woo. japan.

It still hasn't completely sunk in yet. Yeah, I know that I'm leaving next month and stuff, but it still seems like such a far-off concept I haven't really thought about it much. It has been something I've been thinking about doing for a while, but actually doing it? Just seems weird.

Me. In Japan. For a year.

I got a little excited yesterday when a package came from Japan - it was from the Motosu Education Board with info about the place I’ll be working/living, the schools I’m teaching, and postcards and stuff. So it looks like I’ll be teaching at Motosu Junior High & Motosu Elementary School – knowing the actual names of the schools I’ll be teaching at makes it seem a little more real than just knowing that I’ll be teaching at a random Japanese school actually.

My biggest concern about going to Japan was finding I’d be teaching in the middle of nowhere, so I was relieved and somewhat ecstatic when I got a map of the city – Motosu has a shopping mall! And a shopping centre! And banks! That’s right, more than one! I know that seems really superficial, but I don’t think I’m ready to move to a place where buying things becomes an event, rather than something you can do any day. Plus, it’d kinda conflict with my current view of technologically-advanced Japan, with robots and stuff on every street corner…

jetsetting to japan

It's now pretty much official - I'm going to Japan to teach English! I've handed my letter of resignation at work, and making a list of stuff to buy and do before I leave in 44 days, 17 hours 43 minutes, and 37 seconds. It hasn't really sunk in that I'll be moving my whole life to a whole nother country knowing next to no one, but I think that will come once it gets closer to the flight - It didn't even strike me that I was going to go to Korea until I landed in the country and took a 3 hour bus ride to Jeonju last time, so maybe I should expect the same thing this time around.

There's already a huge list of things I have to do before I go - exchange all my money into Yen (since I don't know how rural the place I'm going to is, and may not have any banks or ATMs nearby), get an international driver's license, a Power of Attorney, catch up with everyone, and you know, get my affairs in order and stuff...

...And by "affairs", I just mean downloading the last few episodes of Grey's Anatomy that I may miss, as well as the next season of The Amazing Race.

But don't worry, not all my affairs are seemingly useless and a pointless waste of time - In preparation for the huge void that I will inevitably leave in your lives, I've created a cybertwin, who I'm in the middle of training to be a replacement me for emergency situations. Sure, he won't be much help when there's food to be eaten and things that are out of reach for the vertically challenged, but hopefully he'll be able to answer any question you have...

As long as it's basic. And about liking cheese.

busy at work...

Yeah, I know. Long time no blog. But I can assure you there'll be more blogworthy stuff in the next month or so. At the moment though, I've just been working like 5 days a week, and what have I learned over the past 6 weeks? I'm really good at being fake nice, where to the casual observer it seems "nice". There are some minor differences that are only noticeable if you are keeping a close watch on me though - if you're yelling at me, be it for something that is so not my fault (like, your phone not working, and me not being able to call the repair hotline because they're closed on weekends), or just dropping all-round racist comments (which happen a little more frequently than I thought they would) chances are, I'm being fake nice.

My job's also made me appreciate the extra spending money as well - I forgot how cool it was to buy frivolous stuff and not have to worry as much about saving money - I like having the peace of mind knowing that a piece of pie will not affect my standard of living - well, other than lead me on the almost inevitable path of diabetes and/or heart disease.