Thursday I had the second and last day of training for the staffing company that I work for. I showed up a bit early kind of an accident, and bumped into Corey, one of the guys that I get along with pretty well. We headed over to the meeting place, but we had some time to kill. We were looking at shops around the station and I found a place with a pretty good selection of upscale beers for sale. I bought a bottle of Young’s Double Chocolate Stout that they had, and took it home as a souvenir.
The training itself was a little strange. The moderator couldn’t make it because he was sick, so Corey and I split the duties and ran the meeting. While running the meeting we got to see some of the more unusual personalities of the ALTs, especially the two women that work for the company. They both are super-shy, and I think they don’t have much association with people outside of their school. One woman described herself as “not interesting at all” and the other talked so quietly that nobody knew quite what she was going on about.
I had the second leg of the meeting, and so I kept it moving at a brisk pace, and we were able to finish right on time. Afterwards, everyone gathered outside to say goodbye. Corey was going out to ramen in Osaka with a couple of the other guys, but I didn’t feel like going out and bar hopping with them, so I begged off. They made up a story to avoid taking on a couple of the rookie guys that wanted to tag along, and it was all a big logistical feat to get them to the station with only the people they wanted in their group.
Friday was a national holiday, but Kuniko still had to go in to work and teach a couple of classes. She got home relatively early, though, and we went out shopping for our “plasma party” with Antoine and Miwako. I had told Antoine that we’d get started between five and six p.m., so we had everything ready and on standby just before five. I heard from Antoine about then, saying he just finished up his project and he was waiting for Miwako. An hour later we heard that they were on the road and coming by car, and they expected to be here by seven. I called and gave them the address for their in-car navigation system, and finally they showed up around eight o’clock. We were glad they made it safely, and we could get started eating, but it was kind of a drag sitting around the house for three hours with everything ready just waiting for them.
We had a good time, though. Antoine drank sho-chu from the special dispenser that Yasu had bought for me as a present. We ate kimchee soymilk nabe (which tastes better than it sounds) and watched one of the movies they brought to test out the plasma TV. The movie we voted on was “When Harry Met Sally”, which was a first time for three of the four people. It was my first time seeing it, and it was pretty funny.
It was about 11:30 or so by the time they headed back, so we cleaned up as best we could and then headed to bed. Kuniko had to work early on Saturday, so we wanted to get her to bed ASAP.
Saturday I got to sleep in a little while. Kuniko was off early – driving to work to help administer a mock exam for her students. I slept in and then finished cleaning up after the party. Kuniko got off work a little earlier than she expected, so I ran into Kobe and met her at Sannomiya station. We had lunch together at a restaurant that I’ve been wanting to try – a gumbo/oyster restaurant. We sat at a table and both ordered up gumbo. The flavors were really good – it tasted as close to authentic as I’ve found in Japan. There were a lot of seafood varieties that might not be considered traditional, and I was happy to hear that Kuniko preferred my version of gumbo better. Still, for about 1200 yen it was a great opportunity to try something new. In the same area there is also a Spanish restaurant, a high-class buffet restaurant, and a Vietnamese restaurant. So many places to try – just not enough time to do it.
After eating lunch we did some shopping around Sannomiya, and then came home and made leftover nabe for dinner. We drank some cocktails and had some snacks, and watched some TV. It’s been a relaxed evening at home, and tomorrow we both have the whole day off. We’ll be sleeping in as long as we can, and then who knows what we’ll do the rest of the day.
