violetize

Even though I live in Japan, there's still a little part of my mind that images there is a magical place, somewhere in Japan, that is exactly like this.

Definitely a good week!

Japan is transfer-happy.  In this country (for city employees at the very least) people's jobs get changed entirely every 4 or so years.  Not just little changes, but huge changes.  Often people get moved to different cities hours away.  Sometimes they only get moved within the building, but from a job such as working in the International Department to a completely different section like the Tax Department.  Sometimes people get moved from a place like a school to a public library. O_o

Since I got my job about 1 year and 8 months ago, about half of my school's English teachers, the principal, vice-principal, many teachers of other subjects, an office lady, the head of the International Department at city hall, and now my supervisor have been transferred.  I don't understand the motivation.

How can businesses and institutions hold together at all with any kind of coherent plan for the future with such high turnover and random flip-flopping of jobs?  It's disorienting for me.

It's been a long time, LJ. Here's some songs I recently bought on Japanese iTunes. (Sorry that they don't have real music videos.)

( YouTube videos under the cut... )

Bill and I hosted a 鍋パーティ (Nabe Party) yesterday.  Nabe is any kind of food cooked in a nabe pot.  Examples include sukiyaki, shabushabu, and chankonabe, but there are many more kinds.  This time, one of Bill's friends taught us to make 石狩鍋 (Ishikari Nabe - a kind of salmon stew from Ishikari).  There were 7 people total - 3 from Bill's wind band, and 2 from my workplace.

It went super well, and I was so pleased!!  I learned a lot about how to cook Japanese food, and everybody loved the brownies & ice cream that Bill prepared.  Everyone seemed to have a good time and got along well, so we were chatting up a storm once we got aquainted.  We were all around the same age, which was a different experience from work parties.  It was really good language practice for me, too!

Bill said it was the opposite of American parties, because our guests left the house cleaner and left me & Bill with more alcohol than when they arrived. :-)

Also, the 3rd year students graduated today.  The Japanese image is of graduation is, of course, of cherry blossoms floating down from the trees, but here in Hokkaido it was snowing.   After the ceremony, all the clubs met near the entrance for a send-off of the graduating members.  I don't know why I didn't expect it, but I was put on the spot about making a speech to the English Club kids.  I was really proud of myself that I gave a speech in Japanese right off the top of my head.  It was short and sweet, but it made one kid seriously tear up, and everybody else was smiling (usually I never speak Japanese to them).  After I finished talking, the JTE asked me if I'd practiced the speech ahead of time, so it must have sounded ok!!

I've been posting every day on Lang-8.

( Read more about Lang-8... )

I've also been drilling the jouyou kanji (the 2000-odd commonly used kanji) really hard in an effort to become literate as quickly as possible. I think once I can read native materials more comfortably, my vocabulary and grammar acquisition will shoot way up. So, I've been using the Kanji-Town memory method.

( Read more about Kanji-Town mnemonics... )

Happy Valentine's Day to everybody - single people included!!  I made this gingerbread house out of cookies, candy, and royal icing.  100% edible. ^_^  It's the first time I've made a non-Christmas gingerbread house.  I didn't bake the pieces, though - a friend did.  We had lots of fun decorating our houses together!

My husband and I went to Hakodate for Christmas!

Hakodate is a famous port town with a stunning night view.  From the top of Mt. Hakodate, thanks to the bays surrounding it on both sides, the land is transformed into a ribbon of light.

Here's the money shot:




( You know you want to see more pictures! Clickey clickey! )

The choir director: You're not singing with enough FEELING.  Think about the MEANING of the words!  (Except for you.  You don't understand Japanese.)

Me: *nervous giggle*

Choir director: Everyone ELSE think about the meaning of the words!

At least I understood what he was telling me I didn't understand... :-(

Oh, and the science teacher lady showed me albino frogs and salmon babies today!