Bunko Unzen trip

I was supposed to go to a Conference for English teachers today, which would have involved sitting through many talks, some of which would be in Japanese.

Because the teachers at Bunko had called Seiryo to ask if I could join their school trip to Unzen, I was able to get out of attending the conference. Yay!

Our first stop was at Unzen jigoku. Although I have been here many (many..) times, it's always a little different depending on the company.

Sasaki sensei is easily mistaken for a student, eh?

Okubo sensei (English teacher)

From Unzen Jigoku, we headed to Nita Pass (at the top of mount Unzen).

The scenery was gorgeous! The professional photographer took the teachers' yearbook picture here.



There was a ropeway to take you further up. While the students and the rest of the teachers had lunch, Okubo sensei and I went up.

Here's a view of Isahaya once we reached the top.

Mount Unzen is an active volcano. The last time it erupted was about 10 years ago. At that time, it buried an entire town...After the eruption, there's a new mountain that was formed, called shinsomething. It's the larger mountain on the right.

From where we were, we could people who were hiking the mountain on the left..afterwards, I asked Mori sensei about it. He said that it takes a couple of hours to make it to the top, that he's done it a couple of times.

After visiting Nita Pass, we headed down to the remains of the town that got buried not so long ago..

The last place we visited was a newly opened museum in Shimabara. I learned quite a bit of the history of Unzen. It is only since the late 90's that the government has deemd it safe to return living in Unzen.

Mount Fugen behind me.

All in all, it was a fun and informative school trip!

For the past week, I've been busy organizing our upcoming trip to Kochi next weekend. When I mentioned to Sasaki sensei that we were going to Kochi, he said he's never been and had always wanted to go. So I invited him to come along.

He came over after work this evening, so we could look up some information on the internet about trains, ferries etc. He can read Japanese (obviously..), and I can't..so it was very helpful to have him check some of the info. We're going to be taking all available modes of transportation (save airplane) to get there!

He really wants to improve his English, and has been asking me if I know somewhere where he can have eikaiwa (English conversation) classes. I don't know if he's hinting at wanting me to start some. Maybe we can arrange something every now and then, where he could practice his English and me my Japanese. Just from this evening, we both accumulated a long list of newly learned words...

I'm looking forward to next weekend!!