I Forgot!

hey all,

So Christmas is pretty much officially over. The packages of my presents have arrived where they're supposed to be: the presents from me to my family, and from my family to me.

I, stupidly but probably somewhat romantically, carried Michi's presents with me on our hiking trip in Nikko. She didn't carry mine, so I didn't get mine until last night. Of course, Michi's presents from my family were in the package that I didn't get until Monday, so she got those last night as well.

I have to say that this has been one of the best Christmases I can remember. The presents have been good, but I've also gotten to talk to my family (albeit through skype), play lots of games and catch up with Bri, and spend lots of time with Michi.

Below are some pictures from our trip to Nikko.

Cheers,

From Nikko-2

From Nikko-2

From Nikko-2

From Nikko-2

From Nikko-2

Trademark Infringement

hey all,

So I will risk being prosecuted by the Japanese government and reproduce one of their ads: Nikko is Nippon! Nippon is one of the Japanese names for Japan, and Nikko is where Michi and I went this weekend.

Previously, I've written about my first trip to Nikko. I researched that, planned it, and went there by myself. This time, Michi basically planned the whole thing, for which I'm really grateful. We got a great deal on our hotel (actually a ryokan (travel lodge with hot springs) with a 1200 year history), train tickets and bus fare thanks to her.

We met up without a hitch this time, arrived in Nikko at a little before 10AM, got our bus passes (which let us ride as much as we wanted for two days), and were told that our original plans were impossible by the travel staff. The problem was that it is winter, and Nikko actually gets snow, so many of the hiking trails were icy and dangerous. Not to be stopped, we decided to hike around central Nikko before heading over to our hotel. We hiked up to a waterfall I hadn't seen on the first trip, and revisited the something-something Abyss.

Getting to our hotel was quite the bus ride. The scenery of Nikko is spectacular. The bus drove past Lake Chuzenji, and then wound back and forth through an incredible gut-churning, awe-inspiring, switchback trail before leveling out.

The hotel itself was excellent. The hot spring water has a smell that is unfortunately similar to rotten eggs, probably thanks to the sulfur it gets from its volcanic heat source, but sitting outside with snow all around you while you're warm and comfortable is...nice, to be understated. Dinner was good, but it featured some deep-fried small fish that you are supposed to eat whole, plus a baked fish complete with head and tail still attached.

We got a slightly late start the next morning, as I hadn't slept well the night before (Michi wanted the heater on, but even on the lowest setting, it felt sweltering to me), and Michi thought maybe I wanted to start slowly. We had decided to walk to a nearby waterfall (Yutaki), which was incredible, and from there we took a bus to another waterfall (Ryuzu), and finally yet another bus ride to our final waterfall: Kegon Waterfall.

In between and during our bus rides and sightseeing, we got to talk, tell each other stories, and laugh a lot. It seems that we have recently jumped to some new level, without taking the proverbial look before we leapt.

Pictures coming soon.

Cheers,

Christmas in Japan

hey all,

Somehow my day off became busy. I spent the morning sorting through souvenirs and presents, making sure everything I wanted to send back was accounted for, and then went over to the post office and shipped it to the US.

As luck would have it, while I was doing that, my long awaited package from the US came, but since I was out I won't get it until Monday next week.

On top of that, I've just spent the last few hours going over hotel and ryokan information for our (Michi and me) trip to Kyoto. It looks like that is finally settled.

Lastly, I have packing to do for the trip to Nikko tomorrow. My camera is charged, my presents to Michi wrapped as prettily as I can, so I just need to pack warm clothes, toiletries, etc. I've checked the weather for the five millionth time this week, and it seems to be holding at decent.

Some random news before I go, as I won't be back on the computer till Sunday evening. The Japanese teacher who I work with at my part-time job has been fired. He was a really nice guy, and (I think) an excellent teacher, but he had some disagreements about how classes should be taught with his boss, so they actually sacked him. It doesn't matter too much to me, since I'll be leaving the company myself in March, but he really didn't deserve that kind of treatment, and I know the students (and I) will miss his lesson style.

I don't believe I've mentioned it, but in Japan, New Year's is traditionally a family holiday. You're supposed to eat the first meal of the New Year with them, go to a temple, etc. Christmas, on the other hand, is...a couples' holiday, to put it delicately. Whatever you might expect a couple, or a lonely single to do (try to do) on New Year's in the US; that will happen on Christmas instead.

Last item. Yesterday, I had my last day of work for several weeks. It was the school closing ceremony, which seems really poorly named. There are actually teachers at the school right now, and they will be there throughout the break. As far as I know, the students will not be at school. There are no classes scheduled, but there may be club activities. I do know that each of the students were handed thick homework packets by each of their teachers to do over break. I don't think Japanese people understand the idea of "break" or "vacation," that, yes, one can actually stop working/studying for more than 2 days without dying.

Cheers,

9 Months

hey all,

I just realized that I've been here for 9 months. This is actually the longest continuous time I've spent in a foreign country. I was in Amsterdam for about 10 months altogether, but that was 5 months in Amsterdam, 1 month back home, then another 5 months in Amsterdam.

It is a strange feeling. It seems like I've been doing this forever. I mean, I was in the US for about 8 or 9 months, I think, before jetting out of the country again, like some kind of comet with an irregular orbit. Even when I lived in the US, I skyped with some of my family members that were far away, skyped with my friend Mark, and kept in touch with Bri through online PS3 video games. Not so much has really changed, but at the same time, a lot of other things are totally different.

I have to say I'm still enjoying my life here. My job forms a large part of that, and I think it shows in my posts when it isn't going well. Recently, my job has been pretty fun. Despite some recent rocky spots (no pun intended) with Michi, that part of my life continues to be a source of good times and hope for many more to come. I also have something of a local network of people I can talk to here, which I never had in Amsterdam.

As I complained in the previous post, it is easy to start complaining about all the negative things, but it takes some thought and effort to focus on the positive things.

Cheers,

Weekend

hey all,

Interesting weekend. Got to talk and play some Bad Company with Bri Saturday morning, and continued to play video games, watch movies the rest of the day.

Actually, the interesting weekend started Friday, because the ALTs received their pay checks, and we also had our monthly meeting. I don't believe I've described them yet, so I'll go ahead and do that here. First, we get out of work a couple hours early so we can go the the meeting, which is held either in city hall or the Board of Education building (it changes). Those last couple of hours are usually dead time: for the meeting we only miss one class, and we don't have to pretend to be busy after classes are finished. We aren't scheduled long enough after school to take part in club activities, so we can't fill the time with that. So we really don't miss much.

Anyway, at the meetings, all the ALTs gather together with our coordinator, and discuss any problems we've been having. Usually, everyone has the same problems, but a few people really just like to complain. I've already written this job off, so I don't usually say anything at the meetings. We also do presentations about how to teach certain grammar points. I have gotten some good ideas from some of these presentations, but sometimes they are a waste of time.

The highlight of these meetings is actually the drinking of alcohol which takes place immediately afterwards. This is usually lots of fun, but I've taken to leaving them earlier than everyone else, because they frequently devolve into complain sessions: all the complaints that don't get voiced to the school, the students, and our company, all the complaints about Japanese people, culture, food, etc, just come gushing out in torrent of negativity, which I really can't stand. Sometimes there will be one person voicing a few positive things that just get drowned out in the rising tide. The last thing I need when I'm imbibing an emotional downer like alcohol is lots of negative things flying at me like the monkeys in The Wizard of Oz.

This month's post-meeting imbibing was going pretty well, but I still left early because this time I didn't feel like drinking lots of wine and whiskey on an empty stomach.

Today was supposed to be a shopping day, but that got nipped in the bud this morning when Michi suddenly got angry at me. We've made up, but I see lots of fights like this in the future. It boils down not to personality, character, bad habits, or anything like that, but just the fact that I'm American and she's Japanese. I have to admit that these conflicts have lost some of their cuteness.

Anyway, we did end up doing the shopping, and even tying up a few more loose ends about future trips.

Cheers,

Week

hey all,

So this week has been incredible and awful. Work has somehow been going really well. I've been teaching a lesson about prepositions to my 2nd year students, and doing a review lesson for my 3rd year students. As usual, I haven't been doing too many lessons with my 1st years, because after asking me to come to class, I started going to a couple random ones, but they became boring again.

My students seem to want to talk to me again now that my lessons are getting somewhat better or more fun, which is OK but sometimes annoying.

My part time job continues to go really well. I told them I'd be moving to Tokyo for next school year, and they weren't happy about that. I guess their main problem is their high turn over rates, which forces the students to adapt to different teachers all the time. They pay really well, but even that isn't enough to make me stay in Dasaitama. (Dasai means uncool, and I'm living in Saitama prefecture. This is what Japanese people sometimes call Saitama; a kinda of diss/pun.) If I stay here, I could get stuck in the same school as this year, which would be atrocious. Besides which...

I come to the reason why this week has been awful. I haven't gotten to see Michi at all. Haven't spoken with her at all. We've sent each other maybe 3 texts the whole week. I go to bed at 10:30 or so, and sometimes she might just be getting back from work or from yoga. I get up before she does, and am on my way to work by 7:11 so there's no time in the morning. Shoganai: can't be helped, as they are fond of saying in Japanese. Next weekend, we're going to Nikko, but there are arrangements to make for New Years, and for our trip to Kyoto in early January as well. We still need to go shopping for certain little ones over seas, but aside from any of that, I just want to see my girlfriend. Is that so bad? It just doesn't seem possible to continue this way for another year.

Cheers,

Busy

hey all,

Still busy at school, although today I only taught one lesson. The rest of the time I created a huge pile of cards to use for my second year classes. Yes, I actually spent the better part of 5 hours making these cards. That's how many of them there were.

Something that's been getting me recently is how much time I spend making cards, worksheets, etc for my classes. I mean, I'm not the first ALT to work here; in fact I've met the guy who worked at my school last year. And I know he's no slouch in this department. So the question is: what happened to all the materials he made last year? I've been told that we're not supposed to take these things from the school: since we made them using school materials, they're basically school property. So if ALTs aren't taking them to their next school, then the school must be throwing them away, and I'd like to know why.

It seems like an incredible waste of my life to spend hours making these things if someone has already made them. I don't really mind the worksheets so much, as these are mostly on the computer and thus I carry them around on a USB stick. I'll be able to edit them or completely change them as needed later. But hand-drawn pictures showing how to use various prepositions, piles of hand-written word cards with magnets on the back for the blackboard, drawings of faces for teaching "You look ____" (happy, sad, tired), etc: these took a lot of time and creativity to make, and often get big reactions from the students. If they're going to be tossed when I leave, I'm taking them with me.

Not too much else new this week. I haven't spoken to Michi for a few days. We've emailed, but I guess she's too busy to talk.

Cheers,

Another Busy Day

hey all,

I had another busy day today: 4 lessons instead of 5, which is just about right. I'm also still shopping around for good hotels in Kyoto, which is kinda a pain. I'm trying to strike the right balance between "I want this to be a special trip" and "I'm not made out of money, you know."

Cheers,

I am Batman!

hey all,

I had a really great weekend, and actually a really great Monday too.

Saturday my best ALT friend and I went to Akihabara and shopped for more games and movies. I wanted to sell one of my PS3 games, but they offered me the equivalent of one dollar for it, so I didn't sell it. I did pick up an English copy of Batman: Arkham Asylum, which is by far one of the best games I've played in a while. They have the voice actors from Batman: The Animated Series doing Batman and Joker (the latter voiced by none other than Mark "You're not my father!" Hamil himself), so it is very nostalgic to play the game. Aside from the voice acting, the game looks beautiful and plays amazingly. There are excellent puzzles, interesting stealth challenges, fluid and balletic combat: what more could you want from a Batman game?

After shopping, John (my ALT friend), his girlfriend, Michi and I all met up at Asakusabashi and had some coffee while chatting. After that, Michi and I made some spicy tofu spaghetti (whatever you might think of tofu spaghetti, it was tasty) at her place, and I went back to Omiya. Sunday, Michi and I met up again, this time at Musashi-Urawa and went climbing at an indoor gym there. Lots of fun, since I had gone there before by myself, but this time I actually got to climb some top-rope routes. Michi liked the place too, since we've always gone climbing at two gyms owned by the same company, so the Musashi-Urawa gym was a nice change of pace.

We've settled some more details of our trip to Nikko, but we're still searching for good deals for our trip to Kyoto. I learned that the First Sunrise of 2010 trip is set for somewhere in Chiba prefecture along the coast, but we haven't really set that trip in stone yet.

Today was also a surprisingly good day. I taught 5 classes (out of 6 class periods), and the rest of the time I corrected some worksheets. The classes went pretty well, and (contrary to most lessons), I actually got to be involved a bit more. I made my usual curry for dinner, and spent a few hours playing Demon's Souls and the new Bathman game. I've reached a point in Demon's Souls where I've defeated lots of bosses, but the next areas for three different levels are all too hard for my current character, so I'm going through old levels and beating up the peons to try and get my character to level up. I'm also hunting for some special chunks of rock to upgrade my weapons.

More News As It Happens.

Cheers,

Small Randomness

hey all,

I went out drinking the other night with a friend, and between our talk and the last blog post, I'm feeling much better.

Something I discovered the other day was that Fight Club does in fact have Japanese subtitles as advertised. However, in order to view them, you need to change the settings on your PS3 so that all menus, etc are displayed in Japanese, not English. Why this makes a difference, I don't know, but it's rather stupid when you get down to it: after all, the disc still has the same information on it, and it shouldn't matter what the interface language is; it should always display the same content and same options. That is, in fact, the point of writing interfaces in different languages: so that speakers from different countries can get access to the same features.

Anyway, Michi and I have taken to skyping in the middle of the week, since she sometimes stays at the office till 9 or 10 PM, which makes meeting impossible. Add to that the fact that she does yoga Monday and Thursday nights, and I'm doing my part time job on Thursdays, and taking the time meet during the week becomes a Herculean task.

As usual, we've been planning the holiday trips in advance and playing the intervening weekends by ear. I'd like to get in some climbing here soon, but we'll see. I might end up going by myself if worst comes to worst. For the holidays, we're working on trips to Nikko, some undecided location, and Kyoto.

Cheers,

Still Kicking

hey all,

So in fact I am still kicking around here in Japan. For one reason or another I haven't felt the need to update this recently. So here goes.

Last week not too much really happened. I corrected a bunch of tests, studied Japanese, and made several worksheets for my 2nd and 3rd year teachers. School seems to be going somewhat smoother, but I'm still not too pleased with it.

For instance, there is still no actual English schedule, so when the teachers want me to come to class, they reserve me like a projector or other piece of equipment. If they have an overarching curriculum that they are following, I have yet to be told about it. However, my English teachers know exactly on which page (the right side or the left side) in their students' notebooks the students are currently writing notes on. Yes, students are graded on how well their notes match the official notes that the teacher writes on the chalkboard. But still, is that really an important skill to have? Should we be helping foster critical thought, so that if a person has a problem later in life, they know how to deal with it (or at least can think of ways that they can figure out how to deal with it), or do we want a nation of people who would be lost without their parents and bosses? Somehow their parents and bosses must have learned how to think, and there is the crux.

A second complaint has to do with correcting tests. I always end up doing this for my second year teacher, who uses no less than four unique marks, with specific rules on where and when and how to use them, to mark his tests. These do not in fact make marking tests quicker, clearer, or in anyway better. You could do just as well with two marks (say, check mark and cross-out), along with plus or minus the number of points for partial answers. But no, we need double circle for when students get each member of a group of answers correct (only used in this situation, and never for single answers), circle for when a student gets a single answer correct, triangle for when a student gets an answer partially correct, and slash for when a student gets an answer wrong. And woe to the ALT who doesn't use this system correctly. I get lectured about my test correcting skills by a teacher who shows up late to all his classes, can't remember what lessons he has already taught to which classes, who's desk looks like a Tasmanian devil just finished messing it up, and who generally doesn't know what's going on.

I've put in some more job applications for positions in Tokyo, but no word yet. I also broke down and requested that my company move me to Tokyo next year, despite the (probable) extra hassle of working part-time for multiple companies.

Michi came over this weekend, but things could have gone a little smoother there as well. On Saturday the weather was not very good, and we ended up walking around outside in the rain looking for places to eat. I had already decided on one place, but when we got there it was closed until dinner time. So we walked to a different place closer to my room, and they too were closed until dinner time, but by then it was close enough to dinner time and the shop keeper took pity on us and let us sit inside until service began. After that, I rigged up my PS3 and monitor so we could watch Fight Club on Blu-Ray, which I bought a few weeks ago. I bought it at a Japanese store, and on the box it says it has Japanese audio and Japanese subtitles. Even so, when I played it, I saw Chinese, Korean, Thai, Tagalog, Hindi, Bahasa Indonesian, and several other languages, but NO JAPANESE. So we watched part of a copy of Goemon that a friend had given me instead.

For Sunday, the original plan was to go climbing at an indoor gym, which I was really looking forward to. We didn't do anything last weekend, and at Jogasaki we really didn't get to go climbing very much. But the weather was really nice, so we went to Omiya park instead. That was actually pretty fun, but Michi dropped a bit of a bomb on me. I've been complaining that we only get to see each other once a week, and sometimes not even that, and she suggested that we could get a place together next August.

As long as I get put near her in Tokyo, that will make our lives a little easier, but I've never lived with a girlfriend before, and Michi has only lived with one of her past boyfriends for a month. It seems like getting a place together is a big step, something that my own friends weren't able to do (weren't comfortable doing?) for years. I feel like we are riding on a bullet train, but whether it is heading to Heaven or Hell, it is going there quick. I'll repeat the warning that all my ALT friends have been telling me for the last 9 months: Things happen fast in Japan.

Cheers,