More On Driving in Japan:
The Japanese Police:
Please use caution when driving. Blue lights mean go, but be cautious. Yellow lights mean stop. Red lights mean stop. Remember, do as the Japanese do.
Typical Driver:
What’s a Blue light? Yellow light, move it or I’ll cream you. Red light, oh *$#@ was that a pedestrian?
So I know a lot of my friends are endeared to facebook. As much as they are to text messages and other sources of contact. This article pretty much sums up everything nicely. I don’t often use facebook because of several of the problem reasons listed. I have always been one for direct contact, even a phone call is better than dueling it out over textified madness. Why is it that people have taken to these methods of communication? Sure there are plenty of benefits, but I feel the cons outweigh the pros. Opinions? How about the article? Check it out at Wall Street Journal.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204660604574370450465849142.html
Today marked the first cool day we had in Japan for the entire summer. It’s pretty much been shake and bake since May or June. This might be the first night without AC, finally. I took a long walk around my area and realized at how much sky you could actually see at night. It’s kind of relaxing to have what I had back in Lincoln. The stars are always there for you. To help give you an idea of the expansive lightless fields that I call home, here you go:
The picture really doesn’t do this area justice, but it’s the best I have at the moment. More to come soon on my recent summer travels. As for mattdinofrio.com, it’s still up and coming. Yes I know it isn’t up yet.
So I find that my region is quite disconnected from the rest of Japan. We don’t have a shinkansen so it’s not like we are really close to anything. The closest city is Matsue, and even they have no shinkansen. The closest city that is connected to the rest of Japan is that of Hiroshima which is three hours and a $40 dollar one-way bus ticket away. Regardless of that fact, Shimane is also one of the most famous regions in Japan. In August, during the time of all the festivals, there is a time when the ‘gods’ are absent from all other prefectures and are said to go to Shimane. They also have,… I believe, the second oldest wooden structure in Japan: Izumo Taisha. There’s a lot to check out. Here’s a sample:
So I guess someone found my blog. Usually I find no comment to go through. In stead of the usually 1 or 2 spam, I found 16! Thanks for taking the time to read. I will put up some photos of where I live. Most of the photos up now are places in and around Izumo which is where I live. The little map shows where Izumo is found. Thanks for reading.
Some may be offended with this next post. I just give the truth as it comes. So cooking in Japan, as my understanding will have it, is the woman’s job. Because I live alone, I often get the infamous question “Where do you eat?” That’s when I say, “Oh well there are several supermarkets in my area, so I eat at home.” On Cue: Jaws hit the floor. I also favor the blank stare that I often get, (you know, the one reserved for disbelief or crazy people). I wonder if I should just stop cooking and spend life at the local tempura restaurants. Although I guess the looks I get are priceless enough for me to keep cooking.
I hated this car. It covered the roads for years. My parents threatened me with it as my first car. The once repulsive Taurus that was finally retired is being returned to production by Ford. Not only that, they are claiming it’s got top of line blind spot radar to detect cars in those hard to see spots. Welcome to the 21st century Ford, Japanese automakers have been placing that in cars for years now.
I saw something about Japan, clicked, and it turned out to be a video someone from Tokyo created. It’s pretty cool, check it out.
So tag is a pretty big game here at my school. The 8th grade make their morning dashes in the halls dodging one another, running into walls and other stand-byers. There’s an occasional smack to the face or so. They stop for maybe 2 seconds to admire the red hand print showing up, laugh about it, then continue on. I guess all that fun is the reason why they sleep in class…. or maybe it’s the English.
So here’s a great story for you! I have school lunch. At 3.50 a pop, it’s a little expensive since I have it 20 days a month. Usually it’s a side dish, bread/rice, a main dish, milk, and… well…. dessert if you could call it that at times. I have had all sorts of interesting concoctions. I mean concoctions in the nicest way possible,… no… you can guess what I mean….. I have eaten cabbage, tofu, Japanese pumpkin, carrots, fish, and rice in more ways than you can trip, fall, and land on a rock with your backside. By far the pumpkin soup is AWESOME. The fish with bones was a little weird at first (sure fish have bones….. but you eat the bones with the fish…). But the day I had my rice staring back at me…. I couldn’t handle it. I almost lost myself and after the first bite, forget it. I really try to be open, and I eat everything,… I mean everything, to at least show I’m a “team player” as work would put it. That day too I ate everything…… Now most of you are probably wondering “What the heck?” Well I will tell you the heck part. My rice had tiny,… little,…. white,…. fish. I’m talking the whole fish. Super tiny. And they aren’t tasty. They put those suckers in my rice. Now any gajin here would know what I am talking about. Ninety percent of them would probably gag. For all of you back home though, I have no pictures because I think my teachers would most likely take offense to it. And so the food section racks a second post! I’ll try to post more just for you Ainsley ;).