October 03. 2004 22:31

Animation with a bit of blue grass

The bank and the post office were closed for the weekend so I couldn't get money or the package. I thought they might be open at least a little while on Saturday, but nah. Well, no damage done, I'll just go on Monday. I would've rather had more that 60 yen on me for the weekend, though... Then I went to the International Office to fill out the Internet connection application form. The woman said it'd take about 3 weeks to get the connection, though Dion was told it'd only take a week... And the paper was pre-filled for Kino-ryo dorm, not Fujimura, but Ken implied that there was a connection for Fujimura as well. I don't know, it looks very fishy, but I hope it'll work. It'd make my life so much easier.

Yesterday was the first day at the animation class. I liked it very much, in fact it seems to become one of my favourites, even though we were using Japanese programs again. This time that's not gonna be a problem, because we're doing the animation in Flash and I have it on my laptop ^_^ The teacher was very nice and spoke a little English. In the beginning of the lesson he told the class about his trip to Comiket in the USA, and the fact that I could understand a lot of what he was saying because I know a little about Comiket and it's in my range of interests as well made me like him. He showed me and Dion the animations the class did in spring (they weren't that great, which is kind of a relief...) and explained the goal of the class in English. We're gonna do a minimun 1 minute animation, starting from the story outline and character designs and going through storyboards to finished animation. We got storyboard bases to copy and a page of Neon Genesis Evangelion's storyboard as a model ^_^

We get to decide what kind of an animation we're gonna do: it can be a regular story, a game or a "digital manga". To demonstrate what DigiManga means the teacher showed me his own story, one that he'd just showed in Comiket. It was a story of a data world where this guy had to protect a princess who got kidnapped the second they were introduced, and it was very funny and very well made. The point is kind of to make the squares of a comic move, kinda like the comic-style layout in the Hulk movie but approaching from the other end. You see one to a few squares at a time and move forward by pressing a button. I liked it so much I'm considering doing a DigiManga myself ^_^

With me, the problem about making an animation is again the same as it always is. I have no idea where to get the sounds from. I don't know where all the real animators get their music... Do they have loads of musical friends that can make them background music? I only know Heikki from our class. And I can't make any music myself, I've never understood music beyond singing it or playing it with piano. I love listening to it, but nobody else likes the music I listen to. I've learned my lesson after all the "class top charts" where I brought my favourites in school, so now I just listen to the music I like by myself, very well aware that it's bad in the "real music terms". I think there are some small tunes in school in Turku that we can use, but if I want something of my own, what should I do then? I have no idea...

The first day was mostly reviewing how to animate in Flash, so I took a few notes of the best tips but mostly spent the time trying out the school drawing tablets. You can see the school is pretty wealthy because it has about 30 shiny tablets in the classroom... We only have one at home, shared by three classrooms. The tablets here are so nice to draw with! Now I understand why people love tablets. Mine isn't at all as fluent and easy, so I rarely use it, because it feels like a mouse is almost easier to draw with. But now that I tried the better tablets at school I really want one of them! The newer ones are USB so they're easier to connect, too, while mine has this interesting system of a plug between the mouse and the computer and another plug whose hole I can't even find in my laptop. I took my tablet with me so I could draw with it, but I realized that I don't even have a mouse to USB plug with me so I can't connect it to my comp at all. I don't know if it would work anyway, with the other plug not connected and there being no mouse... When my parents come, I'll ask them to take a mouse to USB plug with them and try it out, and if it doesn't work I'll send the whole thing back with them. Then maybe I can buy a new tablet here ^_^

When school ended, looking at the eventless evening, I was so bored. Another night alone in my room, I was not gonna stand it anymore. I had to get some company, something to do for the evening. I tried going to Tim and Laura's dorms, but neither of them was home. The Canberra group, too, was still at their sightseeing of the day. I sat there waiting, outside the dorms, too see if they'd come home in a while, but then I got so hugry that I decided to go home and eat first and then come back to see if they'd come home.

I lay there on the sofa in the Fujimura common room for 45 minutes before I felt like doing anything... Such a depressing day, makes you just want to waste it away by lazying. But then I got up and made some food. There was this other (Korean?) girl from the dorm making dinner at the same time, and she gave me a cup of her meal to taste. The other girls are so nice, always offering me their food to taste ^_^ I have to make something Finnish sometime to give to them. This far my cooking has mostly been just making rice to go with a pre-made sauce... After the dinner I almost felt like I wanted to stay home anyway, getting something to eat had already lifted my spirits enough to make me feel lazy about going somewhere, but I left anyway, 'cause going out'd be a welcome change.

Then I left to see if I could find Tim and Laura. They still weren't at their dorms, so I went on to the restaurant near campus to see if they were there. They weren't, but I met the grey-haired Canberra lady when I returned towards the Doho-kan, where the Canberra group is staying, and she said Laura was there. I think she mistook Laura fo Lorna, though, 'cause Laura wasn't at the Doho-kan. But anyway, as there now was someone I could hang around with, I went with them. They had a dinner at the restaurant (I really should find out the name so I can address it properly), shared some soba noodles with me because there was so much, and after a stop at the Doho-kan we went to a country bar called Honky Tonk.

It was such a crazy idea, somehow, to go to a country bar. But it turned out to be real fun. There was a band called Sugar On Top playing blue grass, and they were great! I never listen to any country, but this was so much fun. They even had these group moves to go with certain songs. We got them to encore twice and after the gig we talked with them and got photos. One of the women even got the band's website and one member's e-mail address. We just had so much fun. The band'll be playing again the 23rd of December and it'll be followed by a blue grass christmas party, so if I don't have anything better to do then I think I'll go and see them again. A blue grass christmas party in Japan sounds like an experience ^_^

General thoughts of living in Japan

This morning I had porridge for breakfast. Laalaa and the others gave me a survival pack when I left Finland, and it had a small bag of wheat flakes. There was Finnish candy as well, but I already ate all of that :P The porridge was very good, and this time I got to share it with a girl who was watching TV in the common room. My eating habits have really changed since I came here. I have eggs for breakfast every day, mainly because they're easy to make and cheap. The other option is bananas, but they're expensive. For a while I was, for some reason, unintentionally avoiding rice in my meals. In school I took a plate of some deep fried stuff without rice and at home had something ready-made, like the American dogs. But as I realized it, I went back to making rice for dinner, because it's really good. I have pasta in the food cupboard downstairs, but I always end up making something with rice. It's the same at school, I always go for the Asian food instead of the spaghetti. That's surprising, as I love pasta at home, but then again rice isn't half as good at home as it is here.

Today I also decided to start excersizing a little every day. I'll do some sit-ups and push-ups etc. every morning or night from now on. I'm really fed up with this lump of flesh I have for a body nowadays... I wasn't too fit before, but at least I wasn't a ball of dough. I wanted to continue swimming every week when I came here, but apparently swimming is a little difficult in Japan... Or at least Heidi said that it wasn't just walking to a pool like that. She didn't tell any more, though, so for now I'm just hanging on that. I've been trying not to eat too much (well, apart from the Tango trip at least), so I'd lose some weight as well, as planned with Laalaa. Now that I'm out of money it works very well, because I can't afford have any snacks, but I'm afraid I'll go back to eating unhealthy when I get more money. But I'll try my best! I'm in a inspired mood today!

As I mentined wildlife in my last entry, I feel like I should tell that I saw a bat and an eagle yesterday. I was so amazed to see an eagle in the middle of the town, sitting on an electric pole. And the bat was in broad daylight, too. Weird. Oh, and there was a praying mantis in school one day, and at the beach in Tango. I haven't seen monkeys yet, but there's a monkey mountain in Arashiyama where you can go watch them, Heidi has been there. The insects are huge around here, I've seen numerous butterflies the size of my palm, and yesterday there was a wasp that was like 2 cm long. I'm not afraid of wasps in Finland like some are, but that thing sure made me freak. It looked like it could kill a man.

On an almost completely different matter, bikes are essential when moving around in Japan. Everyone has a bike. In fact, vespas are really common, too, especially among old people, and there are a lot of motor bikes. Enough for our campus to have its own motor bike park. The bikes here are not fancy, they don't have any "functions" and they're the city type on which you sit quite upright. (And they're small...) But they're handy and there's a basket in every one so moving big bags isn't a problem. In Finland only grannies have baskets in their bikes, but here I've really learned to appreciate one. I never have problems getting the food home from the convenience store and taking my laptop to school is easy. I kinda wish I wouldn't be ashamed to have one at home, because I'm gonna miss them, but I'm afraid a basket in my cross-country bike would look really silly...

...

Just came back from meeting the Canberra group at the Doho-kan. It's suddenly gotten chilly during the last couple of days. I can actually get a bit cold riding back home, even with a light coat on. I have to warn my parents. Anyway, the Canberra group is leaving tomorrow, so they're giving out all the extra stuff they don't want to take back home. They already gave me an umbrella, a towel, a perfectly fine and quite new small bag, some beauty supplies, batteries, paper and food. They even gave me a half-used railway card and an almost new telephone card. They're thinking about giving off the extra food, as well. I'm going to say goodbye to them tomorrow morning, so they'll probably load me with more stuff then... It's so nice to get all this stuff, but I feel a little silly getting loads of perfectly usable things without giving anything in return. I guess they wouldn't want anything more into their bags, though. Maybe I could draw them a picture.

Oh yeah, I think I haven't said the name of the school they're from yet: it's Australia National University School of Art at Canberra. Helen, the grey-haired lady, gave me a postcard of Canberra that shows where their school is.

By the way, the girl I gave porridge to this morning, a Story Manga first year called An, came to the kitchen when I was making dinner. She gave me half of an apple in return as she got some for herself, but I couldn't bring myself to taking the whole half, because fruits are expensive here. I took a few pieces, anyway, and we talked for a while. She appears to be the only Korean in the dorm, the rest of them are Chinese or something I didn't know the word for (maybe Thai or Taiwanese or something?). There are two other Story Manga students besides me and her, one on the first and one on the second floor. I want to learn more Japanese soon so that I can make friends with them.