Adventures in the Looking Glass

It being  sunny day I decided, after washing my kitchen floor, do the washing up, hoovering, doing the laundry and some yoga, that it would be a nice idea to leave the house and bask in what seem to be temperatures equivalent to an English summer, before it becomes impossible to open the windows for fear of bugs and death by heat suffocation.  Of course, I don't normally like to leave the house on a Sunday, unless it's to take on the swarming mass of Tokyo with other company.  So...I'd forgotten why I don't like leaving the house.  Within about 5 minutes some eijit on a bicycle tried to take me out on the pavement leading down to an underpass.  An underpass, that is, with designated cycle paths.  And he had a fully functioning bell on the front of that bike, too.  I've decided that if I must leave the house, I shall do it on my bike, and then at least I'm on an equal footing and only really need to worry about cars.  Eventually I found a quiet footpath between some houses and strolled down there before taking a hasty detour home, taking an underpass beneath the train tracks which also coincides with the small river nearby heading underground for a couple of blocks.  It was rather eerie under there so I took a photo...on my Holga.  You'll just have to wait for it.

Golden Week was rather lovely.  I went down to Gifu to stay at Rachel's house. I took the night bus, which was an exercise in torture I don't wish to repeat.  It would all be fine if my legs didn't decide to take on a life of their own whenever I'm on long journeys.  Having weird leg spasms while you're attempting to sleep is deeply uncomfortable and no doubt a little weird looking to the other passengers.  Next time I'll just suck it up and take the Shinkansen.

Here're some photos from Gifu:

     

The Other Laura and I posing in Nagoya.           Down by the river in Gifu after the BBQ.  I was sporting an 80s quiff and pink sunglasses.




Looking along the river to Mount Kinka, with Kinka castle at the top.
And this is me half way up it.

After Gifu, my friend Brooke visited for a couple of days.  We hit China town in Yokohama in the pouring rain, and spent the afternoon with jennarose  in a cafe discussing Dean Winchester and drinking coffee.  Dinner was at a cool little Mexican place (it being Cinqo de Mayo (spelling?)) which did great food in small portions and had a quite confused waiter.  I think it took three languages to get all our ordering done - Spanish, Japanese and English.  At the end of dinner the guy lifted up the apron on the little skeleton in the doorway and flashed us a stuffed willy whilst thanking us loudly and guffawing. 

Which also reminds me of the Moroccan restaurant we went to in Nagoya, which did fabulous cheese briwat, hummous and fish tagine.  And then there was belly-dancing!  I was dead impressed. 

Speaking of belly dancing, I shall be returning to the land of shimmy tomorrow after a month's break.  In the meantime I've been checking out various videos on youtube and have decided that I need to learn to do Tribal bellydance.  Watch this and you'll see why. The best bit is about halfway through.  You'll know which bit I mean.

Err, that's it for now.  Maybe some more ramblings later, after I've consoled myself with a chocolate Hobnob and a cup of tea.

In my previous post I put up a clip of Yoshio Kojima, whose morning workout is having absolutely no effect, save for improving my ability to stomp and amuse small children. When we go canvassing for new students in Ina, however, we rely on the Hard Gay technique:



So the news I posted about on Sunday, or whenever, is that I will be going to Cairns, Australia next week for a training trip. This is the end of the six month Big Jump training and for some unknown reason I was selected to go on it (clearly this has nothing to do with business results). I have to give a presentation on teaching vocabulary, which was mightily interesting in the researching, so I hope it goes well. I am sugoiexcited about going, but held off telling anyone until I got my new passport and had all my visa-stuff sorted out, which I did on Monday. Six hours on a train with a low fever is not fun. It's only a short trip though - we fly out on Sunday and back on Wednesday, but it will be my first time in Australia!

In other job news, I've been offered a transfer to Yokohama. The school is huge - twice the size of Ina, and very busy, with loads of staff. I was talking yesterday to the Area Leader there, well aware that he could persuade me that a hot poker up the bum is just what I needed. So I've got to think think think. It would be the total opposite of everything in Ina (they have carpet for one thing).
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I'm starting to settle-in in Ina, but here is the main problem. I like Ina, I like the local people I've met, and it's near the mountains so I can go break my arm in the forthcoming winter when I go snowboarding again. But, it's isolated and the school gets me down sometimes. My ridiculous schedule, the plague of spiders, the lack of a manager, and any notion that anyone remembers we're here. There's no cinema, which used to really annoy me until I found Tsutaya and got re-addicted to the X-Files.

I like the fact that everyone knows me here - yes, I revel in my Gaijin fame - so the anonymity in Yokohama would be something to adapt to, but that was what I enjoyed when I was in London. There are also tonnes of Gaijin, which has its pros and cons. I have liked being away from other English speakers here, but have recently found a group of ALTs in the area, which spices things up a bit.

In Yokhama there will be bookshops, where I can indulge my reignited poetry craving (yeah, yeah, I know it's on the internet but I hate reading from computer screens). There will be Japanese schools, and there will be people my age! But, it means moving all my stuff, reclocating to a new City (much as it pretends to be, Ina isn't a city), making new friends (but meeting up with old ones), and getting used to new students. I will also have big shoes to fill, though I hope that's why I was asked to replace him. Being told you're a great teacher (as I was yesterday) for me is hard to take. I enjoy the flattery but I can't help distrusting it.

Ramble ramble ramble. Any thoughts you have would be appreciated.