First Post From Japan

Hey Guys. Its been 3 months since I came to Japan. Sorry for keeping out of touch with everyone. I have been really busy since coming here and I just haven’t really had time to sit down and write emails to people. Anyway in short, things are going really well here.

I am located in Miki-shi, in Hyogo-ken. I am about a 45 minute train ride from central Kobe (one of the biggest and trendiest cities in Japan). My school is like some kind of advanced special gifted Senior High School or something. The level of English is very high. I am teaching students how to debate and read English newspaper articles and stuff like that. These students are fairly gifted. Most of the teachers at my school are fluent in English. They also teach Chinese and French at my school. It is a fairly big school of about 1000 kids, and they need to pass an exam to enter the school. They have heaps of club activities including random stuff like an American football team as well as tradition stuff such as Kendo, Judo, Karate, etc.
The location of my house is good. I have a 2 story house.1 large bedroom, a study, a lounge room and a garden. I am also about a 5-10 minute walk to all the shops, the train station, karaoke bar... basically everything. I dont need a car, I can mountain bike ride everywhere that i need to go. Rent is cheap too. I think I pay about 15800 yen ($158 AUD) per month.

The students are really friendly and they really want to learn English. Like I said the level is very high. For some classes we are using text books that have been written for university students. Some of these students can write essays in English and research essay topics on their own. In the last few weeks the students have become fairly comfortable with me. I guess being the only foreigner also makes me kind of popular. Many students know my name and love saying hello every time they see me. On my way walking to each class, it is not so uncommon to be greeted by at least 10 students. It’s kind of fun.
My social life has become very active. I have Japanese classes twice a week, and I am doing Aikido 1-2 times a week as well. For weekends I am usually traveling or doing Karaoke and usually consuming a lot of alcohol. I have a great time every weekend. There is just so many things to do here in Japan. Aside from being busy at work, my placement is not so bad and I am having a lot of fun out of school. Right now I am thinking that I might re-contract for another year, I’ve made some good friends and I feel I am getting a lot out of being in Japan.

Last week I rode my bike past a group of police officers. They all got excited seeing a foreigner and all started smiling, waving their hands and saying “hello” to me. I cant see this ever happening in Sydney.

Last Day at Hilton Sydney

Ok, so last night was my last shift at the Hilton Sydney. Turned out to be not so bad, I ended up breaking many rules and had quite a bit of fun. There was even a mini surprise farewell party during the shift, whereby i was even allowed to consume alcohol, and then proceeded to continue to consume alcohol throughout the remainder of the shift.

I even got invited into a guests room and had a few drinks with a friendly hotel Guest. All the guests that night were reasonably friendly to me, but maybe its because i was kinda drunk and didn't really have a clue what was actually going on. Anyway, I got paid to get drunk and do no work... not a bad way to end my hospitality career.

FAREWELL PARTY!!!!!

So, me and my mate andy are both getting ready to leave for Japan on the JET program. We decided to get together and organise a combined farewell party. Check out the poster, feels like I am on some kind of Japanese game show or something.

Dinner At the Japanese Consulate Generals Residence

So last night was the Japan farewell for all people heading off on the Japan Teaching Exchange program. It involved a dinner at the Japanese Counsulate Generals residence in Sydney. Free alcohol was also provided .... YAY!!!


A few words of advice about dinning at the Japanese Consulate Generals private residence.

1) Do not stand in the Consulate Generals ZEN garden

2) Do not mention the word "Love Hotel" in any context.

3) Do not mention your intention to run around your school half naked during festivals

All these rules were broken that evening, maybe the free alcohol was not such a good idea :D

Return to Sydney (via Dubai)

Hey all. I'm now In Dubai and tomorrow I will catching a flight to Sydney.

I have had an interesting trip getting to Dubai. My bags were heavy... like really heavy. in Kathmandu i had my pockets absolutely stuffed full of the heaviest things i could fit in there. I was carrying about 5 books in my jacket, battery chargers and things in my cargo pants, and the guy searching me was like... "what's going on with this guy". despite this I was still like 8-9 kg over my weight limit. This dodgy customs guy looks at me and says "come with me". the guy looks at my bags, sees that they are overweight but says "don't worry, its ok" ... wink wink.... he keeps doing this for a while and i figured he wanted a bribe. I opened up my wallet in front of everyone and pulled out some money... the guy panicked and snatched the money off me as quickly as possible (without looking to see how much it was) and put my bags on the plane.

If the guy charged me for excess weight it would have cost me up to $100. The amount i gave him was 50 Nepalese rupees. (less than 1 dollar Australian). If the guy looked at the note i gave him he would have probably got the shits and charged me, but because i did it in front of everyone he panicked soo much that he didn't even look.

When i checked my bags into the Air India counter in Delhi their scales were broken so they couldn't weigh my bags, how fortunate, Oh how I love Air India.... so efficient, so reliable.

I now face Dubai airport... I'm planing on ignoring all the rules and talking my way through everything (Italian Style). Wish me luck..

So finally i will be back in Sydney... does anyone remember me?

(View of my hotel in Dubai, err.... actaully no, my hotel was about 45min away from here where all the migrant workers lived. I think my hotel was one of the only finished buildings in the area)

Indian 30 hour train ride

Hey guys I don't have enough time to write a proper post, but I'm going to do my best to give you some idea as to whats been happening. Right now I'm in Bodhgaya, which is like Buddhist capital of the world or something. To get here I had to catch a 30 hour train from Dehra Dun, (if you don't know where that is don't worry, I don't either)

The train was a truly memorable experience. On the train we were watching the security guards holding machine guns smoking marijuana right in front of us, had some Hindu yogi hassle us for bisects and when we refused he started flashing his penis at us and showing us pictures of Hindu gods in the attempt to threaten us, had a eunuch ask us for money and then try and put a black magic spell on us, when we all started laughing she/he left us alone. We also had a group of locals storm our carriage because they thought were movie stars and wanted our autographs and to shake our hands.... most interesting train trip I have ever had.

India is truly a crazy place, and when you get used to it, it can be a really fun place to be. Just to let you know.. i have never seen a digital camera for sale yet. A crowed of people gathered around me while i was taking photos in complete amazement just to watch me take photos. they had never seen anything like my digital camera and were fascinated to see how it works. Also don't be surprised to see 5 year old mobile phones being advertised as "new mobile technology" here.... In fact all technology is about 5 to 10 years behind in India. I bought some dodgy DVDs the other day. one of them was music video hits in India from the 1970's. If you thought Saturday night Fever was bad wait till you see this.... it cost me about $1... a great investment in Indian music video culture.



(There are many great photo opportunities in India... this was one of them)