trains are my new best friend

helloooooo,

let me first say i love you and i miss you.

of course i miss you and i love you but who wouldn't.

but furthermore i will admit to maybe getting a little homesick MAYBE or maybe its just a case of slight melancholy.

yesterday i turned on the tv for the second time since ive been here (the first time was because i was reading a book and it was scary so i turned on the tv to occupy my mind and sat in bed watching japanese commercials for a while... note commercials are ten times more entertaining in japan) and i have never been so happy to see harry potter in my life. an english speaking harry potter that is. also titanic was on in english but i chose harry potter wanting something a little less dramatic. im not sure which one it was actually i think it was called harry potter and the chamber of secrets cause thats where they were going and there was this ghost boy named tom riddle who was actually voldermort and he brainwashed ron's little sister ginny into opening the chamber of secrets through this diary but harry potter made everything better so it was ok. i'm not sure what number this one is and i was trying to remember if i read it cause i read up to number 4 or 5 or something but i couldnt remember cause what i remember of them is all mixed up together. anyways i was happy to watch it for a while anyways.

last last week week we had thursday off (march 20th) for the first day of spring (which is a national holiday as it should be being a very important day). on wednesday night i went with mamiko to the bar (the red spanky just accross from the school and the size of a shoebox) only intending to walk with her to keep her out of the rain because she forgot her umbrella and then i said i would come in for a second and then i stayed until 3am. it was good. i added a picture of the bartender,he's really funny and nice, and gets really nervous when he tries to speak english it's funny. and mamiko's boyfriend was there and a bunch of their friends so i got introduced to a bunch of people. mamiko chose drinking and taking an early bus to her meeting in the morning to going home sober so they stayed until around 1am i think and then i just hung around the bar drinking with some people they intorduced me to. one lady was a "teacher of nurses" and spoke some english so we talked and she was really nice.

i woke up to see the sunrise on thursday and here i admit to maybe feeling a little homesick or something of the sort. but then i decided to go to sannomiya and eat cake. im collecting cafes... where i can go and read a book and drink tea (i drink milky tea now) and eat cake or some such sugary confection. i wanted cheescake so that was my intention. i took the train to sannomiya. exploring makes everything better. exploring something new makes everything happy and good again. i walked to motomachi in kobe just beside sannomiya and found a road named Tor road. Kobe is at the foot of a big mountain more flat and sloping than tall. it reminded me a little bit of san francisco because of the hills there were some trollys (but they were on wheels and just for tourists i think). so although i only intended to walk for a little bit and see what was up there i walked all the way up to the base of the mountain where there were only a few houses. it was good, i think it a fancy part of kobe because there was a really fancy little brown brick hotel that wasnt very big but had gold lettering named kobe hotel and in front on it there were four men with fine black suits and crisp white shirts and smooth black umbrellas rolled tighly and clasped with gold buttons and they acted like they were very important business men and owned the world although i probably just imagined they did although im pretty sure that that one sitting in the fancy black taxi cab with the driver with the white gloves had a smug look on his face. there were lots of houses and further up the mountain they were quite fancy with cameras and such. and there was an international school, and fancy bakeries, and somewhere that claimed to be Kobe's new cultural centre and the perpetuator of the new Kobe brand which sounded pretty silly to me. it was a nice walk, i was pretty happy with it. there was a french or italian coffee shop that smelled really good but i was dirty and it looked pretty spiffy so i didnt go in but i definatly wnat to go back and add it to my collection. they seem to be completely smitten with the english and french here. i was walking around in the bottom of sutty and there were all these english and parisian style bakeries and sweets shops and in one all the girls were even wearing the french maid costumes or maybe english that are all black and white and frilly and everywhere the pastry shops and bakeries are always english or french... never japanese hmmmmm. and if you buy soft cookies they are always american country kitchen style. and you've heard about those cafes in tokyo that you can go to where the waitress is a like a french maid and is said to attend to you in all sorts of ways that a maid may be imagined to... its quite scandalous.

anyways after my tor road excursion i was much happier and i decided to walk around some more. so i walked in straight lines remembering not to get lost and keeping the station in mind and in motomachi i found chinatown!!!! it was magnificant there were looming red gates and yellow laterns and a festival sorts with a million little food stands and people doing chinese dances and a million people and i loved it. for some reason i found the existance of a chinatown in japan very comforting. i guess because i love chinatown in toronto and it made me feel like it was home and i think i miss the fact that in toronto there are lots of different people and here there are pretty much only japanese people. it wasnt very big, just a short road, but there were lots of stuff crammed into there and i ate everything that looked yummy not knowing what it was and not really caring. i ate dumplings with delicious things inside of an identity unknow, and yummy crispy spring rolls one with vegetables and lots of ginger and one with what i think is some kind of meat, and i ate these round flatish type dumplings with green vegetables that might have been green onions inside and i think pork. i was very happy... and satisfied. and the ramen looked really good but i wanted to save room for the cheesecake i was still intent of searching for. so after that i went to this cake shop that i had seen before and wanted to go to and had a pot of cafe au lait and strawberry cake layered with puffy pastry and custard and wipped cream... it was pretty special. i sat with my pot (it was crisp white china and in a cylindrical fluted shape although i much prefer the squat round pots that the tea comes in) and my nice white cup and saucer and drank my cups of cafe au lait and ate my cake slowly and read Alias Grace by Margret Atwood which i had brought with me in my suitcase... displacing much that some would consider more important but not me (i finished it today, there was a very strange twist of events that kept me up at night and now i am in the limborific waiting period that i have ordained necessary between books of a day because i dont want them to get mixed up in my head and i feel there needs to be proper time to process). after reading for a while i left and walked around the shops for a little while, went home, and got ready for another day at work.

last sunday (which would have been march 23rd) i decided to go to back to osaka by myself cause its always a more thorough wondering around by yourself and boys never let you do what you want. so i took the train (trains are my new best friend) to osaka... its about an hour from okubo and i always enjoy a train ride so it was good. i got to the train station and managed to find my way to the subway ok and get a ticket and make it back to yotubashi (which is only 4 stops from nishi-umeda the station by JR station) quite perfectly if i do say so myself and i recognized everything and it was all good. i wondered around the shops and walked around osaka for a good 7 hours and it was splendid. i was wondering back to yotubashi when i heard all these people yelling and there was a march going on with all these people holding signs and flags and stuff and a man gave me a flag and the were protesting china's occupation of tibet especially in light of recent events in Lhasa.it was pretty awsome. i was really happy and i walked along with them for a while (and i called david z and 3am your time and woke him up to tell him oops). i had dinner in this yellow painted vietnamese restaurant (maggie went to vietnam and she loved it and said it was her favorite place so i really want to go) and had a yummy plate of lots of little things including my favorite crunchy spring rolls and mango salad and a bowl of something that tasted like hot chocolate with some kind of strong alcohol in it. i set out to find my way back home around 7pm when it was already dark out. ok. we all know i have no sense of direction whatsoever. i only manage becasue i can remember what places look like and lots of little things that i can recognize and use to find my way back to places. but ive never been in osaka when its dark... well i was that one time when we went out but it was in a different part of osaka. and the streets off the main street where i was are very twisty and maze like. so i might have got a little bit lost. but its ok i remained calm wandered around for a while trying to find something i recognized failed and asked a nice man in a convenience store how to get back to nishi-umeda sation. he told me how to get back to yotubashi station and from there i was a-okay to get home. it was actually quite easy and i found my friend the wooden restaurant that was my marker. when i get to the station the ticket buying machines were different than the ones at JR and i couldn't figure it out but then i asked a lady and she was nice and she helped me and it was all good. so then i went home and saya (one of ayako's friends) called me and i had just missed her but i will go back.

last monday i went to fla with ayako and we learnt some new parts that i now have no recollection on and then we had lunch at a really good spanish restaurant where i had some very very yummy fish (it was some kind of white fish) on a bunch of green vegetables that might have been kale or broccalini or something like that and cherry tomatoes and these white vegetables which i think were root vegetables cause they had green tops and looked kind of like turnips. and before that they gave us this little antipesto salad thing laid out on a long white plate all pretty with ravioli and octopus and something else i can't remember that was very good. after that i went with ayako to buy some makeup she wanted at this place where that have a special machine to check the colour of your skin and the ratio of water to oil in your skin and stuff and then i went to buy an espresso machine for nami at starbucks (we gave it to her yesterday because it was her last day and she really liked it... it was made in italy i think its pretty spiffy). after that i met yuka at yet another starbucks where our language exchange turned into a psychology/philosophy lesson. yuka is writing her thesis and she wants to use some english books and translate them into japanese so we were reading this book together and it was all about this guys theory of the ego, soul, and spirit... or at least the part that we read, we only got through a few pages. it was pretty interesting stuff, i remember some of the stuff from other psych and philospohy classes, but its difficult language for an english spearker nevertheless an english as a second language speaker, so it was difficult to explain some of the words and concepts (although i will admit it was kind of fun trying) and i hope i got it right and didnt tell her the wrong thing. we talked for a while, went home on the train, i finished some props for classes and it was goodnight.

tomorrow steph is coming. arriving at 6:35pm at Osaka Kansai airport. i will take the train to sannomiya and a bus to the airport and pick her up and then we will come back and i will show her where i live now. im glad someone is coming from home. im excited to see her. i have to go back home and finish cleaning for her and set up her futon and make an extra key cause she's staying for a month. she is bring things in her suitcase for me from home. i think we are going to go to tokyo and disneyland. she bought a 7 day japanrail pass to explore. i think it will be good.

ok,

i love you,

see you later,

sam

Starting to settle in...

hello,

these are things i have done since last:

i have begun to take fla (hula dancing ie. hawaii) lessons every monday morning with ayako in sannomiya. so far i've had three lessons and its lots of fun i have moved up from feet to arms in coordination but i havnt got to the hips yet... its a lot. sometimes my toes get cold. i went with ayako one monday after class to a kilt shop (a material shop) and she's going to make me a hula skirt like they all have. its going to be yellow with white flowers. there are only a few people in my class. our teacher is really nice. she has long black hair. we are going to dance in a festival in kobe in may. i'm pretty excited... it's pretty cool.

i've been meeting yuka every monday to study japanese and help teach her english. i like teaching english to her. one monday we met in sannomiya after hula and she took me to the international centre and we went to the book store and bought textbooks. i got a beginners japanese textbook and its pretty cool and yuka got a textbook that helps you study for the TOEIC test cause she wants to take it later. yuka is pretty cool, she can speak english really well, she just has trouble sometimes with the right word and mixing up the order of sentances or the tenses. sometimes she asks me to explain really hard things that ive never really thought about before like what exactly would means. i like teaching her different words. i like remembering what all these different words mean and figuring out how to explain them to her. i really like some words. its lots of fun. i like teaching kenta too cause he is really good at english and i can explain different things... last week we talked about reincarnation which meant karma and buddhism which was pretty cool. kenta wants to come back as a cat cause they get to sleep all the time and he's always tired. he thinks he has pretty good so-so karma or at least he tries so maybe he will get to be a cat. i hope my karma is pretty good to but i'm not sure what i would like to be. once i also had him read part of the book i was reading (hunters and gatherers) and i think he liked it and he told the japanese teachers it was an interesting book. he understood the words but i think its hard to put them all together into a story when its your second language, but it was fun talking about it. all i ever want to do is talk about books im reading i get way to excited when i get the chance. also kenta is really funny when you ask him questions or when i ask him to ask me a question like with the word who and whenever i ask him why he says because he is japanese. i think he thinks japanese people are really boring and he said japan doesnt have anything special but i told him it does to me. kenta is my 17 year old student. when i asked him to tell me something i didnt know about him he said that when he was 6 he fell off the second story of his house and broke his head and had to get 7 stiches and everyone was really nice to him and i told him that i had stiches in my head too from when i was little. kenta's pretty awsome i like him lots.

a few mondays ago i went with nami to the hot springs in tarumi. after fla i met nami at the tarumi station and we had lunch at this little restaurant that was really nice and kind of reminded me of toronto and we both and curry and they were really yummy. i had chicken curry and nami had beauty curry that had mangoes and banana in it and it was really good too and i had an almond latte and it was really yummy. after that we went to a shopping outlet and we went to this store called franc franc thats a cool household store and i got four dishtowels that are yellow, red, blue, and green (i use one in my baby o class for when we play peekaboo with stuffed animals and stuff, also we sing hickory dickory dock and my baby's name is maki and she always looks at me with a straight face with her big chubby cheeks just as though she is contemplating everything thats happening and shes not decided what to make of it yet cause shes still leveling it all out in her head except sometimes i can get her to crack a smile). also i bought a space foam pillow and checked cover for reading but i think its too hard. nami get an orange apron. after that we walked over to the hot springs that are in a big building next to a hotel. its really nice. first we put on these loose brown clothes and went into all these different sauna rooms. i remember once i went into a sauna when i was little and it was so hot i thought i couldnt breath so i was kind of scared but it was good. first we went into the middle room and laid down on the floor for a while and then we went into the cold room which is pretty cold but not freezing and then we went into the salt stones room that has all these little pink stones that you lie on and then we went into the coal room or something like that and it was a wooden room and it was really hot. nami sweat buckets but i didnt sweat very much because i never sweat very much. after that we took a rest for a while and then we went to the locker room and took off all our clothes. first we took showers with these little buckets and stools and washed our hair in mirrors with all the other women and then we went into the hot tubs with the jet things that were very strong and kind of itched my skin. after that we went outside. it was raining a little like misty sprinkles which was very nice becasue we were very hot and it was a good contrast. we layed down in this shallow pool of water that was just right and you could just sleep there forever, it was my favorite and i could read a book there for a long long time until i was really really wrinkly like a prune. and then we went into a pool that was really hot and then we sat on this little marble waterfall thing with a bench part and it was really nice with the rain and we talked for a while. nami is really cool, i like her a lot. and then we went into this other pool that was the carbon dioxide pool and it was really cool and fun because all these little bubbles come and stick to you and if you touch them they all float away and you can brush them off or you can crush them and they all pop against your skin that makes you laugh. i wrote my name on my thigh and nami drew a heart on her hand. that was my second favorite pool, it was really fun. it made me think of someone who once told me that little fish come to eat up all the little oxygen bubbles that collect on your legs when you are in the warm warm ocean. last we went to sit in these big copper pots with really hot water and it was just like being cooked in a pot of soup... i told nami that and she laughed. after the big copper pots we rested for a while and then went home, it was a really good day.

a few saturdays ago a boy named hideki (who is the same boy who took me to osaka) went with me to osaka after work to go to a place named club karma to see boys noize and go dancing. i met him after work at kobe station and we drove in his car to osaka which took awhile and we went to the club around 11pm. it was really small and underground and it was really cool and i liked it. there werent that many people to begin with but by the end there were lots and lots of people. before boys noize there were two other japanese djs i think. there was a boy with a blue bowl cut and big sunglasses. we danced it was lots of fun. i got lost a few times but hideki found me and we went home i think around 3. i fell asleep in the car. hideki dropped me off at home around 5:30am and i went back to sleep.

a saturday or two ago i went to another of ayako's friends soccer games but before hideki met me in okubo and we went to a restaurant where his friend works. it's called a tepan restaurant which is one that has those flat grills in the table where you cook your food. i think i ate raw chicken but you can do that here and it was pretty good. we also had this pancake thing with egg and cabbage and bacon and it was ok and vegetables and meat and stuff... it was pretty good. we drove to the soccer game and i watched with ayako and hideki dropped me off at home after and i fell asleep just as quick as a wink.

on the day that i went to the kilt shop with ayako i went to this place called patisserie tooth tooth that i had seen before in sannomiya after ayako had met up with her friend. its a parisian style patisserie and its really pretty. the bottom floor is a little store where you can buy all sorts of beautifully baked patisseries and chocolates and upstairs is a little restaurant with big windows where you can look at the poeple walking around outside. i sat and drank hot chocolate in a fluted white china cup on a white china saucer with a tiny ring of little white buttons and a little silver teasppon on the side. on a square plate i ate a white white snowman made of ice cream with chocolate for his eyes and he stood on a bed of gingerbread snowflakes beside a pile of swept up poached pear and blueberry jelly and nice warm custard. it was magnificant. i read lolita (valdimir nabokov)... it was the part about rita and how he found the letter from lolita. the stairs to the bathroom were lined with pictures of paris in gold and dark brown wooden frames.

one sunday ago i met nami and jon and her friend from osaka named Taka in sannomiya and we played pool in a dingy little place upstairs. it was really smoky because you can smoke everywhere here. i was on Taka's team and we were solids and i get two balls in... i believe they were the blue and maroon balls, i was pretty proud of myself (i believe i raised the cue over my head and jumped). i only got the white ball in once. i think we won, it was pretty cool. i really like jon, he was really funny and at first i was kindof nervous about playing pool cause im pretty bad and new people and these things make me nervous and he was really nice and teased me and i felt ok. after that we went to have indian food at this little restaurnat called ch something and we all had samosas and curry and it was soooo yummy! i didnt think i was going to have curry for a year so i was very happy. i had cauliflower and potato curry spice level no. 2 with butter nan and it was quite sensational to say the least and Taka had fish curry no.1 which i didnt try and jon had spinach and cheese curry which was very good no. 1 and nami had something i cant remember with vegetables that was very good. everyone was sweating sooo much it was sooo funny and the said i was a trooper cause i didnt bat a lash. it was pretty funny. after that we were soooo full and i went home on the train.

a couple mondays ago after english/japanese teaching/learning at starbucks in sannomiya (there is a common meeting place called something that translates into women's tits cause there are big round pyramids) we went to a little bar where yuka's friends work. it was lots of fun. we ate yummy food and drank lots and talked and yuka's friends were really nice and tried to teach me how to use chopsticks properly (i was a pretty good student) and admonished me for not being able to use my rice cooker in a way that made me thing that they would like to take my under the arm and cook me a bowl full of rice. this monday we went to a korean restaurant and ate and drank and it was really really good after japanese. it was lots of fun. yuka is really cool to talk to. next time we are going to go see a movie i dont know the name of with audrey toutou in it, im excited. yuka teaches high school students and foreign university students high level japanese and she is writing her thesis on how to build a good relationship between the foregin student learning japanese as their second language and the teacher using different methods like the journal approach and shes going to study psychology so she can understand better.

this weekend i had everyone (ayako, chika, nami, and mamiko) over for dinner after work on saturday and we had fondue. first we had cheese with bread and vegetables and then we had chocolate with lots of yummy fruit. it was quite delicious. we had plum wine and mamiko brought white wine from kobe and red wine. it was a lot of fun and im really happy they came. my apartment is claner than it ever was before. mamiko said that in the summer everyone always goes to the beach on sundays and have bbqs and play in the water and stuff and she would invite me so im excited. on sunday i get my haircut at this place called mod's hair (apparently its very famous and there are ones in canada) and i practiced some of my japanese. everyone was really nice and spoke a little english. it was very luxurious with a very nice head and neck massage. i like my haircut she said its a bob ie. amalie. the woman who cut my hair was very nice. everyone stood around and waved goodbye when i left... im not sure if it is customary but it was very nice.

ok well goodbye im off to work.

Week Six

well hello,
how are you?
i am fine.
thank you for asking. hehehe...

hahaha ok ok i'm back for part two in which i will catch you all up, up until this very day that is march the 2nd 2008. the valentines are still unfinished, although a few more have been accomplished. hmmm (a tap on the nose one or two) where were we where were we... the weekend of february 17th and 18th (nothing too notable happened at work i dont think... oh! i got sick on i think thrusday or friday and it was not my finest day). on saturday night i went to this little bar called the red spanky with mamiko who is the manager at okubo amity.
i met her for drinks and we talked and the bartender was really cute cause he was really shy to speak english but he tried and he was really nice and it was a lot of fun. mamiko is really cool and i really like her and im really glad i work with her and im really lucky she is my manager. we stayed at the bar until it closed meaning until aboslutely everyone went home and then we packed it in. on sunday morning i woke up really early... i think i have seen the sun rise in okubo quite a few times since i here. once i had decided it was a decent enough hour to get up and about i went grocery shopping for the second time since i have been here (now 6 weeks). in okubo as far as i know we have vivre and suty which are large shopping malls that have a department store like layout and all the stores are arranged in an open concept. suty is really huge... there are several buildings that comprise the suty complex. on the top floor of vivre is a movie theatre with english and japanese films (my blueberry nights is coming out on the 22nd and im really really excited cause it looks exceptionally good and i kind of want to see evening has anyone seen it?) and on the bottom floor of both are huge grocery stores that have a bakery and fresh sushi rolls
and other yummy things and an ice cream shop and lots of other good things. the bakeries here are excpetional and ive been taking full advantage of them (i just ate this savory curry donut thing that was really good and what looked a little like an english muffin pocket with brie and ham in it they were very yummy). i spent along time wandering around suty and vivre and perusing (is that how you spell it?) until i decided to buy groceries at vivre. i will have you know that the fruit is very expensive i saw a mango for 10 dollars and strawberries for 15! and i bought what i thought were oranges because they were on sale and they turned out to be grapefruit yuck! i also bought what i thought was oatmeal but then i took it to work and it turned out to be just plain wheat that you're supposed to mix with rice but chika told me that there is oatmeal like the stuff for breakfast but it comes in boxes in the cereal isle (how do you spell isle? aile? i have no idea) there is no where near as much cereal here as there is in canada. also dried fruit and nuts are also very expensive which makes me sad and miss the bulk barn in fairview mall and i think there was one in the scarbrough town centre too. after careful deliberation i chose two freshly made sushi rolls and some freshly sliced pinapple and decided to go home for a picnic. (when i went shopping all the sales ladies and girls were really nice to me and tried to speak to me in english or just smiled and pointed and when you try something on you have to put a weird paper hat bag thing on your head). i think i got salmon with luttuce and japanese mayonaise and what could have been eel or some type of fish with a sweet teriyaki sauce and cucumber. so i went home and sat on my beautiful wooden floor took out my cutting board with the little fishy symbol on it and my super sharp sashimi knife and had a picnic on my floor that was very satisfying. it was lots of fun and i was very happy with me meal but i think picnics are more fun with two eating in bed is more fun alone.

after i was through with my picnic i went to akashi to meet yuka (my language exchange partner) and have my first japanese lesson. we met at a starbucks (there are lots its the primary coffee shop) right outside the station and practiced english conversation for an hour and then she tried to teach me some japanese for an hour. im not sure how successful it was... watashi wa samantha desu which mean my name is samantha watashi wa is I and desu is the to be verb... i think.

i know some words in japanese but i really have no idea how to put sentances together. the grammar and word order is sentances together. the grammar and word order is completely different. its all very confusing for me. and different. and i cant pronounce half the words correctly... im still saying most of my students names wrong although they are very sweet about it and just quietly correct me or ignore it...apparently you're not supposed to move your tongue when you speak like in english. in japanese there are no r or v sounds so when i was teaching my students the letter v i made them bite their bottem lip and blow.

yuka is a really nice girl. she is in her first year as a high school teacher and just finished making her first exams which sound really hard and shes an expert japanese teacher cause she taught maggie before me and jon before her. after we were done learning we packed up and i came home to take a shower and get ready for our midnight trip to the mountain.

around 11pm i headed out for sannomiya where i met ayako's friend chie who is a very nice girl and we headed over to the bus terminal where we met ayako and her boyfriend. after getting something to eat at lawson's for breakfast in the morning (i got a rice ball with chicken and mayonnaise- mayonnaise is everywhere) we mounted a bus to the mountain (i couldnt tell you where this mountain is or what it's called) with a bunch of kids going on a class trip. going to the mountain was a very surreal experience, surreal in that we left at one in the morning got on a bus with a bunch of kids with all their ski gear, i had no idea where we were going or what was happening when we just randomly stopped in various locations and at the end of the 2 hour ride the parked the bus outside a ski lodge and left us there.

so at like 3 in the morning they parked this bus in that parking lot and turned off the lights and i kept waiting for them to let us out and tell us where we were going to sleep but no they just left us there. we were just supposed to sleep in this big bus until it was time to get up and go snowboarding. it was very weird and of course i couldnt sleep and all i kept thinking was how bad it was for the environment to leave this bus running all night. at 6am they turned on the lights and told us it was time to get up and go. we drove 15 more minutes to the hill and then it was off to the slopes. given my lack of sleep and awkward position i didnt feel too bad as we got up and went to rent my equiptment and get all ready (although the next day my neck killed from sleeping on the bus i think).

i was fully outfitted in ayako's old gear except for a hat and scarf which i supplied and i rented boots and a board. ayako and chie are avid snowboarders while i am if anything a beginner. but i didnt fall down too much so it was ok. we snowboarded for a good long time until it was ok. we snowboarded for a good long time until it was time to get ready to hop on the bus at 5pm.

ayako and chie were really good and they helped me out and gave me some tips and snowboarded with me even though they could go much faster and we stopped and got curry and rice for lunch at the ski lodge on the hill. the boarding wasnt too bad but i had a lot of trouble getting on and off the chair lifts and by the end of the day the guy knew to stop it for me. it was just like canada.

the snow was really good and powdery and fluffy and stuff cause it had snowed all night and there was lots of it which was strange because we hadnt travelled too far and there was no snow in okubo. it was really pretty. it was a lot of fun, but by the end of it i was pretty sleepy and tired and happy to go home.

we headed home on the bus and after another two hours arrived back in sannomiya. chie went home because she had work in the morning and was tired but i decided to wait with ayako with her boyfriend and we went to this burger place called mos burger. mos burger is a fast food chain in japan but its like a million times mos burger. mos burger is a fast food chain in japan but its like a million times nicer than any wendys of macdonalds and the burgers were really yummy.mine had a tomoto and this chilli stuff on it and it was really good. after a couple of hours her boyfriend come and gave me a lift it was really good. after a couple of hours her boyfriend come and gave me a lift to the train station and i got on my way home. the end.

the next day at work i was pretty sore most notably my neck and thighs...snowboarding is hard thigh work at least for me. the work week was ok i was sick off and on the whole week and have had a cold since so i havent been able to sleep very well because i cant sleep when i cant breath through my nose.

i decided that my warm-up for all my table classes (those are the ones for elementary aged children and above) would be jobs because we had this topic card with a bunch of different jobs on it. by the third class i had a routine in which first i went through all the jobs with them and then explained what a job was ie. my job was to be a teacher and their jobs were to be students and thats our work and then we thought of other jobs while i drew pictures and acted out things to help them out. we played charades (which im pretty sure they all thoroughly enjoyed even the shy ones) and i asked them what even the shy ones) and i asked them what their parents jobs were and then i asked them what they wanted to be when they grew up.

i explained to all of them that my mom was a nurse and i was a teacher and when i was little (10 years old) i wanted to be a marine biologist which is a scientist that studies animals under the sea (i drew a dolphin and showed them a picture of a mad scientist) and asked them what they wanted to be when they were 22! years old.

i got a cartoonist, a fisherman, a kindergarten teacher, a baseball player, a flourist, and a lot of a baseball player, a flourist, a video game designer, and a lot of i dont knows... they're only eight. they are pretty cute i must admit. i think it was a pretty good warm up and they seemed to enjoy it...i was pretty proud of myself.

on saturday last week i went with ayako to watch her friends soccer game, we went after work and we had beef bowls for dinner which is a bowl of rice and slices of beef from this apparently famous fast food beef bowl restaurant...ayako told me there is one in new york and it is really famous. the soccer game was somewhere in kobe at a place where they have a bunch of outdoor fields with big huge nets around them where the boys meet every week to have some fun. ayakos boyfriend couldnt come cause he had to work but chie was there with her boyfriend and a bunch the other people i had met at dinner and a lot of other boys.

we sat under this little tent and watched the boys played soccer. it was cute they were such little kids and when it started to snow they were all playing in the snow and had a big snowball fight and it was cute and everyone and the whole field was covered in pretty powdery snow and they were slipping all over the place it was funny. it was also very cold... my toes froze. we got home late.. i fell asleep in the car and chie and her boyfriend gave me a ride home.

on sunday i went to OSAKA!!! Osaka is cool no doubt. i mean its pretty awsome. i mean i was in awe. to begin at the beginning i went with a boy i only know as glasses (because he wears big thick glasses) that i met at the dinner with ayako and her friends. ayako asked him to take me because he knows osaka and she doesnt really like osaka cause its too busy for her. he is really nice and he speaks some english.

we met on sunday morning at i think around 11pm cause i was late oops (although i have been early by 15minutes at least for everything else cause thats how they do it here!) in sannomiya and then we took the train to osaka. its an hour train ride to osaka from sannomiya station so an hour and a half from okubo but i dont mind cause i like the train. haha hes really funny... on the train he got out his english dictionary which is a dictionary of all the beatles songs and all these phrases and some of them are pretty odd and he asked me what all these strange words meant and i tried to explain.

when we got to osaka we had to cross over from JR station to the subway where we took the subway to some stop i forget the name of.first we had lunch and i took pictures of all these pretty pictures painted on the walls. we had lunch at this pretty restaurant that reminded me of the ones in the distillary with the dark unfinished wood and the tall ceilings and the big farm beams.

for lunch i had something that sounds like chicken rice although i think that is incorrect because im pretty sure there is no chicken in it. it came in this really hot stone bowl and it was rice with this tomato paste stuff and on top of it with this tomato paste stuff and on top of it they cracked a raw egg that cokked when it touch the bowl. it was pretty good and i was really full. before that they brough us this trio of a little salad and potato salad and a little cup of soup it was really good and beautiful it made me quite delighted.

after lunch i had tea and it was utterly perfect i was quite delighted. there was a perfect white china saucer and a perfectly round white white teacup and little lumps of raw brown and white sugar and a little jug of cream and a little cup of hot milk. i cannot tell you how my stomach bubbled and i grinned and how giddy i became when they brought it. it just seemed so nice.

at the restaurant they had all these flyers for clubs and shows and stuff and i stuffed them all into my bag on the way to the washroom.

after lunch we walked around this area where there were a lot of clothing store and i think its where the cool kids hang out and that is where we went to the bape store and i looked around for aaron. after that we went to this area that was another shopping area but it was a lot more colourful and everything was kind of closer together and more piled on each other and jumbled and there were lots of kids wearing colourful clothing and there was this little circle square and it was called american something or other.

and then we crossed a bridge and we went to this area called namba. namba is spectacular. it is everything you could imagine japan would be. all i did was look up with my eyes wide and my mouth gaped and my head tilted way back and more than once he had to pull me out of the way of a passing car. there were so many things and they were so big and tall and colourful it gives me chills just thinking about it. i cant describe it i took pictures. being there made me ecstatic, ecstatically happy. it was all bubbly glee. the boy just laughed at me cause i was so amazed and happy i think i skipped.

there was this really tall building with a running manon it that i think it something of a landmark and i stopped to take a picture every five seconds. we crossed a bridge over a river that chika told me the osakians every five seconds. we crossed a bridge over a river that chika told me the osakians jumped in when their baseball team won the big game but its really dirty so lots of them got sick. there was this other really big building and it had this gigantic picture of a smiling mans face on it. we went in and inside it is this recreation of old osaka and there are all these little stands and restaurants and this alleyway with all these fortune tellers and palm readers it was really cool and the elevator you took to get up was it was plastered in these colourful pictures of little asian men with long beards and wiskers on all sides and it was magnificant. when we got out of the elevator they took our picture and at the end glasses got it for me... its in sepia tones and there is a string of chinese laters with the longest word i have ever seen written backwards, its pretty cool.

in namba and the rest of osaka there are a million zillion takuyaki venders cause its really famous in osaka and people love it like our street meet. takuyaki are these little balls of fried dough with octopus in them and you make them on these special metal trays with all these little ball holders and the venders use these little sticks to turn them really quickly its cool. i tried takuyaki in okubo cause there was this truck outside the pachinko place and i wanted to try some street food but i didnt really like it cause its kinda gooey and the dough tastes kinda yucky and uncooked to me but i took the rest to work for lunch and everyone else really liked it.

oh! apparently as we were walking through namba there were a bunch of these men and they all bowed to me as i walked by in a line but i didnt even notice and they were yakuza! yakuza are the chinese mafia in japan i know becasue it was in my book out. im not sure why they would boy to me but glasses said so im sad i missed it.

after we left namba we walked through a big arcade and this area where they sell a lot of electornics. we went to a cafe. i had hot chocolate and a peice of cake that was all these really thin crepes with creme and yunny syrupy stuff sandwiched inbetween that was really good.

then we walked to namba station and headed back to JR so we could take the train back to sannomiya to meet ayako and their other friend whose name i dont know but who i identify as aerobics and who is really funny. we met them at macdonalds and walked over to motomachi (another part of kobe close to sannomiya...just the next stop over) to meet chie at the department store she works at... its a really fancy department store... all of them seem to be. motomachi seems more like the yorkville area or the financial district of toronto and it was pretty quite.

ayako drove us to the harbour and we decided on a place to eat. its really pretty and there is this big complex of restaurants to eat at. we wanted to go to this restaurant where you eat a lot of different food on sticks but it was too busy so we went to a brazilian restaurant that has a buffet and then they bring around this big sticks of roasted meat and shave you off a peice. it was really good and we got lots of pinapple.

after dinner we went to the carnival grounds across the street where they have a merry-go-round and a really really big ferris wheel and an arcade. in the arcade glasses won us some ice cream from this machine and it was really good... they were these weird little balls that were gooey rice paste stuff on the outside and ice cream inside. there was also this place that had all these sticker picture machines... we went in and took a bunch of funny pictures and we shared the stickers... it was fun... and we shared the stickers... it was fun... i'll show you a couple of the pictures that i have on my phone. and that was the end of the night. the end.
ok well i'm gonna stop there cause this place is gonna close in a few minutes,
but i can't believe i'm not done yet. almost.
ok i'll talk to you again soon
byeeee

Week Five

5 weeks.
i have been in japan for 5 weeks now. japan is pretty awsome. what i have done since last time: the sunday i last posted we went out for dinner for my welcome\maggie's goodbye. we went to this restaurant really near the school called j something. it was tradtional japanese food family style so i tried a little bit of everything. i am a much more adventerous person in japan... especially culinarily speaking. i tried their chewy beef guts (the japanese have a penchant for chewy things which is why they enjoy beef guts and octopus so much despite the lack of taste.... i on the other hand was thoroughly repulsed my the chewy gooey texture) which tasted fine but felt gross, their liver which also tasted fine but as anyone who knows me knows i have always detested the texture of liver, clams or oysters, and an assortment of other things not so strange such as fried chicken balls (very popular here). i also triend as many different kinda of alcohol as i could... there was a plum wine, a potato saki, and some kind of strong herbal liquer amoung others. it was a good night.
on monday i went with nami (a girl i work with whose really nice but shes getting married and quitting next month.) to take maggie to the airport in osaka. we took the train to sannomiya and a bus to the airport. i had macdonalds for the first time in a very long time at the airport ... i had a chicken burger and fries and it was delightful. maggie was really sad to leave and i was weirded out because it meant i was teaching classes on my own now and actually in Japan.
we got home late from the airport and i don't think i did much but read - i finished out (it was really scary at the end and i'm not sure i liked how it ended) and now i'm reading hunters and gatherers which is really good but im almost done so im thinking i might read the brothers karmokov yet to evenly distribute my different types of lit.
so then i had my first week of classes on my own. it went ok ...i think only one kid cried and the moms were a big help in the baby classes ... i keep singing all the tunes wrong but the moms know everything so they help me out. my kids are really nice ... even the older kids ... there are only a few that have it in for me and some of the kids are really sweet ( i got my first present from a student from by way of a box of chocolates for valentines day) from this little boy i have on tuesdays and he always brings this abc vehicle book that we read and he spent like 7 years in canada ... i think in like burlington or brampton or something ...he always has a canadian flag key ring on his bag.
teaching is cool but its alot more work than sitting at the desk at the hosptial ever was ....some of my student don't want to say anything so i act silly and make them play chardes and they laugh and sometimes it is difficult to think of all these activities and fun things to do to keep them amused and sometimes it is hard to think of how to explain things...but its cool. The hours are long but it is keeping me happy.
My co-workers are super cool ... i love mamiko (my manager) cause she is awesome and Ayako who i have been spending like every weekend with and Nami and Chika are really cool too except they are both leaving in the next couple of months which is sad but it happens to the best of us.
Me and Ayako and nami went out for dinner after work one night to this little restaurant/bar that was a complete hole in the wall and there was this really drunk businessman and he kept giving us candy and like these little toys... it was pretty strange. We had these little rolls of goat chese wrappd in procuitto with a slice of avacado on top that was like so yummy and this strange little curry soup concoction and i tried a pretty much raw egg. they put eggs oneverything here and alot are mostly raw... again they really like the gooey texture but me not so much.
okay so what is next?
that weekend (which would have have been feb 10 and 11th ) I went to dinner in Sannomiya with ayako and met a bunch of her friends on Sunday night. I went to Sannomiya early on Sunday... cause i had gotten the knack of taking the train by then!!! ...and walked around for a good long while. I must say wandering around and exploring in Japan is utterly fantastic. there is nothing that i think i love more than wandering around by myself sometimes (well maybe being cozy and reading a book and dancing with friend are up there to but wandering is definately up there with one of the things that makes me that makes me happiest) especially when there are good things to see. its unbelievable. Kobe is a super super cool city. I think i love it. there are these big fancy shopping malls and then there are these arcades that are semi outside with swarms of people walking around and there are all these really little parisian looking little cafes that have wonderfully delicious and delectable cakes and pasteries in them where i have made it a priority to go and read in. and the two different sides of the train station that you can get on are like two completely different sides of the sannomiya. on the one side is this big meg ryan billboard and it feels a little more nitty gritty than the other side which seems a little more big city fancy with a big concert hall and all.the other side has all these little street with big neon signs and these little aracdes... its absolutely marvolous to say the least. so i wondered around for awhile, ate a bag of the really scrumptions cookies went through the department stores which are shopping malls with all of these little open stores and it is all designer labels...my first close encounter with marc jacobs, i got this little shirt dress at this japanese label that was playing really good music. leat to say i say many things to covet.
so around 7 pm i met ayako outside on the street where a band was playing where she led me to a traditional japanese restaurant in a little allyway. luckily i didn't wear my holey socks because i had to take off my shoes (i make sure not to wear the holey ones wherever i might have to take off my shoes which means i really need some new socks) it was family style so i tried a little of everything..sashami and other stuff. her friends don't really know english that well but she made it seem we wouldn't be able to communicate at all, but i would have to sit there miming. but they could say some things and they understood alot because everyone had studied english in junior high, high school, or at an outside english school. i was loved because i could speak english everyone wanted to talk to me...they just wanted me to talk so that they could listen to me, it was awesome! i don't think i have every felt so popular in my entire life. her friends are all so nice. i think it was one of the only times i have ever been in a group setting and not felt awkeard or shy at all and didn't sit there quietly staring at people but was actually involved in conversations and human interaction and stuff (well ayako was doing alot of translating but you know what i mean). it was really really cool i felt more relaxed than usual not that i didn't enjoy sitting and staring at people. so we all drank and where merry and one of her friends and her boyfriend drove us home at the end of the night and i promptly fell asleep.
on monday i wanted to go to the hundred yen store (or the dollar store in canada) so i took the train to akashi (a bigger city than okubo is a prefecture or suburb of) and found the hundred yen store where i wasted away hours (or at least one) and bought the store out. first minor crisis: i spent every last cent that i had in the hundred yen store and japan is a cash based society...most places don't take bank or credit cards. and bank machines close at certain times...they aren't open all night and they aren't everywhere like in canada and they aren't open on the weekend sometimes. so i didn't have any money on me so i couldn't buy a train ticket to go meet ayako in kobe like i was supposed to or go home to okubo. so i started to freak out a little bit but i did my best to remain calm...deep breaths constanly telling myself it was okay, remembering what david told me which was, "sister don't freak out if you get lost (or stranded in this case) just think of it as an adventure at leat thats what i do". little steps to maintaining ones grasp on reality and working your way to a sensible and rational solution otherwise not ending up in a corner crying and whispering wild and frantic messages of wanting ones mommy. so i went to the bank i remember seeing but it was closed for cleaning. it being sunday and all, i called ayako but she didn't answer, i went to the train station and walked around but couldn't find any machine. i checked if the train station ticket buying machines took cards but they didn't. i checked if there was another ticket counter but there wasn't, so i went to the train station mall to ask information but she didn't speak very much english at all. so she gave me some directions but of course we all know i suck at directions. so i had no idea what she was talking about so i ended up just walking around the train station in circles and finally found a little place that looked like the bank machine place in okubo and i went in and there were bank machines! they were all in japanese (the ones at my bank have has an english funtion) so i made some guesses and it all went well and i got some money! yay!! salvation!!
throughout this time i was supposed to be on the train to kobe to meet ayako to make valentines cakes with her neices and nephews for her boyfriend. so she called me and i tried my best to relay my angst and relief (although i don't think i came across very well) and i told her that i was on my way. so i got one the train and met ayako in kobe where she was waiting for me to take me to her house with her 2 little neices and nephews in tow. her neices and nephews are adorable. they were shy with me like two seconds and the next thing we were running around the grocery store and i was lifting them in the air (rocket ship jumps...they're pretty popular with the kids). ayako lives with her family up the mountain and her neices and nephew don't speak any english so the whole way there we looked through a food magazine and i pointed to things to ask them if they liked it and they nodded yes or no. after grocery shopping we went to ayakos house and i met her mom who also doesn't speak any english or at least no to me (people are very shy to speak english to an english person) and her grandmother who kept saying all these things to me in japanese but seemed very sweet. so we cut out heart shaped pasteries and helped the kids help ayako make the little cakes and her nephew played wii. i tried boxing and i wasn't too bad and they made me a little wii person who was a pretty funny looking version of myself. here neices and nephews are really sweet and friendly and i had so much fun playing with them and her mother and grandmother are really sweet and i met her two brothers for a little bit and her dad and her suster in law and everyone is super nice. her family is realy cool and it was nice being with a family again cause well you know i like families. i let the kids play with my ipod and take pictures with the camera they seemed quite inthralled for a little while...they are really cute and i felt okay and at home there it wa really good. ayako and her mom and her sister in law made us dinner and it was a variatable feast. we all sat at the table on cushions on the floor and we had little bowls of rice and there was fried chicken balls, and two kinds of little meat balls, curried shrimp, liver, these rally salty pickeled plums, their version of pickles which look like cloves of garlic and this gooey mushed up mountain potato stuff, amoung other things and i tried everything...the mountain potato was a little gooey for my liking but it was okay on rice, the plums were much to salty but that's cause i just took a bite but everyone else poured hot green tea on their rice and mixed in a bit of the plum and made a soupesh sort of thing, and i'm not gonna lie i did not like the liver at ll although the kids loved it, but everything else was great. it was my first home cooked meal. i also ate dried squid on a stick as a predinner snack which i thought tasted pretty funny but the kids gobbled it up. i also go to see their shrine to their grandfather who passed away a few years ago where they offer rice and stuff which was pretty cool. after giving many piggy back rides i was quite tired and i declined ayakos offer to go to karaoke with her friend and she took me to the kobe station where i got cunfused as to what trin to take after telling her boyfriend that i knew the trains like the back of my hand by now and had to call her to figure it out. ayako is wonderfull. she is going to get married to her boyfriend in september so they are just tring to save up for that and they are going to move into another house that there parents own really close by. ayako is very excited that ikea is opening here so we are going to have an ikea trip so that we can buy some new furnishing for her new house and she has already invited me to her wedding and i told her i would do anything i could to help and we might travel a little bit together if we geth the chance. all the people are really good people and i am really thankful and happy. i love japan because they have been so cool to me.
so after a spendid day at ayakos i went home and although i intended to go right to sleep i gathered up all my booty, spread out the spoils of the day on the floor and preceded to spen half the night making valentines that none of you will recieve for many months most likely.

Training and first week of teaching

Hi!!!
So I have now been in Japan for exactly 16 days and 15 nights, but it feels like longer... after I had been in training for just a few days it seemed like I had been in Japan forever. Ok so this is how it goes. I left for the Toronto airport at around 6:30am on Saturday the 19th and we got to the airport around 7am (me, david, aaron, mom and grandma). There was only one person ahead of me in line at the check-in counter place so we sat and had coffee for a while. David Z came to see me off and we called paul to say bye cause they couldn't come to the goodbye/grandma's brithday party the night before (I got to say bye to everyone except pilar cause she was working and steph and sonia and morna and devon). At around 7:30/8:00am we went to the gates and i said bye to everyone for the last time (i might have gotten a little teary eyed) and i went through the metal detector thing-a-ma-bob. the x-ray of bags turned up the nail kit that i accidentally put in my carry on (oops) and so the lady had to search through all my stuff but she was pretty nice and gave the nail kit to mom cause they were all still standing and waiting till i was out of sight which is pretty nice. and then we waved bye and i went to find my gate. i was pretty nervous but i found my gate fine and i didnt have to wait too long until we boarded the plane... only 15 minutes or so. on my flight to vancouver i just slept and listened to music and thought and it was ok... it was 5 hours but it didnt seem to long. i overheard this girl in front of me talking to someone about how she was going to work for amity in japan so i found the girl jen that is also from toronto and in my training group. we met as i got off the plane in vancouver and we found our gate together which was nice. Jen is really nice and its cool to have someone to talk about Toronto about (i miss toronto). I called mom from the waiting area on a pay phone and morna but she wasnt home so i left a message... i hope she got it. i dont know what time i arrived in Vancouver because of the time change but it was some 5 and something hours after I left. We didn't have to wait too long for our flight maybe an hour i'm not sure ... i think our plane might have been a little late because we boarded later than it said on our ticket. on the way to japan i sat next to a lady from osaka that had been visiting the states and she was really nice and she told me that osaka is very hot and humid in the summer (which is what everyone has told me). part way through she moved to an empty row in the back so i could sit with Jen but i promptly lay down and fell asleep (im very happy mom got me my green octopus pillow...the bumps remind Jen of an octopus). so the flight wasn't that bad cause i slept for a bunch of time and i listened to my new ipod (thank you uncle malcolm and aaron) and read. we arrived at the Osaka Kansia airport around 6pm Japan time and as soon as we got through the gates our recruiter found us (they had welcome cards with our pictures on the back so they could find us). we were the last to arrive so we got our luggage sent to our respective places of residence in Japan and then headed to Okyama for training. we took three trains and i regretted not having wheely luggage and the trainers took us to the annex where we would stay for the next week during training (except for the boys who got to stay in a hotel). the annex was cool, i roomed with a girl names Melissa from Boston and she is really nice. sunday night was pretty much straight to bed after i spent a good while running around between convenience stores (which are everywhere) and the train station (which is very nice and big) to try and find a phone card and international pay phone to call mom.

we all had monday off so we went to this castle... i forget its name... that had been destroyed in ww2 and had been rebuilt and we all dressed up in kimonos and these funny wigs.

Okyama was pretty cool... it seemed like a fair sized city but i think it was on the smaller side for Japan and i was surprised at how quite it was... except for the train station it didnt seem very busy.

hmmm we also went out to this little place for ramen thats like this fish broth based soup with noodles and these things that i thought were radishes but are actually jelly like compressed fish cakes and pork. it was really good. the restaurant we went to only served one thing and brought it right to you so no japanese was needed. things i can say (but can't spell) in japanese: arygoto gozyamus (thank you very much), ohio gozymus (good morning), konichiwa (good afternoon), sumimasen (sorry or excuse me), dygobu (ok or its ok or it will be ok). we went to this little sushi place where alll the sushi comes on little plates of one or two of a kind on a convyer belt and i tried eel for the first time and it was really good... it was covered in a sweet sauce. training was hard... it was from 10am-7pm everyday and boring sometimes but it was also fun. our trainers were really nice and we played lots of games and sang songs so it was cool. almost every lunch i went to this place in the train station that made these pastries that were soooo yummy. the okyama train station is my favorite smelling place because they had this belgian waffle place that made them fresh all day and they smelt like warm sticky syrup and everyone knows waffles only mean good things to me. i also had these kroquets with shrimp and mushy stuff in them that were really good and these tempura vegtable patti cake things that were soo yummy. the convenience stores have crazy things like these little packaged puffy sandwiches... i had one with strawberry chocolate and cream in it that was absolutly delightful， but they always make me think of the book im reading called Out by a Japanese author named natsuo kirino about a a Japanese author named natsuo kirino about a woman who works in a boxed lunch factory that makes a woman who works in a boxed lunch factory that makes the lunches they sell in the convenience stores that kills her husband and then has her friends at the factory help cut him up and dispose of the parts. what can i say okyama is pretty awsome and it was fun cause all the people in my training group are awsome. the last day of training which was last saturday we had a trail lesson with two little girls for a tiny tot lesson (they were like 4 and 5 i think) and tot lesson (they were like 4 and 5 i think) and it was really (they were like 4 and 5 i think) and it was really fun and pretty amazing so i was happy. our trainers were really super and nice and they went out of their way to encourage us.... after a particularly bad practice lesson one of them came up to tell me i was doing ok and not to beat myself up if i didnt get it right away... they were akways telling me i was doing a good job and i would be ok and not to worry becasue it would take time. im really really greatful to them so thank you. after our last day of training we went back to the annex to pack up and then the trainers picked us up to go out to dinner. we went to this really nice japanese restaurant to have a family style dinner. Me and jackie shared and since she's vegetarian and I'm allergic to peanuts we got all these weird things like fish head (which I didn't eat) and octopus (which I did eat) while everyone else got yummy things. afterwards one of our trainers who is a very afterwards one of our trainers who is a very funny girl named Shawna took us out to karaoke. we went to this really tall building where you pay by the hour and get all you can drink. it was weird the staff and front desk reminded me of an airport but the halls with all the rooms reminded me of a very large cheap motel... it seemes a little sketchy. so we got a neon pink private room to sing in and we picked songs and danced and drank as much as we could via the phone and some one brings it up to the room. it was very cool.... i thought i was going to be really shy and i was at first but then well then i sang and danced and made a fool of myself as is standard but i was happy.

one of the boys named beau got really drunk and was falling all over the place so i helped him walk home as his special samantha crutch and we went to got him something to eat at the convenience store and all he kept telling me was that he didn't like eggs and asparagus and he kept saying no to everything because he thought everything had eggs and asparagus in it, it was pretty funny but he didnt remember any of it in the morning...he's a nice guy and on the quiet side like me so it was extra funny.

the next morning (sunday) we got up and at 9:30am the trainers met us and we went to the train station to all go to our seperate places where we would be teaching.

two of the girls are teaching at the okyama school where we trained but they came to the train station and their manager met them there. it was sad leaving everyone because they are the first people i met in japan and they are really nice and wonderful and they are my safety net here and im lost and alone all over again in japan without them. they helped me a lot while i was homesick and feeling strange about being alone in japan while at training so thanks to them all. some people had really long train rides.... i think Jen's was like 8 hours.... but my train ride was only 45 minutes. I like the train... i got to see a bit of the japanese countryside and mountians and all the towns in between okyama and okubo out the window... this area of japan is very industial and since its winter and very grey right now and i saw a lot of smoke stacks it kind of reminded me of hamilton.

Part 2
(i decided to break it up a bit becasue i know im writing a novel as per the usual)
i got off at Nishi-Akashi station (i was very nervous about getting off at the right stop but Sarah helped me and made sure i got off at the right one... shes really nice and level headed so thank you). as soon as i got onto the platform my manager (mamiko) and maggie (the foregin teacher who's leaving) met me.

they are super nice and helpful. they took me to my apartment and showed me the area like where the school is and answered all my incessant questioning. i arrived in okubo around 12:00 (we had to take a local train from Nishi-Akashi which is the next stop over from okubo because the super fast train doesn't stop in okubo... there are different trains depending of their speed here. umm by the time i was left by myself in the apartment it was around 2 or 3pm and i spent the rest of the day around 2 or 3pm and i spent the rest of the day setting up the apartment. I got two new futons (a thin cotton matress, a duvet, and pillow) for me (a thin cotton matress and a duvet) for me and a guest, new sheets and blankets, new cutlery and a dich rack, a and blankets, new cutlery and a dich rack and a new knife thats really sharp... it was like christmas all over again! maggie gave me her number and asked if i wanted to come out in sannomiya, kobe with her and her friends that night. i fell asleep around 5pm (i have had a crazy sleeping schedule since i got here thats just starting to work itself out... one night i went to sleep at 8pm and got up at 7am it was crazy... and slept for an hour or two and when i got up i called maggie. she told me how to get to sannomiya (she drew me a map of okubo and to sannomiya (she drew me a map of okubo and the train system before she left) and i took the train to kobe all by myself the first night i was kobe all by myself the first night i was there and i didn't get lost! i was pretty proud of myself, but acutally it was really easy and it was only about 8 stops for 30 minutes. maggie and two of the japanese teachers i work with (ayako and nami... chika wasn't there) met me and nami... chika wasn't there) met me at the sannomiya station. we met maggies freinds (mostly other foregin teachers from the area) at an italian restaurant. Kobe is really cool. I can't wait restaurant. Kobe is really cool.

I can't wait to go back. when i first came to japan i was surprised because it wasn't all that different... it was just like any other western big city except everything was in japanese... i'm not sure what i was expecting but i guess something that was a lot more busy and maybe flying cars... pretty much the tokyo you see on tv. kobe is more of what i expected it is bright (actually okyama was bright to, even okubo is bright- there are a lot of neon lights and okubo is bright- there are a lot of neon lights and it reminds me of las vegas) and there is so much and even on a sunday night the streets where reasonably busy and crowded... although maggie said it was quiet. at dinner i had gnocci, japanese pizza which is like any other but it has this creamy tomato sauce with small ros or fish eggs that was really good and seafood pasta and we all shared. Nami is really nice but she's leaving in march because she is marrying Jon who is a foreign teacher working for amity as an emergency teacher so he works at lots of different schools filling in (it's the next level up). I think they are moving to Kobe where Jon will go to japanese language school (i think???) and Nami will work . I will be sad when Nami leaves because she is so nice and friendly... she already invited me to go with her to a Japanese spa where they have the hot baths and bathe communally with other women and there are steam rooms and stuff. apparently there is a really nice one in kobe. Ayako is really cool i think she is my age and Nami is maybe a year or two older. me and ayako have a lot in common... she likes the same kind of books (i told her about the japanese authors i've read- murakami is her favorite) and she likes the same kind of music and she also loves snowboarding so maybe when david comes we can all go up north and go skiing together. (chika wasn't there but shes also really nice and helpful... she leant english in australia so she has an australian accent which is really cute). i also met all these which is really cute). i also met all these friends of maggie who live in the area who were really really nice and inviting and it was all just a very happy time. one of them whos name i forgot but who is a neighbouring foreign teacher from the states told me about all the concerts she's been to in japan so i'm really excited. i also met these two boys who are foreign teachers in Nishi-Akashi so they are my neighbours (one of them reminds me of the bfg which obviously makes me smile... we took the train home but missed the last one to okubo so we got off in nishi-akashi and took a cab and he made sure we were good and said he was always there if i needed help which was very nice). i went straight to bed and the next day (monday) i met Mamiko (the which was very nice). i went straight to bed and the next day (monday) i met Mamiko (the manager) at the school (which i managed to find again no problem yay me!) and we set out on our day of errands. we went to Akashi City to city hall to get my alien registration card, to the bank to set up my account (i have to remember to look in my mail box for my bank card), and to the mail box for my bank card), and to the mall to get me a cell phone.... which took forever jeez laweez.

Mamiko was super helpful and pateint and she told me a little about herself... she use to be a teacher at okubo school but now she's the manager even though she didn't want to be becasue the other manager got sick and head office forced her to step in as manager and she's sad because she misses teaching anf her students and being manager is a lot of responbibility and is really stressful and there is a lot of pressure on her... i feel really bad for her because she's such a sweet person... when i got to my apartment there was a card and a gift that is traditional for the daughter festival waiting for me... i think i will be sad to leave her and everyone else when the time comes. maggie is really sad to leave, she has been at okubo for two years and loves japan and her kids and the school so much. after we were done getting the cell phone i wandered around the mall which is like a big department store with different open stores and has a movie theatre on the top (6th) floor with english and japanese movies. on the bottem floor there is a big grocery store so i went grocery shopping. i got super yummy oranges that are nice and tart, fresh bread from the bakery and a bunch of other stuff...i spent a lot of time staring at things but for the most part a found everything fine. the first thing EVERYONE has said about japan is that its sooooo expensive and im sure tokyo and the other big cities are expensive but thats like anywhere... major cities are always more expensive then smaller cities. japan has not been expensive at all if anything i have had more cheap meals than in toronto and everything else is comparitively priced. i lugged everything home (home is not too far from the mall) and made eggs with tomato and toast and spent the rest of the night eating oranges and reading and listening to music. (I have also been eating a lot of nuetella and bananas and the bag of dried berries that mom sent with me is all but gone.... its scrumptous with cashews, almonds and walnuts. at school everyone enjoyed the maple cookies and chocolates i brought them and i made french toast with strawberry jam and found myself wishing i had brought some maple syrup.

OK i've had some trouble figuring out how to use me phone although it was the cheapest one and its still spiffier than all the phones in canada... i can videa call, it has the internet, it takes pictures and videos and its super cool for only $200.

Call my mom for my cell phone number.
My softbank email address is samdoerk@softbank.ne.jp which means i can recieve emails on my phone which is good becasue Ⅰ don't know how often i will get to a computer

since then (from tuesday until yesterday or saturday) i have been working. tues-thurs i work 11:30-8:30, fridays i work 12-9, and saturdays i work 10:30-7:30pm. they are long days with 3-7 or 8 classes a day with an hour for lunch... i usually go home for lunch and eat with my shoes on. my kids are between around 1 or so for the mommy and me classes and 17. i have a bunch of baby and tiny tot classes which are floor classes and consist or a lot of games, songs, props and vocbulary cards. the older classes for elementary, junior high, and high school students have more textbook work but we still get to play uno and jenga lots. ive played slap more this week than ive ever played it in my life. i have one parent class with two moms where we just talk about things so thats cool. i have a couple of students that are really high level and are taking all these really hard english tests that id probably fail... one of them even wants to go to university for english.... and i have to help them study for them so i hope i dont mess up. right now is the end of the japanese school year so parents and students are deciding if they want to keep taking my class and since the school is switiching teachers they are waiting to see if they like me which means i better not mess up or people will quit and both me and the school will be in trouble. this week i have been shadowing maggie and teaching some classes on my own shadowing maggie and teaching some classes on my own while maggie watched. some have gone pretty well and others have sucked. my first day (tuesday) i watched all her classes and the second day i had two classes. my tiny tot class sucked and i finished me lesson plan 15 minutes early and didn't know what to do but my Let's Go 5 class went pretty well (the kids where like 10 and 12). yesterday (saturday) i taught 4 classes of the 7 we yesterday (saturday) i taught 4 classes of the 7 we had. some classes have gone really well and others haven't gone so well... like the one where i taught the wrong lesson and the kids talked in japanese the whole class. the older kids (like 10 and up) are usually really quite and its hard to get them to talk even if they know what they're doing cause they are shy so its hard to know if what im doing is right cause they just stare at you. i have been doing a lot of acting things out... it feels like im constantly playing charades. i look silly but the kids playing charades. i look silly but the kids laugh so thats good. my strategy for getting the kids to like me is to act silly and make them laugh and bribe them with cool things i make (there's this really cool game called the hungry pig that cool things i make (there's this really cool game called the hungry pig that the tiny tots love- he has a clear plastic bag tummy so you can see all the food you put in tiny tots love- he has a clear plastic bag tummy so you can see all the food you put in him so im going to make one). the kids are really sweet and im really looking forward to getting to know them and playing with the younger ones and talking to the older ones. i think im going to make a construction paper crown for one of the little girls who is sooooo sweet, but you have to remember to cover everything in packing tape because everything gets put in their mouths. maggie is really cool and im sad shes leaving.... the first school day we went out to lunch together at this japanese fast food place where you order from this machine with pictures of all the food and we had curry with little peices of fried chicken that was scrumnptous and we went out to dinner at a suchi convyor belt place that kind of reminded me of a japanese version of a fifties diner and she told me all about stuff. she's from chicago. yesterday all these people from honbu (head office in okyama) came to pack up old okubo amity school and today they are moving everything to new okubo amity school so im excited to go in on tuesday and see all the spiffy new stuff but i hope i can find everything and they didn't throw out my noteboook cause it accidentally got packed in with everything else. ok well i think i've written enough for now. i'm off to try and find the place we are meeting for dinner.... we are having maggie's going away/ my welcome dinner.

p.s. everything in japan are small... the cars all look like smart cars cause they are all cut off and squishy looking, even the biggest trucks are 10x smaller then in canada. my refrigerator is really short and much smaller and the portion sizes of food are sold in and the portion sizes of food are sold in much smaller sizes in the grocery store. except for the buildings, the building are all big. there are a million convenince stores here and they are mostly 7eleven and lawsons. there are a ton of bicycles here and they all have cool baskets and there is a big bicycle parking lot where they are all crammed in and there are old people that go around giving bicycle tickets. there are SO SO SO many of these gambling places called pachinko places and they are these video game machines with these little silver metal balls that whirl around in a whirly machine above the video game screen and we went into them and there are rown and rows of machines and the noise is deafening from all the little metal balls whirling around and i don't know what they are for but they might be some kind of point system like at chucky cheese where you got the tickets that come out of the machine to get a prize because all these people had big baskets of the little metal balls beside them. also they smell really bad because everyone smokes in them and there are always people playing even in the morning and jackie (shes really cute and she had her birthday while we were at training and we had a cake) said that they are supposedly owned and runned by the yakuza who are the chinese mafia in japan. ok thats really all for now.

love sam