Second last day of the year and nearly 2 months since my last post in this here blog. OK, I’m finally in a typing mood, yay! (writing’s not my forte; I’m much more visual..). So you ask, what’s happened in the last two months???

November
Moved to Marunouchi - a stone’s throw from Nagoya station, Nagoya Castle, and the downtown area. Surprisingly there’s no Macdonalds within 4 blocks. I’ve yet to take photos of the location or my abode, but have some of the living room as we were figuring out how to best fit the two sofas, table and chairs within the room while maximising space. The current configuration has my sofa (yes I obtained a sofa) in my smaller-than-gokiso (but-really-cosy) room. Two weeks ago I found mold growing on the wall around the window, which obviously was due to having the humidifier on and the big temperature difference between inside and outside (the walls are bricks, but they don’t seem to have any insulation.. no surprises there from Japanese architecture). I haven’t had that on since and left the window ajar at night and it hasn’t really grown back since. But the new place is very nice I’m all settled in finally after two months. I’ve nearly finished organising my room. I have an unbelievable amount of stuff. Oh well, looks more homely.

Resigned from Nova on the 9th. Good choice so far. They’re still screwing students and now teachers again.

Looked for a new Job. Had an interview with GABA on the 7th. Was called back for a second interview. Didn’t hear back from them for a few days then got a phone call asking if I could work the next day. Kinda unprofessional and it’s didn’t seem like a good company for a full time job (pay isn’t guaranteed, no paid holidays etc). Nova finally sent me my job separation certificates that I need to claim unemployment insurance (only 5 days illegally late). Received my first paycheck from said insurance on Christmas Day. The ‘7 day waiting time’ to start receiving benefits is so misinformed. It was also only pay for 16 days so was only half a month’s pay, and just enough for my rent and some food, but not a few bills. Nova owes me around half a million yen (around AU$5k) in unpaid wages. It’s still uncertain when we’ll receive 80% of our wages. It’s crazy that there’s a near infinite amount of paperwork that they go through when they already know we’re elegible for the payment, they already know what we’re owed (it took Nova 15 days to calculate thousands of paychecks every month, and already know our back details, addresses etc. So many people over here are so frustrated. I reckon I’ll get it before Xmas next year. Hopefully around springtime though. In the meantime I’ve had a few private students to keep me going a little, but recently they’ve all become too busy…

Voted.

Went to a few going away parties. Cody had one celebrated with a Brasillian bbq, where lunch was 99.9% meat (big sausages and apparently aussie steak). That was sooo yummy! Here I also met a wonderful new friend

Found the first new series of Dr Who on Japanese TV, right where I left off watching it in Australia. yay~~

Had my first Thanksgiving dinner with a bunch of friends.

Visited Nagoya Castle.

Went with an English student to Korankei, a really famous place for Autumn leaf viewing (250+ photos), and even better viewing at night.

Walked around a park/free zoo in Okazaki (more red leaf photography) with my new friend, followed by karaoke and purikura.

Saw Yellowcard (a US pop/punk band with a violinist) live. That was totally awesome. Might have fallen …

Showed an Aussie mate, Mel, around Nagoya, who had some free time from her Martial Arts schedule. Held some Wolverine claws in a Martial Arts shop.

December
Mak visited and went to see Glay (a really really famous jpop band that dresses in Goth but has happy positive feel-good love songs) live in Yokosuka, just south of Yokohama (near Tokyo). Had a cold and gave it to Mak whose temperature skyrocketed and stopped our plans to go snowboarding/skiiing in Nagano a few days later. Went to Akihabara, and wasted some money on an awesome shuriken keyring. Cut the holiday here short for a sudden interview with W5 Staff Services.

Had a successful interview and signed a contract with W5. I’ll start working as an Assistant Language Teacher at 4 elementary schools and 2 junior high schools in Kasugai city, about half an hour away from Nagoya station from the 10th of January until the end of March. My first payday is at the end of February, so I’m going to have to ask kindly for some sort of advance payment. Should be lots of fun though - team teaching to a group of 35 kids

As the colder weather has (at times) stopped my graphics card from overheating, I had my first AAL race in nearly two years. Good fun

Christmas eve was mostly uneventful, but the Christmas lights that Nova never used brightened up the day. Cheers

Went to a Bounenkan (literally a ‘forget the year’ party) with an ex-workmate’s host family in Komaki. There was too much food to choose from, and much alcohol. Was also invited by one of their friends to meet a 6th Dan Iai practitioner who speaks English.

Today I met said Iai practitioner, Todoroki-san, who showed me his collection of swords and Japanese samurai tradition. I was then suddenly overwhelmed by a showering of gifts, including a 40 year old video of Iaido Kata (techniques) and sword making, a neck-tie holding thing (that’s one English word I never learnt.. what’s it called?) that’s made from a handmade part of a sword that I have to learn the name of (one of the two metal bits between the handle and the woven grip), a sword bag, a sword inner-bag (my vocab is crumbling down), and an iaito (katana for iai practice). Yes. I couldn’t believe it. It’s slightly shorter than my sword acquired last year through Matsuoka sensei, but has a better balance, has a wider blade (wide as in the blunt and sharp edges are further apart), and is very easy to practice suburi with. I took some photos of his swords and must print them for him as a thankyou.

Tomorrow I’m going to Nagoya station at 6.40am to go snowboarding in Gifu somewhere with Leith, who’s in Japan for a holiday. It looks like New Years Eve will be a fun and tiring day, followed by a small new years’ party at a friend’s apartment.

I guess that’s most of the highlights for the moment
Ooh yeah one more thing, I found out how to make photo planets! More on that next year. Or later tonight.

Edit: Oh! I also went to my first Onsen (Hot spring). It was so relaxing. It was also a mixed onsen, but there were no other younger people there…

Last night I finished moving the majority of my stuff to my new accommodation in Marunouchi. The area’s quite nice, with a river nearby and many buildings, and it’s quieter than gokiso

I won’t have the internet for a while, and Nova’s situation determines a few of my future options. I really want to stay another 1.5 years, but with job finding difficult and the yen pretty weak, there is still a possibility I might come back in February/March. Depends whether my job opportunities over the next few months are worthwhile.

I went with Atsushi to Auto Land Tsukude, a small 30 second lap racing circuit in the mountains east of Toyota (about a 2 hour drive from Nagoya). We went in his ~450bhp/335kW Nissan Skyline R32 GTR :). On the way we stopped at a Circle K convenience store, where the top left photo (below) was taken. For a kilometre or so after this, the road got extremely narrow for both directions, with room just wide enough for passing oncoming cars at the corners (not really on the straight bits). We went past a rolled car. Unfortunately the Google Earth maps are low quality in the mountains so I can’t find the exact location of the circuit, but it’s somewhere near the town of Shinshiro (the villiage of Tsukude merged with it recently according to wiki). When we arrived some club members (I assume) were TT’ing/drifting around it. We had to wait an hour and a half for us to enter the circuit, but watched them drift and spin :P. We had the circuit all to ourselves for an hour. It was lots and lots of fun!!!

OEuXvPe-dc8

Last month I bought a USB MIDI keyboard controller (Edirol PC-50).

I’ve since been transcoding my favourite songs. When I was learning the piano years and years ago, I could easily work out the melodies of tunes, but couldn’t for the life of me work out chords. Now however, I have surprised myself by being able to work out the chords. As a result, I have found myself able to self-learn songs played with both hands, bass and treble :). It’s also been great for beginning to learn the basics of synthesizers. Having it either hooked up to my 5-35000Hz cans or tv with subwoofer, it’s really cool hearing pure synth sounds not in the middle of a song. If I’m going to mess around with making my own synthesized sounds (not using WAVs, that’s easy!!!), I’d have to get a small mixing board. I don’t think I’m ready for that, let alone with my employer’s financial situation at the moment.

As I’ve posted before, Summer Sonic has reawakened my music spirit. Twice in the last 30 days I’ve been to Club Diamond Hall in Shin-Sakae (A 25 min walk away) for various music events. I was invited by Jake, my housemate, the first time for the ‘N2B Festival Mutation’. There were different bands playing for around a 7 hour period, from 7pm. We arrived there at 8pm, and left at around 2am. It was awesome fun, and Jake nearly lost his hearing… The best moment was basically a DJ and two male dancers dressed in tour de france cycling uniforms, that were simply playing popular songs at a slightly higher speed and getting the audience pumped with participation. Every hand gesture they performed, the audience mimicked. Japanese audiences rock. They really get into it. Oasis - Don’t look in anger and Blur - Song 2 went down a treat.

On Tuesday night after work, I went to the same place again; this time for Punkafoolic; a series of punkish bands playing; including two I’ve heard before. Better Luck Next Time were good, but the Mad Caddies were excellent!! A trumpet and trombone in a rock-reggae band is so awesome; Ska is yummy. I was the only foreigner in the crowd, and being in the 3rd row, the lead singer, Chuck, complimented my moustache between some of the songs. I got some video of all the performers I saw.

A memorable moment was turning around from the third row, and seeing a bunch of audience members running/dancing around in a wide circle together (as often happens at these events). There was a little space in the middle, where a single couple were romantically embracing each other. Such a smiley lovely moment

Olivia The Band were going to play, but due to a family emergency they had to cancel. I met all the band members from Olivia (based in Hawaii), who were all excellent blokes and invited me to perhaps go surfing in Hawaii… Unfortunately I couldn’t meet Better Luck Next Time, as the band members were swamped by their biggest fans…

in September

My Room at the beginning of the month

Mario Party night with Lloyd, Chiho and Sayaka

Sunsets and Clouds

Misfits at Imaike - playing with water and light on the table

Last time at Red Rock before the renovations

Well, my Nova branch closes tomorrow. I had my final day working at Hoshigaoka (星ヶ丘) on Thursday. I’ll be working at Fujigaoka tomorrow, and from next month onwards I’ll be posted at Kurokawa (黒川). There’s so much speculation in the staff rooms and on the internet about whether we can trust Nova to pay us on time next month. Last month I got paid 5 days late. As far as I know, some of my bosses are still yet to be paid. So my housemates and I are considering moving out of our Nova apartment. I really don’t want to move, but if Nova goes bankrupt or we quit we’ll need somewhere else to stay. Gokiso has been soooo nice. Anyway, something to ponder.

Goodbye Hoshigaoka

Uploaded are my photos from this last month.

Here’s one last photo from Summer Sonic - a Panorama taken with my phone

I’ve just updated the pictures up the top of my blog of photos from this year. Enjoy the change!