Weekend BB-Que!!!

So this post is from a wonderful day back on October 24th! I had previously mentioned by new friend Tom. Tom, I had randomly waved at during a festival...but little did I know our paths would cross again at a local elementary school. Usually I only teach at 3 schools...2 high schools, and a special needs mixed school (mostly junior high and high school). But when my base high school is in testing mode (about 5 times a year) I get to do all my work at a local elementary.

It was my second day at the elementary, and since I'm not there enough to warrant a desk...I get stuck in a little waiting room in between classes. I was expecting just to get a lot farther in my latest Sookie Stackhouse novel, but instead, there was Tom...stuck in the waiting room with me! He owns his own private English company, and the elementary school also calls on him! I may have already stated all this. :) Anyways, he invited me to a BBQ he was putting on, and here are pics from the BBQ!!!

His family has two plots of land. One is where his farm is, which is where I got lots of veggies that I showed in a previous post. But the second plot is overlooking this beautiful beach!

Here, Tom and family have all the makings for a good BBQ. Picnic tables, benches, the BBQ :)

The BBQ was scheduled to begin around 3:00pm so that when we were done eating, we could watch the sunset!

Here is Tom, getting his BBQ on. The other people at the BBQ were his students. They decided to have a "Special Class" which just meant English conversation over great food and drink!

We all met at a local supermarket at 2:00p and bought all the fixings...and then drove over to the BBQ location. His students were really cool people.

We BBQed for hours, and had many different dishes. There were two BBQ's and at one point, one was a big pot, where we steamed these sausages that you can see on that rack!

Tom was the master BBQer but we all had our chance to cook.

Here's Tom and his cutie cutie cutie baby! This little lad learns English in the home, and Japanese outside of the home. Meaning both Tom and his wife Izumi are billingual, so they try to provide stability in learning by speaking only English at home, and only Japanese outside of home. I really hope that baby Kento picks up his dad's British accent!

Kento is lucky to have such a great mom and dad! This was really such a lovely day...you know, one of those days that you can't possibly explain via blog. Just one of those days that you look forward to whenever you are down! I'm sure I'll be BBQ'ing there again sometime this year! Maybe in the spring though, after this cooooooooold weather passes. This day last month may have been the last nice day for the next few months!

We all watched the Sunset, cleaned up (a little...I'm sure Tom had a lot of work ahead of him the next morning!), and then went out for a while to Laughable. We all made it home safe and happy!

Festivals Festivals

I start this post with a quaint picture of the Southern most part of Hofu that I was able to get to. I just rode my bike South, until I could ride South no more. :) And I found a cute place, with fathers and sons fishing, and old ladies staring at me like I was out of my Gaijin boundaries.

It was great. All of these pictures are from the second weekend in October, I think. Maybe the weekend before. Or after. Thats why I need to catch up on my blogging ;)

There was a random parade in Hofu going on. It was lovely. It started at the train station (basically where this picture was taken) and went all the way up to Tenmangu Shrine in the Northern most part of the city. I wonder how long it took for the participants in the Parade to walk to route, because it was the slowest parade I have ever seen.

As far as I could tell, it was a parade celebrating traditional Japanese culture. There were all sorts of spots in the parade line. From traditional singing, to guys that looked like ninjas jumping around, to lots of traditional Japanese royalty stuff.

I want to be a little Japanese girl!

There were many princesses being carried up to the shrine in this fashion. It was all very beautiful and peaceful.

And then we switch gears to the school festival at my base school. Far from peaceful, it was lively, hopping and fun! My students did all kinds of skits, plays, dance routines, singing, and joking.

I guess each class had to do something for the festival. In Japanese high schools, the teachers change classes, not the students. So for the most part, the kids are all in the same one class for the year, and teachers pop in and out of that class. I can see benefits and drawbacks to this system that is so different from most American High schools. But certainly one benefit is that all the kids in the class get to know each-other very well...and thus they can create some pretty engaging stuff for festivals! :)

Here is one of my classes doing "Thriller", and you can see when you watch the video. They were so amazing.

The entire festival was hosted by Barack Obama, and Michelle Obama. The MC's were the Obama's. Of course I mean Japanese students who did pretty good role-playing as far as I could tell in listening to their Japanese Obama role-playing. Japan loves Obama. All the time, in different circumstances, I hear "Yes we can!".

I love festivals! I love students! Keep on dancing!

Korea Time!

So this was my first time setting foot in Korea. Anna and I arrived on Nov. 1st, after an excellent Halloween. Nov. 1st was a Sunday. Tuesday was a National Holiday in Japan (National Sports and Fitness Day I think)...so I only had to take one day off (Monday) to enjoy this mini-Holiday. 3 days, and 2 Nights in Pusan, South Korea. Or Busan. Pusan/Busan. I think its Busan, and only Pusan in the U.S. Anyways, it was a great trip, and I'm definitely hoping to go back! I can't wait to see Seoul, and more Busan, and everything in-between!

We took a fast fast ferry. Usually it takes a very long time to get to Korea by boat, so many people take a "night ferry"...But our boat "The BEETLE" is very new, and very technologically advanced. It got us from Fukuoka to Busan in 2 hours and 55 minutes.

Here is a quote from the Beetle website: "At the front and back, the Beetle is equipped with two hydrofoils, which lift the hull of the moving vessel from the water surface (foil-borne). Since the ship moves above the water, it tends to avoid the influence of waves."

We arrived in Busan, got all settled in with our couchsurfing friend (where we stayed) and headed out to enjoy Korea. First stop: quench our hunger with a Burger, Fries, and REAL coffee on the beach (less than a block away from where we were staying).

We walked the beaches, cruised the shops, and searched desperately for a nail place. We had both been looking forward to pedicures, which do not exist in Japan (at least our area of Japan). But in Korea, most things were closed on Sunday. And by the time Monday and Tuesday rolled around, we had some serious shopping to be doing. We tried the Pedicure thing one more time, but its not like in America where there are 10 people waiting to help YOU. It was more like 1 lady with a 2 hour wait. Sigh....I guess I'll have to get my pedicure in good ole' Upland, California next month.

There were really cool statues, and pieces of art up all around the city like this. I can't put all the pictures up on this little blog, but this is just one example of a cool piece of art. A bronze Asgard just chilling in the middle of the bay. Okay, probably not an Asgard, but I can dream.

Every time we walked by a Japanese restaurant, we joked "LETS EAT THERE!!". Sorry Japanese food...you ain't got nothing on Korea. This is the sauce to the amazing Vietnamese dinner we had there the first night. The second night we had an amazing Thai meal. Besides that there was one meal at a bakery, and one at a Korean restaurant, but I wouldn't have called that real Korean. Why did we go to Korea and focus on Vietnamese and Thai? I guess its because there is one Korean restaurant in Hofu, but absolutely no Vietnamese or Thai, so we just had to jump on the opportunity.

The shopping was great. I got to work on my bargaining skills. Didn't buy as much as I wanted to...but I didn't bring enough money :( and only saw a useable ATM the last 2 hours that we were there. But I bought a lot of good stuff. Just not enough to spread around during Christmas. Watch me just go Christmas shopping on the 23rd in Rancho Cucamonga, CA. THAT'D be just like me.

Here was our last little meal before leaving. The only Korean place we ate at, and only had time for RICE. Is that really Korean? Well it was spicy. Spicy Rice=Good rice.

Gotta go back, I love Korea. LOVE KOREA! South. Don't worry.

Oct. 3rd :)

This was the day of my base school's School Festival. All the other school festivals I have gone to have actually been inside the school, and on school grounds. This school festival though was in the middle of the city, winding up through the arcade/ginza street and in the common areas of inner-city shopping. That made it pretty cool!

Because the festivities were in the middle of the city, for all: I finally met the missionaries here! I love festivals like this because it is seriously a great way to meet people. I first saw my friend Tom at this festival also! And the very first festival I went to was where I met a bunch of my other friends including Anna. So yay for random festivals all over the year!

All the booths were run by my students. I spent too much money this day, but its because I wanted to support my students! This "arcade" or walkway or whatever, I'm sure you will see in pictures throughout the year, because it is right smack in the middle of the city. My favorite bar is right here too. Which you will see in pictures at the bottom of this post. :)

Here is my schools band playing something. I think it was "over the rainbow" or something like that. hehe. I stayed for a little bit, but there were no seats left. This took place in the of the community buildings within the arcade.

So after I got done with the school festival...I watched the Series Premiere of Stargate Universe. AWESOME! But I'll try not to bore you with that. But you should watch it. Its definitely a show where you don't need to have watched the previous series to love this one.

Anyways, after SGU, I boogied over to Tokuyama to meet up with my friend Daria. She got tickets to an amazing fireworks display! I think the fireworks were in honor of autumn...they have a festival every first Saturday of October to celebrate the coming of the changing of the leaves. I think. I could be making that up. But there was definitely a mini-festival, and a GRAND display of fireworks. The Japanese definitely know what they are doing with fireworks. It was the best fireworks display I've ever seen.

Granted, I don't think I've ever actually paid for fireworks before this night. Maybe on 4th of July if I were to pay to see them, they'd be extra cool too. But the 900 Yen for these fireworks was well worth it. You can see a short snippet at the bottom of this post (videos go the bottom by default). There was music, lasers, fireworks, all perfectly timed and organized. Even the grand finale was so well thought out. I mention that because I feel like a grand finale in America is just to shoot off as many random fireworks as possible. No rhyme or reason--just a lot! But in Japan, its like the entire show was building up to one emotional finale. It was all like a Classical Composition in the sky.

After Fireworks, I met up with Anna to go to Laughable, my favorite bar (well, up until this point in time, the ONLY bar I knew of). Dude in sunglasses there is the owner, and he is really really cool.

It was a fun night, and once again, made a lot of new friends.

I really liked this guy's devil ears. Lets be friends! ...Now..., I will definitely recognize people that I meet again, but as for names........

Remembering people's names here is next to impossible. Even people I work with everyday. There are just too many people, and the names are all foreign to me. I know thats my problem, its just something I have to get use to. I have 2 folders full of names and pictures in my backpack, to help me memorize names. I'm not happy with my progress though. At least I am trying!

Remember, its always 100000 times cooler if you're there! Press the play button to get a taste.

OH! I FORGOT TO MENTION!!!.. these fireworks were all over the ocean. We had the best seats available, at the port! But the fireworks and lasers and everything were all done from a couple of boats, and an adjacent island. Really cool!

Halloween Day Adventures

So on Halloween day, a handful of JETs went to an orphanage here in Yamaguchi Prefecture. It was one of the most awesome experiences ever. Monica, a JET in Shimonoseki organized the visit. Hopefully it will be a monthly thing, and I'll always be able to make it, because the kids were great, the atmosphere was great, and I just felt so at home there. There were about 10 of us JETs and about 20 kids.

The kids aren't all orphans...there are different circumstances for each child. They ranged from about 5 to about 12. These are all guess-timates. We carved pumpkins, played, and played some more.

Pumpkin carving is so much more difficult than I ever remember it! I started carving the face before de-seeding though. Sigh, sometimes I'm not very smart. But I think someone should invent some kind of machine that just cleans out the center in like 5 min. I think me and the 2 kids assigned to that pumpkin spent an hour trying to get those darn seeds out.

Sorry, can't post pics of the kids or anything, but trust me, if you were there, you'd wanna adopt them all...although apparently adoption in Japan is near impossible. Anyways. ..

Now to totally switch gears...Halloween night. Beware that these pics are not of jolly pumpkins.

Anna and I hopped on a bus to go to Fukuoka. We stayed with our friend Tim again, and didn't really plan on going out, because we were headed out to Korea by ferry early the next morning. Tim and Morita, his friend who we also know from hanging out with them last time we were in Fukuoka, demanded that we get dressed up and go out.

He supplied us with costumes, knowing that we probably wouldn't bring any. Thanks Tim! It was a fun fun night! We were up bright and early the next day to go to Korea, but more on that in another post.

Left-random picture. Even Jason needs a drink now and again.

I'm glad we were in Fukuoka for Halloween. I'm sure no on in Hofu got dressed up. Japanese don't have halloween. There were plenty of Japanese people at the Halloween party we went to..but they were likely there because they love American culture, or wanted to pick up a Gaijin lova'.

To my right--NObama. Gotta love it. The spelling, the gun, the face. So funny.

I was dressed up as "Akuyaku" which just means "bad guy"...like a ubiquitous term for bad guy, in kind of a funny way. Anna was Akuyaku Mikii (Mickey). Bad guy Mickey Mouse.

My friend there with the glasses was really funny. Ask him what he was, and he'd ask you your name, touch his finger to his earpiece and speak into his watch, getting a background check on the 'asker'. Tim is of course Wolverine. Morita is something or another. In the last picture of this post you will see something written on his head. It is "Kill" or "Die" or something...written with MY EYELINER. Anyways, some kind of manga character or something. :)

Smoking baby was a bartender there. He made his rounds to pass out candy to all the partygoers.

The picture is cut off, but he is wearing a diaper. Japan man, Japan. :)

We had a fun time, all in all! Anna and I went back early(ish) since we had to head out early, and the boys probably stayed out all night.

Next Halloween, I vow to really be something for halloween. Its like my favorite holiday, but I never put any effort into it!

Bye bye!

Potluck!

Hey there! Okay, I know you are getting tired of hearing this. But one last time....I have such a backup of things that I want to share with all of you! Before, I had mostly just been going from back to forward. But that doesn't work, because many times things are fresh in my head, and I can't wait over a month to blog about!!! So here, is a "long time ago" blog, and I think I'm going to try to go back to front, front to back, back to front, etc, etc... but of course with exceptions. :) Okay. So now that that is settled....

I think it was October 1st. Lots of us JETs held a POTLUCK at Eric's house. I would like to pop in that I was in the group of the few (5 of us?) people who were around during the original conception of the idea. :P .

I made potato salad. I liked it a lot, but it definitely wasn't the most popular food at the Potluck. I'd like to say, that my mom's potato salad would SMASH everyone else's work. But this was my first time attempting it by myself, and I overcooked the potatoes. Plus Japanese mayonnaise and such is ...um.... "different". Plus, its much better fresh, and I had to make it at least 24 hours in advance because of my school schedule, etc. But... I also need to thank Anna for giving me the yellow mustard that doesn't exist in Japan.

Here is Steve. Cool guy, Cool guy! He is making his "7 layer dip"... although it was 4 or 5 layers..it was amazing! Of course it helped that some saviors made the 2 or 3 hour drive to go to COSTCO in Fukuoka to go buy tortilla chips.

Here, me and Hozumi are eating LASAGNA!! Lasagna made in two big glass bowls. Money. Money~!

We are all getting full. Full off of TACOS, Pecan Pie, Real Cheesecake, etc, etc!!!!!~!

All full and happy... Too bad that in the morning we have "Kencho". Kencho means "prefectural office". Basically, whenever all us JETs have Kencho, it means that we have a meeting thats going to be all day, in a "prefectural office". You get my flow??? :) I liked this Kencho though. Our guest speakers, I feel, really helped me in my everyday working job. Too hard to explain fully.

But that is why we chose to make the Potluck on Oct. 1st...so we could all stay up late, spend the night in the couple of apartments close to Kencho, and get up and go together in the morning.

And after Kencho...One more great night. We went out for "nomihodai" Which means "all you can drink". I think this all you can drink was 2500 Yen, or like 28 dollars. Who of my American friends wouldn't pay 28 dollars for 2 hours of all you can drink??? There was also lots of good food! I didn't get a good picture of the group, but there are almost 30 of us here. :)

Lots of people spent the night one more time, but I had a school festival in the morning, so I made sure *(involved a little running) to make the 10:08pm train home, so I could get up and be a jolly teacher on a Saturday morning. BTW, being a jolly teacher meant buying too many flowers and fruit and stuff front my students. :)

Cobu Night

Yesterday I thought I was going to see Taiko Drumming, which I've talked about before on this thing. I bought the tickets in advance for me, my supervisor, and another Japanese Teacher of English (JTE). We have dinner (which was actually hard, because most restaurants are closed on Mondays). Then we go to the Taiko.

First of all...we hand the tickets to the ticket takers, and are subsequently told that they are the wrong tickets. We were trying to use tickets to some other performance from Oct. 17th. I was so mad and embarrassed. Its my fault because I bought all our tickets. But on the other hand, whoever sold me the tickets is responsible, because I have NO IDEA where she would have gotten the idea that I wanted tickets for that other show. I basically bought the tickets by continually pointing at the flier that was the Taiko flier. It was very very clear what I wanted. But I should have thought to check the tickets. I feel terrible still...Still waiting on word if they will give us a refund for those.

So we bought 3 tickets at the door for Taiko.

It was very very different than I expected. It wasn't traditional Taiko at all. Definitely some form of Taiko, but not traditional. It was Taiko/Hip Hop Tap Dancing/ EVERYTHING. These gals basically did the most rad variety show ever. They sung, they flipped, they played traditional Japanese guitars, they did some sign language. Everything they did went "BAM" in our faces. It was really cool.

I thought the show was too racey for Hofu. This town...not very racey. Some of the dance moves they did, made me feel awkward...worrying about all the 日本人 around me. Like how I felt during Bella and Edwards kissing scene in Twilight while watching with family. But everyone seemed to enjoy it. The one complaint that I heard was about how they wore their Kimono's. They were put on for show, and I guess I can see how people would find that a little disrespectful, because Kimonos are such a huge part of traditional culture here.

Anyways, I didn't take any pictures...no one else was... but they are on Youtube. I think you can watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHEJ0ODoJ8M&feature=related .

Or just search for: Cobu-- Fusion of Taiko Drumming & Funk Tap Dance.

I love this city. But how did such a cool group come to Hofu, Japan? haha. "Yeah. I think we should go to Hofu. I've always wanted to perform there."

Separate thought:

Now everyone at once...lets pray for the aforementioned refund.

Choruru (チョるる)

Okay, two posts ago I talked a bit about the green haired dude which is this prefectures mascot. I found out about him. His name is Choruru. The reason that this is cute is because "Choru" is a dialectical word. I'm not sure exactly how to explain it right, but "choru" is an ending form for verbs that is only used in Yamaguchi Prefecture. Most people in Tokyo wouldn't understand it at all...so it is a lot more dialectical than, lets say... California versus the deep south. There are actually different words here. So the mascot being named after our dialect is cute!

Choruru is the mascot of the Yamaguchi National Athletic Meeting in 2011. There are 47 Prefecures in Japan, and the games go to a different prefecture every year, so the next time this important athletic meet will be here will be in...hmmm 2058? So this is a big deal for sure. The games are held all over the prefecture...not just one central place. Hofu (my city) will get to host the volleyball, and cycling. Most of the cities in the prefecture will get to host a couple different events.

Choruru's green hair is shaped based on Yamaguchi Prefecture's highest mountain. Interesting! At least to me...as a Yamaguchi resident. :) :)

Rockclimbing

I think I have put pictures up before, of the rock climbing walls at Seminar Park. This is the wall that we used for the beginners class. So yes...full story: Rockclimbing class is wonderful! I'm so happy that I find out about these kinds of things through all my supervisors and Japanese friends that know that I want to experience everything I can! The class is free, and after taking 3 classes, we get a certification card that allows us access to all the parks harnesses, ropes, etc. To tell you the truth, I loved this so much that I plan on buying my own harness and shoes. I would have been able to try the wall more if I had my own harness, because there was a line to use the harnesses that they had on hand. And their climbing shoes were a little tight on me.

The class had 23 people in it, and 3 instructors. There was an intermediate and advanced class going on at others walls at the same time, which was a little distracting because they were so amazing! At the end, the wall pictured above was moved!! They have controls that can change the tilt of the wall at 2 different joints, if you will. They made this wall super difficult, and put on a little show for us. And showy it was...they were like flipping their bodies around every which way to make it to the top! I don't think I could ever be that good...but I want to keep working at it!

In theory, the instructors taught us how to tie all our own knots and get it all set up by ourselves. But admittedly there was a language barrier, and I think the instructors just didn't know what to do with that, so they just showed us what to do, and I wasn't able to go through it enough times to remember. I do know that this rockclimbing class didn't use a figure 8...they had some other cool kind of mechanism...but they showed us both, and I got the concept.

This was my first attempt out of three. I couldn't make it past that area a couple feet above my head on my first try...but on my second try (on the right side...) I made it up into the 10th or 11th meter area. The first and second time, fear stopped me from going higher. I mean, I couldn't quite reach, but I wasn't yet comfortable with just GOING FOR it and making a leap of faith. The third try --it was physical strength that stopped me from going any higher. I had already exerted myself in my first 2 attempts. I really need to work out my arm muscles. By the way, I went to the class with my friend Anna, who did much better than me! Go Anna!

Coming down was not as hard as I thought it would be. Turns out that being held On Belay by someone below works just as well as those fair type ones that just take you down slowly. This went a little faster than those fair ones, but felt absolutely safe and secure. Here Anna is coming down in a Top Model pose!

Me! Climbing! Its not as easy as it looks people... Only click on the video above if you really wanna see a white girl struggling. :)

Hofu Flee Market

By the way, really...no one pronounces it Hofu. Its pronounced Hohu which just really throws me off. I was doing a game of "hangman" with 4 real smart girls in my Wednesday English club, and the spaces were: "I love Ho_u". They live in HOFU! Its always spelled Hofu! But, it took them many tries to figure out the F. The man was almost hung. I don't understand why they don't just spell it Hohu if no one can say Hofu.

But yay Hofu! I love my city!

This last Saturday there was a famous "flea market" that only comes around to Hofu 1 time per year! I don't think it should be called a "flea market" (and probably isn't in Japanese), because it is more like a city-wide festival. And when I say citywide, I mean that this was 10 times bigger than even the biggest event I've seen in this city yet. Big streets, small streets, shopping areas, taxi areas, where everything normally is---was inundated with food stalls, goods stalls, performances,...all the firefighters were out shaking kids hands, people were dressed up like famous characters. It was a pretty cool day!

It did remind me of the Orange County fair, but without the rides. There were definitely the games. I need to talk to someone about getting some rides up in here. :)

This is a very bad picture of me eating KOREAN food! Yay! There was an international section of the flea market. My friend Anna had really good information on this area, because she took me to a booth were we needed only to fill out a short survey, and we would get 500 Yen of free money to spend in this international area!

So this bowl of Korean food was free, and I spent my other 300 yen of free money on "kim" which is korean seaweed amazingness (which they DO NOT sell in the stores in Japan) and some Korean spicy ramen packs that I'm saving for a rainy day. I ended up spending a lot more of my own money at the Korean booth, which was probably a bad idea since I'm going to Korea in less than 2 weeks... But I needed Kim Chi NOW! :)

Most of the flea market was just that--a flea market where everyone was trying to make money and sell their goods. But I noticed that a lot of it seemed to be non-profit. This "Come Up Smiling" campaign was to benefit those that lost everything in the tragic mudslides here. You can see on the bottom green part it says "Hofu 2009.7.21". The mudslides were literally just 6 days before I got here. And the city seems to be still in recovery. I lot of people lost their lives, and a lot of people lost everything else. Way to go volunteer work and non-profit!

This is Yamaguchi Prefecture's mascot! I don't really know whats going on with him (green haired guy). I can't find anything online, to help me explain. But the best I can gather from just hearing things here and there, and seeing signs in Japanese, is that in 2011 it will be Yamaguchi Prefecture's turn to host some sort of national olympics type of thing. All over the city there are signs with this guy on it. It seems like they are city beautification areas. Empty lots are going under construction to be turned into beautiful parks, etc.

There is also a money collections box in every single school office I've worked at here. Like everyone is getting donations for this Prefectural beautification project. I'm not 100% sure though. Information is a little difficult for me to get here...so I just form stories of the truth in my head. For all I know this is just some famous cartoon character. hehe. No really, its something to do with the 2011 games.

So Hofu was the showplace for the day of the "car of the future". I couldn't figure out what was so futuristic about it, besides the way it looks. The sign about it was in English and Japanese. Didn't say anything about it being hecka hecka fuel efficient. I was pretty rad though. They didn't let anyone take pictures IN it. :(

Cool car! A car like this in Hofu... Its like seeing a car like this, in... Beaumont. Sorry family in Beaumont. Its just like that though! :)

Above: just one of the many performances. I just got a clip of this performance because the little girls were so cute! They were only about 5 or 6 years old max.