Welcome to Japan!

Well, I'm here! Japan is constantly fascinating me with its culture and all the differences. There are times that I feel right at home... and then I walk two steps and remember I'm still in Japan.

I promised myself and others that I wasn't going to write a novel with every post but I may have to break that promise this first time because so much has happened since I got here and I haven't been able to post until now. You might want to put on your PJs and grab some popcorn before reading this... its a novel (so don't say I didn't warn you). Here is a "summary" of my trip so far:

The flight from Phoenix to LA was a nice, easy flight. It was hard to say goodbye to my family but having them all there at the airport seeing me off was great, I definitely felt like they were all behind me supporting me as I walked through the security line, no matter how hard it was.

me with the boys waiting at the airport (we got there pretty early)

sisters!

mom and me

I landed in LA and had dinner with some APU people, great getting to see and say goodbye to some of my close friends. I miss all of them already!

Back at LAX I Met up with my roommate Kristen (it was great having a traveling buddy), had a hard time getting checked in... had to balance all my luggage in line (I'm sure I was an entertaining sight), had to repack my luggage because some of my bags were overweight, stubbed my toe the hardest I've ever stubbed it (it still hurts 3 days later), almost lost my boarding pass once we were in the security line because of the crazy pushy crowd, barely made it to the gate in time (they were boarding 1st class when we got there, I quickly left my parents a voicemail from the pay phone and then boarded)... it was insane.

Kristen and I before taking off from LAX

The LAX to Taipei flight was pretty easy once I got over all the nervous anticipation from all of the crazy pre-board experience. I stayed up and watched a movie so that I could get in schedule with the time difference, then slept for a while, then woke up and watched another movie, then landed. Easy compared to checking in. :)

We landed in Taipei, when we got off the plane what should have been an easy transfer to another gate took a detour because we were following this very nice lady who seemed more confident in where she was going than she should have been. Lets just say we could have had a little more chill time before boarding the next flight but at least I was able to access some free wifi and skype with my mom a bit.

welcome to Taiwan! we were only there for a little over an hour but we still liked this sign.

The Taipei to Okinawa flight was pretty easy and pain free... we had an interesting "lunch" (it was only 8:30am that included a cheese sandwich with potato and fish in it... but we were entertained by the funny english translations of the stewardess that made the announcements.

our "lunches" on the plane from Taiwan

We landed in Okinawa - CAN YOU SAY HUMID? We got off the plane and had to ride a bus to the terminal... we could feel the heat and humidity before they even opened the plane door. It didn't help that we hadn't showered in the equivalent of 2 days (even though it was just one long day for us) and I started to regret the decision to cut my bangs. Too late now I guess.

WE MADE IT!!!

Then we stood in line for customs - the kid in front of us threw up right as they were giving us the H1N1 virus warning papers... oh the irony.

Got through the first part of customs and had our bags waiting for us - everything got here safely, including my guitar... thankfully!

Went through security and had Mr. Elofson and his wife Chicaco, Rocky, and Michael waiting for us on the other side... it was a good welcome. :) We loaded up the school's van with all of our luggage and headed to lunch.

the back of the van with all of our stuff...

Driving through Naha went pretty slow because the traffic here is heavy all the time... it is a small island with a lot of people and a lot of cars. We had lunch inside one of their malls, at a Japanese restaurant... so my first meal here was authentic sushi and was very good, minus the accidental mouthful of wasabi. Everything here is small, including their water glasses at restaurants so when I got that chunk of wasabi I thought I was going to die... but I survived thanks to Chicaco giving me her water to add to what I had already downed of mine.

first meal in Japan! exhausted from the trip and a little unsure of myself with the chopsticks.

While we were at the mall, we also got a few groceries so we had our first grocery store experience before we even made it to our apartment. It was very difficult figuring out what we'd need and what we wanted when we were so tired and unsure about everything. We got some stuff to make spaghetti, some bananas and other fruit, a few cup of noodles Japan style, and stuff to make good ol' peanut butter sandwiches.

In the instant noodle isle at the grocery store. I'm definitely in Japan now!

After lunch and groceries Rocky (one of the teachers at the school who has been SO helpful in helping us get all set up) and Michael (another teacher from the states that got in a few weeks ago with his wife Sarah) to us to our apartment and helped us get everything inside.

By this time we were SO tired and thankfully had been out quite a while so we really only had to force ourselves to stay awake a few hours while we settled in and unpacked our apartment. We tried to get internet but failed so after unpacking some of our stuff Michael and Sarah came to pick us up and take us to their apartment to use their internet to call and email family. The only problem was that we seemed to put a curse on all internet because, while their internet was working before they came to get us, it refused to work while we were there. We were very tired so we gave up, called another teacher to have her email our parents to let us know we were safe and sound and headed home to shower and get some rest. I finished unpacking before I went to sleep so that I would feel more at home when I woke up the next morning.

The next morning (Thursday) we woke up and continued cleaning and organizing... moved a few items around and got rid of some stuff that had been in the apartment before. The girls that had this apartment last year were very kind to leave some of their stuff behind for us so we really didn't have to do much work to get our apartment set up, but there was a lot of stuff here that we didn't need so we organized what we wanted and piled up the rest to either throw away or take back to the school (the pile is actually still in our entry way... we'll take care of that soon).

After finishing cleaning and organizing we didn't have much to do because we didn't have our car keys yet (even if we did we probably wouldn't have braved driving yet) and had opted out of going to the school early that morning with everyone else. After a little bit of twiddling our thumbs and eating our peanut butter sandwiches for lunch, Rocky came over to try and fix our internet. We figured out that we needed some paperwork with the login info on it so the internet attempt failed yet again but he showed us how to organize our trash and fixed our TV (there are three different trash cans... burnable, non-burnable but not recyclable, and recyclable, its pretty complicated but of course all the instructions for it are in Japanese).

our garbage instructions poster - in all Japanese... we're just glad they like illustrations here.

We went with him to the school to use the school's internet to check our emails and update everything to let people know that we got here safe and sound. After doing that we helped out around the school, there is a lot to do before school starts in a week... they moved locations so there is furniture to set up, books to unpack, and much more, not to mention each teacher being responsible to set up their classroom.

Outside the school there is a few reserved parking spaces for... pregnant women, elderly, and handicapped... got to love the signs!

Kristen and I outside the school!

Our new building used to be a Beauty school, interesting translation. :)

After helping out at the school we went home to change and go out to dinner with a bunch of people from the school. Michael and Sarah picked us up and we went to exchange the last of our US cash for Yen before dinner which was our second experience in the malls (Jusco) here. It was good to see where there was one near our apartment.

On our way from Jusco to dinner we saw a big commotion with a lot of military police and japanese police as well as firemen and a lot of people crowded around one of the apartment buildings (or hotel, its hard to tell what is what here with everything in Japanese). There was a military guy at the top story of the building (5 or 6 stories) on the balcony rail about to jump. It was one of those, "don't look don't look don't look" moments but its hard not to... he had thrown all his stuff out onto the sidewalk including his clothes and a mirror that had successfully shattered all over the sidewalk. It was one of the saddest things I have ever seen. I think they convinced him not to jump because he was talking to someone on the phone and by the time we got through the crowd and back into normal traffic, he had gotten off the rail and back down to the balcony. It was my first real experience with the military presence here... its definitely not all fun and games. All I could do was pray for him and hope that his life gets less desperate. It was definitely an interesting experience to start my time here.

On a lighter note, dinner was so fun and very tasty. Rocky (who coordinated the dinner), Mr. Elofson (the school principal) and his wife Chicaco, one of the secretaries Junko and her daughter Elaina, the kindergarten teacher Lori and her two daughters Caroline and Izzy, Michael and Sarah (the married couple from the States), Kristen (my roommate) and I all enjoyed a wonderful meal getting to know each other. We had Yakiniku which is a Japanese meal where you cook your own food at the table. It is the Japanese version of an all-you-can-eat buffet... and they charge you by the amount of time you stay. It was a lot of fun getting to know some of the other teachers and a great way to meet everyone that I'll be working with over the next year. Did I mention it was yummy? Oh, and I ate an entire bowl of rice with just chopsticks (those of you who have seen me eat with chopsticks will appreciate the accomplishment). After that we came back to our apartment and went to bed, exhausted from the day and the jet lag.

Mr. Elofson with his food (pre-cooked)

Elaina (you can see the grill and a lot of the food in this pic too)

the three new girl teachers, Sarah, Me, and Kristen

our dinner group (minus Rocky who got stuck taking the picture)

Friday morning we got up early and got ready to head in to the school to help for the day. Michael and Sarah came to pick us up but we decided to attempt driving so we followed them to the school (since directions are very hard to get or give here and we had only been to the school once). I drove first and we got there without any mishaps. Driving on the "wrong" side of the road and car wasn't too bad, the thing that got me was the windshield wipers. I was consciously thinking about the driving part and I would go to turn on my blinker and accidentally turn on the windshield wipers because I wasn't thinking about the fact that those are opposite too. It was pretty funny.

me in the Guppy about to drive for the first time... its so humid here that the camera lens fogged up the second we opened the camera.

picture of me and Kristen that Sarah took from their car on the way to school.

We got to the school and checked our email and called/video chatted our families because we still didn't have internet. It was nice to finally get to talk to our families and tell them a little bit about our experiences so far. After that, we got to work and helped out all day around the school. I found out that instead of roaming from class to class I'll be sharing a room with the art teacher for my music classes, teaching my computer classes in the library, and helping out with a few of the high school independent study classes. Even though it is still kind of all over the place, at least I'll have specific rooms for the specific subjects... so I was VERY excited about that news. I worked on the computers in the high school room for most of the day and felt right at home in a tech role. :)

After school Kristen drove and we followed Rocky to our apartment and attempted getting the internet to work yet again... and after about an hour of messing with it, we finally got it to work! I don't know if I've been more excited about anything since we got here. Of course, we spent the rest of the evening on facebook and skype... chatting with friends and family. Everyone is so kind here, including the neighbors who come to your door to politely tell you that your car is too far over into their spot (in our defense the parking spots in our apartment complex are a little confusing because there are two different sets of lines and the shorter ones are apparently the ones you're supposed to go by, but the longer lines are darker so we were just parked between the wrong lines).

Since we had to move the car anyways and we still hadn't eaten (this was around 8pm) we ventured out and tried to go find our way around the neighborhood. We started at the A&W because we found it on Google Maps and wanted to see how many streets it was from our apartment so we could locate our apartment on the map. We decided not to eat there so we ventured a bit further in the opposite direction. We were able to get back to the American Village that is a few miles (we had been there the other day on our way to dinner) away but we didn't stop there... it was quite an accomplishment finding it though. We decided to come back get food from HottoMotto which is a "fast" food restaurant right by our apartment. It was not fast at all but pretty good, at least to satisfy our hunger at 9:30 at night. After that I got to video chat with my mom for a while which was great because we hadn't been able to yet (my dad said it was the fastest he's ever seen her get out of bed). Then I went to bed excited for our Saturday exploring adventures with Rocky (I'm going to post a separate post about that).

HottoMotto

first Japanese fast-food... the chicken wings were tiny!

Overall it has been an amazing time so far and in some ways I feel right at home here already. Its hard to believe I have only been here a few days but time is flying fast and we start teacher training on Monday. I'm sorry this first post is SOOOOOOOOO long but I hope it gives all of you an idea of what I've been up to. I promise to keep most of my other posts shorter.

I miss the familiarity of everything in the US but this is already turning out to be a great experience for me and I am thankful for every minute of my time here. I miss you and love you all!

ps - i'll be posting a video of our apartment and more pics soon!