New Friends, Childhood Dreams and the Shinkansen Girl.

I'm back! Not from the future... but from Fukuoka! (Yeesh, that's gotta be a candidate for 'worst play on words in the blogosphere' right?)

So Fukuoka was cool; the immigration stuff was boring as expected, but at least it went smoothly. I'm now no longer in danger of deportation. Yay fo' me. The rest of the weekend I hung out with Mina; walked around Fukuoka, went to some parks and shrines, ate some ice cream and drank some coffee (iced), did a little shopping for her sisters birthday (it's lucky I'm not embarrassed to be seen walking around metro areas with a giant seal-body pillow), then went back to her place for some cooking and summer night beers while looking over the skyline. Consider me content; it really is good to be back and relaxed.

This has actually been a good week in lotsa ways; aside from a three day workweek (I looooove the public service!) there's another public holiday next Monday! No karoshi for Shaun! I serendipitously ran into another one of the area ALTs at the mall the other day; Greg from Zimbabwe, who's really cool and seems to share my passion for eating and drinking things. He cemented a special place in my heart with many gifts- firstly a couch, the only problem with giving me a couch is that I have no car to move a couch; I got into the spirit of African tribeswomen and hauled it the 2km back to my apartment regardless... on. my. head. Luckily for me it's the type that doesn't have a frame, but still; I felt damn manly (read: sweaty) afterwards.

Shaun and Greg; approximately 50% of Nogatas foreign English teaching contingent, and approximately 50% of the towns sex-appeal in one convenient package.

Second, I am now the proud owner of a bicycle! Her name is 'Linda' (after her previous owner) and it looks like she's done some hard service carting teachers like me to the workplace and beyond for many years. In any case, the bus is on the way out, and excellent thighs and calves are on the way in. I only have one problem; I haven't actually attempted to even go near a bike in something like 18 years.

That phrase, "it's like riding a bike" is completely erroneous. I can't ride a bike, I've been going out to the parking lot behind my apartment and doing ovals while I try to recover whatever anemic cycling skill I possessed as a pre-teen. I'm not sure what the Japanese people who walk past think; probably that it's some bizarre gaijin custom to wobble around a parking lot going 'woah!' and almost tumbling off every few seconds late at night. Hell, they probably think I'm drunk.

In a piece of random news to finish up, I've developed an appalling crush, really, like the stupidest celebrity crush I've ever had (OK, maybe not quite as stupid as the one on Phillip Schofield). It's mainly stupid because it's a girl on a poster. A poster that advertises a train service. A train service that isn't completed. In any case, I've already almost walked straight into two people while staring at her image; I'm not even sure why, objectively I don't even think she's that pretty, but there's just something about her smile. Anyway take a look and judge for yourself; am I deviant?

The smiley gal who makes me want to ride the unfinished Kagoshima shinkansen without due cause, damn you vixen!

Noko is Loco.

I've officially survived a whole week as a high school teacher. Everybody may now cheer.

You know what? It wasn't even hard. In fact I'd go as far as to say it was really, really easy. I walked in expecting to have, well, classes; it turns out that as I'm at the 'sports-centered' Nogata high school and the annual sports festival is approaching, practically all the class time has given way to athletic and performance practice sessions; this means the (quite large) quotient of P.E. teachers are relatively busy, but the 'geeks': those of us who teach things like history, maths, Japanese, English and the like are essentially working in a practical vat of free time.

So this week I've made a few speeches, taken a tour of the school, chatted a lot with the staff, studied some Japanese, eaten some lunches, drunk some coffee and generally tried to act like any conscientious educator would in my situation.

Nogata high school, more often known as 'Noko'. The main building was obviously designed by a person with a fondness for concrete, rectangles and communism.

The staff have all been really nice, friendly and helpful; and they all do their best to meet my broken Japanese with English responses. I've got some big shoes to fill; my predecessor Taea (a charming young Hawaiian woman) came to visit the school for a few days before she said goodbye; she helped me out a lot with advice, and everyone will miss her muchly I'm sure- still, just another reason to swing by and visit Hawaii right?

The kids are all really cool too- some are shy and stammer when they try to speak to me, others are so enthusiastic that they just grab and start speaking Japanese, again I feel like a rock-star; there's nothing like having a gaggle of cheerleaders begging you to dance with them to boost a guys self-esteem. One first year student made my day when she found out that I knew who Haruhi Suzumiya is and then proceeded to organise her friends to perform the dance from the shows title.

Inside a classroom (class 2-3 to be exact). I hardly ever get to be in one of these so it's quite special. Also, the kids haven't dissolved, they've just changed into sportswear and left behind a giant cache of hello-kitty accessories.

So really so far my job involves wandering the halls of a high school and making small talk with students and staff, occasionally observing and occasionally participating in sports, VERY occasionally preparing some materials and ASSISTING in teaching an English class and generally bringing my Shaunitude to the institute as a whole. Far be it from me to complain about Japanese tax dollars subsidising what often feels to me like life in a slightly surreal sports club.

Most wacky/fun things about the job so far:

a) I am the shoe king!: I own and use no less than 4 pairs of shoes while on the job; 'outside' shoes, 'inside' shoes, 'gym' shoes and 'track' shoes (and that's not counting school provided bathroom slippers). I am now proficient in changing footwear in under 8 seconds.

b) Student servitude: there is no janitor, students clean the school in the 15 minute 'cleaning' block at the end of the day while teachers 'supervise'; they even come into the staff room and empty our wastepaper baskets and sweep the floor... never has being slovenly been easier!

c) Coordination central: 'Sports day' over here isn't just about running, jumping and spraying your hair a funny colour: it's about high-grade crowd synchronisation. Everything from student marches to cheerleading to massed displays using coloured boards is controlled with loud communal yelling, taiko drums and megaphones. Sometimes it feels suspiciously like the Nuremberg rally (then the cheer squad plays a Spice Girls song and the illusion is shattered).

Anyway; as always, I'm having fun, being silly and am not dead. Mission accomplished I say.

Stay busy people of the world,

Shaun.

Stars.

There's a lot of festivity this month! Next on the celebratory hitlist is Tanabata, the Japanese star festival on July 7^th. The legend goes that two separated lovers (the stars Altair and Vega) are allowed to meet each other only on this night... awwww... romantic huh? The occasion is celebrated with a summer festival, and people tying poems, prose or wishes to the branches of bamboo trees.

Our Japanese class decked out in Tanabata wear and lookin' spiffy. See the lady on the far right in the blue? That's Fumie my teacher who's slowly but steadily improved the level of my Japanese from 'non-existent' to 'existent but bad'. Quite the achievement.

Luckily, we had the staff of our Japanese language program to explain this to us, this week we forgoed our regularly scheduled lessons in exchange for a Tanabata party, allowing the girls to get decked out in classy kinomos and the rest of us to eat some traditional sweets and write out some wishes; my three this year are (in no particular order):

1. A pair of shoes that FIT.

2. The ability to control my kid's classes through sheer force of will.

3. World peace.

Really, I'll settle for one out of three. The most nerve-wracking part of the festivities was having to give a short speech in Japanese talking about yourself. Luckily I had my teacher Fumie to polish out my grammar mistakes and brief me on how to pronounce everything, domo arigato Fumie-sensei!

Post festival celebrations (the day after actually) I jumped on a bus down to Fukuoka to help Katy get her Birthday celebratory vibe on. Amanda pulled off some stellar organization and a fabulous array of Mexican food, we cracked out and carved up a candle laden watermelon (how Japanese huh?) Then we went down to the park for some more firework-themed shenanigans (wooo! I still have all my fingers, that's 2 for 2!) We stayed up sipping champagne and pontificating about life until the wee hours then eventually retired for some much needed kip.

Katy with her birthday watermelon (tea-lights included), tasty AND far healthier than the traditional calorie-loaded 'cake' alternative; Japanese ingenuity scores again!

I spent much of the afternoon hanging around Amandas place while she was out, taking the opportunity to read my way through some more Haruki Murakami, this time it was South of the Border, West of the Sun, which gets high marks from me for noirish atmosphere and visualization but lost out a little in the actual 'storytelling' sense; I'll still give it a recommendation though since you can read the whole thing in under 4 hours.

Getting festive in the park; we danced like nobody was watching. Unfortunately, someone was. Damn you Amanda! ;)

In the afternoon I grabbed a coach back to Sasebo to do dinner with Laura and Lani and reaffirm my testosterone filled manliness with a cinematic session of Die Hard 4.0, awesomely cinema's in Japan don't suffer hangups about allowing food or beverages onto their premises, so we grabbed a six pack and proceeded to sup our way through it as Mr. Willis got progressively more violent and blood stained in his pursuit of justice. Afterwards we went down to the local park and climbed onto a gazebo roof and watched the fish jump in the horribly polluted river while we philosophized. Very Dawson's Creek, no? :P

Now of course it's time to start another work week. Hooray. Yay. Woo AND Hoo. Pass the tie and call me 'sensei', I've got a whole bag of grammar, vocab and listening skills to teach before next Sunday!

Starlight and love,

Shaun.

Stripes.

One of the best things about being an English teacher in Japan is the vast array of people you meet from all over the world (or at least the English speaking world). Suddenly it's rare to have a group of friends who share an accent, and getting carded at the pub is a cool excuse to check out the drivers licenses of the globe.

Another benefit is that it provides an excuse to celebrate an inordinate number of national holidays; before I didn't even know when Canada day was, now it's marked on my calender and I'm stockpiling maple syrup in anticipation.

In any case, living among such a vast quantity of Americans, it seemed remiss of us not to do something to mark the anniversary of the nations, uhhh... nationhood. You can only imagine my shock and disappointment when I found that the only 'official' July 4^th celebration was held behind the secure perimeter of the Sasebo Fleet Activities facility. 'This shall not stand!' I muttered to Lani and Laura and set about organizing a suitable homage to George Washington et all.

Laura and Lani... ummm... in my bathtub. Don't ask me how this happened (or why they were both in my tiny bathroom AT THE SAME TIME.) But we were lucky there were no fatalities. Note how Lani is reaching out for help while I'm standing taking photos. What are friends for, right?

Not that there was much organization to do, seeing as our idea of a celebration involved those two great pillars of Americana- fireworks and hard liquor. It's been so long since I've had ready access to explosives (what with Australia being one big tinderbox and all) that my childlike joy could hardly be suppressed when I walked into Jusco and found an insane quantity of near military grade explosives to choose from, all available over the counter.

So after work I got back to my apartment to find Laura and Lani already engrossed in beer-swilling and MTV watching. There were many toasts (some even non-ironic) to Lani's homeland, then we wandered down to the park to set off our stash of sky flowers. For some reason we had this idea that it would be cool to set ALL the freakin' things off simultaneously; while the visual result was indeed spectacular, it generated enough noise that we actually ran away before we were arrested under some festivity-crushing noise-pollution ordnance or something.

Fireworks! There's enough firepower here to level and entire civilization (of ants). I think the bottle of I.W. Harper is a nice touch too, it really screams 'responsibility'.

At this stage the bar seemed a good idea, so we wandered off to Playmates, then proceeded to party with the Navy for much of the night, I was amazed by how many of them didn't actually realize it was July 4^th (or 5^th actually at this stage) unpatriotic sods! Still they bought us beer which was nice. Happy birthday America!

Oh say can you see?

Shaun.

Balls must be kicked, deportation must be avoided.

I was back up in Fukuoka for the last few days, it seems like I’ve been living up there on the weekends lately; Most of the trips have been company sponsored, seeing as I’ve had to take multiple trips down to the immigration office to change my visa over from my ‘working holiday’ arrangement (which equates to deportation after six months) to a genuine ‘work visa’ (which doesn’t). I don’t actually mind the travel, because it gives me a fabulous excuse (and a ticket) to go down and see everyone in the big city.

I’m less enamored with my time at the department of immigration, mainly because it involves sitting on a couch for hours, occasionally standing momentarily to hand in/sign some paperwork then sitting down again while some abstract bureaucratic process takes place. Thank god for mp3 players is all I can say.

Anyway, kickball still rocks; we had a totally decent turnout this time round which helped to round out the competition nicely, plus I got to meet some of the newest recruits into the company (Wooo! we’re not the greenest faces on the field anymore!) Actually we only got to play a few innings before the rainy season reared its head and dumped on us with a monsoon. Even that wasn’t too bad actually, we sheltered under a traditional/historical Japanese gate (Amanda mentioned that it is the oldest gate in Kyushu or something), and drank all the beer and spirits we’d brought. Looking back the sight of about 15 English teachers huddled under a historical landmark drinking beer and spirits should seem kinda surreal, oddly enough it really doesn’t by now…. In fact that’s pretty much par for the course. Travel changes your perspectives that way.

It takes more than torrential rain to stop kickballing English teachers from having fun! (From left) Cristina, Lauren, Ed, Katy and Mike take shelter under a historical landmark in Ohashi Park. Extra warmth and comfort provided by the Asahi breweries.

Yeah, so we sat, talked swapped war stories from work, cracked wise (and not so wise) for a while and then scurried off to an ‘English theme pub’ called ‘Morris’ in between bursts of drenching rain. All that good karma I’m building up by being a super-conscientious educator paid off, because (drum-roll) it turns out that the pub stocked Coopers (yes, that Coopers, my hometowns fabulous and much missed pale-ale). In a flashback to a similar experience during my time in London I went crazy and bought everyone a bottle and forced them to appreciate its magnificence. I closed my eyes as I drank and imagined myself back in my beloved UniBar. Then I snapped out and bought a Guinness; sometimes you’ve gotta be pragmatic y’know? At some point in the night we decided that playing Jenga would be an awesome idea. Needless to say nobody’s hand-eye coordination was improved by spending a night in a drinking establishment. Still, fun was had.

Guinness girls! (from left) Lauren, Mitsumi and Amanda with refreshing pints of Irelands finest. Can you spot the Coopers bottle?

I ended up crashed out at Katy’s place, again indebted to the hospitality of my friends, I spent the remained of the weekend exploring some more of Fukuoka and having fun (including making a phone call to my parents from the roof of the ACROS building). I met up with Mike and grabbed dinner at a charming isakia at the end of the day then I jumped on a bus back to the ‘Bo in time to write this and begin another work week. Fun time’s over, time to get back to grammar points and oxygen-depriving neckties.

Be friendly cyber-surfers,

Shaun.

Furnishings are the spice of life.

It was a big day for me today, a day that marks the end of an era; the sleeping on the floor era to be precise. Something finally cracked in me the other day when I woke up and found myself staring into the antenna of a reasonably proportioned cockroach. No more floor naps for Shaun, nuh-uh… one day you’re looking at a roach, next thing you’re waking up strangely full and picking bits of shell out of your teeth.

My solution? Cutting-edge convertible couch technology. A soft sprung surface of synthetic fabric supported by four stout posts that doubles as an effective television viewing platform and a comfortable place to lose consciousness at the end of the day. It’s a beautiful functional thing, and a grand monument to my first complete paycheck.

My couch, the new love of my life, a thing of beauty is she not?

Ummm… yeah, so that’s about it. I know it’s a little sad to write a whole entry about a piece of furniture, but hey… at least it’s a little different than my usual “I went out drinking with some people” entries, right? Ummm… not that I having been doing that, but y’know, I know it must get kinda samey.

Because he missed out last time this is Mike, posed here with the same snake juice (it's official name is Habu-sake by the way) that welcomed me to to this town. God-bless 'im, it's nice to have a friend to share your rituals of pain with.

Yeah, so I’m still alive; I have a comfy place to sleep and I’ve gone three whole days without eating a meal out of a convenience store; I don’t think life gets much better than that.

Sleep well world,

Shaun.

New Friends, Jazz and Dental Health.

Yo cyber-readers! How’s life? Are you staying sane? Did you do something cool today? Life’s flying by y’know! Get out there and have a great day! Ok… finish reading this first though, thanks. ;)

Right, so I’ve been being social lately, I’ve taken to hanging out with a pair of girls who work for the local NOVA lately; Lani (who I’ve already mentioned) and her new roommate Lauren who hails from Devon in England and is brand new to this whole ‘Japan’ thing. Poor thing, she’s landed just as this island is starting to get genuinely oppressively hot; the humidity is killing me, I can’t imagine what it must be like for her.

Ohhhh! New girls! Lani (on the left) and Laura (on the right) finally some people who are even newer at this than I am. This is their first time in an Isakia, bless their little cotton socks. They've already got the ubiquitous Japanese 'peace for photos' pose down pat though.

To make life even more interesting, the company has delivered us an ET to help out with the workload around here (ET stands for ‘Emergency Teacher’ and is no way related to creepy wrinkly aliens just in case you were wondering). His name is Mike, he’s from California, has been working in Tokyo for a bunch of years and he’s pretty much the coolest thing that’s happened at work since I got here, you have no idea what’s it’s like having someone in the office who actually laughs at my offbeat humour.

We all went out for a bar tour last night which involved spending a grandiose amount of time sitting in various jazz bars and trying everything on the drinks menu. We talked about music for hours on end, swapped a bunch of wacky stories, solved all the worlds geopolitical problems and generally did the whole ‘gaijin bonding’ thing that this job seems to tacitly encourage.

Bizarre event of the moment: this week it's the Sasebo 'Dental Health' festival, complete with tooth-brushing demonstrations and an art competition where school children compete to render the best depiction of tooth decay. It's almost enough to make me floss.

In other exciting news (at least for me), I discovered a late-night supermarket about 10 minutes walk from my flat; this means my grocery shopping schedule is suddenly vastly more flexible, and it may save me from having to run down to Jusco during my lunch breaks. I’ve decided that I need to do a serious clear up around here, it seems like the change of continent hasn’t actually improved my housekeeping skills (big surprise) and the fact that I’m having to step over things on the floor to get to the bathroom is a major warning sign of the bachelor lifestyle taken too far. I’m all alone and maidless over here, without family or roommates to share my domestic burdens. Woe is plentiful.

Cool, clean vibes,

Shaun.

Flyers? Japanese? Kickball!

My, what an active few days; there’s been the standard rigmarole of work which never fails to keep one buzzing of course, but this week I had things shaken up a bit by the beginning of a series of trips down to the local university to do ‘promotional work’, ‘promotional work’ in this case is a super-secret codephrase that translates to ‘hand out flyers’. Ok, it’s not exactly what I imagined myself doing when I was riding the plane on the way over here, but it’s actually kinda fun it’s own way; I mean, you nod, smile and say ‘Hello, how are you?’ about 48 zillion times and shove flyers into the hands of university students. Personally I’d prefer to be giving out tissues, because that would be uniquely Japanese, but hell I’ll take what I can get, and a bit of overtime never goes astray right?

I finally went to my first Japanese lesson on Friday too, well at least my first Japanese lesson that actually involves sitting in a classroom and doing exercises; it’s not like I never get a chance to practice after all. It was fun, I learnt all about introducing myself and saying basic stuff like ‘Hello’ and ‘Goodbye’, which was nice because I already knew most of it, so I felt like I was doing really well. I’m sure it’ll be harder next week though. It made me feel slightly guilty about my paycheck too, I pay 500 yen for a months tuition by dedicated volunteers who come in on their day off to help poor people like me make their way in the country. That’s genuine altruism yo.

It’s been a week of firsts, I also went to my first AEON kickball game this weekend… that’s right, kickball; that game we used to play in primary school. It’s back baby, laced with an attractive new coating of beer and karaoke after parties. Anyway, I’ve decided that kickball is indeed a fantastic sport and I’ve decided that my co-workers are all ultra-cool. They must all have hearts of gold to give me a standing ovation for my inebriated rendition of ‘In the Navy’ (a song, I wisely avoid back in Sasebo on account of the local demographic). Bonus props to Mitsumi too for letting me sleep on her floor instead of Fukuoka central park.

Katy and Mitsumi on the field of kickball glory (otherwise known as Ohashi Koen) representing the US and Canada respectively. They both kick balls most admirably.

Best of all, my travel was all paid for, on account of my visa needing to be re-designated; ok, so sitting in the immigration office is never fun; but I’ll take my breaks where I can get them, besides it gave me an excuse to hang around and shop for the rest of the day, which is something I never really get sick of in Fukuoka (wooo! All you can eat engrish T-shirts!)

Go team Kareoke! Singing, dancing, teaching English... is there anything we can't do?

So by now obviously I’m kinda wiped, and yet I have to get back to work tomorrow… yike, oh well… maybe watching ‘Columbo’ tonight will refresh my tired brain… he’s even more hilarious in dubbed Japanese!

Kick on world,

Shaun.

Goodbye Spencer, Hello Telecomunications.

It was both a sad and joyous day today.

Let’s get the sad part over with first: Spencer is moving away from the ‘Bo to the greener (greyer?) surrounds of Tokyo and tonight was his going away party. Of course the party itself was significantly rockin’- we went to the local sports bar called ‘Dreamers’ and indulged heartily in all manner of food, beverages and socialization. It’s always really nice to get everyone together in one place, and while It’s sad to see Spencer go, it was cool to meet some new people too, there’s a married couple called Jocelyn and Craig from California and a very funky young lady called Milani from Utah; I look forward to introducing them all to the pleasures of karaoke, pachinko and binge-drinking.

Spencer with his adoring admirers; we'll miss ya man!

It’s kinda weird not being the ‘new guy’ anymore, but it’s cool to be able to help other people and watch them get settled in. It reminds me of the wonder I had during my first few weeks; in a way I’m a little sad that going to the supermarket isn’t an adventure anymore, but I guess it does save time when you don’t have to stop and take pictures of whatever crazed mascot is on the instant noodles this week.

My big exciting news is that I got my Alien Registration Card, which means Wooooo! I’m all legal and the government has deemed me worthy of the ultimate responsibility: cell-phone ownership! No more trying to organize my social life with a notebook and e-mail, yay!

I went somewhat silly in my excitement and walked into the nearest DoCoMo and grabbed the first phone that caught my eye; I ended up with a Foma SO703i as advertised by some J-pop starlet with alarming regularity on CNN. As befits any piece of technology on this island it’s so ridiculously feature heavy that I live in constant fear of launching nuclear missiles at Russia when I put my phone on silent. Seriously, it makes video calls, reads barcodes, gives GPS information… and the best part, it smells. Seriously, it comes with a frickin’ ‘scent card’ so when you’re talking you can smell lilacs. Uhhh… I wonder how long it took the R&D folks to think up that one.

My phone, complete with its 'aroma card'; it scares me that it probably has more processing power than the space shuttle.

Yeah, so anyway I’m back in contact and I spent a good part of today thumping all the numbers and e-mail addresses (‘cause SMS is soooo 2 years ago) that I had written down on a collection of post-its into my shiny new toy. In case you hadn’t noticed I’m pretty pleased. Now all I need is a set of ridiculously gaudy cell-phone charms and I’ll be set.

Stay in touch world,

Shaun.

All that Glitters is not Golden Week.

*Sigh* well, holidays can’t last forever; and the weekly rigmarole of work has officially returned, not that I’m complaining… much. It’s kinda nice to have the structure back in my life I guess, the students are nice and I have an excuse to eat lunch at the worlds most awesome burger restaurant around the corner from work (it’s called ‘Big Man’, and it serves these deep fried cheese balls which are quite frankly probably the most awesome creation since the inclined plane).

On the downside I have to wear my suit again, and I have to take off my jacket and battle kids and their steadfast reluctance to articulate vocab words again, and I have to listen to listening exercises that sound like awful 80’s sitcoms *again* . Oh well, such is the life of an educator, maybe I just should have picked a cushy job, like military service where you get to wear awesome always-in-fashion camo all day, and the hardest thing you have to do is dodge a few IEDs in Fallujah… I know I’m right because a marine I met in a bar told me so.

Still, sometimes the perks are cool; take this Monday for instance, when the company kindly paid for me to go down to Fukuoka and drink premium beer with a gaggle of supermodels in a hot spring.

Oh yeah, that was just the dream I was having last night before I rolled off my futon and into the harsh grip of reality, a reality that still involved Fukuoka, but replaced the rest with business garb, long bus rides and a long conference about the company’s upcoming self-study campaign (which basically involves us trying to convince our students to buy stuff to help them study at home more).

While I’m skeptical about the campaign (sheesh… how much time can a person spend repeating after a CD before their brain melts huh?) The conference was actually pretty cool if only because it gave everyone who joined AEON Kyushu in the last few months the chance to meet each other and swap e-mail addresses; I got to go out to lunch with Christi and Lauren again, and I met a bunch of really cool people too; I signed up to play kickball in Fukuoka on the weekends (even though I probably won’t be able to make it that often). That’s pretty awesome since I might get some fitness time in too; although melding the kickball with beer will probably act to balance things out.

It was also cool to get a chance to sit down and get some quality time with Chihiro (hell… there nothing like four hours of bus riding to encourage story-swapping; boredom is everyone’s common adversary). Again I’m impressed by her charming accent, and it’s nice to know there’s one staff member that won’t go ‘ehhh?’ when I say ‘zed’, ‘flat’ or ‘petrol’. Bloody colonials… they’re taking over the world I tell you!

Today's photo features signage from the local loan provider. A bold counter to those who claim there is no truth in advertising.

Right, so I just wandered in, it’s past midnight, and even the fact that I just earned a hundred and something thousand yen worth of overtime for sitting and listening most of the day can’t raise my spirits over the fact that I have to start a working week tomorrow. Ergo I choose to collapse on my futon.

Goodnight cyber-readers,

Shaun.

Don Tak Who?

Hiiiii! I’m back! Did you miss me?

Phew, well at least I don’t feel like I’ve been slacking or failing to make the most of my precious vacation days, I can now cross ‘visit Chikushino’ and ‘attend Dontaku festival’ off my giant corporeally nonexistent list of ‘things to do in Japan’.

It’s really cool to feel like a tourist again, and I cannot overstate the newfound pleasure I derive from a protracted period without a tie knot in close proximity to my throat. It was cool to see Cristis apartment, since I’ve been pretty curious about how my place measures up; I must say I’m pretty jealous of her bed, not that my futon is uncomfortable, but I’m kinda sick of having to roll up my bedding during the day like some sort of nomad. Being in Chikushino made me appreciate Sasebo all the more, unlike my town English speakers and signage are not exactly prevalent, still that’s a great excuse to learn Japanese and jump straight into ‘immersion therapy’… plus Fukuoka is only a 15 minute train ride away, so that’s pretty nice. We stayed up and watched Garden State which was nice and homey, and far more comprehensible than the Crazy Restaurant Gang Show which was the televised alternative.

Speaking of Fukuoka, Dontaku was a pretty spectacular… uhh… spectacle. Think giant street festival with a giant crowd, giant floats and lots of other giant things. There were lots of people in their kimono, plus the Dontaku ‘extra’ of hats constructed out of flowers; very pretty, although I can’t imagine where they found that many fresh flowers around here. Maybe they grow them in giant underground vats or import them from China; that seems to be where most organic stuff comes from around here.

The most generic Dontaku photo ever. Ladies with flower hats. I could have posted pictures of 'Ms. Fukuoka' in her revealing outfit, schoolgirl cheerleaders or the 'Transvestite wedding' float, but this is what you get. Feel free to flood my inbox with complaints.

We milled around Fukuoka for a while afterwards, soaking up the atmosphere and occasionally pausing to munch on carnival food, some of which was familiar, much of which was unrecognizable due to it being deep fried in a fabulously artery-clogging fashion. So much for all that amazingly healthy Japanese food; heart disease and obesity epidemic here I come! Hopefully walking several kilometers around the city will help me shed all those extra kilos. Meh… who am I kidding? I couldn’t get fat if I tried.

Even fictional pirates love Dontaku! I put my Dontaku mask on this disturbing effigy of Mr. Depp for this photo. The masks were worn by comedians to hide their identity from the fascist Japanese rulers of ages past, so I think the connection is quite fitting.

We missed Lauren, due to a unfortunate mix up regarding her phone number, hope ya had a great time anyway Lauren! Next time huh? I crashed out at Cristi’s place again, we took a short tour of Chikushino in the morning and grabbed lunch at a local restaurant (woo! I got to work on my impromptu sign-language skills some more) then I hauled myself back to Fukuoka and jumped on a bus back to Sasebo. It’s nice to be back in my own space, even if I did come back to a pile of dishes waiting to be done and a lack of milk in the fridge. Oh well, such is the ugly underside of my bachelor lifestyle.

Hmmm… people are big on maids here, I wonder if I could find one actually capable of doing domestic duties and without all the usual fetish connotations? Nah… probably not.

All the best world,

Shaun.

Monkey (or is it Kyushu?) Island.

Ahhh… vacations, it doesn’t matter how old you get or what you do to procure sustenance in this crazy world, vacations still rock. Especially if they’re paid, and even moreso if you have some friends that are psyched to party.

You know what I was saying about having superpowers? Well it turns out that I do have amazing powers, at least of luck. I was out shopping when I walked past the train station and who should I bump into but Christi? She’d just come off the train and by some amazing stroke of serendipity I was walking past as she was standing outside the train station. Who needs the high tech wizardry of mobile phones (or indeed the low-tech wizardry of smoke signals) when you have impeccable timing and a ridiculous amount of luck?

Anyway, I took Cristi on the big tour of Sasebo (which wasn’t really that big since it involved two parks, a wharf, the shopping arcade and my apartment) we ate Mexican (Viva the nachos!) and then met up with Saori for a night of wanton indulgence in wine, food and TV; we watched three episodes of Queer Eye then switched to ‘High Fidelity’ (mostly because of my incessant heterosexual male whining). Great night though!

After emerging bleary-eyed from our futons the next morning we grabbed breakfast the window shopped for a goodly proportion of the day, I managed to convince Cristi to sample a Sasebo burger while the opportunity was evident, for a fairly petite girl she managed to wolf it down quite easily, props! We wandered around the market district for a while then went to a few 100 Yen stores (the same concept as ‘Cheap As Chips’) to prepare for Hannah’s pirate-themed birthday bash. Being somewhat cheap ‘preparation’ involved buying bandannas, although I splurged and bought a 100 Yen T-shirt and wrote ‘Arrrrr’ on it with a whiteboard marker.

We started off in Nimitz park with jelly-shots then moved up to Gela’s temporary domicile (which is a very nice house in the hilly suburbs of the city) for the majority of the night; again the craziness of the alcohol supply in this country astounds me, I walked into the lounge room and the first thing I laid eyes on was a 3 LITRE bottle of Smirnoff, the second was a 3 litre bottle of Jack Daniels, and after that a 5 litre box of sangria. I’m not even going to start on the ridiculous pile of beer and other assorted spirits scattered liberally around the place.

Anyway, enough about booze; let me tell you about the binge-drinking. We had about 18 people attend in all, and I got to meet a lot of interesting people; special mentions must go to Spencer from Canada for his fabulous piratanicalness and awesome wit (seriously, watch out Mr. Depp), Lauren from England who was kind enough to force many drinks upon me and drag me onto the tatami ‘dancefloor’ and Paco, a fine representative of the U.S. armed forces who gallantly stripped off his shirt and did the manly task of providing us all with substance from the barbeque. Kudos to you all!

Spencer, Hannah and Gela get piratanical; check out all that bootylicious booze! Just looking at it now makes my innards twitch uncomfortably.

We eventually wound up taking taxis back into Sasebo proper (mainly to avoid having the neighbors file charges of disturbing the peace against us) and continued on at another string of bars ending with the appropriately named ‘Treasure’ (which actually has a beach sand covered floor, how cool is that?) I made friends with an ancient Japanese man who taught me how to play crazy 8’s (or ‘baka hatchi’ as it’s known around here) even though he didn’t speak a word of English. It was 8AM by the time we staggered out into the sunlight and sensibly decided to call it quits; poor Lauren… she had to catch a bus back to Kuramoto at 12; still… such is life as an educator, and she’s a trooper.

This kindly old man taught me how to play cards, I gave him my 50 yen bandanna as a token of thanks; it suits him, don'tcha think?

Of course today was pretty much a write-off, consisting of obtaining food, minimum stamina expenditure and avoiding anything that makes loud noises. I feel pretty much fine by now though, it’s amazing what raman, water and sleep can do.

Tomorrow we’re going to go up and explore around Cristi’s place in Chikushino, then go back into central Fukuoka and meet Lauren (our Lauren) for the Dontaku festival, which I don’t have much idea about but am assured is quite a big deal around here. I’m just excited about being stared at by schoolgirls again.

Alright, time to go shove my gear into my newly-acquired Hello Kitty duffel bag. Back in a few days, stay happy alright?

Shaun.

A Week of Gold.

Golden week! Golden week! We love Golden week!

It’s the first day of Golden week vacation today, and as you can likely tell; I’m fairly excited because I don’t have to go into work ever again… or at least for a whole week.

My first week of being a ‘real’ teacher has just flown by…’busy’ would be an understatement; there’s always something to do at the office and the schedule can get fairly hectic at times. Lesson planning has become a five minute matter rather than a half hour project but teaching back to back lessons for five or six hours is pretty draining. The students are always fun though, and it’s great being able to actually feel like you’re helping someone with something they care about. The best part is probably answering questions (‘which is a worse insult, pig or dog?’) and being able to teach stuff that’s tangential to the curriculum (yesterday I explained about fraternities, sonorities and ‘keggers’ to a student who's planning a stay in an American university).

The biggest challenge is probably the kids classes; while adults are well-behaved, with kids it's often quite difficult to make them do the activities as planned. I have a newfound respect for early childhood educators everywhere. So far the teaching points have been making it across, but I still never quite feel in control in the classroom, it’s more like I’m a lion-tamer than a teacher or something. I’m hoping it’s just a matter or practice, otherwise I’m heading to aneurysm-land.

Last night me, Saori and Hiroki celebrated by going out to an isakaia for some food and drinks; lotsa fun! Chihiro's running off to a hot spring for a week (a plan which I am exceedingly jealous of) and everyone else has plans to visit their families (Golden week seems to be kind of a Thanksgiving equivalent over here) so I'm gonna take the opportunity to explore a bit.

I'm not really alone though; I got a knock on the door last week from Gela and Hannah, two foreign teachers who also work in the neighbourhood, although I answered the door in my boxers (I had some misguided idea about an 'early night' or somesuch) they still agreed to take me out and show me the sights ('sights' in this case means 'bars'). We went down to the local watering hole called 'Playmates’ and began a fairly epic night out that ended sometime around 3.30 in the morning and spanned another 3 bars and a karaoke parlour. Both of them are a great source of advice about teaching and life in Japan and it was nice to take a bit of a tour of the town. Hannah lives right above me in my building too, so it’s good to know there’s a friendly face nearby, and her English accent is very charming.

Want to try something different? Some Japanese bars have this stuff, which we affectionately call 'Snake Juice'.

And this is me, Hannah and Gela indulging in aforementioned snake-infused liquor. Why are we smiling? Even I don't know.

I’ve still got to get some plans together for the holiday, lest I fall into a deathly abyss of sitting in my flat watching MTV and eating dry pasta for a week and a half straight. I’m still slightly crippled in the organization department by my lack of internet or cellular phone access, but I’m gonna try and catch up with Cristi and Lauren anyway… after all, how hard can it be? I’m GTS (Great Teacher Shaun) after all!

Golden week means celebrations, and no town celebrates like Sasebo! Because Sasebo celebrates with a giant inflatable hamster.

Ummm ok, I’m gonna go, I need to fold up my futon and vaccum. Grand plans indeed.

(GT) Shaun.