Enkai

For our first day at the office, T-sensei picked us up and drove us to the City Hall to get our alien registration cards and hanko. Then it was to the office. It was pretty much empty, though, as everyone was away at a seminar. Around lunch time AB took us off to eat lunch (ramen!) and then we picked up J and went to try to get us signed on for internet and cell phones (keitei).

AH and I were able to get internet, but they told us they couldn’t sign us up for phones without our alien cards. Then it was a quick stop at the Aeon Supercentre—a mall with a large grocery store, other shops and a big 100 yen shop (like a dollar store) called Daiso (one opened a couple of years ago in Vancouver).

After that, it was our enkai (welcome party). It was at a really nice Italian restaurant—supposedly the chef actually trained abroad. Before we actually began eating/drinking, however, Kacho (boss) gave a speech before the kanpai (cheers).

Then AH and I had to give speeches, but we weren’t really prepared, so we just said ours together: basically just “pleased to meet you and please look after us.”

Then the food and alcohol started coming in vast quantities. After the salad (not pictured) we had these breadsticks wrapped in prosciutto and crustinis with various toppings (avocado, chicken liver pate, etc.) Oh, and it was cool because the chef would actually come out and explain what each dish was as it was served.

Next was an orange salmon carpaccio which was followed by a faintly orange flavoured ravioli. Then it was some little sausages and our final “entrée” was spaghetti (again, not pictured). We had blueberry ice cream for dessert, plus AH and I got special “Welcome to Towada” dessert plates.

In between courses, we also had a question period where our co-workers asked us (in English, or with AB translating into each) questions like: “what’s your favourite movie?” and “how is Towada/Japan different from what you expected it to be like?”

After the dinner, they presented us each with flower bouquets, which was really sweet. We took a group picture to end the night.

Arrival in Aomori/Towada

Our flight to Aomori was on time (apparently this is very rare!) and AH (the other Towada JET, from Thunder Bay) and I were met by AB, a fifth year JET in Towada and Hosa, the sub-section chief of our office. After a scenic drive through the mountains, we arrived in Towada in time for a nice soba lunch at the restaurant across the street from our office.

Then AB showed us where everyone lived—him and his wife, J (the high school ALT), AH and me. He took us grocery shopping at the stores nearest our respective houses then left us to settle in.

Not too long after AB left, I got a call from S-sensei asking if I could come to the eikawa (adult English conversation class) that night. I hadn’t been feeling too tired for most of the day, but by that point things were starting to catch up with me, so I pleaded fatigue and stayed home.

Random pictures from the flight:

Tokyo Orientation - Day 3

Our final day of orientation was also spent in seminars/workshops. I was pretty wiped after the first two afternoon workshops, so I decided to take a nap before our prefectural meeting. BAD idea. I set the alarm properly, but I turned it off without hitting the snooze button and told myself “just 10 more minutes.” You can probably guess that I ended up being late (15 minutes!) for my prefectural meeting. I was the only one late, and with the Japanese emphasis on punctuality, it reflected very poorly on me. ^^;;

There was a Canadian embassy event that night, but since my roommate was still packing (we had to ship our luggage from Tokyo to our cities ahead of time because there wouldn’t be enough space on the plane otherwise), we skipped it and went out for dinner on our own. We went down the street to a ramen place and then hit the konbini (convenience store) to buy breakfast for the next morning. (We could’ve had the hotel-provided breakfast, but that was at 6:30am, and we preferred to sleep in.)

Then we walked randomly around Shinjuku—unfortunately we went in the wrong direction and all we saw was construction and office/residential buildings—until about 10pm. (I was pretty amused by the huge glowing and moving crab, though!) When we got back to the hotel, we saw RT and a bunch of other JETs (old and new) hanging around some stairs (“the stoop”) across the street from the hotel. So we joined them and hung out and chatted until around 1:30am. Thus ended our Tokyo orientation.













Pretty much all of the orientation was spent in the company of English speakers, and so even though Tokyo was fun and interesting, it also felt a bit unreal.

Random photos of our accomodations:

Tokyo Orientation - Day 2

After an "interesting" breakfast (steamed vegetables?) at the hotel, it was pretty much just introductions and presentations until lunch. We met the other people going to our prefecture, and sat through a fairly long, formal opening ceremony for the orientation. Apparently this was practice for many various long Japanese ceremonies/meetings. ^^;;

We then had lunch on the 43rd floor of the hotel, where we were treated to a great view of Tokyo:













After that, it was onto still more presentations! There was a keynote speaker as well as a panel presentation from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT).

The keynote speaker (or one of the panel presenters?) had an amusing anecdote about English education in Japan. He talked about how one teacher brought some students to America. While there, one student's appendix ruptured and they had to take him to the hospital for emergency service. When the doctor asked the student how he was feeling, the student immediately replied: "I'm fine. And how are you?" :P The speaker's point, of course, was that he hoped we would at the very least teach students to answer the question "how are you?" honestly instead of by rote.

Anyway, the MEXT speakers were actually all pretty entertaining, but it was still hard to just sit in a darkened room, listening for hours. After that there was an AJET information fair and various AJET presentations about different aspects of living in Japan.

I went to the sessions on financial management and cooking, but skipped the third session to take a nap.

There was a JET welcome reception for dinner, but neither C nor I were particularly hungry, so we just nibbled on fruit and desserts.































After that, there was a Shinjuku tour for Toronto JETs organized by the Japan Visitors Association. Unfortunately it pretty much just a sanitized version (no sex toy shop!) of the tour of Kabuki-cho we got from RT the night before, but they did take us to Yodobashi Camera, a huge electronics store, so at least C was able to buy a power bar which would accept 3-prong plugs.

We ended the tour at another (but different) izakaya where we had nomi-hodai and tabe-hodai--all-you-can-drink and all-you-can-eat for 2 hours. Of course it wasn't really worth it for me (I sipped some beer and had lots of water), but I was there for the company anyway, so it was okay.

Then it was back to the hotel to prepare for the next day. Before going to bed we went down to the hospitality centre to iron our clothes for the following day. I ended up ironing a lot of clothes because I couldn't decide what I wanted to wear, but oh well.