Les Chevaliers Perdus du Noël

It had been a while since I’d gone to draw with the Art Course’s drawing majors.  Well, “with” isn’t an appropriate word here.  They draw in silence, rarely looking and making a small comment to another student.  Sometimes students will talk to me, but most of them won’t.  It’s hard to have rapport with kids you don’t teach.  Plus, for some reason, all the other times I’ve gone, there’s only been like 3 or 4 kids in the studio.  Today, there were about 15 of them!  I don’t get it.

Anyway, rather than work in pencil, I decided to work straight in ink.  So, this drawing isn’t very good, but it is funny.

The center bust doesn't really have such long hair. Nor a Santa hat poof. ^o^

When I’m screwing around, I tend to give whatever nonsense I draw a title in French.  This piece is called “Les Chevaliers Perdus du Noël,” meaning, “The Lost Knights of Christmas.”  Well, I had forgotten that “chevalier” means “knight,” not “horseman,” which is what I was thinking it meant when I was drawing. It should have been “Les Cavaliers Perdus du Noël,” but alas, I had already written the title on the drawing.

Now, here’s a random photo of Keiji, who you “met” two posts ago, being emo:

When I opened my bag, his hair was over his eyes like that. *Sigh*

And that’s the end of Frankenstein Eli Wastes a Minute of Your Time. ^o^

Gimme Elixir! + Random Life Stuff Vol. 27

Tags

Elixir Recovery Challenge, Final Fantasy XIII Elixir

So, I don’t travel much, but I am taking advantage of currently living in Japan by playing Suntory’s Elixir Recovery Challenge.

*Sound of Readers facepalming*

What’s the Elixir Recovery Challenge you ask [after shaking your head and sighing]? Well, to celebrate the upcoming Final Fantasy XIII, Square-Enix teamed up with beverage makers Suntory to make a real-life version of the Elixir, the drink which restores all your HP and MP. Just that in real life, it casts Haste. (It’s an energy drink. Get it? ^o^) Anyway, if you take a picture of the Elixir with your cell phone, then email it to the Challenge sponsors, if the image is recognized (by computer, I assume) you get an email with a link to participate in a text-based battle.  For winning, you get to download a Flash clock with a picture of whatever particular Elixir you bought (there are 16 different designs). Your personal game homepage keeps track of which designs you’ve acquired.

The coolest thing (but also, creepily Big Brother-ish) about this game is that when you take down a monster, a light will shine with your name on it on a map of Japan on Suntory’s Elixir website, showing your location.  It’s not like you can tell exactly where people are, but you can certainly tell what prefecture they’re in.  Also, since you’re only allowed a 3-letter nickname, it seems like multiple people can have the same name; it really doesn’t matter since what identifies you to the game isn’t your name but your cell phone. When your name flashes, a “can” showing which Elixir you got also shows up at the bottom of the map.

Yup, my username on this game is "ELI." I'm so creative. ^o^ Anyway, I'm holdin' it down for Kyuushuu! We can't get our arses kicked by Tokyo-tou! がんばれ、九州！(<--Fighting a hopeless battle)

Since I really don’t like this drink all that much, I think I’ll stop at 8 cans (the minimum necessary to be entered in the drawing to win a PS3 and/or FFXIII related stuff). When I took this screencap, I had gotten 4 (hence, the 4/16 next to my name).  But I’ve got another Elixir in my locker. ^o^

Alright, on to some Random Life Stuff.

Winter Break Today we had the Second Term Closing Ceremony. That means that next week, I get to sit in the shokuinshitsu all day doing nothing! *Unholy boredom redux* Thank goodness for the Emperor’s Birthday on the 23rd. Well, I could’ve taken nenkyuu, but since I didn’t make any travel plans, I figured it would be wiser to save those days off for going back to the States in March and…potentially, going to Distant Worlds in Seoul in February!  I wanna goooooooo! >_< And it’s cheaper to fly to Seoul from Fukuoka than it is to fly to Tokyo! But I’m scared about the whole not knowing Korean thing, though I’ve slowly been getting courage from other JETs who’ve done it (positive chi shout-out to those JETs!) and since the airfare is cheap (about 200USD round-trip) I don’t feel too guilty about potentially indulging in this.

Oh, Jeeeeesus! At the end of every day, the students clean the school.  Or rather, they “clean” the school.  Anyway, music is played over the school’s PA for the 10 minutes of cleaning time.  Since it’s Christmas time, for now they play Christmas music.  The very first song they play is…Mariah Carey’s “Jesus Born on this Day.” ^O^ I can’t help but wonder if whoever picked the songs knew what that song was about. And during today’s “Big Cleaning,” they played “Gloria in excelsis Deo.” To think of all the past attempts to keep Christianity out of Japan, only to have public school students sweep the halls to gospel. Oh, cruel irony… Once I figure out how to export the recording I did in GarageBand of the gospel-fied cleaning time I’ll post it to here, probably as a YouTube video. (I didn’t record with video because that would involve filming students.)

Dreidel, dreidel, dreidel Last week my fellow JET and downstairs neighbor had a Hanukkah party.  He taught us how to play with a dreidel. I didn’t win much, but it was really fun! And I learned that “Dreidel, dreidel, dreidel, I made it out of clay” is a real lyric, not just something they made up on South Park.

And while we’re talking about religion… A good while ago, we had rakugo at the school.  The performance at the school was kind of like a variety show from before the time of television, as on top of the usual lone rakugo storyteller, there was a performer who did sleight-of-hand tricks. I only got one of the jokes though.  It was:

Question: 神様、信じますか。(Do you believe in God?)

Answer: イエス。(“Iesu,” which sounds like both the English word “yes” and the Portuguese name for “Jesus” which is used by Japanese Christians.)

*rimshot*

Who needs the Double-tipped Spear Technique when you can take down rival warlords with CUTENESS?!

This is Maeda Keiji. Isn’t he cute?! (I think not having 5 cats around is making me fawn over cute inanimate objects.) I wonder, if more Japanese people kept pets, would the Cute Boom ever have happened? I also wonder, what would all these daimyou think if they knew they’d been chibified so modern-day Japanese could hang said daimyou’s pumpkin-headed effigies from their cell phones? “You mean to tell me this is what I unified the country and had countless vassals die for?! FTS!” LOL Ah, poor feudal warlords…anyway, I wasn’t familiar with Maeda Keiji when I picked this up; when I saw it I thought it was supposed to be the Samurai Shodown version of Amakusa Shiro Tokisada.

Free Stuff Rocks the Hell Out of Non-free Stuff I had been trying to decide what to spend my 10,000 yen gift certificate from Yodobashi Camera on, and since time was running out, last weekend I made up my mind to get computer speakers.  My MacBook Pro’s are okay, but well, they’re not much for someone who wants high-quality sound.  I got a 3-piece speaker set for 5,900 yen.  It has a sub-woofer! YESSSS! Time to scare the neighbors with loud rap and electronica! ^o^ The speakers have pretty good sound for the price, certainly better than my computer’s speakers. I used the remainder of the gift certificate to get an iTunes card.

If you can't see the speaker trembling, you ain't got 'nough BASS! And yeah, that's Disney Princess Kleenex. It was on sale. What?

Tiger! 2010 will be the Year of the Tiger.  I miss my Tiger! T_T ‘Twas this emotion which made me buy this (plastic?) mochi with a cute tiger figure on top (sorry the photo’s so blurry):

良いお年を！Raow!

Corazón Salvaje I don’t think I saw this classic period novela when it first aired back in the early 90’s, but thanks to una amiga muy buena, I’m now watching it. In Japan! ^o^ Gracias!

Jingle...torii?

I was going for symmetry but… I bought these little bell garlands at the 100 Yen Shop.  I wanted to make a curtain of them, but they didn’t have that many.  So instead, I put them up like this –>

Only later did I realize that it sort of made the doorway look like a torii when decorated with the rope and paper hanging down. ^o^

As for my City Year coat hanging out there…it’s the best rain coat I’ve ever had, so while I feel a bit weird wearing it here (mostly because of the U.S. flag on the arm, which I think makes people think I’m a soldier; and the CY logo kinda looks like someone doodled over the Japanese flag) it’s mighty convenient.  And it was pretty funny when some girls saw me leaving school with my red coat and red bicycle and exclaimed, “Eri AKAI~!” (meaning, “Eli’s RED~!”) LOL

And speaking of CY… Back in late November, all prefectures held a mandatory Mid-Year Seminar.  Both ALTs and JTEs (Japanese Teachers of English) go to this seminar.  At the end, we played a game.  It involved passing a ball around a circle while saying the name of the person you were passing it to.  Since I’d played similar things in City Year, I was able take the mushiness for what it was and relax.  But I could certainly understand the feelings of everyone who looked around and said, “what’s the point of this? This is so dumb!” ^o^

Ah, well, this turned out to be quite a long post.  But, considering that I update so erratically, I don’t think it’s all that bad.

Til next time!

Just Two Quick Photos

Like the title says…

Tsubaki (camellias)

As explained in the “About Lucky Hill” page, there are camellia bushes in front of my building.  I’ve never associated winter with flowers, having grown up in Michigan.  But there they go, blooming their hearts out.

Building 26. Uh, I mean, Building C.

Building C’s occupants had a year to move out, or so I was told, as the building was to be demolished.  The process has finally begun.  Building C will die a slow, painful death.  The torture is scheduled to end in March.

This is what happens when you write posts at 12:44:21AM. And that’s official Japan time, yo. But alas, so much to do, so little time.  I feel a bit bad about not having plans to travel over winter vacation, but realistically, I’m tired as hell and would be perfectly fine with hibernating in good ol’ Building A.

Christmas Feeling

I saw poinsettia at the supermarket.  They looked sad and wanted to be adopted into a loving home.  They dreamed of a modern penthouse.  For one of them, that dream will never come true.

Because I bought it! Welcome to the Kyoushokuin Juutaku, Christmas Feeling Poinsettia!

Yeah, chiaroscuro! And yes, that is a Captain Jack Sparrow pillowcase.

I started seeing Christmas stuff at the stationary store in early October, but I hadn’t seen these poinsettia until today. The poinsettia back home has enjoyed many a winter, and even bloomed again once after its first Christmas.  I hope that I will be able to have this poinsettia around for as long as I’m here.

“Christmas Feeling” is what the tags on these poinsettia said.  The word “feeling” seems to be a popular one to put on random stuff.  When I read “Christmas Feeling,” I immediately thought of the 1979 song by the group Circus, “American Feeling.” Funny how a song in Japanese can make you a bit homesick.  Although…the song sounds like it could be an ad for American Airlines.  Or is there an airline called Sky Blue?  That might be more fitting, since they actually say “sky blue” in the song.

Here it is, for anyone who may be interested:

Okay, that’s enough randomness for today. ^o^

Oh yeah, one more thing! Whenever I update the header photo, I also update the “About the Header Photo” section of the “About Lucky Hill” page.  Check it out!

Quick Way to Update

I get lazy about updating this blog because it takes a long time to write a good post and choose what pictures I want to add, and resize them so they don’t take up lots of space.  But as of late there hasn’t been anything that needs pictures in particular, and I decided to be as brief as possible since I can tell (the Internet is Big Brother-ish like that) no one’s really reading this so why waste my time writing it? But if I write it no one can complain “you didn’t let us know what you were doing in Japan!”

So I’m a bit irritated.  Sitting in a chair all day will do that to you.  The reason for my unholy boredom is that kumi (homerooms) are dropping left and right due to the swine flu/H1N1/新型インフルエンザ as you may like to call it.  Once 8 students in a homeroom come down with it, the rest of the homeroom is sent home, presumably to prevent it from spreading. How that works given that the students who are sick are already staying at home, I don’t quite understand.  Certainly it makes a big impression when that many students are out, you worry about the kids who will fall behind, and one kumi has as many as 11 students out.  But given that each class has 40 students, when 10 are out that’s still 30 kids that could be in class.  And, given that this “New Type Influenza” (to translate its Japanese moniker) is no more dangerous than the regular flu, and these high school students being relatively healthy young people, they get over it in a two or three days and come back to school so to me it seems like too much fuss is being made.  Indeed, the kumi that have been sent home are only out for 3 days at a time.

Today there was supposed to be a tour of important Dazaifu historical sights for the 1st years, but since two kumi were out we didn’t go, and I guess a kid was diagnosed with it today because yet another kumi will be off for three days.  At least, we got to teach them before they were sent home.  But otherwise…I get to sit in my chair.  It doesn’t take so long to plan lessons, it’s hard to concentrate on studying Japanese while in the teachers’ room, in short, I get bored and read lots of random news on MSN and Mainichi Shinbun.

Stupid flu!

Anyway…to get this blog up to date, here’s some quick Random Life Stuff.

Last Sunday a friendly neighborhood older lady invited me to go to an art exhibit at the Fukuoka Prefectural Art Museum.  Some works from the Hara Museum were on loan, modern and contemporary works by Japanese, European, and American artists.  Then, we went to see the Seinan University Chanteurs’ annual concert at Fukuoka Symphony Hall.  They were pretty good.  It was mostly a cappella, but some songs did have piano accompaniment.  The last song kept saying ピエロ (“piero”, meaning “clown,” from the French word “pierrot”) over and over again.  I don’t think it was supposed to be Pagliacci, but maybe it was something like that.  I thought, “would anyone be able to take a musical composition seriously if it was in English, saying “Clown, clown, clown, clown, clowwwwwwnnn!”?

“Big Size Specialty Store” Twenty-five minutes away (by bike) from my house is an 大きいサイズ専門店, or “big size specialty store” called Zaza.  The first time I went, I was not impressed, but I was able to get two shirts.  More recently, the fall and winter collection came in, and it was much better than the summer fare.  I got one sweater and a pair of pants.  Considering I’m size 16 (in American women’s sizing) I’m glad I can find clothes in Japan, even if it’s not much.  There’s some funky things in style right now that don’t look right on me (or anyone else in my opinion, i.e. shirts so big they might as well be muumuus–no disrespect to Hawaiians).  Anyway, if anyone on Kyuushuu looking to buy “Western-size” clothing stumbles by, here’s a link to Zaza’s site that lists their locations: Click Me, I’m a Link!

Well, that’s pretty much it. I don’t think anyone would be particularly interested in the minor, random details of my life.  But in case you are, my internet bill for the month of October came to 5,103 yen (about 57 USD at this instant’s exchange rate). Happy?

Random Life Stuff Vol. 23

Tags

Japanese TV, Kellogg's, Obama speeches

No, I haven’t actually done 22 other Random Life Stuff entries.  But I figured I would eventually lose count, so it would just be easier to use random numbers in ascending order.  ^o^

I feel the need to clarify what “Random Life Stuff” means, since I tend to use the word “random” a lot.  What I mean by RLS (don’t feel like writing it anymore, lol) is things that don’t directly have to do with working or being a JET, but with living in Japan in general.  Such as watching TV and geeking out.

So on with it!

Yes We Can! – Obama Classic President Obama is pretty popular in Japan.  So popular, that the pop record label Avex has made a CD of his speeches set to rousing classical music.  It was released this past Wednesday.  I’m very tempted to get it, for the silliness of it.  What do you think?  Should I spend 19USD so I can hear Obama talk over “Rhapsody in Blue”?  For the CD’s Amazon (Japanese) page: click here.

Password Protected So far, I only put a password on one post.  It is my name, spelled correctly.  If you don’t know me, well, don’t ask me what my name is! ^o^

TV Update Waaah, Buzzer Beat was in its ending chapters, and I missed the last episode.  But I missed it because I was out having dinner with my downstairs neighbor (a fellow JET) so it’s okay.  Maybe I’ll rent it when it comes out on DVD.

As for Haken no Osukaru, I’ve been thinking for a while that it’s an awful lot like all of the incarnations of Betty (Betty la fea, La fea más bella, Ugly Betty, etc.).  Sure, the title character in Haken no Osukaru isn’t ugly, her quirk is she’s obsessed with the manga The Rose of Versailles.  But otherwise, it’s the same thing: a lowly office worker has more courage and creativity than everyone else and constantly saves the arses of the higher-ups and the whole company.  Much to my delight, after tonight’s episode of Haken no Osukaru, I saw an ad for Ugly Betty!  Season 3 will start airing next week at 11PM, Wednesdays on NHK (analog channel 3 for those on Kyuushuu…and elsewhere in Japan?).  It’s dubbed into Japanese, but since I already saw Season 3 in the States, I think it’ll be particularly good for listening practice.

Renting DVDs One thing I really like about renting DVDs from Tsutaya is that new releases come with bonus DVDs.  Well, maybe places like Blockbuster in the States do that too, but my local video place didn’t.  Volume 1 of Heroes came with a DVD that had a long preview for Burn Notice and interviews with the Japanese dubbers, as well as the very first episode of House (called Dr. House here).  A full episode!  The only bad thing was that it was dubbed over and didn’t have subtitles at all, not even in Japanese.  I can watch simple Japanese dramas without subs and understand a good portion of them, but a sarcastic medical drama?  Though I wonder if the Japanese dub is even remotely close to the sarcasm that is possible with English. Well, it was really funny to hear Cutty say “House-sensei!!!”

無料レンタルDVD = Free Rental DVD = WIN!

Volume 2 came with a DVD that has the first episodes of Fringe, Sarah Conner Chronicles, and Gossip Girl.  Only the Fringe episode is subbed.  I’ve been too busy to watch them, unfortunately.

When I’m not in front of a screen I bet it seems like I’ve come to Japan to watch TV and be online. ^o^  But my time with the tele is less than in the States.  Yet, where does the time go?  Only on Wednesday nights do I go out relatively far, to downtown Fukuoka City (called Tenjin) for a Japanese class.  But that’s only a 13 minute ride away (since I always take the limited express train).  Tuesdays and Thursdays I stay after at school to draw with the Art students, but only until about 6PM (the students are there until 7 or 8! x_X)  Maybe I should monitor my online time more closely, lol!

Since I’m in the future I’m not sure when I should consider it my birthday.  ^o^

GACKT in Spain Waaaah, the 2010 calendar was all shot in Barcelona! Me want it!

Unpolished Rice Bread I’m going to send GACKT some and make sure he eats it. I have yet to find wheat bread.  But I did find genmai (玄米) bread, made with unpolished rice (read: rice that hasn’t had all nutritional value mercilessly beaten out of it).  I also found Kellogg’s Genmai Flakes.  ^o^  Forget cars, cereal shall be the export that saves Michigan industry!

You go, Battle Creek! Export that cereal!

Actually…the box says “Kellogg’s Japan” so this cereal is probably made here.  But still!

If all goes well, the next post will be about the Festa da Bahia with the Amigos da Bahia! Stay tuned!

Shout Out to the Warriors!

The Almighty WordPress Dashboard is showing me several visitors are coming to this blog from my alma mater. Well, and someone told me that a certain 先生 but a link up. ^o^ I just wanted to say hi to all the peeps from the 313 and the metro area.

こんにちは！日本語のクラスでがんばってください。

Feel free to leave comments or questions.  You don’t need to have a WordPress account to do so (but you do have to leave your email address, which is of course, hidden from public view). I don’t bite.

Usually.

Enjoy this blog and STUDY THOSE KANJI!