A new toy!

A few weeks ago, I realized that I really wanted to upgrade my camera. I started talking to my parents about it to see what they thought – my original plan was to pay off my student loans before I bought a new camera.
They encouraged me to go for it.

After a lot of debate, I ended up deciding on the Nikon D5100.
(Photo found here)

When it arrived, I found that it came in typical amazon.co.jp packaging and that the Amazon box was about twice the size of everything I ordered. Then, it was shrink-wrapped and stuck to a piece of cardboard. Once I got that open, I also had the fun of opening all the tiny boxes that come in the big Nikon box. But the surprises were good and once it was finally out of the packaging, I had a new camera to try out. So I grabbed my camera and my bike and went out for a photo-ride.

Here are some of the results.

My first shot: a dandelion. I liked the way the light was hitting it. Though it surprised me because the thing I was most unsure about with the D5100 was the screen that moved. But it was super helpful with this shot.

A rock

I took a bunch of others, but these were my favorites. Keep watching my flickr page to see more recent photos.

Spring Sakura

Here are a few pictures of the spring Sakura (Cherry Blossoms) that were blooming in and around town a week or two ago.

The first two were taken in Furano on my way home one Sunday, along with one that was posted on flicker within the last week.

This one was taken overlooking a part of town.

This one is near our lake.

I like Sakura season in Japan, but it’s very short and we don’t have a lot of Sakura in town. Apparently they aren’t good for potato crops.

A fun prank

Everyday after school, my students clean the school. During that time, my job is essentially to be present. If I offer to help, I'm almost always turned down.

So, I generally make it my job to do ridiculous ALT things.

Today I was closing the door that the students go into to take out the recycling, and then standing in the way of them opening it again - this is a door with clear windows, so the students could quite easily see who was causing trouble. But in true crazy ALT fashion, I pretended not to notice that they were asking me to move out of the way (at least the first time).

The first student had a good laugh. The next made opening motions (and didn't squish my toes trying to open it). The last student was the best though. She is a first year and is generally very shy. She was laughing so hard she almost fell over.

My conclusion is that laughter is our common language.

Shogi

My elementary school had clubs today. They could choose between cooking, games and art.

I joined the games club, they were playing Shogi, like chess and very complicated.

When I first glanced at the board, I thought all the tiles had the same kanji on them and wondered how one is supposed to tell the tiles apart. Turns out they all have very stylized, very hard to tell the difference between kanji on them.

From what little I know about chess, this game seems quite similar.

Anyways, I watched my second grader beat the vice principal (it was the second-grader's first time playing). Then he got to play against me. It took forever because I had to keep looking back at the kanji, comparing them to the pictures and figuring out what they did. Apparently in Shogi, you can bring tiles back from the ones you've captured.

My second grader was taking out tons of my pieces. So I brought back one of the tiles that goes straight and took out the piece he was conquering the board with.

At that moment, my fifth grader came in and said "Rebecca!" and pointed to the fact that I could win the game that had felt super long to me. So I did!

When we finished we got to go sample the tako-yaki the cooking club had made. It was delicious and a wonderful way to spend a sunny afternoon.

After Graduation

The teachers celebrated with an enkai (a dinner party). I was told we were going to a Soba shop. I wasn’t super excited about spending about $30 on Soba, but I was excited to spend time with my teachers, so I decided to join in.

I was quite surprised (in a good way) that the dinner that night was not actually Soba, but a regular enkai.

(sorry for the not amazing quality of photos I have, this camera didn’t do such a good job).

My favorite moment was when the mayor and the head of the BOE showed up, unexpectedly. They sat down and we “kampai”-ed again (cheers!) with them. It was a fun night of celebrating with the teachers.

A frustrating moment with a giggle

I got to play another round of “are you even listening to me?” with a phone call to another customer service company.

This time, Ebay. I had some relatively stupid issues with the site, and needed help resetting my password. (sparing all of you some relatively unexciting details).

I got put on hold for the second time and began to peruse my google reader feed.

That’s when I found this (and I wasn’t expecting the punch line): 

Zits never stops making me want to giggle.

Earthquake

On Friday afternoon at about 2:45 Japan had an earthquake, which has now been determined to be magnitude 9, the strongest earthquake Japan has experienced (since they've been measuring). I was siting at my desk when my school started to shake, though nothing like in the areas around Sendai (see map below).

For my area, it was like being on a boat, everything was shaking, yet nothing was falling. It was kind of exciting. After it was over, I did what I always do and got online to find out how big it was (yes, I've felt other earthquakes, but never as big as this). Usually earthquakes in Japan do relatively little damage and are kind of exciting. I knew this one was different though, when we experienced so many aftershocks - not even very many compared to those near Sendai.

Following the earthquake and the aftershocks, we started watching TV at school and spotted the Tsunami warnings. Luckily, I live inland and far from the earthquakes. My live has been relatively unaffected.

The earthquake has caused a huge mess near Sendai. If you have resources to give to the Red Cross or another reputable agency which can move funds over to help, every little bit will be appreciated by those who have been affected.

The map below shows about where I live and where the earthquake was. I am lucky to be in a place that has been impacted very little.


View Earthquake in a larger map