Making a difference, one Shu at a time...

Hey Y’all,

This Christmas holiday, I’m volunteering to go work on a volunteer project in Andhra Pradesh, India for 10 days. The area I’ll be going to is very poor and depressed, and also was heavily affected by last year’s Tsunami. That said, the Indian government doesn’t give a lot of priority to helping these folks who are viewed in a lower social caste, so there is a lot of work to be done.

While in India, the main goals are to teach and work with the villagers on creating better living conditions. I’ll also be teaching English and working in medical camp, providing free healthcare to the needy.

Here’s the website for more info: http://www.go-mad.org/projindiarelief.php

Cool, huh!?

So the group I’m a part of (Go M.A.D. “Make a Difference, mostly comprised of teachers from my program) is fundraising so that we can make a donation to the village at the end of our period of volunteer work.

SO… I’m hitting you guys up to help me out with this – “anything helps” (I feel like I should be on Market St. in SF with a cardboard sign), so break off whatever you can and if I can smuggle some cool souvenirs out of India, you’ll be first on the list.

You can either donate through PayPal – send to my email address, shu.mike@gmail.com, or email me and I’ll give you deposit instructions to an account that I’ve set up with Wells Fargo. Make sure to leave your name and address and all that good stuff too.

Thanks in advance, it’s people like you that make the world a better place
(Aw I think I just shed a tear).

Love you guys!!
-SHU.

Awaji Soccer Tournament

(My JET Intramural team)

So in the spirit of trying new things, I joined the JET Intramural soccer team of my prefecture, and have been practicing with my team and also with my students. It's cool because the worst students in my class are usually soccer players (they are the dumb jock equivalent), and they really get all jacked up and happy when I come out to practice with them (and they get a chance to try out all of the dirty words they know in English). I've even noticed that some of them are behaving better in class and actually trying harder!

This weekend was the Western Japan Intramural Tournament. It was located on Awaji Island (a small island, in between Honshu (entry city is Kobe) and the next island to the south, Shikoku), on the training fields that were built for England's team during the World Cup. JET/Intramural teams come from all over Western Japan, and the winner of the tournament (not us), goes to the spring Championship in Saitama (and they get to play in the Japanese National team's superdome, cool huh).

(This is the grounds that we played on - mountains in the background, nice manicured grass, and ocean views on the other side. Niiiiice.)

My team was "AC Hyogo," which was the social/"B" team of our prefecture, made up of mostly the beginner players (our "A" team, was mostly big, fast, experienced Brits). We actually never played together as a team before, and it really showed in this tournament!

Overall, our tournament record was 1-3 in round robin play, and we lost the first game of actual seeded play (we won the first game but never succeeded in scoring a goal the rest of the weekend). BUT, it was awesome fun and I managed to score a goal in overtime in our winning game (sweet), got rugby tackled by a big Aussie dude (it sucked, I was seeing stars for 2 minutes), managed to dish out my share of punishment, and came home with lots of bruises and a twisted up knee (sucked walking up the stairs when I got home).

Soccer is fun! I wish I had played in High school! I'm going to keep practicing with the students and JET team and hopefully go out for the A team next year, but for now I gotta ice down my knee, it looks like a big grapefruit. Yikes.

Oh PS, DJ Jeno started his own radio show and is archiving his stuff: http://www.djjeno.com/noisefromthevoid.html it's freakin' awesome music, very ecclectic and cool stuff.

Okay, that's it for tonight. Peace, -m.

Arima Spa and Japanese Bath Houses

(The ubiquitous Japanese "in-come" cat.)

So one of the favorite Japanese past-times is getting completely butt naked in front of a bunch of strangers and soaking in hot baths to relax (sorry ladies, it's men's and women's separate).

Usually you enter these things, put your stuff in a locker and swap out for a tiny towel and some slippers, and then you go into a shower area for the scrub down (Japanese folks get totally clean BEFORE getting into the bath - it's only for soaking). After that you usually have your choice of different tubs, baths, saunas, steam rooms, etc.

Since I've been here I have been to a variety of them, from crappy capsule hotel and backpacker hostel ones, to really sweet set-in-nature, zen garden, healing water types.

One of the best ones I've been to (and one of the most famous in Japan) is at Arima Spa, which is a suburb of Kobe, about 40 minutes from where I live. There is some sort of natural hot spring that runs through the ground there, and there are even little baths that just pop out of the sidewalk - literally you can be walking down the street, stop, take off your shoes, have a seat, and start soaking! Cool, huh.

(Walking is tough! Ayame and I decide to have a soak in the middle of the street.)

The water there is well known because it's got lots of iron in it, which apparently is good for the skin and muscles if you soak in it. It turns the water an opaque, rusty red, and you smell like a rusty pirate sword after you get out. Also at the same spa they had a bathtub that was full of tea water! You soak yourself in this scented tea water and it kinda gives you a buzz. They also have all of these crazy waterfalls that you can stand underneath and the water pressure falling gives you a massage. Rad huh?

So afterwards they have these lounges for you to relax and chill out in. Usually they have massage chairs and you can even hire on a masseuse right there on the spot! They also have all of these beverages you can have - the traditional post-onsen drink of choice is this really awesome coffee drink that comes in these minature milk bottles - and I guess they used to have this old school commerical, so now you're supposed to drink the coffee in the special pose:

(Me and Masa strike a pose.)

Anyway, they're loads of fun until the old dudes start lettin' 'em rip in the water, then the writing's on the wall that it's time to go. Yokorassho!

Fish Fry

I had a cool day at school today! During my free period, I made a guest appearance in the home-ec class and they had a bunch of oba-chan's (old ladies, grandmas) in as guests to teach the students how to tempura fry sardines. Here's how you do it:

1. Take the sardine in one hand and with the other hand, snap the head off, just below the gills. Pull down toward the stomach and the guts and stuff should follow as the head comes off.

2. Stick your finger down new orafice that you've made and "open" the fish via the belly. Like a reverse zipper. Spread the fish open so it's like a fillet. Rinse the fish so the guts and stuff are outta there.

3. Massage the spine and bones so that they start to separate from the meat. Gently pull the spine out, and set aside (you will fry it later too, and it's crunchy, like a skinny french-fry at McDonald's).

4. You should have a nice looking fish fillet now, which you dip into tempura batter. Also sprinkle tempura batter over the fish spines.

5. Deep fry to desired cholesterol level. Remove, and enjoy!

I have to say, it was a pretty cool experience. Unfortunately, my hands were too covered in fish guts to take any pictures but I will try again at home and make sure to document the experience. I was a little apprehensive about eating the spines but man they are pretty damn tasty (and crunchy, in a nice deep fried fish bone kinda way).

YUM!

Remind me someday to write about the time I visited Dan on the cattle ranch and we slaughtered a cow. Talk about gross (but damn those were some niiiiice T-bones)!

Halloween

I had my first English club today. A whole 3 students showed up. Nice to see that English is so popular at school. Usually I only get the office ladies who hit me up for the free English lessons.

In the spirit of Halloween I taught the kids about Jack-o-lanterns and we carved a pumpkin. That's Ohashi-kun, Mimura-chan, and Uguchi-chan.

I got a love letter from one of my students today! I am always teasing them about writing love letters to each other during class, and so after class today I was accosted by a gaggle of 13 year old girls. It's funny because the English that is really popular is mostly from pop songs, so the kids all end up sounding like they are on soap operas. "Are you free this afternoon?"

Engrish

Love Hotel in Osaka.

"...like a Japanese cowboy, like a brother on skates, like a blizzard in Georgia, or a train running late..."

I bet Hera and Cass are dying for a pair of these jeans. Ha! Note that they are nearly $170 too. Free pair with purchase of a souped up Honda Civic.