More Sapporo!

Aug.17 Monday

First day of orientations. We met up with Miki right when we got to the building where the orientation was held! Yay Miki! The building's pretty cool looking. It's called Akarenga and it's this giant brick building that looked super old and like those old school buildings. It's actually the former Hokkaido Gov't building. Now it's a place for tourists to come visit and for JET to hold their orientation. So we got a couple of tourists that would wonder into the JET orientation area and peek in ignoring the signs that say don't enter. Well, who could resist seeing all these foreigners in one room. lol I admit it was an interesting site to see: 100 or so well dressed business style foreigners in one huge room or just milling around together. We looked like tourists except we knew what we were doing of sorts...lol Oh, there were a shit load of tourists from Taiwan and Hong Kong in Sapporo while we were there. I guess it's tourist season for the Asian countries. Anyways there was no AC in the room, but luckily the building has some sort of way of keeping cool. And plus all of us were in "cool biz" meaning no ties or extra jackets or anything. Super casual American style business wear.

So the first day was the basics: intro on the orientation, info about HAJET, and first few months of Hokkaido life and regional meetings. And there was a lot of cell phone number exchanges. =P Anyways being able to see everyone on that first day was awesome. In the evening there was a huge enkai held for everyone. It was held at the super famous Sapporo Beer Garden which was this huge 3 story building that served only Genghis Khan and alcohol. It was 食べ飲み放題. It was quite a lot of food, but so much fun. We were on the 3rd floor I believe and it was like a balcony area. The middle is totally open so that it opens up to the 1st floor. Basically the balcony lined the circular room and in the center you could look all the way down to the 1st floor. It made the place seem huge. Anyways, leave it to us foreigners that whenever some group was cheering downstairs we would also start cheering for them. The entire 3rd floor of foreign teachers cheering and yelling loudly to support the Japanese groups of peple downstairs. I don't think that it's normal for Japanese people to do that. So all the other people on the 1st floor would constantly stare at us or they would try to get us to do it again. lol We were all pretty much filled with alcohol, so it didn't matter. lol Oh, and I got pictures with the semi-cute looking waiters. Thanks to Collin. He knew I thought they were cute so he would ask them to take pictures with me. lol I felt so embarrased and ready to pass out standing next to one of the really cute waiters. I don't know why, but all the waiters who work in beer garden are pretty cute looking. I definitely liked looking at them. XD
Afterwards, Collin, Miki, and I walked around the area and found the Obon festival going on in the middle of Odori Koen. We decided to join in on the Bonodori or Obon dancing. We got into the dance, and then all of a sudden the music sped up and ended...lol We decided to get in to the dance earlier the next day it was held.

Oh, btw, the mascot of Hokkaido is this thing called marimokkori まりもっこり. Basically it's a ball of algae that they made into looking like a man with a boner. =P Marimo means the ball of algae that's super famous here in Hokkaido's Lake Akan, and mokkori means an erection. So it's a play on words or a pun. So yes, a ball of algae man with an erection. I love Hokkaido. They even have a girl version too. Although I'm not exactly sure if it means the same thing. lol Oh and there's also the pun deriving from the work Hokkaido which is Oppaido. Oppai means breasts, and so there are little keychains in the shape of Hokkaido with boobs sticking out of the middle. Ah...XD This island is funny. Look "Marimokkori" up on google or something. You'll see what I mean about that. And also look up mameshiba. My new favorite character! >.< It's so cute yet strange at the same time. But then again Japan's known for that. They're beans with dog ears and a face on them and say the weirdest random trivia info while someone's trying to eat. WATCH THE CM's! They're hilarious!

Aug. 18 Tuesday

Second day! So today was the beginning of our language session. I was in the intermediate class because I wanted to learn more about Hokkaido-ben and surprisingly there were alot of different words they use here! I didn't know that. For example: instead of ごみを捨てる、it'sごみをなげる、かわいい＝めんこい、つかれた＝こわい、こわい＝おっかない。And people here end their sentences with -べ. Yeah there are a lot more words that are different and sentence endings and stuff, but all in all, it's not too different from hyojungo.

For lunch today we went to eat some really awesome tasting ramen. The miso ramen was sooo good. And only about 600yen. Then back to more orientations. I went to one called women's issues in Hokkaido. =P It was an interesting one. And one where women spoke very freely about stuff. lol I quite like these times, cuz it's pretty funny.

In the evening we went to the bonodori earlier this time so that we could dance in it this time. The dance is fairly easy it's 6 steps that repeat over and over again in a large circle. We just learned it from all the ojii-chans and obaa-chans that were dancing in kimonos around us. We stayed from 8pm until 9:30. Yeah a loooong time. During the entire time, the music doesn't stop: the singers keep changing, the taiko players keep switching as well as the flute players so that no one gets tired out. I sat next to this one old lady who was super friendly and would constantly talk to me about how her family's in the taiko group performing and how great Sapporo is and ask me questions about who we were. It was a very fun experience and allowed me to become even more confident in myself in front of alot of people. Cuz this was a dance that circulates in front of a lot of people. Anyone can just join in if they walk in the circle. It was so much fun that night! I enjoyed it quite a lot.

Aug. 19 Wednesday

The last day in Sapporo. >.< Sad day, last day with everybody. Today we did a scavenger hunt with our language groups which was super fun and exciting because it was funny to see so many of us business foreigners in little groups walking around Sapporo in search of random stuffs. Oh, and we found this huge ass post office! It was seriously humongous! 6 stories! I'll post a picture of it soon. It was the largest post office I've ever seen in my life! And we also found the foreigners market where they sold foreign food from all over the world. Ah, good to know where I can find decent peanut butter.

There was a festival at the Akarenga today so we decided to eat there for lunch. I bought a Croquette and an order of Moai which is a hunking peace of chilean sparerib sold by these guys who were from Chile. Of all places, Chilean food in Hokkaido. It was soooooo delicious and filling. After lunch we got on buses to go to the Hokkaido Historical museum. It took us exactly half an hour to get there and we only had half an hour to look through the museum. So it was a power tour. Afterwards we went to the historical village of Hokkaido. The place was pretty cool. It had all four aspects of Hokkaido life: mountain village, fishing village, farming village, and the towns. It basically had buildings that were constructed to look like the old original ones located throughout Hokkaido and the place was made to be as realistic as possible. For example, the mountain village was really in placed in a mountain like setting, the farming village came complete with farmlands and stuff, and the fishing village had a mock sea/pond. That was cool. Miki and I trekked through the mountain area and totally thought we were lost because there was no one else around us and it was very quiet. It was super foresty and everything and wet and misty like. So we freaked a little bit. haha. But we got back safely. And we bought soft cream! No resistance! lol

That night as we headed back it was Stephanie's birthday so Collin, Miki, and I took her out with us to eat huge things of tonkatsu before Miki and her left on their buses back home. I stayed until 8pm with Collin shopping for stuff and omiyage and then left for my train back home too. The Super kamui train was super nice! I felt so comfy sitting in there. I didn't want to get off. I just wanted to stay there and sleep on it all night. But alas, I arrived back home. Thankfully, my apt. is still clean and happy and not swarmed with bugs or anything. =P It's all good.

Otsukare for reading again! Pics will be posted soon with those cute guys I mentioned from the Beer Garden. ^_^