Tokyo!

So we made the genius decision to take a 13 hour bus ride to Tokyo. Despite booking our overnight bus tickets within a minute of each other, Steffanie, the other JET in Hofu was placed on a different bus from both me and Kris, another Yamaguchi JET. This would go on to cause many problems... especially when Steff's phone died halfway through the ride.

But anyway, on to Tokyo. We spent nearly half of the first day trying to find our ridiculous first hostel. I wish I was lying when I call it the sketchiest experience of my life. After nearly an hour of wandering around with a nice lawyer who's been living and working in Roppongi, Tokyo for 3 years, we found the building. It looked decent enough until they told us to go to the 6th floor. Upon exiting the elevator, we find a door with a sign that reads "KNOCK! BEWARE OF DOG!"... complete with the shadow of a GIANT dog barking and jumping against the door. At this point I was imagining my imminent death while racing through my head were thoughts such as "Why is there a dog in the hostel?" and "Will I ever see my family again?" The "check-in" area turned out to be some guy's living room littered with empty alcohol bottles and the entire idea of splitting the bill 4 ways seemed completely alien to him. We made it through the incredibly off-putting experience (with the giant black poodle in another room at this point) only to be led to our hostel... a two minute walk away. Despite requesting a 4-person private room, we were given 2 private doubles... in an apartment... with another bedroom... in which lived some guy who'd been there "for a few years." Other fun discoveries involved finding out the bathroom CURTAIN didn't lock, the toilet light was out, and the toilet didn't quite flush. We barely spent any time there, and for good reason.

On to the fun stuff! We wandered around for a while, first happening upon some kind of kid's festival where we met the Japanese version of the Power Rangers (I know, I know, the Power Rangers WERE Japanese...)

After that, I think we made our way over to Shibuya, the shopping center of Tokyo (okay, all of Tokyo is the shopping center compared to Hofu, but that's beside the point). Fashion in Tokyo is on another PLANET compared to NY. I felt really in place with my awesome gym sneakers amid the sea of stiletto heels.

Anyway, we ended the night with a visit to Alcatraz, a themed prison hospital restaurant. The entire set up is designed to look like a prison hospital and the menu is themed as well. It was all you can drink AND eat for 3000 yen for an hour or two. I will include a picture of the dessert which was pretty incredible so you can all be jealous.


That's all for day one in Tokyo... we survived the night in our sketchy hostel and went to another one for days 2-4... still to come.

Oops

So it's been a while. Actually, more like 13 days. Time to fill in the blanks!

In Japan, around the middle of August, is a national holiday of sorts called "Obon" when people go home to pay their respects to deceased relatives. Not everyone gets off, but we got 4 special days of summer leave for it. Since we are so cunning, we chose Wed-Fri and Monday, giving us a 6 day weekend of awesome.

Wednesday we took a 2.5 hour train to Hiroshima. We later found out we could have taken the Shinkansen (the bullet train) for maybe 1000 yen more and only used up a half hour... which we will do next time. 2.5 hours is a long time to kill. We started off by finding a place called "Okonomi-mura" which essentially means "Okonomiyaki Village" - it's a building that literally has 3 or 4 floors of okonomiyaki restaurants. Everyone sits around a giant hot plate and the okonomiyaki is made in front of you. Okonomiyaki is essentially a savory Japanese pancake. I don't have any pictures, but I know you have Google.

After a delicious lunch, we took a cab over to the site of the atomic bombing. Pictured here is the "A-dome" which is one of very few structures to survive the atomic bombing. It's also nearly directly under the site of the explosion which makes it even more incredible that it's still standing. I felt kind of weird taking pictures of it, so we moved on to the Peace Memorial Park and Museum. This sounds trite and obvious, but they were incredibly depressing though I'm glad I went.


We had a few more hours to get through before our epic Tokyo vacation began, so we killed some time in Kinokuniya, a giant bookstore which has English! Language! Books! I picked up a few books for the Japanese Language Proficiency Exam which is quite unfortunately on my 22nd birthday.

Anyway, we had a bus to catch at 8 PM that we would be spending the next 13.5 hours on, covering nearly half of the entire main island of Japan. Little did we know the trouble we would find....

To be continued! (Okay I'm going to write the continuation right now but I figured I should segment my posts somehow...)

In which I am a slacking blogger

It turns out I am not a vociferous blogger. Monday and Wednesday we went to the Hofu Tenmangu shrine to take part in a yearly festival. The street leading all the way up to the shrine, as well as the steps, are lined with candles. We got there a little late on Monday after having dinner at a grill-your-own-meat place. The waitress didn’t speak a word of English (which is a lot more common than you might think) but we managed to get a large plate of (mostly) delicious meat. At some points, we used the awesomely awesome free Japanese dictionary on my iPod Touch (thanks Mom and Dad!) to do some stilted question-and-answering about our meal. Afterwards, we went to the festival, and we probably shouldn’t have eaten because the food at the festival was SO good. We visited our old karaoke man and got some slushies. Other food at the festival involved: long grilled hotdogs wrapped in a thin layer of egg, covered with ketchup and mayonnaise; grilled octopus; Pikachu-shaped pancakes; fried chicken; sticks of grilled meat; and baby bottles full of some kind of drink. The best part of the festival was probably the fact that we MET　OTHER　ENGLISH　SPEAKERS! We met Anna, another English teacher in Hofu, her friend Naoya, and their friends Yayoi and Toru. We also met a girl named Andrea from Miami, but she was leaving literally the next day, which was unfortunate. We passed some time overlooking the city after the festival had ended and then they took us to a bar called Laughable(s). We’ll probably be spending quite a bit of time there.

The festival was by far better on Wednesday, the final day. Many more people, many more stands, and best of all, the old people karaoke from Monday had been replaced with HOFU　CITY　GANGSTER　RAP, complete with dancing. It was AMAZING. I think Steffany and I were the only two people in attendance that understood how funny this was.

Thursday morning we left for Kenchou – the main governmental building of Yamaguchi-ken, where we had our contract signing ceremony and orientation…. again. That night was a dinner/allyoucandrink/karaoke party. It was pretty fantastic. I really like our prefecture so far! I sang my first karaoke song, Wannabe by the Spice Girls. I think I officially enjoy karaoke, but only when alcohol is involved. We went to another bar afterward, and then I crashed in my awesome $50 single at the business hotel (the Super Hotel – in Japanese, the ‘supaa hoteru’). The next morning involved an endless stream of orientation. We crashed afterward, and 4 of us decided to stay another night to explore Yamaguchi city a little more.

Friday night we went to a lantern festival that has apparently been going on for 450 years. Theodorou family: imagine if the Italian festival in greenpoint involved a much shorter pillar of lanterns being hoisted by a million Japanese men wearing white short shorts. The festival was obviously much bigger than the one in Hofu, but same deal – tons of delicious cheap food stands. Unfortunately (or fortunately) we had yet again eaten at a grill-your-own-meat place for a ridiculously cheap price so we weren’t too hungry.

The next morning we made our way over to a 5-story pagoda. “Pagoda” is NOT a Japanese word, as we discovered the hard way in the cab. Regardless, it was the most beautiful place I have ever been. I never imagined Japan would be as luscious and green as it is. We ate our breakfast on a stone bench next to a giant pond in front of the pagoda. We spent the morning wandering around the pagoda and its accompanying ceremony before trying to figure out what to do for the rest of the day.

We asked the information booth at the front if we would be able to find a tea ceremony but apparently this was impossible. However, something to know about Japan is if you ask someone for any kind of advice, they will probably spend the next 10 minutes drawing maps and conferring heatedly amongst themselves to give you the BEST possible advice. In this case, a woman walked us down the street, went to her car, and gave us each miniature fans (fans are a necessary part of life here) and postcards before further walking us to show us the way. We ended up getting lost and asking a pharmacist for help, at which point he walked us the entire 3-4 blocks to the restaurant. The restaurant itself was less than stellar, but decent. We wandered around the shopping area until we caught our trains back.

Sunday involved finding the OTHER mall in town. It's called "You Me Town" but it's pronounced "you-may" town. I don't get it. I picked up some tupperware and other miscellaneous crap from the 100 yen store and had some icecream that kind of had no flavor.

Monday was pretty uneventful as well. And today is Tuesday.

Tomorrow, depending on how we feel, we may be spending half a day in Hiroshima before catching our 8 PM overnight no-toilet bus to Tokyo! We arrive in Tokyo Thursday morning, and we leave Sunday night (again on the overnight bus). We're staying one night in Roppongi (6 trees) and 2 nights in Asakusa. I really did not give Tokyo a fair chance during orientation and I'm missing big city life although I imagine being in a big city is scarier than a small city when you barely speak the language. One of those days will be spent at Disneyland Tokyo. All of those days will be spent battling rain from typhoons! With any luck we won't float away, and Tokyo will stop having earthquakes... at least for 4 days. Amanda, if you're reading this, I suspect our feet will feel pretty similar to how they felt in Rome when we got poured on.

Anyway, I probably won't be updating since I won't be bringing my computer so this is goodbye for now!

On Saturday we went out on our bikes intending to find the sea. When this brought us to a rather industrial part of town, we decided to explore in the other direction. We ended up at a 7-11 asking what there was to do in the neighborhood. We learned that the Tenmangu Shrine, Hofu's main (only) tourist attraction, was a 10 minute bike ride down the road. So off we went. We stopped at the base for some iced coffee, since it was 96 degrees with a "real feel" temperature of 110. I have never been so overheated in my life! Anyway, this old Japanese man beckoned us into his tiny store, using pretty good English. He treated us to a free strawberry slushy, which was good, because the iced coffees we then ordered ended up being 500 yen each! We talked to him for a while, and then a Japanese woman came in and they started speaking in rapid Japanese to each other. Before we knew what was happening, old Japanese dude bursts out into karaoke, singing along to “Yesterday” by the Beatles. He was pretty good, too! Way better than I would be if I tried, and English is my native language. I get the feeling this guy passes a lot of his time doing karaoke, because he also knew an Italian song by heart, which I’ve uploaded on facebook. I can’t really explain it, but listening to this guy sing his heart out in multiple foreign languages was incredible. I love Japan. He also told us about a festival that is going on for the next three days, where the 100+ steps leadng up to the shrine are lined with candles and decorations. There are normally fireworks as well, but the recent mudslides and heavy rains cancelled them. Apparently the mudslides were less than a km away from the shrine! After a while, we parted ways, and continued on up to the shrine.

From the shrine, you can see ALL　of Hofu. It’s incredible how GREEN Japan is. I never would have imagined I’d be living in a small city in one of Japan’s most rural prefectures, but I absolutely love it. We spent a while exploring, and then started for home. We decided to go out for dinner, yet again. This time we had okonomiyaki. “Okonomiyaki” means “as-you-like-it fried”. There’s two styles: Hiroshima-style and Osaka-style. Hiroshima style involves layering: a pancake layer, a mound of shredded cabbage, some seafood (we had squid), an egg layer, a layer of soba noodles…. And whatever else you want. Osaka style involves mixing it all up and frying it in a circular shape. We had Hiroshima style with cheese on top. After it’s cooked, you slather okonomiyaki sauce and drizzle mayonnaise on top. Holy crap, it was incredible. I couldn’t even finish half of it, so I had the rest for lunch on Sunday. Reheated okonomiyaki is nowhere near as good as okonomiyaki made on a giant stovetop in front of you

Saturday night, we tried to experience the Hofu nightlife and failed miserably. Hofu MUST have a nightlife, but we don’t know what or where it is. We ended up in an izakaya with a Korean expat who’s been living in Japan for 10 years. Oh, and he wouldn’t tell us his age, but we estimated it at 45. Kind of a weird night. I had fun because I essentially got to play translator since he spoke barely any English. Next time we go out, we’re taking a girl our age from my school (she works in the office) and hopefully she’ll have a better idea of where to go.

On Sunday we slept in, and then took off in one direction down the main street. We got nearly to the base of the mountains before the roads diverged and we turned back rather than get lost. We also found the 100 yen store, where we bought some basics. Somehow, my apartment only has ONE frying pan. This needs to be fixed. I have no idea how my predecessor lived here and cooked with one single frying pan, one spatula, and less than 10 forks/spoons/knives combined. It makes me sad enough to not have an oven, and to only have 2 burners, but I can’t really do anything about that.

For the rest of the month, work is obviously really light. Actually, I currently don’t do any work. But my work-days are light as well. This Thursday and Friday, all the Yamaguchi JETs are heading to Yamaguchi City for orientation. Then there’s the weekend. Then in 2 weeks, I’m going to be in another city in Yamaguchi, Kudamatsu city, from Aug 18 to 20 for an English teaching seminar. On the 21^st, we have orientation part two in Yamaguchi city again. On the 26^th is a staff meeting, where I will meet EVERY teacher, and give a speech in both English and Japanese. The 27^th and 28^th are dedicated to visiting the other schools I will be teaching at. And then school starts with the opening ceremony on September 1^st at Hofu SHS where I will be giving a speech (again in both English and Japanese) to the entirety of the school: 1000 students and ~80 staff members.

Anyway, we get this glorious thing called “4 days of paid summer leave” which is separate from our paid leave allotment. So I am taking August 12^th through August 17^th, for a total of 6 days of vacation! 　Unfortunately, it’s very soon so I don’t know where I’ll be able to go…. Okinawa is on the list, but it’s probably way too expensive this close. Maybe Kyoto? Who knows?!

Anyway, that brings this up to date. Check out the pictures on facebook if you haven’t already! And if anyone would like a postcard,email me your address. I wouldn’t mind getting postcards or care packages either, so let me know if you’d like my address!