high school graduation

High school graduation, when every body can act crazy after they are done B)
My high school graduation didn't get too crazy and I don't know about how Japanese graduation works but, every body wears a gown at my school. Girls wear white and boys where blue. And if you have high grades in a perticular class, like honors or AP or with over 100 hours of service hours you get a ribbon to wear too :D When the ceremony starts the best singer in our class sings the anthom, the class president gives a speech, a special guest speaker we hired gives a speech, then the teachers calls out our name and we get out deploma! At some high schools some times people get crazy during the speeches or name calling like bringing party crackers or something like that, mine some body just blew up a beach ball and every one was passing it around (lol)

high school prom

Before graduation, in the U.S. there is the "prom". Where every guy or gal dress up nice get a big limo go to a restaurant and after that dance then go to after prom or some one's house and just party all day lol. The best part is that it's every one's night. The worst part is the drama that happens and bunch a people try to find a date to go with. Xb I didn't get one and it's not the end of the world lololol

Any way prom day, a lot of girls will go around town asking to get their hair and make up done like the seijin shiki in Japan.
Then you go to your friends home since you go with a group on prom day on a limo xD
After taking photos and stuff you go a restaurant, then head to the place where your prom is held that. After dancing for hours you go home change go to after prom and hang out! My graduation year was 2007 so our theme was 007 >v<
It was really fun, except for the drama... What happen was one my "friend" hated this other "friend" we were suppose to go with so she didn't wanted to invited her and her reason was that it was "her" night. Which kinda made me snap but yeah.
Oh, you don't have to your school's prom. You can go to any prom you like if you get invited :D

educational system in the U.S.

First off unlike Schools in Japan, in the U.S., we don't have the "top student chart" which shows how you did on tests and stuff. Since in the U.S. every body is taking a different class and the system is more like the college in Japan. Also the grading system is different depending at the county you attend at. There are private schools in the U.S. but unlike the Japanese private schools a lot of the students just attended public schools since you can get the same or better education as if attending public. Any way, my school's grading system was from A-F. (no plus or minus)
A:100-89.5%
B:89-79.5%
C:79-69.5%
D:69-59.5%
any thing bellow that was a "F"

and don't ask about my grades... they weren't pretty...

International foods in the US

Being Japanese when you hear the term of "Japanese foods" you'll probably imagine sushi, tempura, miso soup.
Well all above are in the menu but, for Americans sushi=norimaki ex:California rolls (don't worry sushi=nigiri so you don't have to worry about eating norimakis lol). And there are bunch of wierd combiations with the sushi rolls like... spicy mayonnaise with tuna and lettece, cheese cream with maguro. Also did you know that there's actually a tempura ice cream?! Actually it tasted great.
Other than Japanese foods Chinese foods are very funky. Like the "sweet and sour pork/chicken", the sauce is usually red ;b but it taste alright. Instead of hoiko-ro or chinjyao we have "beef and broccoli" and "orange chicken" which are very popular.
Some of the Asian foods probably sounds funky or might look strange they actually taste really good and most of the American foods are like that which is the surprising part.

accents in the U.S.

Other than British, Chinese, Australian, Indian accents in English. Like in Japan you talk differently in different areas in the U.S. you talk differently base on the areas you live.

New York


Southern


Black


or what kind of personality you have lol

surfer


prep


nerd


yeah and so on ^^

the funny thing about language

To learn a different language from your native language is actually a very difficult thing to do.
However not all people in the United States or even if they live in a English speaking country are able to speak English.
Some very good examples are Chinese who live in China Town or the American troops living in Okinawa. Even though they live/born in a different country and been there for a long time some people can't speak that language and only their own native language.
Also if you don't have any interaction with your native culture for a long time you tend to forget the language and won't be able to speak it any more. So for me I was very lucky to stay in touch with my Japanese culture and deal with my American culture since I was young. Plus probably my motivation when I was learning Japanese and English was to be able to speak with my family and the people around me.

the use of the japanese "ga" and "wa"

Last month when Professor Shirai came, he talked about why and how a person is able to learn a second language.

He said that...
-youth
-motivation
-output and input

Which did made me think a bit about how I was able to learn English.
But lets talk about that later.

What I thought that really caught my attention was that "が" and "は" are very hard for people who don't know Japanese.
Not the pronunciation but to when to use the words.

When I thought about it "が" was more in the use of representing something that you are strongly sure of.
On the other hand "は" was the opposite way.

But when I asked the professor he did said I was kind of right but "が" and "は" are more like a past and present-tense in Japanese.

Overall it made me think twice about how language is actually hard to learn and fully comprehend.