Here's me goofing around with straws while hanging with friends! (it's a strawberry margarita, or a ストロべり 一マルガリ一タ, for those of you wondering)

There’s a tradition in Japan called Omiyage - where you buy souvenirs for coworkers, or peers, or classmates whenever you go on a trip! (This is a really simplified version of Omiyage, if you want to know more, let me know!)

Anyway, these are (kinda) my first Omiyage! One of my students LOVES DINOSAURS. So, I teach him about dinosaurs as a way of teaching him vowel variation and familiarity with English letters. His mom took him to a dinosaur exhibition that took place here in Tokyo and he brought me back a souvenir! <3 <3 The egg is a metal tin and inside were cheesy rice crackers that we all shared! He also gave me that dinosaur notepad - amazing! 

I feel so happy just thinking about it!

An Edited Version of the E-mail I sent my family

So, last time I sent an e-mail I'd JUST become settled into my new apartment, I'd just started my blog (leslieinjapan.com), and [INCOMPETENT EX-MANAGER] had just been demoted. So, in order:

My apartment is great! I'm just waiting to buy the perfect couch for it, and after that I'll consider it fully furnished! I keep spending money on organizers (for papers, for dirty clothes, for clean clothes, for dishes, etc.) because buying them makes me feel like an adult. It's nice to get to try these new ways of keeping my life together and then discarding them when I find they don't work the way I want them to. 

In my apartment, I've been sleeping in the 'living room area' because that's where the cold air from the air conditioner hits, and I NEEDED THAT during the 30 degrees Celsius nights. Thankfully, the weather seems to be cooling down, and I can soon start sleeping in my loft again! I'm looking forward to it!

My blog is updating about once or twice a week - normally with pictures of things I find interesting, or snippets about my life! It's mostly for you guys and family, so that I can easily post banal stuff as much as I want, without annoying people on my Facebook. I'm probably gonna put this e-mail on the blog as it's own post, but I wanted to sent it directly to you all. [lol, I did.]

Finally, my ex-manager has been FIRED! Well, not fiiired, but he was "repeatedly asked to resign", until he finally "agreed to". "[ex-manager] will spend the final month of his contract at home, and we wish him the best of luck in securing his next job". There were a couple things that struck the final blow for [ex-manager]  - after everyone realized that he had no idea how to be a manager or run a school or really do anything well at all, he was demoted to a teacher. We put him in charge of teaching 'High School Exam Level English' and, considering he didn't even try to make a schedule for the classes to follow, those classes were consistently disorganized. He was then asked to teach a make up class for two of my students - two high energy brothers who even I struggle with. He was given a month to plan a lesson and use the system (that I regularly use with an hour's warning). After weeks of coaching from Current Manager, he showed no signs of improvement, but we went along with the class anyway and he did one of the few things that you should never do in a Japanese English school; he yelled at the kids in Japanese. Current Manager interrupted his class and then taught the rest of it. That itself wasn't enough to nail his coffin shut, soooooo we left [ex-manager] in charge of teaching the school's CEO's eldest daughter, and [ex-manager] did not last long after that.

I'm not saying that I'm happy that he doesn't have a job anymore, but the atmosphere at work is soooo much improved that I really can't say that I'm sad for him.

In recent news, I finally got a Japanese bank account! Annnnd, apparently I'm gonna have three cards from it - a Japanese credit card, a Japanese debit card, and a Japanese cash card. (I had to have a coworker explain what a cash card was, and I'm genuinely still confused why I can't just use my debit card to withdraw money from an ATM instead.) I'm still waiting to receive anything other than the debit card and my temporary cash card, but the interesting thing about mail here is that for any kind of personal card or mail, I have to be here to sign for it. They won't just drop the letter with my credit card into my mail box - they will ring the doorbell and require my signature. Considering the hours that I keep, and the fact that I'm awake and writing this at 1:30 am, maybe I'll never receive it. (This is a joke, I'll totally get it sooner than later.)

In total, things are going well! I'm having a great time over here now! [I miss all of the people who I liked in Canada, and none of the people I didn’t like!]

This kinda thing is BY FAR the most frustrating part of living in Japan. That TV screen is how I connect to the Internet. Obviously, something has gone wrong, but what is it? I can't fully translate all that Japanese with my phone app, but is it important enough to try and contact my manager about it? Is it something I can fix on my own, or do I have to call for help? Is it something that's quick to resolve or is it gonna be days of discussion with a representative from the Internet company and my manager? I don't like bothering people if I can avoid it, so I normally do basic tech checks, and in this case it was a disconnected wire - a very easy fix. But if it had been more complicated (and before a phone plan) I would have had to walk 10 min to the train station, called from the station payphone, hoped that English tech support was free, written all the instructions down on paper, walked back to my apartment, and prayed that those instructions were the right ones. If they did work, great! If they didn't, I'd go back to the station for another try and repeat as often as necessary. Not the most enjoyable way to spend a couple hours.

Studying Japanese is so haaaaarrrrdddd. These are two completely different sounds, written in Katakana. The only real difference between them is the way they're written, which you can only tell depending on the font type used. Studying them, reading them, trying to use them... It's all pretty frustrating.

These are the regular necessities of being sick in Japan, that I bought last week. Surgical masks, vitamin jelly, cold medicine... These kept me functioning, and were available for cheap from my local grocery store!

I finally got my classroom set up the way I want it! I handmade the letters and numbers (which was a great craft to keep me busy!) and there may be another poster arriving in a few days, so the layout may change... But I'm pretty happy with how it's all turned out. My next project is decorating the other two classrooms and the bathroom, just to give it all some life.

GODZILLA!!!!!!!!!!!!

For the past couple days I've had a really bad sinus cold - headache, stuffed up nose, clogged ears, the works. In Japan, it's polite to cover your face so you don't get other people sick, so surgical masks are super common. In a population as large and as closely packed as Japans, it makes a lot of sense to wear the masks - I had a guy accidentally sneeze on me on the train because there was no where else for him to turn, and the masks could have prevented that! The worst part of wearing the masks? The make my glasses fog up whenever I breathe out :(

Last week I had to wake up super early to go to the immigration department. There was a long transit involved. This is just a quick shot of Shinagawa station. You can see all the business men heading to work (and it's not even 8 am!), and the massive advertising that's always hanging out overhead! Anyway, all the immigration stuff seems to be all worked out, so I'm pretty happy with everything!

This is one of my favourite ice-cream bars! Great vanilla flavour with a slice of chocolate in the middle, covered in crunchy wafer! Your hands stay totally clean as you eat it!

A few days ago, I got to see this beautiful view of Tokyo at night! We were up on the eleventh floor of a community centre, if I remember right! An absolutely great time :)

The view from the company office building. This is what I mean when I talk about how compact Japan is, and how visually different it is from Canada. (Also, meet my coworker, Keegan!)

I FINALLY got my kitchen all together and exactly the way I like it! (I've only been here for, like, two whole months - what's the rush??) This is the first time I've ever had to gather living utensils and furniture from scratch, and I'm realizing I was a little naive about how rough (and expensive!) it'd be. A lot of my favourite supplies have been from craigslist, and from other people moving away - that's actually how I got all those spices! What a great deal! Having my kitchen organised makes my apartment feel one step closer to being a home!

Quick list of English things with weird names in Japan Air Condition = Aircon Convenience store = Konbini Iced coffee = Icedo co-he Chocolate Banana = choko banan The weirdest thing is how normal this all is to me, and I've only been here a few weeks

Here's me at senso-ji, which is a good place to pray (except there are so many tourists)

I went to a festival yesterday! Here's a glimpse~