Thursday, November 9th-Pictures

Okay....so here are some pictures thus far....

Thursday, 11/9/06

-Ok...so first things first...I may have found another church.....There's a place that's, thank God, nearer than the other place I went to, and the services are in English....it's about 30 minutes away, and they have services on Sundays and Wednesday mornings....I can't go this upcoming Wednesday because I agreed to do a shift swap with one of my colleagues, however, the following week I'll be off Tuesday, Wednesday, and yes, Thanksgiving...whoohooo!!! Wednesdays would be the days I attend services. I'll see when the time comes how it is......

-On another note, the other night I was out with another colleague of mine and we were looking for a good place to just sit and chill...maybe listen to some jazz or r&b....anyway, 3 strange things happened that night...1. the first place we stopped at was like had men standing on the outside and as we were about to go in, they said, "No, Japanese only" I said, "Well, excuse me....." Then we walked off, and said how they couldn't pull that mess in the states, they could try, but wouldn't get away with it....so we kep' it movin' and my feet were starting to hurt and I was a little frustated so I said, bump it, I'm just gonna ask the next person that crosses my path, that I make eye contact with, soooooo..... 2. I walk up to this lady saying excuse me in Japanese and she starts walking faster...so I'm walking backwards to try and ask her where a relaxing place would be and she just about runs off....my girl, Salina, (colleague) starts crackin' up....she said I walked over to her like I was gonna do somethin' bad to her....I did not realize that....so she's crackin' up at my expense, and these other two ladies saw the whole thing and started laughing....I was able to ask them, and they helped....I was not in the least bit intimidating....that was a first....so, any way....I'm walking down the block with Salina, and I tell her that the next time I see a group of Japanese men walking, that I'm gonna flip the script and clutch my purse tightly....so I'm demonstrating this, but I was talking to her, and it just so happened that two or three Japanese men were crossing our paths when I demonstrated what I would do....I wasn't paying attention to them, but apparently they were paying attention to me, so when I clutched my purse and yelled, then one of the guys, did the exact same thing and mocked or mimicked me with his man bag....that was #3....We couldn't help but to laugh....it was crazy

-Let me talk about transportation for a moment.....Salina is the only Nova teacher I know that has wheels....two to be exact...she has a bike....I did not realize that you need to have your bike registered here, and it's serious.....you can get DWI's here while on a bike...I heard of one Nova teacher who got arrested because he got on his bike while drunk...he had to spend the night in jail and write a letter of apology to the government.....deep.....I've seen grandma's and grandpa's ride bikes...pregnant women....and they do it so fly....they can ride on one side with ease....it's so cool....well that's it for now....until the next blog.........

November 5, 2006-Monday
Well, thus far, nothing really big has happened....but let me mention one of the biggest coincidences I've experienced thus far. Some of you may know the situation of how I was supposed to originally live with this Aussie female in a 3 bedroom....so I was siked that we would have extra room and all....anyway, a week later (all before I went to Japan) my company emails me and says that due to a housing shortage, they were going to temporarily place a man in the third bedroom, and this man was going to be from Trinidad and Tobego. The email was kind of matter of fact...needless to say, I had a problem with this and objected.....I was not trying to come to Japan to get my groove back....so, my company found another location for me and this is where I am now....

Fast forward to a couple of days ago....I was told that my branch was getting several new people, so I was excited that I wasn't going to be the neophyte any longer....anyway, yesterday, guess who I meet? Yes the guy from Trinidad and Tobego, but he's really from NY....he's just Trinidadian.....we got to talking over lunch and I mentioned how the company was going to put me in an apartment with a Trinidadian in Hiratsuka, yada, yada, yada, and he said how it was him, and how he recently moved and can't stand his roomates now.....I asked him how the other apartment was that I was supposed to be in and he said it was PIMP....the space was ridiculous, and the balcony extended around the entire apartment....I felt hurt, but it's cool, because I like my roomates.

On another note.....I think I wrote in the last blog that the missionary, Kevin, stood me up the day we were supposed to meet, however, I just received his two emails apologizing for the incident and letting me know that he owes me coffee....lol, so hopefully we'll finally meet....