Today I took step one towards becoming an English conversation teacher in Japan: I went to the open day of a distance learning TESOL school in Sheffield that I've been eyeing up for a while now, liked the materials they showed me and the advice they offered, and signed up there and then. I'm £525 poorer for it, but I'm viewing it as investment for ( Read more... )

Broken keyboard at home + busy time at uni = no LJ for Amelia. Sorry guys, I've not read any of your entries for about a month, and will try to catch up little by little, but am unlikely to read everything I would like to ( Read more... )

Gacked from marmalade_girl:

( One Word Meme )

I passed my Japanese class exam, but only by seven marks. Last summer's exam I only passed by eight marks. I don't like this pattern very much ( Read more... )

So I'm in the supermarket. In Japan. And so are two dark-skinned men with moustaches. In Japan. They are unusual, I am unusual, we notice each other and go about our business ( Read more... )

Recent Major Stuff:

1. The kareshi made it through to the next round of pilot interviewing! There was much nail-biting, as group interviews crush any hopes of feeling you've made an impression, but he's through to the next interview, reported to be the harshest of the lot. The fly in the ointment: there were three interview days and two filled up ( Read more... )

Okusama wa Gaikokujin (translated as unflatteringly as possible: "The Wife is a Foreigner!") is a show that looks at the meetings of foreign women and their Japanese spouses, take a look at their everyday lifestyle in Japan, then ask the women to host a party and ask a question about Japanese customs (to be explained in a most aggravating ( Read more... )

First day without earthquakes! Aftershocks go on for a LOT longer than I expected, and there were still fairly large ones even yesterday. Seems to be over now though, and probably won't happen again before I leave. I'm glad it's something I got to experience, especially since Ishikawa is known for being a calm area, and I'm thankful that it wasn ( Read more... )

Apparently settling on one set of numbers for an earthquake is very difficult, because I keep finding various reports online and on the TV. Now I can say that the earthquake was a 6.7, 6.8, 7.1 or maybe somewhere in-between, and Kanazawa was either at a level 4 or 5. Apparently 5 is the level at which things start to fall and papers and books ( Read more... )

OMGHUGEEARTHQUAKEKOWAIKOWAIKOWAIIIIIIII

I just experienced my first earthquake ever, and it was magnitude level 6. The highest level is 7. All my papers and books fell off my shelves, everything I could see and feel was shaking, and I had no fucking idea what to do because I am European. Apparently I was not alone in running straight to the ( Read more... )