May 2009

Here is the photographic tour of my aparto...

Here we find ourselves at aparto 304 or san maru yon for those playing at home...

Welcome, come inside...

Sorry folks, dont know how to turn it, will work on that, maybe for now just turn your head to the right
This is the view from inside the front door.
To your left you are soon going to see the laundry facilities followed on your right by some other very important facilities..the water closet...

laundry..ahhh corner

ahh yes the ever important throne..this one comes equipt with a heated toilet seat for those balmy winter mornings

next is also on your right as u enter the aparto..the bathroom.
this was soooo boring until i added some lovely touches from the hyakuuen store (thats the $1 shop) You cant see in this picture but i have installe da lovely plastic storage system in the corner for all my storage needs.

next you will recieve the kitchen tour, brace yourselves it could take...well a second to explain..blink and ull miss it..

so this is it, to the left of the pic u can just see my single gas burner, then we have the sink, 2 cupboards beneath that, the shelf above, and the fancy white wire hanging system, which is handy and dandy. Thats the kitchen, did u catch it all???

just incase you need a little more time for your eyes to really take in all my kitchen has to offer heres another angle, this one you can see the other appliances, my toaster oven and my bar fridge..ahhhh yes, a chefs dream kitchen i know, but alas its all just for little ole me, seems such a waste of space...

ok moving on...

you now find yourself peering out from the kithcen into the left hand side of my living space...there is a temporary cardboard shelving unit in place until i can find some cheap furniture, and far off in the corner the tv area which ill give u a close up later to ensure you get the full in depth detail in this tour...

so same angle, except now the right sid eof the living space...my sleeping quarters...the lovely futon, adorned with my blanket of kittens..ahh so snug looking...you can also see off into to far distance the place i stand to write to you, the computer area, or the study as i like to call it, this area has to be elevated for technical purposes, i cant get the wireless unsecured network without the height....

We are now taking in the living space from an alternate angle, this view is from the sliding glass doors that lead to the balcony..here you can see off in the distance the kitchen area where we have just spent so much time, and u can see from here i have quite the cupboard space, which is a big pluss as its the only area i have to store anything...see the pretty doorway too in case i want to shut out the view of the kitchen...

ahhhh yes, a close up of my sudy, here is the computer, atop a set of storage shelves, with a pretty pink storage unit to house all my technical supply needs, cords, ds, camera and such, quite organised already i am....

the most decorate and least used part of the living area...the tv. i cant understand a word they say and prefer the comfort of my laptop with my new fav website, project free tv where i can watch lots of tv shows..standing up of course to ensure i stay connected to the wireless. I think i have decorated this area the most to compensate for its uselessness....

i have installed a little of my home spirit into the lighting fixtures....

This is my balcony, bet you never would have guessed that if i didnt tell you, that long pole is for hanging my wares to dry, and the silver thing on the floor is to escape down when the tax man comes knocking at the end of my stay in japan....

lastly is the view, but quite frankly, its a crap photo...mind u it is midnight....

goodnight. hope you enjoyed your guided photo tour, you can pay by credit card, or direct deposit into my account..thankyou

So the day arrived when it was time to move from my temporary digs in Hongo, nagoya and to move on up in the world to my own place. Out of the training apartment and into my new home. So i boarded the lovely shinkansen and headed off to tokyo at top speed....oooh i should mention there were some packing issues, i had it seems accumulated far more possessions (ok shopping) than i expected and again my baggage was not able to tolerate the quantities of shoes, clothes anf other goodies i had aquired. Quick last minute emergency dash to the shops for yet another bacg to load my possessions into...okj back tot he bullet train, so off i sped to tokyo, now i had had a fairly good nights sleep before, so i was surprised when i found myself waking up to discover i was 10minutes from tokyo, the 2 hour journey sped by as i somehow managed to drift off to sleep, i didnt even get time to eat the obento i packed for myself. oh well there was always the next train trip from Tokyo to Koriyama. So i switched platforms and embarked on my next journey that was to be the final journey too. Shortly upon leaving the station, again in my super duper speedy bullet train, or shinkansen, the business man next to me started to unpack his obento...and wow, what an obento it was. he had a container with rice, with the customary pickled plum on top, a container with fish, one with some kind of radish and vegetable mix, and then one with something else too that io couldnt quite see without obviosly staring at the poor man. After he devoured his lunch he then proceded to take out his last container from his nifty insulated obento bag...this one contained some fruit..ahhh desert.
Well did i feel inadequate as i opened my pink obento lunch box from the 100yen store to reveal some pieces of fruit and some crackers....hmmmmm

well i arrived safely after an hours journey aside the bento man and was greeted at the station by a chap by the name of Ian who is to be my ps for the next year...(ps means he is my manager i guess u could say)
He showed me on the walk to what is to be my new home, all the places along the way. its about a ten minute walk but its quite nice. the more i saw of my new home town the more i liked. Its not too small, its not huge either, but its pretty good. kinda like the three bears u know, one bed too hard, one too soft, well Koriyama is the just right bed.
So we arrived at my apartment complex and Ian showed me the way to room 304..(he lives in 504, emma in 405, and the other NT james in 202)
I stepped in to a pretty much empty room, and was kind of..well i cant say disapointed as its exactly what i expected, i guess it just was this big empty space and i was looking for a home, and it didnt feel like one, well i made quick work of that..... more on that soon

so we set about doing all the administritave tasks required, move in paperwork, registering as an alien, getting information on where to shop etc
then it was time to clean..and the cleaning still hasnt stopped 3 days later. its surprising actually. this apartment is so small but i feel like its taking forever to get clean. You see it was preciosly tenenated by a young man by the name of TJ and i believe Tj and i have very didfferent standards when it comes to apartment cleanliness. As a requirement all teachers vacating apartments must ensure the apartment is clean. I have no doubts Tj walked away thinking, yeah it looks clean to me, im sure itll be fine, i dont need to do anything else....in walks Brandy...and well lets just say, as i mentioned, three days later cleaning the place...thanks TJ the pother guys got brand new apartments not previosly used by peppy, so their places were proffesionally cleaned, and all their appliences and furniture, BRAND NEW!!! i got ripped off. Oh well, its nearly done now.

Well ill set about getting photos asap.

xxx
Bella

13 may
Ok so since the zoo I haven’t done much. Just teaching and clubbing at ID in Sakae with my friend Hiro. So I thought I’d put up photos of my training apartment so you can see how I’ve been living this past few weeks. It’s a pretty nice apartment, and it’s big compared to what I will be in when I get to Koriyama. My main area will be just one room, where I’ll sleep, and do everything in, and then I’ll have the kitchen coming off that and then a bathroom, that pretty much it. So here it’s a bit luxurious aside from having to share a room, tho Chris leaves this Monday so ill have the place to myself for a week before I head off to my new home on the 25th. I started a little packing already tonight, and well, it’s going to be a tight squeeze, even with the new suitcase I bought....yikes.

14 May
Today i found Vegemite. YAYAYAYAYAY im so excited, itll be vegemite sandwiches for lunch, vegemite toast for breakfast.

I also found a really cool record store, and there is a shop here called Tokyu hands. It has everything imaginable and it is all sooo cute. I got a pattern for a monkey and fabric for a monkey, im going to sew him (ill take photos when he is done mum, so u can see my handiwork!)

Im gettting more comfortable with teaching. Soon i will be in my area and i will be all on my own, so im taking advantage of still being able to observe others and to learn all their games and ideas. some classes are easy to teach, while others can be quite challenging. Depends of the curriculum and the kids themselves.

This weekend i might go back to the zoo with chris and ride the duck boats on the pond. ill pack an obento for lun ch and take a book to read in the gardens. It will be fun.

well here are some pics of my aparto..and the zoo...enjoy

i made hamburgers

I have been back in Nagoya for 2 weeks now. The first week was pretty much all working, mostly in the office doing not much at all, shredding paper, organising files, random menial tasks that were used to just keep us busy for our allocated office hours. I did get the chance to do some team teaching. So I went to schools and taught one of the classes and then observed the teacher teaching the others. I usually work around 5 to 730 each day, I mean it varies depending on the school and the classes, but that seems to be about the average at the moment. It may be different in my area though.
I haven’t done too much since I have been here. We did have one night where we went as a group (with several staff from the company) to a place called Miami beer garden, it’s in Nagoya. (I live about 20mins by subway out of Nagoya at the moment in a place called Hongo) The beer garden was fun, 3000Yen for all u can eat and drink until 10.30pm. That was fun. We then went to a place called hub, it’s a pub. It was pretty good, and then we did the traditional Japanese thing and went to karaoke until the subways started again at 5am. I didn’t sing, but was funny to watch others. At karaoke u pay for the room, its 1500yen per person and it was again all u can drink, so was lots of drinking that night.

The other things I have done while I’ve been here are going clubbing with my new friend Hiro. Its golden week here so I’m on holidays at the moment. At the beer garden I met a girl called Hiro who was friends of some other employees. She said she would take me clubbing this week. So Saturday night she met me at Sakae (Just 2 stops out of Nagoya) and she took me to a place called club id, it was 5 floors, you have to pay 3000yen entry but u get 4 drinks included so it’s not so bad. It was a really cool club and lots of fun with my new friend. Before the club she also took me to an izakaya for dinner and we had some yummy Japanese food. It was a really fun night.

On Friday (sorry it’s a bit out of order....) I went to the Higashima zoo and botanical gardens, I’d like to go there again and explore the gardens some more, but the zoo was a bit sad. There was so many animals there, everything u could imagine, I saw anteaters, rhinos, hippo, elephant, giraffe, monkey, koala, so many types of bear, farm animals, everything, but the sad thing was its so different to back home. Their cages/enclosures were so small. There were even 2 polar bears and they just did not look happy. It was a little depressing to see, but it was a nice day out. I guess our standards back home are much higher than here. All around the zoo there were young children, maybe about 10 to 12 years old all sitting by the enclosures, making sketches and paintings of the animals. These kids were so talented, I tried to have a look at many of their work and it was so good. Some of those kids are great artists, in fact most of them were! I think it must have been some sort of art class, or school subject or something. There were so many children there. Oooh and I had a shaved iced treat too, it was so lovely, it turned out to be quite a warm day and it was such a nice treat to have. Yum.

I think the rest of golden week for me will be lying low, the internet cafe a bit some cleaning, maybe the gardens again. Lots of reading and watching movies and preparing for my classes next week.

One thing I guess ill mention cos its driving me nuts is the rubbish situation over here. All garbage must be sorted into certain categories, burnable, recyclable (there is a few kinds) plastics, bottles, cans ergh its frustrating me, gone are my days of just throwing out the trash, now I have to rinse, sort and carefully examine everything I throw away to ensure I’m not making a mistake. It’s all a very big deal too. You can get in all sorts of trouble if you are not doing it right. Certain types of rubbish get disposed of on certain days at certain collection points. Oh it’s such an effort. I guess that maybe Japan has a good system in ensuring rubbish is effectively dealt with, and I imagine its necessary with the number of Japanese people that there is, but for me, coming from such relaxed standards at home it’s not fun. The most annoying thing I think is when you are walking along the street and u just want to throw out some rubbish u are holding, maybe ur chocolate wrapper, empty drink, anything and nowhere in sight is a bin. You have to hold onto it, and take it home. Most convenience stores have bins out front and also supermarkets. These bins have become my friends. You see some rubbish I just don’t know what separate area it’s meant to go in, is it recyclable? Plastic? Sometimes I’m not sure. Or sometimes I just have ten different types of rubbish all in a row that I’m sick of seeing it, so my latest thing is every day when I leave the house I take a bag of rubbish with me. Mixed rubbish generally (although not burnable, I’m good with the food scraps one) and I deposit it into my favourite bin at the convenience store. The ‘others’ bin this is the best bin. It’s the only bin u can put whatever into, and they are not everywhere so u have to find a convenience store with one. Once u've got that Ur set. So now I try and do my best to sort my garbage, but the others bin at the local konbini is suspiciously full these days and I think it’s because the several other foreigners living in my building have cottoned onto my scheme and are appreciating the others bin too! I don’t blame them, all this sorting is stressful business. I’m told the trouble u can get into if it’s not done right is quite extreme, including eviction, it’s a very serious matter. So I prefer my system, at least this way someone can sort my stuff the right way and there will be no errors. Oh I love the others bin!

ferris wheel in sakae

the easter bunny came to Nagoya

a little bit of oz in sakae

general direction of home..

central park in sakae

roof top waterfall in sakae

me on said waterfall

Well I’m off to bed; I shall upload this tomorrow at the cafe. Oh I’m so missing having the internet!!!!

Xxx
Bella