I spent about 4 days up in Hokkaido around Christmas.
The skiing in Hokkaido was incredible - it was about -10C during the
day, and the sheer size of the ski runs was unlike anything I've ever
experienced before. I'd love to go back there again.
Some older photos I haven't linked to yet:
What better way to celebrate safety week than with robots and pink and
green fluorescent girls? The sign on the left says "don't forgot your
seatbeat". Click the image for a big view, or check out a news article
The taiko drummers on the left were really talented. It was probably
the first time I'd seen taiko live.
昨日仕事に福岡に行ったのだ。博多駅出たらすぐこのエベントが見えた。うち
の同僚が普通と思ったけど、僕たった1年間日本にいて、こういうものを
まだすっかり慣れてないな。
New photos:
(a newly bought table and chairs - 新しく買ったテーブると椅子)
久しぶりだね。日本語でまだよく間違ってるけど、練習のために日本語でも書
こうと思ってる。で、どこから始めようかなあ。
この前のブログの書き入れは、ダイエットしてるって。あのダイエットをす
ぐ止めたんだ。忘年会があったし、新年会があったし。さぼてた。でも最近
一所懸命にがんばってるよ。痩せるためにだけじゃなくて、体のためにも。
このごろに日常生活はうまくいってる。日本語は少し喋られるようになったか
ら友達と遊びにいくとき、話の意味はだいたい分かって、ときどき簡単に答え
られる。すると、最近元気だった。もう子どもじゃないと感じてるし。
日常生活以外は。。ふん。今日友達の家で鍋パーティがあったんだ。友達とバスで
いった。実は、それは初めて熊本でバスに乗った。だから、払い方は分からな
かった。乗ったのは大丈夫だったけど、下りるときすごく大変になった。
バスに乗ったとき切符をもらった。熊本のバスは下りるときに払わなきゃいけ
ないのを知ってたけど、どうやって払うかは知らなかった。
下りるときは、まず、持ってる切符を両替機に入れちゃったんだ。バスの運転
手が顔をしかめたから僕が早くまた切符をとって正解の穴に入れた。それか
ら運転手に見て、なんか彼が両替機に指さした。分かったと思ってて、お釣り
をそこに入れた。別のお釣りが出てきたから、「ああ、安くなった!」と思って
た。新しいお釣りをとって下りた。
外にいる友達が「200えんだよ」って。しまった。100えんしか払ってなかった。ま
たバスに乗って、さっきもらったお釣りと100えんをほかの穴にいれた。それ
から、やっと下りれた。
すごく恥ずかしかった。バスは込んでいたし。僕の顔が苺みたいな赤になっ
てた。まあ。次から払い方を分かってるので、大丈夫だ^^
じゃあ、今日仕事があるからそろそろ寝る。また近いうちに書く、仕事とか勉
強とかがないときに。
It's been a long time! I'm still making a lot of mistakes when I use
Japanese, but for the sake of practice I think I'll start writing my
entries in both English and Japanese. So, where to start?
In one of my recent blog entries I said I was going on diet. That
didn't last long, due to end of year parties, start of year parties,
and me just being lazy. But recently I've been trying really hard to
be more careful about what I eat.
Life's been good recently. I can speak a little Japanese now, so when
I go out for drinks or something with friends, I can understand the
general meaning of the conversation, and sometimes reply (albeit
without prowess much of the time). So, I've been well. I no longer
feel like a child who's unable to communicate at all.
Apart from daily life - hmm. Today there was a nabe party (cooking
vegetables and meat in a pot in the middle of the table) at a friend's
house. I went there on the bus with some friends. Actually, it was the
first time I'd used the bus since I arrived in Kumamoto - partly due
to no real need, and partly because I was unsure how to go about it.
So I wasn't aware of how to go about paying for tickets. Getting on
the bus was fine, but when it came time to get off..
When I got on the bus, I got a ticket from a ticket machine. This is
used in Kumamoto to measure how much you have to pay - a further trip
costs more. I knew this much before I got on the bus, but I wasn't
vsure how to go about paying.
Anyway, when it came time to get off, the first thing I did was stick
my ticket into a coin changing machine. The look on the bus driver's
face was enough to know that wasn't the right place, and luckily I was
able to pick it out swiftly enough with a fingernail (it'd gotten
stuck). The bus driver motioned towards a bigger looking hole and I
stuck the ticket in there. Next the bus driver motioned to the coin
changing machine again. Okay, I thought, and stuck some money in. Some
change came out! Cheaper than I thought. I carelessly grabbed the
change and stepped off the bus.
A friend who was standing outside said "it's 200 yen!". I'd only put
in 100 yen and still received change. Something wasn't right. I got
back on the bus again, put my change and some more money into the
correct hole, and finally got off again.
It was pretty embarrassing - the bus had been crowded, and my face was
as red as a strawberry. Oh well. I know how to use the buses now!
Well, I've got to work today, so I'm going to sign off. I'll write
again in the not too distant future - but between work, friends and
study, it's unfortunately hard to find time for writing. Until next
time!
A lot of events are on at the moment - parties with coworkers, parties
with students and coworkers, trips to fukuoka to watch the sumo. These
have spelt hell to my diet and OT and I have spoken about a 1 week
reprieve.
The trip to fukuoka was great. I'll write about it soon.
I haven't felt like writing recently. I wouldn't say I've been in bad
spirits, because that would be too extreme - just a little bereft of
energy.
I fell off the horse with my Japanese study a couple of weeks ago.
Whenever I stop studying for a few days I find it hard to pick up
again, because the seemingly insurmountable amount of work left ahead
makes study almost seem pointless. Of course that's not the case, but
it can be difficult to snap out of that mindset.
I've still been studying, just half-heartedly. I found a Japanese chat
channel a few months ago, and I spend a reasonable amount of time
there. Speaking is much harder than listening for me, so it's good to
get some more practice with language construction. I've also been
reviewing some of my previous textbooks, but not for the amount of
time I should be.
Since I still get the occasional question from friends about my
"girlfriend", I should clear that up - we stopped seeing each other a
few months back. For no apparent reason, our contact started becoming
less frequent. She said she was busy preparing for her friend's
wedding, and eventually we just stopped talking.
She was a couple of years my senior - something that probably would
have bothered me more back in Australia. But the language barrier
meant that while we were able to communicate, differences in
experience weren't so pronounced, as we weren't able to elocute them!
I didn't think we had real long-term prospects due to this, but at the
time it was fun.
When I first came to Kumamoto I was going out a lot, because there
were so many new things to see, and I had nothing to do at home. Now
that boredom isn't such a big factor, I've tried to tone down the
number of times I head down to the local "watering hole". This is good
for my body and my wallet, but weighs heavily on my social life, as
most of the friends I've met here I see when we go out for dinner in a
big group, or when I drop by a bar. It annoys me a bit that these two
are connected, since I want to socialise more than I want to drink.
The language barrier makes activities like going out for a coffee a
bit of a challenge.
Work is a spirit-lifter in this regard - I think if I was doing the
same job I was doing in Australia, I'd feel a lot more isolated right
now. My students and co-workers are lovely and while the kids classes
remain a challenge from time to time, they mostly go okay. While the
kids can be difficult at times, they can also be really sweet, and I
must admit to getting clucky from time to time. But I don't think I'll
go down that path for a few years yet!
My lethargy for study has extended to exercise too, unfortunately, and
I've put on a couple of kilos since arriving. OT and I have decided to
race each other to drop 10kg. Getting started has proved a bit
difficult for me and he's currently in the lead, but once I get into
gear I'm going to put up a fight. You can keep track of my progress by
peaking at the image in this post - it'll continue to be updated as
the days go by.
It's finally cooled down here and the weather is comfortable for
walking in again. I spent half the day shopping today - picked up some
more bedding to keep a bit warmer and a variety of odds and ends, like
a cheese knife. On my next day off, I think I'm going to don my
mamachari and go explore.(Culinary) adventures in Japan
Episode 253. Okonomiyaki, take 1.
Some okonomiyaki sauce caught my eye at the supermarket today, and I
figured it was time I try and make some. I've attempted this before
with someone else (thanks K - that was fun), but I couldn't remember
all of the specifics.
I located some other ingredients like prawns, aonori (green ground
seaweed), cabbage, and premade okonomiyaki powder. I tried to read the
back of the packet with moderate success - but there were a few kanji
I didn't recognise. When I got home I tried to look them up, but some
of them I couldn't find in my dictionary so I gave up and decided to
wing it.
When making the okonomiyaki I realised I'd forgotten katsuo bushi -
bonito flakes, which are dry, thinly sliced flakes of fish. They're
not essential, but they're nice. Later, I realised what one of the
kanji I couldn't read meant, too - tamago, or egg. Oh well. I poured
in extra powder trying to thicken the mix up. It seemed to work
alright.
Okonomiyaki is a cross between pizza and a pancake - sort of like a
fritter but with cabbage and sauce on top. I managed to cook it
alright, though it fell into a few pieces when I tried to turn it, due
to the lack of egg.
Despite the missing ingredients it turned out pretty well. Yum.
I turned 22 yesterday. Being many miles away from friends and family
back home, I expected it would pass by pretty quietly. But everyone
here's been so kind.
I woke up early, because it's started to get cold in the early hours
of the morning and I wasn't using a a top-sheet. After whiling away
some time, I headed into work. Tuesdays are my longest day by an hour
or two - a total of 9 hours including a lunch break. But it generally
goes quickly unless I haven't had enough sleep, and before long it was
time to knock off.
A week ago I'd dropped into BT's bar. It's a "gaijin bar", which means
it's popular with foreigners and people who want to meet foreigners.
This makes it not the best place to go to practice Japanese, though
there are people who come who can't speak any English, too. But the
bar's got a nice atmosphere - good music playing in the background, but
not so loud you have to yell over it. Comfortable chairs. I'm also
friends with most of the people who work behind the bar. It's nice to
be able to drop by and know there'll always be someone to chat to.
There's a girl who works at the bar - let's call her J - who I first
met a couple of days after arriving in Kumamoto. Her friend was having
a birthday party at a yakitori and via BT I got to come along.
With recent study, my listening skills are slowly getting better, but
my speaking ability is still very low - it takes me a long time to
think about how to word a non-trivial sentence (if I can even think of
how to say it!), and I'm really shy about using my Japanese in a group
situation unless it's something I know I can say quickly.
When I dropped by the bar last week, J was working. Her English is
mainly isolated vocabulary and a few phrases, so when we chat it's in
Japanese. Chatting one on one with her was fun, because it was a lot
easier than it was a few months ago. Learning a new language is such a
mammoth task that it can feel like you're not making any progress.
But little retrospective revelations can be rewarding.
Anyway, while chatting with J, I'd mentioned my upcoming birthday. She
asked if I'd made any plans yet, and on hearing no, she suggested we
go to Kimura-san's - the friendly yakitori guy from that first
birthday party. I hadn't really thought to organise something for my
birthday, so I agreed that sounded good.
Back to yesterday. After work finished, one of my coworkers pulled out
a card and present, and presented it to me. The card had been signed by
the whole office, and the present was a nice tie. I'd mentioned in passing
that I like understated patterns months ago after I'd bought myself
some new ties, and my coworker had remembered. It was really nice of
my coworkers to go to the trouble - I didn't expect anything.
After wrapping up at work, OT and I headed to the restaurant with one
of our students who'd taken the final lesson for that day. When we got
there, we met J and J's friend who'd had the birthday when I first got
here. More than 7 months ago, now.
We sat down at a table and chatted away while waiting for more people
to show up. By about 10pm things got started. We ate a bunch of dishes
like a really delicious Cesar salad, something that looked like
lasagna but which was actually made out of tofu, and various other
things.
After dinner, the lights dimmed, and one of the restaurant staff come
out bearing a slightly wonky but very exotic looking cake. We were all
surprised when we found out J and another girl who was there had toiled
over it for quite some time after work. It was a banana sponge cake
with chunks of banana in it, topped in icing and mushrooms - the
mushrooms made from chocolate sticks and chocolate drops.
Everyone launched into a chorus of "happy birthday", which was
interrupted near the end in favour of another rendition with the aid
of a karaoke machine - there were 2 TVs around the bar and portable
mics and song selection devices lying around. After a very Japanese
version of the "happy birthday" song, we tried the cake.
The cake, despite its slightly non-standard geometry, was actually
really tasty, a fact that its makers were equally content to revel in.
The rest of us laughed along as the cake making pair echoed back a
dialog like:
"umai!"
Horse meat which I made a stir fry with, and another attempt at
kimchee.
Alive and well! I've been lax with the updates recently, because
keeping this updated has fallen down on my list of priorities.
For the last month or so I've had my head in the books, studying when
I can. That's not to say that's all I've been doing, for between work,
the occasional outings and sleep, there's not a huge section of the
day left over. I've started studying at work when I have a bit of free
time, such as in my lunch break, and that allows me to get a bit more
done.
Recently I've realised that I've grown a little lazy, snacking on
unhealthy foods when I need some energy but probably just making
myself feel more tired in the process. When I first got here I lost
weight, but now I've started to put it back on again as I become more
familiar with all the evil delights this town has to offer, such as
the junk food in the nearby 7-11. I'm trying to cut down on the junk I
eat at home now, so I can feel justified when I go out and eat yummy
food with friends.
The photo is the early stages of a mushroom and capscicum kimchee. I
got a little curious about the relative healthiness of some of the
foods I was eating recently. Kimchee's actually really good for you
apparently. For those of you who don't know what it is, it's cabbage
pickled with lots of garlic and chilli sauce. It can be chucked into a
stir fry to turn whatever the stirfry was into a kimchee stirfry.
Originally from Korea, the Japanese call it kimuchi, though it sounds
more like kimchi. Not the ideal thing to eat if you plan to breathe on
anyone afterwards, but it does taste good.
I've also developed a fondness for umeboshi - sour pickled Japanese
plums that I mentioned as rather unpalatable in a previous entry. Best
described as a milder version of those sour warhead lollies we used to
have as kids, though one the latest packet I bought it reads
"tabeyasui", claiming it's easy to eat. I guess it's all relative.
A friend has previously pointed out my fondness for recounting
culinary adventures here. Well, this entry would not be complete
without the story of the "roku jyuu ni bai kare-".
I've previously mentioned the nice Indian restaurant in town. The
regular chef is Nepalese and he's good at what he does, though he
could be accused of being cautious when it comes to spicing up the
dishes - on account of the considerably sensitive Japanese palate.
The restaurant has a hotness scale from 1-50, with anything above 10
being rated as "extra hot". I'd tried a 50 and a 25 with a coworker
previously and it was difficult to distinguish between the two of
them. Even the hottest one was, while comfortably warming, not
terribly hot.
So OT and I went back about a week ago on a mission to test our
limits. We explained to the chef how 50 hadn't been enough last time,
and he nodded but looked reluctant. Eventually he said okay and he
prepared two curries, one a 50 (though perhaps a little closer to 50
than the last 50 had been), and the other "roku jyuu ni bai gurai" -
approximately a 62. I'm not sure how he's able to arrive at such a
number. Ot and I have our doubts as to the scientificness of it all.
Anyway, our curry came out after a while, along with the garlic nan
we'd ordered. The 62 curry was an interesting affair, so seemingly
laden with chilli power that it was viscous like quicksand. Both were
a dark blood red-brown.
The vamped up hotness proved a little uncomfortable for my dining
companion and when the chef came out to ask how it was, and offered to
de-spice one of them, OT gladly accepted.
I actually enjoyed the heat, but the abundance of spices unfortunately
turned a really delicious curry dish (we'd had it before) into
something rather bland. The Indian curry I've had in Australia managed
to sit at a similar level of spice yet do so in a yummier fashion - I
suspect with more chilli oil and less spices.
An adventure, none the less. I think I'll stick to a 50 from now on.
So, what else is new? Autumn finally broke, and within a day the
temperature seemingly dropped 10 degrees. There's still days where the
weather's beautiful and it's too hot, but it's amazing just how
quickly the weather changed. It's also started getting dark by about
7pm, which came as a surprise, since I've endured a combination of two
summers since leaving Australia at the tail end of one.
Life's good.At about 2 PM I went to my work place (Kumamoto Gakuen University) because I heard that the power was still on there. The traffic lights were out at many intersections along the way and I saw several power lines that had been blown down. To see if I could find any more information I took a look at the Kyushu Denryoku (Kyushu Power Co.) web site. They report that as of 4 PM there are 820,700 homes without power in the Kyushu area. Kumamoto has 364,000 of these. It has been the hardest hit by far of any of the prefectures this time. Kagoshima is next with 122,500 and Fukuoka follows with 120,500. These are just the numbers of households so many more people are without power. In fact, though I'm not sure there may be close to a million people without power in Kumamoto Prefecture alone (if a typical household has two or three people).
Nattou curry rice. Despite the somewhat unappealing exterior, it's
really good.
My studying motivation has picked up again since I last wrote, and
I've gone back to studying every day. Partly due to crazy sleeping
habits during the holidays and partly because I'm unable to accomplish
anything after work, I've taken to waking up early and studying in the
morning. It really helps.
Yesterday on my lunch break I walked down to the local big department
store, which is the place I tend to buy my lunch from, as they have
some pretty good sushi there (and the occasional decent salad). While
paying for my sole item, I was hunting around for the correct coins
and I accidently dropped a 1 yen coin - the rough equivilent of a
cent. The girl behind the counter looked at me briefly and I said to
her "ichi en dake" - "it's only 1 cent (so don't worry about it)". I'm
not sure if that spurred her on, because much to my chagrin she
started hunting around underneath the counter for it. And she kept
hunting. I was trying to pluck appropriate phrases from my memory to
get her to stop - "ii yo" (it's fine, really), "kamaimasen yo" (don't
worry about it), etc. Eventually I just resorted to "sumimasen" (I'm
sorry (you're taking the trouble to do that)).
After she couldn't find it on her side of the counter, she came around
the other side and started poking about on the floor. After a minute
or two she finally stood up triumphantly, and presented me with a
slightly dusty, though still legal tender, 1 yen coin.
I had my first ride on a mamachari today. The word is a contraction of
"mother's chariot", so called because they are the bike favoured by
housewives running errands around town. They have thin wheels like a
road bike, but they usually have a basket attached to them for
transporting stuff around. Back home, they might be embarrassing to
ride, but here they're everywhere, and their use is not confined to
mothers.
A kind American who works as a priest - the same guy who helped me get
a washing machine and fridge when I first arrived, has volunteered to
get a bike built for me based on a sturdy frame and some various
parts. The end result should last a while, while costing me under
$200. In the interim he's lent me a mamachari to get around on.
Up until now I'd avoided riding on it, partly because I haven't
ridden in 4 months and I was afraid I'd be all over the shop, and
partly because that sort of bike has a stigma back home and it took me
a while to get over the aversion to being seen on one.
Today I had to go into a national government office to apply for a
full time visa here - currently I'm on a working holiday visa which is
only good for a little while longer. My coworker kindly volunteered to
lead me there, since I didn't know where I was going, and he went so
far as to come up and help me along with the application process to
boot. Which was helpful, as the lady there could speak only a modicum
of English. I probably could have made it through a conversation
without him, but it would have probably taken a lot longer. I've got to
go back again soon because I forgot to take my original degree with
me, so I'll get a chance to see how I fare on my own.
My two weeks of holidays have all but drawn to a close, and I don't
know where all the time went. It was good to relax and catch up on
sleep, though I probably could have used the time more effectively. If
I hadn't been sick when they started I probably would have been more
motivated to use them better. Probably.
This holiday period was centred around "Obon", a buddist festival
where Japanese people pay homage to their deceased ancestors. During
this time a number of fireworks festivals are held, and on Saturday I
got to see one of them.
My girlfriend picked me and two of her friends up, and we drove to
another of her friend's houses. We picked up tea, coffee and drinks on
the way. This friend's house was in very close proximity to where the
fireworks were held - maybe 2 blocks away.
We sat around eating, drinking and talking. I was a bit dazed due to
lack of sleep (awful sleeping habits during the holidays) and the
residual effects of a cold, so I spent more time listening than
speaking. My girlfriend's friends are really lovely and despite my
inability to contribute much to the conversation, they were friendly
and tried to include me where they could. Questions directed at me are
generally easier to follow than conversations between them -
especially as they're likely to drop into the local Kumamoto-ben
(dialect) when talking to each other. I have enough trouble following
standard Japanese!
I was drinking iced coffee for the majority of the evening as I feared
I'd fall asleep if I had any alcohol, but most of the others there
were indulging in some beer. The traditional beer accompaniments over
here are different to peanuts or jerky. There's edamame - which look
like beans but with bigger peas inside, and you squeeze the peas out
and eat them like that. They're less sweet than green peas but still
pleasant. Then there's shredded bits of ika (squid), resembling jerky
but much thinner. I think they put a bit of sugar in with them.
Most of the girls there were in their late 20s, and two of them had
children - the host, and one of the girls we'd picked up along the
way. The lady who we picked up had brought her child along.
Both of the kids were about 1 1/2 years old, and really cute. At my
school I teach kids about as young as that, but it was interesting to
be able to watch them outside the context of an English lesson, where
the mothers are chasing them around trying to get them to behave. By
about the age of 2 or 2 1/2, they start to become attentive and able
to participate properly in the lessons, but at 1 1/2 they're still
very much at an explorative stage and unable to focus for long. At one
point I murmured "chotto abunai" (a little dangerous) to the 1 1/2 y/o
girl's mother, as the daughter had wrapped a curtain cord around her
throat and was at risk of hanging herself if she fell down. The mother
had only turned away for a split second. Remind me not have kids if I
ever develop a heart condition!
The fireworks started about 8pm, and we stepped outside on to the
veranda to watch. The show was quite good - by estimation bigger than
the firework festivals we have back in my home town. It was actually a
smaller festival - the day before, a big fireworks festival had been
held, but I didn't go to that one. Maybe next year.
Today's dinner (see photo) - a raw egg cracked over instant noodles.
When you pour hot water over it, it cooks the egg and the noodles.
Yum.
It's been a lazy month. In the last month I got the internet and a new
computer, which has alleviated what used to be a major motivator in my
study, friendship making, etc - a lack of things to do at home.
Catching up all the computer stuff I used to busy myself with back
home has been fun, but it's left me feeling a little guilty as I
haven't accomplished much this month. It was good to get it out of my
system, I guess, but I've about hit the stage where I think I need to
put down my internet sites, pick up my textbooks again, and spend
more time with friends.
On the plus side, my food and drink budget was considerably lower this
month, on account of eating out less!
An often talked about phenomenon for people living in a foreign
country is "culture shock" - depression or other unpleasant
experiences due to living in a different country and being constantly
exposed to different things. For some it's immediate, for others it
follows a "honeymoon" period where everything is new and exciting -
then reality sets in.
I don't think my lethargy was due to that. My experiences here have
been largely positive, and I'm actually really happy to be here. While
sometimes bemused by the things that go on, what I've seen here didn't
differ to a great degree from what I expected.
There are trying things, but they're things that apply to living in
any country where you can't speak the native tongue well. Some people
come here and never bother to learn Japanese. That's okay, if that's
what they want - but I was always determined to be able to speak with
a degree of fluency by the time I returned home. I'd still love to
attain that, but sometimes it's hard to keep up the motivation to
study every day in order to meet that goal. The study is usually fun,
but it requires energy, and it's infinitely easier to relax in front
of the idiot-box or similar.
When I first got here I talked about how debilitating it can be to be
unable to speak the language. For simple social interactions I no
longer bumble about; communications with shop attendants are for the
most part smooth and I've made some good friends. The more complicated
inevitabilities of life are still taxing at times, though - bills
written in Kanji with no clear indication of if money is due or not,
the renewal of my visa, the possibility of a trip to a doctor and how
complicated that would be - finding a doctor with a modicum of English
ability, or dragging a friend or coworker along to help me out.
I'm aware that by tackling the language issue I'm indirectly solving
my other concerns, but that knowledge alone is not a sufficient
motivator. While it's nice to know that by improving my language
ability I'd be reducing concerns about bills, trips to the doctors,
conversations with people - for the most part I'm able to get by
pretty easily. I can function enough in daily life now.
So recently I've been trying to remember my original goals about
studying the language. And I'm finding it necessary to set a schedule
of time to study, or I never make the time for it. I actually enjoy
studying when I do it. It's just some subconscious aversion to the
energy required that makes it hard to start.
On another note, convenience stores (conbinis) are everywhere here,
and reasonably priced. There's one about 2 minutes walked from my
house (in fact, there's at least 4 within a 5 minute radius). I often
walk to the local one when I want a bottled coffee or something to
eat. The food photo is what I had for lunch today - "soumen". Soumen
are cold, thin noodles dipped in a combination of water and soy-sauce.
Great in summer.
The other photo is my new computer next to my old one - if you look
carefully you can see tape on the left side holding the screen
together.Atarashii tokoro omedetou (congratulations on your new place)
K opened a new restaurant down the road from his yakitori a few days ago, and on the night after the grand opening, OT, BT, my girlfriend, her best friend and I arranged to meet there. It was just down the road from K's yakitori place, and it didn't take us long to find it. We walked in to be confronted with a relatively nicely furnished interior, about the same size as the old place but a different kind of shop. A high set bar counter stood next to about 10 natural wood chairs (each about $350, apparently). On top of the counter were a number of the dishes being served that night, in big open plates which they served from. This new place was an izakaya (traditonal bar / restaurant) rather than a yakitori (meat on sticks place), and so there's a bit more of a focus on good food and less of a focus on alcohol. We sat down at this big communal table, that was filling up the rest of the shop. The table was big enough for approximately 12-16 people to sit down, and the lack of other seating apart from at the bar meant that you generally sit down near people you don't know. This is mildly unnerving at first - if you're perched across the other side of the table from someone you don't know, it feels a little funny to be staring into their face. But at the same time, it's kind of a friendly atmosphere. I apologised to my companions for my lack of genkiness (energy), as I was a bit dazed by my head cold. But I was happy to be there. We ordered a variety of dishes and some beers. The girls didn't drink, as they had to drive. There's no legal driving limit in Japan. Any in your blood and you're in trouble. BT had brought a bottle of shouchuu for K as a little thank you gift, which "unfortunately" resulted in K's staff donating a bottle of shouchuu from the shop back to him. The food started coming pretty quickly, and there was an interesting variety of things on the menu. The highlight (much to the chagrin of readers back home, no doubt), was strips of raw chicken, dipped in a mix of soy sauce and wasabi. They were really fresh, and just divine. Also on the menu was a salad with tofu and .. I'm not sure, it looked like onions but tasted like something sweet. And these mini potato-like things, about half the size of a golf ball, with a furry skin which you clasp and push the potato-esque affair out of. And a separate dish of just tofu, sprinkled with katsuo bushi (shaved fish flakes) and a bit of shouga (ginger). Tofu is generally quite delicate here, and it's really difficult to pick it up with chopsticks. I'd like to think I'm usually okay with chopsticks these days, but tofu gets me every time, and I end up accidently mashing it to pieces while attempting to pick it up. Much to OT's amusement, though he fumbled some food later in the night and I took the opportunity to get him back. After the girls went home due to work commitments the next day, we decided to go back to K's yakitori place - mostly because I was suggesting to OT and BT that a place with food would be good, rather than just a bar somewhere. We ordered a bunch of meat on sticks which was particularly yummy that night. K was working there at the time, and he introduced us to a type of sauce based on halapenos which isn't even on the menu, because it's too hot for the tastes of most of the customers. It was great. BT decided to go home shortly after, as he was dog tired and slightly inebriated. I suggested to OT we drop by a texmex bar/restaurant that we've both been to, and OT seemed receptive to the idea. We were 2 of only 3 people in the restaurant (which perhaps isn't surprising for 3am on a Thursday night). We ordered some burritos and "spicy pickled cabbage" - which just turned out to be pork kimchee (buta kimuchi), though it was yummy. We sat around and talked computer geek talk for a while before deciding to meander home and get some rest.Blood-type dominoes and 117kg melons
It's Tuesday. I'm sitting in my apartment with the air conditioner on full blast, and the soothing sounds of the washing machine in the background. I'm comfortable. Usually Tuesday is my longest day at work - from around 12 until 9, with a lunch break. Today, though, it's a day off, because I had to work over the weekend. There was another summer party on Sunday. I'm getting into the groove of teaching kids, and my voice has become much louder than it used to be. When I first got here and tried elevating my voice, it'd hurt my throat, but now I can yell out vocabulary or praise with very little effort. It's not so much a discipline technique as a way of keeping their attention - getting the students to yell words back at me when I yell at them tends to be more fun. Sometimes I'll whisper or speak in a funny voice just to keep them on their toes. Speaking of body parts, my legs and shoulders are sore again, from the workout I got over the weekend. By the end of these summer parties I'm going to be pretty fit indeed. Well, if I can consistently eat well, anyway. Most of the time I buy healthy food - sushi, rice-based bentos, etc, but sometimes I buy a pile of unhealthy things just to give me something to do after work. Even though I've been going out a lot, there's still the odd day where I go home after work, and the lack of internet means the only thing to do when I get home is to watch TV I can only barely follow, or study. Eating (and cooking) is a way of combatting the boredom. All that will change tomorrow, though - finally the internet company is ready and they're coming around tomorrow morning to install the line. I'm so happy. Japanese TV has its ups and downs much like TV at home. The prime time slots generally have something interesting worth watching, and there's a bunch of dramas on during the day to cater to all the housewives here. To their credit the dramas are better than the "bold and the beautiful" trash that they play back home. I've accumulated a few amusing shows to recant over the last week or two, so without further adieu: One of them that was on a few days ago involved a boy and a girl sitting at Chinese restaurant. They're given a fortune cookie which says something to the effect of "if you break up, something bad will happen". Invariably they end up having an argument and the girl rides home in tears. Up until this point the drama had been perfectly normal, but suddenly she swerves out of the way of some passing animal, and her bike (with her still on it) catapults over a bridge and into the water below. When she wakes up, she's shrunk to the size of a matchbox. It was a little bizarre, but fun. Then there was the taiyaki variety show. Taiyaki is a thing made out of batter and filling, and pressed into the shape of a fish. The batter is roughly equivalent to fritter mixture back home. On this show a bunch of panelists took turns suggesting different types of fillings to try, and once the taiyaki was cooked they'd all sit down and try it - eliciting responses such as "umai!" (yum!), "atsui!" (hot! (it'd just been cooked)), or sour faces for the bad tasting ones. Some of the ingredients they tried were tomatoes (good), grapefruit (bad), rice (so/so), some sort of salty uncooked sea creature (horrible), and so on. Then there was this show that was showcasing some of the local food produce - things like pineapples, some sort of interesting root which was purple on the inside, papayas, etc. But first a bit of cultural background: Japanese love their melons. Watermelons, canterlope, etc - melons are loved by many people here. And they're really expensive. For an average sized melon that you could buy back home, you'll probably have to pay about $10-15. And good melons are often much more expensive - and are often given as gifts. It's not unusual to see a good melon in a box on sale for $30 or $50, and in rare cases even $100 or $200. Anyway, on this show they had this locally grown melon which was 117 kg. It was huge. Then there was the show which goes around interviewing "bimbo"s. "bimbo" in Japanese means poor (as in financially struggling). This show visits people in their homes and enquires about how much they spend in a month, and looks around their house to see what interesting things they can find. Most of the people they interview are students, so it's not a malicious stab at the lower-class so much as a "let's make fun of the students" affair. Actually, 90% of Japanese identify themselves as "middle class", so there's not so much of a lower-class as in other countries. There's an interesting variety of people on the show. One girl had stuck a stick through a tissue box and put a roll of toilet paper inside, so she had a makeshift box of tissues. Her apartment was an absolute wreck, and the people interviewing her commented on how astonished they were that such a pretty girl could live like that. Then there was the guy who lived in an apartment about the size of our laundry back home. The interviewers dug around his kitchen and discovered .. cat food. The guy living in the apartment obligingly made a sandwich with some and took and bite, and then gave the two interviewers the chance to try it. The first interviewer cautiously took a bite and a look of great confusion spread across his face. After a while he finally muttered: "umaiiii!" (yummmy!). The other interviewer was equally surprised. Then there was the guy who served the interviewers some water out of some glass jars, and then cooked his special dish: rice and chilli rice. He'd cooked up a large batch of rice, divided it into half, and then dumped a large amount of paprika into one of the halves. He then served the dish up in two separate plates. The interviewer took a bite and then expressed in a mild panic that it was too spicy! The bimbo ushered him to the unadorned bowl of rice to correct the problem. Another cultural preface before the next show. A large number of Japanese people attribute a person's personality to their blood type. The blood type is seen as having similar properties as horoscopes back home, but there seems to be a more widespread belief in the blood type thing here than in horoscopes back home. On a lot of dating agency applications one of the important parts to fill out is your blood type. I've been given a few strange looks when people asked me about my blood type, because I've actually forgotten what it is. Mum, help me out here! Anyway, there was this show on a few days ago that had divided the kids up into small groups that shared the some blood type, and then the kids were segregated in their group and told to play with some dominoes. Some of the groups were more constructive than others, some preferring to knock things down more quickly. From this observation, the show (with the help of some "doctors") drew conclusions about the effects the kids blood type had on their ability to play.Hisashiburi (it's been a long time)
My updates have been infrequent of late, as work, study and socialising is occupying the bulk of my time. On Sunday I went to Suizenji park with some friends - a famous Japanese-style park & shrine. We ate soumen - thin white noodles, served in water with some icecubes. You take some noodles out of the bowl with your chopsticks, dip it in a soy-sauce-esque sauce, and then eat them. Good in the hot weather! A few days ago I went out to a European restaurant with the other teacher and some mutual friends. One of the guys there works at a bar in the city and he's known the other teacher since school. He's a good bloke. We mainly ate pizzas - fairly small and thin for the $12 a pop that they cost, but we're in Japan - so it's take it or leave it as far as that goes. They also had some nice salads, olives, etc. (I'm forever referring to the other teacher as "the other teacher" since it's not really my place to be plastering people's names on the net - but since this is a cumbersome affair I'm going to start calling him OT from now on) Last night I went over to OT's place after work. He'd cooked up some good spaghetti and we watched "the last samurai" and "kill bill 1" on his gorgeous HDTV home studio. The last samurai was a pretty fun movie, and it was good to watch KB1 again, now that I've seen KB2. My Japanese is slowly improving, though perhaps not at the rate it should be. This is because often I wake up shortly before work starts, and it's difficult to study in the evening, either due to other commitments or just because I'm too tired to be bothered. The good side is that I'm becoming more comfortable listening to others speak, and I'm less shy about speaking as well (even if what I can say is fairly limited). The English level of some of the friends I've made varies from very proficient (due to study abroad, etc) to almost non-existent. A few days ago I went to an Indian restaurant with OT. It's the first time I've had Indian food since I arrived in Japan, and it was a welcome meal. The curries were pretty good, if a little less exciting than the ones from the Indian restaurants back home - though it's not for lack of variety, with things like spinach curries being available (they're good!). On the other hand, the garlic nan they served there was the best I've ever tasted, ditto their pappadums. I definitely want to go back there again. After we'd eaten we went to a bar - the one the above-mentioned bartender works at. They employ a magician every couple of weeks and at one point the magician came over and started showing us tricks. It wasn't the first time I've been shown magic tricks in Japan. A few weeks ago, while walking down the main shopping street with some people from my school, two Japanese guys stopped us on the street and started trying to show us magic tricks. The first guy held a sponge clasped in his hand in the shape of a ball - sort of like a rectangular sponge being compressed into a different shape. After demonstrating its shape to us (never letting it leave his clenched fist), he rolled it around in his hands and "magically" it transformed into a rectangular sponge. Then the other guy showed us his trick. He held a wand-like thing in his hand, and after waving it about for a bit, he turned it into a scarf. At least that trick had some semblance of impressiveness to it. One of the co-workers I was with at the time was really surprised that we'd been accosted like this, because throughout her entire life in Japan, that's never happened to her before. Perhaps there's some sort of magical "show me magic" aura to me. Because a couple of days later in a restaurant, a different bunch of Japanese people started showing me magic tricks again. The highlight of this second performance was a guy with a rope. After waving it about for a bit, he made it transform into a scarf like the guy had on the previous occasion. But he did so in a way that it was painfully obviously the rope had been wrapped around the scarf prior. Barely able to contain my astonishment at this fellow's prowess, I mumbled "jouzu" to him, which basically means "you're skilled". Anyway, back to the magician at the bar. He was actually good. In fact, he was great - I've never seen such amazing sleight of hand tricks from across the table. He was making cards change size, magically push themselves out of a deck, lemons appear under cups, etc. It was really cool.
Some photos that I took on Sunday - the order to the text isn't the
same as on the photos, but you should be able to figure it out.
I just checked the state of my coffers. I've got about 28,000yen at
home, and 10,000yen in my Japanese bank account. This works out to
about $450AUD in total.
Pay day is not for another 9 days, but in 3 days, ECC will pay me for
my two weeks of training. This will more than tide me over, and
provided I limit my amount of discretionary spending (as I've been
doing), I should have a bit of money to spare at the end.
Note that when I say "discretionary", I'm not referring to internet
access and take-out dinners - I factored these into the "essentials"
part of my budget! After the first full pay day, I'll get a gas stove
and start thinking about cooking my own meals. I'm not picking up
expensive take-out foods, though, so it doesn't seem to be a
screaming priority. I value my free time too much to cook every night.
The photo on the right is the name of a driving school (small photo,
because it was taken on my mobile phone). The name is "terabaru", but
for some reason when they converted it into English, they decided to
call it "terrabul". Apparently they live up to their name.
In the past, Kumamoto's rainy season (about a month, from mid June)
has meant close to 40 days of rain, with the occasional day where you
can catch your breath. I'm told that the weather here has been a bit
strange recently, and it's been raining earlier than it usually does.
In the last week, it's rained 3 or 4 times.
My path to work is mainly under cover, and I only have to walk for
about 5 minutes in the rain (complete with umbrella). The problem is
my shoes.
I have an old, much-loved pair of dress shoes that are really
comfortable, if a bit beaten up. As I've mentioned previously, the
soles have become pourous with age, and when I walk in the rain it's
as if I'm standing on sponges, which quickly soak up the water below.
Yuck!
I have a newer pair of semi dress shoes, but there's two problems with
them. The first is that there's a plastic-esque lining on the bottom
of the shoe, which makes the shoe less sturdy on wet ground, and it
also has a tendancy to squeak. The other problem is that the back of
the shoe is made with a hard leather, which cuts up the back of my
feet. I'm going to have to get used to wearing band-aids every day for
the next few months, I think. Maybe the shoes will wear in with time.
This morning I work up, rolled over and looked at the time. In a
semi-awake state I have this reoccurring fear that I'm late for work -
even on days I'm not working. After thinking about it briefly, I
realised I didn't have to work, and I could roll over and go back to
bed.
Then I realised I had an appointment that morning, and I was already a
few minutes late. Expletives followed.
After rummaging around for a meishi (business card) but not being able
to find it, I finally grabbed the "Living information Kumamoto" book
and flipped to the back, hoping for a contact telephone number. Great.
There was one there.
I drowsily typed in the number, before realising I'd typed in the
post-code number of the address. Whoops. Success on my second attempt.
A person at the other end picked up and answered in Japanese. I
replied, "moshi moshi. uh...". In my haste to call I'd both forgotten
the name of the person I wanted to speak to, and how to request to
speak to them in Japanese. After a few seconds, my memory returned,
and I enquired if the person was in. The person who'd answered the
phone was the person in question. I hurriedly apologised for missing
the appointment (which I'd completely forgotten about), and suggested
I could be down there in about 30 minutes. My appointment partner
didn't seem too peturbed by my tardiness and he said 30 minutes would
be fine.
After getting off the phone, I kicked myself a bit more for my
mistake, had a quick shower and a rice cracker, and put on my
feet-murdering shoes as it was raining outside. After a brisque 15
minute walk, I arrived at the Kumamoto City International Center.
The KCIC is a government sponsored building to further interest in
international communication, and serves as a hub for international
affairs meetings, information on Kumamoto's sister cities, and more.
The center has a second floor annex with a number of free facilities
open to visitors, including TVs showing CNN and other news stations,
and papers like the New York Times.
Recently (about a month before I arrived), the center had started
providing free internet access on 3 computers. Previously the
internet access had been available, but at a charge. I've visited the
center a few times and there's often foreigners using the computers,
but sometimes Japanese people use them too.
A very recent addition to the center's arsenal of services has been
the introduction of what's called a "Flet's spot". This is run by NTT
(think Telstra in Australia), and for a fee of about $15 a month, you
can bring along your laptop and access wireless internet services.
Which is great for travelling professionals perhaps, but not so
useful for international visitors - since you need to sign a contract
and the setup process can take some weeks.
The person who looks after the internet access at the center (we'll
call him Y) had sent an email to a mailing list I'm on - an English
speaking mailing list for people in Kumamoto - advertising the
availability of Flet's.. A few weeks ago, I sent a private reply to
him, to point out the inaccessibility of a Flet's spot to foreigners,
and to offer to assist if the center would be interested in offering
free wireless access in the future. It would only cost them about $150
in parts, and I'd be willing to help them get it set up and working.
Y deliberated over this offer for a little while and suggested we have
a meeting to go over some details, and a few weeks back I went to the
center and met with him. He seemed to think the idea of pursuing it
further was favourable, and we had arranged another meeting to give it
a test run.
Which I completely forgot about. But thankfully Y didn't seem upset,
and when I arrived (I'd brought my own router to demonstrate how it
works to him), we gave it a test run and determined that we'd need
two routers to offer the service on both floors - on account of the
heavy concrete between floors blocking the signal. When I left he
seemed happy with the results and we spoke of another meeting to get
the service up and running.
On account of the numerous meetings, and the time spent waiting for
approval of the "project", by the time the center starts offering
wireless internet, I'll no longer have a need for it - as by then I
should hopefully have the internet at home. But it's nice to know
that visitors in the future may be able to make use of it.
On my way home from the center, I swung by Mos Burger - which I've
mentioned before. Their burgers are about twice as expensive as, say,
McDonalds, but the chicken burgers have real chicken in them, rather
than bits of chicken and lots of cereal. They taste quite good.
So I ordered a burger from the lady at the counter. I was anticipating
being asked if I wanted fries and a drink with it (which caused me to
stumble and get flustered last time I ordered from there), and I was
armed with the necessary Japanese this time to reply appropriately.
Alas, I didn't get to show off my newly acquired vocabulary. The girl
then stumbled a bit and managed to ask "eat .. here?" in English. I
replied in Japanese that I'd like take away and she was noticably
relieved that I hadn't replied in English.
I sat down at a table waiting for my burger to arrive, and the girl I
met on my first day in Kumamoto came and delivered it to me. She'd
done a year's exchange in Australia and was the girl with the
noticeable Australian accent. We had a little chat about how I was
finding Kumamoto. She said she hates it here because of the weather!
But it's not so bad. Or at least it won't be, once I do something
about my shoes.
A rainy day, and I felt like taking photos.
The food dish is what one company's take on "kimuchi" is - but
it's not the one I buy, because it's too expensive there! The
poster has instructions on how to put out the garbage.
The garbage system in Japan is a lot more complicated than back
home. Items need to be sorted into about 6 different categories,
and different days are used for different items. Everything is
supposed to be placed in clear plastic bags in the designated
area, so that the garbage collectors can pick up the right stuff.
There's a little alcove for the garbage in our apartment block,
but for some houses, their designated area is just the side of
the street.
Some examples of the categories: "combustible" items - things
like kitchen waste, plastic(!), wood, shoes, etc - are put out
twice a week, on Mondays and Thursdays. Non-combustible goods
like glass and cans get a different day.
But PET bottles are different again, and they need to be washed,
the caps removed, and then left again in clear plastic bags on
another day.
Then there's the bulky goods, which you need to ring ahead for.
They'll pick up things like bookshelves from you (provided you're
not moving out - then you're supposed to pay for it yourself!).
And the recyclable goods days, where possibly working items can
be put out. Some people have semi furnished their houses based on
what they can find from other people on these days, but a lot of
stuff goes to waste, too.
Finally there's the paper recycling. Books, newspaper and
cardboard need to be separated into different piles, and bound
using tape or rope.
I was delighted when I learnt the Kanji for the different days of
the week, because I now know where each of the different types of
garbage goes. Small pleasures.
My hands are sticky from the glue on the back of the gaffa tape, which
melts under prolonged exposure to heat. My apartment has a faint
smell of soldering iron acid. Bits of cable are scattered around the
room. And it's going on 2:30. I should be asleep by now.
But I fixed it.
It's hard to explain how disabling losing access to my laptop would
be. I have a bunch of Japanese lessons on there which I can't study
without it, for instance. It also makes it much more cumbersome to
write to friends, and renders my pending internet connection at home
useless. Ditto my digital cameras. Not fun.
But I fixed it.
I'm pretty lucky, actually. Thankfully, the power-pack was well
engineered - it detected a short-circuit and started flashing to
indicate an error condition. Had it not noticed, it would have
overheated and melted. I could have replaced it (much cheaper
than replacing the laptop), but it would have been a pain to do.
Phew.If at first you don't succeed...
Disheartened with my last attempt at Kimuchi from the supermarket, but not yet ready to chuck in the towel, I picked up a small container of Kimuchi proper. This actually contained the pickled cabbage (which is what Kimuchi is all about). I hoped this new attempt would more closely resemble what I've had from the bento place. I hoped it would be a far cry from the somewhat vile garlic-extract with a bit of red colouring masquerading as a chilli component. I hoped it would give me an excuse to stop going to the bento place every night. Today was a short teaching day - I didn't start until late in the afternoon. First up I had two kids classes. The second went fine, but the first one was a bit troublesome. I mas meant to be teaching the names of the months, but the kids really seemed to be struggling to remember them - be it because there was too much to learn at once, the other students were distracting them, or they just weren't motivated - I don't know. In most of my classes the students are really well behaved (for which I'm very lucky), and the class I had today is perhaps the most challenging from a discipline level. I'm going to have to sit down sometime soon and think about what I can do to improve the situation. It needs a bit of work. After classes finished, I recounted a tale to the other ECC staff about my experience at the bento place the other night. The kimuchi dish I really like is called "buta kimuchi don". The other night I'd said "buta kimuchi, (please)", and the lady at the counter said to the cook what sounded like "kimuchi cho". I noticed what she said was different to what I said, so I decided to ask her, when I collected my food, "which is better?". The other day I'd learnt a sentence pattern in Japanese about how to ask which was better, and this was an ideal time to practice it. Note that there are two entries in the dictionary for "cho" - "work" or "be profitable". What I'd actually heard was "icchou", not "cho" - I heard the wrong word. So after the lady gave me my kimuchi and a smile, I asked her something like: "buta kimuchi to kimuchi cho to dochira ga ii desu ka" - literally "which one is good?" A blank look. I repeated my question and the cook came out from the back area to join the lady. Two blank looks. They started apologising and obviously had no idea what I was saying. I told them it was okay, thanked them, and left. Then returned a few minutes later, announcing "kasa .. wasureta". I'd forgotten my umbrella. It turns out that the lady had said to the cook, what translates to "one order of kimuchi" - so it's not something I'd need to be able to say - what I said originally was better. But because I'd heard what she said wrong, when I tried to ask them, the pair of them had absolutely no idea what I was talking about. ".. kimuchi .. be profitable. which one is good?" Anyway, after I got home tonight I decided I'd try my newly acquired supermarket kimuchi. Not that I'm embarassed to go back to the store - they seem like nice people and mistakes like that are part of the learning process. I'm just trying to economise a little - and hey, I bought a little sushi earlier anyway! It's different to how it's prepared at the bento place, because I lack the facilites to fry it up, the meat to combine with it, or the rice to put it on top of. The vinegar taste from the pickling process is thus more evident and the garlic is a bit stronger - but nothing like the inedible concoction from the other day. I've got some strips of ham in the fridge - if I chop them up and throw them in I think it'd turn out pretty nice. @(@%*&#(%*&#$%(*#$% I just heard an arcing sound. The makeshift repairs I'd conducted on the back of my laptop have come loose and I've lost power. I've got an hour or two until the battery dies, and then the laptop will be useless unless I can repair it again. Woe is me.
The above is my ungrammatical attempt at "drunken old man". I was
walking through a department store today, and I walked through a
reasonably narrow passage-way between the escalator and a wall in
order to get to the side that was going down. There was a man sitting
on the chair and I gave him a faint nod as I walked past as a sort of
unspoken "excuse me".
But I shouldn't have! I reached the escalator and the guy walked up
behind me and muttered something a few times. I couldn't make out his
Japanese, though after he repeated it about 10 times I realised he was
saying "good evening" in a devilishly bad English accent.
The conversation proceeded partly in terrible English and partly in
terrible Japanese (on my part). He stunk of alcohol and it was only
6pm, and I had no desire to continue talking to him, so I tried to
lever my way out of the conversation without appearing rude. At one
point he asked me in Japanese if I drank and he seemed to be trying
to invite me out for a drink - to which I hastily replied "kyou wa
chotto.." - today is a little... (difficult)
After a couple of uncomfortably long minutes, I managed to free myself
from the weird old man's company, and I proceeded to Kinokuniya, which
is a book shop company in Japan. The other teacher had pointed it out
to me yesterday - they've got a selection of Japanese textbooks in
English - it's the first place in Japan I've been able to find a
textbook so far. Now I have more books to continue studying with!
Before running into the weird old man, I'd braved my first haircut. I
was somewhat anxious about it, as I don't know many suitable words
for communicating what I'm after in a cut - such as "this bit short",
"this bit long", etc. The staff there were nice though and after
bumbling about with "this place big, this place small, 1/3rd (miming a
chop)", etc, I ended up pointing in a magazine to someone who had a
similar haircut.
They'd given me a pair of magazines while I was waiting. The bulk of
the magazines consisted of 4 faces per page, all with different
haircuts. There were a veritible wealth of styles to choose from.
Japanese men have a lot more variety when it comes to the way they
style their hair.
Last night I went to see "Kill Bill 2" with the other ECC teacher. The
movies here have this weird ticket system where a limited number of
tickets are distributed to newsagency/stationary type shops. If you
buy a ticket there, it's cheaper - we got an adult ticket for about
$15 instead of the $22 or so we'd have had to pay in the movie
cinemas.
After the movie we geeked it up at his house for a bit - he's got a
very good widescreen HD-TV, digital PVR etc, and the picture quality
is just stunning. Ah well. One day.
Post-geekage, we went to a Chinese restaurant and then on to an Irish
pub which had just opened up near my house about a month before I
arrived. We bumped into one of the hairdressers we'd met the other
night (birthday cake from that night attached), and I also met a
really happy, friendly waitress who the other teacher'd met before.
When she finished work she came and sat with us and we chatted until
the early hours of the morning, which gave me a chance to practice my
meagre Japanese.
I took another 2 hour walk today, exploring another corner of Kumamoto
city. Came across a shrine on a hill with some beautiful vegitation
surrounding it. It was closed - I think you have to pay an admission
fee and it's only open on certain days - but even from afar it looked
magnificent.
Passed by the 100 yen store on the way back - picked up some
essentials I've been procrastinating