Ya, this morning... at 9:37 AM, I was awoken by a new thing...
An earthquake! Magnitude 2-3.
My first earthquake :).
At first, since I was like, sleeping... I thought I was shaking (like, my muscles were moving)... but I soon figured thats not right...
Now, mag 2-3 isn't much. But this is how it felt...
It felt like someone was at the end of my bed moving it back and forth lightly at a rate of maybe 2 shakes per second. Apparently, thats very fast. This earthquake actually originated waaay down off the south coast of Chiba... as a mag 5 earthquake. Glad I wasn't there :). For your info... that is over 100 kilometers away... and we could (and Tokyo too) still feel it easily :). It's AMAZING to think that over 200 kilometers north, south, west, and east of that quake, ALL the ground plus kilometers below the ground, plus ALL the water in the ocean there, is shaking and moving all at once. MANY MANY quadrillions of tonnes of stuff moving... it's kinda rediculous...
Also, to continue with the unnatural natural events of today :)... I could see Mt Fuji VERY VERY clearly from my house today... Thats like... 140 kilometers away... even more crazy, and I've never even seen this from TOKYO, is that you could see the stretch of land that shoots out from Japan south-east of Mt. Fuji. Those mountains are even further away... All this, and it was at Sundown :) I'm kinda annoyed I didn't look earlier in the day when I REALLY could have seen everything.
2008/02/10
2008/02/04
Update on Life
Well, nothing interesting to comment on in terms of travel, but I thought I'd update the blog for the people that watch it :)
So, lately, I've been uh... not busy :) Looking for jobs, however, I've applied to ALL of them... When new ones come out, I apply to them too... so I'm just being patient and waiting to hear back from any of them. It's unfortunate, because Nova, Japan's used to be largest English teacher supplier went bottoms up the week that I arrived in Japan. This means there are litteraly about 5000 teachers looking for English teaching jobs right now :) They all have experience too... which makes it harder.
Therefore! I've also been applying to long-term, career focused computer jobs in programming (my thing) and the occational junior server administrator (my 2nd want to be thing). However, BY FAR most of them require fluency in Japanese and English, and I don't have fluency in Japanese yet :) (Sometimes I wonder about English too...)
しかし！ (shikashi: but!)
Today I was emailed about a job that I did not expect to get a call back from... Saora, looking for programmers and a couple other things, in the Linux department (PERFECT!). I have an interview with them waaaay over in Yokohama, 2 hours away from here.... on Wednesday (it's Monday night now) at 6 o clock. How nice :D
If I get a job like that... I would not be going back to Canada to live... (just visits) and Japan would be my new home for at LEAST a couple of years. But I don't mind :) I like Japan.
We (Chiba) also had snow!!! 5 inches of it!!! Maybe 8 inches fell... but it was melting at the same time as falling so it never looked like more than 5 inches. That happened yesterday... I have a picture... Which I'll upload soon... Look for it in the Chiba area. It should be there when you guys read this.
So, lately, I've been uh... not busy :) Looking for jobs, however, I've applied to ALL of them... When new ones come out, I apply to them too... so I'm just being patient and waiting to hear back from any of them. It's unfortunate, because Nova, Japan's used to be largest English teacher supplier went bottoms up the week that I arrived in Japan. This means there are litteraly about 5000 teachers looking for English teaching jobs right now :) They all have experience too... which makes it harder.
Therefore! I've also been applying to long-term, career focused computer jobs in programming (my thing) and the occational junior server administrator (my 2nd want to be thing). However, BY FAR most of them require fluency in Japanese and English, and I don't have fluency in Japanese yet :) (Sometimes I wonder about English too...)
しかし！ (shikashi: but!)
Today I was emailed about a job that I did not expect to get a call back from... Saora, looking for programmers and a couple other things, in the Linux department (PERFECT!). I have an interview with them waaaay over in Yokohama, 2 hours away from here.... on Wednesday (it's Monday night now) at 6 o clock. How nice :D
If I get a job like that... I would not be going back to Canada to live... (just visits) and Japan would be my new home for at LEAST a couple of years. But I don't mind :) I like Japan.
We (Chiba) also had snow!!! 5 inches of it!!! Maybe 8 inches fell... but it was melting at the same time as falling so it never looked like more than 5 inches. That happened yesterday... I have a picture... Which I'll upload soon... Look for it in the Chiba area. It should be there when you guys read this.
2008/01/25
Onsen!
So last weekend I went to Yunishikawa Onsen (湯西川温泉) in Tochigi Prefecture (栃木県) which is about 160 or so kilometers north (北) of Tokyo. I went with 6 other people, all Japanese, (all are people that went to Canada in the past. I know them through Asako)
Onsen's (hot springs) are WONDERFULLY AMAZING! I think I'm in love. It was extremely fun. This time (as opposed to previous hang-outs with these people), I was able to understand and converse with the other people MUCH more (due to my Japanese skill being much better) and therefore I had a tonne of fun. It went down to -12 or so I think at night... so that made it even better in the outside Onsens. There's nothing like bathing naked outside in the open air under the starry night sky when it's -12 outside haha (oh ya, in Japan, in an Onsen, you do not wear clothes).
Most certainly a new experience. It takes 4 and a bit hours to get from my house to where we went. There was snow, a good deal of it (yay!), so I was quite satisfied. The Ryokan (Traditional Japanese Inn, a must-do for people visiting Japan) that we stayed in... was neat first of all... The dinner and breakfast provided by them was wonderful as well... but a really neat thing is that some of the wood that makes up the building is 800 YEARS OLD. Crazy...
Real Onsen like that one are much better than Hot Tubs... MUCH better... they smell a bit... (due to various minerals in the water, such as sulfer) but you get used to that quickly. They say the BEST Onsen can heal anything except love sickness. I believe them... My back, which had a NASTY knot in it for the past few days, was extrememly sore... However, the INSTANT (no joke) I went in the water, my back felt just fine... Very interesting in deed...
Onsen's (hot springs) are WONDERFULLY AMAZING! I think I'm in love. It was extremely fun. This time (as opposed to previous hang-outs with these people), I was able to understand and converse with the other people MUCH more (due to my Japanese skill being much better) and therefore I had a tonne of fun. It went down to -12 or so I think at night... so that made it even better in the outside Onsens. There's nothing like bathing naked outside in the open air under the starry night sky when it's -12 outside haha (oh ya, in Japan, in an Onsen, you do not wear clothes).
Most certainly a new experience. It takes 4 and a bit hours to get from my house to where we went. There was snow, a good deal of it (yay!), so I was quite satisfied. The Ryokan (Traditional Japanese Inn, a must-do for people visiting Japan) that we stayed in... was neat first of all... The dinner and breakfast provided by them was wonderful as well... but a really neat thing is that some of the wood that makes up the building is 800 YEARS OLD. Crazy...
Real Onsen like that one are much better than Hot Tubs... MUCH better... they smell a bit... (due to various minerals in the water, such as sulfer) but you get used to that quickly. They say the BEST Onsen can heal anything except love sickness. I believe them... My back, which had a NASTY knot in it for the past few days, was extrememly sore... However, the INSTANT (no joke) I went in the water, my back felt just fine... Very interesting in deed...
2008/01/12
A quick update
Hello everyone again. Just thought I'd update on whats going on here... which currently isn't too much.
However, I did have a job interview as a part time English Teacher at a Childrens school. I had that interview today. However, I have declined the offer as the details of the job did not suit my needs... *sigh * So my search continues for a job.
Next weekend, I and 6 other friends will be heading south from Tokyo on a 2 day relaxation trip... So I'll have a blog for that when that happens as well.
Well that's all really... Not much to talk about when you're job searching...
However, I did have a job interview as a part time English Teacher at a Childrens school. I had that interview today. However, I have declined the offer as the details of the job did not suit my needs... *sigh * So my search continues for a job.
Next weekend, I and 6 other friends will be heading south from Tokyo on a 2 day relaxation trip... So I'll have a blog for that when that happens as well.
Well that's all really... Not much to talk about when you're job searching...
2008/01/04
New Years!
Well, New Years has come and gone, and it was fun here.
First off, I've uploaded more pictures on to my site in the Chiba section, and one in the Tokyo section.
The Chiba pictures that are new are of the first sunrise of the year. We stayed up on the 31st of December until 2AM of course... and then went to sleep... and then woke up at 5AM to go out to see the first sunrise of the year on top of a mountain in Chiba. It was very crowded there... several hundred people. It's apparently very popular for people here to do this. So the pictures were taken from my phone... as I forgot my good camera... So the ground which looks like it's black in those pictures was actually lit... It was cityscape and farm land, with the ocean in the background.
After that, we went back home, and had one of the most wonderful breakfasts ever with Asako's family (Grandpa included this time). It is their tradition to have a special breakfast on New Years.
Later in the day... we went off to Mitaka to spend the night there (Asako's Grandpa's house in case you forgot). The next day, we had a party with Asako's family and cousin/uncle/aunt. That was lots of fun. Had a wonderfully large lunch and drank a decent amount. Lots of fun.
Later Asako and I headed off to a temple in Harajuku. A very large one.... It was RIDICULOUSLY busy. It was busy because it is also tradition to head off to a temple in the New Year to pray for best wishes for the upcoming year, and pray for your family, etc... Even people with no religion do this.
Once the holidays are officially over (the 7th/8th), then I'll be starting a job search extravaganza.
I hope everybody's New Years was good as well and lots of fun!
First off, I've uploaded more pictures on to my site in the Chiba section, and one in the Tokyo section.
The Chiba pictures that are new are of the first sunrise of the year. We stayed up on the 31st of December until 2AM of course... and then went to sleep... and then woke up at 5AM to go out to see the first sunrise of the year on top of a mountain in Chiba. It was very crowded there... several hundred people. It's apparently very popular for people here to do this. So the pictures were taken from my phone... as I forgot my good camera... So the ground which looks like it's black in those pictures was actually lit... It was cityscape and farm land, with the ocean in the background.
After that, we went back home, and had one of the most wonderful breakfasts ever with Asako's family (Grandpa included this time). It is their tradition to have a special breakfast on New Years.
Later in the day... we went off to Mitaka to spend the night there (Asako's Grandpa's house in case you forgot). The next day, we had a party with Asako's family and cousin/uncle/aunt. That was lots of fun. Had a wonderfully large lunch and drank a decent amount. Lots of fun.
Later Asako and I headed off to a temple in Harajuku. A very large one.... It was RIDICULOUSLY busy. It was busy because it is also tradition to head off to a temple in the New Year to pray for best wishes for the upcoming year, and pray for your family, etc... Even people with no religion do this.
Once the holidays are officially over (the 7th/8th), then I'll be starting a job search extravaganza.
I hope everybody's New Years was good as well and lots of fun!
2007/12/26
Shizuoka and Christmas!
Well, a few days ago I went to Shizuoka! Shizuoka is about 180 kilometers southwest of Tokyo.
We went by Shinkansen (the bullet train). Let me tell you... the trip took 1 hour and 30 minutes... with several stops.... so about 1 hour of travel time... 180 kilometers an hour.
It was pretty neat :) It takes longer to get from Chiba to Tokyo on a regular train....
Anyways, Shizuoka is just south west of world famous Mt. Fuji! Therefore, the train runs right beside Mt. Fuji. Mt. Fuji is 3770 meters high. It's interesting because the city beside Mt. Fuji, Shin-Fuji, is at sea level. So yes, there are NO mountains or even hills in front of a 3770 meter high mountain and the ocean, which makes Mt. Fuji look HUGE. HOWEVER! As I seem to not have any sort of luck with seeing Mt. Fuji (still haven't seen it from Tokyo... which apparently is rare), it was raining when traveling to Shizuoka. So I did not see anything except a VERY faint outline of it's bottom third.
When we arrived in Shizuoka, we were greeted by cloudy weather, luckily not rain... We headed off to a place called 日本平 (Japan Flat). It's a little mountain in the middle of Shizuoka City that was supposed to have a wonderful view of Mt. Fuji, and in summer, have many pretty plants, flowers, tea farms, mandarin orange farms, rose flowers, and more. Of course, it was very cloudy, 6 degrees with a brutal wind from the ocean that made it seem pretty close to freezing or colder. So we couldn't see Mt. Fuji... cept a few short moments where we saw a faint outline of the lower parts of it. We had a great view of Shizuoka though, and a great view of the Ocean, so not all hope was lost :).
After just wandering around for a while longer, we headed back to Shizuoka Station (静岡駅) (btw, if any of you ever go to Japan... for no matter how long, a VERY useful kanji to know is 'station': 駅。 おぼえて (Remember it) :) ). We went to somewhere in the station... oddly enough I don't remember where... ah! Wait, we went to a bagel cafe! Very good teriyaki chicken on a blueberry bagel there...
After that, we decided there was nothing left to do as it was too late, so we headed to our hotel. It was POURING. Luckily, I happen to have a wonderful jacket that is water proof :) Just my feet got wet. We arrived at our hotel and slept until 9 the next morning.
We got up, had a small breakfast, left, and found another cafe to have more breakfast in. We also read the 'what to do in shizuoka' booklet we got while there. We ended up wanting to go to a park that used to be the site of an ancient castle that has since been destroyed. The park is still there though.
The park was nice, and the day was WONDERFUL. The weather was great, 18 degrees or more I would guess. Perfectly clear, and sunny. After the park we headed off to a buddhist temple. The temple was not the reason for going there though. The temple is built at the base of a mountain. (this is still in the middle of Shizuoka City). However, there are paths heading up the mountain that lead to a shrine eventually. There is a wonderful view of Shizuoka and the surrounding area there. I got many pictures, that can be viewed here .
Sadly, there were clouds starting to come in from the north, that hid Mt. Fuji for my pictures... Luckily, at least I was able to see Mt. Fuji a few times that day.
We decided to take an experimental way down the mountain down a side trail off the back of the mountain. It took quite some time to get back to the station.... (2 or so hours) hehe. Oh well, 'twas a nice walk. We grabbed a couple of bento boxes and hit the Shinkansen back for Tokyo once again.
Christmas has also come and gone now for me. I spent the day in Tokyo, mostly looking for new headphones and a case for my new ipod nano video (green) that I got from my parents ;). I did find some stuff, and got it. Had dinner with Asako at a realllly neat restaurant (looked very ancient-like), and went home. Not too much happened other than that :P I did go to Asako's parents place on the 24th and had a very nice evening there though. I FINALLY got pictures of them there... but not on my camera, so I'm just waiting for them to send me the pictures, and they will be here :).
I've also added two extra pictures to the Chiba album:
A christmas one
A funny one
Merry Christmas all :)
We went by Shinkansen (the bullet train). Let me tell you... the trip took 1 hour and 30 minutes... with several stops.... so about 1 hour of travel time... 180 kilometers an hour.
It was pretty neat :) It takes longer to get from Chiba to Tokyo on a regular train....
Anyways, Shizuoka is just south west of world famous Mt. Fuji! Therefore, the train runs right beside Mt. Fuji. Mt. Fuji is 3770 meters high. It's interesting because the city beside Mt. Fuji, Shin-Fuji, is at sea level. So yes, there are NO mountains or even hills in front of a 3770 meter high mountain and the ocean, which makes Mt. Fuji look HUGE. HOWEVER! As I seem to not have any sort of luck with seeing Mt. Fuji (still haven't seen it from Tokyo... which apparently is rare), it was raining when traveling to Shizuoka. So I did not see anything except a VERY faint outline of it's bottom third.
When we arrived in Shizuoka, we were greeted by cloudy weather, luckily not rain... We headed off to a place called 日本平 (Japan Flat). It's a little mountain in the middle of Shizuoka City that was supposed to have a wonderful view of Mt. Fuji, and in summer, have many pretty plants, flowers, tea farms, mandarin orange farms, rose flowers, and more. Of course, it was very cloudy, 6 degrees with a brutal wind from the ocean that made it seem pretty close to freezing or colder. So we couldn't see Mt. Fuji... cept a few short moments where we saw a faint outline of the lower parts of it. We had a great view of Shizuoka though, and a great view of the Ocean, so not all hope was lost :).
After just wandering around for a while longer, we headed back to Shizuoka Station (静岡駅) (btw, if any of you ever go to Japan... for no matter how long, a VERY useful kanji to know is 'station': 駅。 おぼえて (Remember it) :) ). We went to somewhere in the station... oddly enough I don't remember where... ah! Wait, we went to a bagel cafe! Very good teriyaki chicken on a blueberry bagel there...
After that, we decided there was nothing left to do as it was too late, so we headed to our hotel. It was POURING. Luckily, I happen to have a wonderful jacket that is water proof :) Just my feet got wet. We arrived at our hotel and slept until 9 the next morning.
We got up, had a small breakfast, left, and found another cafe to have more breakfast in. We also read the 'what to do in shizuoka' booklet we got while there. We ended up wanting to go to a park that used to be the site of an ancient castle that has since been destroyed. The park is still there though.
The park was nice, and the day was WONDERFUL. The weather was great, 18 degrees or more I would guess. Perfectly clear, and sunny. After the park we headed off to a buddhist temple. The temple was not the reason for going there though. The temple is built at the base of a mountain. (this is still in the middle of Shizuoka City). However, there are paths heading up the mountain that lead to a shrine eventually. There is a wonderful view of Shizuoka and the surrounding area there. I got many pictures, that can be viewed here .
Sadly, there were clouds starting to come in from the north, that hid Mt. Fuji for my pictures... Luckily, at least I was able to see Mt. Fuji a few times that day.
We decided to take an experimental way down the mountain down a side trail off the back of the mountain. It took quite some time to get back to the station.... (2 or so hours) hehe. Oh well, 'twas a nice walk. We grabbed a couple of bento boxes and hit the Shinkansen back for Tokyo once again.
Christmas has also come and gone now for me. I spent the day in Tokyo, mostly looking for new headphones and a case for my new ipod nano video (green) that I got from my parents ;). I did find some stuff, and got it. Had dinner with Asako at a realllly neat restaurant (looked very ancient-like), and went home. Not too much happened other than that :P I did go to Asako's parents place on the 24th and had a very nice evening there though. I FINALLY got pictures of them there... but not on my camera, so I'm just waiting for them to send me the pictures, and they will be here :).
I've also added two extra pictures to the Chiba album:
A christmas one
A funny one
Merry Christmas all :)
2007/12/22
MC!!!
Thats right! I'm back and MCed!
MCed?
Moved and Cell Phoned!
That's right! I've moved finally in to an apartment. It's a small one (like all places in Japan), but quite perfect for just me. I actually moved here Monday... (5 days ago), but didn't get internet to blog about anything until today.
Also!
I got my cell phone! It's very neat... like all phones here... It can play TV for free, play music, but of course in order to use the music feature you need windows... go figure, not even MacOSX support, how stupid. Oh well, it could only play wma files... which is stupid too, not even mp3.... *sigh * oh well. It can surf the web, use email, all that jazz, has a gagillion other features...
here, the feature page for it. http://www.nttdocomo.co.jp/english/product/foma/904i/f904i/
Tomorrow I'm going to Shizuoka by Shinkansen (bullet train), which means I'll be going about 280 kilometers an hour :D I'll also be passing by Mt. Fuji on the way there! So I'll grab many pics if the weather is good...
I'll make a more detailed post on that afterwords... I'll also upload pictures of my place and Shizuoka when I get back... Right now it's 12:36 AM and I should sleep as I have an early start tomorrow.
MCed?
Moved and Cell Phoned!
That's right! I've moved finally in to an apartment. It's a small one (like all places in Japan), but quite perfect for just me. I actually moved here Monday... (5 days ago), but didn't get internet to blog about anything until today.
Also!
I got my cell phone! It's very neat... like all phones here... It can play TV for free, play music, but of course in order to use the music feature you need windows... go figure, not even MacOSX support, how stupid. Oh well, it could only play wma files... which is stupid too, not even mp3.... *sigh * oh well. It can surf the web, use email, all that jazz, has a gagillion other features...
here, the feature page for it. http://www.nttdocomo.co.jp/english/product/foma/904i/f904i/
Tomorrow I'm going to Shizuoka by Shinkansen (bullet train), which means I'll be going about 280 kilometers an hour :D I'll also be passing by Mt. Fuji on the way there! So I'll grab many pics if the weather is good...
I'll make a more detailed post on that afterwords... I'll also upload pictures of my place and Shizuoka when I get back... Right now it's 12:36 AM and I should sleep as I have an early start tomorrow.
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