Sakura Season

It's April here in Japan and another Sakura season has come and gone by. Sakura season is a really wonderful time of the year where most of Japan is covered in it's signature Cherry Blossom trees for a period of about 2 or 3 weeks. It signals the true beginning of Spring and the end of that season that we all can't stand by the time April rolls around. I got to experience Cherry Blossoms first hand last year in Korea but I think Japan has really showed me why this particularly tree is associated with Japan itself. In Korea, there were one or two places where the Cherry Blossoms were prominent but here in Japan, they seem to be around every corner and in every neighborhood park and even in many yards. The city and the town truly bleed pink. I'd have to say that it's quite a beautiful thing to behold, even if it is short lived. The Japanese celebrate Sakura with something called Hanami. I'm not sure what it means exactly but Hanami is when people go to famous Cherry Blossom viewing spots, have a picnic, and pretty much get wasted under the shade of the Sakuras. Having just experienced my first Hanami, I'd have to say that I'm now most certainly a fan. It's just so much fun and at the same time very tranquil and majestic. Eating your lunch under a Cherry Blossom on a Sunny day is one of the most pleasant things you can do. It's raining petals!

So the past 2 weekends were spent celebrating Hanami. Two weekends ago, we went to Okayama's famous Korakuen Garden, where a large river lined with hundreds of Cherry Blossoms runs just behind it. A large group of people organized a picnic there and we essentially spent the day drinking and playing in the sun. It was a lot of fun. At one point, I even spent time playing Rock Paper Scissors with random picnickers. The old lady I played with got me pretty bad but I successfully defeated everyone I played who happened to have a really bad mullet (which is a lot in Okayama). We ate some street food, saw another awesome low rider crew (they're so damned friendly too), threw some imaginary ninja stars at some trashy guy who claimed he was a Japanese gangster (you're not a gangster if you wear crocs and you have a blonde mullet. More on that later), and had a sumo wrestling contest (in which I lost to someone who is 6 feet 17 inches). We topped it off by going to a Hawaiian bar with really overpriced Hawaiian beer and decent Jap food. It was fun.

Last weekend, we did it all over again but this time with our close friends, Gene and Yui. It was just as fun but on a more relaxed vibe. We went to Kurashiki's Sakazu park, a much more picturesque place than the one we had previously went to. It's just too bad the Cherry Blossoms were already starting to die out. Either way, we had ourselves a pretty great day. We brought some booze, some music, and some take-out McDonald's. What better way to bask in nature than by supporting our favorite planet destroying hamburger joint! We also taught Yui how to play the most awesome card game known to mankind Vietnamese people; VC. For those of you who don't know it, it's a game where singles, doubles, triples, quadruples, and series of cards are dropped into a flat surface in a game of mind blowing Napoleonic strategy. Yeah, it's not THAT cool, but I've been trying to spread it's greatness throughout this planet, one Asian country at a time. So far, I've converted 3 people. We also ate some frozen bananas (there's always money in the banana stand) and chilled our way into a great day. Good times.

So yeah, besides Hanami season, the past few weeks have been less than enjoyable at work. Besides losing every co worker that I started with in Japan, the new classes that I told all of the interwebs about in my last entry finally started. And boy, I am definitely less than thrilled about them. I miss my old schedule and a lot of my new students. I've got a lot of new students that just seem to be more annoying than anything else. And man, that one class with the three 2 year olds...it's disastrous. It's 45 minutes of hell. The babies can't do anything. They just run around and cause havoc, cry, and shit their pants. One of them emptied the trash can onto his head...twice. Well, in hindsight, that's actually pretty hilarious! But yeah, I'm complaining about nothing really. Sometimes change can just be so annoying. You get comfortable in what you do week to week and then you eventually hit cruise control and things become easy. Starting new classes when you're a teacher is like turning off cruise control while also suddenly entering an icy winding path off of the side of a mountain. In other words it's not fun.

Work has just been a bit of a downer lately as well. The big boss has been at our school lately and she has a tendency of creating a very very negative atmosphere, especially where it concerns Japanese people. I've mentioned it before but this time, I've been experiencing it everyday. She is just the most evil, nit-pickiest person ever. The atmosphere has been extraordinarily bad. On top of that, our company offered all teachers an optional field trip on Sunday that turned out to be not so optional. After politely refusing to go, I quickly realized I never really had a choice in the matter when I noticed the chaos that my refusing to go had caused. Everyone was freaking out. My manager got in trouble because I said no. Blah Blah Blah. In other words, they were going to figure out a way for me to go no matter what I said. They just assumed that no one would ever say no to such an incredibly enticing offer. But yeah, glitch in the Matrix (Natalie quote). That's Japan for you. Passively aggressively forcing people to do things they don't want to do.

So then our field trip was yesterday. Overall, it was okay. It was really early in the morning and when your work schedule starts really late, waking up early is no fun. We went to the Kirin Brewery where we walked around some buildings, listened to a Japanese tour guide in Japanese, and watched some Japanese videos (which had English as an option but was for some reason neglected). The best part was the 3 beer glasses that we were able to drink...I mean chug because they only gave us 15 minutes to do so. After the brewery, we headed off to a place called the German forest, which is a weird recreation of a german....umm Village? In the German forest, one can pet goats, milk a cow, ride a baby train, notch some arrows on a bow, slide down a slide, look at German flowers, and drink German beer. Overall, I would have enjoyed it a lot more if they hadn't treated us like kids and given us assigned seats and assigned partners and all sorts of restrictions. Just set us loose! We are grown adults capable of meeting back at a designated spot and time of our own accord! The best part however was making ice cream and my team (the self proclaimed Man's team) consisted of our wonderful president of the company. He is actually a really funny and nice person so it was quite enjoyable. It was just a strange day and it felt like being a cattle in a herd.

Afterwards, we headed to a Sloshball after party (the event that we were supposed to go to if it hadn't been for our wonderful company field trip). That ended up being a lot of fun; just talking, eating, and laughing. Either way, that's basically what's been going on the past few weeks. I've got one more week of work and then it's off to Golden Week vacation! And I still love Japan, especially when I come out of the station and I find a group of 15 teenage boys with horribly trashy bleached blonde mullets, identical track suits, pink crocs, loop earrings, and very effeminate and large Louis Vuitton wallets sticking out of their back pockets. And there is the idea behind me and Nat's next blog; People of Okayama.