My camera and I are finally parting ways, so once I put up the album from last weekend in Osaka, you’ll have to deal with only my words.  Which I’m not writing much of anyway.  My bad.

It was probably due time that she fizzled out.  For 2 years in order to turn the camera on, I had to use some backdoor method involving holding some button for 3 seconds (I missed SO many pictures due to this, btw), and then to turn it off, I needed to take the battery out.  Good times.  Maybe someday I’ll have enough money for a new one, but until then, say hello to Mr. Wordy McWorderson.

I don’t think I’ll ever get used to earthquakes. I suppose by living in a place like this your entire life, you’d get used to them, but even so I don’t understand how the entire world as you know it shaking around can feel normal. Everyone here is so jaded; I’m pretty sure I’m the only one running away from telephone poles and hiding under tables.  One of my coworkers slept through a 4.7.  I couldn’t sleep for the rest of the night!

Today’s earthquake was a 4.something in my region, but it definitely felt like the worst one we’ve had (worse than the 5.something a couple months ago). Thankfully I’m fine, and nothing is broken in my house (well, a case with tacks in it shattered, which was a pain in the ass to clean up). You can’t help but wonder though: if the epicenter had been 100km north or west, or heck, even 50km, this would be an entirely different post. I could be sitting in a pile of rubble. Or under a tsunami.

The worst part, though, is the roller coaster/wave-pool effect. For the entire day, I kept thinking there was another earthquake, or the wind would cause my windows to make a noise like they do during the quake, and I would have to check things like pull cords for lights or keychains on a rack to see if they were moving to tell if it was really an earthquake. This happened maybe ten or fifteen times. And of course, once or twice there actually was an aftershock.

You learn in intro psych that the most addictive reinforcement strategy is a random positive one.  i.e. you receive something (confirmation of an earthquake) for an action (looking at a keychain) on a random schedule. That’s how people get addicted to gambling. Am I going to get addicted to checking my house to see if it’s moving?  Yikes.  Talk about neurosis.

So all of my students graduated in April.  I’m not a complete failure.  Well–they can technically fail their classes and still graduate, but who cares?

first, the high school:

waiter or teacher?

entering the graduation chamber

graduation program

some third year boys

teachers happy to get rid of students

general mayhem in the hallway

the graduates’ shoes (this may be my favorite picture)

signing away

more signage

packing up one last time

–

on to the junior high school:

junior high diplomas

congrantlations

出る杭は打たれる　”the nail that sticks up gets hammered down”
(this girl is having her hair dyed back to black)

up the hill one more time

mascot, sans person.  CREEPY

fastest man at the marathon … and he ran with his family!

sunset over tokyo

post-race foot bath.  a total lifesaver.

iconic tokyo

shinjuku as seen from asakasa

mt. fuji at dawn

the entrance to the Tokyo National Art Center

again, TNAC, as I’ll call it

man at TNAC

lovely design here

and here too

I’m trying to rectify my lack of posting by posting copious amounts of pictures.

dressing up kids and dogs alike:  Japan

play the theme from Totoro, and this is what happens to a kid

my snowman, before his head fell off

snowbunny–the not-so-hot kind

Marimokkori.  Hokkaido’s really really really weird/perverted mascot

how do you lose a boot?

the ONLY acceptable dog+costume combination ever

see above

no unleashed dogs, no litter, no fires, and no … uh?

made of ice

also made of ice.  Japanese people can sleep anywhere.

“yeah, I made this”

so I didn’t have sunglasses

painted buoys

ice frozen from dripping off driftwood