Sho mo nai!

Where have I Been?

Has it seriously been nearly two weeks since I posted anything on here? Madness.
I did feel better on that Monday the sixteenth, but it wasn't until the Wednesday that my appetite was back to normal.
Then Thursday and Friday were the midyear seminar for ALTs, which as per normal fell on "Daikan" or Big Cold, the day that is often the coldest of the year. So naturally it snowed again, but not as much as it did as last year's seminar, nor as much as it did before Christmas.

The first day was rough, and I felt like I had been beaten up afterwards, killed from boredom and bad attitude.
But then I went out with a bunch of people afterwards for Italian food at this place that plays "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" every time anybody comes in the front door. Then back to Kamikatsu for my Eikaiwa class, which was nice and chill, and so I ended my day on a high.
The friday was better, I felt like I came away with some encouraging things and some stuff I can use both at Junior High and Elementary. I tried to get some people together to watch this movie Survive Style5+. but it didn't come together, so I joined the crew who were going to see Sayuri (aka Memoirs of a Geisha). At first I was kind of offended that all of the main roles were taken by Chinese girls, which was really strange. But then when my rage got to the point where I thought violently in my head, "What, were there no Japanese actresses who could have done the job?" I realised that probably the answer is no. Given that most of the movie was in English, and given how remarkably low the English fluency is here, at the very least, the pool of available Japanese actresses was probably really low. Add to that the fact that those Chinese actresses currently have a lot of celebrity in the West right now, you probably have your explanation. Watanabe Ken was in it as well, and though I have seen the occasional B movie on the shelves with his name and face, he was a practical unknown prior to The Last Samurai, as far as I can tell.

Saturday was change my tires and wipers and oil day, and watch Advent Children on one of the model in-car dvd+stereo systems at the place I had it done. Then was Burns night. More on that and Sunday later.
I was starting to feel sick then though, and now Wednesday I am feeling really under the weather again.

This short post is the most I could bring myself to do. I'll try to put up another tomorrow.

posted by Fletcher @ 11:07 p.m.