Kanazawa Castle in the background
Hello Everyone!
Long time no write! hehehe! I thought about writing an email letting you know what was going. But I thought if I made a web page letter instead, I could add some pictures and such. Please excuse my poor English, as I am finding it difficult at times to string a proper sentence together. The English spoken here is sometimes extremely odd and is rubbing off on me! I am also sorry for how long it takes for the pages to load up (if you have a slow computer/slow connection). I ended up putting lots of pictures up.
For those of you that I didn't tell, I am currently in Japan teaching English through the JET programme. I was hired as an Assistant Language Teacher (ALT). My contract here is from July 28, 2003 - July 27, 2004. A whole year in a country where I cannot speak the language! It's pretty wild! Why Japan? Well, truthfully, I wanted to teach English in Hong Kong through the NET program, but they wanted 2 years prior teaching experience. The JET programme, on the other hand, has very lax requirements. It's very competitive to get in because of the lack of requirements, but it likes to hire young people. Everyone here is about 24 years old and below. I'm the old lady here! hahahah!
I live in the prefecture of Ishikawa and I am living in the city of Kanazawa, which is the capital city of Ishikawa. The population of Kanazawa is about 450,000 people, so it's a fair size city with its 3 Starbucks on the main drag. My address is:
#302 Arai Building
2-1-2 Ishibiki-Cho
Kanazawa-Shi, Ishikawa-Ken
920-0935, Japan
My phone number is 076-221-7641 and my cell number is 090-2832-7049, the time difference is +17 hours between Vancouver and Japan. If you are thinking of sending me a Christmas card, please send it to my base school because I will be away in Thailand for Christmas. My mail box at home is not secured and is extremely small. My base school address is:
Shikindai Junior High School
3 - 30 Tobiume-Cho
Kanazawa-Shi, Ishikawa-Ken
920-0938, Japan
I am about 2.5 hours by train away from Osaka (Kansai Airport). I am 4.5 hours by train from Tokyo (Narita Airport). So if you are thinking of visiting me, it costs about $75 for the train ride (one way) from Kansai Airport and $150 (one way) from Narita Airport. You can also fly from an airport near Narita to Komatsu Airport, which is a 20 minute train ride from Kanazawa. But I would suggest taking the train because it will bring you into Kanazawa without transferring too often.
I can't believe it, but I've already been in Japan for 4 months - 1/3 of my time here is gone already! I really love it here, although, I think the novelty is slowly wearing off. But I am still enjoying myself, nonetheless. I am really lucky, and I really don't feel homesick. I do miss my friends and family, but all in all, I think that everything is going smoothly. Tristan visited me in November and spent 3 weeks here. I really looked forward to his visit and was extremely sad when he left. My parents are going to be coming to Japan, hopefully in the spring, although, they were talking about coming here in January. But the winter is going to be extremely cold - it's already really cold!
I have a wonderful apartment. Click here to read about it.
Kanazawa is a really nice town to be living in. It has the convenience of a city, but it's not huge. We have a park called Kenrokuen, which is one of the top 3 parks in Japan. It is the largest park in Japan, I believe. It's only a 10 minute walk from my apartment! It costs about $3.25 to go in, nice to visit once in a while. For locals (and aliens like me) we can go there on Sundays for free. There's a nice market that I love going to - it's kind of like Granville Island, but with WAY more expensive stuff. I think the most expensive crab that I've been able to find there is 20,000 yen which equals to $237.00 cnd. Yikes! The average for a decent sized crab is about 8000 yen ($95cnd). Really expensive - it must be good.
Left: Kenrokuen Garden - would be very peaceful without all the tourists. Right: Omicho market and expensive crab (upper right)
What do I exactly while I'm here in Japan. I'm ashamed to say, but I don't do very much at all. I attempt to work out 3 times a week at a local gym which is SO old - all the equipment is rusting away. But it usually costs about $200-$300cnd to join a gym and each month it costs about $45cnd to work out at it. Thus, I go to a community gym for about $2.50cnd to drop in. I have don't have too interest in learning many of the Japanese arts and crafts. I would like to learn how to fold origami, but I don't see classes offered in that. The rest of my time I hang out with other ALTs and explore our surroundings. We used to go out drinking/partying, but I think that interest has died down for most people, as most of us are usually quite tired after working the week.
Left: Back Row (L to R): Me, Jen, Jason, Sophie, Front Row (L to R): Gayathrie, Loan, Sal, Danielle Right: Me, Brian and Aaron
What have I been up to in the last 4 months? Well, I've traveled to some of the neighboring cities. I've been to Kyoto, Osaka, Tokyo and Takayama. I love travelling around! Click here to read about my travels and see pictures!
How is my Japanese coming along, you may wonder. I don't know any. I quit my Japanese lessons because they changed teachers almost every other class. I didn't really like that. Now, I have to find a private teacher, which I may do in a bit. I can read hiragana (Japanese alphabet for Japanese words) and Katakana (Japanese alphabet for foreign words). Kangi (Chinese characters read COMPLETELY differently from Chinese), on the other hand, is very difficult and I am hopeless at it. It's because they have 2 different readings for every Chinese character! I know how to read some of the easier Kangi in Chinese - so I have a vague idea what is written. I do have some other "frustrations" that I have experienced while living in Japan (besides the obvious that everything is in Japanese). Click here to read about my "concerns"!
For my Christmas vacation in December, I will be flying to Thailand for roughly 2 weeks with a friend from Canada. We will meet in Bangkok and then travel around. I'm so excited, I can't wait to go! I am going to get my scuba diving certificate! I can"t wait to learn! I am also looking forward to the shopping.
Well, that's all that I've been up to since July 2003. Hope you are all well. Please write back to me! My email address is Jen_In_Japan2003@yahoo.com (Jen _ In _ Japan2003 - underscores don't look like they're showing up). I decided to create a new email address because my old one is almost full. You can write to me at the addresses that you know - I still check them once in a while. Take care and if I don't talk to you before Christmas have a...
and
Main Page | August - Kyoto | October - Takayama | November - Osaka | November - Tokyo
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