I Came, I Saw, I Came Again

Penis shrine!
Pictures speak for themselves!

Somehow the order got jumbled with the pictures, but it doesn't matter. 

It's supposed to be a shrine for fertility so I was hoping the fortune I pulled was the unlucky one, but I got medium luck. My friend got max luck, which may or may not be a good thing. The stone with the inscription apparently tells a story about someone whose penis was chopped off as proof he was killed or trying to dress up as a woman to avoid capture or something, I don't know and my friend is not much help with these translation things usually.

Update on the translation:

"His family also got killed. His youngest kid tried to avoid being killed by the subordinate with dressing up as a woman and hid, but eventually they found him and killed. As the proof of having killed him and that he was not a woman, they chopped his penis off.

The people of the area pitied him and built the shrine to relieve his pain."

Pretty cool place, but a bit of a sausage fest.

Close Encounters of the McDonald's Kind

So flower-viewing season started (at the time of this event), and so while I had flower-viewing party with my English club planned (another blog post), I decided to go to the nearby Kokura city party the Kyuushuu JETs were holding as I was invited by a girl that was dating one of them.
Sure enough, I only knew like one person. But the strange thing was, no one seemed to know anyone. I don't know how Kitakyuushuu organizes their JETs, but Yamaguchi JETs all have regular meet ups. And if you live in the same city, you know each other. Not in Kyuushuu apparently.
I had been invited earlier to go join my new friends, an American and a Chinese girl I have a date with tonight, that I met in the train station (coincidentally friends with a friend of mine) in passing for like a few seconds to go to something (which I couldn't make) and then the flower-viewing in the same area, so I was planning to meet them later. If you can't read that sentence, I don't blame you. And sure enough they were able to eventually meet up with me. They brought along a new Korean friend too. Hilariously named what is pronounced "Yum".
They took a lot of pictures, we walked around, saw Tiger Man - had a good time.
[Picture to come when I find it]
While we were talking to one of the larger JETs, an old man came out of nowhere and tried to make conversation. The JET didn't understand him, but the old man was amused with his fat and began to play with it. While this really really creeped out the JET, he couldn't do much to stop him, and then he invited us to join their party.
We were led over to their place they set up, apparently some kind of electric company. They offered us free food and alcohol. The president was young, but full of energy and very funny. Only I really understood them since the others don't speak Japanese except the Korean and Chinese girl. We talked for a while and partied with them. People came and went. I waved to some group of girls and gave them some of the electric company's food, and the president went over and talked to them for a while.
You'd be surprised how much waving will get you in Japan. As you will see.
Later, more of my friends arrived, did some introducing. One of the electric company employees asked about making his kid learn more English, she's like 3 or 4 or something. Gave some tips, pointed out some people that could help.
Then later walked over and joined the girl circle and talked to them for a while. When it was time to go, I told them we should hang out again, they agreed. I asked the guy I had been talking to for his contact info and he was surprised that I was serious.
In Japan, it is waaaaaaaay too common to make promises of hanging out or doing something together or being invited to something or whatever - and not be serious. Which is stupid.
We then decided we were hungry and went to a restaurant and got food.
Then we headed back.
On the way back, close to home, we decided we were still hungry - so one of us decided we should go to McDonald's. I am always up for more food or at least convincing people they need more, so I was for the plan. Somehow we convinced our female friend / one of our friend's girlfriends to not go straight to sleep and join us.
Surprisingly, a bunch of our friends were there. We talked with them for a bit, but then we started getting ready to go.
That's when I noticed a pair of eyes poking over the divider.
I waved as I always do, and suddenly it looked like they were getting up.
We also got up to leave, when I suddenly noticed she had ran up behind me.
She begins to talk to us. Apparently, her and her friend were on a journey since they just graduated high school. They were on their way back to Osaka. She had studied abroad in New Zealand for a year so she was chatting up the Kiwis. Then she asks if they can stay with us. Mind you, this is like 1AM or later.
Apparently their plan was to stay in the McDonald's. It was too far to my place, but fortunately the Kiwis volunteered their place. The male Kiwi said he was glad his girlfriend was with him otherwise it'd be hard to explain why he brought two young girls home with him.
The other girl didn't seem to speak much English, and she surprisingly went along with her friend's plan. So we all walked back in the same direction. It seemed the English-speaker liked me since she stayed behind to talk to me who was walking slower and just being flirty.
Too bad for her, I stayed at my other friend's house to balance out the numbers.
Oh well, I made a new friend.
All thanks to waving.

Jailhouse Rock

So, I have given up a bit on chronology here, but it's not too far off.
I was invited to go to another school's concert because my friend had an extra ticket. At the risk of sounding gay (his own words), he invited me. It was pretty cool, and there was a French trumpet dude they flew over to play like two songs and give a speech and interview in French (with a translator).
But that one student, she managed to find me. Pretty sure she stalks me (not really, don't worry). Anyway, she was excited to see us. I told her my friend was coming to the upcoming flower-viewing party with the club. I wanted to invite foreigners to encourage them all to do whatever.
Anyway, she ran off, then during the next intermission she took a photo with us. Then it ended and she just left. I thought we were free of her.
We left, and were headed to the bus/train, when suddenly "CORBIN!" and she comes running out of the alleyish area and hugs me. Her friends catch up shortly after and we talk for a bit. She then runs off.
Next day at work.
Two teachers show up at my desk. The English teacher tells me, "*****sensei (Not only is it censoring, but I don't know anyone's names, hahaha) says she saw you with Tsubura together yesterday. Did you go somewhere with her?" "No?" So we had a short discussion about why I definitely didn't go anywhere with her and it sounded like the English teacher knew I was telling the truth especially since she yelled my name and others were there. But the other teacher gave me this glare before leaving.
Fortunately, she has recovered from any suspicion I think, so there's no problem.
Later that week I had club with the student, and she ran up and said "Guess what! *****sensei doubts our relationship!" Hoping she is simply using incorrect English, she tells me more. Apparently she was also interrogated. She thought it was hilarious and told other club members. To be fair, it is pretty hilarious.
Stepping back in time a bit and shifting gears, the day after the concert, I was supposed to house my friend traveling from a far away prefecture.  He was scootering from his prefecture all the way to the bottom of Japan and back. But that was also the day I had told the JET in a nearby city I would go to his school's concert. Fortunately I was able to get the visitor to agree to meet me in the other city since it was closer to where he was starting from anyway.
He arrived before me and apparently more or less made friends with everyone. Concert was pretty cool. Again they had flown someone from way far away to do a few songs. They even did a Beauty and the Beast play during it.
We ate dinner, and I took the train back and he scootered to my house. He just barely beat me there. In the morning he left.
So in the end, I was able to keep all my promises, see a lot of concerts, and avoid jail.

So Long and Thanks for All the Fish

So, unfortunately, with the end of the school year, there is a big shuffle. Obviously the graduating students leave and the new ones arrive, but also the teachers. People retire or get moved to new schools. Like a lot of them. Presumably to introduce new ideas or something. But sometimes there are more sinister goals at play like moving problem teachers to remote parts of the prefecture.
Unfortunately, it's also a big secret. Why? I asked - and the answer was: "Huh... yeah, huh, why do we? ...huh... I don't know." Which is the closest thing to an answer you will ever get in Japan for anything. I had already long know that the Vice Principal and Principal were retiring, which made me really sad because the Vice Principal was super awesome and the Principal was pretty cool too, but I wasn't sure who else would disappear. I checked the list, and sure enough, I was losing one teacher. The one that talked to me second most, so it was a bit sad, but she wasn't going far at least, so there's that. No one else I knew or cared too much about was leaving, so all in all, it was a pretty good time.
However.
We were getting a new English teacher. They said she was young. And when she showed up, I realized she was pretty cute. One of the teachers even said I should ask if she was single. (She is!)
I'm getting ahead of myself though, I guess I should mention graduation. I asked and found out that the first and second years also have to attend graduation. When I said that it must be boring for them, my supervisor responded that it was actually funny because everyone cries. She then paused and asked jokingly if she was a bad person. She also told me that it is strange because most of them come back the next day anyway. Yes, the graduates come back on Saturday for extra school.
I was given the glorious task of leading people to their seats. Surprisingly most of them did actually follow, but there were some rebels. Later I was commended on my seat directing as if it took any level of skill. I used the opportunity as I passed the students to issue high fives and encourage doing the wave. The wave was never successful. It never is...
Ceremony started and it was predictably boring. One of the students gave a speech. It was so long, that the band began playing a song, then ran out of song while she spoke. She cried a little which made it even slower.
Eventually it did finally end and we all went home or whatever.
Then Spring break. Obviously most JETs go somewhere for break, but not me. I came in and sat. Fortunately I realized I could be using the time to learn Korean and PHP and stuff, and even began making the English club a website only I appreciated.
So towards the end of that, was some big desk shuffle. The new teachers had arrived and everyone got their new roles, and that meant that we had to move our desks. Not the stuff on it, the desk.
Despite the fact that I tried to talk them into letting me keep my spot and even contributing to the seating chart, I did have to move my desk to the other side of the aisle. So I was no longer next to the popular door, so bothering the students that visited the teachers' room was a bit harder. But I didn't move toooo far. And the new teacher sat next to me.
The other good news was that my over-busy supervisor was replaced with the more talkative Favorite Teacher. The two teachers I would be working with for the year turned out to be awesome and very willing to try my way.
So naturally I got rid of the bowing, allowed students to choose their own seats, and even let them pick a nickname (though most just used their own names). We also wore fun hats to the first class. The new teacher tried to object, but Favorite Teacher told her we have to try things my way or something to that affect.
The new teacher is awesome and is very talkative like me. So sitting next to her is fantastic.
So the new year started. Which I knew meant an opening ceremony.
But apparently it also included a welcoming ceremony the next day. (Which was hilarious)
AND a farewell ceremony. But not like right away like the first two, it was like a week into classes.
The opening ceremony was just a regular one, but the welcoming ceremony had the first years to the left and everyone else on the right, then they ceremoniously faced each other, and gave speeches in the middle.
The farewell ceremony was a surprise. The teachers that left came back during the school day and gave the longest and most boring speeches I have ever endured in Japan. And that is saying a lot. Every one of them gave a super long speech.
Then we had a farewell party that night where they all gave MORE SPEECHES! of the same insane length.
So there's like 20 new people running around now, including everyone in the high up positions, but all-in-all (yes, this time I used hyphens), I think this year will be awesome.
What's left of it.

Late, Slow - It's All the Same (In Japanese)

It really is - 遅い
But that aside, I realize I had never posted about sumo back in November. So here you go.
Last year when I was in Shimonoseki, I arrived just after the JET sumo event ended. Like same-day just after. I don't know how to make that work without using tone, so imagine that sentence made sense.
Anyway, so this year I really wanted to go. At the time, I was dating a JET, and unfortunately, the JET dishing out tickets was my ex. So I thought it'd be a bit awkward to ask for two tickets, but it worked out fine.
So we walk around Fukuoka for a bit. See some temples and stuff. Then we find some large dudes in sumoy-looking outfits. So we ask to take pictures with them. They looked confused so probably they were just trainees or something.
We go into the building and there are all kinds of sumo goods. There's a fairly large crowd and they had to clear a way occasionally to let sumos through.
It took us forever to find our seats. When we did, we were pretty disappointed. We were as far back as you could get. And to make things worse, we were on our own except for the JET that was having relationship problems and likes to wear her heart on her sleeve.
The actual sumoing was really cool - when they fought. But it has that Dragon Ball Z effect. Lots of staring, not a lot of action. They spent a lot of time getting into the ring, then bowing, then posing, then staring, then getting up, then throwing salt, then posing, then staring, then getting up, more salt, more posing, more staring, more getting up, more salt, more posing, more staring, then finally it begins! and it's over. The staring was 90% of each match. And the actual fighting always only lasted a few instants. There were tons of matches at least.
There were also some hilarious spill-outs though. Some of them when they flew out of the ring, really flew. They'd land in the crowd sometimes. I saw one sumo landed his foot right into a cameraman's lap.

But all in all it was a lot of ceremony, not a lot of action.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yhZ64g7sUs If only it were like this...