The Persimmon Chronicles

2009-08-06T17:54:00.000+09:00

Pssst...

I've moved... http://wifebridelife.blogspot.com

2008-10-19T01:30:00.008+09:00

Trying to be great-ful...

Another month, another place to call home. Well, that's what it seems sometimes. Dave and I now live in Scotland. We knew that moving up north was a very real possibility but it wasn't a certainty. That is, until Dave got a job offer to be a reporter, his life's ambition. It was such a wonderful day when we got the news, especially since he turned down another offer to work in London. We considered it but decided that we'd have to bankrupt ourselves just to move to The City and we'd have to scrimp by because of the astronomical cost of living. After Moscow, London is the most expensive city in the world. So that got a big ol' thumbs down. So here we are - on the east coast of Scotland. We live by the sea and I can just stare out into it's watery mysteriousness for ages. It's lovely. The weather has been alright as well. And Edinburgh. Such a beautiful city, but calm as well. It's busy, but not at all as frenetic as London. The shopping is great (a little too great), and one can waste away days in the old streets. I think I'm going to really like it here. So what's all this about trying to be great-ful, you might ask? Well, one of the drawbacks of being a frequent mover/traveller of sorts is the loneliness that accompanies re-rooting oneself. It happened in Ottawa (to a very small extent), definitely happened in Japan and re-surfaced in Nottingham. By far, Nottingham was probably the worst just because I was without a support network and initially, a job. I learned some hard lessons during my time in Notts and I'm not even going to try to go down that road again. I'm just trying to keep my head up, be optimistic, appreciate the awesome situation we're in and cherish this time here.

So here I am. Currently unemployed with money in the bank and no expenses. Such a dangerous combination. But I'm trying to keep busy. Looking for job is my new raison d'etre. This global financial crisis is definitely not helping things but yet I soldier on. I have faith in myself and I know it's just a matter of time until I'm back at work and complaining about it. I hope I find something soon though. When you're without friends, sometimes co-workers are all you've got. But I do not rest on my laurels. I've started the search for pals. I've turned to the internet like I did in Nottingham to find girlfriends and I'm hoping I will be as successful as I previously was. Fingers crossed I don't meet any psychos.

I mentioned that I don't have an expenses right now. That's because I'm living with my future parents-in-law. To some people, this would be a nightmare, but I actually like my future family and am extremely grateful for them opening their house to us. They are such lovely people and I'm so happy that my bethroed comes from such good stock.

So on the days when the sun is shining brightly and I want to explore, I head to Edinburgh by train and spend an afternoon by myself or with my future sister-in-law Louise. There are galleries and museums, shops and cafes, tourist traps and secret haunts - things that catch my eye and make me sigh. With a population of just under half a million people, it's not a big city, but it feels larger than life. It has a castle, old churches, and a rich history I'm actually gagging to learn about it. I repeat, I think I'm going to like it here.

2008-09-16T02:50:00.011+09:00

B-dot T-dot

A couple of Saturdays ago, Dave and I took a trip to Birmingham, which is apparently England's "second city". Considering it's so close, only 1.5 hours on the train, I have no excuse for waiting until 2 weeks before we move to visit this lovely city. By all accounts, the shopping in Birmingham is to die for. Since I've been following a strict budget for the last few months, I didn't get to actually buy any of the copius amounts of eye candy that were on display, but I did get frissons from swimming in the oceans of capitalism once again. We visited a huge, stunning mall officially known as The Bullring. Now, I must preface what I'm about to say by disclosing that I don't actually like shopping or malls. Perhaps it's because I don't have the kind of money that would make buying loads of THINGS actually fun and maybe it's because I don't like the crowds, the noise and the bright lights. But The Bullring, oh, The Bullring. It was bee-yoo-tee-full. It was bright, had a beautiful glass ceiling and was huge and open. It seemed very North American, if you know what I mean. There were even three trampolines with bungee cords on the ground floor (I sat that out due to my rapidly swelling ankle - I hurt it badly the day before). But this mall wasn't just a paragon of shops and cash, but it was also a work of art. It houses Selfridges, the second biggest department store in the UK, after Harrods, and is only one of four in the country. This was my first time at Selfridges, and since I was with the boy and we actually had a purpose for coming to Birmingham, I didn't actually get to explore the store as much as I should have, but from what I saw, it was exceptional.

Now, what do you think this is? An art installation? A futuristic climbing wall? It's actually the side of the building. According to Wiki, "the store is clad in 15,000 shiny aluminium discs and was inspired by a Paco Rabanne sequinned dress." I thought it was awesome. I'm not a huge fan of new-fangled art but I was definitely digging the post-post modernity of it.

The Bullring also featured a 7 ft long bronze of bull (first pic) that was pretty cool, and nice, clean and bright washrooms. Actually, these washrooms had won awards and I was duly impressed.

Perhaps the thing that floored Dave and I the most was the food court on the ground floor of Selfridges. Forget about those antiquated cafeteria like food courts of the past. Now picture an open concept floor with Krispy Kreme (a HUGE novelty in Britain), a gelato stall, an alchohol emporium where you bottle you're own, a curry takeaway stand, a cheese counter, another 7 ft long bull but covered in jelly beans and loads of other delectable things.
But what made Dave and I actually stop and stand with our mouths agape was the Asahi robot. Asahi is a Japanese beer that Dave was quite intimate with during our time in Japan. They were giving away free samples that were poured by the freaking robot!!! I think we both squealed (or maybe it was just me). So cool.

But alas, we did not travel all the way to Birmingham to revel in the delights of The Bullring. No, we were on a much more important shopping expedition. We were on the hunt for our wedding rings. Birmingham is also home to the Jewellery Quarter, "the area [that] is said to contain the highest concentration of dedicated jewellers in Europe with about one third of the jewellery manufactured in the UK being made within one mile of Birmingham city centre." (Thanks Wiki.) There are hundreds upon hundreds of stores selling high quality jewellery usually cheaper or much cheaper that the stuff you'd find on the high street (high street - equals shopping areas). This is where Dave bought my engagement ring and I was seriously impressed that my honey did his homework when shopping for my ring. Plus the fact that he got a high quality product at a low price made me swoon!

Anyway, we knew we had a full day of looking at pretty shiny things ahead of us and we set off on our mission. The first shop we went to was incredibly helpful but more expensive than other shops (the price discrepency between shops is wild), but the proprietor was honest and forthright about what would work for me. I originally wanted a band with a little bling, but since I wanted something incredibly thin, diamonds just wouldn't have worked. He talked about stones popping out and having to be replaced and I didn't want that. I also didn't want something that was thicker but more safe to accomodate stones. With my ideas totally blitzed out of the water, I had to adjust my thinking. I lost track of how many rings I tried on, but we went to about 7 stores. I realized that the best thing for me would be to get a plain, platinum band at the thickness I wanted (2mm). It's timeless, classic, goes with my engagement ring and didn't cost the earth. Dave opted for a palladium ring that we thought would be less hassle than a white ring (you need to get it re-cast every so often) and cheaper than platinum while having most of its properties. We got a quote and were so impressed by the price. We originally thought that we'd put down a deposit and have them shipped to us when we could pay the balance, but the offer was too good to pass up and luckily we had the cash to buy them right away! We went to Subway for a tea and a cookie while we waited for the shop to decrease the thickness of my ring and size up Dave's ring. Forty minutes later, we went to pick them back and actually paid less for what we were quoted. Bloody brilliant. We were high-fiving and terrorist-bumping and it was fantastic. Even though the rain was relentless, parts of England were flooded, my ankle was killing me and I was limping like a lame dog, we were so happy.

We celebrated our victory by having a couple of pints of Peroni (now my favourite beer after experiencing it in Rome) and a pub dinner in an incredibly beautiful establishment. The pub was an old bank and kept a lot of the original features. I especially loved the domed ceiling and pillars. After we finished our very nice meal, we caught the train back to Nottingham. It was late (due to the flooding), but it didn't damper our spirits. We were the champions.

2008-09-02T00:23:00.008+09:00

Updation

I’ve been away for a while, apologies. Does anyone even read this thing anymore? I’m not sure. I kinda lost the will to blog due to several factors:

1) I’ve been ODing on wedding porn. Since getting engaged, Dave and I have been through the highs and lows of wedding planning. For about three weeks, we were planning a wedding in Mexico. I found a fantastic place and made inquiries on packages and prices. Unfortunately, we really only had a couple of times in the year to do it – either Easter or Summer. Easter would have been great, but tickets double in price. Summer may have worked, but getting married in a hurricane would not have worked out for us. Also, trying to coordinate everything between four countries (England, Scotland (same country, different countries, dig?), Canada and Mexico) just proved to be too vomit-inducing. Destination wedding – scratch that.

2) We made a decision about where to have the wedding and we’ll be getting married in Scotland next summer. Not one to rest on my laurels, I jumped straight into finding a venue, a photographer and a celebrant. After weeks of searching, we went up to Scotland and met with our first choices (ok, there were no other choices) and luckily fell in like with each of them. Contracts have been signed, deposits sent away and a feeling of contentment over crossing the major things off our list is being enjoyed. Sure, we have to figure out entertainment, flowers, favours, apparel (for the boys and girls - I've already ordered my dress!), gifts, invitations (they have all been selected), and various other bits and bobs, but I’m determined to be a chilled-out bride. Also, I’ve cut down on the wedding porn.

3) Shortly after getting engaged, we went to Rome and I managed to blog about that. Then we had guests come stay with us. First, there were the lovely Atendido sisters who stayed with us twice during their whirlwind tour of Europe. Shortly after that, another set of funny Filipinas (Cheryl C , Carezza, Cheryl A and Arleen) crashed with us for a few days before we jetted to Barcelona to celebrate my 30th, which was fantastic, by the way. And oh, did I mention I started a new job at the same time???

4) I fell into a bit of a funk, read: depression. I’m not even going to lie about it. I was upset about everything – our apartment, not having a proper job, the uncertainty of our lives, worrying too much, missing everyone, lack of friends. It would grab hold of me and not let me go. Luckily, I had David to help bring me back to life and phone calls home really helped. I joined a gym in June and that has also helped tremendously. I now have a couple of tools that really help when I feel the darkness coming: a wonderful email from Shiloh that I printed out and keep in my purse, and my camera with pics that make me happy.

5) I’m just trying to have a life. Dave finished his classes a few weeks ago and we’ve just been hanging like a couple, which has been great. One of the cool things we did was go see Paddy Considine and watch his short film and hear him talk. It was a surprise for Dave and we both really enjoyed it. We love stuff like that. We also recently got back from a weekend in London. We had such an amazing time. I saw Jill Scott in concert again and absolutely loved it. I’ve done two things at a concert that I’ve never done before: I screamed “I love you Jill!!!” and I cried. And others cried. And she cried. Actually, when I think about it, I cried the last time I saw her, but that doesn’t matter. She ended the night on such an emotional high and I was so happy to be in her presence.

Dave and I also got together with some friends from Japan who live in London. It was so great seeing Jeremy, Ros, Craig and Ed again and reminiscing about J-land. We went to a Japanese restaurant and I had tempura and sushi, then grabbed some Japanese and Korean snacks and alcohol, went back to the place Ed has been squatting in (ok, that’s an exaggeration because this house was amazing and HUGE. Squatting connotes that you’re living in squalor, which is simply not the case at this crazy joint), and proceeded to talk the night away. We went to sleep when the sun came up which is something I haven’t done for a very long time. It was fantastic.

So that’s what been up with me.

I wasn't sure about what the future of this blog should be. Facebook definitely helps me keep in touch with everyone while this is an outlet for my feelings. It served its purpose of updating everyone about my life in Japan and now I’m just trying to get some permanence for the next few years (does that make sense? It definitely does to me). I’d like to turn this blog into a Blurb book and keep it on a shelf, pull it out from time to time and just remember. But after thinking about it, I've decided to continue writing. Not so much about travel as the trips will be fewer until after the wedding, but I have so many thought sabout the UK, culture, society, living and doing stuff that I think I should keep going. For the time being, anyway. So I'm back.

2008-05-05T04:27:00.013+09:00

Roma, Roma, Roma!

On this season's "America's Next Top Model", the remaining models are off to Rome to sashay-chante! As ANTM is my guilty pleasure du jour, I gleamed even more delight out of the show by watching the models zip around the sights I had walked around a mere few weeks ago. Admittedly, while I was there I had so many conflicting feelings that it was sometimes difficult to fully enjoy the city to the max. It was amazing to see the ruins that were built centuries upon centuries ago and walk on the same roads as ancient rulers and heroes of yesteryear. I was blown away when I saw the Colosseum and the Sistine Chapel. My jaw fell when I laid eyes on the Pantheon and the Trevi Fountain. So much history and beauty. I wished I had really read up on the history before leaving for Rome, but travelling around with a history buff does have its rewards.

But.

On the other side of all the glory and wonderment, I felt that Rome was loud, dirty, aggressive and overcrowded. There were so many people and the evidence of so many people was scattered everywhere. Rubbish littered the green spaces and groups of tours spilled into every corner of the city. Also, there were so many g-damned hawkers selling they craptastic wares. They were so annoying and aggressive. No means NO!!! And the traffic! Crossing the street was an exercise in will and determination. But we made it through. So rather than harp on the negatives, I'm going to go through my Top Ten on this trip to Rome.

1. The Colosseum. I loved this structure. Everything about it was fantastic. Dahlia told me that I should watch "Gladiator" before leaving, but I've seen that movie so many times that it wasn't necessary. Even if you've never seen the film, seeing the Colosseum was thrilling on it's own. The inside is smaller than I imagined but still awesome. For me, it ranks right up there with the Twin Towers , the Great Wall of China and the Eiffel Tower. I took about a gazillion photos, but perhaps, this one is my favorite. It was a rainy day, our first day actually, but we were content to walk around the city and acquaint ourselves with it. And what made it even better was that entry was free because it was the week of culture and most government museums and cultural sites were free to tourists. How hot is that? The Forums and the Palatine were pretty cool, but it probably would have been better for me had I known a little bit more about the history. Ah, well.

2. The Vittoriano. Apparently, it's the most hated landmark in Rome because builders destroyed part of the Roman Forum and is referred to as the "wedding cake", but I loved it. I thought it was beautiful in a "nouvelle vague" kind of way. Whereas most of the buildings and landmarks in Rome have a yellowish tint, the Vittoriano is bright white and practically glows at night. It is also where Italy house the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. I stole this pic from siciliatourist.tv because it was under construction while we were there.

3. Trastevere and Janiculum Hill. I loved this area because for me, it was a slice of the "real" Italy. We went to a little shop selling antipasti and Italian pastries and I stuttered out a few lines in Italian because it didn't look like English was going on, if you know what I mean. Also, the ubiquitous hawkers weren't so present. We were there on a beautiful day (actually 6 out of the 7 days were sunny and warm), and we walked up the Janiculum Hill and looked down on Rome. All the pinks and yellows of the city were so lovely. That day was one of my favourites.

4. The Pantheon was another big winner for me. Dave and I were looking for it, just taking our time walking through the streets, kinda like "la dee da", and BAM! There it was. It was massive! Such a huge structure and the inside was impressive as well. The oculus - the opening of the dome - provides light and when it rains, 22 small holes in the marble floor drains away any rain that enters the building.

5. Trevi Fountain. I've never seen it before, even though we got "La Dolce Vita" a few weeks before we went to Rome. It was so pretty and probably one of the most romantic spots we went to. Well, when you take away the crowds, the sellers and the noise.

6. Vatican City and St. Peter's Basilica. St. Peter's is probably one, if not the, most visited church in the world, but lucky for us, the lines to get in weren't too bad. It really is a lovely example of architecture, with its highly identifiable dome and impressive interior. And the Sistine Chapel. I knew roughly what to expect but seeing the ceiling frescoes took my breath away. What was not so cool, however, was the noise factor. Every ten minutes, an announcement came over the loud speaker reminding people that they were in a sacred place and please, for the love of god, shut the fuck up. This was repeated in French, Italian, Spanish, Japanese and Mandarin. The security guards also got in the action by practically yelling and pointing at people to put away their cameras and camcorders even though there are signs before entering the chapel and we were told that no photography was allowed. Sigh. Another thing that made me feel ill at ease was the amazing opulence in the the basilica, the Vatican museums and the surrounding buildings. There was so much gold and priceless treasures, and I was at odds at how the church could be so rich and withstand the ages with its fortunes intact and its worshipers had to live through wars, recessions and sometimes, poverty. Dave told me to watch myself and my deep thoughts while we in Vatican City lest the Swiss guards overhear me and promptly eject me. Still, it was an interesting and challenging (we took the stairs all the way to the top of the basilica - ouch) day out.

7. The Tomb of the Capucin Monks. This place was SO cool, but gruesome, macabre and disturbing. The tomb, or crypt, rather, located to the right and under the church of Santa Maria della Concezione holds the remains of over 4000 Capuc(h)in Monks buried between 1500 - 1870. What's different about this crypt is that the bones and skeletons of the monks are used to decorate the walls and ceilings! Clavicles, vertebrae, and jaw bones make up chandeliers. Hip bones have been turned into candle holders. Skulls are fashioned into arches. Skeletons with their flesh still on are cloaked in robes reminding you that they too used to be living. I was absolutely horrified, yet impressed. While I felt a little sick being there, I didn't turn around and leave though I wanted to. Pictures are not allowed in the tomb, but you probably wouldn't forget this place. At the end of the crypt there is a message: "What you are now, we once were; what we are now, you shall be." Shudder.

8. The whole in the wall store where I bought my glass pendant. I forget the name of this shop, but it was one of those places where if you fail to look to the right of you, you'll miss it. It was more of a hallway with pendants, necklaces, souvenirs and various knickknacks on either side. And behind the glass counter was the littlest, oldest Italian Nonna. We were in there for about half and hour while I was trying to make up my mind on which pendant I should get. There were all handmade in the Venetian style like this (I'm too lazy to take a pic of mine, but it's black, white and yellow). She spoke fluent English with a great Italian accent and I just wanted to put her in my carry on and take her home.

9. Hanging out with Dave, Andrea and Rhys. The hot Scot and I were lucky enough to hook up with the K family and it was fantastic. After months of living without friends from home, it was so sweet just to hang out with some old skool peeps. Dave and I go wayyy back and it was nice to be around the familiar.

We went to the historic sites, ate lots of pasta and pizza and talked, and talked, and talked. Oh, and hanging out with their son Rhys was so fun. He's such a smart little boy and pleasure to be around. He's the one who took the pic on the right. Four year old and a whiz with a digicam. I heart my friends.

10. Being newly engaged in Rome. Even though the hot Scot was planning on proposing in Rome, his spur of the moment proposal in our kitchen was better than anything he could have dreamed up. To me, Rome wasn't the most romantic place, but it was still a great place to be when you're newly engaged. Dave did propose again in Villa Borghese park but no matter where we are and where we go, being with him is such a joy and blessing. We celebrated our engagement at Ditirambo Restaurant in Piazza Navano (thanks Ma and Pa B!) and it was just brilliant. I totally recommend this restaurant and have the chocolate cake dessert. Fantastic.

Honourable mentions: The Beehive Hostel and Apartment: a wonderful hostel with private shared apartments. The staff were very helpful, the apartments were clean (we stayed in 2 over 7 days) and we had huge kitchens. It's close to the Stazione Termini (central train station). Even though Dave and I decided that it was our last time staying in a hostel/shared apartment, I heartily recommend it.

Archetto Restaurant. Recommended by Jenn, we went to this place twice. It's near the Trevi Fountain and the food wasn't fancy, but it was good, filling and cheap.

Fountains, fountains everywhere. We reused our water bottles and filled up on the free flowing public drinking fountains. The water is safe to drink in Rome and it tastes delicious.

And that's Rome. Overall, I enjoyed it though I probably wouldn't go back. A week was plenty of time for me to get to know the city though I know there are more things to do. I definitely want to go to other parts of Italy, but I feel as if I can tick Rome off of my list.

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I will be heading off to Barcelona in a few weeks to celebrate my entry into the "dirty thirties" and I'm looking forward to it. Four friends with Montreal and Toronto are coming to help me celebrate it and I don't plan on having an itinerary. I bought a Lonely Planet and there are a couple of things I know we'll have to see, but I'm just looking forward to the eating, drinking and screeching, er, I mean talking. We'll be going for 3 days and it's going to be good. I have another couple of girlfriends returning to Nottingham to stay with me for a couple of days starting from tomorrow. They were here for a night last week and it was screaming fun. Yeah, laughing so hard that our tummies hurt. That's the good stuff.

After Barcelona, I don't intend on doing anymore European travelling, just sticking closer to home. The hot Scot and I have a wedding to save up for and that means that I can't go off on anymore holiday jaunts for at least a year. We do plan on renting a car and exploring England on our weekends and I'll write about that and other things that are closer to home. I don't think I'll turn this into a wedding planning blog though little snippets of that part of my life may land here from time to time. What I know for sure, however, that this year will be very interesting indeed. Please come by from time to time (and comment!) and see what I'm doing on this tiny island.

2008-04-28T03:14:00.006+09:00

Otherwise engaged...

Okay, I know I haven't blogged in over a month, and really, I should have put all my thoughts and great photos of Rome into a post weeks ago. I meant to, I really did. There are so many cool things I want to share about the city, and I promise, I will, but I need a bit more time. See, about 2 days after I published the last post, I was unexpectedly knocked out of my socks. On a Saturday much like any other, my life changed. Dave, my hot Scot, the man of my life for over the past two years, asked me to marry him. No, I didn't see it coming, and to be fair, neither did he (not on that day, anyway). It was raw, it was emotional, it was the best and sweetest thing that's ever happened in my life, and it brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it right now. I was gob smacked (very British, I know) and only now am I coming back to earth. I've told the tale many times, but I'm not going to write about it because Dave did such a great job telling the story. One word: wowers.

After returning from Italy and having told everyone and changed our status on Facebook, I've been swimming in a sea of stress over where we are going to hold the wedding. Seriously, it's been sick. After many discussions, tons of research and some back and forth, we've decided to have it in Scotland. So for the past two weeks, I've been researching venues and we've narrowed the list down considerably. In between all this research and fretting, I'd been looking for a job and now I'm happy to announce I'll be starting at one tomorrow. Yeah! 4 months of not working is just too long.

So that's why I haven't posted in so long. I'm so due, I know. But I just wanted to share this news. I'll be posting a week or so, I promise. For now, I'll reminisce on Rome by watching America's Next Top Model. Ciao, bellas!

2008-03-20T01:22:00.006+09:00

Seeing the world...

Sometime last year, I happened upon an ad for Traveleyes which really grabbed my attention. Briefly, it's a company that was founded by a blind Glaswegian (someone from Glasgow) and it was his mission to see the world. Of course, if you have limited or no sight, this is impossible. Unless, you organize holidays pairing the blind and the sighted and offer the sighted folks a substantial discount. And voila, that was how Traveleyes was born. The founder, Amar, had a dream, and with determination, luck and some funding, his dream, and that of so many others, was realized. I really admire people who, when having found something was lacking out there, have the balls to fill that gap.

Having found myself with my own gap (February without travel plans), I contacted the Traveleyes people and signed up for their one week trip to Fuerteventura of the Canary Islands from 27 February to 5 March. The short of it is for a discount on the total price of the trip (flights and accommodations), I was expected to accompany visually impaired (VIs for short) on outings and describe the things, people and places they couldn't see. It sounded like a bit of a challenge (I'm not the most eloquent of speakers) and it gave me a chance to meet new people while helping them out AND seeing a part of the world I probably wouldn't have seen on my own. So, how was it?

Ok, first, the good. It was fantastic meeting so many people who didn't let their disabilities stop them from doing what they wanted. Sometimes, they moved me to tears. I heard stories about losing a child to cancer, going to Atlanta for the Summer Paralympics and competing in the judo competition, creating a long-distance relationship through the internet (and subsequently moving to the UK), and taking walking holidays all over the world. The VIs that I spent time with (we were assigned a different partner every day) were remarkable in their desire to live life without boundaries. It gave me such a sense of usefulness when I had to lead people around, read menus to them and describe the world through my own eyes. At first, it was a little nerve-racking, but it got comfortable really quickly. There were a few in particular that I got quite close to quite quickly. The lady in the pic above, Champa, and her husband, David, were a couple that gave me lumps in my throat a few times, as well as made me laugh.

The bad: I have come to the conclusion that I'm totally not into organized fun. This is totally a case of "it's not you, it's me". I'm really not a group person, which I was a little surprised about, but I was a bit stifled about having an agenda everyday. I'm all for planning, but I think I like to just go where the wind takes me when I'm travelling. I'm so not an itinerary chick, and it was totally my bad for not feeling the schedule aspect of the holiday.

The ugly: Fuerteventura itself. The island was nothing more than a big, volcanic rock with some nice beaches surrounding it. There wasn't much to the interior of the island and my search for the "real Canary Islands" was in vain. Development of the island began some 30 years ago, but you wouldn't know it with all the scaffolding, plows and the signs for land for sale. Oh, and it was overrun with Brits and Germans to the point where you could get Fish and Chips everywhere, chips was the side dish of choice, and there were German channels on the tube. I saw way too many white, naked bodies on the beach (one was too many), and if I never see a "German sausage" again, it would be too soon.

In all, I was disappointed about this trip and even regretted it a bit (moi, qui ne regrette rien), but Traveleyes was NOT to blame. I admire what Amar is doing and give him mad props, even though he constantly ripped the piss out of my accent. I fully recommend it for people who are interested in helping and meeting new people and like their travel planned and surprise-free. They have some excellent trips coming up, including Cuba, Italy, Vancouver, Iceland, South Africa and the Greek Islands, and they promise to be unforgettable for the VIs and the sighted alike.

If you have any questions, you can ask me them in the comment section, visit the web site, or check out this news report which features yours truly.

2008-02-19T01:54:00.028+09:00

I dream of Paris...

For a long time, I had my head in the sand and fully believed that the sun rose and set on Montreal. Not only was this city the centre of my universe, but also the centre of the world. I didn't believe there was any reason to leave it for a sustained period and thought the whole world could be found in my backyard. Now, several years later, while I still hold my home city in the highest regard, I know a little better. A couple of weeks ago, I visited Paris, a city I swore up and down I had no interest in visiting. Why go all the way to there when I had what the city had to offer just down my block: the French language, the beautiful architecture, the food...But I was very sorely mistaken.

I decided to take a rather spur of a moment trip to two of the world's most famous capitals - London and Paris. Nottingham is really conveniently located - it's about a two hour train/bus ride to London and 30 minutes from the airport. I decided to take the bus to London and drop in on my cousins for a couple of days then take the Eurostar to Paris.

Now, I've never been to London and didn't really expect much, but I was happy with what I saw. My cousins, Sarah and Esther, are conveniently located in South London and Esther and I went to town a couple of times and I was floored with just how dense London was. With a population of 8 million and home to so many museums, it sometimes felt like I was walking through molasses because the crowds were so thick.

I didn't really get to sample the best of what London had to offer food-wise (traveling on a budget - hoo ray!), but I tried a seminally British stalwart - the cornish pasty. You can get all sorts of pasties and pies everywhere in this country, but apparently, the Cornish Bakehouse supposedly offers one of the best. I tried it twice, and while they satisfied my hunger, I wasn't particularly crazy about them. Meat stuffed in pastry - not rocket science, but no foodgasms here. Perhaps my palate has grown too sophisticated.

I travelled on the tube a few times and I couldn't resist getting a shot under the Underground sign. What was really cool was there was a place right around the corner called "The Japan Centre" where I was able to get an onigiri (rice ball) and some yaki niku (grilled meat) sauce. There were so many Japanese people that I felt like I was back in Japan! Sigh. Excuse me, I'm digressing. London has a pretty easy metro and I found it a great way to get a taste of the characters that called the capital of England home. Unfortunately, I was not lucky enough to get treated to this event though I was in London when it happened. Damn shame.

Overall, I thought London was pretty nice, and was happy to see all those famous sites, but I wasn't particularly bowled over. London is like a song with a really loud baseline: you feel the pulsing beat but you really can't make out the details of the composition. However, I really enjoyed the the museums and the fact that entry was free. I only had enough time to visit two - the British Museum and the the National Portrait Gallery. My appreciation for art, particularly those of the impressionist persuasion, has been growing since I arrived in the UK and I plan on taking every opportunity to see the greats of the past and the future while I'm living here and traveling around.

After a couple of days in London, I set off to Paris on the very sleek, very clean and very fast Eurostar. In 2 hours and 15 minutes, I was in the centre of gay Paris and I was buzzing. Stepping off the train was like exiting a really fast revolving door - you pray you don't crash and burn. Thanks to my very handy Lonely Planet Paris, I knew I had to make my way to the metro station below Gare du Nord and buy a carnet of 10 tickets. My hostel, Oops! Budget, was located in Le Quartier Latin, an area off the beaten track, but still centrally located. At 23 euros a night, it was a steal. It was clean, practically next door to the metro, new and close to restaurants. The only downside, however, was that I was in a dorm and had to share a room with 3 men. All very nice men, mind you, but men, nonetheless. Needless to say, I didn't get a lot of sleep and it was definitely an experience, but one that I'm loathed to repeat again. I would recommend the place and I would return, with an army of girls, but I probably wouldn't stay there on my own again.

After checking in, I walked back out and headed to the Montmartre area where I got down to it. First, I went to the very beautiful Basilique du Sacre-Coeur. Finished in 1919, the basilica is perched at the very top of Butte de Montmartre and has fantastic views of the city. There are three ways to get to the top - stairs as far as the eye can see, a cable car, and a mixture of pathways and stairs, which was the route I took. There were not many tourists on that cold, gray, late-January day, but there were quite a few pushy Africans peddling their crappy wares, one of whom put their hands on my wrists and wouldn't let go. For the first time ever, I felt a shock of fear while I was travelling. He was a persistent guy and I just kept saying "no" in increasing volume until he finally let me be. I don't know why, but he was just on me. A few 100 feet later, I was greeted by more pushy creeps, including one who I could have sworn spoke in Ga.

Undeterred, your plucky heroine soldiered on and made the trek all the way to the top. It was just so stunning. I kept having to stop, look around and pinch myself. My pics really can't do the basilica justice. It was so white and clean. Inside was also lovely and I took a minute to collect myself and pray for an enjoyable and SAFE time in Paris.

After I left the Basilica, I meandered through the tourist stalls in the area and bought a couple of reproductions of paintings and posters and a pretty pair of earrings. I headed south and found myself in Sexyville, or the red light district. I noticed a few skanky ladies trying to physically pull men into their strip clubs so I stuck to the pedestrian path in the middle of the road. I was tempted to go the the Museum of Erotic Art but realized that I didn't have enough time to really give the place the attention it needed. Instead, I walked down further and danced in the glow of the Moulin Rouge. It was pretty freaking cool. Just amazing. There was a line of people all the way down the block and once again I was tempted, this time to see the burlesque show. But I just didn't have the funds to see naked ladies that night, and really, it probably wouldn't have been so fun seeing it solo.

After a simple meal of Vietnamese food (I know, how French), I headed back to the hostel to get some shuteye.

The next morning, I awoke to showers and chill but I left early and went to see the most famous Parisien sites. I went to the Charles de Gaulle-Etoile metro station and started there.

The Arc de Triomphe was the first stop, and OMG, it was beyond my wildest dreams. It was huge and imposing, but awe-inspiring at the same time. I walked the length of Champs-Elysees and kept turning back to stare at it. I took so many photos and I can still recall it clearly in my head. The feeling I felt when I saw it will probably remain with me for the rest of my days.

I spent several hours along Paris' most famous avenue and stood outside such iconic buildings as the houses of Cartier, Louis Vuitton and Remy Martin without have the courage to step inside them. Not that these places were must-sees on my list, but it was cool seeing the beautiful architecture of the exteriors.

I passed by Le Grand Palais and Le Petit Palais and was shocked by how palatial these buildings were. Further down the street, the beautiful golden dome of the Hotel des Invalides,the final resting place of Napoleon, brightened up the gray skies.

I made my way along the Seine, getting closer to what many people consider the epicenter of Paris, and took my time. The sun came out and chased the rain clouds away and I basked in the heat of it. I passed by the Flame of Liberty Memorial and looked at the place where Princess Diana died. It was eerie being so close to the place where someone died so violently and publicly and I thought about how even today, the circumstances surrounding Diana's death takes a leading place on the news roster. Though this sculpture was intended as a symbol of the friendship between France and the USA, it became a shrine of sorts for the late princess.

After hours and hours of walking around in the rain, wincing with pain with each step I took (my new shoes, in particular the right one, weren't fully broken in), I made it to the Eiffel Tower.

And it was stunning. Just indescribable.

I fell in love with it, and the sky cleared and I got to behold it in all of it's amazing beauty. And I was so glad that it didn't disappoint me. There is nothing else I can say.

After a dinner of moules-frites and a dessert of a waffle with chocolate sauce, I went to the (in)famous Louvre and was really impressed. There weren't a lot of people there because I went around 7 p.m. so I didn't have to queue to see the Venus de Milo (remarkable) and the Mona Lisa (overrated), and I took my time through the Roman and Greek sculptures and paintings (my favourites). I was so happy, I even bought a book about 300 featured masterpieces. It truly was a great day.

So there it is. I had a great time and I feel like I've relived my trip by relaying it here. I was pretty tired on the last day and it was so ball-breakingly cold, that I threw in the towel in the afternoon and went back to the warmth of the hostel before I departed in the late evening. But I left satisfied. I will definitely go back. It was a great experience for my first solo trip and highly recommend Paris to anyone.

I have two more trips before I go back to work in April: the Canary Islands and Rome. New posts soon!

2008-01-15T01:13:00.000+09:00

Catching my breath...

I can't believe we're nearly 3 weeks into 2008. A happy new year to all 5 of my readers! It feels like a lot has happened since mid-December, a series of minor adventures in the grand scheme of things. My job ended on the 19th of December and culminated with a horrific office Christmas party with scenes that I still can't get out of my head. A couple of days later, Dave and I flew to Edinburgh Airport where we were heartily welcomed by his wonderful and warm parents. We stayed in the beautiful house near the sea in Fife, Scotland and made day trips to Edinburgh and Glasgow. Scotland is truly a heartwarming country and I loved my time there.

Me and the family. This was my second time meeting the Blackwood Family and they are truly loveable people. I love his sisters and the squabbling that went on between them made me miss my own sisters. The 'rents are fantastic people and I loved talking with them. I heart all of them.

Opening our presents Christmas morning. It was a madhouse - wrapping paper flying through the air, shouts of "Oh my god, thank you!!!" and crazy generosity. Blissful.

Dave's younger sister, the talented and pretty Louise.

Trifle - yumm. This British dessert is comprised of sponge cake soaked with sherry, a layer of Jello, or as Dave's mum kept reminding me, jelly, and a layer of whipped cream. I couldn't eat this on Christmas Day because I was absolutely stuffed to the gills, but when I ate it the next day, I fell in love with it. Sweet without being nauseatingly so, trifle is a fantastic dessert. The different textures complement each other rather than fighting for supremacy, so it all goes down rather nicely. I probably wouldn't make it because it seems rather labour intensive, but I would definitely eat it if it was on the menu.

Ahh, mince and tatties. A distinctly Scottish dish. It's a simple ensemble of stewed mince meat, a side of potatoes, steamed cabbage and suet (flour) dumplings. It's a really easy dish, but I loved it. Comfort food comes to mind.

The beau and I in a pub in Kirkcaldy. I think it's called Wetherspoon's. My fro is growing.

Gringo (Graham) and I. Lovely chap.

Dave's wee sister, Caroline and her friend Claire. We were having a photo shoot in the loo. I didn't care, I was quite tipsy at this point.

Took a scenic walk on the Fife Coastal path. It was an overcast day but the sights were really pretty, especially this waterfall that seemed to appear out of nowhere.

A rickety, old pier. I wanted to walk on it, but I didn't want to fall off and either bash my head on some rocks or get wet, so I didn't.

A beached anchor we stumbled upon on our walk.

At the end of the day, Dave and I got pretty tired (we were both sick) so we had his Dad come pick us up by the side of the road. He then drove us to the lookout point and I started snapping the sunset. I must say, sunsets in Scotland are spectacular. Then again, dusk is spectacular anywhere in the world.

Same day, same locale.

One more.

Yes, I'm a grown women, but the silliest things still crack me up.

We went to the Kelvingrove Museum in Glasgow one day and it was brilllant. I don't remember how many hours we spent in there, but it was time well spent. This war armor from a Micronesia (??) was made out of the teeth of sharks. Cool.

The various expressions of man are represented on these heads.

This reminded me of something out of Jurassic Park.

The Kelvingrove from the outside. Not only was it a beautiful and well laid out museum, but it was free! My kind of outing.

I will be travelling once again very soon, this time on a couple of solo trips. First up, I'll be off to London and Paris! Check back here soon for pics and commentary.

2007-12-15T04:59:00.002+09:00

The other day, as I was waiting for the light to change to cross the street, I realized that I am actually living in England. Yes, it has been 3 months since I stepped on British soil, but sometimes it just hits you, you know? It happened pretty much all the time until about the last day I was in Japan. It’s so easy to take things for granted sometimes. Shiloh and Dave taught me a lot about living in the moment and enjoying what you have NOW rather than fretting too much about the past and the future. I’ve gotten better at doing this, though with the peaks and valleys of settling in a new country, you sometimes lose that insight. But wow. I never thought I’d take a huge leap and live away from my beloved Montreal. I lived in Ottawa for almost four years, but Montreal was always home for me. But here I am, living in my third country within a 2.5 year time period and taking leaps of faith when I would never have fathomed jumping. In the back of my head, home is always there for me, so in a way, a little of the pressure is taken off, but when I commit, I commit. I’m going to be 30 in 6 months and I’ve started to take stock of my life thus far. I used to fret about not having anything to show for my life when I was in my early 20’s, and to a lesser extent, I still do, but I’ve grown so much into ME, it’s a little funny. It feels good.

I’ve come to the conclusion that Japan is and forever will be an irrevocable part of my life. I feel such an affinity for many things Japanese and I have such a tender spot for the country and its people. I read a NY Times article and I felt like I knew the subject, Ms. Matsuyama. When she was talking about preparing sukiyaki and oden for her kids, my memories nearly overwhelmed me. Mmmm, it’s totally sukiyaki and onsen season right now. I wish I could just go to the onsen, get nekkid and soak my worries away. Don’t get me wrong; I got my fill, but it never seems like enough. Dave and I have noticed a few Japanese people in Nottingham (I saw loads in Edinburgh) and we both agreed that there’s a certain sense of knowing and happiness when we’re in their vicinity. There is a trio of Japanese girls that attend the college where I work, and I always try to sit near them when I catch them on my lunch break. I catch snippets of their conversation (in Japanese) and I smile, fully understanding what they’re talking about.

I gave in my notice at work almost 2 weeks ago. I think I made a real impression here as they don’t want me to go. As much as I know that this isn’t the sort of thing I want to do with my life, I was good at it, fit in well with the team and learned a few things (another nice notch on my CV). Perhaps I will get a little moist in the eyes when I say goodbye next Wednesday when the College closes down for the holidays.

I got really excited after I read DBM’s blog (I feel you girl, keep writing!) and from a link to a link to a link, I found my way to http://www.servas.org/newsite It’s a UN affiliated organization that aims to foster peace and international organization through putting hosts and travellers together. The deal is for a small membership fee, travellers can board at the home of a host for 2 or more days FOR FREE. You know I signed up for that post-haste. This is so valuable for solo travellers, comme moi. The only trouble is deciding where to go first. I’m thinking I’ll take my first trip in January. Any suggestions???

I’ve pretty much decided to take a sun holiday in February with TravelEyes. Basically, sighted and blind travellers travel together to cool locales. Due to the fact I recently decided to take a sun holiday every year in either February or March (when SAD hits the hardest), what would be better than going to Fuerteventura of the Canary Islands? Maybe winning the lottery? Maybe, yes. I’m hoping to visit London as bookends to my trip. Just gotta check with my cousins.

On one of those links of a link I visited today, I read about someone who prayed for a friend, and literally 3 days later, got one. I’d definitely like to have a friend, someone who fit. I feel blessed that I can call or email anyone at home whenever I need to, and that I’m living with the one I love (and my ultimate best friend), but it would be great to have a great friend. As one gets older, it’s more difficult to make real friends and really connect. So, as I walking to the bank machine, I said a little prayer and asked for a friend, someone like me, who was funny, smart, well read, pretty (I don’t know why I threw that in – pretty on the inside? I hope I’m not that shallow), and very importantly, available. Let’s hope I get lucky sometime soon.

I've been SOO slack with taking pictures lately, especially of the stuff I've been eating lately. Also, it has just occurred to me that I don't have a Lonely Planet England yet. I haven't had time to be a tourist yet so I'm now looking forward to the two months I have off. I promise, I'll post on the proclivities and absurdities of people and things while I'm living in a country that is HRM (Her Royal Majesty's) everything. Should be good.

2007-12-03T03:51:00.000+09:00

Keep on truckin'...

I've been back in a Western office for almost two months and I can't believe I've actually missed it. Well, actually, I know what I missed. It was the socialisation that goes on in the office. Chatting, laughing, exchanging ideas and generally making the day go faster. I lucked out in landing the placement I did. I'm back in a school, a college this time, and I'm working in human resources. I've been curious about HR for a long time and this job was an opportunity to get my feet wet in the field. It's interesting in a lot of ways because I'm learning about the finer points of recruitment, selection and the ins and outs of managing people. BUT, it's not something I want to do for the rest of my days. Interaction with people outside my colleagues is minimal and the paperwork is never ending. I'm more of a paper jockey than a people aide. Some days I can't be bothered searching for invisible files and calculating how many annual leave hours a part time worker has accrued. But, I get paid, I'm out of the house and I can scratch another job I'm curious about off my list.

But back to my earlier point; months ago I stated that I was looking forward to going back to the office. I was still in Japan at the time and the constant pressure of coming up with lessons for my Japanese students was wearing thin. What was really getting to me was the lack of communication throughout the day. My co-workers were great, but the communication barrier was THICK. I was always doing some independent, non-work related activity like Japanese study, reading or surfing the net. Sometimes I'd get so batty from not speaking in my own language all day that I'd say the daftest things when I'd be out with English speakers. I still shake my head when I think about that. It seems like a long time ago now. I miss quite a few things about Japan, and I recently teared up when I saw some pics of my former students on my successor's Facebook page. But that was then and this is now.

I've been noticing a few things that have made me go hmmm in the past few weeks. One of them is the abundance of BBMs – Bad British Mums. These are the young mums who yell, beat and swear at their young kids in public. I've seen examples of these BBMs at the supermarket, the bank, in the street and at my workplace. They have no patience with their kids and yell at them at the top of their lungs for infractions that do not warrant the punishment. I've heard BBMs telling their children to fuck off, to shut the fuck up, that they're going to get their fucking face smashed, and on and on. To make the matter worse, these shrieks are in gutter English accents which make my ears bleed from revulsion. These BBMs think of nothing of smacking their kids in the face, on the chest and on the bottom, further adding to their petty fury. It truly infuriates me. Of course these BBMs are not symptomatic of the whole British nation, but it's stunning to me that I've seen so many of them in the short weeks I've lived in this country. I've been thinking about children a lot and I know being a parent is probably the most difficult (and rewarding) job there is, but DAMN, I'm ready to give out condoms on street corners.

I've also noticed that Brits love to eat crap. 2 out of the 4 people in my little office area eat chocolate and chips before noon. Fish and chips, fried everything, mayo on everything, large portions – it's a healthy eater's nightmare. I'm not a calorie counter, but I do read the nutritional information on EVERTHING I eat. If it's got too many carbs, too many grams of sugar or fat and not enough fibre, I put it back. And I've been looking – a lot of foods have to too much of the bad stuff and not enough of the good stuff. According to studies and alarmist reporting, Brits are getting fatter and fatter, rivalling Americans in their girth. I've gained 7 pounds since leaving Japan, and while some of that can be attributed to living with a boy and consuming what he eats, it's also because of the availability of snacks and foods that weren't accessible in Japan. Well, NOT NO MORE. I plan on hitting the beach in February and aim to return to my more svelte self (even though I can't find where these extra 7 pounds have lodged themselves on my body) and not fall into the British way of eating. I will sample the local fare and review them, as promised.

One last thing I'd like to remark on is the multiculturalism that seems to be alternatively celebrated and abhorred. Nottingham has a beautiful market square that sees vendors from across Europe peddling their wares and community groups putting on shows. Recently, I've browsed the stalls and have bought cheese from France, olives from Italy and smelled German baked goods. I've also been to Afro-Caribbean Day where I've eaten delicious jerk chicken while watching kids of different hues perform a "hip hop" dance.
There are so many biracial children and adults here and I've seen every hair texture and variance of skin tone. I love it. But turn on the telly and you'll hear how the influx of migrants is putting stress on the school and health systems and how Britain needs to stem the influx of immigrants as their numbers are "alarmingly" high. In a way, my bubble has been burst. I had no idea how much of a "problem" immigrants are to (white) British citizens.

I'm struggling a bit to end this post in a positive way. I'm happy. The sun was out for a bit yesterday and it's out today. I've finally made it to Season 5 of "The Sopranos". Life is good.

2007-11-19T05:24:00.000+09:00

Ups and downs...

This has been, for lack of a better word, an interesting week. I found out the conditions of my visa (working holiday) have been changed and where I had choices a couple of months ago, I now have only one option in relation to working here. Rather than choosing between working full time over twelve months broken up over two years and working part time over 24 months, I can now only work for twelve months, full stop. These twelve months can be full time or part time, it doesn't matter. I just don't have the option of working continuously part time over my allotted two years. Which sucks. It takes away some part of the security I thought I had and feeling secure is my security blanket.

I don't know why things changed or when it happened exactly, but there is a climate of anti-immigration here that I underestimated. Nottingham and England is deliciously multicultural, but some people are just not happy about it. It's a constant feature on the political agenda and in the newspapers, and with the recent tightening of Britain's borders coupled with the terrorist attacks here, things are getting ugly. Or maybe they always have been. I don't know. I've only been here for a couple of months. At this time, I'm not able to critique what I see as an issue of all wealthy countries; the push and pull of "us" vs. "them". All I know is how it's affecting me. The rules have changed and I'm in the mix.

But.

I've started to look at this whole thing differently. Rather than a pitfall, it can be an opportunity. An opportunity to actually travel, get as much experience working in different offices in the UK and to enjoy this "career break". I was pretty down about where I am in my life right now, but I have to look at things differently. I need to. So I will continue to taste the sugar with the salt and ride this thing like the kick ass cowgirl I can be.

2007-10-15T01:50:00.000+09:00

Nott's (not) so bad...

It's been 4 weeks since Dave and I moved into our flat in Nottingham and we're getting nicely acquainted with our new town. Dave has started classes, pursuing a Master's degree in journalism at one of the two nearby universities, and I have started work as a human resources assistant (temporary) in a college. My finding work so quickly after moving in was a bit of a surprise, but I'm pleased to be working in a field that I'm genuinely interested in. I've set up a bank account, Dave and I have registered our names for all possible utilities, and I'm on my way to securing a National Insurance number (comparable to Canada's SIN) and a health insurance card. We're getting used to living together and negotiating through the sometimes sticky terrain of co-habitating, but we're learning and growing stronger as a unit, and as individuals, with each passing day. For a pair of transplanted souls, we're doing nae bad.

I sometimes find it strange that we're living in the middle of England and it's more than a little disconcerting living amongst folks who speak like Harry Potter and Oliver Twist. What's most frightful to me is hearing little kids speaking English in their weird babyspeak. It reminds me of a horror movie for some reason and literally sends shivers up my spine. Anyhoo, I think I've taken to Nottingham quite nicely. It's quite the beautiful, old town. It's got cobbled streets, a wonderful market square (seen here at night), big, old trees to go along with the big, old houses, a castle, a legend (that of Robin Hood ,which I found out is a gross bastardization of the truth. Robin Hood was a bastard. More on that another time.), and tons and tons of fantastic shops. We live quite close to the city centre (about a 10 minute walk) in a beautifully appointed neighbourhood aptly named "The Park" and by all accounts, this is ideal place to live.

However.

There are a few x's behind the name of Nottingham. For one, it's got the highest rate of gun crime in the UK. IN THE UK!! For a small island of over 60 million people, my adopted home is known all over as the place where there is a clear and present danger of getting a cap in the ass. But, to defend Nottingham, or Shottingham as it's sometimes lovingly referred to, it's not as bad as it seems. According to the Wiki article, Nottingham reported a spectacular 51 kills in 2003. For a town with a population of about 600,000 in a country where not even the cops carry guns, I suppose this was a lot. But I think it was a lot of sensationalistic reporting, though I wasn't here at the time. But things have calmed down, with the number of shootings falling to just 13 last year. It's good to know that people have gone back to stabbing and "glassing" one another.

My next gripe isn't really specific to Nottingham, and maybe not even England. It's the phenomenon that occurs on Friday and Saturday nights - the assholing of perfectly reasonable people. The women, who I think have such a fashionable way of carrying themselves, go through a horrifying slutification where they lose their good sense, their minds and their knickers come the weekend. I've seen women walking around in mini-mini dresses, garter belts and panty hose in the name of hen (bachelorette) parties and cleavage like you wouldn't believe. To be fair, women here are definitely NOT shy about showcasing their bosom. I went to a recruitment agency to get registered and the woman who was serving me was wearing a blouse that was too tight and too see through. I had to really focus on keeping my eyes on her face. I don't know, is it just me? I've seen my share of cleavage in my native Montreal, but here it's so OBVIOUS. Maybe because English ladies seem to be particularly well-endowed...? Of course, this observation and slight discomfort is further exaggerated by living in Japan for the past two years and seeing nothing but cotton/silk/wool up to the neckline.

Another thing that I'm adapting to is the drinking culture. In Montreal, you drink for pleasure, in Japan you drink to socialize, and in the UK you drink to get stinking assed drunk. To quote David, "So you see, it's not just my problem, it's society's problem." With recent articles and studies reporting that British people have a high incidence of problems related to heavy drinking (illness, unprotected casual sex, pregnancy), it's a big deal. Friday and Saturday nights are prime time for drinking and you'd be hard pressed not to see signs of binge drinking all over the place. To add to this, it seems that British males get highly aggressive when drunk (must be a throwback from all that historic war mongering). Take for example what happened a couple of Saturdays ago: Dave and I were on our way home from a lovely (and expensive) dinner at an Indian restaurant and we were weaving our way through the crowds of under-dressed, over-intoxicated folk. We were focusing on a particular group of mutton dressed as lamb (grown assed women wearing outfits meant for children) when this guy, a bloke with big ears and a surly expression, was looking at Dave with cold dead eyes and said: "You lil' prick."! This was an unprovoked attack and the ferocity of his conviction caught me so off guard that I burst out laughing! I couldn't help it. I'm still laughing about it nearly two weeks later. What a twat.*

Well, that's it for now. I've been remarking about the food culture here lately so I'll be sure to post something about that soon. Til next time!

* "Twat" doesn't mean the same thing here as it does back home. It means stupid or idiot. It still tastes like acidic glass on my tongue when I attempt to say it though. Incidentally, I'm doing alright with "cunt" (which means bastard or asshole)though it still burns my ears from time to time.

2007-10-06T03:19:00.001+09:00

The journey continues...

The two months I spent in Montreal seemed to pass by in a blur. From late nights out, eating all my favourite food with all my favourite people, to hours upon hours spent by myself trying to put together all the different pieces of me, I had an amazing, if not short, time in Montreal. I also had a chance to spend a week in Toronto and a couple of days in Ottawa. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, yours truly was a busy little beaver.

Alas, all the fun in games in my home city came to an end on September 15th when my little sister, mother and I drove to Ottawa for me to board my flight to Glasgow. The following morning, I arrived in ye olde country, into the arms and the home of the one I love, and officially began my tenure in the UK.

There were so many things to take in: seeing the Hot Scot again after 7 weeks apart, meeting his family for the first time, realizing that I'll be living in a new country and seeing as much of Edinburgh and the surrounding areas as possible. Needless to say, it was a busy week, but it went really, really well. You know when you're filled with anxiety about something, then you do it and it was successful and then you're all like, "ahhhhhh"? Yeah, it was like that. I was as happy as a pig in shit.

Scotland was beautiful and green and cloudy skies and intermittent rain and castles and people saying "y'awright?" I visited some authentic British pubs, perused the aisles of Top Shop, saw a hell of a lot of sheep, got to see where my beloved was from, was awed by a bagpiper busker, and lots of various things that I'm grateful I took pics of, or else would have forgotten. It took my leaving it to realize that I was actually in Scotland. I can't wait to go back at Christmas.

On September 22, Dave and I moved on to stage two and drove a rented van 7 hours from the south of Scotland to the middle of England. The country side was breathtaking. I will put up some pics on Facebook, but I saw the rolling hills that I've come to expect from such films as Braveheart and Trainspotting...okay, maybe not the latter though I did walk down the same street in Edinburgh that Ewan McGregor ran down at the beginning of the film. Yeah, as a total movie nerd, I was pretty excited.

And that's me. 10 weeks summarized in just a few paragraphs. I've seen a lot of things and have written many posts in my head regarding my first impressions of the rose country. I will be updating this blog with more frequent (and shorter) posts and pics of all the interesting things I see and do. I probably won't go on any trips until the new year, but I'm sure there's plenty to see and do in the town I've just settled in. Stay with me as I continue on this path to...I don't know where, self-actualization? Enlightenment? Jewellery from all over the world? We shall see.

2007-08-14T02:17:00.000+09:00

What the body remembers....

It's been over a month since my last post. Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. Actually, no, I haven't been that bad. I left Japan on July 29 and left behind a country that filled me with conflicting feelings, but I can look back and say that all of those feelings came from love.

I had a dream last night. It was the day before the end of the world and I was a Japan, alone. I was in the East Garden of the Imperial Palace (which was the last tourist attraction I went to before I left Japan and the pic at the beginning of this post). The palace was my elementary school and it housed all 77 of my students. I was trying to get a flight to get back home to Montreal but there was a lightning storm, making it impossible for planes to fly (there really was a small lightning storm last night). It looked like I wouldn't be able to see my family before the end of the world. So I went for a jog and I took in the cleanliness of the grounds, the rich blue of the ski, the lush green of the trees and the sweetness of the air. I looked at the faces of my students and I felt if I were to die tomorrow, then I'd be okay. I was happy, so very happy. And then I woke up.

So what does it mean? I've started to miss Japan a bit, and I look back on my days there with a mixture of awe, satisfaction and fondness for my home for the past two years. During the good bits, I could say that if I were to die in my sleep I'd be satisfied with my life.

So here I am, back in Montreal, in transition, feeling like a tourist in my hometown. It's a bit strange sometimes, especially when I'm dealing with people in the service industry and feel like knocking out their teeth because they're so damn rude. It's also really strange to be bombarded with sounds of the city, especially people screeching outside their windows in the morning. There is construction going on across the street so that's always pleasant. And I saw the stars for the first time in over a week, and that was only because I was in the South Shore. That's something major that I miss from Neo - the quiet. Living in the village has definitely changed my idea on where I want to live in the future. Not in a tiny village, but not in the city either. Somewhere with a lot of green space, away from traffic. But that's later. For now, I'm here, soaking up the great weather, seeing my fabulous friends, eating amazing food, being close to my family and shedding the skin of my old life, but keeping the memories and the lessons learned inside me.

I will be leaving again in four weeks, first to Scotland to meet Dave's family then to England to live. I got my working holiday visa without a problem (and so quickly too), so very soon, I will be living my dream of seeing Europe. A new journey for me. This is my life and I'm so happy.

I'm not sure if I will write too much about what's been happening in Montreal unless something really interesting happens or I feel the need to write about what I'm feeling. But I will definitely continue to remark on my observations when I move to the UK and travel throughout Europe. So watch this space! Oh yeah, thanks to everyone who has been keeping up with me over the last two years. I had no idea I had so many people reading this thing. Thanks for the support!

2007-07-04T14:53:00.000+09:00

Getting ready to leave the nest...

Last year, in about May, there was a nest of pretty swallows by the entrance of the JHS. They had me entranced for a few weeks before they broke my heart and flew the coop. This year, a new batch were hatched and I spend several mintues of each day just staring at them in sheer wonderment. I'm having a sense of major deja vu, but rather than taking heart in the knowledge that I will see them again, I know that it will be the last time I observe them in this environment. It's getting down to the wire, less then 3 weeks and counting before I leave Neo for good. Everything is bittersweet, but in a good way. It's positive because I'm determined to go out in a high note and so far, it's been pretty easy. My elementary school kids are counting down with me, not because they can't wait to get me out of here, but because they know that each time I see them, we have one less class together (which means one less class of mind-blowing English fun). I'm bringing the noise/bringing the funk in my last few classes and we're killing it. I hug them every chance I get (such a huge change from over a year ago when they'd examine their hand after I slapped them five). At the JHS, we're cracking mad jokes, with me stooping to the humour level of a 14 year old boy. I've got nothing to prove any more. It's all about the fun. And it's fierce.

I've started to say goodbye to people and I'm handling it well. I guess it's because I've made peace with the fact that most of my relationships will end here. If we hook up again, it'll be glorious but I'm not going to live with baited breath that it will occur. But then again, I haven't said "peace out" to the top guns so who knows how that will play out.

I will be leaving Neo on July 25, leaving Gifu on July 26, spending three days in Tokyo before flying out of Narita Airport on July 29. I sometimes think of how things will play out when I arrive home. What it will feel like to sleep in my own bed and to hang out with my family. I also think about eating whatever food I feel like when I feel like. I especially think about re-adjusting to having choices and variety and understanding languages all the time. I remember reading an account of an ex-JET who broke down in the aisle of a supermarket because there were too many varieties of peanut butter. I love PB and have hardly eaten it in two years. I hope I don't go postal in Loblaws. Don't even get me started about bagels. Montreal bagels are the best in the world.

2007-06-22T14:06:00.000+09:00

On the edge...

I have been a ball of emotions lately. I will be leaving Japan in about 5 weeks and I feel it every day. I'm ready to leave my job and can't help but think "I will never have to teach numbers 11-100 again! Wheee!!!!" or "This is the last time I'll have to teach present perfect! Hoo raa!". But at the same time, I remember that I won't see my 9th graders graduate or that I'll miss their ocarina performance with the great and powerful Sojiro and I get a bump in my throat. That's what happened when my kids ask me if I'll be at their concert and I said no, last year was my last one and the kids said that there were sad. Ack! My tear ducts were screaming for release, but I held it together. I'm getting much better at that, thank you.

But, I've made it apparent in this blog, more than a few times, that I'm ready to come home. That's completely true, but I'm a little apprehensive. My world in Montreal has changed since I've been gone. My family has changed, my friends have changed, the scene has changed and I know a whole host of things I can't even anticipate have changed as well. But most importantly, I have changed. I wonder how I'll react to things that I used to take for granted. This morning, I was on the phone with my sister and she was cussing out some dude for stealing her parking space, and the guy was screaming at her at the top of his lungs. And I said (Christ, I can believe it), "That wouldn't happen in Japan." Eeeek. I don't want to be one of those people that looks at life through the rose-coloured "Made in Japan" lenses. You know what I'm talking about. Those people who were away for an extended period of time and come back to their hometown going on and on about how everything was so much better abroad. I can't stand that. I don't want to do that.

That gets me thinking though. Is life better in Japan? Can I say, that after two years of living and breathing all things Japanese that this was better than anything I've ever known in my life? I can say (somewhat hesitantly), that no, it ain't. There are a lot of good things about the country, as well as a lot of things that don't make sense to me or are just wrong, but life is not better here. I hesitated because I think that Japan has bettered me in a variety of ways. Without all the free time I've had here, and the opportunities I've had to travel and learn about the world and myself, this would have been all for naught.

So while I am sad about leaving my temporary home, and saying goodbye to friends and my sweet students, I'm ready to move on and to see how the new me takes to the outside world, the real world, if you will. I've been challenged and am still being being challenged. But now I'm ready to dip my feet in new waters.

I should be setting sail (or ahem, leaving on a JET plane) on July 29th.

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Last weekend, Gen, Shi, Dave and I went to Fukui in search of nothing but finding a lot. We found some very interesting rock formations in the sea and decided to climb them. Never mind the facts that 3 of us were wearing flip flops, no one else was climbing, and bottom below was full of crashing water and jagged rocks. We climbed and we succeeded. I decided to take the above picture when I had the startling realization that I could very well die doing something that didn't need to be done. I guess I took the pic to commerate this moment when I grew golden balls. Dave was proud and surprised that I attempted this feat but I knew I had it in me. I guess I just choose/chose not to show it all the time.

We also found a sweet little cafe that jutted out into the sea and the view was breathtaking. Though it was seemingly picture perfect, the limitations of a camera made it difficult to do it justice.

I might be able to squeeze in one or two more day trips, but if this was the last one, then I'd be happy. It was all that and I bag of dried octopi.

2007-06-04T20:11:00.000+09:00

Fight-o!

There are many words in the Japanese dictionary that are difficult to translate. One that you can hear on an almost daily basis is ganbaru, which according to the dictionary means to persevere or do one's best. Often, when I tell my kids to "ganbatte kudasai", I translate it to English and tell them to please do their best. Similarly, when people tell me that, I reply "ganbarre imasu", which means I will try my best. However, irregardless of how many times people are told and taught otherwise, the most common translation of ganbaru is fight! Or in katakana English, fa-i(ee)-to! You'll here it at competitions, before tests or when someone isn't feeling too hot. I've decided to adopt this ill-translated word as a personal mantra for my final 8 weeks here. See, I've been feeling amazingly underwhelmed and understimulated during working hours, which means I'm a lazy sack of shit after I'm relieved of my duties. A growing sense of apathy started to take over my mind during my hours of solitude and I began to look at my remaining time as a cold, desolate desert that stretched before me. It sucked. I would awaken for the weekend and then return to a semi-catonic state sometime around 8:15 a.m. Monday morning. But today, I said enough is enough. I don't want my final weeks in Japan to be filled with disdain and blinding anticipation so that I would forget my nearly 100 weeks here. So I will reach down into my spirit and savour the lasts of everything. I WILL FIGHT!

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I had a good weekend and I felt like I accomplished a lot without over-exerting. I shipped four boxes of my belongings, got a quote for my return plane ticket, tried out a new recipe, saw Pirates of the Caribbean, ate at one of my favourite restaurants (mmm, miso katsu, how I'll miss you), thorougly enjoyed watching Snakes on a Plane (Samuel L. Jackson, you are still the shit), walked around near a brook and saw dozens of fireflies (tres romantique) and spent 8 hours making the Samurai doll that you see here. I royally messed up this doll and had to make the pants all over again, plus I forgot to not glue one side of them in order for the samurai to hold his swords in his belt, but it worked out well because my guy is holding swords in each hand and looks like a total badass. I love happy accidents. This doll took a lot out of me so please forgive how used up I look in the first pic. This doll will be my second to last and I'm going to miss these classes that infuse Japanese culture with laughter and conversation. Truly one of the best things I've done here.

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I received a newsletter that contained information about reverse culture shock, which is something I might encounter when I return home. Basically, it's a phenomenom that affects people when they return home after they've lived abroad for an extended period of time. I felt culture shock when I moved here (and how!), and I anticipate feeling its companion when I go home. The newsletter suggested doing a few things to prepare for this inevitable part of living internationally. For example, it suggested making a list of the things that I like about Japan and thinking about which things I can take home, which I can try to recreate back home, and which things I must honour and say goodbye to. This is something that I'll be working on over the next little while. It's extremely important for me to say goodbye to this place properly so that I can close this chapter of my life and move on to a brighter future. The newsletter also suggested writing a list of the 5 people I will miss the most and thinking of the most meaningful way to say goodbye to each of them. Thinking about it makes me want to barf. Saying goodbye is truly the most difficult and painful thing for me. Lord have mercy, it's going to be miserable. Gotta remember my new motto though - FIGHT-O! You can just sense my false enthusiasm, can't you?

2007-05-29T12:06:00.000+09:00

Happy birthdays...

I recently celebrated my birthday in Okinawa and it was one of those trips that will go down in awesome birthday history. It was so great, that for two days after I returned, I was still on cloud nine. Dave and I spent four days in Miyako-jima and each day seemed to go on and on, but definitely in a good way. We weren't running around trying to see every little thing. Instead, we spent three days on the beach and wandered around in our rented car. Miyako is a fairly large island, a lot bigger than Tokashiki, the island we visited last year, so I'm happy that I took Julia-jima's advice and rented a car.

There were so many highlights on this trip. The biggest one was seeing Julia again after nearly two years. Julia and I met in Japanese class and during JET orientation stuff in Montreal before leaving to Japan, and have been communicating exclusively through our blogs and email. Hanging out and talking with her was like having a little bit of home on this island was huge for me. Thanks Julia!

A few other highlights were eating Greek food while overlooking the ocean, Dave and I having a whole house to ourselves, eating a lot of great food and swimming in crystal clear waters. Being on this island with Dave made everything happen in technicolor and I was so happy to share everything with him. It was everything I wanted and more.

Today is Dave's birthday and we celebrated it this past weekend. I organized a surprise trip to Osaka and Universal Studios for him and invited a bunch of our friends to share in the fun. I didn't tell Dave that we'd be going on an overnight trip until the day before and arranged for everyone to meet us on the train. It was perfect: at 8:15 in the morning, 7 foreigners jumped out of their seats in a quiet Japanese train car and yelled "SURPRISE" for the delighted Scotsman. Oh man, it was awesome. But he still didn't know where we were going. I blindfolded him when we were about 30 minutes away and we led him to the entrance of the park where we unveiled in his surprise. A lot of hootting, hollering and hugs later, we entered the park where we would spend 9 hours waiting in lines, playing Catchphrase, talking too loud, eating and drinking overpriced food and beer and going on the fantastic attractions. The Spiderman ride and the huge rollercoaster were my favorites.

At night, we had a really late dinner at an Indian restaurant that stayed opened especially for us (thanks to Kana - arigato gozaimashita!). The food was delicious and spirits were high and I was happy that everything worked out. This past weekend was one of the best times I've spent in Japan (gotta make a top ten list before I leave).

So, I'm back at work and trying hard to get back to my routine. I feel like I haven't had a good sleep in ages. I have about 7 more weeks of teaching and then I'm done, but I've got so many things to do. It's getting a little intimidating. I had a craptastic teaching day today and I'm ready to get out of here. I'm sorry if my writing is lackluster but all my happy-happy joy-joy was spent this weekend. I'll be back on track soon. To everyone whom I've been ignoring through email/Facebook, a thousand apologies. I'll get to you soon!

2007-05-16T14:46:00.000+09:00

My Spring Vacation (Part 2)...

Part 2 of your heroine's adventure took place in the lovely prefecture of Ishikawa. Shiloh, Gen, Alice, the Hot Scot and I piled into a mini van and made our way to the capital city of Kanazawa early Thursday morning. Unfortunately, we were not the only ones on the road. We were stuck in bumper to bumper traffic for hours and we didn't even leave our prefecture yet! But we were together, we had tunes and jokes, a beautiful warm day and the freedom of stopping and starting when and where we wanted to. We saw some beautiful cherry blossom trees in Shirwaka-go, a place well known for it's gassho houses which we stopped to shoot and then continued on. It took us about 7 hours to reach out destination when it usually takes about four, but we got there.

So the plan was to camp and BBQ for three nights and that's what we did. Unlike my previous experience camping in Japan, making camp in Ishikawa wasn't so easy breezy. Some camp sites required a reservation of up to 2 weeks prior to your intended stay! But we got lucky every step of the way and found sites that were convenient and somewhat easy to find. Since there were five of us, we had two seperate tents with Dave and I sharing one. It was pretty small but very cozy and warm even though it got a little chilly at night. A week prior to our road trip, it got pretty cold and it hit me that I was going camping by the sea in May. Oy...but a week and several sleeping bags later, everything was toasty.

We spent a lot of time in the van driving around the coast and I was amazed by all the amazing scenery we saw and the fine weather we had. I can't really remember all the notable sights (I guess they weren't so notable after all), but we visited one place that was breathtaking (see left). I don't remember the name of the place, but I really loved it. We only stayed one night but it was awesome. We also met a group of wild Thai boys who hooted and hollered late into the night. We chatted with one of them and he had the cutest/thickest accent I've heard here in Japan. He was a trip.

And that's about it. It really was one of those "you should have been there" trips. What can I say? We laughed, we played, we talked (maybe too much - my bad) and they went swimming. I want summer to come as badly as everyone else, but I haven't lost my damn mind. It was too damn cold. The water was so cold, it even looked cold. When Dave got in, I heard him hollering from from the other side of the beach. He screamed, "there is no pleasure in this". Indeed.

2007-05-09T13:56:00.000+09:00

My spring vacation (part 1)...

I little while ago, some friends and I were planning on taking a week off and going camping. Due to a few reasons (not enough vacation days, other plans, the desire NOT to go camping for a full week), our camping trip was halved. I had already asked for the days off and there was no way I was going to go back and ask for them back. So I made other plans, and boy, did they work out well.

I decided to go to Tokyo for four days and while I have been to Tokyo many times before, it was my first time to go there alone and hang out with my friend Petra. She's been living there for a total of 5 years and knows this vibrant city like the back of her hand. I got to see the Tokyo you can't really find in the guidebook.

We explored the seediness and sexiness of Shinjuku. We hit the Gay Village (racks and racks of every kind of gay porn imaginable - even sumo love!), walked around in Kabuki-cho (or the "pink" district with its love hotels and host/hostess bars), and stumbled through Korea town where we tasted things with our eyes and noses rather than our tongues.

We went to a photograph exhibit at a "nomadic" museum (a travelling installation) and it was so beautiful. Animals shot with children and adults in beautiful sepia tones. I haven't seen an art show in maybe 3 years, so when I heard that "Ashes and Snow" was coming to Tokyo (actually Odaiba, a man made island just off of Tokyo), I knew I had to go (thanks Greggie for the heads up!). It was totally worth the 1800 yen ($18) admission fee. This is me doing a cartwheel in front of the place. Yes, that's an elephant kneeling in front of a child reading a book. Yes, those are train containers, which are stacked in a checkerboard formation and arranged to house the exhibit. Check out www.ashesandsnow.org for amazing pics and info. BTW, the creator of this exhibit is a Canadian. Woot!

On my last full day there, Petra and I bought one-day train tickets and explored the city. We hit up little stores, walked through old neighbourhoods and very un-Japanese-y markets (where I scored the cutest white flats), soaked up the amazing summer-like weather and ate authentic Bretonne crepes. I remember the last time I had Bretonne crepes - it was when I was living in Ottawa and I went to a creperie. I don't exactly rememberwhich crepes I had but one was a meal crepe and the other was a dessert one. What I had wasn't important. It was delicious and I left that creperie very satisfied (damn, that was about 6 years ago!!).

Well, this sweet little creperie was hidden in a Tokyo neighbourhood and the menu was so enticing that we had lunch there. It was not a mistake. The place was charming, the music was delightful and I even got to speak French. Our Japanese waiter had a pitch perfect accent and I was practically drooling with the overstimulation. Though I'll be surrounded by French in a matter of weeks (!!!), I'm looking forward to eating and ordering crepes in France and Belgium sometime in the future.

All in all, I had a great time in Tokyo this time around. It's funny. When I visited the city during my first time in Japan 4 years ago, I didn't really care for Tokyo. I thought it was loud, crowded and obnoxious. But I've had several opportunities to see its softer side and I truly enjoy and appreciate it. Yeah, it's decadent to the max but it can be quaint and quiet when you go to the right places. I hope to visit there again right before I leave the country.

This dude here was a trip. He loves talking to foreigners (in Japanese) and I hope to bump into his stall again in a couple of months. He was funny, charming, and best of all, gave us discounts. My kind of guy!

I'll write about my camping experience really soon.

Love and mochi.

2007-04-27T14:33:00.000+09:00

A hop and a skip down memory lane...

I don't really have anything of note to report. The last few weekends have been simply delightful; drinking alcohol under the cherry blossom trees, spending time admiring natural beauty with the fine-assed Scot, eating good food, going to a sleepover, making two dolls in one day...nothing newsworthy, but everything special. The workdays have been moving along, some more fun than others, but everything has been worth it because of the kids. I was trying to adapt to a new curriculum thrown at me out of nowhere, but asserted myself and said that I didn't spend over a year making my own curriculum (with all the accompanying games, worksheets, bingo cards, mini cards, flashcards, etc) to have everything changed in my last few months and all my hardwork be for naught. Luckily, the higher powers agreed with me, and I'm going to stick with my own plans and save the new stuff for the next ALT. Thank goodness. I was starting to have dreams about it.

So in this post, I decided to write about me, specifically my hair. If you've been reading over the past year, you know that I cut my hair 13 months ago. Actually "cut" is a misnomer. I had my locks shaved off. Poor David got quite a shock when I came back from Montreal with a haircut that was like something out of an early 90's R&B video. Actually, poor me. I'm not going to lie - it was quite an adjustment (you can go through earlier posts if you want to see what my hair looked like). I went from having to style my hair every morning with a comb, brush, product and a prayer to a quick wash and dash. At certain times, I wonder if it would ever grow.

But grow it did and I started twisting it about 4 months after I cut it. Twisting is a good style for me since I work with small children with curious hands who always try to get into my hair. Plus I could just wake up and go without having to deal with hair drama. Also, twisting my hair keeps me from manipulating it and I believe it makes my hair grow healthier and faster.

I really started falling in love with my hair and grew to accept that it was not straight, or even really curly. It's nappy as hell and I can't really argue with it when refuses to swing to and fro in the soft breeze. But it's unique, like me.

This pic was taken the day I tried to put my thick, kinky hair into a ponytail on top of my head. I was shocked that I actually succeeded and awed by how good it looked. When I tried it out at school, the kids told me I looked like a mushroom. I told them that I didn't care, that I thought I looked good.

So here I am, 13 months later, with hair a few inches shorter than it was before I cut it and a helluva lot more healthy. When I learned how damaging a perm (straightener/relaxer) was, I decided that my health was more important that fashion (though being natural is en vogue these days - go figure).

I'll try to post more Japan-related stuff more often, but to tell the truth, I spend my days soaking up the atmosphere and feelings. Sometimes I see such beautiful things and I want to reach for my camera, but then I stop short because I know pics wouldn't really do them justice. Just like the smells, sounds and tastes - descriptions just don't suffice. But as this advetnure draws to and end, I'll try my best to export my experiences so y'all can learn about Japan through my eyes.

Alright. Golden Week is about to start for me in...1 minute! I'll be off for a week - Tokyo for the first half, and camping in Ishikawa/Nagano for the latter half. Damn, I can't wait. I'll be on the bus tomorrow morning. Big city lights, here I come!

2007-04-16T18:42:00.000+09:00

Posting interrupted...

I was going to post my thoughts on the differences between Canadian and Japanese cultures in light of the recent visit by a contingency of Canucks, and my students impending visit to Alberta. I was also going to post some pics from my fantabulous weekend doing nothing with someone who means everything. But before I was to do all this, I wrote an email to one of my best friends who just had a very beautiful baby. We talked recently and while I wanted to talk to her again, I was out of money on my phone card, so an email had to suffice. While writing this email, I began to think about the "old days"- when I lived in Montreal and could simply pick up the phone and call one of my closest pals and talk, bitch, moan, commiserate, cry, fact-check and do any number of other important activities. But now here I am, thousands of kilometres away, sending an email to a woman whom I've known since before my first everything, asking how she was doing after the birth of her child. It struck me as kinda odd and a little sad. Then I remembered the other 2 babies whose births I missed, and the weddings that I will miss this year and it made me feel so mournful. I didn't cry (though I wanted to), but I thought about those lovely girls in my city of home as I frantically moved around my kitchen, trying desperately to distract myself (thankfully it worked).

If people can be home, then there's no place like home and I'm definitely homesick.

2007-04-11T14:25:00.000+09:00

So fleeting (or saying goodbye, part 1)
The sakura (cherry blossom) season is drawing to a close and it will be my last in Japan. Cherry blossoms don't last long at all (about a month) so you kinda have to remind yourself to appreciate its beauty while you have it. I think the sakura is a fitting symbol of my time in Japan. You sometimes take it for granted, you're sometimes underwhelmed by its presence and then sometimes, when you know it will count the most, you are awed by it. I find myself drawn to its trees at my school and I stare intently at it to the point where the colours and textures disappear. It gets me thinking about my life here and its frustrations and joys. Were it not for Japan, I'd be lacking in so many ways: in experiences, in challenges, in love. I came to Japan and fulfilled the cliche: I found myself. Uggh. It sounds so overdone, but it's so true. It's not that I was terribly lost before, but I guess I'm sure now.

I also think about the relationships I've forged and how I know that the future of these unions is not certain. But rather than be sad about it, I've accepted the possibility of growing apart. And that has given me the ability to appreciate what I have NOW.

Conversely, the imminence of the future is so delicious and daydreaming so addictive. When the little annoying things grate at me, I grow and vilify them, lending validity to my mental escape routes. But I try (man, do I try) to stay focused on the present for it too quickly becomes the past.

I've started to say goodbye to places and things. I've soaked in an onsen for what will probably be the last time. I figure that by starting now, and saying goodbye slowly and in parts (or tiers), I might lesson the blow of leaving in July. Or maybe it's just wishful thinking. Ask me in August.

2007-04-03T15:18:00.000+09:00

Ch-ch-changes...

So yeah, everything is blooming and I feel like I want to get in on the action, so welcome to the new and improved Persimmon Chronicles. I used the previous template for over a year and a half and being the Gemini/Horse sign that I am, I felt like it was time for a change. Like it? Even if you don't, I'm the brains in this outfit, so there.

As I previously mentioned, it's the start of a new school year and that means new faces in the teachers rooms and the schools, and also new seating arrangements. I like that I've moved for two reasons: I'm closer to the door at both schools (making sneaking out during meetings that much easier) and I've got my back to the wall, ensuring that I don't have to feel SOOO guilty about being on the internet at work. But with the good, comes the not so good: my sworn nemesis (in my own head) has moved from the elementary school to the JHS. Oh joy, I get to see his face even more often in the stressful environment that is the JHS. Boo! Luckily, I don't have to team teach with his sickly looking ass anymore. Yay! But the best news is that the teacher switching that goes on every year actually works in my favour, particularly at the elementary school. Hee, hee, hee. I was actually smiling from ear to ear when I heard the news of who is teaching what this year. Could NOT wipe the grin off my face. Soon, I'll get back to teaching and I think I'm going to really enjoy my last semester with all my students, even the asshole-ish 7 year olds. Can't you smell my optimism???

Last week, I was hella busy with the visiting Canadians coming to my town. For some very strange reason, I was entrusted with translating and guiding duties. Luckily, they hired a pro to do the translation of official stuff for all but one of the events. You know, I quit studying Japanese about 2 - 3 months ago, but no joke, I've spoken more Japanese in the last little while than I have in probably forever. I have a lot more confidence and I'm more at ease when I'm communicating with folks. 'Twas good.

Anyway, I went to Kyoto and Takayama with the good folks from Devon, Alberta and wow, I'm temple-d the eff out. No more temples for me please, I'm done! Though the coolest thing EVER happened in Kyoto. We went to visit Kiyomizudera, a pretty famous temple complex and I saw a sumo wrestler!!! I LOVE sumo and I'm so PISSED that I lost the channels that I could watch sumo on, but I'm still a groupie. I plan on going to a tournament in July, right before we leave, and I intend on sitting so close, I can smell their thongs. How hot will that be??? I'm trying to figure out who this bad mama-jama is.

So I did way too much to remember (or care to), but I had a good time talking to new people and sharing my impressions and knowledge of Japan. A highlight was wearing kimono not once, but twice and receiving a million compliments. Spending outside school time with my kids was also wonderful and I must re-iterate, I love these kids so much. I was getting so much love from them and really felt the accumulation of my time here. I even got choked up at a mini-concert they performed for their guests. I had to go to the bathroom and let out a cry that had been sitting in my belly for a little too long. Sheeet, I'm going to miss them so much.

With all the changes going on in nature around here, I was thinking about changes on the personal level and how you can be walking around, doing your daily bizness, and you realize how much you've changed. I've felt like that fairly often lately: when I was listening to the Canadian teens talk about self-designed drama; when I've handled situations differently than I would have a couple of years ago; when I actually stop and think about the best way to act/respond when I did precious little years ago. It's really amazing to me sometimes, these things called life and growth. But on the other hand, I think about the things that haven't changed and how I'm grateful for their maintenance as they equal who I am. I think about the summer and how I'm going to get up to my old trips back home: putting on a slinky outfit and heels and strutting the streets; sitting cross-legged + bare-legged on a beautiful terrasse sipping cocktails, wearing shades and watching the humanity pass by; eating/laughing/making a scene and feeling COMFORTABLE doing so. 'Tis good.

Thanks to everyone who has taken part in this journey (my evolution is being "televised") from the sidelines and right in there in the mix with me. Special shot out to Hot Coffy, whom I don't even know but whose handle I love and whose messages make me feel special. Thanks to those who take the time to comment and to those who read and tell me stuff later. Makes me all warm and fuzzy inside. Dan, don't work too hard. Life's too short.

2007-03-27T13:48:00.000+09:00

Spring in my step

I do believe that Spring is now here. I feel it in the air, in nature and in my bones. I feel like I'm on my way to being completely restored. School is out and I'm going to take the opportunity over the next two weeks to do some spring cleaning at work, organize myself for the new year, and get the ball rolling on organizing things for my successor.

I just got back from a short walk around the school grounds where I was thinking about how beautiful and clean it is here and how different it is from anything I've ever known. I'm having one of those "I love Japan" days and people, let me tell you, I'm going to miss it. I have tons to look forward to, but I know it's going to be extremely difficult to say goodbye.

I briefly chatted with a friend who had returned to Toronto after living in Japn for a few years and she's battling reverse culture shock HARD. I wonder what it's going to be like returning "home" to Montreal after calling some other place home for two years. And then moving away and calling yet another place home. I understand the meaning of what Dave has said several times to me in the past: people can be home. But what do we call those places where we physically are but are not technically home?

Yesterday, the visiting Canadians arrived and I got such a thrill from interacting with them and acting as a translator (my god, since "quitting" Japanese, I've spoken more of it than ever before). It's been awhile since I've felt that exhilirated at something work-related. I hope it's a sign of things to come.

The other day Dave and I were talking about doing things every weekend before we leave and I counted how many we actually have and there's on 17!! The weekends are hard because we basically have to cram everything into 2 days. So many places to see, so little time. BUT, we have booked our tickets for Miyako-jima in Okinawa for my birthday in May. We'll visit the lovely Julia, whom I've been communicating exclusively with during our time in Japan. Getting excited.

Hope all is well with you!

2007-03-26T10:11:00.000+09:00

Peer pressure, beer pressure...

It's the end of the school year here, and along with the long boring graduation/closing ceremonies in the unbelievably cold gym, there are parties. Lots and lots of parties. Japanese teachers work hard, so not surprisingly, they party hard (okay for a few hours about 3 times a year, but they go all the way). Last week, I went to two. I'm not going to another one tonight. My liver, and my wallet, need a break.

I've mentioned before that alcohol is a social lubricant here but I wonder if it's also used for social cohesion. After over a year and a half of attending all manners of parties, I'm not really sure if I like how the drinking aspect of the soiree is handled. The unspoken rule is that you're not supposed to fill your own glass. This is especially true for the principals and vice-principals. You must be on top of their glasses all the time because they are the bosses. You don't want their drinks to run out lest you want to spend the rest of your career in office purgatory. Or so it seems to me.

So this is the scene: you're working on your meal and working on being entertaining to your neighbours while trying to understand their enquiries about your life outside work. Suddenly, out of the corner of eye, the lunch lady/gym teacher/school affairs officer is bringing the sake/beer bottle to your glass. But it's still full. What do you do? Well, you pick that sucker up and either take a polite sip (usually if you're a lady) or chug it down (if you're a big, strong man). At this point, the pourer (the aforementioned co-worker) gives the pouree (that's me) a hit of the jesus juice. Rinse. Repeat. Many, many times. I used to think this was charming. Now I find it annoying. The other night, I wasn't feeling well as I suspected I was coming down with a cold. I had an enkai to go to that evening so I soldiered up and went (backing out was not an option), but decided that I wouldn't drink. Easier said than done.

When I arrived, I explained to my seat neighbours that I was feeling under the weather and would not be drinking. Knowing that I like to whet my whistle on occasion, I was met with ridicule. My beer glass was filled. I obliged them and drank it. At this point, the warm sake came. Confirming my love for warm sake (for the 20th time), my sake glass was filled. Again, the lady doth protest. But apparently not enough. I obliged them. Then I turned both my sake and beer glasses over. Oh, the howls of protest that followed. For the rest of the evening, and when I attended the after party, my desire to remain not drunk was tested as my co-workers and city hall employees begged me to drink with them, to be one of them, when I so blatently didn't want to be. At 11:oo p.m. on a Monday night, I called it quits and bid their drunk asses goodnight.

Ladies and gentlemen, I rest my case on this charge of beer pressure.

In Japan, there is an oft-quoted saying: The nail that stands too tall, must be hammered down. Often times, I feel that I am that nail, and my co-workers, my students, my neighbours and my Japanese friends are that hammer. I'm constantly told how to sit, how to eat, how to dress, how to pose for pics, how to behave and how to be. I am a foreigner in a land that believes in uniformity, conformity and the ever-mighty group. I knew this before I came and can accept it most of time. I don't often complain about this, but there are days when I'm tested.

The beer pressure, the peer pressure: these are things I cannot change but I fight them because if I didn't, I'd lose myself. I didn't come here to become Japanese. I came to become who I am and who I will be. I used to notice these little wrinkles I got on the sides of my mouth, the so-called laugh lines. But they looked so deep and I wondered if I got them from faking my smile for so long. Now, I don't spend a great deal worrying about wrinkles because my momma's got fabulous skin, and while such a thing is mostly genetic, I don't need to jinx myself and bring out things that don't need to be there. So what did I do? I stopped faking it. I stopped saying everything was delicious when it tasted like ka ka. I stopped laughing at jokes I didn't understand. I stopped doing things I didn't want to do and saying things in the hopes of pleasing everyone. I learned the importance of being me, and staying me, at all the times. I still act diplomatically as I know my role as a cultural ambassador, but I don't pretend anymore and now the wrinkles are gone.

That's not to say that their are still little trials everyday. I wrote the following poem the other day when I arrived at my elementary school's graduation wearing a gray-brown suit while everyone else was wearing black (keep in mind I'm [not] an artist and I'm [not so] sensitive about my shit - ref?):

They try to hammer me down,
but I'm strong, oh so strong.
My will is formidable
and I won't bend, I can't.
Then why do I feel the pinpricks
of their eyes
on my back,
my neck?
I care, but I don't,
but apparently not enough.
I'm different;
beautifully,
fashionably,
exotically,
wonderfully,
erotically
different.
But I'm different;
terribly,
disastrously,
scarily,
horribly,
disturbingly
different.
Amazing.
Dismaying.
This is my life (July 2005-July 2007).

Oh, the joys and trials of teaching English in Japan. The beautiful struggle. I love it. I loathe it.

2007-03-15T20:08:00.000+09:00

Looking back, looking forward...

I've been pretty emotional as of late for several reasons: It's winter which means trying to get out under the thumb of feeling SAD, the season of goodbyes has started, it recently snowed non-stop for three days, and I miss my someone special. I'm also thinking back on all the things I've experienced in this country, mainly remembering the good things because there are so many. That, along with my future plans, coupled with the fast-approaching departure from Japan in July is also having an affect on me. I'm in the early stages of getting ready to leave. My contract will end on July 24, my car insurance will be cancelled on July 26, and if all goes well, I will fly out of Tokyo no later than July 31. That means that I have just over 4 months to say proper goodbyes to my students, my co-workers, the friends that I've made here, the country, and to effectively close this chapter of my life. I have to plan speeches in Japanese, give meaningful gifts to the children and those that are special to me (this is of my own volition), pack up and get rid of all the stuff I don't want and ship stuff home, clean my apartment, create a good welcome package for my successor, sell my car, and mentally prepare for my life post-JET. I'm sweating just thinking about it.

But I'm getting excited.

I'm getting busy and keeping myself occupied during those long lesson-free hours at my schools. I'm in the midst of career planning and figuring out how to get into a new field and I'm SO EXCITED about that. This kind of stuff turns me on. I've also been planning/preparing for not one, but two huge moves: one back home and the other to...
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.
.
.
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the UK. Yes folks, not content to have one great overseas adventure in my life, I'm planning for a second one. As I type this, my heart is beating a thousand miles a minute and I keep making typing mistakes, but I'm putting this out in the universe. I've only been thinking about it for about, oh...at least a year, but I haven't written about it because I'm superstituous and believe that some things should be kept private. But this is great news, no? In a few short months I will apply for a working holiday visa (send me your positive vibes, ok?), and if all goes well and on schedule, I will be in England by September. Ok, everyone, let's scream a collective AHHHHHHHHH!!! Deep breaths, deep breaths.

So it's no big wonder that I've been all over the map, but I'm getting back to a more balanced me. Over the next few months, I intend to write about all these things with the purpose of not only keeping you abreast on all the going ons in my life, but to lend structure to my ping pong ball thoughts.

Ok, my stomach is just starting to unclench from all this future talk, so let's switch gears and do something fun, shall we? I've been getting "tagged" a whole lot and while I usually ignore those email messages from folks, I thought it'd be different to post answers to those burning questions people seemingly want me to reply to. Here goes:

4 things you didn't know about me (cuz I couldn't think of five):

1. I'm afraid of the dark. Seriously, I'm a grown woman and I sometimes have sleepless nights because I'm so afraid of what might be lurking under my bed, in my closet or out in the forests. I've watched too many scary movies and have heard/seen too many wacked out things, plus I have a vivid, technicolour imagination. While I can sleep fine the majority of the time, I sometimes have those nights where I sleep with the lights on. I curse the following movies: An American Werewolf in London, Signs, and The Grudge.

2. I sometimes have fashion shows in my apartment. By myself. Yes, I sometimes like to take out the cute things I have in my closet and strut around in my apartment like I'm Naomi Campbell. But I have experience; I've been in several (school) fashion shows and I can work it.

3. I love gross out humour. I'm a voracious reader of literature and non-fiction, I love art house and foreign flicks, and I read the news. But tell me about a movie or a show that involves fart jokes, diarrhea and double entendres, and I'm all over it. Anchorman, Dumb and Dumber and Family Guy are a few of my faves.

4. I hate shopping for gifts. I suffer from major gift-giving anxiety and I absolutely hate shopping for gifts. I'm afraid of the receiver hating my gift, ripping it to shreads and taking out my heart while it's still beating. I try to think about gifts months in advance, but if I forget and I'm stuck for time, I'll freak out, go shopping for hours, wear myself out and eventually get something that I don't love. Blech.

Hee hee. I feel good.

2007-03-14T09:23:00.000+09:00

Having fun on the cheap...

As I mentioned in a recent post, a few friends and I hit a karaoke bar and sang our hearts out for a little while (okay, 3 hours). I'm not a karoke fiend like some others I know, but every once in a while, I'll strain the vocal cords for the sake of self-expression, stress release and hearing a good song. Regardless of your singing ability (howling dogs ain't got nothing on me), more often than not, karaoke is a good and not-so-expensive night out.

In Japan, karaoke, like onsensing (I'll explain shortly), is one of those things that you do to simulataneously expel the pressures of a hard day and embarrass yourself. Prior to coming to Japan, I'd done karaoke'd twice. In Japan, I've lost count. But it's pretty cool in Japan. I'm not sure if Canadian karaoke bars have undergone radical technological transformations, but I really love the computerized nature of this past time. Here's how it works: After setting up a room with the clerk, you can either used a handheld computerized song book or a tradtional paper book. You choose a song or three or five (which is usually against proper karaoke etiquette), punch the number into the remote control or the handheld thingy, wait for your song to come up on the screen, and belt it out. And the coolest part is while your singing and sweating and making love to the microphone, you can pick up the phone in your room and place a call to reception for drinks and food. Pretty hot, if you ask me.

I can't really say how much all of this costs, especially when you lose track of time and stay in the room, usually devoid of windows for FIVE HOURS, but it's a relatively cheap night out and good fun when you're with your friends. Sometimes the end of the night can be a headache though, especially when you've got 2 rooms, 15 people and one bill. Eeek, bad memories all over again. But for me, I can go every few months and find myself having a good time.

Another way to have a good time in Japan without parting with too much of your hard-earned yen is going to the onsen (hot springs). This is another national past time. Onsening is essentially getting naked in front of strangers, for a fee, but if you're not too shy or don't give a fack, it's a worthwhile and pleasurable experience. I love my neighbourhood onsen with it's lovely outdoor baths, cool lavendar pool, a bunch of jacuzzis, a sauna and a steam room, and so much beautiful nature (it's on a mountain). It costs 800 yen and you can stay for as long as you like. There are also massage chairs, the ubiquitous vending machines, two full service restaurants and an adjoining hotel. A few weeks ago, I went all by my lonesome and had a blast. I started out the evening by having a delicious dinner of miso-katsu don (fried pork cutlet with miso sauce on a bed of rice in a hot pot - very Korean), then made my way to the women's locker room. In my neighbourhood, the baths are sex-segregated, but I've been told that there are mixed sex ones and even private ones for just you and that someone special. Anyway, after getting a locker key and a towel (for 200 yen, or you can just bring your own), I entered the comfortable locker room with its tatami mats, long mirrors and bright lights, and proceeded to get completely nekkid. This can be a little daunting for the unintiated at first, but after a few visits, you get used to it. That is, unless you see the kids that you teach, with their mothers, and just sometimes, one of your first grade boys, who is openly staring at your goods while you try to be cute and ask him, in English, how he is. But I digress.

So, you get naked, lock up your stuff, but the key on an elastic on your wrist or ankle and get into the onsen room. First, before even stepping into a bath, you wash every inch of your body at the shower/scrub station. I usually bring my own things like face wash and the like, but body soap, shampoo and conditioner are provided free of charge. When I went last time, I brought my Oyin products, a shower cap and a spare towel to give myself a deep conditioner while soaking (my hair was absolutely luxurious after my hour in). After bathing, you can then get into a bath. You can use a "modesty" towel to cover your most precious bits, but it's of very little use for anyone who is above the age of 5. But be warned: TOWELS SHOULD NOT GO IN THE BATH! I don't know why, but it's a rule, and it must be obeyed.

And that's about it. You take your time dipping from bath to bath and you just sit and soak. I usually go with a pal, but I've gone with co-workers, and it's a time to catch up and let your hair down, so to speak. I've seen more naked Japanese ladies than I care to remember, but it's an experience I definitely recommend. You feel great (it's almost like getting a full bodied message), and man, are you clean! Oh yeah, some onsens have a rule about no tattoos but it's mainly to keep out the yakuza (yes, they do exist, even in my village), but I think for the most part, foreigners can get away with having one or a few. I have one on my back, and while I do cover it up when my students are around, it's not a big concern for me.

Gosh, don't I just sound like a brochure for Japan???

2007-03-09T14:30:00.000+09:00

Been there, done that...

But not in that cynical kinda way...for the most part. The last two weeks have been pretty intense. Lots of travel, lots of seeing and doing things, lots of eating, drinking, laughing and bitching, and precious little sleep. Let take a trip down memory lane, shall we? On February 24, I took the night bus from Nagoya to Shinjuku and let me tell you, it was hella ghetto. I mean, there was a freaking chandelier at the back of the bus. Even the Japanese people were like WTF? It was super cheap though (3,200 yen, about $33), but not worth the price. Ohhhh, Orion Tours, never again.

So, got into Shinjuku at 5 a.m. and made my way to my girl Petra's place to grab a few hours of sleep before my wax appointment. Yeah, that's right, I'm in a foreign country, but I still gotta take care of my bizness. And let me tell you, it was good. But I didn't go all the way to Tokyo for a (very, very, very, very slammin') brazilian wax. No, that would be insane. Worth it, but insane. No, no, I went all the way to Tokyo to attend the 2007 Conference for Returning JETS.

It took place at the stunning Pacifico Hotel in Yokohama (seen on your left) and was definitely worth going to, in my opinion, and not just because we had 3 days off and were let loose in the big city. Despite the ill-focused nature of some of the workshops, geared primarily for those who will be staying in Japan, a few of them were really useful in terms of finding post-JET employment, dealing with re-entry culture shock, making the most of your JET experience, etc. I went to the conference without any expectations, so I left satisfied. I took plenty of notes and the juices in my head, that had all but froze over the winter, flowed freely and wildly and I started planning, thinking and researching as a direct affect of the conference. Jeremy, you asked what I'll be doing post-JET...well, I've got plans (and how!!), but I was debating on whether or not to post them. I'm pretty free with what goes down in my life, as you probably already know, but I'm a bit superstitious about certain things. But who knows, I might share what I'll be doing sooner rather than later...we'll see.

Let's see, what else? Yokohama is famous for their (expensive) Chinatown, where incidently, was the location of our shitastic hostel. I ate too much Chinese food, but enjoyed it nevertheless, and especially enjoyed going to karaoke with Christina, Dave, Ed and Bridget. I also went on the tallest ferris wheel in the world with Dave and snapped some pics.

God, I don't really remember anything else exciting to share with you. Been there, done that.

Another place I went to recently was Hida Furukawa. Ok, let me tell you the deal - the good people of the Hida Furukawa City Hall want to drum up foreign tourist business in the area. To this end, they sent out an invite to the Gifu City Hall office to have some ALTs come to the town for a weekend in order to give them some feedback on attracting foreigners. There would be eating, skiing/snowboarding/snowmobiling, sightseeing, cultural stuff and it would all be for FREE. Those who know me well know that that's my favourite freaking word. We got to stay at a nice hotel with BEDS, eat some expensive assed food, hang out with some old pals and make some new ones and get smothered with Japanese culture. Seriously, it was a lot. As a second year JET, I've done everything we did at least once, but it was nice to practically be given the keys to the city. Oh, and I went skiing, which I haven't done since 11th grade. I told my instructor that it had been about 10 years since I last put on skis but he took me up to the top of the very high hill and made me remember what I thought I had forgotten. It felt really good to ski down the mountain, free and semi-competent. It was also especially gratifying since the lesson was entirely in Japanese save for the words "teacher", "up" and "down". It felt good to hold down conversations with a perfect stranger while re-learning how to ski. Me = supastar.

Well, that's about it. You're updated. I wrote more than I actually meant to about my recent travelling. I have a whole bunch of things about life in Japan that I want to blog about: the karaoke experience, school life, observations about the Japanese, etc. I will try to squeeze in some shorter entries in the coming weeks, but it might be hard as they'll be jam packed. 27 Canadians from small town Alberta will be descending on this tiny, mountain village at the end of the month and I'll be endowed with entertaining, interpreting and translating duties. I will also be attending graduation and year end ceremonies, welcome and goodbye parites, going to doll class, hosting a goodbye party, and going to Kyoto and Takayama, all this month. Throw in seeing the hot Scot and having some semblance of some down time, and I'm completely booked. Should be a trip. Wish me luck.

2007-02-24T10:27:00.000+09:00

The Meaning of Natsukashii...

There is a word in Japanese that I absolutely love and it's natsukashii, which means nostalgic. I learned it last summer and I've been using it a lot lately. I most recently used it yesterday during lunch time. See, everyday at the JHS, there is a student message that comes over the PA, usually about what we're eating and any special announcements, followed by a couple of songs. Teachers and students usually provide a CD and give a brief description of what a specific song means to them. I had to do this one day, without any advance warning, and I was forced to pick a song from Mariah Carey's Greatist Hits. I chose "Dreamlover" because it reminded me of dances at Lachine High School, where Dal, Lenny, Reena and I, would "get down" in our freshest gear. Good times, totally natsukashii. Anyway, Ishikawa-sensei requested "Livin' On a Prayer" by Bon Jovi. Aside: I have always been a huge Bon Jovi nut. I can sing the chorus and sometimes the whole song on most of their tunes and "Livin' On a Prayer" is the gold standard when I go out to karaoke. So when this song came on, and my students continued to eat their lunch without realizing they were listening to pure aural GOLD, I was a bit sad. Yeah, they were born in 1991 and this song came out in 1987, but who cares! IT'S THE SHIT.

So while I was eating my cold fish and warm rice, I was thinking about how great this song is and how many times I've sung it at karaoke with my pal Ed. That's us belting it out last year at Jeff's birthday. I don't know how many times I've sung it with him, but we always give it all we have, with Ed sometimes losing his voice. I started to think that the time we've had here has been so precious and I'll be leaving with so many good memories. I actually started to tear up. I heart my time here. For those of you who have lived abroad or in different cities, what good memories do you have? What was hard/easy to leave behind?

I also got natsukashii a few weeks ago when the second grade class, who are going to Canada in a few months, were shown Canadian money. I actually picked up a $20 bill from the table and sniffed it, hoping to find that distinctive Canadian money smell. It was gone. But feeling it between my fingers made me ache for home and shopping on St. Catherine St.

Without a doubt, leaving here will be too bittersweet. My 9th graders will be graduating in two weeks and I know I'm going to bawl like a baby, just like I did last year. But this year's graduation will be even more sad for me as I've watched these kids grow and mature over a year and a half. So not going to be pretty.

Well, I'm going to Tokyo/Yokohama tonight for a three day conference for JETs who will be leaving in July. We'll learn about how to deal with reverse culture shock, re-entering the job market, and how to best use our experiences on JET in our future. I think it'll be useful for me. I'll also get to be in the BIG city, see my friend Petra, catch up with some old heads and window shop. It's exactly what I need right now.

So here is a big ol pic of me. I'm posting this pic to show you how much my hair has grown since I cut it all off last year. This was the first time that I was able to put it all into a massive ponytail and I'm oh so proud. I feel pretty, oh so pretty...

BTW, shot out to my "little" sister Lisa who will be 25 today! Happy bday sis!

2007-02-18T11:35:00.000+09:00

One big happy family - inside my head...

I got a couple of emails from friends and my sister who read my last blog and thought I was up to here with Japan and my sister said I should just get the hell out. When I wrote that post, I wasn't particularly upset or ready to pack my bags, I was just sort of venting. Yeah, I get frustrated, but I'm not going to quit. THINGS ARE GOOD. Trust me, I have my days, and who the hell doesn't, but for the most part, THINGS ARE GOOD. Let me just break it down for ya, huh?

The job, without a doubt, is tough. Keeping the attention of little minds, especially when you're not fluent in their language is not as easy as it may seem. Sometimes I want to pull my hair out, particularly now because the year ends in 5 weeks, and the kiddies know it. They've been acting like little assholes lately and their homeroom teachers are letting shit slide. It's irritating and sometimes stressful, but my relationships with the students are rewarding. Last week, some dude wrote an article about abolishing the JET Programme, claiming its a waste of money, students aren't really learning English and the whole thing needs to be scraped. When I read the article, I was nodding my head and pumping my fist in agreement with him. I could go on about the problems and possible remedies, but what good is that going to do me? I'm here NOW. The programme is still going on NOW. Rather than gnawing on the hand that feeds me, I rather just slap it some five for giving me opportunities unparalled.

I am so lucky and while it may seem that I focus on the negative sometimes, these periods are short-lived. I have too much to be grateful for: the mountains outside my door, my sweet little apartment, some semblance of a social life, health, love, money, future plans, my easy going students, and just being alive. And when shit gets me down, I just remember that I have 5 months left here and I better make the most of it. Japan has been really, really good for me and to me. That's all I can really say. But when you see me and talk to me face-to-face, you'll see that I've changed and for the better. And I can't shake a stick at that...

2007-02-07T16:02:00.000+09:00

Honestly speaking...

I just want to get a few things off my chest. This is not a rant, just some... confessions.
Even though it was a new year's resolution, I believe I will be giving up studying Japanese imminently. I think I've fought the good fight and made a lot of progress from when I first arrived, but it's been slowing down A LOT as of late. I'm just not motivated. I've been self-studying exclusively for 18 months and I've hit my wall. I've hit it a few times before, but I think this is the end. I'm a student to the core - I need the student-teacher interaction, the homework, the tests. I could get that in either Ogaki or Gifu, two big cities that offer classes, but I gotta be honest: I'm not willing to put in the 2-2.5 hour round trip twice a week. I'd have to give up my weekly chat sessions with Shiloh, my eikaiwa (English conversation) group, going to the gym with Habu sensei, or my one free night a week. It's all about priorities, right? It's more important to me to keep my relationships and myself healthy. And I don't see Japanese fitting into my future. I rather keep my French, thanks.

I HATE being stared at. As a foreigner, I know it's to be expected in a homogenous culture. As a Black foreigner, I feel like a naked alien being pointed and stared at, and talked about. You know, I like attention to a certain degree, but I don't like feeling like I'm a one woman freak show. I know I'm not alone in this country, but I just find it extremely rude and disrespectful when people are openly staring when I'm going about my business. I'm keenly aware when people are talking about me and it pisses me off when people are so deliriously surprised to see a foreigner of my colouring. I especially hate it when I'm in my car and the occupants of the next car over will openly point, laugh and talk about me. Sometimes I want to yell "fuck off! Mind ya business that's all, just mind ya business." But I can't because not only do I represent foreign ALTs, but I represent Black Canadian ALTs. I'm looking forward to being invisible in public again.

Living in Japan was not my first choice. When I was looking into changing my life and experiencing something new, Japan didn't immediately pop into mind. I knew ex-JETs, but Japan seemed a little too...bland to me. (Don't shoot me - just an opinion). Aside from kimonos, sushi and karate, little excited me about the culture. When I think about cultures that are exciting and flashy-flashy, I think of China, the Mediterranean and Mexico. When I thought about Japan, I thought of quiet respect and tradition. I was looking for an adventure and a chance to really challenge myself and live outside my comfort zone. I did a lot of research and the JET Programme matched a lot of my needs and desires. There are a lot of sketchy programs out there and I wasn't about to give up a permanent, comfortable job for something that would find me broke, in slavery or dead on the other side of the world. JET suited my comfortable sensibilities and I can now say, without a doubt, that IT WAS THE BEST THING EVER FOR ME. Japan gave me a chance to SLOW DOWN. I have grown so much since coming here, and while there are little things that I truly, truly LOVE about this country, I absolutely and fiercely treasure my time here. For me, applying to JET was more about me than Japan, the job or the money. It's so selfish, but so worthwhile.

On the heels of that confession, here is another on a similar vein: I don't love Japanese food. Before coming here, I appreciated the subtle flavours, and over the last year and a half, I've tried a variety of interesting and sometimes utterly delightful food. But I'm not in love with it as much I savour the flavours of French, Chinese, Greek and Indian cuisines. Last week, I hit the food hall. I was having some kind of soba by-product that was boiled and I wanted to spit it out. I had a total stereotypical "Black" moment where I wanted to say "Yo, where's the hot sauce?!" I didn't, but I wanted to. I've had Japanese food 5-6 days a week, thanks to the school lunch I get. And while I've enjoyed tasting nearly every possible thing in the food repertoire, my epicurean desires are not satisfied. Dan, thanks for the suggestions to eat as much sushi here before I go home, but do you know where I live? I live in Gifu, a landlocked prefecture. The sushi is all right. Not like Hokkaido, where you guys are surrounded by water. Fish straight off the pier vs. fish shipped in. You can taste a difference, trust me. But don't worry, I'm going to eat all the foods that I enjoy before I leave and take some of the recipes I've truly enjoyed for those times when I just NEED a taste of Nippon.

I am looking forward to returning to an office. When I first began this adventure, I was a little bit tired of being chained to my desk surrounded by paper. And you know what? On the other side of the world, it's the same thing! But I am in the classroom less than half the time, so it makes a bit of a difference, but not by much. I thought teaching could have been a possible profession for me. But it ain't for me. I know, I'm teaching ESL, but teaching doesn't light my fire. I love the kids, I love helping them, but to have my own classroom and teach day in and day out is not for me. I think back on my advising job and I miss it. It was dynamic, it was ever-changing and it was interesting. But back then, it wasn't enough. I'm grateful for this experience because now, I don't have this "what if?" I want to go back to working with adults in an office environment where I can have some privacy, a phone, a computer and some responsibility. I know now that work is not the important thing to me anymore, but still, I know where I belong in the work world now, and that's a good feeling.

Ahh, much better. Thanks for letting me share. I don't know if I've done a good job with accuarately and adequately talking about the positive aspects of living here. There have been so many amazing moments, revelations, people and experiences. I really need to share those. I promise, I will soon. Trust me, most of my time here has been a dream come true. I'm so in love on so many levels and I sometimes forget to convey this on this public forum. My loved ones know that I'm really, really happy. This has been the best time of my life and I will never ever NOT give Japan its props. I think it's my nature to be more vocal about the negative stuff while tending to hold back with the really good stuff, except with those who I'm really close to. So people, it's really, really good, a lot of the time.

Anyway, not much new here. Last week, the gang and I went skating near Dave's neck of the woods. Fun on ice...

I'm excited because many of the Oscar contenders are coming to theatres here soon: The Queen, Babel, The Last King of Scotland. Yeah, we know what I'll be doing for the next few months. ..

It is absolutely beautiful here. Yesterday, it was 12 degrees and sunny. We might get an early spring which will make up for the nearly 2m of snow we got last year. I’ve been hearing that it’s pretty cold in Eastern Canada. I feel for all my peeps in Montreal and T.O. Sorry guys!

My one year anniversary of being natural is coming up next month. I think I’ll post a visual trip down memory lane soon…

I found this on a site when I was searching for a game to teach comparatives:

Teaching Tip:
The main job of an ALT in the school is to encourage the use of spoken English; both inside and outside the classroom. Refuse to yield to the urge to speak to your students (or teachers) in Japanese, even if you know that they'd much prefer it if you did. Insisting that they communicate with you in English forces them to practice, and furthers their command of the language. This is important!! Remember, you are not employed to speak or teach Japanese; you are employed to speak and teach English. Save your Japanese practice for your own time.

This is what I believed since day one. I feel vindicated.

2007-01-29T21:13:00.000+09:00

Sweet and sweeter...don't wanna lose that taste...

Things have been good for your heroine in J-land. The weather has been sunny and relatively warm. The kids have been happy and smiling. I now feel more empathy rather than scorn for my co-workers. I received unexpected gifts and started to build some bridges. I'm half-way through my second year as an ALT and life post-JET is shaping up. Sweet, no? I just hope it lasts...

February will begin in a couple of days and while things have been good, I'm getting that feeling...like blah. I don't want to teach, I don't want to study/speak Japanese. I want to throw my kerosene heater out the window. I don't know...But the weekends are my salvation. Two weekends ago, Dave and I went to Gifu Park for a little walk and to hang out. I haven't been to downtown Gifu City in months, so it was a surprising treat to re-discover the area. We went to a charming cafe, Primo Luce, and I had Pelligrino along with my strawberry tart. It wasn't exactly the weather for it, but I wanted something that reminded me of home, you know? It was such a simple weekend with simple pleasures, but it was wonderful to the core.

This past weekend, I spent time with Shiloh, catching up and reveling in our mutual love and respect. Damn, I love that girl. After attending my last ever Gifu JET conference (yes!!!), we went out for pizza and talked NON-STOP for like 8 hours. The next day, we took a little hike on a bamboo trail then went to the Yoro International Centre to make Japanese sweets. I ate too many, but how could I not - they're so pretty! Luckily, I gave a couple away the next day, which alleviated the guilt of eating so many.

Well, I'm down to 6 months in Japan and while I'm living each day, I'm still subconciously counting down to the end. BUT, I can say without a doubt, coming to Japan was the best thing I could have down for my mind and soul, and my body ain't doing too bad either. I've met some of the most brillant people here who have challenged me and made me question and re-evaluate my life thus far. My future and my life have been changed and undoubtedly for the better. Hell, the sweet just isn't as sweet without the bitter...

2007-01-21T20:01:00.000+09:00

More postcards from Japan...

Life is interesting in Japan. Some pictures for your consideration...

These little cuties are showing off their kairo (?). Kairo is a basically a hot pocket, filled with god knows what. But when you squish the stuff inside, it gets comfortably warm and keeps your hands from getting frozen when your doing your daily business. I have yet to purchase them but I routinely steal them from the kiddies.

Close-up.

Really, look at him...The kid is a goon.

This is a message I wrote for the graduating 6th graders entirely in Japanese (hiragana) with some kanji thrown in. My Japanese fist is terribly lacking in beauty, but I was proud and happy to write all this myself (I had it checked before submitting the final product). The message will appear in the annual yearbook. It says "To the 6th grade: Congratulations on your graduation. Please study hard at junior high school, but have fun, too. Junior high school is difficult, but interesting (fun) as well. Please continue to study English. You are all good students and you speak English really well. See you at Neo Junior High School! From, Kaki."

I agree: Cats should be smacked.

This lovely character is on display at a clothing store at Malera, a huge mall about 40 minutes away from me. I usually go there to stock up on foreign foods and watch movies at their plush threatre. This horse always gives me the willies.

Nothing pisses a Scotsman off like seeing tiny dogs dressed in tiny clothes.

These sexy leather pants are exclusively for dogs! There is a dog clothing shop in the mall. I haven't bought myself any decent clothes here in 1 and half years, but there's a dog clothing shop in the mall. *Sigh*

I have a very sweet surrogate family here in Gifu. Ma (on the floor) and Pa Tokoro (right) are such sweet individuals and they took me under their wing almost immediately. I've spent weekends at their home and they've taken me out and pretty much made me feel like one of their daughters. I work with Pa Tokoro, and while he doesn't speak much English, when I couldn't speak much Japanese, he was always there with his denshi jisho (electronic dictionary) to make sure I could understand his invitations. This pic was taken at Ojisan and obasan's (grandpa and grandma's) house after a tasty dinner of sukiyaki. The young woman in the picture is Ma and Pa Tokoro's daughter who goes to university in Kyoto.

Me and the grandfolks. They love me.

This is a picture of a picture of Wonda, one of the Tokoro's dogs. Wonda, named after Stevie Wonder, along with the other dog, Mini, get dressed up in some pretty awful outfits. When Ma Tokoro told me she wants to dress them up in kimono (Japanese traditional formal wear), I nearly spit my beer out of my nose. I told them that Mini (a female) and Wonda (a male) should get married and wear a wedding gown and tuxedo, respectively. She told me that would be a bad idea because Wonda is like 40 years older than Mini. Hey, at least she's got some morals.

The sakura (cherry blossom): The ubiquitous flower of Japan.

2007-01-17T10:16:00.000+09:00

Ebony, ivory and everything in between...

I'm feeling a little...disturbed. Read here to see why (and read the comments too): http://afrobella.com/?p=142#comments For those of you too lazy to read it, one of my favourite bloggers posted a piece about interracial relationships. Specifically, she referenced a story about how Will Smith would like to do a romantic comedy with Cameron Diaz, but he thinks that America wouldn't be ready for such a flick. The blogger, Afrobella, asked readers to post their comments and I was really dismayed by what I read. Apparently, according to these readers, they (and America), would most definitely NOT be ready for a film showing black on white love, even if it starred two of America's most bankable film stars. Afrobella mistakenly thought "hey, it's 2007...aren't we there yet?" Reading those comments made me think "no fucking way".

I can't even begin to understand what a lot of Black people in America are going through. With the shadow of slavery, segregation and the violent civil movement still on the country, from what I gather, things seem to be pretty rough. But at whose hand? In a struggle, there is usually an offensive and a defensive. In the past, Whites have been the aggressor while Blacks have been forced to submit. At the late end of the 20th century, I believe, the roles had been reversed. I understand that Black people were/are angry (and with excellent reason), but wow, there seems to be so much vile spitting out of the mouths of my supposed brothers and sisters that it's just making me sick. God, where do I start? Let me try...

All that shit in rap "music" about niggas, hos, ballers, bitches...While I miss music videos, I'm kind of happy to be away from bitches getting champagne poured on them, bling thrown in the air by shot-callers, and video hos ass slapping on top of cars. I can't watch it. Who are these people? How have they become role models for Blacks? How is it that this language has seeped into everyday life like a foul smelling stream? Hip hop, I used to love her...

Black-on-Black hatin'...Speaking from personal experience, Black people dissing other Blacks for not being black enough is just plain old effed up. For example, I read about some Blacks not willing to support Barack Obama because he's a biracial immigrant, and doesn't understand what it's like to be Black in America. Wow, talk about shooting one's self in the foot. Here's a man who is tapped to be President and he doesn't get love from some narrow-minded folks because he's not Black enough!!! I've been dissed for being white-washed/brain-washed/a race traitor for not speaking in ebonics, hanging out and dating Whites and not acting the fool. Even my dear moms tends to remind me by saying "you're not white, you know." What is that? Is it fear, disgust, suspicion? I don't know but I think it does nothing but keep minds close and limit potential.

And that leads me to my last point. By being racist (some would say supporting our own), life and viewpoints are limited. My feeling on this is a bit complex, so let me try to explain it and give an example. Essence magazine, which I happen to pick up from time to time, is a Black magazine that covers issues found in all those mainstream magazines. Recently, they decided to celebrate "Black love" by inviting (Black) men to propose to their (Black) girlfriends through the magazine. Readers could then vote on their favourite couple and send them on an all-expense paid honeymoon in South Africa. While I find it encouraging to see Black couples in love and making the committment of marriage, especially seeing so many discouraging Black relationships portrayed in the media and in real life, I find it sad that all genuine love isn't usually celebrated in mainstream media (I can only thing of O(prah) magazine as the only consistently colour-blind publication). I understand that Essence is a Black magazine but I couldn't help but think why not celebrate love period? Am I too naive?

Living in Japan, and before that, Montreal, such matters are not part of my day-to-day. Inter-racial couples are de rigeur here, particularly between Whites and Japanese. I have friends who are or who have found love outside their race. All I can say that loving someone, anyone, is hard work and being there, no matter with whom it's with, should be celebrated, not questioned or looked down on. To those haters, all I can say is feel the love, no matter what colour it is...

***Please don't misconstrue what I've written as a rant against Black folks. Just needed to get somethings off my chest. Also, I know this has nothing to do with life in Japan and I'll get back to that soon.

2007-01-12T15:40:00.000+09:00

The Nasty...

We all do it, but we don't talk about it...until now: http://adventuresofblackwood.blogspot.com/2007/01/taking-care-of-business-in-japan.html Click here to be disgusted, entertained, informed and disgusted again. Seriously funny shit, pun intended.

It's the weekend. Yeah! My car's CD player works again. Yeah! I'm out!

2007-01-09T13:19:00.000+09:00

Thought I'd share postcards from Japan...

I really want to write something really, really good, but I'm afraid that my brain may have atrophied slightly from watching too many movies this past holiday season (Oh god, Red Dawn. Why, oh WHY???) So, I thought I'd send you some postcards of my life here in Japan. I've been taking crazy pictures so you all get to reap the rewards of my efforts...

This is my kochou sensei (principal) at the elementary school hamming it up for the camera. He loves the taste of sake and proceeded to get supa drunk at our year end party in December.

He showed me the correct way to indicate that you have finished with your sake bottles.

My eikaiwa (English conversation) ladies and I made soba (buckwheat noodles) in my apartment. I love soba and it was pretty easy to make. You mix soba flour and water and beat the dough until it's at the right consistency. Then you have to knead then flatten it with a long stick. This is back-breaking. After the dough is spread thin, you cut it really thin.

Since we were novices, our noodles came out a bit thicker, but it tasted good nonetheless.

This is a handmade hanging scroll Dave gave me for our anniversary. I love, love, love autumn and now I have something to always remind me of the autumn beauty of Japan. If you look closely, you'll see a blue bird on a branch.

This is a geisha doll I made a couple of months ago. In the background is a picture of my godson.

Here is a famous Japanese toilet complete with bidet, spray, flushing sound and a hot seat. I took this pic at the movie theatre because I thought it might make some of you jealous. Going to the bathroom in Japan is a sheer pleasure. A lot of washrooms have disinfectant for the toilet which you hardly need to use. And let me tell you, when it's 2 degrees in the school's washroom, a heated toilet is a LUXURY. Now, if I only I could buy one outside of Japan...I do believe it's possible...

Close up of the command station.

While many toilets have the tradtional handle or automatic flush, this particular toilet has a sensor that you wave your hand in front of to get the toilet to flush. Genius.

For some reason I can't load any more pics right now, but I'll post more pics soon...

2007-01-08T19:16:00.000+09:00

Bonzai, Happy New Year and all that good stuff…

Hope everyone had a wonderful and restful holiday and you all get hugs and good wishes for the upcoming year. Wow, 2007…it seems so futuristic. I have a feeling that this year will be odd. Full of upheaval, confusion and imbalance. Maybe I just feel that way because 7 is an odd number or maybe it’s because in 7 months, I will leave Japan and my life will be completely upside down. Well, the only thing I can do is just wait and see. Here’s hoping for a successful and prosperous new year!

On the subject of that, I celebrated my first new year’s eve in Japan. Dave hosted a party at his place (complete with home-made curry and tandoori chicken – DELISH) and we rang in the new year with friends, booze and board games (Taboo and Trivial Pursuit – Dave and I won, despite the head buzz and the fact that I don’t really like the game). I originally wanted to go to a shrine to do the traditional Japanese thing, but it was so cold outside and it had just gotten warm inside, so that idea was nixed. Anyway, it was a good time and we only went to bed when the sun came up. Yeah, my sleep pattern is horribly messed up, but it was worth it.

Will update soon. Latah.

2006-12-27T10:06:00.000+09:00

k-os in my life again...

But only the good kind (I'll expand in a minute). It's now a couple of days after Christmas and I'm back at the (mostly) empty office, at my JHS. I took Christmas and Boxing Day off and tried to make it as Western as possible. For those who don't know, the Japanese don't celebrate Christmas. Oh, it's here, in fact it's omnipresent and you can't walk down the street without passing a jinja (shrine) on the left and a huge blow up Santa on the right. Christmas in Japan is the pagan holiday all Christ-fearing people fear as it has all the fluff and none of the substance. Christmas here is sponsored by Kentucky Fried Chicken and Coca-Cola with the Japanese erronously believing that Westerner's eat fried chicken while spending time with their lover after a hard day at the office or at school. Let's not even talk about the lack of knowledge about Chanukah. Sigh, there's only so much one can teach.

Anyway, like most of my readers, I "enjoyed" a green Christmas. It's unsettling to be in a foreign country for Christmas for the second year in a row (last year was China), but to have no snow when there is usually snow...a bit "the end is nigh", dontcha think? But, in my eyes, this holiday was a special one for a whole bunch of reasons.

Dave and I shared this Christmas together and it puts a big, stupid grin on my face just thinking about it. I spent the first part of the weekend at his and we came to my village on Christmas eve. We picked up a few last minute essentials including foodstuffs and Christmasy movies (Die Hard, Gremlins and Scrooged - uh huh) and settled in for Christmas eve complete with a Christmas tree and pretty Christmas lights (couldn't get a good pic - sorry) and tacos. I just want to say that Die Hard is the SHIT. I haven't watched this flick in ages but damn, they really don't make movies like that any more.

Next scene - Christmas Day. Dave woke me up at 6:31 a.m. to give me a time update and wish me Merry Christmas. My sleep deprived ass was less than merry. Fast forward a few hours later and we were massacring wrapping paper and hee hee-ing like little kids. Among my gifts were a very pretty pair of pink drop earrings (my guy's got taste!) and the new k-os album, Atlantis: Hymns for Disco. As I held the CD in my hands, I welled up. It was exactly what I needed/wanted without hoping for it. I've been craving familiarity/home (see previous post) and it really touched me. I held it to my chest and said "thank you" about a thousand times. Among Dave's gifts were a pair of navy Converse All-Stars (his trademark) and Empire movie magazine. I was happy, he was happy, we played with our gifts and I spent two hours on the home with loved ones at home. 'Twas good.

On to Christmas dinner: I had ordered a turkey through the internet: www.themeatguy.jp (I told you - it's all about the chicken here; can't find a turkey in the shops), and Dave and I made the stuffing, the mashed potatos and the gravy from pan drippings. It smelled like home and the turkey turned out pretty well. We had sparkling rose wine, interesting conversation and love and affection. 'Twas good.

So, here I am, sitting in a near empty school, with the voice of k-os in my ears, and a glow of happiness in my heart and thankfulness for all the things that can't be bought in a store.

Merry Christmas to those I didn't talk to and Happy Holidays to everyone else.

Tomorrow I'll be at the elementary school doing nothing once again, then I'll be off for 6 days, back for 2 then off for 3 more. Tanoshimii (so looking forward to it). I'll be back soon.

2006-12-19T19:29:00.000+09:00

I miss...

Lives shows
Turntabilists
Old skool
Breakbeats
New York in the summer
Shopping in outside shops
People watching
Erykah Badu
"Black movies"
Lounges
Diversity
Shades of Blackness
Cinammon buns
Trying on/buying clothes
Music videos
Dave Chappelle
Lauryn Hill
Baseboard heaters
Sneaking into movies
Realness/Authenticity
My sisters
TV series that I can actually watch on TV
Sanaa Lathan movies
Watching taped episodes of Oprah with moms
Common
Sexy restaurants with market cuisine
French food
Shauna
Dahlia
Ayanna
Jenn
Cheryl x 2
Me

I tried it/I couldn't fight it/Now I want to get back to me/...Back to the (wo)man I used to be... k-os

2006-12-12T08:45:00.000+09:00

The Shape of Things...

I'm 5'6" (and a half) and my measurements are 33-27-39. I'm a skinny-minny on top and bootylicious on the bottom. Though I am a touch ill-proportioned, I'm often desribed as curvy, and that's A-OK with me. I'm very happy with my body and while I can't say I've always felt this way, years of workingon beliving in myself, developing my self-esteem and eating well and exercising has led me to this point. Oh, and the positive reactions of others have, in part, led to my comfort in my skin.

I have always attracted a fair amount of attention for my body. Sometimes it's really nice, sometimes I feel like punching a fool in the month. Sometimes it's a full on compliment, and other times it's non-verbal. While I have learned to accept comments with grace or ignore them outright, I've been completely flustered by my experiences with people's reactions/comments here in Japan.

I've been told then Japanese people communicate with new people by using compliments, be it an overly-effusive reaction to how well one uses chopsticks to how well you can speak Japanese. While I have received such remarks, it never fails to amaze me the inappropriateness of the comments I get about my body. I've had 2 kocho senseis (principals) tell me how beautiful my body is at work parties in front of everyone. I've had perfect strangers visit the school and tell me what a beautiful, curvy shape I've got and how lucky I am. I've had temple monks trace my silhouette with their hands in the air and give my boyfriend the thumbs up sign. I've been fully naked in the onsen (hot spring bath) and have women give me a smile and a nod and say kirei na (beautiful). Little 6 year olds at school routinely molest my ass in the hallway, in class and during soji (cleaning time). Believe me, compliments are great and as Chris Rock says, women need 3 things; food, water and compliments (and the occasional pair of shoes). BUT, I can't help but feel uncomfortable by so much attention.

I know, I know. I'm here to help internationalize the good folks of Japan. I'm here to teach and show them there are other cultures out there. I've been pretty open about how different I am, from my speech to my style of dreses to what I eat on Christmas. I've patiently explained time and time again how I style my hair, have let people touch my hair to feel the difference (something I HATE doing, but feel like I must for the sake of international relations) and also explained why my skin is so different to the kiddies at the elementary school. But there's something about body politics that makes me feel that the topic of my shape should be off limits, at least until you've gotten to know me a bit.

Ahhh, I don't know. Such a sticky subject. I usually forget about an offence until it happens again. I suppose in this cross-cultural experience I've put myself, such a thing is just the nature of the beast. I realize one of the perks of being of a certain age is that people find you attractive and sometimes feel compelled to tell you. I suppose I should get a thick piece of bread and sop up the compliments while they'll still coming my way. Who knows? Maybe I'll ache for the time when strange Japanese men would slowly run their eyes all over my hips, my butt, my thighs and my waist and say in a deep, gutteral voice "kirei na" while giving my boyfriend a thumbs up sign...

Since I'm talking about my physical self, I thought I'd update you on my hair situation. It's growing a lot, and while I prefer to wear my hair in twists most of the time, I occasionally take them down, shake it out and hit the town. Here's a photo taken on Friday.
Me thinks me likey. I really should have cut my hair ages ago.

2006-12-06T10:42:00.000+09:00

A Typical Day (Part One)...

Now, I haven't really gone into the day-to-day details of what I do here, so after 15 months of doing it, I figured it was time to let y'all know. This first installment of a "day in the life" will focus on the elementary school.

I teach at Neo Elementary School, home to 84 students, twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I teach 3 classes each day; grades 1, 3 and 5 on Tuesdays and grades 2, 4 and 6 on Thursdays. I get to school at around 8:20 every day, usually around 30-45 minutes after everyone else gets there. I'm contracted to work from 8:30 - 4:30 and I'll be damned if I get there any earlier to make a show of solidarity with the other teachers. I'm usually brushing my teeth at my window while cars pull out to head to work.

Anyway, after I get to school, I usually set up my materials for the day's lessons. I usually don't have a class first period, so I'm pretty relaxed by the time I head to class. I usually plan my lessons about a week in advance and make all the necessary materials during my free periods. Last week, I cut up 84 red and green pieces of construction paper for my Christmas lessons.

At 9:30, I head to my first class. On Tuesdays it's grade 3; grade 4 on Thursdays. Grade 3 (15 students) is pretty boisterous and loud, but they have gotten a lot better since their new teacher learned how to handle them. Grade 4 (10 students) is pretty rambunctious and it never ceases to amaze me just how loud they can get. However, they have excellent communication skills, so for the most part, I let them get away with it. On those days when I'm just tired or impatient, I threated to cancel the game if they don't shut it.

For each class, I'm very consistent with the structure. First, there is a greeting (how are you? I'm ~.), then there is the song (which is a warm up/energizer for getting their minds into English mode). We then move straight into the lesson. I introduce the topic (e.g. vegetables, activities, months) and then use flashcards so that the students can have visuals to go along with the words. For the first class of a new subject, I (sometimes with the help of the homeroom teacher - HRT), make sure the students know what the word is in Japanese. We do quite a bit of chanting and I throw in gestures for the more difficult words (which the kids always remember even if I sometimes forget), and we just repeat. After I'm satisfied that they have remembered the majority of the words (usually by the second class), I quiz them as a group and/or individually. Sometimes I have students be the "teacher" and they "teach" the words to the other students. They love it. When there is about 15 minutes left of class, I throw in a game. I always have a game or a fun activity to wrap up the class. This is by far the most popular time in class and their reward for learning. Over the past year and a half, I've accumulated so many games. Sometimes I give prizes when I'm in the mood. It's really enjoyable for me to play with them and their teachers (if and when they participate) and I actually like explaining the games to them. I usually do this almost entirely in English with TONS of gestures. For the younger grades, I might explain it all in Japanese. If I'm getting a lot of heads cocked to the side, I'll just do a practice run and it becomes crystal clear.

After 2nd period, there is a 20 minute recess where the students either play, run, skip or have meetings. All the physical activities are held either inside the gym or outside. Just yesterday, the kids had to jump rope outside. I think it was about 5 degrees, yet everyone was outside. But I suppose outside was warmer than inside the gym because the sun was out. You all know by now that Japan does not do indoor heating.

Third period begins at 10:40 and I have grade 1 on Tuesdays and grade 2 on Thursdays. Grade 1 is always ready for war. They are rowdy, loud, can't sit still and don't follow orders well. In essence, they're kids on meth. I owe this in large part to their HRT who can't/won't control them. I have to move especially slow with them because a good lot of the kids are...a bit slow. My 2nd graders, on the other hand, are bright, lovely, energetic, excited to learn, sweet and drop dead gorgeous. I look forward to this period because I know I'm going to have a great time. They want to learn everything and a few of them go to juku (cram or prep school) to get a leg up on their peers in a variety of subjects. I love, love, love this class. They were sweethearts last year and they're still delectable this year.

I have fourth period free and I usually send emails or read my book and wait for lunch. Lunch is 35 minutes long and it's broken up for announcements. After lunch the kids get about 20 minutes to brush their teeth and play games. Next is fifth period when I have grade 5 on Tuesdays and grade 6 on Thursdays. Grade 5 was a horror last year (thanks to the teacher) but this year they're great (thanks to the teacher). Grade 6 is where I really get to challenge them because they've been through 6 years of English language classes and can understand and speak quite a bit. I instituted phonics this year and it's a success. No one asked me to and I didn't ask for anyone's permission. That is pretty much how it works for me at the elementary school. I wasn't taught anything or was given any instructions. I learned through trial and error, by using my imagination and thinking of how I'd like to be taught a second language. I think I've been pretty successful especially since when I walk into class, kids run up and hug me and ask me what we'll be doing. I love when we play a game and they scream "one more!" or "one more time!". It's music to my ears when I hear "tanoshii katta ne" - "It was fun, wasn't it?"

At the end of the day, I walk the kids to the bus stop and it's truly the best part of the day, and not just because I'm nearly finished work, but we get to play! Sometimes I walk them there by myself or with a teacher or two.

I feel pretty lucky that I have a good, small school, but I had to work out the bullshit in order to get to this place. See, there's this buzzword in schools and all over the JET Programme. It's "team-teaching", and at a lot of schools, especially the elementary schools, this doesn't happen. ALTs are not, for the most part, licensed teachers. In fact, ALTs are not to be left alone in the classroom, and are supposed to share teaching and lesson planning duties. This, unfortunately, doesn't happen the majority of the time. I plan about 95% of the classes for my elementary school and choose the topics and the way it will be taught. I do the research, get the materials ready, make handouts, laminate the flash/game cards and plan all the games. I have lesson plans that I use from other schools, use the Internet A LOT and rack my brain. In the classroom, I am sometimes left with the kids (which I actually like better) and when the HRT is actually there, s/he follows my lead if they participate at all. With two teachers in particular, I don't even bother with them. The other day, when I was feeling pretty charitable, I asked one teacher if he wanted to play a game with us and he flat out said no and sat at his desk picking his ass. It's a horrible example for the kids because in this country, teachers have more power than the parents. It pisses me off because I have each grade for 45 minutes a week, and I can't get a few teachers to participate in a (really, really, really fun) game. Well, nuts to them. After I developed a healthy sense of apathy for the team-teaching format, everything became gravy and I'm having a blast.

You may have noticed that I've put a whole bunch pics of my kids in this post and I would ask you not to copy them. I want to share them with you but I'm aware there are a lot of pervs out there. Please take care - I love these kids.

2006-11-28T09:24:00.000+09:00

The Tao of Koyou...

In Japan, koyou, or autumn colours viewing, is a huge thing. Millions of people take time to visit temples, shrines, parks and other places where trees are to behold the beauty of nature. The most famous and beloved leaves are the momoji, maple leaves. They are also my favourite. Fall is quite spectacular in Japan and it makes me a little sad to think that this will be my last one here. But then again, with winter being right around the corner, those feelings are normally short-lived.

On Saturday, Dave and I drove to the nearby town of Tanigumi and walked around in a beautiful temple complex, probably one of my favourites in Japan. Naturally, there were tons of people around, but I still managed to get some good shots with my new and fab camera, the Canon IXY 800IS. It's the newer model of the camera I wanted to buy (as mentioned in my previous post), but it's a beaut. I've been taking pictures like a fiend and I'm loving my new best friend. But I digress.

Before heading to Tanigumi, we stopped at a tree that looked like it was on fire. It was that red. It's the last tree in this series, and it's also the one I'm posing under by myself. I've been wanting to shoot it for a while and I was lucky enough that I got some pics before all the trees got naked for the winter.

We've been really lucky this autumn. The temperatures have been mild save for the last week or so, but the sights have been spectacular. I recommend that anyone come to Japan between October and November. This will definitely be a season that I won't forget anytime soon.

This is my village.

2006-11-24T13:19:00.000+09:00

Deer and the City...

Dave and I escaped to Nara this past weekend and it was a blast. We frolicked with the deer that roam free in this old capital city, did the whole place on foot and found a beautiful restaurant and enjoyed a traditional Japanese meal. Since we decided on this trip a while ago, there was a smidge of anticipation in the air as this wasn't a run of the mill getaway. And luckily, everything worked out even though we were in the car together for a total of eight hours (round trip). All I can say is that I'm a really lucky woman and have so much to be thankful for...I can tell you without doubt that my handsome Scotsman deserves a lot of the credit...

And that's all I'm going to say about that.

Anyway, as I mentioned, Dave and I went to Nara by car. It was our first time driving to a prefecture some distance away, and while it's entirely do-able, it's retardedly expensive to use the expressways here. I've been on toll roads in the States, but driving, like everything in Japan, is tough on the pocket books. One way to Nara from Gifu cost about 4500 yen, about $45, and while this isn't a lot of money, especially divided by two, it's the principle of the thing. It's our car, with our gas (well, this time both were Dave's), and we're using them to travel to another prefecture to spend money on a hotels food and souvenirs, and we gotta pay to use the roads to get there??? But there is an expression that I bust out a lot here in Japan and it's "shougenai", it cannot be helped. It's not such a bitter pill to swallow, just a bit confusing and irritating at most. It's especially annoying when you get on an expressway by mistake, but you live and learn. Moving on...While Dave was the driver, I was given no choice but to be the navigator. Now, navigating and the like is not my strong suit (I get confused in malls), but we made it to Nara (driving through Gifu, Aichi, Shiga and Kyoto) with few screw ups. As my partner in crime said, my navigational skills were adequate (hell, I'll take that as a compliment).

Driving during this time of year is breathtaking. Actually, doing anything that makes use of your eyes is beautiful right now. The trees and hills are pretty much on fire and I've been dying because I'm without a workable camera right now (all this will change soon), but I just step back, behold the sights and just say wow...

After checking into our ryokan (a traditional Japanese inn), we explored the sights, which sadly I do not have any pictures of. Dave was the cameraman and I haven't yet had the chance to steal all the pics from him. While I've been to Nara before (4 years ago on my first trip to Japan with the beautiful and talented Cheryl - whu whu!!), the city is still impressive to me. There was a beautiful pond near our hotel and the nearby 5 story pagoda was reflected in the water. We explored a bit of the Todai-ji complex and the Ni-gatsu shrine that was absolutely beautiful. It was overlooking the whole city which was gently being blanketed by soft drops of rain. Old school, unadulterated romance. We met some deer and to the delight of my traveling companion, he fed them senbai crackers and they couldn't get enough. He was headbutted, chomped on and surrounded but was beside himself with delight. Since I had been swarmed last time, I kept out of the fracas and got some good pics of him. There were temples and shrines galore, but since we had arrived a bit late, we decided to save the realy touristy stuff until the next day. Instead, we walked to the downtown area and Naramachi and just took it all in. We found a kickass souvenir shop and I was so good. Just bought the minimum of crap, including something for my surrogate mom. Pat on the back for me. We walked up and down streets with our huge golf umbrella shielding us and stumbled across the perfect Japanese restaurant. It looked good from the outside and the inside did not disappoint. There was a beautiful garden enclosed in the restaurant and we couldn't get over the atmosphere. The food was really good too - all tempura, unagi (eel), sashimi, rice, soup, pickled veggies and chawan mushi (this eggy-meaty concoction). I had warm sake and basked in the glow.

The next day, we went back to Todai-ji and I was again amazed by the autumn foliage. Reds, oranges, greens...Fall is absolutely my most favourite season and this year's Fall seems even better than last year. Everyone who owned a camera was out there taking pics of the trees making nearly impossible to get a pic without people. But we got lucky.

We went to the Daibutsu(Buddha)-den and stood in the shadow of Buddha. It's a large one and there is a pole with a hole in it that is said to be the same size as one of this Buddha's nostrils. Apparently, those who are able to make there way through the aperture is promised enlightment. Now, 4 years ago, I stood by and watched scores of schoolchildren wiggle their way through thinking "I could do that! I could fit!" But as a shy foreigner, I couldn't bear to imagine getting stuck and having the fire department called to extricate me. Well, that was then, this is now:

Due to the fact Dave couldn't get any good shots of me, I opted to be enlightened twice (one for me, one for him) and went through the hole again. The shot of me emerging is a tad blurry, but watchagonnado? As I pulled my thank-god-it-fits-frame out, the numerous Japanese folks who were milling around burst into applause. I was so embarrassed but I was thrilled that I faced my fear and came out a winner. My heart was beating like a drum and I loved it.

All and all it was a fantastic trip and encourage anyone living or visiting here to take some time out and explore Nara.

*******************************************************************************
Due to my much bitched about camera woes, I'm biting the bullet, dropping some yen and getting myself a new camera this weekend. I was so angry over the fact that my 16 month old camera stopped focusing that I sent an email, a nasty one, to the now defunct camera, Konica Minolta. I got the standard "we can't give a crap even if we tried really, really hard" email, so I'll use this forum to eloquently make my point: FUCK YOU, KONICA MINOLTA!

This is what I hope to own in a couple of days:

You can read the reviews here: http://reviews.cnet.com/Canon_PowerShot_SD700_IS/4505-6501_7-31740585.html I've read the professional reviews (www.dprevew.com had an excellent summary - it pretty made up my mind) and talked to owners and buyers of this sexy little number, and I'm so hot for it, I'm about to explode. Ooooooooh, yeah.

Hmmm, what else is new...I went to a Thanksgiving Party last night thrown by the fabulous Chisako-san, the doll class teacher. About 30 folks came bearing food (my contribution was banana bread) and I ate till I wanted to sleep. No pics, but good memories.

I'm addicted to this blog: http://www.glamour.com/sexmen/blogs/alyssa/ The writer is a chick who has put all of her dating life out there and she gets props for having some king kong balls. I had only one class today and spent HOURS reading all of the archival postings. She's on my favourites list. It's not something I would do, well, without a proper pseudonym and some liquid courage, but she gets respect.

Someone who most definitely doesn't get respect is Kanye West and Michael "Kramer" Richards. Kanye was recently quoted as referring to women of mixed race as "mutts" and "Kramer" went on a racist tirade during a comedy act. WTF, bitches, seriously, WTF??? Kanye rubs me the wrong way a lot because his ego has gotten bigger than his brain and now it's all about the bling and flossin'. Kanye, you get the nuts. And "Kramer", tsk, tsk, "Kramer". How the mighty have fallen...it makes you wonder what's really going on inside someone's head. At first, I was pissed. Seriously, he was saying some shit about Black people getting lynched and that if wasn't for White people, we'd be this and that, and his repeated use of the N-word. Was he on crack??? Oooh, I'm starting to burn again. Relax, relate, release...But yeah, "Kramer" gets bummed without Vaseline.

Anyway, it's the weekend and I'm out like bell bottoms in a few...I'm going to try to post on a weekly basis (minimum) from now on. Life in Japan is rolling by and I want to document as much as a can. Stay classy, people.

2006-11-12T18:30:00.000+09:00

Ahh, that's the spot...

I spent this week alone for the most part because I just needed to time to get my shit together. I had too many contradictory thoughts vying for my attention. I was confused and suffocating. So I decided to call a time out. I organized myself, read like mad, decided on a couple of action plans at school and in life and tried to still myself. I went grocery shopping and took my time through the aisles. I watched some Lost episodes and got caught deeper into the web on intrigue. I baked chocolate muffins for the first time and cooked some new recipes. I thoroughly cleaned my apartment and addressed the mildew problem in my shower. I realized (yet again) that I was hemorrhaging money and put pen to paper and created a budget for myself. I'm still going to have fun during my remaining months here but that will mean I'll have to make some hard decisions. I called home. I spoke to some good friends. I wished my godson a happy first birthday. I went out and tried a new restaurant with my sweetie and we lucked out. Mouth-watering Thai was the comfort food I had been craving.
I went to the doll class and created something beautiful yet again. All mundane tasks, no? For me, they were sanity savers.

**These pics are of my previous doll, the Okinawan. I will post pics of my latest doll, the Geisha, soon.

2006-11-09T21:23:00.000+09:00

Remembrance…

When I first came to Japan, I was completely enamoured by the beautiful sights, the warm nature of its inhabitants and the general mystique of the Far East. As I made my way through each day, I encountered novel experiences and everything was an adventure (and sometimes a drama!). But it was good and it was honest because it was new. Now, 15 months later, everything is routine. I know, for the most part, how to communicate well and make myself understood. I’ve made peace with not speaking perfect Japanese and feel comfortable throwing out some nouns, a subject and object here and there, and always, always, ending with a verb. And while others I know seem to have it all, in terms of accessibility to others and the city, and a general joie-de-vivre, I feel that I’m spinning my wheels, particularly at work, and oh, work it has become. Life is really, really good at the elementary school. That’s where I get my joy during my “professional” hours. I love my junior high school students as well, but the vibe there is…stifling and stressful. My JTE stresses me the fuck out. That fact, coupled with a few other personal issues got me pretty down.

So I decided to step back and take time to heal by myself, for myself. Though I am an extrovert, sometimes being with others saps my strength and prevents me from concentrating on me. Now, curiously enough since I leave in relative solitude, I need to be alone. So this week, I’ve done Kaki-centred activities and thinking and I’m working on living my previously-adopted, oft-discarded, but newly-adopted again mantra “one day at a time”. So far, so good. I’m taking a time-out to do some figurative and literal spring (or is it fall?) cleaning and get rid of some clutter. I’ll also have a doll class this Sunday, which I’m really looking forward to. I’ll post some pics of my second doll soon, then a few of my next one.

Anyway, the title of this post is ‘Remembrance’ because I recently remembered what I love about Japan. See, Dave and I went to Kobe and Himeji in Hyogo Prefecture, which were absolutely beautiful, and is where I think the turnaround began. We had a holiday last Friday and Dave and I set out to Himeji first where we encountered possibly the most famous castle (and one of the few that survived through wars) in Japan, Himeji-jo. The throes of Fall had not yet fully descended on this place, but some leaves had turned and burned brightly against the rest of the green landscape. With about 6 floors and tons of sightseers, it took about 2 hours to visit the castle and its grounds.

After we left the castle, we took our time walking through covered shopping arcades (these hideous “pleasure towns” can be found in every Japanese city) and headed back to the station to continue our journey to Kobe.

Upon arrival, we went to our hostel, a really sweet and comfortable place that had the appeal of someone’s home. It only had 5 rooms, 2 with 4 bunk beds, a double room and a triple. There was also an open kitchen with all the amenities, a TV, DVD player and DVDs, a computer with free internet, and guidebooks and novels. I was instantly enamoured. After cleaning ourselves up, we headed to town and Kobe is definitely a place that should be visited. I hope to go there again before I leave. The shopping, the sights, THE FOOD…excuse me while I wipe my drool.

Kobe is quite small and can be done in about a day, or spread out to two if you want to savour it a bit more. We had to get our bearings on the first night, so we walked and walked, looking for an Indian restaurant to satiate our hunger. I turned into a right demon, a very hungry demon, and right before my head was going to spin around on my neck, we found a very lovely Indian place. We took in the bright lights of the city (so beautiful, how I miss them) and headed back to our hostel.

The next day, we started out relatively early and returned to downtown where we found a very charming place that served sandwiches and cakes. I’m not totally in love with sandwiches, but they are, in my opinion, a luxury in Japan. I had a BLT, with real bacon, not ham, and Dave had a sliced chicken sandwich with spicy mayo. Happiness in our mouths. We made our way Nankinmachi (Chinatown) where we took in the smells and hustle and bustle and vowed to eat there later that night.

In 1995, Kobe was the site of a devastating earthquake that killed more than 6000 people and leveled the city. We went to the place where the devastation has been preserved, the Port of Kobe Earthquake Memorial Park. I can’t really describe it, but I felt the power. It was astounding.

We left the park and headed to the Shin-Kobe cable car to ascend to a mountain ridge to behold the city. We walked around Nunobiki Habu-Koen, which is a herb garden.

After doing the majority of the city on foot, we decided to have a Chinese feast. We gorged on Peking Duck (the real deal!!!), sweet and sour pork, fried rice and spring rolls. The price wasn’t as exorbitant as I was led to believe and it was more than worth it. My salivatory (is that a word??) glands have been activated at the sheer thought.

Though we spent just over 24 hours in Kobe, it was enough to help me recover what I had feared to be lost. Unfortunately, not everyday can be a vacation, and as my better half reminded me, this is going to last forever. But once in a while, it is necessary to be remember the beauty of what once was…

2006-10-27T12:10:00.000+09:00

Can you believe this ish???

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6086374.stm

In other news, I killed another huge spider today. This time, it was in my shower. It was a scene right out of Psycho. I can't believe I'm thinking this, but I'm looking forward to the snowfall, i.e. the bug genocide that will soon occur. But under no circumstances am I looking foward to the cold, damp temperatures INSIDE my apartment...

2006-10-26T09:00:00.000+09:00

The Importance of Being Important...

ALT. Assitant language teacher. Assistant language teacher. That's what I am here in Japan. Some days, usually at the elementary school, I am actually running the show. From conception to design to execution of English communication lessons, I am the boss. Though I am supposed to engage in team teaching with the homeroom teacher at the elementary school, I only do this in 1 out of 6 grades. And that's fine. I like being in charge and having the responsibility. It gives me something to do when normally there would be nothing. I research games, make worksheets and handouts, select the singing music and consult textbooks for inspiration and direction. Most of the time, my lessons are the bomb rather than a bomb. I'll be blunt - English is not the most important, or even an important subject in the curriculum, so after the first few initial months of learning the ropes, I was figuratively, and sometimes literally, on my own. Sometimes, I'm all alone in the classroom (a big no-no), managing the little ones, and I like it better that way. During these times, I'm not an ALT, I'm the language teacher.

This is at the elementary school.

At the junior high school, it's entirely different. My JTE runs the show. He plans everything and leads the classroom, and that's fine, because that's his job. He's a trained English teacher and I'm his assistant, and that's also fine. But what's not fine is how I'm often relegated to the sidelines while he goes over grammar points, vocabulary and verb tenses only in Japanese. I've wasted hours over the past year and a bit just standing there, watching the interaction and trying hard not to daydream lest he chooses to utilize my knowledge and have me join the conversation.

What is difficult for me, and what continues to be a recurring theme in this job is how unimportant I am. I'll admit, I feel somewhat important to the kids and I'm proud with how far I've come with them, and not necessarily in terms of their English skills. And at the end of the day, I know it's what matters the most. But it's that feeling of being useless, of being expendable, that eats away at me.

I think it wouldn't so bad if I wasn't so damn lonely in the day time. The Japanese office culture is SO different than back home. People are perpetually busy and have very little time to do things other than what they're doing (however, I've also seen that the teachers I work with are amazingly inefficient with their time). I do speak to the non-English speakers, but our conversations are so brief due to the language barrier, but it's cool that we at least try. From time to time, I have really good, non-work related conversations with the science teacher and my JTE, and my JTE has apologized for not talking to me more (which was pretty sweet). When we got a new Japanese teacher who is fluent in English, I was so happy and my JTE was like "It's good that you've now got someone to talk to", but she's just as busy as the rest of them. I'm dying to get to know her better, but she's got a job to do so I'm on my own.

I'm not sure if I can adequately explain all of this without sounding like spoiled brat, but it really, really hurts. But I'm thankful for the internet, this blog, my books, the telephone and the weekends. I'm also thankful for those times when I feel useful, like I'm a real part of the team. Last week, all the other teachers were busy so my surrogate dad asked me to take a group of 10 first-graders (7 year olds) to the bus stop and wait for their buses to arrive. That was the first time it had happened and I had several little heart attacks during the 20 minutes we were waiting by the road, but it all went off without a hitch. They got on their buses, each yelling "Sayonara, Kaki-sensei" and I yelled back, waving and calling out each of their names. For me, this was a big something, out of a day filled with a whole lot of nothing.

I'll be handing in my recontracting papers next week when I have a free moment to to discuss it with my JTE. The NO box will be firmly checked. I was going to wait until the new year, but there's no point. I'm not going to change my mind. I was going to hang on to them , just in case, but no matter what happens, I'll have to leave. While I believe that work is something you do in order to live, I need to feel like I'm worth something, like I'm earning my pay. Like I'm important.

2006-10-22T21:31:00.000+09:00

So frustrated...

I've been feeling a little restricted for a little while which has led me to feeling frustrated with living in Japan in general, and Gifu in particular. Don't get me wrong: living in the country has given me a sense of relaxation and peace that have been elusive for the past few years, but sometimes, it's just not enough. And particularly on the weekends. Back home, there'd be a multitude of places to go and things to see every day of the week, and while I spent quite a bit of the past year exploring and traveling, a newly enforced budget and a desire to stay a little closer to home has made for more weekends in either tiny Neo, or Dave's larger town, Ena. This is nice, but sometimes you just want to just go somewhere that doesn't take an hour to get to. Or sometimes you just want to see something that isn't just fully about Japanese culture. You know - maybe a play or an art exhibit or something from another part of the world. Luckily, on Saturday, the crew and I went to Nagoya (over an hour away) to have dinner at a Brazilian restaurant, Nova Urbana.

In Montreal, I started a little dinner club with my closest girlfriends and we christened ourselves Dining Divas. We met once every month and laughed, got ourselves up-to-date with each others lives, exchanged cute little $5 gifts, and dined on delicious meals and drank copious amounts of wine. I really miss those times, and with such crazy schedules with my friends here, I decided to make a Japanese edition (without the $5 gifts).

So on Saturday, Fab Food Fiends (FFF) had our first dinner and I think it was a success. While the meat distribution was pretty disappointing (like 3 or 4 small pieces of incredibly delicious meats), there was live music (by a bonafide Brazilian band) and live dancing (including some Capoeira - Dave and Ethan, remember that god awful movie Monkey brought over one year when we went up north? Yeah, it was kinda like that, but with a Japanese chick in a low cut shirt and ass pants, and no blood), spending time with close friends was pretty sweet. And for a very brief time, I felt like I wasn't in Japan.

I'm in the mood to vent, so I'm going to fire off a few things that have been frustrating me. Here goes:

The high cost of everything, particularly fruits and vegetables. I've been here for over a year and I still get major sticker shock at the shops. I've got my mom's voice in my head saying "Oh hell no am I paying that much for mangos!" It also makes window shopping not fun at all. I bought 8 apples today because I thought I should treat myself. Unfortunately, it cost me nearly $7. One day, a co-worker told me Japanese fruits cost so much because they taste better than those found in Western countries. I looked at her sideways. You know what was going on in my head: Does KN gotta choke a bitch?
Japanese TV. An exercise in banality, stupidity and horrid WTF-ness. I've seen too many shows featuring Pan-kun, a chimpanzee forced to wear clothing and participate in an array of humiliating tasks. Where is PETA?
Horrendous clothing. Slouch socks. Ass shorts. Jeans with part of the thigh cut out and a garter belt in its place. Bride of Frankenstein hair. Obviously too tight/too big/too uncomfortable shoes. And people have the nerve to stare at me. I can't change my skin colour. But you can definitely change your stupid outfit.
Ridiculous driving techniques. Arbitrary use of hazards and stopping on one lane highways.
People who don't slow down when speaking to you when it's obvious you aren't getting what they are saying, even when you ask them to slow down.
Katakana English. I-ee hay-tu ee-tu. If you had to read that 4 times to get it, welcome to my world.
Losing my English, to the point where I make mistakes teaching English to my students.
Not having a decent selection of English books close by. I've kissed my Amazon privileges goodbye for the sake of leaving Japan with no debt.
A lack of delcious, non-Japanese food. I'm an amateur foodie. Food matters to me. I like fusion and all, but not when the the common denominator of the cuisine is Japanese. I can think of 3.5 restaurant dining experiences here where I've nearly wet myself from having food-gasms. That ain't enough.
People, not everything is sugoi (awesome), kawaii (cute), or omoshiroii (interesting or fun). Get some new adjectives..

Bien, maintenant je suis fatiguee. Ah oui, je manque le francais. C'est une peu d'une surprise pour moi, specialement que je suis anglophone. Mais franchement, je pense que je besoin un peu de variete, un peu de excitement. A ce moment, tout est tres...boring. Je suis desolee pour le mauvais francais et le manque des accents...

2006-10-16T14:17:00.000+09:00

It was a good day...

I had a really good Saturday this past weekend. Dave and I woke up early to start our respective days - I was heading to my first washi ningyo (Japanese paper doll) making class in Seki and Lord Blackwood was off to play paintball in Mie-ken with a bunch of socialites from the Gifu/Seino areas. I was pretty stoked at the prospect of doing some bonafide Japanese arts and crafts and set out in my car to make the 1 hour drive. The class lived up to my expectations and then some. A gang of rag tag gaikokujin (foreigners) descended upon the home of the very amiable Chisako-san, a radiant Japanese woman who has been teaching doll classes, mostly to foreigners in English, for about 5 years. One look around her war room, and it's obvious that she is a master in the way of the doll. There were five students in total and she helped us create dolls as beautiful and unique as each of us. The doll I made was called the Temari, which translates to a ball wound tightly with colourful threads, which is what my doll is holding. It took us about 3 hours to make our masterpieces (made entirely out of paper) and we stopped about three-quarters through to break for lunch. We headed to a nearby Italian restaurant that had real bread to dip in real olive oil and I was in heaven. The pasta was pretty Japanesey, as was the dessert, but the bread, oh the bread, how it made up for it.

The class itself was definitely pleasurable for me. I'm not a very crafty girl, though I knit as a hobby and can be creative when inspired, so this was a real treat for me. Already, I feel that washi ningyo making will be a definite highlight of my time in Japan and I intend of making Chisako-san's class a priority for me.

Saturday was also a good day because I saw a battalion of monkeys in a field. It was awe-some. At first, as I was passing by, I thought they were statues because they seemed to be frozen, but I quickly realized they were in fact quite alive, so I reversed on the 1 lane road, stopped my car and put my hazards on and stared in wonder and amusement. I also cursed myself for not having my camera with me. BLAST! I took a few crappy pics on my cell phone camera, but they were less than inspiring. I learned a very good lesson that day - always have my camera on me.

Later on in the day, I hooked up with the crew and inspected their gruesome bruises from paintball. D-dawg had a particularly nasty one on his stomach, but unfortunately, I didn't think to pick up my camera to capture the heinous wound. I also didn't think to document a particularly hair-raising experience on Friday night. After I returned home from a welcome/goodbye enkai (party), I was getting to take a shower when I noticed something black and very fast zip by. Since I had just taken off my glasses, I was as blind as a field mouse so ran to my bedroom to get my specs. Armed with vision, I cast my eyes in the direction of where the thing ran to. To my shock and horror. I recognized the intruder to be a spider. A large, large spider. I screamed and hacked, yelling for David to come and save me from the beast. After much screaming, jumping up and down on the bed, near tears and a couple of false hits, my hero slayed the arachnid and deftly cleaned up the carcass and its entrails from my tatami mat*. It took me some time to recover from this incident, but I'm on the mend as I valiantly slept in my bed last night.

Since I've realized that I've been slacking on taking photos, I will be more consistant with photographing everything from the mundane to the exciting. I intend on leaving Japan with quite a few scrapbooks and for that I've got to keep snapping.

I'm out.

* While I'm usually a very truthful writer, the intimate facts of this story had to be changed to protect the innocents. I will say, however, I was not the only one screaming on that fateful night.

2006-10-11T15:07:00.000+09:00

10 months left...

While I was in Montreal, people would often ask me how much time I had left in Japan, and after rapid calculations in my head, I came to the above answer. I can hardly believe 14 months have passed since I left my warm cocoon of 5-a-7s and near complacency, and now I can hardly believe I have 10 months to go. I'm often reminded that THE END IS NIGH everytime I look into the faces of my kids. I got my re-contracting papers today, and much to my chagrin, my JTE had forgotten that I spoke to him about my plans post-JET, as in after July 2007, so he was dismayed to learn that I will most probably* be leaving Japan 10 months from now. I have until February 2 to submit my signed papers, so they're just going to have to wait til then.

Other than that, I had a great weekend. Unfortunately, at this moment, I don't have any pics to share (I'm hoping to steal some from the hot Scot), but we went to one and a half festivals. The first was a Mino paper lantern festival, which was beautiful. The second was the Ogaki festival, which was celebrating god knows what and we happened to stumble upon. It was just cool to see some lovely people I haven't seen in a while and get to know some others a bit better.

My main squeeze has a very funny blog that offers a different take on Japan and life in general. Check it out: http://adventuresofblackwood.blogspot.com Each new entry keeps taking the place of my favorite one.

Also, read this bit of poetry that knocked my socks off the other day: http://dancingchaos.blogspot.com/2006/09/on-cover-up-girl.html Sigh, I was missing Coco Cafe at Jello Bar right about then.

I'm out.

* probably as in "I'm saying this right now because I don't want to disappoint you, but I'm leaving Japan in 10 months."

2006-10-05T21:02:00.000+09:00

SexyBack...

This was the theme song for me and Dave's time in Montreal. I'm not a huge fan of Justin's but damn, that song is addictive.

As usual, my time in Montreal just zipped by, but with the added pressure of getting ready for Ayanna and Raj's wedding and showing Dave around (it was his first time in the "New World"), life just zipped by in hyperspeed. This trip to Montreal filled me with a myriad of emotions: I felt happy to be home and surrounded by all things familiar, I felt a familiar sense of stress from being pulled in so many directions, guilt from simply not having enough time to see EVERYBODY, shock and sorrow from the shooting at Dawson, a desire to not live in Montreal again, and then sadness when it was time to say goodbye again. Overall though, it was fantastic to see those I love and introduce David to everyone who matter so much to me.

We did so many things, went to so many places and met so many people. We vistied the usual tourist hotspots like the Old Port, Mont-Royal, Downtown and The Main, we ate at Le Biftheque and Schwartz's and made a special trip to Ottawa where we visited Parliament and had dinner with sweet Steph. I also did a couople of firsts: I visited St. Joseph's Oratory (stunning) and ate a smoked meat sandwich at Schwartz's (delicious, much to my surprise. I don't really like smoked meat. Yes, I was born in Montreal). We also hit a local brewery (3 Brasseurs(?) on St. Denis) but unfortunately we did not have time for a proper French meal (Julia, I was gutted. We tried, we really did!).

Luckily, however, Dave had a poutine and had a party in his mouth. We also had some delicious West Indian at Curry House (chicken curry, how I've missed you), and had mouth-gasms at V.I.P. (REAL Chinese food, how I've missed you). It was my 2 sisters, my mom, Dave and I, and we ordered about 10 dishes and finished EVERYTHING. While I was disappointed that we couldn't go to Hot and Spicy because it was closed, V.I.P. was exquisite.

I'm not going to go on and on about this trip because honestly, it feels so far away from now. I'm back at school, nearly over jet lag, and I just blinked and now my calendar for October is full. It was nice to come back to school and be greeted with "Ohisashiburri desu!" Long time, no see. It was especially nice to get greeted with hugs from co-workers and the younger students. I really felt loved and missed.

But hanging it with the crew was pretty sweet. I want to send a special shot out to Dahlia and Steven, who put Dave and I up for nearly a week and were the perfect hosts. They opened up their beautiful (and spacious) home to us and made us feel like family. I've always thought of Dal and I as sisters even while I was going to university in Ottawa and she in Montreal. Weeks would go by with no word then we'd fall back into things so easily. D, I'm so happy to have reveled in your good news and I'm so happy for you. Thanks for everything.

That's about it for now. I'll leave you with some pics to peruse. Time is starting to wind down and filling my head with all kinds of ish...Will share soon...

Oh yeah, if you're a natural Black woman, a fashionista, or someone with time on their hands and loves to read quality writing, then I heartily recommend www.afrobella.com This is my new favorite site and I've been spending hours reading everything on it. She hits the nail on the head on Black icons, hair issues, age issues while reviewing beauty products. I don't feel like I'm wasting time when I read this site. I feel like I'm learning!

2006-10-02T17:50:00.000+09:00

"Muthafucking ants on the muthafucking plane..."

I'm back in Japan, back "home", after a brief sojurn to Montreal, and getting here was one helluva trip. Montreal itself was great, though filled with emotion, and I got to explore the city through a tourist's eyes as I took David around. It was his first time in the "new world" and we did the city good and even headed to Ottawa for a day. It was a freaking whirlwind (I'll post all about it a couple of days), but it was nothing compared to leaving Montreal and trying to get back to Nippon ville. Ok, Dave and I got to the airport 2 hours before our 8 a.m. flight on Monday morning. I thought 2 hours would be enough time for us to walk the security gauntlet but I was wrong. I'm not going to get into the facking debacle, especially since I re-enacted it for my 8th graders today, but it was retardedly and unnecessarily long. After running from one end of the terminal to the other, with 5 minutes to spare, Dave and I boarded the plane only to find out that we would be waiting for some poor suckers who were held up in customs. 40 minutes later we were off. The only thing was we only had 35 minutes to make our connection to Osaka. Yeah...we know how this ends, yes? A sprint through the terminal, a garbled question, a negative response and A LOT OF SWEARING. FUCK FUCK FUCK! SHIT! MUTHAFUCKA! (My personal fave.)

But my dear readers, things worked out for your heroine. OR DID THEY??? Dave and I were comped a night's stay at the always pleasurable Days Inn (thanks to Dave's stellar negotiation skills - "Is there any way you can give us a free hotel room?" said in the sexiest Scottish accent EVER.), we faffed around in Fort Worth, Texas, ate a "Chinese" buffet in the hotel's lobby, had fajitas and burgers at Chili's, saw Dr. Phil, caught the Jet Li flick "Fearless" at the theatre. We had a pretty good time interacting with the locals in BumFuck, Texas. We had an awesome night's sleep (only my 2nd since landing in North America) and made our plane to Osaka. However, by this time, my sore throat and running nose had turned into a full blown cold and the 14 hour ride was not pretty. Landing became an issue because my sinuses were so blocked up and filled with nasty that I felt like my head was going to explode. Remember that scene in Mission Impossible III when Keri Russell is screaming about the pain in her head and she's convulsing, then that chip in her brain explodes turning her brain to mush and fucking up her eyes? Yeah, I was sure that was going to be me. I'm not one to make scenes in public, especially those involving tears, but man, I was hurting so bad and there was so much pressure in my head, that I just let myself go. 3 stewardesses were tending to me and poor Dave was watching me lose my mind but still trying to help me to breathe and unblock my ears to relieve some of the pressure. I shudder thinking about it...

Anyway, I deboarded my plane with my head intact and grateful to have to experience behind me. I should have been giving thanks AFTER I left the airport. Our luggage, which we hadn't seen since we left Montreal effectively 3 days before reappeared in Osaka. Mine was fine, but Dave's was infested with ants! Now, Dave is usually a calm and rational man, but he lost it. That was the proverbial straw. More swearing ensued. Dave had his bag searched by customs. I think this trip took 5 years off his life.

This has turned into a rant. My head hurts. I'm out.

2006-09-11T15:32:00.000+09:00

When did this become my new normal?

Takoyaki (fried octopus balls) made from scratch the other day in my apartment, with my neighbour and co-worker. It looks kinda pretty, no? Cutting up octopus tentacles. Moi??? I could hardly believe it myself...

I'm heading to MTL tomorrow for a couple of weeks, to be an attendant in my best friend's wedding. I'm sorry I haven't been able to respond to the comments from the last post due to me being B-U-S-Y. Thanks to everyone who read and commented. You gave me a lot of food for thought...Yeah, a lot.

Keep well and will post soon.

2006-08-31T13:33:00.000+09:00

Female Chauvinist Pigs...

"We decided long ago that the Male Chauvinist Pig was an unenlightened rube, but the Female Chauvinist Pig (FCP) has risen to a kind of exalted status. She is post-feminist. She is funny. She gets it. She doesn't mind cartoonish stereotypes of female sexuality, and she doesn't mind a carttonishly macho response to them. The FCP asks: Why throw away your boyfriend's Playboy in a freedome trah can when you could be partying at the Mansion? Why worry about disgusting or degrading when you could be givin - or getting - a lap dance yourself? Why try to beat them when you can join them?..."

I'm currently reading Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture by Ariel Levy, and after reading this passage, I asked myself "Am I one of those women?" I consider myself a nouvelle feminist, one to fight for women's rights and argue against the patriarchy, but down enough to understand and appreciate what goes on in the male mind. I can talk about porn, masturbation, bikini waxes then switch to anti-discrimination laws and argue for equality in the same breath. I've heard and seen a lot, maybe too much, and I admit that it sometimes gets to be a bit too much when hanging with the boys. But I wonder where it leaves me? Am I really doing my part to advance the cause or am I just a chauvinist pig with breasts?

Yesterday, someone asked me if I was offended by the representation of the "voodoo" woman in Pirates of the Caribbean 2 and I replied no, because voodoo practioners are usually African or Caribbean then launched into a diatribe about how we as non-whites are hypersensitized by media portrayals of us. I think the film Crash did a good job of showing Blacks in several tones and nuances, but I admit the film was an exception to the rule. Usually though, I'm not outraged by the stereotypical portrayals shown in the media because, to an extent, they're true. There's a part in Crash where a White character says to a Black one "Don't you just hate Black people?" He went on to rant that Blacks seem to mess up the opportunities they have by shooting themselves in the foot, be it through drugs, violence and other such shit. The bad apples just bring everyone down and those are the fools you see on the 6:00 o'clocking news "wile'in out". And that's the image that gets perpetrated in the media by Blacks themselves! 50, Luda, Buckshot, whatever, you know who I'm talking about.

It's like the proliferation of the use of the N-word. I hate the word, but it's everywhere now, used by Negroes, Caucasians, Latinos and Asians. I don't care if you drop the "er" and add an "a", it's still offensive, but its been appropriated to the point that it's colloquial. I remember "The Nigger Family" sketch in The Chappelle Show, and it was just the N-word back and forth, and Dave Chappelle kinda looks down and I think he says "I'm dying inside." I feel that way sometimes when I think/talk about feminist/Black issues. It's everywhere, and while a part of you wants to be included, on the inside, if you will, another part feels bad that you're just a token that's been given a backstage pass.

Am I making sense? What do you think? Do you think our generation is more about trying to join them (the establishment) than beat them? Men/Whites are invited to discuss.

2006-08-30T10:18:00.000+09:00

Year 1 in Japan: A Retrospective...

Before leaving Montreal to come to Japan, I was repeatedly warned that this experience would change me in numerous ways, some big and some not so big. I believed my friends and was open to changes. I had some things to improve on in my life and was looking forward to leaving a city that didn't hold anything new and exciting for me...just more of the same old, same old. Of course, my friends and family were my anchors, but sometimes, you just need to float along by yourself to make things happen. So I took a big chance and did something totally foreign for me - I left security. I had a permanent job with benefits, autonomy and a certain degree of power, a car and the fast track to owning my own condominium apartment. I was almost THERE, but I had to be honest with myself and say that it wasn't enough. I've never lived in a different country and I've never explored a culture radically different from my own. Life in Montreal was fun, don't get me wrong, but it just felt so...small. I used to think that MTL was the centre of the universe and you couldn't get me to change my mind. But after about 2 years of living in Montreal, having returned from university in Ottawa, and visiting Ghana and Japan, I finally realized that there was more to see. After my friend Cheryl moved to Japan on a whim and told me about her experiences, and then seeing an ad for JET in the Concordia student paper, I went to the information session to see what was what. It certainly sounded good so I applied and waited the 5 months to finally hear that I got in.
I moved from dreaming to planning in no time and spent the months between February (when I heard about it) to July (when I boarded the plane) getting myself together: I went to Cuba, I got surgery to correct a long time problem, I got my braces off and I bought tons of clothes and beauty supplies. I said my tearful goodbyes (I lost it at my Sayonara BBQ) and left. Now, a year later, I think I'm ready to share with you what I've learned and how I've changed to date (in no particular order of importance):

1. Being illiterate ain't no joke. Imagine not being to be able to read anything, understand anything, be able to communicate. Having to stop and figure out which bathroom you can enter or what's what at the grocery store. Imagine trying to find your way around town and having NO idea what the characters mean. A year in, I'm not fluent nor can I read everything, but I'm a helluva lot better. I can put some words together and have them make sense. I can figure out a couple of kanji in a phrase and put two and two together (sometimes). I can write little notes in Japanese and not be worried about the meaning being lost. Being illiterate here has made me more aware of the plight of Canadians who can't read or write. But Jesus Christ, if I can go from English to Japanese (I most definitely do not have a head for languages), others can too. They just need the right motivation - like wanting to eat food or leave their house (so not trying to be glib here).

2. I actually like kids. And I can get along with them. Maybe one day, I'll have a few of my own.

3. I don't like to be constantly reminded that I'm Black (AKA a superfreak). I know I'm Black. I have mirrors in my apartment and pictures of myself everywhere. I know I'm different. I just don't like to have absolute strangers point it out at the supermarket, restaurants, toilets, festivals, on the train, you get the idea. I had one girl, one of my elementary students, tell me it was a pity that my skin was so dark. I'm confident in who I am and in my darkness, but goddammit, stop the insanity! (No need to comment about this point unless you want to piss me off). Also, unless you're a close friend looking for a bit of cross-cultural understanding, I don't want to fucking hear about which hip hop artists you like, how you like to get "crunked", and asking me who is better: Cube or Dre.

4. Despite the previous point, I've become a more patient person. You kind of have to be to express yourself in a foreign language and deal with the same questions/statments over and over: you can use chopsticks! can you eat fish? you're so tall! (I'm only 5'7" - barely). do you like rice? I just smile and vent later rather than launching into a sermon on the evils of cultural insulation.
5. I'm strong. Stronger than I ever thought. I don't mean to brag, but it's a testament to one's will and strength to live in a foreign country. I'm so proud of myself.

6. Living abroad has given me valuable insight to what my parent's went through when they left Ghana for Montreal over 30 years ago. They left behind the English/Ga/Twi and traded it in for an unstable French environment. It was hard for them, but now I better understand and love them even more.

7. Since making the decision to go natural (hairstyle), I've found a new definition of beauty for myself and in turn, acceptance. I don't need to conform the mainstream's idea of beauty as it is skewed, particularly for women of African descent. I touch my kinky hair and am awed by its loveliness. I look at myself and see new power in my eyes, nose, lips. I feel like I'm finally who I'm supposed to be and I love it. Geez, I had to come to Japan (with their bare representation of Black people) to finally GET this.

8. I hate, hate, hate bus tours. I've been on two - one to Kyoto and the other to Tottori. Never fucking again.

9. I've learned the power of taking time out just to breathe. My eyes are open all the time, and for the most part, I like what I'm seeing. Without this time, I doubt I would have figured out what career I want to pursue and taking the steps to realize my dream. Plus, having the chance to just read, without distraction has been blissful.

10. In my village, like other towns and cities in Japan, we have time chimes, to signify what time of day it is. At 7:00 a.m. I wake up to Edelweiss (I shit you not), at noon, I can hear the sweet sound of the ocarina, and at 6:00 (5:00 in the winter), I can hear Moon River. Other time chimes can't compare. I can't live without them now.

11. I've learned (finally) that more often than not, it's better to leave things in the past and just let go entirely. The lessons must remain, but the memories associated with the lessons are better left in the past.

12. Food. I really love good food. This is not something new.

13. A travel lust has been awakened inside me. Visiting China and living in Japan is just the tip of the iceberg.

14. I've finally found what I've been looking for, and it's nourishing, beautiful and all mine. Refer to the previous post for a clue.

15. I've changed in the way I let the actions and words of other people sit in my mind. Where I used to obsess over these things, I chew on them for a little while and spit out the fat while ingesting the good stuff. Really, living in this country forces you to let a lot of things simply roll off your back.

16. A smile goes such a long, long way. Being friendly, courteous, understanding, open and outgoing has made this placement reach its full potential.

I feel like I've come a long way from the days I would just cry in my living room, feeling the cold eclipse of homesickness all over me. My days and nights are much more full and my calendar is full of circles and stars and memos. I'm extremely blessed to have such an amazing support network from coast to coast, and in Canada, New York and Ghana. The Motosu and Ono crew have made so happy and been friends in ways I didn't expect. But the most surprising thing for me, the thing that I would never have predicted happening was meeting the Scotsman. Can I really explain it all now, on this public space? I would prefer not to. But he knows. And I know. And that's all that matters.

2006-08-28T11:30:00.000+09:00

Love is...

the thought that has been consumming my mind for the past few weeks, and no big surprise as I've been contemplating my time here, looking back at my past and setting my sights on the future. No big surprise since I've been reading "a story of irreconcilable love and infidelities", each page burning a hole in my conciousness, forcing me to think about the love in my life. No big surprise as the word has been swimming in my mouth and spilling from my lips more often lately. I've recently finished reading The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera and I can't really begin to adequately relate a synopsis of this book, nor explain its affect on me. It just is. But maybe if I post a couple of passages for you, you might be able to understand where I'm coming from: "He suddenly
recalled the famous myth from Plato's Symposium: People were hermaphrodites until God split them in two, and now all the halves wander the world over seeking one another. Love is the longing for the half of ourselves we have lost." If you knew my mind, you'd know that I never bought into the myth of the "soul mate". In fact, I hate the words, the idea. I've always thought of it as a made up word, conjured up my marketing executives and authors of lonely hearts books in an effort to make people feel less than they are if they are single. To me, the idea of the "soul mate" was invented to create a feeling of dissatisfaction in the individual so that they'd have that wanting and the desire to buy into goods and services to make them more desirable to "catch" their soul mate. BUT, I do believe in the idea of deep connection, between male and females, romantic attachments or not. I believe that there are those special people that can touch your life and turn your world into blinding beauty, catching you off guard to the point you weep with delight and disbelief that you are so blessed. I believe that we are all looking for something, an unknown element that will just fit, without explanation, when it's right. We want that Jerry Maguire moment, to really feel it when "you complete me."

Sublime. Divine. Celestial. Love is my religion. And I can finally see it nearly everyday, in every way. In the wind that blows through the trees. In the river that pushes past the road. In the clouds where I swear I can see God (I've rejected the idea of God as a man. Now I'm more comfortable with the Creator as creamy, cumulous wisps of smoke and water). I can feel it in the rush of blood and pleasure to all corners of my extremities, my heart and my brain, submerging me in wave after wave of bliss, nearly suffocating me.

But during the week, betweent the professional hours of 8:30 and 4:30, I see it in my kids. Their eyes, their smiles, the bashfulness and playfulness. I know now why people covet them so. Love personified.
Another quote from Kundera's book: "Perhaps the reason we are unable to love is that we yearn to be loved, that is, we demand something (love) from our partner instead of delivering ourselves up to him demand-free and asking for nothing but his company." I didn't demand the
love of these children, only their attention during class. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I woud fall in love in them, so irrevocably, and that love would be returned through smiles, laughs and acceptance. These kids have taught me to demand precious little from the adults in my personal life as the pleasure of their company is enough to sustain me, and the rewards from this is the love that I seek.

I'm often thinking about next year and of leaving my kids behind. I know that once I take off on the plane, that will be it for our relationship. All I'll have are the memories and the photographs. And I feel my heart squeezing even now and I know this is love as well, this pain that is sometimes is sometimes love's shadow on a sunny day.

2006-08-14T11:26:00.000+09:00

Summer Workshop, The Perfect Swimming Hole, and MONKEYS!

It's been an action packed few days. A couple of blog-worthy things happened, so I'll start with the coolest: Dave and I saw monkeys! I've been living in Neo for over a year, and I've heard stories about the vegetable farm pillaging, sometimes aggressive, always entertaining Neo monkeys, but yesterday, I finally got to see some in the flesh. It went down like this: Dave and I went exploring on a lazy Sunday afternoon. We drove for a little while until we found a place in the river that seemed swimmable. We got out and found that there were people, including some unidentifiable Eastern Europeons camping and barbecuing. We were getting ready to walk in the water when someone yelled out "monkeys" and lo and behold, there was a family of them. It was one of the coolest things I've seen in Japan. We walked around for a bit and found the most perfect definition of a swimming hole. It was so lovely but we didn't have our swimsuits, so we'll test it out next weekend. I can hardly wait.

On Thursday and Friday, Gifu JETs new and old headed to the city for a summer workshop. It was a little crazy, but it was a fab chance to hook up with Japanese people who could speak English. I love my kids, but lord help me, English study is not where their passion lies. But these kids at the workshop were nothing short of amazing. And some of them just sounded like native speakers, which totally blew my mind. This girl, Mai, is a 4th grader, so she is maybe 9 years old. She nearly gave me a heart attack because she was reading an English newspaper that was put on the desk for crafts. When she got to a word she didn't recognize, she sounded it out. Shit on a stick, I don't think I could have been surprised. She was absolutely lovely.

There were a lot of games and opportunities to chat with the kids but it was also cool to meet some of the newbies. I was very happy to see that quite a few were Canadian, including a Black girl from Toronto. Damn, Christina and I made a beeline for her. I believe that brings our female population to 4. Can I get a woot?!

After the workshop on the first day, a bunch of us went to a Turkish restaurant, and it was my first time at this place. I picked a winner of a dish (lamb stew - lamb, how I've missed you), and Aiden got some meat on a sword. Fantastic photo op.

And that's about it. I came to school on Monday to find the head teacher there with her three gigantic dogs - Terra, Alpha and Lord. P.S. She's a science teacher.

Alright, I'll be off to Tottori ken tomorrow for the next couple of days for a bus tour and I'll be seeing the famous sand dunes. After that, I'll have a jammed weekend featuring the swimming hole, an ocarina concert and a movie. After that is an orientation for Gifu JETs primarily for the newbies which is an overnight thing, then I'll be hanging out with my surrogate parents. Mata ne!

2006-08-09T09:24:00.000+09:00

Wazzupwitme...

Yesterday, I had a rare treat. I got to go out to the big city and have dinner with friends, on a weeknight!!!! Wow, that statement warranted four exclamation marks, and while it may not seem like a huge deal for you, it was a rare occasion for me and most blog-worthy. Well, not really, but it was sweet. And what made it even sweeter was that I had the pleasure of the company of my favorite Scotsman, David (sorry Ed, but you understand). Dave came over, MIDWEEK, because he had an appointment to get a Japanese driver's license, and it was the first time ever. My freaking mind was blown.

Anyway, after showing Dave the route to get to the driver's license bureau from my place, we made our way to Gifu City to have dinner with Heather, Mai, Jeff, Ed, his friend Henry, and Sarah. The original plan was to go for Mexican (which I was sorely craving), but we went for Italian when it was learned that the El Paso was closed. Where the food was lacking, the company more than made up for it. It was SO GOOD to see Heather, a wonderful woman from Thunder Bay, Ontario. We met a year ago, and this is the first time we've gone out to something that was non-JET related. At the last JET thing, we promised each other we'd hook up and it came to fruition yesterday. Since she lives relatively close to the big mall not that far from me, we'll be hooking up on a more regular basis. It was great seeing Sarah as well, a Southern belle I hardly see, but always a pleasure when I do. Yeah, it was a simple gathering of friends for dinner, but it was so good to have a reminder of my former life - you know, having a social life during the week. Ahhh...gotta do that more often.

Speaking of my former life, I've been trying to book tickets for Dave and I to visit my former home, and let me tell you, it's a biatch. Firstly, most of the time, it's all in Japanese, which lets me practice, but rudely reminds me that I still have a long way to go before being somewhat fluent (yeah, I know, that's not happening). Secondly, the price variations are insane and I can't help but feel that I'm getting financially molested by ticket agents and for good reason - http://www.debito.org/HISpricing.html. On top of that, the gasoline tax is outrageous. As we will be going for my best friend's wedding and I won't be going on another international flight before leaving Japan next year, I just gotta suck it up and take it up the butt.

I'm currently reading The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera and Oprah's Live Your Best Life. The former is weighty but beautifully written and the latter is full of exceptional writing from very talented writers.

I've watched a few movies over the last little while including You Can Count On Me (loved it for its quiet and soft beauty), Primary Colors (well-written, humourous and surprisingly emotional), Get Shorty (a much loved, oft-watched film), Pirates of the Caribbean (I liked it much better than the first time I saw it. I thought it was too hyped up, but now I think Johnny Depp was fantastic and the whole story was well put together), The Sweetest Thing (I should have known better than trust Aya's recommendation - she saw The Wedding Date for godssake), and The Remains of the Day (a beautiful film, but I liked the book better. Gotta give Anthony Hopkins props though - he da man).

I stole this pic from the BBC web site. I saw it on TV the other day and thought it was just beautiful. It is a memorial service marking the dropping of the atomic bomb on Nagasaki. I doubt I'll have a chance to hit that prefecture before this year is up, but Hiroshima (second time) is in my crosshairs.

So it's been over a year since I landed in Japan and there are some observations that I want to share with you. Not now, but very soon. Stay tuned.

2006-08-03T09:18:00.000+09:00

It's so bloody hot...

And I have no idea how to put captions under my photos...Can anyone help me? In the meantime, please enjoy this pics from Hokkaido and sumo last month. I think I'm going to go put my head in the toilet just to cool off. Jaa...

2006-08-01T10:26:00.000+09:00

Awwwww....

My self-esteem got a nice boost this morning. See, my hair is growing and I'm experimenting with twists to keep it protected from the elements and to keep me looking somewhat decent during the lazy days of summer. They are cute enough, but they make me look like a 12 year old girl. I've worn them out a couple of times and I had my hair twisted for the majority of the Hokkaido trip, but I recently decided to actually go to work looking like this. Last night after dinner, I twisted my hair while watching Remains of the Day (good flick, but read the book instead). They looked good and I was confident that they'd look fine in the morning. So I woke up and tied a ribbon around my hair to make it look even cuter and skipped to school. My closest friend at work commented right away and made me feel really good. A little while later, all the ladies in the office came over to tell me how good it looked and asked me a bunch of questions. Yes, they put their hands in my hair, but they asked first. I usually don't like people touching my do, but in the spirit of internationalization, I allowed it. They really boosted my self-esteem and I'm feeling just lovely. Just wanted to share... Sorry, no pics yet, but I'll be getting my camera back this Friday.

2006-07-31T11:46:00.000+09:00

Hokkaido Highway Blues...NOT

Ahhh, I had an awesome week. Little did I know that embarking on an 6 day road trip (plus 2 days on a boat) to the north of Japan would do me so good. From pulling away from the port of Nagoya to touching down in Chubu Airport, going to Hokkaido was the best thing I've done in a little while. While the weather was perfect, absolutely perfect, the sights were amazing, the sense of freedom was palpable, and camping Japanese style was phenomenal, by far, the best thing about this trip was bonding in close quarters with some of the best people in Japan.

The adventure started out last Saturday, July 22 when Ed, Shiloh and I met up on top of Nagoya Station. Having been truly knackered from our karaoke adventure the night before, our excitement at taking the 36 hour ferry from Nagoya Port to Tomakomai was beaten into a frenzy upon viewing the cruise ship that was our ferry. With an onsen, a movie theatre, a restaurant, comfortable berths and straight up cleanliness, the trip started out right. We had plenty of things to occupy ourselves and time passed by quickly.

Before we knew it, we had arrived in Hokkaido, picked up our rental car and headed out to Sapporo. The cold and wet conditions improved dramatically as we drove on and it was absolutely stunning by the time we reached the prefectural capital. We checked out the usual sights (the clocktower, the TV tower, Odori Park) and spent hours just strolling happily along, being over the moon about sitting on really grass (really, such a luxury in Gifu) and attending out first beer matsuri (festival). After night fell, we headed down and over to Kuriyama to hook up with the oh so fine, Montreal Stephanie. Let me tell you about this girl - she is personality cubed. She's funny, she's hyper-intelligent, she's cultured, she's a hometown/around-the-way girl and she's beautiful, inside and out. We've only had the pleasure of each other's company a precious few times, but kept up with each other through blogs, MSN and emails (thank the lord for technology), but hooking up again after a year was exquisite. Yeah, I heart her hard.

After waking up Tuesday morning at Steph's place, we got our little show on the road and headed to Biei, famous for it's nature and lavendar fields, to set up our tent. Yes, Ms. K. was going to camp. And let me tell you - it was so easy. Camping in Japan is the shit. Everything was so clean and the close proximity to onsens ensured that we wouldn't stink to high heaven after a couple of days. Even the bugs weren't so bad! And our campsite was monstrously huge! We spent two nights there and it was a complete pleasure, even though we were four inside the tent. It was ridiculously cozy, but in a good way.

On Wednesday, we decided to attack one of the Daisetsuzan mountains. I don't know which one we conquered, but we hiked for 5 hours. We felt pretty battered and bruised, but after going to the onsen and having a nice meal, everything was just gravy.

On Thursday, we set out for Toya-ko, which was clear across the prefecture from where we were. I think we drove for about 6 or 7 hours, stopping a few times. We stopped at Furano for a while to take about a hundred photos of the famous lavendar fields. When we finally reached our destination, the sun was setting, which made the campsite so beautiful. We even saw a couple of swans which added to the overwhelming beauty. We cleaned ourselves up at the onsen and headed to the city for a meal. We also indulged in some wine drinking (again) and had a pleasant evening.

On Friday, our last full day in Hokkaido, we enjoyed the beautiful weather by wading in the lake. Ed and I stayed behind because of his cast and my hair do while Steph and Shi swam. Afterwards, we lazed about on the beach and had the sun and the fresh air make love to our bodies. That was probably my favorite time during the whole trip. We capped things off by heading to Sapporo to meet some of Steph's friends, drink in the park with what seemed like the whole population of the city and indulge in some less than mature antics. But don't worry - I kept my clothes on.

I got back a couple of days ago, and while I was just wrecked because I stayed up all night on our final night, I feel sooo good about that trip. I especially feel wonderment about the friends I have here. Ed and Shi, my Gifu compatriots, further solidifed their places in my heart. My dear Stephanie has left this fair country, but hanging out with her over the past week brought back some Montreal into my life, which was sorely being missed, though unbeknowest to me. I raise my glass to thee.

Since I didn't have my digi cam, I will be getting my film developed in the next couple of days. Watch this space for updates. In the meantime, you can check out Steph's pics here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sothereiwas/sets/72157594215951385/show/

2006-07-21T14:16:00.000+09:00

Lazy, school daze...

I was recently informed that I have to give a presentation to some Japanese Teachers of English in a few weeks, and since I'm bored out of my skull right now, I'm starting early. As much as I like working under the gun of a deadline, finding out cool things to say about Canada while I whittle away my long non-teaching workdays proves to be much more fun.

Anyway, I did a google search on facts of Montreal, and this is what I found: http://www.mikel.org/words/true_facts_abou.html I like these sort of lists, written by cocky people who feel they can write about a whole demographic. Sometimes they get it wrong, sometimes they are oh so right. These are a few of my faves:

You might be from Montreal if:

6. You refer to 6 inches of snow as a "dusting."
8. You don't think you have an attitude.
10. Everything in town - at least everything you care about - is a seven dollar cab ride away.
11. When out of town, you think the locals from the area are all hopelessly provincial. Including when you go to another big city.
15. You don't realize that you drive twice as fast as everyone else.
16. You're self-indulgent, extravagant, jaded and pessimistic.
17. You think if someone is nice to you, they must be looking for a vote. Or spare change.
22. You haven't been carded since age 14, anywhere.
23. You only eat stimés during a Habs game 'haldress'.
24. You think that if someone never goes out after work they must be hopelessly square, or ill.

How we'll know you weren't born here:
You cross at a crosswalk.
You ask directions to "Club Supersexe" or "Shay Paree".

Getting around:

St. doesn't mean street. It means Saint.
If Boul Réné-Levesque has mysteriously turned into Dorchester, you're in Westmount. You can speak English now.

Things you should know:

The underground train is not a subway. It's the metro. The subway is in Toronto, and it sucks compared to here.

****************************************************

Last Sunday, I, along with a group of ALTs from Aichi and Gifu prefectures, made it out to Nagoya to watch sumo. I think I've proclaimed my love for sumo on this blog a few times, but I'm going to do it again: I really, really, really love sumo. My favorite wrestler is Asashoryu, this bad boy:

He's Mongolian, powerful and cocky as a MF. He's also the Yokozuna, the top wrestler. It was love at first sight. After sitting in super close seats and enjoying watching matches of the junior sumo wrestlers for 2 hours, the rightful seat owners claimed their seats and we were relegated to our nosebleed position in section J. Though I didn't get to see my man up close and personal, I was happy he won his bout. Next year, I'm going to pay to play and get really good seats. When Ed and I were close, we were able to see the elephant-like nutsack of a particularly huge man. Oh yeah, that's the good stuff...

In other news, some of my kids think that me and my JTE are D-A-T-I-N-G for the simple fact that we went to see MI-III together. I don't really care, just as long he doesn't think we are...

Anyway, this is the last post for a while as I will be going to Hokkaido with Ed and Shi tomorrow. I will try to update pics soon but since I will be taking pics with my film camera (my digicam is at Dave's and he's in Scotland), it might be a little while. A bientot!

2006-07-20T12:41:00.000+09:00

I felt somewhat ashamed...

When I read this article on the BBC web site: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/5188680.stm I am a Canadian with a rich, proud Ghanian heritage. The Ghanian culture is full of beauty and tradition, and the society is peaceful and generous. But I'm ashamed to say that polygamy and man-sharing, particularly in the north of the country, is an aspect that I'm unbelievably pissed off about. Growing up in a household with two Ghanian parents and scores of relatives afforded me up close and personal contact with the drama that unfolds when men, yes men, are greedy and selfish. It drives me wild with impotent fury and makes me both pity and scorn the women who stand for it.

Here are some bits taken from the linked article that I must comment on:

When he leaves me to sleep with another wife, it's painful and I feel very jealous, but I just have to accept it. Umm, no, no you don't. You don't have to accept such behaviour from the man you married. You don't have to put up with physical risk in the form of the ever so popular HIV/AIDS. You're married, but doll, not many folks sign up for this horseshit. Take advantage of the lax cultural values towards marriage, call up a divorce lawyer, and stop the insanity!

Polygamy causes stress. Gee, that's a fucking understatement. Your hubby is getting it on with two other women THAT YOU KNOW OF, you don't work because you choose not to or can't, you have kids to support and your self-esteem is in the toilet. But, I have a funny feeling that by cutting out the cancer that is your marriage, things just might get better.

Taken from another woman: As Muslims, we accept polygamy. If a man wants to marry another wife and she refuses, she refuses God. Umm, yeah, I'm not a Muslim, but I'm a woman, and as a woman, I'm pretty sure that God wants EVERYBODY to be happy. Not just the man and the man's penis, but EVERYBODY. (I don't know enough about Islam to comment about the misogynistic and hateful treatment of women, but I feel comfortable saying that religion, this and others, do not put the interests of women in the same universe with those of the man.)

Polygamy is a sensible arrangement.
Yes, perhaps for animals in the wild kingdom...But then again, animals sometimes eat their young, so maybe this isn't the best group to be looking at.

Competition makes you want to cook the best meal for your husband and raise the best children. Again, I might be wrong here, but I thought love was what made one want to cook the best meal for their mates and raise the best children. If I'm wrong, I've obviously been misled for my whole effing life.

I swear people, I was going to come on here and talk about sumo and how it's going around school that my JTE and I are dating, but this article has gotten me too fired up. I promise though, I'll post before I leave for Hokkaido. GRRRRR!

2006-07-18T09:34:00.000+09:00

Love, friendship and banana bread...

All three have been weighing heavily on my mind lately. I've been thinking about love and it's various definitions and what the word has meant to me in the past, and what it means now. I think about how powerful it is and how it sustains me. I think about what I love and who I love and I sometimes drive myself crazy thinking about all the things I want and need at the moments when I can't have them at all. Then I think about suffering, and while I know I have so much more than many others in this world (and I am thankful for that everyday of my life), my own emotions blind me to everything that surrounds me.

Friendship has also shared space in my mind and thoughts over the past while. Being far away from those who know you best forces you to alter/modify your perspectives on what friends mean during different periods in your life. As one who is adverse to radical shifts in personal paradigms, this topic has been particularly troublesome for me. Those that I need close to me are so far, and those that are close to me are far as well. Difficult to explain, even more difficult to reconcile in my own brain.

And finally, there is banana bread. I've been waiting literally months to make this, but due to the absence of any decent sized baking tins, I've been waiting and searching. Lo and behold, last month at the re-contracting conference, a speaker gave an excellent presentation on living well in Japan, complete with drool-inducing recipes. I finally had some time off to experiment with the one for banana bread in the rice cooker but I needed one more ingredient: baking powder. Now, I knew looking for it at the grocery store might be a bit of challenge, but I sorely underestimated my mission. I really wanted to do it on my own, but I broke after about 15 minutes of reading katakanized English (brutal when you're not in that headspace) and asked for help. That, coupled with the nudge-and-stare-at-the-dark-skinned-gaijin gawks, I was done. I practically flew home in my car and all would have been lost had it not been for the banana bread turning out absolutely perfect. Seriously, probably the best banana bread I've made in ages. The rice cooker made it moist and flavourful - the perfect banana bread. And while it gave me some sun during this our rainy season, it's potency was short lived...

2006-07-06T20:32:00.000+09:00

Today, I ate to mollify my pain...

I would never call myself an emotional eater because I deal with my issues without such crutches as food, drink or drugs. I usually talk it out, go for a walk, listen to music or do any number of a variety of healthy activities. But sometimes, just sometimes, when I feel down and out, I need a taste of the familiar. You know, comfort foods. Those foods that can calm us down, with just a whiff of its scent before consuming it. Pillsbury cookies or cinnamon rolls. Homemade banana bread or apple pie. Hot chocolate with half and half. Oh joy. But since I had none of these at my disposable today, I ate one of my other comfort foods - french fries. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me back up.

It was a rough day at school today. I had a class of 7 (usually there are 10 but 3 were away) that nearly overwhelmed me with their constant chatter and raucous behaviour (thank you, S-sensei, for controlling yet ANOTHER brillant class [sarcasm, sarcasm, sarcasm]), I got hit in the head AND the stomach with a ball, and a huge world map fell on my head. I won't even get into the fact that a bear was spotted near the school this morning. But there were smiles, jokes and tickles in there too, so it was survivable. Ahhh, so is the life of an ALT in Japan. But more personal matters weighed on my head. The biggest one was being absolutely annoyed by the seemingly popular opinion that I am intimidating.

Since coming to Japan, I've heard this opinion expressed time and time again by males who think I'm so exotic, so attractive, but EEEEK! Too intimidating. Intimidating is synonymous with scary, unapproachable, daunting... And I'm not like that, the majority of the time. I know how to assert myself when the situation calls for it, but being people usually come to Japan alone, you have to be open, inviting, and welcoming, the antithesis of intimidating, if you want to make friends. If you want to survive.

I can say without doubt that I am strong, confident, opinionted, able to stand up in what I believe in, and not willing to take any shit. How is this wrong? I couldn't possibly be the person I am, survived the shit I have, if I wasn't raised this way. This public diary is no place to share everything, but I can assure you, things could have gone down a VERY wrong road for me. So I like who I am. I'm proud of who I am. I don't think there is too much more to improve. So why does it feel like punishment when people think that I'm a ferocious cannibal without feelings, ready to maul anyone who missteps (well, that's only when I'm PMSing, but that's 1 day out of the month, even if it happens. Besides that, I'm a very reasonable human being. But I'm digressing)?

I think that it's almost humourous when people say "you look like you don't take any shit," without me saying anything. But is isn't that suppposed to be a good thing, an attractive quality in a person? One friend said that he wanted someone to take his shit. I had to laugh. At least he was being honest.

That's all to say that I felt hurt today which led to being lonely, more lonely than I've felt in a long time. I literally ached for the familiar, for some comfort. I thought about the weekly free dinners at a Ste. Catherine eatery (whose name has escaped me) with strong girlfriends, eating good food, and sharing stories from our fabulous lives. I thought about seeing my friends stand up for themselves and not let anyone take advantage of them. I thought a lot about my former life and I had to smile at the good memories. So with the help of the self-cut, self-fried french fries, I got a little piece of the familiar and felt myself regenerate. It felt good to quench my pain with the fat from the oily fries and the memories in my mind. No matter where I go and where I end up, I'll always be fine, even if I have to bust a few heads a long the way.

2006-07-04T09:44:00.000+09:00

Countdown to summer vacation...

Yes, there are 10 more teaching days left, and while I love my students, I'm ready for a break from the unhelpful homeroom teachers, the lesson preparation (often last minute) and the repitition of English teaching. I'm looking forward to the 6 week holiday during which I will be travelling, preparing for next year's lessons and hopefully swimming in the morning in the pools at my schools. Teaching is so labour intensive. I swear, my respect for teachers just keeps on growing and growing.

Anyway, not much new going on here. Dave and I went to Osaka about a week and a half ago. I may have mentioned this already, but Osaka is the only place close to me, that I know of, that has an esthetician that does hair removal by wax. Ladies in Japan, if you need to take care of your bizness, go see Raddi: http://www.raddietheosaka.com

She is fast, her prices are reasonable and she's nice. I've been talking about her before I actually went to her and now I'm absolutely raving. Girls, if you are in Osaka, and need a wax, go see her.

Aside from that, Dave and I unfortunately didn't do too much in Osaka. It was a hurried, irritable day and we walked a lot, but I was able to snap a couple of fun pics:

I think these "boys" are prettier than me...

For some reason, I find this sign humourous, especially since I've heard Japanese people say "pimp, pimp." I don't know what it is...the accent?

The one at the top is a boat constructed into a building, which was pretty cool.

And that's about it. I've been pretty horrible about snapping photos lately. Since it's almost been a year since touching down on Nippon soil, I've gotten used to a lot of things and most things just seem normal to me these days. But I'm trying to capture things that make me laugh, take my breath away, or just make me go WTF and post them for your viewing pleasure. Like this t-shirt that a 5th grader was wearing the other day:
Yeah, I know I'm supposed to be a grown woman, but I just kept giggling at this and I'm not sure why. Maybe it's the La coupled with a word very close to horny.

And here are a few of the 5th grade boys, mugging for the camera. The one on the right is going to be a lady killer. I almost guarantee it. These pictures don't do him justice, but he's too cute. I hope and pray he doesn't turn into one of those fanny boys like in the picture I posted...

On a more serious note, it's been 25 years since HIV was first discovered and it has been 25 years that this killer has been growing. Since it's inception and the announcement of it being a "gay -related immunodeficiency disease", HIV/AIDS has morphed into a colour- and gender-blind human catastrophe where no country has been untouched. It boggles the mind to think that this disease was borne from a single animal-human contact and has been devastating cities and villages, particularly those in Africa. While much has been researched on the phenomenom on the dark continent, and the reasons for it's spread does make sense at the basic level (poverty, lack of education, misinformation), it's just crazy that HIV/AIDS is still spreading, and quickly, in the USA, particularly in the African-American community. Canada/U.S. have the information, the wealth and the means to prevent the rate of infection from rising, yet it's still here, it's getting stronger and it's killing more people. I thought that it was incredible when I read that "African-Americans make up just 13 percent of the U.S. population but account for an astounding 51 percent of new HIV diagnoses." HOLY SHIT. Please read the article in Newsweek and inform yourselves: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12665721/site/newsweek/

I'm out.

2006-06-25T20:38:00.000+09:00

Not much to say except...

Life amazes me a lot these days. These little babies were tiny, scawny, ugly things a few short weeks ago. Now they are large and strong and ready to leave the nest. In fact, two were gone on Friday. Amazing, and a little sad...but truly wonderful to me.

2006-06-20T11:52:00.000+09:00

Randomness on a sunny Tuesday afternoon...

I just finished a couple of really good classes at the elementary school and I really, really, really, really love my kids. This job isn't thrilling, but interacting with the students is what really does it for me. The elementary kids get SO excited about the stuff they are learning, which makes me happy and forces me to keep giving them my all. I can so do without the bureaucracy, the stupid, inefficient meetings (yesterday I was held captive at one for over 3 hours), and long hours of twiddling my thumbs. But the sweet kids really do it for me. Especially when they are jumping all over me telling me how good I smell, how cool my hair feels and asking questions in rapid fire Japanese that I have no answers to. I heart them so much.

In other news, I received my certificate in beginner's Japanese. Let me tell you, it was a struggle at times, but I'm happy that I didn't quit and accomplished my goal. The last test was a killer and I thought for sure I failed, but I actually did a lot better than I expected. Good for me.

You all know that I'm rocking my natural hair, and everyone around me, including the Japanese people I see everyday, have been really supportive. Yeah, initially it was a shock, but I think my hair is growing quite nicely and I feel quite confident in how I look. Anyways, some of the kids started calling me Kaki Afuro right off the bat, which I didn't mind because that's what I have - a mini Afro. But then it got ugly when someone said "Monkey Afuro" which led to some ill feelings on my part. I didn't beat up anyone, but I told the perps to stop, and they did for a while, but every now and then, someone would say it. Lately, it's been a couple of 5th grade girls, who should really know better because the third graders have stopped it. So last week, when they said it, during a pair exercise in class, I told them how bad it made me feel to hear them say that. With my limited Japanese, I told them that their words hurt my heart and gave me bad feelings. They understood perfectly. Now they are just back to simulating that I got an electrical shock when screwing in my lightbulb, but at least the nasty words have stopped.

Good news for all of you who care about my esthetique needs...I found a lady of Middle Eastern descent who waxes body hair, with natural honey wax, in Osaka. Yeah, that's 2 hours away from me, and a 5050 yen round trip, but I gotta take care of myself! Tokyo is the only other place that I know of near me that does waxing, but the fare is about 4 times as much as the fare to Osaka, so guess where I'm going? I have an appointment this Saturday, but I think I'll postpone it because I didn't realize that, um, how to put this politely...I'll be riding the red train.. God, euphemisms are so retarted sometimes. I'm getting my period, people! There!

Gotta gripe for a moment - I love kushokku, school lunch, because it's usually yummy and different from the stuff I make for myself. But it absolutely slays me when we get potatos, bread and noodles on the same menu. My ass can't take it! Enriched carbs aren't my friends!

That's all I got for now. Latah.

2006-06-16T15:37:00.000+09:00

Trying out this meditation business...

I'm not really one for yoga, or seperating the mind and body or sitting still for too long. I get distracted then I start making up lists in my head or asking myself questions like "Did I leave the iron on?" and "What should I have for dinner?" But I read an article in this month's O Magazine that gave me pause for thought. Oprah interviewed Hugh Jackman of X-Men fame and it seems that he's a really deep guy. He went to a school for philosophical thinking, he meditates to centre himself and he seems to have his shit together without sounding like a know-it-all. I mean, I don't know the guy, but that didn't stop me from hearing his message. By stilling ourselves and taking a couple of minutes to connect with the most important person in the world (ourselves), we can be better. I aim to be a better daughter, sister, friend, girlfriend, teacher and person. I ulitmately hope to be a wonderful wife and mother. While I currently try really, really hard to be all those things, what I'm aiming for right now is to get some clarity for what I want to do with my life.

This has been a needle in my brain for the past 10 years, pretty much around the time I left the Health Sciences program at John Abbott to pursue studies in the creative/communication arts. After giving up my dream of becoming a doctor (I simply do not have a brain for chemistry or physics - it's too finite, too strict), I've sort have been just floating. I consistently do well in every field I tackle : government relations and communication, public relations, marketing, and educational administration, but I have yet to find that passion at work. I've always believed it's important to find that connection with work, to be fully engaged for the 8 hours a day that we are there, but I've come to think that perhaps I just don't have a passion for anything work-related. What stokes my fires are traveling, reading, doing domestic things and caring for my family. I think I'm seeing work as more of a means to my ends: work to make money to travel and working to obtain benefits that will serve me and my family.

I've thought about moving in to a career in community development, international affairs, or in education as a teacher, and while these prospects excite me for a (short) while, the flame is not sustained and is extinguished. So now I'm trying to close the gap between what I want to do and what I should do.

At the Tokyo Re-contracting conference, I attended a workshop for women to address issues facing us in Japan. At one point, someone said that she was disappointed that when she asked her students what they wanted to do in life, most of her female students responded that they wanted to be a mother and a wife. While the room erupted into tsk-tsks and pompous laughter, I sat very still and asked myself "well, what's wrong with that?" What is wrong about wanting to make life better for those closest to you? Granted, I'm not the Leave It to Beaver type, but really, are we as feminists, male or female, too hardened, too selfish, too cynical to admit that there is nothing wrong with the woman who chooses to stay home and be of service to her family?

Admittedly, when I was younger, I thought climbing the corporate ladder, getting that big paycheque and corner office, and living to work was what every woman should aspire for. But now, my ideas and myself have changed. I'm not saying that I'm going to chuck it all and stay home baking all day while dressed in a mu-mu. That's not me. But I can't look down on anyone who chooses to.

So, during my time of stillness when I meditate, or some definition of the word, I aim to get over the guilt I feel for not wanting that crazy impressive career with the long hours, the stingy recognition and the soul-sapping bureaucracy. I aim to feel better about thinking about my future career as a series of interesting jobs that I applied for because I knew they'd keep me stimulated and happy. I aim to use each job as a way to make myself and my family more comfotable without sacrificing my health, my mental well-being and my skin (stress causes wrinkles you know - yeah, I'm thinking about the big things). I aim to have no regrets so that when I'm on my death bed, I could feel fulfilled and contented.

This may be a tall order, but I think that it will pay off. One thing that I've learned over the years is that I can do anything.

Sorry if this is all jumbled. Just your usual Friday afternoon thoughts...(spurred on by a discussion with my JTE)

2006-06-13T17:21:00.000+09:00

Fun times in da city...

I recently went to the JET Re-contracting conference in Tokyo and aside for the blah blah blahs of the workshops, it was quite fun. I got to hang out with Petra, seen here trying to lick a giant ice cream with a couple of random cracked out Japanese girls. We did a fair bit of shopping (mostly of the window variety) and I bought a couple of sensibly priced pieces from American Apparrel (shot out to the MTL) and a Coach purse. WHAAAA? That's right. I got my sweet little number at a MILITARY BASE for a bargain bin price. On top of that, I also got a DVD player for a steal. This mega store is for military personnel and their families, but it definately pays to have connections. Ahhh, the purse is really lovely. Salmon coloured, suede, beautiful and mine. I don't need to purchase anything for a long, long, long time. I am satiated...

While in Tokyo, a bunch of us went out for delicious Indian to properly celebrate the birthdays of Dave and I. It was a good turnout and tons of laughs.

This past Saturday, I went to the "famous" Gifu Ukai. I'm feeling under the weather today and don't really feel like providing a detailed description of the whole affair so check this out: http://www.gifucvb.or.jp/en/kankou/ukai/index.shtml In a huge nutshell, these fisherman train these specific birds to catch sweetfish. Or rather, they train them to be bulimic. See, the fishermen tie a rope around the middle of the bird, preventing them from swallowing the fish.

The fisherman then massages the bird around the neck, forcing it to throw up the fish. Appetizing, no? While we didn't eat any of this sweetfish (I hear the emperor feasts on Gifu's very own on special ocassions), the experience was a feast for the eyes. Unfortunately, I couldn't get a very good shot (I'm having severe pixel envy right now), but I like the one of the 6 boats lining up, their fires guiding their way.

Other than that, it's getting pretty hot here. The rainy season has officially started though it was very beautiful today. July, August and September are shaping up to be very busy and time is just flying. Soon, it will be a year since I arrived...cu-ray-zy...

2006-06-01T15:35:00.000+09:00

Really, I could make a killing…

If I got my act together and got off my ass, I could make millions of yen making sure these kinds of English language atrocities never happen. What the hell is this supposed to say? You can find this everywhere in Japan: t-shirts, shop names, advertisements, foodstuffs, anywhere and everywhere. See, I’d set up this little business where I’d offer my English language expertise (well, what's left of it right now) to businesses. For a reasonable fee, I’d consult them on all things English to ensure they wouldn’t look stupid and English readers wouldn’t be subjected to such drivel. Let’s take ASSE chocolate, for example. Yes, this is a real product. See, if I was working for this company and they came to me pitching this name, I’d make it very clear just what ASS(E) means in the rest of the world and expressly demonstrate it’s usage. Till then, I’ll snap the really messed up ones that either amuse or irk me.

It’s been a nice couple of days here in Neo. The sun is nice and hot and it really feels like summer again. Yesterday I went to Tokino Elementary School to watch a demonstration of an English class for training purposes. The class was alright and I learned a couple of things I’ve already started to implement, but it was more fun to talk to the super curious students and be bitchy with Ed. The real learning occurred on the way to and from the school. I was accompanied by Noritake-san, a 29-year-old teacher (the second dude from the right) who is posted at my schools. He’s really young, sweet and good-humoured. And as I found out yesterday, he’s also really, really candid. He told me quite a few things about his personal life that I won’t mention here because it doesn’t seem right. But the most interesting thing he told me was about how Japanese people talk a lot of talk, but seldom walk the walk. Of course, not every Japanese person is like this, but plenty of them are. I'm sure the will is there, but I guess that rampant workaholicism gets in the way. Ahh, it's too hot to state my case. If you wanna state yours, go ahead.

I had plenty to say, but right now my brain is fuzzy from the heat. Must get home and nap. Later.

2006-05-31T10:54:00.001+09:00

Our own private piece of heaven...

First off, happy birthday to me! I turned a sleek 28 this year and it was one of the best birthdays, ever. I spent it lounging on a beach in a bikini and learning to swim with the help of my trusty (and oh so handsome) instructor/buoy, Dave, and I faced my fear of water. But I'm getting ahead of myself. (Unfortunately, due to some problems I'm uploading some pics, this will be a largely photo-less post. Gomenai - a thousand apologies.)

I had booked the birthday tickets to Okinawa in March, long before I had been informed that May is the rainy season for the south of Japan. I paid attention to the weather reports for about two weeks before we were scheduled to leave and I was dismayed to learn that the cloudy and rainy pictographs far exceeded the sunny ones. Like 5 to 1. In the few days before our depature date, a typhoon hit. Rain, rain, go away. But I decided that I would go to the beach no matter what.

Dave and I left his place in the early morning of May 20th. The sky was gray and foreboding, but Dave was still sweetly optimistic. He was right to be. When we touched down in Naha, we were welcomed with hot weather, a blazing sun and sky as blue as a Crayola creation. It was gorgeous. It was everything I've wanted and needed, and the fact that it was my birthday weekend made it all the more sweet.

We walked around Naha for a few hours while we waited until we could take the ferry to a tiny island further south called Tokashiki. Let me just say this about Naha: It can be inarguably described as eastern Hawaii. You know that America still has a stronghold on this city. From signs welcoming service men/women, to the presence of the American flag, to Army surplus stores and the omnipotence of Taco restaurants, this place was super Americanized. But what they lacked in a Japanese atmosphere, they sure made up for in shops and oh-so-oishii so restaurants. Dave and I picked a good looking one and feasted on marvelous food. I don't really remember what I ate, but he chose a pork soba and it was so scrumptious. The meat literally fell off the bone. I suppose I should mention that the speciality in Okinawa is not fish but pig. Honest to goodness pig. I shit you not, it was hog heaven.

After going a little wild on the omiyage (I also bought myself a killer sarong - yellow and red), we headed to the port to catch the ferry. There was a wedding going on so we stopped and observed, totally encroaching on the sacred ocassion, but I couldn't give a fack. As usual, the bride was wearing a Japanese take on the western wedding dress and as usual, it was gaudy as hell. I think Japanese wedding dress designers try to make their dresses to look like the it came out of the 1980's, circa the late, great Dynasty era. But I bitchily digress.

We boarded the very nice, very fast ferry and in 35 minutes we were in Tokashiki being picked up by the hotel van. We got to the Sunflower Hotel, dumped our too heavy bags and headed to the beach. White sand. Clear water. Deserted. It was getting late so we walked about half the length of it, went out for dinner and headed back to the hotel , thoughts of swimming in the clear water dancing in our head.

The next day, my bday, we had breakfast and went straight to the beach. I had my first lesson with the sexy swim instructor and I thought I made excellent progress. It wasn't until the next day when we went to a different beach that I really applied everything I had learned. Let me put this in caps: I SWAM IN THE FREAKING OCEAN. I DIDN'T DOGGIE PADDLE, I DIDN'T WALK AND "SWIM" WITH MY ARMS. I SWAM FAR INTO THE OCEAN. I DIDN'T TOUCH THE BOTTOM. I SAW FISH. I actually snorkled, for the first time ever and I immensley enjoyed it. Thanks to the help of Dave, I learned how to swim properly, I learned how to tread water, I got to snorkle and for that I will be forever grateful. I felt red and hot and tingly inside. I have never been more proud of myself than learning how to swim on my 28th birtday.

To wrap up, Dave and I had an awesome time, I was actually nice in the morning, I got a tan while Dave burned, we ate amazingly well (A LOT of pork and some fried tacos - actually quite good), we didn't kill one other and found that we got along very well just the two of us and I will remember this birthday for the rest of my life.

2006-05-17T16:07:00.001+09:00

Okay, I lied...

the last blog wasn't the last one before Okinawa because I wanted to post some reviews.

Firstly, I have a couple of web sites I wanted to share. The first is http://bigoe.blogspot.com/ This blog is written by a 23 year old Aussie who is currently working and living in London. The site chronicles her time travelling to different Europeon countries, living in a different (yet quite similar) culture and basically having a great time. She writes well, she has loads of great links and resources and her posts leave me a little breathless each time I read them. I have another year here in Japan, but I'm certainly getting ideas for what I should do later.

The second web site that I check quite often, especially when I need to cackle at someone else's expense is http://gofugyourself.typepad.com/ Fugly is fucking-ugly combined and this site basically rips to shreds the sometimes dubious wardrobe choices stars and their assistants make when going outside in public. The writing is superb and sometimes as black as tar (their Tom Cruise rips slay me). So if you're a celebrity junky/fashion watcher like me, go ahead and indulge in some bitchiness. It can be oh so fun.

Secondly, I wanted to report on a movie that I saw this past weekend: V for Vendetta. Oh. My. God. Go see this film. Take someone smart with you. Discuss the film at length after it's over. Natalie Portman is fantastic in this film. You seriously might consider taking up acting because she is so good in this role. You never see Hugo Weaving's face but if like Shakespearean soliloquy, you will be tickled. I'm not going to get into the particulars of this film, but if you like smart, fast paced, violent, challenging-the-status-quo films that are set in somewhere other than America, THEN GO SEE THIS FILM.

Thirdly, I have to rant about Aveda Sap Moss shampoo and conditioner. After chopping off my hair, and before leaving Montreal to return to Japan, I bought a lot of hair products. Given that I wouldn't have a whole lot of options here, let's just say I stocked up on a variety of products. I was particularly excited about the Aveda products as I heard good things about them. After consulting other African-Americans/Canadians, and speaking at length with the African-Canadian Aveda salesperson who had recently cut off her natural locks and had a short do, I bought the very expensive shampoo and conditioner. Now, I was pretty happy with my Pantene Relaxed and Natural products, but decided to try out the Aveda. Well, it sucked. It sucked ass. It made my hair dry, brittle, crunchy, tangled - I couldn't detangle my hair and there was absolutely no mositure in it after it was dry. I gave Aveda a good shot - 3 washes, but it was obvious to me yesterday when I pulled out several knots out of my hair that this would have to go. I went back to Pantene this morning.

Lastly, I went to a hip hop dance class this past Sunday. Hip hop dance class, you ask? But you're black (ref?). I just wanted to dance around and feel good. I could do that for free at home but there is something to be said for joining an activity and getting out of your apartment. I had a great time. The music was bangin' (Cut Chemist, exsqueeze me??), the instructor was really good (even with his one rolled up pant leg) and everyone was really inviting. I met a really sweet high school student named Marnie who spoke excellent English and I expect to become friends with her. Good times.

I am also contemplating joining the kendo club. The three new members, all first grade girls, have really inspired me and I kicked ass today, so I might commit to it. Still mulling it over.

That's it for now. Probably.

2006-05-16T14:42:00.000+09:00

"Importing Diversity"...

I just finished reading a very interesting book that has helped me to accept my role here in the Japan education system. It's entitled Importing Diversity: Inside Japan's JET Program by David L. McConnell. I fully recommend this book to everyone involved with the JET Program: applicants, participants, alumni, and also those interested in cultural studies. It was truly eye- opening for me, especially since I was struggling in reconciling my expectations of TESL with the day-to-day reality of teaching people who are not truly interested in learning conversational English.

There were several interesting conclusions I came to after reading this book. Firstly, the JET Program wasn't conceived and implemented with the goal of revolutionizing the way English was taught in Japanese schools. Rather, the JET Program was implemented because the Japanese bowed to foreign ( mostlyAmerican) pressure to open up it's borders and become more international. Like most things in this world, this pressure was bestowed at a time where America realized that Japan was a formidable capitalist/consumerist entity, one that was growing but was insulated from the hegemony of American culture. "Western countries [had] protested with growing vigor what they perceive[d] as the closed nature of Japanese society and Japan's refusal to play be the rules of the international liberal trading order." (pg. 14) In an effort to demonstrate that Japan was willing to play in the international arena and refute the common opinion that they were intolerant of the "other" in their homogenous society, the government realized that they would have to effectively "import diversity" . And they figured that the best way to this would be to invite foreigners into the classroom. Up until then, a few prefectures had assistant language teachers in senior high schools, but the powers to be decided that it's goal would be to have a foreigner teaching in every senior high school, and then junior high schools (and eventually, elementary schools). And with this, the JET Program was born in 1989. Therefore, it became abundantly clear to me that I, along with all my fellow JET participants, am not here to help with the goal of teaching kids English. We are here due to the government's plan to show the world that Japan is not an insular, xenophobic society, but rather a country open to new ideas, new cultures, and new people. Just as long as they are here for 1 -3 years. Effectively, we are all pawns to be used (and to use).

The study of English was, is, and most likely, forever will be taught in a way to ensure success on high school and university entrance exams. Though the JET program was instituted in an attempt for Japanese schoolchildren to learn "living English", i.e. conversation, the reality is ALTs are to used for proper pronounciation, grammar usage and harnassing the native accent, ergo to be the oft-called "human tape recorder". On top of this, the ALT is expected to act as an cultural ambassador of his or her country and to paint a nation of millions with one wide brush. From me, my students have learned that Canadians can eat with chopsticks, Canadians like to travel a lot, Canadians are used to a lot of snow, and Canadians can speak at least 2 languages. Of course, those are grotestque generalizations but so is the nature of the beast. When we are put up in front of the class to answer questions from kids, we are unknowingly or unwillingly stereotyping our nations, for better or for worse. The second thing I learned from Importing Diversity is the nature of my role here. I am not here to teach the kids how to be able to hold conversations with native speakers or how to say and remember the basics of English conversation. I am here to fulfill the above listed expectations while bringing something different to the lives of my kids. They live in rural Japan and will probably have precious few encounters with an African-Canadian woman with natural hair and have the opportunity to touch her, talk to her, play with her and learn from her. Before coming here, I thought I had no expectations, but deep down I guess I did. And the fact that they weren't being realized killed me, but everything has been a lot clearer and a lot better after realizing my true place here.

A third thing I realized was that ALTs have the whole world in their palm yet can screw it up by being too greedy, too expectant, too unrealistic, and too unwilling to adapt. Here we are, in Japan, where we have access to the side of the world we'd probably never have a chance to see otherwise. We are paid well, have a lot of free time and freedom, 20 days + of vacation and are given a lot of leeway. But we tend to not be satisfied because we are perpetually culture shocked and may see our situation as "disadvantageous". So we complain about our schools, our students, our teachers when there really isn't much to complain about because this is just how it is. It was this way before the JET Program and it will forever be this way after we leave. I look at my co-workers and think that this is their life. This is what they have chosen and they get the crap times 100. They have to deal with that shitty kid EVERY FREAKING DAY. I should be counting my stars that I just have 1 hell class a week, and it's for 45 minutes!!! That teacher is losing the war everyday, 7 hours a day. I admit that I have moaned and groaned and I don't regret it, but I have seen that I was blind to the reality of how good I've got it. I'm sure many ALTs have truly shitty situations and work in toxic environments, but I've been fortunate. Unfortunately, many ALTs are just brats who may not be ready for the work world or just don't realize how good they've got it, but luckily I realized this before it was too late.

Ok, I could go on and on about what I've learned from this book, but I'll stop here. I feel much calmer and more happy because everything makes sense. Though I will never fit in or belong to this society/culture, I'm accepted for being different and that's fine for me.

****************************************************************************

My bday is quickly approaching and so is my trip to Okinawa. I will probably not update before leave. Will post pics upon my return. I hear it's the rainy season so that's not great, but still, I'll be on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean. Really can't complain! Ta.