Another Update

It’s been a few weeks since my last update, so I’d thought I’d throw another general one up here.

There is not a ton to report, as life has settled into a pattern here, and is pretty much the same old, same old from week to week.

You may notice I haven’t been very diligent about my “Better Know a City” Project recently, but I have been doing some local hikes. A couple weeks ago a co-worker asked to come along on one of my hikes, and I took him back to Mount Hachimen in Sanko-Mura. I basically took the same route I had done before, but it is always fun to show a new person what trails you have discovered. He had a really good time, and brought back a good report to everyone else, and now I’ve got several more requests to go hiking. I may soon be as famous here for my Mount Hachimen hikes as I used to be for my Ajimu tours.

We’ve had a bit of turnover at my office recently, which is pretty common for these kind of English teaching companies. I’m no longer the newest member of my branch, and in fact we’ve had three people leave and two new ones come in. There has been a bit of stress involved all around in the reshuffle, but all in all I think the new members are fitting in very well here, and suddenly I am in the position not of newbie but of experienced veteran. Being the kind of person who likes to give out his opinions and advice frequently, I’m enjoying the change.

I was walking into Nakatsu station last week, when I saw Ron and Nikki, two friends who I knew back from my JET days. They had come back into town for Ted and Yumiko’s wedding. Shoko and I only attended the after party for this wedding, but Justin and Lisa have pictures from the actual ceremony on their blogs.

And one quick news commentary:
Like everyone else, I am shocked by the latest shooting. I am tempted to use this as a platform to go into my opinions on gun control, but I'll hold off for now.

Shoko and I tried to catch some information on the news about it last night, but in Japan the American news was overshadowed by the shooting of the Nagasaki mayor on the street yesterday. I'm not sure if that made the news back in the US or not, but it took up over half of the news broadcast in Japan, and they didn't even mention the American shooting until the second halfhour of the news broadcast.

Interestingly enough, they then showed a few news pieces that had obviously been prepared ahead of time that talked about America's long time problem with gun massacres. After the pieces finished airing, one newscaster said to his colleague, "Earlier I would have said it was only an American problem, but I guess this evening shows it is something in Japan as well."

Link of the Day
Protest Outside of President Bush's Grand Rapids Visit Announced