Having expected this week to be a week of wallpaper-staring boredom I've actually been pleasantly surprised. After Monday's shenanigans in the city there was our severely dwindling eikaiwa (teachers: 2, organiser: 1, attendees: 2- oh dear) on Tuesday, followed by the night of staring at wallpaper (actually spent singing -jing- my leg hairs under the lovely kotatsu heated-table contraption and then last night was a marathon. After a day of making snowflakes at elementary school with 5, 6 and 7 year olds I had a nice evening planned. Do the washing (laundry) and take it to the launderette to dry it, then go to dinner with Christine, Jeremy, Kapo-chan and Jaco at Wakaba.
Well, the launderette was a dream, and the experience added to the long list of things you can do in Japan that you can't do elsewhere:
#8,912 Leave your car unlocked while you go into the launderette
#8,913 Leave your wallet on a random counter while you wander about trying to get change from a machine
#8,914 Drive away leaving 80% of your clothing in a dryer knowing they'll still be there when you get back 45 minutes later.
Although how much of this is because I live in the countryside I do not know.
Anyway, I collected and dropped off my lovely clean and almost crease free washing and headed to Wakaba for a really, really good meal with good company which at one point included a drunken old man with only 2 teeth that couldn't be further apart if they tried. This added to the overall effect as his tongue had a life of it's own and seemed to be doing the hokey-hokey while he repeated 2 of the 4 words of English he knew over and over to Christine who had a suitably disgusted look on her face. You would look appalled too if an old man stood over you repeating, "young", making a licking motion with his tongue, saying "beautiful" and following it with more licking motion. I just sat there laughing with tears streaming down my face. Rude, possibly, but keeping a straight face was impossible.
After a few drinks someone suggested karaoke, so we headed to Katsuyama karaoke bar, a place that becomes less grand by the minute. I could feel it deteriorating while we were in there. But they have upgraded their machines and have many more songs than before which is always a good thing. And due to popular demand our 1 hour slot became 2 and we drank lots more and when the singing turned to screaming turned to croaking we knew it was time to leave. So we all headed home, me marvelling at how the extremely hard-frost/ dusting of snow made the world look like someone had rubbed it with a glitter stick.
I somehow managed to spend an hour faffing about finally going to bed at 3 am and waking up soon after thinking I may be too drunk to go to school. But no, here I am with more free time. Such a difference from yesterday's making snowflakes and answering questions like "can you eat Japanese sushi". Still, after 17 months, people aren't bored with asking that. Kudos to them. Or something...
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it's not just because you live in the countryside. it's the same in the city. people leaving their car engine running while going into the convenience store. bags of shopping in the bike basket while entering another shop. i bet if someone left a big sign on their house saying "going on holiday for a week, feel free to burgle me" and left their doors and windows wide open, nothing would happen. that's what makes japan so special!
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