today is the day that the new alt moves in to her apartment. I cleaned and did most of the stuff yesterday that i needed to do. Tomorrow i have to send off my sim card and modem back to the people. Then close my accounts and finalize my bills for most of the utilities. My suitcase is underpacked and i even had room to put in my backpack and external hardrive. Not much else has been going on. I got accepted to another university that i applied to, but it is the one an hour out of London, so it was just the final back up school. Now to start living off of convenience store food for the next while. I love and appreciate the going away gifts of money that i have been receiving. It will be nice to pay for some things like food and souvenirs with it. Well, got a busy day but hopefully it won't be too bad.

Had my going away party for all the teachers that are going away this year. I was nice and the food wasn't as bad as it had tasted when it first came here. Heck the only thing that was a little unpalatable was the squid sushi. I liked the uni and ukura, I guess the sushi was just really good this time, because i thought uni tasted like mushy butter the first time i had it. I basically have just come up with the idea to not really be affected by what i am putting in my mouth in Japan. "Oh, i'm eating pig intestines, okay. A little chewy but still okay. Oh, whale... tastes like fishy pork." You know stuff like that.

The party was nice, and the karaoke party after it was good as well. The nicest teacher that i had the opportunity to work for was trying to apologize to me with saying "yeah i know you have been a little troubled by the students[ with their poking and such of all regions of my posterior and front] and i was just wondering if it might have been different if you had gone to another town." I was like, "they are just kids, don't worry about it." She reminded me of my first grade teacher, she was extremely nice and she had pretty good english as well. The one thing that a couple of teachers did keep saying throughout the night was "i wish i had learned a little more English [from you was sort of implied]" But i guess it worked both ways with us teaching you Japanese and you answering our English questions. I still think i got closer to them by speaking Japanese though, but then the kids just got used to me being able to understand them.

I sent two boxes home for about 100 bucks with souvenirs and stuff i wanted to keep from here. Not really that much for the my family, but i tried to get a bunch of stuff for the new in-laws. I bet my new niece would probably like cute things like precure and sugar bunnies here. But i don't know. My sister-in-law likes Hello Kitty so i tried to get some things for her. Then i tried to get some boyish things for my nephews, so paper balls and head bands, and fang keychains.

sugar bunnies


precure

Well, i got accepted to one of the schools that I applied for. It is not my first choice, but it is still a  good one i think. Birkbeck University of London is a night school and my classes would be two to three times a week is what the site said, so that would maybe give me a lot of free time, or i will have a lot of homework and studying to do. I guess that means i will be okay with trying to get a job seeing as how i will need money in order to survive there. I do have some saved and i will work this summer to save up some more, but i need to get a student loan secured and all the other things as well along with it. London will be a nice adventure, i just hope that i will be able to find employment after my degree to pay for my student loans.

Today was my last day of classes teaching the first years, and i think the class went well. I did Jeopardy and the kids seemed to enjoy it. Tomorrow is the closing ceremonies and greetings from me and other teachers who are leaving, i need to write some greetings and words to say to them beforehand because i do not think that i could come up with something eloquent off the cuff in Japanese.

The snow keeps on falling here, i am just like "Shkleesh, will you stop already! It's gonna be June before the snow melts."

I will miss it here, but i think Japan has helped me change for the better and given me some good friends and great experiences. I will miss being away from my best friend Amber for a while, but she will have a reason to visit London now.

Well this weekend was the last hurrah for all us folks up in Sapporo. We had lunch with the kids and family that Amber teaches English to on Saturday and then we had a dinner party that night with her other friends. All the Japanese people amber knows are super beautiful and awesome. Dinner was good and a good time was had by all, then we went dancing at the clubs afterwards.

On Sunday, Amber and I went to the movies and had dinner. We saw Agora, which was awesome. Just look at the trailer below. I personally loved Rachel Weisz, and for some odd reason she does good with movies that are in Egypt.




Very thought provoking, and some people thought it put some people in a bad light, but hey the historical events did happen, the people's dialogue and story were fictionalized, but the events did happen and they were all real people.

Pics have been updated.


Wow today was an eventful day. First i had to write my Japanese going away greeting all in Japanese. I hope there aren't that many problems with it. I will send it to the English teacher to look at it before i give it to the Vice-principal. Then i had my last elementary school for the year, and they are by far my favorite school. We had play practice and then all the grades got together for this English class assembly where each of the three grade groups got together and showed each other what they had learned in English class from the year. Then at the end the 5th and 6th graders did a play, "The big turnip." It's a Russian story that never heard of before, but it is well-known in Japan. Then i said my goodbyes and thank yous and the kids gave me three bottles of Tabasco sauce and about 35 pounds of rice. I don't know what i will do with all that rice, i think i will give the bulk of it to the new ALT when she comes, but i want to send some of it home so i can give it to friends and have some for when i get back. Man, think about what you need, and the Japanese will instinctively give it to you. I was gonna buy some more tabasco, and i wanted some rice to take home and now i have it.

Then i have to write a thing for my application to one of the schools i am applying for. I have to write about if there is such thing as "bad grammar." I think i came up with a good 500 word essay about it.

Then finally, the weirdest thing happened, i didn't see it but from what i gathered and the huge amount of key-chains, one stranger apparently gave the kids as they were leaving school right out in front of plain view of the teacher's room, a big amount of key-chains, look at the pic. I don't know if he handed them or just threw them, but there was like 7 or 8 bags of really old looking key-chains- at least 5 or more years old- and they looked a little moldy. So the kids came and gave them to the teachers and they called the cops. i will have to see how this unfolds, but i think that there was about $1000 worth of key-chains in the entire lot. So many of them, there would be enough for more than one per kid, but still it is just so strange. some of the teachers looked around town and drove to find the guy since he was in a car and the kids go a description and a plate number.

An interesting day, but i am still worried about the radiation, i just hope that i can leave here without any injury. I think the best comment i heard in regards to the poor response from the Japanese government-but not the response from the crews and workers, they have given their all and the Japanese people are awesome at a time like this- was that Japan could do without politicians for ten years or something along those lines. Good idea maybe since the public seems to have lost an confidence that they have had in the revolving-door line of prime minsters since Koizumi left power.

Well the earthquake and the tsunami aftereffects seem almost unreal. It seems like where i live is not even part of Japan. We haven't been affected at all and even for where i am especially i do not feel any earthquakes compared to people in Sapporo. The devastation is immense and this is worse than the one in Kobe 15 years ago. It is horrible and then all the nuclear reactor worries are the biggest worries on my mind at the moment. You don't know how much the government is actually saying and how much of it is actually true. I just hope that Japan can recover from this. The Nikkei fell 7 percent in 20 minutes after it reopened since the earthquake happened on Friday. So many people are without home and water and food and electricity. Tokyo is having planned blackouts in order to deal with the power reactors being offline. It just seems so distant, but so close in actuality.

I just hope i can get to London when April comes around.

Wow, totally nothing going on with me this week. I finished the sixth Harry Potter book, and not much else to say about my week. There have been practically no classes for me, or in general at the middle school. All the time is spent on preparing for the assembly to send off the third years and the graduation ceremony next Tuesday. I think i might have already had my last lesson at the middle school, but maybe there will be one my last week of school. None next week, save ONE elementary school class.

The weather is still snowy, with a couple of inches everyday. I guess that makes for good rice, but it could not if the snow doesn't melt in time for the planting season. So much snow, and i am so through with it. Oh well, one last weekend at home before i can go to Sapporo for my last weekend there with friends. At least we get the spring equinox off that Monday so a long weekend next weekend.

Slow weekend and not much to show for it but saving money. The tub guys came today and put in a new tub, i just hope the bill isn't exorbitant. It looks nice, though when they disconnected the pipe for the water to flow to the water heater, they didn't reconnect it tightly and i found a rubber washer on the heater. So i had to have them come back and refit it.

I have updated pics with one pic of me, the band, and some pics from the ski trip. Sorry for the bad quality, i didn't realize that there would be so many double images, and then the kids don't like to have their pics taken sometimes.

The time for me to leave is getting closer, and i don't really know how to feel yet. I am sort of getting sad that i won't be able to see the students i like again, and happy to get out of this weather. I am not getting really sentimental because i know they will be in good hands hopefully with my replacement.

I can't wait to go to London though for my job end vacation. Should be fun since i have some things planned with the people i met there last time. I ask myself if i should try to get a British accent down, or if i should just stay the same, but for some odd reason anytime i hear a new accent or peculiarity in someone's speech i sort of want to try it out. I like accents, and my french one is pretty good from some of the french natives that i have spoken to. Japanese is better than most white people's. Spanish is passable. When i try to speak Hebrew it starts to sound like a little Slavic. Oh well, accents are fun so... gotta enjoy them while you can.

There has been a blizzard going on for the past two days. Lots of white, and not too much snow. I just wonder when the snow is going to melt all the way. I believe it wasn't until June last year that it was all completely gone except for in the mountain tops.

Yesterday was the Hinamatsuri, or "girl's festival." It was called "Momo no sekku" beforehand in the Heian period when Onmyodo and Shintoism were more popular. Today it is represented by eating diamond shaped mochi, sweetened puffed rice, and setting up a doll display reminiscent of the ancient Heian court setup.  This display below contains hina dolls (雛人形）.



Here is the diamond shaped mochi(菱餅) and some hina-arare(ヒナあられ）. The traditional colors of this even are Green, which represents young grass; pink, which represents the peach blossom petals; and white, which represents the snow. The is also probably some Heian tricolor combination with a certain special name, but i am unable to find it.
Hina arare

Hishimochi

Sorry for the big break, the truth is not much has been happening with me. I have decided to only go to Sapporo one more time before i leave in order to save money. Man, these moving out expenses are really annoying. The kids have been okay, but the second years are very touchy-feely in a very non-pleasant way. I just do not get the thing that they all have to touch my stomach or pull on my tie. They do not do this with the other teachers, but hey, just a little bit longer and i am done. If i ever teach again, i would rather it be with elementary school students or college students.

Still lightly snowing, but it is wet snow so it is good for snowmen.