Making friends in Japan!

Recently, some of my friends here in Japan who are studying abroad have expressed concern that they haven't made so many Japanese friends. Or maybe they've made Japanese friends, but it hasn't gone beyond the expected keitai exchange and the promise to hang out and 飲みに行く or カラオケ or whatever suits the new friendship.

I felt like that a couple times, but really, lately I've been realizing I've made some good Japanese friends. It's nice. I'm learning about japanese culture, doing fun activites, and learning some japanese from them. Along with this, I've also realized that my 留学生 friendships are quite important as well. Even though I want to actively make a lot of good Japanese friends, my relationships with other exchange students is quite important because they are in the same boat as me and they're nice to turn to when I am feeling lonely or culture sick or just wanting to speak English.

I think I've gotten better at maintaining Japanese friendships now though. At the beginning, after some event, or clubbing, or whatever, I'd get all of these numbers in my phone in a language I can barely read (okay, I can read some Japanese, but names in Kanji are extremely difficult) and then I'd maybe follow up with one or two people, but it was hard to remember everyone and I'd get a call from someone later who I couldn't remember and didn't remember the name of so it was super embarrassing and nothing ever came of it.

Now I know that the best form if you want make someone into a friend is to text someone the day after meeting them, promising to hang out or do something, or maybe even making plans then! People are extremely willing and happy to meet you, especially if you're a foreigner and you can speak some Japanese (if you don't speak Japanese, of course you're still interesting, but I feel to a certain extent you will never get involved in any Japanese social circles because someone will always have to be translating for you and you'll never know the actual personality of someone else in their native language (believe me, people act completely differently and say completely different things while speaking japanese as opposed to english).

I may have a bit of an advantage (understatement) because I'm a white, blonde american who speaks some Japanese and has social skills and a love of music and goes to Keio and etc etc... I have a lot of things going for me here. I have a lot to talk about. People are always suprised by me. And think I'm "チョウきれい", but that's another subject entirely. I really need to write about flirting with Japanese guys sometime... It's a worthwhile subject to write about it.

I also really need to write about the sentiment of being blonde in Japan. It's a weird phenomenon that I'm experiencing. It made me not want to go back to brown, at least while I'm here. It's like I'm beautiful and magical just because I have blonde hair. People will openly stare (this is a)because I'm a foreigner, but it's also b)because of the hair), I've gotten hit on in the train, on the street, in bars (DUH)... but the amount is a little overwhelming. And even when I don't think anyone is thinking about me being a foreigner blonde in Japan, someone mentions it, or tells me I'm so gorgeous/sexy and they're so jealous, or they brag about having a blonde friend to their friends and family (my friend literally sent me a text telling me about how he bragged to his family that he made a "beautiful blonde friend" to his family over winter break), etc. I met this guy and his friends the other day for drinks at ハチコ前 in Shibuya (I only knew him) and he was like this is Melissa! And everyone was like whoaaaaa and some were like, nervous to talk to me, and they'd be like treating me like a site of wonder or some goddess or something... so weird. It makes it really easy to talk to people though cause they usually want to talk to me, at length, especially if they're drunk www

More on this later! Need to sleep, then write reports tomorrow. I planned to write my reports with my friend Takashi earlier tonight because we both have a lot of work and we don't look forward to it. So we're going to do them together tomorrow at the same time and maybe it'll be less boring. D:

Oh, met a friend earlier tonight as well from Double Dutch club, her name's Mayu... Super nice! We went to a dinner-like izakaya and had a drink and nabe and cheese/edamame gyoza... 本当においしかった! But we were both really sleepy and so we ended it and then I came back and worked A LITTLE and then went to Midori's to meet up for another little dinner and fondue. The fondue totally failed. It was nice though, it was me, Midori, our mutual friend Mika (who's one of my favorite japanese friends I've made yet!!!), Midori's friend Shui-ichi (ie Ted, lols), Kalau, Yassin, and the friend I invited, Takashi. I'm glad I invited him because he said he's super shy, but this was like an event where everyone could speak Japanese, so I hope he wasn't uncomfortable. I really like being friends with him cause he's such a nice guy, so I wanted to invite him!! He invited me to his christmas party too and a live in February on the 15th. Maybe I can make it.
I'm not sure if I even want to go home. If I do, I kind of want to change my plane ticket. D:
We'll see. I have so many traveling desires, and going home for the first two weeks of February just seems like a bad idea... I just don't want to!!