Follow the Night Light

8/26

I had found out from a Fukuoka-Now magazine that Fukuoka was having an Asian Queer Film Festival. I had also been briefly corresponding by email with a Japanese girl who likes the L word, so we arranged to meet in Fukuoka and got to see a film in the festival.

I was a little early to meet her, and when walking around outside, I happened upon a Street Dance performance. I only watched for a minute but it was pretty awesome. Men in hardhats and big pants dancing in unison. Oh Japan.

I finally went to meet Miko which was pretty awkward. We had been corresponding in English, but we talked all in Japanese. We had about 30 minutes before the film started to make small talk which I am not good at in any language. When the film finally started it was in this little room in part of a gallery. There were only about 15 or so people there which might have been nice and cozy if it hadn’t been so awkward.

The film was interesting though. It was an Indonesian film called “Love for Share”. It’s the story of 3 different women whose husbands are polygamous. The first is an older woman and her son, the second follows two wives as they fall in love and run away together, and the third was a younger woman whose husband was catholic and thus couldn’t tell anyone that he had a second wife. I know nothing abut Indonesia, but it was pretty interesting, if long. (I can’t sit still on the floor for 2 hours).  Afterwards Miko walked me back to the station and we said an awkward goodbye, but say to email her again if I ever wanted to do something else in Fukuoka city. So, I might.

8/25

After the Kaya live Friday night when I ran into B on the train, she told me that her town, Ogori, was to have a matsuri (festival) the following day and invited me to go.

Ogori is about 10-15 minute train ride north of Kurume. I don’t know the population but it seems pretty small. Luckily the matsuri was right by the train station and easy enough to find. I’m not sure what the occasion was, maybe Tanabata Matsuri? Anyway, it was reat fun. Tents lines about 2-3 blocks of one street, all leading to a larger performance tent. There were all sorts or food on sticks and shaved ice, plus some toys and games for kids. But the best part was the performances. Gaggles of tiny Japanese kids dancing. There was a range of participants, teeny-adult, but of course the little ones were the best. I seemed to be there for the “dance” portion of the afternoon. I saw cheerleading, jazz dance, hula (Fukuoka has a sister relationship with Honolulu), street dance (4 year olds street dancing is my new favorite thing in life) and more traditional? Japanese group dances. B even got roped into performing with one of the last big everyone group dance dances. She didn’t know the moves but she did pretty well considering. Right before I left they changed into Taiko drumming, which is kind of boring to watch but looks really fun to do. It also included the largest drum I have ever seen.

I left in the early evening because I had dinner plans in Kurume that night. Lindsay, Darcy, Arthur and I went to this little italian restaurant we had heard great things about. I got some amazing gnocchi, but it wasn’t very filling so we met B and moved to Twilight, which is always a good time. We had invited the guy that sold us our cell phones to come, but he backed out at the last minute. We moved to the ridiculous karaoke bar again, which was slightly more expensive on a Saturday night, but still not too bad. Again, I love karaoke and 2 hours almost seemed too short.

On our way back to the station around midnight, we ran into some beautiful Japanese boys playing baseball in the street/alley/walkway. We wanted to watch, but they didn’t seem too into it so we moved down the street again to play playground handgames. I love being in the city at night, even little cities like Kurume. After a while there were less and less people about so Darcy, B and I headed back to my apartment for a sleepover since they had both missed their last trains.

In the morning we lazed about and I made them brunch, which was nice since I don’t get to cook for people often, living alone.

8/23

I just watched Love My Life a lesbian Japanese movie I rented from Tsutaya (110!) It was kind of displayed else I would never have known about it. I don’t think I’ve ever seen any Japanese lesbian movies before. It was all in Japanese of course so I missed the details, but I think I caught most of the basic plot. I don’t know if it was good or not, but considering no one died, ended up in heterosexual couple and there was depicted sex, it sure is a step up from all of the Japanese gay movies I’ve seen

8/24/07

4^th Atomic Core

???/Sex-Android/Kaya/NoGod/Sugar/R-15

Fukuoka Drum Be-1

Just got back from seeing Kaya in Fukuoka!

It was kind of a weird show and I had never heard any of the other bands. Plus Kaya is completely unlike all the other bands. It doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense for them to be playing together. I mean, Kaya says that Sugar invited him along to do a “coupling tour” but I’m convinced that it’s only because Kaya and Loki are totally banging. It’s the only reason that makes sense. Because Loki is totally gay.

Anyway. I actually had a decent ticket number this time, 120, but it didn’t really matter because there weren’t very many people there. Maybe 150.

I did see the one of the hottest girls I have ever seen in my life. She was dressed just like one of those tall, hot, hostclub guys, with the big shoes, big hair and sunglasses. But take all that and condense into a 5 foot girl. Concentrated sex.

Anyway. I’m not a huge fan of these multi-band lives. Usually I only like 1 or 2 bands plus the front line dynamics are beyond me. I usually just stand in the about the 4^th row for everything while everyone else works out elaborate plans to switch places back and forth when there favorite band comes on.

A band whose kanji I can’t read was on first. Very few people cared. Thank god they only played 3 songs.

Next was Sex-Android. I actually enjoyed them a bit. The vocalist was funny. He talked a lot.

Next, to my surprise, was Kaya!

I had never seen Kaya before, but he is just so so different from all the other acts. He just sings and dances (Like a drag queen). It felt kind of oput of place, but it didn’t really matter becasu eit was Kaya!. He is so beautiful. And little! And his voice is great live too. He sang maybe 6-7 songs, mostly newer ones. He did talk for a long time though. When he first opened his mouth some girls who had never heard his speaking voice before (it’s really feminie) whispered KAWAII! It was pretty funny. He talked about. . .I don’t know what. A lot of things. He asked how many people had seen him before and how many people were girls, then boys, then any others. He mentioned his oneman next month which I so want to go to, but Tokyo is kind of out of the question I think.

He told some story about going out with Loki and someone elsefor dinner. I think I missed the punchline on that one.

And I swear he said something about My kare-shi (boyfriend) Kamijo. I have a lot of boyfriends *ticks off 5 fingers*, you know “heeey” “bonjour” didn’t catch the rest but if that’s what he really said then it was funny.

He ended with Rose Jail I think, which I’ve never been a huge fan of, but it was really good live. ^^ oh, and one of his eyelashes was half dangling on his face for a whole song

Next was NoGod who were the most popular. They look ridiculous! Seriously, what? But they were super high energy and everyone loved them. I had left after Kaya to stand in the back, so I was outside the energy, but it looked fun. They didn’t play too much and when they left half the crowd went home too.

So, it was half empty when Sugar came on. I wanted to stay for sugar because I had seen them in Cure and thought Loki was super-pretty, which he is. It failed to show how gay he is though. He is very. . .feline or something. He had a whip! It was pretty amazing. Except he kept doing this pelvic thrust thing that was really awkward and I couldn’t stand to look at him without laughing. Sadly, they weren’t very exciting. I don’t anyone was much into them, so the energy was low. Loki has a nice enough voice though.

After their handful of songs I decided to get my bag and look at Kaya Merch. There was a cool photobook of Kamijo/Kaya/Hizaki/Juka/Asagi. All people I like, but it was 3000yen so I resisted. I really wanted this gorgeous Kaya cellphone strap, but it was 1800, a bit much for a phone accessory, so I was lame and got the lame cellphone strap instead. I’m regretting this now.

I let before R-15 came on because, let’s face it, I didn’t care. I love walking around the city at night. The energy is really cool.

Coincidentally, I ran into B on the train home. She had just been in Tenjin getting her cell phone. We both ended up failing at trains and got off in the wrong places. -_-

8/22

Our office is moving from the building right next to city hall, to a floor in city hall this coming Friday. This means our office is in complete chaos, boxes everywhere, people running around, and we don’t really get to help. Add to this the fact that both of our supervisors have been out of the office for a few days. This is to say, we have been pretty chill at work lately. I just realized that I finally feel kind of comfortable at the office, something I couldn’t imagine the first day I went in and was so nervous.

So, we’ve been using our time to our own ends. I heard a rumor on the street that there is a way to get cell phone and bank account without a gaijin card. (mine still doesn’t come until next week). So during our lunch break, we investigated and it worked! We got a magic paper that allowed us to set up a bank account And get. . .*drumroll* CELL PHONES! Since basically you are a non-entity in Japan without one. This bank account was a blessing because I had just gotten paid, handed the largest amount of cash I have ever held in my life. The cell phone was a bit trickier because they were out of the model I wanted. I ended up paying about $70 bucks for a model exactly the same as Jessica’s, despite the fact that they had some models for 1yen (less than a penny). Oh well, you only get a Japanese cell phone once. (theoretically.)

But it’s pretty! It’s pink and does all sorts of things I don’t know how to use, like Television and radio and internet.

The shine has finally worn off a bit now and a phone is a phone, especially if I don’t have anyone to talk to. But hopefully making friends will be at least slightly easier now that I have a way to keep in touch.

8/21

We mistakenly thought Tuesday was payday and made plans with other Kurume folks to go out for a night of celebration at a Mexican restaurant. This was a brilliant plan because a) our (or at least, my) lives are boring, b) we were all craving beans/cheese/salsa, all that very non-Japanese food, and c) it was 1/2 price drink night.

So, a small group up us piled into to this tiny Mexican restaurant about 10 minutes from my house. The place was packed but it was amusing to see all this Mexican décor in a Japanese restaurant.

The food was good and the liquor was flowing. I am rarely in social situations now where there isn’t alcohol involved. It really is such a huge part of Japanese culture.

It was still early (even for a work night) so we adjourned to this insane looking Karaoke joint. Seriously, it looks like it erupted from the sea amongst all these other plain, dull buildings.

I love Karaoke. Maybe I’ll be bored with it by the time I’m finished with my stint in Japan, but for now, I LOVE it. 6 was a good number of people because even though we only did an hour (you rent private rooms by the hour) everyone got to choose a few songs they liked. It was a pretty great night, and I even made it home to bed by 11.

8/17

Friday was Fukuoka JETs orientation in Fukuoka city. This counts as a business trip so we don’t have to go into the office. It’s about 30 minutes train ride into the city, where we were then escorted to our building. It was really nice to see all the Fuk. JETs together, especially since I had been at orientation with about half of them and it was nice to catch up a little.

The day was basically a series of workshop which all went by pretty fast. ALTs (assistant Language teachers) are divided into Municipal (employed by the city) and Prefectural (employed by the prefecture.) I’m municipal, which is the minority I think. This means I work at many schools, Jr. High and Elementary. Prefetural ALTs are either High school or Jr. high and are probably based at one main school.

Another workshop was divided by region. Kurume is in the southern region of Fukuoka called Chikugo. Kurume combined (Municipal and Prefectural) actually has quite a few new JETs, so we made up a strong contingent along with the other southerners. Our sempai (experienced JETs) helping at the orientation were very cool and made a hilarious video about Japan/Fukuoka/Chikugo life.

After the official orientation, most of us headed to a Beer Garden on the roof of a building in downtown Fukuoka city. The set up was a 4-hour all you can eat and drink for about $30. (All you can drink seems popular in Japan.) The place was primarily a yakiniku restaurant (where you grill meat on the little grills on every table) but they also had a buffet of various other foods plus a wealth of alcohol, so I got my money’s worth, even though I don’t eat meat.

It was fun. I didn’t get to talk to too many people due to the seating arrangement, but I still had fun and stayed for over 3 hours. Unfortunately the trains in Fukuoka all seem to stop pretty early. The last express train to Kurume from Fukuoka is at 10 pm, which puts a damper on any late night activities. I guess I need to make a friend who lives in the city in order to explore the nightlife there.

8/15

My schedule has chilled out enough that I’ve started to get bored sometimes. I have no phone, no internet AND my TV doesn’t work for some reason. This is cruel because I have a deep love for Japanese TV, plus it is good listening practice.

Luckily, we made plans Wednesday night. After another day of mind-numbing boredom at the office, Jessica, Arthur, Chad (A JET from outside Kurume proper), and I met up with Jess’s Japanese friend Youhei for drinks. At 6 because we had to work the next day. We went to “Twilight,” the same izakaya we had gone the first night with Hannah. It’s cute and there was a very cute boy working. (He reminded me a little of Aie from Deadman/The Studs. Maybe it’s just the haircut.) We just sat around drinking and talking (in English) for a couple hours before heading back to Jess’s for more drinking. It was fun. I felt a little awkward sometimes because they’re all straight/trying to get laid, but I was mostly drunk enough that I didn’t care.

It was actually quite strange that we hadn’t been out drinking yet in Kurume, because Japan is such a drinking culture. But, I’m sure this is a first of many.

8/9/07

Fukuoka Drum Be-1

D

Neo-culture Oneman

Bwhaha. So, I saw D play tonight in Fukuoka! With all of this crazy moving to Japan stuff, I have barely had time to think. However, a few weeks ago I did notice that they were playing in Fukuoka and decided to try and go if at all possible. Turns out I didn’t have anything to do tonight (besides you know, finding my sanity, unpacking, catching up on sleep) so I decided to go straight from work to Fukuoka city to see if I could still get tickets.

The Live house was on a map I had, so it was easy enough to find. When I arrived I felt ridiculous. There were all the fan girls lined up in there crazy clothes and I’m wearing my bloody office clothes with my D flags sticking out of my bag. I asked the guy calling ticket numbers if I could still buy a ticket and he indicated that I could if I waited until after all the ticket numbers were called.

I finally got into the live house (~$45). It’s small! Smaller that I’m used to even. But that was nice because even though I was one of the last ones in, I could still have a good view. I bought 2 Mad Tea Party mags (~$25) before putting my bag in the locker.

It was pretty loosely packed toward the back because there are steps. I moved forward to about the 8^th row to start. After a few songs, I got to about the 4^th row, which was the last row before the first step, so there was actually no one directly behind me jumping on my back. I was mad ea bit sad by this actually.

Anyway, D were good. Not as good as last time I saw them in Osaka, but good. I’m not a huge fan of some of there newer songs. I guess this is the first time I’ve seen Tsunehito play with them. (I did actually see him once before in SCISSOR.)

The new costumes are great. The did change at the drum solo from the Kimono costumes to black ones, so it was nice to see both. Tsunehito is SO skinny. He has the flattest stomach I have ever seen. You can barely see him when he turns sideways. He is my least favorite member, but I don’t mind him, I guess. Except when they suck. Then I blame him. But he’s ridiculously feminine and super genki.

Asagi was. . .Asagi. What can you say?

Hide-zou was wonderful, as always. He lept looking sultry which was hilarious. Tsunehito would always talk to him while they were playing and during the encore, Tsune’s (as far as I could tell) was about something Hide-zou said or did. And then he picked him up. *fangirl moment* It was very cute.

Hiroki. Also awesome as usual. He can turn the crowd into a barking pack of dos with a single glance. I’m going to have “HIROKI” in that Japanese fanirl growl ringing in my head for days.

Ruiza was hilarious. I barely paid attention to him, because he was on the other side, but he totally looked goofy as usual. Actually It looked like he was on drugs. He just alays has this goofy smile and movement and can’t seem to focus on anything because he is so totally into playing his guitar.

They had 2 encores. The first, they all spoke. I think all of them talked about/made jokes about Hakata-ben (the local dialect) so of course I had no clue what was going on. It was funny apparently.

After Eden In the 2^nd encore they all said goodbye.

However, I love how they take their long goodbyes, so I ended up getting to touch all(?) of them. My contact with Ruiza and Tsunehito was brief at best, but I got a high five from Asagi and Hiroki, and a special fist bump from Hide-zou. XD

AND I got Hide-zou’s water bottle! *fangirl moment, take 2*

I actually just noticed it has one of his picks in it. I can add it to my D shrine which includes a rose from Asagi and a drumstick from Hiroki. Gotta catch ‘em all!

Anyway. What the hell am I supposed to do with someone else’s water? Keep it? Drink it? I don’t wan tot through it out, but I won’t ever be able to take it on a plane.

Overall, good, relatively unplanned night.

(The following was written poorly over many days. In time I will revise and add photos.)

Live from Japan!

I have arrived, finally, but this still feels surreal.

After spending a wonderful week in Northampton with my girls, I went closer to Boston to stay with Kitty.

On Friday I had my Pre-departure orientation at the Consulate in Boston. This was short and to the point; basically just a chance to get us all together, give us back our passports and tell us when to be at the airport.

It was nice to have a chance to talk to some people, even if I didn’t talk very much. Betsy, who graduated from Hampshire a year before me, was there and will actually be in my same prefecture. I had forgotten, though, that there would be really annoying JETs. There is already one girl I can’t stand to hear talk, but luckily she will be nowhere near me once we leave Tokyo.

It was also strange to realize that JET is a bunch of just graduated college students. College students, not Hampshire students. Leaving the “Hampshire Bubble” is always a slap in the face when you realize that you’re the weirdo.

Saturday we woke up a bit too early anf got to the airport an hour before I needed to be there. There were about 30-40 JETs on my flight out of Boston. We had a super tight connection in Minneapolis so instead of enjoying on last snack in America, I ran to the plane. Our flight to Tokyo was a about 12 hours. There were lots of Jets around to talk or listen to, so it wasn’t tpp bad, even if the movies were horrible.

It was afout 5:30 pm Tokyo time when we landed, even though I didn’t really feel like I was in Japan. We got herded through immigration and customs before getting herded onto a bus. At this point I started seeing other, non-Boston JETs and remembered that JET is actually an international program, so that was exciting. (Nice accents!)

It was around 9pm when we reached the Keio Plaza hotel in Shinjuku, which is very nice. We were at once herded off the bus, to be handed many packets and things. At this point I had no idea what was going on, so I just followed everyone else until I was handed a room key and pointed in some direction.

Turns out Betsy was my roommate. As tired as we were, we were hungrier, so we went on an expidition for food. I am bad at picking places to eat in Japan, so we wondered in a big circle looking at everything before going to an Okonomiyaki joint.

The place was small, maybe 8-10 seats all at bar were they cook the food in front of you. Okonomiyaki is cabbage and egg covered in a sweet sauce over soba in this case. I managed to order one without meat, although going to restaurants makes me realize how little Japanese I speak because I can barely communicate. It was very good, but the portions were huge so we finally gave up and rolled ourselves back home to the hotel.

I slept pretty horribly that first night before giving up and awaking at 5am. Breakfast was a buffet and a nice opportunity to meet new people. Everyone just always seems the most friendly at breakfast.

The orientation on Monday was pretty boring, but we did get to meet our prefectures. There were about 29 people from group B coming to Fukuoka and 4 or that to Kurume. There are a lot of people from Hawaii and some from India, because apparently those places have sister relationships with Fukuoka.

The orientation advisor (current JET) for Fukuoka was Tiffany and she was pretty awesome.

After our prefecture meeting and the (boring) panels, there were a few workshops. I skipped out on the first to go to OIOI. It was hellishly hot, but I remembered exactly where it was. Unfortunately it was not nearly exciting as I remember. I guess I really am less of a fangirl these days.

I caught the tail end of the Vegan & Vegetarian JETs panel before going to the LGBT JETs panel. The panel didn’t really say a whole lot, but there was a good handful of people there so that was nice. They say they plan events and stuff throughout the year, so hopefully, I can get to some of them. Apparently Fukuoka Pride might be in November, so that’s exciting. There was one new ALT from my prefecture and a couple of guys from Oita, so hopefully things will happen in Kyushu.

Instead of a much deserved nap, we then had a dinner. I don’t like huge social events, so after the toast and standing in line for food, I ditched back to my room to relax a bit.

We met up with our prefecture for some karaoke. I can’t sing, but I love karaoke. Around 17 of us crammed into a karaoke room for an hour with all you can drink drinks. It was fun. I had been feeling nauseuous before, but karaoke (and booze, apparently) heals all ills. We sang western songs, in pairs of all dinging along, but I did sing “Seishun Amigo” from Nobuta wo Produce.

We left after an hour so I met up with a few people from the LGBT panel to go to Shinjuku Ni-Chome. I had never actually been to Ni-chome before. We were intending to meet up with some other JETs, but not knowing where they were, we just went to ArtyFarty. It was a Monday night so it was pretty dead, only about 10 people there before we arrived. One guy pointed out to me that apparently a lot of the kind of thuggish looking Japanese boys with buzzed hair are actually gay and dance very very gay. There were two guys who fit that description, so that was pretty amusing.

The small handful of us hung out drinking and dancing for a while before more and more JETs arrived. Eventually we had kind of taken over the place. I left after a couple of hours, even thought there were still people arriving, but it was a lot of fun. I definitely want to go back to Ni-chome some time.

Tuesday our panels had much more focus on teaching. I went to the Jr. High session, which focused on lesson planning for Jr. High. We all had to plan sample lessons based around an exercise in a textbook. It was hard to be thrown into, but once I got some ideas it was fun.

In the afternoon we had workshops. I went to one on Adult conversation classes, which I will be teaching sometimes, one on elementary, and one for JETs of African decent.

By the time the day was over I was completely exhausted. Though I was tempted to go out again, we stayed in to watch TV (Daniel Radcliff visiting Japanese high school!) eat conbini food, and go to sleep by 8:30.

I felt almost refreshed after so much sleep, which was good, because Wednesday was the day we were to go to our prefectures and meet our advisors. We met by prefecture in the morning to all make our ways across Japan. Since Fukuoka is far from Tokyo, we flew from Haneda airport. There were SO many cute little kids at the Airport.

The plane ride was nice. The JETs I was sitting near seemed really nice, I hope I get to see them again. The plane had video on the front of the plane so you could see take off, landing and some of the landscape below. It was pretty neat but it made me nauseas. In no time at all it seemed we were in Fukuoka! That landscape is beautiful! Lots of little mountains and small islands.

Once we were off the plane I wasn’t as nervous as I thought I would be. I got my luggage and we all stood around until we got up the courage to go through the gate to greet our supervisors. It all happened so fast tha tI didn’t get the chance to say goodbye to anyone, even Betsy. It’s a shame because I had been starting to think of us as group.

Anyway, once through the gate Darcy flagged me over. There were 4 of us going to Kurume, so we all were being picked up together.

I’m going to change some names here, but our two supervisors (I suppose they are my supervisors) met us and took us to lunch at “Jolly Pasta.” I failed at ordering and my pasta showed up with scallops, but I just moved them all to the side and it was okay. Both supervisors seemed quite nice, although Hosome-san didn’t seem to speak much English, He just smiled a lot. Munshi-san on the other hand had been an English teacher, so she did most of the talking.

The drive to Kurume was nice. You see such different things on the highway as opposed dot the train. The are is really beautiful. Mountains! Little ones, but they’re there. I love mountains. I think I don’t want to live without mountains anymore. In no time at all, we arrived in Kurume. I think it was bigger than I expected. I have no head for numbers, so I couldn’t really visualize what a population of 300,000 really meant, but it is definitely a city.

Our first stop was the Kurume Board of Education. Arthur and I, plus Jessica from group A who had arrived a week earlier, would be based out of this BoE, while the other 2 in our party would meet there supervisors there and be taken elsewhere.

Now, if you’ve never seen a Japanese education office, its basically just a big room with bunches of desks pushed together in rows and papers littered everywhere. It was pretty nerve-wracking to walk into and disturb all the busy workers just to be introduced to them all. Luckily Munshi san did our short, sweet intros and I didn’t have to talk yet.

While waiting to meet the superintendent and get our letters of appointment, we met our fellow JETs: Hannah and the aforementioned Jessica. Hannah is from the UK and had already been here a year. Jessica, it turns out, lives right beside me, so we all made plans to meet for dinner.

After our brief self-intros with the superintendent, we all parted ways (Darcy and Josh to outside the city) and were carted off to our apartments. My apartment is in an amazing location. I can walk to lots of places in my neighborhood and it is not 2 minutes from a train station that heads right into Fukuoka city. It’s also right near The Jr. High I will teach at. The bad news is it’s a ways from the BoE (where I will work everyday until school starts) and my method of transportation to the BoE and all my elementary schools is supposed to be by bike. Crap. I can’t ride a bike. The first time I tried, I rode straight into a barbed wire fence and that was the end of that. Well, I’m going to have to learn because I don’t know where my elementaries are, but I hear they could be far away and buses don’t stop near them. Boo.

But! My apartment. I like it. It has two connected tatami rooms and a large-ish kitchen. It even has all the necessary furniture.

However, before I could really begin to unpack, it was itme to meet Hannah, Arthur and Jessica for dinner. I was in a total daze at this point, but we went to an Izakaya a few blocks away. Luckily Hannah new the menu and ordered some vegetarian things for me, because I’m horrible with trying to figure out what I can eat on a menu.

After dinner (The tofu salad and eggplant dish were both very nice), we adjourned to Oily’s, an internet café a block from my apartment where Hannah told us a bit about the city. After an hour or so I was beat, so we parted ways so me and Arthur could go crash.

I woke up early on Thursday because I was so nervous about riding a bike to work. I finally gave up and decided that the best thing would be to take the bus. This was also a good plan because I am crazy and planned to take the bus straight from work to the train to go to Fukuoka city to see if I could still get tickets for the D concert that night.

I did make it to my first day of work, and all I can say is thank goodness Jessica and Arthur were there, or I wouldn’t have any idea what to do. They are both better at Japanese than me, so everyone just kind of talks Japanese and expects us to understand. (While I often need Jessica to translate, at least some parts.) Munshi-san did set us down and go over our contract (in English.) Basically, we 3 will all be working in the BoE every day until schools starts (Sept. 3^rd). Theoritcally this is “preparing for lessons” time, but since we don’t know what we’re really doing (and its 3 weeks! ><) it’s mostly a lot of being bored out of our minds trying to look busy. Luckily, she mentioned that we have 6 days “summer holiday” in addition to our 20 days of yearly paid vacation. Sweet.

Because Arthur and I had just arrived, the monotony was broken up nicely by errands we had to run: getting our alien registration cards, our personal seals and lunch. Foreigners can’t do anything without our registration. For me that means, no Cell phone and no internet until I get my card. We applied on Thursday, but it will take 3 weeks! Boo! It’s hard to be in Japan without a cell phone.

For lunch we went to a great little tempura place. Vegetable tempura is one of the great things in life, and this was especially good. Also it was nice to get out of the heat because it was a sweltering 37*C. No idea what that is in Fahrenheit, but it’s hot. The office is theoretically air conditioned, but they try to save energy, so it is still quite hot sometimes.

After drawing out my boredom to near breaking point, it was finally time to go. Our hours are technically 8:30-4:15, but we get there a little early and stay a little late because it looks better to the other workers who have longer hours. (Though, I doubt they notice if I stay in my seat ‘til 4:22 before making a mad dash for the door.)

So, I headed to Fukuoka for the D concert. In my office clothes. See my Live Report, for all the glorious details.

Being exhausted form the D concert finally put me into a Japan schedule, so when the alarm rang, I was still asleep for once. Fortunately Friday was a respite from the BoE because the local university English department had arranged to take all the new Kurume JETs around a tour of the city while we spoke English with some of the English students.

We all met at the station and it was nice to see Darcy and Josh again, plus meet the other JETs who had arrived before us. There were about 10 JETs to 5 Japanese students plus the two professors. We had a bit of an info session and lunch at the university before pileing on the bus and heading for Kora shrine, on the top of one of the mountains overlooking the city. It was quite hot, so we weren’t tempted to stay long and we headed to Ishibashi Museum and city hall before having a nice dinner. I couldn’t eat much of he dinner (just the soup and salad) but I pawned my pork and fish off on “growing boys” and enjoyed the company nonetheless.

Saturday I finally had a chance to unpack and take a much needed run to the Hyaku-en shop (Dollar store. Happiest place in Japan.)

In the afternoon I met Arthur and Jessica fo a trip to YouMe town, a supermall in Kurume. It is bloody huge. I doubt we saw a fraction of it. They both bought couches and I dropped $50 at the bookstore, but overall it was a job well done.

Sunday I took a trip to Fukuoka to really look at aka go shopping, and try and get the LAN port on my computer fixed. The guy at the apple store spoke English, thankfully, so I painlessly left my comp there to pick it up again on Monday. I then got very lost looking for the Algonquins and H.Naoto shops, but during my massive, 2 hour detour, I found a Manadarake. I got some Kano Miyamoto manga (<3) and scoped out the doujinshi, but didn’t end up buying any. Once I found the clothing stores, I was a little disappointed. Algonquins isn’t the same without the awesome blue-haired girl from the Tokyo OIOI store. Maybe some other time.

I took a break at a café where I saw the cutest couple. A casual, kind of Visual Kei-looking pair in their mid twenties reading manga in silence. I was amused.

I had intended to go to a soccor game with Arthur, but we were tired and I was poor, so we just hightailed it back to Kurume.

Monday I took off using one of my glorious summer holidays. I think I really needed the extra day break. I went to Fukuoka again to pick up my computer and buy $100 worth of CDs L That evening Jessica and I took a nice walk around Kurume and ended up near thte BoE. It’s not that far, maybe a 20-25 minute walk. So, I decided to walk from now on. At least in the mornings when it’s not too hot yet.

Tuesday was another office day at the BoE. Unfortunately, Jessica and Arthur both took the day off so I was by myself! Endless boredom x1000. I do enjoy taking breaks with hosome-san though. I don’t understand him sometimes, but usually we can have some kind of conversation, which is nice. I haven’t been speaking Japanese nearly enough.