Bandai-Atami

This week Suzie and Ian came to visit. They were delayed on their flight, but it never occurred to me to check, and we had arranged to meet them at a station here in the city after their train ride. Unfortunately they missed that train, so we walked around the platform for a while and eventually concluded they weren't there. We called Mary to check the times for us and figured out what must have happened, so made use of the hour til the next train by going for a nice lunch set above the station (I'm not being sarcastic, it was in the station and it was still very nice!) When they got in, we made our way back before going for ramen and a drink at the stand-up bar in Hiroo. The next day we were at work, but Suzie has travelled a lot and they just went off and explored - they have seen quite a few things we haven't got round to yet!

It was a 3 day week for us as we had the long weekend for mid-term. This meant we were free to have a bigger than usual Wednesday night out at Doma Doma - all 15 of us - and still not worry about being tired. This said, we got up at 5.30 the next day to visit Tsukiji fish market. It's the biggest fish market in the world and it was incredible, just huge! We caught the end of the tuna auctions (very loud, lots of over-exaggerated movements, just like a normal auction only even harder to follow in Japanese) and had a good look around, before going for a sushi breakfast at a restaurant recommended by fish boy (his name is Alastair but no-one ever calls him that, he has a PhD in tuna and works at the market) which was fantastic. We all had reservations about eating raw fish at 8am but we soon got past that and really enjoyed it. It could have had something to do with the fact that we had already been up for ages by then and it felt like lunch time!

Later that day Suzie and Ian left for Takayama and Kyoto, and we started to ring around for places that we could go away for a few days (nothing like leaving it to the last minute). We wanted to go somewhere new, and find a Ryokan (traditional style Japanese inn) but with an Onsen in the room because Will is shy. We found one we liked the look of that still had space in a small hot spring resort called Bandai Atami. It is in the hills near the shores of one of the most beautiful lakes in Japan, in Fukushima prefecture north of Tokyo, so we hired a car and set off on Friday morning. The rain was horrible all day, and by the time we got there (after getting lost a few times on the way) it was 2.30pm. We had been planning to go up to the lake, but we decided to save that for Saturday and just went to the room.

It was amazing. We had our own little garden with an onsen on a deck just under cover, so I had a hot bath outside while it rained and was all quiet. It was so relaxing and peaceful. I must have had 6 baths in 2 days! We had our evening meal served to us in the room, and the women kept getting on their knees to bow to us fully with heads touching the ground. We felt quite embarrassed really, standing there in our scratty jeans after a 5 hour drive! They got us to choose yukata from a table, and just went out of their way to make us feel special for the whole time we were there. It was the first time we had stayed at a real ryokan, and I would highly recommend it!

The next day we set off to drive around the lake, but the rain was still torrential. The views were still good but we didn't see much through the mist. We drove down through some pretty areas just to see more of Japan outside of Tokyo, and we came across a small sign with the name of a village I happened to have been reading about before, a very old preserved traditional Japanese village called Ouchijuku. It is a really popular place to go, but you would never guess it from the single tiny signpost, we were lucky to spot it. We queued for almost an hour just to park, and I have never seen so many people in one place. Or so many umbrellas for that matter! The rain just poured and poured, and we were soaked through long before we reached the first shop selling umbrellas. The village was lovely, all thatched roofs and old tatami mat rooms which had been kept just as they would have been, and trench streams in the streets with washing places and water wheels. On a sunny day it would have been perfect. For lunch we went to an open tatami room with a pit in the floor where they cooked fish over an open fire. We had a tempura set, with soup and rice and it was nice, but tempura is usually really light and not greasy. This was the opposite, and really sickly. We were still wet when we left, so we headed back to the car.

The drive home was very long, because some roads were closed due to the weather. The rain kept getting heavier and the wind got up, so on the expressway we could barely see the lane lines. We found out later when we got back that it was a typhoon which had changed course unexpectedly and hit the east coast of Japan. We thought it was bad enough to drive home in it, but we found out that our friends Kate and Adam had decided to go away on their scooter, with her perched on the back. They had a five hour drive home on a scooter in a typhoon. They said other people were laughing at them because they looked so ridiculous and were obviously mad foreigners, but they couldn't join in because their faces were numb.

The day after a typhoon here is always so calm and sunny, perfect days after the worst you get. Sunday was like that, and everyone just relaxed and unwound ready for school again on Monday.

Tozanso

Recently we got a new TV. In Japan, you have to pay to get rid of some electrical appliances, so parents often donate things if they are moving away (which happens a lot as their businesses move them around). One family is going to Hong Kong, which has a PAL system as they were under UK control. Japan uses NTSC so they were giving away their huge, lovely TV. We managed to get that, and we went to collect it and lots of other bits and pieces of furniture and appliances that other people were taking. I never fail to be amazed when I see the places some of the international business families live. They are just beautiful, and huge. So much for everything in Japan being small!

Another family wanted to get rid of a large, top of the range telescope that they had. They offered it directly to the school to see if it could be of any use. The we knew about it was an email that went out to the science department and the head of values, offering the telescope. Nobody could understand why the values department had been included, not least Adam, the HOD. It came out later that when the message came in there was a teacher called Larry in the room, who is very dry and very witty. The Japanese office staff often have no idea when he is being serious. They asked him who he thought they should offer the telescope to. He said the Science department. They said great, anyone else? He said maybe the values department, who teach RE, because they might want to look to the heavens and try to find God.

This week has been excursion week for the Middle and High schools. Each grade goes to a different location in Japan for 3 days, from Fuji to Hiroshima and all over the place. This year I went to Tozanso, in the foothills of Mt Fuji. It is only about an hour and a half from Tokyo, which is good as most of my grade group are only 10 years old. We went to Showa-Kinen park, a really gorgeous, huge park with loads of physical stuff for the kids to tire themselves out on. This grade last year were a bit of a nightmare, but this lot were fantastic, so well-behaved and interested in everything, really nice kids. The next place we went was a cave, where they were asking me lots of geology questions and getting spooked out in the dark. There was a tiny little Shinto shrine in the depths of the cave, because Shinto worships nature.

We stayed at a YMCA, and had a campfire with lots of singing and smores (marshmallows toasted on the fire then squished between two chocolate digestives - the sickliest thing I have ever eaten), and then went for offuro - traditional Japanese bath. I love offuro and Onsen (the natural hot spring version). You wash and shower to get clean, and then soak in this huge hot bath, relax and chat. It is a really soothing experience, and great for getting warm on cold days or after skiing etc. When we told the kids lights out, they did it. We didn't have to knock on doors or police them at all, very different from last year - so relaxing!

The next morning the sun was out and the weather was clear first thing, and we had the most fantastic view of Fuji from the site. It clouded over a little before I got my camera, but I think it is still a great sight. Last year I was even closer in Yamanakoko, and didn't see a thing. We went for a hike with the girls to a Buddhist temple about 2 miles away. There were different parts to the temple complex.

The first was a small garden halfway up the hill, which had an entrance way with huge statues of the gos of wind and thunder, complete with massive models of traditional Japanese sandals for them to wear when they make storms. That part was a temple dedicated to healthy feet, and people go there to pray for friends and relatives with feet or leg problems, or take their children's shoes to be blessed. Next we walked up the rest of the way to the main temple at the top, which is very important to Buddhists, as it contains relics of Buddha. It has been dedicated for World Peace. We weren't feeling very peaceful though, because all the way up the hill were Chinese and Korean tourists, who were photographing and videoing our group. They seemed really excited to see western children, and they weren't even trying to be sneaky about it, just walking up and pointing cameras at us all as we walked, or as we stood in a group; all the time. The kids were starting to get a bit freaked out, particularly by one man with a video camera. Eventually one of the other teachers had to go up and tell him to stop, because he just wasn't taking the hint. I felt sorry for his wife - she looked very embarrassed, but she didn't seem to be trying to stop him.

We took a different path down the mountain, down some very steep concrete steps through a garden walk. When I say we, I actually mean the rest of the group. I stepped on a half step edge (taking a photo so not looking where I was going, but still hadn't noticed the big concrete lumps before when I was looking!), lost my footing and went down most of the first flight in mid-air. I could feel myself slipping, and could see there was nothing to hang on to, so I just relaxed and let myself go. I know from experience it hurts a lot less if you are not tense. Still, I did not expect to actually flip over and fall so far. As I fell my legs came over the top of me and slammed into a step below. I landed flat on my back, fortunately with my bag under my head, or it could have been a lot nastier. I took a lot of skin off both wrists, elbows, one knee and had a big dent just above an ankle which immediately went purple. My main concern as I fell was that I would take some of the kids out who were below me, but I stopped just at the legs of the first one (good job I had stopped to take a photo and fallen a bit behind). I can't say for sure whether I was more concerned that they would be hurt, or that it would hurt me even more if they landed on top of me. Probably both. The others said later I was funny when I landed, because the first thing I did was pull down my top to cover my stomach up, then I asked the girl next to me if she was alright, then I flopped again and said "I'll just stay here for a few minutes". I realised when I tried to get up that I could put very little weight on my ankle, and not bend it up towards me at all. I was fine on steps and flat, but slopes were a problem, which was unfortunate as we were on a mountain, and a good 40 minutes walk from the cabins. I hobbled back, and some of the kids were still going slower than me! This is the photo I took the instant before I fell.

We had lunch, but I had gone pale and felt sick, and my foot was swelling, so I was sent back to my cabin with ice and pillows and told to elevate it and rest. I was supposed to be leading an afternoon activity, but there was no way I could run around with the kids. They did a scavenger hunt in my time slot instead. The best part was just as we got back for lunch from the hike, I had a text from Will saying that Sister Egawa had asked if we were ok, and he had said we were all great, no emergencies, no dramas. He tempted fate, so I blame Will.

In the end I went to the hospital with Priya, nothing was broken but it was nasty - I was on crutches for a day or two and I am still seeing the physio and have painful lumps in odd places. I am supposed to rest it but there is so much to do!

The rest of the trip passed pretty much without incident. I couldn't walk around very well and the activity for the last day was a visit to a park of preserved Japanese houses of all different kinds - a bit like the Black Country Museum but Japanese. I sat on a bench by the entrance for three hours. I got a lot of knitting done, many sudoku puzzles and made a good start on a new book, so it wasn't a total loss! This was the only house I could see from where I sat. After that we drove home, and I had to hobble past all the kids from the other grades all asking me what I had done. They were all very sweet, helping with my bags and things. I couldn't help wondering how many of the kids at my last school would have done that and how many would have just pointed and laughed!

Typhoon

It has just taken me almost an hour to sign in to this blog. Not only did I still find it all in Japanese, but I couldn't figure out my password. I tried every combination of user name and password I ever use, but no good. Eventually I had to reset it to what I thought it should be, which still takes a long time when the instructions are in kana. I can only think it must have been inactive for too long and it did something strange. Never mind I am in now.

I have got some time to update today because there is a typhoon and we are off school. We had an emergency dismissal yesterday and then a phone call at 5.20am to say it was too dangerous to travel for most people, so stay indoors. It was forecast, so we knew it was on the way, but apparently the storm changed direction slightly and came straight for us instead of to the west as they said it would. The wind was howling all night, but at 5am the cicadas were still chirping, which I found very spooky. I think it says a lot about the Japanese culture that here in Tokyo all the hotels got booked out so that people would be able to work today. Anywhere else in the world they would just try to get home and then if they couldn't get to work, so be it. Salarymen in Japan are a breed unknown!

I feel almost as though we have never been away, school is back to normal (except my knitting class is now 9-11 year-olds, so harder to keep track of - I have 2 girls who manage to either pull the whole thing off the needles every lesson or get in such a tangle we have to cut it off and start again), the new teachers are good fun, and everything is as we left it. We have invested in some slightly more efficient cockroach defences (ie little boxes pushed into every corner and under every shelf) since one crawled up Will's leg at 3am a couple of weeks ago. So far they seem to be working (touch wood) although we are still getting mosquito bitten quite a lot. My legs look so attractive with angry red splotches all the way up.

We have booked our flights to Australia for Christmas. We are flying to Cairns on the 15th of December and spending a few days in the tropics, then down to Melbourne for 4 days. The rest of the time we are going to stay in A friend's beach house in Geelong, about an hour outside of Melbourne. She is getting married in the middle of it all so there will be lots of people around that we know and I imagine we will be shown around all the sights until we are sick of them by all the Melbourne folks (the UK/Aussie rivalry at school hit a new high with the athletics in Osaka, and can only keep going with the Rugby about to start, so we will probably be dragged around to see how good at sport they are). We are also going to a test match on boxing day, but at least its not against England!

We have finally got new phones (Will's screen cracked and we wanted to change networks too) and these ones are able to send and receive text messages from the UK, Yay! Apparently it doesn't work with O2 phones for some reason, but everyone else can do it. I am still figuring out how some things work, like why I seem to have 2 answerphones so I can never tell if I have a new message cos I happen to check the wrong one (!) and other minor annoyances, but they are much smaller than the bricks we had last year and they give us loads of free calls because most of our friends changed to the same network, so it will be a lot cheaper overall too.

We decided our apartment looked a bit bare, like anyone could be living here, and that we didn't have enough storage space for all the bits and pieces we brought back with us, so we made a trip to Ikea when we got back. We had never driven there before, and we managed to take the wrong exit from the expressway. We could see it in the distance but we couldn't figure out how to get there! Eventually we found it, and bought lots of shelves and lamps and drawers and now it looks a lot more like a home here, we are really pleased. We even managed to spend less than we thought, which has to be a first on a visit to Ikea! I have bought some really nice fabric too, (since another teacher who moved to Hong Kong left me a sewing machine) and I am going to try to make some curtains for the living room. I will put photos of all this on, but I have put my camera away (somewhere safe no doubt) in all the new space and can't find it. Typical.

I managed to get my viola back to japan this year (after much confusion with BA) so I have been helping out with the orchestra at school. I am actually not playing the viola just yet, because the conductor got excited to have a piccolo player and chose pieces that need one, but it is nice to have the choice and be able to just play when I feel like it. I am also doing the sectionals for the wind section, which should be fun. They are awful, bless them, but it will be a challenge at least.

Although it is still very windy, the sun has come out now and the rain has stopped, so typhoon Fitow has passed us. But it is still only lunch time, and we have the rest of the day off, so I am going to go and do the ironing and other things I don't usually get around to. I might even start on my curtains!

The End of Term

In the UK, the end of term was a dragged out process which was pleasant but felt like a big waste of time. All the exams are over, but you still have to teach lessons to kids who just want to go out and play. It goes on for weeks and everyone, teachers included, lose the will to live. Or at least to do very much of anything.

Here at ISSH, the end of the year has crept up on me. I have suddenly realised I have only got four teaching days left, subjects still to deal with, exams and reports to write, assignments to mark, and then as soon as the exams are over it's the summer! I can't believe how fast it has all come around. I am sooo busy, but there is only 2 weeks left and then we have 10 weeks off! I love it!

With school getting to the mayhem stage, the weekends are well needed. The weather has turned beautiful in the last few weeks, warm and sunny, and things are just as busy then as any other time. International schools have very transient populations, and that goes for the staff as much as the kids. With people leaving there are parties all the time to say goodbye (Will is out at a darts night tonight to send off my head of department -no girls allowed: they are just scared we'll beat them). Every weekend has something, right up until the last do at school, the end of year BBQ. We have TGIF parties about once a month on different themes, but this one is put on by the management as a thank you for the year. The band will be playing again, we sound hopeless at the moment but I am keeping my fingers crossed a miracle might happen.

At the weekend we went to a BBQ at the Australian embassy. It was held in the garden under marquees, and there was so much amazing food and drink. Then we watched the FA cup final in the pub and got knocked around by over-excited Chelsea fans. It ended at 2am here - we were knackered.

Tomorrow is the Faculty Appreciation Lunch. I can't get enough of this idea that people appreciate the work teachers do, I feel quite embarrassed. I am sure I don't do any more than I have always done! The parents bring in drinks and food dishes from their native countries and the staff eat them all. All to say 'thank you for teaching our children'. I am glad I am not a primary teacher for this one, because apparently all the parents of your class really want you to try their dish, and you end up with a huge plate of a really weird mix of food because everyone is too polite to refuse. The middle/high school staff get to relax a bit more.

The sports teams have finished their seasons, which means the field is free again and it is light enough and (more than) warm enough to play outside again. I need to get my tan started so I'm not a lobster in Greece! I think I am the palest person in Tokyo.

Hanami and Kimono

A lot of the photos are sideways on here again, sorry. I will show everyone when I am back properly.

Vikki went home :( but we had a really good week together. We did lots of things, and although the weather was horrible at first it turned really nice later in the week. On Thursday we shopped in Hibiya (I got my new camera yay!) and went to omotesando to try and shop there. Unfortunately the Oriental Bazaar shop we wanted is closed on Thursdays. That is the second time I have done that, you'd think I would remember! So we had a Starbucks (we did try a Japanese cafe but I could only read a few menu items and we got stared at) and went home. We were meeting the others that evening to go to see the Arctic Monkeys play in Odaiba. We had been given a route to get there by Priya but our friends had looked up another route and wanted to try it out - so we raced. They won by miles. It turned out Priya had gone that way too, she just told us the other one because it was easier (which it wasn't). We saw the venue from across the way so we thought it would be quicker to walk. We forgot there was a main road in the middle that we couldn't cross so that added even more time to our journey! Still when we got there the concert was great, and then everyone came back to ours and we all had pizza.

On Friday we decided to go for a Hanami (flower viewing) picnic. We went to the supermarket and got smoked salmon, strawberries, crusty bread and cheese and scootered up to Shinjuku Gyoen. It was just beautiful, cherry trees all around in blossom, lovely grass to sit on (a bit damp but the sun was out and it was lovely and warm) and then a stroll around the lake when we were done. We took some photos which I will put on soon (I am naughtily updating during a cover lesson - photos would make it a bit obvious).

The next week at school was 4 days as it was Easter. It felt really odd not having the Monday off too! It is like Christmas, not a holiday at all here but the school at least had good Friday.

There was only a week in between Vikki leaving and Cathy arriving, but she was here to do other things too so we didn't see her for a while. When she did come we took her to Doma Doma (as usual!) and then the next day was Japan day at school. I can't think of a better day for anyone to come in than that. It was my first one and a real experience! All the students and staff wear Japanese clothes or flag colours (we put Cathy in Will's yukata as he was off sick that day) and there are no lessons. Instead, there are mini-courses run by teachers and parents and even some students. There was Japanese taiko drumming, comedy, cooking, pottery, washi egg making, tea ceremony...the list goes on. It is a brilliant day. We went to the calligraphy class first of all, which was so much fun. We were shown how to hold the 'fude' brush properly and taught a few kanji to start off with, then we could practice different ones all we liked. We mounted our best ones. Mine was the kanji for 'Japan' (red). I also learned Hana (green), which means flower and is the name of a friends daughter.

Our second course was kimono wearing. It was good to learn but I have become more aware that traditional costumes flatter the body type of the race that wears them. Japanese women don't have curves. Still it was fun to try and get into the things, really detailed and a long process. I couldn't imagine wearing one all day every day! Our last course was sudoku, a chance to switch off and chat for a while. In the afternoon a professional Taiko drumming group came in to play for the kids. I have never seen so much energy in one place (or so much hair!). it was an incredible day.

Just to round off making Cathy utterly jealous of our school (they don't have an equivalent day in Paris apparently) we had the last TGIF party of the year. Loads of Japanese food, chu-hai drinks and sake, and Cathy got to meet loads of people.

The second week of her visit, we had bought tickets to see Snow Patrol play in Ebisu. They cancelled! We are still disappointed about it, I was sooo looking forward to seeing them. So Cathy went away and came back for the last 2 days of her trip. And the Team Symbas pub crawl.

The PE department at school decided they wanted to raise money and challenge themselves. SO they are doing a 100km trek through bamboo forests over 7 mountains in 48 hours. We all think they are crazy, but we are all fundraising as hard as possible! One of the events was the pub crawl. Apart from the general money from people joining the group, one of Team Symbas (symbas is the name of the sports teams at school) made a model of a man with a huge polystyrene head for people to donate into (they christened him Phil). We took turns carrying Phil around, and when they cracked his head open the next day (the junior school kids were devastated) there was Y108,000 in there. So far they are up to about Y650,000 with a target of Y1,000,000 and 2 weeks to go.

Yesterday was the orientation for the grade 4's coming into middle school next year. It was really strange, because in the UK we were trying to get the kids to come to the school so they had a full lesson and did lots. Here it is fairly certain they will carry on so they have 19 minutes of just a taster lesson of the four main subjects. not long but it took forever to set up! I was taken for cover in my first free, and the lessons were in my other frees so I lost all my time, plus I had to get my solutions and set up for 4 mini-lessons in a row. I appreciated the technicians at home loads anyway, but never as much as yesterday . The head of science is changing next year, and the new one says his prime objective is to get a full-time technician. It will be hard to convince the school but I think the lessons suffer for not having one.

In the staff room there is a calendar whiteboard with all the stuff going on in the next few weeks. It gets updated every 3 weeks or so, and this time we actually fit the end of term on the board. I can't believe we have almost finished the year already! The seniors left today, and there is only 3 weeks left until the rest of the exam classes go. Our flights are booked to come home, the weather has suddenly got really warm and everything feels like it's settling down for a holiday. Well, it will next week. This week actually is a national holiday so the whole place has gone crazy. We had 2 days off, when Will and 6 of the blokes from school went on a boys only scooter trip down to Enoshima island. It turned out to be quite eventful. One of the scooters was sabotaged before they even started. When a replacement was found, it developed a flat tyre within 10 minutes. Because it was golden week there were very few fixing options. eventually they got it sorted, but my quiet 2 days alone were interrupted by 4 phone calls in the first 2 hours as they tried to work out what to do.

The 'scooter widows' had a girly night in. Lovely.

Tonight was the spring show. There was the usual stuff... choir, orchestra, more choir. Then there was the fashion show. One of the options classes along with knitting is needlework, and in that class the kids make clothes. Then they have a fashion show at the end. Definitely has to be seen to be believed. They strutted around to Eric Prids (on a loop) and did little routines. I only wish I had taken my camera. Still, it is a really nice idea for them to show what they have worked on. They were all really proud. Every time I think I must have seen it all, this school has something even more cheesy to surprise me. At least it's never dull!

Bingo!

In the school year at ISSH there are two days outside of the usual teaching events that the faculty must attend. One of these is family festival which I wrote about in November. The other just happened a couple of weeks ago and it is Bingo. I have never seen bingo quite like it before.

All staff must sign up for a work session, and for the rest of the night (it runs from 5-9pm) we have to be around just in case we are needed (apparently they had a big earthquake once right in the middle and over a thousand people had to climb under the tables). My session was checking the tickets of the winners from 8-9pm, the last shift of the night so people were really desperate to win because that was when all the big prizes went, like a holiday, digital camera and other good stuff donated by parents and their companies. The games before had all used a single line to win, but for the big one they had to get a square shape. We had sooo many calls from people not paying attention, who then got stroppy because they thought they had won. For most of them there hadn't even been enough numbers called for a win to be possible! One woman came up with a line, then came up with a square but had missed one number so we sent her away. She came back a couple of minutes later because she couldn't see the number she had missed, so we explained again but she refused to move and stood in front of us checking loudly while the game carried on. Eventually she went away, only for that one missing number to be called next. When she came back, she had tied with someone else and had to draw cards to see if she won. She didn't win. I know it is mean but I was quite pleased because she had been rude and obnoxious and she was a parent so didn't really need to win, whereas the actual winner was a teachers husband so we were pleased. Bingo just seems to bring out the worst in people here. All night there were shouts of "No Bingo, No Bingo" whenever someone called and cheers if it was rejected. Anyway, it took so long that my hour long shift ended at 9.30pm after being shouted at by parents. I went straight to the pub.

Since then I have still been getting sorted for the junior school musical, Jack and the Beanstalk. It was based on the revolting rhyme version and was so funny, the kids were great. I was supposed to play piano, but because I broke a finger playing basketball I ws going to play the clarinet part one handed on a keyboard. We realised when we went to rehearse though, that it would still need to be transposed to fit the piano and violin parts, so I transposed the whole thing and went in on a weekend to enter it into a program so I could print it. It took a while but it was worth it, we had a mini orchestra and the music teacher was chuffed. Everyone said it sounded great too, so I was pleased. I was given some beautiful flowers for playing, and another set from the parents. Its nice to be appreciated!

In school at the moment we have decided to do a cross-curricular project for the 10 year olds. They are studying Egypt in social studies so we are mummifying a chicken in science. Apart from that I have realised that we have a lot of days off for various things coming up, so much so that I think I only have about 5 full teaching weeks left, and for 2 of those I only have 2 classes as the rest of the school go off timetable for exams. I have to get a move on! Still it feels like we are winding down already which is strange - it's only march!

Japan day is coming up at school. It is a day when everyone learns about the culture and history of Japan, and we all do mini courses in things like Taiko drumming, Kimono wearing, board games, Japanese pottery etc etc. I am looking forward to it, although I have no idea what I am doing yet. The teachers get spread out to supervise so I could be anywhere, although I did get my preference form in early so I hope that helps.

It is my friend Tony's 40th birthday today. We went out to celebrate on a boat in Tokyo harbour with lots of food (nabe and tempura and sashimi) and karaoke it was a freezing night but the boat went all the way out into the bay and under the rainbow bridge. it was so pretty and really worth doing for a special occasion.

Vikki is visiting at the moment - Happy Birthday Vikki!
It was raining and foggy when we picked her up from the airport, not a very nice welcome. We took some flowers for her, but to collect the van I had taken them in my backpack on my scooter in the rain so they were a little bedraggled! Still they looked fine when we got them in a vase. She arrived on my birthday so we just relaxed in the day, wandered around Hiroo and had lunch in the stand up bar, had a nap in the afternoon and then went out to the Icebar Tokyo at night. It was great! The entire place is made of ice, the bar, tables, sofas, sculptures, even the glasses. We all dressed up in silver capes and thick gloves and lasted about 40 minutes and 2 drinks before we got too cold. It was really fun though, I would go again. Although Megan panicked when I started eating my glass - she has a phobia about breaking teeth.

On Monday we went to try sushi (not a hit so we gave the fish market a miss) and walked around Yoyogi park and the Meiji shrine. We went to starbucks above shibuya crossing and then to Roppongi for steak and ribs at Outback. On Tuesday we lay in for a while and then rode scooters out to Shimbashi and got the monorail over to Odaiba. Odaiba is a strange place - an island of reclaimed land with a fake beach facing the city and a shopping centre made to look like an English promenade. There is a mini statue of liberty at one point. It was very grey so we didn't stay too long, but the rainbow bridge was still visible. Today we got the train out to Kawagoe, an old fashioned little town known as Koedo (little Tokyo) full of temples and museums and the remains of Edo castle. It was a beautiful day, really sunny and warm, and we went out with a group of friends and walked and walked and walked. Unfortunately, the Emperor and the Swedish Royal family were there too today. We saw them go past in their cars, and everything we wanted to see was blocked off for them. Even the monthly antiques market was just closing so that the way would be clear. We did manage to see Candy Cane Lane, a tiny street of traditional Japanese sweet shops, and had a nice ice-cream. Kawagoe is famous for its sweet potatoes but we drew the line there and had vanilla (they really did have sweet potato flavour ice-cream). We had Yakisoba in the car park of a shrine and came home. Tonight we are going out for Izakaya food and Karaoke for Vik's birthday.

My camera screen got broken while we were out a couple of weeks ago. I took it to be repaired but I was told it would be around £75. It is not that much more for a new one here, so since it is 2 years old I am going to treat myself with my birthday money. Thank you to everyone who gave me some!

Holidays

I am so jealous that all my old friends had half term. I don't think I felt it as much this term, in fact the first half seemed to fly since Christmas, but I was still jealous. We did have a 4 day weekend which was nice though, and a big group of us went skiing to Hokkaido (the northern island).

We looked in the English magazine metropolis at the classifieds and saw an ad for 2 pairs of skis for Y2000 a pair (about £10), so we trekked over and looked at them, and ended up carrying home 3 pairs, one of which our friend Megan took. Will's are 195cm long - The Ferrari of skis, as Adam put it. He really did fly down those slopes! Mine are 170, but there was a problem with the bindings and the resort didn't want the liability of fixing it (I suppose in case I got injured and sued them) although that was handy for them because then I had to pay and hire some. Still, I had poles and boots and all the rest so it wasn't too expensive.

There were supposed to be 18 of us going, but one dropped out with too much work and one had a chest infection, so that left 16. We got up at 4.30am (and called one of our friends who couldn't be on time if her life depended on it) and staggered into a taxi to Shinagawa station, then onto a train for Haneda airport (much closer than Narita, used for domestic flights). Our flight was fine and we landed in Sapporo on a snowy runway with a ground temp of -2C. Then there was a 2 hour bus journey, but by then it was mid-morning and we were tired but excited, so we all enjoyed getting there. We were staying at Rusutsu - a resort where everything is owned by the hotel. That meant that 3 days of lift passes were included in the price which was great - I had been thinking it would be really expensive! Will and I shared a room with another couple, Mark and Megan, who we skied with at Christmas.

On the first afternoon some of the others went straight up to ski but I we decided to save our lift passes for full days and explore instead. Unfortunately, I fell asleep so Will explored with Megan instead and went Ski-dooing (snow-mobile - like a jet ski for winter). He had a brilliant time. In the evening the 16 of us went for an Izakaya meal, made a lot of toasts and had a lot of fun.

In the morning we went for breakfast (Japanese take on western food - not very appetizing. I gave up and had Japanese for the rest of the time). Then we went straight out. It was raining. Not snowing, really bucketing down. Will and Megan tried out their new skis on the green runs while Mark and I went to the top to meet up with them, and when we got off the lift we were in cloud and couldn't see more than a few feet. I also had my boots done up too tight and my feet went completely numb, so the first run was awful. I went inside for a while to recover and then we headed over to the second of the three mountains on the gondola. We did a few more runs then realised that while our jackets are snow-proof, they are not drench-proof and we were wet. We gave up for the day, went for lunch and then just had a swim and Onsen in the afternoon. There were 2 families from school there and I ended up next to a father in the hot tub - not an comfortable experience but not as bad as for Adam who ended up naked next to him in the Onsen!

That night it snowed lots, so we had a nice Italian meal, relaxed and had an early night. In the morning the slopes were lovely, although it was sunny so a little icy on the popular parts. We took this as a cue to go over to the third mountain, mount Isola. It was mostly red runs there so Will was nervous, but the snow was much better. We skied across and met up with a group at the bottom, and then went all the way to the very top in the gondola. The bad thing about mount isola is that it is far away from the rooms and you have to go to the top and ski across to get back to the other side. Megan was feeling really ill so they went straight off to go back to the hotel. We decided to head that way too, but somewhere along the way missed the turn and ended up back at the bottom, which took ages as Will was not confident on steep parts in his super-long skis. We had to get the gondola all the way back up and then try again. The second time we made it, which was just in time for the afternoon activities...

I had agreed to try dog-sledding with Mary. I am still not sure what possessed me to do this, although I have to say it is fun to have done it once. You have to stand on two thin rails behind this rickety sled and hang on and lean around while 2 dogs pull you over the ice as fast as they can (to get to the soup at the end). We had a ride around the track on a ski-doo to see the turns, a couple of minutes instruction, and then we were off. I went first, and I did all the parts where they told us 'foreigners usually fall off here' (Mary is Canadian - I don't know where they think dog-sledding comes from). Then I got to the end and saw the signal to brake. To brake, you have to take a foot off the rail and press down on a wooden pedal that you can't see from standing position. I took my foot off but I missed the pedal and stepped down on the snow. I realised straight away and picked it up for another go, but felt my balance going and made a split second decision that I would be better jumping than falling. On this, I did a kind of swallow dive effect and landed flat on my chest on the ice at high speed (the instructors only words about falling had been 'fall safely' - great). I hit my head on the floor but luckily my padded goggles took the brunt, but I was completely winded. I could see people asking if I was ok but I couldn't get the breath to answer properly so I just lay there for a while until I got some feeling back. That is why it was fun to have done once. My dog-sledding days are over! Saying that, and considering Mary is Canadian, she fell off before they had even got started. The dogs had to run around the track for her to get back on and try again. Then she pressed hard on the brake and fell off at the same point as me, so overall I probably didn't do too badly.

Back at the hotel, Megan was getting steadily worse, coughing and feverish. We decided to try to get an extra room so she could rest better, but when we explained the situation the receptionist just gave us medicine for her. Our Japanese friend Kumi came back with us and managed to get us a room for a fraction of the price which we split with Mark. We went out to a Korean barbecue restaurant - all you can eat lamb, beef, chicken and piles of veggies, plus drinks. It was great. I got horribly drunk and felt really ill, so I was very glad of having our own room too!

The next day we were leaving but not until late afternoon, so we checked out and then went back up the mountain. Will and I skied alone that day. We found one perfect run that suited both of us fine, and just kept going round and round. It was great, we both improved loads and were swishing around all over the place by the end. We decided to quit while we were ahead, so we stopped at 2pm and went ski-dooing with Mary and Mark. We took the forest trail, a half hour session with an instructor through the trees and fields, it was fantastic. Mary managed to fall off the ski-doo too - that girl has no balance! It was great though, I would definitely do that again.

The journey home was more of a chore. We were all tired and just wanted to get there. The plane was stupidly hot, Megan was still fluey and everyone else was coming down with it, we had turbulence and cross-winds landing so it just took forever. Then at the other end there were 2 flights coming out onto 1 baggage carousel and ours was last so we just had to stand around. When we eventually got on the train we all just sat there in silence! We eventually got home at 11.20pm.

The next day was a training day at school - good as no children but for me, actually more work than the standard Monday. I sat through the most boring, patronizing morning of my life, then went home coughing and slept all afternoon. This helped - I didn't get the fever with the cough and have been back at school all week. Will wasn't so lucky, he had a fever and was off for 2 days. I am not surprised, we shared a room with Megan for 2 days as she was getting ill, and lots of the others had it too.

This weekend i have a training day saturday so I only have one day to rest. I can't wait for the spring break. Vikki is coming and I am going to lie in and relax as well as taking her out to see things. I am not complaining, I have had a great week, but I am very tired - you can see why I am jealous of the half-termers!

Photos yay!

Will and I have got a nasty cold and throat thingy. We are feeling sorry for ourselves. I went into school yesterday morning but came straight home again. There is a lot going around so I am not surprised, just annoyed because I was doing so well with no days off so far. People have been saying since we got here "the first cold you get will really knock you about because you are in a new country", and I was starting to feel quite smug that it hadn't. Never mind, as long as we are better for the skiing trip in 8 days time I will be happy.

This weekend was very busy for us. It was one of our friends birthdays, and he had a joint party with his 3 year old daughter. It sounds naff but it was really good fun, with all the adults playing with the kids in between eating too much fantastic food and going outside on the balcony to relax. We were there from about 1.30 and it went on very late, but another friend had arranged a treat for us so we left at 7.

I had been disappointed with the Indian food I have tried in Tokyo, it was slimy and all tasted the same and I said so to one of my friends who is Indian. It turned out that her parents used to own a restaurant in Tokyo, and her mom cooked a sort of mini banquet for us of different Indian foods. It was great! We had 4 different main dishes, with rice and potatoes and salad on the side, and she kept badgering us to go for more. Adam went up 5 times, and still had room for desert! Priya had made desert herself, and it was mango and coconut cheesecake. I was so full after I thought I would have to roll home. We laughed constantly too so I thought I would pop at any moment. It was a brilliant evening, and Mrs Mehta even told me a couple of good restaurants to try so I have new hopes for finding good Indian food now.

We did very little on Sunday, which was a welcome rest, and the swelling on my finger has gone down enough for me to play the piano now with only twinges, so I have to start practising for the junior school production. They are doing Jack and the Beanstalk.

Since I am doing this update at home (therefore all the fiddling around with the language happened again - grrr) I have added some photos from a couple of the things we have been doing.

The 2 above are of us just about to get on the shinkansen to go skiing at Christmas, and Will blending in nicely when we got there. Below is me and Mary at Karaoke (bearable in Tokyo, very different to anywhere else) and Ben and Priya on One world day ( since we don't have a national costume as such, most of the Brits just wore football shirts. Ben had the entire outfit!) I don't know why it is sideways, I can't figure out how to change it so you'll just have to tilt your heads. One day this site will work flawlessly for me and I really won't know what to do with all that time I have leftover...

One World Day

One of the nicer touches of teaching in an international school is the international community of the kids. There is a day to celebrate this each year on 24th Jan, and the friday nearest to it is one world day at school. All throughout the week, the students can wear accessories from different areas - monday was asia and oceania, tuesday africa, wednesday europe and thursday the americas - until it all culminates in a big party on friday. Everyone wears their national costume (or colours if you don't have one) and the kids perform different acts from all over the world, then have a "parade of nations". The kids all come onto the stage in alphabetical country order and say hello in their native language. The reply is displayed behind on a screen, and the audience all shout back. There are around 50 countries represented at the school so it takes a while, but its really nice, especially seeing them all in their costumes. I took lots of photos and there will be a dvd towards the end of the year so I will try to get that.

Will had to work really hard for one world day to set up all the AV equipment and help with the music and lights etc. Unfortunately, the older kids who were hosting the event don't know who he is, so when they read out the thank-you's from a sheet they assumed it was a misprint and thanked me instead. Oops. He got a special mention later on though and it was nice for me!

Over the christmas holiday was a strange time in japan. The decorations all go up and the japanese people are really into the idea of christmas - but they all go to work on christmas day and there is no holiday until new year. So on christmas day we went out to a friends house, and all the shops were open, people were milling around, busy as ever. It was a very strange feeling. At Karens it felt very christmassy, and we had a huge dinner and a really good time (I had my nails painted by a 4 year old and came away looking like a quentin blake monster), but as we left it was rush hour and the trains were packed. It all felt a bit surreal.

On the 27th we went to Nagano prefecture to go skiing at a little resort called Nozawa Onsen. We were a long way from the lifts but there was a free bus, and there really is nothing like getting into an Onsen (natural hot bath) after a day skiing. As we arrived there was no snow at all in the village and we were worried, but just as we got to the top of the mountain it started to snow and didn't stop the whole time we were there. That meant it was cold and blinding, but we could ski ok and had fun.

We tried a red run on the last morning there, but red runs here are different to red runs in europe! We got very stuck. I came down on one leg, Will gave up and walked down, and Megans sat on her skiis like a toboggan. The food was all japanese - rice soup and fish every meal. I was the only one who managed to eat every meal, the others were all wimps and had enough. We have booked to go to Hokkaido In february for 4 days where the snow is supposed to be amazing, and there is a much bigger group going this time so I am really excited about it.

I will add some photos later.

Visitors

Just before christmas my parents came to visit with my Nan. I drove some of my friends to the airport to go off for the holidays and then waited for my family. It took ages for them to come through, and I was starting to worry. I even went to the information desk to ask if everyone from their flight had come through, but they said to wait a bit longer (they had landed and hour ago). Eventually they came through, but their luggage didn't. They had been delayed and had to run for their connecting flight, and the bags didn't make it. Fortunately here there is a fantastic service called Takubin which will deliver anything, anywhere in japan the next day very cheaply. The airport rang us to tell us that the luggage had arrived that night and it would be delivered at ten to twelve. I thought that meant between ten and twelve, but it came to the door at 11.47. We couldn't believe how spot on they had been! None of this waiting in all day business, just pure efficiency. So Mom, Dad and Nan had their clothes again.

Unfortunately, Dad had also left his wallet in Paris. That took a bit more sorting out. Over the next 6 days, we lost so many things it was untrue: my scarf, mom's gloves, bag of souvenirs, dads hat (repeatedly) . We did eventually find every item before they left, but not without much running around and fortunately a lot of laughing. We went to the same shrine four days in the week - first to see the shrine, second for mom to buy some charms, third to look for the bag of charms went it disappeared, fourth to buy some more charms to replace the first lot. On the last day we asked at a hotel we had bee to just on the offchance and found the original bag. I hoped it would all end when they went home again, but I lost my train card the next day. That one never showed up.

The bad luck didn't just apply to personal property. We took our visitors to Ueno to see all the museums on monday - The one day of the week when they are all closed. We took them to Oriental Bazaar (a brilliant place for souvenirs) on thursday - the one day of the week it is closed. Even a hotel bar we tried to go to for a drink turned out to have a special act and an expensive cover charge which only happens two evenings a week for a couple of hours. We managed to go another time. We walked around the city so much my Nan's feet were bleeding by the end of the day, we ate out so much we were very poor, but we all had a good time and they saw a lot of the city. On one of the days we hired a car and went out to see Hakkone, (a pretty little tourist spot in summer but dead at the end of december) and wandered around a sprawling shrine and the lake. We went to Kamakura on the way back which was great - I have made a note to go back sometime and really explore as it was after dark when we arrived so we didn't see much - the top of the head of the golden Buddha was the highlight there. We nearly lost dad when he tried to get out of the car at traffic lights to take a photo, and we had lots of fun with the Sat Nav too!

Phew

I have discovered that as long as I sign in at work, the site comes up in english, so I will try to catch up on posts with lots of little ones whenever I have a spare 5 minutes.

In december the tokyo metropolitan police band came to play for the kids. They did a 5 minute presentation on traffic safety with a very strange looking rabbit suited girl being naff at traffic rules, but that was really just a reason around a reason to visit. The band was fantastic and the kids loved it. They even had some dancers who did flag and baton twirling and were really impressive. The band played Sleigh ride - exactly the same version as we played in Met wind all those times, so I was chuffed and hummed along to the piccolo part all the way through.

Grade 6 time, more later.