Some old pics and getting to know my couch

My mom uploaded a few old pictures after my old blog in response to my request. I'll only share a couple here due to the 'bad hair' that I seemed to chronically have between ages 6 and 23. The above is one of the oldest surviving pictures of me- aged 3 rocking out to "Chipmunk Rock" by the Captain and Tenile I believe. (I'm not sure why I have this in my mind that was the song I was listening too, it could be the fact, or just an artificial memory as I like to call them).
Here is the picture of me the winter after breaking my leg the first time. I heard that my recovery at that time was 8 - 10 weeks. Probably a bigger break, but I wasn't too surprised when the new doctor I went to the other day lengthened my expected recovery time to 6 weeks. But looking at that picture- holy crap- have you seen the movie Bad Santa? Because I'll be damned if that isn't Billy Bob Thornton working as Santa at the Seaway Mall. I wonder if they got robbed that year...?

So I had a soft week last week, with my business classes cancelled, just 2 home lessons, then the end of the week we started stepping up the work load with a couple of trips to ESL College (Though don't be fooled it's not a college- nor is it ESL... it's EFL okay, sorry Chris!). Next week is going to get more tough, me getting reacquainted with my old friend the train. But I have been trying to concentrate on getting lots of rest this week. Maybe a little too much? I think Ritsy was getting a bit annoyed, but she is awesome- been really helpful, I will step up my help around the place now too!
Well the couch I have been using for propping up the foot is usually the couch where the cats sleep. So you can imagine that times there are territorial challenges. The other day Lanma was so funny, she was sleeping on my side and kept stretching until she was almost sitting up straight. Funny girl. Well, one more day of rest then back to it! Maybe I'll shoot for one more posting before I get back to the busy schedule...

The Journey Through Aunt Liz's eyes

In selecting the picture highlights from Aunt Liz's pictures I was challenged with an even bigger selection of pictures and there were some great pictures from before they met with me, but as I can't comment on the places, I thought it better to start from when we met up with them. I also wanted to show some new views, so some of the better pictures I may have skipped as they are similar to the ones I have already shown.

Aunt Liz has a great love for plants and nature and they show in the pictures. Where my pictures tend to focus on the architecture that I find quite interesting, she is always framing hers with plants of some sort or other. The lead picture is quite indicative of this trait, a sakura and another tree frame the main entrance. I am not sure where this was taken though.
This site came to us while walking to the Nara Hotel, a shop owner feeding a deer. It was our first deer siting of many.
Here the ladies, Ritsy and Cathy, and I are checking out the information of the outlying area framed by a Cherry blossom tree and Kofukuji showing in the background.

Outside the entrance of Todaiji, tree and more cherry blossoms.

My car- we progressed back to Hamamatsu and Liz snapped this picture of the interior of my car. I rather like the picture, you can see the new shopping center, Sun Street in the distance, and of course the unique center console of the Vitz.

Next up some more pics from Hama town from Liz's eyes.

The journey through Cathy's eyes part 2

In continuing with a look at my mom's pictures from the trip out to Japan back in April, I will continue flush in the middle of the trip to Nara. These two frogs, while I am sure they have some sort of religious meaning as they are at Shinyakushiji temple, but I think they are just cute.
Here my mom captures quite nicely the unique apparel the young ladies wore at Kasuga Taisha. I believe the flower is called a Wisteria or something like that...
She rather shiftily captured this picture of Ritsy and I waiting at the shinkansen station. Quite underhanded of her, but I liked the picture anyway...
Jumping ahead to our trip to the caves up north, I thought this picture captured well the enclosed grandiose ambiance of the caves.
And finally I have this picture of the front of the caves being guarded by the dragon.

Unfortunately that was as far along as the pictures from her that I have runs, but I still enjoyed to go back and to revisit the memories of early spring, borrowing her eyes! Oh finally, me and some turtles back in Nara.

Living it up at the Hotel Gansuiji...

This is a bit of a leftover topic I never got around to reporting on because of all the excitement with people visiting in April. There is a local temple called Gansuiji that is famous for praying for new babies and ceremonies for good luck for new infants. You can even pay them about $50 to choose your child's name for you- I am sure it is a great honour for some families, but I tend to think part of the fun of having a baby is coming up with the name. We went there in early April, to pray for good luck for our future child as we aren't spring chickens and we thought it doesn't hurt to play it safe. Well unfortunately they said that we should come back around the 5 month mark- it was too early for them to offer their prayers.
The temple is located on the side of my old enemy- Forest Park and so the entire scenery surrounding the temple is quite beautiful. Here a statue suggests a well traveled man arriving at the temple (although this is only my interpretation).
In the outlying area there stands this weather- ravished looking old hut. It brings me to wondering how this thing was still standing, looks like if you breathe too heavily it will topple.
I saw an interesting place that I wanted a picture of, so I returned there a few weeks later to take the picture.
Turns out to have been a great choice as when I returned the Cherry blossoms were in full bloom lending even more beauty to this quiet little area.
I found this hotel immensely interesting with it's all cement decor making it look like something out of a Stephen King movie. The sad fact is that it was probably a poor business idea as it looks like it's a long time closed now.

Like a bridge....

Cathy crossing the bridge at Kakegawa

Looking back at a number of the pictures I have taken over the last few years, there seems to be a couple of recurring themes that pop up. One of them is my love of photographing bridges, so I thought I might just throw a bunch of bridge pictures up for today's blog topic.

Sitting, overlooking the lake at Showa Kinen Park, Tachikawa

Why the love of bridges? There must be some deep psychological reason for having such a bond with simple land extensions stretching out over water. Is it that the bridge is symbolic of always choosing what is seemingly the toughest path, but in the end the path was the easiest?

Okuni Jinja, a small bridge to the shrine.

It could be that the bridge is placed between two equally attractive destinations (like say Vancouver and Hamamatsu) and the bridge is the sign of desolation and abandonment...

Bridge outside of Osaka Castle

Is a bridge a foundation that is seemingly solid but is placed in an unreliable and potentially damning location (like a river with a strong current, or building a house in Hamakita)?

Kinkakuji

Is it just a jumbling of the letters- is it meant to point to the words "G.I. Bred"?

Suspension bridge at Forest Park

Are bridges really a cryptic message left by the aliens that originally inhabited the planet? If we align the basic physical properties of bridges to the correct position in the sky- will we find the secret to eternal life?

Las Vegas, out front of the Venetian

Is a bridge just a way from one point to another?

At Hokoji Hansobo

Does the arching of bridges just remind of the Golden Arches and make me crave the Double Teriyaki Burger at McDonalds?

Okay, not a bridge, part of the Tomei2 highway that is being built here

Or are they just nice to look at?

Okay this was officially my silliest post- but I did like the pictures, so I hope you liked one or two of them.

Stuff and things

Picture.I always found Monet's pictures interesting and bought a Page-a day calendar this year. I really liked the picture from today, titled Seascape, Night Effect.

Clearance Sale! Last week, the wife and I took some older furniture to a recycle shop- and were quite disappointed that they only offered us 2000 yen for it. Well, we took it anyway, but we are still left with two things that we would like to find a home for. If you live in Japan and you need a tv- we have a (I'm not sure how many inches it is- maybe19-21?) Toshiba Wide bazooka tv- that we will part with cheap! If you are interested let me know and I will see if I can dig up any information. We also have a Thomas hot oil heater that is good for small rooms, but relatively ineffective for big rooms. That can be had for free- again just let me know if you are interested and I can find some more information for you.

Serika, Natsumi, Neo, Ryuya, Mi Chan from ESLC

Happyokai. I have worked at ESLC for one year now! Sometimes it feels like it has been longer, but it's been a good experience for me all the same. Both Chris and Hisano, the owners and my friends at the school, have been great to me there and helped me feel welcome and really have been understanding considering how hectic my schedule has been at times! On Wednesday we had the end of year show held at the local Bunka Center (Cultural Center) and the show went really well! All the students had worked so hard over the last month memorizing their skits and there was some anxiety about my students, but everyone did a fantastic job! After we finished with the show, a small group of us went to Mainichi Bowl to say goodbye to one of the students that is moving to Tokyo. A large part of the group was made up of returnees that had spent time in America or other countries, and their English was fantastic!
Chris particularly was putting up some good scores, seemingly enjoying victimizing the poor children!
The gang had a great time.
I was just trying to creep everyone out...
I still don't know what she was doing...
We capped the day off with pizza and soft drinks (yes- really- only soft drinks). It was a tiring but fun day!

Feeling a little springy

It's only February 2nd today ( a National Holiday by the way- Commemoration of the Founding of the Nation Day) and it still is a bit chilly outside, but the day times are starting to look and feel like spring already. The ume (or plum) trees are already starting to blossom all over the place. The two shown above were just a 50 meter walk from my home. So is this one.


Nice to have two day weekends again. I really wore myself out last year working so much. I can now take some 'me' time every week, it has a total different feeling. I was in danger of spiraling into a lazy "do nothing" kind of day yesterday so I willed myself to pick up the phone and touch base with Chris. We ended up going and getting some more basketball in for a couple of hours. The same guys we played with last week were there again, pretty funny and nice guys. I don't think I sunk a single hoop but I was stunning them with my cheeky passes. Chris, recognizing the threat that I posed to his team tricked me into jumping up to blocking him and dug his knee into my leg giving me a Charley Horse. Cunning ploy. Another member of the team charged me with his head down and landed his head square on my cheek. Luckily, I am a pretty sturdy Canadian guy!

Ritsy and I were talking about what we might do when my Aunt and Mom are here. She is thinking of going down to Okinawa for a couple of days. I have never been there and always wanted to, so I hope we can do it- but I don't want to create a huge expense for my mom and Aunt so will probably end up eating a lot of the travel and stay costs for them if we do that- so the price needs to be right! Does anyone that lives in Japan have any other suggestions? It seems they have a tour package that already includes Tokyo, Nara and Kyoto...

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!

The ballad of Ritsuko

The sky was an interesting shade of pink at sunset tonight, but it has nothing to do with the story below!

My poor wife! Yesterday she had to work the graveyard shift at her hospital (hmm I don't like the term graveyard when talking about a hospital...Okay overnight shift). I learned that when she got to her work, the blood van was there so she decided to give some blood. I think she said she only gave 200 mg, so it wasn't so draining (hmm I don't like the term draining when talking about giving blood). After her 14 hour shift, she came home and I was up and getting ready to go as we had pre-arranged to run some errands today.

The beginning of the errands went pretty well (go to the bank, pay some bills, pickup some paper work, pay the mortgage for the month) but even then it was already 1 pm by the time we finished them. We then headed over to the South tax office to fill out the paperwork required to get a refund on the tax paid on our home. To make a long story short, we spent about 2 hours in the office going through the right paperwork and trying to figure out why we could only get a credit for half of the money we should be able get (basically it is my fault, I am a gaijin and I own half of the home, but the loan is in Ritsy's name). That is a good chunk of money we lost out on. Ritsy called the bank( to fix it so that I can maybe get that money next year) and the bank promised to get back to her. We got home and scarfed down some lunch and by then it was 3:45 pm. I headed off to my Japanese lesson and business lesson and Ritsy tried to get a nap. But less than an hour later the bank called her back. After the call the cats decided they were hungry even though it was an hour and a half early for their dinner. Basically she had no sleep at all through the day! Finally she got to bed around 12:30 because I made her stay up and watch 24 with me!

Well sleep well Ritsuko! You earned it!

Pete and Mari's Wedding

Took a day off yesterday, had to rest my aching head!

On Saturday Chris and Aki, Miyuki, Ritsy and I went to Peters wedding held at the local Grand Tiara (a place made exclusively for weddings). Look at these attractive people...

The event kicked off with a little wait where we could enjoy a spot of wine. Afterwards, the ceremony started right on time. Both Pete and Mari looked great...

The reception was held in the 'Rose room', any guess as to why it had that name?
There were a lot of good pictures from this day(So I threw together another video and uploaded it to Youtube Here) , but I can't really post them all, here is a good one with the bride and groom
Chris and I sang Shima Uta to rave reviews. The only hitch was that the MD we had was too quiet so they had to abort the song and fire up the karaoke machine- then they proceeded to pick the wrong song some old Japanese Enka song...
The initial party concluded with the happy couple coming down the steps, Mari sporting a new dress, unfortunately all my pictures are a little dark, sorry!
At that point the camera's battery ran out of power. After that we all went home and changed and came out for the nijikai (or second party) which was quite fun- especially with Peter's crazy surfing friend getting much delight in making me gulp back entire glasses of beer at one time ( a Japanese party tradition). We later found ourselves off to a sanjikai (third party) at an izakaya (I don't know it's name) and Chris and I caught the $50 (5000 yen) taxi ride home around 3:40. All in a very fun ceremony and a good time! My heart went out to Pete, Mari and their family as they woke up at 8 am to go and see Kyoto!

A quick one

A view of the Lions Gate Bridge from Stanley Park in Vancouver.

A short post today. My laptop that keeps dying and then coming back to life has decided to die again. Well it kind of works but I have to shake it to help the Hard drive move, a little counterproductive.

Warren sent me this link to some beautiful pictures. This winter, it sounds like Vancouver is having some of the worst weather I can ever remember it having. Back in December there was a severe windstorm that devastated Stanley Park, one of the great destinations for people. Thousands of tress were blown down, and this Flickr slide show really captures some of this devastation. I heard during this windstorm my mother was without electricity for a day and a half!

Another thing that happened this winter is BC Place stadium, which usually looks like this, couldn`t seem to handle the extreme weather conditions and the roof ripped. Very tough year back home.

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!