Photo Challenge Day 14–a photo challenge kind-of fail

March 14: Eye-level

Nothing of interest was at my eye-level today until this came up. It’s not really a photo of anything but my computer screen, but it gave me a scare for a bit. Thankfully it decided to participate in life again after a few minutes.

When it did, I created a recovery DVD. Happy, happy recovery DVD. If I get this screen again, I can fix it!

Also, I am currently backing up my computer with SyncToy. Why did it take me 3 months to get around to this???

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Another fun day, which ended in the baseball boys yelling incomprehensible things to me across the school – I have no idea what they yelled, but I gave them an I have no idea what you’re saying look and the teacher who was with them gave me one too.

Also, I had HEC practice with my high school kids this afternoon. We played Allie’s ‘The Best Game Ever’ which is every bit as fun as you’d expect. We were rolling around laughing by the time it was done. I’m playing this game earlier in HEC training next year because it also gave us a chance to talk about what a complete sentence in English is (subject verb object).

On top of both of those fun and silly things, the sun was shining today. Though I’d like more snow for boarding, I know that it’s short lived. Soon I’ll be ready for spring and cycling, but not quite yet. : )

An apple!

I came to school the other day to find this on my desk:



I feel like a real teacher, though teachers in Japan don’t usually get apples. I think it was omiyage (a souvenir) from another teacher’s recent trip. But it was a fun find on my desk and had such pretty colors!

Wakkanai

Last month, I went to Wakkanai on a business trip – to a team teaching conference. I went a bit early and spent the weekend with a good friend – which is what the majority of these photos are.
E has a new nephew arriving soon, so she was modeling some of the things she was considering sending over for the new baby.



E also decided she was 10 years old and had to jump instead of using the stairs. I couldn’t resist catching it on film (or, um, digital sensor).



I was amazed when we came around the corner in Wakkanai and found the sea of solar panels, I couldn’t seem to capture them in a way that made them stand out, but to the right of the road and back is where they’re at.



We took two separate pictures thinking later we could photoshop the two together . . . but I’ve since realized I have no idea how to go about doing it.

After a quick around that building, we headed outside to play on the playground. E was curious about this slide and decided to go down it.



When I said “go” she stayed there for a few seconds before I said, I’ve just taken ten photos of you in that position, you have to go!



After playing on the slides, we headed for the main playground. We found this teeter totter, we each stood on one bar and took turns jumping and coming down to get the other person to fly a bit. It was good fun and good for our abs too, I’m sure.



Then we found the big spider web-y thing and climbed in it. E went way up high in it.



I didn’t get so high, but I did have a lot of fun photographing E from new angles.



The playground as a whole, though you can’t actually see the big slides from here.



We decided to go on a short hike, but we weren’t sure which trail to follow – the one up to the look out or this one to a mystery location.



Here' comes E!



E’s queen of Wakkanai shot . . . she takes this job quite seriously.



Guess being a dancer is a part of the job description?



Course that means we need to take some jump shots, right?



Then we went to see the swans, since they had gone north for the summer.



But they had been fenced off because of past bird flu issues. I thought the light on the fence was really pretty.



That same light was also really pretty on E.



We were a bit cold, so we went in search of warmth, and where better than a coffee shop? I got a Vienna tea. Which basically meant they put whip cream on top. It made the slightly bitter straight black tea sweet and nice.



E is great at being cute with her coffee.



Me, not so much.



We had a really fun day of freedom before the conference the next day. A couple of hours after this, we headed to the station to pick up those who were also staying at E’s place that night. We proceeded to have a really fun night of dinner, games and fun.

HEC Replacement Therapy, part 2

After camping at the beach, we headed into Sapporo to go hang out around the beer festival.

R was of course rolling her eyes at the cameras coming out.



Camera war! I think we were both going for the same shot and then shot each other instead, when we realized the other would be in the background.



N, the creeper.



Not sure what L & N were doing, but it was cute.



Being creepy again.



I think she hurt her finger.



H taking her own self-portrait.



Here’s mine.



Another fun shot.



In the end we did get to meet some HEC students, they were doing their own HEC replacement therapy with their ALT – an English dinner at a burger place in Sapporo. It was fun to talk to them and even crazier to find that their school is bigger than my town!



It’s sad to see so many of my friends leaving Hokkaido and moving all over the world and to have to say goodbye. Even so, I’d love to travel all over the world and visit all of them in the future.

One last adventure, part 2

After our travels on Yagishiri island, in my earlier post, H, R and I continued on to Teuri Island.


View Larger Map

When we got off the boat, we were greeted the man from our Hostel who had worried when H called, in perfect Japanese, if we could speak enough Japanese. He loaded our stuff into a cart and then accompanied us to the bike rental shop.

We rented bikes from the very kind people in the shop, who almost acted as though we were the only foreigners to have ever come to the island (I’m certain this isn’t true because I have friends who recommended coming to the island).

Then, we met the island’s police man.



He warned us that recently there had been a few accidents with visitors when they decided to cycle the island (as we had decided to do) and rather than stop to look at the scenery they took their eyes off the road. He cautioned us to be careful and if we wanted to look, to pull off to the side and stop.

Both he and the cycling shop warned us that we would go around a corner of fairly easy riding and then it would be steep riding for about 3k. We set off, following the directions to make sure we had water with us before we got to the steep part.

But, as expected it got steep, too steep for either H or I to stay on our cycles for long.



R on the other hand has been doing lots of insane rides lately and was able to stay on her bike slightly longer.



The view from near the top made the ride very much worth it (though we did consider jumping in a few times, but decided not to as we’d have to get back up).



Though it’s not an amazing picture, look at how blue the water is.



As we cycled the island, we ran into our cop friend several more times. Our conclusion is that with about 350 people on the island he doesn’t have enough to do, so he make sure the tourists are ok.



From the top, we went out to a viewpoint, where we were able to see many kinds of sea birds.

When we got to the Ryokan we had decided to stay at, we were amazed to find that it looked straight out on the docks.



After a quick shower, it was time for dinner.



Dinner was full of fresh seafood and uni (sea urchin). Unfortunately for us foreigners, the uni was still moving. Every time we touched it, the tentacles started moving. I was quite afraid to eat it.

Thankfully the ryokan owner came in to check on us and see if we knew how to eat it. When we responded that we did not, he came over and showed us how to break it open.



Unfortunately, it still continued to move. Despite this problem, I did manage to taste some of it (you eat the orange-ish part). It wasn’t bad, but it sort of tasted like sea-pudding, mostly just salty. It wasn’t bad and I can eat it, but it’s not something I’d choose on purpose again.
When we finished, we headed out for a walk and to see the sunset.





I’m not sure if this picture is going to do it justice, but it was a gorgeous sunset. Including a view of Mt. Rishiri.



On Monday morning, we woke up to another yummy Ryokan breakfast.



Though, I was surprised to find that the egg in the middle was raw. Apparently you’re supposed to mix it with rice and soy sauce.



I’m not sure I’d call it good, but it definitely wasn’t as bad as I had expected.

After breakfast, we gathered our things, returned the bikes and set off once again on the ferry.

Unfortunately, the clouds were low, so we had a soupy sort of fog to look at as we returned.





We made it back to the mainland after a fun weekend, anticipating the next weekend (and bit of the week) to be filled with English Camp and more fun last times together.