Hey gang. Sorry to not post lately. It's been a pretty busy week. Monday night, I was exhausted from the weekend's festivities and had a bad headache, so I went to bed early. Tuesday night, we went to Hitoyoshi with my supervisor to buy phones, and it was 8:30 before we got back, so by the time we cooked and ate dinner, showered, and did other things, it was time for bed. Fortunately, I have time tonight to write for your reading pleasure. :)
On Tuesday, I went to my nursery schools. I have three in Yunomae. The kids there are PRECIOUS! The first nursery school I went to I just met the teachers. The kids there seem really young, like 3 or 4ish, so I'm really not sure how I'm going to play English games with them. The second school was more fun. I gave a little self introduction and taught colors. We then played a game called "fruits basket". All of the kids sit in a circle and have a piece of paper with a color on it. One person is in the middle and calls a color, for example: blue. Everyone with blue gets up and runs to another person's seat. The person without a seat becomes the person in the middle. It's really fun for kids of all ages!! At the third school, the kids were older, so they repeated everything I said. I would say, "I'm from Kentucky." They would say, "I'm from Kentucky." lol. They had no idea what that meant, but it was so cute that they repeated everything I said! :) When I left that school, I made the mistake of giving one of the boys a high five. Suddenly, ALL of the kids swarmed me and wanted a high five. They were hitting anything hand-related.....arm, elbow, whatever. lol. Those kids really didn't want me to leave. They kept saying goodbye and walked me all the way to the gate saying, "bye-bye!"
When I got back to the BOE, I had an interview with the Yunomae newspaper. Good gosh! Do you have any idea how difficult it is to conduct an interview in a language that you don't speak?? It's probably going to be printed that Melissa Reed likes Adolf Hitler or something as silly b/c I have no idea what I was agreeing to! I felt sorry for the reporter. He was having difficulty understanding me, and he had no idea how to ask the questions. haha! Life's an adventure. After the interview, he wanted a picture for the paper. Honestly, why do I always have to take a picture when I look the worst??? On my picture for the alien registration card, I look like a hot mess. I had to get a picture on the first full day Ian was here, so I was in everyday clothes. I wore my Twilight shirt that says, "Hey Edward! Wanna neck?" and has an arrow pointing toward the neck. And yesterday, I looked like I had been running around with sweaty kids all morning....probably b/c I had!
Last night was a bad night for me. :( I kinda fell into a aggravated/depressed/angry/sad mood. As soon as I got off of work, I picked up Ian, and my supervisor took us to Hitoyoshi to buy cell phones. Hitoyoshi is about the distance and time from Paducah to Murray. We left a little after 4:30, and got there around 5:20ish. We knew we wanted to buy iphones for their smartness. Seriously, the translator alone on those phones makes them worth it! There are three major cell phone companies in our area, Soft Bank, AU, and Docomo. Soft Bank is the only one that carries the iphone. We had budgeted 60,000 yen for two phones and a plan. That's about $800. More than enough, right? My supervisor talked to the sales rep, and she said that it would be 63,000 yen for ONE phone!!! She asked if we wanted to shop elsewhere. I said yes. She took us to AU. I knew I didn't want to get a phone there. I've heard a LOT of negative things about AU and how their plans seem cheaper, but there are a lot of hidden fees. We looked there, and Ian and I discussed what we wanted to do. I said why not just get one iphone and split it? We went back to Soft Bank. It just got worse. We were trying to ask if we could buy a Japanese SIM card and put that in our American iphones to make them work, trying to decide to get one or two phones, trying not to spend an arm and a leg on cell phones, and I felt like I had all of this stress building up. Couple that with the fact that I was signing my name to paperwork that I couldn't read. I had no idea what my plan consisted of and what the contract was about. Usually you want to know that kind of stuff, you know?? They got an English speaker on the customer service line, and she explained some things to me, but there's NO way I could remember EVERYTHING she told me! She did tell me that one phone would cost 40,000, not 63,000, and they would divide the cost between months on our two year plan, so we decided to get two iphones. We were there until about 8:00 PM (they closed at 7:00 PM). I felt bad for all parties involved. My supervisor would get home very late, the store employees were being held up, and we were supposed to have supper with a friend. Finally, we had our phones after a stressful 4 hours! As it turns out, we will be paying less for more features than we would in the States!
Once we got home, I sank into a funk. I kept thinking about how things would be sooooooooooooooooooooooo much easier in the States. I rarely understand what's going on at work, and the language barrier is something that I deal with on a daily basis. Also, situations like not being able to understand the cell phone plan are common in my Japanese life. All of this hit me, and I kept thinking, "What the HECK am I doing here?!?!?!?!?!" I laid down and had a good cry time. :( Ian was like, "What's wrong?!?!?" I know it's not all sunshine and rainbows in Japan. There are going to be ups and downs, and last night was a down night. Don't worry, today was an up day. I feel like this blog is long enough on its own, but I'll blog about today tomorrow. :)
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Sunday, August 28, 2011
One heck of a weekend
Hey gang. Sorry it's been a few days since I last posted. I was going to post on Friday night, but time got away from me, and we had to be up early on Saturday morning, so I chose sleep instead. Here's what's been going on:
First, I wanted to say that Ian's a pretty cool house husband to have. He hasn't gone crazy yet from being at home all day. He's really good about researching things. For example, he researched and bought me a new computer, and anytime we talk about travel plans, he can look things up while I'm at school. I definitely recommend to any JETs out there reading this to bring along an Ian-like-person, lol. He or she will come in very handy! :) One thing that he could do that someone mentioned to us this weekend is to find an organization to volunteer for. I think it's an excellent idea! At Kumamoto orientation, they gave us some information about one volunteer organization called Smile Kids Japan, in which you visit orphanages and basically play w/the kids. I think it would be an awesome thing for him (and me!) to do.
This weekend was extremely fun for us! The only bad thing is that we're so freaking tired now. Saturday morning, we woke up at 5:30AM so that our friend, Krista, could pick us up at 6:15 to go to Mt. Aso. Mt. Aso is in the northeast area of our prefecture. It's a beautiful volcano, and I think it has the largest caldera in the world. We met up with other ALTs in Kumamoto City, carpooled to Aso City, and met other ALTs there before driving up the mountain. It was really fun to hang out with other people and get to know our fellow ALTs in the area. There were about 20ish people that went. We stopped at a lookout point on our way up the mountain. I thought the view was beautiful there, but the higher we went up the mountain, the more beautiful it became! We parked in a lot and hiked the rest of the way up.
I've never been to a volcano before, but I was expecting to look down into the caldera and see liquid hot orange lava. Instead, it was blue water. Not exactly the type of water you want to swim in, mind you. If it wasn't so hot that it would peel your skin off, then the sulfur would definitely instantly kill you. Oh the sulfur! It was funny. We were getting ready to take a group shot, and all of the sudden, we all started coughing. It felt like my throat suddenly got very dry. Alarms went off warning people to get away from the caldera. The wind had changed directions, and the sulfur was too much to breathe in, so we had to backtrack a bit and wait for the air quality to get better. Another thing that was funny/scary was these huge round concrete bunker looking things all around. When we asked what they were for, one of the other experienced ALTs told us they are there.....in case. Apparently, 70ish years ago the volcano erupted when a lot of people were viewing it, and they died. The bunker things are there to have a safe place to go to.......in case.
We then hiked around the volcano. The was BEAUTIFUL! I wish I could convey the beauty of this place!! (I will post pictures as soon as I can. We're waiting for a part b/c Ian's computer won't read my memory card. Sorry!) We first crossed this wasteland of black ash and sand. It was pretty, but in a very nothing-grows-here-because-this-land-inhospitable way. The trail up the mountain was a complete and utter mountain goat pass, lol. We just kept going up and up and up. We definitely got our cardio workout!! The views from the top was so dang amazing. Totally worth it. We were actually so high up that we were in a cloud. It felt really wet and misty. It was funny b/c we met a German guy up there. He said that him and a friend were on vacation in Japan. He was very nice.
After completing the mountain goat pass back down, we relaxed at an onsen, which is a Japanese hot spring. Oh me, oh my. It's a really wonderful place to go, BUT here's how the Japanese do it: most onsens are segregated. The boys have one side, and the girls have the other. The reason for that is because everyone is naked. No, you didn't misread that. You strip down to your birthday suit and dip into the hot springs. I told my friend earlier in the week that I was very nervous about getting completely naked in front of everyone, and could I wear my bathing suit, or would that be a Japanese no-no? She told me that it would be a no-no. I know it sounds weird by American standards, but it's completely normal in Japan to do that! It was really difficult for me to take off everything. I seriously had to chant to myself...it's no big deal....it's no big deal....it's no big deal, lol. And here's the thing.....it really ISN'T a big deal. Is it awkward? Yes. However, everyone else is naked, and it's not like you go there to size up everyone or something. After a long day of hiking, sitting in a hot spring was a wonderful, wonderful way to end a day. :)
Today, we had a picnic with some other ALTs from the gun. (It sounds like "goon." It's basically like a county by American standards.) Krista again drove us to Hitoyoshi, where we met everyone else. There were about ten people. We started off the day by driving to a waterfall. That was beautiful. If any of you come to visit us, we will take you there. It's only about an hour away, and it's magnificent! It's probably about 10 stories high. We were able to get close enough to feel the cool mist blow on us. We weren't completely wet by the time we left but definitely damp. It felt pretty good, though, on our way back up the hillside. Interesting fact. We asked people today if we had southern accents. They said yes. We were like "really???" They said yes....that they weren't bad, but they could definitely tell that we were from the south. I asked who had a worse accent, me or Ian. They said Ian!!!!! BUUWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I thought that was hilarious b/c I'm more from the county, and Ian's from the city. Someone was like, "Well, usually it depends on your parents and who you hung out with when you were younger." This also doesn't make sense. My parents have much more of an accent than Ian's, and I went to the little private county school of St. John, while Ian went to St. Mary in the city. Interesting.......
After the small hike around the waterfall (nothing compared to yesterday!), we headed back to Hitoyoshi for a bbq in the park. We were on this island park in the middle of a river. It was a great location for a Sunday afternoon picnic! It was so cute b/c there was a big group of Japanese kids having a picnic w/their parents, and slowly but surely they tentatively made their way to the big group of foreigners. At first they wanted to know names, ages, etc. They asked me if I had a boyfriend (a very common question for everyone to get asked here). I said no, a husband. They didn't really understand, so I called Ian over and pointed at my ring. They still really didn't understand, so one of my friend's translated. Once they realized that Ian was my husband, they giggled and were like "ooooooooooooooo!!!" lol. Those kids loved to play. They wanted us to chase them, which was okay at first. However, when you play tag in this country, you tend to be "it" A LOT. At one time, I was playing tag with six or seven girls. Instead of calling it tag, we should have renamed it to "chase and be chased by the foreigner." :) Their parents brought us over rice balls and beer....I guess as a thanks for babysitting the kids, lol. It was tiring but fun! Whenever the parents called the kids back over b/c it was time to leave, they made the universal sound of disappointment that all kids make when it's time to leave. They were seriously the cutest. Once the kids left, it was time to eat. Ian was really good about being the barbequeer. (For those of you that get that joke, haha.) There's something about grilling that makes him so happy. I think it's a guy thing. :) Regardless, he was the bbq expert of the group. They grilled beef, pork, chicken, and veggies. Granted, there weren't HUGE pieces of meat like we would cook in the States, but it was more than plenty to feed the 10 of us. We sat around and talked for a good long while before going down by the river. I was informed that that river was the third swiftest river in Japan. Another girl and I decided to cross it. It's very shallow....at the deepest part, it barely reached the tip of my khaki shorts. However, the current was something fierce. We couldn't even make it to the other side! I almost slipped and fell several times, which probably would have sent me down the river a bit. (Mommy, don't freak out. I wasn't swept away.) The water was pretty cold, but on a hot day like today, it felt great. We sat by the river for a while chatting, but then someone suggested we go for ice cream. Best idea ever. Baskin Robbins is a pretty big chain over here. While I cannot speak Japanese, I can order by looking and pointing, lol. I had chocolate mount blanc and cream soda ice cream, and Ian had rum raisin and pop rock ice cream. It was sooooooooooo good! It was a perfect way to end a really good weekend!
Alas, tomorrow is another work day. What's up with this full time working stuff? I love my job and the pay, but I don't enjoy the hours. The best part of the day is consumed by me sitting at a desk. Dislike! :) While this weekend was very fun, we have another one to look forward to. Next weekend we're going to the beach w/other ALTs in our prefecture. One of the best benefits of living on an island is that the beach is never too far away! All of you at home, be jealous. Be very jealous. :)
First, I wanted to say that Ian's a pretty cool house husband to have. He hasn't gone crazy yet from being at home all day. He's really good about researching things. For example, he researched and bought me a new computer, and anytime we talk about travel plans, he can look things up while I'm at school. I definitely recommend to any JETs out there reading this to bring along an Ian-like-person, lol. He or she will come in very handy! :) One thing that he could do that someone mentioned to us this weekend is to find an organization to volunteer for. I think it's an excellent idea! At Kumamoto orientation, they gave us some information about one volunteer organization called Smile Kids Japan, in which you visit orphanages and basically play w/the kids. I think it would be an awesome thing for him (and me!) to do.
This weekend was extremely fun for us! The only bad thing is that we're so freaking tired now. Saturday morning, we woke up at 5:30AM so that our friend, Krista, could pick us up at 6:15 to go to Mt. Aso. Mt. Aso is in the northeast area of our prefecture. It's a beautiful volcano, and I think it has the largest caldera in the world. We met up with other ALTs in Kumamoto City, carpooled to Aso City, and met other ALTs there before driving up the mountain. It was really fun to hang out with other people and get to know our fellow ALTs in the area. There were about 20ish people that went. We stopped at a lookout point on our way up the mountain. I thought the view was beautiful there, but the higher we went up the mountain, the more beautiful it became! We parked in a lot and hiked the rest of the way up.
I've never been to a volcano before, but I was expecting to look down into the caldera and see liquid hot orange lava. Instead, it was blue water. Not exactly the type of water you want to swim in, mind you. If it wasn't so hot that it would peel your skin off, then the sulfur would definitely instantly kill you. Oh the sulfur! It was funny. We were getting ready to take a group shot, and all of the sudden, we all started coughing. It felt like my throat suddenly got very dry. Alarms went off warning people to get away from the caldera. The wind had changed directions, and the sulfur was too much to breathe in, so we had to backtrack a bit and wait for the air quality to get better. Another thing that was funny/scary was these huge round concrete bunker looking things all around. When we asked what they were for, one of the other experienced ALTs told us they are there.....in case. Apparently, 70ish years ago the volcano erupted when a lot of people were viewing it, and they died. The bunker things are there to have a safe place to go to.......in case.
We then hiked around the volcano. The was BEAUTIFUL! I wish I could convey the beauty of this place!! (I will post pictures as soon as I can. We're waiting for a part b/c Ian's computer won't read my memory card. Sorry!) We first crossed this wasteland of black ash and sand. It was pretty, but in a very nothing-grows-here-because-this-land-inhospitable way. The trail up the mountain was a complete and utter mountain goat pass, lol. We just kept going up and up and up. We definitely got our cardio workout!! The views from the top was so dang amazing. Totally worth it. We were actually so high up that we were in a cloud. It felt really wet and misty. It was funny b/c we met a German guy up there. He said that him and a friend were on vacation in Japan. He was very nice.
After completing the mountain goat pass back down, we relaxed at an onsen, which is a Japanese hot spring. Oh me, oh my. It's a really wonderful place to go, BUT here's how the Japanese do it: most onsens are segregated. The boys have one side, and the girls have the other. The reason for that is because everyone is naked. No, you didn't misread that. You strip down to your birthday suit and dip into the hot springs. I told my friend earlier in the week that I was very nervous about getting completely naked in front of everyone, and could I wear my bathing suit, or would that be a Japanese no-no? She told me that it would be a no-no. I know it sounds weird by American standards, but it's completely normal in Japan to do that! It was really difficult for me to take off everything. I seriously had to chant to myself...it's no big deal....it's no big deal....it's no big deal, lol. And here's the thing.....it really ISN'T a big deal. Is it awkward? Yes. However, everyone else is naked, and it's not like you go there to size up everyone or something. After a long day of hiking, sitting in a hot spring was a wonderful, wonderful way to end a day. :)
Today, we had a picnic with some other ALTs from the gun. (It sounds like "goon." It's basically like a county by American standards.) Krista again drove us to Hitoyoshi, where we met everyone else. There were about ten people. We started off the day by driving to a waterfall. That was beautiful. If any of you come to visit us, we will take you there. It's only about an hour away, and it's magnificent! It's probably about 10 stories high. We were able to get close enough to feel the cool mist blow on us. We weren't completely wet by the time we left but definitely damp. It felt pretty good, though, on our way back up the hillside. Interesting fact. We asked people today if we had southern accents. They said yes. We were like "really???" They said yes....that they weren't bad, but they could definitely tell that we were from the south. I asked who had a worse accent, me or Ian. They said Ian!!!!! BUUWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I thought that was hilarious b/c I'm more from the county, and Ian's from the city. Someone was like, "Well, usually it depends on your parents and who you hung out with when you were younger." This also doesn't make sense. My parents have much more of an accent than Ian's, and I went to the little private county school of St. John, while Ian went to St. Mary in the city. Interesting.......
After the small hike around the waterfall (nothing compared to yesterday!), we headed back to Hitoyoshi for a bbq in the park. We were on this island park in the middle of a river. It was a great location for a Sunday afternoon picnic! It was so cute b/c there was a big group of Japanese kids having a picnic w/their parents, and slowly but surely they tentatively made their way to the big group of foreigners. At first they wanted to know names, ages, etc. They asked me if I had a boyfriend (a very common question for everyone to get asked here). I said no, a husband. They didn't really understand, so I called Ian over and pointed at my ring. They still really didn't understand, so one of my friend's translated. Once they realized that Ian was my husband, they giggled and were like "ooooooooooooooo!!!" lol. Those kids loved to play. They wanted us to chase them, which was okay at first. However, when you play tag in this country, you tend to be "it" A LOT. At one time, I was playing tag with six or seven girls. Instead of calling it tag, we should have renamed it to "chase and be chased by the foreigner." :) Their parents brought us over rice balls and beer....I guess as a thanks for babysitting the kids, lol. It was tiring but fun! Whenever the parents called the kids back over b/c it was time to leave, they made the universal sound of disappointment that all kids make when it's time to leave. They were seriously the cutest. Once the kids left, it was time to eat. Ian was really good about being the barbequeer. (For those of you that get that joke, haha.) There's something about grilling that makes him so happy. I think it's a guy thing. :) Regardless, he was the bbq expert of the group. They grilled beef, pork, chicken, and veggies. Granted, there weren't HUGE pieces of meat like we would cook in the States, but it was more than plenty to feed the 10 of us. We sat around and talked for a good long while before going down by the river. I was informed that that river was the third swiftest river in Japan. Another girl and I decided to cross it. It's very shallow....at the deepest part, it barely reached the tip of my khaki shorts. However, the current was something fierce. We couldn't even make it to the other side! I almost slipped and fell several times, which probably would have sent me down the river a bit. (Mommy, don't freak out. I wasn't swept away.) The water was pretty cold, but on a hot day like today, it felt great. We sat by the river for a while chatting, but then someone suggested we go for ice cream. Best idea ever. Baskin Robbins is a pretty big chain over here. While I cannot speak Japanese, I can order by looking and pointing, lol. I had chocolate mount blanc and cream soda ice cream, and Ian had rum raisin and pop rock ice cream. It was sooooooooooo good! It was a perfect way to end a really good weekend!
Alas, tomorrow is another work day. What's up with this full time working stuff? I love my job and the pay, but I don't enjoy the hours. The best part of the day is consumed by me sitting at a desk. Dislike! :) While this weekend was very fun, we have another one to look forward to. Next weekend we're going to the beach w/other ALTs in our prefecture. One of the best benefits of living on an island is that the beach is never too far away! All of you at home, be jealous. Be very jealous. :)
Thursday, August 25, 2011
What a day!
Ugh. I probably shouldn't be writing this now b/c I'm not in the best of moods. I just got back from an elementary English conversation class that went horribly, horribly wrong. More on that later. I wanted to get caught up a bit. Not a lot has happened in the past couple of days that was worth writing about, and I thought that maybe Ian would want to write on here. By me NOT writing, I thought he would. Maybe he will sometime soon.... :)
In my last post, I said something about a drunk Japanese guy that sat next to me at the enkai. He tried to speak to me, but I didn't understand 1) Japanese 2) drunk language. We kinda had a conversation about Coke. I asked him what you call Coca Cola in Japan, and he said,"Coca Cola." I told him that in America, we call it "Coke." As it turns out, that guy is my vice principal at the elementary school. Imagine my surprise when I went there for the first time on Wednesday, and he walks into the teacher's room! Haha! How often is it that the first time you meet your boss, he or she is drunk?? The first thing he said to me on Wednesday was, "Coke!"
I know I've said it before, but I'll say it again. I don't know what's going on here. Pretty much the majority of the time, I have no idea what I'm supposed to do or what's going on at the office. At the junior high, it's not too bad b/c the English teacher speaks pretty well and other co-workers know bits and pieces of English. At the elementary school, everyone is extremely nice, but no one speaks English. Imagine how difficult it is for someone to explain something in one language and you try to figure it out in another language. I usually celebrate the small victories. For example, if I hear someone say "juu ichi," I know that they're talking about eleven. Eleven students? Eleven fish? Eleven dancing elephants? That part I'm not sure, but I do know that something in that sentence is eleven. :)
I don't care how long I live in Japan, I'm never going to get used to squat toilets. Whoever had the bright idea to put a porcelain hole in the ground was not a nice person. Luckily, in both schools, I have at least one normal toilet, so I always use that one. However, it sucks to use the bathroom in other places and be confronted with that darn squat toilet. Ian told me, "Isn't it the same? You squat over the normal toilet in public. How is it different?" The difference is the simple. With a squat toilet, you are literally on the ground using the bathroom. Ugh.
On to tonight.....blarg! It was horrible. I knew that I had to do.....something at the BOE at 7:00PM. I have it written on my calendar as "I don't know what at BOE 7:00PM". I thought I was introducing myself to people tonight. I showed my schedule to my English teacher, and she said it was a composition class. When I arrived at the BOE, my supervisor showed me to the room where six elementary school students and two adults (including one of my co-workers at the BOE) sat around a table. I thought that there was an English teacher, and I would be the cool American introducing herself and kindly take a seat as the teacher continued the lesson. As it turned out, it was a conversation class, and I WAS the teacher. The class was from 7-8:30PM, and I waited until 7:10PM. Since there wasn't a teacher, it was then that I realized what was in store for me. :( I gave a self-introduction. Some of the kids knew me already b/c they'd seen me around town or at elementary school events. So when I said my name and asked if they knew my husband's name, they said, "IAN!" lol. I drew a family tree on the board, map of the USA and showed where Kentucky and Paducah are. I drew a map of Japan on the opposite side of the board to show the distance between the two countries. I said my hobbies. At this point in the night, I looked at the clock. Ten minutes had gone by. It was only 7:20PM. The next hour and ten minutes quite possibly was the longest of my life. Since I had nothing planned b/c I didn't know I was going to teach, I had to make stuff up on the spot. I asked about favorite colors, sports, movies, TV shows, if they had brothers and sisters, etc, etc, etc. The elementary school students were very hyper and chatted constantly. I don't know any Japanese words to tell them to be quiet, so it was very disruptive. The elementary school students didn't know a lot of English, but the adults seemed more advanced, so I wasn't sure how to balance conversations between the two. There were huge chunks of time when the students just chatted among themselves b/c I had no idea what to say. Two of the girls preformed a song and dance number for the class by a famous Japanese pop group, and the boys showed me some of their judo moves. I sang part of a Lady Gaga song and preformed an old high school cheer. Gah. It was a ridiculously horrible class. I felt like a big fat dumb-dumb. When we left, everyone said, "See you next time." Awesome. Just awesome. There's a next time! :( Blarg.
In my last post, I said something about a drunk Japanese guy that sat next to me at the enkai. He tried to speak to me, but I didn't understand 1) Japanese 2) drunk language. We kinda had a conversation about Coke. I asked him what you call Coca Cola in Japan, and he said,"Coca Cola." I told him that in America, we call it "Coke." As it turns out, that guy is my vice principal at the elementary school. Imagine my surprise when I went there for the first time on Wednesday, and he walks into the teacher's room! Haha! How often is it that the first time you meet your boss, he or she is drunk?? The first thing he said to me on Wednesday was, "Coke!"
I know I've said it before, but I'll say it again. I don't know what's going on here. Pretty much the majority of the time, I have no idea what I'm supposed to do or what's going on at the office. At the junior high, it's not too bad b/c the English teacher speaks pretty well and other co-workers know bits and pieces of English. At the elementary school, everyone is extremely nice, but no one speaks English. Imagine how difficult it is for someone to explain something in one language and you try to figure it out in another language. I usually celebrate the small victories. For example, if I hear someone say "juu ichi," I know that they're talking about eleven. Eleven students? Eleven fish? Eleven dancing elephants? That part I'm not sure, but I do know that something in that sentence is eleven. :)
I don't care how long I live in Japan, I'm never going to get used to squat toilets. Whoever had the bright idea to put a porcelain hole in the ground was not a nice person. Luckily, in both schools, I have at least one normal toilet, so I always use that one. However, it sucks to use the bathroom in other places and be confronted with that darn squat toilet. Ian told me, "Isn't it the same? You squat over the normal toilet in public. How is it different?" The difference is the simple. With a squat toilet, you are literally on the ground using the bathroom. Ugh.
On to tonight.....blarg! It was horrible. I knew that I had to do.....something at the BOE at 7:00PM. I have it written on my calendar as "I don't know what at BOE 7:00PM". I thought I was introducing myself to people tonight. I showed my schedule to my English teacher, and she said it was a composition class. When I arrived at the BOE, my supervisor showed me to the room where six elementary school students and two adults (including one of my co-workers at the BOE) sat around a table. I thought that there was an English teacher, and I would be the cool American introducing herself and kindly take a seat as the teacher continued the lesson. As it turned out, it was a conversation class, and I WAS the teacher. The class was from 7-8:30PM, and I waited until 7:10PM. Since there wasn't a teacher, it was then that I realized what was in store for me. :( I gave a self-introduction. Some of the kids knew me already b/c they'd seen me around town or at elementary school events. So when I said my name and asked if they knew my husband's name, they said, "IAN!" lol. I drew a family tree on the board, map of the USA and showed where Kentucky and Paducah are. I drew a map of Japan on the opposite side of the board to show the distance between the two countries. I said my hobbies. At this point in the night, I looked at the clock. Ten minutes had gone by. It was only 7:20PM. The next hour and ten minutes quite possibly was the longest of my life. Since I had nothing planned b/c I didn't know I was going to teach, I had to make stuff up on the spot. I asked about favorite colors, sports, movies, TV shows, if they had brothers and sisters, etc, etc, etc. The elementary school students were very hyper and chatted constantly. I don't know any Japanese words to tell them to be quiet, so it was very disruptive. The elementary school students didn't know a lot of English, but the adults seemed more advanced, so I wasn't sure how to balance conversations between the two. There were huge chunks of time when the students just chatted among themselves b/c I had no idea what to say. Two of the girls preformed a song and dance number for the class by a famous Japanese pop group, and the boys showed me some of their judo moves. I sang part of a Lady Gaga song and preformed an old high school cheer. Gah. It was a ridiculously horrible class. I felt like a big fat dumb-dumb. When we left, everyone said, "See you next time." Awesome. Just awesome. There's a next time! :( Blarg.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Our address
I'm sure several of you have been wondering what our address is. I feel relatively safe putting it out there for the whole world to see b/c you'll have to fly halfway around the world if you want to stalk me, and everyone in town already knows where the foreigners live, so it's not such a big deal. We love to get snail mail, so please send us some if you so please!
Melissa (and/or) Ian Reed
868-0612 Yunomae-machi
Kuma-gun, Kumamoto-ken
Japan
If you have labels with your name already printed on them, don't forget to write USA below it. If for some reason it doesn't make it, it will be returned to the sender that way. If you don't have USA on the return address, they're not going to know where Paducah, KY (or wherever) is!
For some reason, the letters that my parents and aunt sent were delivered to me at the BOE. I'm not sure if it's b/c I wasn't at home at the time or what exactly, but don't fear. If it gets to Yunomae, it'll get to us. Like I said, we're the only foreigners in town, so if they see crazy looking foreign mail, they'll know it's for us! :)
It's takes about a full week to get things from one side of the world to the other if you send it normally.
Melissa (and/or) Ian Reed
868-0612 Yunomae-machi
Kuma-gun, Kumamoto-ken
Japan
If you have labels with your name already printed on them, don't forget to write USA below it. If for some reason it doesn't make it, it will be returned to the sender that way. If you don't have USA on the return address, they're not going to know where Paducah, KY (or wherever) is!
For some reason, the letters that my parents and aunt sent were delivered to me at the BOE. I'm not sure if it's b/c I wasn't at home at the time or what exactly, but don't fear. If it gets to Yunomae, it'll get to us. Like I said, we're the only foreigners in town, so if they see crazy looking foreign mail, they'll know it's for us! :)
It's takes about a full week to get things from one side of the world to the other if you send it normally.
Monday, August 22, 2011
Never a dull moment in Japan!
Whew! It has been one busy day! We had English camp this morning in Taragi, tour of shrines and volleyball tournament this afternoon/evening with elementary and junior high teachers, and my first enkai (Japanese drinking party) tonight. We were gone today from about 8:50AM to 9:30PM.
My day didn't start off so well. When I woke up this morning, I felt really sick and a little dizzy. (Before anyone begins the pregnancy jokes, I'm going to let you know that it's 100% not possible for me to be pregnant.) I could barely stand up w/o feeling like I could get sick. I'm not sure what that was about, but after I ate a piece of toast that Ian forced on me, I felt much better.
I love English camp. I told Ian that I wish we could do it everyday! We assembled in Taragi, which is the next town over from Yunomae. The kids were really cute and nervous. After speeches from the mayor and superintendent, we loaded buses for the "camp site," which turned out to be an old school. They said that the school closed b/c there were only two students there, lol. Imagine that! When we got there, we had to play an introductory game were person 1 stands up and says, "My name is Sarah." Person 2 says, "My name is John. Her name is Sarah." Person 3 says, "My name is Jane, his name is John, and her name is Sarah," etc, etc. Easy, right? If the names were Sarah, John, and Jane, yes. However, Japanese names are EXTREMELY difficult for me to remember, lol. After the introductory game, we made name tags and were supposed to make a picture of something on it. I asked my group what I should draw, and one girl told me a dog. My art skills suck. When I showed them the dog, they laughed. One girl said, "alien?" Ian said it looked like a mukade (annoying and creepy Japanese centipede). To avoid confusion, I wrote "dog" above my drawing of a dog. Lunch was prepared for us, and after lunch, we talked a lot with the other ALTs in the area.
Ian and I had to leave English camp early b/c my board of education wanted us back for....something. We weren't exactly sure what was going on. I joke that it's going to be weird coming back to the States whenever I do b/c I'll actually understand what everyone tells me! I definitely won't be able to use the excuse of "Wakarimasen" (I don't understand). We waited for a bit at the board of education, and then they ushered us out to a bus. We had no idea where we were going. I recognized a few faces of teachers I had seen at the junior high and elementary schools. As it turns out, we were on a tour of the Buddhist or Shinto shrines in the area. It was really cool. We stopped at three different ones. I don't really understand much about the religions, but some of the teachers that could speak English explained a little. The first temple we went to was for breastfeeding mothers, the second for women hoping to marry and ......something about water. The last one, I have no idea what it was for, but it was really cool b/c there were these two HUGE chain saw carved dragons on either side of the temple. They were amazing!
After our temple tour, we headed back to the BOE, which happens to be part of the Manga Museum. Manga is like anime. I don't really get it or care for it, but it's HUGE in Japan. We looked at all of the anime and went to change our clothes for the volleyball games. I suck at sports, yet for some reason, Japanese people think that all Americans are awesome at each and every sport. I was the kid that stood in the back of gym class hoping that the ball (in whatever sport was being played) would never reach me. That strategy is coming back to bite me b/c I suck at EVERYTHING I play, and the Japanese LOVE to play sports. My team won 2 rounds (no thanks to me) and lost 1 game. It was fun playing. I enjoyed it, but I suck. I felt sorry for my team. I always feel like the handicap on any team. Sorry, Japan! Ian's really good, though. He's the cool American that can actually play sports, and I'm the dumb-dumb in the back hitting the ball out of bounds, lol.
After the volleyball game, we had our first enkai experience. Whew! The Japanese like to drink! An enkai is basically a big drinking/socializing party. The Japanese work place is a bit more rigid than the American work place, so this is a time to let loose. What happens at the enkai stays at the enkai. :) This statement is completely true. At orientation, they told us that we'll probably see co-workers, supervisors, and teachers absolutely blitzed, but the following morning, it's like nothing happened. There were speeches at first, then a big toast, and then the eating and drinking began. Once people found out that I didn't drink, I got offered Coke. Yay! Once people found out that Ian drank, I felt sorry for him. They kept offering him more and more and more drinks. One of the junior high teachers that I work with gave him a big glass of "spirits" and said, "challenge." Once Ian finished that, she mixed him another drink like it was nothing, lol. Needless to say, Ian went to bed early tonight. ;) At an enkai, you socialize. We never had to get up to move around b/c people kept coming to talk to us. At one point in time, Ian left to go to the bathroom, and a very drunk Japanese co-worker sat beside me and began talking. I wanted to tell him that a) I don't understand drunk words in any language, and b) I don't understand Japanese. Give up talking to me now. haha. A lot of people kept asking about America. It's so easy to say that we're from Kentucky b/c everyone associates Kentucky w/Kentucky Fried Chicken. Thank you, Colonel Sanders! :) We started talking about pizza and the different toppings here and in the USA. I said that my favorite pizza is ham and pineapple. They were blown away that we put pineapple on our pizza. They put shrimp, corn, and potatoes on a pizza, but for some reason, pineapple blows their mind, lol.
There is seriously never a dull moment in Japan. Each day is an adventure....something new and different. I know this feeling will probably eventually go away, but right now, I'm going to continue to ride this high. Japan is pretty amazing!
My day didn't start off so well. When I woke up this morning, I felt really sick and a little dizzy. (Before anyone begins the pregnancy jokes, I'm going to let you know that it's 100% not possible for me to be pregnant.) I could barely stand up w/o feeling like I could get sick. I'm not sure what that was about, but after I ate a piece of toast that Ian forced on me, I felt much better.
I love English camp. I told Ian that I wish we could do it everyday! We assembled in Taragi, which is the next town over from Yunomae. The kids were really cute and nervous. After speeches from the mayor and superintendent, we loaded buses for the "camp site," which turned out to be an old school. They said that the school closed b/c there were only two students there, lol. Imagine that! When we got there, we had to play an introductory game were person 1 stands up and says, "My name is Sarah." Person 2 says, "My name is John. Her name is Sarah." Person 3 says, "My name is Jane, his name is John, and her name is Sarah," etc, etc. Easy, right? If the names were Sarah, John, and Jane, yes. However, Japanese names are EXTREMELY difficult for me to remember, lol. After the introductory game, we made name tags and were supposed to make a picture of something on it. I asked my group what I should draw, and one girl told me a dog. My art skills suck. When I showed them the dog, they laughed. One girl said, "alien?" Ian said it looked like a mukade (annoying and creepy Japanese centipede). To avoid confusion, I wrote "dog" above my drawing of a dog. Lunch was prepared for us, and after lunch, we talked a lot with the other ALTs in the area.
Ian and I had to leave English camp early b/c my board of education wanted us back for....something. We weren't exactly sure what was going on. I joke that it's going to be weird coming back to the States whenever I do b/c I'll actually understand what everyone tells me! I definitely won't be able to use the excuse of "Wakarimasen" (I don't understand). We waited for a bit at the board of education, and then they ushered us out to a bus. We had no idea where we were going. I recognized a few faces of teachers I had seen at the junior high and elementary schools. As it turns out, we were on a tour of the Buddhist or Shinto shrines in the area. It was really cool. We stopped at three different ones. I don't really understand much about the religions, but some of the teachers that could speak English explained a little. The first temple we went to was for breastfeeding mothers, the second for women hoping to marry and ......something about water. The last one, I have no idea what it was for, but it was really cool b/c there were these two HUGE chain saw carved dragons on either side of the temple. They were amazing!
After our temple tour, we headed back to the BOE, which happens to be part of the Manga Museum. Manga is like anime. I don't really get it or care for it, but it's HUGE in Japan. We looked at all of the anime and went to change our clothes for the volleyball games. I suck at sports, yet for some reason, Japanese people think that all Americans are awesome at each and every sport. I was the kid that stood in the back of gym class hoping that the ball (in whatever sport was being played) would never reach me. That strategy is coming back to bite me b/c I suck at EVERYTHING I play, and the Japanese LOVE to play sports. My team won 2 rounds (no thanks to me) and lost 1 game. It was fun playing. I enjoyed it, but I suck. I felt sorry for my team. I always feel like the handicap on any team. Sorry, Japan! Ian's really good, though. He's the cool American that can actually play sports, and I'm the dumb-dumb in the back hitting the ball out of bounds, lol.
After the volleyball game, we had our first enkai experience. Whew! The Japanese like to drink! An enkai is basically a big drinking/socializing party. The Japanese work place is a bit more rigid than the American work place, so this is a time to let loose. What happens at the enkai stays at the enkai. :) This statement is completely true. At orientation, they told us that we'll probably see co-workers, supervisors, and teachers absolutely blitzed, but the following morning, it's like nothing happened. There were speeches at first, then a big toast, and then the eating and drinking began. Once people found out that I didn't drink, I got offered Coke. Yay! Once people found out that Ian drank, I felt sorry for him. They kept offering him more and more and more drinks. One of the junior high teachers that I work with gave him a big glass of "spirits" and said, "challenge." Once Ian finished that, she mixed him another drink like it was nothing, lol. Needless to say, Ian went to bed early tonight. ;) At an enkai, you socialize. We never had to get up to move around b/c people kept coming to talk to us. At one point in time, Ian left to go to the bathroom, and a very drunk Japanese co-worker sat beside me and began talking. I wanted to tell him that a) I don't understand drunk words in any language, and b) I don't understand Japanese. Give up talking to me now. haha. A lot of people kept asking about America. It's so easy to say that we're from Kentucky b/c everyone associates Kentucky w/Kentucky Fried Chicken. Thank you, Colonel Sanders! :) We started talking about pizza and the different toppings here and in the USA. I said that my favorite pizza is ham and pineapple. They were blown away that we put pineapple on our pizza. They put shrimp, corn, and potatoes on a pizza, but for some reason, pineapple blows their mind, lol.
There is seriously never a dull moment in Japan. Each day is an adventure....something new and different. I know this feeling will probably eventually go away, but right now, I'm going to continue to ride this high. Japan is pretty amazing!
Sunday, August 21, 2011
The random generosity of the Japanese
Yesterday was one of those days when Ian and I thought, "This would NEVER happen in the States." We had a couple of different experiences that blew our minds.
1) After we woke up from a great night's sleep on our new full size futon, we decided to have cereal for breakfast. What I call "cereal" here is actually rice with milk and sugar on it, lol. I told Ian that the milk didn't feel very cold. He got a drink from the refrigerator and said that it was barely cool. Oh no! Our refrigerator was broken! The light on the inside was coming on, so we knew it wasn't the power, but nothing was very cold, and when I opened the freezer, I had nearly thawed out chicken. :( To top it off, we JUST went to the super market on Friday night and stocked up. I had to call my supervisor, which is always fun since she doesn't speak English, and I don't speak Japanese. Ian google translated how to say "my refrigerator is broken", so I memorized that, but she didn't understand what I was saying. Instead, I held the phone to the speaker, and let google translate do the talking, lol. She understood and told me "one minute," which meant she'd be over in a minute. I felt so bad! I think I interrupted some event b/c she brought her mother, and they were both dressed nicely. :( She looked at the refrigerator and translated on her phone that it would be 20,000 yen to fix. Ouch. That's $260! She called a repair guy, and he came very quickly. I have no idea what he said to her, but she translated on her phone that the refrigerator was 20 years old and dead-dead....as in there is no repairing it. Sawada-san told us to remove stuff from the fridge, move it, and "wait one minute" again. She left and quickly returned with what we believe was the refrigerator from her own home. It was already cool on the inside. We thanked and thanked and thanked her. I got out money to pay her, but she said that the town pays for it. Awesome! We only lost a couple of fillets of fish. Here's the beauty of this situation: all of this happened without about an hour. We called her, she came, the repair guy came, she left and returned with a new refrigerator all within the hour. That would NEVER happen in the States!!
2) We walked around town a lot yesterday. We ducked in shops, figuring out that the kanji on the outside must mean "drug store" or "bakery" or ________. I think Ian really enjoyed being out and about in town and exploring. Yay!
3) We were invited to "camp" at the elementary school last night. We had no idea what "camp" exactly meant. Were we actually sleeping outside? Did we need to pack anything? All day long, we kept asking ourselves what exactly "camping" at the elementary school meant. It turns out that "camping" is basically a lock-in. When we got there, it was supper time. The teachers and moms had prepared curry w/rice, and some noodle stuff. I made friend the other day w/one of the elementary school girls, so when she saw us, she ushered me over to sit w/her. She introduced us to her friends, got us drinks, and when we didn't have chopsticks, she got up and returned w/some. The food was delicious!! After the meal, we went down to the gym to play dodgeball. Apparently, I've never played the correct form of dodgeball. Whenever we played in elementary school, we lined up against the wall while the other team tried to hit us w/balls. Once you were hit, you were out. Apparently, this isn't how you play "true" dodgeball. Google the rules if you're really interested. They tried to explain the rules in very broken English and Japanese, but I had no idea what was going on. Ian understood. He was the cool American that was good at the game and towered above everyone else. I was the dumb American that had no idea what was going on. At one point in time, I was the only one on my team. Awesome. I felt like a dumb-dumb!
After the horrific dodgeball game, there was a scavenger hunt/haunted house thing in the school. The kids were broken down into teams and given flashlights. One by one, the teams went into the school. Teachers were hidden in classrooms and jumped out to scare them. They had to find certain teachers and obtain their signature. It was a fun experience! Ian and I discussed how it's sad that something like that would probably never happen in the USA. Someone would trip and fall, and then the parents would sue the school or something stupid like that. It's just not like that here. We got separated from our group, so we made our way back to the gym. Only the moms and two young girls were in there. Those girls were the CUTEST! One was scared of me, but the other one I played frisbee with. She was ADORABLE. The lock-in wrapped up around 10pm. When we were leaving, one of the teachers asked us in broken English if we liked "beefu" We said, yes, we liked beef. She lead us to the refrigerator and gave us about 2 lbs. of beef that were left over from supper. Remember, beef is really expensive over here! We thanked her and said what a wonderful surprise that was!
On our way home, we passed by Mr. Fuijita's house. Mr. and Mrs. Fuijita are close neighbors and have basically adopted me. He was the one to invite me to the town festival, and last Sunday, as I walked to the super market, he invited me to a pizza party at his house that night. :) As we passed by, we heard voices. They were having another party. They called us over. It was another pizza party. They invited us to make our own pizza and put it in the brick oven. Yay! I had corn, potatoes, tomatoes, and cheese on my pizza. Ian had salami, corn, and cheese. Other toppings included cabbage, shrimp, and tough chorizo-looking sausage. I know those toppings sound weird, but when in Rome.... They pulled us up chairs and basically allowed us to crash their party for a while, lol.
I know I've said it before, but I'll say it again. People are soooooooooooooooooo nice here!! Ian and I have been talking about it a lot lately, and it will be really weird to go back to the States where you can't always trust people, you have to lock your bike, people lock their cars (people here often leave them running while inside the grocery), etc. Safety here is AMAZING. People here care about people. They will literally give you the shirt off their back. Don't tell me mother, but I think I could stay here for multiple years... :)
1) After we woke up from a great night's sleep on our new full size futon, we decided to have cereal for breakfast. What I call "cereal" here is actually rice with milk and sugar on it, lol. I told Ian that the milk didn't feel very cold. He got a drink from the refrigerator and said that it was barely cool. Oh no! Our refrigerator was broken! The light on the inside was coming on, so we knew it wasn't the power, but nothing was very cold, and when I opened the freezer, I had nearly thawed out chicken. :( To top it off, we JUST went to the super market on Friday night and stocked up. I had to call my supervisor, which is always fun since she doesn't speak English, and I don't speak Japanese. Ian google translated how to say "my refrigerator is broken", so I memorized that, but she didn't understand what I was saying. Instead, I held the phone to the speaker, and let google translate do the talking, lol. She understood and told me "one minute," which meant she'd be over in a minute. I felt so bad! I think I interrupted some event b/c she brought her mother, and they were both dressed nicely. :( She looked at the refrigerator and translated on her phone that it would be 20,000 yen to fix. Ouch. That's $260! She called a repair guy, and he came very quickly. I have no idea what he said to her, but she translated on her phone that the refrigerator was 20 years old and dead-dead....as in there is no repairing it. Sawada-san told us to remove stuff from the fridge, move it, and "wait one minute" again. She left and quickly returned with what we believe was the refrigerator from her own home. It was already cool on the inside. We thanked and thanked and thanked her. I got out money to pay her, but she said that the town pays for it. Awesome! We only lost a couple of fillets of fish. Here's the beauty of this situation: all of this happened without about an hour. We called her, she came, the repair guy came, she left and returned with a new refrigerator all within the hour. That would NEVER happen in the States!!
2) We walked around town a lot yesterday. We ducked in shops, figuring out that the kanji on the outside must mean "drug store" or "bakery" or ________. I think Ian really enjoyed being out and about in town and exploring. Yay!
3) We were invited to "camp" at the elementary school last night. We had no idea what "camp" exactly meant. Were we actually sleeping outside? Did we need to pack anything? All day long, we kept asking ourselves what exactly "camping" at the elementary school meant. It turns out that "camping" is basically a lock-in. When we got there, it was supper time. The teachers and moms had prepared curry w/rice, and some noodle stuff. I made friend the other day w/one of the elementary school girls, so when she saw us, she ushered me over to sit w/her. She introduced us to her friends, got us drinks, and when we didn't have chopsticks, she got up and returned w/some. The food was delicious!! After the meal, we went down to the gym to play dodgeball. Apparently, I've never played the correct form of dodgeball. Whenever we played in elementary school, we lined up against the wall while the other team tried to hit us w/balls. Once you were hit, you were out. Apparently, this isn't how you play "true" dodgeball. Google the rules if you're really interested. They tried to explain the rules in very broken English and Japanese, but I had no idea what was going on. Ian understood. He was the cool American that was good at the game and towered above everyone else. I was the dumb American that had no idea what was going on. At one point in time, I was the only one on my team. Awesome. I felt like a dumb-dumb!
After the horrific dodgeball game, there was a scavenger hunt/haunted house thing in the school. The kids were broken down into teams and given flashlights. One by one, the teams went into the school. Teachers were hidden in classrooms and jumped out to scare them. They had to find certain teachers and obtain their signature. It was a fun experience! Ian and I discussed how it's sad that something like that would probably never happen in the USA. Someone would trip and fall, and then the parents would sue the school or something stupid like that. It's just not like that here. We got separated from our group, so we made our way back to the gym. Only the moms and two young girls were in there. Those girls were the CUTEST! One was scared of me, but the other one I played frisbee with. She was ADORABLE. The lock-in wrapped up around 10pm. When we were leaving, one of the teachers asked us in broken English if we liked "beefu" We said, yes, we liked beef. She lead us to the refrigerator and gave us about 2 lbs. of beef that were left over from supper. Remember, beef is really expensive over here! We thanked her and said what a wonderful surprise that was!
On our way home, we passed by Mr. Fuijita's house. Mr. and Mrs. Fuijita are close neighbors and have basically adopted me. He was the one to invite me to the town festival, and last Sunday, as I walked to the super market, he invited me to a pizza party at his house that night. :) As we passed by, we heard voices. They were having another party. They called us over. It was another pizza party. They invited us to make our own pizza and put it in the brick oven. Yay! I had corn, potatoes, tomatoes, and cheese on my pizza. Ian had salami, corn, and cheese. Other toppings included cabbage, shrimp, and tough chorizo-looking sausage. I know those toppings sound weird, but when in Rome.... They pulled us up chairs and basically allowed us to crash their party for a while, lol.
I know I've said it before, but I'll say it again. People are soooooooooooooooooo nice here!! Ian and I have been talking about it a lot lately, and it will be really weird to go back to the States where you can't always trust people, you have to lock your bike, people lock their cars (people here often leave them running while inside the grocery), etc. Safety here is AMAZING. People here care about people. They will literally give you the shirt off their back. Don't tell me mother, but I think I could stay here for multiple years... :)
Friday, August 19, 2011
And so the Reeds begin a life in Japan...
Today was the first of many normal days to come. I woke up and went to work while Ian stayed at home. Ian's thrilled about this idea. While it'll be good and great for him at first, I'm sure there will come a time when he's bored to tears. Today was perfect, though. He made me breakfast as I got ready, and we ate together before I left. I asked him to pick up the remaining stuff he needed to unpack and clean up a bit. He did! I was incredibly happy when I came home from work today, and the bed was made, everything was put away, and the dishes were done. In addition, after we went to the super market tonight, he made me dinner. Perfect!
Since today was my first day at the junior high, it was like having a first day of work all over again. I met new teachers and co-workers. Once again, everyone is VERY nice and welcoming! All of the students seemed interested to see the new American teacher. A group of girls came into the office mid-morning just to talk to me. I asked them simple questions like their names, favorite movie, favorite subject (one said English, woot!), etc. After my grand tour of the three story junior high, I sat at my desk all morning looking at textbooks. Some of the readings from the textbooks are....awkward to say the least. I'll show you one. This is taken from the first junior high English textbook. It's accompanied w/pictures, but I think you'll find just the words as funny/awkward/weird w/o the pictures:
One day a hungry lion slowly came out of the forest. He wanted some food.
He sat on the grass and looked around. He waited for a long time.
The lion saw a rabbit under a tree. He ran after the rabbit.
Just then, a deer ran in front of the lion. The lion wanted a big dinner, so he ran after the deer.
The deer ran away very quickly. The rabbit ran away, too. So the hungry lion got nothing.
Sometimes we are like this lion.
So wait....huh? If anyone would like to offer an explanation to that story, I'm willing to take it. Another story revolved around a tree in Hiroshima. The tree told a tale about the bombing and how a little girl and boy crawled under the tree after the bomb dropped and died there. Sweet, right? Other than reading creepy stories, my day was fun. This afternoon around 3:40, the school nurse told me that it was "break time" and took me to her office. All of the other ladies in the office came w/us and had tea time. We had little pieces of cake and grapes with our tea. I noticed that no one else ate the skin of the grapes. When I (kinda) asked why they didn't, they noticed that I had been eating the skin of the grapes and looked horrified. lol. Most of them didn't know much English, but we managed to communicate pretty well. They were very curious about me, my husband, life in America, etc. It was really fun to (kinda) discuss those things. The vice principal came in later, and it was very interesting to talk with him. He loves American sports. He doesn't speak a lot of English, but I heard key words like NBA, MLB, football, Dallas Cowboys, etc. He said that he went to Texas and Disneyworld 12 years ago. The school nurse got out an atlas, and he pointed out to everyone where those places are located. I showed them where Kentucky was along with major locations that they would know like NYC and LA.
On my way home, my supervisor passed me and stopped to let me in. I was nearly home, but she said "big bed" and pointed to the trunk. I wasn't really sure what this meant, but when we got home, she showed me what was in the trunk....a full size futon!!! I'm not sure if all of you are aware, but Ian and I have been sharing a twin bed for the past two nights. It's been.....cozy to say the least. Futons in Japan are not like futons in the States. It's basically like a futon mattress that goes on the floor. You have to pick it up and air it out everyday. We were soooooooooooo excited to have it! We would have made due with the twin bed, but it'll be nice to have the comfort of not rolling over and thumping the wall now. :) I had no idea that we were getting it. Have I mentioned that Japanese people are amazing??
Ian and I went to the super market tonight. Ian is soooooooooooooo much better than me at guessing what things are. He's a really good cook and knows what to look for. I can cook if I follow a recipe. However, I can't really follow American recipes here b/c a) Everything is metric. How many grams are in a teaspoon??? b) I can't find common ingredients. They might be at the super market. but since everything's in kanji, that doesn't mean I'll find it. :( Anyway, we loaded up two baskets. We probably spent close to $100 in groceries! I know that sounds like a lot, but we have to create a kitchen. We bought a lot of cooking staples like spices, oil, seasonings, etc. In addition, we felt like trying new things. We'd pick up something, question it, and say, "well, let's try it!" The only thing I have to be careful of is reading the label to make sure there isn't shellfish in anything. I've been lucky so far to not have an allergic reaction. "Kai" (shellfish) is one of the very few kanji I actually know. I keep a little card in my wallet that says "I have a shellfish allergy" in Japanese with the kanji and a frowning face beside it. Ha ha. I've whipped it out a couple of times to show people when I wasn't sure what was in something.
It's a little after midnight now, and I'm going to try out my new futon. Good night, dear readers!
Since today was my first day at the junior high, it was like having a first day of work all over again. I met new teachers and co-workers. Once again, everyone is VERY nice and welcoming! All of the students seemed interested to see the new American teacher. A group of girls came into the office mid-morning just to talk to me. I asked them simple questions like their names, favorite movie, favorite subject (one said English, woot!), etc. After my grand tour of the three story junior high, I sat at my desk all morning looking at textbooks. Some of the readings from the textbooks are....awkward to say the least. I'll show you one. This is taken from the first junior high English textbook. It's accompanied w/pictures, but I think you'll find just the words as funny/awkward/weird w/o the pictures:
One day a hungry lion slowly came out of the forest. He wanted some food.
He sat on the grass and looked around. He waited for a long time.
The lion saw a rabbit under a tree. He ran after the rabbit.
Just then, a deer ran in front of the lion. The lion wanted a big dinner, so he ran after the deer.
The deer ran away very quickly. The rabbit ran away, too. So the hungry lion got nothing.
Sometimes we are like this lion.
So wait....huh? If anyone would like to offer an explanation to that story, I'm willing to take it. Another story revolved around a tree in Hiroshima. The tree told a tale about the bombing and how a little girl and boy crawled under the tree after the bomb dropped and died there. Sweet, right? Other than reading creepy stories, my day was fun. This afternoon around 3:40, the school nurse told me that it was "break time" and took me to her office. All of the other ladies in the office came w/us and had tea time. We had little pieces of cake and grapes with our tea. I noticed that no one else ate the skin of the grapes. When I (kinda) asked why they didn't, they noticed that I had been eating the skin of the grapes and looked horrified. lol. Most of them didn't know much English, but we managed to communicate pretty well. They were very curious about me, my husband, life in America, etc. It was really fun to (kinda) discuss those things. The vice principal came in later, and it was very interesting to talk with him. He loves American sports. He doesn't speak a lot of English, but I heard key words like NBA, MLB, football, Dallas Cowboys, etc. He said that he went to Texas and Disneyworld 12 years ago. The school nurse got out an atlas, and he pointed out to everyone where those places are located. I showed them where Kentucky was along with major locations that they would know like NYC and LA.
On my way home, my supervisor passed me and stopped to let me in. I was nearly home, but she said "big bed" and pointed to the trunk. I wasn't really sure what this meant, but when we got home, she showed me what was in the trunk....a full size futon!!! I'm not sure if all of you are aware, but Ian and I have been sharing a twin bed for the past two nights. It's been.....cozy to say the least. Futons in Japan are not like futons in the States. It's basically like a futon mattress that goes on the floor. You have to pick it up and air it out everyday. We were soooooooooooo excited to have it! We would have made due with the twin bed, but it'll be nice to have the comfort of not rolling over and thumping the wall now. :) I had no idea that we were getting it. Have I mentioned that Japanese people are amazing??
Ian and I went to the super market tonight. Ian is soooooooooooooo much better than me at guessing what things are. He's a really good cook and knows what to look for. I can cook if I follow a recipe. However, I can't really follow American recipes here b/c a) Everything is metric. How many grams are in a teaspoon??? b) I can't find common ingredients. They might be at the super market. but since everything's in kanji, that doesn't mean I'll find it. :( Anyway, we loaded up two baskets. We probably spent close to $100 in groceries! I know that sounds like a lot, but we have to create a kitchen. We bought a lot of cooking staples like spices, oil, seasonings, etc. In addition, we felt like trying new things. We'd pick up something, question it, and say, "well, let's try it!" The only thing I have to be careful of is reading the label to make sure there isn't shellfish in anything. I've been lucky so far to not have an allergic reaction. "Kai" (shellfish) is one of the very few kanji I actually know. I keep a little card in my wallet that says "I have a shellfish allergy" in Japanese with the kanji and a frowning face beside it. Ha ha. I've whipped it out a couple of times to show people when I wasn't sure what was in something.
It's a little after midnight now, and I'm going to try out my new futon. Good night, dear readers!
Thursday, August 18, 2011
A day of "work", computer problems, and Kumamoto....never a dull moment in Japan!
Hello all. I'm sorry it's been a week since the last blog. I've had a bit of a computer issue. My computer has decided to just stop charging. As in.....it's completely dead. I had NO idea what was going on, and it's a little scary to be all the way over here, and my source of communication to the outside world is gone. :( That happened on Friday, so I had to live the weekend w/o internet. Lame. I stayed busy by cleaning house, exploring, coloring a "welcome home" banner for Ian, reading the one newspaper I had in English, and figuring out how to use my Japanese TV and DVD player. Not exactly the most entertaining weekend I've had.
Friday I went to "work". And by that I mean I went hiking in the mountains with elementary school kids. It was soooooooooooooooooooo much more fun than sitting at my desk at the BOE. I was assigned to a group of about ten kids with two teachers and myself. I'm pretty sure that I was supposed to be one of the teachers and watch out for the kids, but since I had NO IDEA what was going on, I pretty much became another kid. Blarg. It was weird being with so many kids b/c no one knew any English, and I don't know Japanese, so we couldn't really talk a lot. It was basically a day of smiles and nods, lol. We walked around the park area and after lunch headed to this lake/river area. It's nothing like the river or lake at home. By those standards, it was more of a large pond/creek area, but the water was SOOOOOO clear. I kept thinking of Daddy, who always says, "Look at how clear that water is" whenever there is a crystal clear stream in the wilderness somewhere. lol. I learned how to kayak! One of the activities that day was kayaking on the large pond. Everyone got their own kayak and headed out into the water. It was a ton of fun! How often does one get paid to play w/kids, hike, and kayak, and consider that to be a day at work? :)
On Monday, I had a little adventure. I had to go to Kumamoto City Monday-Wednesday for my prefecture orientation. Kumamoto City is about 3 hours by train, 2.5 hours by car. My supervisor told me last week that I would go by train. Monday morning was very rainy, so I drove to work. She drove me to Hitoyoshi, the nearest large(ish) city, where I got on the train. She bought my ticket for me, showed me my platform, and waited to make sure that I boarded the right train. Have I mentioned how wonderful she is to me? :) It's only about 1.5 hours from Hitoyoshi to Kumamoto City, and we left around 10 AM. I had to be at orientation by 1:30PM. More than enough time, right? Wrong. Everything was good and great until we stopped on the tracks. They made an announcement on the speakers, but I didn't understand it. People got off the train and walked around the tracks, so I knew we weren't going anywhere for a while. We were at that tiny little train station for a total of 2.5 hours. By this time, I'm late for orientation. I don't know what the heck to do. The train started again, but stopped about 10 minutes down the track and sat again. I finally asked the guy across from me if he could speak English. He said a little, so I asked him if there was a problem with the train. He said that due to the weather (very rainy and stormy), we couldn't go, and they didn't know how long it would take. It could be hours. My heart seriously sank. A little while later, my supervisor called me on my American cell phone since I don't have a Japanese one yet. I tried to explain to her that I was still on the train, but she wasn't understanding. I told the guy across from me that my supervisor was on the phone, and would he please explain to her what was going on. He kindly accepted the phone. My supervisor had me get off the train and came to pick me up. The guy was nice enough to walk me off the train, told the conductor what was going on, and the conductor told me that I could have my ticket refunded in Kumamoto. The kindness of strangers! I had to sit at that middle of nowhere station for a hour and a half in the pouring rain, lightning, and thunder before my supervisor and another guy from work could pick me up. My supervisor brought me a sandwich and a bottle of water to eat/drink. :) The ride into Kumamoto was terrifying. We had to take this tiny narrow two lane road with mountain rock on one side and a raging rain swollen river on the other side. In a lot of places, there was water several inches deep on the road. We finally made it to Kumamoto at around 6:30 PM. A trip that should have taken 2.5 hours ended up taking the entire day. Luckily, I arrived just in time for the welcome party, so everyone was like, "Relax! You've had a rough day!"
I met Ian in Kumamoto, which was very exciting!! We originally planned to meet at the train station on Wednesday at 4:30, but he called me on Tuesday night saying that his ATM card wouldn't work, and he only had about 100 yen to his name (about $1.30). Instead, we planned to meet at the bus station before I had to go to my last day of orientation. His bus was a bit late, but luckily we were able to meet, and he stayed in my building in the lobby while I had orientation. We walked to a nearby combini (like a gas station minus the gas part) for lunch, and I wrapped up orientation around 3:30. Poor Ian. I know he was incredibly tired. He had been traveling since 1:30ish Monday morning until 8:30 PM when we finally made it to Yunomae. He was super happy to get a shower, brush his teeth, and go to bed!!! I took off today to be with him and show him around town. He spent the morning unpacking and skyping family members. At 1ish, I took him to the BOE to meet my co-workers. We made peanut butter cookies and brought those to pass out to everyone. I asked my supervisor how to obtain Ian's alien registration card, but she volunteered herself to take us. She is seriously the best! After that, I showed Ian where the bank and post office were, and we grabbed lunch at another combini. We had a cute little picnic lunch in the park and explored the park. It's really fun to see Ian be so excited about everything new and different. I've been here for two weeks, so the size of the dragonflies, amount of spiders, and cuteness of houses are old news, but for him, it's all new and exciting. It's really fun to watch him be so amazed! :)
I think that's long enough, and hopefully you're still reading by this point, lol. I'll post pictures and a few videos soon to facebook, so make sure to check that out!
Friday I went to "work". And by that I mean I went hiking in the mountains with elementary school kids. It was soooooooooooooooooooo much more fun than sitting at my desk at the BOE. I was assigned to a group of about ten kids with two teachers and myself. I'm pretty sure that I was supposed to be one of the teachers and watch out for the kids, but since I had NO IDEA what was going on, I pretty much became another kid. Blarg. It was weird being with so many kids b/c no one knew any English, and I don't know Japanese, so we couldn't really talk a lot. It was basically a day of smiles and nods, lol. We walked around the park area and after lunch headed to this lake/river area. It's nothing like the river or lake at home. By those standards, it was more of a large pond/creek area, but the water was SOOOOOO clear. I kept thinking of Daddy, who always says, "Look at how clear that water is" whenever there is a crystal clear stream in the wilderness somewhere. lol. I learned how to kayak! One of the activities that day was kayaking on the large pond. Everyone got their own kayak and headed out into the water. It was a ton of fun! How often does one get paid to play w/kids, hike, and kayak, and consider that to be a day at work? :)
On Monday, I had a little adventure. I had to go to Kumamoto City Monday-Wednesday for my prefecture orientation. Kumamoto City is about 3 hours by train, 2.5 hours by car. My supervisor told me last week that I would go by train. Monday morning was very rainy, so I drove to work. She drove me to Hitoyoshi, the nearest large(ish) city, where I got on the train. She bought my ticket for me, showed me my platform, and waited to make sure that I boarded the right train. Have I mentioned how wonderful she is to me? :) It's only about 1.5 hours from Hitoyoshi to Kumamoto City, and we left around 10 AM. I had to be at orientation by 1:30PM. More than enough time, right? Wrong. Everything was good and great until we stopped on the tracks. They made an announcement on the speakers, but I didn't understand it. People got off the train and walked around the tracks, so I knew we weren't going anywhere for a while. We were at that tiny little train station for a total of 2.5 hours. By this time, I'm late for orientation. I don't know what the heck to do. The train started again, but stopped about 10 minutes down the track and sat again. I finally asked the guy across from me if he could speak English. He said a little, so I asked him if there was a problem with the train. He said that due to the weather (very rainy and stormy), we couldn't go, and they didn't know how long it would take. It could be hours. My heart seriously sank. A little while later, my supervisor called me on my American cell phone since I don't have a Japanese one yet. I tried to explain to her that I was still on the train, but she wasn't understanding. I told the guy across from me that my supervisor was on the phone, and would he please explain to her what was going on. He kindly accepted the phone. My supervisor had me get off the train and came to pick me up. The guy was nice enough to walk me off the train, told the conductor what was going on, and the conductor told me that I could have my ticket refunded in Kumamoto. The kindness of strangers! I had to sit at that middle of nowhere station for a hour and a half in the pouring rain, lightning, and thunder before my supervisor and another guy from work could pick me up. My supervisor brought me a sandwich and a bottle of water to eat/drink. :) The ride into Kumamoto was terrifying. We had to take this tiny narrow two lane road with mountain rock on one side and a raging rain swollen river on the other side. In a lot of places, there was water several inches deep on the road. We finally made it to Kumamoto at around 6:30 PM. A trip that should have taken 2.5 hours ended up taking the entire day. Luckily, I arrived just in time for the welcome party, so everyone was like, "Relax! You've had a rough day!"
I met Ian in Kumamoto, which was very exciting!! We originally planned to meet at the train station on Wednesday at 4:30, but he called me on Tuesday night saying that his ATM card wouldn't work, and he only had about 100 yen to his name (about $1.30). Instead, we planned to meet at the bus station before I had to go to my last day of orientation. His bus was a bit late, but luckily we were able to meet, and he stayed in my building in the lobby while I had orientation. We walked to a nearby combini (like a gas station minus the gas part) for lunch, and I wrapped up orientation around 3:30. Poor Ian. I know he was incredibly tired. He had been traveling since 1:30ish Monday morning until 8:30 PM when we finally made it to Yunomae. He was super happy to get a shower, brush his teeth, and go to bed!!! I took off today to be with him and show him around town. He spent the morning unpacking and skyping family members. At 1ish, I took him to the BOE to meet my co-workers. We made peanut butter cookies and brought those to pass out to everyone. I asked my supervisor how to obtain Ian's alien registration card, but she volunteered herself to take us. She is seriously the best! After that, I showed Ian where the bank and post office were, and we grabbed lunch at another combini. We had a cute little picnic lunch in the park and explored the park. It's really fun to see Ian be so excited about everything new and different. I've been here for two weeks, so the size of the dragonflies, amount of spiders, and cuteness of houses are old news, but for him, it's all new and exciting. It's really fun to watch him be so amazed! :)
I think that's long enough, and hopefully you're still reading by this point, lol. I'll post pictures and a few videos soon to facebook, so make sure to check that out!
Thursday, August 11, 2011
Car-tastrophe
Sometimes I feel like a big fat failure in Japan. The following is an example of why I feel that way.
I said in my previous blog that I had to drive to Taragi (a neighboring town) to attend an informational meeting about English camp yesterday morning. My supervisor drove me there the day before, and just in case I got lost, printed off maps for me. The town office was very easy to find, so that part didn't worry me. The driving part did. I feel like I'm 16 again! I get soooooooooo nervous behind the wheel!! This was my first time driving alone in Japan, and this is what happened:
My supervisor told me to leave at 9AM, and that would give me more than plenty of time to get there. I went out to my car at around 8:50. My Japanese car is......special. It's tiny, old, and has plenty of character. The lock is very difficult to get into. It needs some WD-40. What's the Japanese equivalent of WD-40, lol??? Once I got in, I tried to start the car. It wouldn't turn. It wasn't b/c the engine or battery was bad, I just couldn't get the key to turned. I tried and tried and tried. I thought to myself, what the heck am I going to do?!?! I saw a lady in the parking lot and pulled her over to help. I'm pretty sure that it was the sheer grace of God that started that car.
I made it to Taragi fine. The meeting went well, and I met two other JETs that live in neighboring towns. My real problem started after the meeting. I went back out to the parking lot to leave, and silly me, I thought my car would actually start. Nope. Same thing. I tried and tried and tried. It felt like the key was locked in the ignition. I tried mashing the brake, taking the parking brake off, jiggling the steering wheel, anything that might magically make my car start. Nothing. Here's my situation: I'm in a town where I don't know anyone, and I can't communicate with people. I don't have a cell phone yet, but even if I did and called my supervisor, what could I say? Car broke? (Remember, she doesn't speak much English, and I don't speak my Japanese.)
I saw a guy walking in the parking lot, so I asked him to help me. The good thing about Japan is that you can do that. If my car broke down in the USA, I wouldn't do that! I'd call someone to come and help me, and even if someone did ask if I needed help, I would say, "no, thanks. Help's on the way!" The guy was reeeeeeeally nice to me. He tried to start the car but couldn't. He told me, "One minute," and went back inside the town office building. He returned with two other guys. Both guys tried to start it. Nothing. They were looking at the tires, engine, gages, anything that would give an answer as to why it wouldn't start. The original guy left, but the other two guys stayed and called a Suzuki mechanic to come and look at it. (Have I mentioned that the Japanese will seriously bend over backwards for you??) The Suzuki guy couldn't get it to work, either. Everyone was speaking Japanese, and I had absolutely no idea what was going on. The only thing that I knew was that I was currently stranded. I kept thinking, why did I buy this car??? This thing is a POS!! Also, it was incredibly hot on the black pavement. I had sweat dripping off my face, down my back and stomach, and even down my legs. They finally jumped my car, and at least it started!
The Suzuki guy left, and one of the other two guys could speak broken English. He asked if I was an ALT, and I said yes, in Yunomae. He was amazing to me. He never left my side and completely took care of the situation. He told me that I'd have to take the car to the shop. I gave him my supervisor's business card and in half English/half Japanese asked him to call her. We went back inside the town office building, and he told me to wait in a chair in the entrance area. As I was sitting there, I kept telling myself to pull it together. Don't cry. Don't cry. Don't cry. It was sooooooo stressful to not know what was going to happen! He reached my supervisor, and she said that she was on her way.
We went back outside. He told me to follow him to the shop. When I tried to start my car, it was the same problem. :( The key wouldn't turn. My supervisor arrived a little while later. Apparently, my car is REALLY special. There's a little trick to starting it. You have to push the key in, SLIGHTLY PULL IT OUT, and then turn the key. She did it w/o a problem. I'm pretty sure she explained this to the guy. I felt like a big, dumb idiot! I don't think it was completely my fault. All of those guys couldn't figure it out, either! I told the guy thank you, thank you, thank you so much! He responded with, "No problem. Don't worry about it!" :)
When we got back to the office, everyone wanted to know what happened. I'm pretty sure they were all concerned b/c my supervisor had to get up and leave quickly. I'm sure she explained to them that the silly American couldn't start her own car, hahahahaha. Everyone had a good chuckle at my expense. Awesome. As I was saying, big fat failure! :S
I've been showing my scrapbook to my coworkers. Today, I showed it to the very bubbly lady who tries to speak English to me. She kept saying how Ian and my brother-in-laws were so strong. I'm not sure if that's a polite way of saying that they are built bigger than Japanese men or what. Anyway, I think it's funny that the Wurth girls like their strong men! lol.
Tomorrow, I'm going on an outing to the mountains with elementary school kids. I'm not 100% sure of what's going on, but I know that we're going to the mountains. I am pretty excited b/c that means I don't have to go to the office tomorrow! Woot! It's technically still work since I'm obligated to go, but having adventures in the mountains with kids is a lot more fun that sitting at a desk pretending to look busy. :)
-Melissa-
I said in my previous blog that I had to drive to Taragi (a neighboring town) to attend an informational meeting about English camp yesterday morning. My supervisor drove me there the day before, and just in case I got lost, printed off maps for me. The town office was very easy to find, so that part didn't worry me. The driving part did. I feel like I'm 16 again! I get soooooooooo nervous behind the wheel!! This was my first time driving alone in Japan, and this is what happened:
My supervisor told me to leave at 9AM, and that would give me more than plenty of time to get there. I went out to my car at around 8:50. My Japanese car is......special. It's tiny, old, and has plenty of character. The lock is very difficult to get into. It needs some WD-40. What's the Japanese equivalent of WD-40, lol??? Once I got in, I tried to start the car. It wouldn't turn. It wasn't b/c the engine or battery was bad, I just couldn't get the key to turned. I tried and tried and tried. I thought to myself, what the heck am I going to do?!?! I saw a lady in the parking lot and pulled her over to help. I'm pretty sure that it was the sheer grace of God that started that car.
I made it to Taragi fine. The meeting went well, and I met two other JETs that live in neighboring towns. My real problem started after the meeting. I went back out to the parking lot to leave, and silly me, I thought my car would actually start. Nope. Same thing. I tried and tried and tried. It felt like the key was locked in the ignition. I tried mashing the brake, taking the parking brake off, jiggling the steering wheel, anything that might magically make my car start. Nothing. Here's my situation: I'm in a town where I don't know anyone, and I can't communicate with people. I don't have a cell phone yet, but even if I did and called my supervisor, what could I say? Car broke? (Remember, she doesn't speak much English, and I don't speak my Japanese.)
I saw a guy walking in the parking lot, so I asked him to help me. The good thing about Japan is that you can do that. If my car broke down in the USA, I wouldn't do that! I'd call someone to come and help me, and even if someone did ask if I needed help, I would say, "no, thanks. Help's on the way!" The guy was reeeeeeeally nice to me. He tried to start the car but couldn't. He told me, "One minute," and went back inside the town office building. He returned with two other guys. Both guys tried to start it. Nothing. They were looking at the tires, engine, gages, anything that would give an answer as to why it wouldn't start. The original guy left, but the other two guys stayed and called a Suzuki mechanic to come and look at it. (Have I mentioned that the Japanese will seriously bend over backwards for you??) The Suzuki guy couldn't get it to work, either. Everyone was speaking Japanese, and I had absolutely no idea what was going on. The only thing that I knew was that I was currently stranded. I kept thinking, why did I buy this car??? This thing is a POS!! Also, it was incredibly hot on the black pavement. I had sweat dripping off my face, down my back and stomach, and even down my legs. They finally jumped my car, and at least it started!
The Suzuki guy left, and one of the other two guys could speak broken English. He asked if I was an ALT, and I said yes, in Yunomae. He was amazing to me. He never left my side and completely took care of the situation. He told me that I'd have to take the car to the shop. I gave him my supervisor's business card and in half English/half Japanese asked him to call her. We went back inside the town office building, and he told me to wait in a chair in the entrance area. As I was sitting there, I kept telling myself to pull it together. Don't cry. Don't cry. Don't cry. It was sooooooo stressful to not know what was going to happen! He reached my supervisor, and she said that she was on her way.
We went back outside. He told me to follow him to the shop. When I tried to start my car, it was the same problem. :( The key wouldn't turn. My supervisor arrived a little while later. Apparently, my car is REALLY special. There's a little trick to starting it. You have to push the key in, SLIGHTLY PULL IT OUT, and then turn the key. She did it w/o a problem. I'm pretty sure she explained this to the guy. I felt like a big, dumb idiot! I don't think it was completely my fault. All of those guys couldn't figure it out, either! I told the guy thank you, thank you, thank you so much! He responded with, "No problem. Don't worry about it!" :)
When we got back to the office, everyone wanted to know what happened. I'm pretty sure they were all concerned b/c my supervisor had to get up and leave quickly. I'm sure she explained to them that the silly American couldn't start her own car, hahahahaha. Everyone had a good chuckle at my expense. Awesome. As I was saying, big fat failure! :S
I've been showing my scrapbook to my coworkers. Today, I showed it to the very bubbly lady who tries to speak English to me. She kept saying how Ian and my brother-in-laws were so strong. I'm not sure if that's a polite way of saying that they are built bigger than Japanese men or what. Anyway, I think it's funny that the Wurth girls like their strong men! lol.
Tomorrow, I'm going on an outing to the mountains with elementary school kids. I'm not 100% sure of what's going on, but I know that we're going to the mountains. I am pretty excited b/c that means I don't have to go to the office tomorrow! Woot! It's technically still work since I'm obligated to go, but having adventures in the mountains with kids is a lot more fun that sitting at a desk pretending to look busy. :)
-Melissa-
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Being the only foreigner in town
Being the only foreigner in town has its good and bad points. A good point is that I'm a featured item. I'm pretty much a local celebrity. Since we're so far out in the countryside, I might be one of the few foreigners that comes to town. People want to introduce themselves, kids will shout "hello!" as they ride by on bikes, I've seen people do double takes of me, and generally, people want to make me feel welcomed. I do! One drawback of being the only foreigner in town is that I'm the only foreigner in town. :( That means that I don't have any other JET friends that will stop in for a bit or someone to grocery shop with, etc. The closet JET to me is in the next prefecture.
It is soooooooooooooooooooooo hot. Today was HOT AND MUGGY with very little breeze for relief. I sweat....and sweat....and sweat. I have sweat glands in places i didn't even know existed! I took a cold shower tonight, and it felt great. I know that sounds weird, but trust me, it was awesome. One thing that I don't really understand about Japanese culture is that despite how hot it is, they don't mind drinking hot tea. ugh. I hate when I get offered hot tea. I like it, don't get me wrong, but whenever it's sooooooooooooo hot out, the last thing I want is to drink something that is going to make me hotter!
Today was a great day at work. Despite the language barrier, I've been talking to my co-workers more often. I brought my scrapbook to work and showed off pictures during lunch. Everyone really liked the picture of Ian and I last Halloween when we went as a geisha and ninja. haha! Today, I met one of my co-worker's daughter. She studied English in college and lived in Vancouver for a while. She could speak English really well and was really sweet! I enjoyed talking to her. She looked through my scrapbook. Something that I wasn't anticipating was explaining holidays. She knew Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, etc, but one that I had to explain was Mardi Gras. I told her it was a French tradition in New Orleans to put on masks and hand out beads and have a big parade. Even as I was explaining it, I thought to myself, wow, this really seems like a weird holiday, lol.
Tomorrow I have to drive to a neighboring town for a meeting. Wish me lots of luck! It's very weird to drive in Japan since everything is opposite. It really screws with you mind to think in opposite when you're so used to doing it your way! I was asked to participate in an English camp, which I was more than happy to do, and the informational meeting was in the morning. My supervisor drove me to the town today to make sure that I knew exactly where I was going. Despite the language barrier, my supervisor is amazing! She really watches out and takes care of me. :)
It is soooooooooooooooooooooo hot. Today was HOT AND MUGGY with very little breeze for relief. I sweat....and sweat....and sweat. I have sweat glands in places i didn't even know existed! I took a cold shower tonight, and it felt great. I know that sounds weird, but trust me, it was awesome. One thing that I don't really understand about Japanese culture is that despite how hot it is, they don't mind drinking hot tea. ugh. I hate when I get offered hot tea. I like it, don't get me wrong, but whenever it's sooooooooooooo hot out, the last thing I want is to drink something that is going to make me hotter!
Today was a great day at work. Despite the language barrier, I've been talking to my co-workers more often. I brought my scrapbook to work and showed off pictures during lunch. Everyone really liked the picture of Ian and I last Halloween when we went as a geisha and ninja. haha! Today, I met one of my co-worker's daughter. She studied English in college and lived in Vancouver for a while. She could speak English really well and was really sweet! I enjoyed talking to her. She looked through my scrapbook. Something that I wasn't anticipating was explaining holidays. She knew Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, etc, but one that I had to explain was Mardi Gras. I told her it was a French tradition in New Orleans to put on masks and hand out beads and have a big parade. Even as I was explaining it, I thought to myself, wow, this really seems like a weird holiday, lol.
Tomorrow I have to drive to a neighboring town for a meeting. Wish me lots of luck! It's very weird to drive in Japan since everything is opposite. It really screws with you mind to think in opposite when you're so used to doing it your way! I was asked to participate in an English camp, which I was more than happy to do, and the informational meeting was in the morning. My supervisor drove me to the town today to make sure that I knew exactly where I was going. Despite the language barrier, my supervisor is amazing! She really watches out and takes care of me. :)
Sunday, August 7, 2011
Epic fails and exploring
It's Sunday night now, and I'll getting ready for bed. It's only 10PM, but I'm actually quite tired. I walked around A LOT today exploring the town.
Mass time by myself- You remember when you were little and you "played church"? Surely I'm not the only person that did! Well, that's how it felt this morning. Since I can't physically go to church, I want to get in the routine of devoting an hour each Sunday to "Mass time." I woke up around 8AM, so I decided that I would "go" to church when I normally do back home, at 9AM. I got dressed for church just like I would back home and got on my laptop to read the Sunday readings and Liturgy of the Hours. It felt weird to just read out loud to myself. Any interesting ideas on how to jazz up my "Mass time" to make it seem more real?
Epic fail- I washed clothes today.....well, kinda. Despite the fact that I know how to operate appliances, cook, and wash clothes, it's almost like starting over since everything is in Japanese. After a few unsuccessful attempts at starting the washing machine, I finally got it to begin washing. Yay! However, about 15-20 minutes later, it beeped like it was finished. I knew there was no way it could be done, so I went to check on it. When I lifted the cover, I saw my clothes in standing water. :( I pushed a few more buttons, and the water drained. However, the machine never went through a spin cycle, so I had to wring each item. The next thing to do was figuring out how to dry my clothes. It's soooooooooooooooooooooooo humid here, so getting anything dry is next to impossible. Luckily, it's very breezy. I decided to place my shirts on hangers and put them on my clothes line outside. Two problems: 1) Yunomae's weather has been schizophrenic the past couple of days. It's sunny, cloudy, rainy, cloudy, rain shower, sun out, cloudy, rain, rain. Just when I thought my shirts were getting good and dry, it would rain. 2) My clothes kept blowing off the line. I'd have to go outside every once in a while and pick up shirts off the ground and try again. Epic fail.
Exploring- I was able to walk around A LOT today. I left the house around 11AM in search of my host family's house and the supermarket. Luckily, I found the supermarket easily and quickly. It was like finding the holy grail! It's not too far from my house, and I can easily walk or bike there. I want to find my host family's house for two reasons: 1) I need to give them their gift for allowing me to stay there my first night. I couldn't give them anything when I stayed with them because all of my omiyage gifts were in my checked luggage, which i didn't receive until Thursday afternoon. 2) One of my friends that teaches religion classes was interested in showing and telling her students about my experience at the Buddhist temple. I wanted to walk back to the temple and get pictures of the inside. I walked and walked and walked today. Apparently, I walked in the wrong direction because I never found it. I know it's on the hillside.......but there are a lot of hillsides here. :) I actually really enjoyed the walk because people see that I'm getting out and about in town, and it allows me to find things, such as the super market! My mission for this week: find host family's house and Buddhist temple.
Cooking and cleaning- I made my first cooked meal today. Once again, appliances are in Japanese. I don't understand. :S I wasn't sure about the gas stove, either. I tried to use it yesterday, but the flame never came on, and since it's gas, I was very concerned about screwing up and blowing up, lol. Ian was able to show me what to do via skype. (I heart skype.) It wasn't much, but I made ramen noodles and added boiled vegetables and fish. Tonight, I cleaned up a bit. I didn't have to do much since I usually don't leave big messes. I washed the dishes and swept the floors. I miss my roomba that would clean the floors for me. :(
COKE- I celebrated my first successful week in Japan by drinking my big 500 ml can of Coke. It was a happy little celebration for myself. :)
That's all for now. For those of you reading this in America, please eat a big, fat, greasy burger for me.
-Melissa-
Mass time by myself- You remember when you were little and you "played church"? Surely I'm not the only person that did! Well, that's how it felt this morning. Since I can't physically go to church, I want to get in the routine of devoting an hour each Sunday to "Mass time." I woke up around 8AM, so I decided that I would "go" to church when I normally do back home, at 9AM. I got dressed for church just like I would back home and got on my laptop to read the Sunday readings and Liturgy of the Hours. It felt weird to just read out loud to myself. Any interesting ideas on how to jazz up my "Mass time" to make it seem more real?
Epic fail- I washed clothes today.....well, kinda. Despite the fact that I know how to operate appliances, cook, and wash clothes, it's almost like starting over since everything is in Japanese. After a few unsuccessful attempts at starting the washing machine, I finally got it to begin washing. Yay! However, about 15-20 minutes later, it beeped like it was finished. I knew there was no way it could be done, so I went to check on it. When I lifted the cover, I saw my clothes in standing water. :( I pushed a few more buttons, and the water drained. However, the machine never went through a spin cycle, so I had to wring each item. The next thing to do was figuring out how to dry my clothes. It's soooooooooooooooooooooooo humid here, so getting anything dry is next to impossible. Luckily, it's very breezy. I decided to place my shirts on hangers and put them on my clothes line outside. Two problems: 1) Yunomae's weather has been schizophrenic the past couple of days. It's sunny, cloudy, rainy, cloudy, rain shower, sun out, cloudy, rain, rain. Just when I thought my shirts were getting good and dry, it would rain. 2) My clothes kept blowing off the line. I'd have to go outside every once in a while and pick up shirts off the ground and try again. Epic fail.
Exploring- I was able to walk around A LOT today. I left the house around 11AM in search of my host family's house and the supermarket. Luckily, I found the supermarket easily and quickly. It was like finding the holy grail! It's not too far from my house, and I can easily walk or bike there. I want to find my host family's house for two reasons: 1) I need to give them their gift for allowing me to stay there my first night. I couldn't give them anything when I stayed with them because all of my omiyage gifts were in my checked luggage, which i didn't receive until Thursday afternoon. 2) One of my friends that teaches religion classes was interested in showing and telling her students about my experience at the Buddhist temple. I wanted to walk back to the temple and get pictures of the inside. I walked and walked and walked today. Apparently, I walked in the wrong direction because I never found it. I know it's on the hillside.......but there are a lot of hillsides here. :) I actually really enjoyed the walk because people see that I'm getting out and about in town, and it allows me to find things, such as the super market! My mission for this week: find host family's house and Buddhist temple.
Cooking and cleaning- I made my first cooked meal today. Once again, appliances are in Japanese. I don't understand. :S I wasn't sure about the gas stove, either. I tried to use it yesterday, but the flame never came on, and since it's gas, I was very concerned about screwing up and blowing up, lol. Ian was able to show me what to do via skype. (I heart skype.) It wasn't much, but I made ramen noodles and added boiled vegetables and fish. Tonight, I cleaned up a bit. I didn't have to do much since I usually don't leave big messes. I washed the dishes and swept the floors. I miss my roomba that would clean the floors for me. :(
COKE- I celebrated my first successful week in Japan by drinking my big 500 ml can of Coke. It was a happy little celebration for myself. :)
That's all for now. For those of you reading this in America, please eat a big, fat, greasy burger for me.
-Melissa-
Saturday, August 6, 2011
Town festival!
I know two blogs in one day is a bit excessive, but I just had a wonderful, amazing experience! Today I walked around town trying to figure out which store was what and where things are located. I was almost home when this truck pulls into a driveway, and a guy gets out. He tries to tell me something, but I have absolutely NO idea what he's talking about. The other guy in the truck was trying to say something as well, but it didn't help. Another car was going by, and they flagged the driver down. It turned out to be the first guy's daughter who could speak English. She told me that he wanted to invite me to the town festival tonight. I said I would love to come! She was like, "Okay, I'll pick you up at 6." Wow. I would have walked. Do you understand now how the Japanese will seriously bend over backwards for you?
Miwa (the daughter) took me to the train station where the festival was. She explained that her parents organize this festival every year for the town since the town is so small and doesn't have a lot of funds for a big shin dig. As soon as I walked in, I was once again the town pet, lol. Everyone wanted to introduce themselves to me. I'll telling you, everyone is SOOOOOO FRIENDLY here! Miwa's father gave me coupons so that I could try the food and drink. She asked if I drank, and I said no, so she offered me cider instead. She made sure that I tried as much as possible. There was a big potato thing that was kinda like a big fat hashbrown, edamame, little pieces of corn on the cob, some sort of fried meat, and fried potato french fry things. It was all really good! Miwa had to help cook, so she found me a family friend who could speak English, and told me I could sit next to her. Yuka (the family friend) said that she had lived in New York for a while. She had the cutest little girls. She reminded me of my sister, Christina, b/c she was multi-tasking like no one's business trying to feed herself, the squirming girls, answer her phone, and talk to me all at the same time. I was amazed, lol. The guy next to me apparently also knew a bit of English. He asked me where I was from, and I said America. This began our conversation.
There were different bands that played. The first one was a mix of English and Japanese songs. It was very funny for me to hear a Japanese band preform Journey's "Midnight Train" and other classics. haha! The next band was a traditional Japanese guitar band. The guy next to me explained what it was. It looked like a really skinny guitar but sounded like a banjo. :) The next group was a bunch of kids. It was adorable! The next group was electric guitars. Rock on.
I sat there in the midst of people enjoying the food, music, and atmosphere. In my town, I'm pretty much a celebrity. ;) I cannot tell you how many people came up to me and wanted to introduce themselves or say something to me in English. I kept thinking that surely this isn't my life! This is too cool of an experience. It is so incredibly surreal that I'm here and actually doing these things!!! I saw my host family again. They seemed so excited to see me again! The father wanted to show me a new app that he had for his iphone. Ian, take note. He could speak Japanese into it, and it would translate it in writing into English. I heart technology! :) I showed him that I have my own American iphone, and he asked if he could see it. The night ended w/fireworks. Miwa's dad made an announcement on the microphone about something, but of course I didn't understand it. However, he came over to me and made me follow him outside to where the fireworks were. Japanese fireworks=awesome. Even in a tiny town like Yunomae, the fireworks were better than at home. I had such a wonderful time tonight! And to think that all of this happened b/c I randomly ran into some guy on the street. haha! Life's an adventure in Japan!
Miwa (the daughter) took me to the train station where the festival was. She explained that her parents organize this festival every year for the town since the town is so small and doesn't have a lot of funds for a big shin dig. As soon as I walked in, I was once again the town pet, lol. Everyone wanted to introduce themselves to me. I'll telling you, everyone is SOOOOOO FRIENDLY here! Miwa's father gave me coupons so that I could try the food and drink. She asked if I drank, and I said no, so she offered me cider instead. She made sure that I tried as much as possible. There was a big potato thing that was kinda like a big fat hashbrown, edamame, little pieces of corn on the cob, some sort of fried meat, and fried potato french fry things. It was all really good! Miwa had to help cook, so she found me a family friend who could speak English, and told me I could sit next to her. Yuka (the family friend) said that she had lived in New York for a while. She had the cutest little girls. She reminded me of my sister, Christina, b/c she was multi-tasking like no one's business trying to feed herself, the squirming girls, answer her phone, and talk to me all at the same time. I was amazed, lol. The guy next to me apparently also knew a bit of English. He asked me where I was from, and I said America. This began our conversation.
There were different bands that played. The first one was a mix of English and Japanese songs. It was very funny for me to hear a Japanese band preform Journey's "Midnight Train" and other classics. haha! The next band was a traditional Japanese guitar band. The guy next to me explained what it was. It looked like a really skinny guitar but sounded like a banjo. :) The next group was a bunch of kids. It was adorable! The next group was electric guitars. Rock on.
I sat there in the midst of people enjoying the food, music, and atmosphere. In my town, I'm pretty much a celebrity. ;) I cannot tell you how many people came up to me and wanted to introduce themselves or say something to me in English. I kept thinking that surely this isn't my life! This is too cool of an experience. It is so incredibly surreal that I'm here and actually doing these things!!! I saw my host family again. They seemed so excited to see me again! The father wanted to show me a new app that he had for his iphone. Ian, take note. He could speak Japanese into it, and it would translate it in writing into English. I heart technology! :) I showed him that I have my own American iphone, and he asked if he could see it. The night ended w/fireworks. Miwa's dad made an announcement on the microphone about something, but of course I didn't understand it. However, he came over to me and made me follow him outside to where the fireworks were. Japanese fireworks=awesome. Even in a tiny town like Yunomae, the fireworks were better than at home. I had such a wonderful time tonight! And to think that all of this happened b/c I randomly ran into some guy on the street. haha! Life's an adventure in Japan!
Hello from beautiful Yunomae, Japan!
Hello everyone! Thanks for keeping up w/the blog. I haven't been able to write for a few days b/c I just got the internet hook up yesterday. It was pretty much the best thing to happen to me! It's been really weird to not have communication w/the outside world. I felt really isolated to not be able to have that communication, and not many people in my town speak English. Life in Japan is an adventure!!
On Wednesday, all the JETs going to Kumamoto prefecture flew out together. We landed in Kumamoto City where we were greeted by current JETs, our supervisors, host families, or some representative from the town. They had posters and signs w/our names on them. I had two people waiting on me, my supervisor and another guy that works at the junior high in Yunomae. My sign said "Welcome to Yunomae-town, Mrs. Reed Melissa." Close enough. :) We went to lunch and made our way to Yunomae, which is waaaaay up in the mountains. The town itself is in a little mountain valley, but it is surrounded by green mountains. It's BEAUTIFUL here! :) Come and visit me!
I stayed with a host family on Wednesday night b/c my house wasn't ready for me. That was an amazing experience. They were so incredibly nice to me! It was a husband, wife, three sons, and the grandparents that lived in the house. They lived on the hillside, so there was an amazing view of Yunomae! I'm not sure what the situation was, but I think they were the caretakers of the Buddhist temple beside their house. The father showed me around the temple and to the shrine in the woods. There was also this gong thing that he said they had to ring every night at 6PM and every morning at 6AM. It sounds out across the town. He actually let me ring it! It was awesome! They were all really nice to me! They gave me the one air conditioned room in the house and turned it on for me. I wanted to tell them that it really wasn't necessary, but I didn't really know how to explain that. At dinner that night, they kept forcing food on me. I guess they heard that Americans like to eat, lol! I really wasn't that hungry, but they were like, "try this," or "have this." After dinner, it was one of those times that I think I'll remember fondest in Japan. I asked them if they would like to see some pictures from home, and they were so excited! Most of my pictures were in my checked bags (and I didn't get those until those until Thursday), but I had my wedding album on me. In turn, they showed me their wedding album. It was an amazing experience. Despite the language barrier, it was amazing how much we connected through that.
On Thursday, I worked at the Board of Education (BOE). I really have no idea what to do while I'm there. haha. That day, I went through the desk drawers. I found a nursery rhyme book that might be helpful in class. My supervisor took me all around town running errands. We went to the post office to get some kind of stamp for my housing application, bank to set up an account, alien registration office to apply for my alien registration card (yep, I'm an alien now!), picked up my checked luggage that I had shipped, and the super market. It was a busy day!
The language barrier has been a bit difficult. I thought I was quite savvy w/my experiences traveling in the past, but the thing is is that when I went to places in Europe where I didn't know the language, I either a) could guess what things meant since they are mostly romance language based, AND they use the same alphabet that I know, and b) I usually had travel buddies with me. If something didn't work out, I at least had someone to confer with or complain to, lol. Here, it's nothing like that! I'm completely illiterate, which is a really weird concept for me. I have no idea how to read signs or what items at the grocery are. Thursday was a bit difficult for me. After being rush-rush, go-go all week, when I finally came home on Thursday and started unpacking, it hit me. This is home. In addition, I can't understand people or read. I started bawling. :( I know that there will be good days and bad days, and Thursday was a bad day. After my little crying spell, I was over it. People have been VERY nice, but that doesn't stop me from feeling like a big dumb-dumb, lol. It seems like people who know even a little English try to speak to me, but it's often difficult to get the message across. Life's an adventure in Japan!
I don't want to make this too long, but I have lots more to share! Stay tuned! Also, I'm probably going to post pictures later tonight or tomorrow. For now, jaa mata!
On Wednesday, all the JETs going to Kumamoto prefecture flew out together. We landed in Kumamoto City where we were greeted by current JETs, our supervisors, host families, or some representative from the town. They had posters and signs w/our names on them. I had two people waiting on me, my supervisor and another guy that works at the junior high in Yunomae. My sign said "Welcome to Yunomae-town, Mrs. Reed Melissa." Close enough. :) We went to lunch and made our way to Yunomae, which is waaaaay up in the mountains. The town itself is in a little mountain valley, but it is surrounded by green mountains. It's BEAUTIFUL here! :) Come and visit me!
I stayed with a host family on Wednesday night b/c my house wasn't ready for me. That was an amazing experience. They were so incredibly nice to me! It was a husband, wife, three sons, and the grandparents that lived in the house. They lived on the hillside, so there was an amazing view of Yunomae! I'm not sure what the situation was, but I think they were the caretakers of the Buddhist temple beside their house. The father showed me around the temple and to the shrine in the woods. There was also this gong thing that he said they had to ring every night at 6PM and every morning at 6AM. It sounds out across the town. He actually let me ring it! It was awesome! They were all really nice to me! They gave me the one air conditioned room in the house and turned it on for me. I wanted to tell them that it really wasn't necessary, but I didn't really know how to explain that. At dinner that night, they kept forcing food on me. I guess they heard that Americans like to eat, lol! I really wasn't that hungry, but they were like, "try this," or "have this." After dinner, it was one of those times that I think I'll remember fondest in Japan. I asked them if they would like to see some pictures from home, and they were so excited! Most of my pictures were in my checked bags (and I didn't get those until those until Thursday), but I had my wedding album on me. In turn, they showed me their wedding album. It was an amazing experience. Despite the language barrier, it was amazing how much we connected through that.
On Thursday, I worked at the Board of Education (BOE). I really have no idea what to do while I'm there. haha. That day, I went through the desk drawers. I found a nursery rhyme book that might be helpful in class. My supervisor took me all around town running errands. We went to the post office to get some kind of stamp for my housing application, bank to set up an account, alien registration office to apply for my alien registration card (yep, I'm an alien now!), picked up my checked luggage that I had shipped, and the super market. It was a busy day!
The language barrier has been a bit difficult. I thought I was quite savvy w/my experiences traveling in the past, but the thing is is that when I went to places in Europe where I didn't know the language, I either a) could guess what things meant since they are mostly romance language based, AND they use the same alphabet that I know, and b) I usually had travel buddies with me. If something didn't work out, I at least had someone to confer with or complain to, lol. Here, it's nothing like that! I'm completely illiterate, which is a really weird concept for me. I have no idea how to read signs or what items at the grocery are. Thursday was a bit difficult for me. After being rush-rush, go-go all week, when I finally came home on Thursday and started unpacking, it hit me. This is home. In addition, I can't understand people or read. I started bawling. :( I know that there will be good days and bad days, and Thursday was a bad day. After my little crying spell, I was over it. People have been VERY nice, but that doesn't stop me from feeling like a big dumb-dumb, lol. It seems like people who know even a little English try to speak to me, but it's often difficult to get the message across. Life's an adventure in Japan!
I don't want to make this too long, but I have lots more to share! Stay tuned! Also, I'm probably going to post pictures later tonight or tomorrow. For now, jaa mata!
Friday, August 5, 2011
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Back on the Home Front
While Melissa is off having fun adventures, packing up our apartment is going on stateside. The apartment is a wreck. Boxes and clothing to be donated litter the entire apartment. I'll post pictures later. It's horrific.
-Ian
-Ian
Goodbye Tokyo....Hello Yunomae!
Today was my last full day in Tokyo, and tomorrow I go to Yunomae. I'm not sure what the internet situation will be there b/c it might take it a while to get it established at my house. I will probably have an internet connection at work but may not be able to use it for personal reasons. If you don't hear from me for a while, assume no news is good news.
A few new and different things happened today. First, despite my brief stay in Japan, I've already experienced two earthquakes. Don't worry, they were very minor, and it's normal. Someone said that there's at least one earthquake in Japan everyday, but most can't be felt. The Japanese know this, and their buildings are much more resistant to earthquakes than typical buildings in the USA. Apparently, one happened late last night. I say apparently b/c I slept right through it, lol. Yep, due to my severe jet lag, I can sleep through earthquakes! I noticed that one of my other JET friends posted something about an earthquake this morning on facebook before I went downstairs to breakfast but didn't really pay attention to it. At breakfast, a lot of people were saying, "Did you feel that earthquake last night?!!?" My roommate told me that it felt like someone was being rowdy in the next room b/c the walls kinda shook. Some other guy told me that the hangers in his closet were clanging back and forth. The second earthquake was soon after lunch. Since I was actually conscious, I felt that one. I went upstairs to my room to drop some things off, and the floor started shaking. It wasn't a lot but rather just enough to know that it was an earthquake. *A note to concerned family and friends: seriously, scratch this off of your "things to worry about" list. Earthquakes in Japan are normal, and for the vast majority of times are non-serious.*
I met a girl today from England. Guess what her name was? Katherine Middleton!!!!! Hahahahahaha! I'm sure she gets lots of double takes and people going on and on about her name. She introduced herself just as Katherine, but I looked down at her name tag to see that her last name was Middleton. I tried not to get too bug eyed, lol. Poor girl, she probably has to deal w/people remarking about her name on a daily basis.
I left the hotel tonight to find some supper. There's a store only a few blocks from the hotel that a lot of JETs have been going to for snacks or whatever. While walking back in the midst of taking in the sights and sounds of downtown Tokyo, I realized three things: 1) I was proud of myself for leaving the hotel and making my first actual purchase in Japan. Despite the fact that I have no idea what the cashier said to me, everything worked out fine. 2) I absolutely love hearing foreign languages being spoken. I love trying to decipher what people are saying. I love being in a foreign setting and out of my element. It's been a while since I've experienced this, and I forgot how lovely it is! 3) All of the things I said in #2 scare the crap out of me! It's very much so a double edge sword. I'm scared of going to a place where no one has any idea what I'm saying to them. I'm terrified of being out of my element and not knowing where to go/what to do/breaking customs, etc. Yet, you know what? Life's an adventure! It's all about pushing yourself and learning from your mistakes. I can't live life constantly being comfortable. Carpe diem, right? :)
A few new and different things happened today. First, despite my brief stay in Japan, I've already experienced two earthquakes. Don't worry, they were very minor, and it's normal. Someone said that there's at least one earthquake in Japan everyday, but most can't be felt. The Japanese know this, and their buildings are much more resistant to earthquakes than typical buildings in the USA. Apparently, one happened late last night. I say apparently b/c I slept right through it, lol. Yep, due to my severe jet lag, I can sleep through earthquakes! I noticed that one of my other JET friends posted something about an earthquake this morning on facebook before I went downstairs to breakfast but didn't really pay attention to it. At breakfast, a lot of people were saying, "Did you feel that earthquake last night?!!?" My roommate told me that it felt like someone was being rowdy in the next room b/c the walls kinda shook. Some other guy told me that the hangers in his closet were clanging back and forth. The second earthquake was soon after lunch. Since I was actually conscious, I felt that one. I went upstairs to my room to drop some things off, and the floor started shaking. It wasn't a lot but rather just enough to know that it was an earthquake. *A note to concerned family and friends: seriously, scratch this off of your "things to worry about" list. Earthquakes in Japan are normal, and for the vast majority of times are non-serious.*
I met a girl today from England. Guess what her name was? Katherine Middleton!!!!! Hahahahahaha! I'm sure she gets lots of double takes and people going on and on about her name. She introduced herself just as Katherine, but I looked down at her name tag to see that her last name was Middleton. I tried not to get too bug eyed, lol. Poor girl, she probably has to deal w/people remarking about her name on a daily basis.
I left the hotel tonight to find some supper. There's a store only a few blocks from the hotel that a lot of JETs have been going to for snacks or whatever. While walking back in the midst of taking in the sights and sounds of downtown Tokyo, I realized three things: 1) I was proud of myself for leaving the hotel and making my first actual purchase in Japan. Despite the fact that I have no idea what the cashier said to me, everything worked out fine. 2) I absolutely love hearing foreign languages being spoken. I love trying to decipher what people are saying. I love being in a foreign setting and out of my element. It's been a while since I've experienced this, and I forgot how lovely it is! 3) All of the things I said in #2 scare the crap out of me! It's very much so a double edge sword. I'm scared of going to a place where no one has any idea what I'm saying to them. I'm terrified of being out of my element and not knowing where to go/what to do/breaking customs, etc. Yet, you know what? Life's an adventure! It's all about pushing yourself and learning from your mistakes. I can't live life constantly being comfortable. Carpe diem, right? :)
Monday, August 1, 2011
Day One
Today was the first day of Tokyo Orientation. I've basically been out of the room and going to workshops, panels, and listening to different speakers since this morning. It's been a looooooooooooooong day. I've also met a LOT of people. I couldn't tell you half of the people's names that I met, though. lol. It is surprising the amount of countries that are part of the JET program. I've met people from New Zealand, Canada, Australia, Russia, UK, Jamaica, Fiji, and even a girl from Germany. I ate lunch w/her, and she's actually going to my prefecture! She said that she could speak German, English, Russian, Spanish, and Japanese fluently. Wow! I thought I was doing good w/English and my little knowledge of Spanish and German, lol.
Jet lag- beast of burden. I went to bed around 8:30 last night. I know that makes me an old person, but I really needed the sleep. My roommate asked if I wanted to go out, and I was like, "heck no!" It would be nice to go out and see Tokyo, but I would prefer to get over this jet lag ASAP. I woke up this morning feeling nothing, and I thought, sweet! No jet lag! However, after lunch is when it hit. My 2pm would be 12am in the USA, so that explains why I was dragging all afternoon. :( I'm used to experiencing jet lag w/Europe where you land in the morning, drag all day, sleep at night, and more or less are okay. I think since it's such a severe time difference, it'll probably take a few days to adjust.
Japanese toilets- Wow. Talk about sophistication. Not lying, last night I wasn't sure how to flush the toilet. There's a panel on the left in which you can choose to have a warm mist spray your area for cleaning purposes, heat the seat, play music, or adjust the water pressure. In addition, it makes a flushing sound whenever you first sit down for "modesty" purposes. It took me a minute to realize that the flusher wasn't on that panel. Instead, it was on the right connected to the counter.
English bubble- So far, I feel kinda bad about it, but I've been living in an English bubble. I rationalize w/myself b/c I say that I'm basically going somewhere where hardly anyone speaks English, so I might as well soak up all the English I can get now. :) I went straight from the airport to the hotel up to my room yesterday, and today, I've mostly shuffled from one workshop to another in the hotel. I first left the hotel on one of the breaks earlier. One of the other Nashville JETs and I walked to a store close by b/c she wanted to get some snacks. Being outside of my English bubble and on the streets of Tokyo made me realize that I'm probably going to have a bit of a breakdown when I get to Yunomae, lol. It'll be weird to go from speaking English all the time to trying to convey the simplest point in broken English and gestures. Life's an adventure! :)
Jet lag- beast of burden. I went to bed around 8:30 last night. I know that makes me an old person, but I really needed the sleep. My roommate asked if I wanted to go out, and I was like, "heck no!" It would be nice to go out and see Tokyo, but I would prefer to get over this jet lag ASAP. I woke up this morning feeling nothing, and I thought, sweet! No jet lag! However, after lunch is when it hit. My 2pm would be 12am in the USA, so that explains why I was dragging all afternoon. :( I'm used to experiencing jet lag w/Europe where you land in the morning, drag all day, sleep at night, and more or less are okay. I think since it's such a severe time difference, it'll probably take a few days to adjust.
Japanese toilets- Wow. Talk about sophistication. Not lying, last night I wasn't sure how to flush the toilet. There's a panel on the left in which you can choose to have a warm mist spray your area for cleaning purposes, heat the seat, play music, or adjust the water pressure. In addition, it makes a flushing sound whenever you first sit down for "modesty" purposes. It took me a minute to realize that the flusher wasn't on that panel. Instead, it was on the right connected to the counter.
English bubble- So far, I feel kinda bad about it, but I've been living in an English bubble. I rationalize w/myself b/c I say that I'm basically going somewhere where hardly anyone speaks English, so I might as well soak up all the English I can get now. :) I went straight from the airport to the hotel up to my room yesterday, and today, I've mostly shuffled from one workshop to another in the hotel. I first left the hotel on one of the breaks earlier. One of the other Nashville JETs and I walked to a store close by b/c she wanted to get some snacks. Being outside of my English bubble and on the streets of Tokyo made me realize that I'm probably going to have a bit of a breakdown when I get to Yunomae, lol. It'll be weird to go from speaking English all the time to trying to convey the simplest point in broken English and gestures. Life's an adventure! :)
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