Just thought I'd update everyone on the first week :)
July 24- Woke up at 4:30 am in order to jump on a shuttle that took us to Denver airport. We got there about an hour early, being shepherded through security and the long baggage checking process. We stopped for a short layover in LA, long enough to get some last-minute Mexican food however!
After another 12 hours, we were safely landed in Tokyo at Narita airport. Another standing in line/baggage madness followed :) However, it wasn't all bad--it went very quickly! We boarded a bus and were shepherded over to our hotel. The hotel, known as the Keio Plaza Hotel, was mighty fancy. Our room was on the 24th floor! However, the view of the Tokyo night sky was pretty impressive :) The hotel went up to 45 floors--quite a sight at night!
For two jet-lagged filled days, we were bombarded with information about life as a JET, met many people that were also going to our region, and got a few freebies :) Although I ventured a bit out into Tokyo to do a little karaoke (a huge deal in Japan), much of the time was simply spent sleeping or chatting with other JETS :) Then, Wednesday, we were all separated out and taken to our various locations around Japan! Ikuno was only a short, bus, then train, then bus, then car ride away! I quickly met my supervisors and some of the other school teachers before being taken out to the local okonomiaki place for some tasty food with a couple of the teachers.
The teachers are very nice! We shared a few laughs and I got a few Japanese lessons about the meaning of Japanese names! Thursday and Friday were filled then with my first days of work. Thursday was "open High School," which meant that a couple hundred Junior High School students came to the school to experience what it would be like for them to start! I got a tour of the school, and participated in a few activities such as flower arrangement, tea ceremony, and pudding cooking :) It's a great day to be a foreigner :)
Yesterday (Friday) I worked some in the morning, then went to a few club activities until it was time for me to leave work! I played a little volleyball, then watched Kendo! Quite the experience! If you're not familiar, you may want to watch a clip here!
The object of the sport is to get 3 points by hitting the opponent on the head, side, or wrist. The yelling is for intimidation!
The rest of my time here has been filled mostly with cleaning my house and trying to explore a bit around the town. Ikuno was a silver mining town whose heritage goes back about 1200 years! There are also a number of shrines and temples in the surrounding forests! I've only had a chance to see a few!
I'll leave you with a few pictures from my house! It's not too big:) But I'm working at making it homey!
Sayonaura:) Arigato gozaimasu!
