Last evening we drove over to Kuniko’s parents’ house to meet up before the trip to the family gravesite. Kuniko and I were running a little late, but we stopped in at Ito Yokado to pick up some pears in a very fancy box to bring over for the family. We also brought over the remains of the rolled cake that Kuniko’s friend Kayo had brought over to us.

Once we arrived we marshalled our forces and took off. Kuniko drove with her sister in the passenger seat, and me and her mom in the backseat. A funny moment happened on the way – Kuniko was listening to a CD that I had made for her a long time ago, and her sister commented in Japanese that it was a really strange song being played. Kuniko pointed out to her that it was from me, and I teased her by saying it was my favorite song. She was a little embarrassed.

Once we got to the area we parked the car outside Kuniko’s aunt and uncle’s house, and then went inside. Kuniko’s dad was already there trying to fix their television that was affected by the big thunderstorm that came through.

Kuniko’s aunt and uncle seemed to be in a bit of a rush, and they didn’t seem to be surprised that we showed up or that there was a foreigner coming along. We went inside and they served us tea, and a cold beer for me. We sat in a room dominated by an altar, with lots of fruit and other goods lined in front as an offering. There were two large pictures of the grandfather and grandmother, and Kuniko and her sister performed the prayer rituals under the watchful eyes of the family and the portraits.

I would have been really nervous if it everyone knew the ceremony perfectly, but Kuniko and her sister had to get some help, and in turn Kuniko helped me do it. I lit some incense (two sticks, not one or three) rang a bell, and prayed for the dead folks. Everybody took a turn, and then we left to walk down the street towards the local temple.

It was a few blocks away. We turned away from the main road and then walked uphill through a quiet neighborhood until we came to the gate of an old temple. By now it was dark and pretty quiet – and as we walked around the temple you could see the fairly large graveyard, with candles and dim lights burning at various places. We stopped and got some water to wash the gravestone, and then went inside.

We walked around until we found the Kageyama gravestone, and then we repeated the incense ritual, lit some candles, and washed the gravestone in turn. It was very beautiful to see all the candles and gravestones on a dark, warm night like that.

Once we finished we all headed back, and jumped back into the car. From there we went back to the parents’ house, and we had a big feast of hamburg, sashimi, salad, and rice. For dessert we worked on the roll cake, and Kuniko’s dad even opened a bottle of brandy (Remy Martin!) that he had gotten as a gift. It was really good, and I sipped on it at room temperature. The flavors were great – good vanilla and toasty flavors that covered your tongue and lingered for a long time.

Finally we hit the road and came back here. Next to the yakitori, which is about a three minute walk away) they opened a new Lawson convenience store. Convenience stores in Japan are everywhere. They are open 24 hours, they are brightly lit, and you can get anything you need at any hour of the day. So now our lives will be much more convenient with the new store. We walked over there and looked around, and got some snacks and goodies for Sunday.

No big plans for Sunday really. We’ll go back to the gravesite in the evening, but during the day we’ll probably both be studying and relaxing. I promised Kuniko that I’d make some guacamole, so we’ll be sure to have bad breath at the gravestone.

It’s the middle of the weekend, and I’ve been so busy running around lately that I’ve not been able to post in the last few days. Thursday I had a short day at work. The highlight was going into the principal’s office and explaining to him that because Kuniko had passed the first stage of the Hyogo teacher’s test, I’ll have to be pulled off interview duty.

He took it really well. He called up the board of education and chatted with them, and we’re all set. Now there is no conflict of interest. I had to look up that phrase in Japanese to explain to the principal – it was a tough one.

That evening we went over to Kuniko’s parent’s house to visit. Her sister was in town, and we had dinner together and caught up with her. We watched TV, I listened very carefully to the conversations to follow what was going on, and we played with the cats quite a bit.

Friday we slept in. I had taken the day off and Kuniko was free, so we could sleep until almost nine. Kuniko made croquettes for lunch with the deep frying pan that we bought recently. They turned out great – she made some potato ones and some pumpkin ones. There was a lot of preparation time, and it was hard work, but in the end they were delicious.

Friday night we went into Kobe to meet up with Antoine and Miwako. Antoine just got back from his sister’s wedding in France, and he had a great time there. He had lots of good stories, and we ate a huge dinner of dim sum and shabu shabu at Asian Days. It was all-you-can-eat and all-you-can-drink, and we got out of there for about $25 each. Nice!

Afterwards we went to the European beer place and had a few to celebrate Friday night and then took some pictures in a nearby purikura booth. Miwako is starting to get more and more comfortable with us – and the more relaxed she is the more fun we have.

Today we had a college friend of Kuniko’s come over for lunch. We had a salad and an udon noodle dish served cold with cabbage and spicy pork. This was my first time meeting Kayo – she seemed just a little shy, but really nice, and even though I struggled with the Japanese I think we did OK.

A huge thunderstorm just blew through here, with the thunder sounding like it was happening directly over our heads. The rain came down hard, and we stayed inside watching the fireworks.

Later on tonight we’re heading to the Kageyama family grave to pay our respects as part of Obon. I’m not sure what to expect, but I’ll go with an open mind and see what it’s like. The thunderstorms have moved on, leaving it hot, wet and sticky.

Kuniko has the rest of this week off from work – I guess they have some kind of construction going on at her school, so they can’t have teachers sitting around doing nothing. Yesterday Kuniko got to sleep in, but today she got up with me, drove me to school, and then came home and slept in. Nice!

I got considerably less studying done than normal because I had some teachers coming to visit and chat with me. First I spent an hour with Ms. Tsutsumi reliving her adventures in Australia. She said that it was a lot of fun, and she had many chances to speak English. I think that people studying English here in Japan can sometimes lose touch with the fact that there is a reason to study English. It’s good to study it, but it’s even better to use it.

Ms. Tsutsumi really enjoyed visiting some of the houses in the country, and she had a chance to try some of the local wines, which she said were delicious. I’m jealous!

She showed me some pictures of downtown Perth, and the city had many large parks along the waterfront, with lots of green mixed in among the buildings. I thought it was a refreshing change from the concrete of Japan, but she said that it was a waste. I asked her to explain a little more, and she said that the people living there didn’t use the parks, so that space was wasted as a green area. She agreed that it was beautiful, but she felt that it would be nicer if it was being used. Interesting.

My other visitor was Mori sensei, who is getting ready to travel to America to discuss education with schools and administrators along the east coast coming up in a few weeks. She’s nervous because of the amount of translation she will be doing, and I’ll be honest here and say that I don’t think she’s the right person for the job. While she does have the conviction to get it done – she’s not shy – she doesn’t have the skill. It’ll be tough for her, but I think the people in America will adjust accordingly and everything will be OK. We spent almost an hour talking about her plans and discussing possible questions that could come up during her time there.

Say what you like about equality and women’s liberation and gender roles – it is really nice to come home to a delicious lunch ready to go. Kuniko had made a vegetable salad with tofu, and we cooked up the leftover takoyaki from last night, and together they made a really good lunch.

At around three o’clock Kuniko logged onto the Hyogo Board of Education website to check on the results from her teacher’s exam that she took a couple of weeks ago. She had an interview in Japanese the first week, and then the next week she took a comprehensive written exam. She checked the results, and it turned out that she passed the first stage! This is a big deal – for the last six years she has taken the exam and hasn’t been able to pass the first stage… it’s really tough.

Now things get really complicated. The final stage is an interview in English with a native speaker of English – and that will be on the 24th of this month. Because she passed the first stage, a whole chain of events is being set into motion. First, we had tentative plans to go to Brunei to attend the wedding of Kuniko’s friend Risa. Since she’ll be studying for the exam, we have to change those plans and miss the wedding. Next, I am scheduled to be one of the aforementioned native speakers of English interviewing prospective teachers. Obviously there is a conflict if I should end up interviewing my wife for the job.

Last year I participated in this, and it’s really an interesting process. Apparently it’s a new format this year. I’m going to talk to my principal tomorrow at school and get in touch with the board of education so that we can sort this out. In all likelihood I’ll be sitting this one out. That’s probably the safest bet for them.

However, I do have some inside information on how it works, at least with last year’s format. Also, I might know some of the board of education people that are hiring, and maybe if they know about Kuniko it might help her cause a little bit. I’m not sure – but I don’t think it can hurt. Anyway, I’ll be working with Kuniko right up until the exam telling her everything I know, and doing practice interviews.

Right now Kuniko is in Osaka drinking with her co-workers from her old school – now she has a lot to celebrate with them. She made up a dish of tofu lasagne for me to eat for dinner. She covered all my meals today, so I’m a very lucky guy. The tofu lasgne was really good – it was pan-fried tofu, tomato sauce, eggplant, tomatoes, and of course lots of cheese on top. Interesting, healthy recipe.

It’s getting startlingly close to Friday – the summer is flying by.

Today I got up to go to work, and I had to convince Kuniko to stay in bed and relax on her day off. I made up my own bento lunch, and then went off to work in the morning heat. I put in another solid study session in at school, avoiding the heat by cowering over my desk through the day.

When it was lunchtime I pulled out my bento, and some teachers that hadn’t seen me eating my own bento lunch got really excited. They asked who made it, and were shocked when I said that I did. I explained that Kuniko had been working all weekend, so the last thing I wanted her to do was get up in the morning to make me a lunch. Tanaka sensei (female) thought it was great, and she complained that her husband would never do that for her. Yamamoto sensei (male) said that was really nice but gave me a look that clearly conveyed that he thought I was a pussy.

Yamada sensei (female) came over and inspected my lunch closely, paying close attention to layout and distribution of the food groups, and finally gave it her grudging stamp of approval. I was surprised with all the attention, but I guess they’ll get used to it.

I left around two in the afternoon, and came home to find Kuniko studying hard. We decided to cook up the octopus that we had received from her parents last night. It was sitting in our freezer, and when we defrosted it we found that we had four little octopi ready to eat.

Once they warmed up we pulled them apart from their frozen embrace and boiled those suckers up. As Kuniko slowly dropped them in the boiling water tentacle first the arms would curl up in different directions. After boiling for a few minutes we took each one out, cooled them off, and then chopped off their arms and cut them into little pieces.

Once all the octopi pieces were in the fridge, we headed over to Carrefour to do some shopping. We got lots of little cheap stuff, and then came back to make dinner. We ended up having takoyaki, and also some octopus sashimi with a thick dark sauce and wasabi. Yum.

Tomorrow night Kuniko is going to a drinking party with her ex-coworkers from her previous school. I’m going to stay home tomorrow and drink some Guinness that we got on sale at Carrefour, and probably work on leftovers for dinner. Not a very wild Wednesday for me…

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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