Lost in Paradise

HUZZAH!!! I have not forgotten this thing...I promise...no really! Alright, I`m at work, so this post should be short, but I felt bad for not updating, so I`ll tell ya about my weekend. I didn`t take any pictures anyway haha, sorry, maybe next time. So the weekend started on Friday, as I suppose most weekends do eh? I got off of work and jumped on the 5:30 Liner (don`t even get me started on the boat schedules, I finally get it figured out and they change all the times again. Apparently we`re back on the summer schedule, meh, go figure) to enter the great city of Naha by around 6pm. What was I doing in Naha, you ask? Well, as it turns out, two of the Eisa members, a shimedaiko (Small drum) player and a sanshin (for you cultural types, this is the Okinawan version of the shamisen) player were getting married, and of course they have to have the eisa group perform at their reception. That`s right free food and yet another chance to show off my recently acquired skill. I had enough foresight, surprisingly for me, to remember to pack my drum, nice dress clothes, and my uniform! Amazing! I actually do have pictures of the reception, but don`t have my camera here, so I may add those in here somewhere...later. Needless to say, the reception was a good time, many similar parts to an American reception, and many VERY different parts (i.e. some weird video of the bride and bridesmaids covered in black paint and dancing around to "Dragonstea Din Te"...or however you spell it, and about 8 guys in drag doing a performed routine up on stage. I dunno, so don`t ask). So after we performed, me making only a few mistakes haha, we went out and hit the town at an izekaiya (it`s like a nice version of a buffet...kinda tough to explain, I`ll work on that) followed by a trip to the good ole karaoke. That`s right, a night in Japan is not complete without at least a little karaoke. Anyway, after the karaoke, pretty much everyone headed home to their various hotels, but my one friend and I were not quite ready to call it a night...in hindsight going to bed may have been a good idea haha, had to catch the early Liner the next morning which meant getting up at 8am...oh well. We didn`t really do much after that, just headed to some late night restaurant where I had taco rice (oh how I love thee, let me count...nevermind, you get the picture). Finally climbed into bed at the hostel we were staying at by around 4 am. Oh, speaking of the hostel, one of the most interesting places I`ve stayed in yet. It was basically a house with a bunch of beds stuffed in the attic...oh sorry, did I say beds, I meant BUNK BEDS! Oh yeah, awesome, I slept in one of the top bunks. (did I mention there were only two of us staying in a room filled with about 9 beds? no? huh, you`d think I would have...) So that was a good time. Four hours later, I`m getting up and meet up with my post office friend (heresoforth to be called Keita...for that is..his name...yeah) and his girlfriend/fiancee...I can`t quite figure that out. They say their only bf/gf (like, omg, he just totally said gf squeeeeal)...yeah...>.>....<.<....>.>....(those are shifty eyes for those of you that don`t know), but they are saving up together for their wedding. Peculiar and peculiar... Now by now you may be asking, "when is he going to stop typing and rambling, I thought he said he was at work"...or you may be asking, "Why would he possibly need to catch such an early boat, knowing that he is not only NOT a morning person, but also knowing that he would not have a good morning after this...or any...wedding reception?" Both very good questions, and I choose to ignore the first one, so nyeah. The reason I had to get back to my island so early on Saturday is because I started to take diving lessons. Yay! I decided that just in case I wasn`t busy enough, I should get a diving license to take up even more of my free time. Luckily I was not alone in this endeavor, as two of my fellow teachers also wished to learn to dive. Turns out that diving really isn`t all that hard..huh, who`da guessed it. Of course I will admit, I still haven`t gone very deep. That first day was long, and cold haha. The ocean seems to think it`s still winter, despite anything the boat schedules tell it...silly ocean. Oh, I also apparently almost got bit by a sea snake during my very first dive, what fun! I never saw it, but my instructor said it swam very near my arm...I am slightly disturbed by the lack of vision while wearing a mask, tho after underwater hockey, one would think I was used to it. Guess not. On Saturday, we went on two veeeeeery shallow dives, maybe 3 meters, and then we had a sit in the "classrooom" (read the picnic table outside of the diving nistructors building) and went through the instruction book. Now, remember I had been up since 8 and it was now almost 6...plus all I had eaten was a convenience store sandwich that morning while waiting for the boat to leave port. So yes, I was very hungry, and slightly sleepy. "No worries Brett, you can now go home and grab a quick bite to eat and hit the ole futon and sleep all day Sunday if you like." oh, silly silly guest, you obviously don`t know me. After diving, I get dropped off at my house and no sooner had I hung up my wet things than my cell phone rings. Keita wants to hang out. hmmm, do I sleep or go hang with Keita, Nana (Keita`s girlfriend), and whoever else may be at his house. I was going to say no, I swear!, but he had to go and say he was playing Final Fantasy 7....argh a weak point! Tricky tricky Keita. So I go, which ended up having an advantage, I had a good time, and Nana, for some reason, felt she had to cook everyone about five plates of food. *insert celebratory trumpet sound here* Food Glorious FOOOOD! I finally get back to my home around 12, very full and very sleepy. But there is no rest for the wicked, I did get to bed, but had to get up at 8 the next morning to go for day 2 of diving class, yes, that is right, Sunday was also slated as a day for learning how to dive. Now, you may be thinking, but Brett...12am to 8am...why, that`s eight hours my good sir!, surely you were rested up. I laugh at you foolish guest. I already mentioned it once in this post...this veeery long post...but let me reiterate, for the slow ones. I AM NOT A MORNING PERSON! haha, okay. I drag myself out of bed, as I do every morning that I get up when it`s actually morning, and somehow get a ride to the dive shop again. Day two was just as good as, if not better than, day one. We started with a shallow dive, practicing buddy breathing and the like, then had an enourmous lunch provided by the diving instructors wife, then we got an hour break to do with as we pleased. I chose to nap on the beach and play with some of my students I found there for a short while. The second dive was great, it was our first boat dive and I got to do the classic back entry off a boat. The depest we got was maybe 7 meters, but it was still a good time. We got to feed some fish on the bottom, and I saw many amazing fish, as well as some other deadly ones, such as the crown of thorns...i think that`s what it`s called...it`s all spikey and big...and deadly. OH! and I saw a blowfish, that was actually pretty neat...although it didn`t decide we were dangerous enough to puff itself up...darn, I should have taken a stick...note to self, bring stick next time. After the dive class was over for the day, 5pm, and I once again got a ride home (yay, lucky!). Okay, so I should have rested and possibly slept at this point, but I didn`t. About 6pm I get a keitai (cellphone) email telling me that a group of my friends went shellfish hunting during the day and were then having a small get together, and I was invited. So I go, and not only eat real meat (not fish) but get to watch the Japanese/original version of Dark Water...I forget the Japanese title. I was amused, though I didn`t think it was all that scary. Afterwards, they started playing Mah Jhong (once again, however you spell it) and I watched/learned. Whew...so that was my weekend...how was yours?
Brett AWAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYY!!!!!

Hey! Long time no talk...again... So I'm trying this whole "tell the story backwards" thing today so you get more of an up to down plot line. I've decided, after passing one of many of these, that I would start a little segment I'd like to call, "STAIRS BRETT WILL NEVER GO DOWN!" I thought the caps was a nice touch. So, yeah...not entirely sure the purpose of these stairs, but the welcome doesn't look nice at all. Anyway, I thought it would be nice if I gave a small tour of the island and it's beaches (okay well beach, but I promise to go back to Tokashiku beach at one point). Les GO!!!

Okay, so here's a shot of the Southern part of Tokashiki island. You can juuuust make out the lighthouse, haven't made it there myself but hope to one day. I took this and the next shot on the liner (fast boat) one day when I was leaving Tokashiki for a wild night on the town in Naha (if you're nice I'll tell you about that one). The sky can be so amazing out here, when there are clouds the sun shines through brilliantly and when there aren't you get a clear view of the universe at night. I have it rough, lemme tell you.

Ahh, and here's another picture of Tokashiki jima from the ferry. I took this picture more because I loved the giant geyser of water that the liner was spewing. Wow, that would be crazy to try wakeboarding on.

So here's the start of the actual island tour. This lovely little village is none other than Tokashiki itself. I took this shot up near an old army base turned hostel, it was about a 25 minute walk up a mountain, but I enjoyed it.

A bit further down the road from the nice view of Tokashiki you get another very nice view of Mae jima. Also, if you look reeeeeealy closely you can just make out the mainland of Okinawa, about where Naha is. See the really shady, blueish areas around and behind Mae jima? It's crazy at night because Naha is all lit up and a large contrast to Tokashiki.

So here's a slightly worse shot of Tokashiki Village. You can't get much of the front, but you can see back toward the back better, where the rice fields are. My apartment is on the left of the picture, see it? I found it! haha

Here's a picture of Tokashiki's port from above. It's actually pretty big, but unless you look at it like this it seems small. Either way, the Liner port (more on this later) is the white thingy on the right and the big ole ferry docks on the left. Neato

Just a bit down the road from the last couple of pictures is an entranceway to a shrine. It's kind of covered in construction at the moment, but from what I understand, this shrine is a shrine for all the children who were killed or died before their time. If you're nice I may give you a small history lesson a little later on. ~.^

Okay, we're getting close to the bottom of the mountain and we get a good shot of the little (well, not so little) docking area for all of the boats. I know dad would love it, but there aren't really that many sail boats here. Anyway, if it seems like a lot of boats are out of the water, it's because this was taken around the time of a typhoon, and it's never smart to keep your boat in the water during a typhoon...unless you're Forrest Gump or something.

Okay, here's a picture of Ie jima at low tide. Notice the land path? You could easily walk on the dry land to get to the island, but you want to make sure you watch the time, because when high tide hits, all of that goes for a swim and you could be stuck on that little island for a few hours. Not too much fun, unless you remembered your fishing pole.

Here's a picture from about a 5 minute walk to the bottom of the Northern mountain. What a walk to get up, eh?

Finally a picture of one of my favorite places to hang out...well besides a friend's house. This is Marine Box, more commonly called Maribo (Mari from Marine and bo from Box, aren't they clever?). This is pretty much the only bar in Tokashiki, so if I want to drink elsewhere I have to walk a ways. Anyway, when they weren't understaffed they had the beer garden on top open and all the drinks were half price. Two dollars for a pint of beer or a glass full of Awamori, delicious Awamori. They do also serve real food downstairs, and drinking snacks on both floors. Oh, did I mention that the lower floor also goes karaoke every night at around 10? yeah.

So we've reached the bottom of the Northernmost mountain and boy am I tired. jk. This shot is about half of the mountain. The old army base converted into hostel is to the left of this picture and a bit farther up, but even if I had taken a picture of that area, you really couldn't see it. This building is one I've never been into. As far as I can gather, this is the pound, though it doesn't look like much. They apparently don't consider stray cats as poundworthy, since they're walking all over the place, and when they do have animals here (well okay just dogs), they lock them outside, in cages or just roped to the side of the building. Weird...

Ahh yes, here is a picture of the lovely, new dock for the speedy little liner. Apparently this was not here last year and opened up maybe a month before I got here. It really is pretty nice though, but since it's just a dock...well there's not much I can say about it...huh. Oh, we sometimes have late night eisa practices in front of it! that's something right?

So once again, we see Ie jima in all it's glory. This is the farthest South point of the port, where all the water entries are done for the many boats seen earlier. The walls there are definately needed for the typhoon season, those waves can get pretty harsh...too bad I don't have my board. The ferry and Liner enter the port at the right of the picture between Ie jima and the closer piece of land...you can't really see the opening here, but trust me, it's there.

Okay, I thought this was great and felt I should share my amusement. So this is a typical type of advertisement for a convenience store, of course the ones in the city are a bit more high tech, but meh. For those of you who can't read kanji, I will explain their advertising priorities. The sign with the arrow is the store name, Nihamaya. The upper left white sign says sake or alcohol, to the right of that is mizu, water. The lower left white sign reads ta ba ko, tabacco, and the next one should be pretty understandable, toilet. Aren't their priorities great? Of course in the bigger city, when they have less space the top two are alcohol and tabacco. o.O

Okay, so next on the list is the very convenience store that was just advertised. This is one of maybe 4 convenience stores in Tokashiki, Nihamaya. I think I've mentioned it before, but there are no grocery stores on the island, just a bunch of convenience stores. Isn't that great? The great thing about this store is just to the right of it. On the right of the building are two white picnic tables. What are they doing there you ask? Well, they're for drinking on of course. That's right, many times after a practice, whether it's eisa, volleyball, badminton, or taiko, The group will come to the convenience store, buy themselves some drinks, come back outside and drink at the tables for hours, often until the store closes and turns its lights off. You gotta love it. p.s. Surfer Hello Kitty Rawks.

Okay, so on the walk from Tokashiki village to Aharen village you get to see not only goats, but these! Yes you guessed it, rice farms. We don't have much farming space, but what is here is definately being used. I'm still not entirely sure the whole process of growing rice, but I'm sure I'll figure it out by the time I leave. Oh and to avoid future confusion, the name of the island is Tokashiki, but on the island are three villages, one of which just so happens to also be called Tokashiki. Okay, any questions? ...no? good.

Also on the walk from Tokashiki village to Aharen village there is the smallest village of three on the island, Tokashiku. Of course you can't really see it in this shot, but it's in the lower right part of the picture. I'll get better shots later I promise, as well as shots of the southern most part of the island, where there is basically just a bathroom...it's a really nice bathroom if that helps.

So I thought I'd make my big introduction to Aharen Beach with a couple of lovely ladies. This picture was taken very close to the beginning of my stay here, when a large group of fellow JETs came and visited Tokashiki for a weekend of fun. Of course it rained pretty much the whole second day (longest I've ever seen it rain here by the way), but I think fun was still had. Anyway, on your left is the lovely Chiye, posing all cool like, and to your right is the lovely Julie, livin life on the edge and appearing to have a good time. This pic is taken from this little, out of the way viewpoint. To get here you have to do a bit of walking up a semi-steep path filled with bugs and hot, but the moment you get to the top of the stairs and enter the viewpoint, it was all worth it. You are almost immediately struck by a cooling breeze, since you are pretty high up, and then are struck again by the amazing view of Aharen and the surrounding ocean. This is one of my favorite places to go and relax. Just thinking of it makes me want to go there again, but then that would be a bit of a walk...over a mountain...okay, I'm over it haha.

So here's a view of Aharen taken a while back. If you couldn't tell, it is about to rain, and the odd thing is that there are still little to no waves. I'll explain this later, but in this view you can see Tokashiki's next door neighbor Zamami island! Wave, they get lonely. Zamami is apparently actually composed of three large islands connected by giant bridges. I haven't been there myself, but you can easily see the bridges even from Tokahiki, and if you look closely at the picture you may see one for yourself. Needless to say, Zamami is much more populated than Tokashiki's 500. ^^

So I promised I'd put it in and I am. To the left you will see the entrance to Aharen Elementary. Straight, you see...ocean. Oh so difficult to choose. Of course, I choose the job, but don't worry, I make sure to hit the beach after work every week. haha

I thought I'd throw this in now, but this last week, Thursday actually, we had a wakeboarding practice and one of the members decided it would be fun to write out "wake riders" with pieces of coral. Of course I corrected their spelling, but not until I got a shot of it first. I added a little face afterwards with random shells I found on the beach. o('.')b

So as you come onto Aharen beach from the school entry...well any entry really, but this was from the school one...you will get a good sight of this island. I forget it's name, but it's at about the 1/3rd point from Aharen beach to our neighboring island, Zamami jima. I'm told that before all of the boats were powered and dangerous, people would swim from the beach to that island daily for exercise. Makes sense...it's only about 800 meters away, probably good exercise. I was also told that once a year the students of Aharen swim the whole thing. Guess who's going to make sure they're going to be there for the next one. Oh, by the way, that little white spot on the right side of the island is a boat if you were wondering. ^^

Here's my second favorite picture of Aharen beach, taken just this last week. The sun behind the clouds was so breathtaking that I had to risk getting my phone wet (I had been wakeboarding all day, and yes I have a bit of a sunburn). The ocean at Aharen beach is almost always that calm sometimes even calmer. This is because it is caught in kind of a big bowl between Tokashiki island and Zamami island, our neighboring island.

Okay, so we'll finish up the day with my favorite shot of Aharen beach. This is the wallpaper on my phone and it pretty much sums up life at Aharen. Calm waves lapping at the beach as the sun sets behind very fluffy clouds. Isn't life rough?

Okay, last one for the day. Just something I thought was funny. My name place is so much bigger than everyone else's...I don't know if this was intentional...cause I'm so much bigger than everyone else, but it's always fun to watch the kids try to fit their name plates inside mine and make funny new names from them. "haha, Kei Brett sensei" Oh, I forgot to mention, these are the nameplates that everyone has during lunch time. The different colors represent the different grades, and so the food is distributed to the trays depending on their age. So for instance, the yellow names are second graders, and the green ones are teachers, so they'll put more food on the tray of the green plates than that on the yellow tray. "Clever girl" ;P

Ah, and here's a view of the school from the opposite side of the entrance. The big building just to the right is the school's gym. It's a very nice gym, but there's no AC so it gets incredibly hot...blah.

Okay, so when I showed up for my first day of teaching at Aharen, one of the students favorite things to show me was their newly acquired goat, who was apparently pregnant. Just this last Wednesday "momochan," the mama goats name (it means pink, momo), gave birth to a brand new baby boy, "kuroikun," black. (Apparently they like colors)

Right across from the butterfly house is the school's garden, where it is the job of the 3rd and 4th graders after lunch to tend to the crops. Not entirely sure what they're growing there...suppose I could ask...hmmm... And yes, those are a couple of my students, who I had just helped rescue their ball from the deadly grasp of a tree. yeah, go Brett sensei! o('.')b

So we swing around the back of the school and we reach the farthest end of the school from the entranceway. At this end the students have a big butterfly house! There's just caterpillars in there now, but they're starting to make their cocoons and I can't wait to see the end result. ^^

Okay, so now we swing around the left side of the building to the back and what do we find? It's a coi pond!! Aharen's coi seem to be new or something, because they're still small. I have noticed that every school on this island (wow big feat, there's a whopping two...moron) has a coi pond. I always thought of coi ponds as more of a marketing scheme in American businesses to excessively leech off of peoples interests in other cultures, but what do you know, they really are that popular here too...huh. Anyway, just like in the morning, after lunch all the different classes have a job to do for cleaning the school. It's the 5th and 6th graders' job to clean out and off the coi pond. Pretty neat eh? No need for janitors.

Okay, now we've entered the school grounds and if you turn left and look directly to your left you'll see this little (okay well, pretty big actually haha) guy sitting underneath the big tree, hidden from the street. I'm not entirely sure the story behind this guy, but he appears to be some kind of oni (or demon) playing a sanshin, a historical Okinawan instrument that I can't seem to get enough of. I haven't seen anyone worshipping this guy or anything, but I also haven't seen anyone climb on it at all, which is something that the kids seem to enjoy greatly...they're like monkeys. Suppose I could ask the principal about him eh? ahh, but then there's that lazy factor again haha.

So maybe I should be posting these in reverse order, but it's too late now, next time I promise. ^^ Here's another picture of the school from the front, you can't see it but there is a little wall right in front of me so I'm not really lying on the ground to take this picture, the land just starts there. The big white van there is the school bus, I think there's three on the entire island, the bus is needed, since there is only one middle school and one kindergarten on the whole island, so the kids from the other two villages need rides to get there. If you're nice, I'll explain that at a later date or something. Oh yeah again, you can't tell from this picture, but if I were to turn directly to my right you would get a shot of the entryway to the beach (more on the beach later) but how distracting is that? If I were a kid going to school here and I saw the entranceway to the school and the entranceway to the beach on the same road...not so sure I'd get much studying done, eh?

Okay, so I'm trying to figure out this whole posting pictures thing and writing captions for them as well...we'll see how it goes. So it's been a while, ne? Sorry, I've been busy/lazy...as per usual I suppose. haha. I figured today was as good as any to show some of where I work, now the Aharen Elementary school is the school I only visit once a week, but I decided to start with this one...cause I like it better haha. Of course that's prolly cause I only go there once a week, but who knows. Anyway this is a picture of the entranceway to the school, pretty neat eh? Every morning before school starts the students and teachers grab their brooms and sweep the whole area of leaves and then spray down the concrete to clean it off. Impressive, and I can't help but lend a hand.

Aharen as you see it coming down the main road.

Okay, so long time no talk. ^^ I still don`t have internet at my apartment, so I can`t really update the site too cleverly, but I may as well dish out some details I suppose. I`m currently working in Okinawa, the small chain of islands South of mainland Japan. More specifically I work on a small island to the West of Naha city called Tokashiki-jima (jima is Japanese for island). I`m the only native English speaker, but manage to get along with the people here and have even made a few friends/drinking buddies. I was surprised to find people here who could actually converse, granted quite brokenly, with me in English. Right now we are in the typhoon season, so we tend to get a lot of strong winds and rain, but that doesn`t keep it from still being incredibly hot most of the time. Of course, the only way on and off the island is by ferry, so when the typhoon comes in and even for a couple of days afterward the waves are too large for the boats to travel in, so the people on the island are literally stuck until the storm passes and the boats return. Oh, and the boats also bring supplies to the island, like food for the convenience stores (there aren`t any big markets, just a bunch of small convenience stores) so right before the storm hits, the people make a mad dash to the store to buy food, because they don`t know when the next time the boats will arrive. Fun times. It`s an amazingly beautiful island though, and the ocean is clear and blue. If you like snorkeling or diving then this is one of the best places to be (luckily I happen to enjoy both). The waves aren`t big enough for surfing, but the locals make up for it by becoming pros at wakeboarding, something I`d only done once before arriving here, but am now getting better at. Whew, I don`t think my emails are this long...^^;;; K, done for now, hopefully my internet will be set at home so I can throw some pictures on here.

Hey, first time blog. bleh, it will take some getting used to. Don`t have much to say, so I`m just gonna say hello..."hello"...alright, done.

Lost in Paradise

Sunday, March 05, 2006

Sunday, November 06, 2005

Saturday, November 05, 2005

Saturday, October 15, 2005

Thursday, September 08, 2005

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

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