Last update before my home vacation

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So friends, time for one last update before I take off this Friday to go vacation in St Louis. WOOOHOOOOO vacation back home. Well this is a special update, probably the best one yet in my mind. I had planned to get this out last week and suprise everyone with a double update in one week. However, sleep, and exploring got in the way. Either way here we go.

This update is special because it showcases two great nights. The first night I was able to go to dinner with my fellow co-workers both American and Japanese. This was real fun. We picked a place to eat close to work and a big group of us went. The Japenese co-workers that showed up were all from Utsenomia which is closer to Tokyo than Nagoya. They get sent here to work during the week and get to head home on the weekends.

The second night was a good-bye dinner for a contract worker of mine. He lives out in Tokyo and was a great guy to work with. Unfortunatly he had to cut his time short. Even with the sad events surronding his depature me and a group of co-workers took him out to Yaki-Niku , all you can eat grilled beef. So I will let the pictures do the talking from here on out. (Ok I will comment on each one too)

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Photos

Uetake-san
This is my Japanese teacher. Granted he doesnt teach me the best words at times but we do get a laugh out of it. He always has a smile and a joke, so we get along really well. Though both our jokes fall flat on each other, we still laugh any way.

Hayashi-san and Noriko-san
This is Hayashi-san and Noriko-san. Noriko-san translates for us at work and Hayashi-san corrects Uetake-sans use of Japanese.

The road outside
This is a street shot of where we ate.

Settling in
Here we are trying to pick seats. I got all the action covered.

Fukawa-san
I caught him off gaurd.

Yamiguchi-san
When I first met Yamiguchi-san he was getting sick and the next 2 times he came back to Handa he was sick. He finally got better but was still taking some medicine.

Nameki-san
Nameki-san does not speak much english so I am working on my Japanese so we can talk more.

Uetake-san took the camera
So the camera was taken away from me and I did the Japanese sign for no. Which is an X. He took the picture any way.

Mina-san
This is Mina-san (we use her first name instead of her last... because she introduced herself with her first name) She bought me a Japanese book with both english and Kanji so I could study more Japanese.

Ohashi-san
Ohashi-san always has a smile on his face and considers his words very carefully. He has been to the states a good amount of time and wants to go back. He also tried to squirm out of the way of the camera.

Suspicious
So here is a little background story. One day my badge blew out of my badge holder. So Mina-san took it upon herself to say I was suspicious. Since they could no longer tell if I was me or not since I did not have a badge. So I spent a good amount of time avoiding the gaurds to find my badge only to have to pick up the late night pizza while avoiding the scrutiny of the gaurds at the gate without a badge. When I left the gaurds laughed, they had the badge the whole time. From there on out my nickname has been suspicious. I learned the word in Japanese so now we all call each other suspicious. Fukawa-san and Mina-san say it in English and I say it in Japanese.

Thats a water bottle
Uetake-san was demonstarting how the Japanese pour each other drinks then decided just to go straigh to the bottle. It was water, he figured he would just a glass not a huge bottle. So he took the bottle home.

Action shot
He then proceded to pretend to be a baseball player and an angry bottle wielding person.

Baseball Player
He is the baseball shot

Group picture
So here is the entire group. The people you have not met in no paticular order are. Daniel, Clint, Duane, and Dave. Ask me nicely and I will point them out to you when I am home.

Oni Horns
Its not called rabbit ears or Usagi ears here. They are Oni horns. See if you can spot them. Bonus points if you know what an Oni is.

Noriko-san and Michiko-san
These two have the hardest job here. They have to translate back and forth from Japanese to English and back again. Though neither can explain why there must be peace signs in pictures. Noriko-san just says its nice. Michiko-san just laughs.

Night two
So night two was part a 4th July celebration part a going away party. To start off the night I got these two to give me their best Japanese pose. This is Jon and Eric. Eric is a big towering guy. Give him all you can eat meat and he the happiest man on earth.

See he is happy
These two ate at least 2 cows on their own, Daniel and I helped. I was full for 2 days after this.

The peace sign is popular
Alex and his best Japanese pose. Pantipa was not ready for the picture.....

Demian and Michiko
Japan is truely Demian's Island in the sun. Here is Michiko-san again.