Happy New Year!

Happy New Year of the snake!  

Today is the last day of my winter vacation.  How was your Holidays?  I had a great time with my family and friends.  In recent years, I had been away from home, working or travelling abroad, during the New Year season.  But this year, I decided to stay in Japan and spend this time of the year with my family and follow all the traditions that we have.  

On December 30th, we had our parents' 60th anniversary dinner at a nice restaurant.  My sister found that place and told me I would like it, and of course, my parents would have a good time.  She was right.  The restaurant was called Ukai-Tei, and the guests are guided into a private booth with a huge cast-iron hot plate, and a chef comes to each booth to cook for them in front of their eyes.  Sounds cool, right?  We were lucky to have a chef who is almost same age as my parents in our booth.  He was very skilled, cheerful, and entertaining.  The food was just amazing!  That dinner was for mom and dad, but I might have been the one who enjoyed the party the most ;)  Well, it was great to see my parents enjoying the gathering.  

On New Year's Eve, R and I went to the temple to see people hit the gong 108 times at midnight, we ended up lining up with other people to hit the huge bell. It is a tradition for Japanese people to ring this gong for 108 times on New Year's Eve to purify the past years sins.  (It is said that each person has 108 sins.  Yes, we are sinful people!!)  The gong at the temple looked like this.

You can see people lining up on the right.  Each one hit the gong once and pray for the good luck for the coming year.  I've heard the sound of the gong from the near-by temple in the past, but this was the first time for me to actually hit it by myself.  It was quick, but fun :)

The year-end and the New Year must have been the busiest cooking days for my mom.  She cooked a lot of food really nicely from osechi, Japanese traditional New Year's Day cuisine, to meat loaves.  We had my sister and her husband over, and we also invited R for the first time to a family gathering, and had a feast.  My sister played a nice role of being an entertainer, which I believe it was natural of her from being tipsy and happy.  Even my cranky dad looked happy to have all the family members (+1) at the same table.  Oh, and January 1st is my mom's birthday as well!  This year, six people sang happy birthday for her.

This year will be a challenging year for me.  I'm going to change my job and finally move out from my parents' place.  Yesterday, I went to the real estate agency with R to find an apartment.  I found one and have started the contracting process today.  I'm very nervous about this because I have never lived alone in Japan.  I'm sure I can take care of myself, but I have little idea about what I have to be careful to choose the place.  But at the same time, it is exciting to start something new and gain some independence.  If I really don't like the new apartment, it's not the end of the world.  I will move out :)

Today was the first day of my tutoring this year.  I have to quit this tutoring at the end of February due to my moving.  Luckily, the tutoring office has found another teacher who takes over my lessons.  My student is such a nice boy, so I hope he will get along well with the new teacher.  

Tomorrow, I'm going to be back to my regular shifts.  The New Year's resolution is, "Stay healthy and work hard!"

Xmas, Year end, snooZe, and the Alphabets are Over!

Christmas is over, and today, my work this year is also over.  I'm going to have a winter vacation!!  I couldn't wait for this days off.  Ah, November and December were quite busy.  I really needed a vacation.  

This will be the final update of this year, so I decided to quit this alphabetical order system. It just makes writing harder since I cannot come up with good topics in many cases.  I'm going to keep writing from time to time, hopefully more often, but I will choose whatever topic I would like to write about.  

To start my holiday, I'm going to visit Hakone tomorrow.  Me and R started to like onsen (hot spring) a lot this year.  It will be very nice to soak myself into a hot bath, especially in this temperature (6 degrees maximum during the day).  The weather is not really promising, but I hope we can see Mt. Fuji.  We have been trying to capture a nice picture of this big mountain since summer, but no luck yet.  (I once saw Fuji-san from the train, so it shouldn't be very difficult.) 

Have a happy New Year!  

W for "Wonderful Vacation"

Long long time no see! (or write?)  I abandoned this blog for so long, partly because I couldn't come up with a good topic to write about that starts from "w".  Well, but I have used this excuse too many times.  I admit, I was lazy.  

On the fourth week of September, I took a late summer vacation.  The destination was of course(?), Vancouver, Canada.  I haven't been there for two years.  Due to my short vacation, I only managed to stay there for 5 days!  Since the flight tickets were really overpriced, I doubted my decision to visit Vancouver at this time of the year, and at this timing.  But this trip turned out to be absolutely worth going.  I met my old coworkers, friends, and landlady, and they haven't changed much.  The best thing was that they remembered me as if very little time had passed since I met them last.  It was very heartwarming and inspiring experience to talk and catch up with them.  I remembered the reason why I have been clinging to the idea of going back to this place some day.  I love this place, and its culture really makes me free.  

I hear about severe employment situation in Canada, might be worse than Japan, so I decided it was not a clever thing to leave my job in Japan and become a student again without any future prospect.  I feel like a wimp for giving up my dream, but this trip gave me hope.  I realized that I can come back to this place again, even though I'm not a resident.  And this town and this city and my friends will welcome me again.  The important thing is not to forget that there are various ways to choose in my life, and as long as I appreciate and become open to the change and inspiration, I will be able to live my life fully.  

In the end, I am honestly thankful for all the people in Vancouver who made my stay very special, and my loving R who made me excited about coming back home. :)

Beautiful Vancouver Downtown

False Creek 

The sunset from North Vancouver

  

V for "Various"

Working with people from different culture is very exciting and interesting, but at the same time, it's very stressful sometimes.  When I was a foreigner in Canada, I adapted pretty well to its culture, so I don't think I annoyed someone because of my custom or way of thinking. There are various habit and values in the world and they don't always agree with the ones in another country.   
However, I'm thankful that I'm in the environment that I can see difference between Japan and other countries.  What I learned abroad is to accept the way the culture is even though you don't like it.  If you make a choice to stay there, you have to put up with small things that you feel inconvenient or illogical.  Only people who did this successfully can adapt themselves to the foreign country they live in. 
I tend to be too harsh on foreigners who criticize Japan a lot and still claim they love this country, but I should realize that they are from different surroundings and have totally different thought circuits.  If I want to get along with those people, I should just let them be and admit they are not the same as I am.  A rainbow consists of seven different colours, lying side by side, and it looks beautiful.  Maybe society works just like that.

 

U for "Unbelievable!!"

Sneezing, blowing the nose hundreds times a day, and closing the eyes in irritation...  That was me today at the office.  It seems like the hay fever is attacking me!  I didn't use to be allergic to pollens.  Sometimes this kind of allergic reaction happens when I'm about to catch a cold or almost getting rid of one.  I thought I'd recovered from the cold, but then, these annoying symptoms started.  I cannot live even a few minutes without tissues.  I'm hoping that this is just an evanescent thing, and I'll be OK as I completely get rid of the cold.  Just in case, I took some Chinese medicine (this is the only allergy medicine that I could find which doesn't have a substance that makes me sleepy).  If it doesn't work, I'll take some of my mom's allergy pills.  Agh, this is SOOO unbelievably stressful!!

T for "Twilight"

Have you seen the movie, "Twilight," and its series?  I haven't.  And I have never been interested in any of the movies themselves nor the actors and actresses in them.  But I was wondering if the stories are that interesting since this series has been very popular in Canada, and probably in Japan as well.  The actual books might be interesting to read, and they must be easier for me to read than Davinci Code or some other novels aimed at adults.  But they are too expensive to collect for my brief interest.  Then today, I found them in the local library!  It was a surprise.  Why hadn't I thought about this?  Luckily, this library has decent variety of English books.  I should come here often though the location is not very convenient to drop by.  The only problem is, I won't be able to finish reading within two weeks, which is their loaning period :(

S for "Seventeen Hours"

The message surprised me
With an old buried memory
 
It was long gone kindness
That I had left to you with loneliness
Angelic smiles only your eyes saw
Not the sadness that I gnaw


You still look around the building lobby 
Half wishing to find me waiting
Sit in the bus that crosses the bridge
Thinking about a girl once beside leaning


She will never be found anyway
Because I'm seventeen hours away


Awoken from dreams
Your soothing blanket has gone
Bittersweet remembrances
Stored away in mind