I did it! I brought out my courage! (via friends and liquid courage)

Feb. 19 Friday

So I was lucky enough to get out of work early today since my vice principal and other teachers were so nice about it. Yay! Yeah, I had a 3pm train to catch, so I had to leave 2 hours earlier than I usually would. I caught the 3pm train and bumped into one of my graduating high school girls. She`s one of the cutest and prettiest ones. And she`s very sweet. She was on her way home from school so we were headed in the same direction. We had a pleasant conversation (in Japanese) and we decided to exchange info. I told her if you ever want to come to CA, give me a ring because I`ll guide you around and let you stay with me. And she said she will definitely go because I`m there. hehe. It`s sweet because she`s moving in with her bf of 3 years after graduation. They both are planning on doing the same job, so it`s very convenient for them.

Anyways, I got off my train went to the bus station to catch the Lavender-Go bus to Furano. And it was a beautiful sight riding in the bus. The small towns and the nature outside was absolutely beautiful. Everything was covered in white and in the setting sun, the snow glowed a little orange. It was wonderful and made my heart feel at peace. I wanted to sleep before I got there, but I was just too taken by the sights that I couldn`t. Well, before long I arrived at my stop at 6pm and then trekked it 5 minutes up a hill to a cute lil hotel where the HAJET meeting was being held. Directly behind the hotel was the ski hill. The mountains were so beautiful and then lit up by the lights for night skiing makes for a good winter fun combo. heh.

I realized I was late for the 6:30pm HAJET workshop so I rushed to my comfy and quaint lil room that kinda smelled like cigarettes and went down to the meeting room. There were only about 10 people in there as others went out to go eat and stuff or haven`t really arrived yet. We did self intros and then watched the youtube sushi-ya thing. After that were 2 more workshops that I didn`t really need. eheh. Afterwards I was feeling hungry so I went back to my room to get my leftover onigiri and went to hang out in Erika and Nikki`s room. We sat around for awhile talking and then Erika and I decided to go to the hot springs in the basement of the hotel. The water wasn`t as hot as I would`ve liked it in a regular hot springs, but it was warm enough that I didn`t want to stay too long. But thanks to chatting with Erika about Mr. Wonderful I decided to gather my courage and do something about him because he`ll be leaving in about a month. Anyways, after that we went back to my room to hang and wait for Steph and her friend to arrive.

Erika`s room had 4 beds even though they only reserved the room for 2 people. And, since Steph`s friend was also going to be rooming in my room I decided to let him have the bed and went to sleep in Erika`s. The beds were comfy, although, the pillows were, like, half downe half beads....o.O

Feb. 20 Saturday

Got up and went down for a healthy breakfast full of chicken nuggets in the hotel restaurant. lol Then went to the HAJET meeting in which we were introduced to the new HAJET PC which Steph is the new secretary for! Yay! Go Steph! After the meeting we decided to head out for some light lunch at a cute and very smartly decorated cafe in front of the Furano train station. Furano is famous for their cheese and wine and so, of course they would have wine and cheese burgers. It was so huge, but so good. We got two different kinds and split it between the 4 of us. Erika went off to board so it was just me, Steph, Nikki, and Jonno. Afterwards we walked around and then got a taxi to go to the cheese factory. It was very cute looking from the outside, but not as exciting as I thought it would be. No one was really making cheese and non of the machines were moving or doing anythnig. But we saw black cheese! Apparently it was cheese made from squid ink, which, btw, tasted horrible because it was so crazily bitter and inky. We tried about 3 different cheeses that they had out and the wine cheddar was the best tasting. It had a subtle wine flavor to it. I also bought onion cheese cuz that just sounded good.

I then bought an ice cream cone topped with two flavors of corn and cheese ice cream. I was being adventurous, and, besides, I really like trying out wierd things. (but I am going to have to draw the line at bugs. The things freak me out) The cheese one was cheesy alright, but I felt like I was eating cheesecake. So nothing to freaky about it, but the corn, man, if you ate the corn flavored one, it was definitely corn. There were even pieces of corn in there. It reminded me of eating cream of corn. They were good though. We had wanted to make ice cream and cheese and stuff, but because it costs so much money to make it that we would rather save we didn`t do it. We ran into a bunch of other JETs visiting the place as well and then decided to go to the various omiyage(souvenir) shops to buy stuff. I found a bunch of random flavored candy like beer and lavendar and potato caramels. I bought all of them except lavender. It disgusts me to have perfume flavored candy and makes me feel dizzy and nauseous. We went around to various souvenir shops. And then I found it, the most disgusting of all flavors for caramel: genghis khan. Genghis khan (not the famous warlord) but the food is what Hokkaido is really big on and pretty famous for. It`s basically yakiniku(BBQ)lamb. And it`s good. But having it as a caramel? OMG, I had to buy it. I`m a collector of weird candy flavors. I just buy them, but never really eat them and then give them out to unsuspecting house guests. And I gave one of them to each of my friends. It was damn horribly disgusting. From the first taste in your mouth to chewing it, it was just a horrible experience. The taste of meat in your mouth with caramel was just too horrid.

At around 5 we decided to walk back to the hotel from the station. And it takes about 30 minutes to walk there, which wouldn`t be so bad if it wasn`t in a blizzard! Man, that was bad, and we were walking against the wind. So imagine us in the bitter cold getting splashed by a torrent of snowflakes against our faces....lol Well, suffice it to say we were wet. We finally got back to the hotel and dried ourselves off to get ready for the enkai tonight. The enkai was at an awesome place called Irohanihoheto. The seats were the style where it`s tatami, but there is a carved out area underneath the table to put your feet into so that it`s not constant kneeling/indian style seating. The enkai was a 9 course Japanese style dinner complete with lots of sushi. YES. AND! NOMIHOUDAI (ALL YOU CAN DRINK ALCOHOL) WOOHOO. So I wanted to catch up with Steph in how many glasses she`s already drunk, so I ordered about 7 mixed drinks there. After the enkai we went to nijikai (the second enkai/drinking place) which was at a local bar called Bocco. There were about 30 or so of us going to the lil bar which wasn`t big enough to serve all of us and htere was only one guy staffing. But luckily after I had gotten out of the bathroom majority of the people had left to go find some other place to nijikai at.

So there were about just 12 of us left. And so 5 of us decided to get shots. I got a shot of really really rough tequila. My gawd, it was bad. Maybe it`s because I haven`t had hard liquer in a long while, but it was just bad. lol Geez. Even the salt and lemon at the end did nothing. lol And it was a huge shot too, not the puny lil ones at club bars. So, after that we ordered the bartender specialty drinks, which I`m not sure what it was, but it was good, and full of alcohol. lol. I was already pretty tipsy from the 7 glasses of alcohol that I chugged at the first enkai. And I decided to order a tequila shot and 4 more glasses of the specialty drinks at this bar. Yeah...I`m crazy. =P So, needless to say I was already feeling it. I, btw, always carry a deck of cards in my purse in case there is nothing to do when with a group of people and for boredom cases. So, I suggested, "Why not play some king`s cups?" And when the table next to us saw me laying down cards they decided to pull our tables together and make one big game. It was awesome. I got to meet some new people who I`ve never talked to before because of this.

So, for the game, since I`ve been playing it quite recently in Kembuchi (teaching the girls here to play drinking games >D) I know how this game works. But, of course, being as drunk as I was, I could not remember the rules for any of the cards except for the ones that rhyme: like 6=dicks, 3=me, 2=you. So I just made up which activity belonged to what card. I was deigned the game leader, which was totally cool. When people asked me how I rememeber all these cards in my head, I just told them I play this game a lot, when in reality, I was just making shit up as I went. lol I was already kinda drunk so I kept forgetting what card meant what and I`m pretty sure others knew that I was starting to lose it. But I believe I kept up a good front during the whole game. =P Although I know people kept buying me the specialty drinks because I was running low on it each time since I drank a lot. At the time I didn`t think anything of paying because I was so not there. lol But, luckily I rememebred that I had to do that the next day.

Anyways, after finishing the game and we all decided to head out for ramen or go home. All of us were freakin drunk. Yeah. lol Well, I was pretty drunk to the point that I barely remember what was going on, but I was still concious of what I was saying, just not able to control my words. I remember getting into the taxi with Erika and saying obvious and stupid things to the taxi driver because I`m quite the conversationalist when I`m drunk. haha. So I told the taxi driver, "Sorry, we`re a little bit drunk." And he was like "Uh, yeah." And my friend, Erika, just looked at me weird cuz it was pretty obvious. And then I asked "So, do you pick up a lot of drunk people at night?" And he was like "Uh...yes." lol Erika afterwards told me "Uhh, DUH!" eheh. I remember saying stupid things like that, but luckily I kept pretty cool during the game so as to not look so stupid with my peers. haha.

Upon getting to the hotel, I stumbled along holding Erika`s arm for support cuz I knew I was walking funny for sure. It`s the first time I`ve gotten so bad before. Man, those mixed drinks. ~_~; I got back to my room, took a shower, and collapsed on my bed with the world warping around me. Not spinning, warping. lol Everytime I closed my eyes I felt dizzy. So I had to sit up for a while and splash myself with cold water before I could go back to sleep for a bit.

Feb. 21 Sunday

Got up this morning and was still drunk! No headache or anything like that; just dizzy and drunk. We all went down for breakfast. As soon as I put food in my mouth, though, I knew I couldn`t eat. If I ate I would feel nauseous. So I just sat there and drank alot of apple juice and some diced sweet fruit. Because if I ate anything else like eggs or fish or whatever I was gonna throw up. All the other ALTs that morning looked like they also had a pretty rough night of drinking. So everyone was really out of it. haha. I tried to pay back the people who bought me drinks last night, but they said it was fine because I did a good job as a game leader. Whoo! Thank you guys so much! XD So, I guess when I`m drunk, I can play games pretty well. >P I wonder if that works with strip poker or strip anything games. o.O

After breakfast we all checked out and decided to go to the Anpanman shop!! Only to find out that it was too far away and the next bus there did not leave until 1pm. And the taxis would`ve been way too expensive. So we decided to just walk around the area and find a cafe to chill at. And plus I was getting hungry from not eating this morning. eheh. We went to this really cool curry cafe where the guy there spoke really good English. But we ordered green tea ice cream and hot chocolate/coffee. Soon afterwards we headed back to the train station to catch our respective buses and trains back home. And at home I watched Percy Jackson and the Olympians online...which was really not very good at all. I read the book already and was expecting the movie to not really follow the books because of time and other concerns, but it really, really, really did not follow the book at all and was just waaaaaaayyyy different from what I was expecting. Harry Potter did a good job of following it`s reading counterparts as well as LOTR, but Percy Jackson just went way off. I dunno, I didn`t like it and I don`t think it will get as big of a following as HP stil has.

Feb. 15 Monday

So, I know most of you know that I have a thing for one of the elementary teachers at my school, Mr. Wonderful. =) And turns out, he`s leaving in 1 month. He was only here since Septemeber as a replacement teacher for one of the teachers who got pregnant. So after the weekend in Furano I was able to get up my courage and determination to somehow get him to like me. I have 1 month left, what`ve I got to lose? If he doesn`t like me, I won`t see him ever again after 1 month. If he does...well, we`ll see if that will happen or not. Sound reasoning, right?

Today I made up my mind to somehow ask him to teach me how to snowboard...even though I kind of already can. I was lucky enough to catch him alone in his classroom after I had finished teaching 6th period. I "smoothly" transitioned into it. He had mentioned before that he could board, so I asked if he could teach me. He said he wasn`t so good because he learned how to 4 years ago and wasn`t sure if he remembered everything. I thought he was going to tell me that he wasn`t going to be able to teach me, but then he said "If you`re okay with the few amount of info that I know and me being not the best snowboarder around, then I can teach you?" To which I responded, "Oh, yes! It`s totally fine. I can`t board at all!" ...which was a blatant lie...but I`ll somehow make it look like I can`t. eheh. So he said he would try to remember everything and then tell me again later. He then asked me, as I was walking out, if I was going boarding with anyone(Or I thought that was what he asked me, because I got so confused). To which I responded "I think a friend...?" He then seemed to kinda murmer something to which I asked "What?" and he answered "Nothing." ???????

I realized afterwards that I shouldn`t have said that I was going with a friend since I`m actually going to be doing this one on one with him. But I was confused by his question and I was super nervous that my mind was not thinking straight. Whenever I`m around him, my mind goes blank and then I get awkward around him because I`m so nervous that I don`t know what to do. lol

Feb 23 Tuesday

Well, I was going to tell him today after 5th period because I know he`s in his classroom alone. But then, as I was walking over to the classroom I heard a commotion going on in the children`s entryway. I thought that the problem might only take a moment to solve, so I went over to go take a look at what was going on. Turns out that one of my 4th grade boys` pick underneath his snowboot that prevents their shoes from slipping on ice was busted. So I tried to put it back together since he can`t go home without it. It would be dangerous. I spent 15 minutes trying to get the thing back up, only to fail in the end. So I took him and the boot with me to the teacher`s room to see if the head teacher can do anything about it. I spent another 10 minutes with him in there and then I saw Mr. Wonderful come into the room and I knew I could not talk to him anymore. Once they come into the teacher`s room, talk about this kind of leisure stuff is not as easy to talk about anymore. So I really couldn`t do much. I ended up in the school`s health office talking with my friend Yuki who works in there about this. I kept pacing around the room too. haha. She was so distracted by me she couldn`t do her work. Sorry. eheh. =P

So, after having a intense fun conversation with Yuki, I decided that I would somehow tell him tonight via what I had done before. What happened before was, Yuki and I had passed by the elementary school and saw that the lights were still on in the teacher`s room. We knew it was Mr. Wonderful, so after much debating we went to buy snacks at the local conbini and went over to give him the stuff. And that is what I will try again tonight.

Yes, it seems very suspicious and obvious by what I was doing, but I`ll just put it off as something that foreigners do and explain that to him if he asks...lol. So I waited until around 8pm tonight because I knew that most other teachers would`ve gone home by that time. So I went to the school with the food and noticed that there were two cars there and realized that the 5th grade teacher was also there. Luckily, however, Mr. Wonderful was not in the room at the time. I had originally made up a story about how I was coming back from the city next to Kembuchi and passed by the school and saw that the lights were still on. So I decided to buy stuff for you guys since you`re working so hard. THAT was my original story. But I was so f-ing nervous that my Japanese f-ed up and all that came out was "Passed by, lights were on, you guys seemed tired, here (and handed him the bag)." And this was just to my 5th grade teacher yo! lol Geez. I asked if he was the only one here and he said that Mr. Wonderful is still here. He was about to go get Mr. Wonderful, but I said that it was okay and I was just going to leave. He said, "no no, wait. Here." He took out one of the donuts in the bag and gave it to me to take to Mr. Wonderful in his classroom. "You should go and give this to him to let him know you brought all this here. He`d appreciate it." Well, thanks to him I was able to push forward with my plan. Courage, girl, courage.

Well, my heart was thumping as I was walking over to the classroom and trying to go over my lines that I had rehearsed before about how I came to be here. I got over to the room, took a deep breath, and knocked on the door. He was busy hanging up some posters in the room and was surprised to see me. I walked in and my Japanese failed on me again. It went like this, "Passed by, lights were on, doughnut...uh here. Oh and there`s more in the teacher`s room." And I knew I sounded dumb and stupid. lol But he said that he was very happy to recieve it. And I was about to walk away, but then I forced myself to turn around and talk to him about why I really came. So I asked him what he had asked me yesterday about me going with someone. But either he somehow misunderstood my question or he thought I said something else but he answered "No, I haven`t gone with anybody yet." To which I just looked at him confusedly and replied with a "Huh?". And he also did a "Huh?" Then I asked, "Wait, what?" "Uh, sorry, what was your question again?" was his reply. lol We were both so confused with what the other was saying that we just didn`t know what was going on. I felt so stupid, though. Arrgg.

Anyways, I was able to ask him about when he was able to teach me. He said that March would be best. So I`m hoping that means next week as by the end of March all the snow will melt. And I gave a big thank you smile and said "ganbatte kudasai" and left. WHEW! OMG, that was so freaking nervewracking! I was so nervous that I probably was awkward, even though I tried my best to be cool about it. oh, man. Was that all so obvious? I don`t know. I`m just freakin out to whether I was stupid or not. Well, whatever. 1 month left, I`m going for it. Ganbaru-ing. So I will do what I can and if the results aren`t so good, at least I tried. You never know unless you try, right? And you won`t regret not doing it. ^^ So I`m kinda proud of myself for doing it, even if it`s not the most succesful.

Otsukare! More pics will be up soon!