Stats

I think I will start to keep track of things that are interesting to me here.

Typhoons I've experienced in my life, all of which are from Japan: 3.
One: August 4-5, 2004 in Osaka when I was down there with YYchi.
Two: October 9, 2004 in Yokohama, I cancelled my plans to go to an international festival at an international all girls high school.
Three: October 20, 2004 in Yokohama. Typhoon Takage I think it was named. It's the 23rd of the Typhoon season and I believe the record 8th to hit the mainland. It's the deadliest of the typhoons in the past decade killing over 77 people causing hundreds of millions of US Dollars. It was on my day off so I really wasn't affected that much. It passed over while I was sleeping.

Earthquakes while I was in Japan. I think I only experienced one in San Diego and that was in La Jolla when I was at a friend's house. (3)
One: When I just moved into my apartment after my long journey across Japan. It was in September during the first week, I don't know the date exactly.
Two: The first full week of October was the second. I think it was October 4th. That's just a guess, but it was midnight as I was just getting into bed and going to sleep. So that's why I don't know the exact day. I can't remember what I did during the day, but I can remember that the day after was school because we were talking about it.
Three: Today - October 23, 2004. This one is actually a pretty big one. It was located about 160 km Northwest of Tokyo, which makes it even further for me because I live in Yokohama. It was a magnitude of 6.8 and had several aftershocks. I read it on Yahoo news, which was amazing for me because it appeared a few minutes after I felt it. I was like that's crazy fast. It was actually an hour after it originally happened, which still is pretty fast since I just felt it. I was reading that it derailed a couple of bullet trains and some trains were on it's side. That's kinda freaky because I could be on a train that derails and end up on my side at any moment.
I've read that there are seismic activity every 5 minutes in Japan. It is amongst the most volitle area for Earthquakes in the world. There's a freakin' Typhoon season, which is normal. The weather is crazy weird. Today was another beautiful day, but usually summer is hot and humid. Winter is freezing cold. How do people live here? Why do people want to come here? It's beyond me, maybe they were like me and too ignorant to research all this PRIOR to coming. Now I'm here, so I'm kinda stuck since I did all the paperwork and such. I guess I'll see how lucky I really am.

Anyways, back to the things of my day. I had the opportunity to wake up later today, which really wasn't much later since my body has gotten used to getting up at ungodly hours. I took everything a little slow this morning, and then I was off to go to school on a Saturday. I was supposed to meet Takagi sensei and Mr. Kto. - EK's dad.

I arrived around 12:30pm and when I got to the teacher's office, I found a ton of things on my desk. They tend to do that often, use my desk when I'm not there. I think that's the case because it's conveniently clear of any of my stuff and it's next to the shelves where everything sits now. I'm wondering if I inherited a multi-purpose desk that was there for other purposes before I got there. I was just told to wait there until she came, so I just busted out my Japanese Kanji book and started studying. I think I will make a great effort to learn Japanese. I really feel left out of society by not being able to be fluent. But after awhile, I went into the Gym where she was at and she told me to come back at 1:30pm because Mr. Kto wasn't there yet.

It was around lunch time, so all of the male teachers, well seemed like all, but it was only 4-5 male teachers and two female teachers, the ones that sit in front of my desk, went to grab lunch at a convenient store. It was really quite interesting how everyone behaves the same way and the way that they interact with each other. At least I was included today, so that made me feel better. By the time we got back to school it was 1:30pm so I had to rush over to the gym.

At first I was just engaging in small chit-chat with Takagi sensei, then after a few minutes I was invited into a room where lunch was waiting for us. Which made my trip to buy lunch useless. The lunch was great, it was shrimp tempura on top of rice with some soup and other things. I felt kinda bad because I was eating and there was another teacher just watching me. I'm not sure whether she had a lunch or not, but when Mr. Kto arrived he didn't want to eat it. He had already had lunch. So the other teacher i guess inherited it.

They engaged in Japanese conversation, not quite sure what was said, but they were talking to me in Japanese and I was answering in Japanese. It has been a long time since I had spoken Japanese so I was a little rusty. I think I only comprehended 70% of the things that were said to me. That's not incredibly bad since they were talking really fast and were covering their mouths as they were speaking. I think it was pretty good. I thought that the girls on the basketball teams were going to play each other, but they were just using the court to practice. That was it. I thought I was going to have to stay and watch too.

They will be competing in an All Tokyo tournament on November 24th. I think Takagi sensei has championship on her mind. Last year they placed 8th, but this year, she hopes to win the whole thing. That would be pretty good since the girls are only first year students and the girls on Mr. K's Junior high basketball team are looking to coming to Yakumo in a few years. They are supposed to be pretty good players too. I'm not sure if I had volunteer to play Volleyball for something, but at least it's not basketball, because I couldn't play that to save my life.

I think I will begin to start to help with the tennis program soon, but I need to practice a little before I do it, otherwise it could be a very embarassing situation. But they have asked me to do it and the other teachers want to play a little tennis with me too. I'm a little intimidated by the tennis coach since he's towering over me at over 6 foot something. He's got a mean demeanor about him and all the students are afraid of him. But he was helpful when we went to Universal Studios Japan together. So We'll see what happens.

When we finished meeting up, I went back to the office to pick up my lunch and go home. But when I walked into the teacher's office, a whole new set of stuff was on my desk. The teachers were starting to remove everything, but I told them that it was ok, and not to because I was going to go home. It's very interesting what was on my desk, but then I just went home.
I stopped by the Yokohama Commuter pass office and was told that the price of going from Hongodai to Toritsu-Daigaku for 6 months. It's going to cost 90053 yen. That's a big number, but I think I will buy it to extend to Shibuya so I can get to Tokyo for much cheaper, and that's not that much of a price increase. The guy at the office was hilarious. He couldn't translate what I was saying very well, so his partner went on the internet and printed out a piece of paper. On the paper was a translation of what the other guy was trying to say. He had gone online to a translation website. That must have been a good website because it translated it perfectly and I understood the meaning. I can refund the pass that I have now to credit into the new pass. So I don't lose any money for the commuter pass that I have now. So I'm happy about that.

I only have 4000 yen left, which translates to about $40. I won't get paid till Monday, but I can't get access to that money until Wednesday at the earliest since I don't have my cash card to withdraw from an ATM. And I don't have a day off until Wednesday to go to the bank in person to get money. I hope I can stretch the money out. But after that I should be set for the next 6 months living in Japan. I will finally be able to breathe and enjoy myself. I think I will pick up another part time job to get some extra spending dough so I can buy some of the electronic stuff while I'm here. YAY!! I'm excited now.