This will be an ongoing post about whatever I happen to see. Pictures will come when they do--I actually do have a few, but it's a bit late in the night to put them up and I want to get this at least started before I forget--but I hope to give an idea as to what life is like over here.
Back home, we have what are kindly called, "friendly" squirrels. These are not your timid woodland rodent, gayly leaping from branch to branch onto to freeze when anything larger than a rabbit frolics on by. Rather, these are the tiny buggers that wait until the line of traffic is nearly upon them to burst out into the street, then run away as the crash begins; indeed, knowing so little fear, I have heard tell from friends who have been partly scaled by one, only to have it climb back down, giving them a glare that merely says, "stupid human, you were supposed to be a tree."
They don't exist over here.
I am sure that there are squirrels somewhere. Indeed, I have heard someone describe them. But wherever they are, not only are they not in my area, but they are nowhere near as fearless as their American brethren. Nor, I would guess, as fat, but that's true of most mammals over here. Instead, both Omya and Konosu are populated by a particularly virulent kind of bird, comprising of many species. While these feathered fiends will not land upon you, they have a particular habit of trying to outdo the cicada's in terms of sheer noise, particularly during a storm. I know not why they feel the need to shout at the sky as it begins to rain, but it gives the thunder and lightning an oddly terrifying twist to be accompanied by the ha-ha of a crow--yes, they do actually sound different in Japan--or the strange screech of a thousand tiny mouths that have descended upon a tree. Needless to say, I am not amused.
Nor was I amused to get off the plane, and be immediately assaulted by what I had hitherto associated as, "background tropical noise" in nature films. When I upload pictures, the culprit will be clearly seen, though deftly hidden, to be a strange creature known as the cicada. From an uncultured perspective, they have a rather long lifespan for a bug, being 17 years. 16 of those years are spent happily growing underground, munching on whatever it is they find down there, and being particularly invisible to those of us more availing to sunshine. During the other year, being the last of their lives, they burst forth from the ground, and decide to make up for the past sixteen years of silence by shrieking their heads off every chance they get. They do this, I believe, to attract a mate, though I would imagine that it also acts as a perfectly good way to attract a predator. This fact would be a problem, of course, if they weren't so big. I would estimate the length of the body, not counting the wings, to be about that of a tube of chap stick, while in girth they would more resemble a quarter. While these measurements are probably an exaggeration, they are only a small one.
Speaking of size in general, the bugs here are huge. The most terrifying is a type of wasp. It is bright orange and roughly the size of the human thumb. I have seen a couple while out for a walk, and the thoughts going through my head at such an encounter are always the same: 1) If a bee lands on you, the stiller you stay, the less likely it is to sting, therefore 2) if that thing lands on you, don't move and you'll be fine but 3) a bee is supposed to be tiny, which this thing is decidedly not so, 4) if it lands on me, I will be ignoring my smarter instincts and go running around screaming because, 5) it will attract people to me before I am stung, making medical help that much closer and easier to get. Believe me when I say that I'm not that scared of bugs, but these things are an exception to everyone.
In terms of the fauna, it is very familiar but different. Coming from Portland and Willamette, the cherry trees are instantly recognizable and familiar. However, all of the other plants just seem off. The pines are shaped differently, the leafy plants just seem weird, and some of the plants just seem to be unnaturally colored. All in all, an odd combination.
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