I was pretty nervous getting ready for today. It is the last day before classes start, and I had to introduce myself to all of the teachers by making a speech in front of them. Traditionally, as you might imagine, this speech is done in Japanese, and despite taking classes and some training in this area, I was a bit apprehensive. A speech in front of a hundred people in any language is difficult.<\/p>\n
On my way up to the meeting, the principal pulled me aside and was curious where Spring Valley was in America. He had my address from my application, and the PO Box I happened to get while in San Diego was in Spring Valley. When he introduced me, he said that I hail from Spring Valley, USA. So weird that a small little town like that gets a mention in Japan by a school principal. I’m sure all the teachers were thinking, “Where the hell is Spring Valley?”<\/p>\n
I got up and did my introduction in English, and the teachers watched carefully – the ones I knew were smiling, but most were just curious. After the introduction in English, the principal announced that I was going to do the same thing in Japanese. The looks that came over everyone’s faces were amazing. It was as if the principal announced that I was getting on board the space shuttle that afternoon and flying to Mars. I hashed up my introduction a bit in Japanese, but got through it OK. There was a big round of applause, and I think I made some new friends in the crowd.<\/p>\n
After school we went back to Akashi to pick up my alien registration card. I’ve had to haul around my passport everywhere I went to prove I am who I am, but now with the card I can leave my big bulky passport at home.<\/p>\n
On the way back Mr. Komuri, one of the Japanese language teachers, invited us to eat at his favorite takoyaki restaurant. I’ve had takoyaki at a couple of places, and it really doesn’t do a lot for me. This was served in a different style, and even though we’re in just the next town, it is supposedly a “regional variation”. You actually dip each piece in a soup broth, with hot chili pepper flakes floating on top. It was really awesome – great flavor and a little easier to eat. <\/p>\n
When I got home, I was so tired that I passed out on the couch and woke up stuck to it about an hour later. After extracting myself, I decided to go out and check out a yakitori restaurant near my place. I ducked into the restaurant and sat at the bar to watch the end of the Hanshin Tigers game. After ordering some beef, chicken and a couple of beers, I attracted the attention of two drunk guys about my age at the end of the bar. We ended up trying to talk in Japanese and then English, and they insisted I looked like Tom Cruise. I told them that Tom Cruise doesn’t walk around with all the weight I’m carrying, but they insisted on buying a drink for me. They wanted me to try what they were drinking, a drink called Shuu-Cho. It was a clear beverage with a slice of lemon in it. I took a drink and it tasted like slightly alcoholic water, not too exciting. They were a bit disappointed to hear my review, but maybe too drunk to take offense. I have a feeling I’ll run into these guys again – the food was great and cheap. For six meat skewers and three beers it only cost me $17.50. <\/p>\n
Tomorrow I’m doing laundry and hanging out around the house. In the evening I’m going to catch a movie, and then on Sunday I’m going to work on some of the props for my school lessons starting next week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I was pretty nervous getting ready for today. It is the last day before classes start, and I had to introduce myself to all of the teachers by making a speech in front of them. Traditionally, as you might imagine, this speech is done in Japanese, and despite taking classes and some training in this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-65","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pOpl7-13","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=65"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=65"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=65"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bryan.fredricks.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=65"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}