April 四月

 We had a welcome party for the new teacher in the English Department. The salad served during the party was so refreshing and appetizing. 

 A bread truck comes to my visiting school once a month to sell bread and cakes. One of my ex-students works at the vocational center which makes the bread. My supervisor bought this pumpkin chiffon cake and gave it to me. I realized that I've come to use the word "kind" very often in  Japan. But I can't think of a better word to describe the people who are taking the trouble to take care of me.  

In my recent cooking lesson, I learned to make "Datemaki" , a kind of Japanese rolled egg, which is usually eaten during the Japanese New Year. 

 

The spring tournament　for many sports clubs have began. I caught my school's first baseball game. The third-year students saw me in the audience stand and waved happily to me. I was really glad. I remembered the first time when I went for a match and everyone was too shy to even say "Hi". I'll really miss these boys.  

The one and only picture I took with the cherry blossoms

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富山の桜

The cherry blossom season in Toyama city is coming to an end. The sight of the falling petals like falling snow is absolutely beautifully, painfully beautiful.









Over the weekend, I went to Johana to do some photography. Johana is in the south-western part of Toyama prefecture, in Nanto City. It's near the mountains and is relatively difficult to access because there's only one train that goes there and it runs only once per hour.

But Johana is a beautiful area , being so close to the mountains. Since it's near the mountains, the blooming of the cherry blossoms is also later as compared to Toyama City. The flowers were in full bloom and the reflections of the cherry trees on the irrigated rice fields were so beautiful.





The Nanto City website gave daily updates about the blooming status of the cherry tree I wanted to photograph. I was EXTREMELY lucky because

1. The tree was in full bloom.
2. It was a sunny day. (Weather in Toyama is sadly very, very rainy and gloomy.)
3. It was the weekend.

It took me 1.5 hours to get to the nearest station and another 35-min walk to the photography spot. Since it was a famous photography spot and the cherry tree was in full bloom, there were many, many photographers there already.

I have no idea how he got down there because the only way to get down was down the mud steps. But I thought he was really cool. He had his monopod attached to his wheelchair since he wasn't able to hold the camera steadily.

The final shots
(Click on pictures for higher resolution pictures.)

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桜 Cherry Blossoms

本当に春が大好きです。
今年は富山県の松川公園と生物園で写真を取りました。

I really love spring.
This year, I went to the Matsukawa River and the Botanic Gardens to take pictures.

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Haircut~

I've been keeping my hair long since I came to Japan about 1.5 years ago. My students and teachers are used to seeing me without bangs. So, when I came to school with my new bangs, many teachers and students asked me if something had happened to trigger my haircut. LOL

It feels good to begin the new school year with a refreshing haircut. I won't be teaching the third-year students so I'll definitely miss them. On the other hand, I can't wait to start classes with my new first-year students. I always feel nervous meeting the new students because the class atmosphere is so serious. But it's nice to see how the class dynamics change as time goes by.

Cheers, to a better new year! Follow @germanium9

Mail from VIP Japan

This came in the mail today! :) It's a gift for my VIP Japan membership renewal. It's a really nice pouch. I can't bear to use it.

That aside, I'm really excited about the ALIVE Japan Tour. I managed to get tickets for both nights at Saitama Arena. One of them is a VIP ticket. \(^^)/

The ticket sales must be doing very well because they just added more shows in Yokohama and Osaka. Follow @germanium9