Thanksgiving and Playing with Geisha

Our Thanksgiving Feast

It was good.

...and sukiyaki is very good.

Geigi Festival

The Geisha invited me to play a game with them

...and to take a picture

I won the game :)

The hotel had ducks in front of it...I liked that.

They don't really celebrate Christmas the same way here, but at least they decorate for it.

This is the time of year when Mt. Fuji is the best to see (this is the view from my apartment).

Well, I hope that everyone had a great Thanksgiving and felt very blessed. I certainly do, but it was a very different type of Thanksgiving that's for sure. I had work on that day obviously, but my co-workers and I (in trying to not lose the holiday completely) went out to a restaurant for dinner. There really is not much turkey here, so we had fried chicken, yakisoba and sukiyaki. It was a very good meal anyway and I am very thankful for everything that God has given to me. I am so very blessed really.

Last weekend, I got to attend a Geigi Festival in Izunagaoka...for free. Geigi are Geisha that are specially trained in dancing, music, etc. I found out that there are only two registered schools for bringing up Geisha in Japan and one of them is in Izunagaoka. The performances were beautiful and I really enjoyed watching them dance and play music. After the dancing was over though, they then started inviting guests from the audience to play different games with them. I was asked to play one of the games (I'm not sure what it was called). Thankfully, Ai was there to translate and tell me the rules on how to play. I won :) . They gave me two tickets to a marine animal park that is actually here in Numazu (I had no idea about there being such a place...and neither did any of my co-workers for that matter). After the games we were then all invited to dance with the Geisha in a circle. There was such a huge crowd that there had to be two circles though. It was really, really fun. After that the festival was over and Ai and I went to eat an amazingly good lunch still inside the hotel. When lunch was done we then decided to head to Mishima and go shopping at Sun to Moon...which is a good size mall. I bought some slippers for work, since it's getting much too chilly lately. So I hope that you are all staying well and enjoying this holiday season. Merry Christmas!

Taking a Tour

Nirayama Furnace

Ai and I in front of Egawa's statue

Autumn in Izunokuni

The School Room inside the Egawa's Residence

3 in 1 tree

Different looks for different seasons for the 3 in 1 tree

Okonomiyaki joint

So about two weeks ago, some of my friends and myself were invited to partake in a free tour of some historical sites in the city of Izunokuni. So naturally, we went. It was interesting to learn a bit about Japanese history and culture all in one go. We learned a lot about the governor Egawa... who is credited for the building of many large cannons for coastal defense (at Nirayama Furnace) and introducing bread to Japan (it was literally like a rock, but one probably couldn't be too picky back then I guess). We visited his residence and saw the school room where they say modern Japan began. Egawa was very interested in teaching all the Japanese western culture, so that was the focus of this school. This was of course all during the 1830s or late Edo period. Anyway, there was lots to see and we all had a good time. We were all particularly amazed by this one tree within the residence, which was in fact three different trees (maple, oak, and cherry) all growing together...so it looked like one tree, until you saw the branches had different types of leaves growing out of them. After the tour was finished, we returned to Numazu and I went to lunch with Ai. We had Okonomiyaki (a vegetable and meat pancake), which was really, really good. Hopefully, I'll have the chance to have that again sometime soon. That's it for now, but don't you feel smarter now after having read all this history :)

Bazaars, festivals, Halloween- oh, my!

こわいいね? Happy Halloween!

I got a haircut :)

The Festival in Fujinomiya

Fujinomiya is famous for their yakisoba

Yeah for Yakisoba!!

One of the Dashi (floats) from the festivalA bunch of the people actually help to pull it around town

This fall has been pretty fun and full of events. Last weekend I went to a bazaar for a nearby school that some of my students attend. Then of course this week was Halloween...which of course isn't really celebrated here in Japan, but I heard of a party and decided to attend with one of my Japanese friends. It was rather crowded though, so making the most of the night we left and went to karaoke instead. Halloween was never so fun. This weekend I had two adventures: 1. I finally went to get my haircut...and I went alone (scary thought with such a language barrier there) and 2. I went to the Fujinomiya festival. The haircut was actually a pleasant experience (they do an extremely good job at washing your hair here) and I'm looking forward to my next time going. The festival was highly enjoyable to see all the sites. There are dashi (or giant wood carved pillar-like floats that are pulled around by a bunch of people) for each area of the city...I saw at least 5 different ones during my time there. It was really cool to see these because while the dashi are being pulled there are people sitting inside (or literally hanging off of) them, playing drums and other instruments all the while. Anyway, it has been an enjoyable autumn so far and I know that winter is well on its way...it is just starting to get pretty cold here. Therefore, かぜなどひかないようにきおつけてね。(Try not to catch a cold, okay?)

Took long enough...

What I look like in the eyes of Japanese children (I'm the blonde one).

Yes, yes, I know...what happened to my blog? Well, the gist of it is that my camera ran out of batteries (sorry not many new pictures) and I had a cold for a while and I simply did not really do much besides work these past weeks. I have started meeting with a Japanese English teacher (introduced through connections) and we are doing a language exchange. So she helps me with my Japanese and I help her with her English. She is very nice and she has a very cute one-year old daughter, so lessons are always entertaining. We meet once a week for a few hours. My "textbook" that we are using is a bilingual manga (Japanese comic book) called, Nodame Cantabile...it's fun. I am hoping that this combined with using the Rosetta Stone program that I have will help me out...as I still have a long way to go. Anyway, it is something I am working on.

I also went to the doctor's a few times as well. Once to get medication for my asthma and the other was for a routine check-up that was requested and paid for by the company I work for. Both times were interesting (since a translator is required in my case)...but I think in general, I like their system fairly well. Being who I am (a.k.a the girl who always becomes friends with the school nurse right away), I guess it is inevitable that I get to have these kinds of experiences while living abroad.

That should be it for now. I will try to be better about making more posts in the future. Ja ne!

Tokyo is My Friend

Shibuya is so fun!

My purchases

Outside the Sky Bar in Asakusa

New Friends

The club we went to

In the Park in Harajuku

A traditional Japanese wedding we saw while in Harajuku

So I finally now have a chance to write about last weekend in Tokyo. It was amazing and I had lots of fun for sure. Starting out I traveled part of the way there with one of the Japanese teachers that I work with. I took local trains all the way there, which cost half the money and took a little over a half an hour longer than the Shinkansen (bullet train).

When I arrived in Tokyo I stayed with eight other teachers that I met while at training. We had dinner (at a pretty good Italian restaurant) and walked around Asakusa for the evening. The next day I woke up early and went to a huge fish market with my friend Sandy. It was raining a lot, so we didn't spend too much time there...of course I don't think I would have wanted to spend much time there anyway. So we left there and then took the train (I'm becoming more and more impressed with my train taking abilities) to Shibuya. There is some pretty great shopping there, so I felt right at home :) I got a couple c.d.s, some adorable boots, and the greatest hat ever. I'm still excited with my purchases even a week later. After shopping and meeting up with the some of the others of our group we took a monorail to this giant Ferris wheel (which was at one time the largest in the world). It was very pretty seeing Tokyo at night and we had a great view of Tokyo Tower from up in the Ferris wheel. Afterwards, we went and got ready to go clubbing. We met up with some other friends and then headed to Roppongi, which is where one must go to go clubbing in Tokyo. I (always loving any excuse to dance) enjoyed myself immensely of course. We stayed out till six in the morning...as the trains stop at 11 PM and don't start up again until 5:15, but we had a great time just the same.

At 11 AM we had to check out...which took some serious effort. We then all put our things in a locker and headed toward Harajuku, which is a must if only for the crepes that they sell there...so good. It was pretty crowded, but it was a national holiday here in Japan, so it is to be expected. After looking around the park and such we all went our separate ways and took the train home. It was, or at least it felt like a long trip home to one sleep-deprived girl...but the weekend was totally worth it. I will have to make another trip at some time in the near future.

Cleaning and Transportation

My Bike マダリーン(Madeline)

The View From My Apartment

Airing Out the Futon

I rode my bike for the 1st time this past Tuesday (it needed some repairs)...it was scary. I seriously tipped/fell over three times. Once on the way to work...actually that time I rode into a ditch/pit/rain gutter...they're huge here...and the other two times on the way home. I actually had my purse fall out of the basket in the back...I have a basket in the front and the back of my bike. Luckily, the purse was at the scene of the latter spill and I found it quickly...it's not easy finding a black purse in the dark with no light. Needless to say...I have to work on this. I find that I am okay if I think about it like I'm driving a car...then I'm fine for some reason. It's only when I freak out because someone (or something) is too close and I'm afraid that I might hit them that I mess up (don't worry, I haven't hit anyone/thing). So now my purse always goes in the front basket and I don't think I will be wearing heels...even small ones to work for awhile...it appears to help the situation. Granted I think I need to find some new shoes as mine keep falling off while I ride...my co-workers think I'm hilarious.

Today I played housewife and cleaned my apartment. It's incredibly easy as there isn't much to be cleaned. I love the vacuum cleaners here! They work amazingly well. I also aired out my futon...on the balcony...since that is what you're supposed to do here. I think tonight I will go to that movie I meant to see last weekend, but we'll see.

The training is over...

A random shot of a crane I took last week

Well, my training has finally come to an end. Now I have to teach all of my classes on my own...which is exciting and little scary all at the same time. No worries, though. I know I will be fine and in a few weeks it will all be old hat. Today is my day off so the manager and I went around town getting errands done. So I now have a bank account and a bike... yay! I almost got a cell phone also, but unfortunately they now have a lot of new rules for foreigners in getting cell phones and I have to wait till my health insurance card comes in...strange, but I guess they really want to be sure I'm not leaving the country any time soon. So I will have to wait a bit longer on that one. Yesterday I went to the movie theaters, but I misunderstood that the times showed on the list are both starting and ending times...so I missed the movie I wanted to go see. Hopefully, it will be still showing next weekend (it's been out for awhile). I did go explore the local 100 yen store, which is great for school supply things. I have a feeling I will be visiting that place again in the future...it's very useful in my line of work. I suppose that's it for this week. Ja ne!

Working in Japan

Dinner with other teachers during training

My room mate during training (Sandy)

My first night in Numazu (spent with my co-workers)

My apartment

The rest of my apartment...that's about it though :)

Yes, I am officially working and living in Japan. I am almost done with my first week working at my school and it has been a lot of hard work in planning lessons and teaching. Last week I also worked hard during training in creating and doing different lessons for different levels of students. I made a lot of friends along the way. I am now keeping in touch with the other English teachers that I met while training through the internet. My co-workers in Numazu are also incredibly kind and I have enjoyed spending time with them. So far they have taken me around the city and gone karaoke with me (bowling fell through sadly). I am probably going to go look around more this weekend on my own, and maybe catch a movie as well (Hana Yori Dango Finale...for those that are interested). I have been extremely busy with work and trying to keep tabs with everyone, so I hope that this blog will be helpful. Enjoy the pictures of my life in Japan so far :)