Great Canadian Cruz Photos -finally

Places I've Been

create your own visited countries map


Hopefully this will change a bit with a trip to Thailand and maybe Vietnam in December.

Toyama ReRay Marathon

On Sunday, 4 brave souls and I set out in the pouring rain to represent the JET community in the 5th annual Toyama Relay Marathon. With a name like the Toyama Superstars we felt like we could take on the world. So, we aimed for the top 110....and came in 148th!!
The course was just over 42km. We each had to run 4 laps to complete it, and we averaged about 10 minutes per lap. Some of the teams were very serious about it and others...well, they had a different approach.

I will definitely be competing in more of these relays in the future!!

VW stuff

The weekend after I returned from Canada I went to a VW event in Nagano prefecture. I drove down with the owner of the shop where I bought my beetle, and about 10-15 other VW owners. It was a great day, and I even won a prize - "Lady's Owner". There was a guy there from Street VWs magazine and he did a short interview with me and took a few pics. I had forgotten about it until I opened up the latest edition of the magazine a turned to the event page. And there, in the corner was me and my Beetle!!

Bowling with my boys

It's hard not to have favorites when some of your students are bold enough to ask you to spend a Saturday bowling with them... 5 of my 2nd year (grade 11) students asked me last week to go bowling -how could I resist! I picked up 3 of them at the school and we met the other two at the bowling alley. We warmed up with some air-hockey and then got down to business. We Janken-ed (did rock paper scissors) to decide the teams and I had Tatsuru and Shou on my team. Ryota, Takanori and Daichi were our opponents. After losing two straight games...we almost pulled it off in the second game...we went for lunch the restaurant of their choice. My treat! We talked about a lot of things, both in Japanese and English. The big shock of the day was when one of them told me he was changing schools starting Monday. Often, when a student is having trouble with their studies they go to a school better suited to their ability or needs. I was more than a little stunned, and quite sad when the day had ended and I had to say goodbye. I've always had a soft spot for him because I usually had to wake him up at least once every class, and he'd give me this grin that would never allow me to give him much grief.
As we said goodbye he thanked me for being his teacher and invited me to come and watch his band play at a local center in December. I can't wait!

The ride home started off a bid rowdy with J-pop music blaring on the stereo. We decided the next time we'd do karaoke! But it wasn't long before it was evident that all the English had worn them out and by the time we got back to the school it was a lot quieter in the car...