Today it was back to work, and I went in at the normal time to hit the books. I experimented with a new approach to studying. I reviewed vocabulary on the train ride in, and then reviewed new vocabulary that I had learned yesterday for about half an hour when I arrived. Next I did grammar review of new grammar points for about 45 minutes, and then I did 30 minutes of kanji and listening practice. Finally I spent 45 minutes learning new vocabulary, 15 minutes of data entry of new words that I need to learn, and then the last hour was spent reading “Holes” in Japanese. I took me an hour to read three pages.

After all of that I found that I had missed lunch, but since I was going home soon I didn’t worry about it. The group from Australia was back, and Tsutsumi sensei told me all about her trip. She hinted about some interesting stories to tell me later on. I can’t wait!

The principal of the school also went on that trip, and he called me in to give me some paperwork relating to next year’s contract, and some secret documents for the new teacher interviews that I’ll be helping with later this month. He gave me his insights into the trip and I think it was a good way for him to realize how valuable it is to be multi-lingual. He was helpless in Australia, and at the mercy of his translators – Ms. Tsutsumi and Mr. Hayashi.

When I got home Kuniko was already there – back from her school seminar. We got caught up and then had a really healthy dinner of tofu and soumen noodles, with some kimchee on the side to spice it up. It was a seriously healthy meal – and really delicious. We were both full afterwards, but not so full that we couldn’t pick some 31 Flavors ice cream and take it to Kuniko’s folks house in Kakogawa. We spent some time with them and I focused really hard on the conversations to pick up what was going on.

As usual we couldn’t leave the place without lots of gifts – food, fruits and vegetables from their farm, even an entire frozen octopus. Wow. I wondered about the cryogenic effects on the ride home with the frozen block of octopus wrapped in newspaper in the back seat – would it reanimate as it warmed up? I can scientifically answer that “no”, it wouldn’t. Lucky the air conditioning was on.

Kuniko is lucky enough to have the rest of the week off, and I’ll get a chance to take some time off later this week. It’s the bon festival coming up soon – the Japanese day to remember the dead. We’ll likely go over to Kuniko’s folks place for dinner on later this week to celebrate.

Last night I spent a few hours at the Yakitori chatting with Atsuji-san, and also some of the other regulars. It was a lot of fun – we talked about all kinds of stuff, and everyone kept the drinks and food coming. Atsuji-san is a really cool guy, and the more he drinks the less English he speaks. That makes it more of a challenge for me, but I really enjoyed it.

I was up fairly early this morning, and I got cleaned up and spent some time cleaning house and studying. I bought a new textbook on Japanese kanji at the bookstore next door – I’m hoping to focus a little more on reading and writing kanji.

Last night at the yakitori the master had invited me to join him for a late okonomiyaki lunch today before he goes into work. I met him in front of Denya around 3 p.m., and we drove out to a restaurant near Higashi Futami station, where I used to walk every day.

It was a tiny little place that also was selling shaved ice. There were about five other people in there just hanging out, and they were really surprised when we walked in. We ordered up some okonomiyaki from a huge menu – for such a small place they had a great selection. I ordered a kimchee and shrimp okonomiyaki, and the master had an egg and pork one. We had a couple of beers with it, and had a good talk in between bites of the food.

We finished up, and on the way home the master pulled into the liquor store to pick up a bottle of shochu for the yakitori. Atsuji-san came out from the back and said hello, and we talked about the fun from last night and I described my okonomiyaki to him in detail.

Soon enough the master came back out from the shop and then he gave me a ride home. This evening I didn’t need dinner, since the late lunch kind of did me in. I’m getting geared up for tomorrow, and I’ll take my new textbook into school so I can work on it there. Also, Kuniko will be back in town tomorrow – she’s been out of town for her club retreat, so it will be good to see her. This is the second weekend in a row that she’s had to work. No doubt she’ll be exhausted.

I’m spending my single weekend trying to keep cool and study in different ways. Today I got up early and went into Akashi to enjoy a walk through the Akashi park. I spent a few hours in the library when it got hot, and took advantage of their air conditioning.

The library had an area full of tables, with signs on each one that said they were not for studying. Since I was kind of studying and kind of reading at the same time, I was a little worried that someone would tell me to move along. The tables were full of people reading library books. Some old guys were there slumped over the table sleeping, too. I felt pretty sure that nobody would bug me if they’ve got people sleeping there.

After studying for a few hours I walked around the lake and got a frozen orange juice to work on. The side of the lake has benches here and there, so I sat and one and watched the paddleboats scooting around the lake. After about half an hour I started to hear thunder coming from the north, and the clouds in that direction looked kind of dark. I figured it was time to head back to the station for shelter.

On my way back I passed on old man on a bench singing some old Japanese tune – it was slow and a little creepy, and combined with the thunder rumbling to the north and sound of the cicadas in the bushes it gave me a really otherworld kind of feel.

Back in town I did some shopping for a few things, and couldn’t resist stopping in at Starbucks to have an iced frappucino and to study. I’ve heard that Starbucks in Japan are often used by foreigners to pick up clients or girlfriends, and I’ve seen foreigners in this particular Starbucks once or twice working on somebody. I kept to myself, though – enjoyed my drink and read more of my book.

I had chili shrimp for an early dinner, and then watched Jerry Macguire on my computer to make it a nice relaxed evening. Atsuji-san sent me a message and wants to hook up at the yakitori for a couple of drinks, so I’m headed that way pretty soon. I thought I’d get this entry in while I’m still sober.

Well, I’m back to updating after an extended break. What happened?

The server that hosts my website, all of fredricks.net, my dad’s stuff, my brother’s stuff, everything – it died. There was no warning, and it left me and my hosting company standing around looking confused. My hosting company is still standing around looking confused, but in the meantime we’ve moved to another server and things should run a little smoother now.

The nice thing about all this was that I got a couple of weeks break from blogging. I’ll try to sum up all the highlights here, although I’m sure I’m going to miss some stuff.

The biggest change is that now Kuniko has completely moved into my place, and now it’s not my place anymore but our place. We’ve been getting along pretty well, and settling into a daily routine that works for both of us. Right now we’re both on a summer schedule, which is always variable and hard to predict. Some days Kuniko goes into work late and some days she comes home early. My schedule is pretty much from 7:30 in the morning until sometime in the afternoon – I do like the nice air conditioned environment at school.

As for living space, we’ve both had to make some adjustments. Kuniko doesn’t have that much stuff, so it’s been fairly easy finding places to put things. Still, I seem to have a lot of junk leftover from the previous occupant, and I didn’t get rid of it because I was wondering if Kuniko would have some use for it. As we start to go through stuff we’ll make more room.

This past week we started to bring bento lunches to school. It was Kuniko’s idea for us to save money, and it’s a good idea. Right now at school my cafeteria is closed, so I would always go out and buy a sandwich or sushi or something cheap. Still, it’s a lot cheaper to bring your own lunch, and so Kuniko wanted to do ours Japanese style.

In Japan it’s a man’s world, and around here if you are married your wife will often make you a bento lunch in the morning before you go to work. Kuniko wanted to make one for both of us, and I felt (and still feel) pretty guilty about her getting up early to make the lunches. There are some things I can do to help out though, so I’m getting up at the same time to help out.

I’ve always been impressed with the lunches that other teachers bring to school, and Kuniko has made some really good ones for us. We picked up a bento box at her parents’ house, and it has several layers. The bottom level is for rice, the top is split three ways and you can put whatever you like in there. Little hot dogs, tamagoyaki, pumpkin, cabbage and pork, bacon-wrapped asparagus, fried chicken, tomatoes, salads – all kinds of good stuff.

My work schedule is very easy. I study around four to six hours a day, and then head home to do some chores and relax. At work the vice principal is in charge of my schedule, and he enjoys dropping hints during the day on when I can leave, even though I already know that anytime after lunch is OK. There are hardly any teachers here at all, so it’s a quiet and cool place to study.

One interesting development at work is that Yamamoto sensei, the head of the English department, asked me if I would be interested in doing a weblog in English for the school’s website. I thought that was a great idea, so he’s going to check with the school to get approval. I’ll probably update it once a week at first, and if it’s fun I’ll do it more, and if not I’ll scale it back to twice a month or so. I couldn’t imagine doing it in Japanese, but maybe the parents will be interested to see some English on the website.

Speaking of Japanese, I think I’m marginally improving. I’m starting to read more Japanese books, and even though I’m very slow and spend a lot of time looking up words it is a great way to learn vocabulary and grammar structures. Right now I’m reading “Holes” in Japanese, and it is a really good choice because I’ve read the English version and I’ve also seen the movie.

I’m getting more comfortable speaking Japanese, and I think it’s just a matter of knowing your limits and to a certain extent, just going for it. There are lots of times when I say something and people look at me like they completely don’t understand. If you say a word tentatively, often it is hard for them to understand. If you say it confidently, they will very often understand it, or at least pick up on your confidence and pretend they do. I’m also starting to build useful phrases and structures in my head – I just mentally switch out words and then they pop out more or less intact.

We caught a pretty good movie last week called “Team America: World Police”. It just arrived here in Japan and it’s only playing at small theaters – it’s not getting a big run. We really enjoyed seeing it, and I downloaded the soundtrack to listen to while we are hanging around the house. There are some really catchy (and raunchy) tunes on there, and it is one of the great joys of my life to see Kuniko walking by singing “America, Fuck Yeah!” or “Everyone’s got AIDS!” Hard to explain without seeing the movie, I guess. Never mind, moving right along…

Last week we went into Kobe to spend some time at the wedding place planning the ceremony. We made a few big decisions, and some of them were surprisingly tough. For dinner afterwards we went to a Spanish restaurant that served tapas, and we had an assortment with some good draft beer. The sirloin steak on top of the cheese risotto was mind-blowing. It was a really good place, and it’s right along the road to the wedding chapel, so we’ll have plenty of chances to be tempted by it again.

Kuniko and I have been splitting the cooking duties this summer. Once school starts, I’ll probably be doing the cooking during the week, since she’ll be getting home pretty late every night. I’m the one with the easy work schedule, at least for the next year, so I’ll be taking care of dinner. Once we both are working tough schedules, then it’ll be a little tricky to figure out.

Finally, this weekend Kuniko has a seminar (in Japanese: 合宿) for the weekend, and so she’ll be living with her students in Nishinomiya for the next few days. She’ll get to come home on Monday, but that leaves me with an empty house for the weekend. I’ll spend this weekend studying, cleaning, and staying out of the hot, humid weather.

Well, that’s all I can think of right now. I’ll get back in the routine of writing daily, and hopefully there will be some interesting things to say during this slow, hot month of August.

I’m in the middle of getting this thing up and running again. Why was it down? Long story. I’ll update more after work today!

Today I went into work to help out the students who are going to Australia in a few weeks. Mr. Hayashi had organized a “summer camp” where the students would come and prepare for their trip. He asked me to come almost a month ago, and he also invited two other ALTs from the area.

I went upstairs to the work room, and sat with the students. We started off listening to a lecture about Australia from the history teacher, and then we had a lunchbreak. According to the schedule that someone had written on the board, the ALTs would be helping with the next part – making a map to present to the governor of Western Australia. Since it was lunchbreak I went to look for Mr. Hayashi and ask him what we should do to help.

When I got downstairs I saw Mr. Hayashi’s car pulling out of school and leaving, so I asked the history teacher what the plan was, and he was surprised – he said he didn’t know and he thought that I already did. It was right about then that the other ALTs arrived, and so we got busy with introductions, and we all had sandwiches for lunch and chatted, along with the principal and vice principal.

I got a chance to meet Lisa for the first time. She is an ALT from Australia, and so it was nice to have a real live Australian at the event to help out the students. We talked for a little bit and the history teacher listened eagerly, hoping to pick up some English from us.

I asked around and it turned out that Mr. Hayashi had forgotten an Australian calendar at his house. He was still gone when lunch was over, and so we all went upstairs and nobody knew exactly what we were supposed to do. The ALTs introduced themselves to the students, and after that everyone was kind of looking around waiting for something to happen.

After a few minutes I realized that nobody was going to really step forward and take charge, so I did. I found some paper that was in a pile of Mr. Hayashi’s stuff and I had Tsutsumi sensei pass it out to people. We split the group into three smaller groups, and then we talked with each group to give them some ideas about what to do. Sometimes I had to come up with ideas completely off the top of my head, but it served to get people talking amongst themselves. I think people were so grateful for any kind of leadership that they were willing to try anything.

I set up the other two ALTs with two groups, and then some Japanese English teachers with the other group, and then I rotated around the three groups getting ideas flowing and providing encouragement and correct English spelling.

The history teacher told me that Mr. Hayashi is very relaxed, so that is why they didn’t have much of a plan. He complained that he disappeared at a crucial time. I just said that now we are doing fine – everything is going OK. A few minutes later the vice principal pulled me aside and thanked me. He told me very sternly that Mr. Hayashi was not very prepared, and he didn’t look happy about it. Privately, I agree with him, but I didn’t mention it.

Finally about halfway through the project Mr. Hayashi made it back, and he checked out the progress. He thought things were going well, and he walked around helping with spelling and explanations.

After the students finished their projects we did practice presentations, and the students pretended to present them to the governor in English. They did a good job – I think they will be impressed in Australia.

We wrapped it up after that. Mr. Hayashi thanked us for helping out, and so we were free to go. It nice to chat with Jamie and Lisa – it had been a long time since I had seen Jamie. He is wrapping up his contract on the JET program, and is looking to stay around in the future. I’ll be interested to see how his job search goes.

I shared a train home with lots of the students from the camp, and I passed around a picture of Kuniko, and she got very good reviews from the students. I haven’t told them that we’re getting married in November, but I will sometime next term. It would be fun for the ESS students to be able to come to the ceremony.

I’m back home now, staying inside out of the heat. It’s a quiet night of TV and studying, since I went out last night to the yakitori. Tomorrow I have the whole day absolutely, positively, 100% free. What should I do?

I got up fairly early today to go out to Akashi and jump on the train with Kuniko. I had messaged her as she approached, figured out what train car she was on, and then jumped on and met up with her.

I thought I saw one of my students who had graduated one year ago, and she was looking at me kind of funny. She looked a lot different, but I mentioned it to Kuniko, and she said she recognized her from Takasago Minami.

That must have been a funny situation for the girl – she’s on the train, and then she sees Kuniko, and recognizes her. Then, a few stops later, she sees me get on the train and recognizes me. Then she sees me come up to Kuniko and put my arms around her – that must have been a pretty good shock. As she got off the train she said hello.

We got off in Umeda, and took the Midosuji line of the subway south – from there it was just a five minute walk to the American embassy. On the way we crossed several rivers, and the city hall of Osaka, which was pretty impressive on its own.

The reason for going to the embassy was to have a affadavit witnessed and sealed by the vice consul, which in turn would be used at the Japanese city office where I live.

We got to the embassy, and there was a line of people outside, mostly Japanese. There was a kind security guard organizing things, and even though he didn’t speak English (and he didn’t have to, because Kuniko was there) he was full of amusing little snippets of English that he had picked up on the job. At the each corner of the building were Japanese security guards, and the American flag was flying above the embassy. It reminded me of spy movies when all they have to do to escape is to get inside the embassy and ask for protection.

We had to walk through a metal detector, surrender our electronics, and exchange photo ID for visitor badges, and then finally we were allowed to go to the fourth floor. We waited there with people hoping for American visas, an American woman (with great Japanese skills) getting married to a Japanese man, and an angry looking young man who had lost his passport the day before he was to come home from his vacation.

The consul came out and had me raise my right hand, and as I stood under the pictures of George W., Dick Cheney, and Condi Rice I swore that the information was correct. It would have made a great picture if they hadn’t confiscated all my electronics.

From there we went back to the station. For lunch we went to a hamburger place that Kuniko had seen on TV. The place was very busy – there weren’t seats, you ordered and then took it away. We ordered and had to come back in one hour to get our food – that’s how popular it was. The burger I got was big – American sized – and it was delicious. There wasn’t as much a focus on meat as in America, but the other ingredients were a good match.

Next we took the train back to Akashi, and Kuniko led me through the shopping center in the middle of the train station. At the end of the building there was a branch office of the city office, with 4-5 ladies wearing aprons while they did office work. It was pretty slow when we walked in, but when we explained what we wanted they sprang into action. I’d say they definitely hadn’t had a marriage request from a foreigner yet, judging from the instruction manual that they broke out.

We produced all the paperwork that we had collected, and it appeared to all be in order. They kept calling the main office, and as we waited I could see shoppers walking by outside the door with shopping bags full of clothes.

Finally they said that we were finished, so we got up and left. We walked back through the shopping center on the way back to the train station.

It’s at this point that we were officially married, even though we carried no proof of the fact. They will have paper proof for us in a week or so, but we’re in the database as being married.

The whole reason to do this now is because we have more time during the summer to do all the paperwork. I knew that it would be weird to get married in a city office, and it was even stranger to get married in a city office that is part of a shopping center. The feeling was akin to walking into the lonely customer service desk on the top floor of a Sears store in some mall and getting married.

After a bit more walking around Akashi, we went back to our respective homes. Kuniko has to work tomorrow, and study for her teacher’s test this weekend. I’ve got to work part of the day tomorrow with some other ALTs getting ready for our students’ trip to Australia.

I went over to the yakitori tonight to chat with the master. It was not so busy tonight, and I got lots of Japanese practice chatting with one of the customers, Masao-san. He’s a younger guy that spent half a year in Australia and remembers about ten words of English. So we had to use Japanese only, and that’s always a great situation for me.

Kuniko is going to move in on Monday, and so we’ll start from there getting used to living with each other. Stay tuned to see how domestic life turns out…

Today as usual the cicadas were making lots of noise as I walked to school. I can’t begin to describe how loud they can get. When you walk by a big tree full of them you can barely hear anything else. The pressure from the noise presses in on your eardrums, and you feel like just a little more noise would be enough to break them. Forget heavy metal concerts – it’s cicadas that Japanese youth will be blaming for hearing loss in the future.

I got a preview today of what the rest of this month and most of next month will be like. I came into work at the regular time, and about half the people that are usually there at that time were present. I settled in to study and was able to work without distraction until around noon.

I ate lunch (leftover yakiudon), and chatted with some graduates from last year who had come to visit the school. They joked around with me mostly in Japanese, and they sounded like they were really enjoying college life.

At around 1 p.m. I went over to Tsuji-san’s place to chat with her for about an hour. She told her father about her marriage last weekend, and so we talked about that. Her mom came in and served us ice coffee, and she sat in on the conversation for a while. Apparently, it didn’t go well.

Tsuji-san’s father is a pretty traditional guy. Tsuji-san told me that upon meeting her previous boyfriend, her father “hated” him. Yikes. Based on that reaction, it was only natural to keep her current guy a secret. Anyway, her father didn’t have a clue that she was even dating anyone, and so when she told him they were planning on getting married he said it was like finding out she had cancer – a sudden realization that nothing will ever be the same. I said that a comparison with cancer was probably not a very good analogy to make, but she said that’s what she expected from him.

Her mother is taking the brunt of it – her father is retired and spends all day thinking about this, tossing and turning at night, and complaining to her mom. Tsuji-san is going to wait a while to bring her fiancee over. It might be a long while judging from her dad’s reaction.

Her father wanted to be consulted on whether or not they should get married, so that’s why he is so unhappy about it. This comes from a time in Japan when most marriages were arranged. Arranged marriages sound pretty old fashioned to me, but they still happen here. There is such a large population of older people in Japan that the traditions they are used to are dying very, very slowly.

Yesterday was Tsuji-san’s birthday, so I gave her an American birthday card and a container of cheese balls that I found over at Ito Yokado. I know she likes junk food, so they should be a big hit.

I went back to the school after chatting with Tsuji-san – her house is literally right across the street. Nobody noticed that I was gone, and since I had left all my books, dictionaries, and flashcards on my desk everyone just figured I was playing ping pong or something. Not two minutes after I walked back in the vice principal came by and told me that I could leave anytime I liked, so at 2 p.m. I was out the door and off to the train station. This is a schedule I can deal with – I got in 4-5 hours of studying, and I got home at a decent hour.

I resisted the urge to take a nap and spent time cleaning out a closet or two. I still have lots of junk, so I’m going to have to work together with Kuniko to make space for her stuff. We’ll have to go shopping and buy some new shelves and storage, but it shouldn’t be too much stuff. We’re only going to be here for a year and then we’re moving to parts unknown – no reason to go nuts buying stuff now.

I’m doing fishsticks for dinner, and then all the shaved ice I can eat. I broke out Kuniko’s shaved ice machine and I’ve been using it a lot. Today on the way home I bought some “adult” shaved ice. Shaved ice here is flavored very sweet and marketed mainly to kids, although adults eat it too. For the first time today I saw they had two “upscale” shaved ice flavors. At twice the price of regular shaved ice I bought one that was honey flavored with bits of fruit rind blended in – it was not as sweet as the regular ones – quite good. The other one was labelled in English as Deep Blue Sea flavor, which sounded a little too salty for me. I’ll save that for later.

Today we had no classes, just a clean up session, and then after that an hour of speeches and stern warnings, and finally the students could go home for the summer vacation.

I was in charge of students cleaning up my classroom and so we cleaned the windows, and I enjoyed chatting with them as we worked. One of the students does a great impression of Oshita sensei, and we also talked about sports injuries.

It was incredibly hot in the gymnasium for the closing ceremony, and a couple of students passed out from the heat as they were standing there. I was lucky enough to be able to go outside when it was too hot, but the poor students were stuck there.

In the afternoon I hung out with some students at my desk, one of whom I shared a train with over the weekend. She asked me all about my trip to the museum, and we chatted for a long time in Japanese. She said she was really impressed that I went over and talked to her on the train – I guess she wasn’t expecting that.

After a while the vice principal gave me some paperwork to fill out. It’s the same paper I filled out last year – you write whether you will be in the office for each day during summer break. Just like last year I said that I would be there all day every day. This usually works with a nod and a wink – you disappear early and nobody seems to mind.

Mr. Hayashi paid me a visit and warned me that this year is very different, and they will be much more strict. He said that I’ll be working hours similar to my regular hours, from 7:30 to 4-5 in the afternoon. I was surprised that the system changed, but it doesn’t affect me much – I was planning on coming in to take advantage of the free air conditioning. I’m going to study anyway, might as well do it somewhere cool without distraction.

I turned in the paperwork to the vice principal and asked him why the policy had changed this year. He said that it hadn’t changed – I guess Mr. Hayashi was wrong. He told me that I can leave when I want, just let him know what I’m doing and it will be no problem. That’s nice to know – I wonder why Mr. Hayashi got the message all scrambled.

I left right on time today, and picked up some ingredients for tonight’s dinner at Ito Yokado. I used a recipe from a book that Kuniko got the other day. It was a yakiudon recipe, and it had some unusual steps… for example, I’ve never stir-fried using mayonnaise before. Following a recipe in Japanese is pretty tough – every once in a while I bump into a kanji that I don’t know so I have to guess, and I just fill in my own ideas here and there. Luckily, it turned out pretty good.

Tomorrow is my Friday – I’m officially taking Friday off so that Kuniko and I will have time to head to Osaka and visit the American embassy. We’re going to try to get the paperwork done for our legal marriage on Friday, because we both have lots of free time. Don’t panic, though – the marriage ceremony that counts is still on November 20th – a long way off. Still, at least in the eyes of the government, we’ll be husband and wife on Friday. That’s assuming that we are able to figure out the rather complicated paperwork involved.

Back to school… it was hot early this morning, and so I had to sweat it out at my desk for an hour or two until they turned on the air conditioning. Since I had no classes today I did lots of vocabulary memorization, and I did some data entry of grammar to be memorized. Grammar is a lot more time consuming to memorize, but it’s immediately useful. I’m hoping this will help me smooth out my spoken Japanese a little.

All of this studying is in preparation for a standardized test that I will take in December. The level that I will take is probably too advanced for me, I seem firmly in the middle – above the level I passed last year, but not quite at the next level. Hopefully a summer of intense study and a little more conversation will get me on the right path.

After school we had a CPR training course, and it is pretty tough to do CPR with Japanese instructions. I did OK by watching the instructors carefully, looking at the pictures in the pamphlet, and recalling what I learned in high school. The CPR dummies have come a long way – they’ve got digital readouts to tell you if you are pressing in the right place, how much air is getting in, they even measure the speed at which you work. We even got to play with defibrillators. They were simple to use, they talked to you and told you what to do. Of course I couldn’t understand the spoken instructions so well, but we got it figured out.

Tonight I cooked a simple rice bowl with mushrooms and green peppers that I grew out on my patio. I used lots of garlic and some MSG that I found. That stuff tastes great!

I’m off to bed soon – I’ve got the bedroom cooling down right now, and soon I’ll get in there, do some reading, and then hit the sack. Tomorrow is an easy day – just a closing ceremony and some speeches. I’m sure they’ll squeeze in a staff meeting or two, so I’ll probably get stuck working the whole day.

Today was a holiday for me, and so I slept in this morning, and then in the afternoon went into Kobe to meet up with Kuniko after her teachers exam interview. She seemed pretty positive about it, which is good. Its a two-part exam – the next part will happen next week… a written exam this time.

We went over to a pasta place that Kuniko turned me onto a while back. I had a pizza, and Kuniko had a big plate of pasta. Kuniko found a small piece of plastic in her pasta – that came as a surprise. I pointed it out to our waitress, and she apologized. I put the plastic into her hand, and I could tell she was a little disgusted with having to handle it, but imagine how we felt – it was in our food.

Despite the plastic everything was delicious, and after we settled up I did a little bit of shopping at Uniqlo for some new T-shirts. Kuniko got a top at a little shop near the station, and then with our bellies full and a shopping bag in hand, we got on the train and headed back.

When I got home I just relaxed during the evening, organizing my flashcards on my PDA, and listening to music. It’s still plenty hot and humid around here, and so my evenings involve a lot of sweat, even when I’m just sitting there. I battled that a little by getting some shaved ice, but I’ve got to start making it myself soon.

Tomorrow I’m going back to school. I don’t have any classes, so I’ll just hang out and see what happens.

This weekend was been pretty nice so far. Saturday Kuniko came over to get some studying done for her teacher’s interview on Monday. She brought along a gift from her parents, a big box of somen noodles. They are short, dry noodles that you boil and then use for anything you like. Delicious.

In the evening we watched “The Incredibles” on DVD at home, eating Hiroshima okonomiyaki and drinking beer. We went to bed fairly early, and since it was so hot out we ended up both waking up around two in the morning. We decided to open up the house and then go take a late night walk around town.

It was pretty quiet around my town as we walked around. We went down to the 24 hour convenience store and bought some cold drinks, and I bumped into one of the yakitori part time workers who was just getting off work. He was hanging out with his girlfriend, so I said hello and we chatted for a little bit.

Sunday I wanted to give Kuniko lots of time to herself to study, so I went into Osaka to see a Van Gogh exhibit. It was at an art museum just west of Osaka, and I had no trouble finding it following a printed map in Japanese. There was a big line waiting to get in – I had to wait 75 minutes just to get into the museum. It was the last weekend of the exhibit, and it was a holiday weekend, so that explained why there were so many people.

I waited patiently in line, reading my copy of Harry Potter as I stood there. Once I got inside they had metered people in carefully, so you had as long as you wanted to see the exhibits. They had all the famous Van Gogh paintings there, and it was great to get right up close and see them. The oil paintings were particularly impressive – the textures of the oils aren’t immediately apparent in photographs and prints.

After the museum I caught a quick lunch of shrimp tempura donburi, and then caught the train home. It was a fairly packed trip, but I was lucky to get a seat early, so I could finish off the Harry Potter book in comfort.

Back home Kuniko and I killed a little time over at Ito Yokado, and then drove over to a yakiniku restaurant that I haven’t had a chance to try yet. It was really good – we had a great dinner, and I avoided the grilled liver (Kuniko loves it). There was plenty of other kinds of meat to eat, a big bowl of bibinba, and a green salad. We polished it all off and it was only about 4000 yen for two people. Much cheaper than the sushi dinner that Antoine and I were shocked about the other day.

As we were leaving one of the employees recognized me – it was one of the ladies I say good morning to every day at the train station. She caught me off guard because I couldn’t immediately place her – she was wearing a uniform and was completely out of context. She explained how she knew me to Kuniko which was a good thing – I don’t think I could have right then.

Kuniko went home to get plenty of sleep for her test tomorrow, and I went to bed fairly late, staying up to watch a downloaded episode of Battlestar Galactica. Tomorrow I’m going into Kobe to meet up with Kuniko after her exam.

Today I had the only class of the whole week, and it was just practice interviews for the STEP test. Wait a second, didn’t we just have the STEP test? Yes, but Mr. Hayashi had me interviewing again. It was a good opportunity to talk to the students who took the test and ask them how they thought it went.

After that I had two hours to study before an “international lecture”. Mr. Kimura translated the title of the speech as “A Discussion of International Intercourse” which had me giggling. Despite the name, it was a fairly serious talk. The speaker was a college professor here in Japan – she is originally from Poland, and she was talking about her impressions of Japan as a Polish person.

I saw her in the hallway before her speech, and as she walked by I gave her a cheerful “Good Morning!” in Japanese, but she just ignored me and kept walking. That didn’t impress me too much, but her speech was pretty good. She has lived in Japan for 19 years, so her Japanese was really good. Strangely I was able to understand around 80% of what she said, compared to native speakers where I’m about 50-60%.

She talked about fitting in in Japan, and how everyone sees her and expects that she speaks English (she doesn’t). Even though she speaks Japanese people are hoping that they can practice English with her. She sounded a little frustrated, but she’s been here for 19 years so she must be getting something out of it.

It was freaking hot in the gymnasium, and the students weren’t allowed to bring fans in. I didn’t get that memo, so I walked around fanning myself until a teacher told me that it was a fan-free speech. I put it away and sweated big time for the next hour. But we all sweated together, and that’s the most important thing.

The biggest problem I had with the speech was that there was nothing for the students to relate to. Why do they care what a Polish person thinks of Japan? If she’s trying to allude to cultural differences maybe it would be good to give some examples from their perspective. I’ve never seen so many sleeping students. The teachers tried to walk around and wake up students, but they could only get the students around the edges. Like penguins in a storm the ones in the middle slept comfortably.

After school I came home, cooked up a quick omelete to kill off some bacon and onions that I had laying around, and then did some laundry. Not exactly an exciting Friday evening, but it was a lot cheaper than last night. Antoine and I are still reeling over that sushi bill.

Later in the evening my stomach was craving just a bit more, and the master had called earlier to invite Kuniko and I to a house party next Tuesday. I decided I would deliver my RSVP in person and get a stick or two of meat and a beer.

The yakitori was packed – every seat was full but one, and so I snuck in there and grabbed the seat. The master had three part time helpers working with him behind the counter, which is pretty amazing to see – the place is tiny and I can’t believe they were able to move around back there.

Even though it was a packed house one of the part timers that I know came over and took my order right away, and my food arrived within a few minutes, leapfrogging the big backlog of orders that the master was working on. Sometimes it pays to be a regular.

One of the girls at the end of the bar started giving me meaningful looks, with her boyfriend sitting right next to her. He looked at me a couple of times too, but I couldn’t read his expression. There was something weird going on, and I don’t think he was happy about it. I decided to wrap it up after one beer and get out of there. I settled up the bill and told the master that I’d be there next Tuesday with Kuniko, and he looked really happy about it. I think he was also happy to have so many customers, even though he was working really hard.

This week is a three day weekend for me – Monday is Marine Day. I don’t think it has anything to do with the branch of the American military, but the U.S. wrote the Japanese constitution so maybe it is. I’m going to try to sneak off to see some art exhibits in Osaka this weekend, but other than that it’s a quiet weekend. The new Harry Potter book comes out tomorrow morning, so I might run over to the bookstore at Ito Yokado and pick it up.

Today we had the second half of sports day – so this time I was determined to dress a little more relaxed. Yesterday all the other teachers were wearing shorts, sweats, and they looked pretty casual. Today, I wore shorts and a T-shirt, and everyone was commenting on it. “Wow, you look pretty casual!”, or “Is that ‘summer style’ you are wearing?” they asked.

I claimed that it was “Cool Biz”, taken a step further, and they seemed to think I was a little crazy. That’s OK, though.

I played volleyball in between official matches to help warm up the teams, and by the end of the day I was seriously sweaty. I spent the rest of the day in the staffroom enjoying the air conditioning. In the afternoon I went over to Tsuji-san’s place and chatted with her for more than an hour, and then left school around 4:30.

Luckily, Antoine gave me a call – he was finishing up a conference in Sannomiya and wanted to meet up in Akashi and hang out for a bit. It worked out great, actually. I went into Akashi and met up with him. We started by going out for okonomiyaki, then we went to Donkey to play some darts and drink some beer, and then finally we went to the underground sushi restaurant.

It was a lot of fun. The only disappointment was the sushi restaurant. The sushi master showed us a piece of paper at the end of the night with the price of 9600 yen – almost $100! We were really surprised – we hadn’t eaten that much, and we barely had enough money to cover it. We’re thinking he made a mistake, but I’ve had so many cheap/free meals there, that I’m not going to complain.

While I was waiting for the train home one of my former students walked by. She is actually one of the students that was waiting to ask me out once she graduated. The good thing was that she saw me with Kuniko a while back, and so that relieved a lot of pressure.

We sat together on the train and talked all about her college life. It sounded like she was really enjoying it. She is still studying English, but is having a hard time finding somebody to study with. She said that Mr. Hayashi told her not to come back and study with him, so she was a little worried. I gave her my card and said that if she needed help she should give me a call. She seemed really happy, and maybe it’ll be a way for me to make some money on the side.

Now I’m back home and getting ready for bed. Tomorrow is Friday, and I’m looking at a three day weekend. Monday is a holiday, and after that the summer vacation starts. It’ll be study hard every day and stay out of the heat.

Today the sky cleared up enough to have a small sports day event for the students. The boys competed in kick-baseball, and the girls played volleyball. It was a good chance for me to walk around and chat with students. The boys asked me all kinds of questions: what’s my favorite band, what movies do I like, what sports do I play. The girls, on the other hand, ask me if I have a girlfriend. They want to know details, too, but I just give them the lite version.

I had lunch in the cafeteria today with two of the part time teachers, and we had a perfectly normal conversation completely in Japanese. I was able to follow most of it, even if I didn’t understand everything they were saying. I asked them about the girl students’ fascination with my personal life, and they said that students had asked them in their classes whether or not I have a girlfriend or not. They said I’m very popular at the school, regardless of the fact that I’m a foreigner.

I only did a little bit of studying today. Instead, I did some pleasure reading in the staffroom, and chatted with some of the teachers. I had about five hours to kill, but I did it nicely, and tomorrow I’ll be in the same situation. I’m hoping to do a bit more studying tomorrow. I want to take advantage of all this free time – things are going to get busy again after the summer break.

Tonight for dinner I made zaruudon, cold udon noodles dipped into a broth with onions and wasabi. It turned out great, and combined with my leftover takoyaki it made for a filling and pretty healthy dinner. Not much else to report this evening – I’m off to bed.