Author: Oggy (Page 21 of 29)

So I’ve been pretty busy lately.

Work has been pretty fun. I’m getting it down. I have had to submit lesson plans to my boss since I started. He told me today that after next week, I won’t have to do that anymore. My orientation is scheduled for September 11. It’s strange that they don’t have it before we start, but I guess they want us to get into our groove before they start critiquing us.

The last couple weekends have been just as busy. Two weekends ago was the fireworks festival in Sukakawa. It was beautiful. It wasn’t much like the fireworks display in Tulsa on Independence Day. This lasted much longer. It was actually a fireworks competition. It was beautiful, and it was very crowded. They made a whole festival out of it.

That Sunday, we went to Lake Inawashiro. It was just beautiful. We went at around 10:00am. I didn’t think the sun was too bad, so I didn’t wear any sunscreen for the first half hour. BIG MISTAKE!!! I got burned pretty bad. We ended up staying until around 5:00pm. I should have known better.

Then, this last weekend, we had a going away party for the person that I am replacing. There was eating, drinking, and karaoke. It was hilarious. She got trashed, so my boss and I had to carry her back home. I’m sure she felt great when she woke up the next morning and realized that she had to get to Tokyo.

We went to Lake Inawashiro again on Sunday. This time I was much smarter. First of all, we went a little later. The morning sun can be deceiving, so we left at around 11:30. We stayed until 5:00, but I didn’t forget to wear sunscreen before getting into the water. I still got a little burned, but it wasn’t nearly as bad this time.

I have been studying Japanese every chance I get. I am currently learning the Katakana alphabet. It is identical to hiragana as far as sounds are concerned, but it is only used for foreign words. In Japan, the way the differentiate foreign words is through the use of the katakana alphabet. They don’t try to translate the words either, so a Big Mac in the US, is still a Big Mac in Japan. It’s just written in katakana. Of course, there are some sounds that aren’t used in the Japanese alphabets (for instance, R is used in place of L because they don’t use either sound the same way we do), so some words sound a bit different, but once you know what to look for, it starts to get easy.

I think I’m getting the hang of the train system. It was extremely confusing at first, but after using it for a month, I think I can safely navigate it without many problems.

Hope everyone in Tulsa is enjoying themselves.

Not a lot of new news here, so here’s a short post.

I have just been exploring Koriyama when I can find someone to show me something new. I have seen a couple of the new parks, and a new shopping center. They also apparently have a mall within about a 15 minute bike ride. I will have to find that when I have the time.

My holiday was fun, but slow. My new friends’ girlfriend left town to go back to her home town for the rest of the year. He seems a bit bummed (because by train and plane, it’s about a 4 hour trip), but is optimistic. He always finds the bright side. So, we have been keeping each other company. We have played Halo with a few of his other friends, and League of Legends.

One of the things I am finding out about Koriyama is that it like Tulsa in a lot of ways, both good and bad. It’s pretty small. While being the biggest city in Fukushima, it only has about 350k people. There are a lot of young people that get married young, and teenage pregnancy seems to be pretty high (I’m not too sure how the statistics hold up against Tulsa though).

One nice thing about Koriyama is that everything is pretty much packed together. I live very close to the entertainment district. That includes entertainment of every kind. There are quite a few restaurants, karaoke bars, bars, etc, but also prostitutes (yes, I got propositioned when I was exploring the other night) and hostess clubs. No, a hostess club is not where you go to get a prostitute. A hostess club is a place where you pay a pretty hefty cover charge, and buy girls drinks all night so that they will talk to you. My guess is that the girls get a percentage of the cover and drink costs. It was a shock to me, as I would never pay for a woman’s company like that…

Koriyama also has some beautiful parks. I was lucky enough to get a guide in someone that I met at one of the festivals. She is a Japanese girl that used to be a student of a couple of my co-workers, but since she has been speaking English now for 5 or so years, she teaches small children the English basics. She took me to a couple parks in exchange for a lesson on the guitar. It was fun, but it started raining, so it cut the lesson short.

I’m still getting used to the food. Very few things in the super-market have English writing, so I have to guess from the pictures. Sometimes I’m right, sometimes… well sometimes I’m surprised. Nothing too bad though =)

I’m also meeting my neighbors. It seems that the majority of my apartment complex is occupied by foreign English teachers. There is also a small English school on the second level. I think I have only seen one or two Japanese families living in the building. It’s nice to meet people who know a little more about Koriyama than I do who can speak English.

Wow, my short post has become a long post.

So, I think that’s it for the night. I’m off to bed now. I have to go back to work tomorrow, so I need to be well rested!!!

~O~

Today marks a week that I’ve been in Koriyama, and I love it here.

I have done so many things that would normally sound mundane (like go to the grocery store), but it’s all so amazing because it feels very different. Now I know where the super market is, two or three convenience stores, the 100 yen store (which is Amazing), a couple department stores, entertainment, etc etc etc.

This weekend was the Unete Festival. It was beautiful. There were so many Ukata/Kimono at the festival. There were also so many people. It’s nothing like festivals in Tulsa. It went on for two days, and was packed pretty much the whole time. Below is a brief history:

“The backward-facing Uneme shrine is located on the northwest edge of Sarusawa pond, against the backdrop of a torii or gateway. The emperor’s lover Uneme drowned herself because she had lost the favori of the emperor, and this shrine was built to console her spirit. But it is said it was so painful to look at the water into which she had cast her body that the shrine turned around in one night. From 5:00pm, women wearing traditional 12-layered kimono and children pulling Hana Ougi decorated with the seven plants of autumn, parade through the streets of Nara. Miss Uneme from Nara’s sister city of Koriyama, Fusushimas Prefecture, and Miss Nara also parade through the city. Later, from 7:00pm, a Ryutosen, or dragon-head boat, carrying the flower fan and the flower fan carriers crosses Sarusawa pond, and the flower fan is placed into the water.” From here

After the festival we went to a restaurant where they have an all you can drink for one low price. It was pretty amazing. I also got some AMAZING sashimi, a Gengis Khan (that’s not the real name, but they started singing a Gengis Khan song when ordering it, so that’s how I remember it). It’s composed of bacon thin lamb slices with lots of vegetables, served with some type of sauce. I also had octopus balls (no, not like rocky mountain oysters). These balls are composed of a small chunk of octopus meat that has been placed in a sweet bread ball covered in a sweet mayo sauce and fish flakes. It was pretty good. I met a few Japanese people there, three of which could not speak much English.

I was supposed to be going to Lake Inawashiro for camping this weekend, but my digestive system decided against it. So, while everyone else is out and about having fun, I’m getting to explore the places close to home. It’s okay though. It needed to happen. Perhaps later this week I can go to Iwaki for some fun on the beach and maybe some surfing =)

Pics to come. I am having trouble with the photo importer again, so I may need to come up with a new method for my photo gallery. If you’ve got it, check facebook as I will be keeping the photos there fairly updated as I take them.

[EDIT for Words of the Days]

いってきます – Ittekimasu – I’m going
いってらっしゃい – Itterasshai – See you later

[/EDIT]

Yesterday was a really crazy day.

It all started out at noon when I walked to the office. It was pretty warm outside (around 90 degrees) and extremely humid. It was the first day here that I have seen clear skies, so the sun was beating down on me. By the time I made it to the office, I was pretty much drenched.

Yuri, our office staff, was using yesterday to help me get all my legal documents. First she took me to the city hall, where she filled out all my paperwork to get my Gaijin Card (alien registration). I can understand how other Americans would have problems if they didn’t have someone there to hold their hand through the process. The clerk couldn’t speak any English, and the forms all have to be filled out in Hiragana (one of three Japanese writing styles). After we did my alien registration, we waited to collect my insurance forms. So, I have insurance now!!!

I then went to check out cell phones, because everyone has a cell phone here. I think I have been spoiled with my iPhone, because none of the phones looked very interesting until I found a Sony Erickson phone running Android (Linky). It will probably be the one that I get. I’m going to ask around about price plans and see if it is something I really want to invest in.

Then, I got my bank account setup. So their banks are in the post office, and you can do all your banking from the ATM’s. It was pretty funny though, because while we were waiting in the Post Office for all the banking paperwork to be completed, she was teaching me how to say different colors by pointing to things on the counter. So, I try very hard to make sure that I pronounce the words exactly as I hear them, but I apparently can’t pronounce Pink. It’s really easy too, which frustrates me to no end. It’s just pinku, but the trick is to not use a hard U (oo) sound. So for thirty minutes she was pointing at different colors, then coming back to pink, and then her and the clerk at the counter would laugh because the way I was saying it was very kawaii (cute). Well, I guess if that’s the worst I’m doing, then I’m doing alright…

So now, all the official stuff is done. They showed me how to use the ATM and then it was off for lunch.

Once I got back to the office, I wanted to prepare for my first class. There is a CD that I use for listening exercises. I pulled out the CD so that I could listen to it, and studied my lesson plans a bit. Yuri came to get me because she needed something from me, so I listened and took care of that business. Then came back, packed up, and got ready for the train ride. About half way through the train ride, with my regional manager sitting next to me, I realized that I had left the CD in the stereo in the office. Great… I think I did a pretty good job though in the class. I know I spoke too quickly and overcomplicated some of my explanations, but I think it was an overall success.

We got back to the Koriyama station at around 8:15, and upon walking out, there was an awesome traditional drum show. We watched for one of the groups and then left, because we had to get back to the office and it was getting late. I dropped all the books off and met my Sempai (a title meaning senior, so he’s the head teacher) downstairs. He showed me where the super market is and took me out for some really amazing curry. *Sidenote, if you like spicy foods, and there is a 1-10 scale for spice, pick 1 first so that you know what spicy means here. I got a 2, and it was not at all what I expected a 2 on a scale from 1-10 to be… I’d hate to try 10.

It was a full day, packed with new experiences. I was beat when I got home. I hit the futon and passed out immediately.

My word for the day
Pinku – ピンク – Pink

Still jet-lagged.

I woke up at 5:00 am and experienced my first earthquake a couple hours later. It was pretty small. It felt like my apartment hit a speed bump, then it was all over. It wasn’t even until a few hours later that I checked Google for earthquakes that I even realized that it actually was a quake.

I had my first day at work today. It started at 3:00 and ended at about 9:00. I started out with a brief orientation where I was shown the office and was given my work notebook. I then got to go to my first observation. The client was a very big tech firm. I’d say which one it is, but I’m not sure if that would be breaking the confidentiality agreement. Just know this… it’s one of the biggest tech companies in the world… you’ve heard of them. We serve this particular company in many different locations within Japan.

I was also informed that I would be teaching an advanced class by myself tomorrow evening. This was not supposed to happen until I had at least 3-5 days of observation, but the person that was teaching this class is no longer with the company, and they had already been planning on me taking over the class since I was supposed to be here on August 1. That didn’t change even though I started two days late.

I’m not too worried. I have already set up my lesson plans, and feel pretty confident with what I am going to be doing.

I know I’m not really fully explaining anything. I’m pretty beat. I didn’t get much sleep since I’m still on “Tulsa time,” so I’m just going to go ahead an eat, then go to sleep.

Night everyone!

Word of the day
daijobu (dIee-jo-boo) – 大丈夫 – だいじょうぶ – Alright or OK