April 5 - April 18

I apologize for the lack of update. These past two weeks have been absolutely crazy, I have not had the time to sit down and place my thoughts onto the computer until tonight. This week I worked 6 days for over 50 hours and last week was the first week with new classes and flier dating. Sorry for the delay, but try to read all of it, I promise you will enjoy this entry. 

Work was pretty good last week except for the class with the screaming maniac girl. It's a class of 4 four and five year olds. One girl has a strange fascination with running circles around the group of students screaming as loud as possible while I try to teach the lesson. It's really enjoyable, especially when she starts hitting the other students too. Screaming maniac girl took all the concentration away from all the other students any made learning the lesson nearly impossible for everyone. 

Flier dating was taken to a new, better, level the past two weeks at the University. I went with my coworker to Nagasaki University to hand out fliers for special deals we had at the school this month. Besides the fact that I had to come in 2 hours before work to flier date, it was fun interacting with people around my age.

Last Sunday I did Hanami with two former students. We went to the local park and hung out under the cherry blossoms, ate great food, and chatted. Hanami is such a great part of Japanese culture. It feels really spiritual to just relax, and take in the surrounding atmosphere. After Hanami I ran over to Nimits park to meet my buddy for soccer practice. We trained for a bit, met some high school kids, and played 5 v 5 with them until dark. That night I went out to a Nabe restaurant with some friends from the gym. Nabe restaurant is a place with a giant pot in the middle of the table. The pot is filled with a light broth and is set to a boil. You can order as much meat and vegetables as you'd like and just place them in the pot to cook. The food was fantastic.

Monday I had to go to Fukuoka for a business meeting, but the good side was that my buddy Maro met me in Fukuoka to visit from Tokyo. He's one of my good friends from Stony Brook who is doing a year exchange at Waseda University in Tokyo. We met up after the meeting and stopped by a yatai food stall then met up with some coworkers for food and drinks. Before we went to meet the coworkers, we stopped by the convenience store to buy some drinks. We drank on the way, met with the coworkers to drink some more, and "somehow" managed to miss the last bus back to Sasebo. 

Now that we were stranding in Fukuoka until the first bus at 6:20AM, we decided to take on the city. We made our way to a bar recommended by our coworker, but before we went there we stopped at the convenience store again for some more drinks and ice cream. We hung out in the bar until about 12:30AM then headed out in search of a club. The bad news was that we didn't find a club, but the good news was that while in search of this club, we stopped by an izakaya  for more food and drinks then stopped by another convenience store for drinks. By the time our club search ended it was about 3:30AM. Everything was starting to close down in this part of town so we made our away across the district to another part that seemed to still be awake. We grabbed a drink at another convenience store and began to wander around this really shady area. We got offered some massages and invitations into weird bars by some really strange people then stopped on a side street and started to play with this Japanese flashcards app I have on my phone.

At about 5:00AM we passed a bar that appeared to be somewhat lively and we looked in the window. The bartender saw us and stepped outside to invite us. We were just passing by, and Maro told him we didn't have $30 to enter. Upon hearing these words, he turned into a frantic rage and began to yell at us to leave. Maro and I still had another hour until our bus and our eye contact was enough to agree that we were going to stay and see how this played out. The guy said he was going to call the cops so Maro told him to do so. He took his phone out of his pocket, opened it up, started yelling into it saying, "Hello? Police? Yea, I have two foreigners outside my bar, OK thank you." and closed his phone. He said the cops were on their way and tried grabbing us. We weren't having any part of that and Maro started to yell at him to go inside. Anything I didn't understand, I made him feel the same by saying something in English back to him. He would turn to Maro and say, "Hey, translate this for me," or "Hey, what did he just say to me?", but Maro just yelled at him to go back inside. Eventually we won and he went back inside. All in all, we had some great listening comprehension and speaking practice. We arrived back in Sasebo at 9AM and I had work 4 hours later YAY. 

The rest of the week was a blur of busy classes, pre-work flier dating, interviews, and late classes. Maniac Girl was still out of her mind, but this time she ran out of the classroom during the lesson to talk to her mom. This was best for all of us because the students actually had some time to learn the material while she was out of the room.

Saturday came, and it was time to have a drink with Maro. In Sasebo there is a little strip called "Sake Town" in which it is just lined with bars and mini clubs. One of the most self gratifying things in Japan is the joy of drinking in public. I watched a guy walk infront of the police office and stop, take a huge drink from his beer and begin to scratch himself in front of five officers in the window, then proceed on his way. We had a few drinks before then started to zig zag through Sake Town looking for a good place to camp. We walked up to random groups of Japanese people and started talking with them in hope they would take us to the really good places, but it didn't pose as successful as we had hoped. On our last breath of hope, we stopped by a guy talking to two girls and Maro told him we were from New York. His response was, " OK, great so you should go back to New York then. " The girls he was talking to turned out to have no relation to him and started to talk with us instead. Eventually we left with them and took them to a bar around the corner. The perfect revenge to the tough guy who couldn't just be nice to us. 

Yesterday was the Hangover Kayak Adventure for Maro and I. We went with my friend from work to her friend's Kayak store. When we arrived at the sight, we ran over the local market to grab some lunch. Maro INSISTED he had to go to the ATM because he needed money, but I told him that in his drunken blur last night he had taken out ichiman en (equivalent to about $120) at the 7-11. 

Our conversation went like this:

Maro: "Bro you are just making things up." 

Mike: "No man, I saw you do it. Why would I lie about that?"

Maro: "There is NO WAY I took out money last night. Why don't I remember then?"

Mike: "Well considering you took out the money, and stood blindly in the store doing nothing until I had to drag you out…" 

Maro: "Ok. Then where did the money go?"

Mike: "Did you check your wallet?"

Maro: "Yes, I did. It's not there. There's no way, NO WAY I took out money last night."

He proceeds to slowly take out his wallet.

He begins to open his wallet.

Maro: "If I took out ichiman en last night then it would….. OH MY GOD there's ichiman en in my wallet!"

Just off the coast of Sasebo are what is called the "99 Islands", a group of 99 (actually number is 202) islands scattered all over the ocean. Maro and I, the cute couple we are, shared a kayak. One huge problem we faced was that my feet were too big for the peddles to control the rudder. If anyone has ever use a kayak without a rudder they probably understand. For those who haven't, basically this means it was impossible for us to move straight. So if you looked at a map of our journey, it may have looked a little like this.

What it should have looked like:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------>

What it actually looked like:

\ _____ __>

  \                                                                        /            \     / \    /

    \               / \                       _    __                 /               \ /     \ /

      \            /   \                     /   \ /     \         __ /

        \ ___ /      \__/\_/\ _  /                \ / \/ 

There is this anime called "History's Greatest Disciple Kenichi" that is fairly popular in Japan. It's a story about a below average "nerd" high schooler who, with a desire to become stronger and protect those around him, befriends a mysterious transfer student and enters the dojo she trains at. He is trained by 5 masters of Judo, Karate, Muai Thai, Kung Fu, and weaponry. Every day he endures hellish training and is soon met by foes that used to be out of his league. The more people he defeats, the stronger and more diverse the enemies become. He eventually becomes a well known fighter in town, and is followed by the top local gang. I always thought how farfetched and impossible this concept was until lately. Imagine a world when all you have to do is train and get challenged by those who wish to test their strength. 

Anyway, as of late, this obscure, idea that seemed to be so impossible is coming true. There were some hints of it at the gym when the guy next to me felt the need to challenge the amount of  weight I was pressing or pulling. This seemed of the norm. Then last Monday in Fukuoka Maro and I were casually having a drink talking with the bartender. Then out of nowhere he called a challenge for Maro and I to arm wrestle. He stepped out from behind the bar, pulled out the PERFECT sized arm wrestling table and made us battle. After we fought, he stepped in and placed his arm on the table and was screaming ready for battle. 

Maybe word had gotten out to the warriors in Sasebo, but the day we went kayaking was just an epic war. What seemed to be a nice casual day of kayaking in the sunny weather soon turned into a never ending battle of challengers. The minute we arrived at the kayak sight, one of the shop employees saw me and immediately challenged me to an arm wrestling contest. Me, half drunk from last night, was in no condition to be arm wrestling the energetic, border line mid-life-crisis kayak pro. I showed no effort in our battle and allowed him to win. He raised his arms with glee, and ran off to the others gloating his accomplishment. When we had landed on a small island, there had been a group of University students on the same island together grilling and having lunch. Maro, myself, my friend and her partners kept our distance. My friend from work is a Yoga teacher and is extremely skilled at any balance technique. Her and Maro were practicing head and handstands and I started the join in. Maro and I drew a Start and Finish line for handstand walking practice and proceeded to enjoy. The next thing I know, three students approach us and literally the first English words he says to me is, " I challenge you to a battle." After some confusion between what type of battle he meant, we went to the handstand course and had it out. The foes were eventually defeated. 

After the first battle was over, the next group of challengers made their way over to us and proceeded to taunt me with phrases such as "nice muscles" and 『すごいやろ』comments. This group consisted of 5 guys and their specialty was arm wrestling. We had an arm wrestling battle and I managed to come out winner. Just when I thought the fighting was over, the biggest men of the group stepped out and challenged me to a Sumo match. There was really no option of yes or no, so the battle was inevitable. I handled my foe with ease, and pleaded for a break. Before I could finish my pleas, a 60 year old Waseda University Judo club graduate came at me with his arms out in an attempt to swipe my legs and toss me to the ground. I didn't know what else to do but hold the man until his sanity returned. His eyes eventually returned to normal and he left us alone. 

After kayaking and conquering half of Sasebo's youth, we didn't think life could get much better. My friend brought us to a hot spring about an hour away from the kayak spot. It was a hot spring located on the top of one of the mountains at a "Ryokan", or traditional high class Japanese hotel. At a hot spring, you enter the bath area (Yes naked with other guys; just admire the fine ceramics on the ceiling and you'll be fine) and there are spots to sit down and clean yourself off. You use some soap, shampoo and conditioner take a typical shower then enter the baths. There are baths varying in temperature from normal pool temperature to all-natural very hot bath water. It's one of the most relaxing things ever. Just sit and let you're muscles soak and change to different temperature waters every few minutes. Afterwards we went to my friends house and hung out, had a drink, talked about life, and made some amazing curry. We missed the last bus at 11PM and walked about 4 miles home at about 1AM. 

Day: Monday
Time: 7:10PM
Location: Sasebo Arcade

So there we were, Maro and I, two 40oz $3 liquor drinks in, facing the battle of our lives. "Dead Storm Pirates," the name of the game that had claimed the lives of many challengers. Maro and I had enough coins to spare for a family's weekly groceries. We were prepared for the ultimate battle. We stepped foot into those dark curtains, took a huge gulp from our drinks, and placed 200yen to start play. No story, no intro was necessary, all that mattered was that it was "too quiet". We were each armed with a double triggered gun, and in the center was our steering device. Before we knew it, skeleton pirates were boarding our ship and approaching us at blinding speed. There was nothing to do but fire for our lives. The hoards never ended, and just when we thought there was a break, there were cannon balls, flaming arrows, and hatchets flying through the air toward our breathless faces. 

After we successfully sank the first ship, a Kraken emerged from the depths of the ocean. We had to use our wheel to avoid flying planks and debris that were tossed by the Kraken. We defeated the Kraken and proceeded to the next 4 levels. In the other levels we faced mutant crabs, a giant snake boss, screaming ghosts, piranhas, bats, leeches and nothing else but thousands of skeleton pirates. 

We did it, we made it to the final level. In front of us pirates, was the mother of all treasures, a gold plated pirate ship loaded with all the gold we could imagine. Just as our captain bent over to grab this apricot shaped gem, he felt a hard thud kick into his chest. The "undead" captain of the ship emerged from underneath the jewels holding the apricot gem. He opened wide and place the gem into his mouth. The next thing we knew he was leaping at us with a shimmering golden sword. The reaction had to be precise or else he would have taken our heads. He tried to distract us with his ghost minions as he threw flaming swords at us. We didn't buy his deceptions for one second. This was our ship the moment we stepped foot onto it. We took that pirate captain down hard and claimed what was ours. The most intense hour of our virtual lives. 

I am speechless after this week's action. Thank you for reading. I hope all is well!!! Until next time!