Mischief in Tsu

Last Combini Trip

Good bye Matsu

A Surprise Post from Tsu!

So ... it turns out that wasn't my last post from Japan at all. What a perfect last weekend! Friday was dinner and a Lost session in Matsu. Goodbye to Dave, Miki and Tetsuya. Dave made me the most amazing DVD of my time here in Mie, he really is one of the most thoughtful friends I've ever had. Thanks Dave. It was lovely to see Miki and Tetsuya - I'll miss them so much.

Saturday was spent hanging out and in the evening we randomly decided to go to Matsu castle. It's two years since I last went there and I don't particularly have great memories from that weekend so it was nice to go back and share a perfect evening with friends.

I really wanted to spend my last night in my apartment, I don't know why but it was just something I had to do. Despite waking up early I still ended up frantically running around last minute cleaning minutes before my j friend came to pick me up to go for lunch at ... KURA! One last time. My favourite.

Then cancelling my ketai. Hanging out with Nige and Yoko. To Tsu ... more good byes or rather mata nes!!

Ailo and me went for a great dinner at Momo's fave place and then wandered around taking daft pics. Here I am back in her apartment - my last night in Japan. Hope you enjoy the pics (I know it's all in a weird order but don't have much time)...

Sayonara Japan

Here I am. My last post from Japan. Who would have thought it? I didn't even know what a blog was when I first arrived in Japan ... how things have changed!

I've kept thinking over the past few weeks that my last post from Japan should be very poignant and I should reflect on my time here. Now it's actually come to it - I have no idea where to start so I'm afraid I'm just not going to bother, perhaps I'll write something when I'm back home and sat with nothing to do!!

As for my blog I'm definitely going to continue it not sure how often I'll post pictures as my parent's don't have broad band and it takes hours simply checking email. I can't promise that it'll be very exciting either ... something along the lines of 'I went up the town. Scranned some pie and chips' (that's a joke BTW) certainly no purikura and karaoke expeditions though!

Japan mata ne!

Enkai Pics

Yumi and me
Eating raw cow intestine

Singing my own praises

Last night it was my sayonara enkai. It was amazing!

I was asked what I’d like to eat at my enkai, without hesitation I asked that we go for yaki niku and beer! I didn’t want a formal affair with mountains of sashimi and seating arrangements. I got what I asked for – the enkai was at a yaki niku restaurant in Matsusaka and we had our own private room. The food was amazing - course after course of different MEAT including some Matsusaka beef. It doesn’t get better than that! The beers were flowing so of course everyone was quickly very drunk.

We even had a special guest as I asked them to invite Hashimoto sensei who was transferred to Matsu ko from Ohka, I was so pleased he was able to come. I was given lots of lovely gifts; flowers, Japanese souvenirs, jewellery, and best of all a lovely necklace from four of my friends. An English teacher from Matsu-ko even turned up at the start and presented me with gifts from the teachers there.

I think it’s the first time I’ve been to a party that’s been all about me! I’ve had lots of parties at home but I’m always the stressed out host (which of course I secretly must enjoy – otherwise I wouldn’t keep organising them) so this was different, everything was organised for me all I had to do was turn up and have good time. In the most part as well all the teachers there were those who always make a big effort to be nice to me so there was no getting stuck next to someone who didn’t want to talk to me. I was talking to so many different people I didn’t even get chance to drink much!

Afterwards some of us went for karaoke which was loads of fun too and I got to say good bye to Paradise karaoke – again.

Here’s the really arrogant part – I was told by one of the teachers that there had never been a big sayonara enkai before for an ALT, that maybe they’d gone for dinner with the English teachers but other teachers certainly had never gone. Plus the ALT had never received a big present that all the teachers had contributed to. She said to me ‘see Helen I always tell you that you are the best ALT Ohka had, see everyone thinks so, look how many people are here for you!’

It made me feel bad because I think sometimes in my second year I’ve not been very genki and have spent a lot of time scowling at my desk. I forgot how lucky I’ve actually been, I’ve spent a lot of time whinging about school but I should have reminded myself that I have it a lot better than other people. I’ll stand by how infuriating it is to NEVER be told anything and also how terrible my supervisor is but I think overall though I’d been really upset with how they handled the car accident. It was probably a Japanese thing rather than the people specifically though, I obviously have a lot of built up anger regarding what happened to us and I guess I’m always looking for people to blame - which is wrong of me.

Anyway enough of all that – did I tell you the party was great?!! ;)

Job Satisfaction

I take* an evening English conversation class near my house once a month. They seem to think that all my worksheets are very 'professional' whic is nice of them to say but I wasn't too impressed when they asked if I wouldn't mind making up a newspaper of articles they would write. This sounds all very lovely but I see no reason why they asked me to do this just a few weeks before I left and when my brother was visiting too - surely they realise I'm busy and that any other time throughout the two years would have been more convenient (when I spend all day sat at my desk doing nothing).

Of course I made it for them, with all the stupid amount of effort I find myself putting into anything once I start (although I'm sure it was still filled to the brim with typos etc).

It was my sayonara enkai with this class last night and I was starting to become slightly irritated by the woman repeatedly asking me if it was time to see it yet even after I'd told her I'd show them at the end.

The end came and I gave all the students a copy of the newspaper and however much I whinge - the looks on their faces when they saw their articles printed was priceless. For ages they were completely absorbed in the newspapers and I realised that despite my whinging it was all worth it especially when they all started telling me how precious it was to them.



The enkai was fine and I surprisingly found myself getting a little upset at the end - 15 people all giving speeches in English about how great you are is inevitably going to bring on a few tears.

After the enkai I escaped to my second home to hang out with Nige - always good :) It was brought to my attention that for all my ranting and raving about how much I hate hip hop - I just can't help dancing to it. He says I'm a hypocrite - I have to agree although I'm still going to say it's crap.

*Whoops - I used to take an English conversation class

A Late Evening Visitor

After a few hours of cleaning and teaching, Beccy arrived later in the evening for one last night of wine at my house.

I feel very lucky that two years ago we ended up sat next to each other at the J restaurant in Manchester and even luckier that we were able to hang out so much in Japan.

One Week to Go!!!

One week to go and all of a sudden - I'M VERY, VERY EXCITED!!!

The night Aileen was told a 1000 times not to dye her hair and I found myself hiding behind a car ...

Friday was the last big night out in Matsu. Big thanks to Nige for organising a great night - as always. Lots of people, lots of food, lots of drink and LOTS OF DANCING!!! Who would have guessed I'd get to dance to all my favourites in Japan!

Mc Feat - see you back home! We came together and I'm kind of pleased we're leaving together too!
Dougy, Julia and Aileen at TonTons
Dancing ...
... and more dancing :)

Sam and Fiona Sunday

On Sunday we (Aileen and me) went to Kameyama to have lunch with Sam and Fi, good food and of course the best company :)

After a spot of purikura in Tsu I rushed off back to Taki to clean my apartment, which turned into a tiny spot of cleaning and hours spent on the phone - oh dear!

Sam and Fi - can't describe how much I'll miss you! I'm trying not to be too sad though as I know I'll see you again!

The girls ...

... and the girls exactly a year ago.

It's hot so the UK comes to a halt...naturally!

Here's one of many articles out there about the heat wave that is currently going on back home. Click here to read how the UK can't cope with weather extremes. It's amusing because it's exactly the same when it rains and snow more than usual too. Train lines swell, roads melt, businesses go bust, schools are closed, zoo animals are given blood flavoured ice, people are frying eggs on the bonnets of their cars ... and I think Japan is weird ... come on people GET A GRIP!

Surprisingly it's really cool in Japan this week, presently it's a rainy 25 degrees if you can believe it. The world really has gone crazy!

Here I am talking about the weather AGAIN on my blog, it scares me how British I am!

Let me take you down, 'cos I'm going to Strawberry Fields

ALTs throughout Japan this morning were giving their farewell speeches at their school’s closing ceremonies. I just did mine. In Japanese I might add.

I was practicing reading it in my apartment this morning and not once did I manage to read it through without crying, it didn’t bode well.

In the staff room I was feeling pretty nervous but Toshiki came and sat with me, we went through my speech together. When he first read the speech through he looked up at me and said ‘Helen. Maybe you’ll cry’ I told him Nigel reckoned I’d definitely end up blubbering away on the stage, he told me that he agreed with Nige. It meant such a lot to me though that someone was so concerned and had made the effort to come and sit with me (or maybe he was just skiving cleaning duties). He wished me luck outside the hall too and was the first person to congratulate me afterwards. So Toshiki definitely made my morning – thanks Nige for teaching him English!

I had to wait until the end of the ceremony to give my speech, admittedly I was nervous about speaking Japanese in front of 700 people but I was more apprehensive at the thought of breaking down in tears half way into my speech. I told myself to think about the Queen going to the toilet or all the times I’ve been irritated at school -like the days when nobody has said a word to me. I guess it worked a little. I made it through my speech without crying but having said that I was mainly just concentrating on my Japanese at that point (and definitely wasn’t thinking about the Queen). I just cried a little when the students made a speech in English and gave me my flowers. I actually ended up laughing a lot when Akemi was running around trying to get the students to split down the middle of the hall so I could walk through, it was like the parting of the red sea but instead of Moses and the red sea – my best J friend and 700 bored, sleepy students instead!

Think that’s it for now.

Nagashima Spaland

On Thursday we randomly went to Nagashima spaland - we wanted to check out the onsen Milena had recommended.

We arrived and I was asking Vinny to look out for signs for the onsen place, when he brought to my attention that it was 11am and asked me were we really going to spend the 8 hours before we met Fiona in an onsen. Erm ... good thinking Vin ... so we decided to go into the theme park to fill in some time.

It's my second time to visit there and admittedly it's no Alton Towers but we had a lot of fun, surprisingly so as ...

I actually can't stand rides, I spent a few years in my teens pretending I did but I just don't and I'm never going to - so a while ago I decided to give up scary films and rides - my heart just can't take the stress ;) I decided though that all that screaming might be a good release and I think it might just have been. Plus, I was hardly worrying about different forms, packing boxes and cars when I was being projected backwards into the air!

Afterwards we went to the onsen, which was as Milena had said really cool. Thank you Milena for converting me into an onsen lover and for recommending such a nice place.

Tsu for Soba

Thursday evening was lovely - we spent it in Tsu with Fiona and later Aileen, Clionadh and Sam. We went for soba and then onto to our old haunt of Banya.

Fiona

Kyoto - Arashiyama and Sagano

Friday we travelled to Kyoto, where we did some sighseeing, walking, eating, drinking, karaoke-ing and we had the worst sento experience of our lives.

A Crazy Amount of Sightseeing and Walking

Saturday - the title says it all!

Vinny on the Path of Philosophy Yasaka Shrine
Sanjusangendo
Vinny 'Lost in Translation' at Heian Jingu
Ginkakuji
Down town Kyoto

"Come Here to Me!"

Saturday night was spent in a really cool izakaya in Kyoto with Aileen and Clionadh. Lots of yummy food, drinks and fun was had!

We were supposed to be staying in Osaka so Vinny would be close to the airport the next day (BTW it turns out there's a direct train from Kyoto to Kansai which doesn't take much longer than the train from Namba) and also so that he could experience sleeping in a capsule. It was decided instead though that we would stay in Kyoto and try and find a love hotel. Purikura, more drinks and some searching we eventually ended up at a love hotel. I stayed with Beccy and Vicky at lovel hotel in Nagoya at xmas and so I guess it was good to see one again, although have to say I didn't ever expect to end up at one with my little bro!

Ailo and Hels

Ailo and her green drink

"Come here to me Vinny. What's the craic? Everything's grand!"

Yukata purikura

Searching for a love hotel

Outside the love hotel in the morning - not amused!

More Rain in Kyoto

Karaoke and Car Journeys

On Sunday evening we swung in late to Matsusaka to join in with a spot of karaoke and drama ;) I'm so pleased we got to do karaoke with Clionadh and Nige says we definitely got our song quota in even if we weren't there for too long!

Monday was a National Holiday and a day of pointless car journeys. I was really excited to watch the baseball, I drove to Tsu, I couldn't find the stadium, after 45 mins I gave up and drove back to Matsusaka. Nige and me went for lunch, drove to Meiwa to go to the cinema, no tickets left, drove back to Matsu. Having said all that I still had a lovely day hanging out with Nige and Jade, with so little time left it's definitely nice just hanging out with friends!

Doug and me - Last time at paradise?
Cli, me and Ailo
Ailo and the head massager at Nige's after karaoke

Ise Jingu

Yesterday I didn't post, I was going to say it was the last thing on my mind but infact it wasn't - I wrote a post and then just saved it away. I was moaning and whinging and it was boring and I'm determined to be more positive about everything today :)

I'm very pleased that Vinny has been here this week, we've spent the last two days filming ourselves speaking in stupid accents, it doesn't sound so funny but has been and it's made me laugh - a lot. On Tuesday afternoon we headed to Ise Jingu (hey - it's only my 8th time or something!) it was lovely and quiet in comparison to usual and so I loved it even more than I usually do.

In the evening we went for an amazing dinner with Nige and Toshiki, followed by karaoke where Toshiki totally showed the rest of us up.

Lolly

I've unexpectedly found myself sat in work today due to an irritating, nenkyu situation I had not anticipated on. True there are more important things I could be filling my time with than updating my blog. But I'm a blog addict - I admit it.

I was about to email Lolly and decided that I would write some of the things I was going to say here instead, so everyone can read how great I think she is plus we all know I'm rather fond of dedicating posts to my fave people - especially those who read my blog ;)

Lolly made me the coolest leaving present, I didn't open it when she was there on Sunday as I think people were a little worried I'd cry more than I already was. To be honest it didn't really make me cry it made me laugh and smile about all the amazing stuff we've done together this year. It made happy that I've been able to do such great things and with such cool people and I know I'll be friends with Lolly forever so it doesn't really matter that our Mie-era has come to an end.

Lolly - my favourite was the Lost boys page. It made me laugh a lot :) Also, I might never have got that j-dato but as you said at least we had our own and lets face it I'm sure we'd have more fun together than we ever would with some j-boy! Although I'm still holding out that you'll get one in the next year!

Lolly I love you.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

I'll miss you so much.

I hope you have a great trip home in summer.

Here are some pictures from before I had my blog ... no point including other pictures as they appear throughout my blog ;)

Look Ailo still has dark hair! It's November. We were drunk. Nigel was mad with us ;) But we still managed to make it to ...
Kyoto!
The Halloween Party