Thought I'd take a few minutes to write in here cause next the few days are gonna be busy. In fact, today was busy, but what the hell? It is just about 9pm and I have a drink next to me and there is nothing on tv. Is there ever?

I can't remember if I mentioned that our mid-year conference is coming up. Think I did though, in reference to Amy having to give a presentation. Anyway, I was ok with the damn thing coming up but today I found out that I, and everybody else, will have to share a room with four other guys. This does not make me happy. I was told that they are separating us by sex and putting five of us in a room together. Now, I know it is only for one night, but damn, I am past the fraternity years. In fact, I never went through them. I like my space and I like to sleep alone. Anyway, not happy. But hell, if I expect the worst, I'll probably be pleasantly surprised. All the guys are cool, mind you. It's just a completely different thing to have a drinking buddy than it is to live with that drinking buddy. I know, I know....one night. But c'mon! FIVE of us!?

Besides that though, life moves along quite nicely. Went up to Shizen Gakuen today (10 students, up in the hills). Had arts and crafts day. The teacher had mentioned last time that she wanted to do some sort of special thing for Halloween. So today I came prepared to give a little history lesson on the holiday, had Poe's The Raven all ready to read and, thanks to Amy, had a couple little handouts based on Halloween (a wordsearch and a Jack-o-lantern thing). But all my preparation was for naught, or nearly all of it. Turns out that in the first class we made Halloween cards and spoke zero English. And in the second class we made more cards (I just continued mine as I suck at such things) and then had a discussion on Halloween. Second class was much more fun in that last half hour (classes here are 1.5 hours) when I actually got to put the scissors and glue down and talk to the students. So basically I rode out there for just under two hours to spend three hours making a card and then rode back two hours (I know you can't see me, so yes, I am rolling my eyes). Now, don't get me wrong. I am happy to do whatever the Japanese teachers want me to do, but all arts and crafts and nearly no English whatsoever is a bit strange to me. But hell, this is definitely my lowest level school as far as English capabilities are concerned and I just need to tweak my expectations of my days out there. They are all nice people and all, but I think the teacher I work with would be better suited to teaching preschool. Or possibly just running a daycare. You should have seen the way she clapped for me when she'd come over to see how my card was coming. "Oh, that's very good! You are very skilled!" in that high and excited voice. If she was American I would have said something sarcastic (as a joke, of course), but I thought my humor might be lost on her or worse, offend her. So I just smiled and kept cutting and pasting. Think I'll send the card to Amy's niece as she's three and is probably the only one (besides my teacher today) who'll think I did a good job (rolling eyes again).
So that was class. Now, the drive up there and back was something to behold. The trees are changing and damn damn damn! What a sight. Have to post some pictures somewhere as I did remember my camera and shot some stuff outside the bus. I have never, in my adult life, seen such a thing. I have lived in California since I was fifteen, and most of that in southern Cali, so you know that there we don't have four seasons and trees changing color. At least not like this. Perhaps you see a few trees in the neighborhood changing, but this is entire hillsides in flux. And there was still alot of green today. I imagine in two weeks it will be even better. Only problem with today was that it was raining a bit and up there was like being in a cloud. So some of my pictures might look a bit misty and the trees might not come through too well. But it was cool to see it all. I might wait to send the pics though, because I took some two weeks ago and today and will in two more weeks, so it might be better to send them all at once so that you can really see what's going on up there.

Yesterday I went down to Minobu (Buddhist school). I got off the train and was waiting in front of the station for the bus to come pick me when I heard a slight yell from across the street. Not really a scream, but a slight, painful yell. So I look over and there is this elderly lady finishing a fall to the pavement (sidewalk) and she just lies there. Now, it was only about three seconds till someone came running out of the store/restaurant (?) to help her, but it was a long three seconds. And in that time I thought, "Shit. What happened? Is she ok?" then "Why isn't anyone running to help her?" then "Should I go help her?" then "But I don't speak Japanese. What the hell can I do?" And then just as I started walking towards her, still unsure of what my roll should be here (had I been in America, I would have been there in a second), just then, a woman and then another come out of the two shops over there, see her, and then run to her. I really wasn't sure what happened. "Either she tripped, was backed into by that car, or had a joint or something give," I thought. So I watched from across the street as about ten people rushed to help her. They got her cushions, took her bags from her, propped her up slightly, talked to her, and eventually one of them got on the phone. About this time my bus shows up and the driver (I see him every Monday I'm down there, nice guy) asks me about the scene he just came upon (he speaks no English but it was obvious what he was getting at). I indicate that I don't know so he goes across the street to investigate. Turns out that that car was a taxi (didn't notice that at first), she had just gotten out and then he promptly backed into her (hell, man, maybe she refused to pay). What I imagine happened is that she got out on the store side (passenger side) of the car, as that is the side with the automatic door opener and closer, and he must of thought she would simply walk on up to the building, but she came around behind the car and he obviously didn't see her. Anyway, about 20 minutes after all this happened an ambulance came and took her away with the taxi following. And then we left for school.

So there you are. Arts and crafts, changing leaves, and old ladies getting hit by cars. Always something here in the land of the rising sun.

A lazy Sunday over here. Just sitting around, eating noodles and rice, and enjoying a few minutes to myself. Amy is out shopping. I think she's looking for a couple things for her temple. Should be back soon.
My neck is feeling much better. Still not perfect but then again, it never was. One of these days I'm gonna have to see someone about it. But now is not the time. Don't really want to have to try to explain what's going on to a Japanese doctor. Perhaps acupuncture is in my future. I don't know. But the cuts and brusies are all healing up nicely and the scabs are peeling off. So that's all fine and good.

Had to teach a few more classes by myself again this week. Tuesday I taught all three classes by myself due to Yamashita-sensei at Sundai junior high having to be somewhere. He said wherever he was going was going to be boring but that he had to go. Think it was a teacher's meeting or something like that. He was happy that I would be able to handle things myself. It really was no problem as he had warned me two weeks earlier and I was ready. Just played a couple games and laughed a lot with the kids. I think just about all my students are finally getting used to me because they actually flag me down during group games to ask me about certain words and things. They used to always ask the Japanese teachers instead of me. But now, it seems that I have been accepted.
Also had one class on Friday by myself. Turns out that the teacher for that class had to go take part in some diciplinary action for one of the high school students (this school is both high school and junior high, I teach the junior high kids). She told me he had been "violent in the classroom" and that some of the teachers and the kid's parents were going to have a meeting. Not really sure what "violent in the classroom" means; could be a fight, throwing something, attacking the teacher...no idea. Anyway, she asked me if I could handle the class alone about five minutes before class was to begin, and I assured her it wouldn't be a problem. Actually the kids and I had fun. I walked in and told them it would just be me and them to which they all appluded and then I asked them if they'd rather take a test or play a game. They answered in the way that probably all kids the world over would answer, so we played and laughed at each other and generally had fun. Luckily their English is good enough to be able to handle most everything I tell them. Certain individuals struggle but the smarter kids jump in and help. So that is good and makes it a bit easier for me. At one point they all had a major laugh at my expense and I proved to them that I wasn't faultless. We were playing "Categories" where they have to come up with words that begin with a certain letter. The letter was D and the group had written down donuts for the Food category. Well, they had written it out of order from the way that I had the categories listed on the board and I wrote donuts under Animals. They all had a good laugh at that.
On Wednesday (Yuda high--all girls) during my first class (Tanoguchi-sensei--the old guy), we did a little lesson out of the book about complaining at a restaurant. Lesson has a waiter and a lady at the table, and she says something to the effect of "this is not what I ordered" and then after the waiter comes back "it is cold in here, can you do something about the air conditioner?" Anyway, it's pretty easy stuff as far as vocabulary and grammer are concerned, so the kids are really working on their pronounciation. So we are just about done with it when Tanoguchi asks me what the proper way is to get a waiter's or waitress's attention in America. So I hold up a finger and say something like "Excuse me" or "Pardon me" to which the kids all laugh at me and mimic what I am doing. So we all have fun with that for a minute and then it is just about time to go when Tanoguchi says something to them (in Japanese) and they all start batting their eyes at me and waving bye in that little coy manner. "Bye-bye, Mr. Marcus." "Bye-bye, Marcus-sensei." All this said in little high voices, with a little wave and fluttering eyelids. Very strange stuff. I love this class.
Anyway, schools are going great.

This next week I have Minobusan, Shizen Gakuen, and Yuda on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday respectively, and then Thursday and Friday all the JETs in Yamanashi have our mid-year seminar. Technically it is about mid-year in the Japanese school year, course I still feel like I just got here. But anyway, it might be interesting and fun. Amy is having to give a presentation on "team-teaching" since she was found out by the Japanese guy responsible for all the JETs in Yamanashi. He went to her school to view some of the classes and by chance happened to see one of the classes Amy taught. He came back to his office here in Kofu and told our prefectural advisor (Robin--from Texas) that he had been impressed by what he saw and that she (Amy) and her JTE (Japanese teacher of English) should do a presentation at the upcoming seminar together. So now she is. It's always the good ones who get the extra work. That is why I never get extra work. I try to make it appear that I have no idea what I am doing.

Bike woes continue. Crappy Kencho bike got a flat tire. Amy had ridden it down to the train station on Sunday evening to go home and also with the intent of leaving it there so that on Monday evening when she came back up for our Japanese lesson, she'd have a bike immediately availiable. We decided that it would be better to leave the crap bike there overnight rather than her brand new one, just in case. Well, she came back up on Monday evening and I rode to the station to meet her, but when she mounted the bike we noticed that the rear tire was flat. I seem to be having more trouble keeping all three bikes and myself healthy here than I ever had keeping a car healthy back home. Strange.

Ok, that's it. Amy's back and my peace and quiet has gone. Hope everyone is well and I'll try writing in here a few days if possible.

Still in pain. I think it's a little less pain than yesterday though. Had trouble at times getting comfortable last night with my neck the way it is but I managed. Sure could use a nice masage about now. I try to rub my own back and neck but it's never the same, you know? Plus it's damn hard to reach. There are spots I touch on my back, though, that hurt when I touch them. Ah well, I'll heal.

At the Kencho today and what arrives in the mail but a packet of stuff for the Japanese class I am taking. This is a free class offered by the JET programme where they send you a small book every month, along with a test, and you do the stuff in the book, and then send in the test by the due date. Should be good for me. So with this and my Monday evenings with Tomoko, I should be able to finally order that meal I've been wanting. Getting quite hungry. I am actually beginning to recognize some hiragana I see around town. Can only make the sounds though, translation is another thing altogether. But I'll get there. Probably be ready to have an in-depth conversation right about the time I leave I imagine.

I have just about finished the book I am reading, Hokkaido Highway. It's by a guy that was a JET a few years ago and at some point decided to hitchhike from the southern most town on the southern most island, Kyushu, all the way up to the northern most town on the northern most island, Hokkaido. He had decided to follow the sakura, aka. the blooming of the cherry blossoms. It is quite a good book written almost in the same style that Bill Bryson writes his books and has been made even more enjoyable by the fact that I am actually in Japan. Many of his observations I can very much understand and relate to. Pick it up if you like to read travel narratives.
Anyway, I mention this because I am almost done with it and was looking for something to read the other day. Amy and I were wasting some time before our class last Monday (or maybe the Monday before), and went up into this department store to look at books. Of course, 99 percent of the books up there are in Japanese and of little use to me or her, but she was looking for a language book so I went over to a small (very small) turnstyle that holds a few books in English. Most of them are of the bestseller variety that I stay away from but they did have Hemingway's True at First Light. Now earlier in the week I had thought to myself how much I'd like to read a Hemingway book. For some reason it just hit me on the train down to Minobu that I really wanted to read a book by Papa. And the funny thing is that I've read everything he's written except this book. What luck! This is the one that came out a few years ago. I guess his son or his widow or someone like that had found the manuscript in a trunk or closet or someplace and it was published in 1999. So anyway here it was; the perfect drink for a mighty thirst. So I bought it and paid a pretty yen for it. Small standard sized paperback, about 300 pages, 1380 yen. That's about $12. What's that? About twice the price it would have cost me back home? Oh well. Papa's worth it.

Saturday night I went out to a sports bar with a few friends to watch the rugby game. England vs South Africa. There are quite a few JETs around here from England and this was a big game so we all went there to watch, drink and get rowdy. They stood up during the English national anthem, God Save the Queen, and looked quite nervous about this game, so of course, I stood up when the South African anthem came on. I was the only one standing and they looked at me like I was nuts and the enemy. It was great fun. England ended up winning and they were all happy and the drinks flowed freely (but were not free). Rugby is a great sport. Still makes less sense to me than football or baseball or soccer, but I'll get there.

Ok, just a short note today. Don't have much to say. I don't think I have to come back to the Kencho for a couple weeks now. Got schools the rest of this week and then the first three days of next week. Next Thursday and Friday is the mid-year conference and then that weekend is a three-day weekend. Seems like every 3 or 4 weeks around here is a three-day weekend. Quite nice. Anyway, I'll write in here when I can.

Good news and bad news.
Good news is I got my biked fixed. Bad news is I had a pretty bad wreak on it yesterday.
Amy and I walked my bike to the bike store, which took about 40 minutes, and I showed the guy the broken chain and somehow got my point across that I wanted it fixed. So he got the idea and asked me if I wanted to buy a new chain to which I answered in the affirmative. So while he was fixing it Amy and I looked at some of the bikes there and ended up getting her one. It's a granny bike and all, but it's pretty nice. I'll have to put a picture of it up at some point. So between the new bike, fixing my chain and buying a new lock we spent about $240. Cheap if you ask me because it also buys me the luxury of not having to listen to Amy complain about the crap bike she has to ride when we go places. She's going to leave the bike here at my place due to the fact that here is where it is most needed. Her town is small and she can walk everywhere while Kofu is quite large and having a bike here is nearly a necessity. So now I have three bikes here with me.
So anyway, later in the day we went to Starbucks for a small JET thing and then Amy had to go the international center for some work she had to do and I rode home by myself. As I often do when I'm not loaded down with bags or groceries I was going fast. For some reason I just can't bike slow. Unless I'm with Amy or carrying something, I tend to ride quite quickly. So I was riding along and approaching an S-turn that I've gone through many many times before. Problem with this S-turn is that it is quite blind, but if you stay to your side of the road you can make it through quite easily even though it is kinda narrow. So I was about halfway through it when a car suddenly appears coming at me and right in my path. Now I'm not blaming her as I admit I was going too fast, but she was a bit too far over on my side of the road. So I slam on my brakes and swerve to miss her and promptly fall to my left side sliding down the road a bit. I remember quite well (slow motion and all that) that I hit my head on the pavement (no, I don't wear a helmet) and somehow got my left foot tangled up in the straps on the pedals. All of this hurt quite nicely and I lied there for about five seconds before I got up. When I did finally peel myself off the road, the lady rolled down her window and said, "Daijobu des ka?" (are you ok?) to which I said "Yeah, yeah, daijobu." She then apologized in both Japanese and English and I tried to indicate to her that it was alright and my fault. She had a look of horror on her face and was probably thinking something along the lines of "Holy shit! I just killed a foreigner!" So I got back on the bike after looking it over and rode the rest of the way home. During my ride my left foot was killing me and I just knew that I had nearly amputated my toes and that they must be bleeding but I figured I just get home and check myself out there. But to my surprise I was not bleeding from my toes at all. Quite amazing considering how they felt. But I did manage to scrap up my foot, my knee, and got a pretty bad looking road rash thing on my left hip. All of this looks quite bad but none of it is very deep. My arms, chest and back are all ok as it was a little chilly yesterday and I had two long sleeve shirts on.
The rest of the day yesterday I felt ok, but today my neck is truly killing me. I guess I must have pulled something. It's been gradually feeling worse and worse all day and right now it is quite tight. Amazingly, though, my head feels fine and can still put words together to form sentences (you can read this, right?). Anyway, needless to say, I will now be slowing down for that particular turn. I really don't want to have to have the Japanese hospital experience. I think I'll try to avoid that one.
So that's my story on a Sunday evening. Tomorrow is another Kencho day and perhaps I'll write something more. Goodnight.

Forgot to mention this earlier...
Sunday I was sitting around with Amy, watching the Seahawks nearly blow it against the 49ers, and drinking a beer when the phone rings. "Who can that be?" I thought as I looked at Amy sitting on the other side of the room, her cell phone not in her hand. So I pick it up and it turns out to be one of the teachers at Sundai. Sundai is one of my Tuesday schools, a junior high. Can't remember if I mentioned here that I judged a speech contest for them a few weeks back or not, but I did. Anyway, this is not the teacher I work with out there but the teacher (I know I mentioned this) that asked me to help her correct some of the papers her students had written way back when. So we go through the normal greetings and I figure out who this is and then she tells me that one of the students, I think the girl who we gave first prize to for the 3rd year (9th grade) division, had her competition against the rest of the Yamanashi prefecture 3rd year students the day before. And it turns out she won. Damn cool, I think. Cool for the student. Good for the school. And really, if I may get a little selfish here and toot my own horn, it is damn good for me too. I did the initial edit on her speech, chose her to win the contest, and then did another major edit on the speech before she went off to conquer the prefecture. I remember telling this teacher after my second edit of the speech that I was holding this paper to higher standards now that she was going to be going out to a major competition, thus all the corrections. She seemed to understand and thanked me for my efforts. And lo and behold, the thing won. This is not to take anything away from the student, of course, but hey, this was a joint effort. I feel like the girl's pit crew (yes yes, I know, everything is beer and racing to me). Anyway, thought that was cool.

Just had an interesting conversation with one of girls here in the office. She and I get along quite well. While everyone is quite nice to me, she is the only one that actually makes any effort to talk to me for any length of time about things outside of work. I don't blame any of the others for not talking to me too much. They are busy and are probably just a bit nervous about using their English. Most of them can't really speak it to well. But this girl, her name is Miho Tanaka, is quite friendly and while her English isn't great, it is definately enough to go on. Anyway, we talked about me trying to learn some Japanese and I showed her the flashcards I just made this morning. Hiragana flashcards. On Monday I will make the Katakana flashcards. So I show them to her to make sure they looked ok by native speaker standards and then we get into a conversation about Kanji. Kanji may never fully come to me, but that's ok. If I can just recognize a few symbols needed for everyday use I will be happy. I asked her what the two symbols that make up "Kofu" mean. I knew one was something like armor cause I bought a book a couple weeks ago called Essential Kanji that had it in there. So that's the ko part, but I couldn't find the fu part. Well, somehow she found it and it said that it essentially means prefectural center. Kofu being the capital of Yamanashi I guess that makes sense. So essentially Kofu's name means armored prefectual center or something like that. From there we went on to discuss names. I showed her that I had written my name in katakana ("That's wonderful, little boy? And what grade will you be in next year?") and she wondered about my middle name. I expalined that most Americans have middle names but that we really don't use them very often and told her I wasn't really sure why we had them at all. That put us onto her name and how you write it in both hiragana and kanji (and here we get the heart of my story). The two symbols that make up Miho in kanji combine to mean beautiful hops. Is that great or what? Me being the beer lover that I am, and a beer lover who prefers the hoppy beers (mmmm.....India Pale Ale) and her, whose name means beautiful hops, working in the same office. There's a folk song here somewhere.

Ok, that's all for today. It is Friday afternoon, I am out of here in less than a half hour, and I have no plans for this weekend (other than to get my bike fixed and go to a sports bar tomorrow night to watch a rugby game with a couple other JETs, might learn something).
So........KAMPAI!

I am not having much luck with bicycles over here. Got a flat a few weeks ago. No big deal really. Fixed it a day or two later and was good to go. But in the past couple days I have busted the chain on my mountain bike and then yesterday the damn key broke off in the lock of the crappy bike. Luckly the lock was merely wrapped around the neck of the bike (as that's were I put it when I am riding it). I think the rain must have caused some internal rust cause it was quite hard to unlock back at the apartment. And then when I was going to lock it here at the Kencho is when the key broke. So I just left it here all day without a lock. Nobody would want the damn thing anyway.
So anyway, now I have to figure out how and where to get the mountain bike fixed. Again, luckily I was on my home when the chain busted. I was going up a hill, changed down into an easier gear and the thing let loose. I thought that the chain had merely come off, but when I looked down there were two ends that were't joined in holy matrimony and I knew I was screwed. So i walked it the rest of the way home with grease all over my fingers and the chain in my hand dangling like a dead snake (figure if I take the broken chain in with the injured bike, I'll get my point across much better than if I try to speak).

And speaking of dead snakes....yesterday I almost stepped on one. Only, it wasn't dead!
I was walking to the station from the avaition academy, minding my own business and thinking about getting my bike fixed. I was only looking a foot or two in front of me, like you do when you are deep in thought. And then quite suddenly there was something long and skinny not two feet from my feet. I looked at for a split second wondering what it was when it became clear that it was a snake! "Wow," I thought, "pretty cool. I wonder what killed it." But then through my keen sense of awareness (and the fact that it moved), I figured out, "Hey. That thing's not dead." At this I quickly put a few more feet between me and the tempter of sin and watched from a safe distance. It just lied there sunning itself on this slightly cool day. Didn't seem too interested in me and I was soon cussing myself for not having my camera. It was a pretty little thing, about 3 feet long (perhaps minus a half foot for the way we all exagerate in the these situations), and you'll be happy to know that I fought off all temptations to make like the crocodile hunter, grab the thing by the tail, hold it up for all to see (of which there was no one), and yell out, "Whoa, little fella'. You're alright.....She's a bute!" in my best Australian accent. Anyway, I had a train to catch and soon had to call this nature expedition to an end.

Ok, not much else to tell you at this time. I have all afternoon left to go here at the exciting Kencho so perhaps I'll attempt to rivet you with more stories of my escapades. Maybe, maybe not.

Yesterday I went out and up to Shizen Gakuen for only my second time. This is the school with a student population of ten. This is also the school that I ride a train and two buses to get to. It is way up in the hills and I pass through many small villages to get there. A couple weeks ago I emailed my prodecessor with a question and she mentioned that I should probably take my camera along with me to this school as the leaves will be changing about now and it is all quite something to see. So I took my camera along yesterday and got a few shots through the bus window. It is quite pretty but the leaves have only just begun to change. The teacher I work with told me that in two more weeks (the next time I go out there) is when the real colors will be flying. So I'll try to remember to take the camera again and get some shots.
Also, it was pretty damn cold up there. I hadn't taken a jacket cause down here in Kofu it was only a little chilly and I thought it would warm up. But up there it was cold. My shirt was enough for the most part, but I can see that next time I better be prepared. No heating in the school as far as I could tell. But then again, it was quite overcast and there was a slight drizzle so maybe that's what made it cold. Next time might be sunny, I don't know.
By the time I got back into Kofu it was raining pretty hard and I had to ride my bike home without a rain jacket or umbrella. So, I got quite wet and cold. It's beginning to seem that everytime I take the damn rain jacket with me, it doesn't rain. And when I think about it and wonder if I should grab it on my way out and then decide "Nah, don't want to carry it," that's when it rains.
I also came to one more conclusion regarding the rain yesterday. Whoever wrote that song, "Singing in the Rain," sure as hell wasn't biking home with groceries in Japan on a cold day when he got the inspiration to write it. Must have been during one of those nice, southern California, summer rain showers that hardly ever happen and feel so good to run around naked in. Not that I've done that.

We did go to the wine festival a couple weeks ago. It was fun, but not too much so. There were lots of booths set up with different wineries represented in each. Some of the wine was good, but for the most part everything I tried was too sweet. I'm not sure if I was just getting the sweet ones (I usually asked for red) but I don't think that's the case. Perhaps they just make wine really sweet out here. It was good, mind you, just not something I'd want to drink a whole bottle of. I think Amy liked them though.
The way it worked was that you bought a wine glass for 500 yen (a bit under 5 bucks now that the yen has gained strength against the dollar) and then you just walked around to the booths and someone would give you a little to taste. They gave very little but I guess that's the way wine "tasting" is supposed to work. Anyway, eventually, I had had enough of it and went over and bought myself a beer. Sure the one beer was as much (500 yen) as all the tastes I'd had put together but at least it was beer. Let's face it, folks, I am not a wine connoisseur. Sure I like it, but it just doesn't quite satisfy me like a nice keg of beer.
But we had fun. I got some "Hoto" (essentially a Japanese kind of stew) and a large squid-on-a-stick (which grossed Amy out, which means it served its purpose), both of which were quite good. And Amy got some chicken nuggets and a chocolate pancake type thing (boring food, if you ask me). There were quite a few JETs there and we got to talk and share teaching stories and whatnot.

This last weekend we went out to the aviation academy I teach at for its school festival. Again, lots of booths with food and places selling things and all that. But the cool part was the stunt pilot they had out there. Apparently he is quite famous in Japan and I can see why. He was very good. He flew a small biplane with what was obviously a very powerful motor and his stunts impressed the hell out of me. I've been to a few air shows in my life being the son of a Navy guy, and I guess I used to take all this stuff for granted. You know, a few guys up there, flying the speed of sound, doing rolls and flips and dives, tempting death every 45 seconds or so. Ho hum. Big deal. Seen it all before. But I think that now I can realize what might be going on in that cockpit and it impresses me to no end. I mean here is a guy flying his plane straight up, stalling the engine, going into a spin, diving towards the earth at who knows how fast, and pulling out of it a mere few meters before he kills himself and all of us watching. DAMN! And he does it over and over, flying this way and that way, all the time with death tapping him on the shoulder and him flicking death's finger off like an annoying mosquito. Damn fine stuff.
And one of the best things about the show was how close you were to it. His airplane was coming quite close to us at times and it was in those moments that you might have been able to feel a little of what the pilot was feeling. Probably not, but just maybe. One of my favorite things to do at the auto races at Laguna Seca in Monterey was to stand between turns 4 and 5 cause it was there that you get the closest to the cars as they wizzed by at about 140mph or faster. That was the best place to "feel" the cars and the rush would instantly grab me. I was in the car with the driver for a split second as their foot came off the accelerator and hit the brake. And it was nearly the same when this pilot came swooping by our heads out at the academy. I got a great 7 second video of one of his passes. Maybe I'll figure out how to load it onto that picture site. Probably won't do the experience justice though, so just take my word for it. Or perhaps I can explain it this way.......Amy was getting scared. She kept backing up away from the runway and saying "Honey!" with fear in her voice as the plane and pilot came racing at us from altitude. I just laughed at her. She's cute sometimes but I think she's seen too many of those "amazing home video" programs. You know? The ones where people are jumping from burning buildings, teenagers are sterilizing themselves on skateboards, and airshows always end in disaster. Ah well, we had fun anyway.
They also had a group of students out there playing the taiko drums. That was very cool. Probably about ten of them playing all sized drums, a couple of flute-type intruments, a large gong-type thing, and a small bell. The music was great and I think some of my jazz heros must have heard this stuff at some point in their lives cause I can definately hear some similarities. I'd be very interested in taking up a class on taiko drumming, just have no idea where to look for it.

So there you are. The latest from Japan.

By the way. Yes, I miss football and baseball. But hell, the Giants are out of it and I actually did get to see that exciting game where the Cowboys beat the Eagles. They show a couple games a week here. Problem is figuring out when they're on. But anyway, to fill the partial sports void, I am getting into rugby. Right now the World Cup is going on down in Australia which means that the game times are quite convenient for me. So although right now it looks only slightly more organized than that childhood game of "smear-the-queer" some of used to play, with every game I learn something new about the game and am enjoying it quite a lot. Think a cross between soccer and football and you're almost there, although I'm sure rugby purists might disagree with me. Anyway, I'm learning. And get this...there is even a team from the USA in the tournament. I can hear you now "What?! Rugby in America? It's not possible!" But it is. I didn't know it either until about a week ago. So get out there and root root root for the home team.

Another day at the Kencho. The aviation academy is preparing for its school fesitival this weekend, thus, no classes. Can't say I mind though. Just finished a lesson plan that I have to submit at the conference the Yamanashi JETs are having at the end of the month. We all have to come up with something and submit it to everyone else, so after the conference I will have about one hundred new lesson plans. I'm sure some will be better than others, but if I leave there with only 20 usable plans, I'll be happy.
My plan, in case you are wondering, is about the weather. I actually did it last week at my Friday school and it worked so well, I thought I'd use it for the conference. I made up a word search with basic weather related words, handed a copy to every student and told them that the following week I'd be back to explain any new and unfamiliar words. All it had was words like "cloudy," "sunny," "temperature," you know, that kind of stuff. So the next week (last Friday) I was back with copies of the weather report from the English language paper I get. I went over the vocabulary really quick, then put the students into groups, and handed out the reports from the paper. I explained how to read it and then launched into questions. What matters here is both how you phrase the questions and how you allow the students to answer. So it is quite possible to make it damn easy for them or quite difficult. At first I asked things like "What the high temperature today in Tokyo?" "What the morning forecast for Sapporo?" easy stuff. Then I moved on to the major cities of the world, Moscow, LA, Madrid, London, Sydney, etc. After than, tomorrow's forecasts and temperatures. For this they had to be able to read a bit more of the report and listen to whether I said today or tomorrow in my question. Then I hit the big time; questions like "What world city has the highest temperature today?" "What city will have the lowest temperature tomorrow?" "In what three Japanese cities will it rain tomorrow afternoon?" As you can see, the difficulty level is variable. Anyway, the students seemed to have fun and be interested in the whole thing, so it went quite well. And what I liked is that they learned how to read the weather report, they practiced listening and speaking, and that we all had a few laughs. So hey hey, I just might earn my title of "sensei" after all.
Really the teaching is going quite well. Every school throws different challenges at me and I bend to meet each one. Some classes are damn easy to show up to as I just have to do what the Japanese teacher wants, and others require me to think ahead and plan something out. And I like having both styles as all of either would quickly get old.
Of all the schools I think I like Yuda best. It is my Wednesday school and is the all-girls high school (and no, that's not the reason I like it). The students are fun, the teachers are quite nice and joke around with me, and it's only about a 10 minute bike from my place. With how many times I've been there, I am getting quite familiar with everyone and we have a lot of fun.
Speaking of how many times I've been to Yuda, I thought, before I got here, that everything would stay relatively uniform and that I'd be pretty close on the number of times I'd visit each school. Except for my Tuesday schools, that is, since I have two of those. But get this, by this weekend I will have been to Yuda and Yamanashi Gakuen (Wednesday and Friday schools) six times each, Minobusan (Buddhist school, Mondays) four times, the Japanese Aviation Academy (Thusdays) three times, Sundai (one of my Tuesday schools) three times, and Shizen Gakuen (other Tuesday school) just once. Interesting, aye? No? Ok.

So the weather has changed here. And, man, when it changes, it changes. Just three weeks ago I was sweating and sleeping with only a thin sheet on me and the fan pointed right at me. But now, I hardly sweat at all, sleep with two blankets on me, and point the fan at the clothes I need to dry (remember, no dryer). And I like it! The days are quite comfortable and the nights are getting quite chilly. I have even run my heater a few times. Soon the leaves will be changing (have to get some pictures of that) and I'll have to go buy a jacket/coat. It is trully autumn. Only thing missing is live football and good beer. I realized last night as I ran the heater and enjoyed the chill that I love beer best this time of year. I love getting the dark, thick beers and pouring a few down. Stouts, porters, thick pale ales, ambers, red ales, I love them all and you know what? I can't get any of them here! I do love it here, but shit do I miss the good brews. I did manage to find Samuel Adams in a store the other day, but the cost might shock you as it shocked me. They were sold by the 12oz bottle and each cost 300 yen. That's about, and I just checked the currency exchange rate so that I would accurate here, $2.75 a bottle. So a six pack is $16.50! And that's before tax, I think. So yeah, I miss my good beer. Course, you don't have to move to Japan to miss good beer, just move go to certain places in the US and you'll see what I mean.

Ok, that's enough for now. Getting close to lunch time. And unlike the beer selection over here, the food selection is great. Gonna meet this girl I know for lunch. Not sure where we're going but I'm sure I'll like it.

It is Tuesday afternoon over here and I am at the Kencho; thus, I will write a bit in here. Unless, of course, I get interupted and asked to do something. But that just about never happens. Only reason I am mentioning this is due to the fact that I have just spent a couple hours this morning putting together my travel log, which is how I get paid back the money I spend to travel to the schools I teach at. It wouldn't be hard if it wasn't for one thing. It's all in Japanese, meaning it's all in Kanji and Hiragana. I am supposed to somehow read this (names of schools, names of train stations, etc.) and write in the appropriate facts: I traveled to this school by bike, this school by train, this school by bus and train, etc. Keeping the facts straight is quite easy but trying to convey this in another language is not. All this plus the fact that I had to change a few things around on the original template: this trip now costs this much instead of that much, the Minobu line has changed its schedule and now I must catch this train which happens to be an express train and thus costs more, etc. Anyway, I think I got it all worked out and it should be easy to do after this first time. We'll see.

Anyway, I wanted to tell you about yesterday. It was quite an interesting day for the sole reason that it seemed as if I had a sign on me that said, "I am friendly. Come talk to me and have interesting experience."
First, I had stayed the night (Sunday) at Amy's due to the fact that Minobusan high school is down past her and staying the night at her temple cuts about a half hour off my trip on Monday morning. So I left and was walking to the train station when I noticed a young man (maybe 20 or so) walking the same direction as me and about 50 meters ahead of me. No big deal, right? Well, I noticed that he was waving to some of the cars that moved past us and that he was greeting some of the store owners of the shops along the road. This was nice enough, but then I noticed something strange about him, something not quite right. So I catch up to him and he turns to me and says something. And that's when I realized that this guy has some kind of mental problem. He was nice, but something was wrong. So no big deal. Well, I kept my pace up and he speeds up with me. At this point I am beginning to wonder. So now I am walking down the street with a mentally challenged Japanese guy. I wasn't sure what to do. I mean, it would have been strange no matter who this person was, but I can't talk to him (the language barrier) and I'm not one to know how to act with those types of people. But after about five minutes together he got side-tracked by someone in a truck he seemed to know and I was gone. Interesting way to start the day, I thought.
So I ride down to Minobu and get off the train. I am waiting for the school bus when this young guy (maybe mid to late 20s) comes up to me and says, "Excuse me. Are you here on business?"
His question kind of caught me off guard but I has seen him coming and was ready to talk. "Well," I said, "I teach at Minobusan high school."
"Oh," he seemed impressed, "what do you teach?"
I wanted to say, "Chemistry." C'mon, I'm a white guy in your country. What do you think I teach?
But I told him, "English."
At this he seemed surprised which rather threw me for a loop. Did this guy get out much? Hadn't he heard of the thousands of us white people who come to his country under the guise of "English teacher"?
He went on, "Oh, and may I ask, how will you get to your school?"
At this moment I looked over his shoulder at the school bus approaching "That guy," and I pointed.
We then exchanged "Nice to meet you"s and I got on the bus. Really, he was a nice guy, I just wondered about his line of questioning.
So school went well and before long I was back on the train headed home to Kofu. "Home....Kofu, Japan" That's still strange to hear sometimes. Anyway, I had ridden about three stops in my 21 stop ride when three boys (about 10 years old each) get on the train. They walked past me to get a seat and as they did I heard one of them say in his Japanese accent, "American." Yup, that's me. They looked and I waved to which one of the boys bowed his head. Seemed like nice boys, but this was a mere precursor as to what was to happen next. But. Before I get into that I want to skip ahead to later last night.
Amy and I met at a station for our Monday evening Japanese lessons. We grabbed some dinner and then had a few minutes to kill before our lesson, so we were headed to a department store (books) when an old guy on a bike pulled up along side of me and started talking. "Are you American?"
"Yes."
"Do you believe in god?"
"Uh oh," I thought, "here we go." And then I chickened out. Rather than stick to the previous oath I'd made to myself of answering these kinds of questions with a truthful, "I'm an atheist," I said, "Oh, I don't know." You see, that's what I am. And back in America I got sick of people trying to convert me to their religion so I started answering truthfully. This usually threw them off and the questioning would be over (except for the time two young mormon guys came to my door and I nearly converted them, they were highly interested in my way of thinking for some reason). But last night I just wasn't sure about the situation and the language barrier so I just answered a non-commital "I don't know."
Well, in all fairness he didn't try to convert me, he just told me his philosophy in about two minutes (he used circular reasoning) and off Amy and I went. Nice guy. I just wasn't prepared to discuss god and/or religion with someone who might not understand what it is I am saying.
Ok, now, back to the train...
About two stops after the 10 year old boys had boarded the train we pulled up to another stop and I looked out the window. And what did I see but about 30 little red coats preparing to get into the very car I was in. They were probably 5 and 6 year olds, all dressed in identical red jackets and little blue hats. I had my two bags on the seats around me as no one ever sits around me, but here, I had a different feeling, like I needed to both make room for and protect my belongings from this onslaught of little people.
Immediately I was surrounded by one little boy and four of his girlfriends. They looked at me and I looked at them. Then I said, "Hello" and gave a little wave as the doors closed, and what is normally a nice, quiet ride turned into a nursery school on train tracks.
They poked and prodded me. They tried talking to me. They stared at me. It was mayhem. I was like a big furry beast to them. It was best when they tried talking to me. I would tell them, "Nihonjo wakaremasen" (I don't understand the Japanese language) and they would then try talking slower and louder to me. Sound familiar? I didn't know what was being said but they seemed genuinely ammused, "Look at the man with hair on his face!" "He can't even speak." "Hey, hairy man, are you from America?" "Ha ha, he doesn't even know where he's from." "Look at his eyes. What color is that?" "What a freaky looking guy!" "He sure smiles alot though." "HA! That's a sure sign of an idiot!"
And on and on it went. I tried speaking English to them and they tried speaking Japanese to me. It was hopeless. Once in a while we'd connect on something but those moments were fleeting. They were fun and full of energy but after ten minutes of this, I was ready to be back to reading with only the sound of the train in my ears.
One of the girls kept touching my face and attempting to push up my nose (pig-style). "When are you getting off the train?" I asked.
"Look," they said, "the big, hairy man is speaking babble!" And they all laughed. "Say something else!"
"Are you going (all the way) to Kofu?" I sure as hell hoped not.
But it was no use. I couldn't get them to tell me when this experience would end. So I played with them, made faces at them, allowed one girl to sit on my knee while the rest stared at and/or talked to and/or poked me. Finally, forty-five minutes after they had boarded the train, the six ladies in charge of this lot gathered them up into the front of the car and at the next stop they got off. One of the ladies did manage a "Sumimasen" (excuse me/us) while giving me the "poor you" look, to which I said "Daijoubu" (it's/i'm ok). And truth is, it was great. Those kids were cute and fun and I hope they remember this as a the time they met that great, hairy American guy who although not too bright was at least a friendly sort.
So that was my day. "I am friendly. Come talk to me and have interesting experience."

So yesterday I get out to the aviation academy and go to my desk. On it is a small note saying that I will be teaching two classes. Both with teachers I've never taught with before. This comes as no great shock to me as I was warned that every week is different out there. At most of my schools (in fact ALL my other schools) I teach the same groups of students and work with the same teachers every week. But the academy is not like this. I was told that some weeks I might teach with this or that teacher and other weeks not and some weeks I might have only 2 classes and other weeks up to 4. Ok, so not a big deal.
So the teacher I was to be teaching my second class of the day with comes over and informs me it is her class that I will be teaching during 4th period. Ok. And then she said that Ms. Ito (the head of the English dept. and the other teacher I've worked with thus far) mentioned something about my self-intro and the bingo game I played way back when. She asks if I can do this today. "Well," I tell her, "I can but I didn't bring any of the stuff I use for it." At this she gets a slightly concerned look on her face but I put her concerns to rest by saying, "Yes yes, I can do it anyway. I'll make due." So she is happy and I am left to come up with a way to get this done. Then a few minutes later the other teacher comes over and we basically go through the same routine. So now, I am fully expecting to do my self-intro twice after coming to school prepared to do other things, but hell, no big deal.
Well, it gets better.
So I do the first class by writing what is on the poster I didn't bring on the board and attempting to draw a map (from memory) of the United States (I know the map quite well, but drawing it is something else altogether). I've done my self-intro enough that I've got it quite commited to memory. So all goes well and I had to improvise on the bingo game a bit but it all worked out. So one down, one to go.
Well, I get to the next class and, lo and behold, the teacher and I walk into the same room with the same students that I had just, not two hours before, done my self-intro with. "What the f...?" I think to myself, "These are the same students." I was pretty damn confused. So I say to the teacher, "Uumm....these are the students I taught earlier today." And she says to me, "Yes, I know." Now at this point I was just about ready to run out of the room and all the way to the train station. Here I was already to do my intro again thinking it would be different students but here are these familiar faces looking back at me. So instead of running I just thought quickly while she handed back some tests they had taken and came up with a plan.
So we ended up just playing a few English games I've played in my other classes, but I tell you, had this happened a few weeks ago I would have been quite screwed. Anyway, disaster was averted and super-sensei saved his own ass.

It is now Friday evening over here and I don't have any plans this weekend. Might go a few towns over to a wine-tasting thing. Not sure. Apparently you can drink all day on only a few hundred yen, though, so it might be worth a try. Wine-tasting? Try wine-drinking! They obviously haven't met some of us JETs.

Hey hey, I just figured something out. If you go to the imagestation link and then do a members search for "marcusf," you should be able to scroll down and find my member name and then click on it to get to my pictures. So at the top of the home page click the arrow next to albums and bring up members. Then type in my member name which is "marcusf" and that should nearly get you there. I just did it and my name was at the bottom of the first page after the search. Hope this makes sense. Oh, and you can make comments about the pics if you want. Or tell me what you want to see.

Been a while since I've written in here. I apologize to all my fans. Truth is I've just been lazy about this thing and life has taken on that kind of routine that I imagine we all fall into at one point or another. So I've been getting up, going to work, coming home and watching baseball or making dinner or drinking beer or just generally screwing around. The newness of Japan is wearing off and I getting used to the sights, smells, and sounds of it all. This is not to say that I am disappointed. Quite the contrary. I am enjoying my life over here. There are things I love about this country that America is lacking in. Of course, the opposite is true too. Maybe I'll write about that someday.

Anyway, Amy and I have found a way to learn the language that is quite free of pain. Course, I still have to study and that ain't painless, but it's better than sitting in a room filled with people who speak the language quite well while I flounder around like a just caught fish on the floor of a boat. Every week a short bulletin called the "Yeti Spaghetti" comes via email to all us Yamanashi JETs. In it are announcements for various things: seminars, international events, someone selling a bike, someone needs volunteers at their school for something or other, you know, stuff like that. Well, a couple of weeks ago, a fellow JET, Fiona from Scotland, put up an ad saying she had a Japanese friend in Kofu who wanted to exhange English lessons for Japanese lessons. Obviously I emailed Fiona back immediately. She got in touch with her friend, Tomoko, who in turn emailed me. Make a long story short, we met one evening and now Amy and I are getting lessons in exchange for giving English lessons. Great setup, if you ask me. We meet her one night a week and talk and laugh and learn. So eventually my Japanese might be good enough to order a meal, reserve tickets, plan my escape, etc. Tomoko's English is actually quite good. She's happy with just getting the English we all use while she teaches us Japanese. I've tried to steer the lessons over to English but she keeps telling me that the English we speak while going over various parts of Japanese is good enough. But we'll see, I just don't want her to feel like she's not learning anything. She really just wants English conversation though. Also, Amy and her get along well. I thought there might be some tension over me, cause you know, I am quite the guy, but it turns out that Tomoko has a boyfriend and Amy is trying to get rid of hers. So, we are all happy, well, not me, but what the hell.

The weather is finally cooling down over here. It's been nothing but hot and humid and me with swamp ass (as my cousin Matt would say) from the time I got here. Only the occational rain storm brought any relief. But now, the nights are cool enough that I've had to get a blanket out of the closet and the days are just damn nice. Feels like fall. Only thing missing is football, but actually I have been getting some (albeit a few days tape-delayed) so it ain't too bad. Sure as hell am gonna miss playoff baseball though. And my Giants are doing so well. Watch them win it all this year and I won't get to see a thing. Oh well. Anyway, the weather is getting really nice. And I can see Fuji just about every day now.

Hopefully you all are getting the photos I am putting up on www.imagestation.com but if not let me know and I'll send you what you need. I forget who I gave this link to and that link to. I'll put a link to the site to the left soon, but I think you need me to formally invite you before can view the pictures. So just send me your email address if I don't already have it and I'll do what's neccessary.

Ok, this was really just a quick note to let you know that I am doing well and the earthquake didn't get me. Thanks to those of you who emailed me your concerns that day. To the rest of you......either you know your Japanese geography quite well or you were hoping I was gone for good. Too bad for you.