Hell for a weekend

Last week flew by and landed us straight in Hell. In a fun sort of way.



We`re imperceptibly becoming adept at life in Japan. We get to school no problem, we know where to buy the food we want to eat, we know where to exercise and who to ask for help. I`m getting used to feeling like a boy band as I walk anywhere near the vicinity of school with hundreds of teenage girls screaming my name followed by "Kawai!!!!!!! Kirei!!!!!", which mean cute and pretty respectively. Absurd? Yes. Flattering? Yes. Funny? Very. But it makes holding a class`s attention REALLY easy. Sure beats spit balls.

Amidst all this adaption some wonderful fellow JETs helped us arrange to get ourselves to Noboribetsu, a coastal town not far from here famous for it`s onsens (bath houses) and Hell Valley. Transportation is ridiculously expensive here, but carpooling is a much cheaper option. So we hopped in with some girls on their way down to soak up the sulfur fumes of Hell Valley and take in Hell Festival.

Our first stop in Noboribetsu was this beautiful, stinking, boiling hot lake. The sulfur stench is strong, but worth it. It was the first time Brian or I had ever seen such geothermic magic.


A bit of dillying and dallying later we found ourselves in a posse of fellow JETs exploring the stinking, steaming wonderland of Hell Valley. Strange moonscapes of burning water and a bubbling little geyser drew us in despite the stink. If I were to make a 1950s movie about aliens in Mars I would film it in Hell Valley. It reminds me of Christmas on Mars actually. Wayne Coyne could`ve popped right out of that geyser.
We opted out of trying the bath houses which Noboribetsu is so famous for because it was so hot. Instead we headed towards the festival to eat drink and make merry with the demons in town. Most kids were terrified of these demons, but this little guy loves em.


After dark the revelry got started. First came the demon parade.

Then a spell of taiko Japanese drumming (if this sounds boring to you, or even if it sounds good, it`s way better than you`re imagining) came before a parade of costumed people doing a devil dance in the street. It wasn`t quite a parade because the line of people was continuous and they went around in multiple laps.

Finally Satan himself showed up to tell us all we are foolish humans and he`s taking us to Hell. These were his minions.
And the King of Evil Himself!
Why is there a Hell festival you ask? Every town in Japan (Korea too for that matter) has a cute little mascot and because of Hell Valley, Noboribetsu`s mascots are a red and blue oni (demon). These are your basic humanoids with spiky clubs, dreadlocks and horns, but the big statue of one near the entrance to the town enigmatically has soft serve ice cream cones for horns. Hell Festival is the town`s summer celebration, and it`s lots of fun.


This week is promising to be quite slow because of the big standardized tests that are going on. That means days with no classes and lots of desk time. But this weekend we`ve got a van load of Sapporo-ites road tripping to Lake Akan for camping and marimo viewing (cute algae, easier to show you than explain). So we`ll spend our days acclimatizing and day-dreaming of algae balls til then.

An Obon Festival and the Creepy Side of Japanese Arcades

We`re coming up on a month in and we`ve finally got our wits about us. We`ve paid our first bills (you take them to any convenient store and they ring them up as if it were a coke and off you go; very... convenient), finally seen our second schools, seen some festivals and made it to the arcade.

We`ve just started classes. The schools were on Summer break when we first arrived, so lots of teachers were on holiday and there was not much to do. I filled the time by making a kick ass self introduction power point and two English boards (notably not so kick ass, but I was limited in materials). Things are a lot more interesting now that there are people around. And now that we finally have the webernet at home! We can actually get connected. Skype us! We got this crazy wifi device from a cell phone company that runs off the cell phone G-whatever network so we can run 5 devices online at once anywhere in the city. Theoretically anywhere period, but we hear that service is pretty poor once you get out of town a bit. We`re still waiting on cell phones though. And waiting to get out of the city. I think this weekend might be our first exploration of Hokkaido at large.

School is shaping up nicely. I love my 1st school (we can`t mention the name of it or post any photos online; scary emails have been sent about consequences and repercussions, two things to which I have a strong aversion) and I`m just getting to know the second. Brian`s still waiting to teach at his first school, trying to fill the time productively. I learned on my first trip to 2nd school that I must be careful with the pronunciation of banjo. There`s no a sound in Japanese like the sound in "hat", so a Japanese speaker tries to fit that sound into either an a like hot or e like elephant. Turns out that benjo with that elephant e means toilet. My supervisor was a bit taken aback when I said I`d brought my toilet from America for my self introduction.



The last few days before school started where really slow because of this festival called Obon. It`s a festival to honor one's ancestors and most people return home to visit their families and ancestors' graves. So there was no one in the office, but there was this sweet little festival in the park near our house. I love this tiny kimono.

We've also had a chance to explore the city more. We went to the studio Gibli exhibit at the Contemporary Art Museum, we checked out the Art Park and Sculpture Garden (bland), and found Ramen Alley (delicious!) with Charlie and Simon when they were in town for the Sapporo Orientation. And then, finally, after weeks of passing them by, we made it to the arcade. These arcades are similar to the ones in S. Korea, with the drum game and punching bag games (no girl fighter though) and photo booths. But the ones in Korea are infinitely less creepy. Here are some of my favorite creepy little things we found, but there are more in the slide show.

Of course, who could resist the photo booth? That's Rob who's crying blood with Kubricky eyes and Jesse who's talking smiles in the back.

And here are a variety of other photos to convince you to come visit us in Japan.

Still haven't taken photos of the homestead. Coming soon!

Back at a desk and a schedule!

The blog was left to molder away in a digital abyss, but no more! A lot`s happened that we won`t try to catch up on, but some highlights were 1. Costa Rica 2. our wedding 3. honeymoon 4. move to Japan and 5. our wedding!

Here are some photos of the wedding day.
http://madefromscraps.zenfolio.com/p298354021/slideshow
This one has stills of the slide show.
http://madefromscraps.zenfolio.com/p298354021
And here's the link to ALL of the photos:
http://madefromscraps.zenfolio.com/f267187436

THAT was a lot of fun. Thanks to everyone who made it happen. A big thanks to our friends Lauren and Daniel of Made From Scraps Photography for doing such a great job with the pictures. If you live anywhere in the SE USA, look em up.

Now we`re finding a rhythm in Sapporo. Our little home`s feeling quite homey, the jet lag has faded and school is about to be in session. We`ve even been making takoyaki at home! We`ll get some photos up of the house soon, but til then here`s a little visual candy of what we`ve seen and done. Also, look out for the rest of the SE Asia videos Brian`s finished. Better late than never. Maybe soon we`ll be back in a blog rhythm too.

COSTA RICA


HONEYMOON


JAPAN : the beginning of a long and happy relationship

Next Stop: Thailandia

From Burma we flew to Penang, an island just off the North Western coast of Malaysia, to meet David and Duck. we devoured the delicacies on hand there for a couple of days before busing up to Thailand. Compared with the poverty and difficulty of travel in Myanmar, Thailand seemed a land of luxury and easy living. We spent nearly 2 weeks on the beaches of the South and a week in the mountains of the North. At the end of our trip we came back to Bangkok for the 4th time, but it was the first time we'd had a chance to explore it.