a red rubber ball

Making Christmas Cookies With Chopsticks

2011-12-17T10:42:00.004+09:00

I'm trying to get into the Holiday Spirit a little... I watched the Michael Buble Christmas special last night (^_^). Nostalgic, but actually a little over-scripted, don't you think?

In Japan, you have to make Christmas happen--don't expect it to be Christmas just because it's December 25. Some friends and I are planning to make Christmas dinner together--quite a feat in our tiny apartment kitchens, and watch some Christmas movies. The problem is that there are so many people that aren't going home this year, we're going to be crammed in that little apartment. Ah well, maybe cozy, right?

Tomorrow is our work Christmas party with the students. I'm making Christmas cookies in my little toaster oven with some cookie cutters my mom sent me. It's working out pretty well. I'm going to attempt to make some frosting to go on top (^_^) tonight. I don't have a rolling pin of course, so I'm making do with a cooking chopstick. I hope I have enough cookies and don't eat all the cookie dough (^_^).

-- iPhoneから送信

Homegrown Kiwi Fruit

2011-12-15T19:55:00.002+09:00

Living in the country has its perks. Often, we get lots of fresh produce from our students. But this year I had a first: homegrown kiwi fruit (^_^).

My student said that when she was a little girl, her father came home one day with a bunch of fruit trees. She thought he was crazy. But in the years following, also liked having fresh, fresh fruit around (^_^). Now, the trees are quite a bit of hard work she said, but very delicious (^_^). They have apple trees, pear trees, orange trees, persimmon trees, plum trees, kiwi trees... a real orchard by the sound of it (^_^). Growing so much fruit--especially kiwi fruit--in Japan is not so common either...

A few days ago a bad storm came through, so she had to save all the little kiwi fruit before they were destroyed. Lucky me (^_^). I have enough kiwi fruit to keep me happy for awhile now (^_^). I guess I have to share with my co-workers....

-- iPhoneから送信

The sound of the ocean is not far away

2011-07-12T10:23:00.011+09:00

Having Mondays off instead of Saturdays is usually so irritating. Not only do I work at night, I also work Saturdays, so I can hardly have proper relationships with people with normal schedules (blah Blah, typical afternoon-shift bellyache blah blah).

But, if you have a fellow Mondays-off friend, the two of you may discover there are a few blisses tucked inside the empty Monday world. Yesterday, the local beach became August (Nishio English teacher and hippie-esque, slightly insane piece of incarnate sunshine; also fellow Sunday-Monday weekend comrade) and I's private resort beach--yet there were also still a few people around to people watch and enjoy.

I've been craving the ocean. We've both been craving sunshine. So, we packed our backpacks and took our bicycles out there--it took us about an hour to get there, but only 40 minutes or so back because we found a way AROUND the small mountain, instead of having to scale it.

Thus we enjoyed a long afternoon playing in the water, listening to the piped in music on the loud speaker radio mixed with the waves.... I brought my little kite along.. it looked like a cute cicada doing colorful antics above the imported palm trees ^_^ Our bay area isn't so paradise-eque... they have imported the palm trees and the sand is actually not natural but brought in from the south of Japan.. and they renamed the beach Waikiki Beach so it feels more like paradise... it's still not quite the same as Hawaii I don't think ^_^, but it's warm ocean water and bright sunshine ^_^ So we are exponentially happy with it.

Unfortunately, the sunscreen we used wasn't waterproof....... lobster face. Yesterday night, I felt like I had a fever, and today at school was torture. And August is worse off than me. We're hoping all our skin doesn't peel off in sheets.. but I don't know if it can recover >_<

Next time, waterproof sunscreen.... and I have to practice swimming more... Mom made me and my brother and sister take swimming lessons when I was 8, but my sister and I failed, and I've never really been comfortable in water since... so August was trying to show me how there's actually a big bowl of cookie dough in the water, and if you scoop the sides, then breathe while eating it, and kick your legs like a frog, you can swim. Just makes me want to eat cookie dough really, but I'm trying.

World peace

2011-06-29T21:02:00.007+09:00

Sitting on the side of the river in Hiroshima, chilling and looking at the beautiful tragic ruins of the Atomic Bomb Dome. Wishing I had a guitar so I could write another song about being nice to people. I'm sure tomorrow I'd think it was atrocious, but tonight it would be perfect.

It's dark and they are setting off fireworks behind the A-dome--real slowly, like one a minute maybe. Maybe they do this every night in the summer? No one seems overly excited except there's a few photographers out. The fireworks are shaped very distinctly like flowers. The sound is echoing down the river.

I like borrowing other people's towns for a couple of days.. Just hang out here instead of my own town. Of course there's more than just hanging out to do in Hiroshima, though. Today I stayed around here--the Peace park, museum, and Hiroshima castle. It's heavy stuff. After the museum and walking around thinking about it for most of the day, you really feel the human capacity to hurt other humans is ghastly huge.

The museum exhibits about Sadako and the thousand paper cranes, and then the memorial in the park in her honor remembering all the children who died because of the bomb were especially poignant: they remind me of what exactly made me want to come over here in the first place... In fourth grade, we studied World War 2 hard out. And sort of doubled with the war, we studied a lot of Japan. Funny how that happens, isn't it? At university, my world history teacher taught us through the perspective of the clash of civilizations as the driving factor in change. After the war, we all have been trying hard to understand each other. It was through studying this very disgust that made me want to know more way back then. And here I am... still trying my best to understand.

So give me a guitar and I'll write you a song really quick so we can make this feeling bigger and last longer.

Lala let's understand each other
Lala be nice to each other
Lala let's all be together
Lala respect and world peace world peace
Lala

(k, not a serious attempt at song writing)

PHOTO NOTE: The Second photo is the Children's Peace Memorial at night, just after they finished the fireworks and I left the riverside. It was put up especially in memory of Sadako. The little houses around it are full of paper cranes.

-- iPhoneから送信

場所:１丁目,広島市,日本

Vegetable donuts

2011-06-02T11:23:00.001+09:00

Lately, I've gotten used to waking up in the morning--as opposed to statin up ungodly late and sleeping til the afternoon as my work schedule suggests. In return, I get to see the morning light, get a few extra hours in my day, and get morning donuts.

Mister donuts, the donut shop most popular in Japan and conveniently located 3 minutes from my house, has a new line of donuts. They're more like cake than donuts actually, and include fruit flavors like caramel apple, traditional flavors like cinnamon chocolate, and vegetable flavors like spinach and sweet potato. So far my favorite two flavors are spinach and sweet potato and milk!

Donut paired with Japanese study works out to be a very enjoyable morning. I'm glad I got up today

-- iPhoneから送信

場所:２丁目,西尾市,日本

Baths in December

2010-12-16T13:00:00.014+09:00

Running through the cold December night air wearing nothing but a towel our heads.. then gingerly stepping down into the hot hot spring water... ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh..... Elysian Fields. ^_^

Three of my students/friends and I took an onsen trip last weekend. ^_^ Onsens are hot springs, very popular for bathing in in Japan. They are perfect. People have been onsen-ing since before time in Japan I think ^_^ Baths are quite a Japanese tradition.. and definitely they've been bathing everyday loong before they were in the West. ^_^　Everyday, what a concept? ^_^ Onsens are my favorite part of Japan I think.

Sunday afternoon, we headed down to Toba city 鳥羽 in Mie prefecture 三重県. Toba is a seaport town, famous for pearls (and especially the women pearl-divers of back in the day), right beside the famous city of Ise 伊勢 and one of the most important shrines in Shinto, Ise Jingu　伊勢神宮. Our Onsen was called Todaya 戸田家.

We just enjoyed a couple of days of serious relaxing... eating good food... hot baths and more hot baths.... and just girl talk and getting to know each other ^_^ Dinner, then indoor baths... then we decided to explore the outdoor baths ^_^ ahhh... so wonderful, and overlooking the ocean. ^_^ then sleep. then an early morning for a perfect morning outdoor bath... then breakfast in our pajamas ^_^ (because they give you yukata, basically thin robes, to wear while you're there ^_^) and then it was time to check out. ^_^

After we left the onsen, we enjoyed wandering around Okage yokocho　おかげ横丁, the town right outside of Ise Jingu ^_^ Okage yokocho means lots of yummy food again! :D And I found a couple of Christmas presents while I was there ^_^ ah, lovely weekend. ^_^

Time for the annual apple

2010-12-07T03:55:00.007+09:00

Every year I go apple picking in Nagano prefecture 長野県 to the north of us with ladies from one of my community center English classes. It's a wonderful tradition. This year was my third time now. Three autumns sounds like a long time, doesn't it.

In Indiana, we pick apples every year, too. So actually, I have been picking apples every fall for the last 10 years or so. Ironically, I actually don't like apples very much. But, a fresh-picked fuji apple straight off a tree is like candy. In an orchard is usually the only time I ever eat apples. In Indiana, Fuji was a favorite variety. Now I get to pick them straight off Japanese trees.

Japan is so beautiful. Everyday is beautiful. We also stopped by a town famous for the fall foliage on this day trip. It's called Korankei 香嵐渓。 We arrived quite early in the morning: hard early morning sunlight from a brilliant blue sky lit up the leaves. Brilliant colors. It was the end of the season so my students said not as amazing as at peak season. There, we ate a snack: gohei mochi and mushroom tea..

A lovely fall day.

Another America, Another Japan

2010-09-19T13:15:00.009+09:00

Lately, I've been watching American leaders' speeches. Actually, only speeches from the 60's and then, only speeches from Martin Luther King, Jr. and the two Kennedy brothers.

What a different world that was. Was that America? America, where black people were seriously lower citizens than the white majority on a very public and open and acceptable level. And there were marches and riots for equal treatment.

On another front, an America where people who may or may not like socialism or communism lose their jobs and are blacklisted from being hired.

And this America where murders of important leaders maybe came to be not so much of a shock and it would be to me... John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert F. Kennedy all in the same decade?

It all seems like some legend.

Today's America perhaps is equally strange. I grew up with the news dominated by huge scandal, resulting in only the second presidential impeachment since the beginning. Also terrorism on public buildings... Oklahoma City, September 11. The threat of religious fanaticism violence looming everyday. Maybe America is still insane, just with different symptoms.

We did just elect a black president. That's quite a switch from the 60's.

At the top is a speech by Robert F. Kennedy given in Indianapolis on the night King was assassinated. If you have 5 minutes, please give it a go. Robert Kennedy is credited for helping to calm the people and dissuade them from breaking out in the violence seen in other cities that night. It's short and not complicated, but impressing.

I first read this speech from the plaque on the monument in downtown Indianapolis at the location he gave the speech. I was so impressed.

I don't live in the U.S.A right now. Japan is insane, too. I wonder what it will be like in 50 years. I think Japan can fight through some of the insanities, also. There are tensions with the ethnic minorities living in Japan, though they're not at the level of some of the civil rights injustices in the U.S.A of the past. The presence of the foreigners here are part of the education process. I hope life will be less strained for temporary workers, permanent residents and Japanese citizens of non-Japanese or mixed decent in 50 years. Maybe Japan also must have a Cultural Revolution?

Johnny Depp's socks

2010-03-27T00:33:00.000+09:00

The most gorgeous Mad Hatter ever and his almost-as-mad director brought Wonderland's fantastic red castle to Tokyo last Monday: the Japan premiere of the highly anticipated Alice in Wonderland.

My lucky student won tickets to the premiere. So jealous.

In class the week before, she was so excited ^_^ The preparations begin!

Checklist!

1 - What to wear! They asked all the winners to dress up as a character. And who does cosplay better than Japan? :D She ended up putting together the most awesome female Mad Hatter outfit.

2 - What to say!! Well, at least get him to shake your hand right? "Do I say, 'Please shake!!'?" she asks her English teacher. So I (green and writhing with jealousy) teach her that, "Please shake my hand!" should do the trick.

3 - Should I give him something??? OK cool! So what do you give Johnny Depp? Something awesome.. this is once-in-a-lifetime after all... But maybe she won't actually have a chance to meet him anyway.. probably she won't.... so she'll get something practical so she can use it just in case she doesn't get to meet him...

But, she does get to meet him. Not only meet him, but get about a hundred autographs and talk to him and.. yes.. give him her present. Which is socks. triple pack. black.

You gave Johnny Depp socks?!?!?!?! =O :D

Well! She says, I thought, just in case I couldn't meet him, my husband could use them! And I put a note inside, so not just socks....

:D And they were the toe socks.. really normal in Japan.. they give you good circulation or something? I love the idea of Johnny Depp wearing these Japanese toe socks from her. LOL. ^_^ I wish.

Ah, Japan loves Johnny Depp. What can I say, Japan has good taste ^_^ In the premiere press conference, Johnny Depp says Japan gives the warmest welcome ^_^ lol. About a million girls met him at the airport, and gathered around the premiere spot. ^_^ And he was just here last December for the premiere of Public Enemies!

Ganbatte Mao-chan!

2010-02-26T00:52:00.001+09:00

Ganbatte Mao-chan!! Let's go Mao!!

Today is the final skate of the ladies figure skating competition. The final showdown between rival skaters Mao Asada of Japan (woot! to the right) and Kim Yuna of Korea (to the left). Who gets that shiny golden disc.

I caught the short program on Wednesday. So much fun! Mao blew away the competition by 10 points when she got up. And then, her rival Kim from Korea got up right after her, and beat her score by 5 points! Kim skated to 007... so much fun, I must admit. =O I missed the programs yesterday :( but I'm watching the finals now! In a bit, I'm going to go over to Eiden, the electronics store nearby, to watch Mao with all the other poor people on the big screens ^_^ Let's go Mao-chan! Let's give Korea a silver medal!

These games are right fun, aren't they?

Pete and Repete were in a boat...

2010-02-24T16:04:00.000+09:00

Japanese! Sometimes simple, sometimes almost incomprehensibly complicated.

Learning any foreign language can be slow and painful. But being able to communicate in a foreign country--even if it's just ordering coffee, is so rewarding. For one you get your coffee, right? And you now can understand and relate to the people around you a bit more.

Here is a tiny bit of Japanese that can enhance your trip to Japan (and/or your anime watching experiences!).

This channel has posted many videos of single short phrases. They're only about 5 seconds long, so you can just keep playing them over like a sound bite. Repeat and remember..

This girl teaches basic Japanese phrases, etc. by way of Youtube and her trusty sharpie. She's not the best speaker, but I think these videos are rather good.

Just listen and repeat and repeat!

This post is especially for my parents--who are coming to Japan this summer! :D I'm so excited to share everything in my life with them!

PHOTO: Don't you want to understand? ^_^ This is some wall art near the Sakura Hostel in Asakusa in Tokyo. It's a bunch of traditional Japanese ghosts and creatures ^_^ My favorite is the little kappa on the end.. the one that looks like a turtle? They are mischievous creatures that live in rivers ^_^

Ninja skills are better than experience

2010-02-20T16:07:00.000+09:00

"Well, it's been my experience, that experience for the sake of experience, usually isn't a very good experience at all. Unless there's a reason for your experience, a purpose, or you learn something from it, then, well, there's not much point."

Bernard Walton. Adventures in Odyssey, Episode 274: First-hand Experience.

Ninjutsu is undoubtedly the most important something I have learned in Japan. Neigh, it is the most important thing I have learned in life. I owe the success in my daily life to my deftness in Invisible.

Adventures in Odyssey is one of those haunts from childhood that never quite leaves you. This quote was playing in my mind the other day. I've since worked this into my short answer to the ubiquitous question, "So why did you come to Japan?" Er, the part about learning things I mean.. I've come to learn new things. It's true.

THE PHOTO: We visited the Iga Ninja House in Mie prefecture late last summer. We underwent an intense day of ninjutsu training--instruction in the shuriken/ninja star arts and advanced sneakiness techniques--as well as received professional advice in ninja tourist hachigane/forehead protectors. My hachigane, of course, hangs by my door, ready in a moment if there be a requirement of my ninja skills.

Fire cats (w/ video)

2010-02-18T07:50:00.000+09:00

Winter is ending, and the cats come to play in the fires at Hazu.

We went to the Toba Hi Matsuri or Toba Fire Festival in Hazu again this year. We went by train and then met some friends down there.

Festivals are one of my favorite things. In America, festivals are great.. Irish Fest, Indianapolis Labor Day fireworks, Indiana State Fair, your hometown's random city festival ^_^). In Japan, they REALLY know how to make a festival, and they have had hundreds of years to perfect them.

Sum up of the basics of this festival: After walking around at the booths.. catching your fill of goldfish, eating your fill of chocolate-covered bananas, get your spot around the two giant bonfires-to-be. We have a secret spot in the trees behind the bonfires. Well, we thought it was secret but, this year there were about a hundred people there :(

At the starting time, you'll hear the chink, chink, chink of flint against stone: building a fire from the bottom up. A victory shout signals the successful spark, and then the bonfires are lit.

There is a sacred tree inside each of the fires--one for each team, the east and the west. Once the fires begin to roar, the two teams of local Hazu-ites--dressed in traditional festival wear--begin to race up ladders, into the bonfires! They are racing to pull out their team's sacred tree. If the east wins, then there will be a good harvest. If the west wins, there will be a bad harvest. But, our friend says, both teams try hard to win anyway. This is a video! Note the fire falling all over the guys and them jumping off as they catch on fire!

The festival wear is one of the best parts: they fashion the black and white banners of last year's festival into costumes that cover them from head to toe. The end result makes them look just like little calico cats! Meow! or since they're Japanese, nya~! ^_^

We made it around the bay!

2010-02-15T14:19:00.001+09:00

Aroooound the bay and back again!

Minority and I and our little bicycles made it all the way to the tips of the Mikawa Bay peninsulas and back again to Nishio, safe and still friends, last weekend ^_^ (And also just in time to watch the recording of the Super Bowl with our friends... big disappointing end to the day >_<

It was about 130 kilometers, a challenge and the hills almost did me in... hills and a certain failure to turn, which led us over an extremely huge bridge with lots of wind that spanned the whole ocean I think... but we persevered... Minority let me use his bicycle sometimes ^_^ He looked so cool on my cute little schoolgirl bike :D ha ha. And we also encountered some lovely and/or amusing people along the way ^_^

Here's our start: outside Hananoki Elementary School, Nishio. With our trusty Super Mapple!--marked with huge assistance from our friend Al Capone (ありがとうね！arigato ne! thank you!）Our first day was about 50 kilometers. And we sort of took it easy.

We headed south, through Kira and then over the hills of Kota. Can you see how far UP we bicycled? That town at the bottom is Nishio / Kira. >_<

In just an hour we made it down to Gamagori. We stopped off at Takeshima, a tiny island shrine with a huge bridge stretching out to it. Minority hadn't been there. Beautiful as ever.

Oh! Well, I always look at the wishes at shrines now, ever since my friend (Roba) found one that was really funny ^_^ Today, someone hopes he can be a jockey some day ^_^ Awesome. And he/she mispelled jockey ^_^ ちょう　かわいい。　cho kawaii. so cute.

And then we biked for about 10 minutes and stopped at the fish market at Laguna. Yummy! They give you tons of free samples and stuff... but Minority doesn't really like fish. Right. Why did he come to Japan?? But I really enjoyed myself ^_^ It was really 懐かしい。natsukashii. took me back to when I first came to Nishio. ^_^ My student/friend took me there maybe my first month in Japan ^_^ This picture is of a big pile of seaweed.

Turns out that although Minority hates fish, he really likes raw fish. Weird guy. So we ate lunch here. And I also noticed the dialect this time! The fish vendors were saying "Maido!" along with the general "Irashai mase!" or "Welcome! Please come in!" "Maido" is what they say in the west, Kansai dialect. Like in Osaka, the big city in the west of Japan. But they use some Kansai dialect here in Mikawa area, too. I figure it's sort of mixed with the peculiar dialect here... Mikawa dialect. Apparently, Mikawa dialect sounds pretty country to people in the city ^_^ My friend's son is going to University near Nagoya, and she says he tries not to speak in Mikawa dialect because it makes him sound so country ^_^

After lunch we continued on our way... getting a liiittle lost.. adding another hour or so to our trip >_< but we finally made it to Tahara.

It was just getting dark and getting so cold when we made it to Tahara. Sooo lucky that Al Capone had looked up a internet cafe for us to stay at. We asked for directions at a Sugi Pharmacy (love Sugi!) and the pharmacist printed us out a map and everything ^_^ Tahara people are nice ^_^ Turns out we were a block away from it

It was the best internet cafe ever! The name is Aprecio and they have cafes all over Japan... I think I'll look them up next time I go somewhere. So.. in Japan, net cafes, or manga kissatens (mangakissa) are really common. You can pay per hour to sit and use the internet, read manga, drink free drinks--because ours was so awesome they have karaoke, place to do your laundry, massage chairs, other awesomeness. And they also have night packs so you can stay all night.. pretty cheap lodging.

We got 10-hour night packs for 2200 yen, about $22.00 (And thank God they had showers here for only an extra 100 yen. I was so happy.) And they had this amazing free breakfast in the morning! It was a really, really nice mangakissa. Quite comfortable. I had never stayed at one before... only used the internet at them, but Minority had. Lol the gappers are just too poor ^_^ (Our pads were side-by-side.. we have the door open in this picture.)

We were so cold and frustrated trying to find a place to eat in the dark, but by an error in kanji reading (which Minority was humiliated for the rest of the trip ^_^) we happened upon a lovely little restaurant with people so overly-accommodating in helping the gaijin-san navigate the menu (which we could read quite well enough and which was also highly saturated with photos to guide us if we couldn't..). "Gaijin-san wa tenpura ga suki deshou?" "Foreigners love tempura, right?" Yeah.. so I ended up with the tempura. Even though I almost never get tempura anymore. She gave us this stamp rally map though (if we eat at enough of the restaurants we get some free food or something..) and a survey to fill out. LOL. That was fun to figure out. They enjoyed having us I guess, and we had fun. And we got free dessert out of it, too ^_^.

The next morning, after our luxorious breakfast....

...we headed out to the tip of the Atsumi Peninsula. Our second day, we did 80 kilometers. We were supposed to catch the 9:50 ferry across the bay... but we sort of misjudged the distance and got there just in time for the 11:15 ferry :o The area after Tahara was beautiful. Mountains and farms. It really reminded me of Indiana heartland, except for the mountains ^_^ Then we hit the ocean, and it was really beautiful. The ocean is still quite captivating ^_^ I'm still not over how big it is yet ^_^

Irago, at the tip of the Atsumi peninsula, is famous for strawberries and melons. We stopped and got these 花火苺　hanabi ichigo fireworks strawberries ^_^ so delicious!

The ferry ride over was lovely. Nice to sit down in a comfy seat for awhile (and here awhile equals 40 minutes). Here, we are taking our bikes out from below. We, of course, sat up on the deck.

On the other side, on Chita Peninsula, we ate some ramen for lunch ^_^ The city name is Morozaki. It was Morozaki specialty ramen... which Minority got not realizing it was loaded with all his most-hated sea creatures.

We enjoyed riding by the sea for quite a ways. After awhile, we were just driving through towns, and they got to looking quite a bit like we were driving though Nishio for hours. But still interesting. And our road became impossible for bicyclists, so we had to find a new way around... Minority says, "Oh well, if you weren't with me, I would try it." Yeah Minority, and you'd be dead soon. Or someone else would be. :o >_< (Note the "no rickshaws" ^_^)
Then we rode and rode, until Handa, where we found the No Sumoking Bar :D

...then crossed through the Kinuura Tunnel under the bay between Handa and Hekinan, and came back to Nishio ^_^

We made it back to central Nishio about 5:30. Obviously, we made a lot better time day 2. Still, we didn't even push it that much.

I highly recommend this route... it wasn't too hilly. You can see even by the terrain view on Google maps that this area is relatively flat. The view wasn't stunning until we got down to the tips of the peninsulas, and then it sort of turned into hours and hours of Nishio again after we left them ^_^ But still interesting, and totally doable in 2 days. I think next time... I'd like to try taking the ferry to another city... We can go across the harbor to Ise and Ise Shrine! Maybe it'd be worth it... ^_^

The Secret Language of Inches and our Mikawa-wan Bicycle Odyssey

2010-02-06T02:21:00.001+09:00

My friend (Minority) and I are planning a bike trip and I'm trying to squeeze comprehension out of the massive amount of kilometers we have to ride. Japan speaks in kilometers, centimeters, Centegrade, kilos, and other confusing numbers.

In short, numbers are difficult for this American girl. Don't even get me started on how strange counting in Japanese is for English-speakers.... zero, ten, hundred, thousand, ten thousand, ten ten thousand, hundred ten thousand, thousand ten thousand, oku. And then there's all the counters and stuff. Ok i guess I started, but I'm finished now.

But, when we talk about height, and I'm trying to get an image of how much 176 centimeters actually is compared to the boys I have known my whole life... Hark! My British friend says he is 5 foot 11! I feel like we just have made a huge mental link! Someone speaks inches! I'm 5 foot 8! How cool is that! What else can we talk about?? But, alas, that's about as far as our conversation in inches can reach.... if I ask him how much he weighs, he say something about 9 1/2 stones. Stones. 9 1/2. I have absolutely no concept of what that is.... alas. But, every so often, I still ask a British guy (er, I don't know any British girls right now..) or my Filipino friend how tall he is, just to feel this special glow felt in the presence of a inch-measured human. ^_^

But our trip! We originally planned to take our bicycles up to the big city above us, Nagoya. About 41 kilometers, so 82 round trip. But, we decided that would be a pretty boring route, since there's just a lot of nothing between here and Nagoya. So, we are taking a friend's suggestion (enter friend Al Capone ^_^) and bicycling around Mikawa Bay instead! Mikawa-wa, or Bay the area right around our city Nishio.

View Larger Map

This is just a rough look at our trip. It will be around 134 kilometers, or about 83.2637 miles. We are taking two days to to it ^_^, crashing in a manga cafe for the night. We're excited... we'll be around the ocean for a good part of it, and hopefully get to stop off at a couple of tiny random places along the way. ^_^ Oh yeah, lol. No, we're not planning to test our supernatural powers by cycling over the top of the sea... there's a ferry from peninsula to peninsula we can take our bikes on ^_^.

We leave at dawn! (Or actually 8 a.m. ^_^)

PHOTO NOTES:

- The pictures were taken on on the top of a mountain-shrine in Hazu, about half an hour south of us by car. I went there by bicycle on day.. by accident actually. But it was a good day. I look so hot and tired right? Can you see the little fly around my head?? So annoying...

- I can speak to garden gnomes. They speak inches, too.

A Link in Time

2010-02-02T01:59:00.000+09:00

I'm posting a slew of links to the right. Here's a rundown summary of why they're awesome. Some have become part of my every day over these past 15 months, some are new finds.

Four categories:

1 - Japan Blogs Worth Your Time
2 - Useful While You Live Here
3 - Nihongo Tools
4 - Anime! Dorama!

1 - Japan Blogs Worth Your Time

Check out these people's blogs for new and wonderful looks at Japan. Some of these people have just incredible photos. If you like beautiful things, they could make you cry. For photos, especially check out

i, cjw ~.::.~ hiking and climbing in japan - hiking/climbing MANIAC.. he just climbed Fuji a couple of weeks ago! in the middle of winter! =O it's closed! And, his writing is so captivating.

2 Girls and the World - scroll down to the photo thumbnails on the left. Beautiful photos from all around Japan and the world.

dannychoo.com - Your portal to Japan - Great photos, interesting commentary. A Tokyo-ite's view. Er, warning... he loves school girl cartoons and stuff. Nothing explicit but... it might seem awful?

Also, Blue Lotus posts a lot of recipes and stuff. I just found her, so I'm excited to try out her recipes soon!

2 - Useful While You Live Here
Sites I frequent. Mainichi Daily News and Japan Times are English sites of two online newspapers. They're coverage is just ok.. Mainichi has some fantastic photos, though. I actually often use these articles in my classes, too ^_^

Gaijin Pot sometimes has interesting articles, and it's a start for people looking for an ESL job. But if you are seriously looking for an ESL job, I have other sites I'd suggest. Just send me a message!

Cookpad is a recipe site! Yahoo! It's in Japanese, so it might not be much use if you're not familiar with the language. If you want English recipes, please look to Blue Lotus!

Hostelworld and JR Railway are for travelers! Hostelworld will help you out in or out of Japan, but the JR site has station, time and fair information only in Japanese. You can probably figure it out though if you need to!

3 - Nihongo Tools

My favorite section!

First of all, Rikaichan is like a dream, waaay to good to be true! My friend Roba introduced me to it. It's an impossibility, but it's really real! Rikaichan is a Firefox plug-in (if you don't use Firefox, you definitely should). Once you download it (and don't forget the dictionaries!) from the site and install it, a whole new World Wide Web of Japanese will open before you. Just activate, then roll your cursor over any Japanese word.. and a beautiful blue box will pop into your view and both tell you the reading for the kanji and the English translation. (!!!!) It's a miracle. りかいちゃんが　だ～～いすき！！　：D　I looove Rikaichan (but if you had rikaichan you could understand that too! ^_^). It's wonderful for studying. Also, rikai means understanding. And chan is a suffix.. basically for friends.

Denshi Jisho, Goo Japanese Dictionary, and Japanese Wiktionary
are good resources. I use Denshi Jisho ALL the time; aside from being a good japanese-english dictionary, it's got a really helpful Kanji section with a look-up-kanji-by-radical feature. (I'm so so sad when Denshi Jisho is down even for an evening!) Goo is Japanese to Japanese. Japanese Wiktionary has kanji stroke order (!). My Japanese friend introduced me to this one laughing how she found out she had been writing a kanji the wrong way her whole life ^_^

JapanesePod 101 is a site I recently have been getting into. They have free podcast lessons. Really good. And lots of really nice resources, if you subscribe... but subscription is a little expensive... well, it's just they lock you in for 2 years :\

Also.. not online, but don't forget about Microsoft Word... just typing (and the automatic kanji change) can help you check your grammar... and the IME pad... so o o helpful...

Anyway... a few golden resources I wish I had had back in the beginning ^_^

4 - Anime! Dorama!

Yes!! I wasn't into anime much before I came to Japan.. but all that's changed now. ^_^ 　
一番　好きな　アニメは　ナルト　だってばよ！　Ichiban suki na anime wa Naruto dattebayo! Naruto is the best! And narutoget.com is the best site to watch it at. It's sister site is all Bleach. I go to Anime Crazy for all my other anime needs ^_^ (well most of them ^_^). And it's sister site Drama Crazy has tons of dramas from Japan, Korea, China, and more! :D It's also a dream come true. ^_^

Watching anime and drama is also, of course, has benefits as study tools. Sazaesan is actually really good, but it's not on animecrazy or anything. The best place to find it is actually on youtube. But you have to insert the secret conglomeration of characters to get it. They've hidden it from being taken down for copyright infringement. If you message me.. I'll send it to you. But I think you can find it posted elsewhere if you search the right way. A friend gave me the secret. That's how I know. ^_^

That's a rundown... I'm sure I'll be adding more links later! ^_^

###

The Stars Shine, the Mona Lisa Smiles

2010-02-01T16:55:00.000+09:00

*Photo notes at the bottom...*

Last Sunday, Dr. Hammatori took Shipshewana and I to a couple of spots in Nishio.

First was the mysterious building.

This is a huge building with what looks like an observatory on it, which has meddled with my curiosity ever since I came to Nishio. Finally a few months ago I thought to ask the doctor about it (Eureka!). Of course Dr. Hammatori knows everyone and about everything in Nishio.

The mysterious sand-colored-rock and green-copper-topped building belongs to his friend, another doctor in town and coincidentally the owner of the hospital that the gap guys from the UK (i.e. Shipshewana and Minority) volunteer at. And it is in fact... an observatory! But with no telescope. Zannen, ne. Too bad, huh. But still curious, we went Sunday to check it out.

So here's the story, though a little anticlimactic. The doctor's great-grandfather was an amateur astronomy enthusiast, and built the building and the observatory. But, he died before he could have the telescope installed. :\ really tragic.

He also was an avid reader, and he and his son accumulated QUITE a collection of books--medical, and everything else. They had a fancy system installed for the library... well, I guess I lot of university libraries have these, but UIndy isn't quite high tech enough... it's the system where, when you walk into room, it just looks like another wall, but then you select the row you need, and the wall automatically opens to that row of books... you get it, right? so automatic library system... kind of amazing for a home library. So TONS of books, right? Enough to make any decent English major quiver with excitement (even if all the books are indeed in Japanese). There were medical books from Edo Period (circa 1603 - 1868), and even an original copy from before Edo (!). We were enthralled.

It was the doctor's building caretaker who was showing us around, a retired engineer (who also happens to be Dr. Hammatori's friend ^_^ of course). He said we could take a book if we wanted to. =O The row he had opened up in the big library room was art. So Shipshe and I both took a couple of books of Japanese art. :D I also found one, half in English, about the temple Kiyomizu in Kyoto. (The most culturally important city in Japan, hugely old, and not too far west of us.) Excited. We enjoyed coffee with the caretaker after that, and then we had to go.

Second was the museum of red paintings.

Dr. Hammatori also wanted to take us to this small museum/showroom in Nishio. The artist’s name is Goroh Saitoh, and is, well, famous as far as I can tell. He uses red in all of his paintings. His trademark. The museum was wonderful, and even more so because so many of the pieces’ themes were of places I could recognize from Mikawa Bay (this area we live in). Wonderful. Nishio matcha... festivals… rivers.. trains...

But that’s not the half of it. There’s the Mona Lisa, too. The Mona Lisa is, of course, in the Louvre, and no one is allowed to paint it. Before, the only person that ever copied it was Monet. But Saitoh-san was allowed to copy. So now, only two people have ever copied it :D It's funny, it looks out of place sitting among the high-saturated reds of the Mikawa Bay scenes.

Saitoh-san was a really interesting guy and he showed us lots of things, like the professional sumo wrestler’s costume he created for the wrestler to wear during the opening ceremonies of the tournaments. And he had a costume that the participants in this incredible festival near us in Hazu city—the Fire Festival—wear, I think so he could look at it while he painted scenes of the festival. I tried it on :D And he and his father also collect antiques, so he showed us tons of those, and lots of pictures, and told us about this Asian artists event they had at the world trade center. He painted the poster art for the world trade center event, too, and let us have a copy of the poster. Really interesting guy. Such a good time visiting with him and his museum.

An art saturation day. I hope you can enjoy some of the photos. They show a little of our little hometown, and the sites and people of this area too ^_^.

PHOTO NOTES:

1 - The Mona Lisa randomly displayed on a telephone pole somewhere in Japan. I think of Kira when I see this. I feel like I've been to the corner, but I must've missed the Mona Lisa hanging there. I didn't post a picture of his real copy of the Mona Lisa.. I like this one better ^_^

2 - A view of the mysterious building from Dr. Hammatori's condo in the new and very tall Zelk Tower in the middle of Nishio.

3 - Enthralled over one of the medical books. This is the reprint of the book from the Edo period.

4 - A fuzzy view of one of the main pieces in the showroom. We're standing in front of it in a later photo. This is rice. In the forefront is hands making a ball of motchi (rice cake.. a sweet thing). Follow the fields of rice to the top for a history of rice and Japan, and hidden awesome things like the Mona Lisa (in that first wooden shed building on the right), Super Mario! (behind the second barn on the right above the first), and historical figures and stuff ^_^.

Also, this one and the next one really show how his paintings/silkscreens are similar to the woodblock prints of old... scenes of common places and common people of Japan. So captivating, huh?

5 - Dr. Hammatori's favorite. A boy hitting a golf ball off of a boat in the Furigawa River, where it hits Kira and the ocean. Also note the red train at the top! Meitestu is the train line around here, and the regular local trains are red! Very much a part of our lives ^_^

6 - Shipshe, the artist Goroh Saitoh, and me in front of the rice painting.

###

Winter is a little fun, too

2010-01-25T00:00:00.000+09:00

Winter in Central Japan! Who's excited! In Nishio, it's not very exciting. It's not very cold, it's not very warm. There's no snow.

But if you travel just a couple of hours north of us... there are mountains suitable for skiing ^_^. Some of us went last weekend! It was fun overall... but I have found that I am not my father's daughter. Not on snowy mountains. He loves skiing. I can't quite get the hang of it >_< (here meaning takes out tiny children with pink skis during stopping attempts >_<). But yeah, it was still a fun day (and the pink skis girl was ok..). It was fun watching my friends have fun ^_^ And the view from the top was beautiful. BTW.. we were at Mt. Gozaisho in Mie prefecture. Which has the longest gondola in Asia. If you're into gondola length measurements. And, shall I name everyone? Well, from left to right we have Minority, Shipshewana, that girl, Stitch, and Dr. Hammatori. ^_^ yes those are all pseudonyms.

Oh and we saw monkeys. Can you see the pink face just right of center?? Every fall was totally worth it. (!)

After, we left there, we went over to Nabana no Sato (also in Mie prefecture), which is usually a flower park. Ok actually, it's simply an all-the-time, sure-bet icha icha couples spot. Definitely made for dates. The first time I went, it was by myself.. not the best idea.. but the flowers were still beautiful.

Anyway, in the winter, they do illumination! It's incredible! This picture is me and Stitch in a huge tunnel of lights. Dazzling. Stitch is a teacher here in Nishio, too. ^_^

This is a pond! With the wedding chapel on the far side.

But I don't guess the pictures do it justice.

That's winter for now!

###

America the Beautiful

2010-01-04T16:38:00.000+09:00

Well I've been home in Indiana the past 2 and a half weeks, and I have only about half a week more here. It's been an emotional roller coaster. It's so good to see everyone. I can't hardly wait to get back to Japan. Just saying hello after a year, a few hours of conversation, then saying a goodbye for the next year.. over and over is a bit wearying. And adjusting to America, etc. is uncomfortable.

I can't bring myself to wear shoes in the house, and even some places out--like at my parents' church--I feel very instinctively like we should take off our shoes.

Driving with people is uncomfortable... everyone just drives faster in Japan and on the wrong side and all that too... I'm afraid I've become a bit of a paranoid backseat driver... my poor sister >_<

Well, Christmas was wonderful ^_^ I don't want to miss Christmas ever again. ^_^ My uncle drove my grandparents up here for Christmas. They were able to visit with my aunt and her family (along with a new little great-grandchild up there ^_^) up near Chicago, and then come down here for Christmas Day. It was wonderful. We've never ever been around them at Christmas, so it was a sort of once-in-a-life time, golden Christmas. ^_^ Beautiful.

My grandfather fought in the Korean War, and while he was over there, he had a short one-week shore leave in Japan. He actually stayed for a night in Nagoya :O awesome. But his real leave was in Tokyo. It was so cool talking about Japan with him :D Best memory with my grandfather. definitely.

Of course Japan is quite different now. He asked if I rode in rickshaws. No, I never have.. they're sort of more expensive, touristy things. He laughed... when he was there, they were so so common, and cheaper than a taxi. He rode them a lot. ^_^

He also said that while they were there, they took a train across the west of Japan, and went by Hiroshima... so this would be well under 10 years after they dropped the bomb... he said it was a wasteland. I can't imagine it.

I was also able to spend New Year's Day in St. Louis with some friends ^_^ Caught a crowded 4 a.m. Greyhound out there. Did some shopping, watched some butterflies... a lovely reprieve from this Siberian winter. It's not Nishio weather, that's for sure. Being with friends is so good. If not highly emotional. I'm afraid it's making me difficult to be around. >_<

Well, this week, I have some required shopping to take care of... some for me, some for others. And a few more friends to meet up with ^_^ I'm so happy to see eveyone. It's so wonderful.

The picture is our monument in the center of Indianapolis. It's all decorated for Christmas. ^_^

A new Post! Ruth cooks in Japan!

2009-10-20T02:54:00.000+09:00

New post. wow.

Well, this is just a random post to break the ice that's been growing thicker over the past... 6 months.

Japanese cooking. As you might expect, it's easier to cook Japanese food in Japan than it is to cook my mom's food. I have realized that a lot of the stuff I'm used to--maybe chili or Mexican food or baked anything or something else--is either impossible to cook here (for example for lack of an oven...) or very expensive (for example the through-the-roof cost of the taco party my friend had not too long ago).

So, when in Rome... cook some Italian food maybe. When you decide to move to Japan, learn to cook Japanese food while you're there. Or else survive off of cup-a-ramen the whole time. That was pretty much my first couple of weeks... ok maybe month. My co-worker said I was going to turn into a noodle but, it didnt happen, I just became, plump.

Anyway, tonight, I'm eating fried shijimi rice and tamagoyaki ^_^

Fried Shijimi Rice.... this means rice cooked in my friend the rice cooker mixed with shijimi, which is a tiny shellfish, and then stir-fried.. using a seasoning packet. ^_^ Easy right? I'm eating shijimi a lot lately in attempt to consume more iron.... because my body is showing signs of it's absence. >_<

Tamagoyaki.... tamago is egg. Yaki means.. cooked somehow.. in this case fried. Put them together and.. yeah fried eggs. But not the traditional American scrambled eggs. You may have had a bit of tamagoyaki before as sushi. The eggs are mixed with some Japanese seasonings (namely soy sauce, dashi--fish stock, mirin) and sugar, and fried and rolled. It's really easy. Most of Japanese food it. It's nice that it's possible to make delicious food and not be my mom. ^_^ rolling the egg just right is a little hard for me right now though :\ I suppose I'll be able to get the hang of it one day...

Here's the recipe for tamagoyaki my friend wrote out for me in simple Japanese:

....I'll post it in English later! Now to go cook dinner! :D

The photo is from Himeji Castle-- in the west of Japan. It's so beautiful. It's a world heritage site and was somehow spared the air raids of WWII, so it's one of the oldest (maybe the oldest?) castle in Japan. So glad it made it. It's awesome. I went to see it with some students on a one-day bus trip recently. ^_^

2009-10-05T23:47:00.001+09:00

Haunts and Fire

2009-02-24T18:41:00.000+09:00

Almost five months now! Feels like 10 years and only a week at the same time! It seems impossible that my sister was actually here in Nishio... I don't know what I would do if someone from back home came here again... might cause a rip in the time-space continuim.

So now that almost five months have past, I've really begun settling in. I still haven't bought a trash can, or replaced my cardboard-box laundry basket, but those are uh... next on the list. :) The initial newness and nerves and all that of moving to Japan are gone now. I've begun to think of this place as my neighborhood with my own frequent haunts.

I guess our frequent haunts are

- Shubakamana--the Indian restaurant just down the street from MEC (mm mm!biggest and best nan ever!);

- C-dome--short for Carnival dome... it looks like a giant metallic bubble and its the place we karaoke at the most;

- Medisite--bookstore/video and music rental shop close to home.. bookstores are good.. when Rachel was here, we found that somehow bookstores were still so so comfortable, even though we were in a completely strange place;

- Home Expo--sort of a Wal-mart of home goods and simular stuff where I can buy a new cooking pot and a bike tire repair kit;

- Nishio station!--I love that place, complete with trains that take me anywhere AND back to my home again, and my favorite ￥100 store on the third floor (like a dollar store..) :);

- the tennis courts by Mount Yatsuomote and the Yahagi River--we go here every Monday and play tennis.. it looks nice even in the middle of winter :);

- Kappazushi!--great cheap sushi, and when you order something special they send it to you on a little shinkansen train :);

- Itsumo--shopping center complete with my grocery store and the best takoyaki (yummy balls of.... well, breaded octopus I guess.. just had some today! yum!) around here and a good clothes store and sports depot.. which I really like to go to for some reason.. the name means everyday or always, if your curious;

- the Nishio historical park--this has the rebuilt Nishio castle lookout tower, castle gate, little museum, a couple of shrines.. a couple of other buildings and a garden... nice to chill in;

- and the Nishio Rose Garden! complete with foot bath! nothing like going in the middle of winter to soak your toes in a nice hot outdoor bath in the middle of a rose garden, where roses bloom all winter somehow.

Yeah, those are the places I go the most. I still haven't found a proper place to people watch or anything. Just the mall in Okazaki, about 30 minutes away by train. I don't go there so often.

Lately, I've been meeting a lot of foreigners in Nishio and the area. There's some cool people around here! :) It's sort of fun when we all get together, and all our different accents are flying in a hundred different directions :) very cool. Two students from England.. fresh out of high school.. are spending 6 months here volunteering in health care; they leave next week :( so tonight we are having a big karaoke farewell (at C-dome!). I think it'll be fun :) Everybody will be there :) I went to Tokyo Disneyland a couple of weeks ago with a couple of friends here! So much fun!

Well, sorry if this is a boring post. I just need to start posting again :/ :)

The picture is from the Fire Festival (or himatsuri 火祭) in a nearby town called Hazu, right beside the sea. We went with a couple of friends who live there. They build two HUGE bonfires, with a tree in the middle of each, which are holy. Two teams race to climb up ladders, into the fire to pull out their team's tree. One team from the east side of town, the other from the west, and if the west (i think) wins, then that means there will be a bad harvest, and if the east side wins, it will all be ok.... i think the east side won. The guys douse themselves with water and wear clothes made from the banners of last years festival, which are white and covered in blue/black writing... so they look like calico cats! that's what they call them, the neko, which means cats. So cool!

Adjustments

2008-12-04T19:14:00.001+09:00

So... I’ve been here for 2 full months now... it feels longer because it’s been so packed with newness, etc. Well, it’s been a good two months. To be cliché, it’s been a good two months. And of course, I’m still adjusting to some things. So, here are a few:

- sorting my trash. Here, you sort all your trash between burnable garbage, plastics, and recyclables (glass and aluminum), put them in different specially marked bags that you buy at the supermarket, and then set them out to be picked up on the designated days of each. The guys tell me just try a little, but everyone mixes. Just don’t leave anything in your garbage with your address on it, or they’ll come pounding on your door to yell at you. Seriously.

- driving. I actually drove a car for the first time last weekend! Ah! Not only do they drive on the wrong :) side of the road, but I hadn’t driven anything in 2 months, and my car back home was a manual. :/ So I was kinda nervous. But then I started getting used to it. Not as bad as I thought it could be... of course, right hand turns is the worst. And I think I freaked out the people riding with me because I was turning when some people and a dog were crossing the road. I’ve been riding my bike everywhere, though, and I think that’s helped me get used to the right side of the road...

- karasu, crows. They are creepy. They are everywhere. They get in the garbage. They’re smart. They make the creepiest noises ever. I shudder when I walk nearby.

- cockroaches. I caught one and kept in a jar and named it Bob. I taught him English and then indoctrinated him with my no-cockroaches-in-the-house propaganda. I just let him loose last Friday to go forth and spread these new mind-opening ideas of liberation. I also made it clear that rebels will squeezed in a kleenax and flushed into the watery abyss. So, we’ll see how it goes.

- Nihongo. Japanese language. I study. And watch TV. And try to talk with people. Of course opportunities to try to talk and to read surround me. It takes me like two whole minutes just to try to ask, What did you do today? But I’m trying. And I am getting better. I can read a little, too. It’s SUCH a great feeling to be able to read. Oh my word. It’s quite a peculiar sensation to be having class with my 5th grade student and asking him, Oh what it this? And him answering, Oh, it’s.... See? It’s written write here. And then I just say, Oh, I see. I can’t read. So much relief in being able to read.

- boy bands. You thought the 5-piece dancing-singing boy bands died with Nsync and the Backstreet Boys when we were in high school, but you were wrong. And it scares me that I might actually like them. A little ok? I’m not obsessed ok? Really. Ok? Arashi is my favorite :) But I like Tohoshinki, too... and they have a lot more talent.

- speaking s. l. o. w. l. y. It’s pretty tiring. But it’s not so bad. I’m not complaining.. I’m just still trying to get used to it, that’s all.

- defining words without a vocabulary. Or a big one. Defining words like ‘interesting’ without using any word above a.. maybe second grade reading level is a little difficult. Of course, direct translation is sometimes advantageous, but in the case of 'interesting,' the Japanese word for it and 'fun' are the same, so it's still confusing. Or my favorite so far is trying to explain the difference between ‘hope’ and ‘wish.’ Uh-huh. I dare you to try. Remember to use small words.

- taking care of myself. If I don’t cook, there is no food. If I don’t shop, there is no food. If I don’t clean, I get dust bunnies in my shoes. I picked up a Japanese cookbook in Nagoya awhile ago… I’m going to try to cook something as soon as I figure what daishi powder looks like in the store. I cooked the most AMAZING breakfast for myself this morning... I fried an apple and scrambled some eggs. The apple was from the apple orchard we went to a couple of weeks ago. It was SO good. I know it’s super simple, but I was proud.

- coins. In America, we usually reserve coins for vending machines and the penny jar, which sits on our shelf until we know some kid doing Jar Wars for a charity and then we give it to him. Here, coins are a staple that comes in the equivalents of as much as one and five dollars, plus all the other little coins. So, I’m getting used to paying for my lunch and stuff in coins. My wallet is usually full of coins.

- trains. I love them. When I’m out with my student Mika-san and the shinkansen, bullet train goes by... I turn five for a couple of seconds. Taking the train can be a little nerve-wracking. I haven’t tried taking it by myself yet. I went to Nagoya—big city about the size of Chicago about an hour north of us—last Saturday (and went to the castle there.. fabulous!) with a student, and we took the train so I could get used to it. I think I’m getting the hang of it… it’s so nice going with someone who knows Japanese though :/ But I want to try to take it by myself this winter break.

- Attention! Gaijin-wa o-hashi-o sukate tabete imasu! Foreigner eating with chopsticks! You’d think some people want to yell this every time you pick up a pair. Often, the first time you take a bite, it’s to the proclamations of Sugoii, ne! Awesome, huh! It only just started to bug me, I’m sure I’ll get used to it...

- shy boys. I don’t understand it yet. I can’t say all the boys are shy. But most of the ones I have met are. It’s just really different from back home.

Well that’s a start :) Most everything is different here somehow... It’s good though! For the most part. Of course I miss some things about home. And Christmas is making me a little sad. It's pretty much all commercial here.

The picture at the top is from a nearby city called Gamagori. There is a long bridge that connects the land to an island called takeshima (literally bamboo island.. though I'm told there isn't actually any bamboo on it...), which is completely a shrine. Women who want to have a baby pray here. Also, it's a popular date sopt, but the legend is that dating couples that go there that eventually get married, will end up having divorces! We saw many couples :) I wanted to jump in front of them and yell No! Go back now while you have a chance! :)

The joys of hand-me-downs

2008-11-01T17:42:00.000+09:00

I've had the past three days off work. It was pretty nice.

Thursday, I decided to try to take my bike up to Mt. Yatsuomote, which is not too far from my home.

So off I go on my bike, following a map I got from the community center or something. I had just gotten to an area of Nishio I hadn't been to, when I hear someone coming up behind me fast. Well, I can't tell if he's running or maybe on bike or what, but I slow down and get pretty far over so he can pass me, and then, I hear someone bellowing something over an intercom in Japanese, and when I look, it's coming from a police squad car that's stopping beside me. And when I turn around, there's two police officers booking it after me! What in the world! So yeah, I stopped.
So they come up, and start saying stuff in Japanese, and somehow, I understood maybe they wanted some i.d. and stuff, so I start throwing my passport, and my international drivers license at them, though of course I have no idea what's going on... did i run a light or something? or am i supposed to have a license or something and no one told me??

so after 5 minutes or so of standing there and them radioing in my name and all my other information, through one of the officers limited English and my very limited Japanese, we somehow got communicated that, well, they thought I had stolen the bike.

Apparently, this red sticker on the back of my bike is a registration for high school students, and so when they saw it, and saw that I wasn't a high school student, they thought I had stolen it from somewhere. So they wrote down all the numbers, and found out it was registered to a girl named Chihiro... I tried to explain how the bike was given to me by my boss... and so they wanted all her information and stuff. Gosh, I wish I had a cell phone then.

Apparently, this Chihiro is the niece of one of the staff at MEC, who gave the bike to Hiromi, who gave it to me... so Yuka (the staff who gave it to Hiromi) said they called Chihiro, and anyway, it's all cleared up now.... And I definitely went home and scraped off those stickers... and decided not to go to the mountain that day afterall.... Lol.

Cullen, one of the teachers, said that he's heard of that before, and they stop foreigners especially... I guess Garry (one of the other teachers) has gotten stopped, too, and his bike never belonged to a high schooler... whatever. My red stickers are gone now, so *hopefully*... I won't be chased down again... :\ lol.

「I want to ride my bicycle, I want to ride my bike」 and being Number One in Japan

2008-10-23T12:40:00.000+09:00

Yesterday, I went around town on my bike :) It was really my first look at the Nishio that is not within a 10 minute bike ride from my apartment. It was great. And I found a little music shop where I finally got new guitar strings! I popped one the first time I tried tuning it after getting it out of its case for the first time here. So I've been able to commune with my guitar again! It's wonderful.

I wish I could upload pictures, but it seems I have the wrong cable with me.. I hope Rachel didn't take mine with her!! She and Marley may be back some time this week or next.. I hope so!

So, Tuesday in my class at a company called Otics (which has a branch in Indiana and some of the students may actually be transferring there! cool, huh??) we got into a dicsussion about Japanese culture versus American culture. As you may know, they are pretty community-minded here, and it's not part of the culture to bring a lot of attention to the individual...

So the lesson was about personalities... learning some vocab and stuff... and then one of the activities was reading a conversation (from the text) between two people about what kind of girls they like... lol. Person A asked, Do you like girls that are smart and clever or do you like girls that are average? or something like that. And one of the guys in the class said, that the last part, being average or the same as everyone else, is pretty much the Japanese ideal. And You don't really want to be number one, you don't want to stick out.

Once we got that communicated, I asked why? And one guy said, well, we have a Japanese proverb, so he drew it on the whiteboard. Basically, it's, The nail that sticks out gets hammered. So I aksed, But isn't it good to be number on in school? and on a test? and at work? and to be the greatest rock star and stuff? and well, they said yes... So I asked when is it not good to be number one? and they basically said, well, it's case by case. And I asked if they agreed with this philosophy, and again, they just said case by case. I asked our school manager on the way back to school from Otics, and she couldn't give me any circumstances when it wouldn't be good to be number one either.

I've heard of this proverb before, but never really understood how it works in life... I thought maybe I'd get it once I'd lived here. So now I wonder if it is maybe an ideal that all Japanese people sort of hold to, but maybe it's never really applied in real life... maybe similar to our, Hard work pays off, or brings success ideal in America... we all know it, and sort of believe it, but we all know it doesn't work out that way in real life all the time. Maybe similar?

I told them how in America, we would say that the nail that sticks out gets chosen for something good. Isn't that what we follow? Make sure you are in leadership roles and do lots of interesting community service in high school so you stick out in college applications. Make sure your resume looks good so stick out in interviews... have your own style, be your own person.... but it seems to me they think the same way... that's why English is so important... so they can get good test scores and get into good universities...

So anyway, interesting class. Sometimes we have really interesting discussions in class. It's such an awesome way to get to know people! and Japan!

The pic is a manhole cover in the historical area of nishio. Cool, huh? I love how thier covers are like pieces of art here.. it's awesome...

The past three weeks...

2008-10-18T18:11:00.000+09:00

Hello hello!

I know it's terrible it's been so long since I've posted! So much has happened there's no way I can catch up either! Well, I'm between classes right now... this is my last class before my weekend starts. I have off Sunday and Monday. Classes are going pretty well... I'm getting the hang of things for the most part... I was in Osaka--about 4 hours away by train from here--last weekend for a training seminar for the program we use for the elementary school-age kids called Pacific Learning System (PLS). It was alright, I met some cool people, other English teachers.. but I was so happy when I was finally back in Nishio.

I like Japan so far! Food is super great, and the people are great. My students are fun, for the most part, and people in the stores are nice, even though I can't speak Japanese. My Japanese is not improving very fast, but as soon as I get on the ball it will. My vocab has definitely multiplied since I've been here though.

Some things are a little annoying.. like we must sort our trash between burnables, plastics, recyclables, and cans and glass. SO annoying. And they barely have a cereal selection. Frosted flakes is about it, and it's these puny bags that serve like one and a half people. But it's ok i'm adjusting.

The pic above is Rache and I eating okonomiyaki at a place in Nishio with two our our students, Mika and Chie. Wonderful ladies. :) It was so good. mm mm.

K! Hope everyone back home is great!

My Tiny Space!

2008-09-25T22:48:00.000+09:00

The director of the school, Hiromi, sent me a couple of pictures of my apartment. It's so tiny but it'll be so wonderful! I'm not really sure where the bed is... hopefully the photographer is standing in front of it... otherwise it might fold down from that closet in the right hand corner.... They say the apartment is only about a 5/10 minute walk from both the school and the best sushi place in town :) I can hardly wait to eat some Japanese food!

This is the connection

2008-09-25T03:23:00.001+09:00

Hello! Konnichiwa! This is my blog to keep up with everyone! We'll see what it turns into... Please please respond to posts every now and then!

Here's the low down... I leave from Indianapolis this Sunday morning (September 28) and will arrive in Nagoya, Japan Monday evening. It's going to be a looong day :) Glad my sis is coming with me :)

I'll be teaching English as a second language (yes, ESL or TESOL or whatever other acronym you want to give it...) in Nishio, Japan at the MEC English School. Here's the web site! http://meceikaiwa.com/ You can click the "English" button on the home page, or google translate it... my profile is under the staff! So surreal....

Nishio is a town of about 100,000 people, so not tiny, not big. It's about four hours by train southwest of Tokyo.

Also, my phone is not going to work over there, so I'm leaving it here. I'll still have access to e-mail (rshirley42@gmail.com) and facebook and this blog!

I'm very excited and can't wait to get over there! And I'm really going to miss everyone...