(Day +63) Winter is Coming

First off, apologies for not starting this blog earlier. Between work, exploring, getting internet set up, and all the other things I needed to take care of, I couldn't really get to this blog that I wanted to write. BUT! Now that I downloaded an app that is allowing me to tether, I can use the spare time at work to write this family and friends back home who may want to read my wordy, stream-of-consciousness blog posts about my time in Japan.

I'm awkwardly starting you about 2 months into my 12 month stint in Japan, but maybe I'll return to some of the earlier dates to sort of give you an idea of what's been going on. Maybe I'll start a weekly photo thing, or a post about my living situation, pay, etc., but for now we'll start with what's happening now.


ANYWAYS, Hello! Good morning! buenos dias! おはようございます！Guten Tag! It's 9:49AM as I write this -- It's about 5PM yesterday in the U.S. I'm not scheduled for any classes so I have toooonns of time to do "stuff," which in this case is writing a blog. :)

Until now, Japan's had a policy called "Cool Biz" in order to save energy that is typically spent on A/C units during the summer. "Cool Biz" encourages office workers to forego the Tie and Jacket for just slacks and a short-sleeved dress shirt. Now that the weather is cooling down (Especially in Aomori), I'm starting to get the hint that Cool Biz is over. Nearly all of my co-workers are back to the fancy tie + jacket routine, and I suppose I will have to follow suit (get it?) as well. They should really create a thing called "Warm Biz" where you can just come to work in your pajamas to work for the coming winter.

Along with the dress-code change, the weather's been changing as well. Up until now, we've been having weather that's very similar to that of San Francisco -- Half cloudy, blue skies, cool breeze, warm weather. It's been super pleasant. However, since the start of October, we've been getting stronger wind, colder weather, and rain. It's been more difficult to get out of bed, and unfortunately it's only going to get colder.

Since we're creeping into Autumn, the leaves will begin to change colors soon. In Japan, the leaves first begin to change in the north and go in a southward direction. That means that, generally, we in Aomori will get to see the leaves change before the rest of Japan down south. In my prefecture, the peak time for viewing the leaves change is mid-October. The trees on the summits of the surrounding mountains apparently change in late-September, early-October, so they should be changing around now. However, I still haven't seen anything yet.

Despite the colder weather, I still intend on doing home hiking through the red, yellow, and orange trees of Autumn at one of two well-known areas for viewing the leaves changing: Lake Towada and Mt. Hakkoda. Lake Towada / Oirase Stream is the most famous places to view the change in Aomori Prefecture and so I'll try to go here in mid-October (about 2 weeks) before we start getting snowed in. I'll upload some photos of the place when I go, but until then, here's a spoiler.

Source: http://www.japan-guide.com/blog/koyo12/g/121031_19.jpg

Once the snow sets in, I'm probably going to do a lot more hibernating and less outdoor activities. I won't be able to bike places, it's going to be icy and dangerous to walk, and I might get sick, so I will be living it up and exploring until then (hopefully).
Also, click here for more information about Lake Towada

If you haven't heard me mention it before, Aomori Prefecture gets the some of the heaviest snowfall in the world. Wikipedia says that Aomori gets ~22 feet of snow a year (roughly 6 meters), and more than 80% of it falls in the months of December, January, and February. So that's going to nearly my height in snow for each of those months. Imagine that.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aomori,_Aomori

So. I think I've run out of things to talk about.

Until next time!

tl;dr Weather's getting hella cold. It's gonna get colder. Gotta go see the leaves before I get trapped by the snow. TTYL.

(Day +59) Silver Week in Tokyo

This is a late post but I had a little bit of time so I decided to put this up. When I didn't have tethering, I started a journal on Microsoft Word to kill some time. Here's the entry that I made after coming back from Silver Week.

I’ve run out of things to do at my base school.

Just last night. My supervisor e-mailed me that I would be at the base school both today and tomorrow, instead of one of my elementary schools. This was because of some event and they thought it’d be easier to have me at the elementary school on the 6^th and 7^th of October, so that’s what I’m going to do. This wouldn’t be much of an issue if I was scheduled for classes, since I haven’t seen my students in a while, but…

…for the next 3 visits to my base school (Today, Tomorrow, and Monday) I am not going to be scheduled for any classes because the students are testing. -_______-

I tried killing time by making a budget spreadsheet, but I don’t know all the variables yet so I couldn’t complete it. I think that this spreadsheet will help me save money now that I’m not using the $2,500 USD that I brought from home anymore – that all disappeared into thin air from Silver Week in Tokyo, which by the way was tons of fun.

Silver Week in Tokyo

Friday, Sept. 18

·        Arrived to Tokyo in the Evening – Checked into the hotel with Kevin and met up with Ashley for Chuhais and Ramen for dinner in the Asakusa area.

Saturday, Sept. 19

·        Tokyo Game Show – met up with Jon from I.C.U. for TGS. Stayed there until the evening. Super crowded, a bit hot, and spent tons of money.

·        Met Amy and Kevin in the Evening – After TGS, I charged my phone at the hotel, where they held my luggage, and then met Amy and Kevin at Kami-Itabashi station, where we walked to Amy’s house.

Sunday, Sept. 20

·        Ueno with Scarlett – I met up with Scarlett for lunch in Ueno, then walked around Ueno Park where we went to a temple and I got my fortune, walked around a lake, and also found a sort-of flea market type thing. Saw some cool chopsticks, didn’t buy anything. We played the new Luigi’s Mansion game at a game center.

·        Shabushabu Dinner in Shibuya – Scarlett, Amy, and I met in Shibuya’s Starbucks where we talked, then ate dinner at a Shabu-shabu place that was actually quite inexpensive. We definitely overate and I had to try and finish the rest of the meat. It had good Ramune Icecream. Kevin met up with us towards the end of dinner, but he had to wait outside.

Monday, Sept. 21

·        Ramen Lunch in Nakano – I went to Nakano to have lunch with Shigeru at 1:30PM, but he was late, playing Pachinko. I arrived early so I explored Nakano Broadway, then waited at Starbucks. Later, at about 2:00PM ~ 2:30PM, Kevin met up with me since he was free to have lunch. Shigeru finished playing Pachinko, so we all ate lunch together and had a beer at an Izakaya afterwards. He had a “Hoppy Beer,” which was Soju + a non-alcoholic beer – I’ve never heard of it before.

·        Super Mario Brothers 30^th Anniversary Concert: Amy, Kevin, and I met up prior to line up early. I bought the tickets ahead of time. We had a glass of white wine and a snack (Waffle/Churrito) before the concert. The concert was amazing – the band was composed of a drummer, bongo player, pianist, violinist, trumpet player, saxophone player, electric guitar player, bassist, etc. and had an extremely jazzy feel to it. The lights and the booming music was much more than I expected. Shigeru Miyamoto (Creator of Mario) was there, and ___ Kondo (Composer of Zelda and Mario songs) played us a piano solo encore. We tried buying souvineers afterwards, but more than half the merchandise was sold out – I bought a Kuribo and a Super Mario Brothers coaster.

Tuesday, Sept. 22

·        Mt. Takao Hike – Hiked with Kevin, and Thanwa to the summit of Mt. Takao. It was beyond crowded, but the weather was nice. Amy decided to stay home since she was exhausted from her weekend. The summit was crowded too. It was a fun hike though.

·        Visit to I.C.U. – Amy met up with us at Musashi-sakai station to visit the ICU campus that we all studied at 2 years ago. Amy and I walked to the Honkan, which was locked because it was a holiday, and the Gakki, which was also closed for the same reason. We got into Dialogue House, but the Tomitas weren’t there anymore. At dialogue house, we ran into some of the new UCEAP kids. They weren’t that great. From there we went to Bakayama and relaxed until Kevin messaged us to meet up. We went to Global House (Kevin’s dorm) and met some exchange students there as well.

·        Tare Katsu and Nomikai in Kichijoji – following ICU we went to kichijoji – the place we used to frequent when we were studying abroad. We had dinner at our favorite restaurant with Kevin, Amy, Masaru, Elena myself. We meant to meet up with Go, but it was short notice and difficult to plan, and the restaurant was full so we met up afterwards. We bought Taiyaki at another place that we loved, which sold really good sakusaku Kyarumeru Taiyaki. After we met up with Go, we went to Hanbei – the place that we were meeting for the Nomikai. We met up with Koki and his girlfriend, as well as Thanwa and Alex (Ace) and all enjoyed a Nomikai before having to take the last train home.

Wednesday, Sept. 23

·        Snake Café in Harajuku – Held snakes with Kevin and Ashley. 

(Day -38) Aomori City BoE Package!

Today marks the day that I have finally gotten in contact with my Board of Education (BoE)! Around 10:30AM on 6/23/2015  the USPS tried delivering it to me as I had to sign off, but nobody was home at that moment so the next day, technically yesterday, I decided to walk over to the Post Office just a few blocks from home and pick it up!
The packet had real valuable stuff! First and foremost came the important documents (congratulatory messages from my supervisor, contract, job descriptions, terms and conditions of the job, etc.) These forms were in Japanese, but as I made a sad attempt at reading the first sentence, I flipped the page and realized every important document had another version with the English translations. The packet revealed a lot of awesome information such as:

1. Rent is 63,300 yen.   35,000 is paid for by Aomori City.   I only have to pay 28,300 yen for rent each month ($229.02 USD/month).
2. My apartment will be only about 5 minutes by bicycle from my "workplace" which most likely means my base school as I have more than one school that I will be visiting.
3. I get 20 days of PTO! I also get national holidays and new years celebration off!
4. My gross yearly salary is 3,360,000 yen ($27,191.07 USD) w/ monthly payment of 280,000 yen ($2,265.92 USD).
5. The apartment will be furnished, free of charge, with what my BoE deems essential for an apartment to have, which probably won't exceed the bare basics.
6. The contract will be a full year. August 03, 2015 - August 02, 2016)

The packet also included an Aomori City Guide. It was a guide thankfully in English that listed things to do in the Aomori Bay Area including cultural experiences, key places to visit, and different highlights from each area in the region. It also had a little excerpt of where the city's Airport and Shinkansen may take you as well as the time it would take to get there. Just behind this pamphlet/brochure was an illustrated Aomori Map that highlighted popular places included the museum where you can view the Nebuta Matsuri floats yea round.
Lastly at about 90 pages thick was a small booklet titled "A Rough Guide To Aomori 2015." I think I will be making reference to this booklet A LOT. I flipped through it and it has tons of useful information specifically for ALTs. It touches base on your day-to-day life both in and out of work, what to do during lunch, how to get around, weather, everything!
This packet is definitely helping me get pumped about this new chapter in my life and overcome the unavoidable anxiety and nervousness of working and living halfway around the world with a poor grasp of the country's language. It is the first real official documents that I've received from abroad and I couldn't be more excited at the moment. While the current USD-JPY exchange rate sort of makes me bummed in regards to the salary, that may change, and I will still be living comfortably in Japan itself.

(Day -42) Welcome to Aomori City!

This post as of today is almost 1 month and 1 week late, but I want to make the official blog post about the placement for where I will be helping teach English for the next year!

Starting August 5/6 I will be living and helping teach English in the city of Aomori. Aomori's at the northern tip of Japan's main island, Honshu - just across the bay from Hokkaido's city of Hakodate.

From what I found out via Wikipedia Aomori is a small city, but also serves as the prefecture capital of Aomori Prefecture (Prefectures are sort-of like states here in the U.S.). It's got a population of roughly 300,000 people and averages almost 22 feet of snow per year!! most of which fall between December and Februray(V_V). It might sound unbelievable, but I'm telling you the truth. I will literally be moving from the no-snow San Francisco Bay Area to a city with one of the heaviest snowfall in the world. During those winter months temperatures will average about 30 degrees fahrenheit and between the snow and cold, I will still be expected at work -- so that will be an experience that I'll probably blog about later!

Aomori offers a lot of different opportunities to get closer to nature including many different hot springs in the mountains as well as visiting places like the Oirase River Gorge that eventually flows into Lake Towada - both of which are only a couple of the many places you can go.

In the nearby Hakkoda Mountains you can witness the crazy amounts of snow that my region gets. (It also looks very similar to the snow racetrack in Mario Kart 64!)

One of Japan's most famous festivals, the Aomori Nebuta Matsuri, is also held in Aomori City. This summer festival's held in early August and consists of giant lantern floats being carried around the city.

Besides the festival, and natural attractions the city has to offer, Aomori Prefecture is also known as the birthplace of the Fuji Apple - the first Japanese apple. It's the largest exporter of apples in all of Japan. In the city center itself, there is also a excavation site of a Jomon-era settlement, which they call the Sannai-Maruyama site. Despite being along Aomori Bay, I don't think the city's known for beaches.

One last interesting fact - Just like how people from Osaka or Kyoto speak the Kansai Dialect, people from Aomori tend to speak a different dialect - called the Tsugaru Dialect.

(NOTE: For those curious and those applying, I got my placement in an e-mail on May 13, 2015. A lot of applicants never really know when exactly to expect these kinds of information, but that was my own personal date that I received the placement e-mail.)