Spring cleaning (pictures at the end)

I have been cleaning our little apartment and making it all tidy lately. Chris thinks I'm being super active because I am antsy and full of energy. At least I am putting the energy to good use!

I cleaned out our bedroom closet so we can actually store our futon in it during the day. You see, I got lazy and left the futon down for a really long time. This resulted in mildew in the tatami and on one futon. So we had to toss the futon and I have demildewed the tatami. But, since the spores or whatever are still kinda in the tatami, I have to keep the futon up so it doesn't have a chance to grow back. It was becoming a giant pain in the ass because of storage problems, so I just decided to do what the Japanese people do and use my futon closets for my futon. Genius! Heh. It looks really nice. I cleaned off all the dressers as well so it just looks tidy. I like being tidy. You would never know, because I am one of the laziest people on the planet, so I have the tendancy to let things pile up and get cluttered, but I am so relaxed when I finally tidy and have the apartment organized and neat. So, I'm trying to stay in the tidy mode.

I cleaned the kitchen today. Took me about an hour because it involved a lot of washing dishes and taking things down and scrub, scrub, scrubbing the counters. My back is a little achy, but the kitchen looks wonderful! I even moved the stovetop out of it's pit and cleaned back there. That, my friends, was very very disgusting. You see, Chris and I are inept when browning meat and cooking in a skillet, sometimes we tend to flip food out of the pan and into the little gully behind the stove top thing. Usually we half-heartedly try to fish the food out but...well...we are gross. It's kinda like behind the oven in normal houses. Gross, gross, gross! But now it's clean and I won't ever be afraid to put my hand back there again!

Speaking of behind the stove. Funny story ! I was once frying an egg on the stove in our old house (the one that Katie and Eddie live in now). I fried it all yummy and gooey (I like my eggs over easy). It became time to put it on my toast and, like the genius I am, instead of taking the plate to the egg, I decided to take the egg to the plate. I only had to move the egg from the pan to the toast about 8 inches. So I scooped my wobbly egg up in a spatula and tried to move it from the stove to the plate and...slurrp! The egg fell off my spatula down between the stove and the counter. Ewww. Ruined all the paper bags my mom kept there. It was really gross and REALLY stupid. I did clean it out but whenever I think of it, I wonder about all the crap that gets between the stove and the cabinets. It must be really gross. Shoo. Anyways, that's what today reminded me of! I don't think I've ever told anyone that story. Feel special!

Ok, back to life in Japan which is why you read this. I think. Schools are still in winding down mode. I gave my final for Izumo West high last week and it went fine. The lowest grade was an 85 because I am a softy and made the test easy. I also found out that I will be rehired for next semester. Which is excellent! I also found out that Nishi (Izumo West) got a little bit in trouble since they hired a teacher that doesn't have any Japanese teaching certifications to teach classes. Heh. Oops. That's me, by the way. So they are going to have me team teach with another teacher, which is awesome! Essentially it means I'm being demoted from teacher to ALT (assistant language teacher, like Chris and the other JETs) and have half the work but the same amount of pay. I'm sure not going to complain about that! Woo!

I also think the Board of Education is going to rehire me to do my Saturday class with Miymi again. Woo! That's a really easy class as well and fun. I'm not going to do elementary school again because I hate it. So that's really great, too! Seriously, I have about 8 more classes left at my elementary school and it makes me excited to think of no more shithead 6th graders. I'm sorry, that's rude, isn't it? The problem is that they put my class as the last thing the kids have to do before they go home for the day. This causes them to be rowdy and distracted. Also, they are about to graduate into Junior High in about 4 weeks so they are less than interested in English right now. Hate! It's such a stress reliever that I am quitting this.

The school in Kisuki is going well. I'm about to start a fourth class on Thursday. Woo. I am really aprehensive about this class since it's beginner adults and I have no idea how to teach them, but I am working with James (owner) on a curriculum and finding a text so it will be much easier to teach them.

Katie asked me another question! So I will answer it now! I guess if you have a question about Japan or whatever, just ask me in the comments and I will try to answer it the next time I do an entry. Maybe this will be interesting! Anyways, Katie asked about teh term Oriental and whether it's ok to say about food. Honestly, I don't know. Oriental is an English term and since they speak Japanese in Japan, it never ever comes up. It's more of an Asian-American/english/austrialian issue than an Asian issue. If that makes much sense. Oriental is an old term that people don't really think about what it means. It basically just means from the Orient which is not East Asian, but Asian. So an oriental rug can be a rug from China, a rug from Tibet, a rug from India, or even a rug from Pakistan. It's a broad and almost meaningless term. I would just avoid using it altogether and try to be more specific about things. So that's that. I don't use it for anything because it's such a broad term. It's like when I'm called a westerner. It means I'm from a western cultured area (America, Europe, Australia) and is very vague. It's kinda pointless to say.

Now, picture time! Random pictures. Like seriously, random! Try to keep up, there is no rhyme or reason to these photos, just things I took with my camera phone and thought might be amusing to explain or discuss.


Well, I guess not all the pictures need an explanation. This is a fish. He was staring at me. So I took his picture. I tried to get into a staring contest with him, but he totally won. It's like he's dead of something. I actually cropped this picture on my phone, and whenever Mihara-san calls me, this is the picture that shows up. It's really amusing. Maybe not to Mihara-san (who looks nothing like this fish), but it gets a giggle from me everytime. ^_^


Chris is waiting for curry! So I took his picture. Isn't he cute. I don't know why it's so yellow, but it might be the lights.


Yay! It's me waiting for curry! However, I was taking my own picture with my phone and it was suprisingly difficult. So thats my "Shhh...I'm concentrating on not giving myself a double chin when I take this picture" face. Don't my bottom eyelashes look lovely though? I think it's the yellow light. Weird.


It's my friend, the TV! I spend a lot of time with this friend. He tells me funny things and let's me watch Spongebob in Japanese. Spongebob in Japanese is some funny stuff. Patrick's voice is really high and childlike. You can't help but laugh when he talks.


Look! It's my telephone. And some cords and crap that we can't find places for. It never rings anymore. I think we've scared away all the telemarketers with out foreigness. It has really big buttons though. So it's easy to dial. Isn't that nice? Whenever someone does call, our internet modem always clicks first. So it's really easy to catch the phone on the first ring. It kinda amazes people. I like to pretend I'm clairvoyant.


Look! It's Chris's chair next to my chair and my purse. Chris is always sitting in this chair since he uses the computer at the kitchen table. Well, that was true when I took this picture. Now he's moved to sitting across from me under the kotatsu when he uses his computer. It must have been a monday that I took this picture. You know why I say this? Because I can see my computer is by the chair. That happens on Monday when I put my computer on the table during Monday Tea. Wow. This was a boring one, wasn't it? Moving on!


Oh! Kendama! This is the bottom cubby of one of our bookshels. That thing is called a kendama and it's a very traditional Japanese toy. You unwind the string and take the ball off of the little spike. Then you try to catch the ball in the little cups on the side of it. Chris is really good at it. I am...well...not so great. I can do the cups, but I can get it to land on the little spike thing. I like it though. It's so elegant in it's simpleness. Kinda like an old fasioned top. "Kendama" translates to "sword and ball". I will let you play with it when we go home, if you ask me nicely. Just be careful not to smack yourself in the face with the ball. That hurts...or so I've been told. Hrmph...


This is a water glass and Chris's arm in the background. This shot looks kinda artsy, doesn't it? Heh. Anyways, this is how much water they give you when you go to most restaurants. They usually leave a pitcher of water on the table for show. You see, Japanese people don't really drink while they are eating. They drink before and after their meals when they are talking and visiting, but not while they eat. It's really annoying because colas are usually about $2.60 for one small glass (bigger than these, but smaller than American restaurants). This is at an Italian restaurant that we go to, and they don't keep a pitcher of water at our table, so we always run out of water. Bah.


This...this is the dread sink bucket! Ahhhhh! No! Get it away! Hate hate hate! *cough* Pardon me. This isn't the first one. That one got trashed. It was so disgusting. It was actually deeper than this one. But really...deep isn't that much better. You don't really want to get that much food in the bottom. Bleh. I keep little blue mesh bags in the bucket so it makes tossing food away much easier. It sucks though. It always smells bad and make the kitchen/living room smell bad as well. You would think, in a country where they love technological advancements they could give us a fricken disposal! Bleh. But this is what I get. Stupid Japanese apartment. It's stuck in the 1950's. Hate hate hate.

And that's it! Now my fingers are tired of typing so this is my entry. It's long and rambly, but who knows when I will update next! So take care of this one!

Love you all! See you in 5 months! ^_^

MAN! It's been so slow around here...

For real! Nothing interesting has been going on. Just class, watching Buffy, and living life to it's fullest or something. Sorry I haven't been updating, but seriously, not much has happened in the past couple of weeks.

Chris and I went to the dentist on the 9th. It was all very like the dentist in America except a little more high tech. They had this cool little water dispensing machine next to every chair. You put the cup on a little scale and the water pours in until it weighs a certain amount. Then, when you need to spit, you pick up the cup and it triggers the spit sink to activate and the water turns on there. So you spit and then put the cup back on the scale and it stops the spit sink water and refills the cup. Nifty!

Anyways, normal cleaning. Although, I told the doctor that I didn't speak much Japanese, so he cleaned Chris' teeth first and then had Chris sit next to me and translate. How weird. Chris watched them clean my teeth. Heh, I'm sure it was beautiful.

Let's see, what else? Oh! Guess what I'm doing RIGHT NOW? I'm watching...
AMERICAN IDOL! AYEEEEEIII! We are on week 3 or 4. Whatever, they are at the New York auditions. Japan starts it about a month late and then shows them quickly and becomes about two weeks behind America during the top 12 stuff. I'm excited. I love it so much. Oh Ian Bernardo, you are such a bad singer. DENIED!

*cough*

Anyways. My husband is nice enough to watch with me. He says he only likes the audition parts. It's his favorite, but I think he mildly likes the rest of it. He tolerates it, at least. Awww...such a wonderful show.

Katie asked about the torii gates you find at shrines and temples in Japan. Like so:
She asked if they made the torii look like the little pictographs (called kanji). No! Hah. I don't know why they look like that, except they look like doorways which is what they are. Doorways into sacred ground and places. Beautiful. Do a google image search for "torii" and you will find gorgeous pictures. Anyways, they didn't make them to look like Japanese writing. But, there are some kanji that are probably based on the gate. For instance: "開ける" The kanji is the first symbol, the other two are hiragana which is the syllabic alphabet used here. Anyways, the word means "to open" and if you look at the center of the kanji, it looks like the torii gate. Also, the outside bits of it is the symbol for "gate" heh. Woo. So I hope that is an understandable explanation. And interesting. I could really ramble about Japanese if you get me started. It's really a beautiful and fascinating language.

Chris and I are kinda excited. Will, a good friend from school, is coming to visit us in about a month! Yay! Actually, he will be here almost exactly a month and a week from today. It will be so great to have a friend come visit us. That should be a bundle of fun.

And that is pretty much it. All I can't think to chat about. I will try to update more often, but really...it's a really slow time right now. So we shall see!

Hope things are going well for you!

Wow, not much going on over here...

Really. I haven't been do anything interesting, but I figure I would update.

It's snowing today. It snowed last night as well, so it's all white and pretty here. I would take a picture, but that would require me leaving my warm blankets. So...sorry!

Let's see...yesterday I made an epic Yaki Soba for Chris. I put cabbage, carrots, onions, green peppers, sprouts and pork in it. It was very tasty, if I do say so myself. Wow...that took a lot less space that I thought it was going to. Trust me...it was epic. AND! Turns out, I like green peppers and sprouts. Who knew?

Classes are fine. I am done with my 3rd graders and that's kinda nice. Today, my super english class was cancelled so I don't have much of anything to do. It's ok. It snowed...I may just stay in and do some housework it. Or something.

The good news is, at the English school in Kisuki, slowly more classes are trickling in. I have 3 next week (instead of 2) and possibly another will be made. Which is keen, because each class I teach there is about $100 a month. So...yay for that!

Otherwise...that's it. It's kinda boring around here. I'm thinking of you guys! I miss you and wish I were there...