a little off these days

Something's been going on...I think it's an accumulation/formulation/combination of a multitude of factors which have all collided to make me 'Super Bitch' this week. It started with the end of my very last class EVER at Nyuzen High School. I still have to work here until the end of the month, but I don't teach for the month of July. I got back to my desk after the class and wanted to throw something. Usually I just want to cry, but this time I was just MAD!! What's that all about? I think it SUCKS that I have to leave a job that I love so much. Yes, I'll probably like my new job but DAMN, it's gonna take a lot to compare to this place.

So that was the start of it. After that class, anything and anybody that crossed my path has been a direct target for my grumpiness. The thing is, it's irritating being irritable. Everytime I've opened my mouth somthing nasty has come out - Thumper's unforgettable mantra, "If you can't say sumpin' nice...." just hasn't been workin' for me.

Thursday evening was our monthly Colare International dinner -the chili that Gillian made was tasty-delicious. I rode my bike to Kurobe from my apartment (it's about 7 or 8km) and I was cruising on Route 8 (the main road -not quite a highway but always busy busy busy). I really was CRUISING -32.4km/h according to my speedo. I was on the right side of the road, riding on the sidewalk (which is built for bikes as well as pedestrians) -you'd likely get squashed like a bug on Route 8 if you chose to NOT ride on the sidewalk -it's full of big trucks and not so competent drivers. Like the guy who nearly hit me trying to turn into a company parking lot - he hit the breaks, and I squeezed my breaks -both of them, my back end fishtailed and then I yelled a few choice words that even if he didnt' speak English, I'm sure he knew exactly what was going through my head...

I was rattled. I showed up for dinner hot, sweaty and a bit shakey. Everyone's chatting and being friendly and I still wanted to throw something.

BUT THAT'S NOTHING COMPARED TO WHAT HAPPENED TO KIRSTEN ON HER WAY TO WORK TODAY!!! AT LEAST I DIDN'T MAKE CONTACT WITH THE CAR. SHE DID. NO BROKEN BONES BUT THAT DOESN'T MATTER, THE GUY STILL HIT HER!!

K, I HOPE YOU'RE FEELING BETTER TOMORROW!!! XOX

So where was I?

OK, so back at work on Friday...I have to evaluate the mini-dramas that my second years (grade 11s) presented. Each student had to evaluate each of the other groups (that was part of their evaluation...). So, let's do the math. 5 classes of 40 students each, 12 groups per class, they each had to evaluate 10 of those groups. 40x5x10= 2000. 2000 comments that I have to read through, correct and rewrite onto a sheet that I can give back to the groups...sometimes I'm not as smart as you all think I am. I've got 3 classes finished, plus I have to mark listening exams for 400 students.

Friday night was a nice break from my black cloud. K and I got dressed up in Yukata (summer, cotton Kimono) and went to Toyama for an early Canada Day beer garden celebration. The sucky part of this night was that our friend Chika, whom we had invited had to work overtime and therefore couldn't come -but more importantly, she couldn't help us with our yukata!!! We found a site on the internet, complete with a over-cute cross-eyed Japanese cartoon model to take us through each step.

We managed to dance our way into them satisfactorily enough to catch the train to the Toyama on time. We met up with some fellow ALTs -Canadian and honorary Canucks and had an all out drinking and eating fest for 2 hours. The reason we wore yukata (besides it being summer and festival season) was because it was half price if you did!! Kirsten, Adrianna and I managed to get a bit of attention with our golden tresses and yukata! It makes for quite the combination.







Jimmy, the future King of Canada, brought sparklers and after dinner we went out to a park and lit up the night. K managed to convince half the group to wade through the water thingy in the park and I managed to convince her to pose...





We caught the last train home and I was in bed around midnight -had to be, I had to work Saturday morning. Back to marking papers....

Fortunately I had the afternoon off so K and I biked to Yamanokoshi (a pottery shop/bar up towards the mountains). We stopped in to say hello to the new American girl who's been hired there and then biked down to the river side for some frisbee. THIS IS WHERE THE GRUMPINESS STARTED AGAIN. You see, we have a pretty fun group of people in this area and most of them are pretty active and like to play sports. I had had a request to round people up for some ultimate frisbee, but for some reason or another people failed to repsond to my text messages and there were only 5 of us at the field -not enough to play, and even if there was we probably wouldn't have played anyway because the wind was blowing pretty hard. I felt bad because Jake had driven all the way from Kosugi (50some k) to come and play and we had to cancel. Grumpy. We decided to onsen instead and that helped to ease some of the tension.

We gorged on Pizza Jamboree for dinner (happy factor continued to rise) and then went to Uozu (two towns over) for the release of Mark and Rob's (aka the Bento Boys) CD at a bar called 135s. Grumpy factor begins to take hold again. Don't get me wrong, the CD's great and I love the Bento Boys, but minor details throughout the night prevented me from having a GREAT time. I know, I know, tragedy. But when you're already in a hole, going deeper never feels better...it just gets darker and colder.

I didn't manage to get to sleep until after 3:00. Sunday I had to get up and go to Toyama to get my driver's license renewed. Not such a big deal except I had to sit through a 2 hour lecture on 'safety driving' all in Japanese. I was keen for the first 12.6 minutes as I played with my electronic dictionary, figuring out kanji that I should already know (add irritation points) but then it just became too tedious and I switched to short stories by Roald Dalh for the rest of the presentation.

The storm cloud that had settled over me for the past 4 days stayed with me on the drive home. Route 8 at 4:00 on a Sunday...what was I thinking? My weekend was over basically, I wouldn't be home until well after 5:00, pool's already closed so no swim -yucky weather, so no bike ride...

I realize that all of my little complaints are just that, little. BUT, when you're feeling just a bit off like I had been, everything seems that much more negative, unbearable, disappointing, unfair, irritating, and annoying.

Today, I got up, rode my bike to school, got right to work marking papers. I had decided not to start this week the way I had ended the last. Then I got the text from K saying she had been hit by a car. That's when I realized I really had nothing to complain about at all!!

I really should start posting regularly again. Sorry about that -especially to the people back home. I'm pretty busy at work these days with final projects and exams. They keep me busy, unlike most other times of the year.

Had a big BBQ this weekend at the beach and enough people must have made sacrifices to the sun gods, because we had a great day! We set up a big tent that I picked up for cheap. K went overboard on food and drinks, I made chili and potato salad and almost everyone else who came also made contributions to the all day eating fest. There was food and drink to last us from 1:00 to 11:00!!! Lee brought his grill out, as did Johnny. People took turns cooking most of the day. They'd just pull something out of a cooler or bag, stick it on the grill and somebody would inevitably eat it!

We swam in the sea, played frisbee, made a bonfire, had pseudo s'mores, a HUGE b-day cake was devoured in a matter of minutes, the fireworks lasted a couple of hours, and nobody got injured!!!!

A great day, thank you to everyone who came out, especially my Japanese friends who travelled from Toyama and as far as Oyabe to come and celebrate with me!

Thanks to Johnny, Kirsten, Amy, Lee, Chika, Tomo, and Mihoko for doing a fabulous clean up job. There was quite a disaster by the end of the night. We managed quite well in the dark. I spent the majority of Sunday sorting out the recylables and sweeping out the sand from EVERYTHING!! Well worth it, as we managed to come away with only 2 bags of garbage at the end.

If you've got any photos, please send them my way, I didn't get a chance to take many...

off to the beach (you'd think I was packing for a week...)
















Tomoko and Koutaro



















'my' boys! I invited some of my High School kids to come to the party -5 of them showed up and stayed allllll day!! I think they had fun. I know I did!















THE CAKE!! K, Amy and Johnny ordered this from 'the flying pig' (costco online) notice it says 'Rinea and Scott'. Scott's b b-day is also the 19th, but he couldn't make it to the bbq.

Two more busy weekends

Last Saturday was a busy day. I went to Toyama in the afternoon and got a new tattoo! Chikako, a good friend from Nyuzen helped me make the appointment and then came with me to the studio. The place is quite famous in Japan -people from Osaka come to Toyama to get their Tattoos done. Here's the link to their studio: Gaman. Yes, they do Yakuza (Japanese 'mafia') tattoos. They were the friendliest bunch of people I've met in a while. We had a great afternoon in the studio. Thanks Chika for being there with me!









After the tattoo (an outline of my VW Thing -pics to come). Chika and I headed to Kirsten's house for a bake off!! I was a judge as Kirsten, Jimmy and Scott showed off their culinary skills in the sweets department. It was a wonderfully painful evening. I'll let the photos speak for themselves:











On Sunday I was up early and off to Kamiichi town for another day with the private English school that I help teach every couple of months. This time the theme was summer and as always, I had a fun time with the students.

In the afternoon Amy, Kirsten and I went for a bike ride and managed to make it into the next prefecture. You can read about it on my workout blog.

Yesterday I went to Takaoka to watch the annual ALT Charity Show. It was great as always! Jimmy stole the hearts off all with his Pavaroti performance. There was hip hop, penny whistles and belly dancing -all before the main event!









Today (Sunday) and, well, Father's Day I guess. Kirsten and I went for a short bike ride and then to the Nyuzen Festival where we must have said 'HALLO' at least 100 times to here CUTE CUTE students who were wandering around taking in the festivities.

Tonight's the second game for Japan in the world cup. I watched them get defeated last weekend -it was the first time I've ever watched a full soccer game...it' s just not my sport. But I'm trying to learn more! Really I am. But who can really give the World Cup any attention when the OILERS ARE GOING TO THE SEVENTH GAME OF THE STANLEY CUP.

C'MON PEOPLE, GET YOUR PRIORTIES STRAIGHT!!!!

Japanese TV

I wish I could share all the bizarre things I see on Japanese TV.
Even though I still don't understand everything -I can pick up enough now to figure most programs out. The other thing that helps is that most programs are extremely visual. In other words they use a lot of computer generated images to help explain whatever they're talking about and subtitles that prove to be very useful at times (I can check words on my dictionary or look at the kanji characters and figure out the meaning).

Japanese TV is comprised of a lot of variety/talk shows where there is a panel of celebrity guests who, along with us, the audience, are watching some king of event unfold. The panel offers relief (mostly comedy)and provides commentary for the event at hand. It can be anything from sports events, to relationship issues to animal antics.


I'm writing about this because I just finished watching a short program about a guy who hopped on his bike, armed with a GPS system and rode around Tokyo for 11 hours. He, of course had a camera man with him documenting his ride as well as the panel back at the studio commenting on his progress (but not telling us the actual goal). All they would reveal were short updates of of a map of Tokyo now strewn with red lines of the tracking that his GPS system was providing as he rode around. In the end, he finished back at the studio where the panel of guests were waiting to greet him.

He handed over his GPS system to some official computer guy who uploaded it onto a screen and finally the audience was shown exactly what he was trying to do. In etch-a-scetch fashion, the red lines (his 11 hour route around Tokyo) began to form an image. The lines zigged and zagged through Tokyo, sometimes he rode up and down the same street which created a thicker line on the map. The final image (I was anticpating The Mona Lisa or at least Hello Kitty) was simply the mascot of the TV program being aired. That's it, that's all.






11hours, and 78 km later, he had drawn a picture of an already compter generated image. I wish I had the finished image to show you, but it hasn't been posted on the internet yet) or not that I could find. But in looking for it, I came across previous exersions by the same guy. You can check it out here: http://www.nhk.or.jp/nj/housoukiroku_2005.html#39

Another busy weekend

I have been avoiding 2 busy weekend days in a row for most of the spring but this weekend I had two big events. The first was the Toyama Elementary School/ALT Sports Day. This is the 4th year I've participated in this event, and it's fun and rewarding every time!

Elementary students from around the prefecture come to a huge sports facility in Toyama city and play organized games with around 30 ALTs for the afternoon. It's an all day affair for the ALTs as we get there around 10 to do a run-through and to get organized before the kids arrive. We are split into teams by color -red, blue, yellow and white. I was on the white team this year. We had about 20 kids on each team. Although everything is translated into Japanese for the kids, we still explain everything in English as well and the kids love it!

Thanks for the photos Phil!






Sunday I was up at 3:45 a.m. for a VW event that was to start at 9:30 in Kawagoe, Saitama Prefecture near Tokyo. 5 of us went together in Hamada-san's Bus, we stayed until around 4:30 and then headed back home because we all had to work the next day!

I even got to drive for part of the trip! I was a little shocked that they asked/trusted me and very pleased by this -ha. Especially since I had no problems once I figured out the friction point on the clutch. Of course I drove through the only wet part of the trip, but luckily there were lots of tunnels. It had been a long time since I had driven something so big. Mom, I've got to give you tons of credit for driving us around in the big green beast all those years. Now I know where you get those pipes from!

And my ego was boosted even more when the next guy to drive go in and couldn't do it. We didnt' even get up the exit ramp to the expressway before we changed drivers again. Granted, he's only been driving for 4 or 5 years and he drove a Type 3 and now a Ghia during that time...but c'mon! So I have to give credit where credit is due -thanks Dad for teaching me how to drive. Well, first thanks for not abadoning me on the side of the road every time I got out of the car and refused to drive any further during one of your lessons....AND, thanks for giving me the know how to listen and handle a quirky engine.




My buddy Kazz joined us from Tokyo and we spent the day admiring some very awesome dubs. There were two Kubelwagens and only one Thing at the event, but plenty of buses to keep me occupied all day. I met a guy who lived in California for 5 years and is into buses, we exchanged e-mail addresses and hopefully I'll get an opportunity to see him again at more events.

Because it was a swap meet and not a show, people had all kinds of things for sale in front of their dubs. Probably the most random were dress shoes for men and women. Others were selling the usual -models, t-shirts, stickers etc. Shigeo (the Bug Works shop owner) drove his newly restored cabriolet to the event (puck trailer in tow) and had a booth set up for his stuff. I'm not sure how much money he made, but people were really admiring his Beetle and I think that was his main goal.




our first pit stop - of many...but not for food, only gas and cigarettes -that's what I get for travelling with men, um, boys.



the view







Hamada-san brewing coffee for everyone upon arrival.





RARE!!!





Rusty but trusty.




BBQ anyone?





This is a '73 Thing. Mine's a '74 so it has the added side vents. I like the white top. Like everyone else, he got his parts from the Thing Shop

Another 'where I've been' update;

It helps that I've been to 3 HUGE countries. The rest isn't that impressive yet.

Kurobe Road Race

I survived another 10km road race this weekend. When I woke up it was pouring rain, but I packed my running shoes and water bottle anyway and headed out the door.

The Kurobe Road Race is actually called the Jimmy Carter Road Race. You see, Kurobe is the sister city to Macon, Georgia. Jimmy Carter's from Georgia. He actually came and ran this race on a visit to the city -years ago. There are numerous photos of him on the walls of the the sports facility. And every year he sends a message to the runners which is read by a chosen junior high school student from the city -in English of course.

ANYWAY. This year was a poor turn out for JETs. There were only 3 of us -Jimmy, Rene and me. We all did the 10km this year, which was great since they stagger the events and we usually end up finishing at different times when some do the 5 km. I managed a best time - 53minutes, 10 seconds. I should be better than that (check out my workout journal).

We also had some Japanese friends running with us, which always makes things more fun. Ryuichi, who has run the marathon relays with us and is lightening fast was, of course, the first to finish. And Kazu, who is a former NOVA student of mine, joined us this year. You may recall him from a previous snowboarding post.

After the race we had our complimentary bowls of stew and mochi (gooey pounded rice). Then went for a REAL meal!! Pizza Jamboree was calling our names. We introduced Kazu (and Ai, his fiance who skipped the race) to the cheesy, italian goodness!! Appetizers, spaghetti, coffee, shakes and 3 pizzas later we were stuffed and had already forgotten the agony of the run.

After PJ I headed to Colare where there was an international field day/BBQ event going on. I was so full and tired, I just sat and watched everyone running around being international. I still had a great time, as always. Sorry I missed your Taiko Amy-chan. Next time!

Another fun filled Sunday in Japan.

My new bike

In case you don't check my workout blog:

in keeping with Sista K's theme...

here's the view from our apartments just after the rice was planted

YKK Soccer Game

Sunday afternoon Johnny P, Lee and I took in a YKK soccer game.

YKK is the main industry in Kurobe city. Check your zipper...you're probably wearing YKK right now.

Anyway, the company is huge and they sponsor a Japan Football League team. They're pretty good, and almost moved up to the J-League last year (don't ask me what that really means, I don't understand soccer/football). It was a beautiful, sun-filled day. We got to sit with the cheering section. If you've never watched Japanese sports fans, you're missing out. It's full-on, non-stop noise for the entire game. We were given our own instuments to bang away on and bang away we did!!!

Rain

The rainy season is just around the corner.

In Toyama, rain is a very common occurrence, so it's hard at times to tell when the actual rainy season starts and ends. The official month is June, but May so far has been a dreary reminder of what's to come.

As I was walking to the cafeteria this morning to buy a juice box I got a strong whiff of the rain in the courtyard at my school. Smell is such an amazing sense, it can evoke strong memories and consequently, emotions in people. For one brief moment, no more than a millisecond I'm sure, I thought I smelled the spring rain from home. I immediately had flashbacks of the wet grass in our backyard; of morning walks to school in rubber boots; of colorful, stiff vinyl ponchos and short lived umbrellas.

The rain smells different here. It's a blend of salty sea, silty rice fields, densely packed earth and concrete. But the rain smells different everywhere, doesn't it? The spring rains in Greece were thick and comforting. In Ireland however, they were crisp and clean.

I haven't been home for a spring rain in 4 years now, yet I can still distinctly recall the scent of new grass (something I truly miss), wet poplar bark, and the dusty gravel in our driveway.

As I write this, a breeze is pushing the clouds out to sea, the rain is dissipating and soon the sun will begin to warm the air and the earth -boldly changing the scenery and more subtly, the scent.

Kanazawa Relay Marathon

This past Sunday I participated in my second relay marathon in Japan. After the first lap I had flashbacks of the first relay marathon and immediately began to regret putting myself in this torturous position again.

Thanks to the beautiful and talented Amber-chan we (Toyama JETs and friends) entered 3 teams this year. Johnny and I caught the train from Nyuzen to Toyama, met up with more team memebers and took the hour-long bus to Kanazawa in Ishikawa prefecture.

The race was held at the castle grounds and there were already hundreds of people wandering around, setting up their teams, warming up with scrawny Japanese aerobics instructors to the beats of "Oh Mickey, you're so fine...".


Like I said, my first lap felt terrible -I had been out dancing at the Colare Disco Party the night before (another fundraiser for Amy-chan's BEE Ride), but the atmosphere at events like this doesn't allow one to focus on the running part. There's too much craziness to be had!!!



















Thanks to Jimmy and Dan for some of the photos.

For Adam and all the other non-believers (thanks Dave!!)

GO OILERS!!!

Why I love the internet

I can listen to live playoff hockey broadcasts!!!!

I've been listening to the Oilers games this year! It's great, I plug my headphones into my laptop at my desk and listen while I work (or pretend to work).

I've watched a few video clips as well -I've noticed that I am losing my ability to follow the puck. That scares me a bit...


GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OILERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Colare Cooking Party

I didn't really post much about this because I didn't have any pictures, but here are the links to the Colare site:

I made scalloped potatoes and sweet and sour meatballs and banana cream -----pudding.



Colare cooking

Kurobe koku-salon

Post Golden Week Blues

I found myself alone in my apartment last night, glass of wine in hand, counting down the final minutes of Golden Week- I'm the Queen of Countdowns.

5 days of pretty much doing as little as possible after the attempt to reorganize my apartment left it more disasterous than when I began. I now have MORE junk in my shoebox-sized living space, not less. I'm turning into my Aunt Annie...

Aunt Annie was a great aunt of mine on my father's side who lived in a teensy weensy house on what was then the east side of Grande Prairie. We'd go and visit her on occasion, and stepping into her house was like stepping into another world -kind of Hanzel and Gretl meets the trash compactor from the Death Star. She had stuff piled from floor to ceiling on either side of the halls and in every room. Her living room -in my childhood memory- was hardly big enough for 3 people (but me and my brothers were small so we counted as one). I have this image of us sitting on the edge of the sofa or a chair, random objects taking up most of the sitting space, or just standing beside my father, not knowing where to sit. I don't know how accurate that is, but that's how I remember it.

She'd always serve us something to eat, pulled magically out of a bag or a box piled up another bag or a box, which was balanced upon yet another bag or a box. I don't know where she slept, or dined... I have no memory of those details. I guess I thought she didn't eat or sleep, considering there couldn't possibly be enough room anywhere for her to lie down or put a dining table.

The point is, she didn't throw anything out. NOTHING. I'm the same way, I save everything from paper bags to ticket stubs, to bits of string. I have a marvelous box collection -for when I send things home...twist ties for -well, tying. Old calendars for wrapping and making funky envelopes... You see, everything will eventually be put to use. I save with a purpose -most of the time. The hundreds of cards and letters are purely sentimental and I have to get over the fact that I can't keep everything that's been written to me. BUT, I do.

Knowing that I'll be moving in a few months isn't helping my current situation. Now I'm becoming complacent -thinking I'll deal with it when I pack up -but I know it's just going to continue to bother me NOW and it will really irk me when I have left everything to the last minute. And to make matters worse - I'm facing the same dilema at school!!!

Perhaps another list is needed...let me just jot things down...

hmmm, should I used my disney princess note pad? or my VW one? or maybe the one my students gave me? or how about the tiny Buzz Lightyear one? no, maybe the big one with the flowers?....