Happy Halloween: Japan-Style!

Happy Halloween from Osaka! Yes, it’s a big occasion here!

I think this post might be a little more interesting than usual, so brace yourselves! The past week has been a whirlwind of adventures. Some highlights include a random business trip, some crazy Halloween festivities, and attempting to learn katakana, just to name a few. While I’m on the topic of the blog, is it just me or does it seem increasingly Jo-centred? I know you’re all craving a little bit of Scott too, so I’ll get him to dish about his life next time!

Well, we’re finally getting into the good old swing of things at work—to a point where we more-often-than-not have things to complain about the instant we get home. Most of our complaints provide us with comic relief after a long day at work, so I’d like to think that it’s all in good humour. I’m sure our students would be laughing at us if they heard us try to speak Japanese. Last December, I began a self-study of Japanese and it just made me even more aware of how challenging it can be to learn something totally foreign. Since we’ve been here, we’ve found that there’s not really a huge need to know the language well—I mean, we’re functional and can ask basic questions like “Eki wa doko desu ka?”—but most people can communicate in English and get by. Our co-workers are mainly English-speakers and the natives we work with know English better than the average Joe. I don’t know if this is a good thing though, because it’s kind of made me less motivated to learn the language and stray from taking Japanese lessons. Even though I originally intended to when I arrived, now I’m finding it’s a classic case of “there’s just not enough time in the day.” Scott, on the other hand, has had an inquiring mind lately. After our friends, Colin and Laura, decided to learn katakana, which are the main sound combination symbols of the Japanese language like “na” “ga” etc., he found a great site on the net and followed their lead.

Speaking of new things, I began the search for private students about a week ago and have heard back from several people already. When I got home today, there was an email waiting in my inbox from a doctor who want to have a lesson for two hours on my day off—what could be more perfect?! I’m also meeting my first student tomorrow. She’s an English teacher, but because the English teachers here focus strictly on grammar, reading, and writing, she seeking some conversation practise. We’re meeting at a Starbucks tomorrow before my shift.

On to more exciting news! On Monday, as I was getting ready for work, I got a call from the office asking me for a huge favour. At first, I was a little bit reluctant because I wasn’t sure what it would entail, but everything worked out. A teacher who works at a school about two-and-a-half hours away had just found out his father had passed away and had to go back home very suddenly. I willingly accepted the favour—partly because it meant an all-expenses paid business trip to Fukuoka, which is located on the island of Kyushu. As soon as I got off the phone, I had to rush out the door and catch a “shinkansen” or bullet train. Almost three hours later, over 500 kilometres travelled, and close to $300 spent, I arrived in Fukuoka! The bullet train was quite the experience, although way too overpriced. It’s almost like being on an airplane—they have everything from washrooms on board to attendants who walk up and down the aisle serving snacks. Anyway, it was a great way to see Japan’s landscape. Even though it whizzed by, I still snapped some pictures! Originally, I had been given an allowance to stay in a hotel overnight, but realized it was worth my while to catch the last shinkansen home so I could fully appreciate my day off the next day and not have to worry about commuting. It was a cool experience and I’m glad I did it!

Today is a pretty big day here because it’s Halloween! For the past week, it’s been “Halloween week” at all the schools, which means the teachers get to (more like HAVE to) dress up (which explains the ears I'm wearing in the picture above) and teach the students about Halloween customs. Some of the classes Scott and I have taught this past week have included everything from carving pumpkins to making masks and paper lanterns to handing out candy. Japan goes all out for Halloween I tell ya! I walked into my class of two-year-olds today and nearly died—they were just SO adorable. I, however, was not so adorable in my cat ears even though everyone was convincing me that I was “kawaii” or “cute.” This is why I’m glad Halloween’s over—I secretly couldn’t wait to take them off and hide them. Forever.

While I’m on the topic of Halloween, Scott and I had a great time celebrating on Saturday night at a club called “Balabushka” where all the white people in Osaka go! We all met at Laura and Colin’s, enjoyed some drinks, got our costumes ready and headed out. We ran into some of our friends and co-workers and had a great time...well, at least until the cab ride home burned a deeper hole in our already burnt pockets. We’re counting down the days until we get our first paycheque! It will be a glorious day—complete with a trip to Pizza Hut! For the past month, we’ve been walking by the Pizza Hut conveniently located up the road from our place and have practically drooled every single time.

This Saturday is a national holiday in Japan, which means we don’t have to work and even better—two days off in a row! Yay! On Saturday, we’re going to be going to Nara, an area about 30 minutes from here (picture deer, trees, and mountains all within a stone’s throw from the big city). On Sunday, I’m meeting up with some old students of mine from the summer. They’ve invited Scott and me to their university’s festival and we’re both looking forward to it.

We miss you!

Jo & Scott

Getting Ready for Hallowe'en!

Hello everyone!

I just got back from a long walk to Namba in search of an English bookstore. Today’s my day off, so I wanted to get some exercise and check out this bookstore that I'd heard about. After roaming around one of the busiest parts of the city for a few hours, I couldn’t find it, so I gave up, went grocery shopping, and took the subway home. Besides, blogging is way better than reading a book!

Scott and I have officially been in Japan for a month now and although there have been several things to adjust to, we feel like they’re becoming easier as the days pass. We’re slowly starting to get our schedules for work and know our way around the city like natives—it sure doesn’t take long to get used to when you commute every day! We both had good first weeks of work too—despite some problem children. If anyone thinks all Japanese children are well-behaved, you are so incredibly wrong.

To celebrate our new beginnings, we went out with Colin, Laura, and Marcus on Saturday night to a district in central Osaka called Shinsaibashi, which is basically a great spot for shopping and evening entertainment. There are many American, Australian, and Canadian bars too. We’d all been talking to other teachers we work with and they had several bar recommendations for us...so we decided to try one out! We ended up at a bar called “Scorpion” which is a tiny Western bar that plays English music and has many kinds of international beer. They even let their guests pick the songs they want to hear from the computer and let me tell you—Scott was pretty much in heaven! After a night of good company and festivities, we walked home (a whole 45 minutes) because the subways stop running around 12 am.

On Sunday, Scott and I went searching for Hallowe’en costumes. Believe it or not, Hallowe’en is a popular occasion here and stores began displaying their Hallowe’en paraphernalia shortly after we landed in Japan. The first time we saw it we kind of had to look twice, as it doesn’t really seem particularly Japanese. Anyway, everyone loves dressing up here and going to parties. Unfortunately, there’s no trick-or-treating, but I’ve heard it’s a tradition for the “gaijins” like us to ride the train loop line in Osaka and drink (yep...completely legal). I’ll keep you posted about our Hallowe’en plans. For work, we have to dress up because it’s part of “Western culture and traditions” according to our company. So, I’m going to be a cat and Scott’s going to be Dracula. The costume selection was somewhat limited—even at the giant department store we went to! I’m looking forward to seeing all our students dress up too—it’ll be so cute!

Sunday evening was especially exciting for me because I had arranged to meet one of my students, Tomoko, from the Queen’s School of English. She came to Canada in August to study at the School with her university for a month. I’ve been keeping in touch with some of the students who live in Osaka and I’ll actually be seeing all of them at their university’s festival in November. Anyway, it was really great to see a familiar face. Scott and I went to dinner at the restaurant she works at just a few train stops from our apartment. The food was absolutely amazing and she treated us like royalty—complete with a visit to the restaurant’s kitchen!

Well, I hope everything’s fine back home! We miss you and we’d LOVE to hear from you!

Take care!

Jo & Scott

The Joys of Teaching... from Scott's Perspective

Hello Everyone!!!

First off, I know I know... I've been letting Jo do all the posting and you've all missed my creative prose... But here I am!

So, training's done which is awesome and we've been in the teaching world for about a week now... There have been some ups, downs and a wasted guy outside one of my schools.

At our company, we have lessons called Free Time Lessons (FTLs) where up to four people come in and we go through some vocab, I get them to chat and yadda yadda yadda... Well, there are lots of people who come in that are good speakers. I love these people. Even though I've only been doing them for about a week, I've gotten kinda cocky with them (imagine that, me being cocky about something). So, when I get some higher level people coming in, I like to not do a lesson at all, and just bring up a topic and let them go with it... I obviously tend to stray towards topics that get the best conversations... and are kinda rough around the edges. Just today, I had two women and a man, all great speakers so I decided to just say "So, Japan is pretty male chauvinistic, isn't it? What do you guys think about this?" Lucky for me (and probably the male student) he agreed with it and they just went on and on for forty minutes about it. I felt kinda sorry for the guy for the first bit, but in the end it was quite lovely. However, with FTLs you can get some people that are pretty low level... these classes make me wish I'm at home... digging out my eyeballs. These are so bloody boring, and so unsatisfying that you just want to die. Think of saying "Burger... watch my mouth... B B Burger"..."No, not vooga... burger" about 30 times... and getting nowhere. Thankfully they're only 40 minutes long.

Kids classes are a mixture of both worlds too. Sometimes the kids are up, having fun, speaking and make you look like the God of English Teaching... then there's the kids where you're trying so bloody hard, making new games and activities on the fly and they just don't do anything... sure they'll say the words but it feels like they just don't care... like when we were 4-9 and taking French classes... hmmmmm... but French teachers get paid more!

Then there's the randomness that ensues. Yesterday I was on a break so I decided to go to the local Family Mart (convenience store) and get a drink, when I walk by a random door into a staircase that led up to what I later found out to be a karaoke bar. Well, just as I walk out of the building, I see the door fly open and a pile of Japanese businessmen come falling out (literally), all carrying this one guy. He was unable to walk, talk and by the looks of it, know where in the world he was. The guy was shittered. Just think of your froshweek... that guy that never really drank before and just finished his 12th beer... yeah him. So I obviously slow my walk down so I can enjoy as much of this debacle as possible and I'll be honest, they had a great system. Two guys for the arms, one holding his head and the other pushing his legs along... great teamwork! Needless to say after I got my drink and was walking back, they were pushing him into a cab and that was the last of it... good for him! Oh yeah... this was all at 5:30 in the afternoon. What a trooper.

Well, I guess that's about it... plus Heroes just finished downloading. So hopefully I'll get on here more often and let you know what's up. Miss everyone and I definitely missed Homecoming. Hope everyone's having a great time back home.

Cheers,

Scott & Jo

The Joys of Teaching!

Hello from Osaka!

A lot has been going on here, so I’ll do my best to update you.

Last Friday marked the day that Scott and I finished training—finally! It felt like a gruelling process sometimes, but fortunately, we were with a great group of people so in reality, the 14 days didn’t seem so bad. On our last day, we received our schedules and the trainers also took us to observe some classes at two local schools near Tennoji station (about ten minutes from the company headquarters). We saw classes of all levels and really got a feel for where we’d be working. While we were at the Kids Tennoji school, I was introduced to the school director, who I’d be working with. On Fridays, I have a shift at the school and will be teaching at a kindergarten and also a private class!

In terms of our schedules, we work five days a week and have two days off as well as seven weeks of paid vacation. Scott and I decided to have one day off together and one day off to ourselves (I have Tuesday, he has Friday, and we both have Sundays). This was the only arrangement available unless we wanted to teach web classes—something we weren’t too keen on. Because we’re new teachers, we don’t have full schedules yet. Right now, we both have three full days of classes at various schools around Osaka and two “sub” days, which means we have to call the headquarters the morning we work and find out which school we’re supposed to go to. Basically, a sub shift is when a teacher travels to a school to temporarily replace a teacher who is sick or has taken time off—it’s like supply teaching. Sub shifts can be great, as Scott and I found out on Monday, but also very stressful, as we found out on Saturday—our first day of work!

Lucky for us, the trainers let us know on Friday night which schools we would be at. I was scheduled to be at Kids Tennoji, so I was pretty happy about that. Scott was scheduled to be at some school about 40 minutes away from our place. So when the alarm went off early Saturday morning, we rolled out of bed, got ready, ate breakfast, reviewed our lesson plans and did all the prepping that we could. Just as I was heading out the door, my cell rang and it was a trainer from ECC telling me that she screwed up my schedule and I would have to race to a school near the airport (about an hour from here). At this point, I was pretty flustered and didn’t really know where to go. Let’s just say it was an adventure. Anyway, when I finally got to the school around 12:15, I immediately had to teach two classes in a row of three year-olds. I had no idea what I was supposed to do because I didn’t prep for that lesson, so I winged it. After the two classes, I just had one more class—a free conversation class of teens and adults and it went really well. I left the school around 3:45 and headed home on the train. Although the day started off on a not-so-good note, I left feeling more confident and actually felt pretty good on the train ride home.

Scott arrived home shortly after I got in and we made dinner and concluded that we were too drained to go out with our training group. We were also pretty thrilled that Sunday was our day off!

Since we've arrived, we’ve both been talking about going to the Kaiyukan Aquarium—so we figured our day off would be the perfect time to do it! We got up early and made our way to the west side of Osaka, stopped at McDonald’s for lunch, and made our way into the aquarium as eager as the thousands of little kids around us. Apparently, the aquarium is one of the largest in the world. It boasts 15 large tanks containing over 11,000 tons of water and shows species that are part of the Ring of Fire and the Ring of Life—from birds and reptiles to fish and mammals and the infamous whale shark! The Japanese word “kaiyukan” translates to “playing in the sea pavilion” and the architectural layout definitely allows visitors to feel as though they’re at one with the creatures. Too bad the thick sheets of glass get in the way! We had a fabulous time, learned a lot, and took more pictures than we know what to do with.

After the aquarium, we headed next door to the Suntory Museum—home of the IMAX theatre and famous art gallery. Scott and I had free tickets to see the “Toulouse-Lautrec et la vie parisienne” art exhibit because our company sponsored it. Although it was a small exhibit, we enjoyed learning about 19^th century post-impressionist art. Personally, it made me think of home and brought me back to the days of art history class and life at 32 Wellington (where we had Toulouse prints all over the walls). Oh, the memories!

Scott and I ended up getting a deal when we were at the aquarium, which allowed us to see the latest IMAX film at a discounted price, so naturally, we did just that! The film, “Deep Sea 3D” complimented our visit to the aquarium and luckily, we were able to listen to it in English. Johnny Depp and Kate Winslet (the narrators) just didn’t seem to sound the same in Japanese. We also got to sport some wicked 3D shades!

On our way back to the subway station, Scott and I stopped at a little kimono shop where I bought a kimono for 3,000 yen. It’s not a real kimono—more like a casual one that’s made of brushed cotton and is shorter. Anyway, it’s pretty cool!

By the time we got back into central Osaka, it was packed and most of the streets were closed because there was a huge parade happening—the Midosuji Parade. Although we weren’t sure what the celebration was about, we accepted the fans people were passing out on the streets and took some cool pictures of the floats. After making our way through the crowds, it was pretty close to dinner and since we were in a good area to eat, we figured we would stop at a nice restaurant and celebrate a belated Thanksgiving. Our friends had told us about an American restaurant that they had been to, but when we finally found it, it was booked for a wedding, so we ended up eating at a cute little Italian place across the street. Japanese Italian food is hardly comparable to Canada, but it was still pretty tasty!

On Monday, Scott and I worked again. Scott was at a new school and I was scheduled to go to the same school as Saturday. I was pretty relieved that I didn’t have to figure out new directions in the morning and jeopardize being late on my second day of work. On Monday, we both had a full schedule and worked from 2:45 to 8:45—yes, it’s a late day, I know, but that’s what our typical schedule will be like from now on. We have about 10-15 minutes in between each class to prep for the next one or to grab a bite to eat, so it’s not too bad. Scott and I both had really great days and had a few laughs over the things that happened—from little kids eating their boogers to singing songs like “Make a Pizza.” It’s weird how those catchy little tunes get stuck in your head...I caught myself singing it a few times during the rest of the night! I also taught two private classes on Monday—one student was six and was extremely gifted. She could not only speak English fluently, but also listen, read, and write accurately. I was blown away! My other student was an older business man and he had a great time telling me about the cosmetic company he works for as well as the Hanshin Tigers!

So, tomorrow it’s back to work for me and I’m really looking forward to it! I’m sure Scott will get on here and talk about his first few days of teaching.

Hope all is well back home! We miss you!

xoxo

Jo & Scott

Missing Thanksgiving (and Turkey Dinner)

Hello Everyone!

We hope you’re all enjoying your Thanksgiving weekend—whatever that might entail. Just thinking about family and eating turkey makes me want to come home—even if it’s just for the night. Of course, eating miso soup and a salad is hardly comparable to Mom’s Thanksgiving dinner, but I guess it’s the closest we’ll get. We scaled the supermarkets for a turkey, but no such luck! Oh well!

Scott and I have been extremely busy the past week with training. We went for a full six days this week (Monday to Saturday—yuck) and we were absolutely drained after we got home on Saturday night. That didn’t stop us from having a party at our house, though! We were especially tired this week because we were doing kids training, which involved singing songs, reading “The Hungry Caterpillar,” sitting cross-legged on the floor, and basically, pretending to be five to twelve-year-olds in every way possible (I know you’re jealous). Anyway, the training was a blast despite all the energy it took from us. The kids’ trainer, Dave, was also a really great guy to work with—he’s from Wales, so you can imagine the fun we had!

Throughout kids training, Dave’s goal was to put us in the kids’ shoes and make us experience exactly how it felt to be learning a second language. So, guess what he did? He taught us a whole lesson in Swahili! It was both challenging and rewarding, but mostly funny. I now know how to speak a bit of Swahili and I can say “Jambo! Ulifanya ni ni leo?” which translates to: “Hello! What did you do today?”

Since our training group starts work next Saturday (after another four full days of training), we thought ahead and figured it would be the perfect opportunity to engage in some debauchery. Our friends came to our place shortly after work on Saturday and we stayed here for a bit before going to karaoke. One of Laura and Colin’s good friends, Ben, who worked for Nova, joined in on the festivities for the evening. He lives south of Nagoya and came in to Osaka for the weekend. He is also pretty fluent in Japanese, so it made getting around a hell of a lot easier. We karaoked the night away and then came back to our place and went to sleep. Thankfully, we had the day to rest on Sunday. Today (Monday) is a national holiday here. It’s Sports Day! Haha. They have the most random holidays here, but if it means a day off, I can’t complain.

Today, Scott and I will probably explore central Osaka a bit. We want to visit an area called Nipponbashi that’s basically electronics heaven (and also full of porn). I need to get a microphone for my computer so I can talk on Skype. Time permitting; we might also go to Osaka Castle, which is more North. We’ll probably end up dining out tonight and treat ourselves to a Japanese style Thanksgiving dinner. We also have to prepare another teaching demo for tomorrow for the really little kids (age one-and-a-half to four) so we’ll probably be busy with that as well.

Hope all is well back home and we’ll blog again soon!

xoxo

Jo & Scott

Training and a Trip to Kyoto

Hello from Osaka! It's been awhile since our last post, which means we've been busy. I'll do my best to give you a brief rundown on what's been happening in our lives!

Scott and I began training last Wednesday at company headquarters, which is only about three subway stops from our place. Although we've only completed four days of training (out of a 14-day total), it's already been so much fun--and that's honestly the best way I can describe it. We have four other people in our training group--Laura and Colin (the other couple) from Oshawa, Naomi, from Toronto, and Marcus, who's from Australia. They're all really cool people and we've had fun getting to know them! Our trainers are also really fun. This past week, we've been learning from an ECC veteran, Andrew, who's been working there for quite awhile. Although he's originally from Southampton, Ontario (near Owen Sound for those of you who don't know), he now resides in Kyoto with his Japanese wife and he's been giving us "newbies" some very helpful advice about living and working in Japan.

Going through training has really made me and Scott feel more confident about our decision to work for ECC and we've been learning so much more about it along the way. ECC is a very well-established company and has been in business since 1962. Since then, the company has flourished and is not only an ESL school, but has several different sectors. The company offers lessons in many different languages, contrary to what I had previously thought and not only do they have standard in-class teaching, but they also conduct web lessons, business lessons (where teachers visit the place of business and do a custom lesson), and multi-lingual lessons. Basically, the company is far from sketchy, like many of its counterparts (ahem....Nova).

In a country where learning the English language is a desirable skill, many companies revolve around this specific industry. When Scott and I were researching for this adventure way back in September 2006, we learned that there were many large companies (also referred to as the "Big Four"--ECC, Geos, Nova, Aeon), that focus particularly on second-language instruction. While few seemed legit after a brief glance at some online literature, most definitely didn't--and this is why we immediately avoided companies like Nova. Let's just say we're glad we didn't even go to an interview with this company because last week, the company was forced to shut down due to bankruptcy. Nova can't even pay its current employees and as a result, the former Nova employees will have to go job-hunting in hopes of scoring a position in another language company, or go home because they don't have a steady income. One of our friends in Japan right now is in this exact position. Anyway, the Nova stuff has really rattled the foundations of all the foreign language schools because it's all over the media. Naturally, everyone in the industry is worried, and rightly so. This won't be happening to ECC anytime soon and everyone has assured us things will be fine. After all, we're in training, right?
Last Friday after training, our group went out for dinner at an English pub we found in Namba called "The Hub" (an Andrew recommendation!). It was just one of those days where no amount of sushi could satisfy our hunger--we wanted some good old fashioned grease. The pub was a really neat spot because there were not only a lot of other "gaijins" but they also played English music and had a great selection of food--fish and chips being their claim to fame. They were so good! :) The guys were also elated when they saw "1L of beer" on the menu--and of course, proceeded to order it. It was hilarious to watch them attempt to drink out of the massive cylinder the beer came in. And hey, they even made friends with a Japanese guy from the table beside us because they all had the 1L beer!

Getting out of bed was a little hard for Scott the next day, but we still managed to make it to Kyoto with Laura, Colin, and Naomi by noon. Kyoto is a gorgeous area of Japan and is an intricate mix of old, ingrained culture--with geisha and shrines and temples scattered throughout the city, as well as newer culture--with Love Hotels, karaoke bars, massive ads and department stores all over the place.

We took the JR (Japan Rail) train to Kyoto, which was about 25 minutes from Osaka, and then got an all-day bus pass from the tourist information centre. We immediately hopped on the bus and grabbed a quick bite to eat at a traditional Japanese restaurant before scouting out the shrines and temples.

We went to Ninnaji Temple first, which is in the Northwest part of Kyoto and were amazed that anything could be so beautiful. Plenty of pictures were taken...haha. On our way to the next temple, we stopped at a Japanese graveyard and then made our way to the entrance of Ryoanji Temple, which has one of the most famous Zen rock gardens or “karesansui” in Japanese as well as lavish ponds, statues, and greenery. The rock garden itself is quite “Zen”, to say the least, and is about 10 by 30 meters with 15 irregularly shaped rocks within a shallow sandbox containing perfectly raked pebbles. There are no plants whatsoever. Beside the garden, there are planks where people can sit and ponder the meaning of the garden. Although it was quite relaxing, Scott and I were both stumped for answers about the potential meaning. Many people say the garden is supposed to be a representation of Japan itself—the raked stones represent the rippling ocean, whereas the rocks are supposed to be the islands.

After our Zen experience, we rushed back down to Gion, a district in central Kyoto, to see if we could spot some geisha. Laura was reading about them before our trip and told us they are more apt to appear at dusk, because that’s when they travel to their next shifts. Geisha are traditional female entertainers whose skills range from serving tea to playing music and dancing. Although they do not engage in prostitution as part of their job, many people confuse geisha with “oiran”, or high-class court entertainers, who are known to engage in prostitution. Geisha and oiran can be distinguished from each other in a simple way—whereas oiran prostitutes wear their “obis” (the tie around the kimono) at the front (to allow for easy untying); the geisha have them at the back. Anyway, when we got to Gion, there were groups of people (and even more cameras) standing outside a geisha house and although we didn’t know what it was at the time, put two and two together. After patiently waiting for about forty minutes, the first geisha appeared and walked into the house. Everyone was crowding around to take pictures (yep, we were too—after all, is a trip to Kyoto really complete without solid evidence of a geisha sighting?). It was something like I’ve never seen before—these ancient Japanese traditions are still a profound part of the nation’s culture even in the 21^st century. The geisha experience really made me want to learn more—perhaps I’ll see the movie “Memoirs of a Geisha” or read the book. Until then, I’ll just have to be satisfied with Wikipedia! Hey, it’s a start!

By that time, we were pretty famished and made our way to an American restaurant called “Shakey’s,” which was an all-you-can-eat pizza and spaghetti house. Everyone was pretty much in heaven after a long day of walking. After dinner, we did some shopping in the covered arcades and then decided to go to a karaoke place. For all of us, the singing was a combination of hilarity and utter brutality. Just ask Scott! He was having a great time singing “Don’t Stop Believing” by Journey (horribly) and likewise, the girls and I enjoyed our Backstreet Boys medley! Haha. Good times, good times!

Our group originally intended on staying in Kyoto the night, but we changed our minds after finding no suitable accommodations. We were hoping to stay at a Love Hotel for the night, which is a cheap hotel people can rent out for the hour or night to do...uhhh...you know what. Although Love Hotels have a not-so-nice connotation, they are actually quite clean and entertaining. We took a cab to one called “La Peche” in Kyoto, browsed at the available rooms on the board (they’re thematic—for example: puppies, Disney princesses, leather, etc.), took a quick glance at the prices, and decided our money would be better spent elsewhere. All the cheap rooms were taken and the only rooms left were 9900 yen (about $99.00) per night—eek! So, we went back to the train station and caught the last train back to Osaka. In retrospect, it was probably a smart choice because it rained the next day—like ALL day.

We’re planning to go back to Kyoto when the leaves start changing colour. We also want to see the Kiyomizu-dera temple that was almost chosen as one of the seven recent Wonders of the World. In the meantime, we’ll probably do some other day trips around Osaka. Work starts the day after we’re done training and we’re both pretty pumped for that. In the meantime, we still have ten more days of training to get through before we sign our contracts. Yay!

Thanks to everyone who wrote comments on our blog and don’t forget to keep sending us emails/Facebook posts and/or messages. If you want to see more pictures from our adventures so far, Scott made some albums on Facebook and I will too (soon, I promise). We miss everyone! Take care!

Until next time,

Jo & Scott