Day 246 {Ice on Car} - [8 Months]

Yes my 8th month in Nippon and again it seem like things have gone full circle with me again since I first got here… Remember last month I was complaining about I want to go home and yadda yadda??? I am now back in the mode to stay another year, sorry mom, sis, my Church family and my other friends who miss my company I miss you all too… seriously when I think about it, it makes me want to ….. ….. but no no no Im a strong guy ….

So I woke up this morning rushing to go to work…..Only to see my windshield and the other glasses on the car FROZEN SOLID!!!! I was like…What in Jehoviah Shaloam’s name is this????? I sat in the car and turned on the heater while sitting in the car for about 5 mins and wondering why this Ice wont melt…. I used the windshield wiper and that was no good….. I went for a knife to attempt to scrape off the ice and that didn’t work either…. If I continued with the knife….maybe it would have taken 30 mins to complete the scraping process…. So BINGO!!! I filled a bottle with water and poured it on the car and that worked…I then saw Bryan from upstairs walking towards me, and he said sometimes the water will refreeze when you pour it on…..so its best I get an ice scraping device from the home store. I was also told by a couple people that pouring water on the windshield can mess it up big time….

So I drove to my Thursday school which is in the top 3 very snowy areas that I have to travel to… When I got there, a whole lot of snow was on the school compound and the worst thing is that this school is on a little slope….And again I have no snow tyres. The teachers here also warned me that the SCHOOL TOMORROW IS ONE OF THE MOST SNOWY AREAS that I have to travel to and they HIGHLY recommend that I get snow tyres NOW!!!!! So I called my company again, and told them the urgency of my situation… So they said to go to smile service today, which is the place where I bought the car from… for them to put on the snow tyres…

It was 0 degrees celsius today and the sun was actually shining… You can only see the brightness of the sun but feeling the heat is impossible. I drove to smile service and they told me that they don’t have my tyre size so I have to come back here tomorrow evening at 5:00 pm AFTER WORK….. I was like WHAT (NANI) !!!!! Just my luck….and I have to go to that dangerous snowing area tomorrow. I asked them how do I get to that dangerous place without snow tyres?? Then they told me that tomorrow will be ok (daijiobu) in that area and I dont have to worry because the FORECAST shows that there will be fine tomorrow. So I said “OK” and called my company to inform them of the situation…All they could tell me is to be careful on the road and of course, dont be late for work…Yes thats my company for you…. Actually, at a school near to where I should go, there was about 20 cm of snow there and they showed it in the newspaper…

I didnt play soccer today, because they are using the school gym to prepare for some sort of festival thing… All my schools are having this music/acting festival thing around this time. I was invited to one of them but unfortunately it was on a Sunday and the time was a little too early for me… I hope to see one soon though…

Day 245 { Let the Snow Begin }

While driving to work this morning, I noticed some white stuff falling from the sky and I was wondering what in the world was going on. I also noticed some vehicles passing with chunks of ice on them…. The further I drove, the more this white stuff got…..So yes it was snowing like crazy this morning and I of course had to take a bunch of photos and make a little video clip http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=5ybObLXrTHM because this was my first time seeing snow like this…Everywhere was white… I started to worry a bit because I don’t have snow tyres as yet …. I also saw some ice on the road occationally, and many people have been telling me that the ice business on the road is very very dangerous…

All the teachers today came to me in excitement because they knew that this is a first time experience for me. They also warned me that the school that I go to this Friday is EXTREMELY dangerous, so they suggested that I get snow tyres for Friday (Keep this in mind) … I made sure to call my company and ask them what can they do to help a brotha out… Then they said that they can give me 15,000 yen towards paying for snow tyres… HOORAY … They also told me to go to the comapny that I bought my car from in order for them to put on my snow tyres.

Went to my apartment and my internet not working so I watched the Dexter episodes that I downloaded then fell asleep. Only to be awaken by a phone call from my friend from the park. I didn’t go to the English Conversaion today, as they cancelled it due to the crazy snow that has been falling today.

Day 244 { A Little Snow }

At my Tuesday school today, a teacher called me to show me that a little snow was falling. It didn’t look like the snow I saw on the TV so I dismissed it. They said that it was just a little bit so my car is ok to go back down the hill… Later that evening I went to another English conversation thing at the nursing college in Niimi where I did the video shoot on Saturday. The 2 girls I did the video shoot with were there along with some other persons. There were about 17 of us in all including 2 of my JET friends… We introduced ourselves then spoke about our studies, then questions were posed to us. While we were leaving the college, it was excruciatingly COLD and I then dropped home my friends and guess what? It was snowing in the night at about 1 degree celsius… It was COLD!!!!!!!!!!

I then met my little Japanese friend who I saw in the park on Sunday we ate at joyful and chatted again for a little while :)

Day 243 { Computer Fix }

It was exactly 1 year ago today when I applied for the job to come to Japan to work… I had no idea that I was going to make such a decision… Hey but life is too short and time really flies…

Today the principal at my main school asked me if I use the computer at the other schools… So I told him yes, but this school is the only 1 that give me a laptop… I personally take that question to possibly mean “Hey, you are using that laptop wayy too much bro, find something else to do“… Which might be true BUT I could be wrong, and if I am wrong, I might never know in this life time…. So, next time when I go there, I am not going to even touch the laptop. Luckily, my friend Vany called me and he found out I was having computer trouble… So after I came off the phone with him, I tried the memory… I did’t try it earlier because I thought that if it was memory trouble, I would have heard the beeps, but there was no beep. So I still tried based off recommendations from Vany and it seem that my 1 gb memory not working… Also the slot where it was in don’t seem to be working either…. I saw your message after I did this Richard… So now, Im back again on my 512mb, slow as ever… But at least my personal computer is back up now. Thanks Van..

Went to bible study in the night and we practised the little chant that I wrote….We practised it with some actions that we were brain storming and it was mondo fun I tell you… I should perform this on November 30th, the day after I have my presentation about Jamaica at the Niimi library… Novemeber is such a busy month…

Day 242 { Laughter }

I went to church today and I was trying to paint a picture of how the fishes that I dont like look… I did it with my facial expression and the pastors’ daughters as well as all the others who were eating around the table with us were dying with laughter. One of the pastors’ daughters even started screaming with laughter… I have never seen someone laugh like this before… And she kept saying Miteru miteru…. I think it means please show me again or I want to see it again… And every time I do it they laugh out… I mean the fishes look like they were screaming “Taskete Kudasai” (Help me please) before they die….

After all this I went home then met up with the girl who like reggae music from the Friday night English conversations….We walked in the park, swang on this thing in th park for kids lol …. and we chatted for about 3 hours… I don’t know what this means however… but she is pretty cool.

Day 241 { Video Shoot #1 / Meet with 2 in Okayama }

The person who should operate the camera for my video shoot today, came to my apartment a little late because he didn’t know exactly where I lived. How is it that the Jehoviah Witness guy found my place without me even giving him my information but this government worker guy had some difficulty ??? Any way I felt the urge to simply look outside my apartment and it was the video guy right there peeking around the corner… He picked me up and we drove to the Niimi College for nursing students. I met this Assistant professor guy who spoke very good English as well as 2 of his nursing students… As soon as the 2 nursing student saw me, they started whispering and laughing, which is the usual thing when almost any young female meet me for the first time… I think I would enjoy teaching at this college, I wonder if they want to give me a job there … Any way we did the video shoot and it went pretty well in my estimate… It took about 1hour and 30 mins as well as several trial runs to get it done…. The sun was hot today though for a change…

I then went to BIC Camera to purchase a 160 GB Hard disk and also bought GRAND THEFT AUTO 4 :) for the PS3 … I then met my 2 Japanese friends and we had dinner near the train station… We chatted and laughed for a good little while then one of them had to run to catch the bus… The other one spoke a little English and we spoke briefly then went our seperate ways…

Went to my Thursday school today instead of my tuesday school and I was bucking down the place with sleep while shuffling around some papers and acting as if I have work to do… They probably know that I am bored but they would rather see me acting busy than bucking or looking bored. I went home and again fought with the PS3 internet… well at least I can watch videos on the internet but I can’t use messengers at all.