Tadaima.

Aug. 18th, 2011 08:53 pm
swan_tower: (Neuschwanstein)
[personal profile] swan_tower
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At some point -- when my brain has congealed once more out of its current liquified state -- I will post not only about my trip to Japan (which will likely take several posts) but about bilingualism and the difficulties thereof. Because I am freaking exhausted, y'all, and only part of it is the jet lag; a much larger part is the effort of spending twelve days attempting to function in a language for which I have only marginal speaking/listening ability and even less reading.

(A lot of you probably have the same impulse I do, which is to read any text put in front of you, because it's there. You wind up wishing you could turn that damned impulse off when the text is in scribbles the average local five-year-old could read more quickly than you. But you can't. Or at least I couldn't.)

Short form: Japan was indeed, to borrow a phrase, "oh-kamis-why-is-it-so-humid-melty-death-hot," but also awesome. I got to revisit a few places from my 2002 trip, and see a lot more new places, and there will, of course, be pictures. Major, major thanks go to [livejournal.com profile] starlady38 and [livejournal.com profile] kurayami_hime, who served as our interpreters and guides, which I think is the only reason my brain didn't go into full-bore shutdown from language fatigue; both of them are hella more fluent than I am, and also guided me and [livejournal.com profile] kniedzw to an abundance of sights and experiences (the light-up at Kiyomizu-dera! Punk kaiseki! Beach party! Takarazuka!) that we would not have found our way to alone. We are grateful little ducklings.

And now to finish getting crap out of the way, so I can go to bed when this current spate of energy runs out.

Date: 2011-08-19 11:10 am (UTC)

Date: 2011-08-19 02:00 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] starlady38.livejournal.com
*waves to you from her own jet-lagged natural awakening at 5am this morning*

For the record, if you hadn't been there I would have spent all day hiding in the AC. :P

Date: 2011-08-19 03:16 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] briarspell.livejournal.com
Okairinasai! Can't wait to hear about the trip :).

Date: 2011-08-19 05:02 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] mrissa.livejournal.com
I know the exhaustion problem. I can't hear French without trying to parse French, and yet I don't speak good enough French that it's effortless, so when I was nearly falling asleep on the train in Vancouver, the people chatting in French behind me were really really energy-draining for me. Montreal is one of my favorite cities, but it takes a lot of effort because of the compulsive text thing.

Date: 2011-08-19 05:11 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] rachelmanija.livejournal.com
Okairinasai! I hope it was wonderful (other than the heat) and that you ate well. Can't wait to see pictures!

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