After a week of inexplicable depression, my mood, like the weather has improved greatly today. As the weekend draws near this week keeps getting more exciting. My weekends are always fun and this one will not be an exception. After several active weekends in various cities in the prefecture (including a 30km walk in Ibusuki - see photos), my friends and I have decided to relax in the city for this one. Even though it involves a few hours of travel for me, once I get to Kagoshima we’ll be eating out, watching movies and sleeping in…and maybe going for a [View Full Entry]

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This update is long overdue and as such will probably be very long… My morale has sky-rocketed since my last blog entry. The fact that I haven’t written in 20 days is a good indication that I’ve been keeping busy with other things. In fact, I’ve been keeping so busy that the time has been flying by! It would probably take a long time to enumerate every weekend activity I’ve done so I’ll just start with what I remember. Two weekends ago, I decided to branch out and try to make some new friends. I had “networked” with a few people [View Full Entry]

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People left me some really good comments after my last posting about Fuji and I just want to say thanks for the support. The couple of weeks following that entry were really tough for me (as some of you know) as I was feeling really homesick. It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary - just some feelings of isolation and misunderstanding that made me think more wistfully of home. I’m not sure what set it off but I definitely started feeling bad during the Japanese course I attended with the other ALTs at KAPIC. I felt disappointed in quite a few [View Full Entry]

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I am so behind in my blogging that I was going to abridge all the events from the last couple of weeks so you wouldn’t have to spend an hour reading this entry. But how can you abridge a Fuji story?! Plus, there’s not much more to add except that I spent $1000.00 on new furniture last weekend after feeling a bit of disgust and depression at the oldness (and consequent bugginess, mousiness, moldiness, style-less-ness, etc.) of my house. I’ll post pictures as soon as my stuff is delivered/assembled. So here’s the real story: Two weeks ago, after a week of [View Full Entry]

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I don't have much time to write as I am supposed to be leaving soon for a week-long Japanese course at the Kagoshima Asia-Pacific Intercultural Centre, but I wanted to post something about my weekend. Although I had been planning a laid back weekend full of sleeping in and not much else, I was asked to participate in a home stay program halfway through last week. I had heard about the programme and had purposefully not signed up but if there's one thing about me that will never change it's that I can't say "no." Well, this turned out to be [View Full Entry]

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My apologies for not writing during the last two weeks as it is going to make for a tediously long update; however, I will try to focus on the most important items. I am beginning to feel quite settled in my life here so I feel much less need to synthesize everything I’m experiencing. Nonetheless, many important things are still happening so I will try to write a little more frequently to avoid subjecting you to anymore epic entries. I have continued to receive much kindness from the Japanese people I meet both in my town and in the city. The [View Full Entry]

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The last time I checked my e-mail was Thursday and although I didn't write a blog entry for that date, I did e-mail many of you. My week to that point had been pretty positive with only a slight crisis on Tuesday morning as I searched in vain for a bus that would take me to the office in Iwagawa (most of the buses had been halted for Obon - a Japanese summer holiday used to honour their dead relatives) and I was in a bit of a pickle until Andrew took pity on me and drove me to the office [View Full Entry]

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You guys are so inspiring!!!! I should probably stop gushing about all the postings, but they lift my spirits so high I actually laugh out loud...it's a good thing I'm alone at Andrew's place...no one will think I'm crazy! When I get my own internet connection I will try to reply to you individually and start planning for your visits (come on, you know you want to). This is going to be a short entry because my Aussie friend is kindly letting me use his computer and should be back from his Japanese lesson soon. I don't want him to feel [View Full Entry]

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This entry will be short. I am sitting at Popeye internet cafe with my new friend from New York, Stephanie, and an Asahi beer in front of me. Steph and I just met (she is not actually teaching with the JET program but is here on a private contract) but foreigners tend to stick together in the rural areas. She is actually friends with the owner of the cafe (she is very outgoing as one would expect New Yorkers to be) so apparently the beer and internet use are free, though neither of us really understands Japanese and the owner does [View Full Entry]

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I have officially completed my first week here in Japan and have gone from wild, techno-crazy Tokyo to the calm countryside of Kagoshima. The difference is stark. There are no flashing lights down here, no smog hovering over the city, no sky-scrapers. There are lots of mountains, trees, farmland, ocean and tradition. My first four days here have taken me through a range of emotions, many of which I hadn't expected to feel this early in the game. At first I was ecstatic that my area is so rural, abounding with nature and hiking potential. The people are wonderful. Even if [View Full Entry]

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