Well, I only have one class left (tomorrow) until April so things are pretty relaxed. I went in to school Thursday and they were like “why are you here?” so I went home and Friday I didn’t even go in. Good thing too, because it dumped snow that night! I instead spent the day cleaning one of the rooms in my house for the inevitable move; throwing out lots of stuff, then going through all the clothes in my wardrobe. I mostly got rid of clothes that balloon and make me look bigger than I am. I’ll do some good shopping when I go home. I was thinking of sending those clothes home to donate to charity, but there really is a lot, and it really is heavy. I think the money spent sending them would be better spent on presents or weird stuff to bring home.
So ya, one room is fairly clean now there are 2 big ones and a kitchen left to go through. Saturday was spent with some friends as we drove up to get REAL pizza in Okaya. Somehow the hour drive stretched into two and a half, but the pizza was worth it. In the midst of going through games together we touched an old favourite of mine, Eternal Darkness for the Game Cube. As such, I simply had to play it again as it reached that magic point where it’s been long enough that I forgot most of the puzzles and story; and that’s how my Sunday was spent. I did beat it too, at 2 in the morning; so today I’m a bit tired.
So ya, the last 3 weekends I stayed in and maybe saved enough money doing that to pay off my car by now; given my previous “go out and do stuff” shindigs. Maybe I’ll leave school early today to do more of that cleaning and getting ready to move.
I’m excited to visit Canada. So this is how my blog would look if I wrote it while I was still living there. I've been getting in touch with my old self lately; the reverse culture shock will still be huge though when I go home...
I'm just wondering now what to do for my birthday next weekend. I’m on the fence between going to Tokyo where it’s a big city and having some crazy adventure like I usually do, or having friends over for video games again, and maybe having a nabe party. I love nabe. It's been alot easier lately to not try or care, and my happiness and studying have gone way up as a result.
"Eventually we grow weary of seeking treasures outside ourselves and we begin to look within. There we discover that the gold we sought, we already are." -Alan Cohen
tnoy
Monday, February 23, 2009
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Bouncing Back
It was no real secret, as my mood and feelings apparently seem to be, that I have been rather depressed the last week or two. I just had an amazing weekend though and hopefully that makes all the difference.
On Tuesday, since I haven’t had a work party since maybe June,
I went through the effort of planning one. And of course as soon as it was planned, I was informed my other school was having a party. Go figure. Anyways, my Yayoi Co-Workers and I went for Vietnamese food and beer at Hiroko’s in Ina. It was a great cultural experience for everyone and maybe one of the cheapest work parties we’ve had. Everyone wants to visit Vietnam now.
Later I managed to talk most of them into Karaoke, which was also a good time. I sang lots, and it’s strange how I feel my voice has changed; I can’t really belt out the screams for too long if at all. My vocal chords simple don’t vibrate at all with many frequencies, making me feel like I hit puberty again. I should stick to the deep songs and stay away from the Metalica and Bon Jovi maybe :( oh sad days. After I took the train back to Tatsuno where I was able to join up with the other parties taking place. There was more eating, drinking, and eventually karaoke at the same place Melissa was at putting on a show almost a year prior. Everyone was talking about it too, she make quite the impression not only with the singing, dancing, Britany Spears and Bon Jovi, but by the sheer volume of alcohol consumed. Congrats Melissa!
Wednesday was a national holiday and a day of recovery. We somehow spent almost 3 hours at a restaurant and I was ready to walk to the train station and go home, but we went and played ping-pong, which was alright. I got whooped mostly, but it was still fun. Thursday I went for ramen with Junko and her friend, so I invited Dougal out to join us. We had a great time and Dougal said I’m a lot more fun when I’m not around JETs. Maybe it helped that I wasn’t hung over haha.
It helps to be talking about intelligent things too, or just joking around with the language barrier, which I’ve become great at doing. For example, while watching One Piece together, the English Subtitles are teaching Junko all these bad words. Of course it’s up to me to point out what you can say, what you can’t, and what is funny. Like I tell her to say to Neal: “I’ll give you a fat lip” and explain that he’ll laugh; she’s really cute saying that stuff.
Friday came and so did the big ski trip that I didn’t want to go to. I was at my lowest point here and I didn’t want to go, even though there was that nagging “you’ll regret it if you don’t.” Luckily someone bought my ticket from me at the last minute so I could spend the weekend doing nothing. Also because Saturday was Valentines and they do things backwards in Japan where the girls give the gifts, I got chocolates from my caretaker Uchiyama Sensei, the Librarian Inoue Sensei, and one of my students graduating this year. I have to remember them for when “White Day” comes a month later, men return the favour with gifts for the girls. So think of 2 hallmark holidays.
Shane from Minowa got a hold of me and we haven’t seen each other in a long time so we got together for a chill-out night of pizza, beer, video games and movies; something I haven’t done since…. I hate to even think about it. Either way, I needed that. I really, really did. We watched Futurama, played Playstation 3, ate $60 worth of pizza (it’s Japan), and emptied a number of alcohol bottles that have been literally collecting (lots of) dust in my house. I half saw it as house cleaning too for when I move in March to Ina.
Saturday was spent with a hang over, and for the rest of the weekend I only left the house to drive and buy fast food. It’s so nice having a car again; sometimes
I just drove around the block enjoying the weather and mobility. There was sunshine coming in through my windows with the beautiful weather, and there was me playing video games and avoiding my computer. I beat 2 games and played more. I half meant to get stuff done but I didn’t and I have no regrets. It was like being with an old friend again.
Part of the burn out was because my life is so crazy, all the time. It’s good times mostly, sure; but sometimes deep down all I want is something simple, something relaxed. But the one thing I want more than any of that… I don’t have. I’ve stepped up my efforts, changed incredibly, challenge myself constantly, and things definitely are getting better all the time, but it’s been one horribly frustrating disappointment after another; many of the stories of course don’t get posted here, at least not anymore. I just need a break from this expletive.
Like my sister Patty said though: “keep pulling numbers and eventually you’ll draw a winner.” I bought my tickets and will visit her in Vancouver March 14-16, then I’ll visit Regina March 16-24. One month away, should be fun.
"The time to relax is when you don't have time for it" -Sidney J. Harris
tnoy
On Tuesday, since I haven’t had a work party since maybe June,
I went through the effort of planning one. And of course as soon as it was planned, I was informed my other school was having a party. Go figure. Anyways, my Yayoi Co-Workers and I went for Vietnamese food and beer at Hiroko’s in Ina. It was a great cultural experience for everyone and maybe one of the cheapest work parties we’ve had. Everyone wants to visit Vietnam now.Later I managed to talk most of them into Karaoke, which was also a good time. I sang lots, and it’s strange how I feel my voice has changed; I can’t really belt out the screams for too long if at all. My vocal chords simple don’t vibrate at all with many frequencies, making me feel like I hit puberty again. I should stick to the deep songs and stay away from the Metalica and Bon Jovi maybe :( oh sad days. After I took the train back to Tatsuno where I was able to join up with the other parties taking place. There was more eating, drinking, and eventually karaoke at the same place Melissa was at putting on a show almost a year prior. Everyone was talking about it too, she make quite the impression not only with the singing, dancing, Britany Spears and Bon Jovi, but by the sheer volume of alcohol consumed. Congrats Melissa!
Wednesday was a national holiday and a day of recovery. We somehow spent almost 3 hours at a restaurant and I was ready to walk to the train station and go home, but we went and played ping-pong, which was alright. I got whooped mostly, but it was still fun. Thursday I went for ramen with Junko and her friend, so I invited Dougal out to join us. We had a great time and Dougal said I’m a lot more fun when I’m not around JETs. Maybe it helped that I wasn’t hung over haha.
It helps to be talking about intelligent things too, or just joking around with the language barrier, which I’ve become great at doing. For example, while watching One Piece together, the English Subtitles are teaching Junko all these bad words. Of course it’s up to me to point out what you can say, what you can’t, and what is funny. Like I tell her to say to Neal: “I’ll give you a fat lip” and explain that he’ll laugh; she’s really cute saying that stuff.
Friday came and so did the big ski trip that I didn’t want to go to. I was at my lowest point here and I didn’t want to go, even though there was that nagging “you’ll regret it if you don’t.” Luckily someone bought my ticket from me at the last minute so I could spend the weekend doing nothing. Also because Saturday was Valentines and they do things backwards in Japan where the girls give the gifts, I got chocolates from my caretaker Uchiyama Sensei, the Librarian Inoue Sensei, and one of my students graduating this year. I have to remember them for when “White Day” comes a month later, men return the favour with gifts for the girls. So think of 2 hallmark holidays.
Shane from Minowa got a hold of me and we haven’t seen each other in a long time so we got together for a chill-out night of pizza, beer, video games and movies; something I haven’t done since…. I hate to even think about it. Either way, I needed that. I really, really did. We watched Futurama, played Playstation 3, ate $60 worth of pizza (it’s Japan), and emptied a number of alcohol bottles that have been literally collecting (lots of) dust in my house. I half saw it as house cleaning too for when I move in March to Ina.
Saturday was spent with a hang over, and for the rest of the weekend I only left the house to drive and buy fast food. It’s so nice having a car again; sometimes
I just drove around the block enjoying the weather and mobility. There was sunshine coming in through my windows with the beautiful weather, and there was me playing video games and avoiding my computer. I beat 2 games and played more. I half meant to get stuff done but I didn’t and I have no regrets. It was like being with an old friend again.Part of the burn out was because my life is so crazy, all the time. It’s good times mostly, sure; but sometimes deep down all I want is something simple, something relaxed. But the one thing I want more than any of that… I don’t have. I’ve stepped up my efforts, changed incredibly, challenge myself constantly, and things definitely are getting better all the time, but it’s been one horribly frustrating disappointment after another; many of the stories of course don’t get posted here, at least not anymore. I just need a break from this expletive.
Like my sister Patty said though: “keep pulling numbers and eventually you’ll draw a winner.” I bought my tickets and will visit her in Vancouver March 14-16, then I’ll visit Regina March 16-24. One month away, should be fun.
"The time to relax is when you don't have time for it" -Sidney J. Harris
tnoy
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Visiting Canada is Difficult...
I've been bad; I didn't update Monday and didn't really get aftermyself to do it. I can give you a real reason I guess, I was busy with registering a new car. But a deeper reason would be I've been going through a fairly rough time now, but maybe getting better.
So I bought an older used car on Saturday from a Japanese mechanic. It took pretty much the whole day to get to Nagano City, work out some paperwork and temporary insurance. During a bit of the downtime though I hung out with a cool private teacher that did alot of the translating for us, and saw the big famous temple there. He tells me Nagano and Matsumoto people have different attitudes even though the live so close to each other because one city is a temple city and the other a castle city. I'm not going to worry about that though.
I took the car in to get it changed to my name Monday and it has been.... a challenging time for me as of late to say the least. I spent that night eating pizza drinking beers and playing video games instead of writing the blog so that's my bad. I needed that though; and I really don't have much to say about the last week. Classes are winding down and I tried to book tickets home to visit Canada. My original plan was to go from March 18-30 and do a stopover in Ottawa/Toronto on the way back to finally experience some of Canada's offerings like Niagra Falls or the capital.
Alas, my credit card isn't working for some unexplainable reason... even after exchanging emails with the bank we don't know what's going on. Anyways, over the weekend the price jumped $1000. So now I'm booking through a travel agent and paying a little extra, but at least I'm getting tickets.
So now the new plan, which hasn't been finalized yet, is to visit my sister Patty in BC March 14-16, then go to Regina March 16-24. I had to use up almost all my holidays for this trip, but again things got complicated and expensive and hard decisions were made.
I'm glad I didn't post this earlier, as the mood has changed considerably. I guess I can write about that more in my next post as it's a new week, but I can atleast end the blog with one postive story after a hard week.
I spent most of the day Sunday with Junko. We went for Chinese, drove around in my new car seeing the beautiful snow capped mountains and enjoyed the spring weather. I found out it was her birthday the day before, so we drove to a cake shop and I got her a strawberry cream pie that she's been eyeing for a long time. She was happy and so was I, it was a good day.
Just can't leave it on a good note though, as I've been getting specific questions and should probably clarify. We're just good friends as she has her heart set on visiting Canada and studying English in Australia for a while and I'm happy for her.
"Don't spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door." -Dr. Laura Schlessinger
tnoy
So I bought an older used car on Saturday from a Japanese mechanic. It took pretty much the whole day to get to Nagano City, work out some paperwork and temporary insurance. During a bit of the downtime though I hung out with a cool private teacher that did alot of the translating for us, and saw the big famous temple there. He tells me Nagano and Matsumoto people have different attitudes even though the live so close to each other because one city is a temple city and the other a castle city. I'm not going to worry about that though.
I took the car in to get it changed to my name Monday and it has been.... a challenging time for me as of late to say the least. I spent that night eating pizza drinking beers and playing video games instead of writing the blog so that's my bad. I needed that though; and I really don't have much to say about the last week. Classes are winding down and I tried to book tickets home to visit Canada. My original plan was to go from March 18-30 and do a stopover in Ottawa/Toronto on the way back to finally experience some of Canada's offerings like Niagra Falls or the capital.
Alas, my credit card isn't working for some unexplainable reason... even after exchanging emails with the bank we don't know what's going on. Anyways, over the weekend the price jumped $1000. So now I'm booking through a travel agent and paying a little extra, but at least I'm getting tickets.
So now the new plan, which hasn't been finalized yet, is to visit my sister Patty in BC March 14-16, then go to Regina March 16-24. I had to use up almost all my holidays for this trip, but again things got complicated and expensive and hard decisions were made.
I'm glad I didn't post this earlier, as the mood has changed considerably. I guess I can write about that more in my next post as it's a new week, but I can atleast end the blog with one postive story after a hard week.
I spent most of the day Sunday with Junko. We went for Chinese, drove around in my new car seeing the beautiful snow capped mountains and enjoyed the spring weather. I found out it was her birthday the day before, so we drove to a cake shop and I got her a strawberry cream pie that she's been eyeing for a long time. She was happy and so was I, it was a good day.
Just can't leave it on a good note though, as I've been getting specific questions and should probably clarify. We're just good friends as she has her heart set on visiting Canada and studying English in Australia for a while and I'm happy for her.
"Don't spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door." -Dr. Laura Schlessinger
tnoy
Monday, February 2, 2009
February already?
Not a whole lot happened last week, but that’s not a bad thing. It was a bit more stressful than other weeks for some odd reason though, I should learn to meditate or something as I don’t like being on edge.
On Wednesday I met up with my friend Yuri, the former intern at Yayoi. She was gone 6 months to Australia
to study English so it was good to see her again; I forgot how tiny she was! She gave me a cool present, and I forgot hers at my place so I’ll have to bring it next time I see her. She’s moving to Tokyo/Saitama soon to finish her university.
Friday night Michelle, Richard and I had some much needed drinks and food for a proper TGIF, and saw a movie at my place. It rained most of the day Saturday, and Michelle wanted to explore the town but we took a rain check. She came over that night instead and we played video games until late; it was fun if not frustrating at times with some of the levels. Playing games now is almost strange to me; they’ve been off my things-to-do list for so long already. I found that out again Sunday when I picked up a controller again and couldn’t play more than an hour or two before wanting to do something else; and for this game my last save file was back in April. It’s sad too as I look through my spindle of games and remember the good times I spent with my old friends and how they probably won’t get time from me again.
Maybe things will settle down for me, but who knows. I was recollecting how I haven’t had a “normal weekend” like back home in Canada for so long. I’d call up some friends, we’d have some drinks and watch movies or play games. Here I’m off to Tokyo one weekend, snowboarding another, a different country the week before that and you get the picture if you’re a regular reader. I have a feeling things may start to slow down a bit now as I become more settled in; although it was brought up today where I will be living in Ina when I move; details are still being worked out. It will be good to leave Tatsuno.
It was a beautiful spring day on Sunday. Well if 2 degrees is beautiful for you, but it was for me as I come from Saskatchewan.
I was able to put laundry out to dry! Oh happy days; fresh bed sheets and a spotless house now that it’s not too cold to move around and clean. Even gave myself a haircut last night.
As I said to my students in class, my New Years Resolutions are to lose more weight, visit Canada in March, and pass the JLPT 2 this year; a huge step up. My night classes Monday help with that now; I just finished my homework that’s due tonight haha. Procrastinating like that brings back memories…
“If you want to feel rich, just count the things you have that money can't buy." -Unknown
tnoy
On Wednesday I met up with my friend Yuri, the former intern at Yayoi. She was gone 6 months to Australia
to study English so it was good to see her again; I forgot how tiny she was! She gave me a cool present, and I forgot hers at my place so I’ll have to bring it next time I see her. She’s moving to Tokyo/Saitama soon to finish her university.Friday night Michelle, Richard and I had some much needed drinks and food for a proper TGIF, and saw a movie at my place. It rained most of the day Saturday, and Michelle wanted to explore the town but we took a rain check. She came over that night instead and we played video games until late; it was fun if not frustrating at times with some of the levels. Playing games now is almost strange to me; they’ve been off my things-to-do list for so long already. I found that out again Sunday when I picked up a controller again and couldn’t play more than an hour or two before wanting to do something else; and for this game my last save file was back in April. It’s sad too as I look through my spindle of games and remember the good times I spent with my old friends and how they probably won’t get time from me again.
Maybe things will settle down for me, but who knows. I was recollecting how I haven’t had a “normal weekend” like back home in Canada for so long. I’d call up some friends, we’d have some drinks and watch movies or play games. Here I’m off to Tokyo one weekend, snowboarding another, a different country the week before that and you get the picture if you’re a regular reader. I have a feeling things may start to slow down a bit now as I become more settled in; although it was brought up today where I will be living in Ina when I move; details are still being worked out. It will be good to leave Tatsuno.
It was a beautiful spring day on Sunday. Well if 2 degrees is beautiful for you, but it was for me as I come from Saskatchewan.
I was able to put laundry out to dry! Oh happy days; fresh bed sheets and a spotless house now that it’s not too cold to move around and clean. Even gave myself a haircut last night.As I said to my students in class, my New Years Resolutions are to lose more weight, visit Canada in March, and pass the JLPT 2 this year; a huge step up. My night classes Monday help with that now; I just finished my homework that’s due tonight haha. Procrastinating like that brings back memories…
“If you want to feel rich, just count the things you have that money can't buy." -Unknown
tnoy
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