I just booked tickets for me and the roommate to go to JAPAN!!! We'll be there in May and I'll have several days to spend in Tahara. I already have a long list of things I want to do and what I want to eat ( Read more... )

I moved home from Japan. I never did blog about it. I think that was because I was so emotionally numb at the time. It almost didn't seem real. I had spent the whole last year I was there counting down the days until I could come home since after Nate left and my close friend Marie got a full time job I was pretty lonely. I hurt my shoulder ( Read more... )

I've been trying to introduce some Japanese words to my 3 year old nephew's vocabulary. Supposedly this is the best time to learn a second language because his baby brain is still developing but he gets pretty upset when I tell him something is a different word so that we have some version of this conversation over and over ( Read more... )

I haven't heard from all of my friends but Tahara is well and far away from the epicenter that my replacement, Stephen, posted on FB that he didn't feel a thing. A friend in Nagoya felt some shaking but not much more than that. I've been watching the news and twitter carefully since yesterday morning and all of my prayers are with Japan and ( Read more... )

Somewhere between paragliding, a trip to Osaka, goodbye parties, and packing to come home, my girlfriends and I had a yukatta and hanabi party. There wasn't a festival going on nearby before I left so we decided to make our own ( Read more... )

When I first came to Japan I didn't know a word of Japanese. I could barely introduce myself. Today, not quite three years later I went to the post office to send a package, the bank to exchange money, and the SoftBank store to cancel my cellphone all by myself and all in Japanese ( Read more... )

I'm bogged down in cleaning, packing, and going to sayonara parties at the moment. But last week when I was chilling and only thinking of packing/cleaning/sayonara partying I decided to get something off my want-to-do list for here in Tahara and that was go paragliding. I'd caught glimpses of paragliders in Takigashira Park and near Mt. Zao and I ( Read more... )

I know I moved my departure date back in case I got the Peace Boat interview and at first I was really upset that now I had 3 weeks and no interview to go to. I already paid a fee to change and I could hardly pay another one. I did consider asking my dad to foot the bill. He has never just given me money for things in the past (and I never ask) ( Read more... )

My last day of work was on Friday. I taught four classes, had lunch, gave a speech to the 9th grade and then went home. I really didn't think I was going to cry. I only teared up a little at Tobu-sho, my favorite school two weeks ago. And I didn't cry a single tear at Tobu-chu, Takamatsu-sho, or Okusa-sho ( Read more... )

This is what I've been teaching to the 9th graders this week and last. P.28 of the New Horizon textbook where Judy asks Shin to go to a rock concert with her on Sunday. They're meeting in front of the station at 1:30. I've convinced most of the students that Judy is really asking Shin on a date. One of my teachers pointed out that Mike and Emi ( Read more... )