Weekend in Osaka

I don’t even know where to begin. I guess I should start out with a bit of a downpour first and just start typing and see where I end up. Lately I have been occupying myself quite well and have been avoiding the computer as much as possible. Not on purpose per say, but more like because I have been trying desperately to get things to reach normalcy here and sitting at home, alone, browsing the net doesn’t exactly bode well for making a life for myself. I have also been spending a lot of time running and focusing on fixing my muscles to keep in shape for the training. When you are doing 20 plus K in a week (which will actually be 25 this week) there isn’t much more I need to focus on besides listening to my body and treating myself well and studying for the Japanese exam. :-X

I have been doing a lot on weekends to take myself out of the solitude of being home and meditating. This last weekend I took a break from things (mostly because I am broke) and relaxed with friends. Went to B’s and met up with P (a 4th year JET?) in her area. We got dinner then went home to drink and watch TV. It was a nice time and we spent a lot of it watching some trippy movie about Nemo and slumberland. We went to the city the next day but between a series of hiccups and drama about what the other JETs were doing we didn’t end up meeting up with everyone until they were finished with their activities. Dropped B and a few people off at the co-ed swimsuit onsen and met up with K and E for our run. It went fine though I am still hurting unfortunately. Seems like I get more sore the more I run, which I guess correlates but I was hoping my muscles would begin to adjust to the distances. Oh well.

School has been going well. Since sports day things have begun to take on a new kind of rhythm which is also refreshing. My teachers are adjusting to me, perhaps very well and I am falling in love with my job and my students. The elementary students especially keep me up and going most of the time. When I am not swinging on the swings with them at recess or playing games with them in class they are teaching me Japanese and experimenting with what foods on the lunch menu I like. They keep me on my toes too and everyone knows when I haven’t slept enough the night before and the like because my students run me like mad. This leads to me going to bed around 10 every night in order to get up at 6:30 and be ready for class with a bunch of hyper and active children. Even my middle schoolers enjoy teaching me and having lunch together. I don’t have any complaints at all really about how things have turned out. I have even gotten to get involved in some really cool stuff! My students met the local professional basketball team, so I met them too. Another day we made pumpkin tempura together. I played the recorder and the taiko drums and have done various cultural dances. We have made origami cranes and hung them on strings for a trip to Nagasaki. We also play games all the time - though not so much in middle school :-(.

I might be playing the same tune a lot but living out here in the boonies working in schools totaling anywhere from 13-150 students is teaching me a lot about learning and teaching in ways I never thought possible. Take today for instance, I had a meeting about the lesson plan I would use for the next time I visited that school and we ended up getting into a discussion about how Americans decorate their homes according to the holiday. I couldn’t believe I had never before thought about how strange it is that we value hundreds of dollars worth of decorative junk (not to mention the electric bill) all in the name of celebrating holidays half of us don’t even really care about.  I also had a philosophical discussion today with one of my vice principals about the intricacies of the Japanese language and detailed analysis of manga culture. He did most of the talking since it was all in Japanese. Turns out I am really good at listening (totally opposite of my English abilities :-P). So yeah, I am really getting into life here now. :-)

The sunflower ferry to Osaka

Let’s see, last weekend I started writing this and I had spent the weekend prior in Osaka meeting up with some friends and hanging out. We went window-shopping mostly but also spent an absurd amount of time in the Aquarium. I took a ton of pictures (too many perhaps) and also went to see an IMAX movie about the final Hubble mission. Luckily, they had English headphones I could use so I don’t have to guess at what they were saying.  Went down via overnight ferry on Friday night and left on Sunday night since Monday was a holiday. The ride was fine though terribly rainy the whole way. We slept on the floor in what K refers to as 'the slave ride to America' quarters. I can see the resemblance though I think for the price and the convenience it was rather sheik. Spent Monday running a nice long 18K and then cleaning.

This weekend I relaxed. Tried to finish this entry, studied, ran, onsen’d and hung out with friends, as I said earlier. It was really nice and calm. Actually I talked to a friend from back home last night and it made me realize that I have discovered a completely new side of myself since moving out here. I was having a lot of conflict in my last few months at UF because I felt as though I didn’t have the type of self-motivation I would need to do graduate school and maintain a future career as a PhD. Having no one to give me orders or direct me when I need to write papers, apply for grants or start on new research proposals scared me to death only a few months ago. But since coming to Japan, I realize I am capable of so much more than I thought. Not just with living alone and being under no one’s authority but my own, but working in a field where people often forget I am not quite an adult and taking up running as a hobby has really pushed me in new directions.

I seriously began contemplating this change on Sunday while running. My partners left me after 12.5K to finish their other 6 since I had planned to only run 15K. I was left to do the other 3K on my own. I actually had a moment where I thought “they won’t know if I don’t finish... and I am really tired...” but I instantly dismissed the thought and got back on my feet and finished. I think I would have quit a few months ago. I know I would have quit prior to coming to Japan. It isn’t about running though, I find that I push myself in other ways too - I study Japanese for a few hours both during school in my down time, and in the evenings. I also try to take really good care of my skin and body by sleeping early every night and eating well. In the States I guess I always felt like I was pushing to get things done and so I never had enough time. Here though, I feel like I have the time to take care of myself. It isn’t that I don’t feel stressed, because sometimes I do - especially when my students are having trouble or when tests are approaching. But, the Japanese way of life is starting to grow on me. In a culture where people take more time arriving so they have extra time to stay, I feel like I, too, have extra time to spend. Take for instance parking, if this makes any sense, they always back into parking spaces inside of pulling in forward. This takes more time initially but since it is so easy to leave, you feel like you are in less of a rush to finish. When they take off their shoes they even take the extra time to turn them in the opposite direction so they can just be slipped on when you are ready to leave.

I guess this post turned a little serious and I don’t know if it’s all a bunch of nonsensical mumbo-jumbo but I feel better and now you get a least a decent post. Even including pictures! There will hopefully be another update before the week is out with details and photos and videos about sports day. Oh, I forgot to  mention, speech contest also happened and although my student didn’t win, she did an excellent job and our hard work (literally until 8 almost every night we spent practicing) really showed.  I just got home from running and drinking with my neighbors so I am feeling really spent and I think I am going to pass out so hopefully I won’t go this long again without an update and you enjoyed it. Love.