Filed under: Happenings
After saying our goodbyes, Ryan got to experience his first flight across the Pacific ocean. The Japan Airlines plane didn’t have the same cool on-demand movie system that the Contiental plane did so I think he ended up watching Wall-e about 4 times. Everything seemed to work like clockwork – we made it out of the airport, to the hotel, and then to Iida without a hitch. Ryan and I have been in Iida for about a week and a half now and he seems to be enjoying it. I love having someone to come home to and he loves being around me so it’s working out well. I took him to a Buddhist temple, we ate sushi at a conveyer belt sushi restaurant, went to a ramen restaurant, been shopping multiple times, etc so he’s slowly experiencing the culture and getting into the swing of things here.
Ryan’s already learned one of the Japanese writing systems – the syllabic カタカナ(katakana) letters used to write foreign words. While most students of Japanese start with ひらがな (hiragana) the syllabic system used to write Japanese words, with katakana, the vast majority of words came from the English language so there’s no new vocabulary to learn.
コンピューター Konpyutaa = Computer
アイスクリーム Aisu kuriimu = Ice Cream
コーヒー Koohii = Coffee
etc.
So, it’s pretty useful to know katakana, especially with the tons of English words the Japanese like to use in their own language.
I also forced him to visit both of my schools, Fuetsu on Friday and Osahime on Tuesday. I say forced because he really didn’t want to go and was pretty shy the whole time he was there. Oh well, he did it and got it over with. Since the schools are the ones who gave me my job, which in turn, gives Ryan this opportunity to be in Japan, he should at least meet everyone once.
Anyway, Ryan’s been working on ironing out the details with the University of Phoenix and will hoepfully be starting classes fairly soon. At first I was really angry with myself because I didn’t check my student email account for about a week making him miss the deadline for January 26th classes. (He’s got his own email account now so that’ll no longer be a problem) Thinking he’d have to wait 9 weeks to begin classes, I later learned that since the University of Phoenix is so big, there’s enough students to have another set of classes starting the week after, and probably the week after. Amazing!
This weekend I’ll probably take him to the house we’re going to move into later, as well as take him over to my host family’s house where we’re going to be treated to yakiniku (Japanese bbq meat) and okonomiyaki. (a battered vegetable and meat dish that resembles a pancake) Should be fun!
Filed under: Happenings
I’ve been meaning to get back on and write for what seems at least a week or more, and what do you know, I’m already back in Japan and still haven’t written this. Well, here I go..
December 27th my mom and I went to the Outlet Mall at the Lake where I managed to get all the souvineers I needed for Japan all at once. Considering the fact that I took me over a month to amass what I thought I needed to bring, home, this one-stop trip was wonderful. In all actuality I didn’t need much and ended up getting a box of Christmas assorted teas for each of the English departments, cocoa mix from Rocky Mountain for my International Studies department, some gifts from Coach for a few people who’ve done a lot for me in Japan, some books for the school libraries. I needed something small but thoughtful for the principals/vice principals/a couple teachers/host family/etc. and found (or my mom found) some Hammond’s handmade candy canes at Harry and David’s on sale. Anway, except for some Obama merch. for one of my teacher’s at Fuetsu and candies for another teacher at Osahime, I got all my shopping done in that one day, which was excellent.
The next major event that happened was Ryan and my wedding party on the 2nd. It was held at Yen Ching in the afternoon and for what seemed longer than it actually was, nearly the whole family, a couple friends and family friends got together to celebrate with us over some delicious American Chinese food. I felt bad that I didn’t do a better job of inviting people; being in Japan while the plans were being made didn’t help the matter, but seeing that most of the people Ryan and I know are out-of-state or out-of-country, what matter was who was there and not how many people were there.
After that it felt like I’d been in America forever. It was back to my college days – week 3 of the 4 weeks of winter break. When will school be back in session? Aside from helping Ryan pack and move out of his apartment, the last really memorable thing I did in the US besides say good bye to everyone was going to Lewis and Clark Middle School and giving a presentation on Japanese school life to my middle school students. Although I was at first excited to see my students again, after learning that I’d have to come in two days because of block scheduling I wasn’t so thrilled. After the first presentation though I was psyched again. The students, who were 7th graders and who I student taught last year, were about to begin learning about medieval Japan. Although I don’t know so much about that time period, I told them about what I’d done since student teaching. I told them about graduating, applying for the JET Program, getting accepted, moving to Iida, working, the challenges and the rewarding aspects of life as a foreigner, and some of the things I’ve learned along the way. I mostly focused on school life though and how it it is similar to and different from American school. At the end, since I was telling about Japan from my perspective as a foreign teacher, I showed them pictures from a few places I was able to visit that were related to medieval Japan. Overall the kids seemed really interested and had a lot of questions. Some of them want to be exchange students now, some what to meet my Japanese students too. I hope to set up a letter exchange between our schools soon.
