NICE DAY FOR A PICNIC

Today is the start of Golden Week, translation, mega back to back holidays for, green day, constitution day, some other day, and childrens day. And also a nice day for a picnic at Noriko's home. Noriko was so nice to invite me and Susanne to meet her husband, daughter, son in law, and grandson. Also there was Rob and Michele. Just a nice day to relax and eat some yummy food that Noriko and her daughter cooked up.

BECOMING JAPANESE - NAPKINS

Many restaurants and eating places dont really have napkins, and if they do, they are pretty small. Back home you get huge napkins, or you just take the whole roll with you, maybe because we are messy eaters back home, or just like things in quantity. Of course this napkin crisis that has lived with me for the past year just re-occured to me when i was eating lunch with my elementary kids. You get milk, bread, soup, and someother dish. But hey no napkin. Either you gotta bring your own or just use your good ole sleeve or arm, which i have been using quite recently.

In addition to the napkins at the restaurant table, it is also another mission to even find one in the bathroom. Many a times there is none at all! Its kinda good, because they are saving alot of trees, because i know at home, it looks like a war zone with paper towels. So here in japan they got the nice electric hand dryers which i say some are pretty cool and work damn well. And if the bathroom dont got napkins nor a hand dryer, yah gotta bring your own towel. Wierd for me, that i now always carry a hand towel, which is unimaginable back home, but hey guess i am becoming japanese.

CAR INSURANCE

Stopped by the local Family Mart (convience store) today and paid my car insurance. Grand total of about 57710 yen for the year, ouch!

HOLY SHIT! TRAIN WRECK YO!

Its almost normal for me to take the train everywhere here in Japan. So seeing todays news of the train wreck kinda shocked me, so far its been reported that about 57 people died, and over 440 were injured when the train derailed and rammed into an apartment building. These trains are speeding up over 80mph in tight areas sometimes, not much room for error. The force was so strong that the first carriage burrowed down into the basement parking garage of the apt then the 2nd carriage was bent and smashed like a pop can being recycled. And the thing is that is the station i frequent for my Costco trip. Damn how will i get there now? Kinda scary knowing that route. Maybe from now on i will be more inclined to ride in the last train carriage.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=700748

holy shit!!!

doesnt look good

you tell me what this means ... engrish at its best

FILLER UP

And you thought gas was expensive in the USA? I think i put in about $30 bucks today, and i think it only filled up my car halfway, and its about the same size as a honda accord. Gas here is in liters so the its about $1.23 a liter or about $4.60 a gallon! Arrrgghhh...

COACH MARKANE?

Sounds cool, i always played with the boys basketball team, but only played i did. Then came the big teacher change just a month ago. Kamatani Sensei changed schools, so there was no girls basketball coach, so they decided to move the boys coach to the girls side, because they have been so successful in the past, always being number one, but i would have to attribute that to the coaching. So they appointed a new basketball coach to a teacher who never played basketball nor even knew anything about it. Typical japanese style, to have a coach who doesnt know anything about the sport. So of course the new coach Tomo- Sensei complained.

So i told Tomo- sensei not to worry, i would help him out. So all this week i played a bit with the kids, and changed to a bit of coaching mode. Its nice here because the kids all teach each other. So the older ones teach the younger ones. So i just tell the captain sometimes what i want, and its done.

Anyways, my boys team is nice, maybe a bit too nice, heck i dont think they have won a game for 3 seasons or so, no joke. Hoping they could win, i prepped them with defense, because all of them could at least steal the ball or rebound at least. Shooting was another story. So all i taught them was rebounding and stealing for the week before the game. Then prayed.

It was a two day tournament, but of course work is fucking crazy and I had to go to elementary school that day of course. So after i was finished with the little ones i sped home and drove over to the basketball game. Got there just in time to see the 2nd half. Lucky i didnt see more, because it was an awful masacare. The score was like 30-80 in the end, and we werent the winners.

Day two, 2 games left. Ouch, got killed even more, unbelieveable, this team was good. They were shooting like 75%. They were too quick for my kids, guess why that score was like ... 30 - _ _ _ we will just say it was somewhere in the triple digits.

Anyways, fight-O! During the break, the head coach is pretty cool, and suggested to go give the players advice. I took each one of the starters and corrected them on things such as "getting tight on defense", "rebound", "screen out", "steal (cut-o in japanese)" of course i cant speak japanese well, so i had to gesture, point out examples from other games going on, and use katakana words they know like "touch". I was like just go in there and touch em, pressure, push em, foul em. These kids arent used to fouling, it alright to do, in America we love fouling, i mean thats why you got 5 fouls to give. We gotta do that to win. I had visions of coach Karl, Dean, and other greats, what would they do in this situation? All those times watching those NCAA game on TV started popping up like popcorn.

It was onto the next game. Game 3, this was our chance, because this team wasnt as good as the others. So i was praying just like a Disney movie, like the "Mighty Ducks" or something like that. When the game started, amazingly it was close, and i could see the smiles on my kids, they were starting to believe they could do it. The defense was improving. By halftime they were up by a couple. So i told em to keep the defense up. But when the 3rd quarter started, they got rattled by the other team putting up 8 straight points. Then Tomo-sensei called a timeout. He dont know basketball, but he is smart, and knows timing. Amazing man! So we re-grouped and turned up the defense, half court D became full court. Then all of a sudden like at the peak of the Disney movie, the rebounds, steals, and points started coming in. I was thinking like we were the Detroit Pistons, defense wins games. It started all becoming natural for them, and everytime they came back to the bench they were happy rather than sulking. At the end we won by 20 or so points! It was a good day!!!! One of my highlights in Japan by far ...

my boys basketball team ... first victory!

QUOTE OF THE DAY

Mr. Namura writes "A V" on the chalkboard.

• Mr. Namura : "Do you know meaning?"
• Markane : "Mmmm ... sorry, I dont"
  
• Mr. Namura : "Its Adult Video"
• Markane : "Ohhhhhhh ... "
  

QUOTES OF THE DAY

My kids say the funniest things ...

• Soccer kid grabs my chest then says, "A cup"
• Group of about 6 3rd grade girls come up giggling and say, "I want you!"
• Mao the 3rd grade, LV and Channel fan comes up and asks her usual, "how much?" referring to money in my wallet

"HANAMI" IN HIMEJI

Bit late for the cherry blossoms in Himeji this year, because they kinda bloomed mid week and didnt really get a chance to come out til the weekend, dang. Will have to try again next year. They bloom so fast! I figure you got about 1.5 week time to get them blooming at their best. Last year they were really beautiful.

cherry blossoms sprouting into green

himeji castle

an annual tradition of japanese, eating under the cherry tree

gotta get that pic with your cell phone "ketai"

CARS OF HIMEJI

Today, strolled around Himeji and caught a glimpse with my camera, of the usual and not so usual cars of Japan, please enjoy.

my homiez representing himeji, japan

get out your little mermaid sun shade

mini mini mini car

a custom graffiti paint job, plus no wheels no go

REVENGE OF THE NERDS

Every year there seems to be a new crop of kids that add new special english words to their vocab. And of course, they like to share with me their new found vocab. Words such as "sex", "fuck", and "masturbate", "penis" are the tops on the lists. Coupled with great phrases such as "do you play sex?" "do you have sex?" "he has small penis" "big penis". Then there is the japanese naughty words that i dont quite know, in todays class the boys were saying some word that i didnt quite know in japanese, but i am pretty sure it referred to some sexual body part. And to confirm that, on todays lesson they even had the opportunity to draw and make their own sentence. So it went something like this when i looked on their paper. "Have you eaten obuke?" ... and nicely drawn next to it was a picture of what i would presume would be a vagina. Oh those naughty boys. Then not to be outdone of course they gotta gesture to the body part they are talking about. Oh thanks. .... and that was some of the regular kids, and when i got to the soccer boys, that just opened a whole new world ... Reportedly when i talked to one of them in the fall, he told me he had 6 videos, and i am not talking about Nemo. So i had to check on his collection and see how many he had now. Looks like he been busy, cuz he got 12 now, and even some in DVD, wow! He was even generous to even let me borrow one if i wanted, oh my. So after the soccer boys i ventured out to the tennis team to see how they were doing, but looks like i couldnt escape the NERDS, one boy greated me with a middle finger and then proceeded to hump the air in a pumping motion. Of course i have seen this mating dance before by many a past students, and shouted, "nice gesture!" and laughed. Looks like another year with the revenge of the nerds.

in color ... for edgar!

TATSUNO CASTLE

It was a nice sunny day so decided to head up to Tatsuno castle which is conviently about only 8 minutes by bike from my apartment. While riding up there, i think i must have said "hi, hello" to about 8 different kids, from elementary kids to high school. Guess that happens when you teach all of them in your area. Tatsuno castle is quite, small but i like it, it is famous for the two sword welding samurai named "Musashi".

"hanami" up close style

looking through ...

tatsuno castle ... only 10 minutes away!

looking up

cherry blossoms reaching over the wall

COPS AND ROBBERS

Today i was at elementary school and the 5th grade kids wanted me to play with them. So i kindly said OK, so the teacher asked if i knew the game, with "poli". Mmm .. i wasnt sure, but after some handy acting and gesturing by the teacher i figured out she was talking about cops and robbers. She did a nice act of being in jail. So at lunch time i was off first being the "poli" or what we sometimes call "police" or "popo". Anyways had to chase down those speedy little ones, it was boys vs girls. So i was on the girls team, and my buddy was helping me point out the criminals. Because at lunch time everyone is out on the playground, and i dont know who the heck to chase, so many of them. So we were a good team, she would point and i would attempt to round up the kids. After catching one you would have to hold em for at least 10 seconds and then they would go to jail. Or what i would do if i got one is grab em by the legs or body and swing em around for 10 seconds, and roar in victory! That was just to confirm my capture. Anyways it was in good fun, but must take note, not to play that game in the summer because i was sweating like a pig before my next class.

ALLLLLLLLEGRIA

I was like what you girls saying? ...."alllllllllllllllllllegria" ... i thought it was the circus but i wasnt sure. Then i asked them what it was, and they said it was a circus. They liked it. I said i did too, and i got tickets! Then they gave me the, "aw damn look". It was the funny volleyball trio of Maho, Naaaaaa-chan, and Aki. Maho even remembers when i called her cute, as a class example. Hahaha, then it was nice to hear that Maho likes international stuff, and that she wants to travel all over the world. She wanted to go to italy, america, australia, etc. It was nice to hear that, hoped i kinda helped influenced that, or anyways it is good to hear that they want to see the world.

Chilling with the new 1st graders who are trying out for the basketball club, damn they are small, they all must be like under 5 feet tall and 100 pounds. One of em is pretty good, his name is Takuto i think, but damn when u are that small u gotta shoot with two hands, and good luck rebounding.

Today, was the suprise day for the kids, they got new coaches. The girls basketball team screamed, as they found out their new coach. Who? who? who? who is that they all said.... no one knew the guy since he was a new teacher .. but i just came from the meeting where the teacher said he dont want to coach basketball. The thing is sometimes the teachers are appointed a sports club even if they dont know anything about it. So that was the case here, the teacher was a bit older with grey hair, and looked like he didnt want to add more learning a new sport to coach, so he was definetly arguing about it. I can understand his point. He seems like a nice guy, and pretty cool too, plus there is the added pressure that the girls team is one the best teams in the area, so might look bad if he does bad. But i think it will be fine, i am always in the gym so i will help him out if he is there.

Ah brought my new pair of Nike basketball shoes to the gym, amazingly how interested the kids were, from the girls team to the boys team, to even the volleyball team. They were like where did you get that shoe? america? japan? how much was it? is that the kobe bryant shoe?

SEARCHING FOR ANOTHER MARKANE

Ok, bit bored today, so Googled my name.... lets see what we come up with ...

In some european country i am a country side resort of something.
http://www.markane.com/

On tripod, looks like i am a pro wrestler, and have a finishing move by the name of "Markanator" and oh also have been a 3 x deathmatch champion.
http://nwow0.tripod.com/id12.html

I am also a beautiful stallion.
http://www.stallions.com.au/list/markane.asp

Another european language that i dont quite understand (maybe Norway by the extension?), but hey my name is nice and big!
http://markane.skytterlag.no/

Tight, even got my own email address at the University of Indiana.
http://www.cs.indiana.edu/People/auto/m/markane.html

SAKURA, SUN, INDIAN, NEW SHOES

Dang, nice and sunny and warm. Great day! Cherry blossoms blooming, sun shinning, so i brought out the shorts and tshirt. Felt like it was around 70 degrees or so, perfect! Cruised over with Susanne to Kobe to meet Dan and Carla for some lunch. Damn, Dan found this Indian restaurant and it was damn good. Got the B set, included some rice, nan bread, curry, chicken tikka, chicken, and ice cream or other stuff. All for about $11 US. Been craving Indian food, like i crave Cedar's back home. Mmmm ... good. Yeah, better enjoy the days and nites now, because i know the heat and humidty of summer will be coming soon!!

Even dropped by the Outlets in Tarumi for some shopping. Usually i dont find anything, but scored a sweet pair of Nike basketball shoes for $50, it be nice to have a pair cuz i have been playing in my indoor soccer shoes which as you can imagine may not be the best thing to play in.

ON THE TRAIN

Ran into some of my kids on the train, well they kinda just ran into the seat next to mine and Susanne's. It is always cool to see them dressed up besides the school uniform, it definetly adds personality which sometimes school doesnt allow. Especially when you are wearing $75 pink Juicy sweatpants. On board was the funny softball player, Tomomi-yo who i guess likes english, but i didnt really know it till she applied to Susanne's Aioi high school which has an advanced english class. Hitomi who was always sweet and nice in class, going to a high level Tatsuno high school along with their other friend. So i had to ask where they were going on this nice day. They responded, to Himeji for some bowling! Funny to see them all dressed up, so had to take a pic with my cell phone.

tomomi-yo, hitomi, and buddy ... bowling time

hell ya! got me a new set of bball shoes

30SECOND TALK WITH NEW PRINCIPAL

Of course translated in english for all my friends ... here is how the conversation went ..
(note: Daniel is my friend who was the ALT at the princpals old school, the principal had requested a ALT who spoke Japanese before, guess he is not so lucky with me.. ha ha)

principal: Do you know Daniel?
me: Yes, I know him
principal: He speaks very good Japanese, he is fluent.
me: Yes, of course he does, he is Japanese. Sorry, I am Chinese.
principal: Oh, you don't speak much Japanese. (as he walks away)

And that folks was my conversation for the day.

OPENING CEREMONY

Today was the official start of the school year, so there was two ceremonies, one for the 2nd, 3rd graders, and new teachers. Then another ceremony in the afternoon for the new 1st grade kids and their parents. Alot of bowing action going on today, lucky my back didnt go out.

Feel kinda shafted after all the teachers for all the grades were introduced except for me and Morigana sensei, maybe its because i teach all of them, or heck i am the opt out ALT. I felt bad for Morigana sensei too, cuz he is pretty cool and teaches special need students but didnt get to go up. I mean it dont matter too much, but its kinda like respect.

Anyways so the new 1st grade kids came today, they look a bit different in their new uniforms. I taught them all at elementary school, so i know em. They are so cute and small, some are big, and some are small, the small ones i think only come up to my arm pits and weigh something like 80 pounds. It was funny to see some of them in shock seeing me at school. Don't they know i am their jr high teacher ... ha ha ha ... because i only make special visits to their elementary school, guess they dont know the other times i actually work somewhere else. So the kids were a bit lost looking for their classes, but it was all good, and the parents came. Well just the moms, funny thing is that dads dont really come, i would say about 95% female. Maybe dad too busy at work.

parents waiting for the ceremony to start

no more shogakko .. elementary school

where is my new class?

the 3 amigos

NC BABY!!

Opened up the sports page and WOW! North Carolina won the Final Four!! .. Yipee .. That means me and Jimmy won his work pool for the tourney. Got 43 correct, was first out of 37, and got some $$ for Jimmy-san. Not bad for never watching a game this season, or even knowing anything about any of the teams. Good name for Jimmy's login .. jimmy wins .. Hey buddy, got you bragging rights for the year! ha ha ha

MUSICAL DESKS

Today the teachers had to move their desks in the teachers office, depending on what grade they were going to teach next year. Lucky my job was easy, i didnt have to move anywhere. But then again, that means i am still sitting in the middle of the isle, damn, i want a window seat. When the teachers were moving their desks and cleaning them, there were tons of dust bunnies, dust piles never seen before. There was one teacher manning the vaccum, another directing where to put the desks, and others well just moving. Lets say if u dont like dust, dont be at school during the time of musical desks. Its pretty nasty.

FINISHED !!

On a huge, 3 foot by 3.5 foot frame, 7 hours later, 60 plus pictures cut, watching Forever Fever 3 1/2 times, feeling sick, but its finally finished. The super picture collage for my principal is finished, just in time too, because when completed the birds were chirping, sun was shinning, and i was off to school via no sleep.

Gave the present to my prinipal at school, he was super happy with it!! I could tell, and even all the other teachers rushed over and liked it alot too. My principal even joked that he would hang it at his new school, above all the other pictures ... ha ha ha .. i will miss him.

army of pics waiting to be cut

me and principal aka "kocho sensei" nicest guy in japan!

FINISHED !!!!

"Forever Fever" movie, keeping me going with the BeeGee hits

how to do this thing?

CUTTING...

Its about 220am and i am making a special picture collage for my principal who is leaving to another school. Tomorrow is the farewell ceremony, and i am late as usual, making this thing to who knows when, hopefully i will get one hour sleep. Damn, all those peace signs are hard to cut around.

SUPERMARKET SELECTION

Just a daily thought in things. Around the supermarket i am just not used to the selection, maybe its an american thing or something. But back home when you are looking for GROUND PORK or GROUND BEEF you can get it in a variety of leaness. So like 5% fat, 30% fat, 50% fat and so on. But here you just get what you get, there is no cutting out the fat. So yeah when i am cooking that yummy spaghetti or taco, i gotta drain all that extra yummy oil. Then there is also JUICE. You dont get the minute maid variety here. Nope, no choice in pulp, extra pulp, extra vitamin C or whatever. You just get orange juice and thats it, one taste, with no pulp, hope you like it. Then there is the BEER, of course the japanese monopoly of the big 3 , Asahi, Kirin, and Sapporro. Then after awhile, they all look the same and taste the same. Miss those ambers, pales, dark and light beers, and different companies! .... But not to be so harshful, Japan has a great selection of restaurants, everywhere you go you can find them, but then again, you gotta choose between your ramen, udon, katsu, etc. Somehow, you gotta eat what you can get.

NEW TEACHERS AND PRINCIPAL

Start of another school year in Japan. So today was the day where the new teachers came in. I was hoping for some cool younger teachers, but of course that wouldnt happen. 7 out of the 8 new teachers were all men, and there was one older lady. Then there was the new principal who was a man of course. I have only seen one woman principal in Japan so far. Anyways, hope they are cool, because all the old teachers that left were super cool and nice! And i hope they dont smoke too much, just what i need more smoking teachers.