Busy bee

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I've realized that I only have a little over a month until my time in Japan is over...so I've been keeping insanely busy with extra-curriculars and not enough time packing. Don't worry, Mom, I'll make it work!

What have I been doing?? Here's the rundown:

I performed and competed in our local "talent"/karaoke contest that's held every year called Tottori Idol (a take off on the original Pop Idol show). A couple friends and I performed the song called "Shuchishin", it was popular here in Japan last year? We memorized the lyrics in Japanese and the dance too! We even got custom shirts made. We won 2nd place which was a ticket to the annual San-In Beach Party. We're splitting it so it comes down to 2000 yen off per person per ticket we buy! Not bad right?

Next....

Right before I went to Korea, I decided to join the Tottori Sandstorm, our little soccer team in Tottori which is mostly made up of other foreign teachers like me. We didn't have enough members to make a team so I decided to join and helped recruit a few others. I'm glad I joined though because it gave me a head start on working out and getting back into shape after not doing anything all winter. We played in the soccer tournament in Matsue, Shimane prefecture on May 30. Before that, we'd been practicing for two weeks and it was really fun and I realized, hey I'm not so bad. We played on a smaller field with only 5 members per team, it was kind of like futsal. I played goalkeeper and forward since we rotated around whenever people were tired. I scored a goal!! It was in the goal box and a little confusing, but it was the only goal of the official tournament for our team. We also got cool shirts made, a little expensive but so worth it!

The weekend after that I went on a road trip with a few friends to Obama, Fukui prefecture. Yes, same name as President Obama. This town has embraced the name with Obama goods and banners, etc. It was a fun trip, took 4 hours one way. We did a day trip and left Tottori early, around 6am. Other than buying Obama stuff, we went to a food museum, a REALLY old temple, and ate kuzumanju. Good times.

Next, just today, I went to Yonago and climbed Mt. Daisen, the highest mountain in the area I live in, Chugoku region! It was tough, but we did it!!! It took a little over two hours I think to go up and down. Of course we took a lot of breaks and had lunch at the top of the mountain. After climbing, we treated ourselves to Daisen soft ice cream, sooo good! I even got to milk a cow for free!!! I got a certificate and everything. It's the Milk Farm in Mt. Daisen, they have a lot of cows and really, really good soft ice cream.
Here's the video of me milking Cowy:

Other school stuff that's been going on...my students and co-workers threw me a surprise birthday celebration at school since I was in Korea during my actual birthday...so cute, I even got a cake!
We had our school excursion a few weeks ago and the kids and teachers walked to a park about 30minutes away and did all sorts of activities and cooked lunch there. The Chubu (East) area of Tottori also just had their sports tournaments so I went to cheer on my students. In particular, volleyball and baseball. Up until yesterday, things weren't decided for baseball. Alas, my students won't be going to the next stage, but they did win one of the games on Saturday and it was awesome!! They were down 2-0 in the 7th inning (it only goes to 7 in jr. high school games) and they scored 3 runs at the bottom of the 7th!!! Amazing! I cheered so loudly, my students know my signature cheer, the "WOOOOO!!!" because no one else does that here. Japanese people cheer in an organized fashion with songs and chants and hitting megaphones to a rhythm...I just randomly yell things out or "WOOO!" so the kids can pick me out of a crowd pretty easily. Trying to spend as much time with my students before I leave. They still don't know about it, but they'll find out soon enough.

Need to pass out soon...I was up at 6am today to climb Daisen! Tomorrow I have 5 classes. Yikes....

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