Saturday, May 13, 2006
Let's saving the environment!
Oooo, hopefully this helps Japan wean itself from the damn wasteful waribashi.
Thursday, May 11, 2006
Mexico! Part Tres
Last entry about Mexico! So, Friday morning, Eduardo and I got up and were a wee bit hungover…I felt bad for Ana and Luis Felipe, as they had to get up early and go to work! Ewww, not fun! We were hungover and we slept in! Anyway, we got some amazing Mexican pastries and headed to downtown Mexico City for tourist-y things. The downtown was so much more historic and beautiful than I expected. I LOVED the buildings. We wandered around a bit (with plenty of Gatorade to make up for the drinks the night before…man, I miss real Western Gatorade, rather than the shitty Gatorade here), then ended up at the third largest public square in the world? Or something. It was huge! It looked like we were in Russia. They had an enormous church there that was very pretty, but the foundation of all of that area is all screwed up because it used to be a river or something…..so all of the buildings are like sinking in. Anyway, that means all of the buildings are a bit crooked, and it messed with my head whenever we went inside anywhere. It felt like I had vertigo or something! After the church, we went inside…um…a diplomatic big building thing. I think it might have been the president’s house back when they were all dictators. I think. Eduardo will have to help me on that one! It was huge and really interesting…it made me feel patriotic and I’m not even Mexican! I loved loved loved the murals on the walls by Diego Rivera (it is where Diego was painting in the Frida movie). They were beautiful, and showed the history of Mexico. We explored in there for a while, then walked around downtown some more. We ended up at the BIGGEST bakery I have ever seen in my life. It was seriously my definition of heaven….pastries as far as you could see, and they just kept wheeling out more fresh ones! I wanted to take pictures, but was sadly too embarrassed. I think I want to live there!!!!
After being in heaven, we next went to hell….an unairconditioned subway for a half hour on a very very hot day. Not very fun! We went to the part of the city that Frida lived in, which felt completely different from the other areas we had gone to. It was very hippie-ish and didn’t feel like it we were in the city at all. It was really pretty, though, and a nice area. We had lunch there, then wandered around the markets and stuff. The area had a really cool vibe.
We returned to Eduardo’s exhausted, watched some Sex and the City, then showered (much needed after a hot day in Mexico, eww) and went out for a gay night on the town! First we went to Lipstick, a very pretentious gay bar where everyone looks the same and thinks they’re the shit. Aww, how I miss the gay community! I FINALLY had the Red Bull vodka that I have been craving for 11 months, and it was fucking $15!!! WTF! Beers were only three bucks, tho. We danced there for a while until the music started sucking quite a lot of ass, and we decided to have dinner at 1 am. Mmmm, tacooooooooooooooooooooos.
We next went to what Eduardo calls “the trashy gay bar,” which was even trashier than I expected. Um, they had a Beegees music video on when we went in. Since when did they even have music videos back then?! It was awful and there were like five people in the bar, so we didn’t last very long there. On that wonderful note, our night came to an end! Hehe.
Saturday was like the busiest day EVER EVER EVER. We got up far too early for going to bed at 4:30, went to Costco (aww, I miss me some Costco), had brunch with Ana and Luis Felipe, then did a few shopping errands I had to do before leaving. We then went to Eduardo’s aunt’s house for dinner/his cousin Julia’s birthday party. His aunt made tamales and they were SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO good. They were also in the hugest pot I have ever seen in my entire life. There had to have been hundreds of tamales in there, and I am not exaggerating. God, they were so good.
We stayed there for a long time, and it was fun…then we went to Ana and Luis Felipe’s to say goodbye. We thought we would only be there for like a half hour, then go back to Eduardo’s to pack and relax…we didn’t know that they had made us ANOTHER huge dinner! Holy shit! I had had six tamales, plus two desserts and was sooooo full….but I didn’t want to be rude, so I somehow had yet another dinner AND a dessert. Who knows how that worked. It was really fucking good, tho. We got back really late, I packed while we watched 40 Year-Old Virgin, then got two hours of sleep before we headed to the airport at 4:30 in the morning (fun!).
We had my last mango of the trip at the airport (sad!!!!), wandered around a bit, then said goodbye (MUCH MORE SAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!). That was not fun at all :( :( :(
I then traveled home for 25 fucking hours, where I landed in the “why is it cold in May?” country of stupid Japan and returned to my stupid lonely apartment! Hee hee, I am not bitter.
Anyway, it was an incredible trip. Before going, I had only thought about seeing Eduardo, and didn’t really think about actually going to Mexico….I was very pleasantly surprised at how much I loved the country. It is so beautiful and has really interesting history, architecture, etc. Also, everyone was so nice! Well, Eduardo’s friends/family, not bitchy people on the street, hee hee. Plus they have good-ass food, of course. So yes, it was a GREAT trip, and I want to go back right now. AND I GOT TO SEE MY BOYO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Anyway, yep, that’s my trip! I am really behind on posting pictures, but I hope to do that in the next week (yes, I always say that, but I actually plan on it this time).
After being in heaven, we next went to hell….an unairconditioned subway for a half hour on a very very hot day. Not very fun! We went to the part of the city that Frida lived in, which felt completely different from the other areas we had gone to. It was very hippie-ish and didn’t feel like it we were in the city at all. It was really pretty, though, and a nice area. We had lunch there, then wandered around the markets and stuff. The area had a really cool vibe.
We returned to Eduardo’s exhausted, watched some Sex and the City, then showered (much needed after a hot day in Mexico, eww) and went out for a gay night on the town! First we went to Lipstick, a very pretentious gay bar where everyone looks the same and thinks they’re the shit. Aww, how I miss the gay community! I FINALLY had the Red Bull vodka that I have been craving for 11 months, and it was fucking $15!!! WTF! Beers were only three bucks, tho. We danced there for a while until the music started sucking quite a lot of ass, and we decided to have dinner at 1 am. Mmmm, tacooooooooooooooooooooos.
We next went to what Eduardo calls “the trashy gay bar,” which was even trashier than I expected. Um, they had a Beegees music video on when we went in. Since when did they even have music videos back then?! It was awful and there were like five people in the bar, so we didn’t last very long there. On that wonderful note, our night came to an end! Hehe.
Saturday was like the busiest day EVER EVER EVER. We got up far too early for going to bed at 4:30, went to Costco (aww, I miss me some Costco), had brunch with Ana and Luis Felipe, then did a few shopping errands I had to do before leaving. We then went to Eduardo’s aunt’s house for dinner/his cousin Julia’s birthday party. His aunt made tamales and they were SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO good. They were also in the hugest pot I have ever seen in my entire life. There had to have been hundreds of tamales in there, and I am not exaggerating. God, they were so good.
We stayed there for a long time, and it was fun…then we went to Ana and Luis Felipe’s to say goodbye. We thought we would only be there for like a half hour, then go back to Eduardo’s to pack and relax…we didn’t know that they had made us ANOTHER huge dinner! Holy shit! I had had six tamales, plus two desserts and was sooooo full….but I didn’t want to be rude, so I somehow had yet another dinner AND a dessert. Who knows how that worked. It was really fucking good, tho. We got back really late, I packed while we watched 40 Year-Old Virgin, then got two hours of sleep before we headed to the airport at 4:30 in the morning (fun!).
We had my last mango of the trip at the airport (sad!!!!), wandered around a bit, then said goodbye (MUCH MORE SAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!). That was not fun at all :( :( :(
I then traveled home for 25 fucking hours, where I landed in the “why is it cold in May?” country of stupid Japan and returned to my stupid lonely apartment! Hee hee, I am not bitter.
Anyway, it was an incredible trip. Before going, I had only thought about seeing Eduardo, and didn’t really think about actually going to Mexico….I was very pleasantly surprised at how much I loved the country. It is so beautiful and has really interesting history, architecture, etc. Also, everyone was so nice! Well, Eduardo’s friends/family, not bitchy people on the street, hee hee. Plus they have good-ass food, of course. So yes, it was a GREAT trip, and I want to go back right now. AND I GOT TO SEE MY BOYO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Anyway, yep, that’s my trip! I am really behind on posting pictures, but I hope to do that in the next week (yes, I always say that, but I actually plan on it this time).
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
Mexico! Part Dos (Hotcakes!)
This blog title is a shout-out to Holly and the fine folks at Denny’s. Hollah!
Anyway, back to too many details about my Mexico trip! Tuesday morning, Eduardo and I woke up early and went into downtown Guanajuato, which was AMAZINGLY beautiful. The town was home to Spaniards in the 1500s, and was an important part of the revolution/independence, as Mexicans fought the Spaniards there and took back the town. Anyway, because of its history, its architecture made us feel like we were in Europe. The buildings were colorful and beautiful, and there were tons of small plazas where the locals would just hang out. I will post a million pictures of it eventually.
We got a yummy cheap-ass breakfast, then started walking for hours and hours and hours. We got a ton of exercise while we were there (and throughout the whole trip in general). There is a viewpoint on top of a hill in which you can see the whole town, so we hiked up there, among other places. We found a DELICIOUS street vendor-ish place (Not a real street vendor, but not a real restaurant, either. Fuck, I love street vendors) for lunch, where we ate like 300 meals’ worth of food. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm. We relaxed a bit for the afternoon, then went back to where we had breakfast, as they had CHEAP-ASS BEER! We got a 1 liter beer with salt, lime, Worcestershire sauce (sp?) and chili mixed in for $3.50 each! These were incredibly classy beers, as they came in huge styrofoam cups with straws punched through the lid! It looked like some sort of secretive Big Gulp or something. Eduardo is apparently an alcoholic, as he sucked his liter of beer down in like three seconds. I have become Japanese, as I couldn’t drink all of it because I wanted izakaya-type snacks with it. Hello, you can’t drink beer by itself! So, Eduardo was a lush and helped me out with mine :)
That night we had a semi-romantic meal at a restaurant near the plaza. It was meant to be more romantic, but there was blaring Mexican music coming from bands in the public gazebo, and a soccer game that all of the dumb straight people were freaking out about. But it was still fun….tho we ate wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy too much and kind of wanted to vomit. Hmm, maybe not so romantic, now that I think about it ;)
We walked our meal off around town that night, then went to bed. On Wednesday morning we got some pastries for breakfast (MMMMMM, Mexican pastries are the most amazing things in the world), then wandered around town some more. I bought omiyage for my damn teachers (stupid, stupid custom!) and…I dunno what else we did. We got an amazing fruit bowl from a street vendor. It was my mission to have a mango every day I was there, as they are shitty and over a dollar each here! Then we had lunch at the same place as the day before. Mmm, chile rellenos (sp)! Fucking good shit.
That night we took the nice bus back (but it only had dubbed movies….as much as I wanted to watch the Dukes of Hazzard movie in Spanish!), then crashed at Eduardo’s place.
On Thursday we did stuff! Um, wtf did we do on Thursday? Oh, that was our first day in Mexico City. We went to the gay area, where I bought some perfectly legal copies of gay movies! Mmmhmm! We met up with Eduardo’s friend Enrique for lunch. Oh, but before that, we paid to let Starbucks poison us! Allow me to explain….Mexico has recently made the most sketchy invention ever….milk that doesn’t go bad! Um, yeah. It comes in cartons similar to soy/rice milk, but it is “normal” milk. However, you don’t have to refrigerate it before you open it?! Um, yeah, that is incredibly trust-worthy. Starbucks doesn’t have soy milk, but only has the lactose-free version of this milk. I had issues with it earlier in the week, and did once again with Starbucks. Ugh, stupid sketchy milk!
That night, Eduardo and I became members of Mexico City high society by attending the premiere of the National Geographic furniture line. Ana works for Liverpool (a high-class department store) and is in charge of the company’s entire furniture department. She organized the event, and invited us to it. It was in a SUPER SUPER SUPER nice restaurant in the Mexico City equivalent of Central Park. The restaurant is at least $150 per person for a meal! Damn, boy. So, it was nice to go there for free and pretend to be important people. I wanted to take a picture of their bathrooms, if that shows how nice it is. Anyway, the premiere was cool, and it didn’t hurt that we got free wine out of it. It also had a view of an incredibly beautiful lake/fountain thing. Oh, and the speaker at the event was the Mexican/Argentinian equivalent of George Clooney (hot old-man actor).
After drinking lots of wine, Eduardo, Ana, Luis Felipe and I headed out to a bar and had some yummy yummy mojitos and danced a bit. After getting successfully drunk, we had the BEST FUCKING DRUNK TACOS EVER. Holy shit! I had like five and wanted approximately three bazillion more. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Drunk tacos are SO much better than drunk yakisoba!!!!!!!!!
After that, Eduardo and I went home and assed out yet again.
To be continued!
Anyway, back to too many details about my Mexico trip! Tuesday morning, Eduardo and I woke up early and went into downtown Guanajuato, which was AMAZINGLY beautiful. The town was home to Spaniards in the 1500s, and was an important part of the revolution/independence, as Mexicans fought the Spaniards there and took back the town. Anyway, because of its history, its architecture made us feel like we were in Europe. The buildings were colorful and beautiful, and there were tons of small plazas where the locals would just hang out. I will post a million pictures of it eventually.
We got a yummy cheap-ass breakfast, then started walking for hours and hours and hours. We got a ton of exercise while we were there (and throughout the whole trip in general). There is a viewpoint on top of a hill in which you can see the whole town, so we hiked up there, among other places. We found a DELICIOUS street vendor-ish place (Not a real street vendor, but not a real restaurant, either. Fuck, I love street vendors) for lunch, where we ate like 300 meals’ worth of food. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm. We relaxed a bit for the afternoon, then went back to where we had breakfast, as they had CHEAP-ASS BEER! We got a 1 liter beer with salt, lime, Worcestershire sauce (sp?) and chili mixed in for $3.50 each! These were incredibly classy beers, as they came in huge styrofoam cups with straws punched through the lid! It looked like some sort of secretive Big Gulp or something. Eduardo is apparently an alcoholic, as he sucked his liter of beer down in like three seconds. I have become Japanese, as I couldn’t drink all of it because I wanted izakaya-type snacks with it. Hello, you can’t drink beer by itself! So, Eduardo was a lush and helped me out with mine :)
That night we had a semi-romantic meal at a restaurant near the plaza. It was meant to be more romantic, but there was blaring Mexican music coming from bands in the public gazebo, and a soccer game that all of the dumb straight people were freaking out about. But it was still fun….tho we ate wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy too much and kind of wanted to vomit. Hmm, maybe not so romantic, now that I think about it ;)
We walked our meal off around town that night, then went to bed. On Wednesday morning we got some pastries for breakfast (MMMMMM, Mexican pastries are the most amazing things in the world), then wandered around town some more. I bought omiyage for my damn teachers (stupid, stupid custom!) and…I dunno what else we did. We got an amazing fruit bowl from a street vendor. It was my mission to have a mango every day I was there, as they are shitty and over a dollar each here! Then we had lunch at the same place as the day before. Mmm, chile rellenos (sp)! Fucking good shit.
That night we took the nice bus back (but it only had dubbed movies….as much as I wanted to watch the Dukes of Hazzard movie in Spanish!), then crashed at Eduardo’s place.
On Thursday we did stuff! Um, wtf did we do on Thursday? Oh, that was our first day in Mexico City. We went to the gay area, where I bought some perfectly legal copies of gay movies! Mmmhmm! We met up with Eduardo’s friend Enrique for lunch. Oh, but before that, we paid to let Starbucks poison us! Allow me to explain….Mexico has recently made the most sketchy invention ever….milk that doesn’t go bad! Um, yeah. It comes in cartons similar to soy/rice milk, but it is “normal” milk. However, you don’t have to refrigerate it before you open it?! Um, yeah, that is incredibly trust-worthy. Starbucks doesn’t have soy milk, but only has the lactose-free version of this milk. I had issues with it earlier in the week, and did once again with Starbucks. Ugh, stupid sketchy milk!
That night, Eduardo and I became members of Mexico City high society by attending the premiere of the National Geographic furniture line. Ana works for Liverpool (a high-class department store) and is in charge of the company’s entire furniture department. She organized the event, and invited us to it. It was in a SUPER SUPER SUPER nice restaurant in the Mexico City equivalent of Central Park. The restaurant is at least $150 per person for a meal! Damn, boy. So, it was nice to go there for free and pretend to be important people. I wanted to take a picture of their bathrooms, if that shows how nice it is. Anyway, the premiere was cool, and it didn’t hurt that we got free wine out of it. It also had a view of an incredibly beautiful lake/fountain thing. Oh, and the speaker at the event was the Mexican/Argentinian equivalent of George Clooney (hot old-man actor).
After drinking lots of wine, Eduardo, Ana, Luis Felipe and I headed out to a bar and had some yummy yummy mojitos and danced a bit. After getting successfully drunk, we had the BEST FUCKING DRUNK TACOS EVER. Holy shit! I had like five and wanted approximately three bazillion more. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. Drunk tacos are SO much better than drunk yakisoba!!!!!!!!!
After that, Eduardo and I went home and assed out yet again.
To be continued!
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
Mexico! Part Uno
Soooooooooo, I went to Mexico for Golden Week and FINALLY saw Eduardo for the first time in 11 god damn months!!!! I had an amaaaaaaaaaazing time…even better than I had expected. I wanted to write about it so that I remember all that I did. So, in order to not write about it twice, I will just post my journal-ish stuff to my blog. It will probably be hella long, so….yeah. You can skip it if you want :)
On Thursday I woke up early out of excitement and got ready to go to Narita. For those who don’t know, Narita Airport is 1) not in Tokyo (tho it pretends to be) and 2) is fucking far away no matter where you live. It takes three hours to get to Narita, and is a bitch with luggage, but is even worse by bus. So, I impatiently trained for three hours so that I could sit on planes for a bazillion more hours. All together, I traveled for 24 hours. Fun stuff!!!
Despite taking sleeping pills, I couldn’t sleep on the 12-hour flight to Houston. This is proof that Japanese medicine doesn’t do shit, yo. From Houston, I took a plane of death that holds 50 people. It was so short that I couldn’t stand up completely, as my head would go through the roof. Also, my “row” had one seat in it. Um, not acceptable! I had to close my window because it was too scary. Fortunately I slept through most of it (I think out of fear more than exhaustion). Anyway, I finally landed in Mexico, got through customs quickly, and SAW MY BOY, yayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy! I barely recognized him, as he was skinny and in a suit! Crazy old working man ;) hehe. We immediately exchanged my money, where the lady tried to steal $100 from me! WTF! I gave her $650 (well, in yen), and she said it was only 550. Fortunately I noticed the “error” and she was just like, “Yeah, I’ll give you the other 100 in a minute.” Um, nice first experience in Mexico! Hehe.
We had dinner at the airport (mole! And a margarita! Mmmmm), then went to Eduardo’s apartment, where I eventually assed out….only to wake up 4:30 in the morning, unable to sleep anymore! Yes, four hours of sleep in 30 hours is apparently all jetlagged Jeff needs. We made huevos rancheros for breakfast (orgasm), then got ready to go out. Eduardo had a bit of work to do at Berlitz, but first we went to see Rent (the movie)! It opened the day after I arrived….coincidence? I think not! There was only one other person in the theater with us, sad! We were both amused that they renamed it Rent Extreme Lives….you know those gays….they live to the extreme, man! Anyway, it was fun to see it on the big screen. I didn’t like the movie the first time I saw it, but I like it a lot now. And it was nice to see it with my boy, awwww!
After that we went to Berlitz, where Jeff assed out and was about to eat Eddy’s desk out of pure starvation. After acting like a grumpy 5 year-old (do not mess with jetlagged Jeff!), we went and had a HUGE lunch of tacos and tortas. Fuck, it was amazing.
That evening we met up with Eduardo’s friend Ana and her boyfriend Luis Felipe. They were nice enough to invite us to spend the weekend with them in Luis Felipe’s family vacation home in Tepeji del Rio. It was a great place! It’s away from the city, and was really relaxing.
On Saturday, we got up and drove to an area whose name I don’t remember! Eduardo is going to send me a list of place names, so I will add them later. Anyway, we went hiking on a monolith (only three in the world exist) and it was a good workout! We didn’t go up that high, but it was pretty tiring and hot! From the halfway point (fuck going up all the way, yo!) we got a great view of the beautiful traditional town beneath it. We had a gooooooooooooood lunch and beers in town, where I saw an EXACT double of my cousin Zack, which was really freaky. I took sneaky stalker pictures of him for proof! I think Zack grew braided rat tails and is living in Mexico!!!
That night we made dinner and had sake that I brought over at their request. Mmm, it was yummy!
On Sunday we had breakfast, then Eduardo and I took the bus back into the city to meet up with his family. Eek, meeting Eduardo’s family! They don’t speak English, so I was a little nervous, but it was nice to meet them! They are loud and crazy like my family, so I felt at home :) Eduardo’s aunt was VERY excited to meet me and cook for me (hello, they are as obsessed with food as my family….we were meant to be!), and DAMN did she cook a shitload of food. I sat at the table and ate for like three hours straight! We had tacos, and they were sooooooooooooooooo fucking good. She made the best chorizo I have ever had, as well as fried cactus (mmmmm), great guacamole, salsa, fried onions (I don’t know the word for the type of onion….the ones with like the bulbs at the bottom or whatever), and more. FUCK it was good! I was a bit overwhelmed with the Spanish at first, but I understand more Spanish than I thought I did! It’s just like English but with o’s and a’s at the end ;) Hehehe.
We bused back to Eduardo’s apartment that night, then got up early on Monday to go see the pyramids. They are about an hour outside of the city, and they were fucking amazing! There were two pyramids (one for the sun and one for the moon), as well as the ruins of the old marketplace, a temple, and more. They are the first pyramids I have ever seen, and they were beautiful. Also, might I say that the Aztecs must have been fit as shit, because those stairs are NOT easy to climb! Jesus, our legs were sore afterwards. They were incredible to see, though.
For lunch we went to this cool restaurant that’s in a cave near the pyramids. Holy shit, it was muy oishii! We had this lamb dish that was great, as well as yummy appetizers and a VERY good margarita. Mmm.
From there, we went back to the bus station, where we took a 5-hour bus ride to Guanajuato, a really old town northeast of the city. We took the first-class bus and it was SO nice! You have a shitload of leg room, the whole bus is dark so you can sleep, and it has movies and stuff. It was better than a plane! We got into Guanjuato late at night, went to our hotel, and got a room…Eduardo had warned me that since it is in central Mexico, they are conservative there. Man, was it amusing to get a single-bed room for the two of us! The guy at the counter was like, “One bed?! I can give you two! It will be a lot more comfortable.” Eduardo said one was fine, and the guy was like, “Okay…..but I can give you two beds!” After a few minutes, the guy gave in and gave us the room, hehe. We promptly assed out in preparation of our day of all walking on Tuesday.
Told you this would be hella long, Jesus. To be continued tomorrow, maybe.
On Thursday I woke up early out of excitement and got ready to go to Narita. For those who don’t know, Narita Airport is 1) not in Tokyo (tho it pretends to be) and 2) is fucking far away no matter where you live. It takes three hours to get to Narita, and is a bitch with luggage, but is even worse by bus. So, I impatiently trained for three hours so that I could sit on planes for a bazillion more hours. All together, I traveled for 24 hours. Fun stuff!!!
Despite taking sleeping pills, I couldn’t sleep on the 12-hour flight to Houston. This is proof that Japanese medicine doesn’t do shit, yo. From Houston, I took a plane of death that holds 50 people. It was so short that I couldn’t stand up completely, as my head would go through the roof. Also, my “row” had one seat in it. Um, not acceptable! I had to close my window because it was too scary. Fortunately I slept through most of it (I think out of fear more than exhaustion). Anyway, I finally landed in Mexico, got through customs quickly, and SAW MY BOY, yayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy! I barely recognized him, as he was skinny and in a suit! Crazy old working man ;) hehe. We immediately exchanged my money, where the lady tried to steal $100 from me! WTF! I gave her $650 (well, in yen), and she said it was only 550. Fortunately I noticed the “error” and she was just like, “Yeah, I’ll give you the other 100 in a minute.” Um, nice first experience in Mexico! Hehe.
We had dinner at the airport (mole! And a margarita! Mmmmm), then went to Eduardo’s apartment, where I eventually assed out….only to wake up 4:30 in the morning, unable to sleep anymore! Yes, four hours of sleep in 30 hours is apparently all jetlagged Jeff needs. We made huevos rancheros for breakfast (orgasm), then got ready to go out. Eduardo had a bit of work to do at Berlitz, but first we went to see Rent (the movie)! It opened the day after I arrived….coincidence? I think not! There was only one other person in the theater with us, sad! We were both amused that they renamed it Rent Extreme Lives….you know those gays….they live to the extreme, man! Anyway, it was fun to see it on the big screen. I didn’t like the movie the first time I saw it, but I like it a lot now. And it was nice to see it with my boy, awwww!
After that we went to Berlitz, where Jeff assed out and was about to eat Eddy’s desk out of pure starvation. After acting like a grumpy 5 year-old (do not mess with jetlagged Jeff!), we went and had a HUGE lunch of tacos and tortas. Fuck, it was amazing.
That evening we met up with Eduardo’s friend Ana and her boyfriend Luis Felipe. They were nice enough to invite us to spend the weekend with them in Luis Felipe’s family vacation home in Tepeji del Rio. It was a great place! It’s away from the city, and was really relaxing.
On Saturday, we got up and drove to an area whose name I don’t remember! Eduardo is going to send me a list of place names, so I will add them later. Anyway, we went hiking on a monolith (only three in the world exist) and it was a good workout! We didn’t go up that high, but it was pretty tiring and hot! From the halfway point (fuck going up all the way, yo!) we got a great view of the beautiful traditional town beneath it. We had a gooooooooooooood lunch and beers in town, where I saw an EXACT double of my cousin Zack, which was really freaky. I took sneaky stalker pictures of him for proof! I think Zack grew braided rat tails and is living in Mexico!!!
That night we made dinner and had sake that I brought over at their request. Mmm, it was yummy!
On Sunday we had breakfast, then Eduardo and I took the bus back into the city to meet up with his family. Eek, meeting Eduardo’s family! They don’t speak English, so I was a little nervous, but it was nice to meet them! They are loud and crazy like my family, so I felt at home :) Eduardo’s aunt was VERY excited to meet me and cook for me (hello, they are as obsessed with food as my family….we were meant to be!), and DAMN did she cook a shitload of food. I sat at the table and ate for like three hours straight! We had tacos, and they were sooooooooooooooooo fucking good. She made the best chorizo I have ever had, as well as fried cactus (mmmmm), great guacamole, salsa, fried onions (I don’t know the word for the type of onion….the ones with like the bulbs at the bottom or whatever), and more. FUCK it was good! I was a bit overwhelmed with the Spanish at first, but I understand more Spanish than I thought I did! It’s just like English but with o’s and a’s at the end ;) Hehehe.
We bused back to Eduardo’s apartment that night, then got up early on Monday to go see the pyramids. They are about an hour outside of the city, and they were fucking amazing! There were two pyramids (one for the sun and one for the moon), as well as the ruins of the old marketplace, a temple, and more. They are the first pyramids I have ever seen, and they were beautiful. Also, might I say that the Aztecs must have been fit as shit, because those stairs are NOT easy to climb! Jesus, our legs were sore afterwards. They were incredible to see, though.
For lunch we went to this cool restaurant that’s in a cave near the pyramids. Holy shit, it was muy oishii! We had this lamb dish that was great, as well as yummy appetizers and a VERY good margarita. Mmm.
From there, we went back to the bus station, where we took a 5-hour bus ride to Guanajuato, a really old town northeast of the city. We took the first-class bus and it was SO nice! You have a shitload of leg room, the whole bus is dark so you can sleep, and it has movies and stuff. It was better than a plane! We got into Guanjuato late at night, went to our hotel, and got a room…Eduardo had warned me that since it is in central Mexico, they are conservative there. Man, was it amusing to get a single-bed room for the two of us! The guy at the counter was like, “One bed?! I can give you two! It will be a lot more comfortable.” Eduardo said one was fine, and the guy was like, “Okay…..but I can give you two beds!” After a few minutes, the guy gave in and gave us the room, hehe. We promptly assed out in preparation of our day of all walking on Tuesday.
Told you this would be hella long, Jesus. To be continued tomorrow, maybe.
Thursday, April 20, 2006
ONE WEEK ONE WEEK ONE WEEK ONE WEEK ONE WEEK
In seven days, I will be at Narita, waiting to board my plane to MEXICO CITY to see MY BOYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY, yayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy
yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa sevenyahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
If you don’t know what that subject means, you don’t know me, bitch! Hee hee. Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa sevenyaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh babagitibaba. I am SO motherfucking Rafiki from The Lion King, yo.
So, on Saturday morning I woke up a bit hungover from the enkai, and went with Ann into Tokyo to do some shopping, meet up with Emily, and see The Lion King (the musical). It was a very important day, as I went to the Kate Spade store and got my Jack Spade bag that I had seen when Kris was here. I had literally been dreaming about it, and decided to treat myself to it, even though it is more expensive than a month of rent. I have decided that I can live in my bag for a month if I have to. It is so cute!!!!!!!! It is the gayest thing I have ever seen in my life, but cuuuuuuuuuuuute. Thank god Japan is the gayest country in the world, because no one thinks twice about it. However, I fear I may be attacked if I carry it in the States. Let’s hoping that Americans become more fashionable before I return!
Ann and I wandered around Omotesando and Omotesando Hills (the new fancy-shmancy mall there). Hills’ architecture is cool, but I would never buy anything there. Like no one has ever heard of 7/8 of the stores there! I swear they are just expensive because they are in that mall. If a place is too pretentious for me, that is a bad sign.
Anyway, after some fuckfuckfuckfuckwe’refuckinglateandgonnamisstheshow running to Lion King (with Ann in heels, sorry, Ann!), we made it to Lion King. Only Japan would start a show at fucking 5:30 at night (good for trains back to Gunma, tho). Anyway, the show was good! I had seen it in LA, so I knew what it was like in English. I think I enjoyed it the most, because Ann and Em were like “it just made me want to see it in English!” It was really good, tho. I looooooooove how it is directed. The only bad thing is that when Japanese people pretend to be black and soulful, they fail miserably. Hello, you’re Japanese, your voices are thin as paper, you aren’t soulful. But that wasn’t a problem for most of it…good shit! Yay, theatre!
So, on Saturday morning I woke up a bit hungover from the enkai, and went with Ann into Tokyo to do some shopping, meet up with Emily, and see The Lion King (the musical). It was a very important day, as I went to the Kate Spade store and got my Jack Spade bag that I had seen when Kris was here. I had literally been dreaming about it, and decided to treat myself to it, even though it is more expensive than a month of rent. I have decided that I can live in my bag for a month if I have to. It is so cute!!!!!!!! It is the gayest thing I have ever seen in my life, but cuuuuuuuuuuuute. Thank god Japan is the gayest country in the world, because no one thinks twice about it. However, I fear I may be attacked if I carry it in the States. Let’s hoping that Americans become more fashionable before I return!
Ann and I wandered around Omotesando and Omotesando Hills (the new fancy-shmancy mall there). Hills’ architecture is cool, but I would never buy anything there. Like no one has ever heard of 7/8 of the stores there! I swear they are just expensive because they are in that mall. If a place is too pretentious for me, that is a bad sign.
Anyway, after some fuckfuckfuckfuckwe’refuckinglateandgonnamisstheshow running to Lion King (with Ann in heels, sorry, Ann!), we made it to Lion King. Only Japan would start a show at fucking 5:30 at night (good for trains back to Gunma, tho). Anyway, the show was good! I had seen it in LA, so I knew what it was like in English. I think I enjoyed it the most, because Ann and Em were like “it just made me want to see it in English!” It was really good, tho. I looooooooove how it is directed. The only bad thing is that when Japanese people pretend to be black and soulful, they fail miserably. Hello, you’re Japanese, your voices are thin as paper, you aren’t soulful. But that wasn’t a problem for most of it…good shit! Yay, theatre!
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
Nikkuneemu
Among the many nicknames that my kids have for me, a new one that a 3nensei has given me is “Mr. Donuts” (the name of a donut chain). Um, I can hardly think that this is a complimentary nickname! I don’t even want to know….
Oh, well, maybe it’s karma for the name I recently gave a 2nensei, “Nama Ninjin-chan” (raw carrot girl)…I won’t even bother to explain that one.
Oh, well, maybe it’s karma for the name I recently gave a 2nensei, “Nama Ninjin-chan” (raw carrot girl)…I won’t even bother to explain that one.
Druuuuuuuuuuuuuuuunk with teachers
On Friday night I finally went to my first big enkai with teachers (I went to one the week before, but it was only with the 3nensei staff). Friday was a big send-off enkai, as all of the teachers and staff that left for new schools returned for a big BORING assembly during the day (18 speeches that were NOT brief!), followed by a drunk “we’ll miss you!” party at night. It was wayyyyy more fun than I expected, and I also got wayyyyy more drunk than I would expect to be with a bunch of old people!
I got a ride to the place (a nice, fancy hotel, where I was the only one without a suit, oops) from Ms. Kimura’s husband, which was cool, because I didn’t have the motivation to bike there. Enkais are expensive ($50), but I got my money’s worth, as they give you like three meals’ worth of food, plus nomihoudai (all you can drink). P:LUS I got the coolest table there (almost all of the young teachers, somehow, even tho we decided where to sit by pulling numbers? Weird). The Japanese policy is to pour other people’s drinks, even if there is only like a sip missing from the cup….in other words, there is NEVER an empty glass. Um, this is MUY abunai! I swear I must have had…I don’t even KNOW how many beers, because the teachers just kept filling me up! Hmm, that sounds rather dirty.
Anyway, once I was completely drunk as shit and bonding with teachers that I hadn’t even talked to before, we went to the nijikai (second party) at a karaoke place a block away. It was only 20 bucks for karaoke, nomihoudai, and food! Hell yeah, bitches. Ya know, ‘cause I needed more food and drinks. At karaoke, I found out Mr. Satou (a cute teacher who left that I hadn’t ever really talked to) is like fluent in English and knows more English songs than me! We sang My Charona (Sharona?), and it didn’t even have katakana for him to read, but he could sing it all! WTF! And we also sang Oasis’ Wonderwall. Clazy! Then I sang Train Train with Morita-Sensei, who is cool because he is the only teacher that is my age. I also bonded with dear Fujii-Sensei (AKA Hot-Ass Sensei), who was even drunker than me, and was napping during most of the nijikai. He asked for my keitai numbah, hollah! Hee hee.
After karaoke, the hardcore teachers went to a fucking SANjikai (third party), but I knew my limit, so I went home…however, Ms. Kimura abandoned me and I had to walk home drunk as fuck for an hour! Thankfully I had a sense of direction, as my teachers told me to “just go straight,” which would have taken me to Isesaki! Um, no, thanks!
When I got home, I immediately bumped into my thingy that holds my glasses (I don’t know English) and a wine glass shattered on the floor. My drunk reaction to this was, “Oh, of course that happened, I am really drunk,” so I non-chalantly got out the vacuum at 1 in the morning and cleaned it up (while cutting my fingers and bleeding all over).
Yes, a fun night! Apparently I made a good impression, as my kouchou sensei was like, “You have to give me your keitai number so we can drink in Ota!” Haha, yay drunk bonding.
I got a ride to the place (a nice, fancy hotel, where I was the only one without a suit, oops) from Ms. Kimura’s husband, which was cool, because I didn’t have the motivation to bike there. Enkais are expensive ($50), but I got my money’s worth, as they give you like three meals’ worth of food, plus nomihoudai (all you can drink). P:LUS I got the coolest table there (almost all of the young teachers, somehow, even tho we decided where to sit by pulling numbers? Weird). The Japanese policy is to pour other people’s drinks, even if there is only like a sip missing from the cup….in other words, there is NEVER an empty glass. Um, this is MUY abunai! I swear I must have had…I don’t even KNOW how many beers, because the teachers just kept filling me up! Hmm, that sounds rather dirty.
Anyway, once I was completely drunk as shit and bonding with teachers that I hadn’t even talked to before, we went to the nijikai (second party) at a karaoke place a block away. It was only 20 bucks for karaoke, nomihoudai, and food! Hell yeah, bitches. Ya know, ‘cause I needed more food and drinks. At karaoke, I found out Mr. Satou (a cute teacher who left that I hadn’t ever really talked to) is like fluent in English and knows more English songs than me! We sang My Charona (Sharona?), and it didn’t even have katakana for him to read, but he could sing it all! WTF! And we also sang Oasis’ Wonderwall. Clazy! Then I sang Train Train with Morita-Sensei, who is cool because he is the only teacher that is my age. I also bonded with dear Fujii-Sensei (AKA Hot-Ass Sensei), who was even drunker than me, and was napping during most of the nijikai. He asked for my keitai numbah, hollah! Hee hee.
After karaoke, the hardcore teachers went to a fucking SANjikai (third party), but I knew my limit, so I went home…however, Ms. Kimura abandoned me and I had to walk home drunk as fuck for an hour! Thankfully I had a sense of direction, as my teachers told me to “just go straight,” which would have taken me to Isesaki! Um, no, thanks!
When I got home, I immediately bumped into my thingy that holds my glasses (I don’t know English) and a wine glass shattered on the floor. My drunk reaction to this was, “Oh, of course that happened, I am really drunk,” so I non-chalantly got out the vacuum at 1 in the morning and cleaned it up (while cutting my fingers and bleeding all over).
Yes, a fun night! Apparently I made a good impression, as my kouchou sensei was like, “You have to give me your keitai number so we can drink in Ota!” Haha, yay drunk bonding.
Sunday, April 16, 2006
Koizumi: Friend or Foe?
An interesting (and rather depressing) article from the New York Times about the changes in Japan's economy since Koizumi came to office.
Wednesday, April 12, 2006
Indoor Orinpikku
Today the 3nensei and 3nensei teachers (which includes me, woot!) had the “indoor Olympics” during 3rd and 4th period. It was a fluke that I was actually here for it, as I am always at shougakkou Wednesdays (and, it turns out, I think I was supposed to be there today, oops! Hee hee), and I am very glad that I got to see the indoor Olympics in action! The event consisted of 5-6 relays, with the five classes competing against each other. It is basically like field day, but, er, in the gym. Man, it was hella fun!
I have to say, for being a rather quiet and reserved people, the Japanese have some fun and quirky relay games hidden up their sleeves! The first relay consisted of blowing a Kleenex in the air and not letting it drop. The person to keep it up the longest got a point for their class. This is harder than it sounds! I beat everyone, bitches, ‘cause I specialize in blowing, mmkay!
The second relay had everyone put their forehead on a cone, spin around ten times, then race each other to the finish line. The teachers did it last and had to spin TWENTY times! It was hardcore. It was fun to see everyone fall over tho, hehe.
The third relay was fucking CRAZY! Everyone got into groups of five, and they each had a page of newspaper to stand on. Then they played a mass game of janken (rock, paper, scissors) with me (the “janken champion,” according to the rules!). If they lost janken, they had to fold the paper in half, then all stand on it. This continued on until everyone had teeny pieces of newspaper. Man, Japanese kids are good engineers! They had kids on their backs, on their shoulders…anywhere to make it so five people would fit on the teeny piece of paper. No wonder half the population of America can fit on an island the size of California!
The next relay was the wheelbarrow…that’s what we call it in English, right? I think so. They call it “supercar.” Then after that was the crappiest game EVER! The kids had a towel, and had to run to the next person while keeping the towel on the ground with their hands (so they were running hunched over). Hello, that is totally a sneaky “let’s clean the gym!” game, and is clearly NOT a real game! We’ll forgive them for that one.
For the last game, everyone was given a straw, which they kept in their mouth. Every team would line up, and have to pass a rubberband from person to person (i.e. straw to straw) not using their hands. It is a little makeout-ish, if I do say so myself! I had played this before once with Pocky. It’s fun!
Anyway, yeah, that was the indoor Olympics….hmm, maybe it doesn’t sound as fun in writing. It was a lot of fun, though, and it was nice to see everyone being so genki and bonding! Awww, my once-little-shits-of-2nenseis are growing into nice 3nensei so fast!
I have to say, for being a rather quiet and reserved people, the Japanese have some fun and quirky relay games hidden up their sleeves! The first relay consisted of blowing a Kleenex in the air and not letting it drop. The person to keep it up the longest got a point for their class. This is harder than it sounds! I beat everyone, bitches, ‘cause I specialize in blowing, mmkay!
The second relay had everyone put their forehead on a cone, spin around ten times, then race each other to the finish line. The teachers did it last and had to spin TWENTY times! It was hardcore. It was fun to see everyone fall over tho, hehe.
The third relay was fucking CRAZY! Everyone got into groups of five, and they each had a page of newspaper to stand on. Then they played a mass game of janken (rock, paper, scissors) with me (the “janken champion,” according to the rules!). If they lost janken, they had to fold the paper in half, then all stand on it. This continued on until everyone had teeny pieces of newspaper. Man, Japanese kids are good engineers! They had kids on their backs, on their shoulders…anywhere to make it so five people would fit on the teeny piece of paper. No wonder half the population of America can fit on an island the size of California!
The next relay was the wheelbarrow…that’s what we call it in English, right? I think so. They call it “supercar.” Then after that was the crappiest game EVER! The kids had a towel, and had to run to the next person while keeping the towel on the ground with their hands (so they were running hunched over). Hello, that is totally a sneaky “let’s clean the gym!” game, and is clearly NOT a real game! We’ll forgive them for that one.
For the last game, everyone was given a straw, which they kept in their mouth. Every team would line up, and have to pass a rubberband from person to person (i.e. straw to straw) not using their hands. It is a little makeout-ish, if I do say so myself! I had played this before once with Pocky. It’s fun!
Anyway, yeah, that was the indoor Olympics….hmm, maybe it doesn’t sound as fun in writing. It was a lot of fun, though, and it was nice to see everyone being so genki and bonding! Awww, my once-little-shits-of-2nenseis are growing into nice 3nensei so fast!
Tuesday, April 11, 2006
Train train, don’t fuck me over! Train train, you can burn in hell.
When we last left Jeff, he was drinking Friday night away with his teachers and biking back drunk.
So, what did I do on Saturday morning? Why, get up at 4:30 in the morning to hike, of course! Daniel organizes a hike every month or so for Gunma JETs, and Cindy, Sean and I decided to join the others in order to do something different and do something ACTIVE, for once. Little did we know just how active we would be!
I got up ridiculously early to shower the second-hand smoke off of me, then catch the 5:47 train from Yabu to meet up with everyone in Maebashi. I was somehow surprisingly awake and not hungover, which I think is because I had been mentally preparing myself all week long for the awful morning. Oy, that is such a ridiculous hour to wake up!
Anyway, from Maebashi, we broke up into cars and drove to somewhere in Kanagawa (where I studied abroad), then took a couple of buses to the mountain. It took like five hours or something to get there?! Eek! After all of that sitting, I was very ready to start hiking.
The hike was hard in a good way….more work than Sean, Cindy and I expected (just a bit more steep than the usual hiking we do around AEON!), but a good amount of burning-the-winter-fat-off exercise. It took two hours to get to the top, where there was a beautiful view of the surrounding area, including the OCEAN (I miss the ocean! Stupid land-locked Gunma). It was pretty, but hella windy up there, so we hid in a covered area and ate our lunches. I fear that I may have actually gained weight from the hike, as I ate like four cups of rice that day, as well as who knows what else. I also ate all day long Sunday out of pure starvation. Hrm.
Anyway, the way down was just as much work as the way up, as it was steep, and really muddy. I surprisingly didn’t eat shit, though there were many close calls! Eventually we got down to the bottom and found a BEAUTIFUL area full of cherry blossoms and plum trees. They were soooo purty.
From there we had to go to the eki to take the train back to cars….us lazy peeps were not amused to find that the eki was 25 minutes away and uphill! Oy!
Once we got to the eki, the train drama started. We realized the best way for us Ota/Tatebayashi people to get home on time would be to take trains the whole way home. So we looked up the train changes on our keitais (how did anyone ever get around Tokyo before keitais?) and relaxed in the meantime. About 45 minutes into our train ride, we were in the middle of an intense game of let’s-entertain-ourselves-on-the-train charades (it also entertained some old people around us, who seemed to be trying to figure out our gestures, as well). All of a sudden, the train stops and EVERYONE gets off. It takes us a minute to realize this is probably not a good sign. The eki guy comes in to clear the train, and we are like “Wait….does this train go to Kuki?” It was most definitely a bad sign that the eki guy didn’t even KNOW where Kuki is!!! After panicking greatly, we realized we somehow took the wrong train for about 25 minutes (I still don’t know how it happened). It being hours away from the last train, one would assume it would be all right. Or NOT. There was one route we could take that would get us on the last train to Ota (not even our own stops, but Ota), and many routes we could take that would get us there at 7 in the fucking morning the next day!!!!! So Cindy, Sean and I decided to ganbaru to the max and take the route, despite its impossibly short amount of time to switch between trains, subways, and other train lines. What followed is impossible to even give justice in words, but I will try.
At one stop we were about to get on a train that was leaving within 30 seconds, when I asked an old man if it was going to where we wanted. When he said no and pointed to a train on another track (with many stairs in between), the three of us SCREAMED and ran faster than humanly possible to get on the train before it left. Then at the next stop we had five minutes to run off the train, go down many stairs to the subway track, pay our leftover fare from the train, buy tickets for the subway, then go down more stairs to get ON the subway. This involved throwing our tickets and a random amount of money at the eki guy (while yelling “Sorry, sorry, last train, no time, sorry!” in Japanese to him). Then when the subway arrived in Asakusa, we had 9 minutes to walk 550 meters (3/4 of which is going up stairs, and includes two crosswalks that never agree with pedestrians) to the Tobu eki where we had to buy tickets before going up stairs to get on a train. Not only did we somehow do this, but we made it in FOUR MINUTES. Is that even humanly possible?! It was like the eki Olympics! I have literally never ran so fast in my life! I refused to stay in Tokyo for the night, and Sean and Cindy felt the same.
So, in the end, we made it, and none of us even peed our pants on the 2-hour train ride home (a feat in itself, considering how much water we had). We got into Ota at 11:50, then got rides home (thanks, Nacchan!). I then slept so well that I am guessing the entire apartment complex heard me snore.
Lesson from the hike: stay in Gunma when hiking! Not as many trains involved!
Second lesson of the day: Cindy and I are NEVER climbing Fuji in September, as we had planned. 2 hours has me sore enough, let alone 7+ hours. Um, yeah.
So, what did I do on Saturday morning? Why, get up at 4:30 in the morning to hike, of course! Daniel organizes a hike every month or so for Gunma JETs, and Cindy, Sean and I decided to join the others in order to do something different and do something ACTIVE, for once. Little did we know just how active we would be!
I got up ridiculously early to shower the second-hand smoke off of me, then catch the 5:47 train from Yabu to meet up with everyone in Maebashi. I was somehow surprisingly awake and not hungover, which I think is because I had been mentally preparing myself all week long for the awful morning. Oy, that is such a ridiculous hour to wake up!
Anyway, from Maebashi, we broke up into cars and drove to somewhere in Kanagawa (where I studied abroad), then took a couple of buses to the mountain. It took like five hours or something to get there?! Eek! After all of that sitting, I was very ready to start hiking.
The hike was hard in a good way….more work than Sean, Cindy and I expected (just a bit more steep than the usual hiking we do around AEON!), but a good amount of burning-the-winter-fat-off exercise. It took two hours to get to the top, where there was a beautiful view of the surrounding area, including the OCEAN (I miss the ocean! Stupid land-locked Gunma). It was pretty, but hella windy up there, so we hid in a covered area and ate our lunches. I fear that I may have actually gained weight from the hike, as I ate like four cups of rice that day, as well as who knows what else. I also ate all day long Sunday out of pure starvation. Hrm.
Anyway, the way down was just as much work as the way up, as it was steep, and really muddy. I surprisingly didn’t eat shit, though there were many close calls! Eventually we got down to the bottom and found a BEAUTIFUL area full of cherry blossoms and plum trees. They were soooo purty.
From there we had to go to the eki to take the train back to cars….us lazy peeps were not amused to find that the eki was 25 minutes away and uphill! Oy!
Once we got to the eki, the train drama started. We realized the best way for us Ota/Tatebayashi people to get home on time would be to take trains the whole way home. So we looked up the train changes on our keitais (how did anyone ever get around Tokyo before keitais?) and relaxed in the meantime. About 45 minutes into our train ride, we were in the middle of an intense game of let’s-entertain-ourselves-on-the-train charades (it also entertained some old people around us, who seemed to be trying to figure out our gestures, as well). All of a sudden, the train stops and EVERYONE gets off. It takes us a minute to realize this is probably not a good sign. The eki guy comes in to clear the train, and we are like “Wait….does this train go to Kuki?” It was most definitely a bad sign that the eki guy didn’t even KNOW where Kuki is!!! After panicking greatly, we realized we somehow took the wrong train for about 25 minutes (I still don’t know how it happened). It being hours away from the last train, one would assume it would be all right. Or NOT. There was one route we could take that would get us on the last train to Ota (not even our own stops, but Ota), and many routes we could take that would get us there at 7 in the fucking morning the next day!!!!! So Cindy, Sean and I decided to ganbaru to the max and take the route, despite its impossibly short amount of time to switch between trains, subways, and other train lines. What followed is impossible to even give justice in words, but I will try.
At one stop we were about to get on a train that was leaving within 30 seconds, when I asked an old man if it was going to where we wanted. When he said no and pointed to a train on another track (with many stairs in between), the three of us SCREAMED and ran faster than humanly possible to get on the train before it left. Then at the next stop we had five minutes to run off the train, go down many stairs to the subway track, pay our leftover fare from the train, buy tickets for the subway, then go down more stairs to get ON the subway. This involved throwing our tickets and a random amount of money at the eki guy (while yelling “Sorry, sorry, last train, no time, sorry!” in Japanese to him). Then when the subway arrived in Asakusa, we had 9 minutes to walk 550 meters (3/4 of which is going up stairs, and includes two crosswalks that never agree with pedestrians) to the Tobu eki where we had to buy tickets before going up stairs to get on a train. Not only did we somehow do this, but we made it in FOUR MINUTES. Is that even humanly possible?! It was like the eki Olympics! I have literally never ran so fast in my life! I refused to stay in Tokyo for the night, and Sean and Cindy felt the same.
So, in the end, we made it, and none of us even peed our pants on the 2-hour train ride home (a feat in itself, considering how much water we had). We got into Ota at 11:50, then got rides home (thanks, Nacchan!). I then slept so well that I am guessing the entire apartment complex heard me snore.
Lesson from the hike: stay in Gunma when hiking! Not as many trains involved!
Second lesson of the day: Cindy and I are NEVER climbing Fuji in September, as we had planned. 2 hours has me sore enough, let alone 7+ hours. Um, yeah.
Monday, April 10, 2006
Nonde, nonde, nonde!
On Friday night I went to my first nomikai (drinking party) with teachers. They always have them when I am out of town and stuff, so this was the first one I could go to. They are usually with all of the staff, but this was only with the new 3nensei teachers so we could all bond (I sit with them, so I am an unofficial member of the 3nensei staff). I have heard very mixed reports from other ALTs about how fun nomikais are, so I was a bit nervous, as I didn’t want to spend $50+ on a boring night out! However, it turned out to be WAY more fun than I expected!!!
We started the night at a teeny izakaya in Kiryu, where they served us the most ridiculous amount of food EVER. And that is coming from me! I literally couldn’t eat it all, but I was the only one? I was told I had a “small stomach” because I couldn’t finish it. It was like four meals in one, seriously. I wasn’t sure how fun it would be, as most of the teachers are rather reserved in the staffroom…however, get some alcohol in them and they are surprisingly cool and funny!
They were amazed at my gaijin drinking abilities…I drank them under the table and still could have had more. However, one of the quietest women in the staff is a freaking LUSH and is hilarious when she is drunk. I think she should be drunk at work so that she’ll actually talk!
We continued the night at another bar, where I got more second-hand smoke than I have had in my entire life. AND I am worried that they are trying to set me up with the cute 25 year-old single girl in the staff. Oy. Shindy, it’s time for you to be my “beard!” Hee hee.
I took the last train to Iwajuku, had a 20-minute drunk bike ride, then woke up at 4:30 in the morning for a HIKE. Yes, that is insane. I will blog about Train Disaster 2006 tomorrow, so you will have to wait in anticipation until then!
Anyway, yeah, it was a very fun night, and they are way nicer to me than the last batch of teachers I sat with (not that they weren’t nice, I just didn’t talk to them, hehe). They try to involve me in stuff at school, and seem really cool. Yay, I think this will be a good year!
We started the night at a teeny izakaya in Kiryu, where they served us the most ridiculous amount of food EVER. And that is coming from me! I literally couldn’t eat it all, but I was the only one? I was told I had a “small stomach” because I couldn’t finish it. It was like four meals in one, seriously. I wasn’t sure how fun it would be, as most of the teachers are rather reserved in the staffroom…however, get some alcohol in them and they are surprisingly cool and funny!
They were amazed at my gaijin drinking abilities…I drank them under the table and still could have had more. However, one of the quietest women in the staff is a freaking LUSH and is hilarious when she is drunk. I think she should be drunk at work so that she’ll actually talk!
We continued the night at another bar, where I got more second-hand smoke than I have had in my entire life. AND I am worried that they are trying to set me up with the cute 25 year-old single girl in the staff. Oy. Shindy, it’s time for you to be my “beard!” Hee hee.
I took the last train to Iwajuku, had a 20-minute drunk bike ride, then woke up at 4:30 in the morning for a HIKE. Yes, that is insane. I will blog about Train Disaster 2006 tomorrow, so you will have to wait in anticipation until then!
Anyway, yeah, it was a very fun night, and they are way nicer to me than the last batch of teachers I sat with (not that they weren’t nice, I just didn’t talk to them, hehe). They try to involve me in stuff at school, and seem really cool. Yay, I think this will be a good year!
Friday, April 07, 2006
Happy New Year
Today the new school year started, which means that we had the opening ceremony introducing the new 1nensei to Yabuchuu this morning. The kids were SO cute! They were so nervous they looked like they were about to fall over. It was also funny to see them in their “they’re expensive, so we’ll buy big ones they’ll grow into!” uniforms. Awww, little 1nensei, please stay innocent and cute forever!
Other random notes and bitching from the opening ceremony:
-I hate hate hate hate hate the head of our PTA! He is so fucking full of himself! He thinks everyone just wants to sit there at ceremonies and listen to him talk for fucking hours about the wonder of Yabuchu. He literally gave a 10-minute speech today about how he hopes people will enjoy their time here. Um, he gave the exact same, long-winded speech (albeit in past-tense) at graduation two weeks ago. I hate him! It’s a bad sign when his speech is like three times longer than the principal’s. I want to find out who his kid is and give him or her bad grades for having a stupid father! Hehe, maybe not, but I find it weird that he wants to be at Yabuchu more than any of the students. Fucking freak!
-Somehow all of my just-turned 2nensei boys grew their hair long and started styling it over the last two weeks? It seems like two times longer?! I don’t get how that works.
-Man, word travels fast in Gunma. I won’t aide in the spreading of ALT gossip (for once!), but one of my students asked me about the recent ALT “incident?!” Damn.
-The teacher next to me had his program open and would cross out the scheduled time of events with a red pen and write in the actual time that they started? Okay….
-Not opening ceremony-related, but my new scheduler sucks ass, yo. I got my schedule for the next six months, and it SUCKS. I didn’t realize that Kojima-Sensei gave me an awesome schedule, as I had four classes everyday, and two periods off. My new one is a fucking uneven disaster! I have four on Monday, FIVE on Tuesday (um, fuck that shit), TWO on Thursday, and FIVE on fucking Friday(of all days). This sucks ass. He also doesn’t know what he is doing, as 7kumi (special needs) only has two English classes a week (one with me and one with a normal teacher), and he put them both on the same day?! Um…..bring back Kojima, please!
Hmm, is there a positive note I can end this on? Um….I’m getting drunk with my new 3nensei teachers tonight! I hope it’s fun? I’m nervous, it will be my first enkai! Hmm, we shall see how it goes…..and how getting up at 5 am for a hike tomorrow will go. Oy.
K, that wasn’t very positive ;) Maybe next time! Hehe.
Other random notes and bitching from the opening ceremony:
-I hate hate hate hate hate the head of our PTA! He is so fucking full of himself! He thinks everyone just wants to sit there at ceremonies and listen to him talk for fucking hours about the wonder of Yabuchu. He literally gave a 10-minute speech today about how he hopes people will enjoy their time here. Um, he gave the exact same, long-winded speech (albeit in past-tense) at graduation two weeks ago. I hate him! It’s a bad sign when his speech is like three times longer than the principal’s. I want to find out who his kid is and give him or her bad grades for having a stupid father! Hehe, maybe not, but I find it weird that he wants to be at Yabuchu more than any of the students. Fucking freak!
-Somehow all of my just-turned 2nensei boys grew their hair long and started styling it over the last two weeks? It seems like two times longer?! I don’t get how that works.
-Man, word travels fast in Gunma. I won’t aide in the spreading of ALT gossip (for once!), but one of my students asked me about the recent ALT “incident?!” Damn.
-The teacher next to me had his program open and would cross out the scheduled time of events with a red pen and write in the actual time that they started? Okay….
-Not opening ceremony-related, but my new scheduler sucks ass, yo. I got my schedule for the next six months, and it SUCKS. I didn’t realize that Kojima-Sensei gave me an awesome schedule, as I had four classes everyday, and two periods off. My new one is a fucking uneven disaster! I have four on Monday, FIVE on Tuesday (um, fuck that shit), TWO on Thursday, and FIVE on fucking Friday(of all days). This sucks ass. He also doesn’t know what he is doing, as 7kumi (special needs) only has two English classes a week (one with me and one with a normal teacher), and he put them both on the same day?! Um…..bring back Kojima, please!
Hmm, is there a positive note I can end this on? Um….I’m getting drunk with my new 3nensei teachers tonight! I hope it’s fun? I’m nervous, it will be my first enkai! Hmm, we shall see how it goes…..and how getting up at 5 am for a hike tomorrow will go. Oy.
K, that wasn’t very positive ;) Maybe next time! Hehe.
Thursday, April 06, 2006
Child Slave Labor
Yesterday I looked at the schedule for Thursday and it said, “Arrival of the new 3nensei and preparation for the new school year.” It is a sign that I have been here too long when I can sense that “preparation” is a secret word for “exploiting our kids to clean our dirty-ass, nasty school.” Sure enough, that’s exactly what we did!
The new 3nensei arrived at 9 in the morning, and by 9:01 they had the wet rags out and were cleaning every surface you could find (except for the walls, because Japanese people somehow don’t realize that walls should ever be cleaned). The sad thing is that the whole school was cleaned by students two weeks ago, but the damn Gunma winds brought TONS of dirt in through the closed windows, so everything was nasty again. A mixture of guilt and wanting to escape the boredom of my desk enticed me into helping the poor kids, but I am afraid I was worse than the 14 year-olds (13? Eh, I dunno how old they are). All of the kids were busy wiping the floors with wet towels (um, why not use mops?), and I was the ADD one that was like, “Hey, look! A bag full of ball crawl balls!” *throws them at kids* Hmm, I don’t think anyone was very impressed. When the jobs got too down-and-dirty, I would be the administrator and see how the kids were doing on other floors. I sort of helped, tho! I also succeeded in breathing in gallons of dust, so that has to count for some amount of work.
Yesterday Cindy and I were saying how ridiculous it is that the students are in charge of doing so much shit, and it really is true. Seriously, why should it be their job to come in during spring break and clean floors, desks, cubby holes, etc? Also, you really do get what you pay for when you have students do all of the shit for free. Japanese schools would be a LOT cleaner, hygienic, and attractive (well, as attractive as our prison schools can be) if they hired janitors. The only janitor-ish guy a school has is the groundskeeper, who pretty much just trims trees all day long (might I add that my groundskeeper is a bit too over-zealous with his job, and we pretty much only have stumps remaining at this point).
Having said all of this, I do have a lot of respect for the kids for not rebelling and doing a nation-wide towel-burning protest. I only helped for like 45 minutes and I was bitching and ready for lunch and a nap. The kids, on the other hand, didn’t think anything of it, and were barefoot, cleaning the halls (eww). So, Japanese kids around the country, my hat goes off to you. Let you never go to another country and realize that you shouldn’t be forced into doing all of this shit!
The new 3nensei arrived at 9 in the morning, and by 9:01 they had the wet rags out and were cleaning every surface you could find (except for the walls, because Japanese people somehow don’t realize that walls should ever be cleaned). The sad thing is that the whole school was cleaned by students two weeks ago, but the damn Gunma winds brought TONS of dirt in through the closed windows, so everything was nasty again. A mixture of guilt and wanting to escape the boredom of my desk enticed me into helping the poor kids, but I am afraid I was worse than the 14 year-olds (13? Eh, I dunno how old they are). All of the kids were busy wiping the floors with wet towels (um, why not use mops?), and I was the ADD one that was like, “Hey, look! A bag full of ball crawl balls!” *throws them at kids* Hmm, I don’t think anyone was very impressed. When the jobs got too down-and-dirty, I would be the administrator and see how the kids were doing on other floors. I sort of helped, tho! I also succeeded in breathing in gallons of dust, so that has to count for some amount of work.
Yesterday Cindy and I were saying how ridiculous it is that the students are in charge of doing so much shit, and it really is true. Seriously, why should it be their job to come in during spring break and clean floors, desks, cubby holes, etc? Also, you really do get what you pay for when you have students do all of the shit for free. Japanese schools would be a LOT cleaner, hygienic, and attractive (well, as attractive as our prison schools can be) if they hired janitors. The only janitor-ish guy a school has is the groundskeeper, who pretty much just trims trees all day long (might I add that my groundskeeper is a bit too over-zealous with his job, and we pretty much only have stumps remaining at this point).
Having said all of this, I do have a lot of respect for the kids for not rebelling and doing a nation-wide towel-burning protest. I only helped for like 45 minutes and I was bitching and ready for lunch and a nap. The kids, on the other hand, didn’t think anything of it, and were barefoot, cleaning the halls (eww). So, Japanese kids around the country, my hat goes off to you. Let you never go to another country and realize that you shouldn’t be forced into doing all of this shit!
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
The times, they are a-changin’
Japanese people are a seasonal people. Every season brings harsh changes in the weather, various festivals, new seasonal snacks at the conbini (this may be the most important change to Jeffu), and more. Spring has come to Japan, and with it come the sakura (cherry blossoms) and the tradition of hanami (sitting under the trees with friends or co-workers and getting shitfaced in honor of surviving an awful winter and seeing the beauty of the trees). Another important change that comes with spring is that practically every teacher in Japan gets a completely different job! After a week of wonderful vacation, I came back on Monday to say a rushed goodbye to my departing teachers, and have an “oh shit, I barely remembered the old co-workers’ names, now I have to remember NEW ones?!” moment.
Teachers get changed around schools regularly in Japan. I am not exactly sure why, but for some reason they believe it isn’t good for them to stay in one place for long. I feel the opposite way, but whatever. Anyway! I knew that new teachers would be coming, but I wasn’t sure how many, or who was leaving. In fact, the teachers that left didn’t even know until a week or two before they did so. So, on Monday I showed up at work, praying that we would get hot new teachers and that Fujii-Sensei, the hottest Japanese teacher in the world, wouldn’t leave. Needless to say, Monday was a bad day!!! Sigh.
I came in Monday morning and saw Fujii’s desk empty except for his Puma bag (I swear he single-handedly keeps Puma in business). Although I prayed that he was just thoroughly cleaning his desk, I knew better. Fujii and 21 other teachers (!!!) left on Monday and got replaced by 17 new teachers. Satou Sensei, another cute one, left, too! Of the 17 new teachers, only one is cute….hello, NOT a fair trade! I think I need to be in charge of the teacher bartering next year.
Not only is a third of the staff new, but the teachers that are staying are all teaching new grades, too. In other words, no one has any idea what they are doing. This is a nice change, as usually I am the only one that doesn’t know what is going on. Now people are asking ME questions, wtf! I don’t know the answers to any of them, but still :)
Along with the staff changes, we all moved our desks yesterday, as well. It was one of the most amusing moments at Yabuchu so far, as Japanese people actually acted like normal dirty people! There were people ALL over just pushing desks, getting dusty, being loud and chaotic as possible. It was like I was in a different country! I made the executive decision that there is such a thing as TOO much help, so I just watched and laughed. Yes, I’m sure they love me. The new English teacher (a 23 year-old attractive girl who just graduated from college…teaching 2nensei…at Yabuchu….I fear she may be eaten alive) arrived in the middle of this chaos, and I am sure wondered what the hell kind of school she got placed at.
The good news about the desk change is that I got a NEW desk where I don’t have to suck in my stomach and scoot my chair in every time someone walks behind me. I also have my monitor facing the windows so not everyone can see what I’m doing on my computer (I assure you it is ALL teaching-related). ALSO, I have the best people-watching desk in the office! Hello, this is great! I also have a view of two cute teachers to stare at when bored (alas, if only Fujii were here!).
So, even though Jeff doesn’t adjust to change very well, these seem to be good changes so far. Yay, spring!
Teachers get changed around schools regularly in Japan. I am not exactly sure why, but for some reason they believe it isn’t good for them to stay in one place for long. I feel the opposite way, but whatever. Anyway! I knew that new teachers would be coming, but I wasn’t sure how many, or who was leaving. In fact, the teachers that left didn’t even know until a week or two before they did so. So, on Monday I showed up at work, praying that we would get hot new teachers and that Fujii-Sensei, the hottest Japanese teacher in the world, wouldn’t leave. Needless to say, Monday was a bad day!!! Sigh.
I came in Monday morning and saw Fujii’s desk empty except for his Puma bag (I swear he single-handedly keeps Puma in business). Although I prayed that he was just thoroughly cleaning his desk, I knew better. Fujii and 21 other teachers (!!!) left on Monday and got replaced by 17 new teachers. Satou Sensei, another cute one, left, too! Of the 17 new teachers, only one is cute….hello, NOT a fair trade! I think I need to be in charge of the teacher bartering next year.
Not only is a third of the staff new, but the teachers that are staying are all teaching new grades, too. In other words, no one has any idea what they are doing. This is a nice change, as usually I am the only one that doesn’t know what is going on. Now people are asking ME questions, wtf! I don’t know the answers to any of them, but still :)
Along with the staff changes, we all moved our desks yesterday, as well. It was one of the most amusing moments at Yabuchu so far, as Japanese people actually acted like normal dirty people! There were people ALL over just pushing desks, getting dusty, being loud and chaotic as possible. It was like I was in a different country! I made the executive decision that there is such a thing as TOO much help, so I just watched and laughed. Yes, I’m sure they love me. The new English teacher (a 23 year-old attractive girl who just graduated from college…teaching 2nensei…at Yabuchu….I fear she may be eaten alive) arrived in the middle of this chaos, and I am sure wondered what the hell kind of school she got placed at.
The good news about the desk change is that I got a NEW desk where I don’t have to suck in my stomach and scoot my chair in every time someone walks behind me. I also have my monitor facing the windows so not everyone can see what I’m doing on my computer (I assure you it is ALL teaching-related). ALSO, I have the best people-watching desk in the office! Hello, this is great! I also have a view of two cute teachers to stare at when bored (alas, if only Fujii were here!).
So, even though Jeff doesn’t adjust to change very well, these seem to be good changes so far. Yay, spring!
Hisashiburi, Buroggu-san
Yes, I have been a bad blogger, but I also haven’t been home in like 300 years! My sister came and we had soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo much fun. We did way too much shit, so you will just have to take my word that we had fun, ‘cause there is no way I am typing it all out. We went to Kusatsu (famous for onsen), Nikko (a sort of mini-Kyoto in Tochigi), Toyama (host family and EATING like bitches), Tokyo, etc. We had a GREAT time, and it was very depressing to return to my sad boring apartment by myself on Sunday! Not acceptable! However, I realized that my apartment is plenty big for one person, but gets very small with two people! I also realized that I am glad I will never have to live with a girl, because there is fucking long hair all over my damn apartment! GROSS! I will post pictures eventually, but we all know that I am lazy when it comes to that….so, we shall see!
Oh, yeah, since Cindy’s blog is the same as mine, you can read hers to see some of the stuff we did :)
Oh, yeah, since Cindy’s blog is the same as mine, you can read hers to see some of the stuff we did :)
Friday, March 17, 2006
You know what’s boring?
WORK! WORK IS FUCKING BORING AS ALL FUCK! Boring boring boring boring boring so boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring!!!! Is it spring break yet???????
Thursday, March 16, 2006
Photos update
I updated my photos page with pics of Ann’s and my birthday party, Shibukawa, and graduation. Check it out, yo. I will put up non-family-friendly pics on the blog soon, hopefully.
Tales of the Yabuchu
Various stories from Yabuchu as of late:
-The other day at lunch I was STUFFED from the hugest kyushoku ever, and was telling my JTE that my onaka was ippai. She asked me how to say it in English, which worried me a bit, seeing as how she is the 3nensei JTE and should know how to say “I’m full.” I told her, and she responded, “Oh, so you say, ‘my stomachache is fooru?” I was like “um, just ‘I’m full’ is okay.” Ummmmmmmmm……perhaps she should know the difference between stomach and stomachache. Sigh.
-I assumed that every school is like mine on special ceremony days, but apparently not, so I will share the tale of my ghetto-ass school. All students in Japan are required to have black hair. Well, or brown, if they are weird and have brown hair, hehe. Anyway, they aren’t allowed to dye it. However, a lot of the students do so here and get away with it for the most part, until we have a special event such as opening or closing ceremony, singing contest, graduation, etc. Apparently other schools just tell the kids to dye their hair back to black, and the kids listen to the teachers. Here at Yabu, however, the kids can’t be given such responsibility, so we grab them, drag them into the staffroom, and hold them down while we spray their hair black. The morning of every event, a teacher will bring a box of black hair spray into the staffroom in preparation.
Graduation was even more amusing than ever, as I witnessed two kids being forced to wash their hair in the staffroom sink (um, actually that wasn’t so amusing, because I get my water and tea from that sink, EWW. Thank god for the tea lady being bored and cleaning it like every five minutes). The funniest moment by far was when one of the 3nensei sluts (who somehow has gotten away with a nose piercing for like six months?! Hello, I was forced to take out my earring! Bastards!) was dragged in the staffroom, covered in newspapers, and held down while a teacher sprayed her hair. Her look of anger, combined with newspapers hanging from her shoulders was far too much. I SO wanted a picture of it, but decided she probably wouldn’t be very happy with me. Hehe.
-There is this one “bad boy” 3nensei who I literally saw maybe three or four times in the last six months of school. He never acted up when I saw him, but I could tell that I would have hated him when he was an 1 and 2nensei. Anyway, he apparently always skipped classes, as I really had no idea who he was or what class he was supposed to be in. He was at graduation along with a girl who I had NEVER seen, who apparently was a 3nensei, as she graduated too (more details on the fucked-up Japanese education system at Cindy’s blog). She looks like the female version of him, but I think they might be dating, which is VERY gross in my book. Anyway, I pretty much never saw them at school, but the DAY after graduation, they show up (in “cool” sweats, big surprise!) and hang out in the staffroom for like an hour! What the hell! If you didn’t ever come to school while you were a student, don’t come back and hang out after you graduate!
-Japanese kids love word finds more than anything in the world. If you ever want to get kids to focus on English, give them a word find and they won’t talk for an hour. I taught my worst 1nensei class today by myself, which would usually be a recipe for disaster, but they were quieter than they've ever been thanks to the word find. Ah, I rabu rabu me some word finds!
-The other day at lunch I was STUFFED from the hugest kyushoku ever, and was telling my JTE that my onaka was ippai. She asked me how to say it in English, which worried me a bit, seeing as how she is the 3nensei JTE and should know how to say “I’m full.” I told her, and she responded, “Oh, so you say, ‘my stomachache is fooru?” I was like “um, just ‘I’m full’ is okay.” Ummmmmmmmm……perhaps she should know the difference between stomach and stomachache. Sigh.
-I assumed that every school is like mine on special ceremony days, but apparently not, so I will share the tale of my ghetto-ass school. All students in Japan are required to have black hair. Well, or brown, if they are weird and have brown hair, hehe. Anyway, they aren’t allowed to dye it. However, a lot of the students do so here and get away with it for the most part, until we have a special event such as opening or closing ceremony, singing contest, graduation, etc. Apparently other schools just tell the kids to dye their hair back to black, and the kids listen to the teachers. Here at Yabu, however, the kids can’t be given such responsibility, so we grab them, drag them into the staffroom, and hold them down while we spray their hair black. The morning of every event, a teacher will bring a box of black hair spray into the staffroom in preparation.
Graduation was even more amusing than ever, as I witnessed two kids being forced to wash their hair in the staffroom sink (um, actually that wasn’t so amusing, because I get my water and tea from that sink, EWW. Thank god for the tea lady being bored and cleaning it like every five minutes). The funniest moment by far was when one of the 3nensei sluts (who somehow has gotten away with a nose piercing for like six months?! Hello, I was forced to take out my earring! Bastards!) was dragged in the staffroom, covered in newspapers, and held down while a teacher sprayed her hair. Her look of anger, combined with newspapers hanging from her shoulders was far too much. I SO wanted a picture of it, but decided she probably wouldn’t be very happy with me. Hehe.
-There is this one “bad boy” 3nensei who I literally saw maybe three or four times in the last six months of school. He never acted up when I saw him, but I could tell that I would have hated him when he was an 1 and 2nensei. Anyway, he apparently always skipped classes, as I really had no idea who he was or what class he was supposed to be in. He was at graduation along with a girl who I had NEVER seen, who apparently was a 3nensei, as she graduated too (more details on the fucked-up Japanese education system at Cindy’s blog). She looks like the female version of him, but I think they might be dating, which is VERY gross in my book. Anyway, I pretty much never saw them at school, but the DAY after graduation, they show up (in “cool” sweats, big surprise!) and hang out in the staffroom for like an hour! What the hell! If you didn’t ever come to school while you were a student, don’t come back and hang out after you graduate!
-Japanese kids love word finds more than anything in the world. If you ever want to get kids to focus on English, give them a word find and they won’t talk for an hour. I taught my worst 1nensei class today by myself, which would usually be a recipe for disaster, but they were quieter than they've ever been thanks to the word find. Ah, I rabu rabu me some word finds!
Kyoukasho Switch
I found out this week (to my chagrin) that we are switching from the oh-so-amazing Sunshine textbook to One World beginning in April. While this is good news, due to Sunshine’s extreme crappiness, it is bad news to Jeffrey because it means I might not be able to re-use some of my lesson plans next year! Fortunately most of the grammar points are the same, so I should be able to re-use most. We shall see.
I got my copies of One World today and flipped through them, and they seemed slightly better than Sunshine (tho I will miss slutty Yuki!!!). Cindy, I agree that Coach Brown is one scary-ass beeotch, wtf! Also, why does EVERY Japanese-made ESL textbook have to have a character named Mr. or Ms. Brown? Even Yokoso, the Japanese textbook I used in high school, had a Brown Sensei. It really isn’t that common of a last name, folks.
While reading a few random chapters from the textbook (a sign of my complete boredom at work today), I found out that the first English teacher was from Oregon and was named Ranald MacDonald! Ahahaha! I find it somehow fitting that the first English teacher in this country had the same name (albeit mis-spelled) as the mascot of McDonald’s.
I do have one large worry related to the new textbooks…there is a PLETHORA of songs (with freaking music written out in the books!) to sing along to. My JTEs had better not expect me to bust out into fucking days of the week songs and shit. I do that enough at shou, yo. Plus I don’t even do it with 5 and 6nensei there, as they are too cool to sing, let alone chuugakusei, wtf! Ota ALTs, an anti-singing petition may be in our futures.
I got my copies of One World today and flipped through them, and they seemed slightly better than Sunshine (tho I will miss slutty Yuki!!!). Cindy, I agree that Coach Brown is one scary-ass beeotch, wtf! Also, why does EVERY Japanese-made ESL textbook have to have a character named Mr. or Ms. Brown? Even Yokoso, the Japanese textbook I used in high school, had a Brown Sensei. It really isn’t that common of a last name, folks.
While reading a few random chapters from the textbook (a sign of my complete boredom at work today), I found out that the first English teacher was from Oregon and was named Ranald MacDonald! Ahahaha! I find it somehow fitting that the first English teacher in this country had the same name (albeit mis-spelled) as the mascot of McDonald’s.
I do have one large worry related to the new textbooks…there is a PLETHORA of songs (with freaking music written out in the books!) to sing along to. My JTEs had better not expect me to bust out into fucking days of the week songs and shit. I do that enough at shou, yo. Plus I don’t even do it with 5 and 6nensei there, as they are too cool to sing, let alone chuugakusei, wtf! Ota ALTs, an anti-singing petition may be in our futures.
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