biking, teaching, and studying as the cold sets in...

Today at school I was invited to Ihara sensei's cooking class where the students were assigned to make a particular food so that I could taste it and give them feedback on what they made. I ended up having two bowls of udon, sweet potato gratin, a fried egg and rice dish with shrimp, boiled octopus, and ramen. I know, the demands of this job can be a bit overwhelming sometimes.




The cold weather is now back in Shikoku and day by day small changes in routines are made with the burgeoning season. It's strange, I feel very different now than I did last year at this time but I'm able to recall echoes of where my mind was back then. This was a hard month...the newness of Japan had worn off and I had to get used to living a very different life. I had some stereotypical culture shock responses to the adjustment during this period- prolonged anxiety, rejecting Japanese food, going to bed early (8:30 or 9:00pm), paranoia that people were talking about me in Japanese, etc. Thinking back on it, it was a really hard time to be here. I almost couldn't imagine life ever feeling 'normal' in this situation but little by little it happened and I can look back and say that this comfort level was earned through experience. I can't say that everything that I see in Naruto makes complete sense (sometimes it's very far from this case...) but I'm conditioned to it and that makes all the difference.

Anyway, I'm really enjoying spending nights in my apartment making sushi and studying kanji for the JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) in two weeks. I've been pretty content doing that or just drinking tea while listening to music as I'm bundled up on my small floor couch. If you didn't know/remember, there's almost always no central heating in Japanese homes so finding ways to warm up by alternative methods can prove to more effective than simply hibernating under a pile of covers. Taking a warm bath will keep you feeling good for a long time after it's over and washing dishes with hot water can provide a nice break from the cold as well. At the moment, though, it's really not too cold yet because I still can't see my breath in my apartment yet and my olive oil hasn't started to freeze.

Today is the start of a three day weekend and my only plans are to hang around Naruto and get some studying done. I'm really looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow but I'm hoping to work on plans for my trip to Borneo that's coming up less than a month...