Catch up- May

When I said April was busy, May was worse. But the last couple of days Josh was here, we just took it easy in Karatsu. The day after he went home was Dontaku which is a festival in Fukuoka that is just an excuse to eat festival food and watch parades. Sara performed twice with her taiko group while Stuart and Chris paraded around Fukuoka with a cosplay group they were randomly invited to join! I ate butabara |:)

 

 

Then from Fukuoka a group of us went to Shikoku! It was Golden Week after all and none of us had been there.

We took the night ferry across (leaves at 9pm but unfortunately gets in at 5am D:) and then after a stop off at Gusto we went to Dogo Onsen which was the inspiration of the Onsen in Spirited Away!

Dogo Onsen was definitely beautiful but!! Maybe it was because it was Golden Week but they were disorganised and didn’t really explain to us what we could do and what our starting time was… We got the more expensive plan which includes a tour (very short and the highlight was seeing the Emperor’s toilet… “A glorified hole in the floor”), a private room for your group (worth it for keeping your stuff safe and for free snacks), yukatas and a tiny hand towel and the option to bath in both the public onsen and the private one that it meant to have healing powers. We didn’t know we could go in the bigger onsen (the private one is small and both are indoor) and because we didn’t have a starting time, we didn’t have time for the snacks So just letting you know if you plan on visiting it! It was very a very attractive place and the onsen was very relaxing, but like any other… I heard that there is one up the road from there that is better but we didn’t go to it.

After that we hung around in the park and met a guy with a pigeon on a lead… The pigeon was called Mi Chan and had a big fluffy hair band around her neck- she was very sweet but the other pigeons were freaked out by her. Anyway, apparently the guy is on YouTube somewhere!

After that we had ramen for lunch, went up a chairlift to Matsuyama Castle and then drove to Uswajima where our hotel was. I think we had Italian for dinner but we didn’t stay out for long because we were all fairly tired from the early morning.

The next day we went to Uwajima Castle which was really pretty with really steep staircases that people happily clambered up and down. The worst part was going down as it wasn’t quite steep enough to be a ladder so I didn’t turn around but my legs trembled on every step. Then the boys jumped off the Castle walls a couple of times because they’re slightly more courageous than I am.

After that we found a great thrift store and hung around in a park for hours. The koi there were like the koi I saw with my family in Nara- they went nuts for food!

 

 

 

 

 

 

After that I think we went to the sex museum. That was three floors of filth I’ll never be able to un-see; I’ll never be able to look at Buddha or Vishnu in the same way again…

Then we hurried around trying to find the right ferry port while shoving a McDonalds dinner in our mouths and set off back to Saga. We arrived at 5am at Kitakyushu and drove home and were back around 8ish?? Very grateful for our drivers, Stuart and Sara- thanks for a jam-packed trip!

The following Saturday I started Korean classes with Sara and Tim and it is going to be really hard. It’s a good challenge because I’m studying it in Japanese to Korean so it will definitely help improve my Japanese at least. But I’m already struggling with trying to memorise the sounds but hopefully I’ll start getting better.

Sara and I met with Unos again and went boating from Minato harbor to Nanatsugama. Amazingly didn’t get seasick and ate a great sushi lunch afterwards. Everyone was really happy to be hanging out as well so it was a really good day.

The following weekend, after Korean class, we went to Sasebo to watch Chris play at a Live Music event thing for an ALTs birthday. I was a bit intimidated at first and didn’t know how to get talking to my fellow native language…rs (I’ve become rather used to meeting Japanese people- I have a routine!) but everyone was really nice and there was some great music!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sasebo has an army base so when we were looking for another place to go to after the event we saw loads of soldiers :O Real ones Apparently there’s like a proper sized club in Sasebo (clubs are very small in Fukuoka and there’s some odd no-dance rule that’s been introduced now or something??) and I dunno- we ate great food when we were there and the city was really pretty and people were friendly and there were less “Gaijin だ” stares so we decided it’s brilliant and wanna go again. The following day we went on a Pirate Ship to see the 99 islands and then headed home exhausted- that weekend was actually busier than my following week at school! I had a DR meeting that meant I couldn’t go to my afternoon Elementary School and my Friday Elementary School was preparing for its Sports Day so I only had two classes. I always find that Elementary School requires the most work and effort from the ALT whereas Junior High Schools settle into a pattern fairly quickly and worksheets have become fun and quick to make now! I guess I’ve learnt something over the past two years.

Last weekend a huge group of ALTs went to see a baseball game in Fukuoka (I wanted to go to hang out with the first years more and Sara kept me entertained throughout the game by making up English baseball chants based on what the Japanese sounded like). The teams drew disappointingly, then we had a great dinner at Hard Rock Café then headed out to the FIFO event. At first we were all a bit worried as when we arrived all we saw were desperate-looking Japanese people (gaijin collectors tend to haunt these sort of events) but it was actually really fun and I met some great people! There was a Japanese guy who studied in Alabama for four years and his Southern accent was fantastic! My shoes had battered up my feet so badly by that point though that Sara and I decided to go home on the last train. There we had a not-so-friendly encounter with a very strange men who was dressed like a circus performer- top hat, jackets, loose trousers- but they were all grey and worn. He was drunk and his face was purple from alcohol abuse and for some reason I felt frightened. He walked over and sat next to us and gave us both a very slow bow, it’s really difficult to describe why it was so scary but we were relieved when he got off before us.

The next day I went to my Elementary School’s Sports Day which was fun- the kids were full of energy against the hot sunshine and their band performance was really good! I wish British Sports Days had more performances and team battle cries!

And now it’s nearly the end of June and any day now our BoE will be contacting the new JETs coming this August. Very excited to meet everyone!

Emily x

Ps, Sara and I went to Ureshino Onsen last Thursday! It is worth a visit- outdoor and big and relaxing and you can get your feet nibbled by Doctor Fish for ￥500! I won’t post the picture of Sara when she first stuck her feet into the fish water- it’s very tickly at first!

Catch up- April

April was jam-packed. My host family came to visit Karatsu for the day (all the way from Tokyo!). It was their first time here so I took them to the usual places and we had yakiniku afterwards- it was strange to be showing Japanese people around a Japanese place. I was nervous about meeting them because the last time I stayed with them had been sort of strange; I’m not a teenager anymore and I wanted to go out and see my friends and they seemed really hesitant about sending me off on my own… So things were a little weird. Also, my Japanese was very poor and I guess they were expecting me to understand more than I did. So this time, I made sure to study a lot in the few weeks before they arrived so I could impress them and I did and they were all so excited to be exploring somewhere new. The daughter is a JHS student but her English speaking ability is so much higher than any of my JHS students! I guess Karatsu has very little exposure to foreign people, different cultures etc, so there isn’t as much enthusiasm towards learning it as there might be in Tokyo.

The first week of April was the Big Switch. I changed from one Elementary School to another, Central Karatsu ALTs now have a new supervisor, all my JTEs at both my Junior High Schools changed! It was slightly more exciting this time, now that I’m over the initial shock of it caused by last year’s surprise move from my favourite school.

Stuart and I took the changeover week as an opportunity to visit our new schools and meet the new teachers. We’re also using new textbooks this year so we were hunting around for copies that we could have. It was really fun- Stuart has some beautiful schools dotted all over Karatsu so it was nice to see somewhere new.

We also had a hanami picnic in Karatsu

The sakura were late blooming this year so the beginning of April they were at the fullest. I went to see the ようざくら (aka, looking at cherry blossoms at night…) with my Japanese teachers (I have a Japanese conversation class usually once a week now) at Karatsu Castle and the Saga JETs had a hanami party in a park in Saga. We all brought bentos and had a nice catch up under the trees.

My Uncle proposed and is now engaged to Amy. My first Aunt! Congratulations, you guys I was going to demand to be a bridesmaid but they have enough cats between them to claw Amy’s dress up the aisle (five!!).

Joe started filming for this year’s Leavers Video so Hannah and I braved an adventure Takeo. We both kinda like our comfort zones and I don’t think I’d been to Takeo since the Saga Scavenger Hunt in my first year! So we were nervous but we made it. Joe was filming in a very green, pretty area and it was nice hanging out in the sunshine. I rushed through six leavers from Karatsu but to save battery, I saved the last three for another filming day! I talk really fast when I’m nervous though, so I hope my stuff came out OK… I guess he could just put me on slow-mo.

The second filming day was in Karatsu in this random park none of us had been to before. It had this huge rock in the middle that Stuart naturally felt he had to climb. We also went to Kitahama beach and the water was cold but not as bad as I was expecting. Had a nice swim with minimal jelly fish sighting.

The following week, Josh came to Japan! Yay! We went to the steak house, Caravan and chatted with the chef there for ages and met his baby daughter (adorable!) and then drove ourselves along with other Saga JETs (and Becky from Iki Island) to Lofty in Nanayama. It was going to be my birthday in a couple of days and Chad’s the following week so we thought we’d have a joint house party in the cabins in the mountains. It was so much fun- Becky and I even convinced everyone to play Murder in the Dark! That was the highlight of the night (no pun intended). The next day we went to the ever wonderful Funny (a pub like eating place in Nanayama- the master there has a ton of CDs and likes speaking English- there’s also Bass Ale on tap!) and chilled out for the day. The following day was my birthday and Josh took me to Huis Ten Bosch which is Sasebo’s very fake Holland. There were a few too many cheese shops than I would have liked but the resort was really fun and pretty but it was the hotel I loved the most. It was Hotel Europe and the hotel room had two floors and a spiral staircase!! It was so fancy!!!!!!!!!! We also took a canal boat to the hotel- HOW AWESOME IS THAT?! Ps, it’s expensive but totally worth it.

We ate the best steak for dinner and wandered around looking at all the fairy lights- there was also a 3D projection thingy like they have in Prague that was really good.

The next day we went to the One Piece area and we took a ride on the Thousand Sunny (or whatever it’s called)! They had huge models of the characters and I got a photo with all of them, intending to show them off at school but I haven’t had the opportunity yet… should maybe push for an English Board space… Hey kids, look at all this awesome stuff I do that you wish you were doing… Maybe that’s a bit mean?

When we left Huis Ten Bosch, we met Sara and Aoi in Takeo and checked out the azaleas. There is this really beautiful view where all the bushes of flowers lead up to the base of the mountain- we ran around among the bushes while eating ice-cream because we are cool gaijin…

Sara and I had taiko practice in the evening and Josh came along to watch- I wasn’t doing very well though, I was so tired I could barely raise my arms!

Emily x

Catch up- March

I got sick again! After a lovely day of seeing the Ume blossoms and watching the new Sherlock movie, my tummy started feeling bad then I had a disastrous Sunday and stayed home for three days of school with a viral infection! Sara and Tim were awesome though, buying me water and bringing me soup! And the cat sat by the head every day- so cute!

Sara and I went to a World Commercial thing at the newly opened Bus Centre- there was a band performing and dancing in Yukata and the commercials were ace! Quite surreal though as children were running around in front of the screen waving and throwing balloons… felt like I was underwater.

We had various Graduation Ceremonies at school and then it was the Easter Holidays (I still call them that!). With Stuart’s help, I took Mura to the no kill animal shelter in Takeo. It was really hard and I was very upset but yeah, I said all this before.

Emily x

Catch up- February

First snow in Karatsu

Over February I went on a trip with Sara and Aoi to Beppu and lead a craft group at the International Festa! We made peg dolls.

Beppu was stunning. We did the Hell Tour (lots of very hot and unusual hot springs!), went to an onsen, saw monkeys on Monkey Mountain and went on a safari with a twist.

Mura by this point was a little smaller than the two month old tiger!

Emily x

Catch up- January

Here are some pretty views of Tavistock from the next couple of days. I had so much rest and did all the mundane day-to-day things with a little too much excitement. We went for a few walks on the moors. Mum kept fretting about the bad weather but it was so typical of Britain and I just loved it!

On the way to see Dan in London

So next, I said goodbye to my family at Exeter station and made my way to London where Dan met me and showed me around. I don’t go to London very often so I was a bit of a tourist. We saw the usual sights and went to the Doctor Who Exhibition on the same day and same time as Colin Firth so… I kinda… flew the TARDIS with Colin Firth… a little bit! :O

Flying the TARDIS was my last day in Britain then I was on a plane back to Japan. I had the best time. xx

A week or so after I arrived back in Japan, my friends Romin and Chris came to stay with me from Korea for a few days. We met up with Becky in Fukuoka for an excellent night out then did a mini tour of central Karatsu.

After this it was back into the old school routine.

Emily x

EDIT: I lied!

There was also the Pub Quiz that Hannah and I organised (at Lagoon) and the January Conference where I helped out on a Presentation about Classroom Management and had a go at Ikebana (flower arranging).

BET YOU WERE WORRIED!

Emily x

Catch up- December

Looking pretty! My good luck charm for the JLPT 4th December (I passed)

It’s nice summing everything up from last year- looking back before, all I could really remember was how depressed and closed off I was but when I was invited to my teacher’s (my friend’s <3) wedding, and when I had a long overdue trip home at Christmas, I was on my way out of the self-pity and back to normal (been left a little nutty, though).

So my friend’s wedding was a Christian-style one. I am not too sure how I feel about this fashion in Japan (imagine putting on a fake Japanese wedding in Britain!!) but her reason for doing it was really sweet- she wanted her grandmother to be able to experience different styles of marriage (her brother having been recently married, too, he did the traditional Japanese Shinto Wedding).

Anyway, it was beautiful and quite spectacular. She had about five costume changes at the Reception and the groom’s friends put on this huge dance show (to a song called “Spider” 8S) and we all had our own wedding gifts. In Japan, everyone pays a small fortune to the married couple and they give you gifts in return. She gave the most beautiful Arita-yaki pot, made to look like a rose. Stunning!

I was a little bit put out at points because I was the only foreigner there so I got the usual old man attack and because I’m a girl I also got all the young men taking photos with me and squeezing me so my boobs were a little more… present… (really not sure how they managed that though, I’m not very… you know… anyway…)

But then I would wade through the crowd and find my friend and she looked so beautiful and happy that even perverts couldn’t ruin the day!

Before the wedding started we were told when to say Amen. The service was then mostly conducted in English.

He opened an umbrella to protect her from the snow かわいい!

Congratulations Mr and Mrs Ono!

The following day was the Nabe Matsuri! We spent the afternoon eating different types of stew and in the evening, Sara and I went to our Taiko leader’s house where we made gyoza and ate loads of friend chicken! We played gyoza roulette where you stick a load of wasabi in a couple of the gyoza…. I survived, actually, it was the people who made them who ate them!!

Then a few weeks later, I went home.

4am wake up!

I spent two weeks full to bursting with happiness. I love travelling but I of tea, that first plate of chips, miss my family, I miss the damp greens of British countryside and British food!!! I know everyone says that our food is bland but that first cup

YORKSHIRE PUDDINGS!!! I was so happy!

My Uncle picked me up and took me to his new house (he made me tea and bought me sausage and chips!!! Arrrrhahahahhaha!!!!) and the next day Mum, Dad and Jenny picked me up and took me to Granny’s. I wasn’t sure what to expect as I hadn’t been there since the summer that Grandad died and it was very wound up. My family aren’t very easy on each other. Everyone loves each other but… I don’t know what it is, everyone just seems to enjoy pissing each other off. I was able to spend a bit of time with everyone on their own at some point though which was good.

Christmas Eve Service

A few days after Christmas we drove home to Devon. And the next day Sara came to visit me! We spent a day in Devon then took the train to Cardiff to meet my Uni friends. Sara carried on north to stay with Hannah and I stayed in Cardiff for a ‘lush night out’ with my lovely girls Sue and Sarah.

Posing on Dartmoor

Pasty for lunch? Don’t mind if we do!

I arrived back home to Devon just in time for a New Year’s Eve house party with my old school friends. I’ve taken very few photos of said event though; living up to our usual glamour, we all got plastered and screamed a lot.

Thank you for a brilliant night, as always xx

Happy New Year!

Emily x

Catch up- November

It was that Kunchi time of year again!

Day1 was Youhama (evening parade)

Day 2 was a house crawl with one of my schools. This is a tradition of Karatsu Kunchi that I didn’t take part in last year. People open up their houses and prepare huge feasts and invite people in- it’s actually great fun, I met some old friends and made some new ones while avoiding the main crowds (The second day of Kunchi falls on a public holiday so thousands of people crowd into Karatsu- I think I talked about old lady elbows last time!)

Trying on one of the costumes for Kunchi

Posing at another teacher’s house

My favourite part of the day was in the evening when Tanakamaru San (brilliant woman, part of the Karatsu Volunteer Group) invited the Volunteer Group and all foreigners to eat at her house. It was very relaxed and after a day of fretting about my etiquette it was nice just to cross my legs, shout at Stuart and talk like one big family.

Day 3!

We got up early and saw the balloons being launched in Saga City (left the house at 5:30!) and made it back in time to watch the floats be dragged around the hairpin corner at Sotomachi!

We then followed the parade around all afternoon! Ahhh, reminiscing, that was a brilliant day…

Kunchi 愛してる！

After a brilliant start to the month, I went fishing with Barret and Stuart, made Halloween cakes with my Community Centre students, ate nabe served to us by Sumo!!!, celebrated Thanksgiving twice and ended the month with the flu!

My nurse when I was poorly

Emily x

Catch up- October

Stuart and I tried to go to a BBQ in Taku (follow the main road, can’t miss it) and ended up lost up Mt Tenzan. After a three hour detour of beautiful views and a lot of swearing we were greeted with mostly disbelief but also beef burgers and kangaroo! Mmm! Oh, and some Ultimate Frisbee.

Next! Halloween in Karatsu! Seeing as we stand out anyway, we went all out and dressed in pjs….

Awesome. I went as Amy Pond with all the tally marks on her- I had by this time successfully converted Sara into a Doctor Who geek so she appreciated it… no one else knew what I was aiming for though! I don’t think it quite beat my costume from last year…

 I’ve always been suspicious of Hello Kitty and wanted to raise awareness to the dangers of a cat with BLACK HOLES FOR EYES AND A GIGANTIC HEAD.

Emily x

Catch up- September

In September, I explored the ruins of a factory in Imari with some friends. We ventured through mud, thorns and hordes of moskitos to find ourselves in an open hall that was stunning- completely overwhelmed with ivy and trees. Stuart swung himself up onto the second floor from the branches of a sapling as we continued to smoosh and scream about the moskitos- my legs were covered in bites that stopped in a neat puffy line where my three quarter length trousers began.

Scared of venturing back into the moskitos and thorns, we searched for another exit and found one… that led straight onto the main road… Felt a little stupid that we hadn’t found it previously, bought a Pepsi, went to a family restaurant for lunch.

After we got back from Imari, Sara and I went to Fukuoka to check out the British Fayre. I caught my first glimpse of some of the Will & Kate memorabilia (wow!) and we ate scones! Scones!!!!

At school we were preparing for the Speech Contest- at one school I auditioned and picked the two Year 7s and then started preparing CDs so they could practise at home. Josh was still looking for a job at this point so I had him all to myself and spoke to him pretty much all the time which was lovely and nice for him to see Mura growing up!

Emily x

The Kittens from the Bike Basket

I haven’t blogged for a very long while because last summer I found three abandoned kittens and made the decision not to leave them. It was a busy night and they were clearly left there intentionally. I saw a couple of kids pick two kittens up and cycle off with them mewing and wriggling in their hands and seeing as the kittens still had traces of umbilical cord and their eyes weren’t open, I knew they weren’t going to survive kids picking them up and playing with them. So I picked up the remaining three, wrapped them in a shirt and took them home.

I found them a shoe box and wrapped them in a t-shirt while my boyfriend picked up some milk powder and bottle from the 24 hour supermarket. It was really difficult to feed them at first as the bottles were clearly made for puppies but with a cat label stuck on them- we had to very carefully feed them with a syringe until we found better bottles at a pet shop.

We decided to raise them until they were old enough to be rehomed. Unfortunately one didn’t make it, due to some digestion problems that he was just too tiny for the vet to fix. By the beginning of the school term we found one of the kittens a new home! She already had a cat, otherwise I think she would have taken them both, but she was one of the few people who understood that because of the kittens being born with herpes, they had to be house cats. This made it difficult to find the last kitten a home and by March she was eight months old, not a kitten anymore!

I was getting more and more anxious. Everyone I asked, who then asked people they knew, were unable to find her a home. There were a few offers but by this point she had lived indoors for so long that it would be dangerous for her (not only because she’d give herpes to other cats but because she hadn’t adapted to the day-to-day dangers of living outdoors) to ever go outside. Not many people could understand that and I had to turn the offers down.

But then I remembered a friend of mine who had done the same thing as me and asked them for advice. They told me about a no kill shelter in the area so I took the cat there where she will have a much better chance of finding a new home.

I should have researched no kill shelters much sooner than I did. I partly believed they didn’t exist in Japan due to their seemingly complete lack of animal care. A lot of people just pretend it’s not going on… Also, the one volunteer shelter I had found in the nearest city ignored my emails so I was feeling pretty negative and untrusting of Japan’s animal care. But no kill shelters do exist here and the one I went to was wonderful and they made a note of all the things that most people thought was me overreacting and treated them in a very matter-of-fact way. When I said she had to be a house cat they just nodded and wrote it down. And thinking about it, the vets that helped me raise the kittens had responded the same way.

If you do find yourself in a similar situation as me, I recommend asking a local vet about no kill shelters in your area and also making posters and asking people you know. JETs are not supposed to keep pets and most likely you won’t be allowed to keep animals in your apartment, so I’m not encouraging you to go out and look for abandoned animals… rather, if you find yourself in a situation where you feel compelled to do something, don’t take it all upon yourself. I let my prejudices get in the way initially but the Japanese people have yet again thrawted my closed-minded temper! And my friends. I know many of them disagreed with my decision but all the same they supported me and helped me in every possible way.

So thanks to everyone who helped me raise the three kittens from the bike basket, Nacho, Ella and Mura. You are all brilliant and have taught me a lot about Japan that I would maybe never have grasped without this experience.

Emily x

Here’s a link to a slideshow I made to show my family when I visited home at Christmas.