Weekend update

1. I bought a kanji textbook. Don't let anyone fool you: Japanese by osmosis can work! But after over a year, I've discovered that it can only take you so far. Eventually you have to go beyond stock phrases such as "the train is coming soon, please stand behind the white line" or "the train to Kawasaki is coming soon, please step behind the yellow line and wait there". Every once in a while I feel like a complete idiot. Like today when I should have told the travel agent (see below) that I'd like to pay by "furikomi" ("payment via direct deposit"), but instead I told him I'd like to pay by "furikae" ("money transfer", and completely inappropriate in this context). That was egg on my face, I tell ya!

2. My school had a sayonara party for a Japanese staff member who'd been there for about 2 years. We went to an izakaya, didn't let her pay, and then tried to give her the money that was left over after we gathered the funds. She was horrified by the idea, so I explained that this is an important custom in the West, and refusal would be entirely insulting to us all. By the end of the night we made her cry--because we were so very nice to her, not because we were messing with her, but it was great anyway.

3. We booked and paid for a 3-day trip (Feb 16-18) to Hiroshima today. We got a really good deal, through a travel agency affiliated with our company: a package including shinkansen fare plus two nights in a hotel, with a 5% employee discount, came to less than the normal cost of the shinkansen tickets alone. Actually, now that I think about it, they gave us the discount without taking any time to check whether we were actually employees or not, so if you're thinking of touring around Japan and are willing to pose as an English teacher I think I have the agency for you. (Come visit us, we're lonely!)

4. The latest episode of 24 downloaded via BitTorrent about 5 times faster than we could have watched it. We were quite impressed. Maybe someone from Japan was uploading, because we've never gotten that kind of speed from any source back home. You guys are so low-tech!

5. Karaoke is serious business, OK? (This is from sometime in November, not long after we moved schools. I'm not sure what song I was singing then, but it sure as heck wasn't stupid "Arms Wide Open".)