earthquake ride

It's a Friday, and I starte work at 11 and finished before 4. I doubt there will be many days like this in the future, so I'm making sure I appreciate it the adequate amount (by blogging and facebooking, of course!)

It started with a meeting with the teachers in the local area, who split up into their teaching specialisation groups - talking about what I can only assume to be about teaching methods and that kind of stuff. Like everything Japanese, it started with a huge formal meeting with all the teachers, but thanks to my lack of Japanese ability, I was told not to come to the initial 2 hour meeting since I wouldn't understand it - not going to complain when it means I'm at Starbucks instead of falling asleep in a meeting...

Anyway, we were asked to do powerpoint presentations about our countries. Sounds easy right? well, yeah, kinda was. I ended up talking about food, cultural events in Melbourne, and sport. Yeah, I learnt my lesson from last time, so I made sure to actually do some research about sport - I think it's amazing that people think I'm really sporty and stuff here (especially now I'm mega tanned from riding my bike for an hour a day) and just wondering when they're going to see through the whole façade. 

In an effort to spend more time active and not just sitting at my desk, I ended up going to an earthquake museum in a nearby village - it's pretty much a museum about the 8.0 earthquake that hit in 1891 - it was so big, it left train tracks twisted and ground that used to be flat is now like a 6 metre cliff. They've got like newspapers and stuff from when they were reported at the time as well, which is a little eerie. But what I thought was a little weird was the earthquake ride - It's kinda the best way I can describe it - they put you into a room, give you 3D glasses and get you to buckle your seatbelts - you then watch a movie from what I gather, is about this boy who goes on an excursion and manages to get transported to the time of the earthquake, and then wakes up, and goes on an excursion to the same earthquake you're in - all the while being 3D to immerse you in the whole experience (read: There's lots of soccer balls kicked towards you, and this girl sticks her hand out to give a present to someone). Then you eventually watch the boy going on the same earthquake ride you're on, and he's shaking, so they make your seats shake a bit as well - a little post-modern, but weird.

Anyways, getting ready for yet another "getting to know your fellow JET people" thing again for the whole weekend - just another event to hang out, eat and drink, so can't really complain about there being too many...