I want to go there

Naming department: Sucess!

A coffee shop/cafe...called Perky Club...haha perfect! Sounds like my kind of joint.  Now if only I can figure out where exactly it is...I'll be peddling my bike there all the time!

Sankanbi: May

Ok so the last few weeks have been kind of stressful as the school prepared for the May sankanbi (parent view class day)  It's not a "real" lesson, as the principal and Japanese teachers made us come up with a lesson plan weeks ago and then watched them, critiqued them and made us fine tune them with pratice for the last week and a half or so.  Needless to say my 3yr old kiddies were very sick of the lesson before today. I think that might have actually worked out in my favor...as we were all anticipating them going insane and not paying attention because of their parents being around.  Not having the extra excitement of a fun new English lesson probably balanced out the extra energy of the parents! 

So YAY! I think I survived.  The other teacher's feedback wasn't that I was a horrible teacher and should be fired.  So that must mean they liked me! right?! 

On a side note...because of the music practices every morning for the last 3 weeks I now have 5 Japanese kid's songs and dances memorized and running around in my head.  GAHHH!!! one of which is about frogs and the dance involves hopping around like one...help me!

Grand Rapids is AWESOME!

Ok so one of my friends posted THIS LINK on FB about Grand Rapids...a town I love that is close enough to being my hometown as not to really matter.  And it is FANTASTIC!!!  I've watched the video twice already.  I can't believe he was in this video.  So cool!

It's sort of a promotion video for GR but done in a completely new way.  Enjoy and hopefully it gets you seeing what makes West Michigan and the Midwest so great a place to live and visit!

Mt. Bizan revisited

So I climbed Mt. Bizan today with a couple of my friends instead of taking the ropeway up like I did last time.  It was fun and since we stopped a ton of times (man we are woses) it wasn't that strenuous.  The part I hated about it was the fact that Japanese misquitoes apparently LOVE me.  I got about 15 new bites just from the hike up...while my friends maybe got 2.  GRRRR....lesson learned...don't go anywhere in Japan without misquito repellent.  I really should have learned this lesson before now, as every morning I wake up with at least one new bite.  My solution had been to try and find/kill all the ones in my apartment before falling asleep.  I must always miss one or they have a secret entrance into my room.

After we got to the top we wandered the viewing platform and found a couple of benches.  My new friend Hal met last night at Ingrids brought a few beers with him and we drank them as celebration of making it to the top.  It's apparently his tradition for when he gets to the top of a moutain.  I'm good with that tradition as I had told him the night before I don't like beer and he produced a smirnoff for me...sweet!  Hanging out at the top was beautiful and the weather was perfect.  This morning had been extremely humid and muggy, but at that time the impending drizzle had put enough water on the ground to make it perfect outside.  After being at the top for perhaps 2 or 3 hours Hal and Jessica started talking about walking back down....after nearly scratching my legs off I decided that was a bad idea for me and bailed on them and took the ropeway down (I STILL managed to get one more bite).  So now I'm sitting in my apartment practically covered in toothpaste attempting to stop the itching.  I forsee a treck to the store for anti-itch cream in my near future. 

Jessica just called apparently she's only now getting to the station (some 2.5 hours after I split from them) and asked if I wanted to go out for sushi once she gets back....sounds like fun..I'll let you know how that turns out!

Ingrid's

I convinced my neighbor Jessica to go out to the bar with me...to the town's main foriegner hang out spot, Ingid's (I've mentioned her here: Hanami)!!!  Being the only girls there got kind of ackward when a few weird..possibly drunk Japanese guys came over and wanted us to sit with them.  We did for perhaps 5 minutes as it was a novel experience to get approached by Japanese guys.  Meeting ones that iniciate talk is VERY rare.  But as neither of us were interested we just stayed long enough to say we did it...and then left Ingrid's bar for a little while and wandered around. 



Look what I discovered!  It's mate found here



We poped our heads into the other of the foriegn bars as Jess likes the owner there...kookey lady who runs an extremely dodgy place. Once we felt it was safe we went back to Ingrids and did Karaoke for several hours.  Around 3 she wanted to close so we all left. haha 3am and the nights only half over.  Crazy Japan!  One of the guys who was there has a friend who owns another bar that was around the corner....I guess that place is the after-after-party spot for when something is going on around town. The owner kept playing great music and it convinced us to stay even after Hal and Chris left for a different bar.  By the time we decided to leave it was after 5am.   It's now 5:30 and we just got back after walking to the station and catching a taxi home...I'm practically crawling into bed as I type.  Great fun.  Hal,  who Jessica seemed to hit it off with and I can see myself being friends with, invited us to climb Mt. Bizan with him...today I guess it would be. He said noon....which is in only a few hours.  I sincerely doubt we'll be going that early!

phew*

Wrist update number 2.

It hurt a bit yesterday too, not nearly as bad as Monday, but enough to convince me not to seek medical attention yet.

Today I am back to 100% wrist usage.  Thank you Daniel for correctly telling me that I probably sprained it....man now that would be an interesting conversation.

Doctor: "Now please tell me what you did to sprain your wrist?"
Me: "I baked a cake."
Doctor: "I'm sorry, I think you're confused.  I asked how you sprained your wrist."
Me: "I baked a cake."
Doctor: "Are you trying to bribe me for stonger medication?"
Me: "NO! I baked a cake!"
Doctor: "why are you telling me you baked a cake if you aren't trying to bribe me with it?!"
Me: "You asked me how I sprained my wrist."
Doctor:  "How does baking a cake have anything to do with spraining you wrist?"
Me: "Lots of mixing"

Hope you enjoyed the peek into my brain!

Awa Odori Bridge

It plays Awa Odori music (tradional dance Tokushima is famous for) 24 hours a day and at night is a changing color light up display.  Come August there is going to be a massive Awa Odori festival around town that crosses this bridge.  I personally think the light display is a waste of Engineering know-how and electricity...that being said it's BEAUTIFUL and I love to watch it.  The first time I heard the music though I was freaked...took me forever to figure out the source!