I forgot to mention last night that I finally got my internet connection at home up and running. Very long story and I won't bore you with the details here. But at last, it's up. So the next thing I want to be able to do is post pictures on this thing. Apparently you can. You just need to upgrade your account and pay 5 or 10 dollars a month depending on how much space you want. I am going to go for the 10 dollar thing cause it's cheap and cause I might need the space. Only problem right now is that I tried to sign up and the "this site under maintainence" screen comes up. Been trying it for a week now with no luck. So this morning I emailed the site and asked about it. So maybe soon. But the internet is up, that is good.
Also, just to fill you in on the more mundane aspects of life, I have got my satellite dish up and running. Did that about three weeks ago. I am able to get some English stuff (the reason I got it): National Geographic Channel, Discovery Channel, Fox (although the damn Simpsons isn't in English), Animal Planet, History Channel, CNN, the BBC, and maybe one or two others I am forgetting. Some programs are in straight English with Japanese subtitles, others are translated into Japanese but you can hit a button on the remote to get the English feed, and then others (like the damn Simpsons) are given to you in Japanese only. For most of the channels I mentioned above, option two is the reality. There are also, of course, many Japanese channels. I don't normally watch these as I figure what's the point until I learn some of the language.
I did sign up to get most of the sports channels. So I get about 10 of them. So far it's been mostly Japanese baseball, some kind of fighting, European soccer, rugby, golf, some Japanese auto racing series, darts, billards, table-tennis, and maybe a few other kinds. I have gotten a couple of this year's pre-season football games, but they seem to be tape-delayed from a few days ago (possibly a week). Maybe when the regular season starts, I will get more up to date stuff. Nearly all the sports are commentated (is that a word?) on in Japanese, but for some you can hit the little button and get its regular feed. This means English for many sports (though not all) and I've gotten French a couple times for soccer games.
I do get Formula 1 (the real reason I got the satellite dish) but it's in Japanese only. Luckily, I follow the sport quite closely and have been for quite a while so that when something happens on the track or in the pits, I can make a pretty good guess as to what's going on. I've only been present for one race here (next one is Sept 14th for those interested) but it was live and was shown with no commercials. So that was damn nice. Of course, live here and live in California (what I was used to) is quite a different thing. Most races in Cal were aired live at 5am Sunday. Here it's 9pm Sunday. Have to get used to that.
Baseball is fun over here except that it, of course, is in Japanese only. I am less knowledgable about baseball than I am about F1 so I am still learning the game itself. But I like it. The Japanese professional league is made up of 12 teams in two sub-leagues, if you will: the Central League and the Pacific League (six teams each). This may sound a bit small to Americans, and I guess it is, but their playoffs consist of only the Japan Series. The top team from each league plays in this. The season (this year's anyway) runs from March 28th to Oct 1st, with the Series taking place Oct 18 to the 28th (a best of 7 series). I don't know too many facts about the sport that differ from our version other than that each team is allowed only two foreigners. Though I did talk to a Japanese man who told me that one difference is that they employ the bunt much more frequently over here. Speedy guys, I guess. Each team's uniform seems to be based (some nearly indentically, other a bit more loosely) on some Amercian team's version. The Yomiuri Giants look almost exactly like the San Francisco Giants, the Chunichi Dragons look exactly like the Dodgers, the Hiroshima Carp look like the Cinncinnati Reds, etc. I will have to make it to a Japanese game sometime. From the tv, the crowds at the game sound more like a soccer crowd than they do an American baseball crowd, meaning that I hear choruses of cheers. Some of you will know what I mean by this.
So that's the internet and the tv deal.
Phone is up and has been up and running. Can't work the answering machine though. Have no idea what each button says. Had a fellow JET leave me a message about a party a couple weeks ago and it's still on there as I have no idea how to erase it. I've pressed every button on there, but no luck. So if you call, keep the message short as I don't want to use all the space yet. I'll have to make a friend and have him/her help me learn how to erase messages. It's the simple things that get you over here. Fun fun.
By the way, I am putting up a link to the Kofu city webpage for two reasons; one, to see how to do it, and two, in case you are interested. Hope it works.