Hands off the Fast Forward Button!

It's been a fair while, I realise. My excuse is that I've been too busy lazy and that my Photo Blog is much easier to update since I don't have to type any "real sentences".

Well, I'm here now. Let's see how horribly rusty my writing skills have gotten.


"Time flies when you're having fun", "the years seem to pass by quicker as you get older", etcetera.

I'm not sure which of those apply to the way time is buzzing by these days.

One reason I'm probably noticing the rapid speed of the year is that we pretty much fast forwarded to summer from winter. 

I should be used to it after 4 years up North, it being quite common in Hokkaido to have a short spring, but I swear Mother Nature and the Horai decided they couldn't be arsed with a short-term season in between and sent us sunshine and soaring climates in the period of perhaps a week. 

Summer is bang on here now, with temperatures reaching 28°C at the highest and humidity sticking attractively to my why-did-I-wear-black-undies-under-my-white-shirt. (Lesson now learnt.)

Amazing food from a Farewell Party with my students

As with time zooming on, the days left on my current job are numbered.

I'm not the happiest, but at least somewhat content, with the fact that I have a job next month and will be moving to Sapporo. More on that in another post, I think.

Though I've cried, moaned and groaned about my work there will be some things I will be sad to leave behind.

The first is my English students.

Though teaching is not the focus of my current job, I teach a handful of morning classes to some members of the International Exchange Society of the city; mostly a bunch of charming, older ladies. 

They're all lovely, bubbly, eager to learn and look after me by giving me free food, souvenirs, and the occasional trip to the onsen. They are now my friends and I always looked forward to their classes, and it was extremely rewarding when a number of them told me that they enjoyed the lesson. One lady even said to me that since I began to teach them, her views and approach to English had changed, and that, with all due respect to the previous English teachers, I was the best! I was flattered.

I had all but 2 of my last classes with them last month, where they held Farewell parties for me and indulged me with lots and lots of amazing food. A big thank you to them all for making my job bearable when I was finding it tough in the office. I hope to keep in touch with them even when I move to the city a little further away.

Second is my Head of Department (Chief), as I mentioned in a previous post.

He still chats with me fondly and smiles when I greet him. Though other members of my department are nice too, he is by far the one I will miss. Not my Boss, Jekyll. Heh.

Third is working in translation and interpretation. 

It's also not the focus of my work, but I do quite a bit of it, and I find I really enjoy it. I think I enjoy it mostly because I interpret and translate in a variety of genres, and so I get to dip into a lot of things, and gain a bit of knowledge.

For example, the other day, I was asked last minute from a certain International group to translate for some guests from Thailand. I interpreted for them as we visited a number of tourist areas and wineries in my city, and at one winery, they bought wine for the guests. I was casually looking at a wine bottle *cough*, at which one nice older gentleman, whom was welcoming the guests, asked what wine I liked, and bought a bottle of rosé for me! It was referred to as my "payment" for helping with interpreting.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I enjoy interpreting because I get bottles of free wine (ahem ahem), but I enjoyed learning about the places we went to while I interpreted the questions back and forth, and being able to chat with the Thai guests and learning about them and their culture was incredibly inspiring..

My next job is to based on teaching, which I don't mind, but as it'll probably be a part time job, I hope I can find some interpretation or translation work I can do on the side.

That said, I've been to a number of interviews for other part time jobs on the side, which I really hope I'll get. Again, I'll save that for another post.

And with that, I begin probably my busiest time in the office today, where we welcome guests from our sister city in the States, a group of 14 members, of whom I will, along with the support of other staff,  act as the interpreter, tour guide, teacher, etc. It's extremely hectic and drains me but I do enjoy it. The members are mostly all sweet American teens, and I look forward to meeting them tonight.