Carl in Japan

So that was a thing.

2006-11-27T09:00:00.000-08:00

Alright I realize that we have been back in Canada for two months now, but it seems to me I haven't regaled our last days in Japan. At least not here. To anyone who has listened to me tell the stories already I apologize for being repetitive.

We had found out that the new tenants in our apartment in Japan would be arriving at noon on the 22nd of September. Our estimated departure time would be 11:00am. They move them through fast in Japan. Not even enough time to let the door hit your ass. We were told that someone would be doing an inspection of the apartment before we left, but after talking to other Nova teachers we found that that is a rare occurrence and that it usually happens as the next tenants are moving in. So if you sacrificed animals and set small fires in your apartment no one would know until the moment the next tenants were carrying their suitcases through the door. We did neither of those things, but nonetheless we still needed to clean. Fortunately our friend Joe had arrived the week before from Hamamatsu with the intention of traveling home with us. Much to our surprise (and his at being ambushed) we found that Joe is an excellent cleaner (If anyone needs their floors done I highly recommend him). We started cleaning the night before we left and finished up at around 3 or 4 in the morning. It was at that point that we thought bed might be a good idea, however, going to get beer and chu-hi and drinking them at Osaka castle seemed like a much better idea. We also had a mission to accomplish. You see in the year and half that we lived in Japan we had accumulated a significant number of umbrellas. It rains in Japan. Often. Sometimes it looks beautiful in the morning when you're off to work but when you step out the door at the end of the day it's pouring. So you pick up another umbrella. At 5$ a pop it's not a huge sacrifice. Anyhow, we had 11 of them and no idea what to do with them so we decided to do a reverse scavenger hunt at 4:30 in the morning. That meant just walking to the convenience store to get drinks and snacks and making our way to the castle and all the while trying to find interesting place to leave the umbrellas for the next person to happen along. Can you see them?

Umbrellas were not the only thinks left out either. A few odds and ends were left for fellow teachers in the building.

After arriving at the castle with drink in hand we stopped to reflect on the time we had spent and the fact that it would be a while before we were once again in a place that had a national heritage sight that was open to the public at all hours and where we could sit in public and legally drink without worrying about getting a ticket. We found a good spot near the castle wall and sat and watched all of the people walking by and listening to the drunk girl at another bench laughing way too hard and often at a guy who could not possibly have been that funny without a lot of alcohol being consumed on her behalf. We figured out the timers on our cameras and took some pictures and then headed home for a few hours of sleep before we headed to the airport.

Ahhh! The airport! Did I ever tell you about the time Joe almost didn't come back to Canada? We arrived there on time with our friend Chiaki who had joined us along the way. She was there to see us off and help us take care of last minute details that our Japanese skills were not capable of handling without help. We went to the baggage delivery booth where we had our larger suitcases sent to two days before (We did this at the liquor store that also did dry cleaning and package delivery). After that we found a Docomo shop to have our cell phones cancelled. After all that was done we headed to check-in to drop off our bags and get our boarding passes. Then we hit a bit of a hitch. You see Colleen and Joe had picked up hiking sticks when we went to Mt. Fuji and we wanted to bring them back to Canada with us. Colleen checked the internet the week before to see how much this would cost to bring these over and above our regular baggage allowance. It said it would be about $30 Cdn. When we got there, however it was $220 to bring them. Yikes! So we had to go with plan B, which was giving them to Chiaki and having her send them by mail which would be way cheaper. Then Joe decided to hit hitch number 2. As he handed them his passport to check in they looked it and frowned (frown is never good from airplane staff).

"Your Visa expired last week" She told him.

"Yeah that's why I'm leaving" Joe said.

"But it expired, you were in the country illegally" She explained.

"Right, so now I am leaving so I won't be" He reminded.

"I'm afraid we can't let you leave" She said.

"Why not?" He asked.

"Because you shouldn't be here" She informed him. "You'll have to come with me and talk to immigration officials who want to cavity search you"

Okay that's not word for word, but he did get held up for not having a valid visa and had to pay some money. He joined up with us a bit later (before the plane took off and after his cavity search, (which he didn't complain about (He's going to kill me))). After about thirteen hours of flying we finally touched down in Calgary to the cheers of our legion of fans (nine people), and promptly went to eat steak.

Thanks to everyone who read this and shared our adventures. And thanks for welcoming us back to Calgary without weapons in your hands. For continued craziness I have started a new blog for those friends in and out of Canada to keep in touch and such and share the more ridiculous things I find online.

Check out CarltheBaker

Cheers, Carl.

The end is near!

2006-09-05T11:47:00.000-07:00

Hello, all. All? Not sure who actually reads this anymore, but it's almost the last one. As I write this we are sixteen days from coming home, (so stay tuned for party announcements)and I still have stuff to share. Some improv, some people watching and another vacation tale.

Many moons ago I posted pictures of some improv theater I have done here in Japan, including our last show, Robin Hood. Well, Colleen has now joined the improv team and we are attempting to put on Cinderella in just one and a half weeks with only three rehearsals under our belts. Yikes! Hopefully we will have some pictures to post but with both of us in the show I'm not sure who will take them. In the mean time however I provide you with a video clip of our first show at the Kobe regatta and athletic club. One of the musicians that night actually taped the show and added titles and sound effects after. The clip features a scene by the Kobe team, and a scene by our very own Osaka team, the "Wild Bunch".

And while we are in the video mood, summer time in Osaka is always huge for festivals and fireworks. For several weeks it is common to see women (and some men) wearing yukatas on the trains and in the shopping malls as they meet with friends and make their way to the various festival locations. If you don't know what a yukata is, it's like a kimono (traditional Japanese robe) but much lighter (and cheaper) and is made for summer wear, whereas the kimono is for New Years and weddings. It really is a lot cooler looking than I can describe seeing all the beautiful patterns and material so last month I decided to head to one of the festivals and take some video with our new camera. When I think about it I felt a little like a stalker going down to the Tenjin Matsuri festival with a video camera with the intent of following women in their yukatas, but I assure you it was strictly for your sake so you could share in the festivities...honest. Have a look at this clip I put together.

We also took a short trip to visit our good friend Joe in Hamamatsu.

On the way to Joe's we decided to stop in a few places in the neighboring prefecture of Mie. We saw the ninja museum in Iga (yes they have a town spelled just like the supermarket).

The to our hotel in Shima, possibly the most deserted place we have seen since we've been here. I think it was the first time we actually had to look hard to find a restaurant. The next day we took off to Toba, to visit Mikimoto Pearl Island where we watched the women pearl divers gathering shells. We were fortunate enough to be treated to an English commentary that explained that only women were pearl divers because they have natural fat to insulate them and that some women worked with their husbands who would drive the boat and pull her up when she tugged the rope attached to her waist. The narrator stressed that these couples should have a good relationship though or he might not pull her up. After the show we headed to the gift shop and the museum to see all of the beautiful jewelry and pearl sculptures.

Next we were off to Futami to see some rocks. Well not just any rocks, these rocks were special. There are two of them and they are located along the shore. Once a year the local people tie the rocks together with a long rope to symbolize the bond (bondage?) of marriage. It's funny because that's exactly how I picture marriage. In the ocean with a rope tied to you and the other end to a large rock. Please have a look at the picture while I get something to stop the flow of blood from my head (Colleen has remarkable aim when she's reading over my shoulder).

I'm feeling a little dizzy, but I'll continue. After Futami we were off to Ise shrine. A very holy place that is located in two mirror sights a few kilometers from each other. These buildings each have large empty spaces located next to them as they are rebuilt in the empty space every 20 years using ancient architectural techniques. This is a gate leading to one of the sites. I don't know the people in the picture but they wouldn't move so I added them to my collection.

By the time we had finished there the sun was going down and it was time to catch a high speed train and head to Joe's house in Hamamatsu. We spent two days with the old guy where we drank generously and did some shopping and visited Hamamatsu Jou (Jou being the Japanese word for castle oddly enough). Much fun was had by all and when the weekend was up we got on a non-high speed train and spent several hours making the trek back to Osaka. To see all of our pictures from Mie, please click here. To see our photos of that Joe guy and his tiny little apartment click here.

I hope to see my fellow Canadians soon, and remember to keep the 23rd. open on your calendars, there will be more info to come. I leave you now with some more pictures of the strange and amazing.

Hugs and Kicks, Carl.

Appalled, Enthralled and Baseballed!

2006-08-06T08:15:00.000-07:00

Welcome friends, kick back, stay awhile. Let me regale you with more stories of the strange and wonderful. I'm trying to punch this blog up a little for those of you who are browsers more than readers. (yes that means pictures as well as text)

As you can see from the title of the blog I've got a few more tales to tell. So let's start with Appalled. I've mentioned, and shown you in the past that some Japanese television shows can be a little different than back home. Well one evening last week we were absolutely shocked when a dance contest came on. Now dance contests on TV are nothing new but this one caught our eye. For starters it sounded like the hosts were saying "sekushi dansu kontesuto " (sound it out, it's "Sexy Dance Contest") which also is not too bad. Then we saw one of the groups of contestants. It was a group of five or six girls and they were all 8 years old! Yes that's right, groups or single acts in a sexy dance contest and all of them between 2 and 12 years old. Later that night I was surfing around on a news site and found that another English speaker in Japan had also seen it, and was also shocked and managed to tape some of it. So if your interested in seeing why we were so shocked or just how much make-up can fit on a small child, click here.

For the next word in the title, Enthralled let me tell you about Kabuki. Kabuki, if you haven't heard of it is traditional form of Japanese theatre. The performers wear elaborate costumes, wigs and make-up and speak in an older form of Japanese that is melodic and often drawn out for effect. Many Japanese people will tell you that they can not understand Kabuki, which is why most theatres have translation headsets. I had studied and performed Kabuki in High School, so I was very interested in seeing how it's supposed to be done. We went to an early performance which started at 11:00am and went to 4:00pm, but like many people we did not attend all of the show. Three hours was enough for us, considering we couldn't understand a word of it. (no translation for English speakers) It was actually quite similar to what we had done in school only far more elaborate and there were shouters. This startled us at first when a character came on stage and suddenly two or three men in the audience started shouting at them. This happened about every five minutes, people in the audience hollering at the performers. We later found out that the shouters are regular patrons, and that they are yelling the actors names to encourage them. As an actor I think this would probably throw me the first seven or eight times. Unfortunately no pictures were allowed of the performances but we did pick up this cute little guy at the souvenir shop.

And the last word in the title, Baseballed. Colleen and I have never really been baseball fans. I played as a child but never watched it on TV unless it was with my dad or my brother. But I had seen a pro baseball game live in Mexico and it was a blast. So knowing how baseball crazy people are in Japan we figured we had to do it. We were not disappointed. We headed of to Osaka Dome to watch the Tigers (my team) play the Dragons. One thing we knew before going was that you had to buy balloons when you got there to celebrate the 7th inning stretch, but more on that later. Many people were wearing team jerseys and they even sold them in a cute pink version. It wasn't long before we were looking like everyone else complete with plastic cheering bats that you bang together to cheer your team.

What we weren't prepared for was how elaborate the cheering was. There were cheer masters situated throughout the crowd to signal to each other and the fans what cheer was about to start. It seemed liked every player on the team had their own cheer when they were up to bat, and there were several others for which everyone seemed to know the rhythms and chants from memory. It felt like we were in a dance show but had missed all of the choreography rehearsals. I managed to take a few short video clips of it with the digital camera and put them together so you can get a glimpse.

Then came the 7th inning where, shortly before, everyone (including us) started blowing up long balloons with whistles in the openings.

They then launched them into the air emitting a screaming noise to announce the start of the stretch.

To see the rest of the baseball pics click here.

And that's it for me, lots more to talk about but this has gone on long enough.

Hope to see you all soon, we'll be back with Joe September 22nd, party on the 23rd from what I hear. Signing off, Carl.

Oh what the heck, here's a few more pics. Click on them to read a description.

This, that and what the heck is going on?

2006-07-18T11:22:00.000-07:00

In past blogs Colleen and I have mentioned how crazy Japanese television is here, and I finally have proof. This clip features several men sitting in a classroom watching a guy in a video trying (and not succeeding) to read and speak English. The trick is that if anyone laughs at him... well just watch and find out. We see stuff like this all the time. So in honor of this video I will share some of the crazy things I have seen, heard and eaten lately.

Teaching English I get to hear a lot of crazy things, and quite often students will tell you things in English that they would never tell a stranger in Japanese. Somehow speaking English has this magical liberating force on people. I call it the "three beers" effect. This is the number of beers at which the average person will start to tell you things they might not otherwise tell you when sober. I have also found out that some Japanese psychiatrists recommend English lessons for students with social problems. This would definitely explain some of our students. Here are a few things straight from the mouths of students...

Me: Hello, how are you?
Female Student: I feel bad.
Me: Why?
Female Student: My (points to stomach) hurting. So I go to hospital.
Me: What did the doctor say?
Female Student: He take my... (points to vein)
Me: Blood?
Female Student: Yes and my shit.

Ba-dump ching!

Me: Hi, what's new?
Female Student: This morning I take my friend to hospital.
Me: Why?
Female Student: She get abortion.

YIKES!

Me: (talking to students about TV viewing habits) When you were a child did your parents set any rules for watching TV?
Male Student 1: Yes I can't watch TV until finish homework, and I have to go bed at 8pm.
Me: (after making corrections) How about you? (to student 2)
Female Student 2: (speaking very clearly) My mother said don't watch porno.

To the point, Mom, good job.

Me: (while teaching a lesson about story telling) Can you tell me something interesting that happened to you recently?
Male Student: Yes I have a love story. (girls in class get swoony)
Me: Really? What happened?
Male Student: Yesterday I was riding on the train and the most beautiful girl get onto the train. She sat down across from me and she was very tired so she fell asleep and her legs open so can see up her skirt. I was in love.

A true romantic.

Me: (teaching a lesson about facial appearance, we get to the word 'piercing')Do you know this word?
Student: Yes
Me: (pointing to pictures of faces) Who has piercings?
Student: (she points to a picture of a young man) This man.
Me: How many does he have?
Student: He have 5.
Me: (correcting) He has 5.
Student: Yes he has 5.
Me: That's right.(noticing her earrings) How many do you have?
Student: Umm...(she starts to count and gets lost, then points to the left ear) One, two...(points to the right ear) three, four...(points to her nose) five...(and then her finger points past the belly button and down toward her nether regions. She then looks back up and proudly announces) Six! I has six!

...and change the subject!

Well not completely, the teachers can be just as strange at times. Have I ever told you how superstitious English teachers can be? No? That's because generally they're not but it seems no matter what school I teach at they always have some sort of "no-show" god or shrine that you thank when you get a free period because all of your students didn't show up for class. This is ours. Another strange thing around the office (besides my co-worker Kim) is this middle aged man who, from time to time, frequents the large mall area below our school. He can be spotted in a variety of bright colors from hot pink to lime green, wearing wigs and carrying baby dolls and always dressed like a young girl. One day after work I spotted him from behind and tried to sneak in for a shot. He was moving too quickly, so I thought, hell with it, I'm getting a picture. I tapped him on the shoulder and (in Japanese) asked if I could take his picture. Expecting the worst I was shocked when his eyes lit up and he ran to a nearby lighted pillar so I could capture him in the best lighting. He took out his fan, extended a leg and waited patiently while I took his photo. When it was done he shouted a bunch of elated yet completely unintelligible Japanese at me and took off on his merry way.

Let's see... what else is good and bad in the land of the rising sun...

Good: Eating ice cream with my business students after two periods of discussing the marketing strategies of Ben and Jerry's.

Bad: Beers that are too small.

Good: Melon Kit Kat

Bad: Butter and Salt flavored caramel.

Good: Beer flavored caramel.

Good: Cinnamon Pepsi

Bad: Suggestive store names.

Bad: Restaurants where you might get punched in the face.

Good: Finding out Batman lives in your neighborhood.

Bad: Bad vending machine concepts.

Good: Doing yet another show in Japan. This one was kicked off by some music, comedy and dancing in the first act and then followed up in the second act by our humble little improv group performing an unscripted version of Robin Hood with Butch as Sir Guy of Gisborn. David as the Sheriff and Friar Tuck. Genny as Maid Marian and the Bishop. And myself as Robin Hood, all the guys in the competition and the voice of Little John (played by Curtis who was MC for the night but hadn't been able to make it to any rehearsals, so I spoke while he lip synched his lines) The show was great, the audience was lively and I was bleeding from handcuffs before the night was done. I love this country! To see the Robin Hood pics, click here and scan forward.

Stayed tuned for another blog to come soon from Colleen about our anniversary trip to Sapporo and another from me about our first Japanese pro baseball experience.

Hugs and kicks, Carl.

I Feel the Earth Move Under My Feet

2006-06-19T08:35:00.002-07:00

Well it's not actually as dramatic as that. If you've been reading Colleen's blog, you will know that I've finally got another Japanese experience to cross off of my checklist. Earthquake: Done! It actually happened in another part of Japan, and it just so happened that I was awake at 5am, reading, when it hit the apartment. When I say hit what I mean is gently rocked the bedroom back and forth like a mother rocking her child to sleep. I was so excited I immediately jumped out of bed and tried phoning people to tell them about it. I mean it wasn't huge but it was a first and once you feel one it always feels like the ground is shaking if you stand still long enough. Or at least that's what the voices tell me. I wanted to know if anyone else felt it so the next day when I mentioned it at work I was greatly disappointed when I found that neither student nor fellow teacher had a clue what I was talking about. I guess they all must have been sleeping at 5am. Freaks. I was finally, however, validated that it wasn't my imagination when one student who is an assistant research director for a TV station confirmed my story. Yes indeed I had lived through the wussiest of all earthquakes.

On a completely unrelated note Colleen and I took another trip. This time we went to Koyasan (Mt. Koya) to see the home of Shingon Buddhism and spend a night in a temple. It seems it has fallen upon me these days to do the relating of all trips we take so instead of boring you with another prosaic story of a place full of temples and stuff I shall do it in verse so you may mock my pentameter.

Twas a celebration like almost no other
To celebrate 5 years of being stuck with each other
(first rhyme and I used the same word, nice start)
We headed off for holy peak
Two hour train ride and I had to take a leak
We then switched to a cable car and were on our way
Near a New York Jewish mother with far too much to say
(Oh my gawd, I can't believe this is happening to me you know I'm afraid of heights)
So one bus later we were at our hotel
Well it was actually a temple and the monks were the bell(boys)
(my dignity is starting to falter)
The room was quite nice with grass mats on the floor
We checked in then went out on the town to explore
With map in hand we had rain clouds to face us
Two shortcuts gone wrong and we had some dogs chase us
We finally figured out where the heck we were going
Seeing temples and monuments with no signs of slowing
The rain was coming down and we were sharing one umbrella
An old monk took pity and he gave me his umbrella
(Ok seriously what rhymes with umbrella that I could possibly use in this story, Goodfella? Mortadella? W.P. Kinsella? Anyhow, allow me to get back to the torture)
Heading back to our temple we were hungry as librarians(?)
for food made by monks who were all vegetarian
(seriously tons of food brought to our room and all of it veg.)
After dinner we tired and were barely awake
so I went to the baths where a monk saw me nake(d)
6am the next morning Colleen rose and she prayed
with the monks, not for me, no sir, in bed I stayed
(my ankle was killing me and I had no interest in kneeling on the floor for 40 minutes)
Another meal later we checked out without tarry
To walk down a path through a huge cemetery
Cremated remains under stones they were housed
They went on forever, over two hundred thous(and)
(shoot me now)
Ancient and moss covered, with trees as their neighbors
the path finally ended two kilometres later
We got to a point where photos were banned
and saw a huge building where inside it spanned
with thousand of lanterns kept alight every day
by the monks who lived there where they chanted and prayed
(hey I'm on a roll)
After that there were only two things left to see
So we left that old graveyard with its Buddhas and trees
We went to the gate with it's giant stone guards
Then a little stone statue where we prayed really hard
(for my ankle to get better and my own army of ninjas)
Then a bus, a cablecar and a train to go home
And a stop for some Mexican food....'cause I was really hungry
(AAAAUUUUUUUGGGGGGHHHH! One lousy rhyme away from true glory. Now I know how Eminem feels.)

Anyway that was our trip, only made slightly more difficult by the fact that my ankle is still healing and I was using a cane to get around. If you want to see all the pics from Koyasan click here. I also put up a picture or two of our Japanese family. Colleen and I were adopted by our friends Sanae and Chiaki and Chiaki's family who have made it their goal to make sure Colleen and I have tried every food Japan has to offer before we go home to Canada. We love them!

Cheers all, and if you are still talking to me after reading what I so loosely called a poem I will write again soon. Love and Laugh, Carl.

Out of Commission

2006-05-09T05:14:00.000-07:00

Usually I'm not in the habit of posting more than once a month but seeing as I have some sitting around time...why not? If you haven't read my last entry just scroll down a bit, lots of good picture links and stuff. It will also give you a bit of back story as to my current predicament.

I had decided to wait a day for the swelling to go down and it didn't. In fact it got a little worse, so on Friday (two days after the accident) I decided to go to the hospital. I phoned, Hiroko, my private student Koyuki's mother, to cancel my lesson for that day so I could go and see a doctor. She informed me that due to it being Golden Week, many hospitals would have altered hours, and she would make some calls and check for me. Well seeing as it took us forever to find a place when Colleen had to go to the hospital I accepted her offer. Twenty minutes later Hiroko called back to inform me that they found a place that was open and that her husband had the day off so they would come pick me up and take me there. Wow! Never underestimate the generosity of having native friends in Japan. Not only did they take me there but they waited with me, translated for the doctor, put he sock and shoe back on my good foot and took me home again after. The X-rays said that there were no broken bones but there was damaged ligament which would require healing time, a splint, crutches and "Please come back next week."

I went back to work the next day, my six minute walk to the station now being a twenty-five minute trek. Did I mention how much fun it is walking in the rain with two crutches when you can't hold an umbrella? And another thing... I thought I got stared at a lot before just for being a foreigner. You have no idea! Being a gaijin on crutches puts you into superstar celebrity status when it come to being stared at. Children, shopkeepers, housewives, dogs you name it, except when it comes to priority seating on the train. They have special seats on each car that are designated for expecting mothers (not me), people with children (not me), the elderly (mostly not me) and handicapped (me, both physically and sometimes mentally) with a little stick figure picture indicating each. Just like the Olympic event signs but these were for the ol'gimpics. Now don't get me wrong plenty of people have offered up their seats but just as many have not, in fact trying very hard to do the anti-stare while gazing fixedly at the floor. (this including a med student with his face buried in a medical book, studying joints and ligaments). Now don't really expect people to move, but it is difficult to maintain your balance on the wobbling trains when you can't bear down with both feet when the train lurches and you're holding two crutches and the train strap so you don't fall over. The best one I saw though while I was standing at the priority seats with a very old and shriveled lady standing beside me, the train stopped and a young business man got up from his seat. Before the old lady and I could even think of playing the politeness game of offering each other the seat repeatedly, another young business man jumped into the seat and immediately stared at his shoes so he wouldn't see everyone glaring at him. Believe me they were, but no one said anything. That would be rude.

Well now it's Tuesday here and the swelling was still huge when I woke up this morning and the bruising had spread to my toes over the weekend, so I opted for another trip to the hospital. Hiroko offered to join us again (this time by bicycle) and met us there where we waited much longer than last time. I finally got in, and the doctor who could speak some English looked at my foot and said that there was a lot of internal bleeding because the ligament was more damaged than they originally thought so in order to prevent it from taking months to heal I would have to be put in a cast for three weeks. WHAT? A cast for sprained ankle? Man do I know how to do it good! After the casting Hiroko had to leave immediately because her daughter's teacher was coming over to the house for a parent teacher interview at 1:30 in the afternoon. Eh? (Guess they don't do parent/teacher interview nights here.) Not feeling like walking anymore we decided to hop in cab, which can be daunting when you tell the driver where to take you, and then have to give him directions (in Japanese) how to even get to a major area (local train station) near the apartment. On more than a few occasions drivers have refused the trip because they didn't know the area we wanted to go. (they won't pull out a map) But out driver was determined and shut off the meter halfway through the trip, because he didn't have clue. We finally got home having exhausted a good portion of our Japanese speaking ability (migi=right hidari=left), and now after a long nap I am sitting here writing and feeling a tad sorry for my crippled self (Colleen left at 7pm for her 8pm-8am shift). Good thing there are vending machines everywhere.

Before I sign off, just a few more pictures to share. In the food and drink section of our photos I have included Fruit Parfait Kit Kat, Mild Bitter Kit Kat, an unusually named soft drink, and three beer related products. Count them...one...two...three. Also while walking by a children's clothing store recently I looked in the window and saw some little girls clothing with some rather foul English on it. I'm sure the owners have no idea of the meaning. In fact I'm not so sure that I do, considering the grammar.

Cheers to you all, take care, get well soon, Carl.

Missions Accomplished!

2006-05-03T22:02:00.000-07:00

Well it's time I wrote another entry. Every time I write another blog I always mention how long it's been since the last one and laziness usually figures in somewhere. Recently I have been working a lot of overtime and (believe it or not) exercising in the evenings when I have free time. So what has forced me to finally sit down and share some stories and photos? Massive ankle injury! Might be broken or torn, still to stubborn at the moment to go see the doctor, but I imagine a trip will soon be warranted. I was running and went to jump onto a curb when all of a sudden gravity decided to shift. Anyhow, alive and medicated I give to you....something.

When we came to Japan, we had some goals we wanted to achieve. Most of them involved traveling to certain places in Japan like Hiroshima, Okinawa, Kyoto and Mt. Fuji. If you have read our previous blogs you know we have checked those ones off of our list. Since our last blog we have accomplished a few more goals. We have paid off our credit cards (a feat unto itself), went on a trip to Tokyo (including the Disney resorts) and I have done acting in Japan. I teased with it at the end my last blog and at long last here is the story.

While walking through a shopping mall near work one day I was stopped by a large Australian man in bright clothing to ask if I wanted to see a comedy show in Kobe. He said he was an entertainer by the name of Butch Read (which he says sounds like a lesbian book club) who does some improvisation work here in Japan. I mentioned that I had done some improv work in my younger days, including my brief stint at the Loose Moose theatre. He told me that he had trained there as well, and it turned out that we knew a lot of the same people. He got my number and a few weeks later invited me to join an improv group he was assembling here in Osaka. He explained that we would train for a couple of months and then do a show in Kobe where we would square off against a team from Kobe. We began our rehearsals in, The Wild Bunch, a Japanese book shop that specializes in movie related books. It was also the name that we decided to call our intrepid bunch of Osakan improvisers. Butch would be our leader and teacher but not actually be on either team. The rest of the group consisted of Curtis, an ex-Hollywood stuntman from Albuquerque who got to call Charlise Theron a very bad word in her recent movie North Country. Kat, a young lady from Calgary who had no acting experience but did some highland dancing in her younger days. Genevieve a feisty redhead (is there any other kind) from New York who has studied in several countries around the world. And Jun a Japanese man with a decent grasp of the English language and a good sense of humor. We practiced and finally it came to show time, Jun had suddenly gone AWOL (nerves I imagine) and the four members of The Wild Bunch went to Kobe to compete. We were a little worried at first but once we saw the other team we were pretty confident of a victory (winning wasn't actually the aim of the night, the competition was just the format of the entertainment) as the other team was even less experienced and hadn't quite grasped the idea that they should at least look excited if they wanted the audience to do the same. Any how we played some games until we ran out of games that the other team knew how to play and then the audience declared The Wild Bunch as the evenings winners. YAY! We are now practicing for another show at the end of May this time our troupe seems to be rotating every rehearsal so no idea who will actually be performing. If you would like to see a video clip of some of the improv, send me an E-mail and I will pass it on to you.

In other news if you have read my lovely wife's blog (or the second paragraph of this entry)you have seen that we have been to Tokyo recently. She mostly talks about the ~~awesome~~ hotel we stayed in and at the end mentions some places we went with photo links. Allow me to give a little more detail on some of some of my favorite spots while trekking through Tokyo.

Akihabara: An area famous for being a technogeek heaven. Full of technology stores, adult toy shops (no not that kind you pervert, I'm talking about collectables that are meant to be looked at not played with)(mostly), and maid cafes where girls dressed like maids serve you drinks and food in the most subservient manner they can muster.

Roppongi: Party central, where you can find bars and restaurants to fit your every whim. We went to an English pub, a Chinese restaurant and a sports/celebrity bar.

Tsukiji Fish Market: We were up at 5:00am just to get there on time to see all of the action. It's amazing that there's any fish left in the ocean after seeing the amount of seafood that gets processed there daily. After wandering for a while we decided to have sushi for breakfast. Best I've ever eaten. It was so fresh you could almost feel it moving (I kid) and I even enjoyed the free appetizer (a small bowl of tiny raw fish with the heads still attached and a raw egg yolk poured on top)

Yebisu Beer Museum: We first tried to go on my birthday with Joe but arrived too late and ended up having drinks at a beer hall nearby. We were however not giving up, so on our last day we went back to the museum, saw the sights and then proceeded to sample several delicious beers.

Harajuku: Near the Meiji Shrine is an area where all of the hip, fashionable and just plain strange teenagers like to hang out. And Sunday is the best day to go because this is when they put on their ~~best~~ weirdest outfits and show off for each other and the hundreds of tourists who swarm the area to get pictures.

and last but not least...

Disneyland: I have been to Disney World in Florida but never Disneyland. From what I hear it's quite similar to California's version (except that C3PO speaks Japanese at StarTours) but I'm not sure if the crowds are the same. I like that you can get the advance passes now to go on rides without a huge line-up, but you can only get one every two hours which means at some point a one or two hour line for a ride is inevitable.

and...

DisneySea: This was amazing! Picture Disneyland but with an aquatic theme with lakes and rivers, much less children and they serve beer and cocktails in the restaurants. The whole entryway was designed to look like an Italian villa. There was the American Waterfront where we saw a Broadway review and an outdoor stage where people were lined up at 11:00am for the 7:30pm show (I have to hand it to Japanese people, they will tolerate lines for far longer than their North American counterpart). The Mermaid Lagoon which features Triton's Kingdom with lots of small rides for children and an amazing Little Mermaid stage show, done with lots of performers and wires. The Mysterious Island where we went on the 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea ride and Journey to the Center of the Earth. The Lost River Delta featured the rollercoaster Raging Spirits and the adventure ride Indiana Jones: Temple of the Crystal Skull. There was also the Arabian Coast which had some Aladdin themed shows, a two story carousel and an awesome restaurant where we ate many kinds of curry. In the evening, instead of a parade like Disneyland they do this huge water and fire show on the lake where a water spirit meets a fire spirit and they fall in love even though their relationship can never be (too sappy?).

We've posted a bunch of pics of everything, I didn't mention all of it because this blog is already an entire evening of reading but not to fear, almost all of the pictures have some sort of description to tell you the place or situation. Alas, however we got no pictures from when we were racially profiled at a train station and had to show passports and alien registration cards to the police (true story).

For all of the improv pics click here.
For the complete Tokyo collection click here.
For Disney click here.
and to see some new pics of funny signs click here and scan forward.

Now go rest your eyes, Carl.

A very Bishop adventure!

2006-02-28T09:04:00.000-08:00

Did I ever tell you about the time I almost died? Well forget it, that's between me and the robot. What I would like to tell you about, however, is what happens when too many Bishops are in Japan. No not the religious types, not too many Catholics on this island (although even here we still get Jehovah's Witnesses knocking at our door every month). No I mean the mother and father type Bishops. Way back at the end of November and the beginning December my folks decided to pay us a visit and spend a week in our tiny little apartment. Colleen had to work the day they arrived, so I was on my own picking them up at the airport. The 45 minute train ride there was okay but coming back with the two of them and all the suitcases during rush hour, jammed in with the businessmen was a little too much for them. Once we got close to the main hub of the city we left the station for the comfort of a taxi. After dumping the bags at the apartment we headed out to the very same restaurant that Colleen and I went to on our first night. I was going to make them guess what everything was like Colleen and I did, but I decided to be nice and order for them. After lots of eating and talking I took them back home. We didn't have to wait too long before Colleen came home from work, and after more hugging and chatting, they started to wind down. Seriously, it was like bed time hit and suddenly they were out.

The next day we took them to Osaka Castle, seeing as it's only a fifteen minute walk from the apartment. Then after that I forget what we did. Okay not really but I don't necessarily remember the order or exact times we did things, but here are a number of things we did:

Kyoto: A beautiful city not too far from where we live, that was once the capital of Japan (which isn't surprising as I think every city was the capitol here at some point). We were fortunate to have our good friends Chiaki and Sanae volunteer to take us around, show us the good stuff and help us to navigate the transit system for us. Seriously, we wouldn't have gotten half as much done without them. There were so many people in Kyoto that day because it was a Sunday in autumn when many people travel to Kyoto to take pictures of the changing leaves. We also saw lots of other cool things like the Golden Pavilion, a famous Kabuki theatre, Higashiyama Temple and a traditional Japanese wedding that was being held at Higashiyama near the giant pagoda. To look at all of our Kyoto pics click here.

Hiroshima: On a different day we went to visit the war museum in Hiroshima. It was absolutely amazing there just seeing the A-bomb dome, which was one of the only building right near the epicenter of the explosion that wasn't destroyed because the bomb exploded directly above pushing the building downwards instead of knocking it over. No sooner had we gotten off of the bus there, we were approached by a sweet old lady who asked us if she could pray for our happiness. Seriously, how do you say no to that? "No thanks, I've been planning all week to be miserable today, and I don't want anything spoiling it". So in turn we each bowed our heads while she said a silent prayer for us, and then sent us on out way. Near the dome is a beautiful park that is the home to several monuments and statues commemorating all of the lives lost, including a Children's Memorial that was having a ceremony with some school children that day. We then went into the museum, a building with so many pictures, artifacts, stories of survivors and remnants of the aftermath that we were absolutely overwhelmed by the enormity of it. Now at this point you would think that this would be a pretty damned depressing place. And it would have been if it hadn't been for a couple of men who had me laughing so hard I thought my head would explode from trying to hold it in. We had just gotten up to the second floor of the museum and were looking at some stories and graphs on the walls, when Colleen and I walked into a smaller side area to have a look. We had only been there a few seconds when we heard a strange noise. Both of us snapped around expecting my father to be the source, but we were surprised to see, or hear I should say, a Japanese businessman letting out a rather powerful fart. He stopped briefly and then let out a second barrage and then a third. Once he had finished his ten second serenade he casually walked away, as if he hadn't just blown a (smelly) hole in the back of his shorts. Now at this point I'm thinking, that's about the funniest thing I'm going to see all day (being in a war museum you can see how my assumption shouldn't have been too far off). Then, not ten minutes later we're in an area with a really creepy wax statue with melty skin (me and manequins...ick), and all of these remnants of things found in the rubble, when a middle aged man approaches a display to look at a metal bolt that had been warped by the heat. Not realizing there was a glass window in front of the display he bent forward rather quickly to get a closer view. The sound of his head ricocheting off of the glass window echoed through the room as he staggered backwards, his knees buckling under him. His friend raced over to catch him before he hit the floor. He tried to stand to regain his composure, but he had been hit too hard and again he staggered sideways almost taking out an old lady. I really don't remember a lot of the museum after that. I was crying, but not in the sad way. Can you blame me? Before heading back home we took a bus to the harbor and caught a ferry to Miyajima, the home of a very famous shrine that is located out on the water. We didn't get too many good pictures as it had already gotten dark by the time we got there but we did manage to manage to get some Momijumnaju (a soft maple flavored cream filled biscuit that is special to the area) and some Hiroshimiyaki (another local dish) flavored Carl (a snack bearing my name, see previous posts). To see all of our pictures from Hiroshima click here.

Lets see...what else did we do? We went to Nara and Kobe which Colleen and I have mentioned in previous blogs, however this time we were able to visit a different temple which held the oldest wooden buildings in the world. 1300 years old is not too shabby. We ate a lot of good food, rode on a lot of trains and went to a blues club to celebrate my dad's belated birthday. We had originally planned on going to Tokyo and Mt. Fuji as well but the constant walking for hours each day, the crush of people, and the hour long train rides had tuckered them out so we needed a few rest days in between adventuring. Besides, I found that when I pushed them too hard they started to get cranky. After a week or so we sent them on their way to Singapore, wishing they could stay yet at the same time wanting them to go. But that was mostly because after spending and hour or two a day on trains with my father after not having seen him for so long I discovered that he and I could very well be the same person born twenty years apart. Every time I was about to tell a joke or make a comment I found my father saying exactly what I was about to say. Not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing but I like to err on the side of caution. To see the rest of the pictures from the elder Bishops visit to Japan, click here.

Wow, I think I might have actually gotten caught up on all of our previous adventures. We added some new pics to old folders, some of them are pretty funny. Especially the signs and food folders. I had a company bowling party and put a few pictures of my co-workers in this folder. To read about our skating adventures please read my lovely wife Colleen's blog. And uh...yeah that's about it.

No wait, I joined an improv theatre group here in Japan. Provided my visa gets approved I'll be doing a couple of shows next month. We're called the "Wild Bunch", and as soon as I have some pictures of us in action I will send them along.

Cheers! Carl

The newest of years!

2006-01-27T02:33:00.000-08:00

Well I hope everyone is doing well in the new year. Have you broken all of your resolutions yet? My main goal until we come home is to spend more time studying Japanese. And to keep posting our stories regularly, but I've got some catching up to do.

This installation will be about our New Year celebration in Japan and our trip to Okinawa.

Let me tell you this about celebrating the new year in Japan. The idea is not to get together with friends on New Years Eve and drink yourself into a coma. Most people don't go to a bar or have house parties for their friends. This is a time to get together with your family and eat a ton of food. Houses often have grass decorations on the front door, with an orange placed in the center of it. The food that is eaten generally consists of a huge assortment of cold pre-prepared foods so that wives don't have to spend the day cooking. There are cold vegetables, cold egg dishes, cold tai (snapper) and dried fish, also cold. The best part however is mochi. These are small round rice cake that are traditionally eaten at new years. One of my student's mothers gave me a large bag of mochi to celebrate with at home. This generally comes in a very decorative display case (a round plastic two tiered shell with a cardboard stand). Well the clock had struck and Colleen and I decided to crack them open and dig in and boy were we disappointed. They were hard and crunchy and completely without flavor. We immediately asked ourselves. "Why on earth would they eat this stuff and why does everyone always say how much they love it?" Thinking that perhaps we had received a bad batch, we contacted our friends Chiaki and Sanae to see if they were supposed to be like this. Their reply was "Well how did you cook them?" Our answer was "You have to cook them?!" We soon found out that after applying a little heat they become soft and chewy and when sauce or flavors are added they are downright tasty. Chiaki invited the two of us to her house a few days after new years to eat a holiday meal of pre-mentioned cold foods and try mochi the right way. We had it in soup and with seaweed and found out that every year in Japan a handful of children and seniors die from eating it as it is very sticky and can get lodged in your throat. Deadly and delicious. My favorite kind of food. We then walked to a nearby temple to pray. Thanks to a new year TV commercial I had the routine memorized. Wash your hands, throw the coin, ring the bell, clap twice, bow twice, make a wish, clap again and finished! After that we got new years fortunes and went back to Chiaki's house for round two of the food. This time instead of cold food they put a large electric grill right on the living room table and proceeded to make takoyaki, then okinomiyaki, and finally yakisoba. By the time we left that night we could barely walk we were so full and we had many gifts to take home with us, which is a tradition I like here. If you go to someone's house bring a gift. If someone comes to your house send them home with stuff. Yay!

Now about Okinawa. We actually flew there at the beginning of November but I'm just getting to writing about it now because if you read the last blog I have mentioned that I am indeed lazy. I checked our travel book and it states that Okinawa is a prefecture comprising of more than a hundred sub-tropical islands stretching over 700km. With lush vegetation, gorgeous beaches and coral reefs it is a popular destination for many tourists and home to several American military bases. I however state that Okinawa was the location of Karate Kid II and it's freakin' sweet! The weather was about 25C the whole time we were there, but it was overcast most of the time. Still a cloudy warm day beats a cold sunny day hands down. We were there for four days and saw lots of cool stuff while we were there. Before we even hit the hotel we took a taxi to Okinawa castle. It wasn't as big as the castle in Osaka but the design was way different. Okinawa was it's own kingdom before the 1600's when it was conquered by the Japanese, so the castle is a combination of Japanese and Chinese design that (from what I remember) was also created in the 15th century. After that we headed back to the airport to take a really long bus ride to our hotel, which was great. We had an ocean view (well all of the rooms had an ocean view but that's no reason to not mention it) and there were a lot of hills and small mountains nearby. During our visit we spent some time at the beach, took a lot of long walks to enjoy the scenery and ate a lot of great food. We had Okinawa soba (a local variation on noodles) goya (a bitter melon often served in salad) and the occasional dish with Spam in it (Okinawans eat more Spam than any other area in Japan)(this might have to do with American military living on the island?) We also visited a huge aquarium at the Ocean Expo Park, which had both outdoor aquatic shows and plenty to see inside. Also at the park they had a traditional Okinawan village and an absolutely amazing place called the Dream Gardens. It was a series of indoor greenhouses and outdoor gardens where the amount and variety of plant life was stunning. Our cab ride back to the hotel was amusing as there was a very insistent cab driver who was desperate to get back to the other end of the island and wasn't going without a fare in his car. With the help of an interpreter and a little bargaining Colleen and I shared a cab back with a couple of Chinese tourists who were headed to the airport (and incidentally spoke really good English). And so after four glorious days of relaxing and sightseeing we headed back to the airport to return to our daily lives as mild mannered English teachers. In all the trip was really good. The only odd thing was that a lot of people in the shops and many of the hotel staff wore Hawaiian shirts, as if they were competing in a "Who's the coolest vacation destination?" contest. Then again I don't know what an Okinawan shirt looks like so maybe it's the norm. To see the pictures of all of the flora and fauna (does that sound fruity?) from the Dream Garden and a few other places in Japan, click here. For the rest of our Okinawa pics, click here.

Sayonara, Carl.

Time flies when you're lazy

2005-12-25T01:41:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas to all of you in Canada. Hope your day is going well and that Santa brought you everything you wanted. Christmas is a little different here. It's more of a lovers day, somewhat like Valentines Day. They still decorate and play the music in the shopping malls, but no one gets the day off and most children think Santa is a merchandising mascot. Most people don't even know the purpose of celebrating Christmas, in fact I saw the greatest of all Christmas decorations gone wrong just the other day in a department store. They had a large Santa Clause nailed to a cross, big smile on his face and a sign reading Happy Merry Christmas. Yikes!

I thought there had been a lot of time between my last two posts, but when people start asking if you're still alive, I guess it's time to update. We are indeed still alive. And the reason it's been so long since the last post has nothing to do with the fact that we haven't been doing anything. It does however have everything to do with the fact that I am lazy and kept putting off organizing and uploading all of our photos. I realize that it is possible to post a blog without new photos, but I always feel like I am cheating you out of sharing the view. We have actually done several things in the last three months but I will not dump them on you all at the same time. That would require an hour of reading and viewing at the computer and quite frankly it's Christmas season and no one has the time or patience for that.

Lets start with October. A couple of weeks before Halloween, in honour of Colleen's big 3-0, we decided to take our first trip to Kobe. It's only about 30 minutes from the apartment by train, but so are many cities around here. Kobe is well known for many things, some of which are edible, others are just for looking at. Here is a short breakdown.

Kobe pudding: A slightly expensive dessert, that can be purchased in many shops in Kobe and in other cities, but always with the label "Kobe Pudding". To an experienced baker like me it is simply Creme Caramel.

Kobe beef: If you thought steak was expensive where you live you haven't seen this beef. A few thin (3-4mm) strips of this very fatty, heavily marbled beef at your average grocery store will set you back about $30 Canadian. Rumor has it that the cows are beer fed and massaged to produce the tenderest, most flavorful beef money can buy. Makes me wish I was a Kobe cow.

Chinatown: Kobe has one of the biggest Chinatowns in Japan. I am not well versed in the Chinese districts in other areas of Japan so I am not sure whether this fact is valid. I only go on rumor and heresy. We saw it. It's big.

Kobe Earthquake Museum: Not so much a museum as an outdoor display of photos and facts about the enormous earthquake that struck the area in 1995, crippling the harbor area and destroying many buildings and overpasses. It was one of the biggest on record. I think. They have kept some of the damaged area intact so visitors can look at it and go "Holy crap!".

There are many other things to see and eat in Kobe but the weather was lousy the day we went so our outdoor time was limited. We have been back a couple of times since the first trip but didn't take any more photos, seeing as one trip was a repeat of what we had already done and seen, but with my parents (read all about it in an upcoming blog). The other trip was a visit to Costco. Yes that's right. Costco in Japan. I was already feeling closer to home on that trip seeing as Kobe is a more westernized city and many people comment on how, in some areas, in resembles Toronto. When we walked into Costco? I was home. Almost everything was in English, the products were all American, and in glorious jumbo sizes. The prices weren't too bad either and the jumbo Costco muffins brought a little tear of familiarity to my eye. Also in true Costco fashion, every ten steps there was food to be sampled. Yeehaw! Or as they say in Japan "Godzilla!"

Anyhow that's enough for this week, if you want to check out all of our Kobe pics click here. Stay tuned for the New Years edition of the blog where I will extol the virtues of our 4 day trip to the sub-tropical island of Okinawa.

Until then Happy Holidays! Love Carl.

Oh yeah one more thing, here's a picture of my private students with all of the swag my parents brought for them from Canada. I present to you Koyuki, Kento and Ryo.

The Wonderful World of Carl

2005-09-23T03:49:00.000-07:00

Wow, I just realized I haven't sent out a post since the beginning of August. Alrighty, well do I ever have lots to tell. The title of this post is not an ego trip, I swear. It's just that a while back I was discussing snack food in class, and many students informed me that their favorite snack food was Carl. Thinking this was a joke I kind of passed it off, but they insisted it was true, and told me how to find it. It doesn't actually say Carl on the bag, but the Japanese name is the phonetic translation of my name. In Japanese it looks like this. カール. I hope it displays right on your computer. After that I tried to find as many kinds of Carl as I could and these are the results. Plain and Cheesy Carl. BBQ and Oniony Carl. Curry and Salty Carl.

I guess management is happy with my performance at work. I have received a lot of extra training, so I have more responsibilities than some of the teachers who have been there longer than myself. I also just got my 6 month performance evaluation back and it was pretty glowing so they're going to let me stay. It's an easy job though so I take the praise with a grain of salt. From what I hear you've got to be amazingly stupid to get fired. I got a lot of overtime in September which added up to a lot of extra cash, so I bought a second-hand PS2 to maintain my video game addiction, and to use it for watching all the DVDs that Andrew sent me .We also bought a very cheap Japanese DVD player so we had more options at the video store.

Let's see what else has happened. I got an agent so I can try acting in Japan. No work so far. I've also picked up a couple of private students, so I am teaching in their homes. It's a little bit different though as they are children and their level of English varies. One girl I teach is six years old and uses "like, you know" in her sentences. She's better than 50% of my adult students at Nova. The most amazing of all of the events that have happened since my last post, however, is that we climbed Mt. Fuji, or Fujisan as they call it here. Not to be confused with Mr. Fuji the WWF wrestling manager from the 80's.

If you have read any posts by my friend Joe, whom some of you know and some of you don't. He climbed Fuji in July. His experience was a bit different as he went with friends form work, and some co-workers of one of his students. We decided to climb out of season (climbing season ends sometime in August) and went with a tour group. So it was far less crowded on the mountain, however no one in our group spoke English, including our guide. This made for an interesting trip. Before the trip we made sure we were well prepared, we borrowed some jackets and a backpack for Colleen, I made a couple of containers of trail mix (which you can't buy ready-made here) and we stocked up with liquid and chocolate bars. It made for heavier backpacks but we didn't want to be caught unaware. We had to be at the motor pool at 7:50 and seeing as Colleen and I usually go to bed very late, we decided "Hey, lets just stay up! We'll sleep on the bus!" Bad idea. We knew it was a four hour trip there so we figured that was plenty of time to rest up, and it would have been. Our tour guide had other ideas however. First we had to go to Kyoto to pick up more passengers, and then we had a rest stop, then a lunch break, then another rest stop, and finally I believe there was one more rest stop in there before we finally made it to the mountain. And each stop was punctuated by a good 10-15 minutes of instructions from our tour guide, none of which we understood. So in short, when we got to the mountain, we had been awake for more than 24 hours. We arrived at the 5th station of Mt. Fuji in the bus, which seems like cheating because it's halfway up the mountain, but I guess that's how it's done. Once we got inside, we were all directed into a changing area, where other members of our group started changing into expensive climbing gear, headmounted flashlights, spiked boots, oxygen masks and climbing picks. This was the point at which Colleen and I went "Oh S**t!" Thinking we were completely underprepared. This proved to be unfounded though as we had heard from Joe that many locals have a tendency to overestimate the mountain and it was true. Oxygen? It was cold and highly elevated but no more than a cold fall day in Calgary. Anyhow, the changing was done, and we all sat down together to cram in a huge (by Japanese standards) carb filled meal. After the meal we were herded outside to the gathering area to meet our climbing guide. I swear this guy must have been 70, and he was standing there smoking. Once introduced he started barking at us in a rough gravelly voice, which we quickly learned (by watching the others) was instructions for stretching. Okay, nothing too vigorous, we finished and then he proceeded to give us a good twenty minutes of instructions about safety and technique. I'm just guessing here 'cause again, we didn't pick up a word except "toilet". Finally the talking was done, it was time for action. We were heading to the path up the mountain, at 6:00 pm. That's right, we were starting just as the sun was settings. We were climbing the entire way, up the mountain, in the dark.

Alright, that's enough typing for me. To find out if we survived click here, where Colleen will take over the rest of the story. For the pictures click here.

Star Wars and other random musings.

2005-08-06T07:33:00.000-07:00

Colleen and I seem to go through these phases. One of us will be stricken with the writing bug and want to write about everything, while the other one will feel like they've gone to the well and drew up a bucket of sand. This time it was my turn to feel the block. My last blog left us at the Aichi World Expo. We had spent the day with Joe and Leanne and decided it (the Expo) wasn't fun enough for a second day. Colleen's last three blogs have been about the weekend after that. Canada Day, Universal Studios and touring around Osaka City. If you haven't read them yet, I recommend you go here, and check out the last three entries. As for myself, I'm going to talk about all of the other things that have happened.

In the month of May, Canada, the United States and much of the rest of the world was given the opportunity to see a much anticipated movie, that was recognized as the end of a era of science fiction storytelling. Star Wars episode 3: Revenge of the Sith. For some unknown reason, this particular movie was slated to enter the Japanese theatres two whole months after it's initial release to the rest of the world. Again I repeat "unknown reason" because several other movies, such as Batman Begins and War of the Worlds came to the theatres here at the same time as they did in America, well ahead of the Star Wars release. Never the less, we were undaunted, and on July 10th, the day after it was released in Japan (and on the day of our first wedding anniversary) we saw the last (?) Star Wars movie. What you didn't get in North America, however, is the same toys we got in Japan. We all know that for as long as Star Wars has been around it has been a money making franchise the likes of which only my friend Jeremy's basement can attest to. But for the very first time ever, I will have one Star Wars collection that even Jeremy could not achieve. When you match the collectible crazy culture of Japan with an enterprise like Star Wars, you get the Final Star Wars Bottle Top Collection. If you have looked at my toy collection in the blogs before you will have seen my Super Mario bottle top collection. They came in little cellophane bags attached to the neck of the bottle. Each one a mystery as to it's contents, and entirely impossible in Canada because people would just steal them. Well there were 30 Super Mario bottle tops and we got all of them. The Star Wars set, however, had 60 and we have 43 of them so far and two of the bag clips that come with the 1.5 litre bottle. Behold our collection, to date. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. (ten points to Jeremy if he can identify all characters)

I have added one picture to the food and drink section because for one week they were selling SpriteX here, and then it just disappeared. I have also added some photos of the festivals that we never get to see, because of our work schedules, but just so happened to be visible from our apartment. There was the Tenjin Matsuri festival, and a bunch of other festivals so close together we couldn't really tell one from the other, but we got pictures from the balcony to prove it. These two pictures (1 & 2), for example, were taken early one morning when these wagons that were either carried or pulled were traveling around the neighborhood, with lots of banging drums and ringing bells. The one in the picture stopped several times at the cemetery across from our apartment building, and continued on through the streets well into the night, and for the entire weekend. Just last night there was a huge hour long fireworks show that we could see from the apartment. Not well, mind you, but if you want to see the pictures click here. (Disclaimer: They're really bad pictures.)

Traveling shrines are not the only thing waking us up in the morning these days though. I have mention crows before, but these days they seem to pale in comparison. On any given morning you can be woken up by Nationalist Party trucks with people singing and shouting into loudspeakers, electronics recycler trucks with people shouting into loudspeakers, salesmen in trucks shouting into loudspeakers and Jehoavas Witnesses ringing our doorbell (without loudspeakers). The worst, however is the cicadas. Large winged insects with neither the need for loudspeakers or trucks. They are the crickets giant nasty brother, and when captured in nets by the neighborhood children they make a noise not unlike cats being tortured. After a recent rainstorm I found a couple that had fallen from trees, and took pictures. If you aren't squeamish about insects click here and here. Keep in mind those things are the size of my thumb.

Lastly, on my trips through the neighborhood, I have noticed a lot of the cars don't have the same kind of names as the ones back home. Don't get me wrong you still see the station wagons, Mazdas, Lexus and such but the dimensions don't seem the same. They are shorter and narrower (and of course the steering wheel is on the other side) but here are a few of the ones that seemed a little different to me.

I know I started the last paragraph with "lastly" but there is one more thing. In Colleen's blog she brought up a mythical creature that many of you have never heard of, but soon after reading this you will no longer be able to forget. I'm talking about...the Lepricorn. It started in a shopping center as a conversation with Joe and Leanne, and I believe I had slipped into a really bad Irish accent as I am prone to doing. Leanne looked at me, and in one sentence, had the rest of us on our knees laughing. "What are you some kind of Lepricorn or something?". Now I've heard of leprechauns and I've heard of Unicorns, but the idea of a little beer fueled half Irish midget half horse with a horn appendage was too much to handle. People stared at us as we laughed out loud trying to imagine what he might say. "Have you noticed I'm horny?" Or "Would you like to kiss me blarny stones, they're magically delicious?" and our favorite. "Did I mention I'm hung like a horse?" Perhaps in a future blog I will include an artists rendition of the Lepricorn. It just might be the first mythical creature created by a slip of the tongue. Anyhow, that's my time, I'm outta here.

Sayonara. Mata ashita. Carl.

A Familiar Face in a Foreign Place

2005-06-29T04:26:00.000-07:00

I know we haven't posted in a while but we decided to wait until we had some good pics to post, and well...DO WE EVER! I got tons of new pics, and lots of stories to tell, but where do I start? I know, how about Sunday, June 26th. That's the day we got up at 4:30 in the morning. We would have gotten up at 5:30, but since we went to bed at 3:00, I was a little groggy when I set the alarm. We didn't realize our mistake (Did I say our? I meant my mistake. Ow! Let go!) until we were already dressed and awake. So with one and a half hours of sleep under ours collective belts, we headed out to catch a few trains and then a shinkansen (really fast train aka the bullet train). After an hour or so of riding the rails we disembarked in Nagoya. Why Nagoya you ask? Cause that's where we met......wait for it......Joe and Leanne! YAY! We've been here for three and half months, and you have no idea how awesome it was to see a familiar face. After all the hugs were finished, we caught a cab to our Ryokan (traditional Japanese hotel) so we could drop off a few bags and grab a subway to AICHI! Do you like my dramatic use of capital letters so far? When ever I read capitalized letters I like to SHOUT them out. Which I suggest you do as well. Especially if you are reading this at work. SHEEP ARE FUN!

Why Aichi you say? Well they have this little thing going on here called The World Expo. Expensive to get there. Expensive to get in. Expensive to buy anything, but it was well worth it to hang out with some friends and see some cool stuff. There were thousands of people there, and you pretty much had to wait an hour to see just about anything. We decided to do the world pavilions first seeing as the lines were fairly short. We diplomatically decided the UN was the first pavilion to see. Then we saw several others including, Mexico, Peru, India, Tibet, USA, Saudi Arabia, Argentina, several others I can't remember and...oh yeah, Canada. So we're at the Canadian pavilion standing in line, waiting, when one of the staff (who is walking around with a TV screen mounted over her head (attached to a backpack (is it OK to put brackets inside other brackets?) ) showing images of Canada) comes walking over to us and says "Hi, where are you from?". "Canada" we say in unison. "Why are you standing in line?" she says. "That's what we do." I say. "Didn't anyone tell you you don't have to stand in line at your own pavilion?" At which point we stared at each other in awe. With the exception of Leanne, the rest of us were not accustomed to being given special treatment just for being Canadian. We were ushered past the line, into the theatre area and given special AICHI EXPO CANADA pins. They weren't even selling them there. They called us "easy access Canadians" and then we watched the show which, while not really informative, was visually spectacular. It was the best visual presentation of all of the pavilions we saw, and it was one of very few pavilions that wasn't selling cheesy souvenirs near the exit.
After seeing the world, we decided to see some of the technology displays. I LIKE GUM!

We really wanted to get in to see the Toyota pavilion, because they had an enormous robotics display, but every time we looked the line was a minimum of two hours. So we decided for a couple of one hour lines instead. One of them was the Waterworks show where we watched some guy dressed like a mad scientist doing some tricks we have all seen before at the Science Center. The only thing that made it a little exciting was that we wore 3-D glasses because all of the walls on the set were shot with 3-D projectors. Otherwise? Not worth the wait. Then we decided on another hour long line to see the fire show at the Gas Pavilion. A man on stage talking to characters on TV screens while he did some really bad magic tricks and then a lot of gas jets bursting flames all over the stage. We kept hoping one of them would hit the magician. Except for Leanne, she had fallen asleep. After leaving that debacle, we debated warning the others in line, but eventually decided we needed some redemption so we headed for the Japan pavilion. We had heard it was quite good and boasted some excellent sights, including a complete 360 degree theatre. We got to the pavilion and the sign said there was a 70 minute wait to get on. After some discussion the girls decided to wait in line while Joe and I went to get food. Just as we stepped out of line, one of the Expo staff members spotted our shiny new pins and beckoned us over to him. He asked where we were from (in pretty good english), if we wanted to see the Japan pavilion, and then he told us to call our friends (Colleen and Leanne) over. They were a bit confused, but when they reached us the staff member reached into his vest and pulled out four reservation tickets, which allowed us to jump the line and get in immediately. YAY! Once we got in we realized that even if we had waited for an hour it would have been worth it. There were so many cool things to see, and the 360 theatre was even better than expected. It was a bridge that went through the middle of this giant spherical room (kind of like X-men's Cerebro, for all you geeks out there). Once the doors were closed the show started. It was amazing. First it looked like we were floating just above the clouds inside the earth's atmosphere, then we descended through the clouds and saw birds going by us. We headed towards the ocean and then went under the water and headed down and down, watching fish swim by. Eventually the water started to change and then we were in outer space, flying through the stars towards earth, until finally we stopped right where we started, hovering in the atmosphere. The whole time it totally felt like were actually moving, because it completely filled your entire range of vision no matter where you looked (except when you looked at the bridge, but there were glass floor panels). Once we left the theatre we headed down a ramp into a huge area that felt like we were bugs in big back yard. They had a fish tank there where there were tropical fish and fresh water fish in the same tank. They used these microbubbles of oxygen in the water that allowed both types of fish to breath. Very cool! Oh man there's still so much to talk about, and I feel like this blog has gone on way too long already. So to sum up the rest, giant ice cream, bio-lung (a giant oxygen producing ecosystem thingy), wooly mammoth bones, more ferris wheels for Colleen and more tourists (local) than you'll ever want know. Except these guys. To check out all of the pics from the trip click here.

The only other new pictures I have added are in the food section (more Kit Kat), and the toys page (more Mario toys). That's all for now, but Canada Day is coming up and we plan on partying up with Joe and Leanne and spending some time at Universal Studios Osaka. We will have more pictures to send out for next week. Until then, have fun and have a great CANADA DAY!

Okay I'm done, Carl.

Jellyfish, Whales and Rays...Oh My!

2005-05-28T08:16:00.000-07:00

After reading through my past blogs, I have noticed quite a bit of social commentary thrown in. Not that that's a bad thing, seeing as being in a different country is socially....different? Ninjas and samurai constantly trying to kill us, and don't get me started on Godzilla. You thought cleaning up after horses was bad. This time however, I just want to write about some of the cool stuff that we have seen since my last entry. If you have read any of the past entries, you may have noticed that we have been on quite a few Ferris Wheels. Not by chance really, either. I have discovered that my wife really likes Ferris Wheels, and last week when we were at the harbor, we hit the mothership. Mothership? Motherload? Mother Hubbard? I can never remember. Anyhow. Dubbing itself as the one of the biggest Ferris Wheels in the World it looms over the entire harbor. One of? Say what you want, this thing was monstrous. Have a look here, here and here and tell me what you think. We also got some shots from the wheel, and as you can see in the next eight pics, it goes quite high.

One Two Three Four Five Six Seven Eight

We also found the Harbor Mall, which claims to be Japan's first culinary mall. While it was a very cool mall, I can say with some authority that it was just a two story mall. First floor: Food Court. Second Floor: Shopping. Some great shops but the food was nothing special, and they had without a doubt, hands down, all contenders must surrender, the worst children's play area ever! We took a few pics outside the mall as well. A 1/3 replica of the Santa Maria, a cool view of the horizon and a shot of the Suntory museum. See if you can find Colleen in the pic.

The best part of the day though, was definitely the Kaiyukan Aquarium. We got some great pics while we were there, though I will admit it is way hard to take photos through 32cm thick glass. It would have been easier if I had just jumped into the water, but I suddenly started having Star Trek IV flashbacks, and I had no intention of telling them that Gracie was pregnant. (Mea culpa to the non geeks reading this) There was tons of stuff to see there, like frog enclosures (where these two wouldn't stop frolicking), jellyfish tanks (tons of pics of those) and giant spider crabs (quite easily the creepiest things I have ever seen)(besides French clown dolls), but the main attraction at the aquarium was the whale shark (many pics) and the giant ray who just couldn't stop doing loops through the bubbles ("The Bubbles!"). To see all the pics, click on the Aquarium link in the bar at the right. What the f.....sorry, just saw Bruce Willis doing a car commercial. Ahh Japan, where commercials aren't seen as a step down, but a status symbol of continuing celebrity. Back to the Aquarium. We also added a few pics from the gift shop into the food and drink folder, as they had some strange snacks amongst the overpriced souvenirs. Here, here and here. All in all, a pretty eventful day.

I hope everyone is doing well, please don't hesitate to send E-mails, as we get a little lonely from time to time. Oh yeah, I almost forgot, there was a toy shop in the mall and I found a few more Nintendo toys. (I know, I know, boys will be boys). Hope to talk to you all soon.

Love and Laugh, Carl.

Where do they get those wonderful toys?!?

2005-05-14T22:46:00.000-07:00

As a man who has always loved toys, Japan is definitely the place to be. There is no end to the amount of knick-knacks and trinkets available everywhere. On many bottles of Coke and Pepsi there are small bags attached to the neck, filled with collectible toys. Something you simply couldn't do back home as people would just take the toys off the bottle and steal them. So far I have about half of the collection of Super Mario toys from Pepsi. They are these little bottle tops that look like 3-D replicas of the 2-D pixel characters from the video game. Coca-cola has little anime figures attached to their bottles, and we are only missing 5 of those. Which says two things. I am a habitual collector and I drink too much cola.

We have also discovered Yodobashi Camera. It is a stadium sized technology store, near where I work, with enough stuff in it to make a grown man cry. I had no idea so many cool things could legally be stored in one place, without risking peoples heads exploding. Huge high definition TV's, plasma screens, giant wide-screen computer monitors, home printing stations (that copy, scan, and can print photos), water proof cases for transforming any camera into an underwater camera, toilet seats with temperature controls and bidet function, Winnie the Pooh waffle irons, portable DVD players....ahhh! Too much stuff to mention and I haven't gotten to my favorite floor. The sixth floor. This is where you find the toys and video games. It is quite simply awe inspiring. Even Colleen was initially stunned just trying to take it all in.

The range of toys really was quite huge. Star Wars, Power Man, Godzilla, Studio Ghibli (figures from Miyazaki films), McFarlane Toys, Steam Boy, Anpan Man, Hello Kitty and thousands of other Japanese anime toys based on series I have never heard of. They had an entire aisle full of figurines of cute Japanese cartoon females wearing bikinis, lingerie or just skin tight outfits. They had a huge display of Ipets. A robot dog that works like an Ipod but it dances to the music it plays and demands your attention. You feed it with songs. Weird. They also had large screens set up where you could play all of the latest video games on the newest game machines. Oh, and did I mention guns? Along with the incredible collection of models of everything you can imagine, they had a huge locked display case of realistic looking guns, that feel just like the real thing. Same weight, same look, they just don't fire anything, or if they do it's just BBs. They just don't have gun crime here, so no one cares about how real they look. The Police don't even carry guns here. Colleen finally managed to drag me out but not without a few toys. I picked up some Twisted Land of Oz figurines. They are Wizard of Oz figures but with a much more gruesome twist on the story. Click to see the Wizard, the Tin Man and the Scarecrow.

Last week Colleen posted some pictures of where she works and some people asked where my pics were, so here they are. I have also added some photos that we have taken while out and about. Some of them from the Namba district, which is where Colleen works. We went on another Ferris Wheel. There are also a few new pictures in the signs section. This is my favorite so far. Bad grammar, bad photo editing. Also check out the Garbage trucks here. They are so tiny. If you haven't read Colleen's blog about the garbage men yet, I recommend it.

I have only one more old journal entry to add. It's from April 11th, and here it is.

April 11

Mostly uneventful day except for getting my hair cut today. I tried to get "real short on the sides and in the back, just a trim on top, I usually kind of mess it up, a little spiky", but what I got was an exact replica of a hair cut I found in one of their books that was as close as I could get to what I wanted. Okay I guess, but it is a little humbling when the best you do is point and grunt, and hope that the hairdresser doesn't plan on dying your hair the same color as the sharp looking Japanese man in the picture you pointed to. Expensive haircut but they massaged my head, cleaned my ears and the hairdresser held the door for me when I left.

Work was nothing special but I have started to notice that in Japan there are duplicates of people I know back home. I mentioned this in the staff room and suddenly all of the other teachers chimed with similar sentiments. They had all met the Japanese version of someone they knew back home. For example twice now I have had this one student who is a Japanese ringer for my friend J.D. He has the same face, the same mannerisms and he is always wearing a baseball cap whenever I teach him. I also had Erin Maddill's clone today, flighty young highschool girl who loves to talk, play music and can't live without her cell phone because she "gets lonely a lot and needs attention from her friends" as she put it. Same smile, same gestures. Scary!

End transmition.

All Work and No Play Makes Carl.....something....something.

2005-05-06T08:34:00.000-07:00

After reading Colleen's blog about work and whatnot I decided to follow suit with my own version of working in Japan. As opposed to the regular grind I had back in Calgary, (which consisted of 40 or so hours a week working and sleeping so rarely that when my head hit the pillow I would instantly pass out) things are rather different now. I work Monday to Thursday 5:00pm-9:00pm. That's right, a whopping four hours in which I teach five 40 minute classes. Then, get this, on Saturday I have to work eight whole hours in a row from 1:20pm to 9:00pm. For the first time in ten years I am getting eight or more hours of sleep a day, and...wait for it... I have been reading books too! In fact, if you look in that little bar on the right hand side of the page, I have even included a list of books that I have read while in Japan, as well as a list of the movies I have seen here, after all I am still Carl.

(Sidenote: Watching movies is somewhat challenging here. Going to the theatre costs about $20 Canadian per ticket and even then they are about 2-3 months behind North America. That's right, while the whole world is watching Star Wars on May 19th, Japan is the last country to get it in the theatres. Sometime in July I think! So our options are; renting movies, which also have the 2-3 month delay or watching them on tv on Friday and Sunday nights. These are the nights that English movies can regularly be found at 9pm. There is no guarantee that they will be good movies though, as I have mentiones in my previous post.)

Back to work. I have settled in quite nicely after an initially rough start (I was two hours late for my very first training shift. Schedule mix up. But, beleive it or not, I have not been late once since then). At Colleen's school all student files and text books are on the computers. At my school all files and text books are on shelves and there are constantly missing files, misfiled files or other teachers have the files that you need. At Colleen's school they have a break room on every floor. At my school we have one floor, and the break room is the same room as the file room, so while you are running helter-skelter between classes you are diving over people trying to heat up their leftovers. What I mean by "helter-skelter" is that we have ten minutes between each class to grade and write constructive comments on 1-4 students, then find the files for your next 1-4 students, review their past lessons, comments and personal files (age, interests), and then choose a lesson for them. Ten minutes can be a very short time. The students have a varying degree of skill ranging from level 7C to level 2 (it is assumed that if you reach level one you don't need lessons anymore, so we have no level one). Here is an actual conversation with a level 7C student.

Carl: (very slowly) Hello, my name is Carl. What's your name?

7C student: What your name.

Carl: No, no. (gesturing) I'm Carl. Who are you?

7C: Who are you.

Carl: (now writing my name on paper and pointing) Carl...me. You...?

7C: (now nodding) I Carl.

Carl: (pointing again at my name) CARL...(gesturing) This is me. (pointing at their file) You are Emiko.

7C: (now smiling in recognition) You are Emiko.

At which point I dive through the window and plummet 24 stories to my death. No, not really. I grit my teeth and continue. But to show the difference, here is an actuall conversation with a level 2 student.

Carl: Hello, how are you doing today?

2: Very well thank you. And you?

Carl: Pretty good. My name is Carl...

2: Nice to meet you Carl where are you from?

Carl: I'm from Canada...

2: Oh really, which part?

Carl: uh, Calgary...

2: Very nice, you hosted the Winter Olympics in 1988. Look before we get started I have a question. I was watching television and a McDonald's commercial, which I have seen many times now, appeared using the phrase "I'm Loving It". Have you seen this commercial?

Carl: Yes actually, we have almost the same commercials in Canada.

2: And they say "I'm loving it"?

Carl: Yes...

2: Really! I just assumed that they were Japanese made commercials because the english grammar was so bad. I thought that "love" couldn't be used as a progressive verb.

Carl: Well...it...uh (damn it where's Colleen the English major when I need her)

So you can see I teach a myriad of different students. Anyhow this blog has gone on far too long and I am still wanting to attach an old entry. This one is from April 10th when we went to see Sumo wrestling.

April 10

I've been meaning for some time to do a journally type thing of my daily event, but I was hoping to get internet first so I could download a better program than wordpad. No such luck yet, and I have done too many things already to not write them down.

Today we went to our very first live Sumo wrestling event. It just so happens that one of the big tournaments that they do every year is at Osaka Park, which is just fifteen minutes by foot from where we live. We got up early (9am for us) and dressed and walked down to see if there were Fukyu (cheap seats) tickets left, and as luck would have it there was. So for about 1000 yen (ten bucks) each we saw Sumo. There were two tournaments but we missed most of the first one because we were busy standing in line so we could get our picture taken with Sumo wrestlers. They are very big. and no not all of them are Japanese. In fact in the main tournament, when there was just four guys left, it was down to Asashoryu, who is the only current Yokozuna (highest rank for Sumo) and is from Mongolia. Ama, who at 113 kg was the smallest wrestler in the tourney (he beat four guys to get to the semi-finals, including Miyabiyama who outweighed him by over 150 lbs.) and is also Mongolian. Kyokushuzan, also Mongolian. And Kokkai, who won the tournament and 3,000,000 yen, is from Georgia (not USA, the formerly Russian kind of Georgia). Very cool.

After we came home and managed to catch The Mummy 2 on tv. We find about 2 or 3 American movies on tv a week, which is nice because anything that you can understand is better than nothing. They don't do a lot of dubbing here, mostly subtitles. even some of the Japanese programming has subtitles. Probably for the hearing impaired, or just those who like to read their movies I guess.

Cool, Carl out. Of my mind. For now. Bye.

Television: The Americans Have Nothing on These Guys

2005-04-23T10:22:00.000-07:00

The reason I have decided to write this post about television is because it is something near and dear to me, as well as the fact that it was all Colleen and I had to do in our first few days here before we started teaching. They gave us four days off before we had to start training and while we wandered on our various errands during the day, the nights were filled with the endless miasma of Japanese television. Every once in a while we will catch an American movie, which is subtitled in Japanese and not dubbed, as they prefer to read their movies here. (I can only glean this from the fact that even some of their own shows are subtitled, or that we were watching Korean soap operas and just can't tell the difference yet). However they are rarely good movies (ie. Moon 44, The One, The Watcher, Under siege).

Perhaps it is because I don't understand Japanese or the fact that we just have the basic twelve channels here, but there seems to very little predictability at all as far as what to expect on each channel, except that channel one is all Shopping Network all the time, and there is nothing that they don't sell. The other channels play a variety of shows, some of which I understand the concept (like "group of random local comics making random audience members laugh", or "giant celebrity/celebrity sound-alike karaoke/gameshow contest where losers are doused with water or flour"), however these shows appear to be one time specials and then are never seen again. The one show we now know is Monkey Host Quiz Show. I'm sure that's not what the actual title is, but every Monday night at midnight there is this wordplay quizshow with Japanese celebrities (we can only assume their celebrity status as these people seem to appear on every show and on every channel). The strange thing about this show is not the clever wordplay combining Japanese symbols and the uses of their sounds and sometimes different meanings as English words, but the fact that the two hosts of the show are dressed in full costume and make-up to look like Planet of the Apes monkeys ( the blonde ones). WHY?!? There are also a huge amount of panel shows, where there will be one or two hosts and about ten people (see local celebrities) who's only job is to throw in humorous bits of dialogue between video, guest, or insane stunt segments. The following is a list of things I have seen on such shows:

-hosts in all too revealing spandex sitting in chairs with huge steel pans suspended over their heads and a couple dozen ropes in front of them while they take turns passing a pair of hedgeclippers to each other and cutting random ropes until one of them is left unbraindamaged.

-hosts watching as one of their apartments is invaded by a sumo sized man who proceeds to order a couple of pizzas, squeeze his enormous naked frame (too much ass!) into said hosts tiny little bath tub, eat said pizzas on the hosts bed and then ride around town (with clothes on) on the hosts tiny little motor scooter.

-contestants doing some kind of humiliating game/stunt at a swimming pool and then the losers being subjected to the shows "mascot?" (an overweight Japanese man with a mullet who is only ever seen wearing a black belly shirt and speedos) putting them on their hands and knees in the shower room, dumping soapy water all over them and then spinning his speedo clad body across them.(too much ass!)

-a doubles ping-pong match in which each teams inflatable outfits are filled with air each time they lose a point, until at the end both teams are still trying to play, looking like giant paddle wielding balloons. This however ended when ones teams outfits exploded on their bodies.

and the one that had me screaming for so many reasons (laughter, disgust, laughing disgust)

-two hosts in a pre-filmed wrestling segment. Camera cuts to gym where they are squared off against each other. Camera pans out to reveal both hosts are completely naked. Their junk being covered by a digitally added picture of their own faces. The bell rings and they go to it, grappling, pinning, holds, throws, man parts being jammed against ears, until they finally collapse on the floor exhausted and wretching as they realize what had so recently had been resting on their foreheads. (have I mentioned too much ass!)

I'm just glad they don't do segments like that on The View. There are many more things I could mention about the myriad of programs and American celebrities doing commercials here, but really I think I've said enough for now. Occasionally I will throw in more TV tidbits in future posts.

Anyhow, as well as posting this new story I will also leave you with another written after our second day here.

Thursday March 17

Today we tried to find the Joutou Ward office so we could be registered as aliens. I've been treated as an alien back home before, but I've never actually been one until now. We looked at the map and decided it looked close enough that we could walk it. It would have been too if it hadn't been raining (first purchase: umbrellas), and if I hadn't decided to follow the city map to the Ward Office which was about eight blocks from where the Nova map said it was, but when you have three different maps, only one has north at the top and they are all different scale, you kind of have to improvise. Here's something else that's fun, have you ever went into a store or gas station to ask for directions? Awesome. Have you ever done it when you didn't understand the language they gave the directions in? Fun. I learned very quickly "joutou kuyakusha wa dokodesuka?" ("where is the Joutou Ward Office?"). However the instructions I got always ended up being a hastily scrawled map with landmarks I didn't know, or a game of charades in which the only clue I had was direction. Once we eventually found it we realized that, had we taken just one road instead of 27 we would have shaved an hour off of our time.

It was after that we decided to try grocery shopping, which we also hadn't thought we be as difficult. Not as many pictures on the bottles a jars as we had hoped, however we nailed the fresh meat and produce. Some of it is a lot pricier than back home, but by no means all of it. After getting food and a few basic household items we decided it was time once again to retreat for the confines of home. The highlight of the day was definitely the phone cards Nova had supplied us with to phone home.

Until later, make mine Marvel. Carl

P.S. The crows in Japan don't sound the same as back home. They sound like old men being strangled and punched in the stomach, while they laugh at you.

We got Internet!

2005-04-16T21:31:00.000-07:00

Hello hello, we are now up and running, and have many things to share. Colleen and I decided to each do our own on-line journals about our adventures, as from time to time we discover that our perspective on things differs a little. Or in Colleen's words "You're insane!" If you also read Colleen's journal you will no doubt see and read some of the same info but her site is very funny and I hate funny things, therefore I will try to treat my journal with the utmost seriousness.

On that note, we went to our first Japanese drag show last night. Some of the teachers from my school were going, so Colleen met me after she got off work and we went to check it out. What we didn't realize was that the reason they were going was because one of my fellow teachers was in the show, lipsynching to songs and appearing in three different outfits.. Yikes! But we got a few good pictures. The guy next to Colleen is my co-worker. Yikes again!

We have done many other cool things since we have been here, including cherry blossom watching, Sumo watching, sunset watching, drunken businessman watching. Come to think of it we have done a lot of watching, but that is mostly because we don't speak the language. Anyhow, my first post really is just about our first night here. I typed it up that night, but since we didn't get internet for a month (it takes about 3 weeks to set up here) I couldn't E-mail it to anyone. So here it is in all it's glory. With a few editors notes of course. I have logged a few other journals as we have been here, and will post them at a later date, and soon my posts will be a little more current, rather than stuff that happened a few weeks ago.

March 16

Well one of my wishes has come true. Riding on an airplane full of Japanese school girls. Now if I could just get on a airplane full of Swedish bikini models I'd be set. Seriously though, I don't know if any of you have ever spent 11 hours in the air all in one go but it was butt numbingly fun. Also never gave it a thought before but when you fly international to another country and most of the people on that plane are from that country they kind of cater the meals that way. For the first time ever I had raw fish on an airplane. Very cool...if you are into raw fish that is. Also coming into Japan a very excellent view of Mt. Fuji. It is much larger in real life than it is in pictures, cause in pictures you can fit it into a photo album, but in real life, no way.
After getting off the plane and 45 minutes in line at immigration we got our bags, met our rep, gave our suitcases to the delivery service and were then informed that while all of the other teachers were going to a hotel, Colleen and I were going to be directed to the train station where we would be on a 45 minute train ride on our own, until we met our next rep who would transfer us to another train and take us to our apartment. Very strange. We had to walk through this alley to get there. Even the alleys have vending machines in Japan. Our apartment is right next to a cemetery, all the apartments are outside access and the elevators to get us to our floor have windows in them. I don't know if any of you have seen "The Grudge", but it's pretty dang close. Inside the apartment we've got two small rooms, little futon mattresses, an air conditioning unit with digital controls in Japanese (which I am learning to use pretty dang quickly), a two burner gas stove with a fish grill in it, a washing machine (no dryer), a love seat (blue leather), TV (no cable yet), oh yeah and a toaster oven with pictures of the different foods beside the cooking times (so far I can only identify three of them, but you guys might have better luck).
After our intro to the apartment, our liaison left us on our own. We immediately left to roam the streets at night in a foreign country. Wow. We saw city workers gathered in a courtyard, stretching and chanting, then we walked by the site where they were doing roadwork and it was lit up like Vegas with flashing lights and whatnot. There are vending machines on almost every corner, and hundreds of stores with signs advertising things I cannot read. We then ventured into a restaurant for food. It is a very different experience sitting down and ordering food in a place where you just point and hope for the best. We got some kind of fruity carbonated drink, an appetizer that was to my best description, a open topped dumplingy kind of thing filled with chunky mushroom, green stuff and mayonnaise, topped with onion skin that moved like it was alive cause of the steam from the food. (editors note: we later discovered that was not mushrooms, it was squid and the dish is called Takoyaki and is a special dish in Osaka, and can be found absolutely everywhere, and they use a lot of mayonnaise here in almost everything) After that came a crunchy noodle dish with shrimp and squid, which was much more like something you could get in Canada. Paying the bill was a learning experience, we sat and waited a long time and then got up to leave, at which point they rushed over to give us our bill, which is good because asking for our bill would have been a sign language feat neither of us were capable of.

That's all for now, Carl.