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Published: March 1st 2007
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Hello everyone!!! You get a double dose of travel bloggage today because I forgot to publish my last entry last week. Things are still going well in Japan!!! I still have not left Shizuoka, there is so much to do and see here. Have I told you guys how lucky I feel to be living in this city? It really is the perfect size, not too big and not too small and it has so much character and so many things that I am looking for in an ideal place to live. Honestly, I once made a list in my journal of some of the qualities that my ideal city would have and Shizuoka has my top three, lots of great coffee shops (reminds me of the Northwest!!), beautiful parks to run in, and people who bike everywhere!!! Like I said earlier there is so much to do here and I honestly am learning something or discovering something new about this city every day!!!
Yesterday I was trained with a group of people to start teaching Chibiko classes at Nova (preschool children ages 2-4), which I am really excited about. The parents of the children come to class with them and we basically just sing songs and say a few english words the whole time. Afterwards, one of the girls I trained with and I went for a walk through the streets of Shizuoka and we stumbled upon a park that I had never been to before; It had a beautiful water fountain display. I couldn't believe I hadn:t been to it before...there are so many hidden treasures in this city!! Afterwards we discovered a cute little coffee shop called Kissa, which is one of Dawn's favorites.
Last night Dawn, Ben, Will and I walked to a park Dawn calls the foot massage park. Its completely random. Its a beautiful little park with ume blossom trees and cute little wooden bridges and a coi pond. The best part about the park though is a small little area where there is a foot massage "course". There are about 7 different surfaces that you walk over to massage different parts of your feet, some of them are really painful but once you have walked the entire course your feet really do feel better!!! HOw funny is that?? I think I will be frequenting this park since my feet are so sore from running on the hard pavement every day.
OH and speaking of running, the Shizuoka marathon is coming up. The finish line is set up at Sumpu park which is about a two minute walk from my apartment. I have been pleasantly surprised to find that running is really popular in Japan, I was worried I was going to stick out like a sore thumb running through the streets of SHizuoka.
This morning I had a really great run up to the top of Sengen shrine. Spring is definitely arriving in Shizuoka, I went running in shorts and a t-shirt today instead of pants and a sweatshirt and gloves 😊. When I got to the top of Sengen, I had the most gorgeous view of Mt. Fuji that I have seen so far. Sometimes when its cloudy or hazy its difficult or impossible to see Fuji, but today it was crystal clear and absolutely stunning. No matter how many times I see that mountain it never seems to get old!!!! It was adorable today too, because at the top, there were about 40 elementary school kids on a field trip having their lunch. In Japan, elementary school kids all wear the same colored hats to school, so there was a sea of little red hatted children this morning, enjoying their lunch on these cute little tatami mats that they each had carried in their back pack. I stretched for a little while at the top so I could look out at Fuji and watch the crazy little Japanese kids for a little bit. They all had their little "bento" or box lunches with different sushi rolls in them, totally adorable and totally different from what kids in the states would eat for lunch. I thought it was funny though, how similar they behaved to kids in the states 😊.
I spent today shopping for Jessica and Grandpa's bday gifts and got them all sent off, did a little grocery shopping at the train station and found some laundry detergent, which was quite the triumph for me. I set out to buy some about a week ago and ended up getting the wrong thing (definitely not the first time I:ve done this). I have resorted to taking pictures with my new Japanese cell phone of things that I need so I can make sure that I am getting the right thing. I took a picture of the laundry detergent Dawn has so I could find it today 😊. What you have to do to survive when you don't know the language 😊.
I am still studying Japanese when I can, I have memorized hiragana, am working on katakana, but haven:t even begun to think about Kanji. I have set an unofficial goal of taking a Japanese language proficiency test in December to motivate me to study and learn the language. I think it would be a shame to leave this country without knowing some of the language. I can read some signs now, but still don:t know enough Japanese vocabulary to understand anything I read 😊. I always wonder about everything I am missing out on not being able to read the signs around me!!!
Okay well I should be going, Dawn is making a big chili dinner tonight for a few friends and I am responsible for picking up some ground beef at the QQ (the 99cent grocery store!!! They are fantastic they carry everything from fruit and veggies, to meat to MILK TEA to sweet bean treats and its all 99cents!!!). I will have to post a picture of a QQ soon, they are one of my favorite things about Japan...ahah what a nerd I am!!
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