Driving

Yesterday a couple of us went to Nikko - a historic site about 120 KM from Aizu Wakamatsu. I thought it would be a good idea to drive (and it was) but you will never guess how long the 120 KM trip took us. In Canada, it would probably take about 1 hour to drive this distance - maybe 1.15 hours. In Japan it took us over three hours! INSANITY!

This happens for a couple reasons
1) The roads are TWISTY and TURNY as you make your way through the mountains
2) The roads are ALL one lane, so passing someone is hard
3) There are no lights on the roads
4) The Japanese LOVE to drive slow

Oh well, it was a fun road trip!

It's beginning to look a lot like ski season!

This morning I got a phone call from Beth telling me it was snowing on Mt Bandai and sure enough it was!!! Cant wait to start skiing.... You better believe I'm gonna be making up for lost time while in Southern Ontario.

Uhh - You got that?

Every Thursday night I have adult conversation class from 7-815. My students in this class are mostly women (there is one guy) aged from 14~60. They are a pretty wild bunch and Im starting to get the impression they come because they 1. want to learn english, or 2. find me entertaining for an hour!

Tonight we were talking about sports so I asked the question, "What is your favorite Olympic sport?" The first girl answered swimming, and the second girl followed by saying "Oh me too, I love Ian Thorpe."

Ian Thorpe is a famous Australian swimmer well known for his enormous feet so I said, "Oh, you know he has size 15 feet (not sure if this is the actual size, but who cares)" and they were all like WHOAAA! Then I randomly say "You know what they say about guys with big feet...?" All the women were kinda staring not knowing what I just said, and then I'm like "oh it's an English joke" and they all BURSTTTTTT out laughing! I have never seen them laugh so hard! I'm still confused as to whether they understood the joke (big feet = big socks ;) haha NOT!) or were just overcompensating and pretending to understand!

Haircuto, kudasai

Today I got my second haircut in Japan and it was another interesting experience.

First, there was no cashier. You just walked in, put your money in (1ooo Y) what is essentially a vending machine and out pops your ticket - talk about efficiency!

The haircut turned out better than the last one, but I did miss getting my entire face shaved like last time (the woman straight edge shaved my beard, my eyebrows, my forehead, my ears, and my nose)! The added bonus to this place was getting your head vacuumed afterwards! I can honestly say that my hair has never been vacuumed, but it was interesting and there were no small left over hairs! Uncle and auntie, you should look into this!!

Taiko

Tonight a bunch of the Aizu people went to Koriyama to check out a show put on by this famous taiko group called Kodo.

Taiko is essentially drumming but in very rhythmic patterns and very precisely! It looks INCREDIBLY hard, and from mine and Beth's abysmal performace on Taiko Master (an arcade game) I can say without doubt it probably is!

Check out this vid from their performance in Toronto. The show went on pretty much non stop for 1h40mins