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Published: January 27th 2006
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the view
here is the busy intersection out side the apartment i have now been here for almost 2 weeks. so i'm finding my way around a lot better. there's a busy street outside of our apartment which makes it pretty loud at night sometimes, but so far i don't need any ear plugs.
last weekend i went to issasaki with graham and king (he works at the school with us and is from LA). issasaki is a town close to maebashi but has more night life. we went out for dinner at a funky little cafe which is well known for its black spaghetti. so graham got the sgaphetti and it was really black, not just a little bit black, a lot black. the noodles had even been died black by the sauce. it was a seafood spaghetti so maybe the sauce was made black with squid ink. it was pretty tasty. after that we went out to 'club luv' for a hip hop event. but it wasn't a normal hip hop event, or a normal club. the performance/dancing area and the drinking area were separate. the lights were on in the room the bar was in, almost like the cafeteria at a highschool dance, and the performance was a little
prefectural building
me by the river with the citys prefectural building in the background different. the actual rappers or hip hop artists were pretty regular, it was the choreographed dance routines in between the artists that was kinda funny. at first the dances were kinda hockey. most of the dancers looked like gangster wannabees or backstreet boys. but closer to the end, the dances got really good. these kids put a lot of effort into these dances and i was really impressed with how well they turned out. the last few were almost like musicals telling a story as well as having really well choreographed dance routines. i was totally impressed. the thing i was not impressed with was the club attire. so, its the middle of winter here and really cold, but i have never seen so many hot pants or so much skin. the girls here look like hookers when they go clubbing. almost every girl was either wearing hot pants or mini skirts, and a short shirt showing their stomachs. and most of them had on incredibley high heeled boots. it was insane, and king told me that they weren't even that dressed up. so, i definatly need to go clubbing in tokyo for the full experience.
i gt a
river
heres the river that runs through maebashi chance to walk around downtown maebashi and its not so bad. i looked in the shops but they are all over priced. there is a cool department store, kinda like holt renfrew but not quite as shishi, which is really large and confusing and i got lost in it. its called suzuran, and i will attempt to conquer it on my next day off. i'm also getting used to grocerie shopping here. i was a little confused at first as to why the shopping carts were so small, but they aren;t typical shopping carts, they are to put your basket into, so you can push your basket around. i have also found the import grocery store where things are rediculously over priced. nonetheless it's still pretty fun to go there just to look at food that i know. snacks in japan are fabulous! snacks are a specific food group out here. they tend to be made of potato or corn, and they are like chips, only they are light, fluffy and crunchy. there are various flavours, and some are denser than others. my favourite right now are these potato snacks with little bits of veggies in them. its like eating
face paint
i lost at hanetsuki, so graham drew a beard on my face-yay! chips, only the natural veggie taste is better, and i think they are healthier for you. the kids here eat them all the time during snack time at kiddy land.
work is going quite well. the job is quite easy and i like most of the students. every one is eager to learn english, which makes it easy to teach them, and there is only one student who is so stupid that it makes me want to hit him. but he seems to really like me, so i'm trying to be understanding. but he really is so stupid. to make sure i wasn't being biased, i asked some of the other teachers about it, and they all agreed. i'm slowly starting to get regular students who take mostly my lessons, and so far most of them are pretty cool. i'm starting to wonder though about a lot of the students in the salon. they are so nice, and really cool, but they seem to show up everyday. its like a tangible chat room (from the internet), and they seem to be addicted. i wonder, between work and their families, how they find the time to do anything else. oh,
downtown
the entrance to downtown i've also got some regular kids that come in for kiddy land with me. turns out the little girls really like me. they were scared of the men who work there, especially graham, with his big hair and wild beard, so most of the kids that i teach are little girls. i'm also the only female teacher that they have there, so whenever new little girls come to the school, they take lessons with me. so, basically work is pretty enjoyable. we also had a new years party at work. it was mostly for the kids. we had a hanetsuki tournament, which is similar to badminton. it's the traditional version of badminton and the loser gets their face painted by the winer. check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanetsuki for more info. i had to play graham in the first round, and he beat me, which means he got to draw on my face. its was pretty funny because i forgot to wash it off, and i had a lesson with a little boy later and i couldn't figure out why he just sat there staring at me for the first little while.
oh, and exciting news: we finally got a fridge. it
downtown
downtown is archaded, so its like being inside. the stray cats running the streets make you wonder though hasn't arrived yet, its being delivered on tuesday! ok, maybe just exciting to me.
hope everyone is well!
anni
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non-member comment
awesome..have adventurous times dear anni..and o yea hi graham