I found Starbucks!

Hi All!

Well,I have had a good couple of days - spending most of the weekend in Nagano, the nearest big city. I found Starbucks - see picture as proof - AND the Bodyshop so as you can imagine I am very happy! The girls (Kyla and Kat) and I even managed to catch a movie at the cinema and some of you may even be surprised to know that I quite happily sat through Mission Impossible 3! It was all in English with Japanese subtitles, we sat in huge bucket seats in a generously air conditioned room and were even handed clean fleece blankets for when it got a bit chilly. Bliss!

After our offical welcome ceremony on Friday we were treated to free flowing food and beer for around 15 pounds. They even served up chips and tommy k!

I was back to school on Monday and had my first lesson in the evening with an older local man called Makoto. My pre-decessor used to give him private English lessons and I have decided to continue the lessons with him. It`s really informal, he just likes to chat to practice is spoken English. He reads books and newspapers in English but still struggles with TV so I have to talk quite slowly. He has also asked me to teach him all about British culture...but not really sure where to start! There is another student joining the class next week so I have a few days to prepare something! I refused to take any money from him so as a thank you he brought me a fresh watermelon from his family farm! Result...those things are like 10 quid over here! Now, if I could only find my samuri sword to cut it open.

So Tuesday I decided to attend Japan`s biggest firework festival at Lake Suwa. It took me a good 3 1/2 hours to get there AND had to even change trains twice but I still survived. Even though I don`t have a clue what the various station signs say, you can pretty much set your watch by the trains arrival and departure times so as long as I know when the train is meant to leave I can pretty much gaurantee I`ll get on the right train!

I met up with some others and we found our spot by the side of the lake. The locals usually come about a week before the event and put down their tarpolins to secure the best spot so when we got there at about 11.30am, there was a sea of tarps featuring "hello kitty" and friends. Once we had our spot set up we all got comfy to people watch for the next 7 hours - fireworks didn`t start until 7pm! Needless to say, we all got way too much sun and for those who sampled the "squid on a stick" delicacy (not I!!!) it was a very long day!

The fireworks were absolutley spectacular when they got going and lasted about 2 hours. The bangs echoed off the surrounding mountains, so much so it made your teeth shake! And the fireworks lit up the entire valley, reflecting over this huge lake. It really was very pretty to watch.

Then came the time to embark on the journey home. It took us an hour and a half to get to the station - moving a couple of inches every time a new train came along. Once we made it to the train, they squashed us all on like sardines and away we went. When the doors first opened, there was an actual stampeed - no one was spared, women, children, dogs and even old ladies were being crushed left right and centre! In fact, it was the old ladies who were doing the crushing - I guess in this situation "you snooze you loose"!!!

After what felt like days on the train, the Iiyama possy (Matt and me) were chauffered back in the comfort of our AJET president`s airconditioned car...thanks again Julia!!! And I was safely tucked up in my bed before 1am. Pretty long day as I caught my first train at 8am, but well worth it!

Well that`s all for now folks - hope you are still all enjoying reading my blog!

Japdzx