Beware the vampire watermelons.
A week in the new apartment, and so far so good. I have most of the mystery sticky greasy crap cleaned off the places that matter, and most of my stuff put away. I want to get a few decorations and things, but money's dwindling fast, so I'll wait until I get paid to buy anything else. There's a ladybug clock, a skull-and-crossbones bandanna, and a big beanbag chair that are SO MINE after payday.
First full week teaching. "Teaching" being "doing my self introduction over and over and over" at the moment. I'm going to make some changes to it tonight or tomorrow, just because I'm so damn sick of doing the same thing over and over. I made a worksheet to go with it, and I've been photocopying any that have interesting or funny answers to the questions. So far I've gotten everything from your standard funny engrish to adorable little chibi drawings of beavers. On the "I like to play Nintendo DS" side, I have a picture of Phoenix Wright that yells "OBJECTION!"when the slide comes up. That always gets the best reaction. At least one person in each class usually knows the games, so I can get a few laughs and "Eeeeeeeeh~!"s out of the kids by striking the Phoenix pose and yelling "IGIARI!" (the Japanese version) and "OBJECTION!". (Why do I get the feeling that it's the only English word some of them will remember by the end of the year?)
I saw a dead tanuki on the side of the road the other evening. Must have been killed pretty recently, because it still looked very intact, almost like a stuffed animal. I almost stopped the car to get out and check on it, but the poor little guy wasn't going to be getting back up no matter what I did.
There are cute little frogs around my apartment. They must live in the rice field, because I only see them around at night. There was one outside my window one morning, and it was nice and oblivious while I took some pictures.
Finished the first season of Lost. That just about does it for the shows I brought over with me to watch. Now I'm down to a few movies, a fansubbed anime, or re-watching old stuff. That or finding some "foreign" (read: western) things to rent at the DVD place down the road. The irony of living in Japan is that I CAN'T watch Japanese shows or movies I like. Not coherently, anyway. Even when they come out on DVD, 99% of them don't have English subs. Pretty much the only Japanese DVDs I've seen with English subs or dub have been a few special edition anime movies, mostly Studio Ghibli stuff like My Neighbour Totoro. Might give that new Earthsea-based Ghibli movie a try, at least. It looks pretty.
This movie looks nifty. I'd go see it at the theatre across the way from the internet café, if it wasn't in Japanese with no subs.
Man, the crazy recycle shop gets better and better every time I go there. I'll have to do a whole post dedicated to that place. You'd never, ever want to buy clothing there (it's all "vintage", meaning $80 for something you'd pay $10 for anywhere else), but the game, toy, and manga section is a wonder to behold. You can get LOST in that place. It's a eccentric labyrinth of Dragon Quest posters, Gundam figures, old NES cartridges, precariously stacked manga, and j-punk CDs. If you come visit me in Japan, a trip to this place is MANDATORY.
Oh, Hali, what games and shows are Seb into at the moment? I have your package ready to mail, but I want to send him something too.
Maaike, can you do a favour for me? I asked my mom to look for some Canadian animal handpuppets for me, since they'd be good for teaching elementary school classes. She found a polar bear, but I'd like a small moose or beaver puppet to go with it. If you see any around, could you let me know? I'll tell my mom what store it is, and she can pick one up and mail it to me if I can tell her where to look.
Unusual Wikipedia articles. You're guaranteed to find something interesting, or at least WTF?!-able. There's articles on everything from the genealogy of Clan McDuck (yes, the "Duck Tales" one) to vampire watermelons, a list of promises made by the Rhinoceros Party of Canada (“Putting the West Edmonton Mall on wheels and rolling it to areas of the country suffering from economic depression.”), Jedi census phenomenon, and the heavy metal umlaut.
Time to go. I might go driving around tomorrow and look for some of the shrines on the mountains near my town. There's one that's lined wall-to-wall with little carved Buddha statues, and I'd love to see it in person. Though you don't have to go far to find a shrine here. Hell, there's one down the street from my house that's just a little stone nook with a statue in it. I need to take a day to just walk around taking pictures of these things, before they're buried in snow in a few months time.
First full week teaching. "Teaching" being "doing my self introduction over and over and over" at the moment. I'm going to make some changes to it tonight or tomorrow, just because I'm so damn sick of doing the same thing over and over. I made a worksheet to go with it, and I've been photocopying any that have interesting or funny answers to the questions. So far I've gotten everything from your standard funny engrish to adorable little chibi drawings of beavers. On the "I like to play Nintendo DS" side, I have a picture of Phoenix Wright that yells "OBJECTION!"when the slide comes up. That always gets the best reaction. At least one person in each class usually knows the games, so I can get a few laughs and "Eeeeeeeeh~!"s out of the kids by striking the Phoenix pose and yelling "IGIARI!" (the Japanese version) and "OBJECTION!". (Why do I get the feeling that it's the only English word some of them will remember by the end of the year?)
I saw a dead tanuki on the side of the road the other evening. Must have been killed pretty recently, because it still looked very intact, almost like a stuffed animal. I almost stopped the car to get out and check on it, but the poor little guy wasn't going to be getting back up no matter what I did.
There are cute little frogs around my apartment. They must live in the rice field, because I only see them around at night. There was one outside my window one morning, and it was nice and oblivious while I took some pictures.
Finished the first season of Lost. That just about does it for the shows I brought over with me to watch. Now I'm down to a few movies, a fansubbed anime, or re-watching old stuff. That or finding some "foreign" (read: western) things to rent at the DVD place down the road. The irony of living in Japan is that I CAN'T watch Japanese shows or movies I like. Not coherently, anyway. Even when they come out on DVD, 99% of them don't have English subs. Pretty much the only Japanese DVDs I've seen with English subs or dub have been a few special edition anime movies, mostly Studio Ghibli stuff like My Neighbour Totoro. Might give that new Earthsea-based Ghibli movie a try, at least. It looks pretty.
This movie looks nifty. I'd go see it at the theatre across the way from the internet café, if it wasn't in Japanese with no subs.
Man, the crazy recycle shop gets better and better every time I go there. I'll have to do a whole post dedicated to that place. You'd never, ever want to buy clothing there (it's all "vintage", meaning $80 for something you'd pay $10 for anywhere else), but the game, toy, and manga section is a wonder to behold. You can get LOST in that place. It's a eccentric labyrinth of Dragon Quest posters, Gundam figures, old NES cartridges, precariously stacked manga, and j-punk CDs. If you come visit me in Japan, a trip to this place is MANDATORY.
Oh, Hali, what games and shows are Seb into at the moment? I have your package ready to mail, but I want to send him something too.
Maaike, can you do a favour for me? I asked my mom to look for some Canadian animal handpuppets for me, since they'd be good for teaching elementary school classes. She found a polar bear, but I'd like a small moose or beaver puppet to go with it. If you see any around, could you let me know? I'll tell my mom what store it is, and she can pick one up and mail it to me if I can tell her where to look.
Unusual Wikipedia articles. You're guaranteed to find something interesting, or at least WTF?!-able. There's articles on everything from the genealogy of Clan McDuck (yes, the "Duck Tales" one) to vampire watermelons, a list of promises made by the Rhinoceros Party of Canada (“Putting the West Edmonton Mall on wheels and rolling it to areas of the country suffering from economic depression.”), Jedi census phenomenon, and the heavy metal umlaut.
Time to go. I might go driving around tomorrow and look for some of the shrines on the mountains near my town. There's one that's lined wall-to-wall with little carved Buddha statues, and I'd love to see it in person. Though you don't have to go far to find a shrine here. Hell, there's one down the street from my house that's just a little stone nook with a statue in it. I need to take a day to just walk around taking pictures of these things, before they're buried in snow in a few months time.