Best Holiday Ever. Day one

So it is Christmas Day, ten to six in the morning and my phone rings - thanks mum and dad!  I get up to a snow covered Hagi and grab all my gear and get ready to head off with Rachel and James for the weekend.

Rachel and James at the bullet train station.  Still snowing. 

We reached Kobe (near Osaka) around lunchtime and decided the best way to start the holiday was with some world famous Kobe beef.  And, man, was it worth it!  I've heard it described as 'melt in your mouth' good, but I never really understood, until now.

The chef cooked the meat right in front of us along with some veges, miso soup and a salad, then left us to enjoy.  And it was gooooood.  You take one bite of the meat and it kind of explodes in your mouth.  You barely have to chew.  I think it has spoiled me for regular beef from now on.

 The beef before it is cooked, along with bean sprouts and green stuff.

 

After being cooked.  Those are garlic chips on the right.  Officially the tastiest beef I have ever eaten.

We then did the touristy thing and checked out the foreigners area on the hills looking over the city.  It was weird to be looking at (and taking photos of) houses that were so similar to home.  I think it is official: I have been in Japan for way too long.

It was exciting to see a real grass lawn.  James even took his shoe off to check. 

After a few hours, my knee started to hurt, so I headed back to the hotel while Rachel and James kept wandering.  I saw a monkey.  I always struggle in those situations.  Do you give the man money or not?  Is it just contributing to a vicious cycle, or is the monkey treated better when it earns more?  Hmmmm.

Monkey. 

That evening we went out for dinner in Chinatown.  I forgot my camera, so I will have to get some of the others' photos.  The food was good and we all ate way too much.  Then we finished the evening at a specialty beer place with tequila shots, chocolate cake and more alcohol.  I slept well that night.

The Kobe beef meal without the bean sprouts.  Worth every yen.

christmas

It's snowing! And cold!

5cm and counting!

Yay, Winter

So there were a few snow flurries yesterday. Today is real snow and I am at one of my mountain schools. It is cold!
If I hadnt twisted my knee the other day and have doctors orders not to move around too much for thenext 2 - 3 weeks, I would totally be working on engineering asnowball fight!

Procrastination at its best

So last week at one of my elementary schools, instead of working on an assignment, I decided to make snowflakes. Lots of snowflakes. However, I didn't want the other teachers to think I was just playing so I made a poster-type thing. oh, yeah, hard at work. Anyway, I left the poster on my desk when I left for the day. I came back this week to discover the teachers had decided to put it on display. I feel like they are rewarding my time wasting abilities...still, it does look pretty good, right?

Hagi Half Marathon

So today was pretty exciting.  Hagi held a half marathon (21km) with almost 2000 entrants.  Including several Hagi ALTs.  I appointed myself official photographer for the gaijin-team and got a couple of fun photos:

This is Rachel about 5km into the race.  She still had the energy to jump.  The photos of her from later on aren't so good. :) 

 Marc, running on a bung knee, actually looking happy while he did it.

 Dex, James' cousin.  An ALT in the next prefecture.  May or may not have had a slight hangover.

 James.  Still looking suave at around the halfway mark.

 Yes.  This is some dude wearing a maids outfit.  No.  I don't know why.

So this guy saw I was taking photos, stopped, came back to me and posed. 

After the marathon I went to meet up with the others at an onsen (public bath), but apparently every other competitor and their family had the same idea, so I skipped the bath and met everyone for food afterwards.  They had no sympathy for me, desite the fact that I had biked halfway across town to take photos of them and was all tuckered out.  No gratitude!!

My view.

last leaf on the tree

translation please

So this was written on a packet of chips. Thoughts?

What a week!

So Mash, who was an ALT in Hagi 3 years ago, came back for a 5-day visit.  It was mostly spent eating and drinking until very late at night, struggling to school the next day and then starting all over again.  Good times.

The first night: dinner and drinks at a friends' log cabin.  Shak, Mash and me. 

Rocky and Tommy.  We couldn't remember their real names when we first met them, so we nicknamed them according the the Rocky movies. 

Karaoke.  What happens in karaoke, stays in karaoke.  Unless there is photographic evidence. 

James and Michiyo. 

Another dinner at a friends' house.  Free food - no complaints! 

Our last night together, Shak, Mash and I ended up at karoke again until 1:30am.  I had to be up the next day at 5:30 to get to school.  Totally worth it!

waiting for the bus to one of my mountain schools at 6:30 in the morning means I get to watch the sunrise.Of course,it also means i leave my house in the dark.

first winter frost

it was COLD this morning!

two lizards fighting

so i saw these 2 lizards right outside the school entrance the other day.pretty sure they were fighting,what else could it be?

my knee

so its a bit blurry but you get the general idea.

Another photo

So I did take one photo yesterday that I absolutely love - dunno why, it just appeals to me. This is it:

Finally, summer is over

The temperature has finally dropped below 30 degrees, so it is actually possible to go outside again. I woke up this Saturday morning and decided to go for a random bike ride with my camera. It is rice harvest season so all the old farmers are out cutting the rice:

rice. interesting.

A few people cut it all by hand, but usually you see men on a rice harvester, which cuts the rice, strips the rice off the stalk then spits the stalk out the back of the machine while women follow along behind collecting the stalks and doing this to them:


Anyway, on my bike ride I decided to find out what was at the top of a mountain road I always passed but never took, so off I went. Turns out there wasn't alot up there, but I did get a few good shots:

a quarter of the way up, looking down on some rice fields. You can see a rice harvester at work in the second field.

climbing up some ridiculously steep steps to in inappropriate shoes for a higher angle on the fields below. (You can just see my bike at the top of the shot)

Just a random flower close-up. There were only a few bees around, and I couldn't quite capture them. Any ideas what flower this is?

Of course, after a beautiful, sunny morning it started pouring with rain. When it finally stopped around 6pm, I jumped on my bike to race into town to grab a few things. Earlier I had faithfully told mum that I hadn't had any accidents recently (bike or scooter). Um, yeah. That all changed on my way in. As I went around the back of a car pulling out of a side street, my back wheel slid out from under me on some wet metal grating, leaving me with a knee that looks like I attacked it with a cheese grater and a bruise on my thigh the size of a small african child. So not the best end to the day, but at least I will have something to show all the kids at school on Monday!

Not sure I want to know but . . .

Dad, did you ever wear anything like this?
And if you did, did you ever get laid??? Actually, don't answer that. Please.

And Mum, were you wearing something like these the first time you met Dad? If either of you answer yes to these questions, I am officially disinheriting you!!

I'm guessing this is the reason for all those grey hairs, too, Dad.

For Dad

Check this out, old man!

Words of Wisdom

Birthday tequila: Not a great idea.
More birthday tequila: Bad idea.

random photos

So here are a few pics of what I have been up to lately:

Watching some of my kids play volleyball . . . or something.

Enjoying the rainy season as floods destroy crops and close off roads.

Hanging out with South Africans and barbecuing. Its been a busy few weeks, and tomorrow we head off to Tokyo for a 3 day music festival. Can't wait!

Toilet post

We have Panasonic toilet paper! Beat that, New Zealand.

You can also get toilet paper with horror stories printed on them and pictures and all that. Unfortunately, the stories are always written in Japanese, and I'm not really a fan of studying in the toilet.

In other toilet related news, apparently there is a new product available: urinal stickers to help keep toilets clean.

This is from weirdasianews.com: 'tiny stickers designed to look like flies, ladybirds, ghosts monsters and a range of other objects are starting to appear in urinals in public toilets across Japan, with the latest designs featuring changing colors and disappearing illustrations.'

Don't you wish you were in Japan right now?

What a week

So Lucie, who was an ALT last year, came back to visit. She was only in Hagi for a couple of days, so we had to fit alot in!

The first night: drinking at our favourite bar and generally catching up. And watching the soccer.

Lucie, Shak, Bronwyn and me

Don't worry, Dad, that isn't alcohol. Really.

Marc and James 'enjoying' the soccer

(thats Mabo photobombing in the back)

Night 2: Dinner at Charlies house with a heap of Japanese people and lots of curry and cake - a surprisingly good mix.

Shak, Charlie and Lucie - waiting for food.

I would have got more photos but got distracted by the naan bread.


waiting for the train back to Hagi.
Lucie, Dex, Shak, James, Bronwyn and Amelia.

Night 3: KARAOKE! 5 hours of it. Epic.

Lucie and me at the start of the evening. I won't show you the end of evening photo.

James, Tom, me and Shak

Bromance. 'Nuff said.

Bronwyn, Lucie and Yuri.

Yuri is going to America next month. I taught her a few times in junior high school and am stoked that she is doing an exchange. Her english is amaing.