Well. I was planning to write a long post updating you all with what's been happening in my life so far, but tonight coming home from dinner with a friend I accidentally made a huge scratch on another person's car. So I'm a little stressed. I went back inside and told the waitress, and luckily one of my English teacher's was at the restaurant so once the van owners' were found we could communicate fairly well through translation. It also transpires that they are my neighbours, also living in Uddo Tah-un (Wood Town) and the dude knows my supervisor. The joy of living in a small town. On the flip side, seeing as this is a small town and my teacher was at the restaurant, all my schools are going to know about this and I wouldn't be surprised if my supervisor tries to halt my driving "privileges". Ah well, nothing to do until more is known.

So the last few weeks have been an awesome kind of busy. The weather too. It got warm , then cold, and then today it was sort of warm again, due to the rain. I'm sorry, but I couldn't update without posting about the weather, however brief this is.

Seeing as it is the end of the year, there have been quite a few enkais (parties) going on. Last week I had a badminton tournament with the police officers of the town, plus the police of two nearby towns. The tournament itself was fairly miserable, but afterwards we had a very nice dinner where I was regaled with traditional singing and hilarious dancing. And then, of course, in the path that most parties follow, we ended up at karaoke. For two hours I listened to a bunch of really drunk middle aged badminton players croon to several unknown songs. Then I gathered courage to sing Like A Virgin, and though I was definitely the worst singer there, I did get a lot of cheers. A good night all in all.

Last week I had both my board of education enkai, at this swank yakiniku restaurant. Yakiniku is Japanese barbeque, although that doesn't really cover it. There are grills in the tables, and they bring you plates of raw meat and vegetables that you grill yourself. When it's cooked to your liking, you dip the food in delicious sauce, let it cool a bit and eat. Since it's winter, we actually had shabu-shabu, which is a hotpot. The plates of food are still brought, but you cook the food in a pot of boiling water. It doesn't sound nearly as good as it tastes, but believe me, it was awesome. The night was also great because it gave me a chance to practice some Japanese, which I have begun studying in earnest now that I have a bit more free time. Though I am still far from anywhere near fluent, I definitely feel more confident.

Also, last Tuesday, the gun, county, had its annual speech recitation day. All the junior high schools in the region have a few students perform a little skit in English, which the ALTs judge. Afterwards, they are divided into random groups and perform a tiny skit with an ALT. I had been practicing with the four students from my school for the last couple of weeks. I wrote the play, only a couple of pages long, and though I'm not sure if the kids really got what it was about, the other ALTs thought it was great. We had costumes and everything. I thought they did a great job, and I had a blast, getting to know a few of the kids a bit better. One of them I took a shining to the first day. My personal nickname for her is Hermione, although she's the first kid's name that I learnt. Her parents are dentists, and she's this super overachiever who's incredibly smart and is involved in about 15 different after-school activities. Plus, though her pronunciation isn't amazing, her delivery is. Seriously, she sounds so natural in her stress and attitude, better than some of the English teachers at school. Another kid is also one of my favourites, just because he's so cute and small with a perfectly spherical shaped head.

Not so samui

Just as I was getting used to the cold, the weather decided to take a turn to the nice. Yesterday it rained like crazy, and though the windows and doors were closed for some reason all the walls at school were wet. Today is completely sunny and hot. So much that I had to come home at lunch to take off the long johns and extra pair of socks I was wearing. Yes, I wear at least two layers of everything to school. Thank goodness for long johns.

Today I wrote on a whiteboard with permanent marker. This was at elementary school, so I didn't hear the end of it from all the students. I love them though, so I didn't mind. The elementary school kids are great, not only because they put my complaining into perspective as they have to wear shorts to school all year round. Yes, even in the winter. Those poor goobers.

I finally finished my six week run of evening conversation classes. Six weeks may not sound like a lot, but it felt like forever. I apologize to everyone for being in a foul mood since the end of October. I'm two thirds relieved and ecstatic, one third kind of sad. I loved my beginner conversation class, partly because I didn't have to prepare and we just would sit around and eat and talk, but the intermediate class was painful and the kid's club was like pulling teeth. So many kids that I wanted to throttle, but of course that would not look good to their mothers sitting in the back watching me. I teach all the kids at elementary schools, but together those 22 little goobers were about as energetic and smart as empty potato sacks. I mean, seriously, what Japanese kid doesn't know the rules to animal/color/fruit basket?

SAMUI!!

Man, is it cold. I am sitting in my tiny tatami room, with the little electrical heater on, wearing fleece socks and pants and three shirts, and my fingers are too cold to type a long post. It's about 8 degrees Celsius now in the evening, and during the day the temperature still sometimes hits the twenties. Still, I have never felt colder than I do now. I apologize because I foresee the infrequent blog entries of the next few months being nothing but frozen fingered rambles about the progressively colder and colder weather and rants about how a country can be so technologically advanced yet not have such a thing as insulation. Either that, or every entry will contain the same broken record tendencies as those in the following paragraph:

This weekend was good, but cold. I went to the Ibusuki sand baths, which were nice and warm except for the part where we had to walk outside to the beach wearing nothing but yukatas (cotton kimonos, or thin bathrobes), which was cold. I went to a random old Japanese man's house for dinner with some friends and one of said friend's coworker (who happens to know said random man). His wife prepared a delicious meal, which included nabe which is a delicious Japanese traditional soup/stew/hotpot eaten in the cold winter months. This was amazing especially since it was so cold, although the house itself was fairly warm. The next morning was impossible to wake up due to the cold, but we did and then headed to Hayato port to participate in a sailing race. When I say participate, I mean that several of us gaijin were generously invited to sit on this Japanese man's (a different one than that who fed us, but one no less random) sailboat. It was very sunny, but it was also very cold. I wore long johns and three shirts and a scarf and a hat and a coat and was still cold, although we were on the water so I'm sure that has some part to play. Our boat was winning after the first lap, but then the sail ripped and we ended up coming a very cold fourth. Then we ate lunch, and were cold, then had a raffle, where I won a roll of paper towels. Then I came home, where I sat in my bed with the heat cranked up and was still cold.

And now my fingers are about to fall off, so goodnight and enjoy the central heating/insulation you lucky North Americans (and condolences to those that are suffering the cold as well, and apologies for being such a baby about it).

I'm currently listening to a Finnish version of Jingle Bells. Why? My co-teacher/friend for 'Kid's Club' suggested that teaching the kids a Christmas/winter song would be a good idea, and trying to find something suitable I downloaded whatever winter song I could. Never mind that most of the kids can't even pronounce 'left' or 'yellow'. This Kid's Club has been the bane of my existence for the last 5 weeks. Thankfully, I only have two more weeks (until spring!) of it. Even more thankfully, I get an extra hour of paid holiday for each hour that I have to teach.

Christmas here is decidedly strange. The weather is still in the positive teens, with several hot days over the past few weeks, yet even in this sleepy town where I'm positive I am the closest thing to Christian, there are small little lit up Christmas trees everywhere. Okay, maybe not everywhere, and maybe only really one or two, but still. A few weeks ago I was in the city for a few days for Mid Year Seminar, and the first night the city was its usual self, with ordinary streetlights. But by the time we left, a couple of days later, every single street corner had Christmas lights and decorations. It's strange, because while I don't really like the in-your-face attitude of Christmas back home, at least there I can appreciate that people participate in the non-commercial aspects of it; here though, all the decorations just signify mass consumer consumption.

The last few weeks have been both boring and hectic. I'm totally drained on the weekdays due to these hellish night classes. In addition to the Kids Club, I have two adult conversation classes. I've finally had a breakthrough with the beginner one, when last class I didn't bother to prepare any grammar sheets or roleplay dialogue, and just dragged out questioning the class for the whole hour. The students (and how weird does it feel to say students when I'm by far the youngest there?) told me that they actually like that format better, so yay less work for me! The 'intermediate' class is another story. The levels of the students vary significantly, with a couple of infuriatingly shy high school students, a middle aged woman who looks and acts like she's going through some sort of Class A drug withdrawal every time she has to speak in the limited English she has, and a couple with high level ability. I've been meaning to study Japanese all month, since I'm going to Fukuoka next weekend to write a proficiency test, but I haven't had any time. Although I barely teach at Junior High, all my time there is spent in preparation for elementary school visits, night classes or the random periods of what to do if a stranger shows up? assemblies/watching the kids run outside.

So anyways, in the last few weekends, I went to Fukuoka to see a sumo tournament. There are 6 of these tournaments each year, three in Tokyo and one each in Osaka, Nagoya and Fukuoka. These are the only tournaments that affect the rank of the top (or all professional?) sumo wrestlers. The matches started at 9 in the morning, but since my friend drove down and there was a Costco in the area, we had to stop there first (which was awesome). We didn't end of showing to the sumo until about 3:30, but our timing was perfect as we got there just before the highest ranked wrestlers were to start. Our seats were in the second farthest row, but we could still see everything perfectly. Although the actual fighting lasted on average 10 seconds, each match had quite a bit of ceremony. I can't properly describe the utter coolness of seeing these giant (although not as giant as one would think) men in traditional Japanese fighting diapers do that whole stampy thing with their legs then wipe their sweaty faces and throw salt over their shoulders. They would do this ritual about 4 or 5 times before any fighting would begin. There was also this one dude wearing long robes and kind of looking like the Pope but not who would bless the winner. I didn't really understand, but I do plan on going again sometime, maybe in Tokyo. It was amazing.

That may actually be the only thing of real interest to note over the last weeks. It’s strange, because I’m almost past the four month mark (the longest I’ve ever lived in one place outside of Canada) and while I’m definitely getting antsy and questioning the length of time I plan on staying here, it’s also nice to finally feel like I live here. I mean, I already have, but I realize that I have courage to do things I couldn’t a few months ago, and I have some really good Japanese and non-Japanese friends that I didn’t before, and the nauseous feeling that was my constant companion in August and September has almost completely disappeared. It’s mostly the little things, like being familiar with the backroads in my town and noticing the different harvests that go on, that I mean, because my Japanese is stagnantly terrible and I still have no idea what the hell is ever going on at the junior high, but I guess it’s the small things that count.

Urine In The Cup

A few things:

Today I had a medical test/inspection. It is mandatory. I went to the Board of Education at 7:30 this morning. The tea lady, the only woman in the department, escorted me. We went to the second floor of the attached building in City Hall, where I handed in my health sheet to some dude volunteer. Then, in an orderly fashion, I had my height and weight checked, then had a blood pressure test, or as it was explained to me, a “sphygmomanometry”. (Note: no one actually said the word sphygmomanometry to me, it was written down.) Then, a urine test. Although I’d notice the line up for the bathroom and was given a paper cup when I handed in my health sheet, the tea lady made sure to explain to me what was next by gesturing to the paper cup and pointing to a scrap of paper where she’d already written directions: ‘Urine in the cup’. Good to know. Then, it was time for the “electrocardiogram inspection”. This was kind of fun. I got on a table and they strapped all sorts of contraptions to me and maybe made me breathe. I don’t really remember, it was early this morning. Finally, a blood test. Also, there was a “large intesting cancer examination”, but I don’t know when that occurred. Maybe the blood test?

All of a sudden, it got freaking cold here. Last week the weather was wonderful, still hot and sunny during the day with the perfect not too hot not too cool evenings. Then, I went to the city for the weekend and when I returned my house was an icetrap. The heat is currently on in here. The mornings are freezing and almost miserable. I kind of wish I was placed in Hokkaido because at least they have insulation and central heating (I think). I’m in one of the hottest places in this humid country, yet I still shiver to the bones. So imagine my surprise, in these cool nights, to step out of my shower last night and onto a mukade. Mukades are terrible terrible creatures, giant poisonous centipedes. I was lucky in not having had any thus far, and thought I was grand from here on till spring, but no! Big wormy bug with many legs lying on my bathroom floor. Of course, I shrieked. I almost cried, but I didn’t. Somehow I managed to cover it (with the Tupperware container I keep in the shower for when cockroaches climb out of the drain – not so much a problem since my shower’s clogged, but that’s besides the point), then slide some cardboard underneath, while it wiggled and I scared my neighbour with my yelps. Supposedly mukades are angry little buggers, and almost invincible. Otherwise I would have killed it then and there. I wanted to place it underneath my car wheel and run it over a couple of times, but it was cold and past my bedtime. So I just threw it over the cliff beside my house.

Ack! I wanted 8 hours of sleep tonight, but that’s not going to happen. Hope everyone is doing well. Some explanations for my aunt and uncle, sorry this is so late:

Janken. Janken is the Japanese version of rock paper scissors. It’s the exact same actions, with rock beating scissors beating paper etc. School children use it all the time to settle disputes or decide who goes first. Also my badminton club. Also, everyone, as seen by the old dude at the secondhand shop who made us janken him.

Shochu. Shochu is the Kyushu version of sake, I believe. Actually, I’m probably totally wrong on this but I don’t feel like looking up the facts. Anyways, it’s a totemo (very) popular drink in a country that drinks quite a bit. I think the Kagoshima version of shochu is made from sweet potatoes. Kagoshima is the prefecture (like a province/state) that Chiran is in.

Omiyagi. Omiyagi is like souvenir gifts one brings back for coworkers/friends after going away somewhere. I’m unsure of the proper etiquette, like if you ‘owe’ omiyagi every time you leave the prefecture or not. (Although one of my JTEs – Japanese Teacher of English- didn’t tell anyone but me when she went to Fukuoka to shop precisely because she didn’t want to have to buy omiyagi.) It’s usually just individually packaged sweets or candy. When I went to Beppu in Oita, I brought back kabosu/a (delicious lime) flavoured cookies. Fukuoka has these amazing sweet potato cakes, and Nagasaki deliciously dense poundcake.

A Quick Post

Arg, I should write a real post detailing the occurrences of the past few weeks (mostly teaching/not teaching at conversation classes and junior high school) but since I still have to prepare for a conversation class for tomorrow as well as a few other classes but I want to go to sleep, I will procrastinate in the only way I know how: shorthand lists.

Okay, a bit of a lie, but nonetheless:

1. Hyaku (100) Yen shops are amazing. My town has two, one real freestanding giant mecca of my favourite place to be, and another at the back of a pharmacy within walking distance. Some things purchased there: a world map (Japanese style, with Japan in the centre!), many glasses, a little penguin for the faucet on top of my toilet, markers, paper, tupperware, an inflatable hammer, tea towels, coconut baskets, hand warmers, socks, clothes hangers, a laundry mesh bag, a princess tiara (I didn't buy this, but it's in my house), a garden gnome (same), origami, origami instructions, sparkly pens, a binder, plastic chopsticks & container, sweat rags, a coin-purse/wallet, and a really nice work tote. The amount of things that I want to buy but force myself not to lest I want to be able to walk around my apartment is innumerable. I think back to the giant dollar store in Carlingwood and how depressing it is and you just can't compare. The quality of the merchandise and the sheer amount of choice is staggering.

2. My friend was the one to bring this to my attention, but it's worth repeating. Why, in a country where the majority of the population eats rice at least twice a day, can you not find, no matter where you look, rice krispies? They have corn flakes and other various cereals available, but I have yet to see rice krispies.

3. I often wish that I went to elementary school in Japan, but at the same time am very relieved that I didn't go to junior/senior high school here.

I went/participated in a dragon boat festival/race yesterday on the other peninsula. Our boat did not come last in our heat, which we were all very proud of. I had some good conversations with some cute 6 year olds, slept on the ferry back (they have carpeted rooms specifically for sleeping purposes, on a one hour ferry), and went to a sand bath/onsen. It was a nice weekend, but as usual I am exhausted. Thankfully it's a long weekend, with Friday off and no classes on Thursday due to School Culture Day.

SKYPE

I started writing a real post, but I felt that the words were not coming out in the manner that I wished, so expect a new post in a day or two. Or maybe not, since I have three evening classes to teach this week and I haven't prepared as much as I would like for them. Anyways, the point of this post is to tell you all know that I now have internet from my house. I got it Friday afternoon when I got home from work and basically since then every moment that I've been at home I've been attached to the computer. This is terrible.

But I did get Skype. I have no idea how to add people and I'm too lazy to ask individually what everyone's screen names are (assuming you have Skype....for the older generation reading this, I suggest going to www.skype.com to find out more). Mine is, funnily enough, batrobot. So please add me and once I figure out if I need a microphone or not please call me!

Lazy Sunday

Lazy Sunday, and it's amazing. This is the first time in about a month that I've slept in my bed during the weekend, and man how it feels good. Since the last entry, I climbed a mountain, swam in the sea, went to Beppu, Oita, hung out on a barge, and experienced Canadian Thanksgiving, Japanese-style.

I said in my last post that I would talk about many things, but now I don't feel like it.

School is interesting. This past week I finally had my first elementary school visits. Finally. I now understand why everyone who does the elementary loves them so much more than junior high schools. The kids are just so cute and precious. On Tuesday I went to Temino Elementary School, the smallest school that I will be seeing, with only 22 students. 14 of those students are bused in from the town centre because otherwise the school would be too small to run. One of the kids bused in, Daichi, is the son of my host parents. I say this lightly, because I haven't seen them in about a month. But they were the biggest help when I first arrived, feeding me and taking me shopping. I've been meaning to stop by and visit them, and even have the requisite omiyagi to bring them, but I have been too busy.

Anyways, yes, I went to elementary schools. At Temino, after I did my usual self-introduction (slightly shorter and easier than at JHS) and we played some Simon Says and sang Head & Shoulders, it was elective time. Half the kids were driven to the country club, a five minute drive, where we hit golf balls on the driving range. I was totally shown up by the cutest, most compact and athletically gifted 9 year old. Then I was taken back to school, where I joined the non-sports minded kids in knitting practice.

On Wednesday, I went to Chiran Elementary School, the biggest one in the town with almost 300 students. I only visited one class, the sannenseis (grade threes). So cute. As soon as I walked into the school, all the kids stopped cleaning (it was cleaning time) and just stared at me. When I entered the classroom, all of a sudden about twenty small bodies were crowded around me shooting off questions in Japanese, like where do I live and what"s my car license plate number (I think). So random, but so cute.

In contrast, I'm not enjoying the junior high so much. I thought self-introduction was bad, but at least the kids were interested (albeit slightly). The Japanese English curriculum seriously needs some restructuring, as it relies mostly on memorization of arbitrary sentences. I shouldn't say that, since I actually only see each class once every 2 weeks, so I don't have the complete picture of how things work. But in any respect, the students seem to be bored out of their minds with the reading practices and copying of 'key phrases' from the blackboard. I feel like part of my job is to make English fun, but I'm not sure what sort of activities they'd like. I attempted Bingo several times, with mixed results. I feel like I could come up with some good activities, if my JTEs didn't tell me the lesson plan five minutes before class starts.

While junior high is mostly meh, Kagoshima is pretty wicked. I've been living for the weekends, but the weeknights are pretty great too. On Thursdays I play badminton, with a bunch of "beginners". They're loads better than me, but it's still lots of fun. Most other nights I'm busy with other things, either having dinner with Japanese friends or planning my conversation classes or practicing for speech contests with my students or just hanging out with my friend Claire, the ALT in the neighbouring town. I don't know what I'd do without her, especially now as I write this on her laptop while she prepares for going out tonight to see our friend Tammy perform on stage. She's from Ireland, and talks like an Irish, with all her funny sayings and phrases that I've started to pick up, like "What's the craic?" for "What's up?" and "savage" for "awesome". It's great having someone to commiserate about everything that's going on: having someone to help me decipher the kanji signs and try and talk to people with (speaking of, somehow in the last two days we had two different old men randomly give us shochu and beer - once for winning at janken, and the other for god knows why). We're unhealthily obsessed with Joyfull, a family restaurant chain in the style of American diners, but with Japanese foods. We like it mostly because the menu has pictures, so you know what you're getting.

Okay, that's enough for now. If there's anything that you would like me to talk about, if you have any questions, please comment and I will try to write an entry about it. If all goes as plans, I should have internet at my house by Friday, so then hopefully there will be more regular updates.

Almost a month since my last entry! Much has happened since then, and I hope to effectively summarize most of it, but I doubt it. The following will be a lackadaisical account on my part, partly because I am at work and partly because I am very tired and coming down with a cold.

1. Yes, I got my car. I lovingly refer to it as “putt-putt” because that is the sound it makes, especially when I try to drive up hill and putt-putt barely breaks 30. Kilometres. But it gets me around and I got a tape with a cord so I can listen to my iPod on the radio, so despite the perpetual buzzing of the radio and the shaking of the engine, it’s a good one and I am happy. This weekend I completely disregarded my insane promise to the office and drove not only to (and through!) Kagoshima City but to the Osumi peninsula in order to see a rocket launch. We were planning on taking the train to the city to catch a ferry to Osumi where we would get picked up by a friend, but as we couldn’t find the train station I just decided to drive the whole way. The journey from my house to the place where we were staying took about five and a half hours. Of course this includes waiting for the ferry and driving back country Osumi roads (where it is impossible to determine which road is which due to the lack of highway signs) and stopping to look at the map in puzzlement and calling our hosts to yell at them for giving us terrible directions. But it was well worth the trip. The rocket launch was sometime between 6 and 7am Saturday morning. After trying and failing to pull an all nighter, we woke up at around 5:30 after a couple of hours of sleep and made our way to the beach 5 minutes away and waiting for the launch. I almost missed it because I was looking at the ocean and there was absolutely no sound from the rocket, but I did see it fly through the air and I managed to take some pictures. Maybe the pictures will be posted, but don’t hold your breath. After some more hours of sleep, we went to another beach, a bit of a drive away and made delicious barbe-que on a portable grill. The waves were incredibly rough and I guess we got there just before high tide because every 30 minutes we would have to gather all our things and move further down. Since the strand of sand we were on was nestled between the Pacific Ocean and an amazing river, we were soon chased off the beach. The rest of the weekend was passed in Kanoya City and in the putt-putt returning home, which took much longer than expected.


2. School. Teaching at the Junior High School is going well. I’ve only been there while school is on for about two weeks, and so far have managed just to do my self-introductions. I am hoping to god that I did my last one on Friday, and they have become more and more painful each time I have to get up in the front of the class with my crayoned Canadian flag and photocopied pictures of hockey and maple syrup. I’m making it out to sound worse than it is, but nevertheless self introductions are terrible. It is not in my nature to stand in front of 40 people and talk about myself for 50 minutes. I talk as much as I can about Canada, but that bores the kids/they don’t understand. I made the mistake of going on a beaver tangent, explaining the importance of the beaver to Canadian history, which even my JTE (Japanese Teacher of English) couldn’t understand, thereby embarrassing him in front of the class. I still feel terrible about it, but saying the same thing about how we have a lot of bears in Canada gets boring. I also pass around a photo album with random pictures of me with family and friends, and some of the kids are so interested but others could care less, and I can’t say I blame them.

Ugh. I have more to write but this is enough for today. Tomorrow I hopefully will buy a computer, and then the internet will hopefully arrive soon afterwards. In the next post: sports festival, school enkai (maybe), KAPIC.

About the car

So I bought a car. No, wait. I'm going to buy a car. I was supposed to get it yesterday, but they said it won't be ready until today, and now I'm just going to wait until I actually see it and drive it to say that I bought it.

I made a promise to myself a few years ago that I would only ever buy an environmentally friendly car, be it hybrid or electric or whatever. I'm sorry to say that I've broken that promise, as my car requires gas to run. However, since it's teeny tiny and the options are fairly limited in rural Japan, I'm allowing my own personal exception.

About the car:

It's white. It's a Daihatsu Mira. There are many many kilometres already on it. For the price I paid, I had the choice between two white small cars. Seeing as I know nothing about cars, and both required some work before I could actually take it home, I chose the Mira for one arbitrary reason, but as far as arbitrary reasons go, I feel that it's a fairly good one.

The wheel is on the right side, and I am supposed to drive on the left side of the road. On my test drive, I instinctively turned right into the near lane, and almost hit another car. Key word being almost. I'm pretty sure the mechanic told my supervisor, because yesterday when he drove me home he stopped on a narrow side street and made me practive driving his massive van home. Let me tell you, it was not good. For one thing, his car is larger than the car I am used to driving back in Canada. Secondly, the roads are much much much more narrow here, with deep pits on either side that are commonly known as 'Gaijin Traps'. Third, Kagoshima is known to have the highest rate of trafic accidents in Japan (I may be making this up, but I swear I heard this from many people). Fourth, my supervisor is a skinny man that is a more skittish passenger than even my father and has the tendency to let out small shrieks whenever I came close to any objects.

It's not that I drove terribly, exactly. It's more that I drove very slowly and was very nervous. I tried to tell my supervisor that in fact I am a capable driver and have been driving alone for over five years (also a lie...I've been licensed for just under 5 years). He laughed when I said this, shocked that it could possibly be true. Then he made me promise to only drive to work, to school and to the grocery store for the next month. I got him to reluctantly include Kawanabe, the town not 15 minutes away (that took me 2 hours to get to this weekend on bus) since there's both a giant Zellers-type store there and my closest gaijin friend.

Until now I have been both amused and gracious for the overprotective nature of my board of education. There are many things that I could not have had done without the help of the fine people in my office. If I was left alone without any help, I would currently either be squatting underneath some cardboard box or seeking refuge at the Canadian embassy in Tokyo. Nevertheless, there are those things that I am capable of doing, and restricting me in doing so just make me want to pee in spite on the gifts that I am planning on giving these people.*


*Note: I do not actually plan on peeing on any gifts.

Am currently alone in the Board of Education office. I believe everyone else is either at a meeting or at the library. One of my coworkers (that feels strange to say because I am hardly a coworker, more like a deaf and dumb taker of space and waster of time) just told me "It goes to the library" meaning that she is going, not that I should go with her, which I mistakenly thought.

As far as I can tell with my limited knowledge, there are no such things as pronouns in Japanese. Everything translated, be it 'he', 'you', 'I' etc. is "It". Although I can't remember if 'they' is "It" or not. Let's pretend it is for the sake of argument. My third day here I was told, via the ever-reliable Excite internet translator, that "It embarrassed that undergoes complete" or something along those lines, I can't remember the exact phrase. I thought they were rudely bringing up the fact that I cried in front of the whole office on my first day (long story), and I had no idea why they were dredging that up and how I should respond as my face got redder and redder. Turns out they were asking if I needed any help with unpacking my things. I should have known they was no malice intended.

As I was writing this someone from the city hall office just came up and asked me if I wanted to play badminton with her club (?) on Saturday. I was all, Kyu-gattsu? Which means September and she was all, August! And I was all thinking that there are no more Saturdays in August, at least not till 2007 and so looked very confused. After an ordeal of locating and pointing at a calendar I realise that she meant Thursday which is indeed still in August. Yay badminton!

The phone keeps on ringing. One of my coworkers made sure to tell me not to answer it, very useful advice considering all I would say is "Moshi Moshi" and then stare blankly in front of me, an action that does not transfer well over the phone. I guess I could have said 'Nihongo skoshi' or 'wakarimasen' but then why answer the phone at all? I hate talking to strangers on the phone in English, let alone Japanese or Turkish or Farsi.

Eee! I bought a car! Well, I'm buying it tomorrow. Everyone in the office (and in the city hall) seem to know how much I paid (am paying) for it. Then they ask me questions and I mime driving and then stare blankly in front of me when they say anything else. I really need to work on my Japanese.

My shoulders hurt. For some reason, all desk chairs I have found here do not offer adequate back support. I am taking advantage of the empty staff room at the junior high and surfing to my heart's content although it is killer on my back.

There's not much to do here at school. Monday was cleaning day, where all the students come in (although they still had two weeks of summer vacation) and clean the school. Most of the students come in to school anyways to participate in their club activities, which I guess know no break. Anyways, on Monday I had to give a short little speech introducing myself to all the teachers and students. For the last couple of weeks I was being taught Japanese by the staff/teachers at the Chiran community centre, and one of them gave me a little speech to memorize to say in front of the teachers. I tried to translate it into English for my own understanding, which ended up confusing me more.

My speech was:

Watasi ha minasanni eigo o osiemasu
Minasanwa watasini nihongo de hanasite kudasai
hayaku nihongo o oboete otomodatini naritaidesu
Nihon no bunkaya rekisio osietekudasai

When I tried translating it, this is what spewed out:

I give three Ei ending of a word./I teach you its English tail.
Everyone must speak to passing by three harmony in Japanese.
A Japanese tail wants to be remembered and to be made friends early.
Please teach the culture and the history tail of Japan.

Does anyone have any idea what the hell that means? Me neither. I asked my supervisor, and after many blank looks and wild hand gestures, I think I got the basic gist:

I am the new English teacher.
Please speak to me slowly in Japanese.
I really want to learn Japanese.
Please teach me about Japanese culture and history.

I guess I'm the tail?

TYPHOON!

Typhoon? More like ty-fun! No really, there's a typhoon warning in effect. I've haphazardly searched the English language Japanese dailies for information, but all I found was a warning of heavy rains, swollen rivers and landslides in Kyushu and Shikoku. Yesterday afternoon all my office was abuzz with typhoon warnings; they even printed out a diagram of my house to show me exactly where the storm shutters are located, with precise instructions of how to slide them over my windows. This morning every television station had extensive typhoon coverage. I put out the shutters this morning before work, so my little house is a shroud of darkness with no natural light coming in. I'm pretty excited with this being my first ever typhoon.

I'm sitting in the office right now, with a painful shoulder ache, unconsciously ignoring the three men across from me having some sort of conversation in Japanese. I can't tell if anyone actually works here, but maybe that's because I certainly don't. Wait: I keep hearing the words 'shogakko' and 'chugakko' which respectively mean elementary and junior high school, so that must be something.

Yesterday (today?) was (is?) my birthday. I'm really not sure because I received many comments both Monday and Wednesday, but almost none on the actual day itself. I wouldn't be surprised if I am in fact completely wrong and my birthday is really in a couple of weeks.

These past weeks have been, for lack of better words, crazy. There is too much that I want to say but not enough time to write it all. I also lack the energy, to be honest. I guess my actions over the last couple of weeks can be summarized by blank stares, awkward silences, and many cultural faux-pas. However, to say that I am not having an amazing time would be a lie. The people here are incredible generous and kind and the town itself is quite majestic.

It;s Wednesday morning, 7:45, and in an hour I leave Tokyo and head way down south to Chiran. I have mixed feelings; although I am ready to move into my new home and start to get settled, I am very scared too. I met the other JETs in my prefecture, and they seem alright, but I will miss the friends I:ve made in Ottawa. To commemorate our last night, we went to karaoke yesterday. I:ve finally had the chance to belt out what some consider the worst song ever, We Built This City. Consequently, I have no voice this morning and am very, very tired.

Before karaoke, we Canadians had a meeting at our embassy. The cab ride through parts of Tokyo was amazing. I really wish I had more time to explore and see the city. I went into one electronic store, which was the craziest thing Id ever seen. It:s good that I didn:t buy a laptop because the ones here are generations ahead of N America.

I have much more to write, obviously, but there has yet been no time for thinking and I have to go eat breakfast.

I seem to have deleted my blog...

Damn katakana symbols!