Ok, it has been a while since my last update, things are rolling along
pretty damn well over here, I have been busy as normal though I got to
spend a few days at home due to some messed up travel plans but in the end
it was damn nice. Anyways, straight into it ---

First, some humour.

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So, in February I returned to Australia for a brief perdiod (O, and how
brief it seemed, far too short in truth!) for my brother's elopement
(which is just missed) and the subsequent celebrations of his marriage.
The celebrations were at a restaurant on the beach, on a beautiful clear
day and I must say it looked to me like getting married off on a tropical
island by yourself and having a almost no stress party with all your
friends and family later seems to be the way to go. It is wonderful to see
my brother so happily married!

The day after the ceremony was a lot of fun for me as well as my brother
had rented a car, the car he rented was a porsche boxter but something
went wrong with that, so they offered him an Audi Quattro TT Convertible
(looks like a spaceship and handles like one!) for two days instead (he
was also the only person who didn't swear at the car place when they told
him the bad news about the Porsche, a little niceness goes a long way!).
Unfortunately for him he had to go to Perth but luckily for me he put my
name on the list as second driver. Taking corners with 45km/h safety speed
signs at around 100 and rocketing along at 190 or so is damn good fun!
AWESOME!!! You gotta try it some day. (Thanks Bones!!)

Its the only reason my bro is still living, he doesnt yet know how close
he came to losing his life to a smoking gun carried by his only brother.
He was meant to get married a bit later in the year. Turns out that my
favorite band, Opeth, from Sweden, was playing in Adelaide when I was
meant to be back there......*evil grin* Ahh well.

Got to hang out with my friends and family in Adelaide and I think that
really helped recharge my batteries for Japan. Also went to the doctor to
try and determine the reasons behind my long term illness, turns out that
I had had Glandular Fever. No big surprises there for me. Went to a few
different 'alternative' doctors and came back to Japan loaded up with
vitamins and herbs and the like. If I stop taking them for about 2 or 3
days I get sick again so am not 100% better but am feeling generally
pretty good now!

A few weeks after returning to Japan the end of the school year came
around. These ceremonies are accompanied by a number of interesting things
1) Complete silence (from the students) 2) Students marching about and
grimly receiving certificates 3) Practice!! Yes, they practice the
ceremony, a few times! They practice marching, and how to accept their
certificates, and their speeches and how to sit and, this one blew me
away, how to clap!! 4) Crying! Wow, for such a generally reserved people
(they are actually quite emotional lots of the time, but, y'know), I was
amazed that when the students started giving their we are going away now
speeches almost everyone was crying. Girls, teachers, the hard core punk
guys who break windows and terrorise the younger kids, the tealady, almost
everyone!! Its like, now is the time to be upset, get to it!  (Only a
slightly related note, it seems that there is a similar directive applied
to festivals, which are time to be happy and have fun, and they are!) 5)
No teaching for Martyn.

So, after that I had a two week language course in the big city
(Matsuyama). I stayed in Zach's place up in the mountains of Kuma about an
hours drive away from the course. The course was only a few hours every
afternoon but was very useful and has inspired me to study more Japanese
again. I had a great time going out for dinners at Thai and Indian
restaurants with my fellow students. I now have about 4 more days of
constant music playing available thanks to Zach's computer, I think now I
have too much music and am whittling away to find the stuff I like.

One evening during the language course I went and stayed with a JET in a
place called Imabari (she came out to dinner and was a bit sick and would
have had to catch the train home for ages and whatnot). We went to an
interesting bar/restaurant in her village, the owner had built it out of
wood, there were people just hanging out and playing drums and didges, and
the owner was a sea kayaker. All seemingly unusual things to be happening
or to see in Japan, at least for me!

I bought the bit for my computer to get internet here but found out that
they will get adsl (better internet) in Seto at the end of may or early
July so I will wait for that....

I spent the last night after the language course at the Okudogo (where
most of the jets in matsuyama live together) watching gladiator and
crouching tiger (what an awesome movie that is, if you have yet to see it
you really should!) and rock star and getting my hair cut (its short
again, everyone got their hair cut by one of the other JETS).

The next weekend was a blur of picnics to look at the beautiful cherry
blossoms! The Cherry Blossom season is famous and for good reason, they
really are beautiful and lots of people get out and about to see them in
all their glory. Sitting under the trees, cooking a bit of meat and
drinking and chatting is great fun. There will be some pictures on my
website soon. www.dons.net.au/~nevre

Feeling better I decided it was time to return to martial arts training.
So, one eve I went back and this became a real learning experice! Upon
arrival I greeted the Sensei, I was a little apprehensive at this point
cause I hadn't been for the last 4 months or so.  In the best Japanese I
could muster I explained that I had been very sick, that I was sorry that
I hadn't been coming along and said politely, please teach me. He said
something like 'Maybe you are still sick, you had better go and rest some
more', I thought 'Thats nice, he is concerned for my health' and repeated
that I was feeling better and it would be ok to which he replied 'Just to
be sure, go home and rest'. At this point I think, maybe my Japanese isn't
making sense, maybe he didn't understand. So, again with the I'm better,
and again an evasive answer. I say evasive cause thinking about it in the
car on the way home I realise that he is trying to avoid causing any
trouble or disharmony, he was trying to get rid of me without saying why
really. So, I blundered on, its one thing to have read about a cultural
difference, a completely different thing to recognise it the first time
you really see it. After about 5 minutes of horrible not being able to
communicate stuff going on he gives in and says that it was bad that I
hadn't contacted him to say why I wasn't training any more.  That he had
bought a uniform for me and thrown it away! And that I should come back
with my supervisor the next week for a chat. (cause he can speak english).

That night was a hell of embarrassment for me. Not only had I done the
wrong thing and screwed up culturally I had been more than a little
unthoughtful. Hmmmm.  Interesting. Good way to start going about doing
something you really want to do by pissing off the Head of the World
Organisation!! So, next week the meeting rocks around and the new English
teacher has volunteered to come with me cause he lives just up the road
from the martial arts sensei. In Japanese fashion he has rung ahead
earlier in the evening and sorted everything out. So, during the meeting
the sensei tells me that the students had been talking about my
disappearance and thought that maybe I was a bad person (as had he) and
that it didn't reflect well on foreigners but that in the end he was glad
that I had returned cause it took courage to do that, and also when
talking about my first return I caught him saying stuff about how I had
'acted like a foreigner' and hadn't phoned ahead or organised a meeting or
anything.

Wow!! That was an experience! Now I have been back a few times and it is
all going really well.

Went stargazing in Kuma at one point, though it was cloudy so we just got
the plane-erium tour, so now I recognise some of the constellations up
here, its amazing how much I miss seeing the southern cross at times! The
guy who showed us around has named heaps of stars and asteroids and
things, sugoi.

One night at a party I went for a walk up a beautiful valley under the
full moon with mist and clouds and mountains all around. With all the mist
and fog and cloud here it is really a magically beautiful place a lot of
the time.

Now for something a bit different, a report on the yearly health check ups
they have here and which I will soon need to avoid!!

  Using United States Federal Aviation Authority actuarial calculation
methods, it is shown that over 1 in 70 Japanese workers will be killed by
cancer induced by radiation during their company health checks in a
nationwide program which subjects them to the equivalent of over 2000
chest x-rays - more than the average dose received by survivors of the
Hiroshima and Nagasaki experiments.

The single fluoroscopy is equivalent to 150 chest x-rays, and 15 times the
yearly maximum exposure allowed in the United States. It greatly exceeds
the dose received by workers at high level nuclear plants. It is equal to
the exposure received by an astronaut in space for one month (recognized
hazard). But the energy is delivered to the most vulnerable organs of the
body in just a few minutes.

A few weeks ago I went to the sansai (wild vegetable) matsuri (festival)
held in a small town in the mountains. I ate some sansai udon and some
other noodly thing.  Some of the wild vegetables that were in these dishes
were sooooooo tasty and good I have to wonder why they don't seem to be
round very much in everyday eating. They had a market there where there
were about 10 different vegetables that I had never seen before and
wouldn't know what to do with if peeling a boiling were the way to go! We
went for a walk near a small stream, saw a cool little waterfall and a
nice bamboo stand, there will be some pics soon! YUMMY FOOD!

After the language course it was school holidays so I had a week in the
office. Then it was school opening ceremonies and then a few slow weeks at
juniour high so I managed to rack up about 10 lessons in about 10 weeks or
so (maybe an exaggeration but not by much) and a few days at pre-school
and elementary school. The video I was showing (at elementary school) had
the bombing of Darwin in it, I think it surprised some teachers, the
official textbooks don't have much about WWII in them at all, apparently
many people aren't aware of the details of Japan's occupation of Korea and
various things like that and are quite surprised that foreigners know
about the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

I got to see most of a J-League soccer match (I think it was J=league, we
weren't too sure though) before our confrontation with the soccer team of
the neighbouring ken (Tokushima). They had a coach, they had been
practicing, they warmed up, they played against other Kens
(districts)....we had half a team who had never played a real game before,
girls, (the other team didnt let them play, they were serious!) but enough
attitude and some awesome players who bought us to a 2-2 draw at the end
of the game. Being 2-0 down at half time we were looking at a bit of a
drubbing but we came back! It was awesome fun! I want to play some soccer
now! Afterwards we all went out for dinner, after that I ran into a guy
from Peru who was at the language course with me and he took me to a club
(Club Fucktry, interesting name), where they were playing salsa music! Met
a women there who teaches English in Matsuyama and now have a place to
stay about 1 block from the centre of town, any time and also organised to
go stay with a guy from tokushima and go camping with some of the people I
had met on the soccer pitch (unfortunately the last bit didnt work out in
the end). fun fun fun fun fun!

The Moo Moo Matsuri is worth a quick mention, it was in my hometown, one
other ALT came and for $20 we got a plate of meat that sells for a about
$100/kilo. My supervisor came over with 4 more plates and we ate more
amazingly fatty and delicious meat than we should have, as well as other
foods thoughtfully donated by others at the festival.  Yum!

One night I went out to a few restaurants with my old English teacher and
we went to one place we had previously been to. I asked if we could get
some sweet and sour pork cause it was really nice there. The owner said it
is only for people who book in a large group but proceeded to go grab some
from a large group who had done just that, and give it to me. Wow, there
are so many acts of amazing generosity here!

Mt Ishizuchi deserves a special mention. Its the highest mountain in
Shikoku and in this half of the country. It is BEAUTIFUL! We climbed up
it, and near the top you can choose to take the path or be really hardcore
and drag yourself up the cliff, on the huge chains that are thoughtfully
provided! It was an exhilarating experience, the height, the views, the
challenge, the thought that falling off would mean lots of broken bones,
if not outright death. Wow. Near the top was a meter and a bit wide ledge
on a small angle. An easy walk across apart from the 200m drop on either
side which reduced us all to crawling. The scenery is some of the best I
have seen in Japan and coupled with the climbing and the company made for
one of the best experiences I have had in Japan so far.

Unfortunately, the road we came up, the skyline, was closed by the time we
finished. Hmm If anyone can think of a good reason to close a perfectly
good road at 7pm at night without any big signs to tell you its gonna
happen, let me know! The other road down the mountain headed due east (the
exactly wrong direction) and it took us about an extra 2 and a bit hours
to get back to where we started from that day!!

The next day was the Ikazaki Kite festival. There were lots and lots of
kites and most of them had a downward pointing blade about 2 meters down
the string and they fought to cut each others strings. It was very
interesting to watch. Parties have a finishing time here and so do
festivals apparently for at 3 oclock some fireworks went off, the kites
were taken down, the stalls packed up and everyone but the foreigners went
home! It was a very colourful time when the kites were around though!!!!
Awesome weekend.

This last weekend I went to a birthday party, we stayed in a place which
was parttially modelled on old style houses, quite beautiful really, and
cooked over a coal fire in a firepit. We had nabe (its like a stew sort
of, you keep on adding food to boiling water and eat it constantly, for
hours!!). We composed haiku together (one line that pass them around)
which turned out really well in general.

Work is good, my new teacher is great, I have fun in juniour as we can do
more conversation things and practice and games as now the first two years
are ok. Not enough real work at times but........thats how it is!

Tomorrow we are going somewhere to draw pictures together, the whole
school!

Wow, I am sure there are a bunch of things that I have missed. I have been
soooo busy. Been hanging out in the nearest city a bit more and starting
to get to know a few of the Japanese people that the people there know a
bit. Many of them have lived in Australia for a while so have been having
some interesting chats about that and about life in general. Next week I
will starting going to a Uni course in the big city every week, its
Japanese History and culture, in English, with small discussions every
week between Japanese and foreigners, should be good for all sorts of
reasons!

PHEW

That will do for now, have been typing for ages! Want to thank you all for
just being around and being my friends and keeping in touch. I am feeling
much better health wise (little way to go) but emotionally, the last month
or so, I have started feeling so much better, I think I am really turning
the corner happiness wise and life has been really exciting and fun and I
have a lot to look foward to!!

Its all good! Please write and let me know what you are up to!

*love*

Martyn.