First Snow and Random Pictures

a brief addendum to our update.  One day over the past months (around December 4th if I remember right) Meghan and Maria made spring rolls and fried rice.  It was pretty decent, I've added pictures to facebook and to this album.

Also, it snowed this morning, which was bad on a few levels.  On one level, I really can't afford to destroy my running shoes by going for my every-other-day 4 mile jogs (did 4 8-minute miles yesterday, which at least pleased me).  But what's really more important is that Maria had a hard time biking to school, so we're definitely going to have to get a car.  At least, once we get back from Christmas in Minnesota.  It'd be stupid to get a car for about 4 days and then leave for 2 weeks. Waste of money.

Anyway, here's the picture link (pictures are on facebook as well).

Murakami In Snow (and a few random things)

Is it okay for a blog update to lack excitement?

And that's why it's been nearly 2 months since we've put anything in here.  Also, I'm counting our November update as the facebook album of our Yamagata prefecture trip, since there's something like 100 captioned pictures.

We still don't have a whole lot to say.  I've been able to get in touch with my adviser so I finally have a decent idea of what I should be working on (research, while a good thing to work on, was a touch vague.  It's nice to know where to focus and also what reports and meetings I should be preparing for!).  We both did a pretty bad job of keeping in touch this semester, but now that we've been using Skype, e-mail and google wave, I have better hopes because that's a lot more opportunities for contact.

Maria just took her Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT) Level 3 on the 6th of December.  Maria didn't think she did so well, which might as well be a theme for her.  Admittedly, it's not worth a whole lot if she passes, only if someone passes Level 2 or Level 1 (the two highest levels) does it mean much.  In that case, they could get a job in Tokyo and get hired by some Japanese company.  Since this isn't really in our plans, she's not too concerned about it.  It would look nice on a resume and eventually she'll work on taking and passing Level 2 down the road, though maybe not for a few years.  It's been great that she's finally done with it, since she's finally something approximating a normal human being and not sitting in front of her computer working on Kanji, grammar, or vocab all night every night.

School is going well for her, except for horribly behaving 9th grade Japanese boys who like to touch her butt (there's been 2).   That's all better now, they were made to apologize in a way that at least made one of them too ashamed to look at her.  Unfortunately, the "forced apology" is pretty much the highest form of Japanese school discipline so that's about all that they could ever do.  On a much better note, at the end of November I went with Maria for a day to Kamikaifu Elementary, which is a little ways up the coast and right on the sea. I went to an enkai (a party) with the teachers from this school and they invited me to come visit for a day.  The kids and teachers there are a whole lot of fun, the kids are really well behaved and just about everyone seems to get along.  In between lessons, I played 2 sessions of 'tag' with the kids and some basketball with the 5th and 6th graders (the school is so small that they combined 1st and 2nd, 3rd and 4th and 5th and 6th grades).  I think I mentioned on facebook that I really understand how that's Maria's favorite school.  I'm definitely not going to any of the other ones so I'll pretend that they're all that fun and the kids are all that engaged when it comes to English lessons.

That's about all that's news.  Life has been pretty dull here.  We're going to be back in the US from about the 23rd to the 4th, and we're looking forward to that.  We're already pretty busy almost every day from shopping (okay, not as much of that for me), appointments, parties, holidays and so on, and it should be pretty fun.  We miss our dog, strange as that may sound.  I really would love to take her on a walk sometime!  It used to be a great way to start the day!  That's about all for now, and I suppose the question in the title of this post is answerable.  I suspect the answer is a little bit of "no" but I suppose that'll have to do.

This is the American Embassy, your children have gone missing....

Or so it could have gone perhaps.  We went up to Oshiroyama (the castle ruins on the mountain) to get some photos because last weekend when we went to do the same, the camera died after one picture.  So we went up the mountain and took a few pictures (we'll post them sometime). We basically wanted to capture the fall colors.

At about this time, when we had most of the pictures we wanted, a japanese man about 50s walked past us with two walking sticks and started talking to us.  I (Brian) couldn't understand most of what he said except for a few words, but Maria picked up a reasonable amount.  He asked us where we were from, how long we were going to be in Murakami and what Japanese foods and drinks we had tried.  Apparently, not quite enough.  When we admitted having not been to a sushi restaurant he said that "Let's go!"  (or something like that).  This was a fun idea but we didn't know where we were going and we hadn't planned to go out at all.  We told that we had no money and he responded "that's okay, I'm paying for you."

So we walked down the mountain with him, got into his car (what?!) and let him drive us about 10-15 minutes down the highway (are you two stupid?!).  (Answers to the questions: Got into his car, and yes apparently we are).  He certainly was pleasant and on the way down the mountain we had run into one of his friends who he talked to for a moment, and their exchange appeared normal!  So we went to a sushi restaurant where you pick up small plates of sushi as they move past you on a conveyor belt, with no money and he said "grab whatever you want.  don't worry." He asked me if I wanted a beer, but I was too embarrassed to say "well, of course I'd LIKE one but you're already paying for our meals."  And of course, I can't say it in Japanese.  The sushi was really good, I love that wasabi seems to always been in sushi, unlike American sushi where it seems to be optional.  Maria even enjoyed some of it, and sushi is NOT her favorite.

I should mention that at this point, he hadn't even given us his name.  In fact, he never gave us his name.  In fairness, Maria hadn't given hers, but I believe I had given mine.  I have to wonder...why...just...why did we think that this was a smart idea to go with him?

Anyway, we continued to think it was reasonable to go with him, because it was probably a 30 minute walk home from the sushi restaurant (at best).  He took us next to a crepe place where, surprisingly, we saw his friend that we had just seen on the mountain!  (If I could speak Japanese really well, it might not have been a surprise).  Apparently, his friend owns the place.  We chatted for a few minutes, got free samples of ice cream, and a crepe as a gift. 

Back into the car, we drove through Iwafune, which is maybe 2 miles from Murakami.  He pointed out a place that he said was "his apartment" and another place that was "his house."  That's when it started to dawn on us he might be kinda a big deal in Murakami...  owning multiple residences, being a landlord, ya know.  He told us he was an accountant.  Next we drove back to Murakami, somewhat near the train station, and he stopped in the street next to a house.

 Across the street from the house was an office, apparently his office.  He had the big plush office, and I'm pretty sure that it was his accounting firm now.  We sat down in the office and then wow, his wife entered with his cat (?!).  After a moment of chat, we went across the street to his house, the house we parked in front of.  Now, we sat in his living room, he would routinely get up to herd the cat back in the room, and each had a cup of coffee.  We talked with him and his wife for a few minutes (again, no names!) and after maybe 15 minutes, they gave us gifts of a large bottle of beer, a bottle of wine and (what looked to be) expensive sake.  Then he made his staff (working across the street in the office, after dinner) drive us home!  Nice to be the boss in Japan.  And you can sure supervise when your house is across the street from the office.

It was on the way home we learned his name (Shocho-san).  Which is a relief certainly, because we'll have to figure out some gift to get him for taking us all those places.  It was a pretty crazy evening, and definitely it was a huge surprise.  We had a lot of fun, and a bunch of gifts!  Definitely a weird experience!  Japanese people are definitely very nice!

Free TV, TV costs and Frugality

Since Tokyo we haven't really been up to much. The weather has changed quite a bit. Instead of the hot and humid crazy days we have cool mornings and evenings, nice afternoons, and cold nights. All in all, Murakami weather is kind of a mix between Oberlin and Raleigh. It's not as rainy as Oberlin, although it definitely rains, but it's also not as sunny as Raleigh.

I transferred our monthly savings back to America pretty early in the month. Unfortunately, after the expensive weekend in Tokyo, that might not have been the best plan, but we are having a "fun" time trying to live as frugally as possible. I've been making tons of inexpensive food at once so we have leftovers and Brian won't have to buy food for lunch either. Only two weeks until pay-day! I would say we'd have no problem except that we are supposed to pay the bill for national television this month, I just don't know when it's due. Thankfully a teacher is helping me figure it out. Some other things have come up too like paying for a hospital visit, a Japanese exam, and we also have to go to Niigata and get re-entry permits so we can come back to Japan after Christmas break. It will all work out though. =) (Quick note before anyone asks:  the hospital visit was pretty routine and no big deal, so don't worry - Brian)

I'm also knee-deep in applying for graduate programs. I hope I'm mostly finished with my essay, but we will see after my mom and I go through it this weekend. Then I will pass it along to Brian. Anyone who wants to take a stab at it let me know! I appreciate as much help as possible! After finishing this one for Duke, I need to work on the one for NC State, but I think that will just take a bit of re-working the essay, so it shouldn't be as difficult. I've been communicating with Duke on how the financial aid works there and they get all of their fellowships through the national government, which is both good and bad. Good because only US citizens can get the fellowships and they usually to have a 1:1 ratio of foreign to US applicants. It might be bad because of the current economic situation. Thankfully the program is very small, so if I get accepted, I hypothetically should have a decent chance in getting a fellowship. My recommending professors have a little less than a month to get the letters of recommendation in, so I think everything is going pretty well. I'm going to send off my transcripts in the next couple of weeks as well. I should hear back from Duke in the beginning of March, but I won't find out from NC State until probably late April or May.

Because we have been a little low on cash, we've been finding free things to occupy ourselves with on the weekends. Two weekends ago we had an NCIS marathon of season 6. We're also having weekly dates with our friend to watch the new NCIS season 7 episodes. Southpark starts again this week so we might have to have a weekly Southpark viewing night too! =) Last weekend we introduced our friend's boyfriend to Southpark with a few different episodes and the movie. I think he enjoyed it overall, but he thought they spoke pretty fast, and while his English is very good, it's still hard for him to understand everything. (I don't understand all the words in it either). This weekend we are hoping to spend time with our married friends watching Eddie Izzard Dress to Kill. We have also been listening to Going Postal by Terry Prachett on tape every evening.

I signed up to take the Japanese proficiency examination on December 6. I don't know if I'm the only Murakami ALT signed up yet, but I have quite a bit to study, so I asked a fellow Japanese English teacher if she would like to be conversation partners. We will see how that goes. I hope some other ALT's decided to take it too so we can all study together.

I think that's all for now! I hope my English wasn't too bad! I've been a bit scatterbrained recently!

Rosetta Stone wackiness

This isn't an official update.  It's just something amused me so I'm going to share it.  I (Brian) have been using Rosetta Stone to try to learn enough Japanese so that I can communicate and actually know enough Japanese so I can maybe learn Japanese from talking to Japanese people.  It's a good software program as far as introducing you to language and giving you an opportunity to hear and speak a new languages.  Sometimes though, I wonder a bit about it...  The following examples come from the transportation section.

Exhibit A.

The text translates to, "We are standing at a bus stop."  I'm having a bit of trouble figuring out where that phrase is going to be useful while going through Japan.  Also, what gets me about it is that he's not talking to the "language learner", instead he seems to be addressing the pair of women to his left, and they seem pretty engaged with the conversation they're having.  Apparently, you can use Japanese to make pointless observations to total strangers.  Or something.

Exhibit B.  I want to make clear that this is the only picture Rosetta Stone uses of this man.  It's not part of a story "Japanese Language Man Goes to Work!"  or anything.  It's just a middle-aged man riding the bus...

..while wearing a superhero costume.  The text translates simply as "He is riding the bus."  That's it.  No explanation whatsoever.  It has nothing to do with Halloween.  This picture raises so many questions for me, I don't even know where to start.  I admit I like the touch that absolutely NO ONE is sitting next to him.  Would you sit next to the guy in the superhero costume on the bus?  I know I'd be a touch leery of him.  Maybe I should be more understanding, perhaps his super-flight power is in the shop, and that's why he has to take the bus to work.  Anyone think they know his story?  Post a comment if you do.

Silver Week in Tokyo

Quick disclaimer:  these pictures are NOT ours.  I discovered after e-mailing myself photos off of my camera, our (estimated) phone bill shot up ¥800 (a little more than $8 with exchange rates right now, I think).  So we're going to have to connect our camera to a Japanese computer and the software to get pictures off of it, it's google image search.  Sorry!

A bit since the last update, it's my turn to fill people in.  Last Saturday (the 19th), we went to Tokyo for Maria's Silver Week, three successive holidays in a row.  I cannot recall what the three holidays are, and neither could any of the Japanese people we asked.  We might have figured it out eventually, I don't really remember.

Anyway, we left incredibly early, the first of our 3 straight days of waking up at or before 6:30 on vacation.  We took the shinkansen from Niigata City to Tokyo, and we were surprised that we had to pay nearly ¥20,000 for our tickets!  Luckily, it wasn't a problem, just a huge and slightly unpleasant surprise.  Once we got into Tokyo, we met up with Meghan, another ALT from Murakami, and her boyfriend Yuya and went to Outback Steakhouse for some real American food.  It's pretty much impossible to get anything in Murakami that's REAL American food.  Okay, yeah, McDonald's exists down the street from us, and not to be snobby, but calling the stuff from McDonald's food is a stretch.  It's just as bad here as in the U.S. with a few different menu items.  Other places don't believe hamburgers require buns, or seem to have understanding of what a proper sausage is, and forget about bratwurst.  I definitely didn't get enough bratwurst before leaving this summer.

Anyway, Outback was good, but I feel set there for a year, the food seems designed to give you an immediate coronary, but it was nice to have something familiar.  That evening we went to our hostel, in the Asakusa -ward or neighborhood or something.  We eventually found it because the neighborhood was filled with gaijin (foreigners) more than Tokyo usually is.  That was another weird thing, in Murakami there's no foreigners that we don't know (okay, maybe two), but in Tokyo there's foreigners EVERYWHERE, and it was almost jarring to see them everywhere.  It felt like we should know them, because in Murakami we do know them!  Anyway, the hostel room was small and cramped, so we felt like we had to get out quickly.

Maria wants me to add that the hostel room was REALLY ridiculously small, and she's definitely right.  Basically, the room had enough space for the twin sized bunk beds and that was it. We only got sheets, which was fine since they said they had blankets for free if you asked.  Except, they were out when we asked.  So  we slept in the same bed to try to have enough heat.  It wasn't completely effective, but it was a place to sleep and for cheap.

Despite still being stuffed from Outback we still explored Asakusa on foot.  We found a famous temple, Sensoji, which was next door to a Shinto shrine, the Asakusa shrine.  You'll have to look up the relationship between them.  Here are some pictures, thanks to wikipedia.

Feel free to browse through them.  The rest of the Asakusa area was very busy but there were some interesting things.  We walked through "The Edo-era Craftware Museum" as well and saw some interesting recreations of Edo-era everyday items.

We went to bed and woke up early because we had to get to see bunraku theater the following day.  They used great big puppets controlled by 3 performers, with narrators providing voices in a sorta sing-song way with musical accompaniment on shamisens, which is something like 3-stringed guitars.  The way the narrators sang they had to switch out every half-hour or so.  The puppet work was really incredible, though I wish i had understand more of the language since periods without action tended to drag on and really get boring.  You could almost think of it as opera with nothing but recitative, but that's only partly right.  Nonetheless, it was exciting to see and we only almost fell asleep once apiece.

Some bunraku puppets and how 3 people operate each puppet.  The head puppeteer controls the head and the right hand, another assistant gets the left hand, and the third puppeteer does the legs.

More bunraku information:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bunraku

After briefly walking past the Diet (the Japanese capital building) and headed out for Machida, where lots of our Oberlin friends are now living in Japan.  Actually, all of them were people that Maria knew from Oberlin, theoretically I saw some of them around campus, but I couldn't really remember any.  We had some good food Unfortunately not American food, as was our goal in Tokyo, where you can actually get American food.  Those other Obies don't realize how good they have it in Tokyo!  Afterwards we went to karaoke and had some good time singing great songs.  One guy seemed to have a real desire to become an Enrique Iglesias impersonator, and I wish him luck, though I don't know if it has the demand of Elvis impersonators.

The next morning, we again woke up early and met up with Meghan, Yuya, and two of their friends and rode back to Murakami.  Tokyo was really pretty great, but there's a lot of people there, and it was nice to return to the quiet of Murakami, I have to admit.  That's the update for now, keep tuned for another one.

Murakami castle, Family Visits and some other stuff relating to education

Since the Sekikawa Snake festival life has been fairly normal. I've started settling into a routine, and Brian is researching every day. Sports day was very interesting (and long), we started before 8:00 with set up, and it went until 4:00pm. We had a huge boxed lunch, that was more expensive than our normal meals when we go out to eat, and afterwards we had the enkai or work party. We went to a really nice hotel on the beach where we went to an onsen, which is a group bath, but you basically have to shower and bathe before you get into the bath part, and really we spend a lot less time in the bath than I thought. It was very nice to shower after a long day, and it wasn't nearly as embarrassing as I thought to have a shower or bath in an open place with my coworkers.

After the onsen, we went up to the party. The teachers on each team (Red, Green, Yellow, and Blue) sat together at a table. There were many different foods, such as sashimi, chrysanthemum, and many types of fried foods. We also had a lot of Asahi beer. I tried every type of food on my plate and realized that I'm not a big fan of sashimi. I got a bit tipsy, and they had me give a speech, as well as participate in some games, such as "put these teachers in order by age," and "Guess what subject these teachers taught." I decided not to be honest on the second one since I felt so bad being honest on the first one... After the party there was an "after party" at a snack bar. Snack bars are kind of like hostess bars where you pay to be accompanied by a lady. The reason we went was to sing karaoke, but it ended up being very expensive. Thankfully, I only had one drink and I paid about $10 for it.

Unlike my coworkers, I had to work the next day at my favorite little elementary school on the ocean. The teachers there are really close and they go out to parties all the time. Unfortunately, I ended up with a hangover, and started feeling really sick on the ride up. (I hadn't had a hangover in years!) Thankfully, I got some medicine and with a good attitude I was soon over it. I spent my "planning" period talking with the assistant principal who is incredibly funny. All the kids there were very cute and well behaved.

That evening Dad came to visit us. Unfortunately, he had a difficult time with the train systems since the further you get from Tokyo the less English people know, so he got in a bit later than expected. We went to our favorite Indian/Nepalese restaurant that night and crashed since dad had been up about 24 hours. My Board of Education was nice enough to give me Tuesday off to spend with him since I worked Sports Day on Sunday. We spend Tuesday morning being lazy hanging out, and then went to find a restaurant for lunch. It was a very quiet day in the town and almost all of the restaurants were closed. We ended up going to a kind of diner for lunch. It wasn't very good, but it was at least open and a reasonable price. Afterwards we climbed Oshiroyama which has castle ruins on the top. The view was incredibly beautiful and you can see all the way to the ocean from the ruins. The climb isn't very difficult, but it is very steep. Thankfully it only takes about 20 minutes to climb and there are very nice steps all the way up. Afterwards we went home via a very weedy route, and after another rest we went to dinner.

Brian edits:  Two views from Oshiroyama

 

 

I had to go back to work the next day and dad left very early so he could make the train to Tokyo Airport. The rest of the week passed by rather slowly with only a few interesting incidents. On Wednesday I played tag with the kids at school after lunch. Thursday was very rainy for my long bicycle ride to Iwafune Elementary so I arrived very wet. Thankfully they have a nice changing room so I can bring nice clothes to wear. On Friday I had my last self-introduction in front of the school. I also had one class where the teacher did not come to class, so I had to do the whole class with a part-time teacher after not knowing the lesson very well.

On Saturday we got up early and went to Niigata city for Musical auditions. The auditions started at 9:00 so we had to leave by 6:50 from the house to get to the train. The auditions went fine, but we don't know if we will be able to go since the rehearsals are every other weekend and they are all over the prefecture. It makes for a very expensive traveling experience. I think I would like singing in it, but I don't know about all the financial aspects since we are trying to save as much as we can. Brian finished the audition early and went to soccer practice, where his knee complained a bit, so he doesn't know about competing in the soccer tournament either. I went shopping while he was at soccer, but didn't get much. I got two shirts that are a new type of long underwear for winter, and a GARLIC PRESS!!!!! I had a very hard time finding one in Murakami so I finally got one and it should greatly decrease my cooking times.

On Sunday I decided to buckle down and start writing my graduate school applications. I'm applying to Duke for a master's in East Asian Studies and NC State for International Studies. I wrote requests to professors for recommendations and have spent the first two days of this week communicating back and forth about further things I need to provide. Thankfully I feel like I sent everything out early enough, so I hope it won't be too burdensome. On Monday I was able to write a draft essay for Duke. I sent it off to my mom to get a couple revisions and then I plan on reworking it for NC State. I'm going to have everything in by early November so I can get a discount on Duke's application fee and get the process moving. Hopefully I will be able to get some kind of fellowship or grant. I know I won't be able to afford Duke without it.

This week has been going by kind of slowly as well. At the junior high school the students are taking exams all day today, so they have just been reviewing for them, so I haven't been asked to attend too many classes. I have been grading some papers though. I'm at an elementary school today and I only get to teach 2 classes, which are now over, so I have the rest of the day to prepare for the rest of the week.

We are going to Tokyo this weekend and we are going to see Bunraku! We will let you know about it when we get back!

I hope you are all having a wonderful week!

-Maria

Recent Adventures

Now with picture updates from Brian!

I apologize for being so bad at blogging. Here is a run-down of our latest adventures.

Last Saturday we went to the Sekikawa

snake festival. Aimee, another married ALT lives in Sekikawa, and invited us to go. The villagers walk through the

entire village carrying a HUGE bamboo snake on their shoulders. We tried carrying it a couple times, since people take turns and there is a whole group that follows the parade. The fun part was

when they made the snake “slither.” We got thrown around on the street, but it was so much fun! I thought I was really strong when I was carrying it, but I guess I didn’t realize how heavy it really since Brian was so tall he had

most of the weight on his shoulders! The one time I tried carrying without Brian I definitely felt some weight! They started carrying the snake at 9:30am and ended around 12:30pm. We hung out at A

my’s house after the festival and then returned to Murakami.

Brian Edit: Here's our first views of the snake.

Pictures of the snake coiling into the plaza at the end of the procession!

Finally, after the end of the ceremony, the snake becomes a playground:

Murakami has 5 JET teachers. We went out lunch after the festival with Liz. Her apartment building has a restaurant below it and on the weekends they serve Mexican food! Brian and Liz got the Mexican platter, but I got their Margarita pizza with fresh basil to mix things up. The food was amazing and it was nice to find a place that we could go when we desperately need some familiar food.

On Sunday Brian and I spent most of the day resting, and I graded papers from my first week of school. I had all the 8^th graders summer vacation homework. They were required to write ten sentences for three days about what they did over summer vacation. Some of them were really good and some made absolutely no sense. It took me quite a while to get through all of them. We also listened to a Terry Prachett book on tape. We are just that cool!

I was at my base school Monday through Wednesday. We’ve been having cheerleading practice everyday after lunch in preparation for Sports Day, which is this Sunday. All the students are required to learn their team’s cheers. There are four teams: Red, Yellow, Green, and Blue, and I’m on the Green team. Our cheers are very interesting and there are even some dances with them. They base the cheers on popular Japanese songs. On Wednesday we didn’t have classes, so instead we spent all morning and afternoon outside rehearsing for Sports Day. Each grade has special activities they participate in. They have the 100m dash, relays, and slightly more unconventional sports where they all race into a circle and grab tires and the team with the most tires wins. They also have tug-of-war and a race where four people are on two skis and they are required to work together to race around the track. Many of the students seem to have fun, but it was very hot on Wednesday, and they were quite tired from being out in the sun all day.

I have very interesting students at my base school. There are quite a few (about 10-15) who have no respect for the teachers, principals, or rules, and wear their hair crazy and uniforms unbuttoned town to the chest. These students find it really amusing to ask me dirty questions in both English and Japanese. They say the worst things in Japanese because they think I won’t understand them. It’s been getting kind of annoying since the kids will follow me after cheering practice and say ridiculous things to me.

Most of the kids are very nice and shy. I have Yutaro’s sister (the boy we went to karaoke with), who is really nice and talks to me everyday after lunch. There is also a really popular boy who always comes into the teacher’s room and talks to all the teachers. He says he really wants to learn English, and he’s very nice, but I think he might be a bit of a brown-noser. Most of the students seemed to enjoy the Bingo game I made (it took me ages since I made different ones for each grade, and photo-shopped pictures of real things for it). Overall I know they aren’t huge fans of learning English, but it’s fun while I’m in class.

Yesterday I rode my bike to Iwafune Elementary School. The ride doesn’t take very long, about 20-30 minutes, and the kids were so cute! I worked with the 3^rd, 5^th, and 6^th graders. I got to play with the students after lunch and I picked weeds with them. They are very patient with me when I can’t understand what they say, and they use a lot of gestures. We played Tag and Stuck in the Mud. The teachers all thought what I wore to ride to the school was really cute too, and they all cried out “wakai” which means “so young!.” I’ve been getting that a lot recently. Most Japanese tend to get married in their late 20’s early 30’s so I’m a bit ahead of the curve.

Today I’m at my largest school, Murakami Minami Elementary which has over 430 students! I only get to work with the 6^th graders today, but I will also work with the 5^th graders.

Karaoke and Real Japanese food

We had a fun weekend filled with some uniquely Japanese experiences. I don't know how karaoke works in the U.S., but I suspect it isn't well. We went to complex (the only possibly word) for karaoke, you rent out private rooms, they have thousands of songs in the catalog, english and japanese (also Korean and Chinese too I think, but I could barely read the Japanese so I didn't bother). Lots of fun, we sang a lot of songs, there should be some pictures.

I know a lot of people say things like "I can't sing karaoke/dance unless I've had enough to drink." Well, apparently the Japanese think of people like that, because we were thrilled to find that for about 800 Yen (maybe 8 dollars?) we could have all we could drink for an hour, they'd just keep bringing the drinks. Definitely a good deal, and at the end of the hour, those who ordered drinks were in good spirits!

That was Friday night, on Sunday afternoon we went with Meghan, another English teacher in Murakami and her boyfriend Yuya to a Japanese seafood restaurant. When we first got the food, I was pretty stunned. Lots of seaweed and basically lots of stuff that I would never have thought of eating. Shame I forgot to get a picture, but I want to put into writing that I promise to produce a picture of a meal like that, since I'm sure there'll be more. An entire fried fish is not a common sight back home, I don't think. It was pretty good, but I'm not keen on eating a thing from a shell so fresh that there's little bits of gritty sand crunching between my teeth.

Maria starts (started) work today, and the kids begin going to school tomorrow, so we should have some new stuff to post somewhat soon!

Apartment Photos

Since we keep getting requests for "pictures of our place" here they are!

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Here we have the front of the building, the "Danger Stairs" upt he building, and the front door! Jolly fun we're having! (I am anyway, you'll have to roll with it).

Here's a blurry shot of the front entryway. Note that we're standing in the kitchen to take this picture. Since it's Japan, you have to take your shoes off and wear "inside-only" shoes. Now I (Brian) grudgingly admit this does keep the place neater, but it's kinda annoying. I guess we'll say "when in Rome" and that sort of thing that fails to reassure in anyway, it's just a nice way of saying "put up or shut up".

Here's two pictures of our very tiny kitchen. There's no real cabinets, nor any counter space. But we do have a nice rice cooker! Otherwise, it's a pretty sad kitchen, but it does the job, I suppose. We've found that cooking fairly easy Japanese food isn't too bad. We tend to do noodles or rice, with a meat and a vegetable, at least so far.

Here's some pictures of the bathroom area. We just have a washer, no dryer, so clothes end up having to hang up. We bought a laundry rack for 80,000 yen just yesterday, because we weren't sure that using the clothesline in the winter (when it's supposed to be cold) is going to work so well.

This is the living room. Maria's computer is hooked up to the TV, sound and video, so we can use it as a DVD player or for listening to audio books. We're soon getting TV, as long as we're close enough to the DSL server.

It might look pretty small, and it is, but for Japan it's not too bad. We're able to have a larger apartment because we live in a rural area.

Finally, here is out tatami room (tatami mats on the floor), this is where we sleep and where I do my research work.

We just got cell phones so we'll be taking pictures on those too now (getting a cell phone in Japan is more complicated than in America, I think. Everything has internet and 10,000 features). Hopefully we'll have some pictures of the festivals that we're going to and been going to soon, but our friends took those photos so we're waiting for them to get internet and then send them along. This weekend, the 22nd, might include a trip to Shibata, where they have a festival, and next weeekend will be a trip to Sekikawa for a festival that somehow involves a giant snake.

arrived safely and without internet!

It's a travesty, but it's true. Just letting those known who might have wanted to talk to us soon, we have no internet right now and probably won't for a little while. We should by the very beginning of september at the worst, but that's all we can be sure about. For me the worst part is that I cannot really do a lot of my work until we get some kind of internet connection, so I`m forced to figuratively spin my wheels for a couple of weeks.

I am in an internet cafe now and I can write a bit more than was put in that last paragraph. Things are going pretty well here, and we`re having fun working on learning Japanese, seeing as Maria` is a bit rusty and mine is nonexistant. We miss our puppy and we miss our friends and family, which isn`t much of a surprise. Also, this blog post looks funny because I am typing on a Japanese keyboard, and I`ll occasionally hit the wrongぶっとｎ and get a bunch of stuff that doesn`t make sense in Japanese or in English.

Yesterday we walked down the ocean, about 4km from where we live, and we looked out at the sea of Japan. We don`t have pictures yet, but we can promise apartment/neighborhood/ and points of interest photos once we are all hooked up online. The apartment was small and the futons very thin so we decided that we needed to add some mattresses (rather, Maria did). It`s cozy though, except for not being thrilled about sitting on the floor, it`s pretty nice and well sized for a Japanese apartment. So that`s about all we can report on for that front.

The food is a bit strange (squid at the grocery store) but the rice is good. We`ll add some more next time we can get some access, hope to talk to people soon!

Update to "Married!"

So far I've found that being married is about the same as living together, but maybe traveling and constantly doing different things will do that to you. Evi has lost a couple pounds, which we are very thankful for, by playing with her doggy cousins, Poly and Bogart. She went on her first canoe ride today and we managed to not tip over! Brian wouldn't let me buy a doggy life-vest for her so she wouldn't drown, but she's proven to us that she can swim! Sorry, I do talk quite a bit about my cute puppy, but that's because we spent over a week away from her, and she is being so very cute and cuddly right now...=)

Married!

Well, it's been about two months, and as probably most people who have ever considered reading this know, we've gotten married and moved out of Raleigh! I'm writing this from the lobby of the hotel that's on the same resort as the timeshare we're spending our "familymoon." there's no internet access, making it extremely difficult for me to get work done back at NC State.

We're with my wife's family to celebrate her maternal grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary. I'd write more but it's really a pain to sit in a small lobby in eastern Wisconsin. Visited Lambeau field today, it was pretty awesome. Perhaps in a few days when I actually have real internet we'll make a real update.

Also, it's definitely time for me to work really hard on my Japanese.

Waiting is the obnoxious bit.

This blog is going to be about how me and my (soon-to-be) wife are spending the upcoming year in Japan. The purpose is to give us an easy way to keep track of what's happened there and let friends and family who are interested do the same.

So the preliminaries. We haven't gone yet. I'm sure anyone who reads this is aware of that. Here's our schedule, which is fairly simple:

June 27th-28th: Leave Raleigh, drive to Mankato.

July 2nd: Wedding rehearsal.

July 5th: Get married.

July 6-? (about a week): "Familymoon" near Green Bay.

July 31st: This is my birthday. Maria says it's important for this to be added. I'm not sure why. Perhaps I'll get a birthday porter, or maybe stout.

August 1st: Maria flies to Japan.

August 3rd: I fly to Japan.

What fun! All sorts of logistical details still need to be worked out, but that's okay.

What we're doing: Maria is teaching English in a Japanese school. I will be doing research for my disseratation at NC State.

Oh yeah, and the reason I'm spending the time to make this blog now is that we've finally heard where she's assigned. We'll be in the city of Murakami, in the Niigata Prefecture. Here's some information I've dug up on it.

Climate Information:

http://www.weather2travel.com/climate-guides/index.php?destination=niigata

Tourism Guide:

http://www.enjoyniigata.com/en/nature/

More Travel/tourism stuffs:

http://www.japantravelinfo.com/blog/?p=953

Fairly exciting I guess.