the Chronicles of Hafnarnia
[Most Recent Entries]
[Calendar View]
[Friends]
Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in
Matthew Hafner's LiveJournal:
[ << Previous 20 ]
| Thursday, February 7th, 2008 | | 11:05 pm |
Well things seem to be looking up for me.... Last year I said I was doing so much in November and early december...well they all turned out well I passed my calligraphy test (well not really test, I submitted 3 pieces of work and judged sufficient to pass) 初段 Then I also finished the Half Marthon 完走 And the crown jewel... I passed my japanese test!!!! I can't believe it... １級 I tried to study pretty hard for it...I wasn't quite finished with 2kyu study when the year started, so I had to catch that up and work my way through a mountain of new words and kanji and grammar and much harder reading...i knew my reading was going the biggest problem. I studied that the most intensely... It ended up being my highest subscore...and kanji was my lowest which i expected after the test (in all the practice tests it was always the highest)... Anyway, thats my third test in 3 years...3kyu => 2kyu => 1kyu I am finished with the JLPT forever...kind of like the end of a road, but I don't know which road to turn to now.....i really don't want to sound like i am bragging because I know I can't speak Japanese well enough... so next I guess its the Kanji Kentei (I took 4kyu at my school but still waiting for results) and then the GRE. Any advice? matt | | Sunday, January 20th, 2008 | | 3:01 pm |
Singapore and Malaysia
It's full swing winter here. It has snowed off and on the past few days and has been below freezing the last few days (which is apparently rare here)...but as soon as the sun goes down it gets super super cold. Winter in Fukui is just a perpetual season of cold...i can't remember the last time my feet felt warm....oh wait i do, it was in Malaysia!!! So during the winter vacation, I spent a super relaxed two weeks in Malaysia and Singapore. It was so stress-free it was almost as if I didn't take a vacation. Everything we attempted to do, we could do really easily. Any time we had to buy bus tickets we could easily obtain them and we always had accommodation, though not always the nicest (for 3 dollars a night, one mustn't complain!). I went with a friend of mine who lives in Sabae. He was a super easy travel companion...he is also a Taiwanese American which helped in times when we needed Chinese. First off, in total, I spent 9 days in Malaysia. It was supposed to be the rainy season, but it only rained twice the the whole time we were there and both times were at night. We flew in Kuala Lumpur (it's called KL by the locals) the same day and crashed at a youth hostel pretty close to center of town. But the next day we went to Penang. I thought it was going to be a beach paradise (apparently I didn't read my travel book very well), but it turned out to be a food heaven instead...the eating was good let me tell you. Malaysia is a melting pot of almost every Asian culture: native Malays (who are predominately Muslim and the majority) Chinese, and Hindi. Penang is the only state in Malaysia that has a Chinese majority, so there was a definite Chinese slant along with the colonial one. So food was always amazing in its variety. Chinese for breakfast, Indian for lunch, Malaysian for dinner...kind of like that but in different orders every day...also there was a lot of delicious western food. Anyway, Penang was really nice. I enjoyed it. We stayed a dirt cheap place and ended up with lots of mosquito bites, but 3 dollars a night is hard to beat. We went around the colonial areas, and visited some large Buddhist temples. There is also a small national park that we walked along to go to the monkey beach...I was really excited to see monkeys, but when i got there, all the monkeys were more or less eating garbage..kind of a bummer, but a fun walk through the jungle. We also met another friend of ours there and met another traveler who we traveled with later in Singapore. Overall we spent one too many days there, and probably should have went with our friends to the beach resort a little further north close to the Thai border, but it didn't work out. Next we went back to KL. The first day, we tried doing all the walking sites, but got super lost a few times, but KL is super compact so it was easy enough to walk around..we more or less walked north to south and back to the center. We tried to go to a lot of museums but most of them were closed for some reason or another, but we managed to make it to the Islamic Arts Museum, which was a really awesome place! I learned a lot about Islam that I didn't have any clue about. That was good for me. I also saw a ton of calligraphy. Since I have been learning it in Japan, i was quite impressed with the differences between Chinese, Japanese calligraphy and Arabic Calligraphy. (in Arabic calligraphy, artists use a reed pen rather than a brush). We also tried to go three more things but they were all closed. On the second day, we got up early and lined up for the free tickets for the Petronas Towers. We got there at like 730 and it was already packed. Luckily (i guess) we got tickets and went up at like 245...the whole thing is just a long commercial for Petronas, but I think I have been to 4 of the 5 tallest buildings in the world now...if not 5 of the top 6. In KL, we saw a few movies, all terrible, but we also went to Chilis...it was American prices, but it was a taste of something we couldn't get in Japan. It took me a while to realize why they didn't have baby back ribs...they had beef ribs though. After KL we went on a day trip outside of the city before heading to Melaka (also called Malacca). We went to a Hindi religious site built into some caves in the mountains. We climbed some steps and saw a lot of Indian children getting blessed (?) I am not sure what was going on religiously but people seemed to be satisfied by it. The caves had really colorful statues, which has me convinced that India is the happiest place on earth. I would like to go there next though I may not be psychologically ready for it. We spent two days in Melaka...well 2 nights and one day. The place we stayed at was really nice (except for the bat in the hallway..it eventually left)! It was an old converted Chinese manor. The center was open and sun came through it. The owners were kind of an old couple of an Indian dude into American 70s and a Chinese dude who spoke so fast in English I couldn't understand him. In Melaka we saw the colonial sites, mosques, temples and churches. The main part of the town is the old dutch fort and all the buildings are red. Also most of the houses in the center of town mix Chinese, Dutch, Portuguese and British architecture which make for pretty unique houses. We toured some along the way and learned about Straits (as in Straits of Malacca) Chinese culture. We ate at Pizza Hut there, which was Amazing. The next morning we boarded a bus for Singapore. Singapore's border control was strict and takes a lot of time (at least going in) You can take alcohol in from any country but Malaysia...if you try you have to pay a huge tax (alcohol was so expensive in both countries that I only had a warm beer on new year's the entire trip, so I can't review the brews). Singapore is kind of surreal. The government has super strict laws (i.e. it is illegal to chew gum and there is hefty fine for forgetting to flush). We were there for 4 days, which is probably a day too long, but I really enjoyed it. Singapore is kind of like an American city except it is super clean and almost every sign is in four languages (Chinese, English, Malay, and Tamil) In Malaysia, the Malay was on top, then Chinese, then English, then Hindi, and finally Arabic. It is a super multi-lingual society, but English is used as the mutual language between the different language groups. Both my friend and I had friends living in Singapore who showed us around 3 of the 4 days. The main attractions were the super super nice museums. There was so much information available and most had cool audio guides. We spent 5 hours each in the National Museum (there was a history museum and a Louvre Special Exhibit of Greek Statutes) and Asian Civilizations Museum (which was awesome!). But Singapore is a place to eat and shop mainly. Which we did, though the only thing I bought was a hat. The stalls were the best and cheapest places to eat. All in all, I had a great time. It was very relaxed and There were no troubles and I even managed to avoid sunburns thought it was over 90 every day. I also had mango fruit drinks practically every day and ate amazing Indian and Chinese food every day. I would love to go back and do the nature and beaches (as that was the colonial tour) There is a mountain I would like to climb as well, though there are many other places on the agenda. Next up is Hong Kong! Hopefully I can make it one piece until then...its sooo cold! I hope 2008 will warm up, but it looks like an exciting year! Singapore Album http://okstate.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2156489&l=a8d48&id=17109565Malaysia Album http://okstate.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2157749&l=b85b3&id=17109565 | | Sunday, December 9th, 2007 | | 10:31 pm |
From November 3rd to December 2nd: I ran a half marathon graded about 700 essays went to the caribbean for a week went to an all day concert went to a wedding gave a presentation at a conference and took the jlpt i did too much | | Sunday, November 4th, 2007 | | 10:55 pm |
13miles/21km 菊花マラソン♪
 Well I did it. I managed to run the half marathon on Saturday. When we first started training for it in September, I was gung ho into it, but as time passed and I got more urgently pressed by study...i kind of gave up and didnt train. I wasn't even gonna do it. But all the runner's names were in the papers, and students and teachers came up to ask me about saying I was great for trying...meaning I had no choice but to do it. So the wednesday before, I ran a 10k in preparation. I made the 10k fairly easily, feeling I could go further, but that is still half of the true distance. So basically, the month before the race, aside from basketball and running 5k once with Donna, I ran a 10k three days before the actual race....dumb dumb dumb. The actual race felt great. While waiting for Chris, Mari and Holly, I talked with people I knew by the registration. I saw the whole curry house staff...they came up to since I go all the time and told me to go after the race...Anyway, we all got lined up and started at 910. I had two goals, Don't walk and make it in under two hours. The course was thankfully very flat and I had my ipod to keep going. I also had two energy packs on me from Mari's suggestion. I don't have any complaints about the course except for the water placement stations...perhaps they could have been distributed better? I don't know. The course was pretty much up and back. The turn around was the halfway point which was nice because we knew how much we had left. A lot of kids were on the course cheering on which helped A LOT! I ran my first 10km way too fast and died the last ten...had I been running a 10k, I would have a great time I think (for me). Ultimately I made my goals...didn't walk (even managed a tiny sprint at the end and finished in: 1hour 59minutes 33seconds  stoked to the max about that here is my ipod playlist Take On Me Aha The Fool On The Hill The Beatles Satan Said Dance Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! Hyper-Ballad Björk Björk センスレス ASIAN KUNG-FU GENERATION Toxic Britney Spears Boys Don't Cry The Cure Just Like Honey The Jesus & Mary Chain The Jesus and Mary Chain Hey Ya! OutKast don't ask why My Bloody Valentine コスモス Polaris Pain Jimmy Eat World 銀河 [Album ver.] フジファブリック A Little Time The Marked Men Youth Matisyahu Thriller (2003 Edit) Michael Jackson Our Faces Split The Coast In Half Broken Social Scene ガッツだぜ ウルフルズ Clark Gable The Postal Service 7.11 days Registrators Up Against The Wall Peter Bjorn And John Channel X The Soviettes Heroes David Bowie 君という花 Asian Kung-Fu Generation Jamie Weezer WORLD'S END SUPERNOVA くるり Love will tear us apart Joy Division 地平線を越えて フジファブリック Current Mood:  my legs hurtCurrent Music: love will tear us apart | | Sunday, October 14th, 2007 | | 11:21 pm |
The decisions I made in Tokyo
I haven't written a real entry in forever let's trying! let's summing up summer ( Catching up summer break....長いよ )The month of September was so busy. School Festival Sports Day Field Trip and Speech Contest. Speech Contest was really great this year. The boys we picked were super smart and gave great speeches in terms of English. They spoke so fluently and performed well. They were super animated, one kid screamed at the end of his, which earned them the title of genki boys. Anyway both kids got prizes and really seemed to enjoy themselves in the process. I think this was a great experience for them and they have become even better leaders in English class. After the contest was over, I had planned long before to go to Tokyo. My life has been somewhat of a mess recently. I had a lot of things to think about some I wanted to put all the chaos surrounding me on the outside and spend time alone to think...tokyo seems like the perfect place. here all my problems are compounded around me whereas in tokyo all the problems are on the outside and i can more or else ignore them. I went there to think about what I wanted to do, how i was going to do what I decided, and what i needed to do to do it right. Being there, while reading a lot while reading trains fairly aimlessly, helped me relax considerably. I came to the following conclusions. I am going to stay on another year (barring something unforeseen). I came here to follow my dream and there are still things left to do. I know that I want to have an Asian-based career in the future, so it just makes more sense for me to stay here. I enjoy my school, aside from the grading but it comes with the job i suppose, and i know what i am doing (most of the time). So if i want to learn about Japan and Asia as a whole, I should stay here and absorb as much as I can. I certainly lead a more active life here than I ever did at home. I have gained priceless on-the-job experience just being the only foreigner in a japanese work place...quite different than as an exchange student. So I am sure I will stay here. 90% likely I will stay at my current school. 5% chance of going to a high school 5% chance of going to another JHS. In that third year, I want to use it to prepare for life after JET School. Which is going to be grad school (though some world travel might fit in some where between). Since I have gone this far, I want to try to go graduate school here, put all this Japanese study to the test. It means having to pass 1kyu (level 1 proficiency test. I have been studying pretty hard the last few months so I have at least a small chance of passing it...assuming I can improve my reading comprehension skills. That is what I have been practicing the most. In the 3rd year, I will also have to take the GRE possibly twice depending on the score, search out scholarship and financial aid opportunities, more than likely take the Ryugaku Shiken (which is a step higher than 1kyu) and possibly 1kyu again if I fail (which is really likely). If I pass 1kyu, I might try for the business test for good measure because it has a spoken component. The Ryugakushiken has essays. Ideally I want to go to Waseda in Tokyo (another reason to go to Tokyo, see what life there would be like). Of course there are great Asian studies programs in America which I want to research and learn more about (living in Hawaii sounds nice..maybe I just like Islands..the thought of being surrounded by the sea the rest of my life is pretty appealing). I want to measure all my options, but my heart, i think, is here. There are some serious drawbacks to staying: a third year away from family, falling farther and farther away from my own culture, missing out on experiences elsewhere because I am limiting myself to life here. I am going to be more socially isolated. there are pluses which include staying at school and deepening my friendships there. i also will really improve my japanese. i get to study and travel because this a flexible job with decent pay... might as well extend it...i get to meet interesting people and do tons of interesting things and have some pretty memorable (and at times awkward) experiences. i know its pretty early to decide this stuff, but being a second year means staying here longer keeps me from being elsewhere and its getting close to time to make more serious decisions. barring something major, it looks like i will be here another year 日本万歳！ | | Friday, October 12th, 2007 | | 12:26 am |
the hardest thing I have ever done in Japan besides leaving
was getting this freaking drivers license. I cant measure how much stress and embarrassment it caused me, but I got the mother effer. Look out roads, I am a 初心者 again!  look out open roads (at 35mph) consider this the debut of my beastly sideburns as well | | Thursday, July 26th, 2007 | | 3:06 pm |
Summer Break part 1
I got back yesterday from my first summer break trip...i guess it really started two weekends ago with Gion Matsuri (which I will write up later). On Friday, I had my school end of term party at a nice place next to the school. I hardly ate but definitely drank my share (made it to the second and third afterparties still on my feet...somehow i came home with more money than I went with) The party was fun. My seat was next to the principal's so he talked to me almost the whole night...once again i went with him to the after party. it was fun, got to talk to a lot of people. on saturday, aside from a massive hangover and my throwing up, i left on my road trip to Shimane. It took 9 hours to get there, but I could only drive like 35mphs the whole way (60KM). My friend from Gaidai is an ALT from out there, so I took the chance to visit the two least-populated prefectures. Tottori Ken is pretty empty--between the two big cities, there is absolutley nothing but beatiful beaches. It is also home to Japan's only sand dunes  there really is only one  they have camel rides   proof that i was there  On my first full day in Matsue (in Shimane ken) I visited the Izumo Taisha. It's supposed to be one of the holiest shrines in Japan as well as the oldest    can't actually walk up to   rabbit myth statue  big rope (?) people were throwing money into it On the next day, my friend and I climbed Daisen in Tottoriken. It was a gorgeous day and one helluva climb. I didn't know if my ankle was going to hold up but the walking stick was great. Once you got about like 1500 meters, there were no more tall trees, so you could see all over. The mountain (actually its a volcano) is only 10k from the sea and there are no other tall mountains around it. So the view was amazing. The climb was well worth it, but it took me out the next day, so tired. When I got to the top, some old people were drinking beer...i can't imagine.. after the climb, we hit up an onsen to relax.      that is the actual summit, but you can't go there because the trail is blocked off, it would be suicide to try it The last day, i went to the Adachi Art Musuem in a tiny town. It has what has been voted to be the best garden in Japan 4 years running. The collections were nice too...plus gaijin discount!    this is supposed to be a living portrait..really cool! im off to fuji rock then hokkaido!!! goodbye fukui, hello tent | | Monday, July 9th, 2007 | | 10:35 pm |
It's Monday again. I had a really interesting experience on Saturday. I volunteered for an English summer camp at the prefecture's school for the blind. The school's grades are mixed all the way from kindergarten to high school. There is even a massage school attached (massage has long been regarded as the traditional occupation for the visually impaired in Japan). The school itself only has 21 students in all grades (not counting the college) and there are 37 teachers. The building is fairly new and really nice. A person with a job like mine visits the school two days a week, pretty good for such a small school. There were only 7 students attending the camp, but 14 people volunteered. So maybe some of the students were pretty overwhelmed at first, but they could speak English really (especially compared to my students in the same grade, in fact i think they are better that my students were). Although it is the blind school, it doesn't mean that every student has complete vision loss. Only 2 of the students had no sight. Some students had partial sight, while others had no central vision or other vision related problems. One girl wasn't blind at all but rather she was deaf. There is a special school for the deaf, but I am not really sure why she was at the blind school. One of the major focus of the camp besides giving the students the chance to learn and use English was to inform us about the school and more about blind culture. After some warm up activities, we were split into groups. The students were the leaders and taught us about different aspects of their school life. The first activity was learning how to type in braille. We were given the opportunity to use a braille typewriter and given a alphabet sheet and told to write messages to the students. I was surprised because the keyboard only had 9 keys (6 button keys, return, space and backspace) each button had a corresponding dot. I learned about how braille was organized and how it gets abbreviated in English. Of course typing an entire book in braille would take many many many pages, so there is a short version of it (for example, can becomes just c, etc). The next activity was a school introduction. My group was lucky because some members of my group got a massage from a graduate of the massage school. Unfortunately I didn't get one. I wanted to try the acupuncture...but I think after my hospital stay...I've had enough of needles. The students explained the facilities to us and we learned a lot about how they life day-to-day. Some students stay at dorms at the school if they live far away. Afterwards, we got to try blind sports. They have a special game (apparently created in Japan) called blind volleyball. 6 players play on each side and it's pretty similar to regular volleyball except for it is played under the net rather than above. The first row is for students who can't see, if they have some vision, they are given an eye mask. So you play in darkness. The back row is for people who have vision and are allowed to watch without their vision obstructed. There are more specific rules that I won't explain, but the game really teaches you communication because it is the job of the back row to guide through verbal commands where the front row needs to go. When I tried the front row, it was very stressful because I really had no idea what was going on, and it was rather difficult to respond and follow commands (i still mix up right and left in English). You learn the value of team work. The kids of the school really killed us...like 11 to 3. Experiences like this have really increased my interest in special education, especially my weekly classes with the special education class here. Pretty mind-opening experience. That night also happened to be my supervisor's going away/birthday party. We went to a really nice restaurant in Fukui City. A place called PINORI. They had pretty delicious Japaneses blend Italian food. They also had American Cheesecake which was great..but served with a weird flavor of ice cream that didn't really match the taste well. It's said that my supervisor won't be around for a while. I hope she has a happy healthy baby. I am going to miss her a lot! Afterwards was the afterparty of the ALT sayonara party. I couldn't make the first party, but the second and third parties were pretty sweet. I drank way too much and was always surrounded by beautiful ladies. I had a really good time. Sunday we went to see the lotus blossoms in Nanjo.. Summer Break is not coming soon enough, i'm excited out of my brain!!!!!!!!!! woo much love matt | | Saturday, June 9th, 2007 | | 8:12 pm |
my hospital experience
Last week from Monday to Wednesday, I was supposed to go to Tokyo for a training seminar, instead I was in the hospital for 5 days with pneumonia.. So in terms of life experiences, I can stratch being hospitalized in a foreign country off the list. Glad that's over for sure. Let me tell you, there is nothing to do in the hospital. I had a senile old roommate that the nurses were always yelling at. I liked him until the last day when he decided to wake up to early at 4, and then again at 5 and again at 6. So why was in the hospital? Apparently, I got pneumonia from somewhere and I had a fever of over 103 at some point (39.5C). I didn't do much at the the hospital. My teacher friends bought me some Manga, I started reading A Wild Sheep Chase, I got pretty far on the Kanji Kentei DS game, and I watched all the episodes of Heroes on Dan's Video Ipod. Heroes is a cool show, I recommend. In the hospital, I didn't do much. I woke up, when i became able to eat again, I had some bland breakfast, then had my morning IV, sat around, took naps, had lunch, sat around waiting for people to visit, did more of the same, had my evening IV. With the IVs, everytime I got was scheduled, I got stabbed with a new needed, they just didnt use the same spot all week...so I got various needle marks and bruises on my arm. The nurses were friendly, but also all business. As I got more and more of my wits about me, i became more popular with the nurses...mainly because I was about 60 years younger than the other patients, and I never needed diaper changes. The most friendly nurse was also the worst at giving shots and left huge bruises in the places she stuck me. I didn't have any appetite the first few days, so I had some health supplement IV, which sucked because it was long and I had to leave it in overnight. I'm really thankful for the people that came to relieve my boredom. I will have to do the same for them...now i have to take it at a more relaxed pace for a while so that I don't get that sick again. take care matt Current Mood: relieved | | Friday, June 1st, 2007 | | 12:32 am |
birthday dinner
I never thought i would get excited about a birthday dinner of cow intestines and tongue before i moved to japan | | Thursday, May 31st, 2007 | | 9:39 am |
Happy Birthday to me
Today, is my birthday, but it doesn't feel any different. I guess it's pretty impossible to feel drastically different overnight. I hope it's a good year. Maybe this is the year I finally grow up, but it's not likely. So much has been going on lately. It's left me pretty exhausted. I never get enough sleep, but with everything I want to do, I feel that isn't an option anyway. I will try to catch up this weekend, as a present to myself. Two weeks ago, I went to Amanohashidate. I went with Rob and Peaches, and we drove down there on a Friday night, to beat traffic during the day on Saturday. It was a fairly long drive, but not so bad, and we never got lost. Originally we were going to camp, but the rain stopped that. We were lucky because we ended up staying at a completely vacant youth hostel on the north side of the bay. Amanohashidate is considered one of the 3 best views (scenes? scenary?) in Japan (the others being Miyajima in Hiroshima and Matsushima in Sendai...i went to Miyajima in my Gaidai days and probably will go to Matsushima in the summer) The big appeal is, a long sandbar spils a harbor in half and it is covered by some 8000 pine trees. If looked from the top of the hill, you can see the two sides of the harbor, the line of trees, and the beach on the sand bar. The popular myth? legend? tradition? is to few the scene upside down through your legs. So you do a toe touch and view the scene...supposedly the line of trees looks like a bridge to heaven (which is its name in Japanese). It was a pretty good view, but it was also raining a lot. To get to the viewing hill, you can climb a bunch of stairs or take a ropeway or a cable car. We decided to climb the stairs up and ride the ropeway down. The ropeway was something straight out of the 50s, playing some strange music. Afterwards, which I thought was the better part of the trip, we drive a little north on the Tango peninsula, to a small fishing village called Ine. It was unique in that most of the houses were built directly on the water. So instead of having a garage, they had a boat dock bulit straight into the water. It made for some good pictures (assuming you have a good camera, which I don't). We took a boat tour of the harbor to view them. You can throw shrimp chips out at the seagulls, but it also attracks small hawks (maybe they are actually called kites). So it was pretty freaking seeing them battle the sea gulls for the food. We saw a water gas station with like 15 of the birds perched there. Another sweet thing about the village is there are wild monkeys in the town. We saw an old lady working on the side of the road, and there was an embankment over her head. A monkey was sitting there. When she realized about us and the monkey, she decided to stare at us instead of the monkey. I guess she is more used to monkeys than a car full of gaijin. They also had some nice rice field views right on the sea. I love seeing the sea, but I don't have much desire to get in it. This last weekend, I went to Kansai to visit Jeff and his roommate visiting Japan. Unfortunately, we didn't have enough time to do good siteseeing, but we ate a lot of good vegetarian food. I found a place that had falafel. It maid my life so much better. It's been too long. Next week, I have to go to Tokyo for a training seminar. I hope it goes well wish me luck | | Sunday, May 6th, 2007 | | 2:14 pm |
| | 2:04 pm |
僕の冒険
I have been lousy at updating this soooo i will start fresh with Golden Week! Golden week was split into 2 halves this year. We had Monday off, class on Tuesday and Wednesday then Thursday and Friday off. I have to admit I did a terrible job planning...in fact I didn't plan anything but I had a really great time! First half: For the first half, I made a quick trip up to Osaka to see my old host family. I hadn't seen them since I got back. We made pizza which is one of the the first things they ever made for me while i was living with them. Also my japanese has significantly improved since I lived with them the first time (from being non-existant to conversational, somewhat). They told me that I had an Inaka (rural) accent to my Japanese, which made me pretty happy...i guess that means i am adapting pretty well to my life in Takefu. My host brother got into college, so I hope he will come up to visit Fukui once or twice while I'm living here. It was a nice reminder of my old study abroad days. On the Monday holiday, I climbed Hino-san for the third and final time for a while (I want new experiences and new mountains) Hino is pretty tough because the last 900 meters are pretty intense because the mountain gets really steep from that point. Right when I got to the top, I saw two of my students. I can't escape them even in my free time :P The two days of school were pretty good...nothing of interest. On the Wednesday, I went out with some of the Ichinensei young teachers for beer and chicken. I love Yakitori. I love beer. I got to talk to some teachers I haven't really got to talk to yet, so that was exciting....I may or may not be going to Fuji Rock this summer Second half: Luckily for me, my sorry ass with no plans, Peaches planned to go camping during the latter half of golden week and invited me to go. I hadn't been camping since maybe high school, so it was nice to go again...problem was I have no tent and no sleeping bag...but since it was car camping, it was easy to just bring a futon and a blanket. We camped on the northwest corner of biwa-ko in a place almost right on the lake...we were a little off by a river, but it was still nice. It was nice to sit around drink and eat by the camp. On the next day, i went hiking in the south of the prefecture at a mountain called 武奈ヶ岳 Bunagatake. It was 1213 meters. In order to get to the summit, we actually had to climb a different mountain first (御殿山Gotenyama) and the cross over to it. I felt aside from the first part which had fairly continues inclines and narrow trails that it was a pretty easy climb. I took 5 hours, but if I had gone by myself....maybe I could have done in it in 3 and half 4ish. I hike a little faster than my fellow climbers did. I guess that makes my 5th mountain in Japan. I still need to try for Hakusan and Tateyama. I don't know why I never climbed a mountain in America. After that, we hit a nice but small and crowded onsen....too many little kids. When i got back to the campsite, i was told the plan for the next day had changed (originally it was to be a trip to Hikone and do things there) but it was decided that we were going to go to Shizuoka-ken for a Matsuri. So we tidied up the campsite and left at the crack of dawn for our highway adventure across honshu for the festival. It was in Hamamatsu. I guess there are more Brazilians there than there are here. A lot of Portuguese signs. So the concept of the festival was each neighborhood in the town created a kite (some 172 separate ones) and they fly them. The kites were huge, about the size of two doors next two each and each had massive teams to get them in the air. I didn't seem especially windy that day, but they got way up. They all had ropes tied two them. Each neighborhood had support teams with children and residents that would blow horns and beat drums to cheer on their kites. It seemed like the kites were supposed to fight each other and try to stay up there the longest. It was really cool when two kites could be maneuvered well enough to make it happen. One, the "hayai" kite, was especially good at taking other kites down. You could hear it rip through another kite with its rope tail once. The festival was really cool, and I'm glad that Shana knew about it. ( Spring break photos )( Old spring break pictures )i guess its school tomorrow matt Current Music: The Long and Winding Road--The Beatles | | Tuesday, May 1st, 2007 | | 11:40 pm |
Spiderman-3
SUCKS!!!!! Don't see that piece of garbage...it came out already in Japan...they managed to make a movie worse than the first two....they must have really tried fuck that piece of shit | | Tuesday, March 13th, 2007 | | 10:35 pm |
| | Sunday, March 11th, 2007 | | 8:47 pm |
never get in a car accident in japan if you aren't japanese | | Saturday, March 3rd, 2007 | | 6:42 pm |
| | Friday, February 23rd, 2007 | | 4:08 pm |
hokkaido
Things have been really busy since I got back from Hokkaido about 2 weeks ago. It was a fun trip. ( Hokkaido trip )last friday was the echizen city teacher enkai. it was pretty interesting, but not that many teachers showed up. i got kind of drunk and spoke english. the next day was badminton, its still a good time...i wish i could play more tonight is a new teacher welcome party tomorrow is higashi camp and sunday is hiking matt | | Sunday, February 18th, 2007 | | 4:00 pm |
Step 1 over~!
Before i came here, i wrote out my dream that i wanted to accomplish in japan. I felt for sure before I came here that i would want to stay for 3 years...and I still feel that way now. I already re-contracted for the second thing...but things can always change..especially when the teachers change in April. Luckily there is a really good and friendly staff at my school now...i hope there won't be many drastic changes. Anyway, so my first goal was to pass the level 2 test of the JLPT. I figured i wouldn't have any chance...considering how busy I was when I first arrived and how little i studied the month of August. I tried to study really hard after that though...albeit it was an extremely tough test. I was sure I had failed...or at least if i did pass, i was going to be right on the line...but my results came while I was in Hokkaido...and I can breath a sigh of relief because I did pass... i passed fairly easily at that. I got about 80% across the board...each subject...that kind of surprised me because it didn't show me my weak points very well.... well i thought I should have gotten higher on the kanji/vocab part, but i was stoked about the high score in reading/grammar. so now i am left to study for the level 1 test. I have 2 years to pass it, but ideally I would like to pass it on the first try in December....but there is a huge bridge...and i do almost completely self study... i have a tutor but the only thing we do together is read some simple articles. i'm getting slowly literate but Kanji is still killing me...i feel i am strong in grammar, and that is pretty easy to teach yourself, but expanding the vocab is proving pretty difficult. there is just so much i don't know...i'm glad there is no interview test, but i am so bad at conversation its getting better i guess, but damn its hard. i got to put myself in more situations where i have to talk...but passing the test, especially on my first try in about 2 and a half years of study made me pretty happy. i guess i can call it an accomplishment...but no complanancy!!!!!!! lvl 1 is going to be hard, but when i pass it, all the doors will open up here ganbarimasu! | | Sunday, February 4th, 2007 | | 10:48 pm |
Don't eff with a noblemen, BIATCH
today was kimono taiken day in Echizen City...of course they made me a noblemen. i was kind of hunter outdoorsy type, needless to say, i looked good...not going to lie     illegitimate child, mari was dressed as a prostitute...SCORE!  scowl Hokkaido this week! i already booked all you can eat lamb and beer!!!! for thursday...hmmm lamb |
[ << Previous 20 ]
|
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
hafnarnia's journal
geeky