When I go into a classroom, especially one that’s not mine, the students are almost always expecting a show. I have a couple of classes with Mr. Hayashi where I just repeat a few lines for pronunciation practice and that’s it. Most of the time I’m running the show, and these kids expect entertainment.

Today I had three classes which I’ve dubbed “Anything Classes”. The teachers have me come in one day a week and I can do anything I want. I was about to say “anything I want within reason” but no such limitations have been placed upon me yet.

Some of the students see it as an opportunity to catch up on their other homework, some sit there captivated, hanging on every word, some fall asleep, and some watch me politely and wonder what the heck I’m saying.

Today Mr. Yamamoto had asked me to do a couple of things that I would consider pretty boring if I were a student there. One was dictation using the new vocabulary words that they have been memorizing. I made four sentences using the vocab and then read them off. The students dutifully tried to copy down what I said. Usually small problems with the difference between my accent and Mr. Yamamoto’s throw them off.

After that the class was all mine, so I had them read an original story that I wrote about learning how to drive and the fate of my first car. They liked the story – they couldn’t believe that you could be behind the wheel at sixteen years old. The age here is eighteen, but it’s prohibitively expensive to get a car and drive right away.

After that, I passed out a word search puzzle using their new vocabulary. As everyone was thinking about how boring this was going to be, I reached under the desk and pulled out a bag of mini-Oreos. That perks the students right up. I told them the rules and said the first one up to the front of the class with everything found would win the sugar.

The students really get into it – the class is almost humming with excitement. You can bet that no Japanese teacher has thrown down a prize during class – I know that it rarely happened to me in my high school days. For about eight minutes all the students are hunched over their papers trying to find all the words. One kid got a nosebleed but didn’t want to go to the nurse because he would miss out on the chance to win. One of my winners came up to the front of the class with shaking hands. This is high stakes stuff here. We’re talking about a bag of Oreos!

My other class was with Mr. Hayashi, and we were doing pronunciation practice. Mr. Hayashi decided to have some fun – he had me try to pronounce some Japanese words. The kids were laughing at my pronunciations – and I think it made them feel a little better. It’s easy to get discouraged, but when we were joking around trying to pronounce “Fukuoka” it was nice for them to see I was human, too.

I also spoke with Mr. Hayashi and got the low-down on Thursday. It’s the first day of mid-term examinations, and in the afternoon we are going to try to play a teacher’s softball game. After school, Mr. Hayashi invited me to a BBQ at his place. He’s going to have a veal tenderloin that he bought directly from his favorite restaurant in Kobe. We’re going to eat that with a cheap Chianti and tell stories in Japanese. It should be good practice for me.

I also managed to negotiate an abbreviated schedule on Friday, Monday and Tuesday. I will be working just a couple of hours each day and then I’ll be free to do whatever I want. Now I just have to think about what to do. None of my friends are on the same schedule, and Kuniko has to work, so whatever it is will have to be local, and solo. Hmmm… what would you do?

There was a big PTA meeting in the afternoon so I snuck out early, and came home to cook up some gyuudon. Mine never comes out like the cafeteria’s, but I’ve decided that it’s because the grade of beef that I use is probably much higher. I’ll just have to enjoy the homemade stuff.

Monday morning, and the weather is still a little wet. I have developed a small hole in the sole of one of my shoes that collects water during the rainy days, and makes obnoxious squeaking noises as I walk. After a couple of days the water dries out and then I can walk without the soundtrack.

I joked around with the teachers from the English department in the aftermath of the big party on Friday. Mr. Yamamoto had just seen me bustled into a black van and didn’t see who I got in with – he jokingly thought I was being kidnapped. I told him that I kind of was, but that I had a great time.

I had three first year classes today, and the students were full of energy. They like the shakeup of going to a new classroom, even if it means they might have to do something goofy in front of the class.

Mr. Hayashi taught me Japanese during the extra afternoon period, so before I knew it it was time to get out of there. On the way home I picked up some groceries and had a big bowl of macaroni and cheese (sent by my folks) with little weiners cut up inside. I had a decent salad alongside, and it was delicious. I also had a XXXX beer – it’s as close as I’m going to get to microbrews around here. It costs me about $2.50 a bottle, so I better enjoy it. It’s still cheaper than buying it at a bar – that’s what I have to keep in mind.

I did an hour of studying kanji, and then I hit the sack. The weather is warm enough that I’m just sleeping under a sheet now. Soon, it’ll be off with the sheet and I’ll be opening my doors and windows. It’s warming up!

Today was dedicated mainly to studying. I studied some new kanji, as well as some new grammar. I actually spent about four hours straight studying – it kept me busy.

In the evening I cracked open the Guinness Bitter and tried it out. It was actually pretty good – unusual, but nice.

While drinking the Guinness, I started up the grill with the new firestarter, and it worked great with almost no smoke. My neighbors will be happy with that development. I grilled up some chicken with the Jamaican rub that Nancy and Lynn had sent me a while back. I also grilled up some pineapple and had some rice with black pepper. The meal was great – just what I needed to wrap up a hard day of studying.

I called Antoine and talked to him for almost an hour – we compared experiences over the last couple of weeks and made plans to try and get together next weekend. I also called Kuniko and chatted with her for a while. She told me all about her dinner – the Japanese version of meat and potatoes. Afterwards I went down to the yakitori, which was packed! I had a couple of beers and some snacks and talked with the master while he tried to keep up with everyone’s order.

Now I’m back home and getting ready for bed. I might put in just a few more minutes of studying, and then I’ll be ready to head back to school tomorrow.

This morning was reasonably slow paced. I spent some time on the phone with my mom and we caught up on things. I made myself a nice breakfast of eggs, tortillas and salsa. The weather was pretty nice – with some high clouds and no rain.

Around lunchtime I walked over to Carrefour, and picked up some luxury items. They have a big machine that cuts up a fresh pineapple and leaves all the good stuff for you to buy in a bag for 400 yen. I picked up one to try – the one I got at Costco was a lot of work to cut up, but it tasted great.

I also picked up a selection of beers – Guinness Bitter, a beer that I first saw in Scotland at a grocery store there back in August 2000. It’s taken this long for me to find it again. I haven’t tasted it yet, but I’ll post a review when I do.

I got two other beers, a bottle of El Sol from Mexico, and a bottle of XXXX from Australia.

Besides beer and pineapple I got some firestarter cubes to try with my BBQ in an attempt to keep the smoke to a minimum. I also got some chicken breasts for dinner on Sunday night.

After I got back I sat down to study, but ended up giving up and taking a nap. I ended up waking around five o’clock. Twenty minutes later Kuniko called – she and some of her friends were heading my way and wanted to see if would join them for a movie.

I got organized and ran outside just as rain was starting fall. Kuniko picked me up, and behind her car was a car with her friends – a teacher from her old school and an ALT friend from Himeji that I’ve heard a lot about… Yuri.

Yuri is a Japanese American who learned Japanese as her first language. She looks Japanese, she talks Japanese, but she also speaks fluent English having been raised in Los Angeles. She has signed up for a second year on the JET program, but it sounds like she’s already getting tired of it. She’s looking to settle down somewhere.

We went to Kakogawa and saw “Big Fish”, which was a strange but pleasant experience. I enjoyed some of the visuals and the jokes – but nobody else in the theater was laughing. Maybe it was a tough translation.

After the movie Kuniko drove Yuri home to Himeji, and dropped her off there. By then it was pouring rain, and so our goodbyes were very brief. It was good to finally meet her – for a long time she was the “other ALT” that Kuniko taught with, and it was interesting to hear about her experiences through Kuniko.

Kuniko drove me back to my place, and even though it was getting late I talked her into coming up for some fresh pineapple. I had the benefit of a nap so I wasn’t so tired, but Kuniko was exhausted. The pineapple was a nice treat to cap off a relaxing day.

The weather was beautiful today, and I found myself spending a lot of time gazing out the window wishing I was climbing hills or traveling the countryside. My classes weren’t too tough, and I had a new lesson for the first years that went really well. It is a lot more about fun and games since they are studying for their midterms that are coming up soon.

During one class we were doing a drawing exercise, and one student drew me. He was actually a pretty good artist – he captured my slightly crossed eyes and five o’clock shadow perfectly. He also drew a picture of a samurai running someone through with a sword, with lots of blood. It’s an interesting contrast.

After school I lounged around the teacher’s office, helping Mr. Hayashi with some English projects that he is working on. Finally around five o’clock Mr. Kimura, Mr. Hayashi and I jumped into Mr. Hayashi’s car and took off. We had one of the new teachers, Ms. Mori, following us to park her car at Mr. Hayashi’s house. From his house we just walked over to the restaurant.

Ms. Mori has a silver Mazda (called Matsuda here in Japan) Miata. It’s a two seat sports car and it’s pretty cool. We were walking to the restaurant and I mentioned to Ms. Mori that I liked her car. She smiled and said, “Just the car? How about the driver?”.

Huh?

While I stammered and struggled to recover my composure, Mr. Hayashi chimed in and said that it’s a two seat so there’s room for one more person in there. They laughed together and Ms. Mori just kind of kept walking and didn’t say anything else.

What a weird situation. I’m not sure if there was something planned there, or complementing someone’s car is more serious in Japan than it is back home… I was a bit flustered. I have enough problems at school with Ms. Shigata – I don’t need to be chased around by someone else.

Little did I know that this wasn’t the only trick up Mr. Hayashi’s sleeve that night We got to the restaurant, the same one that I visited on my birthday. The menu was basically the same, and again it was all you can drink for 90 minutes, which was very nice. I had three big beers and three glasses of red wine with my meal. I sat next to the vice-principal for a bit, who didn’t drink much but did enjoy speaking English with me. Ms. Mori sat across from me and talked to me a bit more during the evening but didn’t bring up anything else dramatic.

Mr. Hayashi pulled me aside and told me that he is planning a BBQ during the midterm examination period. He wanted to know if I thought one of the new office workers was particularly attractive. I knew where this was going, but I was stuck. I tried the most neutral answer I could think of – “She seems like a nice person”. Mr. Hayashi said that he will invite her to the BBQ – he seems determined to get me involved with somebody, and lately his efforts have stepped up.

Finally around nice o’clock we all staggered out onto the street in Kakogawa. One of our school’s third year students was unlucky enough to be outside on her bike, and so all the teachers enjoyed the chance to chat with her while buzzing. I talked with her mom in Japanese and managed to fake my way through half the conversation.

Mr. Kimura had said that he was going to take the train home and walk back with me – we would get off at the same station. By the time everyone was finished talking with the student, he was gone. I was saying “Where’s Mr. Komuri?”, accidentally switching his name for Mr. Kimura’s. This all you can drink stuff is pretty hardcore.

Mr. Maeda wanted to give me a ride to the station – he had been drinking but his wife was waiting to pick him up. At first I said that I would take the train and not to worry, but he insisted, and dragged me over to the car. I jumped in the car and met his wife and three children, and the look of shock on their faces when I hopped in was just perfect.

His wife had a big smile and a great sense of humor, and took the whole thing in stride. I introduced myself, and the kids all sat there with their mouths wide open. They insisted on driving me home, but when we got close they said they wanted to go to a family restaurant near my place. One cool thing about their van was that when they were backing up the GPS screen turned into a video showing what was behind the car as it backed up. The outline of the van was laid over the top of the video, so she just backed up looking at the screen and didn’t even look over her shoulder. Wow.

We all went inside and ordered some snacks and drinks. I had a non-alcoholic beer, and we sat and chatted. The kids were very shy. The son hid behind his menu, and when his mom took the menu away, he sat there with his eyes closed and a big grin on his face.

After about half an hour, they insisted on driving me to my doorstep, even though it was just a short walk. They were both genuinely happy to have been able to spend time with me outside of school. Being a foreigner in Japan gives you the chance to make a lot of people very happy – they want to meet new people and whenever you spend time with someone, they will probably remember it for a long time afterwards.

Well, it’s been as wet as I’ve seen it in Japan and everyone says that it’s still a month before the rainy season starts. The strange thing about the weather lately is that one day it will be rainy and the next day full sunshine. It makes it a little harder to plan weekends.

Today was my easiest day of the week – Thursday. I have just three classes, and they are the first three periods, so I’m done by 11:30. I locked myself in my classroom after lunch and got in about two hours of studying. Afterwards I read Doraemon at my desk until the staff meeting.

All this studying seems to give me a little more insight into what people are saying around me. Now I am able to get the vague gist of a conversation, whereas before I might only catch a word or two every couple of minutes.

After school I came home and made up a big plate of nachos – I realized that I had all the fixin’s just laying around – so it came out to be a great meal. Spicy!

This evening I’m just doing a little more kanji studying, and cleaning up the house a bit. There’s a chance that Kuniko might be able to visit at some point this weekend, so I wanted to do a little caretaking around here.

Tomorrow is the teacher’s enkai after school. It should be interesting – a lot of the teachers are still a little uncomfortable with each other, and the new teachers are definitely uncomfortable with me. Then they will have to meet the old teachers… a lot of social variables in play tomorrow.

Today was a pretty warm day – the weather has been alternating between sun and rain, but it’s always warm.

I had only one class in the morning, and two in the afternoon. The classes were pretty uneventful – one student turned in her homework on a paper folded into the shape of a heart. Inside she did a pretty good job on her assignment, and even said that she loved me. Yikes.

I’ve heard rumblings about a staff softball game, which is supposed to take place during midterms next week. I think I’ve been drafted by some team – but I’m not sure. That’s how communication sometimes works around here. I catch words and phrases in Japanese, or somebody asks me a vague question in English. My prediction is that I’ll be on the softball field next week swinging away.

Back home I was still up for grilling – I fired up the grill out on the porch. The grill smokes quite a bit early on, but eventually it gets going. I’d like to find a way to cut down on the smoke – I’m sure it makes the neighbors nervous.

As for the food – I grilled shrimp on skewers, and then soaked thin-sliced pork in some sweet ginger soy sauce and grilled those. I had all of that with a big green salad and a tall glass of cold water. Oh, yeah.

The downside of the grill is that once it gets going it still has plenty of power to cook more – I feel like I’m wasting valuable energy by throwing my stuff on for fifteen minutes and then I’m done.

In the evening I spent some time studying kanji, and then called up Kuniko and chatted for a while. She sounded a little down – I think she’s pretty tired. There’s an outside chance that she’ll be able to come visit me this weekend. I’ve got a English staff party on Friday night. Mr. Hayashi had invited her to come to a second party afterwards at Amuse in Kakogawa, but she said that she probably couldn’t make it. Maybe it’s better for her just to stick close to home and rest up – we’ll just have to wait and see how she feels.

I’m off to bed – I’m reading Doraemon comics in English and Japanese.

I’ve emerged from a self-imposed media blackout until I was able to see the final episode of Survivor. For two days I carefully avoided looking at any websites that might give away the winner. Tonight I just finished watching, so now that I know I can surf the web without a problem. It was a good season – lots of spicy stuff with hurt feelings and emotions – the kind of stuff I enjoy as personal entertainment.

Today was another four class day. I was busy all day long, but it made the time fly by.

After going thirty two years without a complete stranger slapping my rear end it happened twice today. Having never played in team sports where ass-slapping is more common, it was a strange experience. As I walked to one of my classes with my CD player in one hand and handouts in the other some of the baseball team guys came by and wanted to give me their customary high five. Since I had my hands full they gave me the low five equivalent.

Two classes later one of the girl students was running past me on the way to her class and she gave me a slap on the butt as she went by. I said “watch it!” in English, so hopefully she’ll get the gist of the message. The last thing I want is to be the whipping boy for five hundred Japanese schoolgirls. That’s the kind of fate you read about in spam e-mails.

A while back I had two of my classes listen to Radiohead, and nobody got too excited at the time. As I was talking with Mr. Yamamoto in the hallway, one of the students came up and asked him if he could ask me to bring the CD in for her to listen to. I was happy to turn someone on to Radiohead.

One of the part time teachers today stopped by to encourage me while I was studying Japanese. I had spoken to her a week or so ago to break the ice. She was more comfortable walking over to talk with me, so hopefully we can talk more. The good news for me is that she knows almost no English, so it forces me to use my Japanese in a professional setting.

My leftover grilled beef made an excellent BBQ Beef sandwich for lunch today. Some of the new teachers watched with envy as I bit into this dagwood of a sandwich. I felt like I was in some kind of carnivorous Wendy’s dreamland. This was a great sandwich.

After school I went straight home and cooked a relatively mild dinner of beef curry and rice. Gradually the temperature has been getting warmer. The good news is that my apartment opens up on both sides, so I can get the breeze coming off the inland sea as it cuts right through my building. Soon it will be too hot even for that, but for now I can sit and type on the computer as a cool breeze comes through.

I’ve caught up with my posts – whew! Blogger, the company that runs the software that I use to update my site, has some new features. One of the new features is the ability for you to add comments to the site.

To add comments, there should be a link at the bottom of each entry. Click on the link, and it’ll take you to a place where you can add comments to an entry. I’m still fooling around with it, but I thought I’d let you know that it’s there.

The rain was coming down hard all last night, and so I was ready for a wet one. I put on all my gear, grabbed the extra large umbrella, and went outside in the downpour. Once I got out there it wasn’t so bad. The downside of the large umbrella is that it catches the wind easily, so I have to be more careful about holding on to it.

I had four classes today. My first class started but no Japanese teacher showed up. The class and I waited around for about five minutes, but it seemed liked nobody was going to come. I had no idea who was supposed to be there, and I didn’t want to leave the class there while I chased all over the place looking for the teacher. I made a judgement call and taught the class alone.

Some of the exercises had to be adapted because I had designed them with two teachers in mind, but really it worked out just fine. The students did pretty well – I think they were amused to see me working without a net. It was a first year class, so they haven’t been around long enough to know how abnormal the situation was. I handled things in English throughout the class, and switched to Japanese when students got confused.

After class I found out that Mr. Kimura was supposed to be there. He was pretty embarrassed that he forgot, so I think I’ve got a free beer coming from him one of these days.

Mr. Hayashi finally booked my flight back to the USA today. I fly from Osaka to San Francisco on July 16th, with a couple of hours stopover in Seoul. I get to spend about two weeks in California, and then I get back on the plane on August 2nd and fly back to Korea. I have to spend a night in Korea, which saves me some money but also costs me some money in hotel bills. I think it’s some kind of kickback system by the travel agencies, but that’s fine. It’ll give me a chance to eat some more spicy food before I get back to Osaka.

After school I met up with one of my ESS students, Harada-san. She normally takes her bike, but the rain was so heavy that she took the train today. I rode the same train back, and she sat next to me and we chatted in English only the whole time. I noticed that we were getting lots of dirty looks from other passengers. I have a feeling talking with students on the train and maybe sitting next to them is a bad idea. I’m not sure, but I took my cue from Harada-san and enjoyed the chat. A while back she asked me only to speak to her in English so that she is forced to learn, so our conversation was slow but pretty wide-ranging.

Back home I organized a couple of loads of laundry and decided to fire up my new grill. It’s just a ceramic bucket with a grill on top and a little air duct on the bottom. I tried to get the fire going, but it was pretty smoky, and there wasn’t much heat. Luckily I had a backup plan, and had a pan ready to fry up the meat if the BBQ didn’t work out.

While I was waiting for the rice to finish cooking, I peeked out the window at the barbecue, and while I was in working on other things, the charcoal had turned red, and that sucker was putting out some heat. I threw some more charcoal on the coals, and in five minutes I was grilling my meat.

The meat is really thinly sliced here, so it cooked fast and I was in business. I grilled up beef and also pork. I had marinated the beef, and the pork went on just with a dusting of black pepper and some spicy stuff my folks had sent me a couple of days ago.

The meat tasted great, and my whole back porch smelled like roasted meat. The lady next door came out of the balcony to see what was smelling good, and I gave her a big wave and a grin. She was probably getting a big cloud of smoke blowing into her place when I was trying to get the thing started – I’m lucky she didn’t call the fire department on me.

We slept in a bit today and then had a quick breakfast of granola, orange juice, and yogurt.

As Kuniko and I walked towards the Shin-Osaka station we noticed that there were a lot of students on a school trip walking through the area. The students stared at me, and some of them giggled and gestured. The station is a central hub for travel because it has the Shinkansen bullet train line. It might have been the first time for the students to visit a big city, and maybe the first time to see a foreigner in person.

Sometimes I take for granted what a great situation I’m in – I’m centrally located and it’s easy to get to a big city when I want to. There are a lot of very isolated parts of Japan, either on islands or so far away from train stations that it’s a big deal to go to the city. Seeing the student’s eyes go big when they saw me was a good reminder for me that I’ve got it pretty good. I wonder how I would feel about the JET program if I had to make a four hour trip to get to a supermarket.

Kuniko had to catch a train to go to work, so she gave me her apartment key and I went another direction towards Osaka castle. Himeji castle is the big castle to see in Japan – it’s the original castle, so you walk through an authentic atmosphere all the way to the top.

Osaka castle on the other hand is a rebuilt replica. It’s still cool, and there’s some great exhibits inside, but still there’s something strange about taking an elevator to the top.

I took the Osaka loop line from Osaka station, and I was there within ten minutes. I was surprised that it was so close. The grounds and park surrounding the castle were huge, and the moat was surprisingly far away from the castle itself. I walked around the park and enjoyed the scenery, and even grabbed a snack at one of the booths around the castle. The guy was nice enough to give me tea as well.

A couple of students came up to me and asked me to answer some questions for a survey. They did the whole thing in English from some notes that they had. I took the survey and answered their questions. I noticed that the title of their survey was “Osaka Castle Gaijin Survey”.

There were a lot of foreigners around the castle touring, so I imagine they weren’t having a tough time with digging up people for the survey.

I enjoyed the view from the top of the castle, and took my time walking through the castle. The exhibits were nice – the suits of armor were first rate, and it was scary to see them there empty. One thing I never knew was that they had face plates that had scary expressions on them to scare their enemies. It was spooky to see the face plates grimacing at you even though there was no face behind it.

Continuing to explore I crossed the moat and went through a business commercial district. There was a shopping center where I found some interesting things – there was a restaurant for dogs, and a store that had Irish pint glasses. Oh yeah.

Finally I wrapped up my trip and went back to Kuniko’s apartment. I bought some salami and pepperjack cheese (expensive!) and stuck them in her refrigerator for her to find later, and then I sat back and watched the Hanshin Tigers game for about half an hour.

Kuniko got home soon thereafter, and then we went out for dinner. We both had a sushi craving, so we sat down for some excellent onigiri sushi. Kuniko and I ordered our favorites, and we just ate and talked, catching up on each other’s day.

We stopped in at Starbucks on the way back home and saw lots of foreigners there too. None of them seemed to friendly. I think it’s a very normal thing for foreigners to get used to being special and the only one around, so when they see someone that impinges on their uniqueness, maybe they aren’t so happy about it. For my part I just smile and nod.

I headed back home to Futami around 8 p.m., ready to go to work the next day. It was interesting to come into my home and see things all laid out from Saturday night – I dropped everything and ran out the door, and so things were all ready for me to crawl right into bed and hit the sack.

Saturday morning, and I was up at six in the morning and out the door. I haven’t done a decent hike in a long time, so I was eager to do something a little ambitious. I took the train to Kobe, and walked from the station up Rokko mountain.

The day was beautiful – maybe the best weather I’ve ever hiked in. The visibility wasn’t great from the top of the mountain, but it felt great to be outside walking around without a worry in the world.

I continued on past Rokko mountain and went up and down several more mountains on the ridgeline until I finally got to Maya mountain. Maya was where I crapped out during the 50k hike a while back. It was nice at the top, and I snacked on some onigiri that I had brought along.

After enjoying a nap at the top I headed down the ropeway and cable car combination, and then took a bus ride back to Sannomiya station. I took a few minutes to check for American maple syrup at the import food store, but I struck out – just Canadian maple syrup. Not so good – I like the buttery taste of American maple syrup.

Finally I headed back home, and went right to sleep – a sweaty mess. I woke up and decided to run over to the yakitori for dinner. The master was pretty lonely – his wife had commandeered the television to watch volleyball. He was dying to watch baseball, so when I came in he had an excuse to turn the channel – they both know that I enjoy watching baseball when I’m there.

I ordered up kimchee fried rice – one of the usual things I order. We have a sadistic stand-off going with the kimchee fried rice. I said that I like it spicy, so each time I order it they add a bit more spice to see when I flinch and say that it’s too much. This time was pretty close. I was sweating big time as I ate it, but it was delicious so I didn’t say “uncle”. Maybe one more time and then it’ll be too hot to handle.

The master is trying to get Hanshin Tigers tickets. He invited me to come along if he scores the tickets. I’m hoping he gets them – I still haven’t been to a game.

I headed home, and then started studying Japanese while listening to AC/DC. Kuniko called a little while later – she has to work both days of the weekend. I think she’s a little frustrated with the long hours they require at her new school. She’s a trouper, though – she works them and she doesn’t complain.

We talked about her schedule over the weekend and during next week, and it sounded more and more like we wouldn’t be able to get together for a long time. I misunderstood her at first and thought she wanted me to go over there this evening, and then the more we thought about it the more it made sense. I threw some clothes into my backpack and ran out the door, and then took the train ride to Osaka and was at her place by 11:00 p.m.

I’ve tried to do more spontaneous things like this lately, even though my brain’s natural reflex is to stay in a comfortable place. Every time I do something like this, it ends up turning out great, and this time was no exception.

Today was a pretty busy day at school. I got a good chance to spend some time with Miyake sensei, a part time teacher that has been studying English very hard. We set up some time to just sit and chat. It’s good practice for her, and I enjoy it as well. She has a good sense of humor and is a quick learner.

One of my classes that I have with Mr. Hayashi normally was all mine today. Mr. Hayashi was going to Kobe for some kind of meeting, so I taught the class on my own. It sounds impressive, but really all I did was give out some handouts, administer a test, and shoot the breeze with the students in Japanese and English.

At the end of school we had an assembly, so I snuck up behind Mr. Komuri and asked him if he was up for playing darts at Donkey that night. He gave out a startled giggle, and about a hundred students turned around to look at us. After calming down, he did say that he was interested, and he called around looking for some folks to go with us. We found a taker in Miss Yamamoto, one of the teachers that was transferred last term.

After school I came home and received a shipment from my last Costco excursion. Right after the delivery guy left, I caught the train to Akashi and walked over to Donkey. As I walked in the place was pretty empty. The master and his wife were there, and they recognized me from last time. A younger lady was there working, but she was also drinking a Corona. I wasn’t sure about her situation but she seemed interested in mine. Once I mentioned that I was waiting for Mr. Komuri, everyone got a smile on their face. He’s such a cheerful guy – he has that effect on a lot of people.

Mr. Komuri and Miss Yamamoto showed up and we ordered drinks. Mr. Komuri also asked for some food, and said that anything is OK. That gave the master a chance to serve us some strange things. I had some tiny squid – not cut up – just little babies. They had some mustard over the top, and they were actually pretty good. We also had some sashimi that was great and some tamago-yaki.

The younger girl served us the food and drinks, and then started practicing darts. She kept looking over at me to see if I’d step up and give her pointers or something. I tried to pay more attention to Mr. Komuri and Miss Yamamoto. After our snack we stepped up to play some darts. I explained a very simple version of baseball, and so we tried it out. Mr. Komuri did OK, about the same as last time. Miss Yamamoto was having some trouble but I could tell she was having a good time. I was throwing really well – kind of impressing myself. The master’s wife came out and played a game with us, and she was not too bad.

The master came and watched, and then joined in on a game. He pulled out one of those dart “holsters” that usually means he’s a serious player. He owns the board, so I was sure that he was good. I beat him by seven runs at the end – and he started pushing for me to join the Donkey team. I just smiled and said I’d think about it. I’m not that serious of a player, and it’s more fun to just play with friends.

After a few rounds of drinks we went out for okonomiyaki, and had some new flavors. One was really good – a thin pancake with pork strips across the top and a fried egg on top. It was really good with the sauce and the onions on top – wow! We closed down the okonomiyaki place and headed back home. In the station I said goodbye to everyone, but suddenly Struan came walking by out of nowhere. He was heading over to Murphy’s, so we went over together.

I haven’t been to Murphy’s in a long time. The place was just the same, dark and crowded. There weren’t many foreigners besides us, but Melanie came in with a couple of friends so that made it a bigger crowd. The beer prices went up – 850 yen for a 12 oz. glass, not even a real pint. I had one, and then I bowed out, having consumed plenty already in the other two restaurants I’d visited.

It was a fun night, and next Friday we are having an English teacher’s welcome/goodbye enkai. I’ll get to see Miss Yamamoto again, which will be fun. Now I’m off to bed!

The weather today was beautiful – not a cloud in the sky. The temperature was nice and warm, so no jacket required! I walked to work loaded down with gear for class and leftover sushi for my lunch.

All three of my classes today were during the first, second, and third periods. The nice thing about that was that I was done by 11:30 in the morning. I sat down and ate some sushi, and then spent the rest of the afternoon prepping my next lessons. Mr. Hayashi came by and dropped 15,000 yen in my lap the help that I gave him on the technical translations. It was a lot of money for not a lot of work. We said he’d buy me lunch sometime, too. Nice!

Mr. Hayashi has also agreed to tutor me in Japanese. I’m hoping to take the Japanese language proficiency test that is administered yearly. I’m shooting for Level 3. Level 4 is the lowest and Level 1 is the highest. The gap between Level 3 and Level 2 is huge and I don’t think I can get there by the end of the year. Mr. Hayashi bought a textbook for me to study, and the whole thing, including the instructions, are in Japanese. I spent some time today reading through it, and it was hard work. My first class is tomorrow, and we’re going to try the new book. I hope it works well.

ESS club met after school, and some of the more genki students got there early and they were eager to get started. I chatted with them in English and we looked through some magazines that my parents sent over from home. They really liked the pictures of California and the west coast. We talked about our upcoming cultural project, and what we will need to build a big display. One of the long lost ESS students even dropped by, and I think that she was surprised to see the turnout. No sign of the boy ESS student, so I’m not sure what his story is.

I had leftover Mexican food for dinner tonight, and sent off some e-mails. I’m thinking about going hiking this weekend – tomorrow is already Friday, so I need to start making plans!

Antoine and I met up in Kobe today, and enjoyed some sunny weather. The crowds were out sightseeing, and so we stood around in from the movie theater where we usually meet and just watched people walk by. We caught up a little bit, and then decided to jump on the train to Amagasaki and hit Costco.

As we got out of the station I was looking for a taxi, and instead there was a bus there with the Carrefour logo. Carrefour is right next to Costco, so we jumped in and got a ride for free. We just stepped out of the bus and walked next door instead. Probably a little uncouth, but I’ve spent enough money at Carrefour to feel no guilt whatsoever.

This was the second time I had been to Costco, and so I knew a little more about what to expect. First we ate some giant pizza at the snack bar in the front of the store (seafood pizza? no thanks) and then we grabbed a cart and walked the aisles. I discovered a couple of things that I didn’t see last time, like Rosarita refried beans, and French’s yellow mustard. Antoine was pretty happy with what he was finding – some shaving supplies, DVD-R’s, and various snack foods. He fell under the Costco curse and spent around $130. I spent only $30, so I felt like I had accomplished something.

Antoine carried his stuff off with him, and I shipped mine home, since I had a large box of charcoal that I didn’t want to deal with on the train. To get back the Carrefour bus was nowhere in sight, and since we didn’t have any Carrefour groceries it would have been a little awkward anyway. We saw some foreigners from Costco getting on a bus that looked like it’s ultimate destination was the train station. It was 500 yen a person, but I did some quick math and figured it was cheaper to take a taxi. We walked over to the side of Carrefour and waited about 10 seconds for a cab to come by. It 730 yen to take the cab straight there, so we saved on the bus and we got there quicker.

I got home around 3:30 and I started slicing things up for a sushi dinner. I had planned on cooking my own eggs for the inside of the sushi rolls, but I had found a slab of precooked eggs at the store for only 100 yen. I was a little worried at the store because the kanji on the package didn’t say “egg” – only on the back in small type. When I cut it open I found out why – there were fish cooked into the egg slab. Yikes! So, I cooked my own eggs.

Tomorrow it’s back to school – a two day week for me. It’s been so long since I’ve been there that I forget how many classes I have and what ones they are. I may have to show up and do some scrambling!