The weather has started to become pretty humid, and the rainy season is in full effect. Although most of the day was dry, things started to get wet in the evening. That makes a big difference if you had planned to sit around in an outdoor beer garden.
My day went really well. We had a short ESS meeting and I spent a lot of time with Iku-chan, one of the new members. She is so shy, and so quiet. If a balloon popped in the next room she might faint. As she gets comfortable hanging out with me, she tends to talk more in English. She also is a great artist, so if she has trouble describing something in English or Japanese, she’ll draw it, and she’ll draw it well.
After school was out, Mr. Hayashi and I caught the train in Kakogawa and went all the way to Sannomiya. We met up with Mr. Kimura and Miss Yamamoto, who is now teaching at another school.
Her English has improved a bit since I talked to her last. Small differences, but altogether our conversations went pretty smoothly. Together we all walked to the entrance to the beer garden and took an elevator to the roof. The sky was cloudy, and rain was threatening. We each paid around 3000 yen for all you could eat and drink.
They had a full cocktail bar, two kinds of wine (sweet stuff, yeck!), and two kinds of beer – a black “stout” (not really that stout) from Kirin, and Heineken. The place was sponsored by Heineken, so their logo was on everything. As for food, they had every kind of fried food you could imagine. They also had some salads to keep the health department happy, but it was all about the fried stuff. The baseball game was on a big screen projected against the wall, and so we just relaxed and drank and drank.
While Miss Yamamoto was loading up on food and drink, Mr. Kimura made a comment that sounded like he was interested in her. Mr. Kimura seems like a pretty shy guy – I wonder if he’ll make the move?
Finally we started to feel sprinkles from the darkening clouds. Luckily we had gotten our fill of booze and grease, so we adjourned to a nearby coffee house to sober up for the train ride back home.
It was a school night, so I didn’t get back so late. Even so, I drank lots of water and popped a few aspirin before I went to bed. Just in case!
