Basuketoboru

Today has been highly productive, I think. Many things were accomplished, and I feel relatively good about things. One of the JTEs (Japanese teachers of english) is coming over to my place later to help me out with the internet. HOORAY. I'M SO HAPPY.

Plus, I have the day off tomorrow. Granted, it's a forced vacation and really, I'd rather just go to school (and play kyuudo) but oh well. Tomorrow will also be my "get stuff done" day. I have plans. Mostly housekeeping things, like getting my re-entry permit since I can visit things during daylight hours.

I also want to go back to korakuen garden. I've wanted to see it ever since Paul & Ava put up pictures and told me it was in Okayama. It's actually really really pretty, and I even bought a year pass to the gardens. I want time to go down there by myself and just relax, enjoy nature, and think. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's cool with friends, but I've always found something peaceful about gardens. Same thing with aquariums, during non-busy hours. It's just peaceful.

I had no idea I liked gardens and stuff so much haha. I mean, I know I love aquariums. I will pilgrimage to a city that has a great aquarium, just like how I'm planning on visiting the aquarium in Osaka as well as the aquarium in Okinawa. I'm really really excited for that one! X)

But gardens... as someone pointed out to me, I really like them haha. I won't quite make the trek out to find that awesome garden, but if there's one in town, there's an 80-90% chance that I will want to see it, and make the trip out to go visit it. It's weird. I don't... love flowers or grass really. But gardens are peaceful. In Panama, I even went out on an adventure to try and find the botanical gardens near Panama City. And holy crap, was that an adventure. We ended up going to this park area, hiking, finding red ants, taking a taxi out to the real botanical gardens, found out that it was more like a zoo with lots of green leafy things around it, went around and looked at the animals, saw wild monkeys, debated about taking the (supposedly dangerous) bus back, couldn't figure out when the bus was, ended up hitch hiking since we couldn't speak spanish and had no idea how to find a cab since it was kind of in the middle of nowhere, hitchhiked back to NOT panama city, ended up in the City of Knowledge, found other members of the scholar ship, and hitched a ride on the bus back with them to our ship.

Yeah that was an adventure. And an awful sentence and poor display of English. Oh well. :)

The point is, I like gardens, and some of them have given me very memorable... trips.

Oh yeah though. I got kinda sidetracked (something that is quite rare for me...). I finally got the nerves to ask if I could join the girls in practicing basketball! It took the foreign exchange student, Axel Lee (who was born in Singapore) to get me to follow him to the gym and shyly ask the girls team if I could practice with them.

Also, note to self, don't run without shoes for prolonged periods of time. It is painful. My feet sting, cause I was rebounding for them for a little bit and doing some of the drills with them. In my nice work clothes too haha. That wasn't smart. I think I'm going to have to start bringing an extra pair of shoes and change of clothes. Sigh... just when I thought things were going to get simple, I have to go and make it complicated.

I'm really excited though, because it's finally a way I can exercise. I'm horribly out of shape. Kyuudo club is also going to lend me one of their rubber bows (gomuyumi) to strengthen my arms with. Hopefully, between kyuudo and basketball, I will slowly yet surely get back into shape. I hope.

It kind of makes me think though. As JET participants, part of what sets us apart from others is that we're suppose to not only teach, but also... what's the word... propegate? Encourage? Encourage the exchange of culture between our own and Japan. That means joining clubs, because not only are we learning things, but, we also get more exposure to the students, and can start building relationships. Part of the whole cultural exchange is building relationships with Japanese people (and other foreigners!) I think. It's an important part of what we do. God my feet hurt right now. But the more that we can do, I think, and the more we can "hang out" or whatever outside of class in the clubs and stuff with our kids, the more... we're actually working.

This basically means, that unless we're staying in our houses all day, really, we're always working. Depressing thought? I'm not sure. But I mean to have fun with it. :)

That being said, I need to LEAVE WORK. X)