Fliends

Right now, before we move on let me just clarify a few things...

I did feel mean about Sarah, but also I felt that well this is my time here and I'm not going to spend it obligated to spend time with people I don't want to you know since it's only for a short while and well I was just really homesick at the time and really felt pressured into being friends. So I decided it was best to stay true to myself.

And you know what it WAS, because I saw her at follow up training the other day and she has a new best friend who is obviously happy to have someone else to hang with...every waking moment! And well I just wouldn't have been able to do that.

I'm kind enjoying discovering things on my own and...well I kinda like time to myself to be honest, so I don't feel the need to be with people all the time and I am glad not to have to feel guilty for not hanging out with someone to do so.

And I have made some friends of my own, in my own time. Jeannie, American with the wicked sense of humour I was telling you about. She's here with her husband, Sebastian (very never ending storyish name!) who's a musician who spends his days exploring the city, making buddies and writing lyrics while she teaches English - they've travelled to SOO many places and I really like that they are such interesting people. hmmm, maybe intruiging is the word, yes I think I find them intriguing.

And Katie, a TINY blond australian who's got a bit of a raw deal in the flatmate stakes with a girl who leaves VERY strange (alternative) pornography lying around and never cleans the loo after she goes (you have to use the brush everytime here - it's something to do with the way they're made - sorry for those with weak stomachs who read this!). She's also got a degree in Journalism (like me) and has just spent a few months hanging out in South America (a place I'd REALLY love to go!) - and I mean seriously 'just hanging' coz it was so cheap to live! And she has the same views on people here as me and just wanted to take her time getting to know the place before making friends and is homesick AND then she met Jamie who I also know - honestly it's freaky how alike we are!

Oh yes and then there's Jamie who's a fellow Kiwi who's been getting himself into a bit of mischeif already having arrived home after a night out the other day ringing the doorbell and yelling 'fire, fire!' Which caused a bit of a rucus since apartments in Japan are VERY snug in terms of location to each other..hee, hee - naughty kiwis!

THEN he ALMOST missed the last train the other night (leaves Tokyo central at midnight - if you miss it you have to say in town ALL night and sleep on the footpath like the 'salarymen' businessmen who drink so much after a day in the office they don't make it home!) only to find the one he caught only went half way home - bugger (fine kiwi term that one) taxi's are VERY expensive here!

As are watermelon's by the way - $25!!

But I digress, I've also come to like my flatmates a lot more too - Lauren (from Ohio like the Drew Carey show) is particularly funny and eternally optimistic. She and I are hoping we get lucky in the roomate drawcard stakes when Jackie (current roomate) returns home to Canada in June - fingers crossed it's someone cool!

AND I'm very proud of self coz have also made some japanese friends which well it just would be wrong not to since I'm in Japan and all!

Aki, who works for L'Oreal and trained as an interpreter at university so she speaks very good english - lucky for me! and is really into Jazz. She was going to take me out to check out this jazz bar last week but I lost my VISA (story for another BLOG), so I'll have to tell you more about the bar another time, but it sounds VERY cool.

And also Yuzo, who has a business degree and has just come back from living in Germany where he learnt to speak English very well (seems to be a theme with my japanese friends!) as he had an English flatmate. We've a baseball game scheduled as soon as I get this VISA business sorted. So that will be another future BLOG also - baseball is HUGE here would you believe!

So anyway, that's all in the future, back to what I've been up to since I got here.....

p.s. none of my students can understand me when I say 'Friends' - they think I say 'Frinds'. It is very strange not being understood!

And I work with a bunch of aussies too, so they all find it funny whenever I say something...especially the number '6' and 'fish and chups'...honestly, some people!