Spring Break
It's Spring Break over here in Japan, and yours truly was lucky enough to get the whole two weeks off (last year the board of Education made me choose between taking vacation time or sitting at the office doing nothing, but this year they were feeling more generous). So I've been doing my best to make the most of it.
The highlight of Spring Break was
A Friend's visit
When Greg and I were up in Sapporo this summer, we met another JET named Chris who we really got along well with. And it is a small world in the JET community, because we soon found out the 3 of us had a mutual friend. One of Chris' friends from University was one of our JET friends down in Oita prefecture. (His friend was also named Chris. It gets a bit confusing with two people both named Chris, but try and stick with me).
Anyway, for Spring vacation, Chris decided to come down to Oita prefecture and visit the three of us. He just left yesterday to head back to Northern Japan, but while he was here we did our best to show him a good time.
Onsen (naked baths)
Oita prefecture, and especially Beppu city in Oita Prefecture, is famous for its Onsen, or naturally hot spring baths. So we felt we had to make a day out of that. We went down to Beppu city and took in a couple, Onsens, including getting buried in a sand Onsen.
Fukuoka City
As Fukuoka is the biggest city on Kyushu Island, we felt we should show him some city life. Since all of us live out in the country, we took advantage of being in a big city to do things we don't usually get to do, like go to the movie theaters, or to an English book store, or get some decent Western food.
Mount Yufuin
And of course we did some hiking as well. We climbed up Mount Yufuin, which was a bit of a tough climb, but had a great view from the top.
Cherry Blossom Viewing
This time of year the Cherry Blossom trees are in bloom in Japan. These trees, although only in bloom for a couple weeks, are much beloved here in Japan. They are everywhere, and for most of the year look plain and boring, but for the two week blooming season, it is very beautiful. It is traditional to hold a picnic under the cherry blossom trees to enjoy the flowers, and so we attended Cherry Blossom picnics on Saturday in Beppu, and Sunday in Usa. Saturday night in Beppu was also the "Mountain Burning festival" in which one of the mountains surrounding Beppu is set on fire, and it was very amazing to see.
My apartment
I've developed a bit of a reputation out here for having a messy apartment. On the way out to Beppu one day, I needed to swing by my apartment to grab a few things. Both Chris and Chris had heard stories of my apartment, but never seen it in person. They were very amazed. I asked them afterwards what they thought, and Chris responded, "Have you ever had the experience where you hear stories about a thing, and you think it can't possibly be as bad as everyone says it is, and then you see it and you discover it is even worse than you imagined?"
(PS- I am planning on cleaning the place sometime soon).
Four Brits and Me
Chris, Chris and Greg are all from England. Eoin, who went to the same University as Chris and Chris, also tagged along on some of our excursions. So I was the odd man out on a lot of the conversations. And this week especially many British colloquialisms have begun to creep into my vocabulary, but this should hopefully wear off soon.
Other Spring Break News
We had a farewell party with the Board of Education, for everyone who was getting transferred out. I did my best at participating in the conversation, but all the old men at the Board of Education tend to speak Japanese in the local dialect, which is pretty unintelligible to someone struggling with Japanese as a second language. This, coupled with the fact that it is considered impolite not to drink Sake at these events, means I had quite a head ache by the end of the evening.
I had a couple free days before our friend Chris arrived in which I wasn't doing too much. Went hiking by myself for one of these days, which is always a bit lonely but good exercise I suppose.
On another day I drove my car up into the mountain side and just got out and walked around the mountain neighborhoods. Very beautiful in that area. The rice fields are cut into the mountains to form what looks like a series of steps, and the houses are all very old and traditional. I ran into some of my elementary school students, and we went to the river to try and catch tadpoles and crabs. They also showed me all sorts of things around the little neighborhood, like the local temple (hidden in the mountain side) or where their grandparents play gate ball (the Japanese version of croquet). It was a very idyllic afternoon.
Links and other random stuff
Since I'm not posting regularly these days, there is a lot of stuff going on in the news that I'm tempted to comment on but don't have the time to. But if you've been reading my Brian Bork's or Phil Christman's weblog, they've been doing a pretty good job of covering the bases. Also if you've been reading there weblogs, you'll have noticed they both referenced to Noam Chomsky's weblog, and Noam Chomsky's website can be found here.
Many people need no introduction to Chomsky, but if you are unfamiliar with him, I can't recommend him highly enough. He is polemic, but he since he brings up information ignored by the mainstream media, he deserves at least to be read and considered no matter what part of the political spectrum you find yourself on.
And on a completely different note...
Many of you have recommended to me a movie called, "Lost in Translation." I haven't seen it yet, because it hasn't been released in Japan yet. But you can read a really interesting article on why "Lost in Translation" is not going to be released in the major theaters in Japan.
And lastly: My friend Greg has posted an online photo album of the bike trip (mentioned in my previous entry). I'm not in any of these pictures, probably because I was in my car driving instead of biking. But if you want to look at these pictures to get an idea of what the trip was like, you can view them here. (You do have to log in and create an account first, etc, but it's relatively painless). And while your there, you can check out Greg's other online photo albums, and see pictures from the hitch hiking trip to Hokkaido that he and I did this summer.

Video Version