Counting Down

There's only two and a half weeks before I head home and I've been really busy packing and getting ready to leave. I went to Kikumi's on Monday night to watch a movie and have dinner. Another friend, Taka, came as well and we had a great night. I had my last Board of Education meeting on Wednesday and went out to dinner with Leah and Lisa afterwards. Friday I met up with Megan to go to Aru Aru City. We stayed until it closed looking for gifts for Megan's friends. We walked back to my apartment afterwards and ordered pizza for dinner. I stayed up late that night to get Welcome to Nightvale tickets that went on sale at 3 AM Japan time, so Megan stayed late to keep me company while I waited for the tickets to go on sale. She left for last bus, but I'm glad she could stay with me at least for a bit!

On Saturday I packed a few boxes and sent them off to America in the morning. In the afternoon, I met up with two of my former Shinozaki students. They heard I was leaving and wanted a chance to say goodbye. After introducing myself to their parents, we headed off to the most popular teenage girl spot in any culture, the mall. They showed me all their favorite stores I helped them pick out English books and cute bags. We went to the arcade for プリクラ (purikura, specialized photo booths) and played taiko drum rhythm games featuring new songs. We ended the afternoon at the food court where we had chocolate, banana, and strawberry crepes. After saying goodbye I headed back to Kokura to meet up with Caol for the Kitakyushu JET Sayonara Party. Eighteen of the JETs living in Kitakyushu came out for dinner and we had a fantastic time! Everything went their separate ways after the party and Leah, Caol, and I headed for karaoke. We only stayed for two hours before heading home, but we had an amazing night!

Sunday I met up with Juha and Dan and we all caught the bus to Fukuoka. For Jake, Dan, and I it was our last game day in Japan. We made sure to get there early so we'd have all 12 hours full of games. We played a ton of different stuff. I played a few new games I love and want to pick up when I get back to the States and some of my old favorites. By the end of the night there were only seven of us. Jay had a few bottles of wine for us to share to celebrate and we ended on a murder mystery game. It was so much fun and it was great to see all the board game people again before going home.

Today I'm starting my last week at Tsukida. So far I've had some great last classes. It's so bitter sweet, I love all the teachers and students here, but I'm really excited to come back and start working in Colorado. I have my Board of Education goodbye party in a few days, Kokura's Gion (a summer festival) starts on Friday, and Leah and I will take our last Japan trip to Naoshima over the weekend. It is a long weekend, so next weeks update will probably be a day late, but I'm so excited to get my last few adventures in before I start packing up for good!

More Birthday's and Games

Last week was a calm week at school. I had a lot of nice classes and enjoyed eating my school lunch in the classroom with the students. I got some great news Thursday morning, I will have a job when I get back to the States! I also found out my flight home will be one July 30th and I'll be flying to Boston via Toronto. I'll be flying home in a month and a half and although I will miss Japan, I'm really excited to come back and start on my next adventure!

I went out with Leah on Thursday night to celebrate. I cooked dinner and we both went to Bob's bar for a drink and some karaoke. We both went home early, but it was nice to see her! On Friday my friend Lisa came over after school for a girls night in. I cooked and she brought a bottle of wine and dessert. We live a bit far apart from each other, so we don't see each other often. It was really nice seeing her and we ended up hanging out well into the night.

Saturday we celebrated Bec's birthday. I met Dave for coffee in the morning and we headed to the castle together. Chris rented a BBQ and we had a little picnic on the castle grounds. It was a ton of fun! I left with Marc and Tanya a little early to head into Fukuoka for the night. The JET charity committee hosted a pub quiz to raise money for the relief effort in Nepal. Juha was originally supposed to be on their team, but he had to drop out at the last minute, so I went instead. We did win, but it was a great night and it was nice to be in Fukuoka again.

Sunday Marc and I headed back into Fukuoka for a game day. I've missed the last few months of gaming, but it was really nice to be back! We played some games I've played before, but we also played a bunch of new games! We played from 11 AM until well after dinner. Marc and I headed back to Kokura around 9:30 PM. It was a great week!

This week I'm excited to be in Matsugae again for school. I'll also be back in Fukuoka over the weekend for the JET Sayonara party. I have to work next Sunday, but afterwards some of us are thinking of going to see the new Mad Max movie (it comes out next Saturday in Japan). I'm really enjoying the last of my time in Japan and I looking forward to my last few trips before heading home!

Game Day

I know I said these would get longer, but I'm sorry to say this will be one more short post. However, next week I will be at speech contest and the week after will be my performance and Kobe trip, so these should liven up soon! This week I spent late at school every day helping the student practice for the speech contest on that will happen this Saturday (10/4/14). This week I will be doing the same and I'm so excited for the contest to be over so I don't have to stay late anymore! I will also be judging half of the original speeches, so I'm excited to here what the students from around Kitakyushu came up with!

This week like I said was fairly uneventful. On Friday I went to Swing21, the jazz bar I'll be performing in next week, to run through our set. It was a lot of fun and I got a chance to talk more with everyone. After rehearsal I met up with Patrick, Leah, and the two new JETs Chris and Becca at a Turkish restaurant. Even though I've been here over a year now it was my first time going. The food was delicious! The owner is from Istanbul, but can speak English and Japanese. We talked with him a lot about the different cultures and asked him questions about Turkey. We ended up staying at the restaurant for hours just hanging out after a long week of stay late at school to help the students with their speech contest practice. It was really nice to relax and learn a bit about a new place!

Saturday I mostly stayed in and cleaned. I could have gone out with some friends but I'm trying to save a little extra money for my Kobe trip coming up. Sunday I went into Fukuoka for a board game day! It was also my friend Jake's birthday, so we had a little cake for him and a few of us went out to dinner afterwards to celebrate. I played a whole bunch of new games including one called Rampage where you are a monster and you get to destroy buildings and eat people by dropping you monster token on little buildings and people. It was so much fun! We also played a deception game called Blood Bound where we all knew our own character, but no one else's. We had to figure out the ranks everyone else was, who was on our team, and who was the one neutral person and then try to capture the other teams leader. I ended up being a special character that acts like one team, but is secretly on the other one. I ended up not only interfering with an attack and saving my real teams leader, but I also captured the other teams leader winning the game for my team! It was a complicated game, but a lot of fun! I also tried a new Japanese game that was similar to Uno, but with more effect cards. All the cards ere worth point values and can be discarded or played for effects on the table in front of you. The only catch was that any card played had to match the color or number of the top of the discard pile, like in Uno. At the end of the game you count the number values of all the cards in your hand and on the table in front of you. If you are the first to lose all your cards, you get no points even if there are cards in front of you. The person with the least points after three rounds is the winner. I was in second place both the first two rounds, but ended up winning at the end of the game! It was a lot of fun! I also played some games I've played before like my favorite Betrayal at the House on the Hill and got to introduce some new people to a game called Takenoko. All in all it was a great time!

Sorry again for this being a short one. Next will hopefully be more exciting and even if it's not the week after I'll be able to talk about performing at Swing21 and spending the long weekend in Kobe!