Help! Help! I'm being opressed!

Sunday, July 29, 2007

The heat here is absolutely amazing. It's the most opressive thing I have ever experienced! I'm sure I wrote about this when I had first come here but I just can't get over it. I wake up around 6:30 and just going to the bathroom has me drenched in sweat. I can't keep my apartment cool either!

It's time for Nina to buy an industrial sized fan.

In other news, I'm sitting at my desk of this fine Sunday morning. 'Why' you ask? Because this weekend has been devoted to parent teacher meetings which means that all teachers must report for duty both Saturday and Sunday. For me, I had no meetings to attend but Monday and Tuesday are mandatory vacation days so I could either take off of work and have a 4 day weekend or save my free days and come into work.

Obviously, I chose the latter.

It's when a whirlwind of excitement let me tell you. I'm now half way through Harry Potter 6 (again) and I've begun studying for the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (hence forth known as the JLTP) Level 3. I really don't think I'll pass but I'm going to try my best.

Also, in the news today, I have finally recieved my new used computer!!!

I came in the other day and practically threw a tantrum at my old machine. The teachers saw this and decided to finally help me out in this department and the Network Admin finally hooked me up. I am now running XP and I am very VERY pleased.

The only problem is that I am no longer an administrator myself (I have mommy and daddy controls) so I can no longer install software which means if I want to install:

Quicktime
Firefox
Java
MS updates
WinRar
Google Toolbar
Change the time on the clock which is annoyingly 15 minutes off
Whatever else sparks my fancy...

I have to get the network admin in here to do it for me.

Words can not describe how much of a pain in the ass that is. I think I'll learn to live without. For now, my computer no longer crashes when I close MSWord (o^u^o) I couldn't ask for more!

I'll be in the states in 8 days!!!

Say What Who?

Thursday, July 19, 2007

Once again I've waited too long to update my blog. So instead of going on with a long winded description of a single event, I'm going to write about a bunch (and I use the phrase loosely) of things that have happend starting from most recent to least recent and I'll put in extra details when I feel like it.

Cheers!

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As of this afternoon, I'll be completely done with teaching classes until September.

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I have this special thing with the students at Odochi where if they do something I think is special, I give them 1 or 2 Nina Dollars. They look like this:

For the most part, I don't think the students actually knew what they were for but I had in mind that I would hold an auction maybe every term (there are three total) and I would let them buy candy and maybe one really expensive but pretty cool American toy.

Well, when the Largo guys came, they left me with a bunch of really cool presents to give to people. The had so many donations for people in America (such as the devil rays, Eckerd college and Disney) that they had too much to give to people. So I got the leftovers. On top of all that really cool stuff, Adam decided that since he's leaving he needed to clean out his apartment and I got some more cool stuff!!!

So needless to say, when I held my auction yesterday, the kids got spoiled rotten.

However, the best prize out of all the prizes was an old nasty box of Jelly Belly Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans. It was absolutely hilarious to see the students stick a bean in their mouth and cringe. After a while, I asked one girl if maybe it was just too sweet for her and that was why she was cringing. I thought maybe it was actually a good bean but the American flavor was just too much for her. She turned to me with the most disgusted face ever and said, "No. This is definitely NOT sweet". Hahaha, she was eating a grass flavored bean too.
HAHAHAHHAHA

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An earthquake hit on Monday. I didn't know about it. I didn't feel it. I've had at least 3 people email me about it. But no one seemed to notice the typhoon that directly hit my area. (Not that I expect anyone to!)

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Monday we had a holiday so that made it a three day weekend. I had some major plans to go camping with some friends but Saturday started out with the first typhoon of the season. It's pretty funny actually. Everyone was really sort of scared but from what I could tell, it was just a tiny thing. Nothing like what we get in Florida!

HA! I laugh in the face of a numbered typhoon. It is nothing like our hurricanes with human names!

At 9pm it was set to hit my town exactly and by 9:30 the rain stopped and suddenly....nothing. It just decided to die right then and there. And that was the end of it. Sunday was beautiful and that is the end of that disappointing story.

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I had originally planned to go camping with Nick and a girl named Son. She's a Korean CIR and came on JET in April. I first met her at the Sayonara Party. She was talking to a few people so I walked over to join the conversation. She was sitting down where as I was standing and she looked up with the most puppy dog eyes and fervently told me in Japanese, "I'm not Japanese. Everyone thinks I'm Japanese. I'm not. I'm Korean. I came in April," and then turned back to the other people and kept the conversation going.

Basically she could pass as being Japanese. Her Japanese is amazing. She doesn't know a lot of English but we still get along pretty well.

On Sunday the would-be-camping crew went out to Katsurahama (the beach) to see what had washed up on shore. But the conversations we were having must have looked so interesting! Nick (also a CIR) would be chatting away with Son in Japanese and I would pipe in with English and Son would understand enough to comment back in Japanese. It really is a very ethnic group! A Korean, American and Australian!

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This is how I've been feeling most of the time:


Completely smitten with life now that I have a car.

And btw, don't ask how that's going. On the 6th my license will expire. On the 7th, I'll be on my way home for 2 weeks. When I get back, I'll have a hellava time getting that damn Japanese license. Don't ask because I'm stressing as it is and I'll bite your head off with a whole explanation of what a bs system the Japanese have going here. And trust me, knowing the craptastic Japanese system should be on a need to know basis only and believe me when I tell you, you don't need to know!

It doesn't matter.

Whoo! I've got a car!!!!

Cars, Parties and Bottoms!

Sunday, July 1, 2007

This past weekend was the Sayonara Party for all the JETs that are leaving in July and August. It was on top of a hotel at a beer garden. The theme was Good vs. Evil and I have some excellent pictures that I'll post later. I went as an angel because I'm cheap and knew that I'd be staying sober. That's right folks, I bought my car from a leaving JET who was attending the party. She drove it in and I drove it out.

But before that, on my way to the actual party, dressed in said costume, about a 40 minute ride by train from home, I got a call from the Theif.

Theif: Nina, did you meet up with your supervisor?
Nina: .........no....why?
T: Because you're 20 minutes late and he was supposed to pick you up.
N:.... huh?
T: The party is tonight! You know, the drinking party that we have after doing something important. This time, it's to thank everyone for doing such a good job with the Largo Exchange. The principal really wants you to come!
N: ......
T: I guess Twitchy-sensei forgot to tell you.
N:Yeah I guess so.

I could kill. I'm talkin' first degree murder. They will see it coming and no one will be able to stop me. I even TALKED TO MY SUPERVISOR THAT SAME DAY about how I had this really cool Sayonara party to go to. Does anyone ANYONE mention a party for the Largo exchange? Not a one. Not a single fucking one. Out of 6 JTEs and a principal, vice principal, and office lady, whom I know all attended because they were all very involved, no one said a word.

whatever

Switching gears!

I got my car!!! And I'll post pictures later. For now, I'm too busy trying to figure out how to drive on the left side of the road. You'd think it would be easy enough to think left lane, left lane, left lane. But there's a whole lot more that goes into driving on the wrong side of the road. My entire car is mirrored! I tried to turn on the blinker and the windshield wipers go. I turn around to back up and I have to turn to my left, not my right. It's kind of a weird feeling to say the least. All my muscle memory is now wrong!

But I'm getting the hang of it I think.

I decided that I wanted to go and do things that I couldn't before I had a car so I took Erinn around to a few places. We went shopping at a great Jeans place, had dinner at an American style steak house called Bikuri Donkey (Surprise Donkey...as in Donkey Kong) which is only a chain in Japan but was cute anyway (^_~)v

She also had a coupon for a spa so we decided to go in and get a massage. Everything in the place was from Indonesia and they specialized in aroma therapy. I chose a scent called Power and smelled like citrus and sandalwood. Very nice. So I got the complete naked rub down which included my butt!!!! She asked if it was alright before we started but I was still surprised anyway. I walked home with sandalwood oil all over and it felt and smelled so nice (^^) I think I'll go back but...well, at $50 a pop, maybe not so often.

For now, I'll continue driving like a madwoman down the road at 30 miles an hour! (speed limit is 40 at the best of times. Whoo I'll be flyin!)

 
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