Halloween in Japan

Happy Halloween everyone, I just finished my Halloween and it was one of the best ones I've ever had. My costume was a generic red ranger (of course), I got a stretchy spiderman esq ranger mask then red sweats and a red sweater so when I took the mask off it was normal clothes. I didn't wear the mask to school but when I got there everyone put them on. Someone was in like this cute pikachu pajama thing someone had a big afro (he was going as one of the other ryugakusei) and someone else was going was a sexy devil, when the teacher came in she fell to the ground laughing. It was so funny to see her reaction. She took pictures of us later. During the break right next door was the other Japnaese class and they had some other costumes but the best was a monkey costume. Since our windows had a little balchony Les (monkey suit) went from his class and just came through the window that our sensei was at, oh man it was another fantastic expression.

Walking around school you could see the greatest reactions from Japanese people because like they really wanted to stare but would try and hold them selves back from doing it and everywhere you go you hear (ah bikurishta! Surprised) or (ah halloween ne). In the elevator I could tell just how uncomfortable the people felt with us in it. Then after class we all took the train to sannomiya. It was a big group like 25 some odd people in costume we even had a few pictures taken. At sannomiya we spent some time getting everyone together then we walked to this restaurant/bar it was an okay size for a Japanese place but with all of us crazy foreigners it was probably pretty freaky for the staff working there. We talked a lot, played some darts and waited forever for our food.

Then we set out for karaoke. We originally wanted to do a small group but everyone said they wanted to go but no one was ready when we wanted to go and people couldn't make up their mind on anything so we didn't get to the karaoke place until like 9 when we wanted 8. There was a person out side the karaoke place who talks to people on the street to pull them in and I asked how much it was and they said 200 yen, which would have been okay but when we were getting set up all of us got confused at how much it was so when we had to pay it was double what we were all expecting. We all were getting frustrated and angry about it but when I think back on it, the sign did clearly say it. It was just with the sales person pushing us and everyone fighting no one was able to think it out clearly apparently. Lesson learned the hard way I guess.

A few of us left sannomiya at 11:00, we have a filed trip to himeji castle today but also the trains stop running sometime around 12:30 which is really annoying if you want to have fun. In the states I would stay over at a friends house until like 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning then drive home, here you have to be very concerned about how late you stay out other wise you take an expensive taxi or crash at an internet cafe (they are actually private rooms with TV, computer and access to showers and a giant manga library, I have yet to go myself though)