So much to say, so much to say, so much to say! By the way, if anyone is thinking of sending me a present (bold of me to suggest such a thing) maybe you could burn a cd with some of your favorite music? Or even tape a radio station? I'm a bit of a technophobe and have not yet learned how to do such a thing (downloading music), and the radio station in Tokushima is abhorrent. And I'll apologize here to my friend Ryan, who is ethically against any such piracy (rightfully so)... but... Well, I have no valid excuses for encouraging you all to be pirates. I just miss listening to music from home. Arrrr, me mateys!

Anyway, back to the crack. ('Crack' is gossip, according to my Newcastleite roomie). EARTHQUAKE!! Yes indeed, folks, I have now experienced a real earthquake. Five AM on tuesday morning I awoke very suddenly, like people sometimes do before their alarm goes off. You lie there for a few moments, wondering--why am I awake? and then your alarm goes beepbeepbeep. Except this time, there was no beepbeepbeep. Instead, my room began to sway, my overhead light swinging; I felt as though enormous arms had scooped up the earth and were rocking it like a baby, with terryfying effects. All I could do was lay there, eyes popping from my head. I had only two thoughts: "What should I do? There's no furniture in my room to hide under!" and "Oh, %$!#&! I'm naked! They're going to rescue me, and I'm going to be naked! What if I'm not wearing anything when the building collapses? Should I get my shoes first, or should I put some clothes on?" The shaking might have lasted for 30 seconds or two minutes, I don't know. But as soon as it stopped, I was up, throwing on a pair of yesterday's pants and a dirty inside-out-and-backwards t-shirt. I called for Joanna as I frantically ran around the apartment, trying to decide what was most important. Put on shoes? Get my passport? Turn on the TV? Turn off the gas? I opted for tearing open the sliding glass door to look at the river, to see if a tsunami was coming. Joanna came out of her room and (more calmly than me) suggested we turn on the TV for some sort of report. The epicentre was in Kyushuu, just east of Hiroshima. There, it registered about 5 on the measurement scale (I don't know if they use the Richter scale in Japan). Here in Tokushima it was a 3. We eventually decided we were safe and went back to bed. When I told my students about my terrified earthquake antics later that day, most of them were highly amused. Many of them woke up during the shaking, and then just rolled over and went back to sleep! I can't imagine being so calmly accepting of inevetible disaster... but I suppose there aren't a lot of options. You can live your life in fear, but then you're only living half a life.

Hmmm... what else? Ah yes, I'm moving!! I'm taking a one-room apartment close to BuBu's shop. It's miniscule; the entire apartment is not much bigger than my current bedroom. There's one gas burner, a wee bar fridge, and a toilet/bath combo, which is very unusual in Japan, as it's considered quite dirty to bathe where you poop! You usually only see such a combination in the tiny little business hotels. The tap over the sink actually swivels so that it also performs as the tap for the bathtub; the entire apartment is quite the miracle of space-saving ingenuity. I won't have any furniture save for a small coffee table that Bubu's family is donating to my cause. I'm actually pretty enthused about my impending sparse lifestyle. I'd like to have a few pillows so that when I'm entertaining guests, they won't have to sit on the hardwood floor, but I don't imagine I'll bother getting a television or a dvd player or a couch or a bed or anything like that. What do I need them for? I'll have my futon for a bed, which I fold up and put away every morning. I'll have a few plants which I'll bring from my current apartment, my books, my art supplies, my little stereo. I've got a nice little balcony, so perhaps I'll get a chair so I can have my tea out there in the morning. The main thing is that I will only be responsible for myself, and that was part of my mission when I decided to come to Japan. I wanted to prove to myself that I am capable of functioning as an independent human being before I moved into the next stages of my life, whatever they may be. So far, so good!

We have a new teacher, a Scottish fellow named Andy. They poor bloke never learned how to ride a bicycle, so he's been having quite a time in Tokushima, the City of Cyclists. He's fallen off quite a number of times and will be well scarred up before he leaves this country! I have to pick him up on my way to work on Saturday, his first full official day at Nova Kitajima Fuji Grand; I'll be leaving VERY early. I've seen him out a couple of times now, and it's quite nice to have a new friendly face in town. However, I think I'm turning Japanese-- like most normal Westerners, he makes eye contact when we're talking, and I find myself having a hard time looking back, as is the Japanese custom-- you don't look anyone in the eyes too long because it's considered too aggressive! Anyway, maybe he can help bring me back to that fact that I AM a Westerner, and that eye contact isn't such a bad thing.

Went to Takamatsu with Yoshino last week; we had a great time, taking or bikes in the back of his station wagon. Takamatsu is the biggest city on this island, and it's about 45 minutes from Tokushima, depending on which roads you take. To get there we went through the countryside, stopping to see some famous sand hoodoos (quite like the ones on the way to Summerland from Penticton) and a shrine that was apparently filled with male and female body-part art and sculptures-- I say apparently because unfortunately, it was closed! The countryside was breathtaking, and I ooohed and aaaahed as we drove through the lush mountains and past deep gorges with deep cool streams. I saw palm trees and small houses and bimbom fruit trees (like apricots, but more tropical) little narrow streets and rich green valleys. When we got to Takamatsu, I was almost disappointed to be there; I prefered the scenery and diversity of the countryside. We first went into the Takamatsu Prefectural park; it's been cultivated for nearly 360 years, and it was quite spectacular, particulary the display of Japanese irises growing in the centre of one of the ponds. (I took lots of pictures for you, mom!) One park guide caught me messing with the carp (I was trying to pet them, of course) and instead of scolding me, he gave me a 15 minute in-depth explanation of the history of the park in perfect English. The one phrase I remember from his lecture was, "This park is arguably one of the most beautiful in Japan." I remember because I was impressed with his accurate use of the word 'arguably'. Funny how being an English teacher can suddenly make you aware of the intricacies and the ridiculousness of language in general. How often do we speak without saying anything at all?

Anyway, from there we got the bikes and rode around Takamatsu. We stopped to eat famous udon noodles-- which I had enormous difficulty eating because of my conditioned terror of making slurping sounds; I have since been admonished by several of my Japanese friends, who tell me that you cannot taste if you do not make noise! At the time though, I was so embarrased and upset by my inability to slurp that I was nearly crying, my steaming bowl still full in front of me while Yoshino had finished his. He encouraged me by telling me to "image the carp" that we had fed in the park-- with their great big sucky mouths! He also said, "Oooh, good sound!" whenever I managed a half-assed slurp. I was glad to get out of there when we were done. We went from there to a wax museum that depicted the history of the samurai wars that had happened in the area hundreds of years ago; the costumes and the faces were quite effective, but I've always been a little freaked out by life-size dummies of any sort, and so I was glad to get out of there as well. Smelled funny, too. The drive back was on a bigger highway, so no real spectacular scenery, although the sunset was gorgeous. Yoshino always plans such adventersome days, I quite like having as a friend. I'm going to have to do something for him sometime-- cook hamburgers maybe?

Anyway, I best get out of this smoky cafe and back out into the rain; it's quite windy and wet today, but very warm, so it's really not a big deal if I get soaked. Wish me well-- I've got a challenging couple of weeks ahead!

Namaste

endrene