Food Happiness (name of a grocery store)

When the shit starts flying... Get a shovel!
This week has been a tough one... Luckily it's Saturday and the week is over! Longer blog entry to come later off to shape the minds of the future into English speakers.

Unconcerned but not Indifferent

So it's Monday... I have woken up three times now on the same train at the wrong stop. I have been trying to get home for about six hours now... Had to share haha the struggles of getting home are epic evidently luckily this country is safe and no one mugged me while I slept!

Class Winners 1986 Regional Drags

It has come to my attention that maybe drinking and blogging don't mix. I think I need to get a breathalyzer ap for my phone... I'm sure there's one out there.
British teacher and I are going to Chiba today. I'm not sure what's in Chiba but I don't really have much else to do. I've been reading a bunch of books a student gave me. They're a really easy read so I've finished four in two weeks. I need to get out more haha.
I have to say, I feel really sorry for the people who work the graveyard shift at the Family Mart near my house. I always wander in at strange hours on the weekend, buy a tall boy, mumble things in English, try half assed to speak Japanese and then laugh at myself on the way out lol.
Last weekend some teachers and I went to a very cool club in Shibuya called Womb. The music was wild, the place was huge and packed and there were a lot of foreigners there. I now know where to go when I want to meet foreigners lol. The club was featured in Babel... Worth checking out if you're in the area :)
I'm trying to figure out how to post pictures through my phone, once I do I'm set!

Tokyo Says Dont Drunk Drive

Haha ok です。
I finally figured out how to blog with my iPhone. I will never need a computer again!! Things are well on my side of the world. I'm so happy I figured how to blog via le telephone!
So... What's new here... Teaching is still a challenge but getting better every week which is reassuring.
I'm practicing my Japanese a lot which is both fun and embarassing of course but in the end who really cares? I'm stared at whether I try to speak the language or not :)
the rainy season is here... They say rainy I say horribly humid... Not really rainy. I wish I was willing to show how bad my hair looks haha. Humidity...
My birthday is in less than a month.. Sad bit true that I will be spending it alone and working. I can't be too sad because I am where I chose to be lol
the other foreign teacher has since left and been replaced. This means I am in charge haha. The new teacher is great so far. He's British and we call ourselves team Britain. He worked for Nova before... The one I applied to but they had gone bankrupt...
I keep in touch with the teacher who left and his girlfriend which is making a good support group here.. It's still funny to comprehend that I am in Japan. It feels so natural even though I can barely speak the language.
One of my students took me to a bar called 'K's Bar' in my area... They have tons of Islay Malt scotch so I had one called Aber.... Something... hahaha it was peaty so the name wasn't too important... Aberdeg? The bar hangas a St. Andrew's Cross and is called K's... It's a good omen ね。

Dick Brewer

Yep... I saw a t-shirt here that said Dick Brewer. I thought about buying it but then I think I might save my money for something even more classic. I took a picture though and will be uploading it when I figure that out.
I have also been taking of hillarious Engrish on menus. Example: Big ball of chicken meat served with one egg yolk.
So... It's been a while since I last posted. I am sorry for my negligence. I have been kept on my toes with work lately. I barely have time to do anything sadly. I only had one day off of work this week and it definitely shows. One of my students told me I looked terrible today and had too many zits on my face. Thanks for the honesty? Sorry I'm so homely? I had to go in for follow up training for kids lessons yesterday. It was very useful so I'm not too chapped about having to go in on my day off and it meant I got to see everyone from training which was nice. After follow up training we went to a pub and watched some of the World Cup! Go Portugal. One of the teachers at my school asked me how Canada's soccer team was and I told her we call it Hockey and its played on ice there.
I've been trying to watch a lot of the World Cup which is great and meeting a lot of people... locals and foreigners. Suprisingly enough I am using a lot of Japanese with my new local friends and I am being shown around my new city. My one new friend, Takumi, taught me how to say 'thank you' in Samurai Japanese so we try to get me to use that in daily situations. Example: buying a coffee at Family Mart 'katajikenai' not 'arigato'. The look on their faces is great!
The new teacher has arrived who is replacing the other teacher. He's really nice so far and is from good ol London town. We've decided from now on we're only teaching British English.
My time is up here though... and I left my blog notebook at school today. Otherwise I would be writing a much better blog! I promise to be back soon to give a more detailed entry!
P.S. @DarkEnergy Happy (Belated) Father's Day... a card will be in the mail sometime this year.

Hair/Make Fairytale

So, I thought it might make my blog titles a bit more interesting if I used the various Engrish I saw on my merry little travels. Another little gem I saw was "Ab's Make" = gym? Good times.

So I survived my first week solo. No one got bitten on my watch so I think that constitutes the week being a success!! The really little kids are a bunch of laughs to teach. I get to dance, play jenga and sing songs with them. One class, they were all wearing sticker name tags so I could use their names, the kids took them off and put them over their mouths - lead to a very nice and quiet class! Haha. I think I've gotten the hang of class planning which is nice I was worried for a while that I would be spending hours and hours preparing for lessons. The students are all really nice which helps.

Funny things I've noticed:

1) Even little old ladies here have iPods.
2) Business men, riding bikes in their nice suits, in the rain while (almost definitely drunk) and smoking.
3) The young guys here... wear lower cut shirts than I do, and have nicer hair. Think 80's glam rock look. Maybe I should step up and bring my A game... I thought I had but I stand corrected!
4) The novelty of being a foreigner. I get open mouth stares. When I see another foreigner... I OPEN MOUTH STARE.
5) There is a milk bar in one of the train stations - Does it serve LSD I wonder... like the milk bar in A Clockwork Orange.

I should be getting a phone sometime this week finally!!

Some funny things deemed worth mentioning...

So a few things I have come across on my Japan adventures that I believe to be worth mentioning.

1) Last night as I left the train station on my way home I was listening to my iPod and heard what sounded to be motorcycles. Moments later what appeared to be some sort of biker gang pulled up into the Family Mart sidewalk area. On mopeds. Yes, I accidentally stumbled upon some kind of moped gang pep rally of sorts. Some even had passengers on the back and one moped was even flying the Japanese war time flag. http://www.deepdarc.com/module/album/getpic/pic-775-medium.png　They were all sitting on their mopeds drinking beers or coffees. I found this to be very amusing and just had to share. I hope someone finds that as amusing as I did.

2) The sounds of Tokyo. I really wish I could share some of the excellent sounds one can hear throughout Tokyo. The first thing that comes to mind is the different songs played at each train station. Each train station in Tokyo has its own little song that is played when a train nears. Not joking. Who wrote this music? Its hilarious. Cheerful little blurbs. I love it. Some more great sounds of Tokyo. The various angry protesters who drive through the streets of Tokyo with megaphones blasting their propaganda. (I've heard people are angry about current politics regarding the Americans on Okinawa) and the last sounds I will mention are the ones found in Pachinko parlours and arcade halls. The noise is defeaning and people seem to spend hours and hours in these places.

Time is up! Till next time!