What a weekend. Saturday was fairly mellow. Kuniko went off to work in the morning, and I stuck around to do the community cleanup at the apartment complex. The cleanup went pretty well – I received my instructions from the manager, who plopped some hedge clippers in my hand and trusted that I was familiar with the topiary arts.

Not having done a lot of hedge trimming in my life, I approached it hesitantly at first, and later with much more gusto – shaping the unruly bush into a big arc. I had fun clipping away while other people did much the same thing. Nobody here was an expert clipper, but we just had fun with it and the hour passed quickly.

I chatted a little bit with Jane on my way back to the apartment, and we talked about her new neighbor who will move into my place after Kuniko and I leave. She even offered to help us move, which was very nice of her. I think our move won’t be too tough though – she should be safe.

I cleaned house and did laundry throughout the morning, and when Kuniko came home in the afternoon she did a load of laundry, studied, and got some well-deserved time to relax. Later in the evening we went over to the Kageyama household for dinner to celebrate an early father’s day.

Kuniko’s sister was there as well, so it was nice to have everyone around. We had a big feast and then sat around the TV and chatted and ate dessert. We had brought along our Nintendo DS with the brain training game, and that was a big hit with Kuniko’s sister and father. They both played it for a long time.

Sunday was a really crazy day. We got a chance to sleep in, but Kuniko couldn’t sleep very well and ended up staying awake most of the night. I managed to sleep in a little bit, though. We spent the morning reading and relaxing at home, and then drove to Carrefour to park the car. We parked there and then walked to the nearest JR train station – Tsuchiyama, and from there took a train to Nishi Akashi station. In Nishi Akashi we had an appointment with an apartment rental place to look at some places. We need to get serious about moving – the deadline to move out of the teacher’s apartment is at the end of next month!

We had trouble finding the place at first, so Kuniko called and a few minutes later an employee came running up to guide us to the office. He was a really talkative guy, and he had us both on edge the whole time we talked to him. Unfortunately, he was the guy that was going to drive us around to see the apartments today, so we got plenty more exposure to him throughout the afternoon.

Back at the office they gave us some papers listing a few of their recommended properties to look at. We had found three properties on their website that we wanted to see, but they didn’t seem aware of those. We asked about it, and they went to the back room and soon emerged with those three property sheets as well. There was a really pushy boss working there, who told us that he was sure we would find something we liked today – he had a feeling it would be one called “Green Heights”.

We headed out to the car, and drove off to the first place in Okubo. We had decided to look around Okubo because of it’s proximity to a JR train station, the big shopping center that is attached, and it is a little closer to Kobe than where we are now without getting close enough to be more expensive.

The first place I liked immediately. The neighborhood was just one street off the main street leading to the station, and it was only a 2 minute walk from the apartment to the station. It was on the third floor above some offices and down at the floor level there was a nice looking yakitori right there. The bad news was that it was too small. One of the rooms was just about the size of our bed – no room for anything else. Unfortunately, that was a show-stopper.

We looked at a few others without finding one we liked. There was a big one that was part of a duplex in a quiet neighborhood – and at first I really liked it. It had two floors and its own parking spot, which is a big deal in Japan. The rent wasn’t so bad and the place was huge – maybe a little too big.

As soon as we entered the place the agent started saying bad things about it, and he continued to say bad things about any of the rental places that they didn’t recommend. He pestered us for our opinion and wanted us to list our preferences in order all the time – “Which is your favorite so far?”, “How about this one?”, “This must be better than the other one, right?”

It was the hard sell – I’ve seen it before. He was pushing the recommended properties, and he wanted us to sign up for one of them today. Even though we knew we were getting the hard sell, it didn’t make it any easier to deal with. Luckily we could speak English to each other and exclude him from the conversation. He would interrupt us and say “What’s that?” “What did you say?” Never has speaking English in a foreign country been so useful.

We got to the “Green Heights” place that his boss had recommended, and he was gushing about it before the car stopped. It was a 7 minute walk from the station, on the third floor of a building on the main street. We climbed the stairs and went in, and looked around. I had steeled myself to be wary of this one – it was one that he was pushing. We looked around and it seemed nice – very clean and pretty spacious. The price was OK, so why was he pushing it so hard? Kuniko and I talked about it, sometimes talking right over his “What do you think?” and “Do you like it?” questions that he fired at us constantly.

I liked the place, but I was a little worried about the neighborhood. Right across the street was a gas station, and I didn’t know how much traffic noise there was, especially during rush hour. There was no air conditioning, but he assured us that we could install it without a problem. I wanted some time to think about it.

Part of the hard sell is not giving you time to think about it. You push someone into a decision. We were hoping to just look around today and then if we liked something, talk about it and come back later. We had hoped to get dropped off at the nearby station when we were finished, but that wasn’t in the cards. He wouldn’t drop us off, but said that his boss wanted to talk to us about Green Heights, and I knew that was the big push to seal the deal.

We made up a story about having an appointment to get to, but it didn’t faze them a bit. They sat us down in their office, and said that a place like Green Heights was sure to move soon, maybe in the next few days, so we had better jump. All my instincts were to walk away and talk about it at a leisurely pace with Kuniko. Kuniko, though, didn’t really want to wait – she was fine with the place and didn’t see why I would need time.

In the end we said that we wanted some time to think and we put down a little bit of money to hold the place for a week – we had to fill out an application, and then they finally let us go. The money part was funny – they asked how much money Kuniko had, and she said she had only 3000 yen, and so they said “no problem” and took that. I’m lucky I didn’t say how much money I was holding, because I think they would have taken that, too.

After getting manhandled we walked back down the street, relieved to be away from such an annoying and pushy company. Just as we were about to turn the corner, the annoying guy came running and calling our name – he had forgotten to make a copy of one of the forms, and so we had to wait outside a nearby convenience store while he made a copy. Kuniko and I were getting pretty pissed off by then.

He apologized and we gave him the curtest of goodbyes and then headed to the station. We were so flustered that we took the wrong train from the station and ended up in Akashi – we had to catch another train to go back the right way. Eventually we made it Okubo, and decompressed by eating McDonald’s (we didn’t have much cash on us anymore) and talking about the day.

Without all the high pressure it was easier to think about the place and whether we liked it or not. It was clear that Kuniko was ready to pull the trigger – it was just me holding it up. I had lots of questions – renting an apartment is tricky in America, let alone in a foreign country where it would take me a month to read the contract. Kuniko answered the questions and explained everything to me, and it helped a lot.

We did a little bit of shopping and then decided to walk from where we were to the Green Heights apartment. It took just 7 minutes to get there, and we were able to look around the neighborhood on the way. There were a couple of shops on the ground floor of Green Heights – a Los Angeles-themed hair salon, and a cake shop (danger!)

We walked up to the apartment and stood outside, looked around and then walked to the nearby supermarket to look at what they had for sale. It was no Ito Yokado, but I don’t think we’ll be in a good situation like that again soon.

We walked back from there and I finally decided that it was OK and that we should go for it. I had gotten my questions answered, but the biggest holdup for me was that this place was the one that the pushy people were pushing – so something must be wrong. I almost didn’t want to take it just to spite them, but it is a good place, and that is what is most important.

Just to top off the day, on the way home we started talking about my future in Japan. It’s a tough topic to talk about since there are so many question marks for me. Kuniko asked me some good questions, and I had no good answers. It made me feel bad that I couldn’t answer them and a little like I have been wasting time the last three years instead of working towards something.

That depressed me even more on top of the pushy real estate company, so by the time we got back home I was pretty bummed out. We went to bed and talked a little bit, and that helped a lot. We talked about we wanted and what we expected, and talked a little bit about our different cultures and how those were shaping our expectations.

Just before we fell asleep the real estate guy called to bug us some more, and then he called again about 10 minutes later but we didn’t answer. Then he called our home phone number, but we didn’t answer that either. Enough is enough.

I think about their sales process and I can’t believe how it is going to work out for them despite almost everything they did. They need to let the properties speak for themselves. Now we will rent this place despite hating (hating!) the people that are renting it, and resenting the whole process. In the end, they will probably think their tactics were effective, and they’ll keep doing it. Even if we wrote a letter complaining, the manager will still say, “But at least they rented something!” Scary!

Finally, the day served as a gigantic wake up call for me that I have to focus on my future more. I’m sure I’ll have no problem landing a job in the short term, but as for five years from now, ten, twenty, I’ve got a lot of thinking to do.

Today was my last culture festival at Takasago Minami, and so I approached it keeping in mind that it was my last chance to enjoy it and spend time informally with my students.

As usual there were lots of interesting exhibits. Nothing as dramatic as last year, probably because of the price tag of last year. In the morning I walked around enjoying the displays, like the little green men from Toy Story set up to greet people as they arrived. They also had a huge banner made out of tiny squares of colored paper. From a distance it looked like a photograph of my school. Very creative!

The format of the event was the same as the previous two years, but this time I was a lot closer to the students participating, so every time they did a dance routine or an exhibit I knew at least one student well, and that made it much more interesting.

As usual it is a sweaty place in the gym during the festival, because they have to close all the doors and windows to make it dark for the dancing and plays. The first year I sweated the whole time and was miserable. The second year I froze some sodas in plastic bottles the night before, and then brought those with me to keep cool. This year I sat right behind the principal with the student council – those are choice seats. They had a fan dedicated to keeping the principal (and those behind him) cool, and we were right next to the cement wall of the gym so it was naturally cool. Good spot.

The dances were interesting – lots of variety. One class did a very quick version of West Side Story, and another class did a pretty bad version of Cinderella. The taiko drummers were the best, though – and it was unanimous among the students and staff that it was just like seeing it at a real concert. I was really impressed – I haven’t seen much taiko but this was really, really good.

The teachers even did a couple of songs. It was pretty bad, but I guess that is part of the entertainment value for the students. They had some new members this year, and Nozaki sensei dressed up in a red dress and a blonde wig and did what I can only describe as an interpretive dance number while everyone else sang. She seems normal enough in the staffroom, but she was one freaky lady today on stage. She stripped off the wig and the dress during the number, and everyone in the gymnasium was very relieved to see that she was wearing a jumpsuit underneath.

Sitting with the student council was fun, too. They are all pretty outgoing people because they are generally the leaders of their classes, so they were completely comfortable to talk with me about what was going on. It was a pleasure to have the chance to chat with them.

What else? I did the tea ceremony with the tea ceremony club, stopped in at all the classrooms at lunch to see some of the interesting exhibits. One class had a mural made entirely of folded cranes – very impressive.

Now I’m back home and pretty tired out. I put some pictures here if you’d like to check out today’s events. Tomorrow is Saturday but I still have to get up early to help with community cleanup. Kuniko has to work, but Sunday we both have the day off – for Kuniko it will be her first day off in about 20 days!

Kuniko came back from school pretty stressed – she had a busy day. Her speech went really well, so I was glad to hear that. Her school has her working right up until the day we leave for our vacation, and there is a chance I might go and help her out. I’m not sure yet, though, so we’ll wait and see.

Today I had just one class in the morning, since the afternoon classes were cancelled to prepare for the big culture festival tomorrow. The class was a guest lecturer at an international understanding course. The students listened to me lecture in English, with the history teacher translating. My message was that it is a very good thing to study other cultures, and it is one of the things that have changed me profoundly. After a forty minute lecture, we opened it up to questions and answers. The only question was “Are you married?” Ouch – so much for an effective and interesting presentation. Actually, later there was a sign that at least some things sunk in.

In between classes I was walking down a hallway and saw two boy students pushing each other. One left quickly, and the other one followed yelling at him wanting to fight.

In three years at this school I’ve never seen a fight, and I always thought that was weird. I didn’t want one to start now, so despite what they tell us in Assistant Language Teacher School I stepped in and held back the kid that wanted to fight. He just tried to push forward past me, but I did the passive resistance thing and told him to head back to his class. After a few minutes I got him turned around and headed back. Later I went to the teacher in charge of the students and reported what happened in broken Japanese, so hopefully they won’t pick up where they left off later. It won’t make me popular with either of the students, but I think I did the right thing. Ask me again in a week, though.

In an interesting coincidence, Tsutsumi sensei told me that she had to break up a fight between three different groups of students. She said they were all girls, and the leaders of the groups didn’t get along. She got involved in separating them and the subsequent discipline, so she was late to our class yesterday.

Today was the last day for the student teachers, and although there is no English teacher’s class to evaluate, I dropped in on an international understanding lecture done by a young student teacher. Earlier I had walked by a class being taught by her and everybody was making “Help me I’m bored out of my mind” faces at me while her back was turned writing on the board. I was a little nervous that the class would be mind-numbing.

In fact it was quite good, and the students all stayed awake and alert throughout the class. Part of the reason might have been that the back of the class was full of VIPs like the principal and vice-principal. Anyway, the student teacher did a really good job and explained well about the United Nations and how and why Japan is not a member of the Security Council.

After that class I ran over to have lunch at the cafeteria really quick, and then met up with Miyake sensei for a quick English lesson. At 12:30 the school stopped early to get ready for the festival, and so I spent time with the ESS club and also walking around looking in on other classes preparations. I spoke a lot of English and it was good to see everyone working hard.

One of the topics I touched on during my international understanding lecture today was what things I liked about Japanese culture and things that I didn’t like. One of the things I complained about was how people tend to not greet each other while walking around. I told the story of how I have often seen people in Japan work very hard not to meet my eyes or say hello, but in America people that happen to walk by each other are more likely to be friendly and say hello.

During preparations I was walking around and walked by two of the students from the international understanding class, and they made a special point to say hello and make a greeting. At least they understood that much of my lecture.

At four o’clock we met up to take a picture of the ESS club, and then soon afterwards I went over to meet with Tsuji-san. Today was our last meeting, since she will be getting married in a couple of weeks and moving to Himeji. We decided to make a party out of it and go out with her other student, Alexis, and Alexis’ boyfriend from the USA.

Tsuji-san and I walked through a torrent of rain to get to the restaurant. We were a few minutes early, so they set us up at the table to hang out. The owner of the restaurant came out and said hello, and gave me a small ceramic plate from the local shrine as a gift.

It turns out the owner is a big fan of traveling and he really likes meeting foreigners. Alexis has been there a couple times, so he went out and bought a small Pennsylvania state flag to hang in the restaurant to make her comfortable.

We didn’t wait long before Alexis showed up with her boyfriend visiting from home, Jake. Jake was a really quiet guy but he seemed very intelligent and was still in kind of a shock stage about Japan. It was fun to watch him struggle with the sashimi platter and decide what to eat and what was too risky. He’s been in Japan for just over a week now, and he’s been sick twice in that time. There was lots of cooked food, though, so he got by just fine.

The conversation was pretty much just in English because Alexis speaks just a little bit of Japanese and Jake doesn’t speak any at all. It was a challenge for Tsuji-san, and we didn’t make it any easier for her by talking about nostalgic American cultural icons like Chutes and Ladders and Candyland. I tried to bring her into the conversation when I could, but it was pretty tough to bridge the gap between all the different backgrounds at the dinner table.

They kept bringing food and we kept eating it – loads of do-it-yourself BBQ, fish, eggplant, tamagoyaki, fried potatoes, and even big plates of tempura. When we finally got full we tried to head out the door. They told us that they had more food coming for us, but we pleaded full stomaches, and they let us slide by having us drink fresh green tea at the bar with some dessert. This was after we paid the bill – it was just a chance for them to talk to us and get to know each other better.

The master of the place was happy that he could speak to me in Japanese, and we compared notes on our visits to Texas. His whole family was working for him, and he has sent all of them to be students of Tsuji-san at some point. He feels that English is important for them to be better people.

We finally extracted ourselves from their hospitality, but not before taking home some sushi for the next day. They were really nice, and I was sad to think that I’ll be finished with the town of Takasago in a few months and won’t really be able to drop by and say hello in the future.

Even though I went out I still got home before Kuniko, and she was happy to dig into the sushi that I brought back once she made it home. We crashed out in bed exhausted. Friday is the culture festival at my school, so I’ve got something to look forward to.

I had quite a busy day at work – four classes and helping ESS prepare for the culture festival. The classes went pretty well – the first year classes went smoothly and without a problem. The second year classes on the other hand, were interesting.

The first class was with Tsutsumi sensei. Unfortunately when it was time to head up to the classroom, she wasn’t around. Usually she is right there ready to go, so I was a little worried. I went upstairs, and saw her in the hallway, heading back down to the staffroom. She had a slight problem she had to deal with, so she asked me to get the class started without her.

No problem. The class was about different types of music, so I stood up in front of the students and tried to explain what “funk” music was without using Japanese. Tough! We got through it, though. Another challenge – explaining “weird” as an adjective to describe music.

I got through the vocabulary, and then did a dialog with myself, and finally got the students working on their own dialogs in pairs – about 20 minutes into the class. About that time, Tsutsumi sensei came in and told me that she would explain later but there was a big problem with a girl student. I never heard what it was, because I was busy the rest of the day. Maybe tomorrow I’ll find out.

The rest of the class went just fine. The second part of the class involves listening to the band “Cake”, and the students overall seemed to enjoy that. We had a few minutes left at the end so the class treated me to a rendition of the song they will sing during the culture festival. It was a piece of spoken word/rap music that was a little scary coming from the mouths of my students, but it was pretty good.

The next class was with Yamamoto sensei, the exact same lesson plan. He runs the class with an iron fist, and so they are always quiet and reluctant to speak. On the other hand, they have the highest English scores in the second year, so I know they can do English. Today was much like other classes with them – any questions I ask are met with silence. They don’t want to get it wrong, and they don’t want to look bad in front of Yamamoto sensei because he will jump down their throats. There are four students in that class who will volunteer to answer questions just because they are friends of mine, and they are confident in English. Without them I would still be in that class right now asking “What kind of music do you like?”

In that class we had some extra time at the end as well, so I played a second Cake song for them (“The Distance”) and it was met with complete silence. No reaction, nothing. I think probably every single person in that class hated the song. It was a weird way to end it, and I left feeling a little like everything was a total failure.

Were I a rookie teacher I would think that it was a bust and I would never do the lesson again, but from previous lessons I can guess that some people actually liked the songs, and some people will come up to me in a few weeks and ask for more information about the band. Nobody gets too excited at first, but deep down, somebody liked the lesson. I hope.

After school I dropped in on Mr. Yamamoto’s class practicing taiko drums for the upcoming school festival. They were getting lessons from a third year student who is good at drumming, and Mr. Yamamoto was shouting his own instructions, too. The students giggled a lot at my presence there – but eventually they settled back down and practiced. It was fun to watch, and I’m looking forward to seeing them on the big stage Friday.

I’m back home now and getting ready to cook dinner – Kuniko will get home around 7 tonight, so she’ll have a little downtime tonight. I can’t wait to find out how her speech went…

Not much exciting to report today – Kuniko is still struggling along even though she is exhausted. I’ve got relatively easy days, so I’m just doing what I can to support her while she’s going through this. She came back home tonight exhausted again, and tomorrow she has to make a 30 minute speech in front of her whole school, so she’s anxious about that.

On my way home today I bumped into a student of mine from last year’s graduating class. She is studying English in college, but she was disappointed that they aren’t spending much time actually speaking it. That sounds about right from what I’ve heard. There are foreign lecturers, but they can’t speak one-on-one with all their students.

She was just about to ask me to teach her English one-on-one, but luckily my train arrived and I said goodbye. At my stop I got off the train with another one of my students – a 2nd year boy. He said hello and I asked him if he was headed home now. The problem was, he thought I was asking him if he would to my home. I tried to correct his misunderstanding in Japanese, but it just made it worse. Finally I just said goodbye, and he was very relieved to say goodbye back to me and head out of there.

Tonight I cooked up garlic pork steaks and a green salad on the side. We ate at a reasonable hour since Kuniko arrived home around 7 p.m. We’re off to bed early to try to get a jump on the big day tomorrow…

It’s about 9:30 in the evening and Kuniko is going to get here in the next 30 minutes or so – I’ve got some time to write an entry before getting dinner ready. Tonight at 10 p.m. there will be a World Cup game that I might watch a little of. Everybody at my school will be sure to be tired tomorrow because it is Japan playing, and people around here are really excited about it.

Today I had just one class – the first period, so once that was done I had the whole day to do as I pleased. I worked on planning for the trip, did lots of studying, and spent a couple hours lesson planning.

The head of the office came by and brought an interpreter along to explain to me that I was going to have to move out of my house soon. Luckily it didn’t come as a surprise to me, and I think he was glad to see that. He’s a skittish guy – he looked like he was afraid I was just going to say “no”.

I’m suffering big time from sunburn today, but I think by tomorrow the worst will be over. The other teachers were amused to hear my rice planting story, and a little jealous that we eat rice for free all year because of it.

I’ve got three different kinds of marinades working on chicken breasts, so I better go in there and get them cooking. Hopefully Kuniko will get home earlier tomorrow so she can rest up a bit.

Today I met up with Kuniko’s parents and a couple of her uncles to help plant rice. Kuniko had to go to school, so she missed out on the adventure. I had my shiny new boots to use that day, and I’m glad I brought them. Kuniko’s dad was wearing a Gundlach Bundschu hat that my folks had given him – by chance so was I, so we made a matching set.

The rice planting is a pretty modern operation – a tractor runs around the rice paddy in a specific pattern, and it is really interesting how it delivers the plants into the mud. They load it with what looks like squares of sod – young rice plants ready to go into the ground. As the tractor traveled there were lots of tiny frogs jumping like hell to get out of the way.

The tractor looked like fun, but unfortunately I didn’t get to try it out. Maybe next year. In fact, there wasn’t a whole lot for me to do – just watch and help load the tractor with more sod when it ran out.

We planted two rice paddies. There were a couple more, but Kuniko’s folks did that work yesterday, so it was a relatively easy day. When we finished up we spent a couple hours cleaning the tractor and the trays that the young rice plants had been growing on.

They had a strange machine for cleaning the trays, and me and one of Kuniko’s uncles tried to figure it out. It had power, but we couldn’t figure out what the power was for. We pushed the trays in one side, and the were rinsed with water on the way through. I figured it was heating the water, but after a while it was still cold. Finally somebody walked by and told us to turn it on, and so we followed the cord back a ways and found a switch. Once it was on, the thing automatically received the trays, cleaned them, and spit them out the other side. At least I wasn’t the only one that was clueless.

After everything was taken care of I helped with a little modification to one of the barns at the family farm. It was really just Kuniko’s dad working, and four guys standing around offering comments.

Kuniko showed up around 3 p.m. and was my ticket out of there, so I headed back to the Kageyama household and we drank coffee and relaxed a bit. We snuck out of there before her mom could cook us dinner, and did a little bit of shopping at Carrefour on the way back home.

I’m tired and I’ve got a sunburned neck, so I’m off to bed. It was a good experience today – I’m looking forward to doing it again next year. I managed to take a few pictures. You can check out the pictures here.

Saturday morning I had the place to myself – Kuniko was off to school to teach a few morning classes. I did a little laundry, a lot of studying, and had a some snacks for lunch. By the time Kuniko got back in the afternoon I was ready for a nap, so I slept just a little bit and then I was ready to head into Kobe to meet Nel and Antoine.

We had a good time in Sannomiya. We started at a pizza restaurant. There aren’t many restaurants in Japan dedicated to pizza, so this was a unique experience. Also, they number every pizza they make, so you can see exactly how many pizzas they have made before yours came out of the oven. As for the quality of the pizza, it was a little bit bland. The toppings were a little thin, but satisfying enough. We had a “Worker’s Pizza”, which had different meats and garlic, and a “Mexican Pizza” which had just a slight bit of spiciness, but otherwise didn’t seem very Mexican at all.

Afterwards we went and shot pool for about an hour, and from there went to a Japanese German beerhouse that I’ve wanted to try. I think it is owned by Sapporo, and they had a few homemade beers there that we could try out. One was quite good, but the other one, a wheat beer, didn’t taste very good at all. The waitresses were dressed like St. Pauli girl, so that was a big plus.

Nel and Antoine have two different directions they are heading after JET. Antoine will be looking for a job in the area, and Nel is looking for something in Tokyo. We talked about our different job strategies, and also about how we first met. It was good times. Hard to believe that we all started this adventure in Los Angeles about three years ago.

I came on back home and found Kuniko already crashed out – she has been working so hard lately. I curled up right beside her and went to sleep. I gotta plant rice tomorrow!

This morning I had to watch a pervert at work on the train, but despite that I had a pretty good day. The pervert is always on this train, and although I wasn’t exactly sure that he was a pervert before, I’m convinced now.

He was sitting a few seats away from me, and suddenly he got up and walked down the length of the train car to sit next to a sleeping woman who was nodding off on her way to work. I watched carefully, ready to go over there and catch him in the act. The guy looked around casually, and then started looking carefully at the sleeping woman. He tried to look down her shirt, and kept watching her from various angles. Right about then my stomach was turning, but there wasn’t much to do. I kept a close eye on the guy, and the guy next to me was watching carefully, too. I had to get off soon afterwards, but hopefully that guy was keeping track of what was going on.

My day at school was pretty uneventful. I spent a lot of time talking with students, and I spent some time looking at logistics for the Europe trip. I was lucky enough to get out of work right on time, despite all the madness involving preparations for the upcoming culture festival.

On the way home the train was free of perverts, and I got home with the idea to head over to Carrefour and look for some rubber boots to use during the rice planting on Sunday. I was in luck – I found a pair of size 27 boots that I squeezed into for only 900 yen. I also picked up a few other valuable things and then headed home for dinner. I made up some vegetarian yakisoba that turned out really nicely.

Soon after Yasu came over with omiyage from his trip to Tokyo. We sat and drank beers and talked about his trip, and also our plans for the future. We switched to sho-chu when we ran out of beer, and the conversation turned philosophical. It was fun to hang out, and he stayed until it was time to meet Kuniko at the train station.

Kuniko had been at a long meeting, so she arrived home really late tonight. I feel bad for her because she had to work both days last weekend, and she’s working both days this weekend as well. As soon as we got back we went right to sleep.

Strange weather today – lots of clouds and the threat of rain all day. Today was the first day I wore short sleeves which must be some kind of weather indicator. Yesterday it was plenty warm, and when I got prepared for it today mother nature threw clouds and rain at me.

I caught a later train than normal and shared the ride with one of my students. He is a second year student and is a big fan of kickboxing, 80s heavy metal, and volunteering to help animals. Interesting guy. We spoke mainly in Japanese until we got to school. He was really nice to talk to.

At school I dreamt up a lesson plan for an “International Understanding” lesson for the history teacher. It is the first in a set of two that I agreed to do. It should be fun – I’m going to say some very un-Japanese things, and I hope the students enjoy hearing them.

Between classes I had some spare time to think about the trip to France and Italy this summer. I flipped through the guidebooks and realized that there is no way that we’ll be able to do everything that I’d like, so we might as well take a leisurely pace and enjoy the trip. I’ll continue working on little details and we’ll see how it goes.

Kuniko arrived home late tonight, and we had a very simple dinner of leftovers. We had lots of cheese and crackers to kill off, and even some curry and rice that was still floating around. She was really tired from her day, so I anticipate that we’ll be getting to bed early tonight.

Tomorrow is Friday and I’m tentatively planning on a visit to the yakitori tomorrow for dinner since Kuniko has a long meeting after work – she won’t be back until nearly ten o’clock. Saturday I’ll be free during the day and then heading into Kobe for pizza with Nel and Antoine. Sunday is the day of the rice planting. Since nobody seems to have size 30 rubber boots laying around for me I might end up playing a very peripheral role. We’ll see – if it rains all bets are off.

Once again we were sleeping in this morning and missed making lunches. Maybe we are staying up too late at night? It was nice to sleep in a little bit, though. I got to work right on time, with a big list of things to do.

Surprisingly, I knocked out what I thought was a big list in less than 40 minutes, leaving me with two classes in the day and lots of free time to study. The longer I work here the more of a handle I get on how things operate, and I’m able to use my time efficiently. I’m not sure what to do with all my spare time, though. I use most of it for studying, averaging about four hours a day. I’m sure my next job won’t allow me so much free time, so I’m trying to enjoy it now.

The history teacher came by today and wanted to ask me about the TV show “American Idol”. It was broadcast on cable here for the few people that have cable, and the history teacher was following the show religiously. He was puzzled with the end, though. I didn’t watch the show, so I don’t know all the details, but apparently a pretty normal looking guy won out in the end against a pretty good looking girl. The history teacher was perplexed – she was clearly more attractive, why didn’t she win?

In Japan, at least in mainstream music, the appearance of the artist is as important or more important than how well they sing. They need to look good, they need to be able to dance, and then, finally – they should be able to sing. This isn’t all Japanese music, just the most popular stuff that is on the TV and radio all the time. There is an underground music culture in Japan that is less concerned with appearance and more with music, but most people don’t know about this obscure music or don’t care about it.

This morning was another sleep in for Kuniko and I. Between the two of us we managed to sleep in too late to make lunches to take to work. Oops. We did get out of the house on time, but a jam in the ticket machine at the train station caused me to be ten minutes late to work. The good news is that I always come in more than an hour early, so no big deal.

Today was a bookends type schedule – a class in first period and a class during the last period. Everything in between was free. The first period class was student interviews, and I held them completely in English. The students did much better than last time, so I was encouraged with their progress.

I had to pick something up at the local shopping center, so I walked out there and while I was there got a bowl of noodles for lunch. When I got back, a teacher gave me a donut filled with anko (red bean paste) and so that was a fairly substantial dessert. Then the history teacher dropped off a hot dog that he had bought for me – I was pretty full by the end of the day.

My last class was a first year class, and my co-teacher was a substitute – Nozaki sensei for Mori sensei. The class had a great reaction when she arrived, and they stayed loud and active during the lesson. Nozaki sensei was surprised – she said that the particular class is always quiet when she teaches it.

Speaking of Nozaki sensei, she and I spent some time talking between classes. She is trying to get out of the study group with Hayashi sensei and Miyake sensei. Her English is really good, and she says she is tired of doing the study group and having Hayashi sensei correct her accent. I told her that if she doesn’t like going, don’t go. Besides, if you are going to have someone correct your accent, make it a native speaker. Hayashi sensei’s accent is stronger than hers – she should be teaching him.

After school we had a teacher’s meeting, and once again there was a minor insurrection among the teachers. They seem to be flexing their muscle against the principal. This time it was about having teacher’s pictures in the PTA handbook. Interesting – this may be building up to something, but it is likely that I won’t be around when it blows up. Something fun for my successor.

Tonight for dinner Kuniko cooked up curry and rice. We have curry a lot as kind of a self-defense for all the fresh vegetables that come our way from Kuniko’s folks. It uses up a bunch with each batch, and lasts for a long time. We’ve still a bunch a veggies to eat, though, so we’ll have to figure out another veggie-heavy dish. Maybe yakisoba…

We dragged our tired bodies out of bed this morning and reluctantly headed off to work. I went in for just my morning class, and then soon afterwards took the rest of the day off to solve my visa issue once and for all.

I’ve been taking lots of time off lately – an hour here and there, sometimes half a day to take care of things relating to my visa. I feel pretty guilty about it, which shows you how well I’ve adjusted to the Japanese workplace. My school has been really flexible, though, and as long as it doesn’t conflict with a class it is no problem.

Before I left for Kobe, Nozaki sensei asked me for some help. One of her ex-students had sent her some phrases that she has run into in America, and she asked her to interpret them. Nozaki sensei didn’t know exactly, so she asked me. The phrase was a big surprise for me.

“Falsie manufacturers live off the flat of the land.”

Lots of things to delicately explain, and it took me about five minutes to get through it carefully. I like the phrase, though, and I’ll have to remember for some other occasion.

I caught the train to Akashi, and from there to Kobe, and then walked to the immigration office in the south of town. I paid 10,000 yen for two permits – one to live in Japan legally and one to come and go as I like. I put all the papers in a folder and fifteen minutes later they called me up and gave me my passport with a brand new visa that lets me live in Japan for the next three years. This is good news – now I can safely take our trip to Europe in the summer and be able to come back.

On my way back I went to the Akashi city office and updated my foreigner registration with the new information. They were very helpful there, and I got through the paperwork fairly quickly.

On my way out I considered how far I had come in three years. When I first arrived somebody had to talk through the whole operation – now I’m doing it on my own. It’s a nice sense of satisfaction and independence.

I finally got home around 3, and then I called my mom in the US to wish her an early happy birthday. It sounded like they had a pretty good birthday party for her tonight, so it turned out to be good timing.

Tonight I’m going to try to cook the gnocci I bought the other night – it’s pasta night. Tomorrow I’m back to school for the whole day, and I’m looking forward to a pretty light week.

It was a nice relaxing weekend for me and a tough working weekend for Kuniko. She was out of bed and off to work early on Saturday morning. I spent the day at home doing laundry, cleaning, studying, and generally getting the house organized.

When Kuniko got home around four o’clock, we had just about an hour for her to relax before heading to her parents house for dinner. Dinner was delicious, as usual – hand-wrapped sushi rolls, and gyoza on the side. Kuniko’s dad came in later – he’s busy out on the farm. He gave us lots of farm products to bring back home – strawberries, lots of onions, a head a cabbage – it was a big haul.

Sunday we got to sleep in just a bit, and then Kuniko was off to a Rotary Club meeting for some of the international students that they are sponsoring. Since one of Kuniko’s students was invited, Kuniko had to go, too.

While she was gone I spent the day studying and squeezed in a game or two of MarioKart on the DS. In the evening I went into Kobe to meet up with Kuniko after her meeting to have dinner.

On the way there, on the JR platform in Akashi, there was a guy in a really nice suit slumped over on the bench asleep. As I got closer I noticed a giant puddle of puke on the ground around him – I guess he drank too much. He was a mess, and it was interesting to watch the people around him and their reactions. Sometimes I see the odd puddle of vomit while walking around in the mornings, but this was the first time I saw the birth of one in public.

I met up with Kuniko near the Hankyu train station in Sannomiya, and from there we headed to the restaurant to check it out. It was a Thai restaurant that I had heard good things about, and I had made reservations earlier because I had also heard that it was a popular but small place. We got there a little early, and they turned us away, saying that we would have to come back right at the reservation time. We walked around a little bit and came back, our stomachs audibly growling.

The place was packed, and we actually shared our table with another couple across from us, with a wooden screen giving us privacy. In Japan I’ve shared tables with strangers before – that’s no big deal. The screen was there to afford us a little privacy, but you had to worry about maybe your foot or leg hitting the people across the way. Interesting.

We ordered a few things and were really pleased overall. We had fried garlic and pepper shrimp, and a fried pork dish covered with onions and spices. The shrimp had a really amazing sauce that we couldn’t get enough of, and the pork dish was nice and spicy – it had us sweating. We also ordered pineapple fried rice, and it was served in half of a pineapple. It was a little too greasy for us, but it was still delicious. For drinks we had juice, and I had a coconut juice that was just awesome.

We did just a little bit of shopping after dinner, and then headed home. We blended up lots of fruits and yogurts to take care of the strawberries we got from Kuniko’s folks. We also got into a bad situation with Tetris – we promised not to go to bed until one of us defeated the computer. It took almost 40 minutes to get that accomplished, but finally Kuniko did it. We went to bed exhausted – which is a bad way to go to sleep on a Sunday night.

Not a really tough day for me – in fact it flew by. I had kind of a grueling stretch of three classes in a row in the morning, but after that was done I was free for the afternoon. I spent most of the time marking the journals from the three classes, and then I had about an hour free later to enjoy my book and do a little bit of studying.

After school I headed into Kobe to meet Kuniko for a Mexican dinner. She is working through the weekend, so it is our only real chance to celebrate the end of the week.

We ate some great tacos, burritos and even some fajitas. Everything was really good, and we walked back to the train station with stuffed stomachs. On the way back we stopped in at a new import food shop, and I got a chance to buy some fun stuff that I can’t find normally. I got some fresh gnocchi, a can of iced Kona milk coffee from Hawaii, and some Jell-o, which was reasonably priced for a change. They had lots of other stuff I want, but I’ll wait and enjoy it gradually.