Semi-season

No, it's not half a season. Semi (せみ ( 蝉 )) in this case refers to a semi large insect, with a squat face, large wings at maturity, and appears to have a long proboscis like mouth. It has 2 main stages of life, that I have observed, juveniles are wingless and have more claw like forelegs for climbing, I assume. Where as the adults have large wings and more leg-like forelegs, as they don't need to attach to trees, falling shouldn't be a problem.
Oddly enough, every time I see them they do have a problem with flying... They don't seem very good at it. They give off an aura of clumsiness and seem a bit stupid (as far as insects go).
I've come across 3 in the last few weeks, a juvenile, and adult, and what my host brother described as a nearly dead one (death by aging), that one was interesting, seeming to have lase transparent wings that seemed more like moth wings, but you could still see the partitions of wing segments. I figured it might just be a different species of cicada, but i really have no idea about these things.
Although I've only seen 3, and various empty husks from when they mature, they will become more and more apparent in the coming weeks by the characteristic noise that they are infamous around the world for...
If you hadn't guessed yet, it's a cicada.

And they're so damn cute:












I've always wanted a new pet, no actually that's kind of a lie.
But these things are fascinating.

... Now I do know some stuff, there are apparently over 30 species in Japan alone (200 odd in Australia by the way), so perhaps the early post-shedding one had shed that day, while the later one was as my host brother suggested, a lot older.
Also apparently the adult males, who make the loud noise, can 'turn off' their ears while calling. That could be handy in many a domestic home.
They can reach sounds of 120dB, which is enough to cause permanent hearing loss to a human if placed next tot the ear...

From what I can work out by image similarities, the 4th image is of this species http://homepage2.nifty.com/saisho/photo/abura/aburazemi.html .
I would assume most of the cicada in the same street would probably be the same species, but I can't say for certain... they seem too different to me. The markings behind the eyes are completely different, so I think I'm gonna stand by saying they're 2 different species.
Still fascinating, I wish I had a camera with better macro... I shall endeavor to find out more about the ones living in my area, but I was told it's very hard to catch them... I've not yet had any problem...

In other news, I can hear fireworks in the distance, as that is traditional summer festivities. Speaking of which I finally found out where to buy some... From a convenience store, they are so very convenient here. Small, everywhere, with everything.

Now let's look in my little notebook that has been sadly neglected too much... resulting in few points to talk about.

We were playing through what we could during club, and the end of the song gets pretty epic in my opinion. So as we're getting all crescendo-y and the songs about to finish, rain starts to build. And when we finish, everyone ends up staring outside cause it is hammering down with rain. The teacher suggested it was the awesomeness of the song that did it. I agree.

I was standing on one side of the pedestrian crossing just outside the station near my school, with my umbrella above my head stopping me from getting wet. It's a nice big one that makes a good walking stick too. I look to the other side of the road, and think nothing of the 6 or 7 people standing there. Till I notice they're not using umbrella's... It wasn't raining.

Oh! I was on the train coming home from Saturday club last Saturday, believe it or not, and out the train window, when about to stop at the station near my house, I see a hedge. But not just any hedge I hasten to add. It was a dragon, a typical eastern dragon, made from a bush.

Hmm, again club related, we were doing an excessive on timing, in this case semi-quavers, so we were saying various 4 syllable words, like 'takahashi' and others. The teacher then made me have a go, I can't remember the word, but after a couple of times saying it the entire club was laughing at my accent. Apparently I was saying the 'o' part slightly wrong... Then I deliberately exaggerated it, just for giggles.

And that's all my notes... So the rest is off the top of my head (as was the cicada bit)

I'm going to go and see the new pokemon movie soon, not for the actual movie itself, but for the pokemon I can download onto my game. A shiney 2nd Gen legendary dog, and Celebi, for those that understand.
I've also pre gotten my ticket to see the new Studio Ghibli movie when it hits theatres, which it may have done already... Going to see that one with my host brother. It has something to do with a very small girl, bug sized, but I only know this from posters. So the story is a complete mystery to me, and I probably wont be able to understand half of it. Good fun.

Well that's it for now, my mind has blanked and I can't think of any more at the moment. I shall endeavor to use the little note pad more so I can tell you all the awesome things that happen, but we shall see.

So long, and thanks for all the fish.

July

It's hot, often wet, and PE these days is horrible... So I like to stay inside and do stuff in the house.
But I have school everyday so that's not so easy... And from next week I also appear to have club activities on Saturday. This isn't a problem cause that's the best thing about school at the moment.
Should be, depending on circumstances, heading down to Myazaki to perform in a country wide soukyoku competition, at least that's what I gather it to be... However circumstances include, a form I need to fill out requiring host family's signature, and seeing as I'm supposed to be changing host family sometime I don't know what to do about that yet... Actually that's pretty much it, but it is a problem, I think I'll call up YES and ask them what to do...

Now to my notes, that are few...

I saw a dragon fly on the train... I got on after school, and a large black dragonfly was flying around inside... Made my day. On another day, I was on my last train for the day, and I looked at one of the seats. On it was a woman, and a man sleeping with his head on her. So I assumed they were probably partners. Then I saw the woman give his head this look that said she had no idea who this guy was. Then when we got to my station, she got up and left, he looked around for a moment looking almost asleep still, then I left the train and didn't see anymore. I thought it amusing.

I discovered there is a family of cats living nearby my school. I saw a bunch of kittens playing around outside the school, and had to be careful not to chase one of them too far away from home... Another day I saw their mum, a white bedraggled looking thing with a green eye and a blue eye. Looked incredibly evil, and just glared at me as I passed. I see them every now and then after that.

I think I like Celtic music...

I lost track of what else I might have been going to say here, so I'll end with this final note.
My host families have all had previous students, bar the second that I only stayed with for 3 nights. So to make a good impression you have to be better than previous students, and then life is easy... Though I dunno how well I'm doing at that cause it's rude to ask.

So farewell for now. You have not yet seen the last of me...