oh my blog,
right now, there are people on tv totally eating big cooked centipedes.
great!
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
always drink water
oh blog,
i taught two classes today and even posed for the school yearbook. i don't have anything left to do today but sit and look busy for a few hours, so i thought i would make a blog post.
i took some pictures the other day at a festival at the rest stop across the river. the rest stop is called "oasis" and has a little room with nothing but twelve different vending machines, and a big market, and a stage for people to dance on where everyone can watch. they do these dances so the tour buses always bring people to sit and relax.
some middle schoolers did a drum show, which was neat.
here is the view of the river from behind the rest stop. there are some boats and people are getting on for a ride.
one of my first grade students was there with his family. i got to take this picture with him, which was followed by him hitting me in groin.
oh, i went zorbing on monday, which was appropriate because monday was national "health and sports day". zorbing, so you dont have to look it up, is when they strap you in to a giant plastic sphere-within-a-sphere and roll you down a hill. there are two options as to how you want your zorb; you can either take it dry, with a harness, or take it "wet", which means the ball gets water in it and you get soaked, without a harness. i took the harness route, which is okay, but i will have to wait until it gets warm again to zorb wet.
here is a picture of what it looks like when someone is going down the hill.
you just spin around and around and bounce until you hit the padding at the bottom of the hill. here is the view from the top.
one ride is only 700 yen, or little more than $7. it was fun and cool but the bouncing was a little hard on my neck, and right before it ends i felt like i was spinning way too fast.
i am thinking about going to okinawa for christmas.
i think i am going to have some instant yakisoba with microwave chicken pieces for dinner tonight. next week there is an academic conference which will i believe be mostly in japanese, and the week after on halloween i have to go to the city for a foreign teacher conference. but those things will be over very soon.
great!
i taught two classes today and even posed for the school yearbook. i don't have anything left to do today but sit and look busy for a few hours, so i thought i would make a blog post.
i took some pictures the other day at a festival at the rest stop across the river. the rest stop is called "oasis" and has a little room with nothing but twelve different vending machines, and a big market, and a stage for people to dance on where everyone can watch. they do these dances so the tour buses always bring people to sit and relax.
some middle schoolers did a drum show, which was neat.
here is the view of the river from behind the rest stop. there are some boats and people are getting on for a ride.
one of my first grade students was there with his family. i got to take this picture with him, which was followed by him hitting me in groin.
oh, i went zorbing on monday, which was appropriate because monday was national "health and sports day". zorbing, so you dont have to look it up, is when they strap you in to a giant plastic sphere-within-a-sphere and roll you down a hill. there are two options as to how you want your zorb; you can either take it dry, with a harness, or take it "wet", which means the ball gets water in it and you get soaked, without a harness. i took the harness route, which is okay, but i will have to wait until it gets warm again to zorb wet.
here is a picture of what it looks like when someone is going down the hill.
you just spin around and around and bounce until you hit the padding at the bottom of the hill. here is the view from the top.
one ride is only 700 yen, or little more than $7. it was fun and cool but the bouncing was a little hard on my neck, and right before it ends i felt like i was spinning way too fast.
i am thinking about going to okinawa for christmas.
i think i am going to have some instant yakisoba with microwave chicken pieces for dinner tonight. next week there is an academic conference which will i believe be mostly in japanese, and the week after on halloween i have to go to the city for a foreign teacher conference. but those things will be over very soon.
great!
Sunday, October 11, 2009
post to a blog
hello blog,
i just went to a small festival at the rest stop across the river. watched nice dancing, ate some sacks. i even had a yogurt peach tea.
this spider is just about everywhere. now you know what it looks like. there are at least ten of these on my house right now. hopefully the cold will kill them soon, because they are scary.
tomorrow is national health and sports day, so i get school off but there is still badminton club, which i am looking forward to.
i got to hold a cute two month old baby.
great!
i just went to a small festival at the rest stop across the river. watched nice dancing, ate some sacks. i even had a yogurt peach tea.
this spider is just about everywhere. now you know what it looks like. there are at least ten of these on my house right now. hopefully the cold will kill them soon, because they are scary.
tomorrow is national health and sports day, so i get school off but there is still badminton club, which i am looking forward to.
i got to hold a cute two month old baby.
great!
Friday, October 9, 2009
recent events
blog readers,
today, at the office of an elementary school i was offered four cups of coffee, where i accepted and drank three of them.
i am having some computer trouble. right now i am operating in safe mode, which is very convenient, except i cannot do anything that requires sound. so skyping becomes impossible, which is a problem since skyping helps me feel closer to people i am very far away from. i am waiting for an english speaking (i know, right?) acer representative in tokyo to call me back and help me troubleshoot the problem. i have a vague idea what could be wrong, and i really just want to send the computer in and have them fix it, which will probably cost money, since it doesn't sound like i am covered even by the foreign travel warranty.
in other, better news, there was no 5th or 6th grade class today because those students went to a sports day at another school, and when the teachers got back, there were 2 large sized hokka hokka (takeout restaurant nearby) bentos for me.
great!
today, at the office of an elementary school i was offered four cups of coffee, where i accepted and drank three of them.
i am having some computer trouble. right now i am operating in safe mode, which is very convenient, except i cannot do anything that requires sound. so skyping becomes impossible, which is a problem since skyping helps me feel closer to people i am very far away from. i am waiting for an english speaking (i know, right?) acer representative in tokyo to call me back and help me troubleshoot the problem. i have a vague idea what could be wrong, and i really just want to send the computer in and have them fix it, which will probably cost money, since it doesn't sound like i am covered even by the foreign travel warranty.
in other, better news, there was no 5th or 6th grade class today because those students went to a sports day at another school, and when the teachers got back, there were 2 large sized hokka hokka (takeout restaurant nearby) bentos for me.
great!
Monday, October 5, 2009
actually
blog,
sadly, i was just informed that in the event of a "super typhoon" which will cancel school for all of the students, "teachers must work", and i would still be expected come in here. great!
sadly, i was just informed that in the event of a "super typhoon" which will cancel school for all of the students, "teachers must work", and i would still be expected come in here. great!
stuff and things
oh blog,
here are some of those pictures i told you about.
but first! i got invited to badminton for adults by the lady who sits next to me in the office at the elementary school near my house who is also in my english conversation group. her english is pretty good, in fact. so last night i went to badminton with my gym clothes and new gym sneakers, which i had never worn. we practiced for a half hour and then got split into teams where we played a bunch of other teams. the vice principal is so good that he can play doubles alone and win all of the time. i was paired with a nice woman, and we lost our first 3 matches, including the third against the vice principal. but then we somehow won the last 2, 15 to 14 and 15 to 13 respectively! it was a lot of fun and i think i am going to go back every week. it is good not to be interacting with only schoolchildren.
and now, you may look at some digital photographs.
this is a scuplture of a dancing man on a bridge over the river in tokushima city. doesn't it look nice? that's because it is.
here is a water tower or some other type of feature that has, surprise, illustrations of some dancers on it.
i call this one "would you like something to drink?" there are nine vending machines lined up in a row, because you are probably thirsty already.
and here is a picture from the morning before i went back to tokushima city for the prefectural speech contest. it's like 6:45 AM and there are two old ladies talking about things. what are they talking about? you can see the rice fields, which are everywhere.
so those are the pictures i have to show you.
there is a "super typhoon" called Melor, Typhoon #18, headed directly for japan, directly for this island. it is supposed to be here tomorrow and it is supposed to be horrible. if you don't believe me, you need to look at this:
and probably read this too. if i am lucky (or unlucky?) i will get a call at around 6 AM tomorrow telling me that school is cancelled and that my services (stamping english workbooks with the date, repeating sentences, being cheerful and have people call me "young" all day long) are not needed.
lunch today is milk, rice with some little vegetables in it, a miso type soup with carrots, tofu, some other stuff i dont understand, and a piece of what looks like salmon with maybe some egg cooked over it, sprinkled with bread crumbs in a tin foil dish. today's lunch does not look like it is going to get higher than a 7 on my lunch scale of 1 to 10, 10 being delicious.
that's it for today. keep tuning in for more blog updates.
here are some of those pictures i told you about.
but first! i got invited to badminton for adults by the lady who sits next to me in the office at the elementary school near my house who is also in my english conversation group. her english is pretty good, in fact. so last night i went to badminton with my gym clothes and new gym sneakers, which i had never worn. we practiced for a half hour and then got split into teams where we played a bunch of other teams. the vice principal is so good that he can play doubles alone and win all of the time. i was paired with a nice woman, and we lost our first 3 matches, including the third against the vice principal. but then we somehow won the last 2, 15 to 14 and 15 to 13 respectively! it was a lot of fun and i think i am going to go back every week. it is good not to be interacting with only schoolchildren.
and now, you may look at some digital photographs.
this is a scuplture of a dancing man on a bridge over the river in tokushima city. doesn't it look nice? that's because it is.
here is a water tower or some other type of feature that has, surprise, illustrations of some dancers on it.
i call this one "would you like something to drink?" there are nine vending machines lined up in a row, because you are probably thirsty already.
and here is a picture from the morning before i went back to tokushima city for the prefectural speech contest. it's like 6:45 AM and there are two old ladies talking about things. what are they talking about? you can see the rice fields, which are everywhere.
so those are the pictures i have to show you.
there is a "super typhoon" called Melor, Typhoon #18, headed directly for japan, directly for this island. it is supposed to be here tomorrow and it is supposed to be horrible. if you don't believe me, you need to look at this:
and probably read this too. if i am lucky (or unlucky?) i will get a call at around 6 AM tomorrow telling me that school is cancelled and that my services (stamping english workbooks with the date, repeating sentences, being cheerful and have people call me "young" all day long) are not needed.
lunch today is milk, rice with some little vegetables in it, a miso type soup with carrots, tofu, some other stuff i dont understand, and a piece of what looks like salmon with maybe some egg cooked over it, sprinkled with bread crumbs in a tin foil dish. today's lunch does not look like it is going to get higher than a 7 on my lunch scale of 1 to 10, 10 being delicious.
that's it for today. keep tuning in for more blog updates.
Sunday, October 4, 2009
The Results
blog,
we did not win the speech contest. we are not going to tokyo. we did get "a very good result" which means a big certificate and a big box with a big trophy in it, which mayuko deserved, and now we do not have to practice anymore. this is kind of ok because the tokyo contest is 3 days long. we went out to eat with mayuko's family at what i feel like is the japanese equivalent of denny's without actually being denny's, because they have denny's here, it just wasn't called that and had japanese food. we all had variations on a little piece of hamburger meat which they call "hambaagoo" - mayuko and her dad got the one filled with cheese. i really don't want to get into the content of the speeches, but mayuko had the best pronounciation out of just about everyone!
how do you celebrate having the best banana of your entire life? i think i just had this banana. it was the perfect ripeness, perfect number of honey spots, best firmness, no rotty parts at all.
but to balance out this good thing, a bad thing has happened. do you know the rubber inside slippers i have been bringing around from school to school; well the right one has apparently shrunken substantially in my car. a yahoo! answers search provides the idea that rubber shrinks when COOLED, which would mean that it got very cold last night in my car and that wearing it on my warm foot should help it to EXAPND again, but it is very tight and uncomfortable right now.
i got invited to play badminton at school here tonight at 8 with some teachers from various schools. i do not have my own racket, and i dont think i have played badminton in several years, but it can't be too difficult to hit a little "shuttlecock" over the net with one of those things.
anyway, i am going to the elementary school up in the mountains in the afternoon today, and i heard that rachel, the company provided teaching assistant/lesson planner is also going to be there, so i probably won't have to do much work myself, which is ok. although i was told to make a powerpoint (i have the word "ski" written next to this) and "bring cards of acitvities" of which i have none. let's hope rachel has good ideas.
gotta help teach a class or two before lunch. at this point teaching means slowly and clearly reading something and then having it repeated back to me upwards of five times in a row, with the hope that the kids either memorize it or get an idea for how it sounds.
there are a few photos on my camera that didn't get uploaded for some reason. they happen to be the best ones that i took. look for them some time in the near future, between now and when i come back to america.
we did not win the speech contest. we are not going to tokyo. we did get "a very good result" which means a big certificate and a big box with a big trophy in it, which mayuko deserved, and now we do not have to practice anymore. this is kind of ok because the tokyo contest is 3 days long. we went out to eat with mayuko's family at what i feel like is the japanese equivalent of denny's without actually being denny's, because they have denny's here, it just wasn't called that and had japanese food. we all had variations on a little piece of hamburger meat which they call "hambaagoo" - mayuko and her dad got the one filled with cheese. i really don't want to get into the content of the speeches, but mayuko had the best pronounciation out of just about everyone!
how do you celebrate having the best banana of your entire life? i think i just had this banana. it was the perfect ripeness, perfect number of honey spots, best firmness, no rotty parts at all.
but to balance out this good thing, a bad thing has happened. do you know the rubber inside slippers i have been bringing around from school to school; well the right one has apparently shrunken substantially in my car. a yahoo! answers search provides the idea that rubber shrinks when COOLED, which would mean that it got very cold last night in my car and that wearing it on my warm foot should help it to EXAPND again, but it is very tight and uncomfortable right now.
i got invited to play badminton at school here tonight at 8 with some teachers from various schools. i do not have my own racket, and i dont think i have played badminton in several years, but it can't be too difficult to hit a little "shuttlecock" over the net with one of those things.
anyway, i am going to the elementary school up in the mountains in the afternoon today, and i heard that rachel, the company provided teaching assistant/lesson planner is also going to be there, so i probably won't have to do much work myself, which is ok. although i was told to make a powerpoint (i have the word "ski" written next to this) and "bring cards of acitvities" of which i have none. let's hope rachel has good ideas.
gotta help teach a class or two before lunch. at this point teaching means slowly and clearly reading something and then having it repeated back to me upwards of five times in a row, with the hope that the kids either memorize it or get an idea for how it sounds.
there are a few photos on my camera that didn't get uploaded for some reason. they happen to be the best ones that i took. look for them some time in the near future, between now and when i come back to america.
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