Attention! Dog in Classroom!!

At Kamimotobu J. H. School today, as I walked across the parking lot to the staff room building, behold! what a sight - a stray puppy following one of the teachers. The teacher had no clue as to from where the puppy had suddenly presented itself. No-one knows who belongs to it, but I have a feeling it is going to adopt the school. The students definitely love it, bursting with "kawai" on their lips all girls would rush to pet it at any given moment. And the boys gladly fed it their vegetables from the school lunch, keeping the meat to themselves ( but naturally...).

The interesting part of all this was that when Hiromi sensei and I stepped in the class, the dog was inside prepared to study English. It patiently sat through most of the class, yet at times it couldn't resist the temptation to be petted by the students. The class had been divided into the boys team and the girls team for the lesson on debate. The chief guest and moderator sat in the middle.

Sometime during the class, one of the girls discovered it shivering on the floor . And she benevolently donated her blanket to it. She put it over the animal, to its extreme discomfort. and it circled the class room attempting to shake it off, but unsuccessfully. At the end I felt I must intervene. so I spread the sheet on the ground, and after sniffing it and patting it into shape, the animal sat upon it in peace, grateful for the attention and love it received.

After lunch when I went to speak to the students, I discovered that it was named Gonzales at first, but then it was discovered that its a she, so it was renamed Kaserin. And I knighted her Lady Catherine, Her Majesty Queen of Kamimotobu JHS, served upon by her faithful subjects, the students of Kami Chu. \(^0^)/

On a more nostalgic note:
For those who remember Golden, if you were to see this dog, you will be taken aback at how uncanny the resemblance is... same golden fur, same white diamond on the forehead, same gentle soft eyes, same quiet docile nature. I know it may sound crazy, but I wonder if she has reincarnated... I wish I could adopt Lady C, but there is no way I could separate myself from her when the time comes to leave.

I hope the school takes good care of her.

Girlfriends

Some of the girls I miss the most

(sorted Alphabetically descending order):

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VARSHA:

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PAROMA:

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ISA:

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GAYATRI (with Isa and Poro):

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ADITI and AYUSHMA (from right to left):

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And the other girls whose picture I dont have will have to send me a pic so I can post it along with these....

:)

Sakura Matsuri

The Cherry Blossom season is here!

To celebrate the arrival of the first Sakura in all Japan, my town hosted a small festival on 20th and 21st of January, 2007 on the famous Mt. Yaedake.

Okinawan cherry blossoms boast of being a brighter pink than the faded, subdued one of the mainland. These blossoms first start blooming on Yaedake and then travel south (within Okinawa) and then travel up north on the mainland. NHK cover this movement on national TV and cherry blossom tracking is an extensive affair in Japan.

I, personally, have been waiting since I was first told that Motobu gets the first sakura; keeping my eyes and ears wide open for any hint or talk of sakura. So, when the time finally came, there was no way I would miss out on the festivities. Brave Rachel was kind enough to come to Motobu for this short-lived event, and join the festivities with us, the Motobu ALTs (Paul, David and I).

The weather gave us a respite. it had been rainy the day before and everyone had doomed the event. But my prayers were answered, we had no rain that day, and in fact the sun even showed up for a brief moment to bless the occasion. We were able to enjoy walking around the matsuri grounds and eat sakura ice-cream and sakura mochi! and all of us bagged some goodies at the games.



Here's David and me trying to proudly present our town:

Famous Okinawan band "Afromania" orginally from Motobu, performed. They were quite good. And having not heard a live band in quite some time, I just felt transported to another realm.

Of course I bumped into many of my students. The brass band of Motobu Junior High School opened the festival, and a bunch of badly-behaving boys of the same school displayed some attitude and amateur break dancing. These girls played the sanshin:

As Rachel writes in her blog, there was a sense of lets-do-it-all and enjoy the most as our time here is measured, like the ephemeral sakura...

My Town

Finally PICTURES of my cute lil town. Well, actually its not really so little, but its definitely a very important town. Just imagine, Google Earth has a crystal clear zoom into Motobu and not Nago (the city up north). This is what wikipedia has to say:

Motobu, Okinawa
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The location of Motobu in Okinawa.
Motobu (Kunigami: muᵗuːbu; Japanese: 本部町 -chou) is a town located in Kunigami district, Okinawa, Japan.
As of 2003, the town has an estimated population of 14,481 and a density of 266.69 persons per km². The total area is 54.30 km².
Motobu is located between the towns of Nakajin and Nago and can be reached by either route 449 or 82.
Several islands can be accessed from Motobu, namely the small islands of Sesoko (by bridge) and Minna-jima (by ferry). Both islands are incorporated as part of the Motobu township. Ferry service also runs from Motobu Port to Ie-jima.
Despite its modest population, Motobu boasts three large supermarkets and eight individual schools from the elementary to high school levels.
Like many towns in Okinawa, Motobu is composed of what were formerly several smaller and independent villages. In addition to Motobu proper other included districts are Sesoko, Kamimotobu, Sakimotobu and Izumi.
The Okinawa Churaumi Aquarium is located in the northern portion this town.
In addition to the aquarium other notable sites include numerous out-of-the-way cafes along the 82 from Nago and a popular pizza restaurant known as Cafe Kajinho on a hill overlooking the town.

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Well, they missed out from mentioning that Motobu is the first town to have sakura - cherry blossoms- in Japan. Sometimes Nago overtakes Motobu, and there is stiff competition between the two. The sakura has started to bloom. I saw some on the way to Nago yesterday. And Liz has already posted a picture of it. Next weekend we will have the sakura matsuri in Motobu. I am looking forward to it and am so excited! My first Cherry Blossom!



Here's a satelite picture of Motobu:




And, here is the Bridge to Sesoko:

This is toguchi port area:



A view of Ie-jima:



And u can see Ie-jima in the background, my house (hidden in the photo) is left of the biggest white building, but see how gorgeous the water is:

That is my favorite spot, by the way. These are the steps where i have seen many knee-weakening sunsets. These are the steps where i enjoy ice-creams from my favorite oba-chan. (sigh!)

Ok. The next pic is the toguchi bay, with the blue bridge as background, and a closer pic of the blue bridge follows next:

Glass Craft

Today I went over to the Nago Glass Factory to do some glass craft. this what i made:

musings...

And then the music stopped. One knew it would. everything must to come to an end sometime. In the silence of the vaccum, one felt the emptiness of a lingering emotion, stil there, but not quite.

Like a longing...

My First Trip to a Japanese Hospital

After not having been able to recover from a cold for over 2 weeks, i finally decided to take the plunge, and submit self to the mercy of Japanese doctors - about whom i had heard horror stories to chill the bones. I anyway dislike doctors - no let me not say that, i should rather say - i dislike visiting them.

so what is it like in a Japanese hospital? well, its pretty much similar... except for the language... you have to register at the main desk; wait for your call; then a nurse takes all the info: whats wrong with u, your temperature, pulse, BP etc. then you wait some more till the doc calls you, you repeat everything again, and in the process some poor old man faints/has a heart attack and there is pandemonium in the ER, you are shooed away to a corner to observe CPR.

Well, i am sure it doesn't always happen like this but this is what happened today. after things calmed down, i was taken to another doc who had Santa-red-jolly-cheeks and spoke some English. i have absolutely no idea what interaction took place between him and my sensei, but i was told to drink lots of water, cough out whenever i felt like-as in not to hold it in, and to rest. i got a powdery medicine from a pharmacy and went to buy my groceries.

the things of interest were the various anti-bacterial liquids keep at the entrance, which had to be used on the following circumstances: dizziness, vomiting, loosies, and cough. my sensei couldn't explain the exact reason for these oddities while we both just de-bacterial-ized our hands. I was left on my own to ponder: was one to spray the fluid on one's arse if they had loosies? or ones head if they felt dizzy? mouth for the other two symptoms? i am sorry but i don't understand why these four conditions were posted. i can understand that when entering a hospital one has to sanitize potential germ-carriers, so why the even mention these four in particular....? Why not just tell people to spray the alcohol as they were entering a sanitized atmosphere? I guess its coz this is Japan... land of the inexplicable situations!!

my new earring

my new earring style had my students in splits of hysteria. i put an earring through both my piercings. it is quite cool and i like it very much! i am rather proud of my inventiveness. it shows how much 'vella' time I have :)

1. vella: a hindi word signifying the happy state of inactivity and uselessness.