Day 5: Supermarkets and Barbeques

I was able to sleep in until 5:30 today, and probably could have slept more but wanted to get up.
My room has a little balcony thing outside the window, and below that is a garden:

I got ready for the day and we had breakfast a little before 7:00. My host mom said they usually eat a little earlier, but that they were out of milk and eggs so she had sent こちゃん to the store to get some more.

Breakfast:

I ended up using chopsticks instead of the fork and knife.

Around 9:00 I went with them to the supermarket to get ingredients for lunch and dinner:

"花火" = "hanabi" = "fire flower" = fireworks.

I really liked the grocery store because there was a lot to look at and read. It was nice to have so much straightforward "This thing that your looking at is called a _____" all around me. We learned the names of many kinds of food/household items in high school, but I had forgotten a lot of it and this really reinforced some of that vocabulary.

After that, we went back to the house, unloaded groceries, then went to a driving-park-thing.

At first I thought it was go-carts, but it was a little different. The cars go a lot slower, and it's designed to kind of seem like a little city road with crosswalks and stoplights:

I rode once with こちゃん (he steered and I worked the pedals), and my host mom sent me the picture she took of us:

(Note: The pedals are on the right because they drive on the left side of the road in Japan. Both sides of the cart had steering wheels, but they were connected.)

Last night, my host dad helped me figure out what bus route I should take to get home if I have classes that end after 5:30, and on our way back my host mom and たくん walked with me to the bus stop where I would get on the bus. While we were there, we met another host mom waiting at the bus stop with her student, but I didn't know him. We rode in the car again until we got to the bus stop where I would get off the bus, then she walked the boys and I home from there.

After that, we had そうめん(soomen) noodles for lunch:

I was going to study for a while and probably nap, but こちゃん came up to my room and asked if I would play with him and たくん. We played a Nintendo board game:

They are both super adorable. たくん kept landing on turtle shell squares which let him choose someone to have to skip their next turn. Every time he would land on one, こちゃん would explain to him why it would be better for him to make me skip my turn, but たくん would just giggle and say "いいえ、お兄ちゃん！" = "No, older brother!"

Before we could finish the game, my host mom reminded us we were going to a place with doughnuts at 2:00 and that it was almost time to go. The place that we went had a bunch of handmade things for sale, as well as kitchen and bathroom utilities. It was kind of a weird combination. They kept making batches of doughnuts and it seemed like customers were free to take one because when a batch was done people would line up and take doughnuts, but I didn't see anyone pay:

Note: If they were being sold, I think my host mom paid for mine because they just handed it to me when I got to the front of the line. I am not yet a doughnut thief.
I ended up getting a small hair bow:

It came with this slip of paper which I might try to translate eventually:

On our way walking back to the house, we passed some model homes and looked inside two of them. They were really fancy. One of them had a teeny tiny little outside section with a fountain, and they both had one or two really nice tatami mat rooms. The second one had horse figurines in it that my host mom said were "幸せになる馬" = "shiawase ni naru uma" = "horses that bring lasting happiness." I think they're Scandinavian:

When we got back to the house I started to study more, but ended up knocking out for an hour and a half until dinner. For dinner we had barbeque chicken which was really good:

We also had some leftover bread from breakfast warmed up on the barbeque which I was a little unsure of but it was actually better than normal toast. (Note: It's not the same type of bread we usually use in the US. I don't know if our bread would fare as well under the same circumstances.)
There was also lasagna which my host dad cooked in a cast iron pot over charcoal:

Finally, we had ほっき(hokki) cooked on the barbeque. I didn't have much because at that point I was sort of full, but apparently it was one of the types of sushi I tried yesterday. It looks like a big clam:

One of my host family's neighbors came over for the first half of the barbeque. She was nine years old and didn't talk to me very much, but gave me this bead:

This was also the first time I got to spend more than a few minutes in passing with my host mom's mother who lives in the same house, but sort of a different section. She seems really cool and is funny.

A little while later, we had birthday cake and ice cream for my host mom's birthday:

Afterwards, I helped my host mom clear the table and do dishes. We talked for a while, and I understood most of what was going on which was cool. Then, when we started talking about places, she pulled out a globe and some small photo albums and it was really great to be able to talk about things with so many visuals. I told her about my flight over and my plans for August, and she explained where they went on a vacation she had mentioned earlier.
It's only 8:00, but I think I'm going to try to study for a bit then go to bed by 8:30 or 9:00 because I'm still pretty beat.
Good night!

Also, I like たくん's hat:

It says "Super Happy State."