Big post today, and I’m exhausted. Since today was Sports Day, I could again take advantage of being casual and I wore shorts and a T-shirt into work. The idea that I would wear shorts on the way to work, rather than changing into them, amazed the history teacher. He thought that it was a little racy of me. I told him I’m proud of my legs, and I’m not too worried what other people might think of them. No wonder he’s having trouble getting a date.

After seeing Sports Day last year I was a little more familiar with the routine, and I could be in the right places at the right times to take pictures. The events were the same as last year, and I spent a lot of time walking around chatting with the students.

I spent even more time this year posing for pictures with students. I lost count of how many pictures they took, but I was doing the peace sign all day long.

As I was walking by the line up for one of the events, one of the students asked me if I wanted to join in. It was the tug-of-war, and I agreed that it would be fun. I took the place of another student, who gave me his headband to wear on the field. The other students hid me behind a wall of bodies, and then we ran out on to the field and lined up on the rope.

Everybody was chanting my name, the first year students that we were competing against looked a little upset that there was a big foreigner on the other end of the rope, and the teachers were consulting to decide whether it was fair for me to be there or not. In the end, one of the teachers lined up for the other team, but he wasn’t the biggest guy in the world. We started pulling, and we won… the students I played with were so happy – I think they might pay attention for a few more minutes in my class now.

We did a second round, and this time we won again. I jogged off the field with my team and everybody did a round of thanks. The judges were trying to figure out if what we did was kosher or not, but the other teams were cool with it, so it was OK.

Afterwards I went to the water fountain, and everyone was smiling and saying hello and giggling and taking pictures with me and it was then that I realized that maybe I’m living some kind of high school fantasy or something. I wasn’t popular in my high school days – I was a big geek that didn’t do anything socially and really just aimed to get through each day alive.

Now I’m walking around like the Big Man On Campus, and a lot of that feeling spills over into other parts of my life here in Japan. It will be interesting to see how those feeling evolve over the next few years. Nothing lasts forever, but I could see how some people might start to base their self-esteem on the opinions of a thousand Japanese teenagers.

Anyway, enough psych-babble. A new twist to an old event was a race where the participant approaches a tray filled with flour. Inside the flour hidden away is a round piece of candy. They must get the candy in their mouth to continue on, and it made for some great scenes. I got lots of pictures of that one.

The taketori was great, too. The girl students compete to drag 13 bamboo posts across their own finish line. It’s the closest thing to a riot I’ve ever seen. All in good fun, though – nobody got over-competitive and nobody, amazingly, got hurt.

Last year the most impressive event was the kibasen. That’s where students in groups of four shoulder someone and then run around the field trying to rip each other’s hats off.

This year I was called in to help try to cushion the fall of the students if they got in a big fight. I was on the field during the event, and it was really cool. It’s a controlled violent situation, and it’s great to be down in the trenches.

Here’s short movie (1 MB) that shows a close up of the event. At the end I almost drop my camera and you get a great shot of the dirt and my foot.

After school I headed back home, and Nishi-Futami, the new station that I’ve been using was packed with people. Ito Yokado was open.

I don’t think I’ll go into much detail about Ito Yokado, because I don’t think you want to read about how much joy a shopping mall can give me. It might be enough to say that they’ve got just about everything I’d ever need there. There’s a bookstore, a CD/DVD shop, a food court, a restaurant level, a clothes store the size of a Mervyn’s back home, a big supermarket, an electronics store, a home life store, a pet store, etc, etc, etc.

It took me about an hour to cover all three floors thoroughly. There’s still stuff I missed because it was so busy. There weren’t very many imported goods, so Carrefour will still get my business occasionally.

Here’s a short movie (3.1 MB) to show you what it was like on the floor during the grand opening. I hope it calms down soon.

The coolest thing about the new supermarket was that they had an enclosed glass room where three sushi chefs make up sushi for you to take home. Kind of like going to a sushi restaurant except that they charge the grocery store price.

I’ll be rambling on about the new store for weeks, so I apologize in advance. It’s going to totally change my lifestyle for the next few years, so it’s a big deal.

I took home some mushrooms, OJ, bacon and milk, and I’m hoping to make some pancakes, bacon and eggs tomorrow for breakfast. It’s been a long time since I’ve fixed up a big American style breakfast.

A regular day at school today as far as classes, but the whole schedule was abbreviated so that we could prepare for Sports Day tomorrow. There was some last minute work to do out on the field, and I found myself with a sledge hammer at one point pounding in metal stakes to separate the spectators from the participants.

I was accompanied by a small posse of students that were supposed to help me out. We walked around for a while until we had completed the task, and then we were free to go. An easy job, really.

On the way home I was waiting for my train at the station and some kids on the platform across the way were calling out names and trying to get my attention. I was surprised to hear some bad stuff coming out of their mouths. The kids were smoking and generally being “bad kids”. They looked like college age, but I’m guessing they don’t go to college.

They kept calling at me, and when I looked over and smiled they didn’t stop, they seemed to get bolder. I kept looking, they kept talking trash.

So I walked around to their platform to say hello.

As soon as I started in their direction they freaked out. They must have thought that I wouldn’t come over – after all I was on another platform. When they say me coming up the steps they ran to the end of the platform and were behaving like I was carrying a chainsaw. Their train came before I could go over and introduce myself, so I just smiled and waved goodbye to them as they crouched down low in their seats.

I don’t think anyone appreciates being called names, but my plan was just to go over there and say hello. I can’t say much more than hello in Japanese, but I thought it might embarrass them a little bit and maybe they’d think twice about harassing people. I don’t know if I’ll see them again but I hope they are a little more polite next time.

At home I got a strange phone call from a student that wanted me to teach her English. She asked me if I had called her, but I hadn’t, anyway, not since the first time I called her about a week ago.

I also heard from the master at the yakitori. He said that I had called him. It was a different phone number, he said, but he called it back and got me. Strange, I told him. Lately my portable phone has made some weird noises when it’s charging on the cradle, and I fear that it is making some weird connection and redialing numbers that I’ve called before. This is just lately, so I’ll keep an eye on it. I might need to get a new phone, though. Meanwhile, my new student probably thinks I’m a stalker or something. The master didn’t seem to care.

Well, I’m off to bed. A day out in the sun and a night out drinking combined to make me a very tired guy today. I’m hoping to get a full night’s sleep because tomorrow is the big Sports Day and also the grand opening of Ito Yokado.

Today was the Sports Day practice at our school. It’s a way to get the students used to the ceremony, and also to do some preliminary heats for the running events. The students have to sit out in the sun and cook, and the teachers are free to find shade under tents or trees. We did several walk throughs and there was plenty of paramilitary marching going on. I don’t think I could march if I had to, but these guys did great!

I was wearing shorts and T-shirt, Mr. Casual, and also some sunglasses to keep the glare away. Students loved the casual look, and the sunglasses were a big hit. Last year at this time I walked around chatting with the students, but I didn’t know what they said. This time I could do a lot more, and it was much more fun.

After a full day of sitting out in the sun, everyone headed back in. There were some severe sunburn cases out there. I got a little sun, but mostly I was tired. Not so bad, really.

I walked from floor to floor, dropping in on classrooms to see how their class flag was coming along. The students were happy and surprised to see me, and it was fun to comment on their flags. I really enjoy that time when they are surprised to see you, but they still give English a try.

After school Mr. Maeda, Mr. Ikeda and I walked over to Mr. Maeda’s house to kill some time before the get-together in Takasago. Mr. Maeda’s wife greeted us at the door and really made us feel welcome. She served us snacks, beer, and even a tofu dish that had squares of cream cheese in it as well. Excellent. Mr. Maeda’s kids were so cute – they are really well behaved (at least when I’m there) and I hammed it up for them so they must think all foreigners are insane.

A while later we walked down to the izakaya, a place right near the train station that I use every day. They had a table ready for us, on tatami Japanese style. I barely fit under the table, but it worked. It was a little tough on the legs, though.

Listening to Japanese among drunken teachers is a lot different that listening to the standard Japanese on my CD’s. I was lucky to get one or two words a sentence. The teachers were debating, and occasionally arguing (in a very non-confrontational Japanese way). Mr. Yamamoto sat next to me and gave me the blow-by-blow and so I was able to at least keep up with the topic if not the gist of the conversation.

We ate a ton of food – all kinds of strange things both raw and fried. I drank some beers and then switched to Oohlong tea around ten o’clock. Finally, I decided to throw in the towel and head home. Everyone was really nice and they even dispatched two escorts to walk me from the restaurant 100 feet to the station. I wasn’t even nearly drunk enough to need them, but it was a nice thing to do.

Now I’m back home and ready for bed. I can tell I’m going to be exhausted tomorrow!

With four classes today, the toughest three taking place one right after another, I was pretty busy. I had a misfire today in my last class. I was playing concentration with the students, and I had taped 30 cards up on the blackboard. During my first few classes things went fine, but unfortunately, I forgot to shuffle the cards before I taped them up on the board. One team won the game 14-1. How embarrassing for me. That’s what I get for trying to cram too much into one day.

Other than that, things went fine. Mr. Maeda, one of the new English teachers, is planning a party Wednesday night to hang out with song of the teachers that I don’t know too well. Initially I couldn’t go because of Mr. Komuri’s 50th birthday party, but at the last minute Mr. Komuri moved the day so I was available. I’m looking forward to hanging out tomorrow night – it should be fun!

After school we all went outside to set up the field for the sports day practice scheduled for tomorrow. It was pretty easy work – all we did was supervise a group of students. Even better, our group of students wasn’t responsible for anything, so it was just an exercise in looking busy.

For dinner Jane and I went out to an izakaya near the new train station that I’ve never been to during my entire first year in Futami. It turned out to be pretty good. The place was clean and nicely furnished, and the food was really good. I walked in with Jane and sat down, and then Jane and I tried to sort out the menu. When the master came by, I did all the ordering, and throughout the meal I ordered more drinks and food. At the end of the meal we were heading out, and they asked if Jane was Japanese. After all, she looks Japanese, why the heck wasn’t she speaking? Jane is used to this, and did her explanation about her mother being Japanese and her father being English. She is having a very different JET experience than me – still a positive one, but very different.

From there we walked to the local 7-11 for dessert, and then walked back. It was a nice meal out – I had fun exchanging stories with her about teaching and our students. She’s really having a good time, and I picked up on her energy and excitement – it’ll help me be more enthusiastic for my own students.

This morning it was tough to wake up after such a relaxing weekend. I took a hot shower and had a piece of toast with cinnamon sugar, and then headed out the door to catch my train. I’ve got it down to a science now, where as soon as I step on the platform the announcement for my train comes on overhead.

At school I had the first period free, which I always like. It allows me to take care of things that I might have forgotten about or put off. You can do a lot of work when you are undisturbed for 50 minutes.

The vice principal called a meeting of all the teachers during the lunch hour, something very unusual. He said that two pieces of graffiti were found around the town of Takasago, each threatening the life of our second year math teacher. This has happened before, and nobody can figure out who is doing it. I’m not a big fan of the guy either, but I’m not considered a suspect.

Anyway, we had a special assembly to sternly address all of the students. They asked the guilty party to step forward so they could kick him out of school. Yeah, right. I don’t think they expected that to work, either.

During the extra seventh period I studied with Mr. Hayashi, reading and translating a short biography of Yoko Ono. Mr. Hayashi is helping me with my accent as well – it’s definitely American right now.

I don’t know why but I’m really enjoying learning a foreign language. Japanese is tough, really tough. I feel like I’m just packing in words and grammar and eventually someday the dam will break and I’ll be speaking Japanese like crazy. Right now it’s still broken Japanese as I urgently think through words and grammar in my head to say it correctly.

During my last visit to Kuniko’s place she had a TV show on that was teaching English to young kids. There was a Japanese girl and a foreign guy, maybe American. They spoke in rapid fire kid-friendly Japanese, and then would demonstrate English. The Japanese girl would speak with a thick accent. The guy was creepy – he was dressed like a crazy man to be more kid friendly. Still, I was impressed with his Japanese and couldn’t help but admire it. It’s rare for me to see a foreigner, let alone one that can speak great Japanese. I don’t plan on being on any Japanese TV programs, but it was just a little inspiring.

I had sushi for dinner tonight, and on the way home I timed the two train options I have. One puts me in Nishi Futami two minutes later than the one that runs to my old station, so it’s worth it to wait for that one. The Ito Yokado is bustling with activity, and it’s just about ready to open. I was peeking in through the windows, and it looks like a huge place. Friday’s the big day.

I woke up early this morning in Osaka, and had a quick breakfast with Kuniko before she had to go back to school. I can tell she’s really exhausted from all this work. The good news is that she’ll be given some compensation days later on. Hopefully she’ll be able to use that time to recharge. In the meantime, I did what I could to help her relax, and just chatting quietly over a bowl of noodles in a dark restaurant in the “pink light” district near her house seemed to do wonders.

After seeing her off at the steps of her apartment I went to the Shin-Osaka station, and kind of merged with a group of athletic looking guys heading to the bullet train. As we turned the corner lots of people appeared looking for autographs and taking pictures. Amazingly, they didn’t want to talk to me.

Apparently these guys were members of the Osaka soccer team, headed off for a game somewhere. It was good to be upstaged and ignored, I just cut through the crowd and grabbed the next train out of there.

The trip back was nice – it was early in the morning and the weather was still cool. There was a nice breeze blowing as well, and I had a nice moment of zen on the Sanyo train platform listening to Gerry Rafferty’s “Baker Street”. Once I got home I answered the call of my futon and was zonked until late morning.

I spent the day studying Japanese and doing laundry – two things I’m becoming very good at. For dinner I ran down to an okonomiyaki place that is pretty close by. It has erratic hours, but today I was lucky. The only downside was that it was seriously hot in there, especially once he started cooking my dinner.

It was a nice mellow Sunday. Now I’m recharged and ready to go back to school tomorrow.

This morning I was up early to fry up some pork and have it with some eggs and green peppers, working to fight off my mild hangover. At eight o’clock we had the community cleanup duty, and it was Jane’s first experience with that. She was surprised at first, but soon warmed up to it. The very helpful tea lady that used to be at my school has been helping Jane out a little bit, so I was glad to see she was in good hands.

The cleanup went by quickly and easily, and I went back home to clean up and get ready for my hike.

A couple of weeks ago one of my ex-students had invited me to come visit her at her new job, flipping burgers at the Japanese hamburger chain, MOSBurger. Today I was planning a hike that took me near there, so I decided to drop in.

The place was near Hoden station, just a few blocks away. I had to ask directions from a guy running a makeshift fruit stand, and everyone in the fruit stand stopped to watch and see what I wanted. When I said a burger place, they nodded their heads as if they had suspected all along.

I saw Haruna working the cash register when I got there, but I got called to another line, so I didn’t get a chance to talk to her. She smiled and said hello when she saw me, but I get the impression that they’re pretty strict there. She didn’t have any chance to come over and chat. I enjoyed the burger, though. I made the trip back to the train station and on my way home stopped into Carrefour for some specialty supplies.

I’m getting ready to go to Osaka to spend some time with Kuniko. She’s got to work tomorrow, so I’m not sure what I’ll do on Sunday. The master wants me to come play on his volleyball team, but the timing might be tough. We’ll see what happens!

Today was a busy day at school. Mr. Hayashi told me that one of his best friends from childhood died the night before. Apparently he was riding along on his bike and he had an aneurysm and that was it. Mr. Hayashi said that he was always a guy that was under a lot of self-induced stress, so that’s probably what did it. Mr. Hayashi was remarkably cavalier about it, and he wasn’t letting it ruin his day.

I asked and received permission to sneak out a little early from work, and used that time to get on the train and head to Takarazuka, Antoine’s home town. He met me at the station, and showed me around town. He has a nice house, not an apartment like I have. The place was a decent size, and he had a nice giant refrigerator, which is ironic because he doesn’t cook. We didn’t spend much time looking at his place.

After seeing his digs we went to a yakitori that he used to frequent every Wednesday. We sat down and I let Antoine do all the ordering and talking, in loud English. He did a good job of getting his point across, and the master and his assistant looked amused as they took our orders. We ate lots of food, quite a bit of it fried, but it was delicious.

Antoine asked the master of that yakitori about one of the other regulars, a doctor that would come in to chat with Antoine in English. The master gave the doctor a call, and within a few minutes, he was hanging out with us. He brought a huge bottle of shou-chu to drink, and even gave us a couple of glasses. It was very good, it actually had some flavor.

Moving down the street from the yakitori we stopped at another bar that was billed as “American Style”. They served Miller beer, had lots of Americana hanging on the walls, and a dark wooden interior. It was called “Rag Shack”. I had a Negra Modelo and a Guinness, and we sat around and talked about Antoine and his new girlfriend.

Finally, around ten o’clock I decided it was time to hit the road, and I was home by midnight. It was fun to finally see the town where Antoine is from, and to meet some of the folks he hangs out with. Nice people.

The nice thing about my Thursdays is that I have the first three classes, and then I’m free the rest of the day. My classes went just fine, actually. The third year class that I have with Mr. Hayashi has been interesting. At first I just helped out with various English subtleties, but lately Mr. Hayashi has been using the class to help me study Japanese.

Mr. Hayashi will write sentences in Japanese on the blackboard, and then ask the students to write the translation in English in their notebooks. After giving them time, he’ll ask me to translate the sentences into English. Sometimes I don’t know a kanji, or I’ll get it wrong, but mostly I get them correct. The students take it as a matter of course, but there’s a little pressure in there, and it makes it a good way for me to learn translations.

Besides the class, Mr. Hayashi is also helping me with sentence translations. I do the translations, and then he checks them and offers suggestions. At first I was always trying to literally translate everything, but the more I relax and just try to get the idea, the better I seem to do. Translation is an interesting skill – looking for all the right clues in the text and providing the proper nuances, trying to guess the tone from the context, and just getting the idea across.

After lunch a student came to my desk and started stuttering before I realized who it was, the pervert-in-training from my class yesterday. He apologized in English for drawing the picture, and turned tail to run. Before he could get far his homeroom teacher laid into him a little bit more, and then Oki sensei decided to get in some kicks while the poor kid was down. I felt bad, because I had initiated the whole thing by making a comment to the teacher. Now the kid will probably hate me for life, but at least he’ll think twice about female anatomical illustrations during class time.

The ESS club met after school, but only a few of the students showed up. I gave them my omiyage from my trip to America, and the Spongebob Squarepants backpack clips from Walmart were treated like religious icons. Worth their weight in gold, they were. I also had a new student join the club. She had been on the trip to Australia, and while she was there she met a Chinese student doing a homestay. She said that he is now her boyfriend, and they use English to communicate since neither can speak each other’s language. Sometimes it takes a little love to realize how important learning another language can be.

After school I came home and cooked up the best damn yakisoba I’ve ever made. Noodles, mushrooms, onions, strips of pork, sesame seeds, and the obligatory hard boiled egg on top made for a top notch dinner. I had a salad on the side with a sesame dressing that I can’t get enough of.

I talked with Antoine on the phone and we arranged a plan for tomorrow night. I’m going to head to Takarazuka to meet him in his ‘hood – the first time in a year that I’ve actually seen his digs. We’re going to a yakitori that he frequents, and just hang out a little bit. It’ll be a short trip, since the last train leaves around 10:30 p.m.

Wednesday and Thursday are my easy days, with only three classes each day. Today all my classes went really well. I’ve decided that in the class that I teach alone, I will try to use more Japanese to explain some concepts. I used quite a bit today and it worked really well. The students paid a little more attention and were more patient with my English questions.

During my first year class, one of the boys in the class was impressing his friends by drawing a picture of a naked woman, and the attention to detail was startling. He asked me what I thought of it and I explained in Japanese that drawing something like that was not appropriate for the classroom. He looked nervous but still kept at it. After class I mentioned it to the very stern Ms. Terano, and she said she’d have a talk with him. He’s going to love that little chat.

I spent a lot more time today walking around and chatting with students instead of hiding in the teacher’s room studying. As usual it’s good for the students to have a chance to chat in a non-classroom environment, and it’s good for my ego to leave a trail of giggling girls everywhere I go.

After school I stopped in to do a shopping trip at my local grocery. It’s probably one of the last few times that I’ll shop there. Ito Yokado will open up in a couple of weeks, so the little grocery store will be obsolete. Don’t shed a tear for them, though. Today they were out of orange juice and chicken. I made do with shrimp and grape juice, but it’ll be nice to shop at a place that has what you want, every time.

It was shrimp (instead of chicken) curry and rice tonight, and some listening comprehension homework for dessert. I did a little cleanup after the big storm yesterday, chatted with Kuniko via e-mail, and had a nice quiet evening. Tomorrow is another easy day for me, and the weekend is fast approaching.

Today was the big day for the next typhoon. In Japan they give them names and numbers, and this one was number 18. It was billed as bigger than the last one, which rearranged everything on my patio. Not surprisingly, students didn’t have to come to school today. Unfortunately, the teachers did.

Everybody was happy about the typhoon, because that meant that we didn’t have to teach classes. The students are happy, the teachers are happy, and because it’s a “natural phenomenon” we don’t have to make up the day later on. Excellent!

The bad news was the the dirt from our baseball and soccer field (fields are sand, not grass) was kicking up in the heavy winds, and a neighbor complained. The principal announced that we would take steps to try to reduce the dirt flying around. His plan:

We were to go out on the field carrying a firehose and try to wet the thing down in typhoon force winds. Yeah, good idea. One teacher even objected out loud during the announcement, something that is very non-Japanese. The other teachers looked at him like he had snapped.

We went out there and did our best, drenching each other in the process and I’ve still got sand in my hair, ears, and eyes. Yuck. We walked around with a couple of hoses for about fifteen minutes, hopefully appeasing the neighbor. Then we all went inside and had a staff meeting to talk about October’s events.

Mr. Hayashi suggested that we go over to the local coffee shop for lunch and kill some time over there. By the time we got back, everyone was leaving, and the winds were getting even stronger. They said that Sanyo train line had stopped running, so Mr. Hayashi drove me home. What a nice guy!

I arranged some things out on my patio to prepare – I lashed down my wooden plant rack with an extension cord to keep it from leaving the balcony area. I called my folks and chatted with them for a while. It had been a while since I talked to them and it was good to catch up.

During the afternoon I studied transitive and intransitive verbs, watched a movie I had downloaded from the internet (Liar, Liar), and talked with Kuniko on the phone. Throughout the evening the wind was howling outside, and a couple of times it got louder than I thought it could ever be. Not much rain, just heavy, heavy wind. I went out on the patio twice to recover some things, but most of what was going to blow away went during the last typhoon.

I’m headed to bed – it’s extremely humid right now so I’ve got the bedroom chilling and drying – can’t wait to get a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow will no doubt be a cleanup day at school.

Today was back to work and everybody was talking about the earthquakes. What’s better, tomorrow a new typhoon is supposed to blow in that is as strong or stronger as the last one. Nobody is sure if we’ll even have classes tomorrow, but my prediction is that we will. The typhoon seems to be moving slowly enough that we should be OK.

I had a busy day with four classes. They went pretty well, and the students were paying fairly good attention considering all the distractions that nature has been providing lately. Some of my students said that they had seen me with a girl at a movie theater, and they asked if it was my girlfriend. I played dumb and said that it might not have been me, or that maybe it was an ALT friend. I guess they didn’t identify Kuniko, so her identity is protected.

Mr. Hayashi told me that a student’s mother had seen me with a girl somewhere, and he asked me all about that. A couple of weeks ago he was sure I was gay, now he’s sure that I’m hiding something good. He seems to be patient about rooting out the information. I think he figures that time is on his side, and he’s right.

After school I went across the street to practice Japanese and English with Tsuji-san. She helped me with some new verb conjugations, and I helped her with pronunciation. Next week she’ll be in Hokkaido sightseeing, so I’ll have next Monday off.

I got out of there around 6:30, and went home to rustle up some dinner. I made koyadofu for the first time, guessing from the back of a box and trying to read some of the Japanese. I ended up doing OK, but there’s something I’m missing. The flavor was good, but the texture was a bit too firm. I’ll try again tomorrow night.

I finally caught up on some e-mail, and now I’m headed to bed. Tomorrow may be an easy half day to weather the storm, or a regular day with a wild windy night. We’ll see what happens.

Just had another earthquake here as I was trying to fall asleep. This one seemed longer and stronger than the other one. Everything is OK – hopefully no more before tomorrow!

We woke up early, but then went right back to sleep and managed to stretch out the morning until about 10:30. We had a breakfast of granola and orange juice, and then listened to an English radio show on NHK. Kuniko listens every weekend, and also tapes it to practice with later. I wish they had something like that for Japanese learners!

After the show we decided to go into Osaka. We were both looking for some books, and they have a gigantic bookstore inside the Hankyu building in Umeda. We jumped on the train, and then took a short walk over to the Hankyu building. Umeda was crowded, and as usual it was tough to walk around with so many people. Kind of like walking around in Disneyland, except it’s everywhere.

We went to the bookstore and found the books that Kuniko was looking for, but I struck out in my search. I decided to try to find them online. We both started to get a little hungry while walking around, and Kuniko suggested a sushi place that her co-workers took her to a week ago. I agreed – I’m always up for good sushi.

If you’re ever in Japan, the best experiences you’ll ever have will come when you allow a Japanese person to show you around. Kuniko took my hand and we walked through busy shopping malls, down strange alleyways filled with neon and noise, and finally to a busy street that had lots of restaurants. We ducked into a certain sushi place, and sat down at the bar.

We ordered up some beers, and I asked what Kuniko recommended. She told me about the choices, and she said that they have some exotic sushi there that is kind of rare. The one that got my attention – horse.

A long time ago I had heard a story about a guy that ordered sushi based on pointing at the menu and had gotten horsemeat. I always thought it was an urban legend, especially since I’ve never seen horse on any menu in any sushi restaurant that I’ve been to. Kuniko pointed to the menu, and there it was. 700 yen for two raw pieces. Sure, order up!

We had lots of other sushi first, and then the guy came over with the raw horsemeat on sushi rice. In my mind I had expected a bloody chunk of flesh, but it just looked like a piece of beef. It wasn’t quite raw, either – it had been cooked ever so slightly. I picked it up with my chopsticks, dipped it in a little soy sauce, and ate it.

Hmmm… actually, it tasted a lot like beef. The flavor was a little different, the meat was tender because it was uncooked, and altogether I gave it a thumbs up. I’m not sure I’d order it every day, but it was tasty. I told Kuniko later about what happens to horsemeat in America, and she was impressed that I had even tried it.

After that we had some more sushi, raw shrimp, crab rolls, and tuna. We were pretty full, so we settled up the bill and hit the road. Back home we were both so tired that we laid down to rest for a few minutes and ended up sleeping for about an hour.

I helped Kuniko by checking her transcription of last week’s radio news, and then I packed up my stuff and made for the station. It was a great weekend, and since next weekend is likely to be very busy for her, it might be a while before I see her again.

On the way to Shin-Osaka station it started pouring rain – seriously pouring. I got caught in it, and ended up getting on my train dripping wet. Luckily I got a seat right away and sat next to a very friendly guy that didn’t mind chatting with me in simple Japanese.

Just after the train passed Sannomiya station heading west towards my town, we suddenly stopped. The train rolled to a complete stop, and I was surprised how jerky the stop was. We were stopped, but the jerking of the car continued – people started murmuring in alarm and I looked outside and realized that we were having an earthquake.

This was a pretty good sized earthquake. Usually when there’s an earthquake you can run for your life, but in a train car your options are limited. I just kind of watched what I could see outside in the dark – the buildings weren’t moving, but the wires and trees were shaking quite a bit. After about thirty seconds of shaking, it stopped.

The conductor of the train came on and gave an announcement, but I could only understand a little bit. These are the situations when not knowing enough Japanese really hurts – he might be saying that we’ll be spending the night in the train car and I wouldn’t know.

Luckily, the nice man next to me told me that we would have to wait for about 15 minutes so they could check the rails and make sure that everything was OK. I wondered vaguely how they check the rails – there’s a lot of mileage between stations. However, 15 minutes later we were on the move. No problem – I caught the Sanyo train line from Akashi and now I’m home safe. The first thing I did was call Kuniko, and she said that she really felt it. She’s OK, but she was worried about me.

The website that I read said that it was a 6.8 on the Richter scale, centered somewhere in the Kansai area. I’ll probably hear more details tomorrow at school.

I got plenty of rest last night, and woke up refreshed and ready to eat in the morning. I made myself a big Denver style omelete, and got ready to head over to visit the old man in Takasago that I had agreed to meet. Before I left I stopped by Jane’s apartment and helped her move some furniture around. We managed to get things the way she wanted, and I made a few phone calls for her in Japanese to arrange her internet connection. Then I had a quick lunch and headed to Takasago.

At the station I met the lady who asked me about this initially. We soon were met by another lady who drove us to pick up yet a third lady. As we were driving around collecting people I started to wonder if I understood correctly about chatting with an old guy. Was that just a ploy to get me in the car? Am I going to be sold into white slavery?

Turns out the next stop was at a private home, and when we went in, I met the old guy in question. He had a stroke about a year ago, so half his body wasn’t working too well, but he spoke a little bit of English and he wanted to try it out on me. We sat down around the table and chatted.

Everyone was very nice, and they kept me eating tea, coffee, fruit, cookies, everything. The wife was bustling around in the kitchen keeping us set up with food and drink while we chatted in the living room. He had lots of questions. We even pulled out the Japanese calligraphy gear to do a little calligraphy. It was fun to try it out – I’ve never really done it before. Everyone said “oooohh” and “aaaaahhh” while I wrote kanji like 高砂 and 教職.

We had a great time, but as we continued we started getting into more difficult topics like Japanese whaling and birth control (two separate topics, actually). The more complex stuff meant that they had to resort to Japanese to explain their ideas to me, and that was just too tough to understand. After about three hours, I apologized and said that I had to get going.

They dropped me off at the station, and everyone was really happy with how it went. I thought it was fun, something that made everyone happy.

Kuniko gave me a call after she got home from work, and invited me to come over and hang out at her place for the weekend. I was on a train ten minutes later and pulled into Osaka one hour after that.

She was exhausted from working on Saturday, and so we decided to get a pizza (spicy jalapeno pizza!) and watch a movie that one of her co-workers lent her, The Rock. It’s kind of a body count movie, and watching it again through Kuniko’s eyes was an interesting experience. I would cringe as the bodies would stack up.

We were off to bed after that. I think we were both so tired for different reasons.