Harvest Time!

This weekend I was lucky enough to harvest some rice at Tsurubara Farm in Oonomachi, when I saw lucky I mean, I got to work in my free time! However I had a good time, stop reading if you’re not interested in how the harvest process works. Here is how we did it.
We started of by gathering the courage to start, I think this is a very important part of the harvest process and is not to be underestimated. After gathering enough courage and taking pictures of the rice field we started off. You got the rice with a sickle, one that looks like the one on the soviet flag. You don’t really cut the rice as much as you slice it off. Which I guess is the same thing, as soon as you get the hang of you’ll be going through the rice field pretty quick. Don’t be fooled though, it isn’t light work at all, it was really quite hot that day and working in the sun really tires you out.
After cutting about half the field, it was time for a very nice barbecue, with fresh vegetables practically straight off the field (no rice, we left that in the field). After the barbecue we went back to the field and gathered some bamboo, to make a structure to dry the rice. But before you can hang the rice to dry, you must first bind it together, which is just not a very fun thing to do… It takes forever and feels like your making no progress at all, when you see you ARE making progress and are nearly done, it’s just the greatest feeling. After we were done with the entire thing, we had a quick bite to eat and went off to an onsen. This Onsen is based on the same mountain as where I saw the monkeys the other day, but due to it being pitched black dark, I didn’t see any monkeys which didn’t ruin my night to be honest, because it was a nice onsen, kind off small but the company and atmosphere was good. Plus the onsen was extremely hot.
After melting in the onsen for an hour or so we headed off to find something to eat, and found out the place we were headed for was closed, so went for some Korean food, which I must say was really good and really spicy. But I like my food a bit spicy. So after being returned home by Tsurubarasan (つるぽん) It was a good day which I had good feeling about.
Thursday I have to do a survey on a bus, I hope I can make out what people are saying and manage to my job! Saturday I am moving house, to the city. Looking forward to watching all my shows again, living in the city and living closer to work so I don’t feel so damn tired every time I get home!

Music: Black Milk
Mood: Nervous

PS. No more pictures (by me) until I get proper editing software, so that will be Saturday!

Camera and a new place!

Oh man what a weekend! Nah I’m kidding, I did not do all that much this weekend, I did find an apartment, bought a camera and went to Yufuin! Let’s start with the most important! The camera, I went to a mall on Saturday to buy a camera, I had already done my research (with thanks to Eelco), I had been playing with the thought of buying a camera for awhile and decided now was the time, a good, relatively cheap camera became available.

I bought the Pentax K-X with a 18-55 lens, and a 55-300 Lens. Motives for buying the camera, were simple, it was the price, using it is relatively simple, it looks cool, is good a night photography and it comes with two lenses (other cameras just get you the body for the same price). This gives you an introduction of why I went to Yufuin.

(Next paragraph is full camera talk) I went to Yufu for the sole reason to play with my new camera, hehe. The place itself is not that special I think, it is a typical touristy Japanese town. It’s got a lot of character, but that’s spoiled by the amount of people in the town and the silly amount of stores selling the same stuff. But I came there to take pictures, and so I did. Took some nice ones I think, and a lot of blur! The effects I want to get out of my camera is going to take me some time a tripod and macro lens! I might buy a little tripod, but I am definitely not going to buy a macro lens at this moment. So I am going to settle for a Raynox 150, for doing some light macro work. I also went out tonight, after reading a lot about night photography, to shoot some pictures of the street in front of the house.

I think I managed to get a couple of nice ones out of it. Well that is for a first try, without Photoshop to work with. Oh yea Also found an apartment! It’s a nice place, LeoPalace in the middle of town, does not cost me as much as I thought, it’s got everything I need in it, fridge, washing machine, internet, futon, TV, microwave all I need is some chopsticks and an iron, and I’ll be set! I’ll get some pictures of the place up later. I will be moving house on the 23rd.

Listening to: Joell Ortiz

(edit: Added some pictures!)

Mikoshi!

This week was another fun one! I have picked up running again, because I was feeling the urge to run. I ran in the area around my host family’s house. Encountered this super nice river amongst the rice fields, I will have a pictures next week I think.  Or not it is really up to me whether or not I take my camera with me.
All right! Back to the fun and interesting stuff! Well to me at least. Friday I went to a sand onsen called Hyotan in Beppu, this was my first time, and I must say it felt very good. You basically do like you do on the beach, get buried in the sand; however this sand is very hot. The heat comes from everywhere, and I am not quite sure how it works but I guess there is hot water underneath the sand, heating up all the sand, it kind of feels like a walk on the beach when it is really hot and your feet hurt when you walk on the sand. Kind of felt like that, after hiding in the sand for a while, you enter the bathing area, which was pretty good in this onsen, a big waterfall like bath, an outside bath and clean inside bath.

The fun stuff continued the next Saturday, I went to a festival introduced to me as a Yamamatsuri in Nakatsuka, and this was one of the best festivals I have been to yet. It all took place in the small town of Nakatsuka, after arriving a little bit late we were immediately welcomed with the enthusiasm that I am starting to get used to here in the south. Everybody is extremely friendly, and I think foreigners are not that plenty down here everybody wants to talk to you. The usual questions come up, “do you like beer?” “Where are you from?” “What beer is from Holland”, man talk! So after drinking a beer, it was time to carry the mikoshi. This was quite fun, since I am not really prepared to carry a real mikoshi I got to help carry the Kids Mikoshi, don’t think that means it would be light. Thing is still damn heavy, it is just the real Mikoshi, are even heavier. It was a fun night, during which one kid asked me whether or not I was Japanese, I of course said Yes and somehow she did not believe me, hehe. But since I had to go see the boss the next day, at around 11 it was time for me to go home and sleep, which was kind of a shame because the people I had met that night were all super friendly and I would have loved to drunk some more with the people there.

The next day was another busy one, leaving at 10 o’clock to go see my Sacho(boss) speak at a fair for Ryugakusei(International students). The speeches themselves were really hard for me to follow but I managed to get most of the story and it was quite interesting. Sacho talked about how hiring exchange students in the past helped him out in the past, and how it is still helping him out, because one of them is running their sister firm in China, and the other one is my internship supervisor! Quite interesting, however this event was not for me, but more for people with a better grasp of the Japanese language. There were a lot Chinese and Korean people in the audience and only a few westerners.

After listening to the speeches at the fair, Umeki San, Tsuru san and Yamaguchi san and me went to see the monkeys on Mt. Takasaki.

Man this was awesome, it was not quite as wild as I had imagined, but there definitely monkeys there, and I could have taken one to Riverside if I had wanted too. They were really cute too, lots of tiny monkeys, playing in the puddles.

After seeing the monkeys, we went to the Umi tamago, man that was a lot more fun than I thought it was going to be. I guess it has been a while since I last visited the Dolfinarium (I think the last time was when I was about 10 years old?). But it was a good time, I keep getting surprised by the sheer size of animals, for examples sea lions are just these huge creatures, really cute but at the same time they are a bit scary because of their size. I played some catch with dolphins, this was definitely a highlight for me. The dolphins would toss me the ball and I would toss it back, I guess that is a simple explanation of catch, but the fact that it was with dolphins made it super cool.

The big aquarium was filled with fish from seas from all over the world. They really thought about the presentation of the aquarium and you can view it through a giant glass wall, which even extends a little bit into the floor. There were a lot of beautiful fish, and I kept laughing as my co workers asked which fish were good to eat!

So after watching fish all day, everybody felt like eating sashimi for some reason. We went to my new favourite restaurant and ate until we could not eat anymore.

So this was another weekend full of activities, contemplating whether or not I should take a break next weekend, or just keep on trucking. There is still a lot of things I want to see and do here in Kyushu, anyway I’ll keep on posting over here!

My work

When I first arrived at Chiikikagaku, I was drenched in sweat, I carried my suitcase from the station to the company, which is not that far but it was still very hot. Maybe not the best first impression, but as soon as people saw my suitcase, everybody understood what went down. I was introduced to some people in the company and was told to come back on Monday, 8.30 sharp.

 On the follow Monday I was introduced in the traditional Japanese way by giving a small speech about my self, my hobbies, my hometown and until when I will be staying with the company. And afterwards it was time for my introduction interview. This was conducted entirely in Japanese; I somehow managed to understand everything and realized what I am going to be doing here. I will be basically be doing whatever they tell me to do. Haha. This means the day to day business of the company, I will be shown around and work in most of the departments helping in which ever way I can with my limited Japanese but fluent English.
My goals during my stay here are simple but very hard. I want to improve my Japanese reading and speaking ability, as well as understand more about the Japanese way of running a company which I believe is very interesting. I am very glad that I went the usual route of going to a Japanese University first and then to the internship, because even though my Japanese is limited now, it feels like it is a million times better than it was in February. I am able to answer and ask my co-workers a lot of questions in Japanese, this hopefully will enable me to fit in the company really smoothly.
The people in the company are all very nice and for some reason very interested in Holland, so it is easy to talk to them about Dutch or European things. Plus it seems that a lot of people here have not been to Tokyo or want to reminisce about Tokyo, so I can talk about that too. But besides that I think am willing to try and do a lot of things, for example I want to climb a mountain whilst I am here! There are some hiking enthusiasts at the company so that is a bonding factor. Other than I am pretty much down for what ever, I love drinking and playing soccer so I plan to do those things here too! Even though I try to adapt myself to the Japanese culture I will also try to be myself, I am able to function in  Japanese society, but am still so very Dutch. I think being Dutch is a quality when you use it with good measurement.

Current mood: Excited and Coffee is keeping me awake for the ride

Week Report!

Last weekend I spend with Monorichi, and her family. Her home is in the middle of the Beppu Mountains, with an in-house onsen. We went to a shrine called Futagoji. This is a Buddhist shrine in the middle of the forest and mountains.

So I think that is a day off well spent, however it is not over, that day it was Respect Elders Day, basically it is the Japanese people visiting their grandparents and parents. It was a good time, eating some Sushi and Udon. But feeling kind of like an intruder, even though everybody was as nice as I could expect anyone to be, I was hindered by the fact that they love baseball and I have no feeling towards that sport whatsoever. I still had a good day though.

This Saturday I set out to grape picking with people from work. I thought that was what were going to do that day, get in some overalls and pick grapes. But we also visited a farm called Ooga Farm, I am not sure whether that was just the name or a Japanese way of saying Organic farm. But never mind that it was a beautiful garden with access to a beautiful natural beach. It also had a lovely greenhouse, filled roses and herbs, the smell reminded me of my granddad, not that he smelled of greenhouse (well sometimes he did…), but he had one in his garden too.

The lunch we had this place was just out of this world, I had the chicken, which was delicious, it came with a minestrone soup, a nice salad and bread! It had been a long time since I ate some fresh brown bread. And the bread combined with delicious olive oil was just drool ~

After this feast we set of to find a grape picking farm, because the one we wanted to go apparently was closed today. We were lucky enough to find another one in the area, the owner of the farm told us the story how he went from being a salary man to being a grape farmer. It was quite an impressive story about him moving out of the city driving around the mountains to find a suitable place for his farm, building everything from scrap with his bare hands. For a second I thought, hey this might be something for me, but then I realized I liked comfort and a conbini within a half hours drive.

 I did not really have a clue what it was going to be about. But it came down to cutting down a pre bagged, bag of grapes hehe. It was still a good time though. I got to know my co workers a little bit better. After the grape pickings we went to a nice onsen in Beppu, called Shibaseki Onsen. That water is hot damn, but it feels so good. The water in the onsen was a lot whiter than I had seen before, afterwards my skin felt like a babies behind.

From the onsen on went to eat some Curry also in Beppu. I had the Thai Curry which was just delicious and spicy, kind off reminded me of the curries Eelco made in Rotterdam. The vibe of the shop was a good one, the interior really hit it home for me. I like these family restaurants, the woman working the front of the store whilst the man is cooking in the kitchen.

Today was another fun day! I went to the zoo! And this zoo was cooler than all the ones I have been to before in my life! You ride around in a bus, with a some food on a tray and you are actually allowed to feed the animals! It is called African Safari in Beppu it is really a good place to visit if you are in the Beppu area. It is amazing how close the animals get you. This is the closest I have ever been to a Lion, I doubt I will ever get much closer than this. To be quite fair, I do not want get much closer than this. Other than that I was made to play with some tiny dogs, they were cute, but I was wearing my Sunday clothes and these hairs man, they are just messy haha. Still since I was this oasis of peace amongst loud kids, the dogs liked me and all wanted to sit on my lap…

Oh and I also did some work, starting next week I will be doing presentations on the Netherlands in Japanese. I must say I am quite excited and hesitant, because I feel my Japanese is getting worse after school, but I will ganbarimasu it!

I also got to do something different from translating, reading a marketing report in Japanese. This basically meant putting everything in Google Translate (My new best friend) and reading the English that comes out of that. Still an interesting assignment and I hope my findings help the people involved.

Mood: Tired, but kinda relaxed

Music: Tim Roscoe DJ Set 21-07-2010

PS. Kangaroos are really big from up close!

Work

I started my internship this week! I must say I enjoy it more than my last internship, even though it has only been one week. I learn so much here, about Japanese language and culture. The company, with the longest name for a company ever (Chiikikagaku Kenkyuujo), basically helps local governments reactivates their community with the help of new software and training for the staff of these governments, but they also do promotion for these areas, creating a big archive for all the tourist and interesting spots in the local areas, that you usually would not visit so easily because there is no info available. This is where I come in at the moment; I translate the Japanese into English and do research in Japanese about cities and their areas, which I then also translate into English.

The people at the work are all really passionate about their work; they have that typical Japanese mentality of coming to work early and going home late. They make me feel bad for going home at the time I was assigned to come home at hehe…. I should not feel bad I know but I still feel for the people working late, it is real contagious though, everybody is working hard, so I work hard too, or at least try my hardest.

Yesterday we went drinking with everybody from the office, to say goodbye to one of the employees and say hi to the new intern! It was really nice seeing everybody in a different environment than the workplace. And one stereotype about Japanese people is just true; they can not drink at all! Had a good time, just adjusting to the work rhythm and speaking Japanese all day, makes me tire so easily.

As for the home situation at the moment, I feel quite happy staying here for another couple more weeks, but after that I really want to have my own place. The host family is really nice. I just want a place for myself, closer to the city and to my company. Because the commute takes about 40 minutes by bus now, which is just a pain.

I also did some fun stuff! Climbed a few mountains, by car that is! Mountains are amazing, seriously. View is amazing.

Wall of text incoming

It’s been a long time since I wrote a proper post, but here goes. Click on more!

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Kyoto #2 – photos!

I visited Kyoto with my dad a few weeks, I stole his camera and took these pictures, the complete Kyoto view on his website

Update

So I promised to blog a little bit more! That was a big fat lie but I am going to try to keep up a little bit more. I am planning a bigger update soon but this one will have to do for now.

I am fun over here, living a lot more healthy then I was a couple of weeks ago, cooking my own food and using vegetables and stuff haha. Been doing a lot of working out and playing football. For some reason I have not been sleeping well at all in Japan. No matter how tired I am I always wake up at 5 o’clock in the morning which is just awful. I do manage to go back to sleep but it just messes with me.

Anyway this is it for now. Expect a bigger post soon.

Current mood: Tired but feeling good
Music : Reflection Eternal ofcourse…

Kamakura

I wrote this for one of my classes, thought it would fit on here as well!

We visited Kamakura on a nice Sunday. This is an area near Tokyo where they have accumulated a big number of shrines. The day started out with us all gathering at Machida station.

On arriving at kamakura we were greeted by our guides for the day. They were very friendly and properly guided us through the entire day. The first thing we witnessed was what seemed a simple road. But the road was build by the shogun to pray for the safe delivery of his first son. The road is special because it is very wide at the end and small at the beginning. This makes it possible to see down the entire road without much trouble.

At the beginning of the road, here is a huge Shinto temple. At this temple we purified ourselves and saw a 1000 year old tree that unfortunately fell over about a month before we got there. Still the temple itself was impressive especially the approach. It sits up top of a hill which makes it look even bigger than it is.

After seeing this nice temple we went to see 大仏(DaiButsu, Big Buddha), which really is big. This really impressed me especially after realizing that there used to be a temple surrounding him which got destroyed in a tsunami. We got to enter him and see how they constructed this big Buddha. With the help of a wooden frame they were able to make this big bronze Buddha in the 13th century.

After that we went on to see the Hase Dera, which is a very nice looking temple.  With a nice cave with a lot Buddhist gods which all stood for things like doing well in love and financial fortune.

Random Observation; In Japan it is either dry, or it rains all day