Saturday night Kuniko and I went over to visit Kuniko’s folks. We wanted to deliver some flowers in advance of Mother’s Day on Sunday. We’re going to be a little busy on Sunday, so we wanted to say hello. They were a little surprised that we were there – Kuniko had left a message but they didn’t get it.

We had some coffee and gave them flowers and chatted for a while. Kuniko and I were both tired, so we headed back home early.

This morning we slept in, and I think we might have slept right through the community clean up hour. Usually it is on Saturday, but because of the rain they must have postponed it until today. Oops.

In the morning I got a phone call from a guy that wants to hire me to work at his brand new conversation school that is opening in Kobe. I applied for the job a while back, but the more I find out about it, the more I get nervous. The guy was nice to talk to, though, and I felt a little better about the situation after talking with him. If they hire me I will be the most experienced teacher there – that’s a scary thought. The guy mentioned that one of the reasons he is moving back to Japan (he’s a Japanese American) is that a fortune teller in Takasago told him that it was the right thing to do. Red flag!

We’re going to head into Akashi to look at a few places to live soon, and then in the evening Kuniko is going to a second party for a friend’s wedding. I’ll be flying solo tonight and I’m seriously considering a big bowl of ramen for dinner….

I’m catching up after a few busy days. Thursday went pretty smoothly, but Friday I went out after work with Antoine, and we both ended up drinking a little too much. We hopped from place to place – we played pool, had hamburgers at Star Child (I had a chili cheese burger. Wow!), the Lock Up, and finally ended at the Belgian Beer place which is a new thing for us – usually we begin there.

I think we had just ordered up a sho-chu and a whiskey, and soon after that Kuniko called and she came over. She was just the wakeup call we needed, and we wrapped things up and headed home. It was late, and we caught the second to last train of the day, so we pulled in at home after one in the morning.

I got up this morning early with Kuniko since she had to go in and teach a couple of classes. I had a bit of a hangover, but nothing too bad. I hope Antoine is feeling OK, too. We’ll have to wait a long time before we do that again.

Every two weeks on Wednesday, I have a really busy schedule. Today was hectic, and it reminded me what other teacher’s normal schedules are like. The good news is that I did all the preparations earlier, so things went really smoothly.

I met with Mori sensei today, and gave her my draft for our next lesson. We’ve had differences in the past on how a lesson should run – I won’t get into it here. She looked it over, asked a few questions, and we decided to try it as is. Let’s hope it works!

In my three years in Japan I’ve noticed one thing that would make you cringe if you knew it… Japanese men usually don’t wash their hands after going to the bathroom. I know, I know, there are exceptions, but I have noticed that most guys at my school or people in public bathrooms rarely wash their hands when they finish up their business. It’s enough to make you want to never shake another hand at a party. Luckily bowing is more common here – I’ll stick to that. Seriously – is it a strange cultural phenomenon? I told Kuniko and she wasn’t so surprised. What’s the deal?

We had a really boring meeting in the afternoon, mainly talking about a new performance review system that sounds a lot like what I dealt with back in the U.S. It’s a new idea here in the Japanese public school system. Traditionally here you just get older and your pay goes up. It explains why so many teachers sit around playing solitaire and sleep through meetings. I’ll tell you this – those same teachers were paying very close attention to our meeting today. There is some concern, but underneath it I think that everyone believes that basically it will end up being the same system, with a new coat of paint on top. Since I’m outta here in a few months, I didn’t really concern myself too much with it.

It’s taco night here at the Fredricks’ household – as soon as Kuniko gets home we’ll spin the tortillas and get the party started. I’m seriously craving Mexican food…

Kuniko was lucky enough to have today off from work, but she got up early, heated up my bath, made me breakfast and lunch, and gave me a kiss out the door as I left at 6:30. Wow.

I did more lesson planning at work, and had a good time chatting with students both in class and outside of class. I am always amazed at how hard the students will try to speak English when they aren’t in the classroom. Somebody ought to take that idea and run with it.

During the morning I followed up on a suggestion to track down Hasegawa sensei, the former director of the board of education in Hyogo prefecture. My principal thought he may have some job leads, so I spent a lot of time on the phone and finally figured out where he was. I love trying to speak on the phone in Japanese, especially figuring out all the polite things to say. I wish I could just call people all day to practice more.

I will confess to hitting the hockey websites now and then during the day to keep track of two NHL playoff games – Buffalo vs. Ottawa and San Jose vs. Edmonton. Of course I don’t get hockey on TV here, so I need to follow them on the websites. I was very pleased when both Buffalo and San Jose won their game today.

As part of the full service that Kuniko performed today, she picked me up in front of the school when I got off work, so I really had it easy. We came home and had salmon for dinner, and sat around relaxing. Kuniko had even done the laundry, washed the bathtub, and did the dishes.

My head and shoulders were still hurting, so I went over to Ito Yokado to get another massage. This time I had them work on my shoulders and neck, and it was the best money I’ve spent. It was a little disturbing to hear all the cracking and popping going on inside my sore muscles, but the lady did a great job, and I came out of there feeling like a million yen. I could get used to heading over there now and then for a rubdown. Maybe I’ll get addicted to going there like the old men here who get addicted to hostess bars. Then again, maybe not.

I’m off to bed soon. It’s a seriously busy day at school tomorrow, so I better get some rest.

I’m back in the swing of things at work – vacation is over and today I was spending most of my time planning lessons for this week and next. The history teacher was happy to see me again, and told me that he spent the whole holiday watching movies at home, so that means he’ll have loads of questions. One of the questions today was “Does making out mean having sex?” Yikes.

I had only one class in the afternoon, and it went fairly well. The students were very active and were dying to volunteer to speak English. I kind of missed my students while I was on vacation, so I was glad to be back in front of them teaching.

The weather is getting warmer and warmer, and today I went to school wearing just a long sleeve shirt and slacks – no jacket required.

Tonight Kuniko has a school welcome party to attend, so I was home alone this evening. I had some ham and a caesar salad, and sat around watching TV and doing some last minute flashcards. I limited myself to one hour on the Nintendo… but I’d love to play more. It is seriously addictive.

Kuniko had to go in to work this morning, and so I decided to get up early with her and take the trip into Kobe. While she was at work I went hiking on the eastern side of mount Rokko, a place I have never hiked before.

I started at Rokko Michi station, and headed due north up the hillside. I passed lots of interesting neighborhoods, and it was fun to see a side of Kobe that I haven’t seen before. There was a women’s college up there, and some really interesting apartments built into the side of a hill. I took plenty of pictures, too. Some of them are here.

I hiked to the cable car station, and then took that to the top and enjoyed walking around the area. There were a lot of roads and lots of houses – it was like a small town up there. My first stop was a farm and dairy that I have been wanting to visit for a long time. Unfortunately, the farm was more of a petting zoo, and it was a big tourist attraction. To get to the dairy and the cheese you had to pay admission to the petting zoo, and I ended up doing my shopping at a tourist shop just outside the farm.

I managed to get some cheese there, although their selection was surprisingly slim. I did drink a glass of fresh milk, which was quite good. I also got a chance to buy a local beer, and later in the evening when I drank it it went down quite well. Very good, but a little too expensive.

I made the long descent down the hill into Kobe, and the downhill trek took almost an hour. It would have taken a lot longer going up that way – I’m glad I took the cable car. Back down in Kobe I bought a few games for the Nintendo, and that was quite an experience. I knew about a used game shop in Sannomiya, but I haven’t actually been inside. I went today thinking I might save some money, and it turned out that there were games there, but not the games that I was looking for. The games all had anime pictures of girls in short skirts and there were just guys buying them. Yikes – I got out of there quick.

Finally I picked up what I needed, and met up with Kuniko. We met up for some lunch, and then did a little shopping around the area. Finally we came on home and we’ve been resting our weary feet. Kuniko cooked a really good dinner – a garlic, shrimp and rice dish with miso soup. I think the rest of the evening will be more of the same, and then tomorrow we’ll try to enjoy our last day of this long vacation.

We are close to getting our tickets booked for Europe this August. It is turning out to be a real adventure. More on that later…

Friday was a pretty mellow day. We stayed in most of the day doing laundry and playing with our new Nintendo DS lite that arrived. We’ve been doing a brain training software that is kind of fun. It’s a real challenge for Kuniko, but nearly impossible for me since it’s not in my native language. My scores are always really low, and I try to use the language thing as an excuse, but so far, it’s not working.

In the evening we went over to Kuniko’s parents’ house for dinner. Her dad was late getting back, so we went ahead and ate dinner without him. When he did get home he didn’t mind that we ate first, and I think everyone was just happy that he didn’t get in an accident or something. I drink whiskey with him and we talked about all kinds of things. We ate easter chocolates that my aunt and uncle had sent. They really enjoyed those, and were really happy to exchange presents. They’re already thinking of something else to send…

I woke up today with no headache, and I’ve been feeling fine all day today. I’m off the medicine, even though I have lots left. Maybe it’s better to stay away from the painkillers and muscle relaxants for a while. Even though the headache is gone, there is still a little soreness in and around my head. My teeth hurt from clenching.

Kuniko and I went into Akashi this morning. We did something I haven’t done in nearly five years – we went geocaching. We walked around with my old GPS unit inside of Akashi park until we finally found a cache, but in a surprise move the cache only contained a map to another cache. We followed the map carefully, with clues like “count the number of stones on your right as you walk” etc, and then finally found the cache. We had to walk by two lovebirds making out to get there, and they didn’t really like the intrusion.

Kuniko’s opinion of the treasure hunt was “It was fun.” I suppose we’ll do it again sometime. There are not as many around Japan as there are in the U.S., but I think there are some in Kobe to try out, so maybe we’ll do that next.

After treasure hunting we did another search, and stopped by an apartment hunting place to look for a new place to live. We’ll be moving in July, so we have started looking at places. We’re pretty flexible on location, but we really want to be near a train station (preferably the JR line) and also near a big grocery store. With Kuniko’s car Carrefour is not so far away, so we can always stock up on cheese and wine when we need it.

For lunch we ate at Mister Donut. I know what you are thinking – eating donuts for lunch is not a healthy thing, but they actually have some new lunch items on their menu. We had two different noodle dishes, and they both were really good. They came with some dim sum on the side, and we were both impressed. I could have eaten more, though. We did buy some donuts for breakfast tomorrow.

We did a little bit more shopping in the area and then headed home. We made one last stop at IY and then came back here. Kuniko worked on a project to get all our favorite recipes organized into folders, and I worked on flashcards and fooled around on the computer.

Kuniko and I have been lusting over the new Nintendo DS Lite that came out in Japan a while ago. They have been sold out here and are really tough to come by. Yes, I want to play games with it and so does Kuniko, but the clincher came the other day when I found a program that will help you learn how to write Japanese characters. They also have programs to learn foreign languages, including English. The adult market is thriving. We were able to order one through Amazon Japan, so if all goes well we’ll have it within a couple of weeks. I can’t wait to try it out.

Soon Kuniko is headed over with another teacher to pay a visit to a student that needs a little extra attention, and when she gets back we’re having a sushi dish for dinner. Then we’ll catch a DVD that we rented the other day and relax. This long holiday is turning out pretty nice.

Tuesday I had two classes during the day, and a monster headache to keep me occupied in between. Although I’ve had a cold and a headache the last couple of days, I’ve been avoiding the aspirin, but finally Tuesday afternoon I buckled and took four aspirin. Unfortunately it didn’t even make a dent. Golden Week is from Wednesday to Friday, and usually most places are closed, so Kuniko convinced me to see a doctor in the evening.

When she got home Kuniko drove me to a hospital that was still open, and we talked with a nice doctor who seemed slightly crazy and very nerdy. He was really nice, though, and patient with us. He had me laughing (albeit nervously) and in the end offered to give me an injection in the back of my head to stop the pain. It was tempting, but a little scary. I finally decided to just go with the drugs, so I got a prescription for some painkillers, muscle relaxants, and even some kind of medicine patch to wear on the painful areas.

We got the prescription filled at a nearby pharmacy, and a very serious pharmacist cautioned me about all the medicines. She was completely serious – like the world hung on the balance of my use of these drugs. I think maybe she could have used some of my drugs as well.

After dinner I took the medicine and applied a patch, and things started getting much better. The headache diminished somewhat, and by bedtime it was only a minor irritant. Good advice from Kuniko – I’m glad I went to see the doc.

I woke up this morning with a serious sore throat which promises to turn into a cold by mid-week. I’ve had a headache now for the past five days, and today I just kind of lost my appetite. Kuniko got up early and made breakfast and lunch for us, and that let me sleep in a little bit which felt good.

At school I had just one class during fifth period, so I put in a request to go home early right after the class, and then I went home and slept for a few hours. Now I’m up and about, but getting ready to lay down again. I’ve got just one more day to get through at school tomorrow, and then I’ve got five days off in a row.

I definitely got some sleep in this morning, but Kuniko was up early. She was cleaning house and doing laundry early on. The weather was beautiful today, and so we made some plans to go out and enjoy it.

Kuniko’s sister was still in town, so they decided to do a little shopping at the outlet mall in Tarumi. I came along and we had a good time walking around and seeing everything there. There were lots of people at the mall, and so I enjoyed people watching quite a bit.

We got home from shopping and had Kuniko’s sister come up for snacks and a couple of games of Sorry. She learned quickly, and won the first game she played. After a few games she decided to head on out. Kuniko and I did some shopping at Carrefour and then came on back home, pretty worn out. We’ve both got to work tomorrow, so it should be a pretty mellow night tonight. In addition, I’m feeling a little sickness coming on – maybe a cold. Just in time for the Golden Week holidays…

Saturday Kuniko got up early and headed into Kobe to get ready for the concert, and I followed shortly thereafter, arriving a little earlier at a station called Rokkomichi. I was pleasantly surprised with the area. It had a nice feel to it, and it was in the shadow of Rokko mountain so there were lots of trees and hills nearby. It might be a place to look at someday to live.

I took a short hike on faith and managed to find the music hall, and since I had a little time I went to a nearby restaurant for some okonomiyaki, since I had heard that the concert could last almost three hours. I didn’t want my stomach growling during that time, so I ate a nice lunch and then headed over.

In the lobby of the concert hall I met up with Kuniko and was introduced to her students, both current and last year’s students. They all seemed really nice, and I think they were excited about the show.

I went inside and sat with two of Kuniko’s foreign students – she is teaching them Japanese. They are exchange students from overseas – Haley is from Canada and Jess is from Australia. It was my first time meeting Jess, but she seems like a smart girl and I think they are really enjoying their experience in Japan.

The concert was divided into three parts, and each one lasted about 40 minutes. The students did great – I enjoyed the show. The last part was an orchestra type arrangement, with almost twenty people playing various instruments, mostly the mandolin guitar.

At the end of the show they had a little tribute for two members of the club that are approaching graduation. It was their last concert, so there was a lot of tears and emotion.

Once the show wrapped up I headed back home, and Kuniko headed to Okayama to catch the tail end of a wedding party for one of her friends. In the evening I headed to Denya for some yakitori and had the chance to chat with one of the regular’s brother-in-law, who was a really nice guy. He bought me a couple of beers, and then put in a call to his daughter who came bearing a photo album. They pulled out a picture of me with his brother-in-law, and gave me the pictures. He was a really nice guy, but I had a hard time understanding his Japanese. The master was put in the position of being the interpreter. He translated the very colloquial local tongue into standard Japanese for me – a Japanese to Japanese interpreter.

The yakitori also had a new item on the menu, a steak. He grills up the steak just how you want it, and then serves it cut into strips. The price is right and the flavor was awesome. After the yakitori I headed over to IY and discovered some interesting things on the third floor. Bugs are really popular here in Japan, and they had a temporary wooden cage built and it was filled with insects – giant beetles – crawling around. Kids can buy them and they use them as pets.

Kuniko got home at a reasonable hour thanks to her sister, who drove her back from the wedding party in Okayama. We get a chance to sleep in on Sunday, so that is something to look forward to!

No, not really. But if there was a day to do it, today might have been it.

Today I went into school without a lesson plan for the three first year lessons, but luckily Mori sensei had left the plan on my desk last night, so it was waiting for me when I arrived. I spent the morning going over it and making sure I knew what was going on. It was a very complicated plan, concentrating heavily on the textbook and workbook. Usually I don’t use the textbook so much in my class – but I was letting Mori sensei run with this lesson to see how it went.

It went poorly.

The first lesson was with Nozaki sensei, who is bright and cheerful and refreshingly straight forward. She told me before the class started that she didn’t like such a complex plan – she’d rather leave the class to me and let me run the show. She (and all the other English teachers but Mori sensei) see my lesson as a chance to relax a bit and let me handle things. It’s a good way for the students to be completely submersed in English.

Unfortunately the students in our first class forgot their textbooks at home, leaving us with a pretty useless lesson plan. We improvised by writing lots of information on the blackboard, skipping some activities, and Nozaki sensei even drew a really good cartoon right out of the book on the board. When the class finally ended we were tired out, and ready for a break. Luckily for Mori sensei, our misfortune allowed her to make copies of the textbook for the next two classes. Nozaki sensei politely gave her a very Japanese-sized piece of her mind, and it was interesting to watch the dynamic between them.

My next two classes were with Mori sensei, and right off the bat Mori sensei took control of the flow and the class, and she guided the whole thing in English and Japanese. Most of the lesson ended up being in Japanese, and the students kept looking at me wondering when I would talk. Unfortunately the script didn’t call for too much of me talking. It did focus quite a bit on student pronunciation which I think is a very good thing.

After the first class Mori sensei announced that she felt the lesson put too much emphasis on her talking, and wanted me to talk more. I did my best the next lesson, but Mori sensei frequently jumped in and cut me off with some Japanese. She even made fun of my English pronunciation in a side Japanese joke to the kids. I don’t mind if she makes fun of me, but if kids think they sound stupid trying to pronounce English correctly, they won’t try anymore.

I’m getting all worked up again. Count to ten… OK.

I survived the classes, though, and that was something I wasn’t sure would happen earlier. As soon as I got back to my desk I started thinking about how I can adapt the lesson to something more my style – I have to teach the lesson with several other teachers, too, and today some of them told me they’ll be counting on me to “take care of them” through the new lesson.

The rest of the day was good. In fact, it was great. I marked the homework that the students turned in, and I was pleased overall with the results. The students did better than I expected.

I had some time at the end of the day, so I spent the time walking around the school talking with students instead of just sitting around the staff room. I talked with students hanging out in the hallways, walked through the newly upgraded gymnasium, and poked my head into the kendo room and the ping pong room. The new first year kendo members came over to say hello to me. It’s always strange to carry on a conversation with a student when they are wearing a big metal mask. Behind the metal bars you can see the same old cheerful student from your class, they just look like a pissed off samurai from the outside.

While I was walking around talking to students everyone would take a moment to say hello to me. Everyone was happy to see that I was around and taking an interest in what was going on. Two girls followed me around the whole time. They are kind of Bryan groupies – they always try to get my attention but then they start turning red and giggling as soon as I say something to them.

I left school right on time, feeling pretty good. Walking around making that many people happy was certainly enough to make up for my bad experiences with Mori sensei.

Now I’m home and hanging out on a Friday night. I have a feeling that Kuniko will be home late since it is the last night before her concert, and I’m sure her club members are practicing like crazy. I’ll be heading into Kobe tomorrow to catch the show – should be fun!

Wednesday was a free day for me – I had no classes because the first year students were on their orientation trip to Miki. I hung out all day and studied, paid a visit to have lunch with Tsuji-san during the fourth period, and wrapped it all up and got out of there right on time.

Kuniko got home late again, but we still had a big salad for dinner, and got her to bed early. Hopefully she’ll get a break soon to get some rest. She’s been working very, very hard. Unfortunately with her concert coming up this weekend and a wedding party after that, it might be tough to get that break.

Today my normal morning class was switched out to give me an opportunity to learn how to do tea ceremony at a special class in our school. The class is part of the trial “International Understanding” course offered by our school. The history teacher had arranged it, and when I got to the tea room (our school has a very cool tea room built right in) everything was set up.

I joined about seven students and we learned from the instructor – a woman that comes to our school just to guide the tea ceremony club, and occasionally to teach some other classes.

While one of the other teachers snapped pictures we all sat in a very uncomfortable “seiza” position, which means you sit on your knees and slowly constrict the blood flow of your legs using your own body weight. The history teacher assured me that I didn’t have to sit that way, but I didn’t want to be the only one not doing that, so I held out until one of the students finally gave it up, and then I gave it up too, and sat cross-legged.

I think the students enjoyed having a total rookie around, and so we had a good rapport going despite the very strict lesson we got about the ceremony itself. It’s a very complex ceremony, and there were so many directions on doing such and such with only your right hand, and turn this three times, and fold that twice exactly like this… well, you get the point. Overall it was a good, though. I’m looking forward to doing it again sometime.

On my way home at the end of the day I shared a train ride with one of my ex-students – this one was from two years ago. She is attending a dance school in Kobe and we talked about Takanan for most of the train ride. It was a good chance to speak lots of Japanese.

Kuniko got home relatively early tonight – around 6:30. We had a huge dinner of ham sandwiches and salads, and then walked around Ito Yokado buying some household goods and some things for tomorrow in an attempt to burn off some of the calories.

For the first time in a long time I’m dreading going to work. Tomorrow we have no teaching plan, and the teacher responsible for it, Mori sensei, just got back from the orientation trip today. Hopefully she’ll have an outline on my desk tomorrow morning, but I’ve got to prepare for the idea that maybe there will be no plan. We’ll see what happens tomorrow. I’ve got three classes in the morning, and they are all getting the new (plan-less) lesson. Ick.

This week I have a pretty light schedule, partly to make up for last week’s fairly heavy one. I just had two classes today – no sweat. I had fun with the students today, and I even had some come to my desk during lunchtime just to chat. Overall the level of English of the students seems higher than last year, or at least maybe they are less shy this year.

As a result of my meeting with Mori sensei the other day, we were scheduled to meet with all the other English teachers that teach first year English, so that she could explain her plan to them. The time for the meeting came and went, though, and Mori sensei was too busy to do the meeting. Finally, with five minutes left before my regular leaving time, she said she was free.

Nozaki sensei takes evening courses every Tuesday in pursuit of her Master’s degree, and so she always leaves right at five. She was worried that she might not be able to get to her class on time. She called me aside and said that if I told Mori sensei that I had to leave, then she could make her class in time. I don’t know why she couldn’t just say it herself, but it was a fine idea – I wanted to go home on time as well. So I told her that I had to run, and so it looks like we’ll be tackling the next lesson without a planning meeting.

Things in the first year English department are pretty shaky right now, and I’m afraid that my successor will get dropped into a tough situation. It’s not a bad situation, it’s just that there is no clear plan or responsible figure – Mori sensei is too busy to take care of everything, but she doesn’t want to give anything up.

I’m back home and waiting for Kuniko to get home. We’re going to have a healthy dinner after the pizza feast last night. Tonight the plan is avocado salad – hope it turns out OK!