Rice planting

I'm posting the link to the Japanese blog that talks about our rice planting day from a few weeks ago.

You can check out a couple of pictures there.

Follow this link and click the pictures to make them bigger....

http://ameblo.jp/shigeshigemaron/entry-10260398072.html

What've I been doing?

Wow, I have really been letting this blog slide, huh? Let's see... what have I been up to???

• Saw a Flogging Molly concert in Fukuoka.
• Missed the last train home from Fukuoka and had to stay in a hotel because I was eating ice cream.
• Planted tomatoes, a storm came the next day and blew down 4 of them.
• Planted peppers, eggplants, Japanese pumpkin, watermelon, one unknown vegetable, and a couple of flowers.
• Started replacing the paper on my shoji doors... 2 down, 8 to go!
• Hung noren up in the house and some at the entrance to my future flower garden.
• Got calf deep in mud for a day helping the Takasago family plant their rice paddy by hand.
• More or less finished trimming the trees at my house.
• Aquired several large pieces of pottery to use for plants and my "deer-chaser" water garden, and started clearing the yard to plant flowers.
• Ate dinner with several families around the island during Golden Week.
• Started running with the track club, and then decided that my tolerance for running in circles has become nearly nonexistant.
• Ate black rice for the first time.
• Listened to some great live shakuhachi and koto music, and played some maracca type instrument in front of the audience.
• Enjoyed the beautiful weather and the recent full moon.

Tonight, I'm having a barbecue at my house with the high school teachers. I hope to get more pictures up, but my broken camera is a hindrance at the moment.

My first graduation in Japan

Follow this link for photos from after the graduation ceremony for Hokusho Nishi High School!

http://ojikaenglish.blogspot.com/2009/03/hokusho-nishi-graduation-photos.html

Birthday Photos

I spent my birthday with a few friends from the island at the bar/restaurant down the street from my old apartment. It was a great time with lots of good food! After eating, we all walked over to the "Melody Box" and sang karaoke!

On the Wednesday after, there was another small gathering at my place... supposedly for an english class that had to be rescheduled... but it was actually a surprise party. Unfortunately for them the surprise was leaked and I found out about it!

Finally, a few pictures!

Here is a slideshow from the photo album showing some of the pictures I took of the new house. You can see that they start out with the floor removed and the old tatami pulled out. The house sat like this for about three days while things dried out. Then the new tatami went in and you should be able to see a little bit of how things looked after that process was done. Unfortunately I only have three "after" photos of the place so far. I guess I need to take a few more. The next step for the house is to replace the paper on the sliding shoji doors and get some Japanese style curtains to separate the rooms and add some color. I'm also working on the garden outside.

New Address

My new address... basically the same as the old one with the numbers changed:

Ojika-cho Fuefuki-go 811-1
Kitamatsuura-gun
Nagasaki-ken 857-4701
JAPAN