24 - Icumen

It’s summer. Strange to think that this is my third summer here. The first was busy as anything, being full of orientation and whatnot, things like getting phones and arranging bank accounts. Last year was a lot quieter. I remember sitting around in the staffroom in a t-shirt and shorts (‘cos in summer, you can pretty much wear what you want most of the time) with very little to do. This year’s a funny sort of mix. I’m busy, but maybe not THAT busy.

Let’s see. Steph and I fly home on Saturday, a prospect I’m not looking forward to. Not the being home bit, I can’t wait for that. But the going home, that’s not gonna be a good time. Still, Wheel of Time’s picked up from the thick treacle that was books nine and ten, so maybe I can just marathon it for twelve hours. Wonder what kind of films they’ll have? Being home will be great, it’s always much easier to relax and unwind in Leicester than Kobe, but it won’t be just two weeks of sitting around. No, we’ve got a wedding to plan! The first week will be spent meeting photographers, visiting reception halls and having a long, serious talk with the minister at church. Then it’s off to London to get Steph authorized for British matrimony or whatever kind of bureaucratic nonsense they name it, and back again for wedding suits and stuff. Still need to pick a best man for that.

Oh, yeah. Then there’s the save the date video. Nearly done, but it’s been a real uphill struggle. Some of our UK time will be spent filming for that, I reckon. Which leaves me exceedingly little time, I reckon, to chill. I suppose that’s fine. I suppose knowing there’s going to be a wedding at the end of it helps. But it sure is starting to feel like my peaceful days are over. After this there’ll only be something else. Honeymoons or mortgages or something. Urgh.

I guess the heat doesn’t help. Kobe is so humid it’s easy to feel like you’re drowning. Every morning it’s a huge struggle to just clamber out the front door, and the only air conditioning I get in a working day is on the bus. Very unpleasant. I hear that Japanese meteorologists are saying that this year’s rainy season was too short, so we’re gonna get a really nasty hot streak until late October. Compared to that, any amount of time in Britain, even if it’s all spent on my feet arranging this one event, is welcome.

Lots of goodbyes this month. Kobe JET is getting a bit slaughtered this year, with some real amazing folk returning home or just moving elsewhere in the country. Lots of parties, I suppose is the upside to that. This year’s farewell event was excellent, a fitting sending off to all the JETs leaving this year. I guess the upshot of that is that we’ll be receiving a whole bunch of newcomers to make up the numbers. That’ll be interesting. Rumour has it that JET is hiring more experienced Japanese speakers than before, including some who speak it at a near-native level. The times they are a-changing, I guess. I can understand, based off the sort of reception I got when it became apparent I spoke Japanese. The teachers here make no attempt to hide the fact that their lives are made considerably easier by my language ability. I wonder how many of them have teaching experience? I’m told by some of the ex-teachers on JET that English teaching here is incomparable to elsewhere, so maybe they won’t be aiming for people with experience. Or maybe I’m wrong about that.

There’s not a great deal to talk about, to be quite honest with you. Life goes on, and the end of the first semester isn’t a really big deal. Been having a lot of meetings about Summer School, which is gearing up to be really great. A friend and I will be running one of the activities for the kids, which isn’t a massive job but still requires pre-planning and whatnot. Also I’ll be giving a presentation at the preceding Job Training event, which is pretty much the same. Lots of meetings, then. Also had what they call a ‘delivery service’ yesterday, where some of us went off to an elementary school up in Sanda City to help the teachers there plan English classes. It was a good day, I thought, and the staff there were ace. Also managed to meet a couple of my old ES teachers there, too, which was great.

I do love games. This week I’ve been playing Civilization 5, picked up in the Steam sale, which is really great. I had a lot of issues with 4, but they’re all gone in 5. I like being Celtic. All that faith! Also there’s Torchlight, which was free to buy about a month ago. Bought Torchlight 2 recently, so I really have to press on and finish the first one so I can get around to starting the second. Fun game. A little repetitive, but certainly exciting in a sort of Diablo-y, Borderlands-y, loot-y way. Looking forward to trying 2 out in multiplayer, maybe over the summer. And then there’s Cube World, which is in alpha and not really a deep game yet, but is still a lot of fun. I’m an undead warrior who rides an alpaca. What more can I say?

There’s still a ton of talk about Pokémon, though. Just a few more months until X and Y, and it’s becoming a real struggle to avoid news about new features so I’ll be surprised on release. And I DO want to be surprised. It’s probably a good thing that I won’t be able to make it to the Pokémon convention in Tokyo near the end of summer. It’s all I can do to stop myself immediately planning out my teams.

Steph and I are thinking of getting new phones this summer. Our iPhone contracts end at the end of next month, if I remember right, and we’re both thinking like maybe it’s time to move on from Softbank. The deal was great, and the phones were immensely useful, especially for our opening few weeks. But the phones are getting old now, and it’s looking like it’ll almost be cheaper to get something else than have to constantly get our old relics repaired. A friend of ours recommended a full reset before making any big decisions, which is a fine idea, but I would so like an Android. And a phone company that isn’t often a bit iffy with foreigners, despite having a foreigner as one of their store mascots. Have an excuse to visit au as well, what with my overseas landline debts to pay off. That’s what you get for picking an airline that’s based in another country, and sees fit to change your itinerary once a month and demand that you call them (not email, never email) to confirm the changes. Doesn’t help that the bills got sandwiched between some ignored junk mail for several weeks, meaning I now have to pay some late fees as well. Regrettable, but not the worst thing to happen. One of the good things about watching Game of Thrones is being able to say, ‘at least we won’t be having THAT wedding’.

Think I’m about done. Short one today, eh! Took me thirty minutes to write, apparently. Still gives me time to advance Polynesia to the Medieval era before dinner, if I play my cards right.

Thanks for reading.