Big fat post

Apologies in advance if this one is a little hard to read, I've written a whole load of stuff while my internet was down for two days (think my neighbour went away) So I wrote it in word, and well... it kind of piled up a bit! I've divided it up into two sections, first day of work and partying in Japan.

FIRST DAY OF WORK

Friday was my first day of work, I have come home exhausted, but feeling satisfied, even though I have a big bruise on my head. Now more than ever I appreciate the importance of communication here. Whether in English, Japanese or body language (lots of that going on hehehe.) Normally I work over at the hospital clinic/ care centre but I started on a Friday, which meant I was at the nursery, over at the other end of town. It’s strange how children the world over are so similar. I was put in to work with one of the youngest groups, the two year olds, and found that all the funny faces that work in the UK work on children here. The Japanese as a society are quite shy normally, so these active and noisy children were quite a surprise. It was also amazing that, despite how different I was to everyone else there, this didn’t seem to bother them at all, and was instantly accepted as just another member of staff. It makes me wonder what changes in growing children’s mind that makes them shy of foreigners later in life? Discipline was handled in a different way, the children had set activities to be doing throughout the day, which changed continually, from playing with toys in the morning, to going for a walk, to eating, sleeping, playing with toys, going outside again. If one of the children started getting toys out during food for example, they would at first be ignored and allowed to carry on, but after a few minutes if they continued would be given a stern telling off (by two year old standards) Other things that I found strange at first is that the staff just let the children climb all over them, they didn’t explain why.
Now about that bruise, after lunch I was told to go and play with some of the older kids out in the back garden, (which was really just a dusty playground, there’s not much grass here at all) Some children were practicing walking on mini stilts, I helped them, naturally as it was a part of my duties. While assisting a little boy called Yuji, one of the children behind me fell off their stilts, and the wooden stick collided rather forcefully with my cranium. That bloody hurt. As none of the staff had seen this happen, and not wanting to cause a scene, I tried to carry on as if nothing had happened, occasionally grimacing, but trying to work as before!
Another things that surprised me as the day went on, was that the language of football was also a universal one, being British I am naturally a genius at football ( as if!) and a small game of passing the ball between me and Yuji soon turned into a full fledged match between both sides of the playground, as more and more children expressed their curiosity. I felt quite proud of managing to organise this mini game and not causing a riot, but then again, it wasn’t exactly Southampton VS Portsmouth.
After work I spoke to my fellow gapper Tom, and it sounds like the work at Roken (the Hospital) is a lot easier than the work at the nursery. I loved working at the nursery but I think working there five days a week would probably kill me. Variety in work is very important I think. I also no have a much better understanding of the phrase “challenging but rewarding”. But then again it’s not like I came away here with any illusions that these six months were going to be easy anyway.
Two final random points, first off, even though almost every car round here is Japanese, the abundance of Minis is incredible! There are at least 3 dealerships round here selling original Rover Minis, and countless more driving around very noisily especially at night. There are few of the new type driving around too, but they don’t seem to be as popular. It just tickled me that my dad said when I left, that it would be the last time I would see a Rover for six months (or something like that) and it turns out there are loads. Jags and Range Rovers are also occasionally seen, I’ve seen more Jags than Fords, which is strange. Maybe this place isn’t so different to Winchester after all (joke!).
Second random point is that I’ve nearly been here two weeks, which seems really strange, some days it feels like I’ve been here forever and other days it feels like I’ve only just arrived. I’m looking forward to settling into a work routine anyway. Now I just need to start planning what we’re all going to do for Christmas.....

PARTYING IN JAPAN

Last night was a really wild and incredible one, I enjoyed myself loads but in a very different way than I would of at home. There is a small Gaijin and Gaijin-loving community here (Gaijin means foreigner, which is what I am) This community is essentially centred around a women called Amy who is a Kiwi out here in Japan teaching English. We met her early on shortly after we arrived in Nishio. She teaches adults mainly who are either learning English from scratch or are seeking to improve their spoken English. Most of them are real Anglophiles too. Anyway... It was Amy’s birthday last night, and so I got to sample a real bit of Japanese night life and partying. We went to a place called the C-Dome, which is essentially a massive dome in the centre of the City which houses a massive Arcade on the ground floor, and about 40 Karaoke rooms on the second floor. On a side note, Arcades in Japan are not really for anyone under 18 after 10 o’clock, in fact, anyone under 18 isn’t allowed in, this is mainly because as well as the usual arcade games we have in the West, they’re also full of untold numbers of gambling machines and slot machines, roughly organised inbetween all the shooting/racing games.
Anyway last night we went straight up to Karaoke room number 35. All the rooms are identical in size, about 9 metres long and 5 metres wide. This room was filled with about 18 people, drinks were everywhere, as well as party food, and a massive screen showing the words and music video to the current song being Karaoke’d. Karaoke here is different than in the UK. In the UK I always get the feeling that Karaoke is almost a competition, even though it’s just supposed to be a bit of fun, and you often seem to get a load of people taking themselves too seriously, the Karaoker is often asked to stand in front of everyone to perform their song too, which is just embarrassing. Here it was hard to describe the atmosphere, everyone always clapped when a song ended, and would pay complements to the singer, regardless of how awful their singing was, I must say my rendition of “Ruby” by the Kaiser Chiefs left a lot to be desired. Anyway, the atmosphere was very jovial and relaxed, and to be honest it was the first time I was really able to let my hair down in weeks. The microphones were wireless and you passed them around the room, which eliminates the cringe factor of having to stand up and sing in front of everyone. The other strange thing was that there was no drink bar, everyone had to buy their own drinks somewhere else, then bring them in. So we basically just stopped off at the local “Family Mart” and bought loads of drinks, then took them over. This jovial event continued until 1 am when the place closed. Unlike chucking out time in the UK, everyone quietly and meekly left exactly on time, and shuffled/staggered off home, which I found completely bizarre. At this point about half the party decided they’d had enough and bid their farewells. We were then told by Amy that she knew of a really good bar where we could continue the night, but if we “messed up the atmosphere” we would never go there again, or be let anywhere near it. My fellow gapers decided they’d had enough when they heard this (besides they had to get up early on Saturday to travel to Osaka on the bullet train). But curiosity got the better of me, and I decided to go along.
That was the best decision I’ve made the whole time I’ve been here.
The bar looked inconspicuous enough on the outside, inside the only way I can describe it was as “Japanese Hippy” I’ve never ever ever been to a drinking establishment anything like this at all, and I don’t think I would find anything like this at home. The floor was traditional Japanese matting, so shoes off at the front door, covered here and there by rugs, there were no tables or chairs, just sort of “floor seats”. The room was very green, with strange plants and other things hanging from the roof here and there. The proprietor was very welcoming and led us straight to our place, so relaxed and informal, almost like he was our best mate, he just scribbled down what we wanted to drink on his hand. I wanted to take pictures of the interior, but I had the feeling this wouldn’t be appropriate, so all I got was some snaps of the loo. It’s basically like this everywhere inside. Around halfway through our stay a guy who I can only describe as an actual “Japanese Hippy” came and sat next to us and just chatted randomly about the world and everything, and was especially interested in what I was doing in Japan. We eventually left at 4 am when I returned to my apartment and snuggled up into my futon, feeling very fulfilled.

I still can't believe it's only two weeks...