Tuesdays ramble

1. Hockey - Got a call from Chris on Saturday with a couple of options for the evening, either drinking with Adam again or watching more hockey. Being a Canadian and having to work the next day, I chose the hockey and volunteered to be designated driver so the boys could pack back a few brews. We found Tomoko there to take in the game as well and we cheered for Pete Wright and his buddy Dave. Unfortunately as they were the two biggest and best players on the ice for their team they were picked on madly by the referee with the big head (didn't take picture, his head was too large), and Peter was given a 10 minute misconduct for shooting the puck after the whistle (some of the worst reffing that I have seen, some even muttered the 'r' word). Needless to say the ref killed the game, I guess he was trying to protect the smaller Japanese players by calling tight, but he ended up making calls on clean hits that were just to hard for his liking (he told Dave- "It's because you are big" --- can you imagine a ref in NHL telling a player that's ridiculous!). Well our spirits severely dampened by what turned out to be a 2-2 tie we hit Denny's for a little after game grub.

2. Kyoto - I complained about my Prime Minister's comments about the Kyoto treaty but it seems I was too quick to react. Thankfully in Canada the Conservative govenment doesn't hold a majority of the seats in the Parliament so the House was still able to vote in favour of Kyoto's emissions regulations. I had neglected to save the link, but I did see that Harper acknowledged (naturally after he read my blog) that the environmental problem is one to be reckoned with, I guess he just didn't like Kyoto's method as he heavily rallied the Conservatives to vote against it.

3. Basketball - Pete, Chris and I hit the ball courts on Sunday for what turned out to be a good day of gaming. We played two matches and I thought I played alright, though I am far from the pro that my colleagues are. Chris actually blogged about it here, though I think he had fired up his photoshop a bit because I don't remember being as excellent as he reported . Anyway, we had a wicked time and my bones ached for the next two days (yes, that includes today), but it kind of aches in a good way.

Bits and Pieces 2

Nothing special has really happened so far this week, so a few short topics;

1. Bike Ride
I didn't really get my required exercise in through the weekend, so I took my bike out for a bit of a ride. I went to Cainz Home which is a home center- like Home Depot or Rona back in Vancouver. The ride is about 6 kms and includes a killer hill that should help condition me a little bit for the Forest Park mission. I did alright on the hill but about 2/3 of the way up I had to get off and push the bike. On the ride, there used to be a couple of farms with a bunch of trees with funny things hanging from the branches like mirrors and CD's. While they were probably there to scare away birds- I was hoping to use them for comedy in my blog. Tragically they were taken down from the trees.Cainz is a great place to shop, anything you need for around the house. Furniture, landscaping, lumber, even pets- yes it was at this Cainz home that we found the irreplaceable Santa;
2. Pickton. Back home in Vancouver there has been an interesting trial of a pig farmer that had allegedly murdered a large number of hookers. The details can be pretty gross, but it amazes me that this sort of sick person can walk the same earth as we do. Well if you want to read about the Pickton trials just click here.
3. Hockey All Star Game. Okay I have only watched the Super skills competition so far, but Vancouver's only representative Luongo looked good so far, good job! I think it is a travesty that the Sedins are left out of the game though!
4. What it takes. I was thinking during my bike ride yesterday about what it takes to live in a foreign country. It boils down to Patience, Hard Work and a Positive Mentality. You need to be patient with learning the language and becoming more functional and a part of the environment (it is easy to have the illusion that you don't need to learn Japanese when you teach English but it isn't entirely accurate). You also need to be patient with meeting people, networking and making friends. All our best friendships take time to develop and basically will always take time. The Hard Work comes into play with establishing yourself with a job and learning the language. The positive attitude helps you get by day to day. Sometimes it is easy to question your decision to live somewhere else, but it is more healthy to accept that you made the decision and not to waste time asking 'what if...'. You made the decision stick with it! If you aren't happy with the way things are at the moment, then work to make it a better situation, or move again.

That is all for today, have a great one!

Hockey Night in Hamatown

Sunday was mostly spent resting the head after a night of drinking (of course after I made it through my classes- sorry to my students!). But I was glad that I called Chris up because he reminded me that our other friend Pete had invited us to watch him play some hockey. He even promised to score some goals and get in a fight for us.

Well even Ritsy was interested to go and watch- it's pretty dry for watching live hockey around here.

So when Ritsy got home, we hopped in the car and picked up Chris, then headed off to the Miyatake Sports Center to watch some hockey. Our plan was to have some McDonalds on the way, but we changed our plans and settled for some kaiten sushi nearby. What a great call! My hungover body was so happy to be taking in sushi, I automatically felt 5 times better by time we left. Incidentally if you ever have a chance to eat kinme(gold eye red-snapper) nigiri do it! It's delicious!

Pete literally letting off some steam between periods.

The game was actually pretty interesting, I think even first time hockey watcher Chris was enjoying it. Unfortunately Peter Wright's team only had 8 men so couldn't actually change a whole line out at a time. So by the third period the team was really slowing down and looking exhausted against a fully stocked opponent. They got up to a 5-3 deficit, but then the other team started scoring like mad and it was a 9-3 final I think. Pete was great though, he had some great stick handling, could muscle the opponents out of the way, and even tried a Mario Lemieux style behind the feet shot. Well I want to check out a game when he has some more players! Or even better yet try to learn to skate and play too! We'll see....
Incidentally if anyone was looking to buy a single Ice Skating item, they have it for sale at the center. I wonder what the one item is, I hope it is a skate...

Baths, Bikes and beyond...

In last night's class I was talking with my students about Yamaha Living Tech, Yamaha's line of nice looking and well- built household components. This industry is really large in Japan, the kitchen set or bathroom set is usually sold together as a package when you are building a new house. Unfortunately, my home doesn't have one of these nice looking kitchens or bathrooms, and I wish I could change that. My student that works there, Harry, was inviting us to visit the showroom in Hamamatsu. One interesting thing, if you make a reservation, you can actually take one of their baths for a test drive- that's right you can take a bath in the showroom! Don't worry the bath would be totally private and closed to prying eyes! Very interesting idea. I heard they also have a cooking class- but it is for women only! Well if you are in Hamamatsu, check it out!

My mission for the bike ride 2 days ago also was a failure. I wanted to get some serious distance in to burn a few calories, but my tire decided to get punctured only about 4 kms from my home! So I ended up sitting at an Eneos gas station for an hour waiting for them to fix my tire for me. That cost me 2100 yen ($20.00) so I had no money and I lost my energy while sitting and waiting, so I just went home. Oh well, there is always next week! I think the next mission might be to take the bike out to Hamamatsu central to check the job board- I need to get some work for my mornings!(Edit: Just after posting this I received an e-mail from Satomi offering a new morning class! Thanks Satomi!!!)

Pete's wedding party is this weekend, so I have to start working hard on practicing Shima Uta as Chris and I will be performing it during the reception. Could be a disaster!

Todd Versus Forest Park

This year, I want to shave off 5-10 kgs and hopefully I can get some results this year - to be honest it has been a goal of mine for a while. In December I was seriously mulling over the idea of joining a gym here locally. The problem with that plan is that a sports gym is so darned expensive here. It could cost me between 7000-8000+ yen (meaning $7o.oo to $80.00 roughly) which to me seems like a huge commitment. A couple of my students mentioned that a coworker of theirs had lost weight by simply riding his bike around Forest Park once a week. Well I am about 4 kms away from there, so I thought I would try for a second time to make it out to the park.

This time I set out on my MamaCheri (Mama Chariot= an old woman's bike with a big basket in front) towards the park. I managed to make it to the point I got stalled at last time, the Shrine (or temple) in Miyaguchi that I walked around and blogged about before, with no problems and continued on up what I hoped would be a short hill. About 4 minutes in I was feeling a little dizzy and out of breath and stopped. I haven't been riding in a while and was probably a bit dehydrated from only drinking coffee in the morning and not water.

The place I stopped interests me. There is one main freeway that connects Tokyo and Nagoya known as the Tomei highway. The govenment has been building a second highway ( I will call the Tomei 2) to help ease the traffic strain the Tomei has on busy days ( I guess). The interesting thing is how long it is taking to build the thing- they were already working on it when I first came here 5 years ago and seem no closer to being finished now then they were then. Here is an empty looking highway bridge...
Seems like a ghost highway.

I restarted my endeavour to climb the hill and eventually got off the bike and pushed it up the steep parts of the hill. I had to make Forest Park this time! Finally, I made it to the sign, but there was no sight of the actual park. My head hadn't cleared very much so I had to sit down and gather myself and turn around. But I made it to the sign this time!
Next time I will make it up the hill all the way! Either way it was good conditioning for future riding. I had felt that a shorter, steeper ride would be easier for me to handle than a longer ride, but I am simply not ready for this task yet! Well, at least I ended up riding about 12 kms, so I did get some exercise out of it.

Today I am going to ride my bike out to a shopping center called Ito Yokado and have a coffee there and study a bit of Japanese. The good thing is that it will be about 22 kms round trip, should be good exercise for me!