A Gift Most Unexpected
Today was a great day. Not in that I had to work from 10:00-5:40 ('cause that's never fun) but that one of the most amazing gifts practically landed in my lap. This is surely God moving.
Last Saturday or Sunday, I had a couple of voice classes. Voice class is done in a room where there are many chairs (set up like a little discussion room) enough for maybe 10-12 people to sit comfortably. Anyway, the teacher's job is to just facilitate free discussion in that room. So no official teaching, just talking. So we can talk about anything. So last week I started talking about how I missed my piano at home and asked questions about where to rent or buy one here in Japan. I also asked people whether they played instruments. Not unlike Australian primary schools, everyone seems to have played the recorder before, hehehe. Then one of the students started talking about playing piano before and having received a keyboard about 2-3 years ago. He said he didn't play it anymore and needed to get rid of it. Now here's a perfect opportunity!!! Apparently it was a burden to him because he needed to pay the garbagemen to dispose of the keyboard. One of the other students suggested giving it to me. :D :D :D :D We never really finished the discussion about how, when or if he would pass the keyboard to me.
On top of the trouble of actually getting the keyboard from my student, Nova have this thing about gifts. My rationale is that I'm helping him as much as he's helping me, though its probably a bit one-sided :). Anyway, TODAY!!!! I finished my third class and was walking back to the teachers' room when I caught the student sitting down waiting for class, with a large package next to him. My absolute surprise, he had carried the keyboard to the Nova branch to give to me, and I hadn't even asked him to bring the keyboard. That was a seriously awesome surprise. I thanked him profusely of course, and God was definitely working in this. I could elaborate more but I won't.
Anyway after work I took it home to try it out! So exciting! The keyboard's pretty cool but old as gold, and the sounds are also old as gold. Like some serious 80s sounds, stuff from the Terminator 1 soundtrack hahahaha. You know that theme...I've got at least 7-8 sounds that sound like that! It's an old Yamaha EOS, and while I was jamming on it, I realised that I have a lot to be thankful about back home. Even if I had a dodge crappy keyboard like this EOS, I shouldn't be complaining, because I could also have nothing. And this something is WAAY better than nothing. I'm so unbelievably happy I've got something to play on now, I didn't know how I was going to survive without an instrument. That student is in my A-list now :)
Sankeien Gardens...
Went to Sankeien Gardens today with Geoff. Also happened to meet his friend Hisham and his sister Iza, both from Malaysia. Hisham worked with Geoff in StreetWise back in Melbourne, and Iza has just moved to Japan to study Japanese for four years.
We initially strolled around Yokohama station looking for some food, and guess what?...settled in on McDonalds :) Maccas seems a little bit healthier here, I donno why, just the taste. Anyway Iza was getting a fridge delivered to her place (which is an hour away from Yokohama) so she went back, while the three of us continued on a bus to Sankeien.
Sankeien is unlike any place I've yet seen in Japan. Maybe because its not near a train station; the area is very residential, lots of houses, not really any apartments, and where we were, not many businesses, just small convenience stores. A nice change from Tsunashima, where I just see apartments, no houses, and lots of small businesses and the closer you get to the station, more businesses and eating places.
Here's the funny part. When we were waiting at the bus stop to catch the bus, a woman (mebbe late 40s) overheard us speaking in english and helped us out by telling us which bus to get on. Coincidentally, we were all going to Sankeien, so she rode the bus with us. Hisham had a good chat with her the whole way to Sankeien (about 30 mins), while Geoff and I sat nearby. When we got off, the woman (Honda Kazue) offered to show us her house, and asked us to come for coffee after we had finished at Sankeien gardens! That's hospitable for you. She gave us her number and told us to call her when we were finished at the gardens.
We took off to the Sankeien gardens which Geoff had seen on the internet and thought it was a good place to go. He was right. There were some very picturesque views; hope my photos do it some justice. The cherry blossoms were out, but this park was not solely for viewing cherry blossoms like Ueno park, there were more traditional Japanese buildings and nice walking paths. We spent a good two hours there, and halfway through I realised I had lost my jacket. It was a good jacket too. Luckily, I had taken all my valuables out of it before taking it off, so I didn't lose my phone or wallet or camera. The Sankeien gardens I think were more beautiful than Ueno park, but maybe that's because there were far less people there. The giant lake in the middle made for some really nice reflections, and it was a very nice, sunny day but I was still cold without my jacket :(
After the park, I tried calling Kazue (first name) only to realise I hadn't actually saved the number so I tried calling all these other numbers which I thought it was. Unfortunately that didn't work, so we just rocked up at her house, heheheh... didn't know whether that was rude or not ;). She was extremely nice and had prepared coffee, made some sticky rice balls with bean paste inside wrapped with an oak leaf (for each of us), and also some onigiri (those triangular rice cakes with seaweed on one side to hold) with ikan bilis inside!!! The small white fish, so it really reminded me of mum's cooking. Yum. She showed us round her massive place, her mum had passed away but lived in a connecting house; she showed us her mum's house, the living room, bedroom, her pottery, calligraphy and drawings, I gather that her mum was very talented. Anyway, Kazue herself spoke such good english because she had worked in America for 12 years as a PanAmerica Airline stewardess. I think she said PanAmerica went bankrupt sometime in the 1990s, but she was one of the first 7 Japanese stewardesses asked to work in PanAm, because at that time they had started getting more Japanese customers. Anyway, needless to say we were very grateful for the unexpected hospitality. We spent around an hour at her place chatting about Japan, some about the World Cup, our jobs as Nova teachers, etc.
The day was pretty much over from there, although I must point out that I was pretty cold. I need to go buy another jacket now. And I NEED A TABLE!!!! Almost bought one for 4725Y, or about $60AUD at Muji (just like an IKEA, except a bit more ex. www.muji.net)
Signing off, it was a good day, enjoy the photos!
Inside Yokohama station
Just a nice flower outside the entrance of Yokohama station, while waiting for Geoff
Yodobashi!!! My favourite 7 floor electronics store at Yokohama :)
McDonalds, how cool yeah? Like an open counter.
In Sankeien, lots of houses. Very different to Tsunashima
Ueno! And all the cherry blossoms!
Today was my first official day off. Planned to go to Ueno with Jody and check out the huge cherry blossom park there. It ended up being pretty cool.
Left at around 12:00, Kristen and her friend Sarah were leaving for the same place to look at this Prado exhibition, some famous dude named Auguste Rudin (Gates of Hell, the Thinker, etc. I'm very uncultured, I dunno this stuff). The Prado exhibition was from Madrid in Spain, so this coming to Japan was a big deal apparently, and Kristen and Sarah are big art buffs, so we travelled together to Ueno.
Jody was having a pretty bad day. Just in general, things didn't seem to be going too well for her. Shortage of cash, trouble with train tickets, unable to find stuff within her bag, all very amusing but at the same time, I'm sure it was frustrating for her. Anyway, when we got to Ueno, we met Jody's best friend here in Japan, a girl named Trang, Vietnamese from Brisbane (everyone's from Australia) and her boyfriend Eric (Minnesota). Its cool being able to meet people from all over the place, except Japanese people, hehehehe.
Most of the photos I took today were at the cherry blossom park. You can see a picture of Jody, Trang and Eric sitting on some park bench. We strolled around and around until we exited the park (that's where you see the Gates of Hell pictures) and then met up with another of Jody and Trang's friend (Trang's roommate) Madeleine. She's from Scotland, and has been teaching at Nova for about a month. We walked around the city a little more, actually that's when we walked into the toy store, it was very cool. After we got out of the toy store it suddenly became really really really cold. The wind chill factor was massive; that was the main source of the cold. We trundled around a bit more, the purple building I took a picture of and the photo of Eric and Jody cleaning their glasses was around the last of what we did today together.
Side Note: In Japan outside glasses shops (like OPSM), they've got these cool little stands which have a steaming hot pot of water and a cold one. You dip your glasses into the steaming hot pot of water, and it cleans the glasses for you. Then you dip it into the cold one to cool it down so I guess you can wear them. Its a free service; I've seen people around Tsunashima do it as well, great advertising tool :)
Jody and I travelled back to Tsunashima and it was getting late, around 6ish. Oh by the way!! On the train ride into Ueno, Jody helped me download Sudoku from Vodafone Live! service, I'm gonna have to pay extra for that :( But I played it all the way on the train ride there, and back home again. AWESOME!!!! If you've never played Sudoku, you need the exposure. The greatest logic game ever. Anyway, once back in the 'Nash (Tsunashima), Jody took me to Book Off, which is a great place where they sell tons and tons of used books. Except here in Japan, the books look full on new. And all kinds of manga, like each volume for 130Y, which is $1.50 AUD. I'm gonna get one of those massive One Piece ones, and maybe a couple of Bleach ones, just so I can practice reading hiragana and katakana. Anyway, I bought a USED GameBoy Color for...350Y, and a game for the same price!! Bomberman! Hahaha, its antique, but its cool. So all that for $10AUD, but now I'm running out of money. They were selling used Ps2s as well, and a used PS for like $25, hehehe. Tempting, but no.
The day ended with four of us going to Saizeriya (the local supper hot spot, non-japanese food) at about 10:30 for supper. Its actually 2:30am right now, am I'm eating some instant noodles. Goodnight!
