• 15:24 Waiting to board my flight!! #

Automatically shipped by LoudTwitter

• 08:45 I have a cold and am really burned out on just sitting around in the office all day. I am VERY ready for my trip home. #
• 08:48 The baggage carrier service will come Tuesday to get my luggage. So convienient! Only $20 to not have to drag my suitcase around Tokyo! #

Automatically shipped by LoudTwitter

• 09:05 Got the key to my house worked out, now I can go back to needing a vacation in peace :) #

Automatically shipped by LoudTwitter

• 09:18 Was late to school, and will probably have to leave early to go talk to the Board of Education. Oops. #

Automatically shipped by LoudTwitter

• 15:03 Hey guys! I got Twitter! Small updates are better than nothing! :) #
• 15:23 I just finished my last class with this years graduating 3rd years. The term is nearly over... #

Automatically shipped by LoudTwitter

♥ First and foremost -- I HAVE MY TICKETS HOME! Well, not really, I still have to pay the deposit, but the dates are set! As soon as I go after school today to pay, they are locked in! I'll be in the country from March 21 - April 4th, though I won't be back in Chatty until the 29th. I'm hoping to rent a cell phone at the airport ^^ Yay! So excited!

♥ Coming in at a very close second in importance is that I have made a decision about the next year. I am going to recontact with my current employer. Meaning I will be in Nagano until August 2010. I decided it for a number of reasons, but basically I decided that the most important thing to me, at this point, is to stay in Japan with a well paid job. This is the best way for me to do that. I'm having too much fun to change it up yet.

♥ Looks like I'm going to try to go see TeniMyu in a couple weeks. I am far, far, too easily swayed by pretty boys and the idea of going to a show. I'm excited though! I've been wanting to see one, and apparently this one is great ^^

♥ School started back today. So long winter break. You were far too short.

♥ Had a great time on my small vacation with Joanna and Jade, which I feel I can call this given that it was longer than 1-2 days. We took LOADS of PurKura pictures, shopped a ton, went to Meiji Jingu shrine for New Years, watched a ridiculous show, and I saw a small concert. Over all, I think it was a good way to spend a few days ^^

♥ Some pictures!


The floor of the department store this photo booth was on was full of stores for guys who dress like this. Yeah, I was confused too.

( Billboards of shows I want to watch this season! )

( Other! )

♥ Took Joanna to Matsumoto this morning so she could catch her bus back to Nagoya. It's been a great couple weeks, and despite the expected bickering, I'll definitely miss having her around.

Ah snow, my icy nemesis, I see we will soon meet again.

This year though, I am ready.

I will not be defeated twice.

I'm missing lots of days, but at least I'm posting more!

Winter is come. All at once. It's routeenly in the 30s now, and I walk home in the pitch black dark at 5:30PM. Thankfully though, Ono (where I work, not where I live) has entered the current era with a shiney new self serve gas station, and happily, it's on my way to/from the train staton. It even has how drinks inside! This seems like a small thing, but a lot of gas stations don't have food, and until now, Ono didn't have anywhere open before I was due at school for me to get coffee or breakfast. So I'm pretty excited, it just opened last week, and I just stopped in today. Yay! So at least there's that.

In other news, I need long underwear and snow boots. It flurried all day yesterday, and and day now, it's going to start to stick.

Sorry I missed a bunch of days! I took pictures, I just didn't post them!

( Pictures <3 )

I got to teach some classes alone today. I conducted them with full maturity. As did my students.

Typical elementary school lunch.

Ooops. This is a little late.

To be honest, I got home yesterday, started playing a game I found online, and suddenly it was 11 PM and I crashed.



For those who haven't seen it, this is a real sign from a restroom on the highway.

( Unrelated Daily Picture )

Anything I had to say about today is gone after seeing Obama's acceptance speach.

I spent the whole time crying.

It feels amazing to be proud to tell people I'm American.

I didn't say all the pictures were going to be worthwhile. This is of the figurines around my living room lamp.

Went in to Matsumoto today on a whim, and happen upon a huge Culture Day parade and festival.

I'm going to be posting one picture each day. And writing at least a little caption about the day. It's not big updates, but I think it'll be good.



Today was gorgeous, and not all that cold. I have tomorow (Monday) off. I'm glad for the downtime ♥

Sitting here waiting for the train, autumn weather perfect, a song that makes me feel nostalgic for last year playing through my headphones… I feel like I could stay in Japan forever. I don’t always feel like this, and maybe it’s because last week was so bad, then today was so good… I don’t know. I just feel really at home. Like this is home.

I fit in here, oddly. Maybe not into most of the clothes, or in speaking the language... but I just feel like I’m suited for here sometimes. I can so easily relate to my students. Same way I always could in the states, only now I’m not sure I could do it in Tennessee. Even with my minimal Japanese, I can strike up a conversation with almost anyone here. I just am very tuned into the pop culture. The only thing I know about America anymore is what I see on the Daily Show. I just worry that it’s going to be a very difficult transition to go back home. I do things here. I have things that really interest me. I’ve been to more concerts in a year than I’d been to in my whole life. It’s just one example, and who knows how I’ll feel come winter... but just today, sitting here on the train now, I could stay.

More and more I want to stay a third year. I wouldn’t stay with JET, Nagano is simply too cold for me, but I do want to stay in the country. I’m at least definitely keeping my options open.

I just wanted to get that out. ♥

( A few random snapshots of my life. )

There's so much to post about that it gets overwhelming, and I don't write down any of it as a result. But I have to start somewhere! Here are a few odd, very Japanese things that have happened in the last week or so. I could talk about the trips I take, and I will post some recent pictures, but I think right now this stuff is more interesting than hearing about how I went to Tokyo for the 50th time.

* Last week at school a student drew me a character from a movie we both like, and gave it to me. The character is a metal band singer from a comedy, and has 'kill' written on his forehead. I put the drawing on my desk with the other little things I've been given, and just forgot about it. The following day the Japanese English teacher who sits next to me and I had the following conversation:

Him: Ah.... did you draw that?
Me: On, no. Yui did, it's a character from a movie.
Him: Ooooh. Um.... do you know what the character on his head means?
Me: Actually, no.
Him: It's 'kill'.
Me: Haha, that matching the character.
Him: Aaaah... I'm glad.
Me: Huh?
Him: I thought you had anger in your heart.

I almost laughed right there. How passive and Japanese is that? As if I drew a picture that said 'kill' on it to send him some sort of passive aggressive message... Oh, Japan.

*When Jade and I went out to eat on Friday, we tried a new little restaurant, and the guy who owned it kept coming over and speaking really simple Japanese with us. Asking where we were from and stuff. Then, or of nowhere, he bring over a big red pepper and asks if we know what it is. We say yes, and then he goes on to tell us that he is going to give us 4, and brings us out a bag of them, with upon later inspection also contained a small pumpkin. He was just honestly a nice guy, but it was still very funny in retrospect. In my next post, I'll show you a picture of the vegetables.

*On the train ride home that same night, a 70 something Japanese man sat down next to me, and we talked for a bit very casually. Then, suddenly, he breaks out a business card and writes his cell phone number on it. It was at this point that I suddenly 'forgot' how to speak Japanese. For the rest of the conversation, he would say things to me, and I would pretend to not really understand them. Things like "Do you live near the station?" "What's your cell phone number?" and "Would you like to come to my house?" All to which I responded, in bad Japanese, more or less "Japanese hard." I can not BELIEVE that guy thought he stood a chance.

*In other news, my 3rd year students are just finishing the unit in the book about the little children who "slowly died" at Hiroshima. Oh, Japan. I dare you to try to find a more awkward chapter for me to teach.

So those are the interesting things I've had happen lately, but from now I'll try to update more frequently! Talk to you all later!

There's quite a bit I want to talk about, but for now I'll just write the announcement I should have written a week ago:

I have no internet at home until the 21st. This is why I haven't been around, and why I will continue to not be around for the next couple weeks.