Time, where are you?

I don't even remember the last time I got to sleep in.

The last two saturdays have been gruelling 8am-alarm-clocks, getting to some remote town on the big land mass somewhere on other side of the harbor, and teaching a bunch of form 3 (year 9) kids how to spell and playing games in English.

The saturday morning before the last two was spent behind the wheel and being yelled at by an old man who's supposed to be teaching me how to drive.

Anything before that is a blur now. Life has just piled itself with stuff. I can't even say what all that 'stuff' is. There's just always something going on.

Is it 'cause this is city life?

Or is this work life?

Or my calendar is a magnet for..'stuff'??

Two weddings and two funerals

Somewhere in the beautiful countryside of North Thailand near Chiang Rai on this beautiful Saturday morning, Thais and Americans were singing and rejoicing the union of two of the loveliest people in the country - Brandon and Aum. I met them when we went on a missions trip to help out YWAM Thailand in Bangkok, ministering to college students and at the nearby slums, and generally helping out at the BJD Centre. I was supposed to go, and I planned on going, but instead...

I went to my Aunt's 'funeral', or rather, the scattering of her ashes at a memorial garden at the south of Hong Kong Island. She had fought cancer long and hard for the last four years. Sometimes she won, but not the last time. I heard that she wasn't in much pain at the end. And she went peacefully. It was a brilliantly sunny and breezy day, but despite being surrounded by rolling wooden hills and vividly colourful flowers, Cape Collinson was a heavy and oppressive place. It was a morning of mourning, but also a moment of finally letting go, laying to rest a loved and loving woman. As my Uncle said those simple words of remembrance, the lump in my throat grew harder, and my eye make-up dissolved. I took some of my Aunt's ashes in my hand, said a silent prayer, and let her float out of my hand onto the grass. I tried to not think about the fact that I hadn't seen her for quite a few years, and I won't be seeing her for a quite a while yet. But I pray that she is in the loving arms of God, who called her out of suffering and into His glorious light, as he does for all of us.

The next funeral will most likely be the death of my audit exam on Monday, given the pace of revision that was going on today. I blame this partly on John AY...

...who's in Hong Kong attending a wedding, but so very kindly took time out of his busy-best-man schedule to have

九記牛腩 (beef brisket) with me on Friday night.

Here in Thailand

...people don't shove you back in the train, but actually let you get off first.

...you can bargain your price down from 200 baht to 80 baht.

...taxi drivers will give you extra change if they don't have small change.

...if you're tired of walking you can just hop on a motorcycle-taxi that takes you home for 10 baht.

...its always hot enough to swim outdoors.

...people will smile at your camera if you ask whether you can take a photo of them.

...some of the dudes are actually quite goodlookin'!

I can almost taste the fish sauce

In just over 48 hours I'll be sitting by the pool in Bangkok, sipping a cool mocktail in the evening warmth, enjoying homey Thai food, and probably reading Audit notes for my final conversion exam.

Letters to me

Despite the riveting nature of my overly highlighted Contract Law notes, my mind couldn't stop wandering all afternoon, and it was finally drawn away from those tasteless law notes by the stacks of paper under my desk. Those stacks of paper are unread letters written by my Japanese students when I was leaving Japan. It's been 3 months since I left and they're still unread, still sitting under my desk, and still gathering dust.

I opened up a big bright red envelop that contained all the letters from Class 1-1 of Onahama II JHS. Most of them were in Japanese, some tried hard with their very limited English, and some wrote me essays. They all wrote with such sincerity.

"I will always remember those fun English lessons we had."

"Thank you for teaching me English."

"Please come back to Onahama."

"I will never forget you."

I didn't want to forget them either. But...I can't recall any of their faces anymore. Who's Sato Mizuho? Who's Makino Kento?? Which one is Toshiki, who in his letter thanked me for remembering his name?

Amidst the hecticness of work and resettling back in HK, there have been moments, many moments, where I wondered whether leaving Japan was a mistake...wondering how life could be like had I stayed...the easy life, being the sempai, the parties, the salary...

But most of all I miss my kids. I still wonder whether I could've done a better job had I stayed, developed a deeper understanding with them, and actually see them learn and grow and shine. But I guess God has better plans. And I can only trust, in faith, that where I'm at right now is where I'm supposed to be.

Nonetheless, no harm taking a few wandering strides down memory lane right?

Here are some of the hilarious/lovely/mind-boggling things they've written to me...

"For a short time でしたが thank you very much!!!"

"Come to Japan sometimes, I'm waiting for Samantha."

"ぼくの名前も覚えてくれてうれしかったです。" (I'm happy that you remembered my name)...Sadly I don't anymore.

"香港に帰ってもぼくたちのことをわすれないでください" (Don't forget us even when you've gone back to HK)

"サマンサのいるまちに行きたいと思います。だから、そこで待っていてください。" (I want to go to your town. So please wait for me.)

"First, I was surprised listening you are British and China kid." (In the first lesson I did a self-introduction..and told them I was mixed. lol.)

And the most epic of all letters:

To our most wonderful teacher, Ms Samantha.

It is always difficult to say goodbye to someone whom we love.

Time waits for no one and the time has come.

We should say no more than "thank you" for what you've done,

but we are out of vocabulary and can't think of one.

We promise to improve our English,

so what you've taught us will never perish.

However, please learn only this.

The person is connected to the person somewhere by all means.

As for it, a teacher is the same as us, too.

Thank you very much so far.

Please be careful about a body,

and please work hard at work from now on.

Goodbye, Samantha.

Sincerely

....

And this was written by a junior high 1st grader!!! Most of them are still learning how to hold pencils properly. I have this letter permanently stuck on my wall.

Gradual culture realisation, and reverse culture discrepancy.

"RCS! You will most likely get RCS! Prepare yourself and protect yourself from the effects of RCS!"

No it's not a contractable disease.

It's reverse culture shock - three words that plagued all the seminars at the JET leavers' conference, the JET Leavers guide and conversations that were engaged in the last few months of being a JET. I had sort of braced myself for it, although I was pretty sure I wasn't going to get it.

And I was right. Sort of. I don't think I actually experienced any reverse culture SHOCK, per se, when I came back from a clean, quiet, friendly Japanese town to the hustle, bustle, smoggy and noisy city of HK.

Indeed, there was no shock. But I can't deny that, as I re-integrate more into the local culture, and re-familiarise myself with people's behaviours and the surroundings, I gradually find more and more things that test and demand a push of my patience limits to new levels.

Elaborations to follow in upcoming posts.

North-westerlies

Last Saturday morning, I set out at 11am with my phone, a $100 bill, and ambition in my track pants pocket. There was a perfect breeze and the sun was shining undisturbed over murky-blue sky.

A jog along Bowen Road, a hike half-way up to the peak, (and half-way by bus), dim sum lunch and a large frozen yogurt (shared) later, we ended our mega-workout-hangout-day with a walk (and swinging on monkey bars) around the peak.

It had been a while since I saw HK from the peak. Hong Kong is tiny but anything beyond Kowloon was covered in such smog that you can only see a vague outline of the NT hills.

It's this time of the year - where the North-Westerly winds bring all the dust and smog and poison from China's over-polluting factories to our 'fragrant harbour'.


But at least I should be thankful that I have Saturdays off instead of working and living in an over-polluting, smog-filled factory in China...

Stop. Breathe. Cough.

I am currently enjoying a rare moment of peace in my hectic week...

Well...more like I'm procrastinating when I should be doing my finances, and its also about an hour before my HK-orphan friends (ie friends who had immigrated abroad and they've come back to HK to work but their Chinese parents are still away) come for some home comforts of Chinese soup.

Life has not stopped since I came back to the City over two months ago. Life doesn't stop in the city. One day you're bombing a tax exam with 60 other people, and touring haunted houses at Ocean Park the next night, and sitting in century-old buildings having expensive dinners with your mum's old colleagues the night after....

That is why I am going to stop this weekend. There will be no schedule. No definite place where I have to be at a definite time. It's all mine this weekend.

The setting sun

「もう日本の時代ではないですね．．．」

Japan's golden age has long gone, Mrs. Y said.

I was at a dinner party where the host and some of her friends were Japanese, and somehow the conversation took on a turn onto Serious Avenue, and went on a course of Japan's-going-down-the-drain route.

They're observations were all too true, sadly enough. Even Mrs. Y's 16 year-old daughter could tell that the young people in Japan have no dreams, no ambitions, no goals in life. They were content on working as an OL or in restaurants and fast food chains.

The percentage of foreigners in Japan is perhaps not as high as that of in other Asian countries, but there is a considerable amount in Tokyo and the major cities. "And yet the level of English has not improved one bit!" Mrs. Y sighed. Mrs. Y is Japanese and married to a Chinese man, and they live in Hong Kong with their daughter. They all speak fluent English. And while Mrs. Y's Japanese accent is still there, she is perfectly understandable and speaks English with complete confidence.

"Many of my friends from kindergarten when we lived in Tokyo have moved abroad." Said the daughter. There were two other Japanese families at the party, and hundreds and thousand others in Hong Kong, Singapore, Bangkok...all left the aging nation that was once as glorious as the rising sun.

Fear.

We fear because we don't know. We're not sure. We expect the worst.

Death. We're all pretty sure of that fact and that we will all, 100%, die.

But who is sure what happens after?

My dearly beloved aunt died last Friday. She had no kids. She lived with my uncle. She had been struggling with cancer for around 4 years.

Where did she go at the end? I don't know.

What did she believe in as she lay on that death bed? I don't know.

Did someone in the hospital tell her that Jesus the Son of God came to die on the cross for her and raised on the 3rd day to give her new life and hope for life after death? I don't know.

I will probably never know.

All I NEED to know and believe is that God is a just God. He is a righteous God. He is a faithful God. He is a loving God. He is a God that gives his children chances and creates ways so that they will find Him. He is a God of comfort, shelter, peace. He is a God of healing.

He is a God that gives us hope and courage to conquers all fears.

365

New challenge.

1 photo.

Per day.

Everyday.

That's it.

http://offwhite365.blogspot.com/

Work life lessons

It's been more than 4 weeks since I started my first ever permanent job.

There's a lot to learn, but so far this is what I've picked up...

It's normal to have sweaty feet whilst wearing high heels.

Internet speeds at work are particularly slow after lunch since everyone's taking a break and surfing the web.

The rush hour bus waits for no one. Not even when you're in heels. Especially when you're in heels.

Working in a 'professional environment' doesn't mean the office toilet seats are always clean.

Working in Hong Kong means you won't have time to blog.

Stars for dim sum

Michelin star, that is.

And for HK$10 dim sum, that is. (~1.30USD)

Last week, my keen foodie friend (and his friends from out of town) were already standing outside Tim Ho Wan dim sum restaurant at 7:45am (yes A.M.), 2 hours and 15 minutes before opening time. I was still in bed. But when I got there at 9:45 there was a queue of about 20 people behind my friend and his friends, who were already joined by more friends. I joined my friends, making those people at the very back of the queue wait longer.

After ticking almost everything on the peice of paper (there were 8 of us), we finally sat down, full of hunger and eager expectations. Food gradually flowed onto the table, and into our stomachs, with the table full of plates and bowls most of the time. More more more! We handed in a few more dim-sum-order-sheets and they handed us a few more buns, dumplings and noodle rolls. We probably ordered a bit too much, as by the end most of us were reaching maximum capacity, and the dim sum woman told us off for leaving food and letting it go cold. So we stuffed the rest in.

Very stuffed and satisfied, the bill came to HK$50 each.





And then we went to a Qi Pao exhibition at the Hong Kong History Museum and looked at dresses.






Oh no...I just realised how I said I'd keep blogging and asked you to keep checking this space and then zoom its been three weeks without a single post...! I guess that guy (in the last post) was right.

"Who has time to blog anyway?!"

...said one of the speakers today at the firm's orientation programme. It was during a Risk Management presentation and he talked about how not to share work or client information with friends, in public places, in social networking sites and blogs. But the overall impression from all the talks and seminars is that we'll be so busy and have so much work crawling out of our [edit] eyes that we won't even have much of a life, let alone blog.

But I will still try. I think. Because even though Hong Kong is and has always been my 'home' I still feel like a bit of a stranger here.

Today I just discovered a whole street of chinese and dessert restaurants. There's always something small but interesting that one can discover every single day, and you don't even need to deviate from your usual commute to look. It's actually right in front of me. It's all those things that I take for granted, but still worth noting, such as this advertisement for plumbing services (or more specifically 'unclogging of pipes') written on the bus stop downstairs from my flat...and pretty much every single lamp-post or bus stop post around HK. I wonder how many numbers I can collect.


So keep checking :)

A little less conversation...

...because opening my mouth was extremely painful today.

They say 'No Pain No Gain'. However....not only did I gain a lot of pain, but I lost a whole lot of wisdom today. A whole wisdom tooth, that is. It was buried deep in my jaw, with just a slight corner of it peeping out. But for the last few days it had been pushing and kicking about, like an unborn child in a mother's tummy. But the dentist said it's no good. A goner. It had no space to flourish and display its full glory with my gum as its throne. So it was given the death sentence. Or the extraction sentence.

The extraction process itself was relatively painless (just an intense 2 minutes of what felt like strong pressure on the gums). But when the anesthetic wore off, and as I regianed feeling in my right jaw, pain crept in, my appetite withered away, and so did all my energy and will to speak. So all day it was pretty much just my mum talking to me all day. And me hm-ing and mmhmmm-ing. Which was alright because I'm not a very talkative person anyway whereas my mum always has lots to tell me so we were quite used to it.

Ps. One more day of freedom until I slave my soul away for the corporate world. Mmmhmmm.....

Herng Gong

Hong Kong. For good. Since 12 August 2010.

So far, in alphabetical order...

Bank.

Church.

Dim sum.

Dentist.

Facial.

Fifteen minute gym session.

Instant noodles with spam and egg.

Mangos.

New friends.

Old friends.

Pacific Coffee Company.

Papaya.

Pad thai.

Replacing my HKID card.

Shopping.

Stanley Market.

Tour guiding.

ZZZZzzzZZZZZZ-ing.

'So...how was Japan?'

Or 'Talk to me about Japan!' or 'So - Japan?' or 'What have you been up to the last two years?!'

I've been asked that so many times since I've left Japan.

I never really know how to answer that. So I just say 'It was good!'. Which is pretty lame. But truth be told I'm never sure how much people actually want to listen to me talk about Japan. Once I was told to tell everything right from the beginning. That would've taken a whole week. So I made a rough conclusion of Where I Was and What I Did and Who I Taught and How Good/Bad My Japanese Is and How Good The Sushi Was...

I probably should think about what I should include in my 'Japan summery' answer. I feel slightly like I'm being tested and I should maybe prepare for the question. Perhaps I should write an essay, with introduction, body, conclusion; and then memorise it.....?

Nah. I think the fact that I remember different stories/facts/things when I talk to different people is interesting enough for me. That way I can talk as much as I want about Japan, just spread amongst a large bunch of people.

'So...how was Japan?', you ask?

Read the blog, ya lazy pants.

Whirlwind @@@@@

Since landing into Heathrow (and then subsequently Manchester) last Wednesday, I've been whirling around Britain (with a few days of quiet recharge at my grandpa's internet-less house).

So after a mega massive lunch with Grandpa and his friend and my uncle and aunt on Wednesday (yesterday), I hopped on a non-stop train bound for London. A friend from Uni met me at the station and very kindly (and probably pain-stakingly) lugged my 30kg suitcase from Euston to Russell Square; we dropped off my luggage in my student accommodation room, and came back out to meet two others for dinner and drinks.

Today - with my trusty *laminated* London sightseeing map, I walked from Russell Square to Farringdon for a morning Starbucks chai tea latte with a friend I hadn't seen for over two years. We talked about PhDs, boys, old friends, and reminisced our old Bristol days (we went to seperate boarding schools in Bristol). Then I strolled along the London wall towards Liverpool Street, met another friend, had lunch, we walked to Shoreditch, discovered there was nothing there except for homeless people and crummy cars, so hopped on a bus and underground to Oxford Circus. We abandoned each other after a spot of shopping to meet our respective friends in various places.

I always thought London was big, but it turns out that it was pretty small. I say this because I bumped into two different friends - one from church in HK and one from Uni (although I hardly spoke to him then) within 3 minutes of each other. (Oh and before that we spotted 'Fatboy' from Eastenders at the tube station in Liverpool St.) And then after dinner, I bumped into another Uni friend in the tube station as I was heading home.

Conclusion: London is beautiful in the sunlight.

All that I used to take for granted...

Remove yourself from England for two years and you realise how actually there's a lot of wonderfulness in this country. Any sort of 'culture shock' that I anticipated was masked by being in the beautiful British countryside, surrounded by...

lush green fields,

trees of many different sorts,

cows grazing lazily under patchy clouds,

sheep wandering around the park with their heads in the grass,

lunches in a quiet pub with Grandpa,

tea, banter and lame jokes with old friends,

watching people attempt a picnic in the park under big umbrellas,

wearing 3 layers myself whilst people around me are in t-shirts and flip flops...


This past week has been such a whirlwind I don't know where it's gone. I went from cleaning my apartment til 4am in the morning, dumping unwanted clothes at the community centre, sending the last 2 boxes in the post, packing up a 29kg suitcase, zipping through Tokyo, hopping on a plane from Narita, coincidentally sitting next to a fellow JET-quitter and reminiscing our JET days that had ended 24 hours ago..........to landing in crummy Heathrow Airport, transfering to Manchester, going to the Lake District to spend 3 days with 14 long lost Warwick friends, walking up trecherous peaks, going go-karting, drinking tea and lots of bantering, pub lunches, walks with grandpa, and lazy TV dinners.

And there's more to come as I storm London tomorrow and Brussels on Saturday! Watch this space!

I am...

...a selfish bitch that never does anything for anyone but only expects people to do me favours.

Apparently.

Thanks for the reminder.

99

99:00:00

...and counting.

My apartment is still a mess, there are boxes and presents and flowers and things everywhere. There is dust under the desk, under the sofa, under the fridge, under the washing machine. There is dirt in the bathroom, toilet, entrance. There are still posters and pictures on the wall, unwanted manga on the shelf, junk in the cupboard...

Then there are parties to attend, BBQs to roast, drinks to be drunk, yakiniku to be grilled, sushi to be devoured, presents to be exchanged, tears to be shed...

IS IT REALLY POSSIBLE THAT I'M MOVING OUT OF ALL OF THIS IN 99 HOURS??!

OMG

Two weeks left in Japan!!!

It has definitely been too fast.

I want to stay.

I want to influence these kids more.

I want to see my church rebuild and reconnect to the community and revive this city.

But I also don't want to stay.

I don't want to feel like I should be doing much more for what I am paid.

I don't want to risk getting sick and tired of this place before I leave.

I don't want to keep doing something that's not really related to the career path I'm thinking of having.

I don't want to be stuck out here in the sticks without a drivers' license and have my mobility depend on other people.

I'm in a big bundle of emotional contradictions...

RANT

Last week was crap.

Or perhaps it just does because I am. And I'm an idiot.

All started on Monday the 21st. I get to the bike shed to find my bike missing from its usual spot. For 2 seconds I thought that it was stolen. And then I retraced my thought to the previous few days...and it dawned on me that I had left it at the bus stop on Friday afternoon when we had to go to the Board Of Ed that day. FREAKIN. So I had to speed-walk to the bus stop to get it because I had first period. And it also had to be the most humid day of the year so far, so I was literally drowning in my own sweat and self-reproach. So I finally get on my bike and bike to school, only to have a bug fly into my face and get stuck on the one-inch mixture of sweat and make-up. Eghh.

I got to school just on time. I was still sweating my eyeballs out. Ms Shoji was...being herself and 'dying' of the heat. I seriously think she needs to move out of Japan to somewhere more moderate. Anyway, we had to start the 1st period - with the special needs kids. Great. Ms Shoji and I had absolutely no plan at all. So we just went in and wing-ed it. They weren't too hard to satisfy though, fortunately.

All day I had been looking forward to our apartment-JETs-dinner-gathering at the Indian restaurant down by the waterfront. The thought of having naan and curry and mango lassi kept me alive through the 4 periods I had. Evening came and we all biked down in eager anticipation - only to find it SHUT and SHUT FOREVER. FML. The irony was they shut the day before, because there were 'no customers'. So we had to settle for Italian.

Tuesday the 22nd, which was exactly 24 years after I was born. We (the non-recontracting JETs) had to pay a visit to the Superintendent, the top BOE staff and the city mayor. We got introduced three times, said thanks/polite stuff three times, bowed many more times, and a crappy 'souvenir' from the city government. It was probably the hottest day of the year so far and we had to be in suits. Yuck.

Then I remembered someone once told me that on your birthday you can get a free scoop of ice cream at Baskin Robbins. So we made our way eagerly to Baskin Robbins in the hopes of a free scoop of SWEETNESS and COOLNESS in the sweltering heat. But when we got there, I was told you had to register onto their keitai (cellphone) internet site as a member which takes time and then it will take more time to get that birthday coupon. WHAT. What a STUPID idea. And so none of us got ice cream at the end. BR just shot themselves in the foot.

The day improved as I met a few friends for sushi for dinner (although one girl wasn't very happy either since she just lost her wallet and a whole load of money). Raw fish - always the best cure for crappy times. We then proceeded to Bar Quartet - the coolest most tasteful bar (and smallest) bar I've been to ever. We had vanilla chai and wonderful cheesecake (with candle, b'day song and all! Thank you Kotaro!) and lovely company.

Wednesday 23rd - I wasn't really looking forward to the kindergarten visit in the morning. And I was proved correct. It was another mucky wet sticky day, and I had to entertain 25 kids for 2 hours. Kids don't understand the concept of foreigner. So they just kept talking and talking and talking to me like I understood what they were ranting on about. I got about 60%. They also kept dragging me around and hitting me and hugging me and pulling my shirt. We then sang 'Head shoulders knees and toes 8 times', played 'what time is it Mr Wolf' and did some other stuff. By the end I had lost half of my voice. The taxi that was supposed to pick me up from the kindergarten at 10:30 didn't come. The kindy had to call for one again I had to wait at the entrance in the wind and (almost) rain til 11.

I also got an email from a friend who meant good when she was giving me advice on something but I interpreted it wrong (and I was feeling grumpy already) and got even more grumpy.

Thursday 24th - all the germs that the kids gave me yesterday were defeating me. My voice was half gone, my nose was spraying, my head was throbbing. I endured the day but was grumpy and looked like hell. I also had digestive issues...ugh.

Friday 25th - The week finally gets better - because I took today off from work. I slept, watched TV, got groceries, read some more of the book about the fall of modern Japan, and in the afternoon went into town, got dressed in a Kimono and went to the JETs farewell party thrown by the Board of Ed. I took many pics, and drank a moderate amount of alcohol and spoke to many people. Silver-lining!

Goodbye. Speech.

Principal, Vice Principal, teachers and students,

I can’t believe it, but I’ve been in Japan for almost 2 years, and in no time I’ll have to leave. Words cannot describe enough how wonderful an experience the last 2 years were. It’s something I can never forget. And I’m really glad that I was able to come to Ena Junior High School. From the beginning I’ve felt welcome, and I have enjoyed every visit to Ena.

Before I came to Japan, I thought I knew much about Japan already – sushi, manga, anime, salaryman, bowing again and again…but there was so much that I didn’t know. Experiencing ‘real’ life and traditions, sharing in your joys and pains, learning Japanese culture like Oyaji-gags…are irreplaceable experiences.

I’m not here to tell you to “DO YOUR BEST”, nor to tell you to “STUDY HARD”, but I simply want to quote a song I heard once in Japan.

きみは愛されるため生まれた (you were born to be loved)
きみの生涯は愛で満ちている (your life is filled with love)
永遠の神の愛は われらの出会いの中で実を結ぶ (God's eternal love is shown through our relationships)
きみの存在が 私にはどれほど大きな喜びでしょう (your presence gives me such a great joy)

I really felt your love for me. I’m grateful that you have treated me so well, just like family.

I want you to know that everyone is born to be loved, and hope that you will show other people the same love that you have shown me. You are always loved – by your family, by your teachers, by your friends, and by God in heaven.

I love Japanese people, I love Japanese culture and language. I want to keep studying Japanese, and hopefully I can make some Japanese friends when I go back.

I hope we can meet again some day in the future. I wish you a life filled with love and purpose.

Thank you.

Mah Crib

...or my £150 per month apartment, aka home/comfort zone/shelter/refuge for the last two years.

For those who didn't have the PRIVILEGE (or guts..) to come visit me here in Japan/Iwaki, I thought I'd show you all what you're missing out :P

First of all, my living room
(which is also used as the guest room when people DO visit...if people do visit....>_<)

Please excuse the mess.


Next, my kitchen. My typical Japanese tiny lack-of-counter-space and unreachable cupboards kitchen.

It's usually tidier than shown above...



Next, washroom.

This is where the magic happens. The magic that happens every morning where I transform from groggy messy sleepy pasty looking off-white girl to a less messy less sleepy less pasty wider-eyed looking off-white girl.

And last but not least, my 3rd favorite place in the apartment (after my bed and the shower)
- yes, the loo.

But it ain't no ORDINARY loo, if you look closer...or at the photo below...

Yes, it comes with buttons.
Buttons that will wash your..um..yeah.
As well as for girls, the..um...yup.
And buttons that adjust the temperature of the toilet seat
(warm toilet seat = BIG win in the winter )
as well as the temperature of the water that washes you.
And of course a 'save energy' button.


My bedroom is not very interesting. So no I'm not showing you my bedroom. Live with it.

So there you go!

What I will Miss. Or not. [School chapter]

It's quite random, but here it goes:

I will miss kids screaming "SAMANSA!!" or "HALLO!!" down the corridor when they see me.


And maybe even the them yelling "Suzanne!" (name of some idiot TV personality) by the 9th graders.


I will miss bumping into my former-students in downtown Iwaki and seeing their shocked look and their "OH! It's Samansa!".


I will miss kids writing "I love Samansa!" on little coloured paper for me.


I will miss kids yelling "I LOVE YOU!" to me in the corridor or in the mall downtown.


I will miss the kids' laughter in class after I've said something funny.


I won't miss the "I don't wanna be here" looks on most 9th graders face during a pre-lunch or an after-lunch English lesson.


I will miss certain competent English teachers who really know how to use me and engage the students.


I won't miss certain English teachers' bizarre/useless teaching methods which completely make me redundant in class.


I will miss staring out into the sparkling blue sea when the summer heat makes one day-dream every 4 minutes.


I won't miss the cold under-heated classrooms in the long freezing winter.



I will miss the funky poses and peace signs that automatically appear whenever I point a camera at the kids.


I will miss turning up to school on a Sunday and frightening the teachers (who are there to supervise sports activities) for going to school on a Sunday and then chatting to them for ages.


I will not miss going to Palace Iwaya for enkais. (3 times a year every year! Same place, same food, same overly-serious atmostphere...give me a break)


I will miss the Ena Junior High Principal teaching me Iwaki-accents/expressions.


I will miss the Ena teachers making fun of Mr Fujita for his 'cold' oyaji-gags.


I will miss the bland expression on the kids faces at Mr Fujita's feeble attempt at making a joke.

SAYONARA (Japanese version)

This is the speech I gave/will be giving on my last day at each school.
English version shall follow a bit later.

校長先生、諸先生がた、生徒の皆さん、こんにちは。

信じられないことですが、私が日本に来て、もう二年間も経ち、あっという間に帰国をしなければならなくなりました。　ほんとにすばらしい経験をしたこの２年間は、とても言葉にできないし、決して忘れることもできません。そして、この中学校に来れたのがほんとにうれしいです。最初からみんなが私を歓迎をしてくれたし、毎回の学校訪問もほんとに楽しかったです。

日本に来る前に、日本のことをいっぱい知っていたんじゃないかと思っていました。すしとか、漫画、サラリーマン、何回も何回もお礼することなど．．．しかし実は日本のたくさんのことをよくわかっていませんでした。日本の実際の生活や伝統を体験したり、喜びや悲しみを人々とわかちあったり、日本のおやじぎゃぐを習ったりしたことは掛け替えのない経験でした。

私は「がんばれ」とか「しっかり勉強しなさい」とは言いたくないです。ただ日本で聞いたある曲の歌詞の一部を皆さんに伝えたいと思います。

きみは愛されるため生まれた
きみの生涯は愛で満ちている
永遠の神の愛は われらの出会いの中で実を結ぶ
きみの存在が 私にはどれほど大きな喜びでしょう

私は皆さんの愛をほんとに感じました。皆さんが家族のようにとても親切にしてくれて、ありがたかったです。

私は皆さんが愛されるために生きていると覚えていてほしいと思います。そして、私を愛してくれたように周りの人々にも愛を注いでほしいと思います。みなさんはいつも愛されています。家族から、先生たちから、友達から、そして、天国にいる神様から。

私は日本人と日本文化と日本語が大好きなので、香港に帰国しても日本語を勉強し続けて、日本人の友達を作りたいと思います。

私はいつの日か、また皆さんに会えることを願っています。目的を持って、愛に満ちた人生を送ってください。

ありがとうございました。

My First Japanese Hospital Experience. i.e. TERROR

"Samansa Leezu, please go to exam room number 2"

I knocked, slid the door open, said good morning to the man in the white cloak and sat down. He gave me a brief glance, and turned back to look at his papers. He asked me how I got hurt, still looking at his papers, and I explained how I got that 1-inch long 0.5cm wide cut on my knee. He took a deep breath. He then turned to look at my knee, and I took off my make-shift wound-cover (which consisted of disinfected cotton for make-up-removal and a band-aid on either side to keep the cotton on my knee). He looked at it a bit, jotted notes, looked again, drew a picture of it, jotted more notes and sighed again. Throughout this whole time I couldn't see his facial expressions due to a massive surgical mask and a pair of thick glasses over his face.

"It says here....you got this cut...yesterday...!?"

"Yes."

He sucked his teeth.

"How did you do that?"

"I was running for the last train at the station, and fell on the stairs, and hit my knee on the stair." (But I caught the train! I didn't tell that to the doctor though.)

"Hm....since it's been over 6 hours since you did it, if we stitch this, there's a risk of it getting infected. It might fester. Pus. Ne."

"Oh......"

"But since it's the knee part unless we stitch it it won't really heal."

"OK...."

"So.....what do you want to do?"

I think this was the first time I ever got asked by a doctor what I want to do. Was he serious?

"Uh....I think it'd be good to get stitches. Can I get stitches?"

"Hmm........have you been disinfecting the wound since yesterday?"

"Yes."

"Hmmm....."

"So...stitches?"

"I think...that would be good."

FINALLY.

I was told to get on the narrow bed. I got on and lay down and waited while the nurse flustered around and faffed around getting the tools requested by the doctor, except perhaps she was being the Japanese subordinate and not being confident and authoritative and kept asking the doctor "is this it? No? How about this one?"

I rolled my eyes.

OK so we're finally ready. The doctor starts cleaning the wound. "Shodoku...ehh wound cleaning!" He said in wobbly English, pronouncing the 'ound' in 'wound' like 'round'. He pokes around my bruised and bleeding knee asking "does this hurt? Does this hurt? How about here?" And keeps asking even when I said YES to all those questions. He takes out a massive needle for local anesthesia and pokes my knee once, waits for a while, and then again, at which point I exclaim "woah again!?" (not expecting the 2nd poke). He replies, "oh, you felt that??" with a tone of surprise.

I was starting to get slightly more worried.

With my knee completely numb, it was stitching time. The nurse brought the doctor some stuff , and doctor replied, "is this all you have?...(mumble)..Hmm....(mumble to nurse)....kore, tsukainikui na - this is kinda difficult to use. But that's all we got? Oh well...shoganai - that's too bad."

I was nervous & in disbelief to the point of speechlessness and couldn't protest; and my knee was numb and wet with anticeptic so running away wasn't really an option.

With each stitch I tried to force myself to think of a different song so I can take my mind off what these so-called professionals are doing to my poor once-beautiful knee. But I couldn't. I felt defeated. I tried to accept my 'failure' and comfort myself and convince myself that it will turn out to be a 'cool battle scar' and/or a (slightly morbid) souviner from Japan. My knee was numb of pain, but I could still feel the pull of the thread through my skin. Doc tells me, "I can't stitch them up too tightly, as there's a small chance that it will fester. So....it's a little loose. OK?"

"Uh huh"

The ordeal was finally over. More anticeptic, then gauze, tape, and bandaged up. I hobbled back out to the reception and joined my friend Hi-chan who drove me to the hospital. I told her about what went on in that room, and we both gave each other looks of shock and disbelief. We vowed to never come back to a hospital ever again.

A week later I went back to the hospital to get the stitches out. That was not as bad but not good either. Next post.

Aunt Julie

I'm praying for you. Get well soon.

Backwardness of Japan (cont)

3. Perhaps I was a bit spoiled when in SSGC (my high school in HK), but even back then (8-10 years ago?) we had a PC in every classroom, as well as a projector, even though the teachers didn't really use them that much back then (I'm sure they use it more often now) . It was a bit of a pain in that first week when I had to do my self-intro presentations to the new 1st graders, that I had to lug my own laptop to school (in a tiny bike basket), drag the school TV across the corridor to each new classroom that I went to (all 8 of them), faff with plugging in the TV, the laptop, the connection between the TV & the laptop...in order to show students pictures of my countries and family and hobbies and so on. (But in that school they did have a spanking new widescreen flat TV)

4. No divisions in classes according to ability. Before they enter into Junior High School, kids have to sit a test to determine their academic levels, and then the kids are put into classes so that abilities are spread even across ALL CLASSES in the grade. These kids are then stuck with each other for every single class for at least one school year. So the kid who's slow at learning English or Math is taught at the same pace as the kid who's miles ahead in English or Math.

Side note (but related): In Japan kids don't properly start learning reading and writing English until 1st grade junior high (ie beginning of secondary school) (Although it is expected that most of them know how to sing/recite the ABC and read capital letters ABC). So last week in class kids were doing their "penmanship" book, writing capital & small letters in order. In this one class all kids were at around the letter 'm' or 'n', or at least supposedly. All was well until the teacher found a student who has finished tracing & writing all the letters all the way to 'z', and more (there were sections after to write simple nouns and sentences). Turned out that the kid did it all in Juku (Japanese cram school - attended by over 60% of Japanese kids, apparently). He was subsequently told off by the teacher in front of the rest of the class for, essentially, being ahead of the class. He was told that he had to get a new penmanship book - so that he'll have 1 for school and 1 for Juku. The teacher then told he rest of the class that they either follow the pace of the class, or they have to get a new book to do in their own pace/do in Juku if they want to be ahead of class. I suppose it's understandable that the teacher doesn't want some kids to be too ahead and finish the book themselves and end up having nothing to do in class and potentially disturbing others who are supposedly working hard.

But it also seems to send the message that being ahead of the class is not a good thing, that everyone should move forwards at the same pace. And this example shows exactly why classes need to be divided to accommodate the difference paces and abilities of each student.

I was walking around the class during of those penmanship lessons and spotted one girl with another open book underneath the penmanship book. IT was a notebook where she was already copying down contents of pg. 22 of the textbook (and that page happens to be on numbers, so she was writing down 'one, two, three...hundred' etc) while at the same time she was "following the rest of the class", writing aaa.....bbb....ccc.....ddd....

5. Back to toilets. In train stations or highway rest stops, there would usually be about 50% 'Western style' toilets (ie toilets as we know it), and 50% of Japanese style ie squat. Young and old alike used either. In less urban places (actually even in popular sight-seeing spots like big shrines and temples) it would be mostly squat toilets. 2 of my schools had 1 western style out of the 4 toilets. But 2 other schools had none. Even in the really nice, decked-out wedding hall/popular banquet venue (called 'Palace Iwaya'), squat toilets were carved into the washroom's marble flooring. (Although they did have western style too)

6. No central heating in schools, houses, pretty much anywhere. When winter rumbles in, so do the kerosene heaters are rolled out of their summer slumber in closets or garages, and there is an unmistakable scent of kerosene in the air. Kerosene brings me much comfort in the winter. Because it means the place I'm entering is warm. That (kerosene heaters) and / or the kotatsu.

Backwardness of Japan

Birthplace of highly intelligent robots, high-speed railway system, pioneer in high tech electronics and fashion trends and the source of some of the world's craziest and newest concepts and ideas, you can hardly call Japan "backward"...can you?

But in fact there are still many backward practices and things in Japan. They're not all necessarily bad. They're not all necessarily true for all parts of Japan but certainly true for where I've lived for almost two years.

At almost all of the schools I've visited, a few things have come to my attention
1. No intranet / central network
2. Use of blackboards and chalk
3. No computer and projector in classroom
4. No divisions in classes according to ability
.
.
1. Most teachers have their own laptops, but at most they are connected to the printers, and not the internet. Notices are circulated in old-school paper form, and not internet/intranet. Most of these notices don't even concern many of the teachers. But it is imperative, in Japanese culture, that every single teacher knows what every single thing that's going on in school.

I'd imagine the same in any Japanese company or government department, which diverts me to another point - the high collectivity value, or group mentality, or team concept, in Japanese culture, which is deeply rooted within all Japanese people. There was a meeting in the staffroom a couple days ago about the Taiikusai - Sports Festival. For ages each teacher who was designated the P.I.C. (person in charge) of each even would explain in detail about how each game is played to the entire staff.

(In Japanese junior high schools sports festivals, students don't do 'real sports' as we know it, but more like 'games' that involve physical input, e.g. 25-person jump rope; 3-people-4-legs, throwing beanbags in to a basket hoisted high up in the sky, a massive relay etc...And the point is that most of these games are not inter-grade competitions, but rather inter-class. So the 1st graders only compete with 1st graders, 2nd with 2nd etc.)

But beacuse of this need-to-run-everything-by-everyone-mentality, 1st and 2nd grade teachers end up having to listen to 3rd grade games' explanations, and vice versa, when in fact they have very little to do with it. I suppose this is just so that every single person knows exactly what will be going on that day and don't have the excuse of not knowing any single thing.


2. Chalk & blackboard. I don't know about other schools in other well-developed countries, but in my school in HK we gave up chalk and blackboards ages ago (10 years ago maybe?) and we used white boards and markers instead and don't have white dust flying all over the place or accidentally have big white hand marks on our bums. But not here in Japan. Not even in the school that was NEWLY BUILT (as in we moved into that school 5 months ago) - they had in built air-con, heaters in every classroom, new desks for teachers and students, BUT they still installed blackboards, and squat toilets - even in teachers toilets too. Sigh.

(others to come later...at a time when I don't have to get up in 6 hours time and make a 3 hour train ride)

Stinking Foreigners (Nagasaki. Days 6-9)

We stank in the car on the way the Beppu Mazda shop to return the car (it’s about time, I hear you say); we stank on the 3 hour bus ride to Nagasaki; we stank on the street-car to our hostel; we stank in the hostel even after showering; we stank in the pasta restaurant; we stank in our sleep.

The next morning we were supposed to be booked in for a cruise to Gunkanjima (Battleship Island), but just as we were leaving the hostel at 8am, I got a call from he cruise company saying that the weather conditions weren’t good, it would be too dangerous to go out, and they had to cancel that day’s trip. LUCKILY, we managed to get booked into the next day’s morning cruise.

[We were up and out so early, that none of the restaurants or cafes around the A-bomb monuments were open, so we had to settle for combini breakfast. And it took us forever to find that combini. And it was out of the way from the monuments/attractions that we wanted to see that day. Ah well.] We packed in lots of things that day - Nyokodou 如己堂, Urakami Cathedral, Peace Park, A-bomb Museum, A-bomb epicenter, the old Dutch housing (‘Holland Hill’ オランダ坂), Confucian Temple (孔子院), Ooura Cathedral, China Town, and wrapped it up by filling our tummies with famous Nagasaki Champon (Chinese style noodles).

Saturday 3rd April – We woke up to our last full-day in Kyushu. 8am, clear blue sky; we didn’t get a call from the cruise company, so we rented bikes from the hostel and rode down to the pier. We got to Gunkanjima in about 45 minutes.

Gunkanjima’s original name is Hashima. Gunkanjima literally means Battleship Island, because of the shape and its silhouette. It used to be a thriving coal-mining island, with mines going as deep as 1000m below sea level. It was once the most densely populated island in the world, but now it is a ghost town with crumbling buildings. The island's most notable features are the abandoned concrete buildings and the sea wall surrounding it. At one point, over 5000 people lived in this tiny island, 9 times the population density of Tokyo at that time. But as petroleum replaced coal in the 1960s, Mitsubishi stopped its mining activities at Gunkanjima and announced the closure of the island in January 1974. By April that year it was completely deserted.

We went ashore the island and were divided into three groups and were taken to three designated observation spots, and some members of the crew explained about the history of the island and what we were able to see and showed picture what it was like back in its ‘glory days’. It was creepy and strange but also wonderful. Surrounding the newly built concrete observation platforms of the observation areas were crumbling buildings and structures. Buildings with no glass, half falling apart; dilapidated structures, empty frames, a dried up swimming pool…It was hard to imagine how so many people could have lived here. But the existence of these buildings – apartment blocks, school, offices, gym, bath house, movie theatre, shrine etc. is stimulating and makes you want to imagine the sounds and the activity that happened here all those years ago. The whole experience was not so much creepy, but bizarre and extraordinary.


Back in the Nagasaki mainland, after lunch, we mozied on to Dejima. Dejima used to be an artificial island that stuck out from next to Nagasaki port. It used to be the Dutch trading zone, Japan’s only outlet to the outside world during its self-imposed isolation of the Edo period. But it’s no longer an island anymore due to land reclamation. And most of the buildings were knocked down. Only recently did the government make an effort to revive this significantly historical part of Nagasaki with reconstructed buildings and exhibitions of what the rooms might have looked like, with dug-up artifacts and donated or reconstructed equipment and exhibits etc.



After some tea and cake and shopping, we cycled to the bottom of Inasayama, a hill in the West of Nagasaki. A cable car ride took us up to the top of the hill, and offered us a spectacular view of the city of Nagasaki at night (apparently called the 10 Million Dollar Night View). Wikipedia says that “This is also a common place for young local couples to break off relationships.” Aahahaha. Aww dear.


On Sunday morning, we explored some of the local temples near our hostel, visited Meganebashi ('Spectacles Bridge'), bought last minute omiyage (souvenirs), had our last Nagasaki Champon and bid sayonara to wonderful wondeful Kyushu. It was truly an amazing trip. Kyushu has absolutely everything you need for a good trip - mountains, rivers, cities, volcanoes, castles, gorges, priceless views, abandoned concrete islands...! Amazing amazing amazing. I would readily go back anyday. Thank you Kyushu. Thank you God for his amazing grace and awesome creative power and giving me the opportunity to go and experience it. BIG LOVE!

“Fumikiri ga arimasu” Near death experience 3 of 3.

(Fumikiri = railway/level crossing)

(Kumamoto, Oita. Day 5)

I realize that when you put 3 easily excitable girls together, they get excited at almost anything. If you saw how wakuwaku we were in this random but utterly delightful bakery we found, you’d think we were high. High on yesterday’s sulphur perhaps.

Breakfast sorted, we journeyed to what was known as the ‘Las Vegas of Japan’ – Beppu, Oita Prefecture. I wish I had appreciated the fresh air more during our drive towards Beppu. We went from one sulphur-stinking town to another, even more stinky one. Beppu is literally covered in onsens and hot baths, with steam coming out from many of the buildings and even street gutters.

As soon as we arrived in Beppu, we headed straight for ‘Hell’. We bought our 地獄めぐり (Jigoku Meguri – hell tour) tickets and started at 海の地獄 Umi-no-jigoku (Sea hell), where the minerals made the water blue (hence the name). We proceeded to Oniishibozu jigoku (bubbling pools of hot mud); Yama-jigoku, where they had random animals (peacocks, hippo, llamas, elephant, flamingoes, chipmonks…); Kamado-jigoku (hot water pools that change colour); Oniyama-jigoku (here they had lots of crocodiles); Shiro-ike-jigoku (white pool); Chi-no-ike-jigoku (blood pool – red hot water); and lastly Tatsumaki-jigoku (a geyser that gushes out boiling hot water every 30-40 minutes for 5 minutes – we were lucky *again!* since the moment we stepped in the geyser went off, as well as the flashes of the dozens of cameras from a big tour-bus group of Chinese tourists and Japanese tourists, who had probably been waiting for ages to see the natural geo-thermal fountain.


After checking into our hotel and dara-dara-ing and deciding what to do, we set off to find this famous onsen (‘Hyotan onsen’) recommended by our hotel. We were already pretty tired, so after a hot SAND BATH and a good (normal) outdoor onsen bath, plus several plates 100-yen kaiten sushi later, we were so fura-fura during the drive back to the hotel that we didn’t realize the car navi telling us that there’s a fumikiri (level crossing) ahead. By the time we did, it was too late. “WAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!” we yelled, while Reicho ducked (yes, inside the car). Not only did we not stop, but we ran right through the crossing just as the bars were coming down. We had escaped death and destruction (of our rental car) once again.



Next morning, still a little shocked by the reality of our “giving Death the finger” experience, we drove (very carefully) to Beppu Hoyo Land, a famous (but somewhat dilapidated) onsen for a mud bath to take our minds off yesterday’s episode. Yes a MUD BATH. It was the strangest sensation. It wasn’t like the whole bath was filled with mud, but under a meter-deep of murky water is hot, soft, slippery mud. Your feet would sink into the mud a little bit, up to your ankles perhaps, and it would be quite hot at first, but if you stay still your feet get used to it, and its actually quite nice. But it was a mixed (men & women) open air onsen, and no towels were allowed in the water, so as long as you kept your body (and ‘bits and bobs’) under the murky water, you were OK. There was a special entrance for the women to let us immerse into the muddy murky water before going out into the ‘open/shared space’. The water was just about the right depth for your hands to reach the bottom, grab a handful of mud and spread it over your arms and neck and face. To be honest if I had known better I probably wouldn’t have done that – I don’t think they actually ‘clean’ it. You find all sorts of things in the mud – sticks, stones, leaves, hairs…let’s just leave it at that.

Another down side to the mud bath is that we REEKED of SULPHUR for the next 36 hours. Even after two showers.