The Kory Who Lived

P90X Pics

2011-05-18T07:46:00.010+09:00

On Saturday May 14, I completed the 90 day workout program P90X. I started on Valentine's day and worked out every day (almost) for three months. I watched what I ate and followed the nutrition plan as closely as possible. It's been a fun process and I've learned a lot about exercise and eating.

I have always been loath to show pictures of me with my shirt off or even walk around the house with my shirt off. But it is a tradition for P90X grads to take before and after pictures of themselves. So I'm going to go against my norm and show my before and after pics here.

Day 1

Day 90

Day 1

Day 90

Day 1

Day 90

Day 1

Day 90

Day 1

Day 90

As you can imagine, I'm pretty pleased with the results. I'm already on round 2 and hoping to get even better results over the next 90 days.

And we're back!

2010-08-22T23:02:00.003+09:00

Well it's certainly been a long time since I posted. Apparently Blogger decided it didn't like my background template anymore and changed it. So I've got this one up for now until I feel like taking the time to change it.

Some people (aka: my mom) have asked if I'm going to keep updating this blog now that we've moved back from Japan. The answer is, of course! I planned well when I started it a few years back and didn't put anything about Japan in the title, so I can keep going with it.

The past month has been a crazy one. Yesterday was the one month mark of being back in America, and things have been crazy to say the least. When we got back we spent about 5 days in the Houston area seeing my family and our friends down there. Then we headed up to Abilene for a week. It took me a little over a week to recover from jet lag and get back into this time schedule. While in Abilene we bought a car, a white Pontiac Vibe, and got our new iPhones. We are loving the iPhone 4. We also ate at a lot of the places we had been missing, most notably Taco Bueno. More on the food and what it's done to us later.

After our time in Abilene, we went to Dallas for a few days to spend time with Kelly's grandparents. We had a nice visit. While we were in Dallas we also got to see Joe and Andrea and their baby, and we had dinner with Beau and Alex. This was the first time I had seen those guys since Beau's wedding back in July of '04, so that was a great visit.

After Dallas we drove back to my parents house, dropped off Caspian, and then got back in the car and drove down to Corpus Christi for the weekend to see James' place down there and hang out for mine and James' birthdays. We did some swimming and some grilling and had a lot of fun.

We then went back to Houston where we stayed for the rest of that week. We caught an Astros game, saw some more friends, and spent some more time with my family. My 30th birthday was on the 12th. I spent the entire day loading up our Budget truck for the move. Not the most enjoyable birthday ever, but I was turning 30 after all. We did however, go out to Pappadeaux for some cajun food that night where I sufficiently stuffed myself. Very nice.

Now back to the food. With all of the restaurants that we missed for so long coupled with the southern hospitality and everyone constantly feeding us, our bodies have been in a bit of disarray. I've already put on some of those pounds I worked so hard to burn off. But it was a good few weeks of food. Now, it's time to get back to business.

Anyway, we left on the 13th and started our trek to Orlando. We took our time, not wanting to drive for long, long hours or drive at night on unfamiliar roads in unfamiliar states. We stayed a night in Baton Rouge and a night in Tallahassee. The drive was my first time to ever be in Mississippi or Alabama. Of course, we were only in Mississippi for a little over an hour and Alabama for about two (only because we stopped and ate lunch there.) But I'd say that counts. Finally we got to Orlando around 1pm on Sunday, checked in with the apartment complex and started unloading. Unloading was quite an adventure. Our apartment is on the 3rd floor, so needless to say, my legs were feeling it. But we got it done.

You can see some pictures of the drive, the apartment, and the last month on our Flickr.

So now we're here. Still a little light on furniture and desire to unpack boxes, but we're here. Caspian's having trouble getting used to the noises that come with living in an apartment complex. After all, in Japan we only ever had one other person living in our building and he was hardly ever there. He barks at the neighbors, dogs outside, cars doors, the air conditioner, the ice maker, etc. But hopefully he'll get used to it. Kelly starts school tomorrow after a crazy weekend of auditioning for the season. I'm starting to get a feel for what it's like to be married to an MFA student. I start my next class tomorrow which will give me a little more to do besides applying for jobs all day. It's slowly all getting rolling again.

We've been so busy the past month that we haven't had a lot of time to sit back and reflect on our time in Japan. That's maybe a good thing considering how sad we were before leaving. It really all seems like it was a big dream now that we're back. Like a completely different life. But I've been in contact with some of my students, and they've been telling me about their study abroad trips and English camps so that's been a nice reminder.

Finally, while we were driving last weekend, I passed the time in the truck by seeing how many different states' license plates I saw. I had only AM/FM radio in the Budget truck, so there wasn't much else to do. I was driving pretty slow and it was a bit difficult to read the plates as they sped past me. I'm sure there were more, but here is what I got:

Texas
Louisiana
Florida
Mississippi
Alabama
Colorado
Arizona
California
Arkansas
Georgia
Delaware
New York
West Virginia
Virginia
North Carolina
South Carolina
Pennsylvania
Nebraska
Tennessee
Wisconsin
Michigan
Illinois
Ottowa

Last Day at Yoshiko

2010-07-19T12:49:00.007+09:00

Friday was my last day at Yoshiwara High School. I didn't have any classes that day, so my main mission was to finish cleaning out my desk, clean my desk, and then do my final wrap-up procedures.

It was a really great day. I received so many wonderful gifts from teachers. Many students brought me cards, cookies, and other things they had made for me. Between every class, I would hear students calling my name to go meet them by the door so they could give me something or take a picture with me or just tell me goodbye. The love and kindness I received was really overwhelming.

The 26 homeroom students (the ones in whose class I was crying last week) invited me to eat lunch with them. I had never been invited by students to eat lunch with them so it was really special. We all sat around in the room eating and talking about various things. It was a lot of fun. I had some leftover omiyage from when we first came to Japan that I had never given to anyone, so I put it in the middle of the room for the students to janken over. (Janken is the extremely sophisticated and complicated Japanese version of rock, paper, scissors.) When lunch was coming to a close, the students all stood up and gathered around. One girl named Mayu, a very smart and sweet girl, read me a letter she had written in English. It was so sweet. Here is an excerpt:

"You are the only ALT who has been teaching us English since we entered this school. So your existence was very great for us. I was surprised and felt very lonely to hear that you were going to go back to America. I wish many times it was a lie...I can't believe you will not be here when we come back from Australia...Lastly what I have been thinking of for a year and a half is that we are really happy to have you as an ALT at Yoshiwara High School. The fact that you were our ALT will never change..."

As you can imagine, this was very hard for me and for her. But we made it through. After she read that, Izumo pulled out his guitar and asked me to sing one verse and chorus of "Change the World" with him one last time. That was fun! I'm glad I remembered the words. Finally I told them to do their best in Australia and left before I turned into a weeping mess again. Many students were waiting to greet me in the hall outside of the classroom. They gave me cards, letters, presents. I gave them each a hug, and then they went on to class and that was the last I saw of any Yoshiwara High School students.

I spent the next hour or so packing up all of the things I had gotten that day and then left school for the last time around 2:00. I did my last rounds in the teachers' room and the school office and Emily walked me out. I got my bike and walked off campus rather than ride. I didn't want to get away too fast. As soon as I started walking down the drive that leads off of the school grounds, I lost it. I'm glad I was alone. Two years of great memories came rushing back, and I knew that even if I return to Japan someday, I will very likely never enter Yoshiwara High School again, and with a few possible exceptions, I will very likely never see those students again. Walking away was one of the hardest things I've ever done.

I turned and took this picture when I got to the street. You can't see much of the school, but I'll never forget this view.

So it's farewell to Yoshiko. But as I said to the students in my farewell speech and they have really taken to, I don't like to say goodbye. So I say "See you later!"

See you later Yoshiko! また合いましょう！

Muscular ALT

2010-07-15T18:42:00.003+09:00

Chikako from 36 homeroom drew this very accurate picture of me for my farewell party in their class. Looks just like me doesn't it?

This was also on the board:

Another day another tough goodbye. This is hard.

A Moving Day

2010-07-13T21:40:00.011+09:00

In Japan, many people say that they are moved by things, referring to an emotional (or moving) experience. This is of course a normal English expression, but it's not one that I have ever used very often.

Today, though, I had what can only be described as a couple of moving experiences.

First, during third period, a couple of very good students from 25 homeroom came to get me from my desk. I didn't have a class so I was free to go with them. This is a class of students that I taught every other week in the first year but only about once a month since April. They are incredible students though, some of the nicest and smartest in the school.

When we walked up to their classroom, I heard cheering start inside. I turned the corner to find a big circle of students all clapping for me with an empty chair for me. They were throwing me a surprise farewell party! This was what was on the board:

Along with this t-shirt:

We sat in the circle. One girl named Yuki made an opening speech in English. Then one at a time, each student came to me and presented me with a card that they had made themselves with their thoughts about me written on it (in English of course.) They were so sweet! The third girl to come up finally got the nerve to ask me for a hug. I gave her a hug and after that, I gave almost every student, including a few of the boys, hugs. Later, the first two girls who had missed out on the hugging, asked me for one anyway. It was a very special experience.

Here are some of the cards:

Mai

Haruna

Koji

Haruka

Saki (nice Mt. Fuji!)

This one is from another girl named Yuki who has always been a big Kory fan (as you can maybe tell from the shape of the card.) When she handed it to me she said, "This is my smell. Smell it please." I did and it smelled like perfume. She had sprayed her perfume on it. Very nice perfume might I add.

After the cards were handed out, we took some pictures together:

I talked to them for a few minutes and told them what I would do next. I gave them some final words of encouragement. Finally, a boy named Tomomi gave a farewell speech to me that literally left me in tears. Then they made an arch to lead me out of the room (a common practice at Japanese farewell parties.) I told them thank you again, and I was escorted back to the teachers' room by two of the girls. It was an incredible, moving experience. I was in shock and felt so honored to be cared for that much.

And that was just the beginning. Later in the day, I had my final class with 26 homeroom. These are the 2nd-year International course students who I have had in class at least twice a week since they started at Yoshiwara High School last April. I have gotten to know these students better than any others at the school. They have always been my favorite class ever since they first came. They are leaving on their three-week study abroad trip to Australia on Sunday. So for this class we decided to do an all-out, Jeopardy style Australia review game. I had some leftover $2 coins from our Australia trip this past December, so I offered those as the prize to the winning group.

The game went well. They remembered most of the answers. Then, after the game I gave my Australia pep speech, but I was having a hard time not getting choked up because I knew that when they come back, I'll be gone. They knew too of course, which was making it even more difficult. Emily gave a short pep talk after that, and then it was time for me to close out the class for the last time. This is where I lost it. I told them how proud I am of them and that I've always loved teaching them and how much I would miss them. I was having a horrible time getting through it, and when they started to cry, oh my goodness. It was a mess. I had written individual notes to each of them and handed them out and gave each student a hug. By the time we were done, I was crying, almost all of the girls were crying, some of the boys, even Natsuga-sensei.

I hated to finish the class on such a sad note, but at the same time, I think it was good to get it out. I had to let them know how I feel about them, and it was good for me to see that they feel the same way. That group of students is very special to me and I'll never forget them. I gave them all my e-mail address too, so I'm sure I'll be hearing from some of them. :) I hope so at least.

Before I left the class, they gave me a big card that they made for me with short notes from everyone. Here it is:

So yeah, it was a moving day to say the least.

Three more days of work, 2 more classes for me. And less than 8 days left in Japan. It's hard to believe. It's moving a bit too fast for me.

Final Dinner at Namaskar

2010-07-07T11:06:00.005+09:00

One of our favorites places to eat during our two years in Fuji has been a small Indian restaurant near Fuji Station called Namaskar. We've taken quite a few people there including my parents, Kelly's family, and Kerry.

Namaskar has a total of two people who work there. There's the Japanese owner who also doubles as the waiter and the chef who is an Indian man that speaks very little Japanese and a little bit of English. Before we ever went there, we had heard stories about how the owner/waiter was a very grumpy man and not very nice. Our first few times there, we kind of felt the same way, but eventually he started to recognize us and we started to see through his hard exterior. Then last summer when the Haseltines were here, Jeff spoke to him as we were leaving and told him we really love the place. He said we went there a lot and then gave Jeff some keychains to give to Melanie and Claire. That's also when we found out that the chef speaks a little English.

Fast-forward to last Friday night. We decided to make it our last trip to Namaskar and ordered our favorite things. We had a great meal. Kelly had always joked about taking a picture with the owner on our last visit, but she was getting cold feet. So when we left, after we paid, I told him that in a few weeks we would be returning to America so this would be our last time to eat there. He seemed shocked and disappointed and then gave Kelly a really pretty Indian bracelet and me a cool Indian keychain. Then we got him and the chef to take a picture with Kelly. Here it is:

He's even smiling a little! Then after that, he offered to take a picture with me in it. I taught him how to use the iPhone camera and here it is:

It was a great last visit to Namaskar. Before we left I told him, "Oishii tabemono o arigatou gozaimashita." (That you very much for the delicious food.) We'll never forget that place.

The Bicycle

2010-07-01T19:53:00.004+09:00

Anyone who's been reading mine and Kelly's blogs the past few weeks has probably been noticing a bit of a depressing tone. So here's a lighthearted story for you all.

As most of you know, I ride my bicycle every day to work. It's about a twenty-five minute ride which I do twice a day, once there and once back. The road I ride on is not in the greatest of shape which has taken a severe toll on my tires, brakes, and the overall quality of the ride. When we first got here, I bought a light blue bike. I rode it for a year and the brakes had really deterioriated, almost to the point where they didn't really work anymore. Then one day last August, that bike was parked at Tatebori train station and I lost my bike key. I walked around for a few days without it, but that wouldn't last long because I needed to go to work. So I had two options. The first was to take the bike somewhere and get the lock removed and then buy a new lock. The second was to buy a new bike. The brakes were so bad on that bike that I decided to go with option 2.

After buying a new bike (a much better one might I add) I left the old one at Tatebori for a few weeks until once when I went to the station, I noticed a sticker saying that the bike needed to be removed. Apparently they keep track of which bikes never go anywhere. So I walked it home, not an easy task since the lock keeps the back wheel from turning thereby forcing you to carry the back of the bike. But I got it there. A few weeks later, I decided to go take the lock off of the bike just in case we ever had a guest and needed an extra bike. I got it off and left it outside our apartment by our storage bin. There it sat for three months until...

The day we left to go to Australia for Christmas I was waiting for the cab that would take us to the station and noticed the bike was gone. Someone had stolen it. Oh well. It was of no use to me. If they needed it, then so be it. Good luck stopping.

So that was that. Until today when I got to work one of the English teachers told me that the police had called and said they had recovered my stolen bicycle. (Note: When you purchase a bicycle in Japan, you have to register it with your name, address, phone number and workplace.) At first I was like, "What are you talking about? I rode my bike to school this morning." Then I realized what it was. So the police came to visit me at my school to have my verify if it was my bike. It was.

The main police officer, who spoke decent English, asked me a few questions about the bike including but not limited to: "What day was the bicycle stolen? What time was it stolen? What was the exact date that you last saw the bicycle? What time did you see it?" I obviously didn't know the answer to any of the questions so I just made up some answers that seemed logical. Then I had to go to class, but they needed me to fill out a report. So these two police officers waited for me the entire 50 minutes I was in class. It's kind of comforting to know that Fuji City is so safe that two patrol officers can sit in the conference room of a school for 50 minutes waiting on a foreigner to come write a report about a bike that was stolen 7 months ago.

So I go to the conference room and as soon as I walk in the main guy asks me if I can speak Japanese. I gave the answer I always give to that question. "Sukoshi." (A little bit.) So we sit there for 30 minutes talking in mixed Japanese and English all about this stolen bicycle and the details of where I had it parked and what direction it was facing and how I hadn't put it in our storage room because I had a table in there. Finally we get the details all worked out and I stamp the paper with my hanko to confirm its accuracy. Then the officer gives me a little lecture about how when something is stolen in Japan, it should be reported immediately so they can catch the person. "Sumimasen." I say.

Finally they get up to leave...and here's the best part...they gave me the bicycle back! Seriously?! What do I want with that bicycle? I'm leaving Japan in 20 days and now all of a sudden I have an extra bicycle to deal with. And I can't ride it anywhere because the brakes are broken. So now it's sitting at my school still with no lock. The plan is to take it to a recycle shop where hopefully I can get some money for it. But I can't help but thinking, if the guy who stole it really wanted the bike so bad, why not let him keep it? It's been his for 7 months after all.

Anyway, that's a great example of the crazy things that can happen any day here in Japan.

Winding down

2010-06-27T18:26:00.005+09:00

Well we officially have 24 days left until we leave. It's amazing how quickly the time is going by right now. We've got so much to do to get ready to go it's hard to imagine getting it all done. We have a long to-do list and we're slowly knocking things out one at a time. Somehow it'll all get done. I hope.

I started telling my classes in the past couple of weeks that I'm leaving. The reactions have been about what I expected. A large group "Ehhhh??" (which basically is Japanese for "you're kidding, right?) and then a few students who throw in some individual exclamations. In one class, a group of girls who are pretty big fans of mine said "No!!!" and then "I need you!" "I want you!" "I love you!" One boy brought his worksheet up to me after class and asked me to sign it. His reaction when I said I was leaving was, "Unbelievable." It's going to get harder and harder over these next few weeks, but I'm going to do my best to maintain my composure as long as I can.

This upcoming week will be my last week with a full slate of classes. The week after will be final exam week and then my last week I'll have just about 5 classes. My last class will be on July 15 with my last day at work being July 16. It's hard to believe there's only 3 weeks of school left.

Farewell party season has officially gotten underway. A bunch of us got together at Ashley's last night for a farewell party for our usual group. We had a Mexican themed party with lots of great Mexican food. Most of us aren't leaving for a few weeks of course, but the next few weeks will be so busy for all of us that it was most convenient to have the party this weekend. It's kind of crazy to think that in less than a month we'll split apart from all of these people that we've gotten to know and go our separate ways. It's very likely that we will never see most of them again. We'll stay in contact of course through Facebook and other random things, but over the years I'm sure the contact will be less and less, and then eventually we may never talk at all. It's funny how life works that way. But it's been great getting to know people from all different walks of life and backgrounds and parts of the world. It's been an interesting two years, and I'm glad that we could spend it with a good group of friends.

As Kelly mentioned on her blog, rainy season has been going full steam for the past couple of weeks. It's been pretty unpleasant outside for the most part. The worst is the morning rain. One of the worst ways to start your day is to put on a hot rain suit, hop on a bike, and ride 25 minutes to work. Then go inside and take off the rain suit only to find that you're soaking wet anyway from sweat. I've spent the majority of the last two weeks sweaty. You kind of just always sweat. It doesn't really stop. The school is still refusing to turn on the air conditioners in the classrooms because it's not July yet. It makes for really uncomfortable classes. None of the students want to do anything because everybody is so hot, and I've even found that I'm having a hard time focusing when I'm teaching. I lose my train of thought mid sentence or forget what part of the lesson I'm in. Rainy season is a strange animal. I'm used to hot and humid weather of course being from Houston, but the weather during this time of year in Japan is so different. It's much worse. It's hard to really describe it. I think you almost have to experience it for yourself to really understand.

So anyway, I was remarking earlier this week that though I'm still sad to leave my job and my students, rainy season is making it a little less painful. All I know is that in three and a half weeks, I will never have to ride my bike to work in the rain again. And that is a very happy thing.

Finally, here are some gems from the student classwork archives. There was a lesson in a book about Turkish cuisine and how it's a fusion of Asian and European culture. So I had them create a new food that was a fusion of foods from different cultures and then draw it on the board. Here are the two best:

An onigiri dog. This is a combination of Japan (onigiri) and America (hot dog). I think the ketchup and mustard is also a nice touch.

Sushi gelato. This one is Japan and Italy (gelato.) Tasty I'm sure. 36HR is always good for a laugh.

Happy anniversary...to us!

2010-06-10T18:19:00.002+09:00

Today is our 4 year anniversary! We're celebrating by taking an anniversary weekend trip to Tokyo Disneyland! We're leaving in about an hour to go to Tokyo. We'll wake up tomorrow morning and head to Disneyland for the day. We both have off Friday because of our school festivals last weekend. We'll go to Disney Sea on Saturday which is Japan's extra Disney theme park. Orlando has Epcot Center and Tokyo has Disney Sea. I don't know much about it, so I'll have to let everyone know more about it after we get back. We're excited though. This is one of the things we've been looking forward to since we got here. I haven't been to a Disney theme park since we went to Disney World for Spring Break when I was 9. I'm not trying to hide my excitement.

I told some girls today that it was our anniversary. They didn't know the word anniversary, so I wrote June 10, 2010 on the chalkboard. Under that I wrote June 10, 2006. Then next to that I wrote Kory and Kelly and drew two lines connecting our names. Finally I drew a heart. That's when they finally understood and said "Happy Birthday!" I quickly informed them it was "Happy Anniversary." Then I told them that we're going to Tokyo Disneyland and one girl, Yuka said in perfect English, "Bring me a present please!" I couldn't resist this effort so I said "Okay what do you want?" "Candy." "OK what kind of candy." "The chocolate crunch candy that tastes like strawberry." So apparently Yuka knows her Disneyland candy. I told her I'd do my best. I love my students!

Here we go! Off to a Disney adventure!

The beginning of the end

2010-06-08T11:12:00.010+09:00

Do you ever have one of those days where you just wake up feeling low? Well I'm having one today. Here's why: Sometime late last night or when I woke up this morning, it finally hit me that we're leaving Japan in a month and a half.

The past three days were great. We had our school festival this weekend, so I spent all day Saturday and Sunday at school. It was a great time. There were performances by a lot of the clubs and all of the culture clubs had rooms set up all over school displaying things and selling things. The sports clubs sold food and there were big crowds of people from all over - parents, friends, former students, random people from the community. It was a big festival and a lot of fun. I walked around school going into the various rooms and talking to and taking pictures with students. I bought some things and made donations to some of the charity fundraisers. I spent a lot of time in the English club room where we were doing a fundraiser to raise money for Oxfam. We had a student doing a magic show and we gave away some bags with treats for everyone who donated at least 100 yen. In total, English club raised 20,747 yen (roughly $200) for my Oxfam Trailwalker team. I was very proud of them. They worked really hard this year and did a great job.

So the festival was a lot of fun. All of the students and teachers were happy and having a great time. There was just a positive feel in the air.

Yesterday was the annual sports festival that falls on the last day of the school festival. On this day, all of the homerooms compete in various athletic competitions. There are 100 meter sprints. There is a homeroom relay where every member of the homeroom runs 100 meters of a relay. There are about 40 students in each homeroom, so as you can imagine, it's a long relay. They have class jump rope competitions where all of the students in each homeroom jump rope with a giant long jump rope. There's tug-of-war, 5 people/six legs races, a girl's dance, human pyramid building, and all kinds of other crazy events. It was so much fun! We did a teacher relay as well where a bunch of the teachers compete with a bunch of students in a relay. I ran 1oo meters in that. Just like the festival, everyone had a great time. It's really neat to see how much pride the students take in their homerooms. They all tried their best to succeed.

After the sports day, there was a talent show to close out the three-day festival. Most of the performances were just ok, but they had fun and the students watching enjoyed all of them. One group of about 12-15 girls did a 10-15 minute dance routine. They closed out the show and they were amazing. It really looked like they had been practicing for a long time. I actually did a secret performance in the show as well. Secret as in very few people knew I was doing it until the curtain came up. I have a student who plays guitar, and I approached him a while back and asked if he'd like to do a song with me in the talent show. He agreed and we decided to do "Change the World" by Eric Clapton. He played and I sang. It went really well and the students all loved it. I've been wanting to sing for them for a long time, so I'm glad I got the chance to do it. I was happy to be able to perform with him. I think it meant a lot to both of us. I'll try to post a video of it on here soon.

So, after all of that, I woke up this morning feeling the post-festival let down. It's like the feeling you get after a vacation. You've been looking forward to it for so long and you have so much fun, and then it ends and you go through a few days of feeling a little glum.

But in this case I kind of view this as the beginning of the end. There are no more big events left at school. Just a few weeks of classes and then finals and that's it. It'll be over before I know it. I'll be up on the stage giving my farewell speech to the students in no time. It's going to be a hard month and a half. I decided a while back that I would start telling the students that I'm leaving after the school festival. Well, now school festival is over, and that time has come. I'll probably start letting them know next week. Not looking forward to it. Cue the tears.

So anyway, that's what I'm feeling today. Hopefully when I wake up tomorrow to go to work I'll be feeling better. I know that it's probably the best thing for us to go home now, but right now the thought of leaving Japan is not a happy one for either of us. It's going to be tough.

My take on the Jim Joyce call

2010-06-04T09:15:00.005+09:00

I'm sure most if not all of you that read my blog are at least vaguely aware of the Jim Joyce incident. If you aren't let me lay it out for you.

In Wednesday night's Detroit Tigers vs. Cleveland Indians game, pitcher Armando Galarraga was one out away from completing a perfect game. (For those unfamiliar with what a perfect game is, check out the Wikipedia page.) On what should have been the final out of the game, first base umpire Jim Joyce blew a call and called the runner safe when he was clearly out, thereby costing Galarraga the perfect game. It would have been the 21st perfect game in major league baseball history, the third this year, and the second this week. But now because of that call, it stands in the books as a one-hit shutout. Galarraga faced 28 batters and retired 27(+1) of them.

You can watch the play here.

I read about what happened before I saw it because I was at work when it happened. I watched the replay during my lunch break and couldn't believe it. I thought that it would at least be a close call -- a "bang-bang" play. But it wasn't. I can't imagine what Jim Joyce was looking at. The only thing I can imagine is that he was looking at Galarraga catching the ball rather than the base. I don't see how else he could have missed the fact that Galarraga clearly beat the runner to the base. It wasn't even close. And in that situation, with that much on the line, it needs to be a lot closer than that to even consider calling him safe.

As a lifelong baseball fan, every time I watch the play, it makes me want to cry. Though many people I know don't quite get it, I see baseball as an absolutely beautiful game. The design and the uniqueness of the game is amazing to me. I see beauty in a close call at first. The fact that the field is designed in a way that a slow grounder, if fielded properly will almost always result in an exciting close play at first base is just one of the things that I find to be wonderful about baseball. And a perfect game is one of the most amazing accomplishments that a baseball player can achieve. It's a once in a lifetime performance by a pitcher with amazing teamwork all around to preserve the perfection. To see it end on a mistake like that is heartbreaking.

I feel so bad for everyone involved in the situation. I feel bad for Galarraga. I feel bad for Jim Joyce. I feel bad for the batter Jason Donald, who knows that he was out, but will go down as the one who broke up the perfect game. It's a situation that is just so unfortunate. I have a great deal of respect, however, for Jim Joyce who, after watching the replay after the game, went and found Galarraga and tearfully apologized to him. He's been a big league umpire for 21 years and he openly admits that he just blew the biggest call of his career and cost Galarraga a perfect game. Umpires know they're human and that they make mistakes, so you won't hear one say something like that very often. You have to respect him for that.

Bud Selig won't reverse the call and give the perfect game to Galarraga. I don't like that decision, but I can understand it. If you go and start reversing calls the day after games that could open up a big can of worms for situations like that in the past and future. Although if there was ever a time to do it, this would be it. What I don't understand is why baseball is so reluctant to use instant replay. This is 2010. We have amazing technology at our disposal. To waste it is ridiculous. People say, "Oh baseball is a sport with so much tradition. We can't ruin the purity of the game and of the human nature of the game by resorting to technology." I find that argument pointless. We can't fight against the progression of our society and the tools at our disposal. Football and basketball use instant replay with great success. Calls are reversed that should be reversed and stand that should stand. Baseball needs desperately to join its counterparts in the 21st century and start using instant replay.

Armando Galaragga should have had a perfect game on Wednesday night because Jim Joyce should have been able to use technology to reverse his mistake, his human error. It's just such an unfortunate circumstance.

The Ends Have Come

2010-05-23T20:18:00.004+09:00

After spending most of my Sunday writing a paper, I am now officially halfway finished with my first course for my Master's Degree in Education from ACU. This paper I wrote today was a challenge as my brain just wasn't having it, but I worked my way through it and produced what I would consider to be an acceptable essay.

The course has been quite a beast up to this point. For the degree program I'm basically taking one course at a time. There are 10 altogether. The one I'm taking now is called Negotiation and Mediation. It's been interesting. There was always a stigma in my mind about online degree programs. I think that's the same with most people. When I tell people I'm earning my Masters online the response is usually something like, "So...like Devry?" I can't speak for some of the online Bachelors degree programs like Devry and what not, but I can say this - judging from the first 4 weeks of this class, this ACU online degree is legit. I've worked extremely hard. Kelly can attest to that. I spend several hours reading and writing each night, and my Saturdays and Sundays are almost completely devoted to doing school work. I don't know what this will bring for me in the future, but I now know that once I get my M. Ed. degree it will be just as legit and hard-earned as one I could have gotten by going to school on campus. Maybe even more so because I have to balance a day job in the meantime. I'm feeling really good about it at this point.

One of the interesting things about it is that since we're not in a classroom, the professor has to be creative about how he teaches. There has been a lot of group work and a lot of videos. This past week, there was a podcast featuring a mediation simulation. I thought the voices of the actors sounded familiar. After a few minutes of trying to place them, I realized that it was Adam Hester and Gary Varner from ACU theatre. After all these years, those two are still contributing to my education.

Well it's series finale season in the world of TV. This year is going to be especially tough as my two all-time favorite shows will be having their series finales on back-to-back nights. Lost, as everyone in the world knows, has its finale Sunday night. We'll be cutting off all communication wih the outside world starting tomorrow morning so as not to be spoiled. We're going over to Dion's tomorrow night to watch the finale with a small group of devoted fans. I've been a dedicated follower of Lost ever since the very beginning. I remember being at the lakehouse and seeing a commercial for Lost and thinking, "That looks kind of interesting. And it's got the hobbit from The Lord of the Rings, so I guess I'll watch it." I watched the premiere with my mom a few weeks later, and I remember getting to the end of the Pilot episode and thinking, "Wow. That was awesome. And what the heck killed the pilot?" I can't believe it's coming to an end. It's going to be crazy.

In addition to that, 24 will have its finale on Monday night. Though I feel 24 has declined in quality drastically over the past few seasons, I've been a devoted fan for a long time. I didn't see the first season when it aired because I was still at ACU and a theatre major has no time for watching TV. But when I was living with Andy the next year, he recommended that I watch an episode of season 2. I did and I was hooked. After season 2 ended, Andy and I went back and watched all of season 1 on DVD that summer. I believe that season 1 of 24 remains to date one of the best all around seasons of television ever. They've jumped the shark a bit since then, but I'll watch the finale this week and bid farewell to a great series and an awesome character.

I've been having a lot of dreams about Lost and 24 lately because of these finales. There's going to be a big void when the Jacks in my life (Bauer and Shephard) are no longer around. I'm going to have to find some new TV to watch. Any recommendations?

In honor of the 24 finale, here is an example of how it is popular even here in Japan. You ever wondered what Jack Bauer eats during his 24-hour days? The answer: Calorie Mate.

Food and drinks

2010-05-14T23:00:00.007+09:00

In my final few months in Japan I want to start posting some pictures of random things that I eat, drink, see, etc. regularly. Here are a few for this week:

First, here is a coffee drink that I bought from a machine at work. In Japan, you can buy all sorts of drinks from vending machines. It's not just cokes and sports drinks, but coffee, chocolate drinks, orange juice, tea, flavored tea, etc. This is Kilimanjaro Blend Coffee, or キリマンジャロブレンド. It's a sweet coffee that I get every once in a while when I'm feeling extra tired in the morning. During the winter, it came out of the machine hot.

This is one of my favorite items from the bread stand at work. It's a cheese bread puff thingy. When I get it I just point at it and say, "Kore." (This) It's pretty delicious and most definitely bad for you.

This is a new dessert they've started selling at the bread stand. I didn't know much about it, but I saw the strawberry icing and I was sold. It's a pastry and it had some type of cream cheese type substance inside. Very nice, but only a once a week indulgence.

This is one of my favorite drinks to get from the machine. It's mikan juice. Not 100% but still very good. Mikan is mandarine orange. This is what I buy when I want to be refreshed but need more sugar than water or tea can provide.

That's all the food and drink pics for this week.

Here's a funny picture though. I've been reading my textbooks for my first course in ACU's Higher Ed. Master's Degree program. Caspian decided one night that he might like to get his Master's degree too.

Happy weekend!

Spring has arrived! (finally)

2010-05-07T12:04:00.003+09:00

Kelly has posted a bunch of Trailwalker pics on Flickr. Check 'em out if you haven't yet, and if you have, check 'em out again!

Almost two weeks removed from the Trailwalker I can look back on it as a really good experience. It almost kind of seems like the whole thing never happened. Like it was all one big dream. On of the most amazing things about the whole experience is how I never really felt tired the whole time. I was tired physically of course, but never sleepy. And my mind was completely alert the whole time. It wasn't until we crossed the finish line and went into the cabin and sat down that it really hit me. I was asleep shortly thereafter.

Physically I'm mostly recovered. There's still one spot on the back of my left heel, the achilles really, that hurts. But other than that, it's like it never happened. I've even gotten back into my regular running and working out routine. And it's very nice to have my weekends free from hiking and things like that. I feel like a normal person again.

We just finished up Golden Week. The weather was absolutely beautiful. By far the best weather we've had since probably October. No rain the whole time and warm. I even busted out my shorts, t-shirts, and flip-flops. It's funny because many people in Japan believe that you shouldn't start wearing short sleeve shirts until June, no matter how hot it is. It can be 80 degrees on a beautiful May day and if you're wearing short sleeves, they'll ask you, "Aren't you cold?" But we gaijin don't always adhere to these "rules," so on Sunday I was on the train going to Dion's house for a barbecue wearing shorts and a t-shirt. Everybody was sitting around in their long pants and light jackets and sun hats staring at me like I was crazy. And I just stared right back. It's springtime people! Enjoy it!

I didn't do much during Golden Week. As I said we had a barbecue at Dion's. Kelly and I rode around town one day taking advantage of the nice weather. We went to a really good sushi place on the other side of Fuji called にこにこ (Niko Niko.) And on Tuesday, John and I went to Tokyo for a Giants game. That was fun as always. The Giants won 5-1 over the visiting Swallows. Heroes of the game included 阿部 (Abe) the 1st baseman, ラ三レス (Ramirez) the left fielder and ゴンザレス (Gonzales) the starting pitcher. As you can see, the Giants are very multicultural.

Back at work now for a short 2-day post-Golden Week work week. It would be nice if they could make up another holiday and actually turn Golden Week into a week instead of a 5-day weekend. But it's Friday now, so we're almost finished. No major plans for this weekend. I think we're going to some sort of classical concert in Shizuoka tomorrow. Should be fun.

Well, back to grading diaries!

Brief Oxfam Trailwalker wrap-up

2010-04-25T21:11:00.004+09:00

We did it! This will not be a very long blog post. I'll post more details about the hike later when I'm feeling a little less groggy, but I'll give the basic details now.

We started the hike Friday morning. The starter pistol went off at 9:05 (uncharacteristically late for Japan.) We finished the hike at 11:44pm on Saturday night. Altogether our time was 38 hours and 39 minutes. We came in 55th place overall out of about 160 teams. The first 20 to finish were trail runners. This means they basically run every part of the trail they can. So basically of the teams that didn't run the course, we came in 35th place. All four of finished, which we were really happy about. Many teams lost members along the way due to injury or exhaustion. Of the teams made up of people we know (ALTs from our prefecture) we were the 3rd team to finish and the 2nd to finish with all 4 members.

So that's the basic info. I want to write all about the hike, but just can't find the energy to do it right now. I can say this: I don't think words can give an accurate account of how difficult this was. It was, without a doubt, the most difficult thing I have ever done. There was a time in the middle of the night Friday night when I questioned if I could finish. We all did. The rain turned parts of the trail into a complete mess. One stretch that took us a little over 4 hours on our practice hikes took us over 7 hours because every step we took was into ankle deep mud. I laid down at checkpoint 5 for about 45 minutes but never went to sleep. So I ended up doing the whole hike without sleep. It was extremely challenging. But we made it. So, like I said, I'll write in more detail about all of it in the next few days.

What I can tell you now is that my body survived amazingly well. I actually made it through the hike without a single blister on my feet. I'm hurting all over, but the worst looking part of my body is my fingernails and the skin surrounding them. That's an accomplishment all on its own.

So anyway, the Fuji Crew did it! Thanks everybody for your support! It was a great accomplishment and we're very happy about our results.

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow...

2010-04-22T12:32:00.002+09:00

The big day is almost upon us. We've been training and fundraising and preparing for about 6 months now for the next two days of complete torture. Reading various thoughts and posts on Facebook from the many ALTs around the prefecture that are doing this hike, I find that most of us have the same feelings right about now. What were we thinking?

But at the same time I know everybody is also excited and full of nervous energy leading up to the start tomorrow morning. The weather forecast is calling for a good deal of rain and some pretty cold temperatures. Weather forecasts are notoriously bad in Japan, but I have a feeling this one is going to be accurate. It's pouring outside right now, at least. What I'm hoping for is to at least get started and get the first few hours under our belt before the rain kicks in. It'll be a lot easier to stay positive if we're not already soaked when the event begins. But, no matter what, we're all going to gambatte! We have no other choice. We can do it!

So for my last post before the hike, I'll give some final details so all of you back home can be thinking about us.

Fuji Crew fundraising total (to date): 143,033yen (Thank you very much!)
Start time: 9:00am (I was wrong in my last post.) 7pm CDT Thursday.
Arrival at Checkpoint 4 (estimated): 7:00pm, 5am CDT Friday. This is the first place we will see our support crews made up of friends and family (including Kelly!) They'll have some positive energy, food, and changes of clothes for us.
Arrival at Checkpoint 7 (estimated): 8:30am Saturday, 6:30pm CDT Friday. This is where we will take our longest break and possibly try to get a little bit of sleep.
Finish (estimated): 8:00pm Saturday, 6am CDT Saturday This is where we pass out.

As you can see, we're shooting for a little less than 36 hours. It's going to be tough, but we feel like we can do it.

Well, keep us in your thoughts as we go and I can't wait to report back on how it went with pictures, stories, etc. Let the Oxfam Trailwalker Japan begin!

Kyoto, School, and Hiking - Busy Times!

2010-04-10T21:49:00.006+09:00

A lot has happened since my last post, as usual. We had a great time in Kyoto. It was really nice the first few days we were there. The weather was nice and it was relatively warm. We were able to take lots of pictures and see some cool places. We went to a big market on the first day we were there and bought some household decoration type things. We also saw many temples like Kinkakuji and Kiyomizudera, and a really cool place called Fushimi shrine where there is a long, long pathway lined with thousands of torii gates. Kelly recorded a short video of it. It started to rain a few days into the trip which put a damper on the rest of our activities. Most of what you do when you are in Kyoto involves being outside, so we had to deal with it. Living in Japan, we have gotten very used to keeping an umbrella with us most of the time. I always used to prefer small, collapsible umbrellas, but now I like to use the bigger kind. They're more tedious to carry around, but when you spend a lot of time walking around outside in the rain, they're definitely more effective. We actually got into a good routine when we were sight-seeing and Kelly wanted to take a picture. I would go over to her and hold her umbrella over her while she took the picture. It worked out pretty well.

We ate a lot of really good food while we were there including what we both proclaimed to be the best sushi we have ever had at a place called Tomizushi. It was a very small restaurant, and we sat at the counter and just told the chef what we wanted when we were ready for something else, and he would make it right in front of us. It was so good and fresh and a great way to start our trip. Other interesting restaurants we ate at include a tofu restaurant where almost everything we ate was made from tofu and a delicious tempura restaurant where the tempura was cooked right in front of us. It was pretty amazing.

We put some pictures up on Flickr that we took with our iPhones during the trip and the rest will be up on Flickr eventually. I'm glad we got to go down there finally. It's one of the must-see places in Japan.

The new school year got rolling this past week. We had a big turnover of teachers, especially in the English department. We had 5 English teachers leave and 4 new ones come in plus one who returned from maternity leave (which can last years in Japan.) All of the new teachers seem very nice, so I'm looking forward to getting to teach with them. One of the teachers who left was Morita-sensei who was by far the most helpful person to the ALTs at our school. She was always willing to drop everything to help us even if she was in the middle of something. She even helped out Jeff and Gwynn when there was an unfortunate key incident during their visit. She will be missed greatly.

The new ichi-nensei are cute and small and nervous as usual. As well as extremely excited to be in high school. I'll have my first class with new students on Tuesday. Really looking forward to that. They are sure to make my last four months fun and exciting.

We had our last practice hike last night before the real deal in two weeks. Last night we did Checkpoint 7 to the Finish. Altogether it was only 20km, but it's a very difficult stretch. The people who designed this course decided it would be a good idea to put the most difficult sections right at the end. Why? I don't know. To be cruel, I guess. In the last 20 km there are three mountains that you have to climb up and then down. Basically it works like this. You start off from CP7 and walk along a gravel road for a while until you come to a mountain. You climb the mountain a long way. It's very steep in places and just an altogether long ascent. When you get to the top, you go back down the other side, as would be expected. A long, steep decline. At the bottom of the mountain is CP8. From CP8 you almost immediately start climbing another mountain. This mountain it extremely steep. There's even a section where there is a rope along the trail to hold on to to prevent falling backward. This was actually a nice change because it gives you a chance to use your arms for a bit rather than solely relying on your legs. You finally get to the top of the mountain and of course, you immediately go straight down. When you get to the bottom of the mountain, you cross a road and on the other side of the road? You guessed it! You start climbing another mountain. By the time we got to this mountain the sun had come up which made climbing it much easier. When we got to the top, there was a nice view of Mt. Fuji very nearby.

We made the descent to Lake Yamanaka where the finish is and then slowly made our way bus by bus, train by train back home. Altogether the hike took us about 7 hours which isn't bad. But it was definitely taxing on the old legs. My left knee started tightening up on this hike and the hike last weekend. I think my legs will definitely be happy when this is over.

This was our first hike to do with all 4 of us together since back in January, so it was good to get together and check on our pacing and strategy. I think we've got a good system worked out, and I have full confidence that we'll complete the hike. We've now all done every part of the course. We're taking next weekend off from practice hiking to give all our wounds a chance to heal. Then we do the real hike on April 23-25. Our starting time is 8:00am. That's 6pm CDT on April 22 for anybody back home who wants to know exactly when we're starting. I'm getting really excited about it. We've reached our fundraising goal, and now all we have to do is do it.

Here are some pictures from the hike:

This is from before obviously. These pictures (on my desk at work) are the step by step pictures of the trail that we use to make sure we don't get lost. They come from the Oxfam website on full pages but we decided to cut them out and put these booklets together to make them easier to carry around during the hike. It worked out well last night.

John and Ashley at the top of the third mountain of last night's hike. It was about 5:30 in the morning here. John, as you can see, is a self-proclaimed non-morning person.

Me at the same place. The shining area you see in the far right is Yamanaka-ko. It's one of the Fuji Five Lakes. You can also kind of see the base of Mt. Fuji in the background.

Fuji-san starting to peek out from behind the clouds with Yamanaka-ko in the foreground. This side of Mt. Fuji (the northern side in Yamanashi Prefecture) gets much more snow than the side we see all of the time.

John, Linton, and Ashley coming down the final mountain.

Spring Yasumi!

2010-03-19T14:19:00.003+09:00

Today at school was the closing ceremony for the school year. The school year here goes from April to March as I've mentioned before so when everybody returns in April, the students will have moved up a grade and a new batch of students will be coming in.

The next two weeks are officially "Spring Vacation." This doesn't mean that everybody gets to stay home for two weeks and enjoy a free vacation. Many students will likely be coming to school everyday for sports practices and other club activities. Some others will probably come up for extra tutoring and studying if their grades were not up to par this past year. But there won't be any classes or any official things going on. That is until March 30, a random Tuesday, where despite the fact that it's "Spring Vacation," all students and teachers have to be here for the teacher farewell ceremony. In Japan, many teachers get tranferred from school to school at the end of the year and they have very little say in when they go or where they go. The joys of being a government employee. So on March 30 everybody comes up and they have a big ceremony where the leaving teachers give speeches and then everybody who is staying packs up their things and moves to their new desk for the next year. It's quite a sight.

Anyway, we teachers have very little duties during this break so many people take time off. You have to take your paid leave days, you don't just get to go free. So next week, Kelly and I are both taking the whole week off and going to Kyoto for a few days. Kyoto is one of the most historic cities in Japan, and we have yet to make our way down there, so this week is when we're going to go check it out. We're looking forward to getting out for a while and spending a relaxing time sightseeing, taking pictures, and as always, eating some good food. I'll tell you all about it when we get back.

Well, I hope everyone has had good spring breaks and what not back home. The weather here has been going back and forth between warm and sunny, cold and rainy, warm and rainy, cold and sunny. Today is cold and sunny. I think tomorrow is supposed to be warm and rainy. I'm ready for spring to get here for good. We're maybe about a week away from cherry blossom time. I can't wait!

First Night Hike Recap

2010-03-09T09:02:00.003+09:00

We had our first night hike on Friday night. We were doing Checkpoint 4 to Checkpoint 7 minus a stretch of about 6km of open road at the beginning. Altogether the hike was 38km.

We met up at Gotemba Station at around 7pm and took a bus for about 20 minutes to the place where we were going to start. After stretching a bit and getting our headlamps on, we began the hike. Other than the Mt. Fuji climb, none of us had ever gone hiking at night before. So this was sure to be an interesting evening. We walked down a road for a few minutes and then got to the point where we were supposed to turn onto the trail. We turned right and immediately we all stopped, clearly taken aback by how incredibly dark the trail was. After kind of getting over our brief moment of alarm, we started up the trail. I was in the lead at the beginning and my alarm returned when I turned the first corner and in the light from my headlamp I saw a pair of glowing green eyes. A black cat was standing in the middle of the trail. I was like, "Are you serious?" The cat quickly ran away though and we returned to our hiking.

The first stretch was a pretty long one, about 12 kilometers I believe. We basically climbed up a mountain and then back down the other side. There were some pretty interesting moments.

At one point we came across a point where a tree had fallen over right in the middle of the trail. We couldn't really see a good way to get around it, so we ended up just having to climb over it. Only a few minor scrapes occured. There was also a point where we came into this stretch of trail with tall, thick bamboo on either side. It was flat at that point and I got a strange sensation like the scene in "The Fellowship of the Ring" where the Hobbits are in that clearing and Frodo senses that the Ringwraiths are coming and the camera does that crazy zoom down the road. It was a bit creepy. The coolest part of that stretch however was when we got to the top of the mountain and took a short break. We looked out in the distance, and though it was extremely dark and a little cloudy, we could see the snow on the top of Mt. Fuji in the distance. I would have loved to get a picture of it, but it was way too dark so it'll just have to be a picture in my mind.

We finally got to Checkpoint 5, a really nice temple, and stopped to apply some bandaids and eat some onigiri. At least I ate onigiri. Linton had a homemade bacon sandwich which I decided was a great idea for the future. We stayed a little longer than intended at CP5 and then finally I downed a Red Bull and we got going. We got a bit lost trying to get started on the next part, but once we figured out where to go, we made great time. CP5-CP6 has a lot of open road so once we got on the road we got set on a nice, brisk pace and went for it. There's not much to note about that section, really. It'll be a welcome easy part when the actual hike comes.

When we got to CP6 around 2:45am, we realized that we had not seen a single person, car, or anything since we left the bus stop when we started the hike. In fact, the only other living thing we saw besides each other was that black cat. It gave us a sense of really being alone out there. Kind of cool and creepy at the same time.

We left CP6 at about 3am and headed out for the last stretch. This is where things got interesting. By this time, as you can imagine, we were quite tired. We were starting to slow down drastically. We got to a point around 4:00 where we had to go straight up a very steep trail to get up a mountain. It was no gradual incline. It was tough, but it got even worse about 15 minutes up the trail when it started to rain. We managed to get to the top before the big rain started. We quickly threw on our rain gear, wrapped up all of our stuff in plastic, bags, and set out again. The rain was really picking up and fog started to set in. It got to the point where the leader would literally have to stop every 30 seconds or so to see if we were still on the trail because it was so hard to see. We couldn't see more than about 5 meters in front of us. There was a point where we knew we had 2km until our next landmark on our map and we just kept walking and walking and walking. We were sure we were lost. We stopped and had about a 5 minute meeting to decide whether we should go back or keep moving. We decided to keep moving and we're glad we did. It turns out we were still on the trail, it was just taking us a long time because we couldn't see.

We still had quite a long way to go. We were pretty exhausted and started getting delirious. Ashley was asking random questions to keep from going to sleep while walking. I think Linton started whistling. I just walked in complete silence. We were being put to the test. Once the sun came up it got much easier for us to see. That definitely helped our pace. We got to the final stretch of open road and by this time it was really pouring. We walked along the open road for about 4km until we finally made it to town, saw a person for the first time, and made it to the train station just before CP7. We got to the station at 8:15. Altogether the hike took us 12.5 hours. Not too bad!

We learned some things from this hike. We definitely know we're going to be tired at these points, but we learned that positive thinking is the way to go. And we have to continually support each other. We each had a funk during the night at different points, so we have to remember that that's going to happen and not get frustrated if somebody is slowing down or getting edgy. We have to fight through the tests.

We have a few weeks off and then we're going to get back on it after the spring vacation. Sorry no pictures from this last hike. It was pretty dark. The next hike will be a day hike so I'll try to get some up from that.

Thank to everybody who has donated so far. We're getting so much more support than we imagined and getting close to our goal. I think we'll have no trouble reaching it and going beyond. It's really great so thanks a lot!

Oxfam Trailwalker Japan - Fuji crew!

2010-02-26T12:19:00.009+09:00

Well as I mentioned a month or so back, on April 23-25 I am participating in a team-challenge to raise money for Oxfam International. The event is a 100 kilometer hike that takes place over 48 hours through the forests, hills, and mountains of Japan. It is called Oxfam Trailwalker.

Oxfam Trailwalker takes place in 12 countries around the world, and it is said that the Japan Trailwalker is the most challenging of all. Take a look at the site to read all about the trail and information on the hike.

So you may be thinking, "What does a 100km hike have to do with rasing money for charity?" I'm glad you asked. Each team of four that competes in the challenge is responsible for raising a minimum of 120,000 yen which is roughly equivalent to $1,346. The money that is raised goes to help people in need in places like Congo, the Philippines, Cambodia, Laos, India, Mogambique, and South Africa. To read more about how the money is used, look here. Last year, Oxfam Trailwalker Japan raised 49,246,830 yen.

My team is made up of Ashley Janssen from Minnesota, John Land from Alabama, Linton Rathgen from Christchurch, New Zealand and myself. We are called Fuji Crew.

So how can you help? You can go to our Just Giving site where you will find more information about our team as well as some pictures and information about how to make a donation. The donation on the site will be in Euros so your money will be transferred from Dollars to Euros to Yen. But no matter what, it'll go straight to Oxfam and help us to reach our goal of 120,000 yen by April 9. Anything above that amount would be great too.

If you have any questions about the event or anything else, let me know. As we do more practice hikes, I'll start to post some pictures on here and we'll continue to update pictures on the Just Giving site. You can see some of Ashley's below.

Thanks for reading and please help us out.

よし！

2010-02-17T14:42:00.002+09:00

Well I did it! I successfully completed the 10K. I came in 125th place out of around 190 boys. Or at least the boy who I raced the final 50 meters or so to the finish line came in 125th place. I wasn't given an actual number. I don't know my exact time yet. I'll find that out tomorrow at school when we get a packet with everybody's times. I'll look up #125 and count that as my time since we finished at almost exactly the same time. But I added up the minutes and seconds of the songs I listened to while I ran and came up with something around 45 minutes! Which is unbelievable! I guess my natural pace is much faster than the 11kph I run on the treadmill at the gym.

So needless to say I was very pleased. And I'm very tired. The unexpected hills really took it out of me. I took the rest of the day off and came home (making a stop to eat a huge lunch at Katsu-ya on the way.) One very bad thing about having this postponed from Friday to today is we have school tomorrow. I even have a 1st period class. So I'm going to rest up for the rest of the day.

Emily took some pictures of me while I ran that I'll post as soon as she sends them to me.

おつかれさまです！

Let's try this again

2010-02-16T21:16:00.004+09:00

So as of now, everything is a go for tomorrow. We're going to try this one again, drier but much colder. Here is a picture from my Accuweather app to show you exactly what the weather might be like when I'm running tomorrow.

Or for those metrically challenged...

I've come to like Celsius because it makes things look more exciting. So I'll probably be running sometime around 11. I'll be wearing shorts although Kelly keeps telling me I shouldn't, but I always run in shorts so that's what I'm comfortable in. I probably will forgo a t-shirt however for something with long sleeves. We'll see.

iPod is charged and ready. Here's hoping this thing happens this time!

Another chapter in a long book of February blah

2010-02-12T09:00:00.002+09:00

Well Marathon Day got cancelled today. I was just getting up to get ready when I got a phone call saying that it was cancelled because of rain and that I should come to school because we would be having a regular class day today. So after weeks of looking forward to and preparing for this day, I'm feeling pretty let down and unhappy. It hasn't been cancelled completely, only postponed until next Wednesday. Next Wednesday will be the last chance to do it. Unfortunately the weather report I looked at this morning predicts rain on Wednesday too, so it's likely that it'll be cancelled altogether. I guess I have to keep my hopes up though.

Have I mentioned lately how much I despise the month of February? It seems like February is always full of bad things. There have been a few decent ones mixed in, but for the most part, I have been having bad Februarys for as long as I can remember. And this day and this weather just add to the long list of things I can't stand about this month. Sometimes I wish I was a bear so I could hibernate through February. Just go to sleep on the night of January 31 and wake up on the morning of March 1. Oh well.

Sorry to be a downer this morning. I'm just going to have to go to the gym after school today and run another 9K and keep my preparation going. Hopefully that'll make me feel better.

The clock is ticking...

2010-02-11T18:48:00.002+09:00

Well tomorrow is the day. It's currently pouring down rain in Fuji and has been all day, but if the rain stops during the night as it's supposed to, 200 high school boys and I will be running a 10K tomorrow. I know it seems silly to be getting all worked up about 10K. It's not like it's a real marathon or anything. But considering that I have never done anything like this before, it'll be a big accomplishment if I complete it. And if I start, believe me, I will complete it.

I'll also be making good on the promise I made to some students last year.

Well today was a holiday, National Foundation Day. No idea what it celebrates. We spent the entire day indoors, Kelly reading her book, me playing Playstation, while it rained outside. You can't do much more with a Thursday holiday anyway.

Wish me luck tomorrow! If I survive, I'll tell you all about it!

Thinking about the old days...

2010-02-05T13:35:00.004+09:00

Exciting day here at school today. Today was the last day of exams for our third year students, so they officially have the time from now until graduation (March 1) off. The time in between is used for students to make up classes or tests that they need to graduate. So today there were about 250 giddy third year students cleaning out their homerooms for the last time and packing up their stuff. They were very excited.

It reminded me of when I graduated from high school coming up on 12 years ago. I remember the day pretty clearly. It was a Friday. I had been exempt from all of my exams except one which I requested to take on that day during 7th period so I wouldn't have to come back the next week and take it. I took the exam, which I bombed (don't tell my dad,) and when I finished, my teacher let me leave. I remember walking down almost every hallway relishing the fact that I was finished. I knew I would likely never see those hallways again (which would have been true no matter what since the school has been completely remodeled.) Then I made the way out to my car and headed home. It's hard to believe that I have not entered the main part of that school building, old or remodeled, since that day. I think the last time I went on campus at all was about 8 years ago right after I graduated from college when I went up to give Mrs. Childress her Tommy Act II score back. She was retiring and had just left for the last time so I missed her. A bit anticlimactic I guess.

Well enough reminiscing. I had my last classes with the few third year students that I teach last week. I handled myself pretty well although I think if I had said any more I might have choked up a bit. I don't think I'll handle myself quite as well when I'm leaving in July. These students that are graduating have been a great class, but I don't have quite as strong a connection with them as with many of the students who I will be leaving behind when I go. It's going to be tough. But no thinking about that now.

Well as you may have heard, Kelly and I both passed our JLPT. For those who are unaware, that's the Japanese Language Proficiency Test. There are currently 4 levels and we passed level 4 which is the beginner level. But that by no means takes away from the accomplishment. It was tough. Surprisingly, I had my highest percentage on the listening section which is what I was most worried about going in. My lowest was grammar - no surprise. I plan to keep studying even after we leave, and depending on where we end up I may consider trying for level 3 next year. We'll see.

Well, one week until the 10K. I'm getting nervous, but I'm ready to get it overwith. I'm shooting for a time somewhere from 56 minutes to 1 hour. The pace I usually run at puts me in that range, but I usually run on a treadmill that sets the pace for me. It's going to be much different running on my own. I'm hoping the gameday adrenaline kicks in though. I've said from the very beginning that I absolutely do not want to finish last. Last year, the last student finished at about 1 hour and 5 minutes, so I think shooting for 56-60 minutes should be okay. I saw some students doing running practice in P.E. today and I think I can take 'em. Today after school I'm going to the gym to do my last long distance practice run. I'll do a couple of shorter ones next week. Today I plan to run 9km. So by the time most of you read this, my legs will be jello.

Kelly just put up some pictures on Flickr. Some old, some new. Go check 'em out!

First blog of the new year...my bad

2010-01-20T10:06:00.002+09:00

Well I got fussed at by my mother this morning about my lack of blogging. We can't have that, right? So here we go.

I'm at work now killing time until my next class. Right now I'm teaching a lesson to my ichi-nensei on "How to Do Things." I'm not actually teaching them how to do things. The lesson is on how to tell someone how to do things. So I'm teaching use of things like first, second, then, next, after that, finally, etc. I have an activity at the end where each student has one step of a task and they have to find the other three classmates who have the other three steps to that task and then put them in the correct order. When they're finished they read the steps out loud for the class using those sequence words. I've taught it once and it went well. Hoping it goes well for my classes today.

This is the third week back from the break and I'm finally starting to feel normal again. The first week and a half I was still in post-vacation mode and had no motivation to do anything. I wasn't looking forward to my classes and didn't want to plan lessons. But now that things are back into a real routine, I'm feeling good. The weekend comes much faster the busier you keep yourself. That's a lesson I wish I had learned a long time ago.

I've started a new workout routine these past few weeks. It's not a New Year's resolution thing because I was going regularly before. I've just started working out harder and longer. No more taking it easy on myself. I'm really enjoying it so far. I'm trainging for two major things. I'm planning to do my school's 10km marathon next month. I'm nervous about it, but I think it'll be really good for me to do. Also I'm taking part in a 100km hike in April for charity. It's the Oxfam Trailwalker where you work in teams of four and together complete a 100km hike in 48 hours or less. I'll write more about that later. It's a very big deal and I'm really excited about it.

Finally, as many may have seen on my Twitter or Facebook, we have officially told our schools that we will not be recontracting for a third year. So what this means is that we will be heading back to the States at the end of July. It's bittersweet because we really like living in Japan, but we think it's time to move on. As of now, we're not sure exactly where we'll end up, but we know we'll be flying into Houston sometime at the end of July.

Well, gotta go to class!

Random thoughts

2009-12-15T21:03:00.005+09:00

Whoa! I forgot I changed my blog layout. I went to the blog and was quite surprised by the color scheme. What do you think?

Just a few things today. I took Caspian on a walk earlier. He's developed a bit of a hacking, choking kind of cough lately that we were afraid was due to his collar choking him on walks so we got him one that hopefully will be better. He seems to like it. Here's a picture of it in action.

Here is another picture from the walk. I'm glad that after all this time I still love to just gaze at Mt. Fuji. It's better to do this when I'm walking Caspian than when I'm riding my bike home because of safety reasons. Unfortunately that limits my lighting. This picture is actually lighter than real life. It was pretty dark when I took this. It was 4:55pm. Such is the life of living in a country with no daylight savings time.

Speaking of this great country we live in, we recently got into a discussion of how great the train system is here. Especially the Shinkansen system. Did you know that people are looking into the idea of building a high-speed train line in Texas. It would connect Houston to Dallas, Houston to Austin, Houston to San Antonio, Dallas to Austin, and Austin to San Antonio. They're calling it the Texas T-Bone. Check out the website! I think this would be a great idea for many reasons. High speed public transportation is a great thing and very convenient. Plus, this system would create a lot of jobs for people to build it, run it and maintain it and jobs are we need right now. In addition to that, it would jump-start the economy in Texas by greatly increasing tourism. Just think how much more often people in Houston would visit Dallas and vice-versa if there was a convenient way to get there that would save them money on gasoline. They go to these other cities, spend money at stores, restaurants, bars, etc. and then see the prices at their own stores, restaurants, and bars drop because people from other cities are doing the same. If train lines like that could be built all over the country, the US could save extreme amounts of money on oil and usage of oil would slowly but surely be decreased assuring that we could have enough for the future and decreasing our dependency on oil from the Middle East. Plus tourist money would be spent all over improving our own economy. The public transportation industry needs to be improved in the US. We cannot keep depending solely on cars and airplanes to get us where we need to go. Trains are the answer. Sometimes to move forward, you need to look back and see what worked in the past. That's my opinion.

Finally for today, here is a picture of some coloring I did while I was bored at work today. It is a family tradition of my family to color Christmas pictures and then write the date, time and temperature. I don't have any coloring books so I printed off something from online and colored it. I think it was actually colder than what this picture says but this is what my Accuweather iPhone app said so that's what I went with. Enjoy!

Fun with finals and more!

2009-12-03T19:53:00.009+09:00

It's finals week at school this week which is always great. It means a few days of no classes so a lot of time relaxing at the desk. Of course it also means having a lot of tests to grade. Tests this week have been good, bad, and some in between. The usual. My favorite part of any of the tests that I wrote this term was a section in our ichi-nensei International Course test. We taught them a lesson on Australian slang to prepare them for their trip to Australia next summer. So for the test I wrote a paragraph full of Australian slang words and had them translate it into "normal" English.

Here's the papargraph with the normal English words in parentheses:

G’day! (Hello!) How ya goin? (How are you?) This arvo (afternoon) I was having a barbie (barbecue) in Brizzie (Brisbane) with my mates (friends). I was eating some Roo (kangaroo) and a Sheila (woman) came up and asked me if she could have some tomato sauce (ketchup). I had put heaps (a lot) of tomato sauce (ketchup) on my tucker (food) so I didn’t have any more. I told her “sorry” and she told me, “No worries!” (It's ok!) Then she said she wants to have brekkie (breakfast) with me tomorrow. Crikey! (Whoa!) You don’t believe me? It’s Fair Dinkum! (true!)

The students did pretty good on it although I doubt many of them really got it. Oh well, I was entertained at least.

Here's a funny essay that a girl wrote in another class that is about to go to Australia in March. The question was, "What are you nervous or worried about for your trip to Australia?" I hope you can read it.

I like the end. "I think miss you my long hair." It'll grow back, I promise.

Last weekend after Kelly aced her GRE (!) we took advantage of being in Tokyo and ate at Outback Steakhouse. It was very much like the real thing. Not exactly but very close. The waiter spoke to us in English, and it's the first time since we've been here that we've paid our bill at the table. There was even a service charge (tip) which was kind of refreshing, not that I'm looking forward to going back to paying tips when we go home. Here's my meal:

That's definitely a Bloomin' Onion there. As greasy as always but oh so delicious. Outback special medium rare, garlic mashed potatoes, and cole slaw. A caesar salad preceded all of this.

Kelly about to devour her meal:

And here is the Santa Claus hanging out outside the restaurant. We thought he was funny so we took some pictures of his descent down the chimney.

Here Kelly tells him "Good luck!"

He goes down waving goodbye.

And down to make some little children very happy (or help out grilling steaks in the kitchen downstairs - one of the two.)

Finally, as with most places, the flu has been going around a lot lately. Many students have been out with it (regular - not swine.) Each day they write the names of the students out with the flu in blue chalk on the absent student board. Absent students without the flu are written in white chalk. And everyday in the daily information page we get on our desks there is some section reminding us that インフルエンザ (influenza) is still around so we should wash our hands and use rubbing alcohol constantly.

At the beginning of each month there is a section in the information sheet telling the average number of students that were absent, late, and left early per day for each month. This is what was in there today. For those not familiar with Japanese writing, 月 means month so ４月 means April and so on. The top line is absent, the middle is late, and the bottom is left early. Notice how the numbers have jumped the past few months.

That flu doesn't mess around. One thing I thought, however, is that those numbers are still a lot better than you would see at most American high schools. I mean, even in the month of November, 9.3 students were tardy each day. If a school in America had that number, imagine how ecstatic the principal would be. Hopefully things stay that way in Japan and improve in America.

The Yen

2009-11-24T19:28:00.003+09:00

Bad news everyone. Today was a sad, sad day in the teachers' room of Yoshiwara High School. The 51 yen...is gone. Yes, someone finally decided that they needed that 51 yen badly enough to take it. I can only hope for the sake of humanity and all that I believe in, that the person who took it was the original owner of the money. If not, may God have mercy on us all. The spot where it used to be just was not the same. Here is a picture. WARNING: This is not for the faint of heart.

Brings a tear to my eye.

So now I'm thinking that I might put another 51 yen back there. How much would that freak everybody out? What do you think? Should I do it?

Tonight I made a good dinner if I may say so myself. I got the idea for the recipe from a student. We were doing a class on writing recipes in English. Most of the students wrote things like miso soup and scrambled eggs. But one girl did Salmon and Broccoli Cream pasta. The recipe she wrote and the picture she drew made me immediately want to eat it. So tonight I made the recipe almost exactly except I added garlic (of course) and substituted scallops for the salmon. I cooked the pasta and the broccoli together. Then I sauteed mushrooms and garlic. I then added the scallops until they were cooked. I removed the scallops and added some alfredo sauce (I still need to learn how to make a cream sauce from scratch) and mixed in the pasta and broccoli. I put the scallops back on top and garnished with rosemary. Served with some salad on the side, it was great. Kelly recommended that I do lessons like this more often.

In other news, I'm very mad at the Texans. Kris Brown is Houston's new Brad Lidge.

Never a dull moment

2009-11-05T22:14:00.015+09:00

We've had an interesting past few weeks. Last week was full of Halloween craziness of course. Halloween has become a bit of a big deal around my school so I felt obligated to decorate and do some cool stuff. It's funny because I never really paid much attention to Halloween from about age 12 until last year and now all of sudden it's become a big deal. Emily and I had some students make decorations and were surprised as always by how creative they can be. We had ghosts and mummies and jack-o-lanterns and bats and spiders hanging all over the LL room. We pinned up our green cobweb thingy and some other spooky things and had a pretty nicely decorated room. It's nice to have a room on campus that nobody else really uses because you can do whatever you want and most people never even know. I didn't get any good pictures of the room or the decorations so these will have to suffice.

As for the classes, we had Halloween parties in our International Course classes and our Elective English class. The activities varied. We did a mummy wrap (always a crowd pleaser,) pin the wart on the witch, scarecrow stuffing, and pumpkin basketball. For that we had some little soft pumpkin toys that the students had to shoot into trick-or-treat jack-o-lantern buckets full of candy. If they made it they got 2 or 3 pieces of candy, depending on which one they made it into. Not many made it, but everyone got 1 piece for trying. We also did an activity with two classes called Mummy Body Parts. We had boxes at the front with stuff inside. The students had to reach inside and decide what body part was in each box. We had tofu for brains, udon for intestines, canned asparagus for fingers, little quail eggs for eyes, yarn for hair, and jelly for snot. It was pretty gross and smelled pretty bad though, so we nixed it for the rest of the classes.

I did my jack-o-lantern carving again. Here is this year's creation. I also dressed up again this year. Please none of the "where's your costume?" comments.

Last weekend we went to Tokyo to watch a Rugby match between the New Zealand All Blacks and the Australia Wallabees. These are the national teams for their countries. It was a great time. We sat with some Kiwis so we were going for the All Blacks and they came away with a victory! We also got to see them do the famous Haka before the game. This is a tradtional Maori war chant that they do before every game to psych themselves up and intimidate their opponent. I guess it worked. Here's a picture from afar of them doing the Haka.

And since that doesn't help with understanding the Haka very much, here's a video so you can all see what it's like. Note: this is not from the game we saw.

As for the rules of Rugby, I can't help you much with that. I did a crash course a few days beforehand and got to where I had a basic idea of what was going on by the end of the game, but for the most part it all looked like chaos to me. I guess that's probably what football looks like to most people who aren't from America.

Yesterday I had a unique class. Our school had a visiting dance troupe come and perform for all of the first years. The principal thought it would be neat to have them sit in on a class. The interesting thing about these people is that the group consisted of Chinese adults and Australian children. So along with some supporters like directors, parents, brothers and sisters, and other random people, I had my class of 20 students plus about 8 Australian kids, 3 Australian adults, 16 Chinese young adults (20-23ish) and another 5-7 older Chinese adults. And we all took part in an English Oral Communication class. It was pretty fun yet very crazy. We were able to get everyone involved, even the Chinese girls who for the most part could not speak English. I gave stickers to them if they answered just like I do with my regular students and they were very appreciative. All in all, it was good experience. And one that I'd prefer not to repeat.

And for the crazy things I see every day section of this blog, here are a few pictures of some posters in the teachers' break room at school. I can't figure out why they're in there, but I don't really try.

This one is about safety on the streets.

As you can see, they advise you to wear your seatbelt, wear bright shiny things when you are out at night, and watch out for drunk drivers if you are an old lady crossing the road. Here are some close-ups of the faces.

His seatbelt clearly is very comfortable.

She definitely sees the shiny things and thinks they might be aliens.

Not only is he a red-faced drunk but apparently he was blowing bubbles in his car right before this photo was taken. I love the fact that his can says "BEER" in English.

And the next poster...

As you can see, these mikan are very hot. Of course they are! The kotatsu, and two heaters are running at the same time. What's wrong with these people? Not only are they running up their electric bill and harming the environment, but they're ruining some perfectly good mikan. Mikan don't taste good hot!

Poor little guy. I know how you feel.

Picture Time!

2009-10-19T20:33:00.012+09:00

Here are some random pictures from recent weeks/months I wanted to share:

Caspian got some bread at the beach. He had no idea what to do so he just held it in his mouth.

This is my group's poster from English camp. Our groups name was "Kory and Funny Company"

Caspi got a new toy from my parents. This is pre-destroy.

The sunset from our first night at Goza Beach last month.

Kelly played with fireworks.

We rode on some boats.

This sign is in the bathroom of an Indian restaurant in Numazu (not our Indian restaurant.) Nothing makes me want to travel somewhere more than a picture of endless sand.

I went to another Shimizu S-Pulse game. S-Pulse won 1-0. A pitcher's duel.

Apparently somebody's been sleeping overnight at school. Working too hard, or trying to save money on rent? I guess we'll never know.

Caspian has taken to sunbathing lately.

Our annual ichi-nensei hiking trip was last Friday. Here's part of the group eating lunch.

Hiking down a long set of stairs.

Cool, old bridge. Note: this is not the wobbly bridge that I decided to jump repeatedly while crossing, making about 10 girls scream for their lives.

Obligatory waterfall shot. Not a recycled picture from last year but might as well be.

Fin.

A great Saturday and a busy week ahead

2009-10-04T22:19:00.003+09:00

I finally went to Kelly's favorite onsen yesterday after a year of hearing her talk about it. It was pretty amazing indeed and I can't believe it took me this long to go. I sat in every bath they had on the men's side which included: regular hot bath, herb tea, green tea, two other herb baths, sulphur, grape, salt, and carbonation. My favorites were the salt (because I floated), carbonation (because I was covered in bubbles), and the yellow herb (because it smelled good.) I also sat in an extremely hot sauna for a few minutes and then immediately went and sat in an ice cold bath. Why? I don't know. But it was invigorating!

Before the onsen we had gone white water rafting with a big group of people down the Fuji River. It was pretty fun and brought me back to my youth group days and our canoe trips. The rapids were few and far between but it was still fun. We also jumped off a cliff into the water at one point. This was the highest point from which I had jumped into water since I jumped off the high dive at our local pool when I was a kid and had extreme pain in one of my ears. I was nervous that it would happen again which is why I hadn't done it in so long, but there was no pain. It was pretty nervewracking though. Standing on a cliff waiting to jump off with 30 people watching you is quite intimidating. I'm glad I did it though.

School is in full swing right now. I spent a lot of time last week getting some 3rd year girls ready for their university entrance interviews. They were on Saturday so I hope they did well. I've got a busy week ahead of me this week because I have two tests to write as well as the listening dialogue that goes along with them. Then we have to record the listening part and get it to the teachers by Thursday. In the meantime, I have a lesson to plan and a presentation for our Mid-Year Seminar to put together. I haven't started on any of these tasks so I guess you know what I'll be up to in my free time this week.

I signed up this week to take the Japanese Language Proficiency Test - Level 4. That's the beginner level and I think I should do well as long as I study enough. The test is in December, so I have time but I know it'll sneak up on me if I'm not careful.

Finally, for anyone who is curious: awhile back I wrote about 51 yen that was sitting in the teacher's kitchen at school. Well, it is still there just waiting for someone to claim it. Here is a picture of the infamous coins, looking lonely and forgotten:

Maybe everyone is scared to take it because that guy on the fan is watching. Probably.

English, Japanese, vision, weather, books, and friends = this blog post :)

2009-09-12T13:55:00.003+09:00

I've been sitting here trying to think of something interesting to write. It seems that my lack of blogging lately might be due to the fact that things have gotten very routine for me so things don't seem as interesting to me anymore. I need to remind myself that that's not the case for most of the people who read this and also remind myself that I need to really appreciate what's around me. So anyway, here are soem random snippets from recent days.

I had my school's English camp a few weeks ago. It was the ichi-nensei International course class - 41 students. There were ten ALTs there altogether including Kelly. We were in Gotemba which is on the other side of Mt. Fuji from here but still in Shizuoka prefecture. It was a lot of fun and very tiring as I was pretty much in charge of running the camp since I planned the whole thing. I was really proud of the kids and I even told them so. They did great and tried really hard and we all had a lot of fun. I absolutely love this group of students. I've found that at the end of the day, the one thing I love more than anything here is my students. Pretty different from before, huh?
I started taking Japanese one-on-one tutorials last month at FILS, a place for international sharing here in Fuji. I meet once a week with a guy named Wake (wah-kay.) It's been pretty interesting although I wouldn't say my conversational Japanese has gotten much better. He teaches me a lot, but we never practice what he's taught me. I think I might ask him next week if we can practice a bit more. I'll also be starting the Intermediate Japanese language course soon which will get me back into studying. I'm planning to take the Japanese Language Proficiency Test in December. I'll probably take the level 4 (the easiest one) although I'd like to shoot for level 3. But I've got a ton of kanji to learn if I want to try for level 3 so I probably should just keep my expectations realistic.
I've been on my last pair of contact lenses for quite a while now, but I can't order new ones because my doctor refused to let 1-800 Contacts send them to me because my prescription is old. So I'm kind of in limbo right now. I've started wearing my contacts while I ride my bike to work since I can't handle being outside without sunglasses on and then I change into my glasses when I get to work. This is the first time I've worn my glasses at work here so a lot of people have been very surprised. The students notice, but when they can't think of how to ask me why I'm wearing glasses they just hold their fingers in circles up to their eyes to look like glasses. This is my cue to explain why I'm wearing glasses. I've gotten good at recognizing these visual cues.
The weather has been cooling down over the last week. It's not what I would consider fall weather but it's definitely not hot summer weather anymore. I only fan myself for 5 minutes when I get to work now instead of 10. I'm very ready for fall.
I'm currently reading a book called The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. He's one of Japan's most respected authors. This is the 2nd book by him that I've read. It's a slow read and I'm a slow reader so since I checked it out, I've re-checked it once and am about to have to re-check it again. I'm not even close to being halfway through. In the meantime, Kelly has read 6 books.
I've had a recent bout of homesickness earlier this week after talking to my two best friends James and Adam on Skype last week. Adam was in Corpus Christi visiting James so I called them up and got to talk to them. It was the first time I had actually talked to Adam since before we left and only the second time for James. So that was fun and a good reminder of some good times and good friends.

I suppose that's it for now. Gwynn suggested that I set a weekly blog day like Kelly did. I haven't decided what day that will be yet, so I guess I'll surprise you.

See you!

What's my Age Again?

2009-08-22T23:20:00.005+09:00

So despite the fact that I turned 29 last week, I have a new boy-like obsession. I've never really been into cars or toys or toy cars. But earlier this week I made my daily stop at 7-11 for breakfast. I have become a semi-coffee drinker. I say semi because it's not like other people who have a coffee machine at home and make coffee and sit and have their morning coffee every morning. I just stop at 7-11 and buy a can of coffee every morning along with the sandwich, pastry, or onigiri that I eat for breakfast. It's usually sweetened a bit as well.

So anyway, I went in earlier this week and looked at the coffee selection when I noticed a free prize on top of the Boss Rainbow Blend coffee. I didn't even look at the prize in my morning stupor. I just grabbed a can and headed off to work. When I got there and pulled the coffee out of my backpack I discovered a toy car was the free prize. I was only slightly interested until I realized that it was the kind of toy car that you can pull back and then let go and it will go forward at amazing speeds. All of a sudden I was very interested.

I looked at the thing that came with it and found out that there are 9 different cars in total. I have since become a Boss Rainbow Blend coffee addict. I have 6 of the 9 cars. Here they are:

I plan to get the other 3 soon and then have races down the hallways at school with my students. I'm sure it will annoy the other teachers, but after being here a year I find that I don't care about that one bit. It's gonna be fun!

In other news, we've been working on a website lately. I joined the Shizuoka chapter of AJET (Assocation of Japan Exchange and Teaching.) We are basically in charge of planning events and bringing the JETs of Shizuoka together. I am the Shizuoka AJET webmaster. Kelly designed the website and is teaching me how to manage it. So far it's going really well. You can check it out here.

Next week is my school's camp and then school starts back up again the week after that. I'll be glad to get things rolling again. Though I've enjoyed the break from classes, the days go much faster when stuff is actually happening. Plus, I miss my students! :)

See ya!

A month of fun and changes

2009-08-04T20:26:00.002+09:00

So apparently Kelly and I have switched good blogger statuses. Sorry about that. I mean, good for Kelly, but sorry I've been so absent lately.

Kerry was here a couple of weeks ago for about 6 days. It was a short visit, but it was great to see him. I felt like we spent the whole time doing the same thing that we do whenever everyone visits...eating. But there's a lot of good food to eat, and when you have only a short visit to fit it all in, what do you expect?

The night Kerry got here we went to a baseball game in Yokohama. The Yokohama Baystars vs. the Chunichi Dragons. It was a fun game. A very old stadium, much smaller than the Tokyo Dome where we saw a game back in April, but it had a lot of character and great fans. Chunichi came out on top which was not surprising because Yokohama is apparently a pretty bad team. But it didn't deter the fans around us from cheering until the bitter end. Although, seeing as we didn't particularly care about either team, we left after the 8th to beat the people back to the train.

We spent the next few days in Fuji and the surrounding areas. We went to the beach in Atami one day (the only day it didn't rain.) Kerry and I then went on to Tokyo where we met up with a few of my friends. We stayed in a capsule hotel which was a cool experience. The capsule was small, but not as small as I always imagined it would be. Certainly not as small as the drawers that Kramer had the Japanese businessmen sleeping in on that one Seinfeld episode. We spent the next day going around Tokyo and seeing some different things, shopping, and people watching. We went out that night in Shibuya before getting chased by the rain back to Shinjuku where we played some pool. Kerry left the next day and hopefully was able to track down his luggage at Narita Airport. I only took a few pictures while he was here. You can see some on the Flickr site.

After Kerry left, I went on the Fuji Rock Festival for 3 days. This a big music festival in Niigata, Japan (nowhere near Mt. Fuji despite its title.) Fuji Rock is considered to be the Lollapalooza or Glastonbury of Japan. I had an absolute blast. We camped out at night and listened to live music all day. It was my first music festival and it was absolutely one of the most fun weekends I've ever had. I got very little sleep, got rained on several times, walked in a ton of mud, and enjoyed every minute of it. Among my favorite bands I saw were Oasis, Simian Mobile Disco, The Melvins, Ben Harper, Franz Ferdinand, The Airborne Toxic Event, Jimmy Eat World, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, The Shibasushirazu Orchestra, Diplo, and Weezer. All in all a great weekend.

My new teaching partner, Emily arrived last Wednesday. I'm looking forward to getting to work with her. A lot of the new JETs have been arriving and I'm really excited about meeting them. It feels like when a new freshman class would come into the theatre department at ACU. There's so much gossip going around that I feel like I know them even though I haven't met them. So finally on Friday night we'll get to meet some of them. Then next week I'm working at the new ALT orientation so I'll get to meet a lot of them there. Should be fun.

Last tidbit: Now that Andrea has left, I have suddenly become the person that two of the girls at school tell all of the gossip to. I never knew what I was missing out on before. I now know who is dating who, who nobody likes, etc. Useful information. :)

Busy busy bu...oh sorry I got distracted by all of my work.

2009-07-08T19:59:00.005+09:00

Yeah so the last two weeks have been the busiest of my time in Japan. I've had plenty of extremely busy days or two days but these weeks have been the kind where I get to work and don't have time to sit still, much less check my e-mail at work. Which is saying something since I have an iPhone and can check e-mail while I'm going to the bathroom. Not that I ever do that...

I'm not sure what's made me so busy. I think it's the combination of finishing up classes for the semester, writing tests, recording listening tests, tutoring students for speaking tests, planning for orientation, planning for English camp, grading tests, and checking essays. When everything piles up on you suddenly you're like, "Whoa, what happened?" But the funny thing is, I don't mind it. I think I found myself with the ability to do as little work as possible so much in the last few years that actually having a lot of work to do has been a nice relief. I like not having to think of work to do. When I have to find work for myself is when I stop working. But I've worked overtime almost every day for the past two weeks and it's great. Not to mention the fact that people have taken notice, which never hurts. Not saying I prefer to work overtime. But...you know.

We had an area schools softball tournament on the 4th of July. It was a teachers' tournament. I played left field and batted cleanup for my school. I probably should've batted leadoff since I went 5 for 8 with 5 singles over our two games and our leadoff hitter hit like 5 homeruns. Oh well. We won our first game 12-0 and I was 3 for 5 in that game. Then we lost our second game 12-9. I was 2 for 3 in that one. I made a pretty costly error in left in the second game. The bases were loaded with one out. Our pitcher had already walked in two runs and the batter hit a sharp ground ball single to left. It should've been a simple one run single but I went after it to pick it up quickly from the side to keep an extra runner from scoring. I didn't use good fundamentals and the ball went straight under my glove and rolled forever. Everyone scored (it reminded me of little league because there were no fences) and like 8 runs ended up scoring in the inning. We scored a lot and made it close but we couldn't catch up. It was interesting playing with people who speak a different language. They use English terms for a lot of stuff in softball/baseball. This includes thing like, "Nice pitching", "Nice batting" "Nice play righto" "Nice play Thado" (that's third.) But at one point there was a run down between second and third. Now being the knowledgable baseball guy I am, I knew that more running, less needless throwing is always better in a rundown. So our shortstop gets the ball and doesn't see that one runner is standing on third and another runner is running to third. So I start shouting There! There! There! Second Second!" And he's like, "Huh?" Then he sees him and we start the rundown. So the other guy is still standing on third and the shortstop is about to throw to third and I'm thinking that's an error and run waiting to happen so I yell, "No! Run! Run! Run!" But this guy doesn't speak English so I should've been yelling "Hashitte! Hashitte! Hashitte!" Fortunately people spend a minimum of 6 years learning English in Japan and this guy is relatively young so he knows "run" and runs him down and tags him out to end the inning. It was fun though. It took all Saturday afternoon but playing softball was not a bad way to spend the 4th by any means.

After the softball tournament I went and met up with Kelly and many people at our friend's house for some 4th of July festivities. We did some grilling and listened to lots of music and had a good time. Americans were outnumbered by non-Americans (including English, Scottish, Irish, Kiwi [that's New Zealand], and Japanese) but no matter. America's birthday was celebrated and respected by all. There was a lot less America complaining than there would have been if George W. Bush had still be president that's for sure. Everybody loves Mr. Obama. And a nice, loud rendition of the Star Spangled Banner was sung as well. Nice. And loud. In tune? No.

I'm looking forward to Kerry getting here soon. He gets here in 10 days as a matter of fact. So far on the schedule for his 6 days here are baseball, karaoke, Tokyo, and food. Pretty standard. I wanted to go to a Yomiuri Giants game (the Yankees of Japan) while he was here. Unfortunately they're playing the Hanshin Tigers which would be awesome expcept for the fact that the Tigers are the Red Sox of Japan and therefore the game is very very sold out. So we're probably going to see the Yokohama Baystars instead who can probably be considered to be the Pittsburgh Pirates of Japan. Oh well. They're playing the Chunichi Dragons who we saw play the Giants in April and who Tom Selleck played for in Mr. Baseball. So it should be fun if not necessarily crowded.

Hope everybody's doing well and had a good 4th. We're looking forward to rainy season ending, which is awful. Hopefully only about another week. At which point it will just be hot. And no, Houston people, don't talk about how we should be happy to get rain because it's just been hot with not enough rain there. You don't want me to wish this your way. Trust me. You like being able to breath, don't you?

Finally, here are a couple of pics from our karaoke night with the Haseltines:

Claire wasn't feeling karaoke at first (as you can tell by the microphone laying on the table) but she found her groove eventually.

Jeff and Gwynn sang a few duets I had never heard in karaoke before. Including songs by Bread and Elvis. But they were great!
Not pictured is Jeff and my duet of "America" by Simon and Garfunkel. My harmonies were questionable.

Here is a picture of me and Kelly after the Yoshiwara Gion Festival. It was our first festival wearing jimbei and yukata. Bunny ears courtesy of Jeff. :)

Peace!

Future Comic Book Authors

2009-06-23T21:15:00.011+09:00

Just a short one tonight. I wanted to share some funny things some students turned in. Only in Japan do you take pictures of your students' work.

In our 2nd year English class, we are doing a lesson on Problems and Solutions. The 2nd year classes have been a bit boring so far this school year due to several things. The textbook is not very good for one thing. Also, we only have each class once every other week and since there are two ALTs, I actually only see each class about once a month. We used to see these students every week. Finally, there is something that happens when students become 2nd years. They seem to lose all of their excitement and energy. The classes with them become almost painful.

So I decided with this lesson to try to give them something creative to do. So instead of just talking about Problems and Solutions, we are having the students draw their own 3-frame comic strip about a problem situation and how it is solved. Some are pretty basic, but some are very creative. There were two from a class today that I thought were really funny. So I took a picture of them to share! Here you go...

The problem:

Notice it says "Lun over the person" at the top? It never gets old.

Tension mounts:

The Solution:

Glad to see everything worked out okay. I like how the one guy is breathing a sigh of relief. I think I would too.

And the next one...

The problem:

Cat is plump. That is definitely a problem.

What's he gonna do???

Oh, of course!

The solution:

Now that's one good-looking cat!

These made me happy. :)

Happy Memorial Day!

2009-05-25T18:51:00.003+09:00

I was thinking last night about different American holidays that I've missed this year or had to work on. And when I thought about all of them, I realized that I almost feel more upset about working on Memorial Day than any of the others. I worked on Thanksgiving which was strange of course, but we did celebrate it with people a few days later, so it wasn't like I missed out on Thanksgiving altogether. I didn't work on Christmas and although I wasn't with my whole family or family-in-law I was still with Kelly and Caspian and we had a family Christmas. I worked on Labor Day but that wasn't a new thing. I've worked on Labor Day many times and used to have football practice on Labor Day every year. But Memorial Day was always one of my favorite holidays. I liked it because it kind of marks the beginning of summer. There would usually be only a little more school left or it would be completely out. I spent many a Memorial Day weekend at the lake swimming and jetskiing. It was a good way to get my first suntan (or burn) of the summer. The food is good, it's relaxing, it's warm, and altogether a great day/weekend. So, it was a little disappointing being at work today. I'm pretty sure this is the first time I've ever worked on Memorial Day. Thinking about all of the people who will be spending the day grilling, watching baseball, swimming (unless it's raining of course) etc. makes me a little jealous. But, it's like I tell Kelly quite often when we think about things we're missing back home, we have a whole life worth of Memorial Days to enjoy, but right now we're enjoying Japan. I don't always say Memorial Days of course, I fill in that blank with whatever fits the situation. Kind of like an English class.

But I guess the main thing I realize with missing Memorial Day is that there is no clear marker for summer here. I will keep working all summer and am actually at the beginning of a pretty busy few weeks. So while the random weeks here and there with no classes that I spend just sitting at work are a nice break from the regular class schedule, nothing beats summer vacation. I'll have to get my summer fix in different ways I guess. We need to get to the beach before rainy season starts.

Well, I guess this post hasn't been very deserving of the exclamation point in the title. But I do mean it. To all of you lucky people out there with the day off today, Happy Memorial Day! Have a hot dog, take the jetski for a spin, and watch the Astros lose for me.

Our apartment

2009-05-21T20:57:00.017+09:00

We don't make claims of liking our apartment that much. In fact, we're pretty open about the fact that we don't like it. It's old and not well cared for. Really the only positives are that it's cheap, close to Kelly's work and bigger than our other option, which is my school's apartment. Nevertheless, it's our place and as I was talking to my friend James on Skype the other day, he mentioned that he hasn't really seen many pictures of our apartment to the point where he knows what it looks like.

So, earlier this week I walked around taking pictures of the apartment with my phone and now I will share those with James and all of you. (Warning: I did not clean the apartment at all before taking these pictures.) So here you go. This is what we see every day...

What we see when we open our front door and walk into our apartment:

The front door from the inside. And our new shoe shelf. Makes the genkan much tidier.

Turn right after entering and you see the guest bedroom. Otherwise known as "the place where we throw all of the stuff that we don't have room for anywhere else and then try to clean and make livable when someone is staying over." Those clothes would usually be hanging outside to dry, but it was pouring down rain the day before so I hung them up inside.

Our wardrobe:

Turn left after entering and you see the bathroom area:

Behind that door:

The shower (across from the sink):

Turn right after entering (and after the guest bedroom) and there is the kitchen. That bag hanging is the recycle bag for プラ: Pura - everything plastic you could possibly imagine. We don't have a trash can for it yet.

The kitchen sink. And some newly purchased Dr Pepper.

Open the shoji doors on the left side of the kitchen and you have the living room:

The underside of the kotatsu table:

Turn left when you enter the living room and you see the bedroom:

Our futons (without sheets)

The view from our bedroom window. That's Mt. Fuji in the distance:

The view the other direction:

The door you saw in the kitchen leads to this, the balcony (equipped with washing machine and clothes line):

The view from the balcony:

Kelly's school, also from the balcony:

Go out the front door and you have the stairs. We're on the 3rd floor:

Fuji-san from the stairs. Getting harder to see every day as we near the summer:

The other direction:

Our local neighborhood rice field. Since I took this the field has been flooded because apparently that's how you grow rice. That's also how you attract thousands of frogs to croak all night long.

So there you go! I hope you enjoyed the picture tour. No more writing for tonight. Goodnight!

Rainy Sunday Ramblings

2009-05-17T14:37:00.004+09:00

Pretty normal stuff lately here. Golden week was a few weeks ago. We didn't do much. Karaoke one night, the Hamamatsu Kite Festival one day and a lot of resting. Then school got started back up and it's been pretty routine the past few weeks. Mid-terms are next week, so it should be an easy week with a lot of grading. We're leading up to our school culture festival which is at the beginning of June. That is supposedly one of the busiest times of the year, but I'm looking forward to it. I have a feeling it'll remind a bit of preparing for a show although English club is not really doing anything all that big. But it'll be fun to be a part of a big event like that at school.

Other things going on: I recently got a membership at a gym. It's on my way home from work, so it's not hard to make myself go. My deal has always been that if it's convenient for me to get to the gym, then I'll go. But if I go home first or have to go past my home to get to the gym, I won't go very much. But I've been going there after work very consistently and it's making me feel a lot healthier. I run everyday and lift weights. Everything is pretty much the same as a gym in the states other than the fact that all the weights are in kilograms instead of pounds. But I know that 1kg = 2.2 lbs, so I can get a pretty good idea of how much to lift.

Here's an interesting development I've been noticing at work. A few weeks ago I noticed 51 yen sitting in the corner of the teacher's kitchen on the ground. I didn't pick it up because I didn't really have a reason to, so I just left it there and went on my way. Then, last week I noticed this same 51 yen had been picked up and put on a table by the door to the kitchen. So someone took the trouble to bend down and pick up this 50 yen coin and 1 yen coin and rather than keeping it, they put it on that table. What's funny to me is that in America, if 50 cents was laying on the ground, it probably would not last a day. And I don't really think there's anything wrong with that. If I was in America, I probably would have picked it up the first time I saw it and kept it. Maybe not the 1 yen (or penny - in America's case.) But here it was just a natural thing to leave it there. What else is funny is that because people use so many coins here, it's likely that whoever it belonged to in the first place probably never even noticed it was missing. Yet, someone put it on that table as if the person would see it and say, "There's my 51 yen! I wondered what had happened to it." I'm interested to see how long it sits there. At what point do I take it? Will I take it? Will anybody take it or will it still be sitting there a year from now? I'll keep you posted on the happenings of that 51 yen.

Finally, I have recently discovered that after all of these years of saying I hate tuna fish sandwiches, it turns out they're not so bad. I actually bought cans of tuna at the grocery store a few weeks ago and have made a few sandwiches. I'm not sure why I thought they were so bad before. Maybe it was just the smell. Or maybe I really didn't like them and my taste buds have just matured. Makes me wonder what else I might like now that I didn't used to like. Meatloaf? Surely not. But I guess I owe it to myself to try it again someday. We'll see.

I'll be getting up at 4:30 Monday morning to watch the Rockets game. Hopefully if they lose it won't ruin my Monday. But I'll still be proud of what they've accomplished. I have a good feeling about it, though. Hopefully. Go Rockets!

Baseball, Broadway, and Blood

2009-05-01T20:24:00.008+09:00

Sorry for not writing much lately. Busy times.

The highlights: New school year started this month. This just in: I love new students! They are so happy and energetic and eager to please. They have been the highlight of the last month by far. I can't wait to get to know them better.

We went to a baseball game in Tokyo last weekend. We saw the Yomiuri Giants (the Yankees of Japan) against the Chunichi Dragons (Tom Selleck's team from "Mr. Baseball".) It was quite an experience. When it all boiled down to it the game itself was the same. I admit I had a much harder time paying attention to the game than usual. I think this was for several reasons:

a) There were many new things going on around us. The surroundings were just so different from what I'm used to. For example, you won't find many cheerleaders at American baseball games, but the Giants definitely had cheerleaders. Very interesting.

b) Each team had an official cheering section. The Giants section was bigger because they were the home team, but the Dragons also had a section in the left field bleachers and they meant business. As in all Japanese baseball games, each player had their own cheer so the cheering, drums, and chanting went on constantly. Very entertaining.

c) I didn't know many of the players at all other than the few who had recently played in the MLB. (Edgardo Alfonso being one for those of you who follow baseball.)

d) All of the loud speaker announcements were in Japanese. I never realized how important the PA guy was to keeping the crowd in the game until I couldn't understand him. I can't even honestly remember if there was one actually.

We were Giants fans that night because why not. So anyway, here is how the game went. An early solo homerun by the Giants (Alex Ramirez, obviously not Japanese.) The Giants added a run later to make it 2-0. It stayed 2-0 for quite a while until the Dragons got on the board with a solo homer around the 5th or 6th. Then they tied it up in the 8th. In the top of the 9th the Dragons took the lead on a 2-run blast. It was not looking good for the Giants. But I have seen too many comebacks in my day (being an Astros fan) to lose hope. Bottom of the 9th: First batter singles. Second batter draws a walk. Third batter: 3 run walk-off homerun, game over, Giants win 5-4. In typical Kory form, I gave high fives to the couple sitting behind me.

We went and saw West Side Story in Gotemba the next day. It was a pretty good performance. It was all in Japanese but I know the songs well enough that I could keep up. It was interesting to hear Bernstein and Sondheim done in Japanese. Jerome Robbins' language is universal though, so the dancing was quite good.

And for a completely anticlimactic ending to this blog, we had medical checks at school today. I did good in my vision test where you have to say what direction the thingy is pointing. Right, left, up, or down. Of course the people giving the test speak only Japanese so I had to say migi, hidari, ue, and shita. No problem. I then had some things attached to my ankles, wrists, and chest to measure something. Not really sure but I did as I was told. Blood pressure followed that and then the final step, the dreaded blood sample. They took three tubes of blood. The good part is that they only inserted the needle once which is the worst part. I have no problem with shots, but I hate having blood samples taken. I guess it's just bad memories from when I was on Acutaine and I had the most painful blood samples every six weeks. If only ProActive had been invented already. So hopefully it looks good and I don't have to do it again.

We are now at the beginning of Golden Week. We had a holiday on Wednesday for Showa Day but then had to work the last two days. But now we get the weekend and the next 3 days after that off. So it's a 5 day weekend. No big plans other than possibly going to a kite festival in Hamamatsu. It's going to be nice to rest though.

Here are some pictures from the baseball game. No zoom because I took them with my phone so...yeah.

The game in progress

The outfield

The 7th inning stretch cheerleaders

The Giants cheering section

Mount Fuji Climb

2009-04-14T19:20:00.002+09:00

Check out the video Kelly made of our Mt. Fuji climb at http://www.vimeo.com/4129654 !

Back to Normalcy

2009-04-09T19:46:00.010+09:00

Lots of things going on lately. We are nearing the end of Sakura season. For those that don't know, Sakura (Cherry Blossoms) bloom every year in Japan around the end of March/beginning of April. They are very beautiful and bloom almost all at once, causing quite a stir in Japan. They are only in bloom for about a week or two and then very quickly and suddenly the petals all start to fall off until they are all gone. It's a time that a lot of people here wait for all year. People go to parks with friends, sit under the Sakura and have picnics, etc. This is called hanami (looking at flowers) and is extremely popular. We did our own hanami last weekend with some friends at Iwamoto Yama Koen. There were cherry blossoms everywhere and a lot of people and it was a very nice day. We've been lucky because after the weeks and weeks of rain we had, it has been very nice since the cherry blossoms started blooming. We took some pictures at the park which will be on Flickr soon, but until then here are some I took with my phone to tide you over.

Here some petals fell on my leg while I was sitting. I thought it was kind of a peaceful moment.

The group getting ready to leave. It started raining a bit while we waited for the bus.

Now the petals are falling and that's very pretty also. It makes the ground under the trees look pink. And when they are falling sometimes it looks like snow. It's very nice. On my way home today I saw a little girl, maybe 5 or 6 years old sweeping up the petals under a tree. At first I wondered why she was doing it, and then I noticed that she had a little bag that she was putting them in. She wanted to take some home which I thought was very sweet.

Things were extremely slow at work the past few weeks until this week. In Japan, many teachers get transferred to different schools at the end of the school year, so my school had about 8 teachers leave (which from what I hear is not that many.) We had a farewell ceremony at school last Monday to see them off, so all of the students had to come up to school even though it was the middle of their official spring vacation. Then that night we had a farewell party complete with the leaving teachers being picked up and thrown in the air by all of the male teachers. It was pretty funny.

We went to my school's brass band concert a couple of weeks ago. It was really good! I had only ever heard them play the school song and the Japanese National Anthem, so when they played things ranging from Mozart to Disney to Gershwin to J-Pop, I was very impressed. These kids work hard and work long hours and it shows. I'll definitely go again whenever they have another concert. It's good to see the students in a different light.

The new school year started this week and the new ichi-nensei (first-year students) came on Tuesday for the first time. We had a welcome ceremony for them and then today we had a ceremony where the new ichi-nensei were paraded in front of the ni-nensei and san-nensei and then all of the students had to take an oath of friendship and respect. Ceremonies are funny here. Today was also club introduction day where the new students got to see all of the different sports teams and clubs and then walk around and see the clubs in action. We had a good number of students come to English club. We were doing an Easter day, so they got to decorate and eat Easter cookies and dye Easter eggs. Hopefully we'll get some new students. Right now we have like 12 and two of them are leaving in July to go to America and Canada to study abroad for a year. So we could use some more.

Other than that, I have my first class of the new school year tomorrow. It's going to be nice to get classes going again and get back to normalcy. This last month with no classes was pretty boring which made the days go by slowly. But now I've got new students, new classes, new teachers, and I'm ready to get going.

Two more pictures:

The Sakura outside my school. A bunch got cut down to build a handball court (which coincidentally got its first use the week that the cherry blossoms started blooming) but these were left.

I thought this was so funny I had to take a picture of it while riding my bike. Don't worry this guy was riding so slow I didn't have to ride fast to keep up, so I was being safe. I just think it's funny how small his bike is. He's a grown man and this is like a little kid's bike. Maybe he hijacked some little kid for their bike.

That's all for now. Happy Easter!

Japan Meets the Parents - Final Day

2009-03-23T11:57:00.002+09:00

We woke up yesterday morning and headed off to church in Numazu. We had a nice service and everyone was very excited to meet mom and dad. I think they enjoyed the service although they didn't understand anything. Fortunately we had our English version of the sermon sheet to follow during the sermon. At the end of the service it is usually customary there for the guests to say a few words, so dad got to talk with somebody translating for him. He did good! After church we had the family lunch where we got to eat some good curry and talk with everybody. The people asked mom and dad a lot of questions and dad, of course, went on to tell everyone that Kelly and I are singers which led to us singing part of "As the Deer" for everyone. I forgave him. :) But now I might have to lead some songs in English next week.

After that we went back to Fuji. It poured down rain all day so we didn't do much. We walked to the sweets shop aorund the corner and had Don Don for dinner again. Most of the evening was spent talking and packing.

This morning I had to go to work, so I got up a little earlier than normal to make sure everything was in order. We said our goodbyes and they filmed me as I rode my bike off to work. Kelly got them in a taxi a little later and sent them on their way to Shin-Fuji station. They are currently (I hope) on a bus that will take them all the way back to the airport (a 4-5 hour ride.) Their plane leaves at around 6 and gets back to the states a few hours earlier (it's like LOST - Time Travel!)

Mom and Dad - it was really great having you here. I'm so glad you got to come and see our life here and meet some of the people we spend our time with. I hope you gained something from the very different experience and that you will remember your time here for a long time. There is so much to see in Japan that you didn't get to see, but I hope you enjoyed what you did see. We love you!

Well, I'm at work now and there is certainly not much going on. I actually just walked away from the computer for a few minutes because a TV was turned on to watch Japan finish off the USA in the World Baseball Classic. I watched despite the fact that I was going for the US. Oh well. I'll go for Japan in the final. I wouldn't be surprised if the whole game is on in here tomorrow. That would be a nice way to get paid.

Day 7 and 8 - Traveling Around

2009-03-22T17:28:00.007+09:00

I worked on Thursday and we didn't do much that night so there's not much to tell for that day.

Friday was a national holiday here (Vernal Equinox Day) so Kelly and I didn't have to work. So we all waited out the rain in the morning and then headed in the afternoon to Shiraito Falls in Fujinomiya. It turned out to be a pretty nice day although a bit cool and we walked around and took a bunch of pictures and looked in the shops. This is the same waterfalls that we went to back in August and put pictures of on Flickr. We had fun and once the wind blew away the clouds we got an amazing view of Mt. Fuji. I'm sure there are pictures of that and the other sights but we haven't gotten around to them so I've got nothing for you right now.

That night we took mom and dad to one of our favorite restaurants (because all we do is eat apparently,) Namaskar. This is the Indian curry restaurant. We all got curry and naan and ate until we were pretty miserable. That's one thing I've noticed about this past week. I guess it's just that we have been wanting to take them to all of our favorite places, but we have been eating like crazy all week. I'm going to have to hit the running trails this next week.

Saturday we took a day trip to Kamakura which is a town in Kanagawa prefecture that is famous for having a ton of temples as well as an extremely large Buddha statue. We walked all around the town there and saw several temples, ate ramen, and saw the big Buddha. Many pictures were snapped, same story as above. But here are a few I took with my iPhone.

We were all pretty tired and our feet hurt when we got back from Kamakura, so we didn't do much for dinner. We had Mos Burger again and another crepe from Orange Pot and then went home.

I really enjoyed some of the things in Kamakura because it was really cool to see things that were built so long ago. I think sometimes I don't focus on that factor enough, and I was glad I took a moment to imagine what it might have been like long ago. Sometimes I get into history. Maybe I'll read up on Japanese history a bit more.

Only a few more days. I hope they've enjoyed their visit. They seem like they have. I know we're all tired enough. Last post of the visit to come tomorrow.

Day 5 - Visit to Yoshiwara High School

2009-03-19T19:38:00.004+09:00

Wednesday was an exciting day because I took mom and dad up to my school to see where I work and to tour the school and meet some students and teachers. We took a cab there because that's the easiest way. Didn't think they'd want to ride bikes all the way like I always do.

When we got there we were greeted immediately by both vice principals and the principal. The vice principal told me they had made an announcement that morning to tell everyone we were coming. We put on our indoor shoes. I, of course got to wear my regular indoor shoes but they got to put on some of the school's slippers. They were too big for my mom and too small for my dad, but they survived. We went up to the teachers room and met some teachers up there. I showed them my desk and we looked around a bit. We went up to the LL (Language Lab) room which is where I teach several classes, and I showed them some of the not-so-high-tech things we have in there. While we were in there, some students came in and got to meet mom and dad. They introduced themselves in English and did very well I thought. We had a pretty simple conversation and I'm sure they could not wait to get out of there. Our students often enjoy trying to speak English with me and Andrea but they get a little freaked out whenever someone else shows up. But I was proud of them nonetheless.

After the LL, we went to the library and looked around in there. My mom also presented the librarians with a book about Texas with lots of pictures. They were very happy and looked through the book as soon as they opened it. I told them in Japanese that my mom is a librarian too which they found very interesting. They even took the book and put it on display at the front of the library so everybody can see it when they come in which I thought was very nice. It was a nice cultural exchange moment. :)

Finally, we walked over to another building on campus where we attended a Koto concert by our Koto club. It was a small room and a small concert, but the girls were absolutely amazing. I had never heard a Koto played in person before and the things they were able to do with it was quite impressive. I'd like to go again sometime. They had a quiz during the intermission/tea time of the concert where they asked various questions. They even asked some questions about the U.S. (who is the president?, where is the Statue of Liberty?) Both mom and dad answered a question right and won a prize. All in all it was very enjoyable. The lady in charge of the Koto club was very funny and friendly and did a good job of making the foreign guests (mom, dad, myself, Andrea, and her friend Tammy) feel welcome.

After the concert and a final look at the school we walked to the public library where I checked out some books and then went home. We had dinner at an izakaya called Watami and had some crepes for dessert at the Orange Pot. Finally we went back home and did the usual, sat around full until we all got too tired and went to bed.

Kelly and I both had to work today so nothing exciting happened with us. Mom and Dad did some exploring apparently but didn't venture too far from home. Tomorrow (Friday) is a national holiday and the plan is to go to Kamakura. Details to come after the trip.

Here are a few pictures of the Koto concert on Flickr. There are students in the pictures so they're only available to Flickr friends and family so if you're not one yet, get a Flickr account and add us.

Japan Meets the Parents, Day 3 and 4

2009-03-17T22:02:00.004+09:00

Monday we took mom and dad around Fuji and showed off some of the places we like to frequent. First on the schedule was Espot, our usual grocery store. We walked down every aisle and showed all of the things in Japanese and different foods that you don't see at American grocery stores. They were especially intrigued by the giant whole fish and the octopus that was wrapped up like any of the other meats in the store. I think they even took a picture of that, which will probably show up on my mom's Flickr soon.

After Espot, I called a cab and we went to our favorite ramen restaurant, Bankara Ramen, for lunch. It was good as usual and they both did very well eating noodles with their chopsticks. After that, we went to Aeon (and strangely had the same taxi driver as before) and showed them all around our mall. We went from store to store and bought a few things, had Baskin Robbins, and shopped some more. We also saw these shirts hanging at the Hawaiian shop which we thought were pretty funny:

Photo courtesy of Kelly

After all the shopping and Kelly's required Starbucks visit, we went back home, ordered pizza, and all vegged out for the rest of the night.

Today (Tuesday) Kelly had to work but the folks and I took a trip to Shizuoka City to see the sights there. We spent a bit of time shopping in one of the train department stores (which are huge) and then ventured out into the city. It was tough trying to be a tour guide for a city I don't really know much about, but we managed to find a good Tonkatsu restaurant for lunch and then got on the correct bus to take us to the Sengen Shrine in town. This shrine is actually three shrines in the same location and it was very beautiful. We walked all around and took lots of pictures. We were even able to see some of a ceremony going on inside one of them. After looking at all the shrines, we decided to hike up the mountain that was behind the place. It was a bit of a tough climb (no Mt. Fuji, mind you,) but we managed to make it to the top and see a wonderful view of the city with Mt. Fuji in the distance. There was also a Buddha statue at the top to commemorate the victims of a bombing during WWII. It was a nice scene all around. I even managed to have a pretty decent conversation in Japanese with some people while we stopped to take a break. I did however, confuse the lady into thinking that I was in high school somehow. I told her I live in Fuji and she said something about college. I failed to remember that I had not mentioned that I was a teacher before saying the name of my school. She looked at me confused and asked in English, "How old are you?" I then realized my mistake and quickly said "Eigo kyoushi desu. Gakusei janai." (I'm an English teacher. Not a student.) The climb back down was easier and we got back on the bus and back to the station, bought a few things and headed back to Fuji. Before going home we stopped and had Mos Burger. I had a melon soda with my meal because it was St. Patrick's Day. Actually I just had it because I like it, but mom was quick to point out that the extreme greenness of my drink was perfect for the day. Finally we headed home with sore feet and legs and have been lazy ever since.

I took a lot of pictures with the Nikon which we'll get on Flick later, but I did take this picture with my iPhone which I have to share. It's a little blurry because I was trying to take it in hurry, but you can get an idea of the situation. This happens on the trains a lot, but I thought it was hilarious that it happened to my dad.

Japan meets the parents, Day 2 - Festival Time

2009-03-16T20:27:00.003+09:00

We all packed up Sunday afternoon and went to a festival in Fujinomiya. It couldn't have been a more perfect day. It was sunny and cool but not cold. Not many clouds in the sky and Mt. Fuji was looking wonderful and clear. There were a ton of people there and we met up with some friends and found a spot to lay down some blankets and enjoy some good company. Dad and I went on a mission when we first got there to get some food for everyone. The lines were pretty long so we ended up just getting about 8 yakitori and taking them back to appease the hungry mouths. Mom and Dad got to meet all of our closest friends and see who we spend the majority of our time with. Caspian even got to come! He didn't enjoy the ride in his bag on the train or the bus but was very happy to get to come along. He sat very nicely in Kelly's lap and of course had several children come to see him with the usual exclamation of "Kawaii!" All in all, it was a fun outing and a good chance to relax and enjoy a beautiful Sunday afternoon.

Pictures on Flickr!

Unfortunately our camera was running out of battery so we didn't get many pictures. :( Our bad.

We were all pretty tired after the festival so for dinner we had Don Don and all retired early.

The parents seem to be enjoying their time so far. We're all kind of wearing each other out though. None of us are used to this much activity I think. And it hasn't really begun yet. Monday's post to come soon.

Japan meets the parents, Day 1

2009-03-14T22:01:00.006+09:00

We've just about finished mom and dad's first full day in Japan. We did basically what we do on a normal Saturday: sit around, eat, sit around, sleep, sit around, eat, and sit around. And it won't be long before we go back to sleep. But it's been a fun day. It's good to have them here and doing some of our usual stuff. This was the official jetlag recovery day before we start doing a bit more traveling around after this. Here are some pictures:

Eating sushi at Kappa, the conveyor belt sushi restaurant. First real sushi experience for both. They did well!

Sleepily lounging in the living room after eating yakiniku (grill your own meat.)

And this is from last night, in Shinagawa on our way back from the airport. Their first meal in Japan.

We'll be putting some pictures up on Flickr too so check those out!

Trek to the airport

2009-03-13T09:48:00.002+09:00

Well I'm about to leave in about an hour to go pick up my parents from the airport. I'm taking the local lines to get there to save money and then we're taking the shinkansen back to Fuji. Mom has been very excited about riding the shink so it should be fun.

We're looking forward to a fun week of being tour guides and giving my parents a bit of a taste of our life in Japan. I have some ideas of what we're going to do but a lot of stuff we'll just see what happens. We'll definitely be eating a lot of our favorite foods. :)

I'll post some updates through the week of how they're enjoying their stay.

Graduation

2009-03-01T16:25:00.002+09:00

Well for the first time since I stopped waiting tables, I had to work on Sunday today. Today was graduation for the third year students. It was a very nice ceremony, extremely different from American high school graduations. There were definitely no beach balls or fog horns at this graduation. It was very structured and well-rehearsed.

The structure of the basic diploma handing out was this: There are 6 homerooms in each grade (at my school.) Each 3rd year homeroom teacher went up to the microphone and called out each of their students names one at a time and the student responded to their name with a loud "Hai!" (That means yes, of course.) At the end of each homeroom's names, the head student of that class went up to the stage and received the diplomas for their class. So there was no walking across the stage by each student. After all of the students names were called, there were a few speeches. One by the principal, one by the PTA head, and a few by some students. When everything was finished, the students all walked out while all of us teachers stood in a line and applauded for them. Many of them gave their homeroom teachers high fives as they walked by and several teachers and younger students cried, of course. It was a nice ceremony but a bit too cold in the gym. That's to be expected though. I was also very pleased to hear the normal graduation song being played as the students entered the gym. It gave me some sense of reality. And our band is very good. Small, but good.

I spent the afternoon signing graduated students' yearbooks, many of whom I never taught but wanted to talk to me and have English written in their yearbook. I wrote the same thing for pretty much everyone:

Congratulations!
I am very happy for you.
I enjoyed having you in class. (if I had them in class)
Good luck and have fun!
See you!
--Kory コーリー　(that's my name in Katakana)

I also had several students take pictures with me, which is always fun.

So all in all it was an easy day despite the fact that I was at work on a Sunday. So I'm one day into my six day work week. No classes this week. Just a lot of test grading as this week is exam week. We also have junior high entrance exams to grade this week for the students who are trying to get into our school for the new school year. I'm assuming I'll be grading the English part. I hope.

Marathon Day

2009-02-13T20:58:00.013+09:00

Today was Marathon Day for Yoshiwara High School. We all went to the Fuji sports complex where it was taking place. The route was basically around the track once and then out of the stadium, around the stadium, around the tennis courts, down the street, around the baseball field, back down another street, through the parking lot and back into the stadium. The girls had to run the route two times and the boys four times. My predecessor ran last year so a lot of people expected me to run but I most certainly did not.

My jobs were pretty simple. My main job was to take a marker and mark students' hands when they ran by at the end of one of one lap. This was to make sure nobody hid and only ran one lap or something. So I made marks on people's hands, wrists, forearms, and unfortunately one shirt. I promptly found that girl after the race and apologized for putting red marker all over her gym shirt.

My other job was to shoot the starter pistol at the beginning of the boys' race. Our Kocho-sensei (principal) usually does it and today he came and asked me if there was a specific word in English for the gun. I told him it's called a starter pistol and then went on to tell him that I used to watch my dad shoot them off at the beginning of races. So he decided that because of this, Andrea and I were going to do it today. So Andrea started the girls, and I started the boys. It was pretty fun and made me feel important.

After the girls' race many of them ran up to me to tell me what place they finished. Some of my favorite students (i.e. the ones who talk to me the most) finished as well as 4th to as low as 200 somethingith. But I told them all that they did a great job and was sure to smile and give them a thumbs up because they all like that. (If only it were this easy to make girls like me when I was in high school.) :)

With the boys, one of the students in the class I work with the most got first place which was amazing. First place out of 240 or so boys is pretty good. His name is Shuhei Baba so I think on Monday I'm going to call him IchiBaba. "Ichiban" means "number 1" in Japanese, so I think it's a pretty good play on words, which is not easy to do in Japanese.

I also may have accidentally committed myself to running in next year's marathon. The girls were all wanting to know why I didn't run and I made excuses about how I wasn't in shape which they didn't understand, and then how I have bad knees which they didn't understand, and then how I just plain didn't want to run which they didn't care. So finally I said "next year...maybe." Well they have limited English so they understood the "next year" part but not so much the "maybe" part. And they all got very excited. So I guess I need to run tomorrow and start training.

Here are some pictures from the event:

The students in the stands awaiting their fate.

The "opening ceremony"

Pre-race stretching

More "stretching"

The girls waiting at the starting line.

Andrea starting the girls.

The boys at the starting line.

Me following in my dad's footsteps (apparently) and starting the boys.

As a result of my "hard work" at the marathon, I got released from work an hour early today.　おつかれさまでした！　やった！

Long Sunday Walk

2009-02-01T15:15:00.011+09:00

It is a beautiful day outside today! It has been very cloudy and rainy over the past few days and then last night it was extremely windy all night. So the result of that combination is that the rain and clouds formed a new layer of thick snow on Mt. Fuji and then the wind blew away all of the clouds so we can see it. Kelly went to go do some strawberry picking with the girls today so I took Caspian for a walk to enjoy the nice weather. We ended up taking a longer walk than I think I've ever taken with him. Maybe the longest he's ever taken. We walked down the usual path and then kept going and went along a trail that goes next to Fuji River (or at least what I think is Fuji River, known as Fuji-kawa.) I didn't have the good camera but I took some pictures of some of the cool shots with my iPhone. Here are my favorites:

I hate that I got my fingertip in this one, but I like the picture anyway.

Here is a shot of the same thing but different angle. Lots of snow on Fuji san.

River, factory, mountain.

Lots of blue...

Caspian wouldn't pose, but I wanted to put one of him on the walk anyway so Kelly would believe I took him. :)

The river

Three things Fuji has a lot of: paper mills, Pachinko parlors, and Mt. Fuji.

The week to hereafter be referred to as: THAT WEEK.

2009-01-29T22:02:00.005+09:00

Wow, this has been quite a week. Probably one of the busiest and most stressful since I got here. Here it is:

Monday - This was the day of my observation by the people from the Shizuoka Board of Education. Ashley Harvey, the JET ALT Prefectural Advisor and Yasuo Suzuki the Japanese supervisor of ALTs both came to the school to observe a few of my classes. So I had class 2nd period with our Elective English class. They were doing their final presentations on their high school life. Some good presentations. This class is not the strongest at English but they try really hard. Then 3rd period we had an observed lesson for our 2nd year International course class. This was with me, Andrea, and Dobashi-sensei. They are working on presentations about various countries around the world and we did a sample "bad" presentation to show them what not to do. Then we observed them while they did group work. Right after that class was my observed OC I class with Hara-sensei. It was a lesson on small talk. It was one of the shyest classes but it went pretty well. They did good. Then me and Andrea had lunch with Ashley and talked to him about all kinds of things. After that was a non-observed first year International course class where we taught them English terms for origami. Finally we had a meeting with Ashley, Yasuo-sensei, and the entire English department during 6th period. I got a lot of great feedback and tips about the classes. It was really good to have a productive meeting full of compliments, advice, tips, and constructive criticism. It was just like an Adam Hester post-run through notes session. So...that was just Monday.

Tuesday was a relatively slow day. Two classes but my first period English II class really annoyed me. They were not well behaved and I had to stop and actually make this comment in the middle of an activity: "Okay, I want you all to stop. Please move back into your rows (they were sitting in groups.) There are too many people talking and not enough people writing." I hate being an adult sometimes. So we finally got through the lesson. Then there was another first year International course lesson later in the day.

Wednesday: This was THE day. 1st period: 3rd year International course final speeches. We gave them a choice to either do a speech or write a paper. There are 36 students and 6 people did a speech. So the speeches ended pretty quickly. They were pretty good. One was great. After they finished we had all 36 students stand and say what their post-graduation plans are. 2nd period: OC I lesson. Careers. A decent lesson with a decent class. 3rd period: A new English II lesson. A lesson on how to order pizza in English. It was fun and the students liked it but it was one of those lessons that requires the ALT to be a big time entertainer so it took a lot of energy. 4th period: a break. Lunch: A curry filled donut. Better than it sounds. 5th period: Another OC I career lesson. Good class. Went well. Getting very tired. 6th period: Another OC I career lesson. Bad class. Lots of talkative boys. Absolutely love the girls in front for participating. They are wonderful to me. Very, very tired. Cleaning time: Stood there staring off into space. Finally all classes are over but guess what: I have to have an OC I lesson plan done for Thursday by the end of the day and I'm not ready! So I stay at work an extra hour finishing the lesson plan and finally get home at 5:40. I had planned to cook. We got take out Don Don instead. The Kaki Fry Bento was especially good. That's a bento with fried oysters. Very good. While Kelly gave Caspian a bath I fell asleep with my head on my computer. In bed by 9:45.

Thursday: It's only Thursday?!?!?!?!?!?! One class! We can do it. New OC I lesson. I get to work early and explain the lesson to all necessary parties. Everybdy is like, "what?" We do it anyway with loads of fast-paced preparation the hour beforehand. My class goes okay. Sasaki-sensei said, "Not bad for not having a meeting about it." I was like, "Bleh." We got through it. That's what counts. No more classes for the day. I read and corrected six 16HR student diaries. Then I proofread a teacher's essay for a grant application and graded some 3rd year International course papers. Remember those? Yeah, they are hard to read. I only got through about 8. Finally the day was over. I came home and cooked some delicious (if I do say so myself) Buffalo chicken bites and garlic mashed potatoes. We watched LOST and now I'm writing this and listening to music. Current song: How to Disappear Completely by Radiohead. I feel that.

Tomorrow: One class. Elective English. Two presentations, a video, and goodbyes. Following that I will finish grading 36HR papers and call it a week. I think I've earned some internet at work time. Agreed? Agreed.

Can't wait for the weekend! What's that? Laundry needs to be done? Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!

If only I was 6'8" and one of the most recognizable athletes on the planet...

2009-01-24T21:51:00.003+09:00

I'm sure this commercial is playing all over the place back home but I saw it online and thought it was funny. It reminds me of how I used to listen to rap and rock music to get ready to do musical theatre. Plus, I'm a big Lebron James fan so I always enjoy watching his commercials. They're well done.

I'm feeling much better and getting back into the swing of things. This next week will be one of the busiest I've had since I got here. I have my observations on Monday and then a bunch of classes on the other days. So I'm ready to do it and get through this week and then it will be smooth sailing after this. We had a relaxing Saturday. Laundry, cleaning, grocery shopping, and laziness. Nothing wrong with that.

Sickness update

2009-01-20T20:07:00.004+09:00

Thanks for the well wishes. I took a sick day on Monday and stayed home and rested due to a very unpleasant night Sunday night. I couldn't breath through my nose at all and so I couldn't sleep and since I miraculously had no classes on Monday, I stayed home. I went in today and when I got there the teachers came over to me and Andrea (who is also sick) and when they saw us they were like, maybe we should reschedule today's classes. So we did that and we both left early. I stayed until about 12:45 and made a lot of copies and what not to be ready for tomorrow. I also spent a great deal of time sitting around completely zoned out. I think maybe I took too many doses of my medicine in too short a time because I was very foggy-headed. But anyway, I came home and took a long nap and woke up feeling a little better. I just took a bath and let the steam work on my head for a few minutes and now I'm going to watch 24. I think with a good full night's sleep tonight, I should be in good shape to get back to normal. Let's hope since I have 4 classes tomorrow. And I'm definitely ready to do something at home other than lay around and sit on my futon. So again, thanks for the well wishes and pray that Kelly doesn't get sick.

Sick weekend

2009-01-18T14:31:00.004+09:00

Well as you may have already read on Kelly's blog, I came down with a bit of an illness yesterday morning. I started having a small cough at work on Friday but didn't really think it was anything major. But then Saturday morning I woke up with the chills and aching muscles and an even worse cough so I knew things were not right. The headache and fever followed soon and I have been bedridden ever since. But I'm feeling better now so it seems that I didn't catch the flu that has been going around. I'm still in bed recovering but definitely not feeling as bad as yesterday. It's basically just turned into a head cold.

The funny thing about it all is that when I first took my temperature yesterday it was 100.5 and then a few hours later is was 101.5. But I never really felt like my skin was hot enough to have that high of a fever. So we thought that maybe the electric blanket was making my body hot and making the thermometer read high temperatures. I guess we'll never know, but if I did have a fever I think the electric blanket played a large role in making it go down. After the 101.5 I took a few hour long nap with the blanket turned up pretty high. I woke up drenched in sweat, which as we all know is a good sign that your fever is going down. I took my temperature again and it was 98.5 so I credit the blanket with the quick cure.

So anyway, I will have ended up spending my whole weekend laying around in bed once I go back to work tomorrow. Not a great way to spend any weekend but we were probably not going to do anything this weekend anyway so if I was going to get sick it might as well have been now. Kelly has done a great job of taking care of me as she always does when I'm sick. She made me soup and rice and some delicious onigiri and checks on me constantly to see if I need anything. She also banned me from the kitchen all day yesterday which was probably smart. Caspian has also checked on me regularly and been very excited the few times I've stood up only to be disappointed when I lay down again a few minutes later. But he makes for good company even when we're just laying around feeling sorry for ourselves. :)

So here are my picks for the championship games this weekend in case anybody cares. I'm picking Pittsburgh to beat Baltimore and I really think that Arizona will beat Philadelphia. So I'm picking Pittsburgh and Arizona in the Super Bowl. We'll see. I won't pick the Super Bowl winner yet. Might as well wait to see if I got these right first.

Positive feelings and Photoshop

2009-01-15T20:17:00.005+09:00

I had a good day today. Nothing really special happened but it was a good day. I had a new OC I lesson today, and it didn't go exactly according to plan, but I just went with it and figured out what will work better next time. It's nice to teach a lesson and have the luxury of figuring out what you can change to make it better and not just assume that the reason why the lesson wasn't perfect was because of the students. It sounds weird I guess for me to want my lesson planning to be the problem, but my students were the problem so much last year in Channelview that it's really a relief. And it really went well even with the planning issues. I do this lesson 4 more times, the last being an observation by my prefectural advisor and his boss. The PA is a guy named Ashley from New Zealand who is a really good guy and fun to hang out with and his boss is named Yasuo Suzuki. I've met him a few times and he is really nice too so I'm not worried about it. I can get some good advice on how to make my lessons more effective and some feedback on what I do well. It will be much nicer than the occasional random drop-ins from my boss last year which always just succeeded in making me nervous. I'd much rather have Ashley and Yasuo-sensei coming to observe me than Dolores Umbridge. Did I say Dolores Umbridge? Sorry about that. I meant the CISD Fine Arts director who will go unnamed. Don't know why I'm going off on a tangent about Channelview. I guess I'm just thinking about how I felt a year ago at this time with another semester to go and how much I dreaded every day. I've been dealing with the usual winter homesickness/culture shock/my goodness it's freezing/I want some Tex-Mex feelings that apparently are very prevalent at this time of year for JETs, but it doesn't make me forget how much more I like this job than the job I had last year.

We had curry for dinner tonight for the third time in the past two weeks. It's becoming sort of a comfort food for us. I guess it's always been a comfort food for Kelly but it's getting more like that for me. Maybe it has something to do with the cold. More accurately it's probably the fact that it's easy to cook and so requires less time in the unheated kitchen.

Well anyway, I think I had something really interesting to write about tonight but in all my rambling I seem to have forgotten it. So anyway, hope everyone's doing well. I hope more people are reading our blogs than are commenting on them. I'm trying to write more this year so the more feedback I get the more motivated I'll be to write. It's like having a good audience for a show. As much as you hate to admit it, you always give a little bit more effort when your audience makes you aware of the fact that they're there.

And now the unveiling of my first photoshop effort! I got home today and took some pictures of Mt. Fuji and later played around on photoshop. It's not as impressive as what Kelly can do but here it is anyway. It's just something basic to start with. I'll put it on Flickr too. Hope you like it!

An interesting experience

2009-01-11T22:28:00.003+09:00

No work tomorrow for Coming of Age Day. It's the day that all of the people who turned 20 in the last year and their families celebrate the fact that they're 20 which is the age here where you officially become an adult. We rode past the Rose Theatre today and there were a lot of guys in suits and girls in kimonos. Very nice looking. We would have stopped to look longer but we were headed to eat ramen for lunch and some dressed up 20 year olds are only interesting for so long when you're hungry. :) So maybe we'll see some more of them tomorrow.

Had an interesting church service this morning. The preacher typed and printed up an English guide to the sermon which was very generous. This is the guy who Jeff saw get baptized 25-30 or so (?) years ago and wrote in his Bible. He speaks very good English and is always good at including English in his sermons, prayers, scripture readings and everything. We have a guy that sits with us every week and translates for us which is extremely nice. We feel bad because he doesn't get to sit with his wife and his little son who is like 2 starts running all over the church during the service. But we are definitely grateful for his help. So anyway, the sermon today was about baptism. There was a lady there who is very sick (maybe cancer - I never really heard what the illness was) and she got baptized last week. At the end of the service, the preacher asked that everyone gather around her and lay hands on her and pray for her. This was the first time I've been a part of something like this in Japan. I was always very stand-offish with things like this at home even though this was a regular occurrence at Sugar Grove. I sometimes knew the people who were being prayed over at Sugar Grove more than I knew this lady. All I knew about her was her last name. But when people stood to gather and pray for her, I found myself right in the mix with my hand on her back. I don't know what the difference was. I guess I just found myself in a situation where I felt like I had no reason not to do it. This was a new Christian and she was in need and there was a genuine feeling in the congregation that we needed to pray for her to help her in any way. It was the first time I have really felt a part of this church. It was a good feeling. We didn't come here for a spiritual experience. We didn't come here to be missionaries disguised as English teachers. We came here to be English teachers and to get a cultural experience. That is what our time here has been and will continue to be dedicated to. But if every once in a while we learn something about ourselves and grow spiritually, then there is certainly nothing wrong with that. So I just wanted to share that experience.

So anyway, tomorrow I will be celebrating the fact that I turned 20 8 1/2 years ago by sleeping in and then watching NFL highlights online followed shortly by watching the premiere of 24 season 7. Everybody watch it, it's going to be amazing! Go Jack Bauer!

Back to work

2009-01-07T21:18:00.006+09:00

Went back to work on Monday and have had a slow few days. We had opening ceremony yesterday (Tuesday) and I realized that I am going to have to get some gym shoes. You're not allowed to wear shoes in the gym that have been outside so I can't wear my regular tennis shoes but I'm not allowed to wear my indoor shoes either even though they have never been outside because they're not gym shoes. I don't really know all the reasons for everything but I just do as I'm told. So anyway, during the opening ceremony I was standing in there in my socks and my feet were extremely cold. So I'll be getting some gym shoes soon hopefully.

It's funny that there was an opening ceremony because it's the third term of the school year so it's not like it's really the opening of anything. And they just had a closing ceremony two weeks earlier. But Japanese people love their ceremonies so have one we did. This is going to be a short term with only two months of actual classes (one for the 3rd years) and then who knows what in March. The 3rd years have their finals at the beginning of February and then disappear for a month until graduation on March 1. Plenty of time apparently for them to die their hair and then have to be taken into the teacher's room on the day of graduation to die it black again. Or so I've heard.

First classes of the term are tomorrow. I have an OC I lesson on parties. We're teaching them how to invite people to a party. Hey, it's the next chapter in the textbook. And then we have a 2nd year International Course class where we're starting a new project. The students are going to work in groups and do a presentation in English on some different countries that we've chosen. If I can remember correctly the countries are Brazil, Italy, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Argentina, Vietnam, India, and Sweden. A nice mix of topics. Hopefully the groups with Mexico and Italy will go the extra mile and bring some food. :)

Here are some pictures for your viewing pleasure:

This is the gingerbread house we made at school right before Christmas. Some students helped us make it and of course many students helped us eat it later in the week.

Thought this might be interesting to anyone who has never seen any Yen before. I was getting change to put in my pocket and thought it was funny that these few coins make 2000yen which is roughly equivalent to about $21.50. Important coins!

First Post of 平成 21 (2009)

2009-01-02T14:34:00.007+09:00

Happy New Year everyone! I hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Year. I was very glad for 2009 to come around. 2008 was a bit of an up and down year for me and though it ended on a pretty positive swing, I'm ready for this next year to try to make this a good year the whole time. So hopefully you all have your resolutions in order and are ready to make this a great year too.

We went on our trip to Nagano prefecture for Christmas from the 24-28. It was a great trip and a good chance to get away and relax with just us for a few days. We had snow the day after Christmas so though it wasn't a white Christmas it was close enough. We got to see some beautiful scenery and enjoy the ryokan experience but I think we were all (Caspian was there too) ready to get back to Fuji. It was just so cold the whole time that it started to get uncomfortable. So we enjoyed it but I think we'll probably stick to the big cities for our travel from now on. Kelly took a ton of pictures and has put them up on Flickr so check them out. The snow monkeys were the highlight of the trip. Very cool to get that close to animals in their natural habitat.

This week has been a lazy one to say the least. We got back into town on Sunday afternoon. We spent most of Sunday-Tuesday lazing around and playing on the computers. We started watching the most recent season of Survivor on Sunday night and had finished the whole thing by Tuesday night. So yeah, that's basically what this week has been like. I guess we should be taking advantage of the week off by going to some nearby towns and shopping or seeing local sights, but our laziness often gets the best of us. We like to stay at home so that's what we've done. We both go back to work on Monday and it'll be good to get back on a regular routine.

For New Year's eve we went over to Andrea and Joe's apartment. Andrea is the other ALT who works at my school and Joe is her husband. We had tacos and a lot of snacks, watched some Futurama and played Bomberman on their Wii. One of the more low-key New Year's Eves I've had in a long time but it was a good time. I guess I'm getting to the age where a low-key get together is going to be more common than big parties. Nothing wrong with that. So anyway, we stayed over there until a little after 1 and then came home to Caspian and the new electric blanket we got from Kelly's parents. (Thanks!) It has been very cold lately so it's nice to be able to lay down on your own futon and get under a warm blanket.

So that's what we've been up to for our holidays. We definitely miss everybody and I think this time of year brings that out even more. I was jealous of Kelly getting to go back for a few days since she got to see her family and some friends but especially because she got to eat Taco Bueno, Little Panda, and Chilis among other favorites. But I'll survive. It's making me a stronger person. :) I've also been feeling the pain of missing all of the bowl games that are going on right now. I got up this morning and found a live feed of the Rose Bowl and watched the 2nd quarter. Better than nothing I guess.

Well I'm listening to a CD I bought with one of my iTunes gift cards so I'm having a hard time concentrating while I'm writing this. So if this post seems a little scatterbrained, you can blame it on Dave Matthews. Once again, Happy New Year and don't forget to go check out the pictures on Flickr. あけましておめでとうございます！！！

End of the semester

2008-12-17T13:13:00.003+09:00

Hello there. Well, Kelly's been out of the country visiting the fam and getting ready for Anne's wedding while I'm still here in Fuji working like a dog. And by working like a dog, I mean a dog like Caspian whose only work involves sleeping, eating and licking. Yes, slow days these days at work. I had 6 classes last week and all were pretty easy and then 3 on Monday and 1 yesterday and now I'm done with classes until the new term starts in January. So these last three days will be pretty slow and boring so I am switching back and forth between studying Japanese and vegging out on the computer. And then every once in a while I go and supervise some kids during cleaning time which basically means me talking to them and showing them the cool things on my iPhone. :) Tomorrow is outdoor cleaning and then Friday is closing ceremony followed by the teachers' Bon-Enkai which is an end of the year party. It's at an onsen resort type place so I'm expecting some good food and relaxation and also planning to test out my Japanese on some of the other teachers who I've never talked to before. So that should be fun. I actually had an entire coversation with a guy in Japanese last weekend. It was pretty cool. Granted it wasn't about politics or the economy or anything tough like that. It was about food which is what the majority of my English conversations are about anyway. But it was still an accomplishment in my mind.

So as I have basically come to the end of my first semester of teaching in Japan, I'll give some thoughts. As most of you know I was a teacher at home for three years with a one year "let's see what else I can do--ooh I don't like sales at all" break mixed in. And I can say with confidence that I enjoy teaching here 10 times more than I ever did at home. Yes it is completely different because I'm teaching a different subject and I'm an assistant teacher, and I have less class time each week, but not having to deal with behavior problems and students who don't care about me or my class is such a relief. This is the first full-time job I have ever had that I didn't want to quit a month after starting. So that has led to my being much happier over the past four and a half months than I have been in a long time. Because you can have a lot of friends and a good family and a lot of good stuff going for you, but you spend so much time at work that if you don't like you job, you're going to be unhappy. At least that's how it works for me. So anyway, I love working here. The classes are fun and not too hard to plan or teach. I love the students and I love the fact that they actually want to talk to me and at least say hi when they see me. I like the way the school is set up and run, and though some things are very strange and would never work in American schools (i.e. the students all sitting in their classrooms unsupervised while the teachers have a morning meeting - try that at Channelview High School!), I've gotten very used to the routine and I feel comfortable with it.

As for problems I've encountered, it can be extremely difficult to get students to respond to you in class. I guess the only thing worse than giving an incorrect answer is giving an incorrect answer and using incorrect English while doing it. But sometimes if you can get one student to break out of their shell and volunteer an answer it helps everyone. It also can be a little taxing at times to work with so many people that don't speak your language, but considering that I was never really a big talker at my other jobs, that's not as bad as it seems. I guess other than that, the only other problem is that sometimes it feels like some other teachers don't take my job seriously or see what my purpose is. But the great thing is, I don't really care. :) I know what my purpose is and as long as I take it seriously, that's all that matters.

So those are my end of semester thoughts. I'm definitely glad for a 2 week break coming up in a few days. It will be nice to get away from work (I've only taken one day of leave all year up to this point - a record for me) and be able to relax and experience the holidays in Japan. But it will also be nice to not dread going back after the break like I always have before.

I'll try to fill everyone in on our vacation time and what we're up to, but since I probably won't write again before Christmas, I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and enjoys your time with friends and family.

ﾒﾘ- ｸﾘｽﾏｽ!!! 　

Christmas lessons, exam week, and junk food (but not too much)

2008-12-04T14:28:00.005+09:00

So things are beginning to slow down now after a hectic past few weeks. Last week and the week before I was getting all of my classes in with their final lessons before exam week this week. I did a Christmas lesson with my first year Oral Communication classes. There wasn't a lot of oral communicating going on I guess but it was still a fun lesson. We did a white elephant gift game. You know, the game where you can keep your present or trade with someone else (that's my class version.) I made some of the gifts and bought the rest at the 100yen store. Before this job I would have griped heavily (and did) about spending any of my own money on stuff for classes, but I didn't really mind this time. It was actually kind of a treat for me. The gifts that were stolen from other people (or traded in this case) most often were the Dave Matthews Band and Coldplay CDs I burned, the Christmas card signed by me and Andrea (mostly stolen by girls), and the 100yen coin. I found this odd because it was just 100yen (roughly equivalent to $1) but these kids wanted that money. I guess they needed to buy something to drink at lunch. So anyway, that was a lot of fun and the students really enjoyed getting gifts no matter how small and inexpensive they were.

So this week has been exam week. It's weird because there are actually two more weeks of classes after this before winter break, but it's just one of those things you don't question because there probably isn't an answer. So I wrote all of my tests last week and have been grading this week. It's nice because unlike most ALTs (including Kelly) I have someone to split the duty with. But I graded 122 OC tests, 120 English II tests, and about 75 International Course tests complete with essays which are always fun to grade. It gets to the point when reading essays where I'm not even sure what's proper English anymore. Our OC students did the best by far. I actually thought the test was going to be a bit hard but they all did well. Well, there are always exceptions of course, but for the most part they all did well. So they've earned themselves a harder test next term! Haha!

Other than that not too much is going on. We had a Thanksgiving dinner last Saturday at a friend's house in Fujinomiya. We all had to work on Thanksgiving so we made up for it on the weekend. There were six of us there and we had chicken (no turkeys to be found in our city), mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes (made by Kelly), green bean casserole, dressing, homemade rolls (made by Kelly), and pumpkin pie. It was all very good. Then we sat around and played Wii and some other games for the rest of the day. Here's a picture of the food:

There are more pictures from the event on Flickr.

あの...other than that, I'm getting ready for a two week break coming up in a few weeks. One week that I'm taking off and one that I'm given off. Kelly is leaving next weekend to go on her trip through Abilene and Nashville. She'll be gone for 10 days so I'll have plenty of time to get myself in trouble. :)

Last few notes, I took my first test from the JET Program Japanese language course. You take it on your own but I didn't look at the book or any dictionaries or anything while I took it (even though you're allowed to.) After I finished, I checked my answers and only missed 2 out of 40. So I was pretty pleased with that. Now it's time to start on month two.

And finally, just to show how immersed into the Japanese culture I am getting, I realized today that my taste for sweets is not as it used to be. This morning I made my daily stop at 7-11 to get my breakfast and lunch and they were out egg, ham, and lettuce sandwiches (my usual breakfast.) So I looked around at what else I could get and saw some doughnuts covered with icing and sprinkles. I used to be a sucker for doughnuts, especially ones covered or filled with any type of icing or frosting, but as soon as I considered getting it my stomach turned at the thought of eating anything that sweet for breakfast. So I turned around and got a microwaveable ham and cheese burrito instead. Hey, I didn't say I've lost my taste for unhealthy food!

November School Events

2008-11-15T15:43:00.005+09:00

Okay so I have officially ruined my status as a good blogger. Sorry, I kind of lost track of how long it's been since I last wrote. Some interesting things have gone on the past few weeks. You can read about the Shimizu S-Pulse game, Halloween, and the Daidogei street busking festival at Kelly's blog. The one thing I'll add is this picture of my jack-o-lantern that I carved at school.

It's a cat!

Other happenings include my school's 100 year celebration last Friday. The whole school met at the Rose Theatre (the same place we saw the musical) for the whole school day. We had a practice ceremony in the morning so the students would know exactly what was going to happen. In the practice ceremony the speeches were much shorter. The real ceremony started in the early afternoon and the place was packed with honored alumni, PTA, donors, families, etc. I understood almost nothing that was said during the 2-plus hour ceremony and might have even dozed off a bit during the keynote speech by some famous Japanese soccer player/coach who I can only assume went to school there. But I did participate in the singing of the school song thanks to a translation from Kanji to Romaji by Andrea. I knew the tune because ever since the October 1 school assembly where the students sang it unsatisfactorily, they have been playing it during lunch every day. The students didn't sing along during lunch but I guess it was a threat to say, "If you don't sing it better at the 100 year ceremony we'll keep playing it during lunch every day for the rest of the year." I guess the principal was satisfied because they haven't been playing it anymore. The ceremony was capped off by a performance by our nearly-Olympic qualifying rhythmic gymnastics team. It was pretty impressive. And then a taiko drum performance finished it all off which was amazing and very loud. Also a little awkward when a few of the drumming guys came on stage in nothing but what appeared to be a sumo-type diaper. The reaction of the students made me realize that these students are not all too different from American students after all. So despite my inability to understand much, it was a nice ceremony and a good chance to be around all of the students and teachers in a different setting. I also got to wear my suit for the first time since Tokyo orientation.

Yesterday was Sports Day at my school. It's the annual day in the fall where everyone participates in sports instead of going to class. This is something that would never be allowed in American schools where parents would call and complain that their child shouldn't be forced to play sports. Here everybody did it and they took it seriously, evidenced by the high number of injuries that occurred. The school nurse was very busy. The first-year students played handball, second-years played volleyball, and third-years played basketball. I was an alternate for the 36 homeroom boys basketball team because they only have 5 boys but I would only play if one of them got hurt. I wanted to play but I didn't want anyone to get hurt so I didn't mind not getting to play. I'm also not very good at basketball so it was probably best that I didn't play. I did get to play on the teacher's handball team that played the winning boys handball team at the end of the tournament. I've never played handball before so I was kind of thrown into the fire a bit but I guess I held my own. I definitely had the biggest cheering section of anyone that was playing with constant cheers from all of the students of "Kory gambare!" I have to admit that made me feel pretty good. In the end the students won 8-7 in a sudden death overtime. And I got a nice scrape on my knee. Battle scars.

So sports day was fun. In May or June there is another sports day that involves more team building exercises, many of which look extremely dangerous to me. So when that happens I'll try to take some pictures. Other than all that, it's been mostly work and regular daily life. I'm definitely feeling like I've got a pretty good routine. I'm enjoying work and the cooler weather. Mt. Fuji has been looking very pretty lately with snow appearing on the top. It's amazing how much closer it looks when it's clear outside. Yesterday I could actually see the fifth station with my naked eye from a window at school. So we'll try to get some more pictures of Fuji-san soon. Please remember to check out our Flickr site for all of our pictures.

I hope everyone is doing well. Sometime soon for anyone who is interested I'm planning to do a post about some of my lessons so you can see exactly what I do in class. But I'm tired of typing now so it'll have to wait.

さよなら

Eventful Yet Relaxing Week

2008-10-17T23:45:00.022+09:00

It's been a pretty easy week this week. Mid-terms were going on so there were no classes. Monday was a public holiday so on that day we slept in and then went and had sushi for lunch. The rest of the day was spent lazing around the house sleeping and doing whatever. Then on Tuesday Kelly had the day off because she worked on Saturday, so I took a day of paid leave since there was only testing going on at school which doesn't require my assistance. So we went to Shizuoka to get our multiple re-entry permits so if we want to leave the country we will be allowed back in. We heard about a good Mexican restaurant in Shizuoka and we were going to go check it out. It was raining so we bought some umbrellas at the train station and headed into the city. The map we had turned out to be very inaccurate but we eventually found the place after about 30 minutes of looking all around the area and of course it was randomly closed at 1pm on a Tuesday. Very disappointing. The sign out front said closed Sunday but said nothing about Tuesday. And it even said Tex Mex on the door which is exactly what I needed but alas, it was not to be. So we went and had ramen and gyoza. Always a good substitute. After that we went and got our permits done and headed back to Fuji. We would've gone to see some stuff in Shizuoka if not for the rain.

Tuesday night I finished reading a book that I started on Monday. A very quick read for me who usually takes at least a few weeks to read any book whose title doesn't start with "Harry Potter and the..." The book was called The Five People You Meet in Heaven. I strongly recommend it. It is a great story that gives a little boost to your outlook on life. Certainly a fictional view of Heaven (for all we know) but very well written with a great view on the meaning of life. So anyway, check it out if you haven't already. It's by Mitch Albom, the same author as Tuesdays With Morrie.

So back to the week, Wednesday I went back to work, planned lessons for next week and played in a teachers badminton tournament. I haven't played badminton since elementary school but I had a blast. It's amazing how you can play a game with a bunch of people who speak a different language than you but once you get started, you just play. Ahh sports, the universal language. My partner, Ito-sensei and I lost both of our games but it was still fun. I'd like to do it again sometime. Then I spent Thursday planning more lessons and grading Oral Communications I mid-terms. It was a listening test about everything we have taught so far this term. We recorded the listening part ahead of time and they played it over the speakers in their classrooms. There were questions from my self-introduction on there. In the recording I mentioned Kelly's name several times and then asked the question on the test, "What is Kory's wife's name?" In my lesson I had talked a lot about Kelly and also mentioned and showed pictures of Kerry and Amanda. So the options were A. Kerry, B. Amanda, C. Kelly, and D. Lucy. Now remember that Japanese students have problems with the L sound because there is no L sound in the Japanese language. So they usually use the R sound for words that require an L. Hence the constant confusion between Rs and Ls. So anyway, Andrea and I graded a total of about 240 tests and we discovered that somewhere around 85-90% of them marked A. Kerry as my wife's name. So there you go Kerry, you're now a girl and my wife apparently. I have to admit that I kind of expected that to happen, but the rest of the test was so easy that that was really the hardest question on there. So I don't feel too bad.

And finally today we had school excursion day as an end of testing week reward for everyone. I went with the first year students. We went hiking to some waterfalls on the Izu peninsula. It was pretty fun and an easy hike. I got to talk with some students a lot so that was very enjoyable. They love practicing their English with me especially in a non-formal setting so it was good that they could break out of their shells a bit. I made hiking buddies with a couple of girls and may have accidentally promised them I would eat lunch with them at school next week. It was neat though because at first they would ask me a question and then I would answer and then they would discuss their next question with each other and decide how to say it in English and then ask me. But eventually as we found out more about each other, we started actually having a conversation, which was nice because that's pretty much what my role is here. Conversational English. So it was good to see it come to fruition a bit.

Here are some pictures from the trip:

The 16HR students on the bus before we left school:

The "haunted" tunnel we walked through:

My new best friends:

Some waterfall pictures:

My Wasabi ice cream I tried for the first and last time:

Some of the 16HR guys:

Back to regular classes next week. But then Halloween is coming up and the kids love that. Hopefully I'll have some good pictures to share of that too. That's all for now.

Rescue Mission

2008-10-05T19:43:00.005+09:00

Not many updates lately. Sorry about that.

The past few days have been devoted to a very important happening. Yesterday Kelly and I made a trek to the Tokyo area, not for a weekend checking out the coolest city in Japan but for something even more exciting. Caspian finally arrived in Japan! After months of preparation and worry and tons of e-mails going back and forth between us, Gwynn, Animal Quarantine, and who knows who else the day finally came for him to arrive. We got to Narita around 3:30pm and his flight was scheduled to arrive around 4. We first went to Animal Quarantine who immediately sent us to the American Airlines Cargo office where we had to turn in some forms and get some other forms and wait. After we got the forms from them we went back to Animal Quarantine who checked the forms and then sent us back to American Airlines. At this point we met a Japanese couple who happened to speak good English. The husband was actually raised in Dallas. How about that for a small world. They were picking up their cat so we went everywhere together to make sure none of us went to the wrong place. When we got back to American Airlines we went up to the next floor where we handed in some more forms and then all got into a van to go back to Animal Quarantine and in the back of the van were two kennels. One with the cat and one with our Caspian! I had to sit in the front seat so I couldn't see him but I heard all of the high pitched squealing from both of the girls in the back seat. Once we got to Animal Quarantine again I finally got to see him, and they let us take him out. Kelly got him out and held him while they scanned his microchip. He was visibly shaking from fear because he had no idea what was going on. Definitely glad to finally be out of the kennel I'm sure but it was short lived because we had to put him back in and go fill out more paperwork. We did that in the Animal Quarantine office while they checked him out and then we went to Customs to fill out even more paperwork. I impressed everybody by pulling out my hanko instead of signing my signature (at least I imagined that they were impressed.) For those that don't know, a hanko is a red stamp that is used in Japan as your signature. It's your name in kanji. Anyway, after customs we all walked back over to American Airlines cargo where we paid and finally were officially reunited with Caspian. About a two and a half hour process altogether. We bid farewell to the other couple and thanked them for translating everything for us. We were definitely lucky to have run into them. Once we got out of the cargo facilities we finally let him out of the kennel and let him walk for a little bit. We fed him and gave him water on the sidewalk (in his bowls, not literally on the sidewalk) because he obviously needed them. We then set off for a long trip back home. We finally got back to our apartment around 1:30am. Train times are really screwy here. He was stressed out and didn't like having to stay in his kennel on the trains and in the stations with so many potential petters around. I also didn't like having to carry his kennel around everywhere because though he is a very small dog, the whole unit became quite heavy. But we all got home in one piece and we're doing good. Many thanks go out to the Haseltines for helping take care of him until he was able to come. It may not be as exciting for him here but we are certainly very excited to have him back. We feel complete with him.

So anyway, that is the story from our end of Caspian's coming to Japan. A world traveler! In other news, we went to a local musical that one of Kelly's students was in today. It was definitely interesting and even entertaining despite the fact that we understood very little of it. I could pick out a few words including a very touching moment at the end where the main character said to her mother, "Okasan, gomennasai." (Mother, I'm sorry.) The dancing was very good and the staging was good enough that we could basically understand the plot. Definitely different from American theatre though. Including the opening where two characters asked the audience to be kind to them (Yoroshiku Onegaishimasu) and the end after the curtain call where one actor offered a formal thanks and bow to the audience along with an echo from the entire cast (Domo arigato gozaimasu.) Of course that kind of goes back to the prologues and epilogues that Shakespeare wrote into some of his plays, proving once again that theatre is a universal art form no matter what language it is in. But all in all it was very enjoyable. And the theatre was close to McDonald's so we got dinner there afterward. Always a good thing.

Edit: I just realized that some of you who didn't know us before Japan might not know who Caspian is. Check out our pictures of him to get up to date on our baby:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/koryandkelly/sets/72157604692137436/

Random Day Off

2008-09-23T19:04:00.003+09:00

There are many holidays in America that we do not get to experience over here in Japan. We worked on Labor Day and will have to take paid leave to get days like Thanksgiving and Christmas off. But I guess all things even themselves out in the end. Because today we got a holiday to celebrate the fact that the night and the day were the same length. Yes that's right, Autumnal Equinox Day! So even though today was a Tuesday and we had school on Monday, there was no school today. Not a bad way to break up the week. So when we go back tomorrow we will have a short three day week left. I can handle that.

We celebrated the day off by going out with friends last night and stuffing ourselves full of Japanese food. We have a friend that speaks and reads Japanese very well so we just made suggestions, handed him the menu, and he went to town. Edamame, 7-spice chicken, crab croquettes, caesar salad, two kinds of soba, gyoza, and the main course...lots of sashimi. It was all very good and very affordable. Gotta love the cost of living in Fuji.

Today we went to Lake Tanuki with some people to enjoy our day off together. It is a beautiful lake not too far from here with a great view of Mt. Fuji. Unfortunately that view was covered by clouds as usual but it did peek out a few times. Once the weather starts cooling down the cloud cover will disappear and we'll get a more regular view. Kelly took lots of pictures today so we'll get those up sometime soon.

Speaking of pictures, we've got some new ones of our trip to Osaka up on Flickr so check those out if you haven't already.

So back to work tomorrow. I've got a new Oral Communications I lesson tomorrow after doing my self-intro lesson for all of them. I've done that lesson 15 times and have two more to go. I'm definitely a bit tired of talking about myself. But now the new lessons will start now so that will break up the monotony. Before long, I'll be wishing I could do some more self-intros.

That's all for now.

A night never to be forgotten...or repeated

2008-09-02T20:58:00.000+09:00

We climbed Mt. Fuji this weekend. Yes that's right. The tallest mountain in Japan. The dormant volcano. The wonder that people travel from all over to see that we get to see on a regular basis. But seeing it wasn't enough so we climbed it. Am I glad I did it? Yes. Are my legs glad I did it? Absolutely not. But that's okay because I can now look at the mountain every day knowing that I have conquered it. It can't taunt me. It's like the beginning of that old Alabama song: "You see that mountain over there? One of these days I'm gonna climb that mountain." Well I climbed that mountain. And hear this: I will never do it again. Though rewarding and satisfying, it was one of the most difficult and trying things I have ever done in my life. The saying goes like this: "If you never climb Mt. Fuji you are a fool, and if you climb it more than once you are a fool." I concur. One of the teachers at school said that Mt. Fuji is only for looking at and not for climbing. Oh well. I climbed that dude and I'm proud of myself for doing it. I recorded a lot of footage which will be posted on either mine or Kelly's blog as soon as it goes through the editing room (Kelly sitting on the floor with a Dr. Pepper, some flan, and the computer.) But here's the basic story for the meantime:

We meet at Fuji station at 7:30pm where we are picked up by a bus and head with about 25 ALTs from all over the prefecture to the Fujinomiya fifth station. The fifth station is the highest you can go on the mountain by car and believe me it would be impossible for anyone who is not a professional mountain climber to start anywhere lower. We get to the fifth station at around 9:15pm and acclimate ourselves to the altitude for an hour, starting the climb at 10:15pm. Yes pm is correct. It's pitch black and we are equipped with flashlights, layers to add as it gets colder, food to eat along the way (they say you burn 7,000 calories on the climb), rain jackets, and of course the official Mt. Fuji walking stick. It takes about an hour to get from station to station with station 10 being the final one. It gets colder as we climb so you try to add layers but then you start to sweat because you're climbing a mountain so you're constantly adding and removing layers. We walked through some clouds which required us to put on the rain gear because you don't want your clothes to get too wet. Kelly and I got separated after the 7th station as I left her in the hands of other people not knowing that they would leave her as well. But I had to go at my pace or I might not make it. It's kind of like when you're running and you have to go at your pace because you'll get too tired if you go any slower or faster. At least that's how I justify leaving my wife behind on a mountain. So anyway...I eventually get to the 9th station around 2:00 or so after climbing by myself for a few hours. I say by myself. There were hundreds if not thousands of people on the mountain that night, but I was not with anybody from my group which basically translates into: anybody that spoke English. But at the 9th station I finally found about 6 people from my group. They were sitting in the station resting and magically out of nowhere this station was serving hot food. So I got a plate of 1000 yen curry and some green tea and suddenly had the energy for the rest of the climb. So we set out for the top of the mountain. Little did we know this would be the hardest part of the climb. It was basically a single file line the rest of the way because the path was so narrow and every step was a step up 1 or 2 feet at least. But then finally at about 3:50 we reached the top. And let me tell you, it was freezing up there. And I don't mean freezing in the general sense. It had to have been in the 30s Fahrenheit and very close to freezing. We found a place to sit down and have an oxygen tank party. Very necessary because the air up there was thin, but we all had these small light oxygen cans that we carried with us the whole night. So anyway, the reason for the overnight climb was so we could watch the sunrise from the highest point in the land of the rising sun. I used my compass that Adam gave me as a groomsman's gift to figure out where east was and we sat and waited in the freezing cold. It was cloudy so it was hard to see, but the sunrise was still pretty cool. We could see different cities around the mountain and how they looked in the sunrise. All in all it wasn't as great as I heard it would be, but I didn't care. I was watching the sunrise from the top of Mt. Fuji. When we made the decision to drop everything and move to Japan we said that we wanted to experience as much as we could. And this was one of those experiences.

So after the sunrise, I checked out the crater, found Kelly, took some pictures, changed my socks, ate some bread, and began the descent at around 5:30. I won't go into too much detail about the way down except for this. People kept telling us beforehand that the way down was harder than the way up. I didn't believe it until I started. To start with, you're already completely exhausted from the 6 hour climb up, but then add in the fact that this is a volcano so all of the ground is loose ash and volcanic rock. We were basically slipping and sliding the whole way down. Kelly fell once, I almost fell about 10 times, I slowly sprained both of my ankles and both of my big toes started to bleed from my shoes pressing against them. Advice: if you climb Mt. Fuji, cut your toenails beforehand. I'm notorious for being bad about cutting my toenails and it came back to haunt me this time. So anyway, we finally got back to the fifth station at around 10:30 and collapsed until everyone else got back. We got back on the bus around 11:30, got dropped off at Fuji station and took the train back to the station next to our apartment. Kelly went to eat lunch and I went home. I fell asleep around 2:30pm and didn't get up until the next morning when I got up to go to work. That was a rough bike ride, let me tell you.

So in the end, it was an experience like none I have ever had and none I will ever have again. Ever. Ever. But you know what? I CLIMBED MT. FUJI!!! I certainly don't want to discourage anyone from doing it that has the opportunity. Just know that it will be very difficult, but it will also be an experience that you will never forget. I will be telling my grandchildren about it someday, and that to me is worth every step.

In other news, I gave a speech in front of the entire student body on Monday, which was the first day of the new term. It went well. I made a joke in Japanese and some people actually laughed. Here it is: America no Texas kara kimashita demo watashi wa cowboy dewa arimasen. Translation: I am from America's state of Texas, but I am not a cowboy. I had a welcome lunch with the English staff today and surprised everybody by eating sashimi. Apparently there is a misconception here by some people that Americans don't eat raw fish. But I love it and it was great today. I sat at the head of the table with the principal who talked to me about the Astros, and I lamented how they were good in August as usual but that it was too little too late as usual.

Here is a picture I took from the top of Mt. Fuji with my iPhone. It's not great but like I said there will be a video coming soon. Take care!

In memorium

2008-08-27T20:23:00.000+09:00

Most of my posts will be about Japan, but I have to take time now for a personal note. I found out last night that Leroi Moore, the saxophone player for the Dave Matthews Band passed away last Tuesday from complications involving an ATV accident he had in June. I am realizing that being here keeps me a little disconnected from the world back home even with the internet. The fact that a member of my all-time favorite band died and I didn't find out for a week is a little strange. I was shocked to find out while just randomly surfing the web. He was an incredible musician and one of the founding members of the band. Dave Matthews actually gave Leroi his demo tape back when he was a young musician trying to make a name for himself. So in a way, he was responsible for the forming of the band which is pretty amazing because he was always kind of the one in my mind that stood in the background and let the other guys get the glory. There have been many nights that I have sat back listening to DMB alone or with friends and just being amazed by the smoothness of Leroi's sax. I don't know anything about the instrument, but I know he's one of the best I've ever heard and I personally will miss listening to him play.

I'm including a YouTube video of one of my favorite live songs by the band. This song kind of features Leroi Moore and he has a great flute solo followed shortly by a sax solo that all builds up with the violin and drums to a pretty cool climax. That to me is what this band is all about, and I think he had a lot to do with that. The song is called #41 and this is from the Listener Supported live album. It's about 10 minutes long. You can watch the whole thing if you want, but if nothing else skip ahead to 3:45 and listen to the classic DMB jam session that follows. If you've never heard Leroi play you're sure to be impressed.

He will be missed.

Video!

2008-08-19T20:42:00.000+09:00

Well those who have checked Kelly's blog in the past few days know by now that we have internet in our apartment finally. Kelly has put up some pictures on her site that we took a few weeks ago as well as some new ones and also on our Flickr account so you should check those out. I'm going to put up a video that I recorded on our first morning in Fuji back on August 1st. It was very early and I was very tired so please excuse my lack of energy and cleanliness. But you can see a tour of the other apartment that I use basically for showering in the morning in the middle of my roughly 3.5 km bike ride to work. That's kilometers for all of you Americans out there. Yeah I still don't quite get the whole metric system thing. I do know that I am 176 cm tall though. Or something like that.

I was at the Yoshiwara High School camp in Susono for the past few days. We had a lot of fun with the 40 students and 10 ALTs. I recorded a lot of video and as soon as I have a chance to sort through it I'll get some of it up on here. It was great to finally get to meet and work with some of my students. They are very good and for the most part did a great job with their English so I'm looking forward to working with them some more.

Anyway, enjoy the video. Keep in mind that I had been in Fuji for just over 12 hours when I filmed this so obviously I know a little more about things now. It's a bit long and choppy I guess but I didn't really feel like doing any major editing tonight. Hey there's nothing wrong with a little extra Kory in your life. Later!

When you've already read your textbook twice...

2008-08-11T14:35:00.000+09:00

...the day can certainly drag by. I try not to spend too much time on the computer at work but this day has been the first day since I got here that I have absolutely nothing to do. There are about a total of 6 teachers here today and I don't think anybody has anything to do. I was about to fall alseep at my desk and I figured that I would rather be seen sitting at the computer forever not doing work than sitting at my desk sleeping. I know that once school starts there will be so much to do that I'll never be bored but right now is officially the dog days. But the good news is that I leave Wednesday for a three day orientation in Kakegawa. So that should be fun. So anyway, I guess I should open up a word document and read it. That at least looks like work. Sleepy, sleepy, slee...

Mt. Fuji!

2008-08-07T16:23:00.001+09:00

Well after exactly one week in Fuji, Japan we finally have a Mt. Fuji sighting! It's been so cloudy that we haven't been able to see the enormously large mountain that sits 15 miles north of us but last night right after dinner I went outside and there was Fuji-san! It is definitely big and we have a great view from our apartment. I could still see it on my ride (I now have a bike!) to work this morning but it's gone back into hiding for the time being. Kelly took a lot of pictures though so I'll try to get some on here soon. It's kind of tough right now since we still don't have internet in our apartment but be patient and soon you'll see lots of pictures and posts. I'm staying late after work just to post this and I'm not one to do that very often so consider yourselves lucky.

We had Kelly's school's camp the past two days and that was a lot of fun. It was my first chance to work with any students and they were really cool. My school's camp is in a few weeks and tomorrow we have Jr. High day where 700 jr. high kids will come to our school and see what we have to offer. Kids get to pick what high school they go to here so I have to put on my best show to make the kids want to come here. It should be fun.

OK I'm ready to go home now so that's all for this post. Talk to you later!

Fuji-bound today!

2008-07-30T05:57:00.000+09:00

Well we're here in Tokyo and have just about completed our orientation. We've learned a lot and gotten an amazingly large number of books and other materials. We've met a lot of people from all over the world which has been pretty cool. For example, the other night we went out to eat with people from our prefecture and then went and sang karaoke. The crew we were with included the following: an Irish guy, a British guy and girl, and Kiwi guy (that's New Zealand), an Australian girl, a Scottish girl, and some other Americans. It was a blast and a lot of fun to hear about their countries and to tell them about ours. It was especially funny to hear the British guy, Marc talk about how Americans have murdered the English language. We're definitely looking forward to hanging out with all of them some more in the future.

So we leave today to take a 3-4 hour bus ride to Shizuoka to go to the Board of Education there and then after that we will be taken by our supervisors to Fuji. Kely and I work at different schools so we have different supervisors and will probably be split up for the first time today. So that should be a very nerve wracking experience. But we're excited and hopefully will make our way back to the same apartment by the end of the day. And we'll also get our first look at Fuji-san today. That should be quite surreal.

I'm not sure when we'll get internet working in the apartment so it might be a while before I can write again, but I'll try to find time as soon as possible. Kelly has put up a video on her blog at http://kellyinjapan.com so check that out. Ja matta!

Getting crazy!

2008-07-23T06:03:00.000+09:00

Well we leave in less than 4 days and I'm definitely getting excited and a little bit freaked out. Though I don't think it has officially hit me yet. It might not until I get on the plane. We're in Abilene right now seeing the Haseltines again before we go and dropping off Caspian until he's able to join us in September. We go home tomorrow and I think that I'll be sadder to leave him than anyone because he doesn't understand that we're not leaving him for good. But he'll be taken good care of and have fun and then we'll see him again in September. Jeff and Gwynn are giving us some good Japanese lessons in the midst of helping us work out countless details, and as usual we have books and papers spread out everywhere. It's a good thing our parents love us. :)

It's amazing how much there is to do when you move out of the country. I never realized how much I was responsible for until I had to start wrapping things up. Now I wish we had started sooner on some things. So (advertisement coming...) if anybody is looking to buy a car, we have two!

The Pre-Departure Orientation is Friday night at the residence of the Consul-General of Japan in Houston. I imagine that is going to be quite an experience. And to add to it all, I was asked yesterday to give a short speech at the reception that follows on behalf of all of the JETs that are flying out with us. How crazy is that? I guess I should prepare something, but I tend to give better speeches when I just wing it. Probably not a good idea in front of the Consul-General though, huh? So I guess I'll be writing that Thursday night.

So anyway, we've got almost everything done or at least figured out for the meantime. Wish us luck in final preparations. Here we go!

Houston JET Q & A

2008-06-30T03:21:00.000+09:00

We had our Q&A session for the JET Program yesterday. Kelly wasn't able to go, but I went to represent us both. It was a very good and well-run day with a lot of good information. I think that after sitting and listening to people who have done this before talk about their experiences I have finally started to realize how soon all of this is going to happen. But I've also started to realize that this is something that I can do. It gave me a strange sense of relief to look at all of the other people who are flying out from Houston and see the same panicked and terrified looks on their faces as I've seen on our's for the past few months. I didn't get to meet a lot of people, but the ones I met were very nice and helpful. There was a strong feeling of excitement mixed with nervousness mixed with uncertainty mixed with anticipation. It feels good to know that so many others are in my shoes and doing all of the same things I'm doing in preparation.

It's good that we now have some more materials to look at and study just to make us feel more prepared. I think we're very prepared though. I think we'll be ready. I'm starting to get that energy I used to get before going to camp or mission trips or big vacations where I would read and re-read everything I had just to get myself excited. We have a lot to do in the next month to get ready for this, but I now know that by the time July 26 rolls around, we will be feeling very confident. It's getting close!

First

2008-06-22T07:03:00.000+09:00

This is the first blog of my first blog. I don't have much to write now but seeing as I'm moving to Japan in 34 days (!) there will probably be some pretty interesting stuff to write about soon. So stay tuned!