted edamame along the edge of the water. It amazing to see how fast the plants grow. I feel like they're my children except they don't speak, are green and are fantastic to eat. That's awesome since kids are easier when they don't talk, green is my favorite color and I love to eat. Anyways... yeah I've been very impressed by the power of plants and rain. It's rained everyday I've been here so far which also explains the growth of our plants. When it rains we can't work in the field which means after a few days of rain we have to do some serious weeding.

July, 5th. If I don't get to bed now I wont have energy enough to go hoe weeds tomorrow so sayonara.