Trip Home.

Maybe I haven't already talked to someone who's reading this about specific dates, but yeah, I'm coming home. I'm flying in to Washington on August 15th for 2 weeks. I'll be flying out on the 30th. I'll also be taking a quick jaunt up to NY in there somewhere.

If you're somewhere in the area, I'd like to see as many people as possible so let me know. Email works best.

lhaineroberts@gmail.com

On another note, Tenryu has way too many animals coming out. Yesterday, during normal activity, I saw:
-1 Black, Blue, Yellow, and Red Lizard.
- 10 Frogs.
- 1 Crab on completely dry land in rocks... No idea...
- A spider that, with its legs splayed out was nearly the size of my fist.
- A rattle snake less than a foot away from me during my evening run. And his rattle was just a rattlin'.
- And all the other bugs, mosquitos and crawling jumping and flying things that find their way into my house every night.

See everyone in a month.

Happy Birthday !

Happy Birthday Grampa from the people that couldn't make it.



Here's us outside the Ryokan in Tokyo, and a shot from the Sumo Match the other night. The other Yokozuna lost that night, and a Bulgarian Ozeki (2nd rank) is now 10- 0. Geraldine has more pictures but they'll have to wait until they arrive at my computer. Until then. Happy Birthday!

Golden Week Road Trip: Foodies Read.

Golden Week is a set of three Holidays that fall close together in Japan and -- depending how they fall -- often give close to a week off from work to everyone in the country. It's also the most expensive, traffic filled, and gas price raised 20 cents time of the year. To avoid this, my friend Bryce, his girlfriend Kasumi and I drove down to Kochi-ken on Shikoku, one of the Southern islands of Japan. There were gorgeous beaches, surfing (I wanted to take a lesson but didn't get a chance), but we also had the good fortune of staying with Kasumi's aunt and uncle. Her uncle is a dentist by day, a devoted fisherman on weekends.

Two of the fish caught and eaten that day.
The cousins and myself scoping out the spread.

Below are photos of the beaches, castles, but most importantly, the feast of fresh sashimi, stews and other stuff we ate our first night. Without a doubt, the BEST meal I have eaten in Japan.

The whole meal. Some items pictured like the soup are just one serving for one person.

Three kinds of sashimi, two fish one lobster. Huge clams baked with spices, miso(maybe?) and mushrooms. Seared Bonito marinating in Yuzu Ponzo, Yuzu and onion. Taki stew. Asparagus Tempura. Fried River shrimp. Lobster Miso soup. And that's not even all of it.

Lobster Sashimi served in the shell with two other fish sashimi on either side.
Bryce lifting the fish to reveal the expertly sliced sashimi hidden inside.
Japan is a land of beautiful presentation in food.

Foodies enjoy. In my opinion, this is about as good as a Japanese meal gets.

Looking out from the castle's walls.
The view from the southernmost point of Shikoku.

Engrish

In the States, we like Japanese and Chinese writing. The characters look cool. That's why so many people get tattoos of things they have NO CLUE what they mean, and trust a tattoo artist. Most Japanese who have been to America have stories of encountering a tattoo that says something like, "Construction" or some other similarly important word that deserves a permanent place on our skin.

That said, we can relax knowing that Japan often butchers our Language as badly as we butcher theirs. Here are some prime examples and their locations I've encountered. I've omitted some of the truly filthy ones (like you often see on 5 year old girls' t-shirts) so that I won't make anyone reading this blush. They are punctuated with shots of Cherry Blossoms because it's that time of year and I felt like it.

After having said that, here's a hat some friends bought for me. It's in some of the pictures.

"The desire not be ghettoised as a playground for hardcore perverts is apparent in a dress code stipulating goat costume before S&M gear.

They don't get much better than that, but here are some other fun examples from two of my students notebooks. Now, this is not what they wrote, these are the covers of their notebooks, as purchased.

A cartoon drawing of Alice from Alice in Wonderland and...

"My mind is paralyzed. A wonderful day."

A picture of a blond haired blue eyed baby and a cake...

"New life begins from today. Being surrounded by my favorites... My dream that has begun to move. Let's produce an elegant dining table. Soft light makes foods delicious. The table is fully loaded with every kind of taste. Ever deepening taste of my household dishes. I've come to know true joy. I now live nicely. Ah! An actual sense."

Posted message in a Japanese hotel:

"You are invited to take advantage of the chambermaid."

Graduation and Stuff...

Me with my Graduating 3rd years. One is going to the English School!
& Me with Nakamura Kyoko sensei, my JTE.

Graduation was two weeks ago. Unfortunately, it occurred on the same day at both of my schools, but I was able to go to Tenryu's graduation to see off my students there. It was a little bitter sweet, of course, having to say goodbye to my students. But it was certainly more difficult for the other teachers and the students. In Japan, teachers are cycled around usually every 3 years to new schools. This can be VERY difficult for them socially, as it will often separate them from their friends and family by a couple hours drive. So after graduation, there are tearful goodbye speeches from the departing teachers. The students cry. Understandable, considering they spend more time at school then home and teachers, particularly homeroom teachers, end up becoming almost like another parent. I also had to say goodbye to my JTE in Tenryu, Nakamkura Kyoko sensei (pictured). The new JTE will arrive tomorrow.

Me with my 3rd and 4th grade Elementary students after a Christmas lesson
& Me with my beard at the village restaurant after two weeks in India.

Aside from that, I've been keeping busy with goodbye parties and snowboarding. The snowboarding has been fun, and I even went out and picked up a board. It's strange to have something I really enjoy doing in the winter. I'm almost sad to see it go. Spring has really come, and the Cherry Blossoms are blooming around Tenryu. So on that note, this post has a few photos that I've been sitting on for a while. Hope you like 'em.

Me teaching in Urugi with Usami Sensei.


Snowboarding with Kyoko, her two coworkers, and son. I hadn't bought my board yet.

Me Snowboarding with some of the Iida area ALTs. Now sporting my hot new board.

Finally, it looks like I will be coming home this summer for 2 weeks. Those 2 weeks are: August 17th - 30th or so. Block it off now.

Mumbai (Bombay) and Elephanta Island [Sorry. This one has been in Draft for AGES...]

I can only dream of the day I have such a magnificent 'stache.

After a drive back to Delhi, we flew down to Mumbai with the hopes of seeing a Bollywood movie, or maybe being picked up off the street to play a western extra. I want to dance and do a little head shake shoulder move. After a little scuffle with our cabbie, we left our night 1 hotel and hit the street for a market.

This was what I'd been waiting for since I got to this country. A real market, real people shopping for vegetables, fruit, fish (covered in flies) and best of all, REAL STREET FOOD! I ate my first of many 3 rupee Samosas (about 8 cents) and it was amazing. After we wandered a bit longer, we came across some kids playing soccer, who we joined. After I embarrassed myself and fell on the ground trying to kick the ball (It was really, dusty! Another kid did it too I swear!) I just talked to the older kids about America, India, and Japan while the girls talked to the younger kids. It was one of several interactions we had in India where money was never mentioned. There were lots of spectators as we talked and messed around with the kids, but it was a lot of fun.

Me playing soccer with the older kids & Laura messing with the younger ones.

The next day, we saw the kids again, and then transitioned to a different, cheaper hotel. On the way I did my first Yoga. I tried Yoga breathing in College once, but this was the first time I'd been put in front of a teacher (at the Yoga Institute no less) and made to feel completely inadequate with my flexibility. Awesome.

A perspective on sleeper cars... not sure why I look so damn serious... & Cristina pointing out a somewhat important sign.

Eventually we caught a boat to Elephanta island. It's a cool network of caves on an Island off the coast of Mumbai that have lots of statues, many of which are dedicated to telling the story of the Hindu god, Shiva. The first cave was amazing and had all the pictures you see... the rest, should you ever visit, are skippable. It's a World Heritage site though, and def. was one of the coolest things we saw on the trip. Lots of picture from that on the albums. It's the really cool statues in the caves.

Shiva and Krishna's creation story in the caves of Elephanta Island.

Then, we caught a train down to Goa. I will not be discussing Goa except to describe it as like a British Key West. Lots of older folks and a certain Hedonistic vibe. The beach was great though. The following are are links to Cristina and Laura's web albums. They have a few new pictures over mine, so if you're interested, give 'em a look. Maybe one more India update... maybe not. I'm falling behind (by about 3 months) and I have a huge festival in 2 weeks. Send me emails and say hi!

Goa. Me with one of the cows wandering the beach.

Laura's Photos

Cristina's Photos

Hounen Matsuri (Fertility Festival)

I had heard about this one a while ago. And when you hear about a huge wooden penis parade, you kinda take notice. Apparently this one is unusual for Japan too. When Kyoko saw my pictures, she said it looked quite strange.

Choices Choices... & My Chocolate covered Banana.

So basically it's a huge Fertility festival, one of the largest in Japan. The Tagata Jinja (Temple) is a year round shrine for fertility. Young couples go to visit and pray for fertility and even to touch the wooden phalli inside as part of that exercise. But once a year, the huge, 2.5 meter wooden penis you see in the pictures, makes a pilgrimage from its temple, to the nearby temple of what is supposed to be an equally impressive wooden vagina. I say "supposed to," because despite our looking in the temple, we were never able to catch a glimpse of it. If women touch the phalli during this parade, it's the ultimate in fertility blessings, so naturally with all the mid-20's foreigner women I know (I swear all I hear sometimes is talk about babies), there was a lot of that going on.

Some of the other foreigners at the festival.
And a nice, somewhat touchy feely older Japanese man.
& The Famous Shrine being carried in the parade.

Thankfully, the weather also could not have been better. The cold has finally broken and spring is definitely here. The Ume (plum) blossoms are coming out, Sakura are also just starting to show themselves as well.

After the festival, I had a small party at my house. It was a little awkward renting a keg from one of my student's grandfathers, but that's rural life I suppose. And given the drinking culture here, I wasn't too worried. All in all a great weekend.

Here's the Link to the Photo Album.