Studying

I don't have a lot to report, except I am really enjoying studying Japanese in Okazaki. Here are some pics of my dorm building.

Here is the outside. The first window to the right of the part that sticks out is mine.














You go in under my window (not the garage door), then up stairs to the balcony, and here is the door to my floor.















There will be a fireworks festival on Saturday. Okazaki is famous for fireworks, so this should be quite good. The caretaker of Yamamoto House, Mr. Yamamoto, will have a party on Saturday for everyone here. Then we can watch the fireworks from here.

The weather is hotter here than in Tochigi, but it's less humid, so that's better. It's also sunnier here than in Tochigi. I have a green umbrella, and I have a phone strap that indicates the UV level. I tested using my green umbrella as a parasol, and aparently it wasn't blocking the UV rays much at all. So I bought a black parasol. Japanese ladies use them a lot. They are more comfortable than wearing long sleeves, and easier than reapplying sunscreen. So that's one Japanese habit I've picked up.

Another odd thing I've seen is the light switch for the toilet room is usually outside the room. I can imagine every Japanese child going through a phase of turning the light off when other people are using the toilet!

Walking the Nakasendō

Today, I did something I'd wanted to do for a long time. Before the Meiji Restoration brought trains to Japan, the Nakasendō was an important road. When the Meiji Restoration modernized Japan, some parts of the country got left behind, like parts of the Kiso valley which were formerly important towns on an important road. In the 1960's residents of some of these towns decided to preserve and restore their Edo-era appearance. They did, and the tourists came.

There is an 8 km. (5 miles) section of the old road between two of these towns, Magome and Tsumago, that is now a hiking trail. Magome is in Gifu prefecture and Tsumago is in Nagano prefecture. Today, I hiked that trail.

Part of it is the original stone road. I thought about the porters who got to carry people in palaquins while wearing straw sandals. Part of the trail is gravel and part of it is paved. There are a few short stretches where you have to walk on the highway.

Being Japan it is, of course, hilly. It took me 3 hours to do. It was very beautiful, with woods and the occasional waterfall. It seemed like a route a party of D&D characters would use!

I took a train to Nakatsugawa, then a bus to Magome. I hiked between Magome and Tsumago, and waited for over an hour for a bus to Nagiso, then took a train to Nagoya, then back to Okazaki. All in all, a full day!
Here is a view of the area before I got to the trail.








Here are some views along the trail.

































Here is a straw horse I saw in Tsumago. It makes sense that there would be a horse in this area -- the "Ma" in Magome means "horse"

Fun in Okazaki

Today I had a placement test, and then orientation. I finished the Minna no Nihongo series the last time I was here. But due to a lack of practice, I will be re-doing some of it. That's OK, though. I haven't had a lot of opportunities to use some of the grammar points, so this will reinforce them. Language learning is a "use it or lose it" endeavor.

There have been some additions to the campus since I was here last, including an indoor tennis court and a community learning center. I had lunch at the campus cafe, which is a bar on weekends. I've met several interesting people as well.

I went to Aeon mall with a fellow American afterwards. From where I am staying, it's worthwhile to take the bus from the train station. In cooler weather, I'd walk.

The road sign above says "Silver Road" in the blue section, which I'm guessing is sort of like the "silver seats" on buses and trains that are reserved for the elderly, pregnant, infirm or those with babies. Underneath it says to watch out for the elderly.

Okazaki has an unusually high number of traffic accidents, in part due to the high rate of car ownership. That in turn may be due to Toyota's headquarters being nearby. Also, even though there are a lot of cars, the roads are the same width as they have been for a long time. The city is not laid out on grid. Originally, Japanese towns and cities were purposely NOT laid out on a grid to make it harder for invading armies to invade.

Classes start tomorrow. There are 23 classes per week, with only 3 on Fridays. Next week the "intensive" bit kicks in!

I'm in Okazaki

I got to Okazaki at around 8:15 am. The night bus was uneventful, except that the bus was waiting across and down the street from where another woman and I were expecting it.

I'm staying at the Yamamoto House dormitory. It's very nice, and closer to the school and train station than the dorm I stayed in the other times I was here.
My room has a fridge with freezer (the white and yellow thing in the pic). The fridge is bigger and nicer
than the one I have in my apartment! And there is a TV. I'll just leave it on when I'm here for listening practice.

The drapes are closed because the sun would beat in otherwise. There are a lot of noisy birds outside. It's hot here, but not as muggy as Tochigi.

Since I was here last, there is a new grocery store between here and the school, and a new shopping area with movie theaters by the Student Village, where I stayed before.

Beer index

I check the weather on the Japanese Yahoo! site each day. Today, I discovered the beer index! From what I can understand, it's an index of optimum beer drinking conditions. From the map, it looks like you can't go wrong with a cold one anywhere in Japan today.




















Less fun, but equally useful to those of us who must hang our laundry out to dry, is the laundry index.

Last Day of the Term!

Today was the last day of the term at school. I am now on vacation through the end of August. I am celebrating appropriately.









Japan has some very inefficient systems. A good example is the immigration offices. For most things, there is a fee to be paid. But you can't just pay the fee at the immigration office. That would be efficient. Instead you must buy a stamp to pay with. But you can't buy the stamp at the immigration offices. That would be somewhat efficient. No, you must go to a nearby convenience store to buy the stamp.

However, some things in Japan are very efficient and /or convenient. An example is the bottle of Corona I bought to celebrate the end of the term. Everyone knows that Corona calls for lime juice. If you live by yourself, you must either buy enough Corona to use up the lime or bottled lime juice you bought for the Corona, or throw away some lime or lime juice. In Japan, Corona conveniently comes with a packet of lime juice attached! Isn't that great?











What will I do on my summer vacation? Unlike the real teacher at the school, I am on vacation for the whole summer vacation. I am going to Okazaki, near Nagoya, to a Japanese language school that I've attended twice before. I'm also going to do some travelling on weekends, so I'll have some interesting things to post.

I can't say enough good things about the Yamasa Institute, and I'm not alone in my opinion of the school. First, it's convenient. You can study from 4 weeks to years depending on your inclination , available time and finances. Secondly, it's affordable. The school is not for profit. Finally, Okazaki is a nice city. It's less expensive than Tokyo, and conveniently located. Also the school owns its own housing, so housing is affordable and close to the school. And all that wouldn't matter much if it weren't a top-notch school. In terms of contact hours, you really get value for your yen. If anyone is interested in studying Japanese in Japan, go to www.yamasa.org. They also offer lessons online.

It's been very hot and very, very humid. It's not global warming we should worry about, but it's global humidity!

Critter update

The civet died that day, and when I went out later, someone had removed it. Later and several blocks away, I saw a bag of trash that had been ripped open and dug through, so maybe it got into something that it shouldn't have.

At work I mentioned that I'd seen one near my apartment, and nobody else had seen one in the "wild". I had read that they are nocturnal, so the fact that I saw it out during the day means something was wrong with it.

Laughed at by Students

Yesterday, a couple of girls laughed at me.

On Saturday, I had gone to Sports Depo in Bell Mall in Utsunomiya to buy some more things for my Mt. Fuji climb next month. I found this:











I had read about canned air conditioning, and was actually looking for such a thing. Hey, a Japanese company sells ties that have a fan built in them, so why not? The canned air that you use to dust out keyboards is cold, so this would be just another use for an existing product.

I was in the teachers' room, and two of the girls that were helping with osouji (cleaning) were complaining that it was really hot. Which it was. I'd brought my can in, so I said, "Come here, I'll show you something. " I gave each a spray on the back, which they liked. I showed them the can, and said, "Air conditioning!"

They looked at the can more closely and laughed.

It turns out it IS cold air that is being sold here. But it's intended to be used in case of injury -- like an ice pack.

My pride was not injured enough to need my canned ice pack -- after all, my can of cold air still does what I want it to do!

Wild critter in my yard

Today I woke up to hear a crow having a fit outside. It sounded like it was right outside my front door. When I looked outside, I didn't see a crow, but I did see this.

From what I've been able to figure out, it's a masked palm civet (ハクビシン or 白鼻しん）. It is not native to Japan, but they do live here. This one appears injured -- it's walking in circles and every so often one of it's paws would turn upside down. They are nocturnal, so I normally wouldn't see one in daytime.

I will leave it alone.

Spoiling Cats

Today, I was accused of spoiling my cats.

I was in the grocery store and ran into another English teacher who lives in my apartment building. We compared basket contents, and she wondered why I had canned cat food in mine as we are not allowed to have pets. I explained that when I send a box home, I send treats for my cats. Don't look at me that way. They are NOT spoiled. Much. Well, OK, but they deserve it.

No, I don't label the cat food as such. First, I give the folks at home credit for knowing not to eat anything with a cat on the label. (Why are pet food and baby food the exceptions to the rule that the product itself is pictured on food container labels? If they aren't exceptions, I don't want to know.) And second, we all know that any cat food I buy is probably good enough for people as well.










This one is bonito and shrimp.










This one is tuna, with crab added.










This one is first rate tuna.

Rainy Season is Over!

On Tuesday, I was told that rainy season is over for this area. Mind you, it was raining at the time.

Here are some unrelated pictures:

Here is a rice field, showing how tall the rice is now. This field is between my apartment and a shopping area with a Wal-Mart like grocery/general store, a book/video/CD/videogame store, a cell-phone store, a clothing store, a restaurant and a 7-11. There is also a drug store inside the grocery/general store.









Here is a nice flower garden. Even if people don't have a yard, they often have a pot or two of flowers.










Here is a view down a street near my apartment. On the left, you see some green netting near and on a wall. That is a garbage collection point. Everyone in the area puts their garbage out in the same spot. The garbage truck doesn't stop at every house. The green netting is to put over garbage bags, so they don't blow around at all. This area is mostly houses, but there are also apartment buildings and small shops.

More on Weather

The humidity is due to Rainy Season, or Tsuyu (梅雨) or Baiu, which literally means "plum rain". The Ume, which is really a Japanese Apricot ripens at this time.

I like plum wine. I also like umeshu, which has ume in the bottle. But I've found a few more ume beverages to enjoy.

Here is a small can of ume soda.











Here is some sparling umeshu (sans ume in the can). It's also not as sparkling as I was led to believe. The flavor is, well, "subtle". But it's in a can, so I didn't have high expectations for it anyway.

Oh, the Humidity.....

You've all heard, "It's not the heat, it's the humidity," right? Well, it is SO true!

This is looking down from across the street from the school on Friday morning. I have never experienced humidity as high as it was then.


This is the same scene Friday afternoon, after the sun came out. You can see much further!




Finally, Friday evening, a thunderstorm came through. Saturday was hot and humid, but not as humid as Friday!





During June, some mornings it would be cool and humid. It was impossible to stay dry, even though I wasn't really hot at all.

The classrooms have no airconditioning or fans. The only ventilation is opening windows in the classroom, and on the other side of the hall. Usually that's enough, but not Friday. Plus, every so often a bee or moth will fly in the room and distract everyone!

Independence Day!

I hope everyone has a safe and happy Independence Day! A big "Thank You!" to the service men and women and veterans, who made this holiday possible!

Digging in the Dirt

Last Friday, I got a memo and asked an English teacher what it was about. It said that on Monday morning everyone would clean the school grounds in the morning, and I was asked to participate if I could. Well, why not?

So, Monday I showed up in work clothes (athletic wear) like everyone else. Unlike everyone else, I had no idea what this would entail. I thought it might get called off since it had rained a lot on Sunday. It turned out all we were going to do was weed the flower beds. In this case, all the rain made the job much easier.

There are several flower beds, including one for each of the classes. There are 4 first and second year classes and 5 third year classes. So, there are 13 classes.

I love gardening, and I agree with Mom that digging in the dirt is great therapy/relaxation. I miss gardening, so I really did enjoy this.

Of course, all the kids had to line up by class first. Then, there was a short speech. Then we sent to the appropriate flower bed to weed. We also picked all the blooms off the marigolds. I know marigolds need to be dead-headed to keep them blooming. And I suppose that nobody is going to look at them every day to just pick the dead blooms off. So, all the flowers came off. Later, during cleaning time, we took the piles of weeds and flowers to the compost bin behind the school.

Here is a flower bed that didn't get done, to show you what they looked like before.









And here is an "after" shot.