Today was the last day of my contract, and the last day at my school. If you look at my posts from the past it’s pretty apparent that I’m really fond of Hamawaki Jr. High, from the students all the way to the principal everyone is really nice and has a good attitude. With this in mind I got up and headed to school ready to make lots of speeches and say lots of goodbyes.

Kuniko had to leave for her school really early, so I went to school alone. There was strange weather on the walk to school – it was a beautiful sunny day, but occasionally rain would fall out of the blue, and occasionally wind gusts would almost blow you off the sidewalk.

The first order of business at school was getting ready for my classes today. I had a full schedule of four classes, so I got in touch with the teachers for those classes and did a final check that we were ready. Just before the morning meeting the principal pulled me into his office to chat with me, and then he brought me out to say farewell to everyone.

I hate farewell speeches. I did mine in Japanese, but I didn’t have much to say since the principal kind of stole my thunder and told everyone what I was going to do next. He did say that he wished there was a way for me to stay a lot longer, but because of the school board system their hands were tied. I thanked everyone for taking care of me, and said goodbye. Out of the blue a couple of teachers gave me some presents – Takagi sensei gave me a present from all the English teachers, and Higuchi sensei gave me a chocolate cake that she had baked for me. Then the first year teachers presented me with a gift, a big box full of cakes and chocolates. I was totally overwhelmed.

I had the first period free, so I used the time to pack up some of my stuff and give my contact information to some teachers. I exchanged contact information with everyone that I enjoyed working with, so at least in the future we can keep in touch.

My classes were really fun, since everyone knew it was my last day and their last class with me. My last class was the last of the day, and it was with Kuroda sensei and her homeroom class. She had prepared them well – after we finished our activities they all shouted “We love you! Goodbye!” at the same time in English. They presented me with a stack of cards – each card was a message written by one of the students. They also gave me three leaves from their class houseplant – if you plant the leaves then they grow into a plant themselves. I was really touched. Kuroda sensei was my favorite teacher at Hamawaki, and I was really glad that my last class was with her and her homeroom class.

In between classes I had lots of visitors, and I collected some more love notes, chocolates, and a huge card wrapped in a red bow with messages from the students from the 2-5 class. Finally, after school we did a closing ceremony on video. They broadcasted the video to all the classrooms, and everyone watched it on their classroom TV. I had prepared a long speech, but the third year students didn’t get back to their class until late, and I severely abbreviated it. A student presented me with a huge bouquet of flowers, and he made a really nice speech in English thanking me for teaching there. Then it was over.

I got a late start home because various students came by to say goodbye, have me autograph their books, or take pictures with them. Finally I got organized and loaded up all my loot and walked home. I was really surprised what everyone did for me, and it made me wish I could work there more. The situation was really good there, except for the fact that it was a temporary situation.

Lastly, on the way home I shipped off my textbooks, timesheets, and my health insurance card to my staffing company, officially ending my contract. I’ll be doing a short job for them at Kobe University in the middle of March, but that should be it for W5 Staffing.

I managed to get all my stuff back home safely, and after having a glass of wine and resting up a bit, I got started reading cards, opening presents and sorting through everything. There was a lot of stuff to go through, but it really made me happy to read through all the messages.

When Kuniko got home I made ham, cheese and avocado sandwiches, and we had Higuchi sensei’s chocolate cake for dessert. Kuniko had a maddening day at work today – for every high point that I had, it seemed like she had a low one.

The big bummer was that the tour guide that is joining them on their trip to New Zealand really rubbed Kuniko the wrong way. Kuniko said she is all about money and business, rather than the experience that the students have. She also sprung a surprise on Kuniko and the students – their flight to New Zealand has an extra stopover in Taipei. Originally they had just one stopover in Hong Kong. One stopover is bad enough – two makes the trip way too long.

They’ll be in the air a total of 30 hours or so to go to New Zealand, compared to the 20 hours we were in the air to get all the way to France. The travel agent waited until a few days before the trip to tell them about the second stopover, ensuring that there is no way they can change companies or plans. That sounded pretty underhanded – I feel for Kuniko. Travel agencies make a ton of money off school trips – they overcharge for everything (a major theme in Japanese travel).

There were a couple of other things that pissed off Kuniko today, so she was happy to drink a couple glasses of red wine and eat a chocolate cake with me. I think seeing all the goodies I got helped cheer her up a little bit. We did a little late night laundry, and then went to bed around 11:30 – kind of a late night for us.

When the train arrived at Okubo station Tuesday morning, Kuniko and I were second in line. The doors opened, and as we started filing in some guy came walking in from the side and cut in. I was a little surprised – cutting into the line whenever you want is usually a privilege exercised by the elderly in Japan. Still, I didn’t think much about it until we lined up for the super rapid train in Nishi Akashi.

This time we were about fifth in line, which is normal for us. As the train doors opened, the same guy came walking over to the front. On the way he dropped his cigarette on the ground and the cut in front of everyone and went in. This time I paid a little more attention to see if he was retarded or something – what was his problem? He seemed normal enough. He was wearing a fur-lined jacket, a little taller than your normal Japanese guy. Maybe 35 years old, with dark skin that was starting to get potchy from all the tobacco he inhales. I wanted to give him some dirty looks, but he stood all the way on the other side of the train.

Kuniko got off in Kobe, and I went on to Sannomiya and changed trains at the Hanshin station. To my shock the guy came walking down the steps and started to look for a line just as my train was showing up. I geared myself up to block the guy out, but he picked a line down the platform a ways. I couldn’t tell if he cut into that line or not.

It didn’t really piss me off that much, but it made for some excitement on an otherwise very quiet commute. People in Japan generally follow the rules as much as possible, so when somebody does that it really stands out.

Today was the last day of exams, and once they wrapped up the students were really relieved. They ran around the school, did their sports clubs for the first time in a long time, and visited the staffroom to say hello to me and some of the other teachers. Three girls gave me love letters and chocolates – kind of like a leftover from Valentine’s Day and also a thank you for helping them pass their high school entrance exams.

The letters were cute – they usually wrote in English, sometimes with Japanese. Nothing in there too heavy, but I was a little surprised how some of them felt about me. They were harboring these crushes pretty well, because I had no clue whatsoever.

After school I went back home to Okubo, and Kuniko got off early so that we could go to Futami and get an eye exam. With the conclusion of my contract I won’t have a health plan for a little while, at least until Kuniko gets me set up on hers. I thought it would be a good time to pick up some contact lenses. Kuniko was also complaining of some problems seeing in one eye, so we both took the exams. Mine went just fine, and Kuniko’s vision turned out normal. As she put it, there are people with a lot worse vision than hers, and she’s not ready for contacts yet.

We also went to Ito Yokado afterwards, and bumped into Miyake sensei there. She said that she had a sore shoulder from playing Wii the other night. She looked really happy about it, though.

Finally we came home and had some cheap sushi for dinner from IY. We were both really tired from packing so much into these last few days of work. I have my last day at work tomorrow, and Kuniko leaves for New Zealand on Friday. It’s down to the wire for both of us. I was lucky enough to be able to go to sleep, but Kuniko stayed up and had to mark exams. Ick.

On Monday I went into work, enjoying the idea of no classes all day. I also had in the forefront of my mind the fact that they sprung me loose early on Friday because there were no classes, so I was considering the possibility that I might get another chance to bail out early.

As it worked out, though, I was at school all day. The principal walked by a couple times, but other than talking with me about this and that he didn’t feel the need to let me go. It was fine with me, though. I got a ton of studying and flashcards done.

A little before lunch the office manager Sato-san came over to my desk and said hello. She is going to be gone for the next three days, so she wanted to say goodbye to me now. I asked her why she was going to be gone, and she said that since she has worked for the school for 30 years, she gets three days paid time off. For thirty years you ought to get a gold watch or something – three days off seems a little weak to me. But in the Japanese work-all-the-time-and-forgo-vacations philosophy, maybe that’s a big deal. Enjoy your three days, Sato-san.

At four o’clock I headed home to straighten up the house a little since we were having some friends over. Yuri, a former ALT in Himeji, was back in Japan to visit her friends. She came over along with Tamura sensei and her boyfriend, Takuma. Originally we had offered to meet them at a restaurant of their choice, since we were tired out from entertaining the other night. Tamura sensei kind of invited everyone over to our house, so we had to think of something easy to make in an hour for five people. Kuniko did some pre-work Sunday night and made bruschetta, and I put together a big pot of spaghetti with a couple of different sauces and a simple salad.

It was an enjoyable night. We caught up with Yuri – she’s working in a bank in Little Tokyo in Los Angeles. She’s dating a Mexican guy, and really enjoying life back in the United States.

Tamura sensei and Takuma were doing pretty well. We ate a lot of food and drank beer and wine while playing the Wii. Takuma is a young guy, just 21 years old, so I played boxing with him. He was pretty good, but soon he was covered in sweat. It is a really good workout using the Wii, especially if you’re not used to it.

Finally around eleven we walked them back to the station and said goodbye. We were totally exhausted heading home, and we didn’t have the energy to wash the big pile of dishes that was left after the party. We went straight to bed and conked out.

Sunday night, and Kuniko and I have just finished off the leftovers from last night. We’re taking batting practice on the Wii and relaxing.

Today we went over to Anthony and Risa’s place for lunch. They live in nearby Asagiri, but everyone is so busy that we haven’t been able to meet up. They recently built a house there, and they even have a dog, so we went over to see how domestic they really were.

They met us at Asagiri station, and we walked over to their place. It was good to see them again. They looked hale and hearty – nobody had changed at all. Their house was really nice, and we met their dog who was sitting outside in a mini-dog run.

While their house was a three story place, it wasn’t as large as the Okamoto’s place. Since the Okamotos live out in the sticks, they can have a bigger place. Risa and Anthony’s place really used space creatively, and it was fun to poke around.

Anthony had made authentic Malaysian curry for us, and he served it we rice that he got at a special store – it was long grain and not as sticky as Japanese rice. The curry was excellent, with good flavor and spiciness. We supplied the desserts, and by the end of it everyone was really full.

Anthony had a little mini ping pong table upstairs in one of the rooms, so we played three or four games. I’ve never played on a tiny little table like that, and it took some getting used to. At first I lost big, but I was starting to improve by the end of it.

We headed back home from there, and we’ve just been relaxing ever since. Tomorrow we’re headed back to work, and it’ll be my last three days of work this week. Monday and Tuesday I don’t have classes, so it should be a really easy week.

This weekend is quickly drawing to a close, so I thought I’d sit down and write it up. Saturday morning Kuniko had to go in to work, so I just slept in and then cleaned up the house a bit. By the time Kuniko made it back after work she was tired out, so she took a nap.

At the end of the day I went out to meet Miyake sensei and Nozaki sensei at the train station. They looked just the same – nobody had changed at all. We talked and laughed on the way back to my place, and we settled in for some drinking and eating. They got us caught up on everything at Takasago Minami, and we told them what we’ve been doing. We looked at our vacation pictures briefly, and drank lots of wine, ate lots of cheese, bruschetta, salad and lasagna. Kuniko really went all out cooking and we ate as much as we could. We also had lots of desserts, so we kind of pigged out. It was the first time for Kuniko to meet Nozaki sensei, and I was happy to see that they got along really well.

We got to talking about the Wii, and of course they wanted to give it a go. They were both playing tennis, and then we all played a round of bowling. It was a lot of fun – the Wii is great for parties, and it really is interesting for all ages. To see Miyake sensei bowling like a professional was a real treat.

Nozaki sensei and I talked a little bit about her school, too. She runs a school from her home, and she has about 70 students from elementary to junior high school age that come in the evenings to take English lessons. Right now she has a Japanese lady that is teaching them English, but that lady is leaving for another job. Nozaki sensei had arranged for a friend of hers from America to come and do the job, but that fell through. She had asked me a while back if I knew anyone who was interested, and at the time I couldn’t think of anybody.

Now my contract is drawing to a close, and the staffing company hasn’t told me anything at all about the next contract. I have a feeling that they won’t have a contract at another school for anybody, so my job search had just begun. I’ve also been really hoping for an opportunity to study for my master’s degree, and so the idea of working for her was really appealing.

There are pros and cons, but overall it sounds like it will be good. The job is a part time job, four hours a day Monday through Friday. It is in the evenings, so I’ll have time in the mornings to study and work on my degree. Because it is only a part time job, the money isn’t as good as what I’m making now at a full time job. When you break it down by the hour, I am doing OK. Still, the overall family budget will take a hit, and combined with the cost of grad school we’ll have to get used to a little less money laying around.

Kuniko and I had talked it over beforehand, and everything sounded good, so I went ahead and told her that I’m interested. She was really happy, I was really happy, and I think it’ll work out great. It doesn’t start until the beginning of April, so I’ll have a month of unemployment. I need to think about a way to stay out of trouble until April.

Even then, the next semester of grad school doesn’t start until September, so I’ve got to figure out something to do in the mornings for six months. I can do some pre-studying, but I’d like to find a way to earn a little more money, too.

Between all the wine, all the Wii, and the good conversation, everyone was a little tipsy. We walked them back to the train station around 10:30, and then came home a organized a little bit before bed. It was a great evening, and I think I’ve got something interesting job-wise in the near future, which is a big relief. What better way to get a job than to drink a couple of bottles of wine with your future boss?

For reasons that I am not allowed to mention here we had to rush to work early in the morning in Kuniko’s car. Kuniko dropped me off in Sannomiya and then hurried off to her school, and so I made it to work with plenty of extra time. The car ride was actually kind of nice, because the weather today was very rainy.

As usual when I arrive at school earlier than usual everyone makes a big deal. I settled into my desk and made some hot coffee to warm me up from the cold, rainy weather outside. Today the students were having their first day of exams, so there were no classes for me – just studying.

I had lots of memorizing to do, since my little accident yesterday. With all my free time I was able to get through 700 words, and now I’m back up to date. What a relief.

Harada sensei, the slightly off English teacher, had been complaining about being stuck in the Japanese system of employment yesterday. She is a part time teacher, and her contract says that she has to work a specific set of hours. Despite this, her boss and her coworkers always tell her that they expect her around all the time, and she is kind of trapped into doing it by peer pressure. That’s part of being in the Japanese workplace, and luckily something I don’t have to experience because of my ethnicity.

She was at my desk complaining and complaining about having to work on Friday, when normally she is supposed to get that day off. I told her that she just needs to stand up for herself and say no, but she insisted that if she did she’d never get another job in Nishinomiya city. People would see her as being an outsider – not somebody that is part of the group, and the word would spread. She was really adamant that she was trapped in a bad situation.

I finally pulled out the big guns and invoked Rosa Parks. Harada sensei and all the other third year teachers had a lesson on Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks earlier in the year, and I told Harada sensei that maybe she’ll have to be the Japanese Rosa Parks and just say “No way” when they ask her to work above and beyond her contract. She seemed really inspired, and I was suprised to see that she was not at work today. Either she got sick, or she was pulling a Rosa Parks and sitting down at home instead of at work.

After exams ended at noon, I helped coach some students who are taking an interview test on Sunday. This is the second part of their certification under the STEP program. I’ve done interviewing for the STEP program in the past, so I was in a good position to help them out. One of the students grew up in Singapore, so her English was really good. She’s pretty shy in class, but once she was alone she did great. I expect that she’ll pass with no problem.

I went back to my desk and ate lunch, and then continued studying, translating Japanese newspaper articles into English. I overheard the school principal saying my name to someone else over and over again at the other side of the room, and soon Takagi sensei came over and told me that the principal said I could leave early because of the exam schedule. That was how I ended up heading home around two o’clock in the afternoon on a Friday. What a very nice surprise.

Since I got home early I went to work cleaning the house a bit for our guests on Saturday night. Kuniko also got home a little early, so we did a little shopping in Futami for a chair, a small food processor, and some supplies for the lasagna dinner tomorrow night.

It’s almost bed time, and Kuniko is up late making lasagna. She’s got just a little bit of work tomorrow, and then we’ll be able to enjoy the afternoon together before our guests show up. It’ll be nice to relax a little bit.

Greetings from Friday night. Thursday was my second to last day of classes, and it was one of those nice days where all the classes are lined up right up until lunch, and then I was done for the day. I enjoyed eating my lunch and then did some studying before heading home.

The big deal at school lately is all the sick people. Not just the students, but teachers have been taking sick days, and that’s a big deal. Lots of people have reported having the flu. I’m not one of them, luckily. The second year students have close to twenty people out, and two teachers. We lost two first year teachers today – they both went home right after classes with high fevers. Everyone else was gargling and scrubbing their hands with soap and hot water.

A while back I loaded some new vocabulary into my handheld computer, and today I realized that I screwed up some of the data accidentally when I entered it. Tonight after work I went into the data and tried to get it all fixed up, and ended up making a big mess of it. To make a long story short – I lost the week’s learning, and I’ll have to go back and do it again. The good news is that everything else is still there, and for a little while it looked like I had erased it accidentally. That would have been more than 6000 words down the tubes.

Another good thing is that even though the software won’t have the records of me memorizing my words this week, the fact remains that I did memorize them. They’re still in my head, and when I redo them tomorrow I should be just fine. The point of the whole exercise is to keep them fresh in my head, all the time, and so this is just a case of a technology crutch temporarily malfunctioning. I hope.

My evening was spent in front of the computer cursing while Kuniko worked out her aggressions on the Wii. We had a simple stir fry for dinner that turned out really nicely, and then hit the bed pretty late. Tomorrow is Friday, at last.

This winter has been unusually warm, and recently there have been signs of spring approaching. It has been warmer at night, and in the mornings, too. It makes getting up and going to work just a little bit easier.

Not much to report at school today. I had an easy set of four classes, and I said goodbye to a lot of students. Some of the students pulled me aside afterwards and personally thanked me for helping them with English, and that was really nice. My biggest task was finding the time to study between classes and knock out my daily vocabulary quota. Lately I’ve been learning 20 new words a day on the weekdays, and just reviewing existing words on the weekends.

During the beginning of my last class of the day, one of the “challenged” first year students who is having trouble adjusting to regular school life came walking through the second year classrooms and trying to flash the female students. He is a tiny little guy – the same guy that tries to walk into the classrooms while the girls are changing clothes and pretending that he didn’t realize.

By the time that the teachers caught on the boy was running down the hallway pulling his pants up and all the girls were screaming and laughing at the same time. I don’t know what ever happened, but I’m sure we are in for some long consulations and lectures about it tomorrow.

Today Kuniko had a graduation ceremony at her school, and so she got home just a little earlier than usual. We had a healthy dinner tonight, and some manjuu for dessert that Kuniko brought back from her school. Now we’re just relaxing around the house and watching some goofy TV shows.

The week is wrapping up quickly, and we’ve got a lot of things to do this weekend. Friday we’ll be heading to Midori to do some shopping for a new kotatsu cover, and then we’ll be having Miyake sensei and Nozaki sensei over for dinner on Saturday. Sunday we’ll be having dinner with Risa and Anthony, and then it’s back to work on Monday… it should be a fun weekend.

I showed up at school right on time this morning, and I was particularly sleepy. I made some coffee (something I don’t usually do at work), and settled into my chair. I was happy to see that my schedule was free for the first period, so I didn’t have anything to do for almost two hours.

Suddenly, Harada sensei, the slightly batty English teacher, came running into the staff room and told me to come down to her classroom and help a student there. I wasn’t too thrilled about that given my condition, but I walked down to the classroom, walking along the hallway with my steaming mug of coffee. I walked by several teachers and the vice-principal who looked at me strangely for carrying the coffee. There’s a little bit of a culture problem with walking around with food, and it’s a little unprofessional to be drinking (even coffee) in front of students. I was too sleepy to care, and a little peeved with being summoned to a classroom.

The students in the classroom were pretty surprised, but they got over it. I drank the coffee while helping the students, and it was pretty non-intrusive. After about 20 minutes of helping students we wrapped things up and I went back to the staff room for the morning meeting. I always like helping the students, but I really prefer when they ask me, rather than having a teacher demand my time. Maybe I was just grouchy this morning.

I had a wide variety of students today, including two classes with the deaf students. Those were really fun, and the students really responded well to the lesson. I had a sick kid come in who wanted to practice pronunciation, but I couldn’t hear him through the doctor’s mask he was wearing, and he kept having coughing fits. I sent him back saying that it was better to get healthy first. Besides, I didn’t want to catch his disease.

Another student in one of my classes pulled me aside and gave me some “special Valentine candy”, which was a piece of chocolate attached to a Domo-kun postcard. On the back she wrote some nice comments in English, and her address in Japanese. She asked me to write to her in the future, but I’m not sure whether that’s a good idea or not. I don’t think I’d like my daughter exchanging letters with some old foreign guy I don’t know. Thanks for the chocolate, though!

At the end of the day I got wind of a teacher’s meeting. At this school there is not a big meeting room like my old high school in Takasago, so the teachers sit as is in the staff room and hold the meeting. Usually I sit in there until the end of my day at four, and then sneak out the door, trying to be as quiet as possible. Today at 3:00 I was talking with the vice-principal, and he said that I could leave early.

Actually, he never said that. Part of living in Japan is understanding the unsaid. The conversation went like this:

Me: I hear there’s a teacher’s meeting today. What time is the meeting?
VP: It starts around 3:45. But really, it doesn’t matter.
Me: I see. Thanks.

From that conversation, I left at 3:30, and there wasn’t a problem. The VP was saying that it doesn’t matter if I leave early – in fact, I could leave anytime. But he never officially said that, so nobody could pin it on him later. Very interesting.

I used my extra time to buy a manga that a student of mine had recommended. I’m not a big fan of manga, mainly because they can be a little weird, and there’s a real dork vibe that goes along with reading them. They are cheap, though, and I thought it would be worth giving it a read-through to see how it is.

I also bought some supplies for Kuniko’s baking habit, and then came home and made some rice and prepared a stir fry for dinner. Kuniko got home really early, and so we had the stir fry donburi style, and now she’s in the kitchen making some more peanut butter bars. We gave away lots of them around Valentine’s Day, and now we’re craving peanut butter again. We’ve got some friends coming over this weekend, so they might like to try them, too.

Tomorrow I have another full schedule at school, but things will start to taper off, and Friday, Monday and Tuesday I have no classes because of exams. Then I have four classes next Wednesday, my last day at Hamawaki Junior High. I’m going to miss my school!

This morning Kuniko slept in a bit on her birthday, and I made lunches for us today. We made it on time to the train, despite being pretty tired from the weekend.

At school I was surprised to find that Matsunaga sensei had filled a standing order from Costco, and I had a big case of refried beans, a big block of cheddar cheese, a package of sausages, and sixteen bagels waiting for me at my desk. Score!

I had more good news, too. All of the students that I had coached to pass their high school entrance interviews had passed. They were really excited, and each and every one of them made a point to come thank me personally. I thought that was a nice touch. One of them even gave me some late Valentine’s chocolates that she made. Score!

Almost all of my classes nowadays are the last classes for each group of students. I say goodbye and good luck to them after the class, and I’m touched by their reactions. Mostly they don’t want me to go, and to tell the truth I don’t really want to go either. I know I’m going to miss these students a lot.

At the end of the day I dragged all my loot from Costco home, and then did a serious Wii workout while waiting for Kuniko to get home. We had some leftovers for dinner and some Reese’s sticks for dessert to celebrate her birthday. I was still pretty bummed about last night’s dinner fiasco, but Kuniko is completely over it. I guess that is what is important.

Sunday morning we slept in soundly. It was really nice to just lay around drifting between sleep and being awake. Kuniko got organized and hit the road first, because she had a lunch to go to as part of her work. Before she left we squeezed in a phone call to party central California – my dad was having his 60th birthday party, and they were getting ready for a big rush of party-goers. I can’t wait to hear how that party went.

I met Kuniko in Kobe after her lunch ended, and together we walked around town. The idea was to get a birthday present for Kuniko. Unfortunately Kuniko couldn’t find something she liked, so we caught a movie to kill some time before dinner. We saw “Dreamgirls” at the new theater in the Mint complex that they built a few months ago. The theater was really nice – kind of American style with really comfortable seats and a nice modern screen. The movie was OK, but not my favorite. There was plenty of music, and plenty of different styles to make it interesting.

After the movie we headed up the hill to House of Pacific for dinner. We arrived about 10 minutes early, so we sat in the lobby for just a little bit, and then the lady I organized the dinner with led us up to the bar where we had a glass of nice champagne to celebrate Kuniko’s early birthday. After a leisurely drink we let them know that we were ready to head to our table, and they sent a couple of people to guide us there. The service is always really good at House of Pacific, and it was a lot like being escorted by the Secret Service wherever we went.

The table was great – we could enjoy a beautiful view, and dinner was great, too. They had forgot about the wine, so I re-ordered a bottle, and they brought it up and served it up. We had lots of food for dinner – beef carpaccio with Parmesan cheese and aioli mustard, a grilled crab meat salad, blue cheese risotto, and the main course, roasted lamb ribs with bamboo shoots and garlic.

Dinner was a homerun, and I thought everything was going to work out perfectly, but as dessert arrived, the wheels kind of fell off the wagon.

They served up the dessert to Kuniko, a three course dessert of different chocolate desserts. They had written my previously delivered birthday message in English and kanji across the plate in chocolate, but unfortunately they used the wrong kanji for her name. Kuniko’s name uses an unusual kanji, and knowing this I had spelled it all out on Friday night by writing it on paper, but they still screwed it up. No biggie, but I was a little disappointed. Then, just as we finished dessert, the real coup d’ grace – a cockroach ran right across the white tablecloth.

Holy crap. It was a small cockroach, maybe a teenager, and it was moving too fast for us to catch it. I’m not a big fan of cockroaches, and Kuniko hates them. That was the kiss of death for House of Pacific. We won’t go there again, and it was a little sad. Not only did we have a shocker after dinner, but we’ll have to find a new favorite restaurant.

I paid the bill and we headed out of there as soon as we could. After the bill was safely paid I told our host about the cockroach, and she apologized, but it wasn’t quite the apology I was hoping for. Overall, I thought it was a real disaster.

We caught the train and headed home, and we were both really tired out from walking around Kobe all day. Eventually we got home and got to bed, but it was a little bit of a downer of an evening.

Saturday I woke up with the alarms going crazy, and a pretty good headache on top of that. Kuniko was zonked out and by the time she was up and moving she was running a little late for work. She ended up taking her car though, and that saved a lot of time.

Thanks to my hangover I was a lot less productive that I had hoped. I managed to do some laundry, but I didn’t do my usual cleanup job. Instead I hunkered down in the kotatsu and drank lots of liquids. For lunch I ventured out to Jusco across the street for some sandwiches, and then came back on watched Survivor on my computer.

Kuniko came back in the early afternoon, just in time for me to head back to bed and take a nap. While I was zonked out she did some relaxation of her own, and then she went off to get her hair cut just about when I woke up.

She came back a few hours later with a haircut that she didn’t like too much. It’s a little shorter than she wanted it, but I think it looks good. It’ll just take some time to get used to it.

We had stew for dinner, and watched some TV and just lounged around and enjoyed the evening. Friday really took the wind out of us, and so it was good to take some time and recharge.

Friday after work I met up with Antoine in Kobe for some drinks and to catch up on our job situations. We started the evening off at the Belgium beer place, because it is close to where we meet up usually, and all that Hoegaarden on tap is just too good to pass up.

They didn’t have seats at the bar, so they set us up in the cafe, which is usually full of women eating cake and getting ready to party for the evening. We were surrounded by by them, and on the whole it was a pretty enjoyable situation from our perspective. Antoine told me all about his new job prospect, and it looks like he landed a job with the Takarazuka board of education as an ALT.

Antoine has been working on a temporary basis through a staffing company like me, waiting for the start of the school year. I found the ad for this job while I was digging around on the internet, and I forwarded it onto him. The process was pretty intense – he had to go in for three rounds of interviews, a Japanese test, and a physical exam. The Japanese test surprised me – I couldn’t believe he passed, but apparently it was good enough to get to the last round. He finally got a letter from the board the other day, and it looks like they are offering him the job. He couldn’t read the contract so he couldn’t give me details, but it sounded pretty promising. I’m glad that he found something a little more permanent – it helps with his wedding plans and his future.

As for me, I came to a career crossroads a while back, and I decided to take the road that is a little rougher hoping that it leads to a better place. While Antoine is thinking about being an assistant teacher for the mid to long term, I think that I want to do a little more than that. I’m hoping to go to school and use that education to get me teaching at a higher level – maybe at a college somewhere. That will take time, though, and I need something to pay the bills in the meantime. I’ve got some ideas, but nothing solid yet.

After talking and drinking at the Belgian place, we went across the street to the Sapporo beer hall and had a big mug of beer there. The waitress insisted on speaking English while she served us, and she even gave us the hard sell on the appetizer menu. We were able to stay away from the greasy food and save our appetites for dinner.

Dinner was a place that I saw featured on television a couple of days ago, Kim Katsu. It’s a chain, but a little more upscale. They have custom tonkatsu (fried pork cutlets) that were really good. Instead of using a thick pork cutlet and frying that up, they roll together lots of thinly sliced tender pork, and then add some flavors inside and then finally fry it up. You can choose lots of different kinds – we had three different ones – garlic, cheese, and onion. They were really good – I’m ready to go back and have more.

The waiters and waitresses were really good there and kept us in drinks long enough for the alcohol to start taking effect. As we were ready to go, Antoine went to use the bathroom. I commented that it was literally behind the wall we were sitting next to, and so he went in there and then knocked a couple of times to show me how thin the wall was. When he knocked everybody in the restaurant looked over, and I pretended that I didn’t know what was going on. Antoine was in the bathroom and didn’t know that everyone was staring, so he knocked again – just in case I missed it the first time. I knocked back and he seemed satisfied, and the other customers seemed a little perplexed.

Next stop was up the hill at the House of Pacific. They have a really nice bar with a good view of the city, but when we arrived it was full. While we waited in the lobby on couches they served us drinks. We had a really nice Burgogne Pinot Noir by the glass for only 500 yen – it was a great deal. While I was there I took the opportunity to make some arrangements because I had made reservations there for Sunday night to celebrate Kuniko’s birthday. I talked with the lady that I made reservations with. She spoke fluent English, so it was easy to make the arrangements. I wrote a birthday message on a piece of paper for them to use on her dessert, and I also ordered a bottle of the Pinot Noir to go with our dinner. The things I did that night played a big part in the story on Sunday night, so keep this in mind for later.

As we were wrapping up the first glass of wine and the waiters were trying to get us to smoke cigars, Kuniko called and invited us to hook up with her and her coworkers who were drinking near the station. We finished up at the House of Pacific and headed to the station, and after some fumbling around we found them in a tiny bar on the eighth floor of a building tucked into an alleyway.

Kuniko was drinking with Yamaguchi sensei and Ono sensei, the two teachers that had come over and had a tequila party with us. One sensei was the one that tumbled down the stairs later that evening, but she appeared to be doing fine with no ill effects. Antoine and I ordered some beers and hung out with them for a while – it was pretty clear that they were just as drunk as we were, and that made it much more fun.

Finally we hit the road just before the last trains, and everyone made their separate ways home. Kuniko was a little tough to manage on the way back, but it was a fun trip. The train was starting to get full, but she managed to squeeze into a seat that had about a half a seat of room next to it. She turned to the old man next to her and asked him “Would you mind scooting over a little bit so my husband can sit down?”, but she asked him in English. The guy didn’t even bat an eye – he answered in English… “Nooooooo. No. No. No.” Luckily the person on my right moved a little and I was able to sit down. Across the way there was a guy completely passed out taking up three seats and a lot of the aisle. His mouth was hanging open and I thought that it would be bad news to be him tomorrow morning.

We got home safely, and tucked into bed. Kuniko had to work the next morning, so we fortified with vitamins, water and aspirin and hit the sack. Good times…

Not much to report today. The weather was back to cold, but still windy, so it was a little tough to get up and go out in the weather again.

At school I had four classes in a row – first through fourth periods. That is always nice because you finish the day by eating lunch, and you have the afternoon to relax. The students were in a strange mood today, being quieter than usual sometimes, and louder than usual other times.

Maybe it was a leftover vibe from Valentine’s Day, but two girls declared their love for me today. One whispered it in my ear between classes, and the other one called it out across the crowded teacher’s room. That got a big chuckle from the other teachers and got the student ejected temporarily.

I’m back home and Kuniko is swinging away at Wii. We had a super healthy dinner, and then we were on dessert leftover duty. We had lots of odd desserts laying around, so we worked on getting rid of those. Tomorrow is finally Friday and we’re looking forward to the weekend.

It was a strange weather day today. When Kuniko and I left this morning the wind was blowing hard, knocking down signs and sending debris flying all over the place. The temperature was about 10 degrees warmer than usual – it felt like typhoon weather.

Later, once I got to school things settled into slight rainfall all day long, and slowly the temperature dropped to a normal level.

Although today was Valentine’s Day, there was no sign of it among my teachers and students. No students gave any chocolate to teachers, and no teachers gave any chocolate to their co-workers. That is, nobody gave anything except me.

Kuniko had been hard at work making secret chocolates for me, and she served them to me last night. Today we both brought in the extra chocolates to work, and I passed them out to teachers that I like. They were taken by surprise, because on Valentine’s Day in Japan the boys are supposed to receive, not give. I didn’t mind, though, and made a lot of people very happy.

That wasn’t all that Kuniko had done for me. She also made me a special lunchbox. The lunchbox had a pumpkin salad (with ham and onions), tamagoyaki rolled with cheese, ham and vegetable stir fry, hot dogs, tomatoes, and the main dish, cubes of sirloin steak that she sauteed with onions. She cut the carrots into heart shapes, and even the furikake on the rice was arranged into heart shapes. Wow. She did all that without me knowing.

At the end of the day third year students that had taken exams to enter high school came back to report on how they thought they did. The students that I had been coaching to enter the international school came back in tears. They were bawling and insisting that they didn’t have a chance. It’s a competitive school, and I wasn’t surprised that it was tough for them. I was surprised that they were taking it so hard. They have chances to enter other schools, and just because they didn’t get into this school doesn’t mean that they can’t work hard and be just as successful. But they don’t want to hear that right now. It was a little sad to see all the tears.

Now I’m back home and waiting for Kuniko to get back. It’s going to be a late night for her. I bought some roses and have them ready for when she gets back – she earned them with that super-lunch she made for me.

The end of the week is drawing closer, and I’m going to be going out with Antoine Friday night, and Kuniko on Sunday night. I’ll try to document all the fun and post some pictures later on.