Wales 1 England 0

Tonight was the final of mine and Phil's long running pool tournament. Despite going 1-0 up and feeling confident, a couple of cruels twists combined with solid Welsh play to get us to 2-3. After that it really should have been 3-3, but a cushion shot on the black was minutely short, leaving the black hovering over the pocket for Wales to clip it in and take a 4-2 lead going into the break. 4-2 became 5-2 before England heroically brought the match back to 5-4, only for Wales to end it in the next.


All credit to Pip for taking the victory in the end- our Pool Mondays have become the stuff of legend (at least on our respective blogs), and even pool owner Akira looked close to tears are Filipu left the Theatre of Dreams for the last time. In all seriousness though, Phil is a top bloke and a worthy pool opponent, and will be greatly missed.

Carrie and Phil- おつかれさまでした！

This weekend I said goodbye to good friends Carrie and Phil, who are leaving Japan and moving to Prague. Well actually I said goodbye to Carrie, as I'll be facing Phil in tomorrow's tense Pool Final, which will be the last time I see him on these sunny isles. Our farewell involved a curry at the delightfully named SWAD (does it stand for something? what does it mean? answers on a postcard) followed by some drinks. Photos to follow when I steal them from other blogs.

On Saturday I returned once again to my favourite place Takamatsu, revisiting Ritsurin Koen and the lovely area around the train station and by the waterfront.

And on Thursday I'll be off to Thailand!! By the time I come back I'll have been living in Japan for over a year- plenty of time to philosophise on that later though, as at the moment the mighty Iraq are battling with the equally mighty Saudi Arabia in the Asian Cup Final. Come on Iraq! I'm sure no-one would begrudge that nation something to cheer about.

The Final Countdown...

After 12 long weeks, and 132 frames of competitive pool, the outcome of mine and Phil's epic contest will be decided in four days time.

Tonight I clawed my way back into a game that I thought I would lose (4-2 down at the break) to sneak it 6-5, and keep my hopes alive. In 3 months I haven't once led the tournament, yet whenever Phil has taken a lead I've eventually pegged him back. Its now 6 matches each...

Monday will be a tense encounter, yet it will also be a sad one as its the last chance I'll get to see my good friend from Wales before he returns, via Malaysia, to Europe, and before I head off to Thailand for my summer holidays.

Look out for photos of our last bout, including Pool Master Akira, and news on who triumphs and becomes 2007 Okayama Prefecture Gaijin-In-Akira's-Bar Pool Champion.

倉敷夏祭り- Kurashiki Natsu Matsuri!

This weekend I went to Kurashiki's summer festival, a great excuse for people to drink beer, eat street food, and wear kimonos. It was a great day that I only found out about thanks to fellow jets Meghan and Bethany. Without overstressing the point, it yet again demonstrated how amazingly community-oriented Japan is- grandmothers dancing next to 5-year olds, everyone enjoying themselves, getting drunk and having fun without trashing stuff.

After a few hours of watching parades and listening to the same music again and again and again and again... I "encouraged" my companions to go to a sports bar to watch the Asian Cup Quarter Final between Japan and Australia (two of the group, Bethany and her visiting sister, are Ozzies). What a thrilling game!! Austraila scored first, but Japan hit back within two minutes, before extra-time was played out and it went down to penalties. The hero of the day was none other than that living legend Yoshikatsu Kawaguchi! Me and the other Japanese guys in the bar were chanting his name as he saved not one but two Ozzie penalties, and Japan recorded a deserved victory 4-3 on pens. Back of the Net!

Some Photos From Onomichi

The first real test of my new shiny camera was in Onomichi! Here are some of the results...

Let's Make All Our Dreams Come True

One of my jobs as Shonan High’s resident foreigner is to come up with a naff English slogan for the school festival. This is meant to be based loosely on the ideas of students in the "organising committee".

Last year we had the pretty cool "All Our Hearts Beat As One". Wish I’d thought of that one. It was certainly a step up from "Let’s Make All Our Dreams Come True", which inexplicably seems to be a favourite phrase of Ono-sensei. The year before that someone had clearly be watching the Three Muskateers, and shamefully stole "All For One, One For All". The cheek!

Anyway this year I was given very strict parameters for what I could and couldn't choose, which severely hampered my creativity from the outset. The "Organising Commitee" presented me with "One Day Treasure Believe Your Friend". When I broke the news that this was completely nonsensical, they requested I think up a tagline with a similar 'feeling' to it. After pausing to wondering what feeling is actually associated with this car-crash of the English language, we finally settled on "A Day To Treasure With Friends". It’s certainly less grandiose than "All Our Hearts Beat As One", but for an afternoon of lazing around school and eating takoyaki- aka the School Festival- it seems quite appropriate.

Anyway, its been a while since there’s been a competition on the blog so lets see who can think up the best Japanese-English-"nice thought behind it but sounds pretty cheesy in practice"-slogan. Prizes will of course be available.

Tarako Tarako Tarako!

Tarako!!


















Two days have passed (or maybe three), and I sensed you were all eager to hear more about Kaminocho station's new ticket barrier. It became clear to me yesterday morning that the arrival of said barrier is a major event in the lives of many Kojima residents. As I arrived at the station for my commute to Seishi High there was actually a small posse of old people standing around the barrier discussing it. It reminded me of the ewoks staring in awe at R2D2 and prodding him with sticks. Anyway, its truly big news when the old people stare at the barrier rather than me!

The rest of my day yesterday was about as laid back as could possibly be. In fact its quite scandalous that I got paid for what was 7 hours of total relaxation. It started with my getting into work at 1pm only to be told that there was a big meeting until 3pm, so I could take off and go shopping for 2 hours. After a leisurely trip around Aeon shopping mall I headed back to sit down for the afternoon movie on TV (in Japanese, but still). After dozing through that I had a leisurely dinner whilst watching more TV. Just as I was settling down to do something productive S-sensei declared it was time for golf practice! So off we went, in his sports car, to the local driving range for an hour of practice, before he dropped me off at home a full hour earlier than I'm meant to finish.

Today was like being in a labour camp by comparison. I had two whole lessons, although one of them did include eating tacos. And between the hours of 3 and 4 I played in a mini target golf tournament with Yoshida sensei, Kawahara sensei and Toda sensei. We even had students to carry our clubs! :)



Despite all this stress-free living I remain on edge for the coming weekend, as a big, bad, scary typhoon is scheduled to hit mainland Japan on sunday. I'll either be at home or in Kyoto, where I'm hoping to see the Gion Matsuri, though I can't imagine how good that'll be in a torrential downpour. Only time will tell...

Shocks and Surprises

I’ve titled the post as above because I can't think of any other way to link a cockroach falling on me and a new ticket barrier at my local station. The first event traumatised me severely- I’d arrived back home in the dark of the late evening, slightly tipsy as I swerved into my bike parking space, when I noticed something moving on the floor. I saw it scurry away, then took my bike keys out of my bike to open my front door (put together to be truly “Steve Proof”). It was only then that I noticed a big buzzing cockroach on my shoulder!! Even writing this makes my skin crawl, but at the time I immediately swiped at it with my hand while simultaneously shrieking like a little girl at the top of my voice (I say this without shame- YOU try finding a big f*ck-off cockroach on your shoulder!) Once it was on the ground I stamped on it about 6 times before rushing inside.

This is only one in a series of cockroach incidents recently. They appear in my apartment on average at a rate of 1 per week, and every time there is much shrieking and throwing of things.

Anyway, onto the next bit of news, which is the new ticket barrier at my train station! It's truly the most ineffectual ticket barrier ever. Picture a big wide open space, with about 2 metres on every side and no barriers except for this rectugular ticket checking machine in the middle. It was being watched today with beady eyes by a JR employee (one of Japan's train companies). He insisted that, after we'd walked past the barrier to buy tickets from the ticket machine, we walk back, insert the ticket and somehow pretend to pass through an imaginery barrier before heading up to the platform. No-one looked impressed, and he was even less impressed by my grinning as we lined up to complete the process. If it led to slight amusement for me, many of the elderly residents of Kojima seemed genuinely shoocked to have to deal with such a piece of technology, and on returning home from Okayama tonight everyone gave the unsupervised ticket barrier stares of open disgust. I enjoyed the collective feeling of malcontent, and if I'd had a few more beers I'd have probably boo-ed it loudly. Obviously this saga is yet to be resolved, but I'll keep you all posted.

Finally, I levelled the pool series tonight with a 6-1 win, before finally settling for a 7-4 victory. That leaves me and Phil at 5-5, having played a whopping 110 frames of competitive pool, and with just 33 more frames- 3 more matches- to play before he leaves these isles.

Shonan Strikes Back

After the teacher transfer window in April I knew the kimochi, or general ambiance, at Shonan was going to change. However recently there has been an explosion of Japanese-English or "Japlish" at work. Not the usual "how are yuu aimu fine sankyuu ando yuu" of the students, but a move amongst many of the young teachers (and Y-sensei) to mix English words into everyday conversation.

The most obvious example of this tendency is Y-sensei's cries of "Let's Go!! Smoking!!!" whenever he heads for the downstairs smoking room. But today, this craze reached new and worrying heights. Instead of his usual "see you later" or "see you tomorrow", K-sensei decided to sign off by declaring "May the force be with you!". Incidentally this is because N-sensei told us that he was a big Star Wars fan- he told us he'd memorised "may you force be with you" and "yes my master" (after which I broke the news to him that it was actually "may the force be with you"). Now K-sensei has decided to put the phrase into general usage...

It worries me on a number of levels, not least because K-sensei seems to expect me to reply with "yes my master" whenever he says it.

I think I'm going to teach him such words as antepenultimate and pulchritudinous in an effort to create a higher level of english debate.

Anyway here are a few pics from around my local neighborhood...

(Cloudy day Seto Ohashi hashi)

(House of Kojima's very own "Salt King", Nozaki)

Some Nature

Seto Inland Sea

A Boat

Canada Day

On sunday a posse of us met in Kurashiki to say goodbye to Christopher, Sarah and Ezra, soon to be departing Japan for home. It also happened to be Canada Day, celebrated in international style with Australians, Americans, Japanese, New Zealanders and two Brits kicking a football around while drinking cans of beer (who, me?)













Christopher and Sarah are truly wonderful people, not least because they gave me some tahini so I can fully realise my humous dream. If that wasn't enough of an excuse to lavish them with praise, they also happen to be the biggest Bob Dylan fans I have met outside of the Martin family. They'll be sorely missed, and I look forward to travelling to Canada some time in the future to see little Ezra inherit their passion for Bob and greek dips.

In other news tonight's pool match saw me claw my way back into the tournament after last weeks humiliated 9-2 defeat. I won 6-3 before Pip took the two consolation games to make the final score 6-5. That leaves us at Steve 5 Phil 4 with the weeks counting down before Phil and Carrie head back to Way-yels, and then on to Prague.