"let it ____,"

I had a little walk today. I stood up from my desk and trundled along to the main front and entrance of our town hall to peruse our Sister City stuffs. Photos, picture books, and happy smiles of people on exchange in both Canada and Japan. I was reminded a little bit, happily of course, of how much I love my home. How nice my familiar parts of Canada are to me. Don’t you love home, too?

But this is not the time for sap. No, it’s not. The reason I bring this up is because on this walk away from my desk I was on a break from staring at a screen or textbook, breaking and considering what about to teach our kindergarten children this week at our end-of-week class. I was planning.
As I was planning and walking and breaking, I was staring out the window at, yes, the snow falling. And so that falling snow led me to reflect on home, the pictures of home being there infront of me in cabinets in our town hall’s front entranceway.

You get the flow here? I sure hope not because that’s about all the ‘trying to be literate and explaing what I’m thinking’ that I’m going to do. Hope I don’t make your head hurt with all this.

Speaking of work, however, I was on my rush to clock-in this morning and in the process of picking up a lunch box for lunch at our local and divine convenience store(s) here in town, and our usual selection of foods was interrupted. I was astounded to see that we have seasonal offerings in our lunch boxes! Seasonal offerings even at a convenience store! Golly, goodness, me!

Now you can’t blame me for being excited at this, it’s food, remember? The selection jumped at me right off the shelf. In Japanese it was a tasty Go-moku gohan with Shio-yaki sanma. That is a five-flavoured/ingredient rice (rice with tasty bits mixed in -like mountain vegetables and stuff), and grilled mackeral-pike/saury -whichever way you wanna spit that one.

The lunch was a good one. There was nothing like being filled with flavours-of-season, and filling the lunchroom with a fishy stench that can only be described as ‘all that is Fall’ to many coworkers here in the office. I did have to down a breathmint after because though tasty, that fish packs a punch in the olfactory department.

And now to keep this post readable and to keep you happy let me change again topics and say just one more..
Students changing in class. I am sure all of us ALTs and CIRs and whomever the like (hello to you all) have seen your share of things already in your time here in Japan that have made you wonder and almost want to gape. But you don’t. Or at least I hope you haven’t stared at anything you found unfamiliar.
Today, for example, while finsihing a splendid class with a game of Twenty Questions (which, for all you ALTs, works wonders in my middle and high school classes with the students. They love it) I was walking out of the room with my Japaenese Teacher whom I teach with and one of the boys in the class threw down his bottoms so fast he was almost flash into a new costume before I realized what had gone on.

Now luckily changing in public isn’t a problem here in Japan -in case you haven’t been to a public bath house here yet. And maybe I am just a flip and a step behind classrooms being used as changerooms (maybe I am yet to understand that). Forgive me either way.

Today’s event was just something that I wasn’t expecting after a ripe hour of teaching and learning English with the third year high school students. It was one of those moments like when you see someone dropping a flat of eggs out of the corner of your eye at the market and you just know not to stare. Or maybe YOU would stare, but not me.

Anyways, that’s the hat. I have loads of more things that I would love to cherry you on about but you would have to buy me a cup of coffee and I would have to promise you interesting stories. Maybe we will have time for that sometime. Hmm.

Right. It is snowing here in town and I still need to find me a decent winter coat. Any brand name suggestions? If not I will have to lose myself somewhere in the floors about doors of department stores in Sapporo and find myself something warm enough to run about in the snow in.

And here’s hoping you enjoy a cup of cocoa by the fire. I know that I’ll be having mine right after I cook up some veggie-stocked-full curry this evening. And I hope you have a great-on week. I’m not kidding about the Twenty Questions game either -for all you ALTs out there. Give it a whirl and think about it over cocoa afterwards at home. Or don’t. Maybe you just want the cocoa.
Either way, until next week..

Ciao,

Yes, today’s picture is an elephant playing in the snow. I think it’s cute.