Sunday!

This morning, we had breakfast before having our own chapel led by Naomi in her room. Then from 10:00am, we went to the New Hope Diamond Head church service. Unlike last week, when the pastor of that church preached, this week's sermon was preached by the pastor of the other New Hope church of Hawaii through the projector.

After the service, we went home, then walked together to Genki Sushi for lunch. It's nice to have a sushi restaurant within walking distance! (^-^) The sushi was really good as I had almost forgotten how much I missed Japanese food.

Priscilla and I had been planning to go to Borders bookstore today but later decided not to... so I stayed home in the afternoon and did many things, including reading and painting. I really try not to use my eyes too much but it's not easy to think of something to do that doesn't require vision! So anyway, here's the product of today's try at painting with black Pelikan Plaka ink:



It's just a snapshot so the quality isn't that good... it's the islands of Matsushima which I visited while in Japan.






For dinner we got food from Jack in the Box and ate it while watching "A Knight's Tale", which was so funny it had us all laughing!

Well, tomorrow school starts again, and I hope that I didn't miss too much from skipping some classes last week. Hope you all have a great week as summer vacation is almost over for the kids!

Back from LASIK!

So I have survived the eye laser surgery on Thursday, and though I'm still not supposed to be at the computer much, I guess blogs are allowed. :P I've missed a few days, so I'll go over them briefly.

At 7:45 in the morning on Thursday, Naomi took me to Aloha Laser Visions for my surgery. Naturally, I was more than a little nervous! They gave me some kind of pill called valium, which obviously has some kind of calming effects but has opposite effects on some people (like Priscilla). The first part of the surgery where they cut out a flap from the cornea was rather uncomfortable, but the actual laser part didn't hurt at all... just smelled like something burning when the laser was going "bzzzzt!". Immediately after the surgery, which took about 20min, everything looked foggy. Naomi drove me home, put me in bed, and left again to drop off the Kanais at the airport. Too bad I didn't get to say good-bye to them at the airport...
To Mr. and Mrs. Kanai and Maria: Thank you for all the wonderful times!!

I slept for about 4 hours after surgery, and when I woke up, Voila! I could see!! :D It feels like I am looking through a lens because I hadn't been wearing glasses or contact lens, but I can see everything so clearly! I'd never realized till now how bad my eyesight actually was before. Amazing!! Thanks to everyone for their prayers in making this come true.


So now my eyesight is 20 20 and might become even better in the future. :) During yesterday and today I've basically been taking it easy and getting used to my eyesight. Today we got to clean up the whole house and go to Walmart to do some shopping... lots of fun!

Okay now I am getting off the computer before Priscilla or Erin tells me to get off.

2nd day of class: Design and Psychology

Just like yesterday, I woke up at 7:00am and walked to my 8:00am class. Only this time it was not sculpture class, but the design class. Surprisingly enough, a big majority of the students in the design course was guys, and there were only 6 girls altogether. Still, I managed to make friends with a girl from an international school in Yokohama. I also got to know this guy from South Africa.
I think this design course is going to be a lot of fun!

After the morning class was done, I met up with Priscilla, who had just finished her psychology class, and walked home together. We ate the last of the ramen in the house for lunch and stayed at home for a couple of hours watching a movie.

My second class today was psychology. This class seems like it will be pretty interesting too, though there are quite a few exams and things to do. The South African student from my design class happened to be in this class too, so that was nice.

For dinner, we went to Dixie Grill with the Kanais. They're famous for their steak and ribs, and some of us ordered ribs. I felt like eating fish rather than beef, so I got fried catfish.. mmm! I even took a picture of it, but atm I am too lazy to upload. :P

Tomorrow morning I am skipping my sculpture class to go to the eye doctor and prepare for Thursday. :)

Survived first day of class!

Yes I really did survive it! And so far all 3 classes I attended today seem really great (though I won't know for sure until I get into the real thing... today was just the introduction), and the instructors seemed to be good teachers. Here's how the day went:

I woke up at 7:00am at the sound of my alarm beeping. Waking up as quietly as possible and carefully walking around Maria to avoid stepping on her, I changed my clothes and walked to campus to my first class: the 8:00~10:30am sculpture class.
The students there seemed quite artsy... the instructor, Mr. Browne, seems to be one of the most prominent sculptors in Hawaii, which is something even though Hawaii isn't very big. He was a nice guy and explained everything about the course to us. This class is going to be fun, I can tell.. we're going to make stuff with everything from paper to toothpick to clay, and near the end of the semester we're even going to make a silver ring! *is excited*

The sculpture class ended very early and left me with about 3 hours to spare before the next class at 12:00pm. I killed time by going over to the computer lab to check mail, then walking over to the library (where there's peace & quiet) to relax with some art and history books. I also did some random drawing as well. Ah I love spending time at the library!

Next class: ESS (Exercise Sports & Science) 12:00~1:15pm
This class is about health, fitness and wellness of your body and how to use the knowledge to improve your lifestyle. lol Sounds difficult, but from what the instructor explained the class doesn't seem too complicated. The classroom we're using happens to be the same as the one we used for math class a year ago.

Priscilla and I walked home after this class, and while Priscilla and Naomi left shortly after lunch to shop, I stayed at home until they came to pick me up and drop Priscilla and me off at campus for our 3rd and last class of the day, which was...

Speech 3:15~4:30pm
Honestly speaking, I didn't know what to expect of this class since I didn't know what kind of speech we were going to do in it. I thought it was the kind of speech where you stand on a podium in front of a million people and say something impressive and/or entertaining... but it turned out that this class is all about developing and improving person-to-person conversation skills. Suddenly this class became a lot more interesting to me! The instructor is a nice man too, which makes this class more likeable.


So that's how our first day of class went. ESS and Speech are the two classes Priscilla and I are taking together this semester.
For dinner, we all met with Mr. and Mrs. Kanai at Chiang Mai, the Thai food restaurant where they serve the best pineapple fried rice in the world! We all enjoyed and loved the Thai food, including the yellow curry and the green curry. Oof, now I'm stuffed again! :P


Tomorrow's classes: Design class (8:00~10:30am) and Psychology (3:15~4:30pm).

School starts tomorrow... aaahh!!! *ominous music*

Today, we brought Mr. and Mrs. Kanai over to our house and had a short chapel led by Erin before going over to Diamond Head Theater to attend a Sunday service at New Hope Diamond Head church. This was my first time to go to this New Hope church service, and it was a good, spirit-filled service.. the pastor's sermon, which was about the key of worship, was very good too.

After the service, we went by to eat dim sum at Happy Day, a Chinese restaurant. I love Happy Day, and I was so happy to be able to go there with the Kanais. :) There was so much food, even Peking duck, and we were all stuffed!

We parted with Mr. and Mrs. Kanai in the afternoon and went home. After a short relaxing time at home, all five of us (the four of us and Maria) decided to go watch the dance movie "Step Up". It was fun and cute, and I liked the romance scenes a lot! Not a movie for kids though.

The rest of the day was spent at home; Priscilla, Maria and I sort of watched the DVD of the film "Jacob", though we skipped many scenes, not because it was bad or anything, but because the story wasn't exactly the way it was in the Bible, and some things didn't make much sense. :P

While eating dinner, which consisted of the ample supply of leftovers we had from all our meals at restaurants. Mmm they were still good! While eating, we watched yet another movie! lol We watched Red Eye since Maria had been wanting to see it for some time. Very suspenseful the first time to watch, but after a few watches it's naturally not quite as exciting.


Oookay, school is starting tomorrow and Priscilla and I are getting ready right now. Since it's the first day, though, it will only be an introduction of what the classes will be like. The classes I will have tomorrow are: Sculpture, ESS (Exercise Sports & Science) and Speech. I'd better go off to bed soon as my sculpture class starts from 8:00am... so nighty night!

Weekend with the Kanai family

We did a LOT of shopping today! After waking up late in the morning (again), Erin, Priscilla, Maria and I went to the campus bookstore to buy some things that we needed. Since the semester has not yet begun, the campus ground was strangely quiet and empty. Priscilla also took some video of Maria doing stuff (like running and touching trees) at campus, to use for music video.

After that was done, we drove directly to Kahala Mall, where Naomi had already driven Mr. and Mrs. Kanai to. We got some lunch and met up to eat together. Mmm love food from Panda Express!

In the afternoon, we shopped in many places at Kahala Mall. Priscilla, Maria and I went to Claire's (accessories), Macy's (clothes), Jeans Warehouse (more clothes), Barnes & Nobles (books), Tower Records (CD&DVD), and Longs (drug store). We each bought some clothes and other things... a lot of fun! Although Mr. and Mrs. Kanai, Naomi and Erin stayed out for a while longer, Priscilla, Maria and I drove back home first.

For dinner the Kanais once again took us out to dinner, this time at Chili's. Being out with them is so much fun! The steak I had for dinne was really delicious. :P Yum!!
Thank you so much Mr. and Mrs. Kanai!

Tomorrow is Sunday, so we will have our own chapel at home, then go to the New Hope church.

Oh, and one more thing....


I'M GOING TO HAVE MY EYES LASERED!!! It will take place next Thursday so that it will make my college life easier. Woot I am so happy, I still have a hard time believing it's actually happening so soon! So thank you to everyone who have been praying for me and supporting me all this time.

My eyes feel weird...

This morning we slept in till very late in the morning. At lunchtime we went to Ward shopping center with the Kanais. Unfortunately, Naomi, Priscilla and I had no time to eat and shop at Ward with the Kanais because we had to go to have our eyes checked at the laser surgery place. I hadn't had my eyes checked in a very long time, but I went for a checkup to see if they can do a laser surgery on me too. It was cool to see all their cool gadgets and machines since they have the best of everything... besides, everyone at the place was really nice and fun. The results showed that my left eye is far worse than my left and that I should get that fixed asap, and that I am a good candidate for the surgery. Priscilla and Naomi's checkups went well too! Wow my eyes feel so weird after all the lenses and lights I stared into!

Went back to Ward to pick up the Kanais, then drove back to Aloha Laser Vision for Takako-san and Maria to buy good sunglasses. Finally, we went to Nordstrom and shopped for clothes and shoes. It was very fun, though Maria and I had to take turns riding in the trunk of the car (because there were 6 people in 1 car).

When we got back home, it was already past 5:00pm, so we got a little time before we all left again for church service at Kaimuki Christian Church. It was good to see some church friends that I had not seen in a while. The worship and sermon were done by guest musicians and speaker from the campus crusades, so they were all young people. Because of that, tonight's service was pretty different than usual. It was amazing to see a 17-year-old boy do such an energetic sermon.

Finally, the Kanais took us out to dinner again, this time at Old Spaghetti Factory at Ward. Mmm the food there was delicious as always! By the time we got back home it was a little before 11:00pm.

I am getting so sleepy... *yawn* G'night!

The Kanais are here!

Last night I slept like a log for nearly 10 hours straight! While I was asleep, Naomi, Priscilla and Maria went to the eye doctor for Priscilla's eye laser surgery. It was successful, and they came back at around 9:00am for Priscilla to rest and sleep for a few hours.

We left our room dark so it wasn't too bright for Priscilla, and after she woke up it was up to Maria to keep her entertained by talking to her endlessly! lol If anyone had been just outside our room in the afternoon, he or she would have heard lots of talking, singing and babbling from inside! In the end some of us were going hyper and couldn't stop laughing!

Oh yes, Mr. and Mrs Kanai safely arrived at the airport this morning! They came to our house once before going to their hotel to relax. It's great having them here!!

Until the evening, Priscilla, Maria and I stayed at home. For dinner the Kanais took us out to a veeery nice restaurant called Shore Birds, where they serve steak and other great food, including salad bar. All the food was wonderfully delicious, and we had a great time! Thank you Mr. and Mrs. Kanai for taking us there! Now I gotta go off to bed...

but before that, I will put up some pictures I took during my trip in Japan.




Rather scary when a whole flock of these birds zoom right over us!









A loony-looking emu.










A row of ancient organs. See how few the number of the keys are? So cute!

In Hawaii again!

Wow, what a long day it was... it's hard to believe that 24 hours ago I was in Japan! Seems like a long time ago already. My family took me all the way to the Narita airport. After a not-so-bad flight to Honolulu during which I got to doze off a little (though someone to my left was snorrring!!), I got through a very smooth customs and swiftly got out of the airport to be picked up by Naomi, Priscilla and Maria in Naomi's new car! It was very nice seeing them again! :D

It was, however, still a while before we got home. First, we stopped by at Aloha Laser Vision for Priscilla's checkup... she's going to have her surgery tomorrow!! Hope it goes well... I am going to have a checkup on Friday.
We also went to a hospital to visit a church friend and see her newly born baby. :)

After getting home at around 1:30pm, we had a quick lunch, then I did all my unpacking. For the rest of the day, I relaxed, watched TV and had fun with the others, all the while trying not to fall asleep. :P

That's about it for today. In my future posts I will post some piccies that I took while in Japan.
Tomorrow, Maria's parents are coming over! It's going to be fun, though I will soon have to start preparing for the Fall semester, which is to start next Monday. :)