(no subject)
I think I'm going to need this entire week of non-activity to get over last week. I just have no energy. I guess the lack of activity at work isn't really helping. I spent 5 hours this morning looking at different graduate school programs just because I had nothing better to do with my time. The life of a JET, ladies and gentlemen.
Last week really started on Saturday, when I made my way down to KZ about midday to take in the festival there. The festival, called the Hyakumangoku, or 1 million bales of rice, festival, was one of the bigger ones to happen in Kanazawa so it was all very exciting. And hot, mustn't forget the hot. The main attraction was a giant parade all throughout the city (and when I say "all throughout", I mean it - they had to walk 6 miles! Or was it 6 km? I'm not sure. but still, long way!).
The parade was divided into three-ish parts. I'll get to why "ish" in a moment. The first part was a bunch of marching bands and was called the "music festa" or something along those lines. There are, incidentally, a lot more marching bands in KZ than I would have thought - and they apparently all have their own baton-twirling corps, or at least that's what it seemed like. It was actually pretty cute because several of the bands were obviously from elementary and/or middle schools, so there were these little childrens walking around attached to drums that were about as big as they were. I think it made the pace of the parade kind of slow, though, because the kids had to stop every so often, have a rest from carrying their instruments around, have some drinks, etc. (Most of the kiddy bands, incidentally, were playing the theme from Lupin III. It is actually a proven fact that if you are around a marching band in Japan for longer than about 10 minutes you have a 100% chance of hearing either the Lupin theme or the Cutey Honey theme - sometimes both.)
The second part was...a bunch of stuff (hence the ish, you could probably divide everything in here into separate parts, but I don't want to) I don't really remember all the parts of it, really. I remember that we got to see the three "Miss Hyakumangoku" and some kabuki people - but the best part was these bunch of guys carrying ladders. Now, you say "oh great, a bunch of guys with ladders - sounds THRILLING" probably with as much sarcasm as you can cram into your town. Well, oh doubters, harken unto my words and remember those pauses that I was talking about before. You see, during those pauses, the men would set the ladder upright and one of them would crawl all the way up to the top to perform feats of derring-do. (you know, I wrote that and then I had to go and look up "derring-do" because, seriously, it looks pretty weird) They would hang off the latter with only an arm or stand on their head on top of it, or anchor a leg and do some poses while supporting themselves on said anchor. Crazy stuff! Very cool to watch.
I feel at this point that I should reveal that I had forgotten to charge my camera the night before. So...I have all of one picture of these guys because after that my camera crapped out ;_;
The last part of the parade was the Maeda clan and all of their vassals. The vassals (the army, ladies in waiting, etc.) are apparently all made up of volunteers, because several of the KZ/Matto JETs got to dress up and go along. Now, I use the words "got to" like it was a wonderful magical experience, but remember that they had to walk 6 (some unit of distance) on a hot sunny day while stopping several times (but never sitting down) . They seemed to be glad to have done it, but whenever the words "next year" came up, they were immediately followed by something along the vein of "no way". Oh, i neglected to mention that they were wearing traditional clothing, to boot. (Either a full yukata ensemble or armor) It LOOKED very impressive, though.
The parade went all the way from the station to the castle and ended with a big procession of entrance into the castle. After that, some stuff happened inside the castle, but I got bored and went to watch the yosakoi dancing instead. This turned out to be fake yosakoi dancing and I proceeded to leave in disgust. This enabled me to meet up with the others and watch 300.
I enjoyed 300. It fails at historical accuracy, of course, but given that that was never it's goal, I don't really see that as a problem. It's goal was, instead, to look awesome and I really feel that that was accomplished. I have two critiques though. (I don't think these are particularly spoilery, but if you are paranoid about such things, go ahead and skip the next paragraph)
1. I really could have done without all of the "meanwhile, back in Sparta" stuff. I don't think it added anything useful to the movie.
2. Why bring only one battle rhino? I realize that they are not particularly easy to procure, but seriously either bring a whole herd or just don't bother.
Ok, you can look again. I would like to take this moment to say that one of my teachers just walked in and gave us all ice cream. Man, teaching English in Japan is awesome when it is not being completely maddening!
The next day was uneventful except that I watched Pirates of the Caribbean 3. I was also generally amused by it and have the following two things to say. These are DEFINITELY not spoilers, but you can skip them if you like.
1. Barbossa is The Awesome.
2. If you cut out all the bits where Orlando and Keira speak (and instead had someone summarize them or something) not only would the movie be cut down to a decent length, it would also massively improve in quality! (I don't DISLIKE them, per se, I just don't care about anything they do and have long since ceased to be interested in their so-called relationship)
That is all.
Monday morning it was time for bright and early wakeup-ness so that we could catch the bus to Komatsu where we would catch the plane to Tokyo for the Recontracting Conference. 8:45 flight meant that we were in Tokyo by 10, and, since the conference didn't start until two and I didn't have to register until 12 at the earliest, I made my way to Akihabara. (or Akibahara as some say. To avoid this confusion, just do what everyone in Japan does and say "Akiba") Sadly, I was abandoned in my quest by my not particularly loyal companions (i.e. the KZ and Matto people who had also come) who wanted to eat and get in line early and had many, many hours Wednesday afternoon for spending around Tokyo. (During said hours on Wednesday I would first be flying back to Noto Airport and then be making my way to Nanao to help with the Grass Roots Summit AKA The Moft Curiouf Affair of the 300 Denizenf of the Fair Ftate of Colorado Coming to Noto)
Now, this was my fourth trip to Tokyo. During the first (Orientation) I was scared out of my mind (for a wide variety of reasons). During the second (the trip last October/September), I was largely annoyed with the city. During the third (the trip with my parents), I was largely in a good mood (mostly due to no longer having to feel aftershocks). This time, I have to say that I am starting to like the city. Say what you will about it's size and crowdedness, but MAN that public transport system is great. I am even starting not to mind the crowds. This makes me worried about my mental health, but there you go.
Akiba was good, although I had been infected with the "i want to get into line early" disease, so I went through it faster than I would have otherwise. BUT! I did manage to pick up a few DS games, the identity of which probably doesn't really interest the majority of the people reading. Still, I was pleased.
I made my way to Shinjuku (which is where the hotel that we were staying at for the conference was - this was, incidentally, the same hotel that we had orientation in) and got to the hotel just in time to join up with the rest of my group and get in line together. Therein followed: the conference.
The conference had it's good points and bad points - the main bad point being that I am not entirely sure that I learned anything of use from it. The best part by far was going to a "switching places" seminar wherein we were taught Finnish so that we could see how our students feel when they don't know what is going on. We played Finnish fruits basket! Fruits basket is a game that is quite popular in Japanese grade school/elementary wherein the students sit chair arranged in a circle and each student is assigned a fruit, when their fruit is called, they have to switch seats, with the caveat that there is one chair too few for all the students. The student who does not get a chair has to call out the next fruit; if you call out "fruits basket" then everybody has to switch chairs. It's a fun game! And it is especially fun when you are trying to remember fruit names in Finnish. At this point, I think the only one I remember is ananas and that is only because it is the same as in Polish. Regarding what I learned during that seminar (other than how to say "pineapple" in Finnish) I can see how what was amusing for one hour could wear thing pretty fast and I think it is important that I remember the feeling of confusion and frustration that I felt - of course, some ways to address that would have been useful, but I'm creative, I'm sure I'll think of something.
There were several other good speakers during the conference, and there are some ideas that I am going to have to think pretty hard about to see if I can use them in my own classes. So I guess it was not a complete waste of time. Also, Tokyo for three days! What am I whining about?
During our "conference-free" time, we hit tower records for English books and generally wnadered around Shibuya in pursuit of Good Times. (I purchased Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, despite its reputation as being disappointing, just because I think the title rules, and a Diana Wynne Jones book. I would have bought more, but sadly, they would not have fit into my backpack) Sadly, one of our nights out was overshadowed by the dreaded specter of one who I will only call "penguin". This was an individual with such a STAGGERING capacity for inspiring irritation in his peers that I am amazed that he has managed to survive this long. Sadly, we were caught by him as we waited for our compatriots and he invited himself along. We are all too polite to tell him off to his face, but MAN did we bitch about him the next day. In fact, we were so desperate to spend the following night without having to feel constantly irritated by him that we concoted an elaborate plan of surveillance and staggered exits with a prearranged meeting place to forestall any attempt to join us.
Now, usually when I talk about concocting elaborate plans and generally engaging in the activities of espionage, I am employing hyperbole to describe the depth of my feeling. HOWEVER, in this particular case I am deadly serious. We even had a code with which we could message our teammates in the event that the mission was compromised - each one of us was willing to sacrifice him or herself so that the others could continue on. (Ok, NOW I might be exaggerating.) Although I continue to be convinced that our plans were foolproof and COULD have been necessary, it eventually turned out that they were unneeded as the personage in question had plans of his own. Sadly, this information was only recieved after I and my fellows had provided an elevator full of people with an amusing, if somewhat mystifying spectacle and after I had done what I thought was a perfectly fine job of stealthily dodging from one pillar to the next in order to reach the meeting point.
Oh well, at least it was fun. And, well, he DIDN'T join us, right? So it worked. Sort of.
On Wednesday, the last day of the conference, I was sadly forced to incur the wrath of the conference staff as I chose to vacate the premises early in order to not have to worry about being late for my flight. This is because I was flying into Noto Airport, which only HAS the two flights a day and I (and my Noto fellows, who also had to feel the burn of the staff's displeasure) were already taking the later one. The reason I was flying back to Noto and not Komatsu was due to the aforementioned helping with the Curiouf Affair. Also, it is always annoying to get into Komatsu and still face a three hour ride to Anamizu. Unfortunately, leaving necessitated that we give back our nametags which meant that the staff had a lovely itemized list of the people who had chosen to leave. I curse myself now for not coming up with the idea of just handing it off to someone who was staying. On the other hand...I think "not missing my flight" is a legitimate reason for early departure. It's not like I went off to play in Tokyo. Nope, went straight to the airport, bought some Tokyo Banana as omiyage (I was feeling guilty for skipping out the week before exams - even if it was required)
I took the monorail to Haneda, incidentally, and I have to say that it is very nice and gives an excellent view of Tokyo as it goes.
After that, to make a short story shorter, we got on the plane and went back where I promptly got into Christy's car (she'd come to pick me up) and headed to Nanao. That, however, is a story for next time. Friday, I think. In the meantime, it is bloody hot in here and the ice cream is long gone, so I thik that's my cue to leave.
Last week really started on Saturday, when I made my way down to KZ about midday to take in the festival there. The festival, called the Hyakumangoku, or 1 million bales of rice, festival, was one of the bigger ones to happen in Kanazawa so it was all very exciting. And hot, mustn't forget the hot. The main attraction was a giant parade all throughout the city (and when I say "all throughout", I mean it - they had to walk 6 miles! Or was it 6 km? I'm not sure. but still, long way!).
The parade was divided into three-ish parts. I'll get to why "ish" in a moment. The first part was a bunch of marching bands and was called the "music festa" or something along those lines. There are, incidentally, a lot more marching bands in KZ than I would have thought - and they apparently all have their own baton-twirling corps, or at least that's what it seemed like. It was actually pretty cute because several of the bands were obviously from elementary and/or middle schools, so there were these little childrens walking around attached to drums that were about as big as they were. I think it made the pace of the parade kind of slow, though, because the kids had to stop every so often, have a rest from carrying their instruments around, have some drinks, etc. (Most of the kiddy bands, incidentally, were playing the theme from Lupin III. It is actually a proven fact that if you are around a marching band in Japan for longer than about 10 minutes you have a 100% chance of hearing either the Lupin theme or the Cutey Honey theme - sometimes both.)
The second part was...a bunch of stuff (hence the ish, you could probably divide everything in here into separate parts, but I don't want to) I don't really remember all the parts of it, really. I remember that we got to see the three "Miss Hyakumangoku" and some kabuki people - but the best part was these bunch of guys carrying ladders. Now, you say "oh great, a bunch of guys with ladders - sounds THRILLING" probably with as much sarcasm as you can cram into your town. Well, oh doubters, harken unto my words and remember those pauses that I was talking about before. You see, during those pauses, the men would set the ladder upright and one of them would crawl all the way up to the top to perform feats of derring-do. (you know, I wrote that and then I had to go and look up "derring-do" because, seriously, it looks pretty weird) They would hang off the latter with only an arm or stand on their head on top of it, or anchor a leg and do some poses while supporting themselves on said anchor. Crazy stuff! Very cool to watch.
I feel at this point that I should reveal that I had forgotten to charge my camera the night before. So...I have all of one picture of these guys because after that my camera crapped out ;_;
The last part of the parade was the Maeda clan and all of their vassals. The vassals (the army, ladies in waiting, etc.) are apparently all made up of volunteers, because several of the KZ/Matto JETs got to dress up and go along. Now, I use the words "got to" like it was a wonderful magical experience, but remember that they had to walk 6 (some unit of distance) on a hot sunny day while stopping several times (but never sitting down) . They seemed to be glad to have done it, but whenever the words "next year" came up, they were immediately followed by something along the vein of "no way". Oh, i neglected to mention that they were wearing traditional clothing, to boot. (Either a full yukata ensemble or armor) It LOOKED very impressive, though.
The parade went all the way from the station to the castle and ended with a big procession of entrance into the castle. After that, some stuff happened inside the castle, but I got bored and went to watch the yosakoi dancing instead. This turned out to be fake yosakoi dancing and I proceeded to leave in disgust. This enabled me to meet up with the others and watch 300.
I enjoyed 300. It fails at historical accuracy, of course, but given that that was never it's goal, I don't really see that as a problem. It's goal was, instead, to look awesome and I really feel that that was accomplished. I have two critiques though. (I don't think these are particularly spoilery, but if you are paranoid about such things, go ahead and skip the next paragraph)
1. I really could have done without all of the "meanwhile, back in Sparta" stuff. I don't think it added anything useful to the movie.
2. Why bring only one battle rhino? I realize that they are not particularly easy to procure, but seriously either bring a whole herd or just don't bother.
Ok, you can look again. I would like to take this moment to say that one of my teachers just walked in and gave us all ice cream. Man, teaching English in Japan is awesome when it is not being completely maddening!
The next day was uneventful except that I watched Pirates of the Caribbean 3. I was also generally amused by it and have the following two things to say. These are DEFINITELY not spoilers, but you can skip them if you like.
1. Barbossa is The Awesome.
2. If you cut out all the bits where Orlando and Keira speak (and instead had someone summarize them or something) not only would the movie be cut down to a decent length, it would also massively improve in quality! (I don't DISLIKE them, per se, I just don't care about anything they do and have long since ceased to be interested in their so-called relationship)
That is all.
Monday morning it was time for bright and early wakeup-ness so that we could catch the bus to Komatsu where we would catch the plane to Tokyo for the Recontracting Conference. 8:45 flight meant that we were in Tokyo by 10, and, since the conference didn't start until two and I didn't have to register until 12 at the earliest, I made my way to Akihabara. (or Akibahara as some say. To avoid this confusion, just do what everyone in Japan does and say "Akiba") Sadly, I was abandoned in my quest by my not particularly loyal companions (i.e. the KZ and Matto people who had also come) who wanted to eat and get in line early and had many, many hours Wednesday afternoon for spending around Tokyo. (During said hours on Wednesday I would first be flying back to Noto Airport and then be making my way to Nanao to help with the Grass Roots Summit AKA The Moft Curiouf Affair of the 300 Denizenf of the Fair Ftate of Colorado Coming to Noto)
Now, this was my fourth trip to Tokyo. During the first (Orientation) I was scared out of my mind (for a wide variety of reasons). During the second (the trip last October/September), I was largely annoyed with the city. During the third (the trip with my parents), I was largely in a good mood (mostly due to no longer having to feel aftershocks). This time, I have to say that I am starting to like the city. Say what you will about it's size and crowdedness, but MAN that public transport system is great. I am even starting not to mind the crowds. This makes me worried about my mental health, but there you go.
Akiba was good, although I had been infected with the "i want to get into line early" disease, so I went through it faster than I would have otherwise. BUT! I did manage to pick up a few DS games, the identity of which probably doesn't really interest the majority of the people reading. Still, I was pleased.
I made my way to Shinjuku (which is where the hotel that we were staying at for the conference was - this was, incidentally, the same hotel that we had orientation in) and got to the hotel just in time to join up with the rest of my group and get in line together. Therein followed: the conference.
The conference had it's good points and bad points - the main bad point being that I am not entirely sure that I learned anything of use from it. The best part by far was going to a "switching places" seminar wherein we were taught Finnish so that we could see how our students feel when they don't know what is going on. We played Finnish fruits basket! Fruits basket is a game that is quite popular in Japanese grade school/elementary wherein the students sit chair arranged in a circle and each student is assigned a fruit, when their fruit is called, they have to switch seats, with the caveat that there is one chair too few for all the students. The student who does not get a chair has to call out the next fruit; if you call out "fruits basket" then everybody has to switch chairs. It's a fun game! And it is especially fun when you are trying to remember fruit names in Finnish. At this point, I think the only one I remember is ananas and that is only because it is the same as in Polish. Regarding what I learned during that seminar (other than how to say "pineapple" in Finnish) I can see how what was amusing for one hour could wear thing pretty fast and I think it is important that I remember the feeling of confusion and frustration that I felt - of course, some ways to address that would have been useful, but I'm creative, I'm sure I'll think of something.
There were several other good speakers during the conference, and there are some ideas that I am going to have to think pretty hard about to see if I can use them in my own classes. So I guess it was not a complete waste of time. Also, Tokyo for three days! What am I whining about?
During our "conference-free" time, we hit tower records for English books and generally wnadered around Shibuya in pursuit of Good Times. (I purchased Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, despite its reputation as being disappointing, just because I think the title rules, and a Diana Wynne Jones book. I would have bought more, but sadly, they would not have fit into my backpack) Sadly, one of our nights out was overshadowed by the dreaded specter of one who I will only call "penguin". This was an individual with such a STAGGERING capacity for inspiring irritation in his peers that I am amazed that he has managed to survive this long. Sadly, we were caught by him as we waited for our compatriots and he invited himself along. We are all too polite to tell him off to his face, but MAN did we bitch about him the next day. In fact, we were so desperate to spend the following night without having to feel constantly irritated by him that we concoted an elaborate plan of surveillance and staggered exits with a prearranged meeting place to forestall any attempt to join us.
Now, usually when I talk about concocting elaborate plans and generally engaging in the activities of espionage, I am employing hyperbole to describe the depth of my feeling. HOWEVER, in this particular case I am deadly serious. We even had a code with which we could message our teammates in the event that the mission was compromised - each one of us was willing to sacrifice him or herself so that the others could continue on. (Ok, NOW I might be exaggerating.) Although I continue to be convinced that our plans were foolproof and COULD have been necessary, it eventually turned out that they were unneeded as the personage in question had plans of his own. Sadly, this information was only recieved after I and my fellows had provided an elevator full of people with an amusing, if somewhat mystifying spectacle and after I had done what I thought was a perfectly fine job of stealthily dodging from one pillar to the next in order to reach the meeting point.
Oh well, at least it was fun. And, well, he DIDN'T join us, right? So it worked. Sort of.
On Wednesday, the last day of the conference, I was sadly forced to incur the wrath of the conference staff as I chose to vacate the premises early in order to not have to worry about being late for my flight. This is because I was flying into Noto Airport, which only HAS the two flights a day and I (and my Noto fellows, who also had to feel the burn of the staff's displeasure) were already taking the later one. The reason I was flying back to Noto and not Komatsu was due to the aforementioned helping with the Curiouf Affair. Also, it is always annoying to get into Komatsu and still face a three hour ride to Anamizu. Unfortunately, leaving necessitated that we give back our nametags which meant that the staff had a lovely itemized list of the people who had chosen to leave. I curse myself now for not coming up with the idea of just handing it off to someone who was staying. On the other hand...I think "not missing my flight" is a legitimate reason for early departure. It's not like I went off to play in Tokyo. Nope, went straight to the airport, bought some Tokyo Banana as omiyage (I was feeling guilty for skipping out the week before exams - even if it was required)
I took the monorail to Haneda, incidentally, and I have to say that it is very nice and gives an excellent view of Tokyo as it goes.
After that, to make a short story shorter, we got on the plane and went back where I promptly got into Christy's car (she'd come to pick me up) and headed to Nanao. That, however, is a story for next time. Friday, I think. In the meantime, it is bloody hot in here and the ice cream is long gone, so I thik that's my cue to leave.