good day!

today i helped three third year students (matric equivalent) with their english speeches. it was so satisfying. they are stereotypically shy except the boy one who likes to break into lion king medlies. he liked me pictures of the kruger park one hell of a lot.

i apologise for the abscence of punctuation lately. these keyboards are a little hard to navigate.

today i tried melon milk from a vending machine. it costs about five rand, comes in a 500ml cup with ice and tastes bloody great. there are about 27 other things in the vending machine i am eager to try. oh! i taught the pupils today the word eager. they liked the kruger park pictures better.

will post photos on the weekend

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my new cell phone is the weight and dimensions of a wonka bar. it can do a lot of things that i do not understand.

mum - i am　not posting at five in the morning. something is off with the clock on this pc, I swear.

today I discovered from my receipt that my alien resident card had my surname missspelled KAHAN. ooh vok. so i went to the town hall and said `here. wrong` as politely as I could and guess how long it took to fix? five mintues baby! either these people have nothing to do or they really are as efficient as everyone says.

food highlight of the day was honey bread. half a loaf of white bread soaked in honey and then toasted covered in whipped cream. not a traditional dish i am told.

and Okimoto-sensei prepared me a frozen tea to take to school. its a cheap summer tea called somethingsomething which tastes like very floral but weak coffee. yum yum (oshi oshi)

i took pictures of my school children today in their sailor suits playing the tuba outside; its 34 degrees.

Carrie I am so glad you are enjoying!! now write me an email lady!



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well well well so much to tell!

the jet-lag has kicked in good and proper. only got two hours sleep last night ahead of what was a unique and tiring day.

headed off to hiroshima at noon. the smoking rooms in japanese airports are very depressing places! when i touched down in hiroshima prefecture (a prefecture is like a province) I, along with the other JETS was greeted by three people from my school - with a banner! I felt like a rock star. Martine, Kaneshima-san and Okimoko-san then escorted me through the green hills of Hiroshima o my new school and new life in Mihara...

I was whisked off first, to my suprise, to school where I met the principal and vice principal (that's Kyoto-san and Kocho-san...I think). Kaneshima-san, my sweet sweet supervisor, translated for us as we went through the school contract - the men seemed particularly adamant about my being on school grounds at 8:20. The headmaster said to me 'do you know the difference between high school in South Africa and high school in Japan? In Japan we are very punctual'. I must say, I have never been more terrified in my life: sweating, wearing the wrong shoes and sososo tired in a room with three distinguised, calm and serious men - all in blue shirts and black pants.

I then went to buy a watch (go figure) with Kaneshima-san guiding me through a department store and neighing at the prices of watches these days.

I then returned to school and in front of the staff - i had no choice - i shamefully transfered panties, shampoo and gifts from my big bag to my small one.

i also used a japanese style toilet. :(

then Okimoko-san and Kikawa-san who are teachers at the school took me to dinner and the prospect,　honestly, mortified me. I was SO tired, I speak no japanese and to top it all off we go to an Italian resturaunt. I thought I wouldn't survive. But i did. The food could not have been further from Italian kitsch. It was like a backward fusion style - the best Italian flavours simplified into a japanese style. So get this; we order a chef's salad, fried fish and okimoko-san has fresh garden vegetable pasta. The so called chef's salad is a delicate portion of italian lettuce topped with macerated onions, strips of pan seared beef and two blocks of vegetable terreine: wafer thin strips of carrot and mushroom suspended in gelatine that was lightly pickled in flavour. The fried fish was a whole sardine pan-seared on broccolli with a little portion of rattatouille and a single prawn - split down the middle - its head gunk removed and replaced with blobs of mayonnaise. the prawn had been seared too i think but grated tempura batter was piled on top. The pasta was italain spaggetti in a vinegarette topped again with wafer thin radish, broccolli, red pepper. every dish was so beautifully presented. very haute cuisine. and utterly delicious. delicate! i,m sorry to have rambled ala-jamie oliver or whatnot but it really was remarkable.

conversation was not at all formal or uncomfortable. these two japanese ladies were so kind to me. at no point did i feel that being polite pushed me to incinserity (which had been a major anxiety). my genuine suprise and enjoyment of the food and the company was huge.

tomorrow i get a cell phone. Kaneshima-san got me an english brochure (eigo no hon). They look bloody amazing. all the colours and whizz banging!



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Apple Ginza

I bunked my orientation workshops (for the most part they're a total bore) and headed to the Apple store in Ginza. I rode the tokyo subway all by myself! Shinjuku 08 to Ginza 16 on the Marunouchi Line. Although the signs and voice prompts on the subway were mostly unintelligable, I recognised certain words und understood from the syntax whether it was a command or a direction or whatever. Domo arigatou gosimasu, Jenkin-san!

Apple Ginza is THEE Apple shop in Tokyo - THEE electronic capital? Well, it didnt disappoint. The facade is so minimalist its almost invisible; like the Anti-Voldemort headquarters in J.K Rowling's London : if you dont know about it you won't see it. Inside its four storeys. The chic store-people call your order through to the appropriate floor then a lift made of 4" glass top bottom and sides wisks you silently up where another chic store person (hair north facing rather than the first floor's south easterly style) is standing waiting with your product packaged at the till. WOWEE! Supre cool.

Sadly for me I arrived at this temple of neutral wet with sweat and red-faced with my hair in every direction (but mostly southerly. wet and plastered to my face). They were kind enough to pretend that I looked how I wanted to look - in my head.


Going to Mihara tomorrow. Hopefully the light will be different there or something and I can start taking photos that aren't utterly rubbish!

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whose the pro?

A Japanese person just asked me for directions. i nearly died. I was so proud. couldnt help the poor fellow much though.

Today the minister of Arts, Culture and relations who was supposed to do the key note speech at our welcome was late because his train had stopped due to someone jumpin in front of it. heavy days!

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very small in japan

Driving into Tokyo from Narita airport (a distance equivalent to OR Thambo - Jozi) these were the things that struck me.

The green: it is lush. But with plants completely unfamiliar. Both jungly in the tropical sense and foresty in the typical northern sense. Very beautiful.

The density. Buildings really are on top of one another. And they do not stop. But they are well proportioned - small mostly with lots of diagonals and cut-aways so that, although everything is on top of everything else, they accomodate eachother and it doesnt seem claustro.

Its also very very clean.

There are several rivers running through Tokyo with barges and bridges.

The city is aesthetic and planned to the enth degree. The words that came to mind were 'Western', 'European': I think i must rethink what those words stand for. The functionality and elegance isn't a function of being European - its from being first world. So this was a new thing that I learnt.

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My hotel has a lending library of umbrellas outside. You put in a deposit and then you can take a beautiful white and lilac striped brolly with an ivory handle (that matches your outfit perfectly) with you around the town. It's drizzling on and off and the sky is white with constant cloud giving everything that photoshop inner glow.

My toilet has a bum washing button.



So here I am! Bloody hell. So lekker.

i'll post something more intelligable and picture packed soon. x





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