(the snowfall at Sapporo University; not quite the snow as is in my town -will snap photos of me town soon!)
A mighty wind and and some right-y, tight-y long underwear. Now, I haven’t been counting the days that I’ve been living in long underwear (no, not the kind of underwear with a flap at the behind), but the comfort of this heat-tech, warm-ish, winter-away-keeping undersuit has been truly remarkable. Recently, due to the chillyness of the surrounding.. well, everything, my tastes have migrated to warmer and woolier articles of clothing, cloths, towels, etc.
You name it, I want it. I would say that I’ve got loads of warm-y, winter-bashing things like wooly sweaters, and such things but I don’t necessary have the means of getting to the spots that sell such warm things. So I have but a few warm articles, thank goodness.
I need to tell you -yes, I need to make the following point. There are already mounds of snow outside my house. I am struck thinking.. when I was but a kid I always wanted, waited for enough snowfall so that I could burrow and dig and create a fine little snow house for myself in my front yard. Well, whether the weather systems, furious snowfall or otherwise something of the like both combined, there is enough snow here to build a castle! Okay, about forty or a hundred snow castles -the really humongous kind. I’m talkin’ like if you weren’t careful as you dig the heaping snow could collapse back on you and they would have to send one of those husky wompy-faced dogs with the little canine collar flask full of some kind of delicious brew that would save soul and body at one gulp.
Yeah, there be a lot of snow here.
Anyways, winter is assuredly here. And though before here in town our weather would snow, and then melt, and then wind (be windy), and then snow again.. no, no, the snow is definitely here to stay. And very much in time for Christmas !
I can’t tell with much certainty what I’ve been up to lately but the months have been melting away faster than cheap chocolate in hot cocoa. And if you are complaining that cheap chocolate doesn’t melt all gone in hot cocoa, well, you’d be right about that, too -but there are those kinds of days as well, the days that feel like unsightly, unsavoury little lumps at the bottom of our cocoa cups.
But things have mostly been a right breeze.
Speaking of today, for example. At high school after two profound English classes -the last of this marked season much to our student’s content- the students were selling wares and goods to the steady stream of townsfolk that barred the blowing snow to come and purchase, chat, and see all for sale.
After class I wandered down with teacher-friend in tow and bought up a ‘happy [cooked] chicken’ as the label reads, some local rice, red beans, kidney-like beans, lamb stew, key chain made from legitimate lambswool, etc. Got it all for a fine price, I did!
Gosh I love my town.
And so regarding school and not just the things you can buy and see there, at this point in the season classes are coming to a close, teachers are dishing out assignments to be whittled away over Christmas break, and students are muttering in wait over the last English classes as they wait to sleep in, rest up, and do a whole bunch of nothing for the holidays -aside from whatever else is really done over winter-y holidays here in Japan by pouty students.
There are some of us that will be plastered to office chairs in wait of closing-time bells, and holiday promises. But of course work will beget the better bite out of us before we.. okay, before I get away to enjoy any travels that I have planned. More on that later. But work is a machine in itself. It is fantastic to see this winter-y season in swing here in Japan. Unique events, some in same and some different and all of it fun.
But Christmas is no doubt just days away. Without sending up complaints I am still in working as to what my Christmas will look like.
Hold on for a little flashback here.
I remember having spent no less than two Christmases in Thailand. Those times and those travels were rich and fine. One of those several years ago Christmas evenings in a simple hut in the at near tropical latitudes, we were surprised by a Christmas choir of students from one of our nearby Thai schools we were teaching at. What fun that was.
Whether it has been a candy cane slid across the desk in warm gesture during the holiday season, or a packet of chocolate mix slipped into a desk drawer there are no doubt suprises to the holiday season, possibilities of things a-happening, or.. just well, in my case, plans to be made.
(above: a wintery waterway on campus at Sapporo Uni)
And I am looking forward to it all. As of right now I will have a hot date with a few Christmas films, some jingle-y reindeer antlers, and take-out food from a tasty town shoppe.
It’s in the making. Don’t send that script off to Hollywood yet.
But let me give you a stark sample -as I bopple along and write- of a few events this weekend last.
Last Friday was our Christmas party here in the office -for us office folk. The lot of us, and some people that I had no idea that I worked with because I virtually never had seen them in the office, piled into and company van and bumbled our way to a sightly town restaurant-aside-highway. We sat on tatami floors, ate fried foods, drink this or that to our own bliss, and played bingo all for a few hours. After all was said and done we again piled into vans and evacuated our dining location for a smaller and louder ‘snack’ or karaoke shop for hors d’oeuvres and singing -karaoke style.
(above, a Christmas party dinner. Wish you were here)
It was great fun and in the end one person was dragged home by another in expection of a restful weekend due blowing winter weather. And so it was.
The next day I made it out to our northernmost main Wakkanai city here in Hokkaido, shopped, bought a new game for entertainment’s sake, and had some famous ramen noodle soup at a tasty place that I had not yet tasted.
Book shops, home stores, icy roads, and pop music made the day all tied off with a brief department store stop. Home in time for dinner, and snow to shovel, it was a real ‘win’ of a day.
So this last week I have but a few more classes to roll and achievements to achieve.
In the end nothing too special but the speciality of Christmas itself.
Without minding the promptness of this post I welcome you a fine Christmas. A warm Christmas.
Now let me get home so I can fish you out some photos to show you and fill in the gaps of this writing that I hoped to send to you.
Still haven’t worked out today’s dinner, but with any luck one doesn’t have to look much further than a well stocked fridge and a pantry littered with a few cup noodles all ready for slurping. I still have a healthy portion of deer meat to devour, and a fresh cooked and wrapped chicken so rightly purchased from our agricultural high school to do away with. Chicken curry anyone? Or perhaps a midnight chicken sandwich?
But, if I may interrupt myself, I have just -as per the guidelines and suggestions of our JET language textbook- tried my hand at ‘de-mae’ or doorstep/doorstop takeout delivery, etc. I jingled on the phone a local eatery, ordered a mixed noodle dish topped with any variety of seafood and veggies on special and in no less than twenty minutes had myself a plate big enough for two of noodles and seafood-y things for about eight dollars CAD (dollars). Nice. Thank you, JET textbook. Although I had a heck and a speck of time trying to explain in Japanese where my house was located. But in the end I am fed and they are worked. Thanks!
So long as we stay fed until we read again,
ciao
(tonight’s supper. Whatever it may look like to you, it was a telephone ordering achievement and a mighty fine fill for me!)
The Traveller's Typewriter 