Saturday

The plan was that MJETs (an organization that gets Miyagi JETs to come together) was holding a walking tour of Sendai, followed by a Nomi-tabehodai (all you can eat and drink) and some late night fun. So, Alia and I catch the bus for Sendai, which ended up being a surprisingly cheap and easy way to get to the city. We get there a little early, find some JETs we know and have lunch. I quickly realize that the GPS on my phone was far more detailed that I could have imagined and has made the walking tour all but moot (it was a flimsy pretext to go partying anyway). A

About the time the walking tour was about to start, a good 20-30 Jets had gathered at Sendai station and everyone was on their cell phones trying to IR connect phones to transfer numbers and email addys (think proto typical pictures of trendy Japanese youth and we were it). After a buying 4 JLPT level 2 books (it's coming up people, I hope you've signed up!) we headed to a pretty good Indian restaurant and got smashed again over some pretty good stories.

Speaking of stories, here's a good one I heard (I'm going to convey it in first person cause it's more interesting this way). So, on Friday we had our 2nd term beginning ceremony. There were two new teachers, myself and a 20ish female Japanese teacher. The ceremony starts and the new teachers are welcomed to the stage to the regular fanfare you'd expect. The Japanese teacher goes up the stairs first and assumes her place on stage, then I head up. But wait, as I get to the last stair on the staircase, the whole thing breaks and I go tumbling down the stairs just shy of the stage.

The place goes dead silent

I get up with just a few cuts and bruises and laugh it all off, but every second I get a "Are you ok!?" from each teacher and I try to tell them I'm fine; though, it's painfully obvious that they are not fine. However, the ceremony keeps going, I say my spiel and everyone claps. Yay. Is it over? Oh no no no. The ceremony was 2 hours... 2 frackin' hours of standing in the hot sun while being leered at (the kids were supposed to stand, but many broke down and sat on the ground - we teachers did not have the luxury). So, the other new teacher and I are bowing and nodding at the appropriate times, and the time FINALLY comes to get off the stage. The poor girl next to me took one step and jelloed to the ground. And I could see the determination in her eyes to stay conscious, until the final moment when she finally conched out. "Oh, this is terrible," I thought, "but at least it takes the attention off of me."

And that's what you can expect from Japanese Junior High Schools.

Dinner was followed by some pretty good Karaoke, which was followed by a trip to Bar Isn't It (which wasn't, it was more of a club). It's also important to mention that our group acted as a sort of magnet for English capable Japanese people, so the JETs pretty much ended up being the party at the club. I could go into the details of the club, but they wouldn't be very coherent. So, just imagine lots of inter-cultural lovin' going on. After people danced for about 3 hours (until 3:30am) my small group decided to pack in for the night. I had made arrangements to stay at a friends place, but all the trains had stopped at 12am, so I was screwed. Luckily, I met an ex-Jet, Sarah, who became a private JET in Sendai and she offered her flat to us for the night. So, we finally got to bed at 4:30am and set our clocks for 9am to catch our 10am bus.

Mmm, nothing like hard drinking, strenuous exercise and the prospect of no sleep.