Alright, here we go again. Sorry for the time off but I had to recharge the old battery.

Life is still plugging away over here. Schools are going well and the weather seems to be slightly warming up a little. I can actually turn off my heaters during the day (if I'm home) and just let the sun warm the room. At night it is still quite cold but I have gotten used to it and still prefer this chill of winter to the hot humidity of the summer. I am not looking forward to that heat again.

Gaylyn's visit went well for the most part. Think she was a bit shocked by the differences over here but she seemed to enjoy seeing a different way of life. The most difficult thing for her was definitely the food factor but with some effort on my part, and the part of one of my teachers we managed to keep her fed and satisfied.
I picked her up at the airport on that Friday and we rode into Tokyo where we checked into the hotel and went to eat and drink and wait for Amy and Dilek. So we did all that and on Saturday got up with a full day of sumo before us. I am becoming more and more knowledgeable on the sport and am thus liking it more and more. It is a great sport with personalities, tactics, controversy, and lots of ceremony. I'll explain it to you over a beer sometime. Gaylyn liked it too and we had a great day. After that we rode over to Shibuya (part of Tokyo) and walked around before heading to a TGIF's for dinner (American food for Gaylyn). Dinner was good but not that big a deal, which surprised me considering I hadn't had a real burger in months. I thought I would be missing American food by now, and I do miss certain things, but not as much as I thought I would. Anyway, while we were in there it started snowing and we came out to a heavy snowfall of big, thick flakes. It was quite cool. So we walked around for a while and then headed back to the hotel.
Sunday we woke up and went to Shinjuku for a bit of shopping. Not my favorite thing to do but it wasn't about me, so I tagged along trying not to fall over from looking at yet another purse. Eventually we finished all that nonsense and went to the station to catch a train back to Kofu.
On the ride we noticed that there seemed to be this strange white substance all over the hills and ground that wasn't there when we left. "Well, by golly," I said to Amy, "I think that thar white stuff is snow!" We were a little excited by it all being from California and all. Dilek (from Iowa) was noticeably less impressed.
So we got in to Kofu, said "goodbye" to Amy, who had to catch another train down to Ichikawa, and the three of us caught a taxi to the apartment building. Gaylyn, upon getting into a car for her first time over here, said "I don't think I'd want to drive over here." Not sure if was the small roads, the close walls and buildings, or all the pedestrians, bikes, and other cars that make up the moving obstacles, but she seemed happy to let the taxi driver do his thing.
So Monday I had to head down to Minobu and decided to let Gaylyn stay in Kofu. The teacher and the kids don't speak much English and I thought that it might be a bad school to make Gaylyn's first. I'm getting used to it all but even for me, Minobu is a challenge. So she was free to rest that day.
Tuesday I would have loved to take her to school but it is a long bike ride out there and I wasn't sure how to get Gaylyn there. So again she rested. She was going to go explore downtown but I don't think she ended up doing it. Not really sure why, but I think the next three days made up for it.
Wednesday we went to Yuda. I think Gaylyn liked this school. The first class ended up singing to us half the time and then we sat around and talked. My second class's teacher was sick so there was change of plan. We instead went with Yazaki-sensei (normally my third class's teacher) to a class I had seen only once before. The girls seemed interested and all went well. Then my third class was as normal. Gaylyn isn't much on talking to groups but she managed to say a few words and then sat down to let me run the show. So it went pretty well. One thing the girls were interested in was how tall Gaylyn is. She's 6 feet, I believe, and although there are tall Japanese women around, they certainly aren't in abundance. So the question, "How tall are you?" was asked many times.
JAA was Thursday and once again, I think Gaylyn had a good time. The students there are mostly boys and they asked me several times whether Gaylyn was my girlfriend. I kept telling them that "Amy" was the name of my girlfriend and they all thought they were being quite funny. The other teachers out there seemed to like Gaylyn and I could tell the feeling was mutual. So Thursday went well.
Friday we went to Yamanashi Gakuen and I had my normal four classes. Gaylyn liked this school too but less so. The junior high kids were less interested in her than the high school kids had been and more interested in just playing games. Understandable, I think. But again the teachers all wanted to talk with Gaylyn and I think she left feeling rather good. She even got to sit in while two kids (from the high school) practiced their speeches on us and we gave them feedback.
So I think all in all Gaylyn enjoyed the school thing. She even mentioned that she'd like to go home and perhaps attend one of her nephews classes at some point just to see what its like.

I have to tell you about the weekend but it's gonna take a while and I have a couple things I need to do here at the Kencho. So check back in a few days.