Last Tuesday, my religion class went to see a Noh performance at Heian Shrine. Noh is a traditional type of Japanese theatre performance utilizing minimal music, a small troupe of actors, and some choreography. It was an outdoor, firelight Noh performance and school completely paid for it. Professor Ludvik had us meet at Heian Shrine at around 4:30 in the afternoon, an hour before it started, so we could find optimal seats. The entire performance began at 5:30pm and went until 8:50, though I ended up leaving at 8:00 because I needed to go home and work on my Japanese presentation. During the course of the evening four plays were performed, with a tiny intermission between the first and second for the firelighting ceremony. The shrine itself, light up at night was beautiful. I wish Heian Shrine were open at night because I would definitely make the trip to visit it. Anyway, while the performances were all in Japanese, we had been given translations of the plays beforehand so that we knew what was happening. Despite knowing what was going on, I found my mind wandering as Noh performances are on the "slow" side rhythmically. Visually though, it was absolutely gorgeous. Of course, we weren't allowed to take pictures or video of the performances (just like any other theatrical performance), but it was totally worth it to go, though I may not need to attend again for some time.
Wednesday, I literally went to school for three hours and came home and worked on my final Japanese presentation for the rest of the day. Pretty uneventful, but very productive.
Thursday, we had our final presentations. The Center had invited our host families to attend, so I got a little bit dressed up, headed out armed with my newly revised powerpoint and my whole speech memorized. I was sixth to go, so during the presentations before mine, I continued going over and over my speech in my head. Finally, it was my turn. Truthfully, I don't really remember giving it, though I"m told by both my classmates and my host mom and my teacher that I did well. So win. Later, in the afternoon, religion went on a field trip to a Zen temple, where we learned about the Zen tradition, the differences between Zen meditation and other types of meditation, and then attempted mediation ourselves. However, it was terribly hard to even try as people kept volunteering to get slapped with the stick (the Zen monk would walk around and if you wanted to be hit with the stick -- it's supposed to wake you up if you're falling asleep (he aims for an acupuncture point on your back) -- you would bow, he would adjust you accordingly and then you would get slapped). I didn't opt to try this though everyone else did. I know I may never have the opportunity to get slapped on my back with a cedar stick by a Zen monk in a Zen Temple in Japan ever again, but I thought this was one experience I could forgo.
Friday, was a pretty simple day. Did homework, went shopping with Austen, went to Shakey's with a bunch of people, had dinner, went to karaoke, and then headed home.
Saturday was very similar as I did homework, hung out with Austen, went to dinner with Yan and some of his Japanese friends. After, a group of us met up at the Hub and proceeded to spend all night out. I got back home at around 6:00am. Oh these all night long nights...I'm unsure if I'm going to miss them or if I will happily give them up once I'm back in the States.
I haven't really been feeling well for the last two days so I've been taking it easy. But I have a couple papers to write and finals to study for. Oh how I despise the end of the quarter.
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