Okutama

Today, the only plan was to go to a part-time teacher’s BBQ in Okutama. Do you know where Okutama is? Me either, but I learned that it’s actually in the Tokyo area and considered part of Tokyo. It’s a mountainous area famous for its campsites and BBQ facilities. I woke up really early today when my e-mail on my cell phone rang at 7:30am. I had slept late last night to get ready for such an event since I know that we won’t be sleeping till very late.

I left my house around 10am to get to Shinjuku station by 12pm. That was the meeting time for a part of the teachers going in the first group. It was pretty interesting to tell you the truth. I met one of my co-worker’s husband there. Then we took a two hour long train ride from Shinjuku to Okutama station via the Ome line.

Since we were the first group to arrive, we started getting things ready for the BBQ. It was supposed to start at 2pm, and since I only had a little breakfast today and no lunch, I was getting very hungry. But we were getting things ready to eat, so that was good, but you know that when you get things ready, it takes forever before you actually get to eat.

We ate for a long time after the cooking started. I think it started around 3pm and lasted till around 7:30pm. Then half of the group left to go home, while the other group that was staying the night, or the group that I fell in, would go to the Onsen to take a bath.

When we finished with the bath, we went back to the lodge to get some more snacks and drinks. We did this till around 1am. Then we all went to sleep. But we had to get up early to go back to Tokyo since there were things other teachers had to do there even though it was our day off. I had to get up at 4am to go back to Tokyo.