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I keep wanting to wait until I have pics to show you guys before mentioning some of these things since my pics of Japan tend to be very good, but I guess it'll have to wait until I find the spare time to make up a photo post (and my friends send me the photos).
Anyway, I'm stuffed atm since my student took me out to lunch for our lesson. You will never become better at making small talk than by living as an English teacher in Japan. I'm pretty sure I could make a conversation last for hours now and talk about absolutely nothing. This particular student is the singing lady and she's so nice and fun to be around. I love talking to her even if her English is only slightly higher level than my Japanese. Luckily, she knows she can revert to Japanese whenever she likes and chances are I'll understand her *L* The restaurant was called Bistor Gourmand and it was very posh. Lots of extra tableware and stuff, though the waitress made it her duty to make sure the silverware was removed as soon as it was used so there was little chance of confusion (not to mention, I think they expected you not to know what to use... *L*). I had the pasta meal which involved a consume of salmon and shellfish and pepper, followed by a cold potato/corn soup (as my student put it, "Japanese taste"... I kinda felt like I was judging on Iron Chef). Then a salad and the a plate of pasta with a sort of meat/cream/tomato sauce that was surprisingly delicious. Followed by iced coffee you can see why I am stuffed now *L* That's good though since I don't get to eat until 10pm tonight.
Other than that, I went to Doigohama (beach) on Sunday with G., her boyfriend, M. and K. It was a great drive through valleys and windy roads to reach this beautiful view and beach. We had a bit of trouble finding parking, but once there we were able to spread out. I wore my bikini, and it was as effective as I remember it being *eg* (This is why I wanted pics to show you...) The beach was lovely with nice sand, and a low tide so you could go pretty far out without any trouble. Walking down the beach was really interesting people watching wise. We saw kids pissing right in the ocean (er, yeah...), weird beach posses, yakuza (judging by the near full body tatoos and punkish looks...), two gaijin, a number of watermellon breaking with sticks and blind folds, really weird floats in odd shapes (fanta bottles, mellons, crabs) people being buried in the sand (including a pornographic one...) and more skin than I've seen in Japan... ever. *L* I got hit on too:D
We barbecued on the beach, courtesy of G.'s boyfriend. Food was plentiful with pork, beef, eggplant, onions, carrots, mushrooms, edamame, and sweet corn. The eggplant and mushrooms were surprisingly delicious, and I found I really enjoyed the corn which is a first for me (without butter at least...). We lounged in the sun, went swimming again and generally enjoyed ourselves until around 5 or 6 when we packed up and headed to Ichinomata onsen (since there were no showers at the beach).
The onsen was on our way back and was as beautiful and relaxing as I remember even if the bloody mosquitos bit me about ten times when I was sitting outside (for all of the two minutes I was out there). It was nice to get a water shower massage again and relax in the water after a day at the beach. The day wasn't over when we got back either since M. and I stopped off at Joyfull for A.'s going away party (he's heading to Hiroshima). A really excellent day all around and one I will remember fondly for a long time. It takes a lot for me to enjoy the beach after all. (I tend to get a bit too cynical about sand...).
I have a french lesson again tomorrow which means I need to get back into French mode again soon. I have this really strange urge to reread the Little Prince too and I kinda wish this guy had a high enough level for us to do so. Oh well. I've taken to wearing handkerchiefs in a sort of babouska (sp?) style on my head now since I've gotten sick of wearing hair ties this summer. It's pretty easy to do so since the daiso (100 yen shop) carries tons of handkerchiefs with beautiful prints.
Class yesterday was weird. It's summer holiday so my first class (other than baby class) didn't even show up. My second class were only half there and stared at me in quiet horror when I tried to teach them addition and subtraction (I knew they had to know it but it took forever to get them to catch on...) but enjoyed the game of bingo later at least. And my last class were bored but so was I. In the meantime, K. is leaving and we don't have a teacher to replace her so were all set up to do extra classes over the next few weeks. I don't mind too much since I've taken off kickboxing this month (wouldn't have been able to make most of the classes anyway) and it should be kinda interesting to see what these other classes are like. So long as I get my holiday to Nara and Kyoto, I'm good *g* Speaking of which, planning what to do in Kyoto is a bitch. There's far too many places to see and too little time to do it. I am being such a geek and going to visit the Shinsengumi's grave site too...
Anyway, I'm stuffed atm since my student took me out to lunch for our lesson. You will never become better at making small talk than by living as an English teacher in Japan. I'm pretty sure I could make a conversation last for hours now and talk about absolutely nothing. This particular student is the singing lady and she's so nice and fun to be around. I love talking to her even if her English is only slightly higher level than my Japanese. Luckily, she knows she can revert to Japanese whenever she likes and chances are I'll understand her *L* The restaurant was called Bistor Gourmand and it was very posh. Lots of extra tableware and stuff, though the waitress made it her duty to make sure the silverware was removed as soon as it was used so there was little chance of confusion (not to mention, I think they expected you not to know what to use... *L*). I had the pasta meal which involved a consume of salmon and shellfish and pepper, followed by a cold potato/corn soup (as my student put it, "Japanese taste"... I kinda felt like I was judging on Iron Chef). Then a salad and the a plate of pasta with a sort of meat/cream/tomato sauce that was surprisingly delicious. Followed by iced coffee you can see why I am stuffed now *L* That's good though since I don't get to eat until 10pm tonight.
Other than that, I went to Doigohama (beach) on Sunday with G., her boyfriend, M. and K. It was a great drive through valleys and windy roads to reach this beautiful view and beach. We had a bit of trouble finding parking, but once there we were able to spread out. I wore my bikini, and it was as effective as I remember it being *eg* (This is why I wanted pics to show you...) The beach was lovely with nice sand, and a low tide so you could go pretty far out without any trouble. Walking down the beach was really interesting people watching wise. We saw kids pissing right in the ocean (er, yeah...), weird beach posses, yakuza (judging by the near full body tatoos and punkish looks...), two gaijin, a number of watermellon breaking with sticks and blind folds, really weird floats in odd shapes (fanta bottles, mellons, crabs) people being buried in the sand (including a pornographic one...) and more skin than I've seen in Japan... ever. *L* I got hit on too:D
We barbecued on the beach, courtesy of G.'s boyfriend. Food was plentiful with pork, beef, eggplant, onions, carrots, mushrooms, edamame, and sweet corn. The eggplant and mushrooms were surprisingly delicious, and I found I really enjoyed the corn which is a first for me (without butter at least...). We lounged in the sun, went swimming again and generally enjoyed ourselves until around 5 or 6 when we packed up and headed to Ichinomata onsen (since there were no showers at the beach).
The onsen was on our way back and was as beautiful and relaxing as I remember even if the bloody mosquitos bit me about ten times when I was sitting outside (for all of the two minutes I was out there). It was nice to get a water shower massage again and relax in the water after a day at the beach. The day wasn't over when we got back either since M. and I stopped off at Joyfull for A.'s going away party (he's heading to Hiroshima). A really excellent day all around and one I will remember fondly for a long time. It takes a lot for me to enjoy the beach after all. (I tend to get a bit too cynical about sand...).
I have a french lesson again tomorrow which means I need to get back into French mode again soon. I have this really strange urge to reread the Little Prince too and I kinda wish this guy had a high enough level for us to do so. Oh well. I've taken to wearing handkerchiefs in a sort of babouska (sp?) style on my head now since I've gotten sick of wearing hair ties this summer. It's pretty easy to do so since the daiso (100 yen shop) carries tons of handkerchiefs with beautiful prints.
Class yesterday was weird. It's summer holiday so my first class (other than baby class) didn't even show up. My second class were only half there and stared at me in quiet horror when I tried to teach them addition and subtraction (I knew they had to know it but it took forever to get them to catch on...) but enjoyed the game of bingo later at least. And my last class were bored but so was I. In the meantime, K. is leaving and we don't have a teacher to replace her so were all set up to do extra classes over the next few weeks. I don't mind too much since I've taken off kickboxing this month (wouldn't have been able to make most of the classes anyway) and it should be kinda interesting to see what these other classes are like. So long as I get my holiday to Nara and Kyoto, I'm good *g* Speaking of which, planning what to do in Kyoto is a bitch. There's far too many places to see and too little time to do it. I am being such a geek and going to visit the Shinsengumi's grave site too...
