On vacation

Those are beautiful, beautiful words.

I like my job a lot, but I really felt that I had to get away for a bit to try to recollect strength and think of different ways to approach all that is my Japanese life.

I've been staying with my former host family from the Chuo summer program last year. My host mother asked me to teach English to the older of the two sons, who is now 8.

It is REALLY nice to be able to teach someone what I want and how I want. For example, I really like to use computers as a teaching aid, but classrooms simply don't have that kind of nifty technology. Not to mention I can teach English correctly as I know it instead of having to change things due to what the teacher is working with.

It's nice.

I have to test him again on this later, but the 8 year old memorized a pretty good length self introduction a little while ago.

"My name is Ryou. I am 8 years old. I like hamster. Do you like hamster?"

And yes, he does know what each part means. :D

Tokyo is nice. It's been good to just hang around and meet up with people. I've been taking it easy.

At the same time, I found that I really do like Kagoshima. I've found myself talking about different aspects of Kagoshima life with people and found that I really, truly enjoy it.

I also know that deciding to go to Tokyo was an awesomely good idea.

Christmas was uneventful except for a party I went to later on in the day. Uneventful Christmases are pretty standard for me, so it was no big deal.

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. :)

Winter clothes and packing

I realized recently that I really like buying winter clothes. Especially buying warm socks and sweaters. It makes me wonder just what I am going to do with myself once the weather starts to warm up again.

I suppose that's the only real good part about cold weather- keeping warm.

I'm headed up to Tokyo on Sunday. It won't snow there, but it is colder there than here. Being bad at really knowing temperatures just from hearing the numbers, I don't really know what to expect.

So, I am thinking in my head how to pack my bag. I won't be really able to pack until Saturday because I have to do laundry first. I also need to buy souvenirs to give to people in Tokyo. I need to study the domestic flight baggage policy better, too.

I'm definitely worrying too much.

As you might've been able to tell from the last entry, I kind of have a strange perception of time these days. The days seem to be moving slower (probably because I am looking forward to Tokyo so much) and I am used to them moving so fast. I thought when I wrote the last entry that it would be the last one before going to Tokyo.

But I have a feeling I am going to feel much better once I get on the plane.

Hopefully, I'll feel much more present for my next entry.

Not much to say

It's Saturday here, a little more than 15 minutes before it's Sunday.

I haven't posted anything yet this week. Not because I haven't wanted to, but rather I was unsure of what exactly to say.

Life has been pretty uneventful.

I'm going to Tokyo on the 21st and I will be there until January 3rd. I am glad I made a decision about what to do for Christmas and New Years. As the days roll by and the holidays get closer, I realize more how difficult it will be for me to be away from California.

I didn't really expect to feel like that. I thought that at most I would miss my family's tacky gift exchange. I learned otherwise when I was standing in line to mail Christmas packages to people back in California and I found myself getting a little upset.

What was kind of funny (in a not so funny way) was yesterday while I was at one of my middle schools, one of the English teachers came up to me and started talking to me about how Christmas is such a family holiday overseas, like in the US and England. He kept talking about how it is so important for people overseas to be with their families and I wished he'd realize that I -am- a person from overseas away from my family and that he would just stop talking about it.

But- feeling weird and a little bit upset on and off about being away from the holidays, doesn't mean that I am not ok or that I wish that I wasn't here. I won't regret being here in Japan instead of the US, either.

I am glad that even though I thought my first Christmas away from home wouldn't be too big of a deal, I still arranged for myself to go somewhere so that I can distract myself with meeting people and moving around. I guess it turns out I'm pretty good at watching out for myself even when I am not 100% sure what's going on in my head.

So, if anyone wanted a psychoanalysis about how I feel about having this first Christmas away, here it is. I don't really want to say anymore because I don't really want to think about it more. There's no point to that besides getting upset because that won't change things. I want to stay in and enjoy the present.

This is rather mushy and probably something that should rather go on my other blog.

Something relating to this blog, however, is that since I will be out of town for about 2 weeks starting the 21st (Sunday), there might not be weekly updates here. I know I'm not very reliable about them yet, anyway.

2 minutes until Sunday. I'm posting this.

伊集院ラーメン Ijuin Ramen

This is a story about ramen.

Sorry if this blog isn't written so well. I wrote it rather quickly.

As some might know, I've had a vicious cough lately and my nose has been rather stuffy. During these times, I tend to prefer spicy food, hoping that it will clear up my sinuses.

Yesterday, when the end of my work day was approaching, the idea of having spicy ramen popped into my head and really appealed to me. I thought about it even more and decided that I wanted to try to get the ramen to go and eat it at home. Not feeling well and barely having a voice, I didn't really feel up to sitting in a restaurant.

There's two places for ramen here in Ijuin and one of them I knew for certain had spicy ramen. So, on the way driving home from work, I looked at the sign in front of the shop and was able to read in that short time that the shop opens that 5 for the evening.

So, I walked to the place at 5 and then was able to read the sign even better. The opening time was not 5, but rather 5:30. Further, the shop doesn't even open at all on Tuesdays.

I decided to go to the super market and buy things to try to make my own spicy ramen, but as I was walking around the store, I realized that I was really really hungry and tired. I ended up just buying premade food for dinner and gave up on ramen for the day.

Today, as the work day was wrapping up, I decided to go by the ramen place at 5:30 and ask if I could do take out as I had planned the day before.

I got there and asked, but they couldn't sell ramen to go.

I decided to try the other ramen place, Ijuin Ramen. I went into the shop and asked about taking ramen to go. The two guys in the shop said I could. It turned out they gave me a regular bowl from the shop and asked me to return it when I can. They covered the bowl with plastic wrap in hopes that it would stop the broth from spilling. They put that, along with chopsticks and a spoon on a tray for me. When I was still uncertain about how it would hold up in the car, they got out another case for me.

I was so surprised that they did that for me.

I think some readers would probably say that this kind of hospitality is "typical Japan", but I honestly don't think that's true. Sure, people here are very kind and helpful a lot of the time, but, like in any other country, an experience like that is very rare and awesome to have.

I drove home, careful of the ramen in the back, hoping that no matter what I do with my life, I go about it thinking outside of the box and going out of my way to make something work for someone the way they have their heart set like those guys did for me.

Oh, and the ramen was delicious.

More little fish and something about a tree

Today I went to one of my elementary schools that I hadn't been to in a while. I got out of my car and realized this was my first time being there since the hot weather died down and the cold weather began.

As I was walking up to the school, I thought about the desktop picture on the computer that I usually sit at. It is a picture of a tree in the schoolyard. The leaves in the picture were yellow because the picture was taken in fall/winter. I thought it was funny that the picture was on the desktop because it was the exact angle and view of that part of the schoolyard that someone using the computer could see if they just looked over the screen and out the door. So, as I changed into my indoor shoes, I was thinking that because the leaves had probably changed colors again, the image on my screen and the real life one would be really similar.

What I didn't realize is that because it is no longer hot out and it is actually becoming very cold each day, they don't leave the door open anymore. So, they can't see the real life tree from the computer at all except for glances when people go in and out.

Is that why that picture was used for the desktop???????

:)

It turns out that I am okay with eating small fish whole with school lunch if it's served on rice. I figure that's because if it's on rice, it's easier to pretend it is something else I eat on rice. Plus, these small fish taste better than the other small fish.

I shot hoops (basketball) with some elementary school students today. It was fun.

Japanese study, the lack of travel bugs, rain...etc.

Ew, so much for forcing myself to update weekly, right? I am not entirely sure what happened last week because I had time to post and I knew I hadn't yet, I just didn't. Maybe I didn't feel like I was quite in the right state of mind. Anyway, this will be last weeks very tardy entry.

People are often asking me where in this island, Kyushu, I have traveled to since moving here. Seeing as how I've been only to Kanoya for a week with the other new ALTs and to Kagoshima for shopping trips and parties, I don't really have an awful lot to tell people. I look at the experience of other JETs and I realize that they are really traveling around- not just in Kyushu, but other places in Japan, too.

For me, though, at least at the moment I don't feel myself being particularly bit by the travel bug. I kind of think just living here is enough adventure for now. I've done the touristy thing in Japan a few times and now I just want to experience living here. I am, of course, not saying that I won't travel- I have every intention to, but I don't and probably won't as much as other people do.

If anything, I feel like I -should- be wanting to travel because everyone else does.

Either way, I am going to Tokyo next month for Christmas and New Years. I am way more excited though, about going to see people like my friends in Tokyo and my former host family than doing any sort of sightseeing. I guess what I really prefer at the moment is to be places where I have connections.

By the way, I started private Japanese lessons about two weeks ago. The teacher is really nice. I always forget when I am not taking Japanese lessons that I really truly do enjoy them. Of course, we're reviewing right now, so I get to feel really smart. (haha) Of course, since I started learning Japanese over 5 years ago, there are a lot of really basic things that I have forgotten, so really it's great to be reviewing.

Winter came. This morning it was raining really hard. Here's something I don't understand. Apparently around June-July is the rainy season, July-August is typhoon season. Okay, so, with that established, what IS all of this extra rain? Does it ever stop raining here?

I found a dead bird yesterday. I thought immediately of how in the US one should report dead birds immediately because of the threat of West Nile Virus, so I told someone in Japanese. They told someone else, who called the building owners, who had the bird removed. No idea what came of it because I don't know what the standard procedures are around here, but I feel like I did the right thing.

Samurai and Ijuin Town

About a month or so ago, I was in the teacher`s room of one of my middle schools. Throughout the day, there was an ongoing discussion about a poster that a couple of the students made to put up in the halls.

I could tell that the teachers were trying to figure out whether it was appropriate, but I could not figure out exactly what was so controversial about it.

The poster had a man who appeared to be a samurai on it and I heard the word samurai used a lot. So, I figured that maybe the problem with the poster was that it was disrespectful to the samurai in the local history.

It made sense when I thought about it. There is a big statue of a samurai warrior in front of the train station, a giant samurai statue-type-thing that you pass to get to the train platform, the sewer covers here have samurai helmet designs on them, many of my schools have some sort of samurai suit of armor or something on display, and part of the town`s biggest festival is a procession of people in samurai armor who walk to this town from Kagoshima city.

It would make sense that the people in this town might get offended if there was something insulting samurai posted.

I asked and BOY was my thinking wrong.

The Japanese teacher of English I asked, Mr. Matsumoto, told me that many students who go to the school`s ancestors were the poor peasants back in the samurai era, and to them the samurai poster would be offensive because it refers to the old class system where their families were at the bottom and warlords were at the top.

It makes sense that descendants of people who were at the unfortunate end of social hierarchy to think a little less of samurai symbolism. However, I was surprised that the town seems to still really hang onto it`s samurai history while there are such negative sentiments and concerns about that going around town.

In the end, the students were allowed to use their poster after the word "samurai" was erased.

Clearly there are so many things that I do not understand.

Colds, stoves, ringshaped lightbulbs, and videos!

So I'm recovering now from a fairly vicious cold. It was vicious because usually I don't really get sick, instead I just feel miserable in the "fighting off a cold" stage for a freakishly long time.

I mentioned the fact I had a cold to the leader of the English Conversation class for adults and he started sending me several emails asking me if I am okay, if need to go to the hospital, if I have been eating, if I was sick in bed, if I needed one of the female members of the class to come see me. It was really... umm... overwhelming.

It's not unusual in this country to go to the hospital just for a cold. By this, it doesn't mean being admitted to the hospital, but getting medicines from the doctor. Still, to my foreign ears "do you need to go to the hospital?" is still a bit shocking to hear.

My stove in my apartment has been broken for about two weeks or so now. I have a free used stove lined up for me which I have to pay the installation fee for, but I am still kind of waiting for something to happen there. No one has even come by to see if there's anything easy to fix on there. I couldn't be more unfamiliar with this kind of stove, so if I accidentally jiggled it in a way that made the gas pipe loose, I wouldn't know. It would be kind of embarrassing if some installation guy came and found something simple like that with my old stove. Of course, in my situation, it looks like if that's the problem, there's no way around finding out that way.

Today I went out and bought a new lightbulb for the lamp in my room. I suppose it's not appropriate to call it a lightbulb because technically it's a ring shaped lightbulb. At first when I saw these lamps that have them in my apartment, I didn't think to consider that they were very different from lamps I had in the US. On top of that, I noticed those light... rings in the store when buying a regular lightbulb before, but for some reason it didn't dawn on me that I would end up buying one. Nothing struck me as odd until the moment I realized I had to go buy a light...ring.

Holding the burned out one in my hand, I almost wanted to throw it like a frisbee because of it's shape and size. I took pictures of the lightbulb... ring... thing and I'll post them sometime.

There's a lightning storm going on outside. I don't really know what the "what not to do during lightning storm" rules are given where I am from, but I remember hearing YEARS ago that it is unsafe to be on the computer when there is lightning. I don't know if this is still true, but I do intend to get off of this computer if I hear it coming closer.

I don't have a terrible lot more to say right now anyway, either, I think.

I missed a big festival on Monday because of my cold.

Here are some videos I've taken--

Here's a broadcasting van. Source of lots of noise pollution in this country. I have no idea what this one is saying, but they do everything from advertise to telling citizens to clear the path (emergency vehicles.) There are A LOT of vehicles that have much to say around here.


This next video is a procession of performers going from one part of the festival I mentioned in the last blog, to another part which is across the street from my house. I filmed this from my balcony (as I did the last video).


Yes, I did wander down to the festival eventually. Here are some more performers-


This is proof that you can be a Japanese major and take Japanese culture classes, but still find aspects of Japan's culture that you find, well, REALLY hard to comprehend and several shades of hilarious. Watching men stand in line to hit a bunch of sticks with another stick while screaming their heads off taught me this. A faaaar more informed person commented this video saying that this is called "Yakumaru Jigen Ryu".


Last video-
I never thought I'd see people performing taiko drumming dressed as samurai warriors. Now, I know I was truly a person limited in imagination. :D

Actually, to make matters worse, for some reason I think of the ninja turtles whenever I watch this video. I actually thought of that while I was filming too. I imagined the ninja turtles doing taiko. (haha) I dare you to tell me you didn't!

Myoenji festival

Last weekend, there was a festival here in Ijuin. Part of the festival took place just across the street from my apartment building. It was fun to have so many people and so many things happening around where I live.

On the first day, I wandered down to see the festivities a few times, but mostly spent my time sitting in my living room area on the computer with my window open so that I could hear if something interesting was going on outside. Near the end of the day, some other JETs came along and I found myself on a quest to find a place to eat cake (I am not sure how this happened.) Anyway, it was good to hang out with people.

Yesterday, the festival had a lot more going on and there were a lot more people around. It was really exciting. My students were just about everywhere. There were also a lot of other JETs around, so I didn`t end up returning to my apartment out of slight boredom as I had the previous day.

Anyway, I uploaded some new pictures. To see them, click on the "Photos" tab at the top of the page.
I also took videos of various things, which I will share in some form sometime soon.
I have a lot going on this week (parties and work). That`s probably why I wrote this blog now even though I am rather tired.
I`m sure that I will be EXHAUSTED by the end of this week.

The meat smell, the tents, and lack of waves

Now that the humidity outside has died down, I`ve been hanging clothes to dry outside rather than inside. At first, I didn`t like the smell the clothes carry after being hung outside, but I am getting used to it.

It`s kind of like smoky, meat-like smell. I don`t know why but since I moved here, I`ve thought that this town carries a strange scent that makes me think of meat (but -not- in an appetizing way, though.)

There`s a festival coming up in my town. I guess it`s this weekend, but tents have been up for it nearby my apartment building since last weekend.

What`s kind of neat about the tents being up is that the pictures my predecessor sent of the view of the apartment balcony had tents in the same place. It wasn`t like I was really expecting to see the tents when I first physically looked off the balcony myself, but seeing the bare area kind of made me... well, not "sad", really, but a little disappointed. (lol) But now the tents are back!

I finally got to go to the beach last weekend. It wasn`t at all as pretty as Monterey. The water looked gross and there was a wave breaker for people who want to swim (my Monterey raised mind says "HA!") in the ocean. Still, though, it was good to finally see ocean more than just a 2 second or so view from a car.

Little fish

There are some things you simply can`t be prepared enough for.

A example of this is kyushoku- the school lunch provided in elementary and middle schools that you eat in the classroom.

Usually, I think they are fine. Not exactly my favorite foods, but I can deal with it.

Well, except for one thing.

Today was the second day I came across it.

Small fish fried whole.

I really want to be able to just suck it up and eat it, but I can never eat more than one or two of the bunch that I am given. First of all, eating something whole like that is really unfamiliar to me. Secondly, it doesn`t even really taste that good to me. As much as I want everyone to be impressed that this foreigner would eat anything, I keep having to draw the line with that and another food that I will not mention (I have mentioned it and I`ve learned my lesson).

Anyway, so I was in the teacher`s room today, just waiting for the time to go to a classroom to eat, and the principal and vice principal were already eating. I was attempting to psych myself up for eating the fish and failing horribly when one of them turned to me and asked perfectly seriously-

"Is rice okay?"

Today`s lunch was rice, miso soup, and those fried fish. And of all those things, he thought I`d have trouble with the rice!

I was actually asked if rice was okay one other time that day, too.

And I had to explain that I have, indeed, used chopsticks in the US.

More to do with music, etc.

This week's update a little late this week. Of course, I haven't "officially" announced that updates are to come here on either Sunday or Monday of each week, but that's kind of what I was thinking I'd aim for.

Sort of continuing on the topic last time- last week the brass band from Kamimura Gakuen (Aya's old high school) came to one of my elementary schools. One of the songs that they played was the Atsuhime theme song that I talked about in my last blog. It sounded very awesome in person.

I am really starting to feel like I am enjoying working at the schools. Regardless of whether I am talking to a teacher who knows English or not, I've been having good conversations with them. And the students are getting more familiar with me, so they're a little less shy.

At one of my junior high schools, a new building opened up. This building is really nice and kind of fun to wander through during the afternoon break. Yesterday, I found the music room and the music teacher let me try to play the "koto". I think I might want to take lessons in that instrument now. That is pretty amazing for me, I think, because I hadn't really thought about taking up an instrument (except maybe taiko) since I was in elementary school.

Moving onto the next topic, I feel a little weird bringing it up, but I think it's kind of a unique cultural thing, so I will anyway. Sometime during the weekend, my supervisor's father passed away. Unlike in the US where a person would think it would be weird to go to a memorial for someone that they don't really know, in Japan it's commonplace to do so if you knew (worked with) someone in their immediate family. So, me and the other ALTs who I had a meeting with on Monday were told that we should either go that evening or we should send money for the grieving family with someone who was going. I agreed with our decision not to go because we don't really know what to do at the Japanese memorial service and it's not really the right situation to be fumbling around as we would other occasions that are new to us.

The next day, as we were told beforehand, the guy from my office brought back thank you gifts from my supervisor's family. It was a handkerchief and a box of packets of sugar. To me it still feels strange to have received a gift for that and I am not sure what to do with these things because of that.

I have the other ALTs bags still. They are in another office, so they weren't there to get theirs.

So basically I left work yesterday with three bags of... ummm thank-you-for-your-sympathy-and-donation gifts, my regular two bags I carry to work, and a pretty good sized package of instant ramen that was given one to each person in the office randomly right before I left.

Anyway, I suppose that's it.

Atsuhime (篤姫)

Frequently on Japanese television, there are period dramas which tell the stories of people in Japanese history.

One of those programs that's been running since before I arrived here in Kagoshima is Atsuhime.

The show was playing in the background as I was engaged with something on the computer, but I realized then that I wanted to remember the Atsuhime drama because I consider it to be part of the times now for me.

The story of Atsuhime and the fact that her story is now being aired on national television is something very special to the people here in Kagoshima prefecture. That is because Atsuhime was originally from Satsuma (former name of Kagoshima).

During the time it takes place, the clan ruling the Satsuma area was very strong unlike other clans located closer to the shogunate that were kept weaker in order to keep the shogunate in power. Satsuma was too far away to control as much as other areas. Naturally, one would conclude that this was a proud time for Kagoshima.

I'm having trouble feeling like I can explain this further very well, so here's the wikipedia article on the show.

For me, personally, I find the show a little hard to follow because of how quickly the characters speak and the heavy dose of polite language (keigo) that they use. Not to mention the fact that I haven't really took the time to watch each and every episode as it airs.

But it is something that the people here seem to take pride in and I think that's great.

Sometimes, though, I watch just the theme song sequence at the beginning because not only is the song absolutely beautiful, but also the images they choose to go along with the song.

Here's a YouTube video.



When I went with Aya, Jenny, and Kathryn to a big fireworks show in Kagoshima city, they put off fireworks to this song. It was really, truly amazing.

While I can't call myself a fan, I wrote this blog because it is something I want to remember when I am thinking about when my time living here in Japan had just begun.

Almost 2 months

September is almost over. The beginning of October will mark two months since I came to Japan this year. The longest amount of time I`ve previous spent in Japan is about to be doubled. And then after that, a lot more time to come.

Things are still going pretty well.

The typhoon I mentioned in my last post ended up being demoted to Severe Tropical storm, but the news still referred to it as a typhoon, so that was kind of confusing. Either way, the storm veered to the East as it was hitting Kyushu, so although the Eastern half of Kagoshima was hit -pretty- bad, the skies were pretty clear on the Western side where I am.

To tell the truth, it was kind of disappointing, because I wanted to have a fun story I could tell people about me waiting out the storm, all alone in my apartment.

But there will be other typhoons.

Last week on Tuesday, I began to have ear pain. I stopped ignoring it in favor of work on Friday and went to the hospital (regular doctor appointments take place in the hospital here) on Saturday. I thought it was an ear infection, but the Ears, Nose, and Throat Doctor I visited on Monday said it was a viral infection in my nose and throat. This made sense because my throat was bothering me as well.

The other night, I woke up in the middle of the night because my ear was really hurting, but actually that was the last I had of substantial pain from. The next day (yesterday), my ear rather felt like it was underwater. Today is just feels kind of funny.

I realized that I like going to the doctors in Japan. It`s a fun challenge to try to communicate health things in Japanese, especially since medical words are often so similar. I hope the doctors appreciated the challenge too. Maybe they wished I brought someone fluent to help translate.

For me, though, I don`t like to bring translators to places because that just means that they can talk super fast as though I am not there. And often, since I`ve gotten here, I`ve felt like my "translators" were not able to explain things much better and often they`d rather make decisions for me instead of trying to help me understand. I much prefer to put out the effort and go without a translator.

I should be getting internet in my apartment as soon as this weekend, so hopefully I can set a certain day of the week when I was post here and the posts will be more structured and thought out.

Sports Day and typhoons

So I went to my first school Sports Festival at one of my middle schools on Sunday. Probably due to the timing of my first visit to the school, I didn`t get to participate. Actually, it turned out no one quite knew I was even attending.

It was still a lot of fun. Probably the event that was the most fun to watch was the relay races. One especially fast or slow person can change the outcome of the race so much. It was fun when two teams were neck to the neck during the whole duration. But, on the other hand, I felt sorry for the team that was lapped.

I definitely don`t consider myself to be very athletic, but I really do want to participate in a Sports Day event next year.

Although if the event occurs in the rain as it did this time, I might consider taking that back (although I probably won`t).

There`s a typhoon coming, so we`ve been getting A LOT of rain lately. I don`t really QUITE understand how big it is and what it could mean for me, but I`m looking into it whenever I have the chance. We did have a typhoon since I`ve arrived here and I`ve been in the edges of typhoons before, but something seems different this time. Anyway, it should be arriving around Wed/Thurs and everything should be fine. :)

Lately, I`ve been getting a little tired of eating rice and noodles so much. So, the other night, I bought bratwurst, hot dog buns, mustard, and beans and had a very not-Japanese dinner. It was nice and it felt really good to show myself that I really do have a lot of options of what to eat here even though sometimes it doesn`t seem like it.

I still have no internet at my apartment, but I`ll get to the bottom of it.

"First blog"

Because I am using my own laptop at a computer lab, I can finally post the REAL first post that's been sitting, waiting patiently on my desktop in a word document for a month now.

Wow, I can believe it's been a month since I got here.

Before I paste the blog, some news-

-As you might have noticed, I finally was able to fix the template. Let me know how it looks on your respective browsers.
-I was also finally able to upload the pictures I've taken so far on my camera. If you look at the top of the new template, there is a "pictures" link that should take you to my facebook album. When that album fills, I will start a new one and give it the name "pictures 2"- no worries, it will be user friendly. ;)

So here's the first blog, it's not super great or anything, though---

Written first night in Hioki City, Kagoshima Prefecture- August 6th, 2008 at 8:54 pm.

So I’m sitting here in the living area of the apartment that I moved into today. It wasn’t quite what I had imagined from looking at pictures, but nonetheless, it’s a really great place.

The Tokyo Orientation days (we arrived on the 3rd) were very hectic and busy. Also, I didn’t find those particular days to be “Japanese” seeing as how we had very little time to physically leave the hotel.

I did, however, get chances to meet my host family on the first night and Tokyo friends on the second (Macha, Nori, Ai, Ryoichi, Yukihiro).

On the way to Kagoshima, I was very excited about living in this prefecture that I’ve liked so much for such a long time. All of the way to the office I was sooo happy.

At one point, I looked into a miror in a bathroom and realized I had a really, truly happy face.

Then we went to the apartment.

I stepped into the door with the two people from the office who were helping me and suddenly it sunk in that I am going to be living here. On top of all that, I am going to be living here alone. This thought really got me anxious and upset.

On top of that, I don’t internet here yet, so I felt very isolated from everyone that I once counted on.

I called Aya- that made me feel better, but she was busy with driving school at the moment.

I went out to dinner with one of the ALTs of the city who came with me (he’s British) and a CIR (she’s Korean.) I felt better after getting out and hanging out a little.

After I got back I began listening to some music on my iPod and realized that my entire taste in music changed in this transition. It seems that I’ve been unconciously collecting songs with “you can do it,” “count on others,” “be easy on yourself” etc. messages to them during the past few months. Then I started to view this apartment as a series of puzzles as I figured out other parts of settling down. I think my mood is quite a bit different now.

Anyway, I feel like I’m about to pass out, so I am going to start heading towards bed. I have to get to the office tomorrow morning at 8:30.

Eww… it’s going to be hot once I turn off the air cooler in this place.

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Funny enough, my taste in music switched back to how it was before since then. :)

Cars, bugs, and phones

I`ll make this quick because I have to leave to go to one of my schools, Ijuin Kita Elementary School, very soon. It`s my first day of the job I came here to do.

I`m excited, but also very nervous.

I did end up buying a car on that day and I have a cell phone now, too.

Things are finally coming together.

I can`t wait until I can finally get internet at my apartment, though.

In other news, I saw a really huge bug.

And, from the looks of it, I will see this huge bug when I go home today as well.

The reason for this is because it seems to be living happily in the elevator doorway.

The bug, including it`s huge wing span, is about as wide as my hand.

I took pictures, but sadly they`re on my regular camera. I won`t be able to share those pics for a while longer.

I could, however, try to get a cell picture of it.

I was really startled when I first saw it. And I`ve been taking the stairs a lot more.

In the meantime, here`s a cell pic of my car.


Gotta go!

KAPIC

It`s been hard to want to blog these days due to the fact that I can only really use internet in the office. It seems that it will be at least 2 weeks before I can finally get internet set up in my apartment.

Last week, the new JETs in Kagoshima prefecture had our orientation in Kagoshima city in Monday, then on Tuesday most of us went to the cultural center in Kanoya known as KAPIC. It was rather fun to spend so much time with other JETs in the prefecture. The area where KAPIC was located was also very beautiful (pictures to come when I have internet at the apartment.) At the same time, I was also pretty tired the whole time.

On Saturday, I went with Aya (IchikiKushikino city, Kagoshima prefecture native/Japanese little sister), Jenny (Prefecture ALT who also lives in Ijuuin Town), and Kathryn (a couple hours up North of us) to a big fireworks festival. We all put on yukata at Jenny`s place, so we got a lot of attention walking around. It was far more crowded than I expected and it got pretty crazy (frightening even) in the crowd when it began to rain. It was nothing like people themselves were going crazy, but I felt nervous around so many people crowded together with umbrellas and children here and there.

The fireworks show itself was very nice, though. There were some breaks and I don`t really know why those were in there, but a fireworks lasted a long time.

Yesterday I went out shopping. Grocery was a good part of it, but I also bought a new chair and a new kitchen towel holders because both of those things were broken. I found a pretty neat store where things are not only cheap, but also (badly) translated into English. I decided that when I get things like cleaning supplies where it would be good to know directions, I`ll try to buy from that store so I have a much better chance of understanding correctly.

This morning, I was -not- ready to get up when I did. It`s Monday and I already feel like I could use another weekend.

Tomorrow, I believe, Aya`s relative who sells cars is going to be coming by the office to show me a car. I really hope that I don`t feel pressured to make a decision about it too soon...

It`s hot

But maybe I just think it`s especially hot today because I had to drag one of my suitcases to the office today.

I`m going to an orientation in Kagoshima city until tomorrow, then going to a culture center in Kanoya for culture and language lessons until Friday. So, I have my packed suitcase right next to me.

We had a typhoon! I`ve experienced those before, I think it was moreso the edge rather than the stronger part of it. Being from the Monterey area, I`m not used to thunder and lightning storms that last longer than around 10~20 minutes. It`s pretty crazy.

My apartment is beginning look a lot more like a place where I live. I have pictures up and things like that. I took pictures and was going to use my friend/neighbor/fellow ALT`s internet to upload them, but she wasn`t at her house yesterday evening for some reason. Oh well...

I`ve been experiencing some frustration on the language end in that sometimes when I try to speak Japanese to people, I can understand what they are telling me but I can`t think of the suitable reply at the moment, so they think I don`t understand at all. For example, I decided to try to call the post office yesterday on my own instead of waiting until later and getting a native Japanese speaker to help me. I understood what she was saying I felt like we were getting done everything that we needed, but she still referred me to a English language line that charged a fee. That was kind of frustrating.

In other news, it looks like I`m buying a car. It was `strongly suggested` by my supervisor and, according to Charlie and some others, renting a car is better if you only plan to stay for one year, otherwise it`s better to buy. Aya has a relative in Kagoshima city who sells cars and I`ll probably get a good deal from him.

First blog

This isn`t going to be as structured as I wanted my first entry here to be. Probably because I`m typing it in circumstances different than what I expected.

Technically, I typed my first entry on my first night and it is saved onto my laptop at my apartment.

But right now, I have no internet at my apartment and I`m using my work computer at the city education office.

Meaning that I can`t post my `first blog.` I was thinking I`d wait until I could use internet at my apartment to start, but I realized as time went by that so many days were passing and people would want to read my initial thoughts about things.

So I`ll post the real `first blog` later on.

Life in Japan has been treating me well so far. I`ve been going through the process of settling down in my apartment pretty smoothly and people have been very nice around here.

As I will mention in my `first blog,` I did experience some initial depression, but now I feel very cheerful and I`m really happy to be here.

There`s not an awful lot to do for work these days because school hasn`t started yet, so I basically just hang out at the office.

Last Friday was my first work related party. It started out at an Izakaya where you can drink and eat all you want. This was really a lot of fun because I got to see people who usually seem pretty serious be really friendly and relaxed. Afterward, we all went to karaoke where it was apparently very surprising that I already knew a number of Japanese songs. (haha)

Saturday, there was a gathering of Kagoshima JETs. We went to Kagoshima city, toured around a little bit and went bowling. I ended up leaving early because I didn`t feel very good and I just didn`t feel up to hanging out with so many people then.

Yesterday, Aya and I went to Kagoshima city. The plan was to go shopping and try out a Mexican restaurant called `Crazy Uncle` to lunch. It turned out that the Mexican place was closed. So we ate somewhere else for lunch, stopped by the foreign foods store, returned to my apartment, and we made Mexican food for dinner. It was really a lot of fun.

It was actually my first dinner I made at the apartment, so it was really great for that reason, too.

Aya also helped me figure out the waste disposal system around here. It`s actually EXTREMELY complicated. Regular garbage is called `Burnable` and there are separate bags needed for plastic, plastic bottles (strangely called `Pet Bottles` around here), plastic/Styrofoam containers, `dangerous things.` There are really more details about this whole thing than I can really think of right now to write, but I think I`ll do okay. I also have to write my name on each bag so that I`m accountable for how well I sort. Intimidating, right?

Post

Just something to put here until I can actually do a real post.

Ugh... why does my template put all my titles in caps? I'll figure out how to fix that soon.