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!

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.

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!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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!

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.

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.

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.

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!

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.

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!

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.

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 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!

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 :)

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???????

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!

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.

Photoso de randomo

Instead of posting useful pics, here are three ones taken because I was both bored and amused....



An apartment complex called "kuroobaa" Heights. I thought it was supposed to mean Crowbar Heights, but Ann realized that it's meant to be Clover Heights. I wanna live in Crowbar Heights!


Only in Japan is it okay to park like this


These are all over the trains lately. They are meant to be running noses, but they look rather penis-y to me!

Sotsugyou omedetou!

Today was the graduation ceremony for the 3nensei. They have been practicing forever, and I predicted that it would be very organized, but probably not entertaining at all, as it is Japanese and boring (I’m not a bitch!). Man, did I predict things correctly! First of all, I stood up and sat down so many times that it felt like I was at Catholic church! All we needed was someone molesting little boys….oh, wait, that’s me! Ahaha, I kid because I love. Anyway, it wasn’t very fun at all. Even the 3nensei seemed bored! On top of the boredom, I was literally about to pee my pants for like two hours until I finally left in the middle. My thought process throughout the entire ceremony went something like this: “Man, this is fucking boring. Fuck, we’re standing again?! At least I’m sitting next to the hot sensei, rowr. Man, I have to pee. This is boring. FUCK, I have to pee. Why is this PTA guy talking for ten hours?! Shut up or I’ll pee on your face. Fuck this is boring and I have to PEEEEEEEEEE, end now!” Yes, good times in the gym.

Afterwards the parents and teachers watched the students leave school for the last time, it was really sad! Well, not really leave school, but like walk away from it….or something. I was happy that I brought my camera because I finally got to take pics with my students, yay! Man, I have never done the peace sign so many times in my life! It was fun, though….I’m gonna miss my 3nensei! Sotsugyou omedetouuuuuuuuuu!

The Wonderful Wiz of Shibukawa

On Friday Cindy and I branched out and actually (gasp) left Ota for the night! We wandered up north to the ever-happenin’ metropolis known as Shibukawa to party Shibs-style! It was a lot of fun, and Shibukawa is actually a lot bigger than I expected based on descriptions. It’s cute!

I do believe the whole night was a big excuse for me to ruin the week’s diet as much as possible. Not only did I get a “snack” at McDonald’s, but I also ate for like seven hours in a row. Hrm. Oh, well.

Anyway, we went to The Wiz, the local karaoke place, which was…..extremely interesting :) I don’t think words can do it justice, but I will try. First of all, I was surprised, because it is the American version of a karaoke bar. There aren’t karaoke boxes, but one karaoke machine and lots of tables (the place was huge!). All of the tables are surrounded by the most ‘70’s chairs one could possibly imagine, and it is all dark and VERY ghetto, indeed! The place is run by an old obachan who does everything herself, including putting in your songs. You write the numbers on a piece of paper, give them to her, and she puts them in. This gives her a bit too much control, as apparently some nights she will just stop putting them in when she is trying to “hint” that you should leave! Hahaha. Anyway, the place was huge, but we were the ONLY ones there. It was fun! It was nice to see Shibukawa peeps, as well as others that wandered on up. I think the lady may have had a crush on me, as she would stop serving drinks and stare at me while I was singing? Hmm, perhaps I can get some old lady action in Shibukawa! Sweeeeeeeeeeet!

After a lot of nomihoudai, we made our way to Chau’s house, where we proved that we are the biggest nerds EVER by playing Taboo until 4 in the morning. I seriously could have played it for like five more hours! We played east coasters versus west coasters, and might I say that west coasters are amazing! We more than doubled the east coasters’ score, and their may have been a small amount of bitterness in the room! Hehe. Also, I must say that Daniel is a genius and had the most elaborate explanations for words, while the rest of us could barely speak English. Hmm.

We assed out at Anna’s house at 5 in the morning (thanks, Anna!), and I discovered that I am an old man, as I hadn’t been up that late in a million years. Saturday we went to lunch in Shibs, then trained it back to Ota to see Narnia at AEON. Um, that is the longest movie EVER. It really isn’t THAT long, but it feels like eight years long. Also, the kids annoyed me. Ehhhhhh, I didn’t like it very much. Sad. We also tried the tabehoudai place at AEON and discovered that like many buffets in America, it was too good to be true. We got a coupon for a free meal the next time we went, and no one wanted it! Haha.

On Sunday I got on my knees, worked up a sweat, and got dirty………bleaching my floors! Hmm, perhaps I should have invested in some gloves for that project, as my hands still smell of poison. I came to the conclusion halfway through that I don’t plan on doing it again this year because cleaning floors sucks. Time to buy a Swiffer! It was good, tho, as I have been meaning to do it for like eight months. I should have visitors more often, my house is gonna be hella clean by the time Kris comes!

I also went to Bunshindo and rented the gayest shit EVER. I got another Hirai Ken CD, Waterboys (the movie about a high school boys’ synchronized swimming team), and Umizaru (a movie based on the TV show about divers who wear spandex the whole time). Mmmmm! I watched Waterboys, and it is really good in a horrible horrible way. Good stuff!

Meh, I really need to upload a million photos but I am oh, so lazy. Eventually!

Busy doing nothing?

So this week I have practically no classes because of graduation prep and god knows what else. I usually get bored just sitting in the staffroom, but somehow I am extremely content doing nothing for seven hours? In fact, I got the rest of the month’s schedule this morning, and I was annoyed that I actually have more classes in the next two weeks than I thought. How dare I have to teach this month!

One might think that having so many hours of pure freedom would mean that I am getting all kinds of things done….reading and finishing the ENORMOUS pile of books awaiting me, making reservations for when my sister comes, planning…I dunno, stuff. But somehow 4:05 comes and I can’t remember what I did all day long. Seriously, I am never bored or just staring at the wall, but I have no proof of being productive. I do very, very small “chores,” but nothing big….where the hell does all of the time go?! I know I’m not the only ALT that feels this way. Hmm, perhaps the staffroom somehow alters one’s sense of time. Who knows. All I know is that I’m doing nothing and loving it!

Daietto chuu

Because we feel disgusting in every way possible, Ann, Cindy and I are attempting the impossible: we are going on a diet. It’s a sad day when we have to take such drastic measures, but I’m afraid we have reached that point where we are SO fucking fat and lazy from this stupid-ass winter that it feels like we’re each pregnant. With quintuplets.

The diet officially starts today, but I did a pretty good job yesterday, too, so it sorta started yesterday for me. Except for the Ministop berry parfait :) We aren’t going to stop eating by any means, but we are going to eat smaller portions and limit dessert to a small piece of candy or form of sugar that fixes the craving but doesn’t go overboard like, say, a bowl of MOW ice cream. I MUST lose weight before seeing Eduardo, dammit!

Fortunately for my body’s sake, the weather is starting to warm up, so it is actually possible to bike around and exercise a bit more than in the last three months or so. I went around town yesterday and it felt nice. Unfortunately for the diet, however, Kris (my sister) is coming in a week and a half, and I don’t see how two Santilli children together could possibly adhere to a diet while on vacation! Hmm. We shall see. If anyone wants to join our mission, you are more than welcome. Let’s ganbaru!

Let’s play “find the gaijin!”

Eventually I want a picture of myself in a crowded Tokyo train with my head about ten feet above everyone else’s, but in the meantime I have my staff photo that is pretty much the same thing, only on bleachers. I was just handed the photo and it is RIDICULOUS, I really need a scan of it. I knew when they put me in the middle it was a bad idea in the first place, but I am seriously like three heads taller than the person next to me and white as…..something that’s really white. Oy oy oy. No wonder people can always find me in crowds!

A Debauchery-filled Weekend

I think I had enough fun on Friday to make up for my otherwise very chill weekend. Friday night was Ann’s and my combo birthday party and it was muy tanoshiiyo! Well, what I can remember of it, hehe. The night started out at Ikkyuu, my (and most people’s, kana?) favorite izakaya (Japanese-style bar) in Ota. We got a TON of food (too much, if such a thing exists!), and nomihoudai for $35, and we DEFINITELY got our money’s worth out of it. Hmm, I hope we can go back there! Anyway, I think there were 23 people there? A lot of loud-ass gaijin, is all I know! It was hella fun. Highlights included Grant’s bucket of 100 yen presents, including a princess set with rings, a wand and a crown that I was like “Fuck, no, I am NOT wearing that shit!,” then proceeded to wear it for an hour for some reason. Also, the obligatory freak dancing with Veronica, making out with a few people (um, I didn’t remember that until I saw photos….why do I always make out with people in Japan?), being loud as fuck, and god knows what else. It was fun fun fun fun fun, so thank you for everyone who came AND THANK YOU CINDY AND EMILY FOR ORGANIZING IT!

After that some of us went to karaoke at the usual place above Gen, which will no longer be the usual place, as we can never go back there again! I broke a glass, stole a Hirai Ken poster (and was SO not sneaky in doing so), we had a fucked-up remote (or fucked-up users, kana?) and we generally irritated them as much as possible. But it’s okay because we are sick of that place anyway. It wasn’t as fun as normal karaoke because of the fucked-up remote, unfortunately, sniff. But it was still fun, I’m sure….I can’t remember that much other than falling over on Veronica and her saying “AN ENTIRE MAN JUST FELL ON ME!” Hehehe. Sorry, V!

Ann and I stayed over at Cindy’s that night, which was a cool way to make it so the night didn’t end with last trains.

The next morning we woke up far too early, but had a good breakfast and chilled with our hangovers. Because of tiredness and general badness, Saturday was pretty much a waste of time :)

Sunday was more productive than most Sundays, but nothing exciting to talk about. Except for the Ministop double berry parfait, which is SO DAMN GOOD. Everyone must go to Ministop right now and get one. On that thrilling note, I will end this entry. Photos to come when I get unlazy!

The health benefits or gargling?

K, so I have been meaning to ask this for a while…

In Japan, to promote staying healthy, they tell you to wash your hands and gargle water. There are signs all over school for it (though to be fair, there are signs all over school for EVERYTHING, from “wear a bike helmet!” to “save your money!”). I understand the need to wash your hands (even though the Japanese soap-in-the-net thing is a bit sketchy to me), but does gargling actually have any health benefits? The only time I ever think to gargle is with salt water if I have a sore throat. Does gargling water actually get rid of germs? What is the apparent point of doing so, and does it actually work? I need to know, people! Feel free to leave a comment.

In the words of Aristotle, this is some fucked-up shit

Apparently eating too much crappy-ass pizza can mess with your brain.

Those crazy Chinese

Yesterday, Ann, Cindy, Sean and I were discussing how Beijing would never be ready to host the Olympics, and then today this article comes out. Too amusing.

Shizougakkou

Check out my awesome rapper Japanese. I’m really cool!

Yesterday I had shougakkou for the first time in three weeks. I managed to avoid it two weeks in a row thanks to an orientation and being sick, so I was dreading actually drudging up enough energy (hmm, I don’t think that’s the right word. Or the right use of that word. Hmm. Drudge? Eh, whatever) to teach 5 genki shougakkou classes. However, it actually turned out to be a fun (albeit COMPLETELY exhausting) day.

Apparently I had enough genki-ness stored up from the two weeks off that I was like on crack the whole time and was all over the place and really happy? It was strange and I kinda freaked myself out, but the kids seemed to enjoy it. We’re also at the end of the year, so I don’t really care if I have big themes for the lessons or not. I did for most of ‘em, but some I was just like “Let’s play fruit basket and karuta for 50 minutes!” which the kids seemed to love. Also, the lesson of the day is: if you own a big-ass dice, bring it to shougakkou and let the kids roll it. It will entertain them for HOURS and they will beg you to let them roll it more. Not exactly sure why, but I highly suggest it.

The highlight of the day was lunch time, when one of the 6nensei classes had a big lunch party with the teachers. It was SO fun and SOOO cute, I wish I had brought my camera! They invited all of the teachers into a special room with their kyushoku, but they also made us yakisoba sandwiches and a strawberry pastry dessert, and they served us drinks, as well. Oh, I also got an invite in the mail from them for this party, AND they re-scheduled it so I could be there, awww! I love my 6nensei!

Each table had a few students and a few teachers, and the kids made a board game for us to play. And at the end of the (huge and delicious) lunch, they played a song for us on their recorders! AWWWWW! I really wish I would have brought my camera! They were so cute, though, and really excited for it. Aww, I love my 6nensei! I can’t wait to teach them at chuugakkou (although that means I have to watch them turn into teenagers and become possibly bitchy! Noooooo!).

It was a good day, though. I also turned in my FUCKING culture board, finally. I refuse to do it next year, dammit!

Last night Sean, Cindy, Ann and I went out to dinner and stayed out as long as possible to delay going home and thinking about work the next day. It was a fun dinner, though.

And now I’m at work….lalalalalala. One class cut today, though! AND evil Yoshiki’s class is cut tomorrow, wheeeee!

Saabisu

So in Japan products will oftentimes randomly come with a "saabisu" (service), which is a free little present (usually of the cute variety) that comes along with said product. These are often attached to sodas and other things at the grocery store.

Today I was at the drug store and had to choose a decongestant. I would usually get Sudafed, but it is illegal here because of the meth-making stuff in it. Anyway, while debating between brand names, I noticed that Contac, while being a bit more expensive than everything else, came with a cute saabisu. So, that made my decision for me! Damn, I guess that cheap-ass marketing really works....


Kawaiiiiiii!


A towel that came with a bottle of water.


This came on a wine bottle. What could this mysterious plastic contain?


It OBVIOUSLY becomes an extremely classy wine "glass" for picnics!

Ankeeto

This month’s lunch menu came with the results of a survey of 2nensei students on the back. The survey had questions regarding their eating, sleeping and health habits, and I think was just an excuse to indulge Japan’s not-so-secret love with surveys and graphs, but it had some interesting results.

When asked how they were feeling the morning they took the survey, only 22% felt well, 8 % “felt well and had various conditions” (um, I have NO clue what that means), and 69% didn’t feel well.

When asked what time they went to sleep the night before, only 9% went to bed between 9-10:00. 18% went to bed between 10-11, 29% went to bed between 11-12, and freaking 42% went to bed some time after midnight. Dude, that is NOT much sleep for growing chuugakusei to be getting! Might I mention that it’s later than I go to bed, sad! No wonder these kids are always sick, they’re too busy studying, doing sports, and studying even more to eat, sleep, or have fun. Poor kids!

Gee, Bush is so multi-cultural

From The NY Times:

“President Bush is planning a two-day wind sprint across India this week, when he will meet with political leaders, chat up high-tech millionaires and give a speech at a 16th-century fort. But to the consternation of the Indians, he will not see the country's most famous monument, the Taj Mahal, a decision that Mr. Bush said was made by an omnipotent scheduler.

"Look, if I were the scheduler, perhaps I'd be doing things differently," Mr. Bush said last week, when he was asked in an interview with Indian reporters at the White House why he was skipping the Taj. "I'll be the president, we've got the scheduler being the scheduler. I'm going to miss a lot of the really interesting parts of your great country. I know that."

Mr. Bush has never been a sightseer, and his planned two days in India and one in Pakistan are typical of a president who visited the Great Wall of China in 30 minutes flat.”

Not only does he sound like a jack-ass in the interview with the reporters, but how the hell does someone visit the Great Wall in 30 minutes?! Ugh.

Oishiizo

So, I am officially in love with Hirai Ken, the Japanese popstar. He is the hottest not-hot guy in the entire world! I am far too addicted to his greatest hits CD and DVD....I have been watching his music videos in unhealthy doses lately, but....Hirai Ken! ROWR!

I don't expect anyone in the States to understand my obsession, as I would also be confused at my choice. But coming from Japanese Jeff, he's fucking hot, yo!

Koukou

My 3nensei graduate in two weeks, and many don’t even know what high school they are going to yet! I can’t imagine not knowing what high school I would attend a month away from the new school year starting. That is so crazy to my procrastinate-y American mind, let alone an organized Japanese mind! How do they not go crazy not knowing such things? More power to ‘em, I suppose.

I also can’t believe how far some of my students are going for school. One of my favorite students told me today that she is going to a school in Takasaki. Dude, I can barely be bothered to go there for shopping on a Saturday because it takes so long to get there! How the hell can she go there and back every single day?! It seriously takes like an hour and a half to get there from here because of the train transfer (unless she is motivated and wants to bike a half hour to Iwajuku every day, which would equally suck). Man, these kids are crazy.

Doing new things?! What’s that?

I had a VERY enjoyable weekend, although it went far too fast. I love that weeks go by really quickly, but I don’t enjoy the fact that weekends go by equally as fast. Hrm.

Anyway, Friday night there was a Country Ma’am (me, Jenny and Cindy) gathering at Cindy’s place to watch the Golden Globes and other assorted American entertainment. It served as an excuse for us to eat far too much food and talk shit about celebrities for four hours. We thought more people were coming, so we had enough food for like six people or more, but of course the three of us ate almost all of it. Jesus, we have problems. It was fun to watch the Golden Globes, tho, and the good thing about watching it a month and a half after it airs is that we all forgot who won, so it was surprising!

We also watched a few interviews with Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger (yes, I realize I have mentioned Brokeback like 300 times in the last two weeks, but whatever!) and I got really annoyed with the STUPID questions they ask them. First of all, every interview is the same, and every interview is homophobic. It’s really annoying! I am half irritated at the interviewer and half irritated with our society for those questions needing to be asked. Like, every interview pretty much consisted of them asking about the “risks” involved with playing a gay character and how nervous they were doing the kissing scenes and stupid shit like that. Like, it is obvious that they will ask those questions, but it is also so fucking stupid, in my opinion. Hello, they’re fucking actors, their job is to pretend to be someone else, it shouldn’t be a “risk” to pretend they’re gay. Also, I got especially irritated when Oprah was asking these questions because I would have expected better than her. To me it’s not different than asking if an actor was nervous about kissing a black person on screen or anything like that. It’s fucking ridiculous. *breathes*

Um, where was I? Anyway, that was Friday and it was fun! Hehe. On Saturday I met up with Cindy and Ann and went to Korona no yu, which is the onsen and sauna at Korona. I had heard great things about it, but I didn’t realize that it was the GREATEST PLACE ON THE PLANET, holy shit! It’s really new-looking and nice, and was SO relaxing. The onsen was great, but I fucking loved the sauna. You get to wear these comfy-ass pajama-like things made out of towel material, and since you’re not naked, it’s co-ed (not that naked things aren’t co-ed in Japan). There was this great hot rock room and all kinds of stuff. I was the lonely sweaty-ass Whitey McWhiterson, but I still enjoyed it. There is also a theater room where you can lay down and watch movies, a relaxation room with magazines and TV to watch, and all kinds of shit. It was sooooooooooo good, I am SO bringing any visitors there.

After that we met up with Emily and had Thai food in Ashikaga to celebrate Ann’s birthday (happy birthday, Ann!). It was sooooo good. They also gave us the “VIP room,” which was like our own private dining room, which was cool. And we deserved it since we ordered about 300 different dishes.

After that we headed back to Korona and wasted time while waiting for a pool table. While we never ended up playing pool, we did some crappy purikura, I rocked ass on taiko (and got my own little fan club of kids who practiced their English on me, awwww! And I got fucking blisters from the drum sticks, bastards!), and played darts (don’t ever play with Cindy; I think she is secretly British!). It was a really fun day because all of the activities were something we hadn’t done before. It was soooo nice to discover there is more stuff to do in Ota! Very very fun day.

On Sunday I talked to my sister for over an hour about her visit…I can’t believe she’s here in less than three weeks! We have some fun stuff planned, I can’t wait. I also talked to my family, watched Love Actually (fuck, Rodrigo Santoro is fucking hot), and wasted time doing god knows what. I love me some Sundays.

Ah, Memories

Sean asked me the other day what I did for my last birthday, and I couldn’t remember at all. My generic answer was, “Hmm, probably drinking with friends and dancing. There’s always lots of dancing!” Thanks to iPhoto and the “remember the drunkest moments of your college career in photos” website known as DannyFayDotCom, the flashbacks came flooding back of a very fun cocktail party turned into a very very drunk and bad scene of me raping poor Nathaniel (pretty much literally) on the dance floor of Neighbors (for those of you fortunate enough to have never been to Neighbors, it is the sole gay bar in Eugene, Oregon (my college town), and to add to its classiness, it used to be a McDonald’s). Ugh, bad bad bad memories. Nate-kun, I highly doubt you are reading this, but just in case….sorry! Hee hee. A few photos of the occasion just because I’m bored:


Danny Bonaduce! YEEEEEEEEEEA!


Aww, the girls!


Poor "stung by a bee on the face" Alexia!


Where da hooks for hands at?


Awww, dinner party memories!


Me and mi mexicano.


Nate, pre-rape


Always a sign of badness to come....


Thank god this picture doesn't go further left...

Movies!

Man, I am so excited that good films are coming out in the next month. A bunch of us saw Walk the Line on Monday (I would recommend to anyone…I didn’t give a shit about Johnny Cash, but it was a good film and Reese Witherspoon and Joaquin Phoenix were amazing in it), and I think I’m seeing Jarhead this Monday. Narnia and Syriana are out next Saturday, then Wallace and Gromit and Brokeback are out later in March. Yay, movies!

On a non-movie note, Holly informed me today that Coldplay is coming to Japan in mid-July! Woot! Let’s going!

Almost Friday

Man, the week goes by much faster when you miss two days of work! I was feeling crappy this week, so I didn’t go to work on Tuesday or Wednesday. I was planning on taking a “sick” day on Tuesday anyway for my mental health, but I think the fates punished me for doing such a thing, as I was actually sick, hrm. But at least it made me feel a lot less guilty! I was still out of it on Wednesday and couldn’t even think of being genki enough for shougakkou, so I missed that, as well.

Man, days off are addicting! Sleeping in + being able to talk to Eduardo + lots of TV + making yummy breakfasts = why do I ever go to work?! I made huevos rancheros yesterday with the corn tortillas I found at AEON (!!!) and it was fucking GOOD. I found salsa there, too, and it is wayyy spicier than I expected. Man, I am so Japanese now, I can’t handle spicy stuff at all. I was like sweating and sniffling and crap, it was embarrassing. I may very well die in Mexico.

Yesterday was my birthday, and might I say that anything past 21 is just really boring! Oh, well. At least I didn't have to work on my birthday ;) At night I went to Chuck E. Cheese’s with my friends and we ate some pizza and played lots of games….I won enough tickets to get a back scratcher!!!!!

…Or, I went to Moti (yummy Indian restaurant) and ate WAY too much food.

Today I came back to work, and it was a fine day. We had the 3nensei okurukai, which is like a goodbye party for the 3nensei (different than graduation). I thought it would be a bit more interesting than it was. It was a couple of speeches and all of the grades singing their konkuuru songs. I didn’t really get the point of it, and even the 3nensei seemed bored. Hello, Ann’s high school had like rock performances and skits and shit! Oh, well.

This is a really boring blog entry! 15 more minutes of work, yay!

Pictures!

Finally, pics to show from Jenny and Skye's birthday party...


Aww, Ota love!


Crazy girls not getting alcoholic drinks! Tsk tsk!


This picture scares me a bit.


This picture scares me a LOT more! That is the most molester-ish look I have ever seen! At least Jenny seems pleased with it ;)


Dipping my "chopstick" in a "Mexican"


WOW, Aussies put their all into karaoke!


Hmmmm.


I remember being really impressed with not falling over while doing this.


Look out, Sean, you got competition!


I do my best Brokeback Mountain impression....

More photos can be seen on my photos page.

HELL yes!

Conbinis are coming to the US!

A little touch of home

My parents sent me a care package today, and what is the item I am most excited about? Sadly, a can opener. However, I have a legitimate reason! I usually am not a "USA all the way!" kind of person, but let's face it...American can openers are much easier and more logical than Japanese/European/whatever can openers. I have managed to cut myself quite badly due to horrible Japanese can openers, and other times I just avoid canned items for fear of pain or anger problems (yes, I am retarded, but come on!). So, this entry is an ode to American can openers. Honestly, would you rather have this beautifully crafted piece of heaven:


Or this piece of shit that one would use on fucking Brokeback Mountain:


I mean, I guess I would use this, but only if it meant that I got to have mad sex with Jake Gyllenhaal. Until then, I'll use my American one, and my uncut fingers will be very happy with that decision (tho another body part will miss the options involved with the camping type).

Eduardo, Margaritas and Chilaquiles, here I come!!!!!!

I just got my nenkyuu (time off) for Mexico!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My kyoto sensei rules. I’m always afraid to ask for time off that conflicts with school (this will be five days I’m missing of actual school), but then whenever I muster up the courage to ask him, he’s like “Yeah, whatever, have a safe trip!” Hehe. WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO MEXICO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Time to book my flight!

Running out of creative titles for weekend-related posts

I had a good weekend, and I SORT OF did more than the usual lazy weekend. Well, kinda, hehe. On Friday I made my way over to AEON after (the worst, longest day EVER of) work and spent wayyyyyyy too much money on myself! Damn! I was all proud because for once I saved the amount I told myself I would save every month, and then some, but the “and then some” was spent at various stores in AEON. Hmm, I sense that sentence made NO sense. Anyway! So, Takeo Kikuchi is my favorite store in AEON, but every single shopping trip there goes something like this, “Oooo, I love this shirt! I wonder if they have my size? Dammit, they NEVER have my size! I hate this fucking store!!!! FUCK YOU!” and then I walk off angrily. BUT this time I found the most Jeff-ish sweater-jacket thing in the world, AND they had my size. So, I ignored the price tag and bought the motherfucker!

I also treated myself to the Hirai Ken CD/DVD set at HMV because Hirai Ken is my lovah. Rowr! And I bought Coronas, salsa, and chile verde sauce (!!!) at the foreign food store. And I bought shit for my kids at the 100 yen store. And I think I got something else. Plus dinner and Starbucks. Yes, Jeff spent 2 man on Friday. Anyway!

On Saturday, Cindy came over to watch Veronica Mars, but we were retarded and had NO clue what was going on, as we hadn’t watched it in two months. So it was very confusing and weird. I’m definitely going to need to rewatch the whole season in like one sitting this summer. After that we headed to Emily’s for dinner and game night!!! It was muy fun! Emily made an OISHII dinner, and then we played Taboo for a VERY long time (but in my opinion, you can never play Taboo for too long). I sense the neighbors may not have liked us, as I get VERY loud when giving hints or guessing at Taboo. But it was fun! AND the Country Ma’ams kicked fucking ass at the game, since we’re all psyshic. Sadly, every single hint had to do with either food or television, but whatever works, no? I wanted to stay longer, but the last train from Niragawa was at 10:59, so Jenny, Sean and I had to leave too damn early. I am SOOOO sick of trains! But thanks, Em, for a fun night! We need to do it again!

On Sunday I was ADD and couldn’t do anything at all, so I really have no clue what I did all day long.

As a side note, Cindy and I are extremely concerned, as we have not been hungry since Friday night! We had a HUGE dinner at Ootoya and apparently it had enough calories to last throughout the weekend?! I have only been eating because I feel like I should…even last night when I was lightheaded from lack of food, I wasn’t actually HUNGRY? WHAT IS GOING ON!!!!!! Needless to say, this is an overeater’s worst nightmare. Pray that it somehow fixes itself soon!

Burookubakku

Brokeback Mountain is coming out in Japan in March, woot! I saw a commercial for it last night at HMV and it reminded me how translations of films can totally change the meaning/impact of the story and dialogue..."I wish I knew how to quit you" is translated as "It's too painful!" Um, no. Sigh. Oh, well, at least I can see it on the big screen now!

Dirrty Spelling

So today I had my 3nensei doing word finds (dude, Japanese kids LOVE English word finds…even the “cool kids” who usually don’t do anything in class!) while I graded other kids on their dialogues. One of the puzzles’ themes was careers, and so there were words like “lawyer,” “doctor,” “cook,” etc. All of a sudden one of my students turns to me and says “Jeff, how do you spell cook?” (in Japanese, the word for cook is Jengrish and is spelled “kokku,” and sounds a lot like something that you wouldn’t want to be when you grow up, if you know what I mean). Before I could answer, she asked, “Is it c-o-c-k?” Um. Hmmmm! Thank god I somehow could control myself and not give away that that was a real word, as well. I don’t know how I suddenly became mature but I was just like “Oh, no, actually it’s “c-o-o-k,” but good guess!” Hee hee. Oy, I am easily amused.

Japan and Mexico both suck!

K, I realize I am probably the only American to ever fly from Japan to visit fucking Mexico, but could we please make the fares a little less ricockulous? I can’t find ANY flights after taxes under 10 man ($1000). Hello, Jeff doesn’t pay this much for flights! NOT ACCEPTABLE! Since I am going to end up paying so damn much, I am looking into JAL since they have a non-stop flight to Mexico (but not back? I don’t get it), and I might as well get Asian service and food if I’m gonna spend a bazillion dollars. Hrm. We’ll see.

On another note, why are Japanese people so unorganized when it comes to travel? First of all, I don’t enjoy the lack of being able to buy tickets online (everyone uses travel agents; I am a control freak, god dammit!), and I don’t understand why they don’t book sooner. Most airlines don’t even release their flights or prices until TWO MONTHS before departure? That is freaking ridiculous! I want my ticket now, dammit! So I am reluctantly waiting until two months before departure, but I hope it doesn’t fuck me over. Mehhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Let’s swimming to Mexico!

Shucchou

Yesterday was an amazing day for three reasons: 1) I got to sleep in for 2 1/2 hours, 2) it was SUNNY and WARM and 3) I didn’t have to go to school! WOOT! Tobu ALTs had an orientation kinda thing in Tatebayashi in the afternoon, so I managed to skip out of all of shougakkou, which was wonderful, as I needed a break from it. I love shou, but I was totally in need of a week off! Woot.

The orientation was at Scott’s school in Tatebayashi, i.e. the nicest school I have EVER seen in Japan by far. Holy shit, it is an amazing school, I’m so jealous! It’s only three years old and has solar heating, heating in the hallways, wide corridors, nice bathrooms, TECHNOLOGY, is clean, (sort of) doesn’t look like a prison, etc etc etc! It is fucking amazing. Most schools in Japan were built like the day after World War II and have NOT been updated nearly enough since then (or at all, it seems!), so it was like being in a whole different country. It is weird that in a country with so much unneeded construction, that they never build new schools. I don’t get it.

Anyway! Um. Orientation. So, we watched Scott’s class (um, his students are creepily good, and apparently are even when there aren’t like 20 scary gaijin staring at them), then discussed the class and team-teaching in general. I found it amusing that this is the second day of the orientation….when was the first day? Oh, yes, SEPTEMBER. The dude in charge mentioned “day one” multiple times in his speech, and fuck if I can remember that far back!

The orientation was fine….a bit boring, but not as bad as some. Also, that BOE dude was full of shit. I know everyone who was there knows what I’m talking about!

After orientation Cindy and I were thinking of going to Mexico (a very simple name for a Mexican restaurant) for dinner, until we saw how unbelievably sketchy it looked. So, instead Mami drove me, Cindy and Angie to Ota (thanks, Mami!!!) to meet up with people for yummy-ass sushi at our favorite kaiten place. A couple of beers and lots of sushi later, we all didn’t want to go home and face the fact that we had work the next day (it SO felt like a Friday), so we went out for unneeded dessert at Typhoon. It was cool because we got to watch the Olympics on a huge projection screen. At first downhill blah blah skiing was really exciting, until we got to the motherfucking 35th person, at which it was NOT EXCITING AT ALL. Hello, were they just letting random tourists go down the slopes?! Bah. I want some bobsledding and skating up in hea!

Anyway, eventually we faced the fact that we had to go home, as it was a school night (sniff sniff), and the night ended. Boooo work! But yay fun day.

How do I get into these situations?

So, I go to the same barber at my kick-ass 1000 yen haircut place every time. He’s really nice and cool and fun to talk to. However, I fear I may need to stop seeing him because I have gotten into a true Santilli sibling predicament (only Kris can understand what this means)!

So, last time I was there I was saying how I was going to Thailand for winter break and he was like “Oh, you’re going with a lot of girls? You’re going to get a lot of action!!!” A lot of my students go there, plus I didn’t really feel the need to come out to my fucking barber, so I went along with the conversation, but now he thinks I am like the biggest pervert EVER! According to him, I am fucking my way through Japan and now I don’t know how to deny this! Saaaaaad.

On top of this, yesterday he was like, “You know a lot of girl ALTs, right?” I said yes, and he proceeded to tell me that he had a few friends who are interested in going on a “gokon” and I should invite my girl friend ALTs to go with them! ACK! A gokon is when a group (usually of five guys and five girls) go out together for dinner, see who best matches with who, and break off into single dates in the end. It is pretty much like group speed-dating or something. In other words, NOTHING I would ever recommend my friends get randomly involved in! I was like “Hmm, well, most of them don’t speak Japanese!” to try to get the idea out of his head, but I promised that I would tell my friends. So, er, if any girls out there are interested, do I know some boys for you! ;)

Oy. Jeff may wait a while before he gets his hair cut again!

Putting the “gay” in geijutsu

So the other day I was sitting at my desk during lunch (as I do), and Ms. Ito turned to me and said, “Maybe during lunch you can go outside and play basketball with the boys?” After a moment of pure terror at this thought, I informed her, “Um….I can’t play basketball.” She then proceeded to ask me what sports I do play, at which I made a big dame sign with my arms to inform her that Jeff+sports do NOT mix at all.

I made excuses for my lack of sportiness by saying that in high school I was in band, drama and the student body president (wow, that looks SOOOO nerdy on paper, sad!), and she was like “Ah, geijutsu dane!” (“You’re artistic, huh?”). Yes, I am indeed VERY GEIjutsu!

Also, I don’t want any more of this “her wanting me to participate in school more” shit. Hello, I already teach four classes a day, I’m like twice as busy as most ALTs! Meh! Let me read and write E-Mails in peace, woman!

I swear I don't work for the marketing team of The NY Times

An interesting op-ed. I would elaborate, but I think the article concludes it better than I could.

Who did I sleep with for this to happen?

After two months of dreading the moment that my Japanese Language Proficiency Test results would arrive on my desk, they came today and I was fucking surprised to see this:


How the HELL did that shit happen?! It’s about as giri-giri as one can get for a passing grade, but we’ll ignore that! Dai shokku, I tell you, dai shokku!

Shuumatsu wa dou deshitaka?

That question summarizes every Monday class of Japanese throughout high school, and now summarizes every blog entry on Mondays. So, on to my weekend-ness!

On Friday I felt very productive by getting my ass all the way to Tatebayashi (i.e. the fucking corner of Gunma that might as well be in a different ken) by 6:30. Of course I only went there to eat, but still! Some of us got together to celebrate Helen’s birthday (happy birthday, Helen!) at an Italian restaurant called GUM (as Helen pointed out, why WOULDN’T a nice Italian restaurant be named GUM?). I put my lactose intolerancy to the test by getting the lasagna there, which was pretty much a big bowl of cheese with a noodle or two thrown in. Fortunately I didn’t die.

I was also happy to FINALLY see Mami for the first time since December! Damn. And yeah….it was a fun night!

Saturday “morning” I got to talk to Eduardo, which was nice, as we usually only get to talk on Sundays. I fear he may need my housewife duties ASAP, as macaroni and cheese proved to be “too much work” for him to make for dinner that night. What is Mexico doing to him?!!! Eduardo, I’m on my way :)

After sitting on my ass for most of Saturday, I was actually happy to bike all the way to Iwajuku in order to get some much-needed exercise. I trained from there to Maebashi for Jenny and Skye’s birthday party (happy birthday, Jenny and Skye!). It was MUY fun, yo! We had two hours of nomihoudai and tabehoudai (all you can eat and drink) at Ninnikuya, followed by two more hours of nomihoudai at karaoke. Yes, my friends, that combination may spell abunai! It was a lot of fun, but Jeff gets very loud and judgmental when he is too drunk in Japan! I apologize if I pissed anyone off accidentally! I also apologize if I flirted with anyone (I vaguely remember saying something dirty to Scott, but I fortunately repressed what exactly I said). I remember most of the evening, tho, which is generally a good sign. I was amused how Jenny and I fell on the ground in karaoke (usually a sign that the night should end soon) and she was immediately whisked away into a car! It was like the Secret Service were watching out for her or something. Anyway, good times were had!

It was a little depressing how at Ninnikuya all of the tables had plenty of food except for the one with Ota peeps, at which all of the food was devoured in about ten seconds, followed by grumbles of “Um, when is more food coming?” A bad sign, indeed! It’s also bad how Cindy and I are such bitches that we never bother to mingle with anyone we don’t know. You know, because we have enough friends, we don’t need more ;) Hahaha.

Anyway, I biked my drunk ass back from Iwajuku and perhaps talked to myself in a combination of English and Japanese the whole way there. Drunk Jeff of course had to make a detour at Ministop in order to get the LAST man (um, you know there would have been drama if there hadn’t been any at all!), then assed out.

On Sunday I talked to Eduardo some more (yay!) and my parents called saying they want me to try to go home. Meh, I don’t wanna! They can come here, dammit. Hehe. I watched the last episodes of Arrested Development, which were FUCKING HILARIOUS. I want it to live on on Showtime, but if it doesn’t, I thought it ended perfectly. I also watched The Virgin Suicides, which I didn’t dig so much (k, for some reason I have been using the word “dig” lately, and it is weirding me out). Like…I don’t know. It wasn’t what I expected, I guess, and I just didn’t get the point of the film? I think I am just too old and bitter now because I don’t understand teenage shit anymore (Catcher in the Rye and Vernon God Little had annoying-ass teenage characters and I had to stop reading them ‘cause they were just too irritating).

So, yes. A weekend full of birthdays! Muy fun. Photos to come soon (Drunk Jeff and Jenny accidentally stole each other’s cameras, so there will be a bit of a delay).

Crazy-Ass Laws

Dude, this is really fucked up