Ichi-go Ichi-e

I`ve decided to tackle the weekend of September 4th and 5th in one long post! Or something like that. The keyboard at work is Japanese key layout where punctuation is entirely less necessary so I`ll probably get frustrated half way through trying for the thousandth time to find the apostraphe key and throw it out the window (everything, they`ll think me mad!).

Friday I went to badminton with plans to go to Hide-chan for supper after. Kiwi Josh showed up (but I guess now he`s the only Josh but to avoid confusion with our familiar Canuck Josh, I`ll continue to label him so) and decided he would join me on my Hide-chan adventure. Duncan, the other ALT from Shiraoi (there`s only two of us in our awesome town of awesomeness) is always at Hide-chan on Fridays so we met up with him as well. Afterwards, Kiwi Josh, Duncan, Ken (from badminton) and myself all set out to Sumie`s birthday which was taking place at another bar elsewhere (I really had no idea, I was just following along).

On the way to the destination bar, we decided to stop and have a drink (cola for me!) in this small alley lined with tiny one-table restaurants – it was nifty and cute with a really good atmosphere! While we waited for Duncan`s awesome friend Izumi to show up, I had oden for the first time! As you can see, I had half way eaten the oden before I remembered to take a picture. I also forgot to take a picture of the cool alleyway/street thing we were sitting, but I`ll be back there I am sure.

It was getting late so Ken made his way to our original destination, and I meant to follow but I was entertain by drunk Japanese and Kiwis playing a New Zealand drinking game – Wizz Boing Game – I think it was called. (there`s no quotation marks on this keyboard btw). After we headed to a bar called Secret Garden which had a nice comfy atmosphere. I spoke in mostly terrible Japanese all night about Japanese history and other random topics with Izumi and a couple girls whose names I can`t remember. (Duncan was passed out on the couch during this final part, I never asked him how he got home.) (Correction: I did – he doesn’t remember the latter half of that night!)

Those of us who went to Secret Garden that night.

So I never made it to Sumie`s birthday – which I feel a little bit guilty about, but I honestly wouldn`t change that night for the world! I saw my first Japanese sunrise as I drove home at four in the morning.

The next day, I picked up Josh and we headed to a hockey game – late though, I`m chronically late for mostly everything, and by late, I mean I arrive right on time, but I`ve been informed that in Japan that five minutes early is best.

I don`t care was anyone says, Japanese hockey is no more less violent than your average hockey game (not including NHL) – if you put a bunch of dudes in heated competition against each other, they`re going to start playing dirty. Especially with the huge difference in skill between the two teams I saw. Makiko-san, the woman who organized this whole outing is very…enthusiastic…about hockey. She sat us right behind the Oji Eagles` bench and even hushed me when I was talking to Dan and Mel because it would `distract the players` – first of all: it won`t – they can`t hear us. Second of all: They probaby don`t care. After that, she stopped harassing me to join their fanclub – so maybe it wasn`t all that bad. Don`t get me wrong, Makiko-san is very nice – but a little too clingy and overzealously accomodating (if that even makes sense).

Only picture I got of the game – Japanese hockey looks like Canadian hockey.

We had supper at Lumbini, a Nepalese/Indian restaurant

The next day was seriously cool – I went to the Tarumae Sun Festival with Duncan and his crew – all Japanese except one French guy. That`s good for my practice! Still feeling like my Japanese isn`t great – but I`ve started studying for at least an hour a day (any more and I get a headache).

ANYWAYS, I digress. At the Tarumae Sun Festival – I saw neither Tarumaesan nor the sun! Photographic evidence!

That is where my volcanic neighbour should be

Lots of nifty stands on the festival ground

But it was still warm – ridiculously warm! We barbequed on small charcoal grills they would give to each group. Um, the can in the picture is filled with tasty cheese that we decided would be more tasty if it was melted…in a beer can. How classy!

Meat on a charcoal grill! So tasty!

It had lots of stands with food – I only partook in chocolate-covered banana and ageimo – a sweet potato (flavour-wise it was sweet but it wasn`t a sweet potato) on a stick, fried. No picture sadly, I was actually eating someone`s leftovers!

All the while, there were shows going on. Amateur (I think) junior high-aged girls singing pop music and wearing matching outfits (one group wore skirts that were way to short to be parading in front a crowd like that!). That part was mind-numbing – I`m not a fan of Japanese main stream music so much. It`s more showmanship than talent and not terribly unique in my opinion! Hope that`s not too offensive. The less mainstream stuff is pretty awesome – the Japanese indie/underground (?) scene is pretty awesome.

Next weekend should be pretty exciting! Not much going on this week though.

Jizo statue in Noboribetsu

First and foremost, a big shout out to Brenna who not only set up this blog, but is also  hosting it now too! Thank you!

So here’s a summary of the last two and a half weeks:

Leaving day: Mom and Aaron took me to the airport. I was told later on by Aaron that  my goodbye had been incredibly abrupt! I hadn’t meant it to be that way, but honestly, I’m  terrible at goodbyes and didn’t want to cry – which I didn’t that entire 20 hour trip!

In Vancouver, I had my final meal in Canada. I had to have something very Canadian – so I ate poutine! One thing I’ll miss: Poutine! One thing I won’t miss: How I feel after eating  poutine.

The flight from Vancouver to Tokyo is the long stretch at about 9 or 10 hours in the air. It wasn’t that bad with the fancy screens and being able to pick which movies you want to watch. I thought I’d be reading or gaming for most of it but I actually ended up watching “Time Traveler’s Wife”, “Alice in Wonderland”, and “How to Train your Dragon”. Then my headphones broke, so I ended up playing some Dragon Quest 9 but there was only an hour or so left to my flight. Also, the people I sat next to kind of sucked. They weren’t friendly and the the female of the two took up a lot of bloody space.

I landed in Narita Airport which divided up into two different terminals. I picked up my baggage and made my way through customs. It was difficult to explain my situation since I didn’t have my work visa yet but I was bringing enough bags to stay for a lot longer than 60 days. In the end, my terrible Japanese was terrible – so they let me through without any trouble.

Here’s where things got complicated. I’m hauling these heavy suitcases around and I think I need to go to terminal 1. So I hope on this bus to go to terminal one, hauling each bag on one at a time. At this point, I feel awful – I feel like everyone is staring at me as I hold up the bus with my plentiful baggage. We arrive at terminal 1  and take each bag off, individually again and go the airport attendant proudly holding out my ticket as I believed the hard part was over – WRONG! I needed to be in terminal 2, where I started. I didn’t have to go through the embarrassing bag hauling at all, but now I would have to do it twice. I got on the same bus (different driver, thank god!) and made it to the proper place, checked my bags again, and waited for the plane that would take me to New Chitose in Hokkaido.

When we landed, it was raining the likes of which I had never seen. Apparently it was the remnants of a typhoon which had hit other areas of Japan much worse. We arrived in my town, Shiraoi near maybe…10 pm? My first meal in Japan was from a convenience store – gyoza, yakisoba, melon soda and some onigiri. Then I promptly went to sleep and woke up at like…6 am.

First week: Josh was here for the first week of my stay in Japan – which I’m grateful for. He taught me a lot of stuff before he left though I’m sad we didn’t have more time. He taught me to drive on the left side. At that point I felt like it was an impossible feat to train my right-side oriented brain – but honestly, now I think nothing of it! I’d like to note that the speed limits are stupid. 40 in most place within the city and 50 on the highway. 50 km! That’s stupid slow. Everybody speeds though and I honestly can’t blame them. I’m surprised there’s not more cases of road-rage in Japan.

We went out to eat a lot – Josh took me to Clipper for sushi which was AMAZING! It’s kaitenzushi which is the rotating sushi bar. There used to be one in West Edmonton Mall, but I don’t think it did so well. I haven’t gone since he left because I haven’t become brave enough to venture forth on my own but soon my sushi-eating instincts will take over and no one (or fish) will be safe.

We ate So-su Katsu (Sauce katsu I’m thinking) which is breaded pork cutlets on top of rice – nothing undelicious about that!

We went to Hide-chan (pronounced hee-day)- which I love and have pretty much gone every Friday since I’ve arrived. It’s a yakitori bar-type place and the owners – Mama and Master, are amazingly nice people! I feel so at home there that it’s become my cheer up place after a long week.

We went for Indian-style curry with Josh’s badminton club (now my badminton club!), then to bowling. I totally sucked – like an intense amount of suck. It was ten pin bowling which I’ve never done – only 7 pin for this girl. After we did karaoke and though I suck, I love karaoke! In Japan, you rent your own small air conditioned (yay!) room and you and your friends sing!

Another night, Josh took me to Old which is probably the coolest little establishment I’ve ever been to. I want to go back – but I’m not sure if I can just go by myself :S I think once I’ve met more people I might return. I’ve been told it’s an old house converted into a bar. There we had Josh’s farewell party and stayed out til 4 am. At this point, I’m still jet lagged so that was quite the feat for me! By the way, my bedtime in Japan is 10 pm and my wake up is 7 am or 7:30 am – that’s AMAZING for me! If you’re name is Justin, you know all about how hard it was for me to make it to work for 10 am!

Josh GTFO’d the country and I was left my lonesome. That week was the worse. I didn’t want to go outside, I cried quite a bit and felt stupid and lonely everyday – not going to lie. All I could think about is “Why did I ever decide to do this?’ – Worry not, I get a little grumpy sometimes – but now I’m way better! I’ve done so many cool things and met so many cool people!

Amanda on her own: I started work, if you can call it that! I work from 8:30 to 3:30, have an hour lunch break (when I eat tasty school lunch!) and usually only work about 2 to 4 of those hours. I started using all that extra time to study – buuuuut that makes me sleepy so I started reading “Namaah’s Curse” (smutty smutness of wonderfulness). They can’t read English so if anyone even cared to ask – I would just tell them it’s studying or something. I finished that and now I’m working on the second book after “His Majesty’s Dragon” – “Throne of Jade” or some such. I’m thinking I need to by an e-book reader so I can buy more books and not have to worry about trying to take them back to Canada. I was thinking a kindle since they’re pretty cheap now.

I joined the Badminton club that Josh was part of – even bought some shoes that are specifically for Badminton yesterday. Already, I think I’m getting better! It’s a lot of fun!

On Sunday of last week, I went to an international barbeque and then on a hike to a waterfall. They hadn’t told me about the hike so I dressed specifically for a barbeque. I wore my cupcake shirt because nothing says “Hey, I’m cool, I like cupcakes” like a cupcake shirt. Also, a jean skirt. So the hike was made more interesting by my choice of apparel. We walked through the river, climbed up rocks and the whole time I was thinking “This had better be a really nice waterfall” – and you know what, it was.

That pretty much the first two weeks summed up. I probably forgot some things but I’ll talk about them later. I plan on going back and adding photos to this post as well – but I’m kind of tired of writing right now! Tomorrow I’ll talk about my adventures to the aquarium! After I clean my house, I’ll try to have a video tour of it for all you curious people! (so, like the week before I leave).

Miss you all!