Quick Update

I just finished getting most of my stuff packed for tomorrow and thought I'd add a quick update before I leave.

Bright and early tomorrow, I'll be heading to China to meet Sheila and Miho in Shanghai, and from there we'll travel to Australia together! I can't wait....! It'll be nice to get away from this cooler, darker, often damp weather we've been having here. It's been a pretty mild winter so far, so I really shouldn't complain too much.

I haven't had a chance to update my blog this past week. However, I dont think there's been anything too eventful to report. When I finally get a chance to sit and update, I can never seem to remember anything that happened....I feel like there are many times when I think 'oh, I should remember to put that on my blog' or 'that would make an interesting blog entry'. But nothing comes to mind now..

I rushed downtown after work today to get to the main office before they closed at 6:30pm, in order to change some money. Making the trip downtown at rush hour is a nightmare...The way people drive does nothing to improve the situation either. For a country that is so stickly about following rules, the way people drive here leaves a lot to be desired....!

On my way home, I stopped by my favorite kaitenzushi place for take-out. The chef calls out "irashyaimase (welcome) misheru-san" when I walk in. I think I've been there too many times!!

It's still early, but I think I'm going to head to bed. I'll write again in the new year :)

Happy holidays everyone!

Dinner in Sasebo

I met up with Amber and Alex, and we started off for what turned out to be a much longer than expected drive to Sasebo. The traffic was horrendous! But, the company in the car was good....we had a good chance to catch up.

In the last 2 weeks, I have had 4 different people say they've had dreams of me.....it's nice to know that, if nowhere else, I'm at least popular in people's dreams!

Dream 1: I got a short message from my dad saying that he had a life-like dream where I came home to London for the Christmas holidays. ‘Is there any truth to this?’ He asked.. it’s easy to read the meaning behind that dream, it’s nice to know that I’m missed…I miss you too, dad!!

Dream 2: my mom had the same dream! My dad hadn’t told her about his dream, and when she mentioned hers, he said he’d dreamed the same thing. This made me double check my plane tickets were in fact for Australia, and not London…!

Dream 3: An acquaintance downtown

Dream 4: Since we had a lot of time in the car on the way to Sasebo, Alex shared his dream in detail…after hearing it, I almost wish I hadn’t..! First my hair turned out to be a wig which I pulled off, then I found out that I had cancer and jumped out of the window…anyone out there want to share their interpretation of this dream? (Roxy??) Preferably something with good meaning..!!

one more from Shalini:
Dream 5: Neda and I were on your driveway in London, and your Dad was at the door. You had just come up the front patio stairs with your bags and were greeted. Then for some reason all of us were looking at the front bumper of your car because it looked damaged slightly, and you had been driving it.... that's all I remember:)

We were supposed to meet up with Jeff, Jill and Brittina at 6pm, and ended up arriving a little after 7:30pm. We were able to meet up with Brittina, and spent an enjoyable evening at a Starbucks and a Mexican restaurant.

Amber was very eager to dig into her (and my!) food!

Later in the evening, I discovered that they had *never* done purikura! So we wandered around downtown trying to find a game center. Game centers are usually fairly easy to find..but of course, when you're looking for one, there's none to be found!

After asking a few people, we eventually found our way to one.

By the time I got home, it was a little after midnight. I was happy to find that mom, dad and Roxy were home! It's always nice to speak with everyone from home...I miss them!!!

I got to bed a little after 4am. I’m not in the habit of staying up so late..!

Gender equality

Does this really help with promoting gender equality?...

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/12/15/061215185055.rh4zncaw.html

Day at Bunko

I spent the first half of the day at Bunko. There is only 1 class left before the holidays..man, time goes by fast.

Once I was done with the classes, I went to Seiryo where the students' listening tests were waiting to be corrected.. It's all multiple choice, so I was able to finish it all by the time it was time to go home.

These days, I’ve been feeling rather lazy..maybe it has to do with the sudden change in weather, it’s become cooler, darker, sometimes raining..just miserable. I can’t get myself motivated to do anything. When I get home from school, all I want to do is sleep!

Bery bery sleepy

The term test period has started, so no classes today. The Listening portion of the term test will be done on Wednesday, so I don't have too much to do today.

It's a good thing too, because I had a hard time keeping my eyes open...I think I might be heading home as soon as I'm able to.

Slumber party at Amber's (Dec 9-10)

I went over to Amber's place, to meet up with Amber and Jeff. Our plan was to spend a warm night in, just hang out at Amber's place.

We went to my favorite kaitenzushi restaurant where both Amber and Jeff had their first experience with natto.

What is natto, you ask? Natto is fermented soybeans. It's very rich in vegetable protein and, supposedly, has many health benefits (if you are able to eat it..)


When I first arrived in Japan, one of the first questions people (especially students) would ask me is whether I can eat natto. It's extremely sticky, and smelly. You either love it, or hate it. I fall in the latter category....Always open to trying new things, I was happy to try it when it was first offered to me by a family who had a homemade version of it. Thinking maybe the store bought version might taste a little different, I tried it as well. In both cases, I had the same reaction to it.....natto is just not for me.

Apparently, it wasn't for Amber or Jeff either.

I ran into a student who had graduated from Bunko and his parents at the restaurant, as well as my upstairs neighbours. It was a nice surprise!

We loaded up on lots of junk food, and headed back to Amber's place for a night of singing/guitar playing, scrabble (for which Alex came up to join us), and movies. By 5am, we were ready for sleep..!

The next morning, umm maybe more like noon, Amber treated us to french toast, covered with maple syrop and topped with strawberries and icing sugar. It was delicious!

I got home a little feeling a little pooped, and ended up heading to bed very early. But it was well worth it..!!

Amanda visits Seiryo and Brett stays over

It’s term test period at Amanda’s school this week, and since she’s exempt from writing the tests, she has nothing to do at school. I invited her to come to Seiryo as a guest to give the students a chance to practice their English on someone new, and for her to see what the classes are like here.

The students loved meeting Amanda, they were really excited at having her in the class!

From school, I headed to the Baha’i center downtown to meet Brett. Brett is a 54-year old New Zealander Baha’i who’s been the caretaker for the Baha’i center in Osaka for the last year. He was asked to help do some fix up work on the center here, since Robert left. He arrived earlier this morning, and will be heading back to Osaka tomorrow. I had offered my place to crash.

When I arrived, I found that he had already changed the locks on the front door, made a makeshift cover for the window (which I had flung myself through last week), and was finishing up doing some odds and ends.

A short while after we got home, the doorbell rang…it was Iwata san. The last couple of days had been so busy with work that I had completely forgotten there was our Japanese conversation class today!

We had dinner together, accompanied by very lively conversation (as is always the case with Iwata san!)

Japanese Language Proficiency Test!

We got up bright and early to catch the 6am bus to Fukuoka. The test location was at Sangyo University. We made it there with 10 minutes to spare before the start of the exam.

I ran into a bunch of people I hadn't seen in a while...there were easily thousands of people who came to write the test.

The test, which lasted from 9:45am-3:45pm is comprised of 3 sections. Thankfully, there were breaks between each section.

I won't be receiving my results till February, but I'm pretty sure I didnt accumulate enough points to pass.......!

Heading back to Nagasaki was more eventful than I thought it would be....turned out EVERYONE was heading to Nagasaki and so the buses were all full...Right up till the last one that leaves around midnight..! So we ended up catching a train for the 2 hour trip back, then had to take a taxi to whereI had left my car in Isahaya.

I'm just glad we could make it back today...! I need to catch up on sleep for work tomorrow.

A day downtown

Amanda spent the night at my place, so that we could head to the Japanese Language Proficiency Test site together the next morning.

We met up earlier in the day and spent the day wandering downtown,

ate out, and got lots shopping done.

We wandered by the cinema at the mall, and since the James Bond was going to be starting soon, we decided to go in to watch. I rarely go to the movies in Japan...I think this may have been only the third time in the little over 2 years I've been here!

Despite feeling a little under the weather (lost my voice, and coughing...) it was a fun day out!

On our drive home from Nagasaki city, we witnessed a motorcycle accident happen right in front of us!

The car ahead of me made a right-hand turn, cutting off the motorcycle coming down in the opposite direction. In order to avoid a collision, the motorcycle swerved and ended up falling of his bike, rolling over 6 or 7 times before stopping limp in the middle of the road. The bike, continued to slide along the road stopping a good 10 meters away. The car that was responsible for this just drove away!!

We pulled over, along with 2 other cars. The man on the motorcycle wasn’t wearing any body protective gear and as a result had ripped up his pants and had huge scraps all over his legs. Surprisingly, he was conscious but seemed in shock. He was lucky to have been wearing a helmet. I helped him to the side of the road while the two other guys went to pick up the motorcycle that was blocking traffic. This is a time when I really wished I could speak Japanese well!!

We waited around for a while for the ambulance and police to arrive. When they arrived, one of the police officers came to get a statement. When the police officers arrived, they asked who saw what had happened and both men who had stopped to help pointed to us. We had been in a position to see the whole thing happen. I could see the look of ‘oh no…they’re foreigners..’ briefly flash across his face as we approached us. He spoke very slowly, articulating very clearly at first. Once Amanda answered his first few questions in her excellent Japanese, I could see the look of relief on his face. It is a good thing that Amanda could express herself well. He took down all the information they needed, then after watching the man go off in the ambulance, we continued our way home.

Watching the man fly off his motorcycle like he did made me realize just how dangerous riding one of those things is……as cool as they look, they really don’t provide any protection..!

David, please be careful!!!

Just a regular day at school

This past week, all the second year students were on a school trip to Tokyo. With only the first year students practicing the club activities, I figured it would be ok to join in the volleyball practice. It was fun!

Since the summer, I haven't been going to my volleyball practices..I went once, and my thumb was still really sore, even though I'd wrapped it up before starting. I haven't gone since....I miss playing. So it was really nice to play tonight!

Miyamoto sensei was one of the teachers that accompanied the students to Tokyo. She brought me back some cookies from Tokyo Disneyland:

How sweet of her to go through the trouble of bringing something back!