Eek!

So, I got an email today about the Kobe Marathon I sort of let myself get talked into applying for without really thinking about how far 42.whatever kilometres actually is.

Well, they only went and let me in. Hence the eek.

I am now wondering if this calls for a shopping trip for new running shoes, and possibly some running clothes, because I'm a girl and shopping is my go to activity when I'm totally out of my depth.

Eek, eek, and double eek. Any tips?

Good intentions

If the road the hell is paved with good intentions, then much of that paving comes from the random people who insist on trying to make conversation with me at the most inopportune moments. And the conversation nearly always starts with, "Where are you from?"

Any Gaijin has had it. There you are, deciding which conbini bento to have tonight, and wondering just exactly what that mystery vegetable is, when someone sidles alongside you and asks the dreaded question. The conversation then continues, if you're British anyway, along one of several lines. How do people get to work in the London fog? Why is British food so bad? Isn't Kate Middleton (or Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, as we now have to call her) beautiful? (For the record, London isn't actually that foggy and hasn't been since Victoria was on the throne; I love British food, mostly because I was raised on it; and yes, she is beautiful, but ugly princesses aren't allowed. Fact.)

If my mumbled answers, refusal to make eye contact and gentle movement in the other direction haven't had the desired effect, the conversation monologue will then continue with "My cousin went to America." Um, that's great, but, what with me being British and all, what has that got to do with me? I usually try to find out where in America, but they can never remember, which always makes me wonder just how close this cousin is.

Things usually grind to a halt at about this point, and I'm free to go. With a huge, great, big sigh of relief.

The problem is, I genuinely think most people who do this think they're being welcoming. It doesn't cross their mind that they are simply reminding me that I stick out like a sore thumb. I've heard stories of other Gaijins telling people too eff off when they start this type of conversation, but I can't bring myself to do that. It's done with good intentions, after all. But, at the same time, I'm rarely friendly when this happens. I'm from London, and only crazy people engage you in random conversation there, and I can't quite shake the habit. It's not as though I'm going to make lifelong friends that way, is it?

Not fitting in is a common complaint in the foreign community. I can deal with having communication problems or cultural problems with friends, because we can work on those over time. But when strangers in the street keep reminding me that this is not my home, it's very difficult to make it so.

Another day, another bout of randomness

When I found myself in a lift with a group of teenage girls today, I had already realised that the kind of humidity we are experiencing makes me find the world an odd place. I mean, if you spend the day alternating between an airconditioned land of English education joy, and the sensation of walking through soup any time you venture out, it's going to do weird things to you.

These teenage girls brought a new meaning to the word "inane". And, as I'm sure you've noticed by the lack of anything even vaguely resembling deep thought in this here blog, I love a bit of inanity. Until it's delivered in voices so high they make dogs bark, in a lift with no airconditioning, when it's 32 degrees with a humidity level of, oh I don't know, I didn't actually listen, but it was a lot. I actually have no recollection of the content of their conversation, all I have imprinted on my mind is the high pitch. And the over-whelming urge to laugh.

Wanting to laugh in a lift is a bit like wanting to fart. Really hard to keep in. The more you think about how you shouldn't, the more urgent it becomes. So in the end, I found myself giggling in the way of crazy people for a good ten minutes, after successfully holding it in for the entire lift journey. Even when they didn't notice they were getting out on the wrong floor, except for the last one in the lift, who noticed, and then held the lift while the others tottered back in on their high heels. Brilliant.

I can't really explain what it was about these particular girls that entertain me. I think it might be the humidity and accompanying lack of sleep that might be sending me giddy, which must be a welcome respite for those around me from the grumpy madam I usually become when it's this kind of weather.

PS I am still trying to be good about the aircon, but, as I allow my students to vote on whether we use it or not, and my colleagues are basically penguins, I'm fighting a bit of a losing battle. Which could also be interpreted as I like to play the martyr, but, when it's this weather, my need to care about global warming declines quite a bit. Did  hear someone say "hypocrite"?

Why bother?

I'm studying for the JLPT, yet again, at the moment. This is the third time I've taken it, and I don't feel any closer to passing it. Not being able to pick up a newspaper and find out what's going on, or any of the other things I can't do because my reading skills in Japanese are so poor, is really starting to annoy me.

The other day, I decided I wasn't going to bother going to the test. What's the point? If I'm just going to fall flat on my face again, why bother?

I've been feeling that about running recently too. If I can't manage to finish a half marathon without incident, what's the point? Why not just give up, stay home and watch TV, like so many other people do?

And then, I happened across this video.

A Nike commercial may be an odd source of inspiration, but it worked for me. Tonight, I went to my running club and ran about 6 kilometres (I decided not to measure to take the pressure off a bit), which is the most I have run in ages. Then I came home, and did a practice listening test. It's a start.

So, there you go. My life advice. When you feel like giving up on things that are important to you, waste some time on You Tube, and see what happens.

It's been a while...

This week, I've been rather busy with building my ark (thanks for the idea, M) because this rain doesn't look like it's going to stop anytime soon. I've never seen a rainy season quite this rainy, which might explain why, every summer that I've been here, the city government warns us that a water shortage is imminent while proceeding to seemingly do nothing to fix the situation. Because local government is the same pretty much everywhere you go.

Anyone will tell you that cycling in a rainstorm is a one way ticket to grumpy. I have been carrying a change of clothes, a towel and a hairdryer to work everyday because my clothes never dry out in time for my class. And my raincoat, that I got for a bargain 1000yen, isn't actually rain proof. Which might explain the price.

But here are a few pictures from my week.


This hair salon is down the road form my apartment. I'm definitely going to take their advice.



On someone's bike outside the convenience store.

I went shopping the other day, because I was having one of those weeks when all the clothes you loved last week are completely hideous this week and you desperately need to replace them. The staff gave me this mask to protect the clothes from the make up I wasn't wearing.



The local summer festival started early this year, I can only assume it's an attempt to boost business at a time when no one is doing well. Here is a totally uninspiring picture of it. I don't feel like I've captured the spirit of the event, but you can see the cute balloons if you squint a bit.

 So there you have it, life in a land where the rain won't stop.



Just checking. Yup, still quite a dull daily existence



Bt I wouldn't have it any other way. Here are a few things from the past few days. 

 



This is the place amusements go to die. It's weirded me out every time I've passed it. Weird and creepy.



If this river didn't have a dam at the top of it, this picture would be unremarkable. But this is usually bone dry, to the point people just walk across. I wouldn't recommend that right now.

This was my attempt to capture the rain we had on Sunday. It literally rained like this all day. My poor flowers almost drowned.

This is my roommate's dog when he7s not wearing weird clothes or trying to eat my food. I know he's funny looking, but he's also really cute.

This was another attempt to show the huge amount of water we had swimming around on our terrace. And the plants apparently don't like that much rain.

Yup, rain has been the theme of my life this past few days. And we have more rain due tomorrow. Marvellous.

By the way, if you've been wondering why I haven't been commenting on your blogs lately, it's because blogger won't let me unless I'm anonymous. And that makes me feel like a lurker. Sorry, it's not that I haven't been enjoying them.

Who are Arashi? Well, let me tell you...

A while ago I made a flippant comment about people squealing as if Arashi had walked in their living room. And the lovely Maria wondered, and I quote, "Who the hell are Arashi?" Now, I'm no expert on J-Pop, I think the lovely Kathryn would be the go-to person for that, but this is my quick intro to the little I know.

Arashi are managed by Johnny and Associates who basically own the boy band market in Japan. Johnny's has a kind of academy from which they select members of the boy bands they manage. SMAP is another boy band managed by Johnny's, and, between them, Arashi and SMAP dominate the TV schedules. Arashi are on TV about twice a week here, while SMAP have a show every Monday, and that's before you take in to consideration the various films and dramas the members are in. Not to mention the one member of Arashi who, randomly, reads the news. Add in the fact that almost every commercial break features at least one member of these bands, they advertise everything from bananas to home building companies, Nintendo DS 3D and beer, and it's no exaggeration to say they dominate the Japanese media.

Arashi are the younger band, being in their 20s, so their fan base seems to start with the girls in elementary school, although it is by no means limited to them, their concerts are packed with people of all ages, waving their souvenir fans. SMAP are in their 30s, in fact, I'd say a couple of them are knocking on 40, so their fan base starts a little older. I guess it's fair to say, if either one of these groups walked into someone's living room, people would squeal.

So anyway, here is an Arashi video of them looking, um, well, a bit camp actually, in their matching outfits, but you get the idea, anyway.

And the next one is SMAP, not really taking AKB48 too seriously. I particularly enjoyed the interview, when I wasn't quite sure who was mocking who.

.

So there you go, my guide to Japan's two biggest boybands.

Ooh what a day!

Today started off by being rudely awakened by the loudest rainstorm ever. Seriously, I thought rocks were falling from the sky or something. And then I remembered that my camping chair, the pink one I bought last week so I could sit out on the terrace, was out in said rainstorm. I sort of wondered vaguely if it would survive, and then opted to go to the kitchen and see if there was anything there I fancied eating. Once I had tracked down an early morning snack (I was woken up by rain, so any snacks were clearly calorie free) I had totally forgotten about the chair and my day had begun.

Stop one was the clinic to pick up a prescription and have a mini check up. Having cycled there in the rain, I was bedraggled in the way people are when they cycle across town in the rain. Weirdly, despite my raincoat, the arms of my cardi were wet, so I looked the epitome of the drowned rat as I fell into the reception. I say fell because I was sort of trying to take off my raincoat and open the door at the same time, which I have now learned results in falling over. Good to know.

I've always disliked the head receptionist at this particular clinic. I've always had the impression that she hated me at first sight, or maybe she doesn't like foreigners, or maybe she just doesn't like people. There is one desk at the reception with two women sitting at it. One has a sign in front of her saying "reception" and the other a sign with "payment". The one who hates me was on the "payment" side. As she was doing nothing, I dug out my slightly damp insurance card and tried to give it to her.

"Please wait a moment," she said. And I realised she was making me wait for the other woman to be free so that I could hand her my insurance card. Because how could the woman who hates me possibly take the card from me and let me go sit down and dry myself off? She was busy, um, waiting just in case someone wanted to pay. As it happened, no one wanted to pay, and she sat there doing nothing until long after I had handed my insurance card to the woman sitting directly to her left. A good ten minutes, in fact. While the other woman dealt with two or three new patients. Their system works well for someone, I'm sure.

On the good side, when my weight was checked, I found out I had lost 2kilos. So, stomach bugs are good for something.

By the time I came out of the clinic, the rain had finally stopped. Yay! Except that I still hadn't dried off, so I had the pleasure of looking like a drowned rat while everyone else around me wondered if English people don't have hairdryers, because, hello? It stopped raining ages ago.

I met a friend at my favourite cafe in Matsuyama. If ever you're here, you should definitely head there for a nice cup of tea and a muffin.

I took the photo from a distance because I didn't want to look like a weird stalker.

The owner makes loads of different types of muffins,and every time I go in there, he's invented new flavours, so there's always an excuse to try one. It won't be long until those 2kilos have gone back on and I'm whining that I'm fat. At least I found a good way to get fat, though.

In an attempt to demonstrate, once again, that my life is tres Rock n Roll

This bicycle was outside the convenience store I might have popped into for a cheeky croissant on the way to the gym. And yes, I'm aware that defeats the point of going to the gym, but I was hungry and tired and the only thing that was going to get me to the gym was a croissant. Not to mention that you're totally missing the point, because, hello, the bike has no saddle. It's on the floor. What happened to the owner? Did he (or she, I'm an equal opportunity pointless wonderer) just leave it there? Or was he one of the geeky looking men blantantly reading the magazines they are either too cheap or too embarrassed to buy but feel perfectly OK with treating the shop like a library and staying there for hours?
More to the point, was it worth the time it has taken to type out this nonsense to ask you what you think?

This city has loads of randomly placed wild flowers. If I had managed to find my camera in my cavernous handbag just a bit faster, this attempt at an arty shot would have had a train in the background. Which would have upped the arty factor, I thought. Anyway, isn't the train line pretty?

And this is what has been keeping me from normal life this week. My kanji homework. I can't go to all of the lessons on offer because they class with work, so until this week, I was keeping up by doing most of it at home. But this week, I made a mistake and missed a unit, so I ended up doing loads over the past few nights. I ended up doing an hour of study before I left the house this morning just to catch up and now I'm back on track. Yay!

Exciting life I have, don't I?

Some more pictures, because you know you love them

Thursday June 2nd: I cycle past this "Church of Baskin Robbins" every morning on the way to work. And every morning I think "ooh ice cream", because it's never too early for ice cream, I think you'll agree. But the shop is closed when I go past at 7.30am, so I promise myself I'll get one on the way home. I never do. It's not actually a church, by the way. It's a hotel with a wedding chapel. I used to live nearby, when I first moved here, and it was a handy landmark when I got lost on the way home after a few fizzy pops.

Friday June 3rd: I passed this temple on the way home form the DVD store. I took a different road to normal and stumbled across it. Inside were some monks chanting their evening prayers. It was such a beautiful sound, I'm sorry it doesn't come across in the picture. Needless to say, it wasn't what I expected when I took a shortcut home from Tsutaya.

Saturday June 4th: I went to Starbucks with a friend for a bit of a girly chat and got to use my cool Starbucks cup. Someone gave it to me as a souvenir when they went to Hawaii for the Honolulu marathon (one day, I want to join them) and I love it. It's different to most people's cups and gets me 20yen off every drink. Some may scoff at the 20 yen, but I remember what my Nan used to say, "Take care of the pennies and the pounds will take care of themselves." A wise woman, my Nan.

So there you go, 3 days, 3 pictures. You're getting to see how Rock and Roll my life really is.

The Year of Fun Stuff- a photo a day for June

Now the name would have worked so much better in May, when it would have rhymed, but I tried to run a half marathon then, so I needed to put this challenge off for this month.

And June is here. It came right up behind me and made me jump. Which is no excuse for not having a challenge this month.

I have long admired people's 365 day photo challenges, but have never thought it would be something I would stick to. My camera is always in my bag, but I only take it out from time to time and take thousands of photos of hat one day. Then I forget about it for ages. And I hardly ever upload photos either.

Which reminds me, I have some great pictures from Golden Week (a month ago now) that I will share at some point, if only to prove that out here in the sticks has some cool stuff too.

Anyway, I thought I'd give a photo a day a go for this month.

And here is my picture for today.

The selection of Japanese books I'm currently pretending to study for. Some are for lessons I'm taking and some are for studying at home for the test I'm taking at the beginning of next month. Oh and the cute killer whale notebook is for writing kanji in. I chose the cutest one they had at the time.

So there you go. A picture for today. I wonder what photographic delights I will have for you tomorrow?