Arriving.

      Ohaiyou Gozaimasu! And welcome to the first blog entry from Japan! We have only been here a week and already there is so much to tell. Allow me to begin with Tokyo Orientation--nay, before that: the flight from LAX to Tokyo! We were lucky to fly Singapore Airlines; apparently this company is quite the talk of the town when it comes to international flights. Sure enough, when we hopped on the plane, we were greeted by Singaporean stewardesses in traditional garb offering us hot towels. There were amenities coming out of their amenities: TVs on every seat with new releases to enjoy for free, unlimited cocktails and wine, sirloin steak for dinner, Ben and Jerry’s ice cream for dessert...I mean this thing was PLUSH. The ten hour flight ended up being much more enjoyable than I could have imagined. Of course, by the time we landed in Tokyo, we were pretty wiped, and we had to wait around to get our luggage, go through immigration, go through customs, catch our 90-minute bus ride to the hotel, and check into our room. Long long day. Thankfully, there were JET volunteers every step of the way cheering us on, welcoming us to Japan, and directing us to where we needed to go.

We woke up the next morning at around 5:30AM, Tokyo time, feeling pretty rested. We couldn’t sleep anymore, seeing as it was 12:30PM Denver time. JET lag!!! (Get it?) We enjoyed the view from our room, then walked around Shinjuku a little (the district of Tokyo where our hotel was). We found ourselves in the middle of what we called the walking rush hour. Soooo many people walk to work here! It’s a sea of people in white dress shirts and black pants all going the same direction. Kind of cool. After we navigated our way through the crowd, we grabbed some breakfast at the hotel. That was a pretty funny experience. So a typical breakfast in Japan is rice and miso soup. But for the JETs they had prepared something quite different. I think they were trying to appeal to our Western palettes, because it was an assortment of french fries, miniature hot dogs, scrambled eggs (which were a strange consistency), steamed vegetables, fruit, and bread. Haha. 

After breakfast the orientation festivities began. Not much to say about that--it was a lot of hoity toity introductions, welcome ceremonies, papers, and talking. Lots and lots of talking. There were a few helpful workshops throughout those two days, but most of it was pretty...well, you know...orientation-y. 

We met lots of fellow JETs, of course (there were close to a thousand of us staying at the hotel!), and more specifically, JETs who will be working in our same prefecture. That was cool. We swapped some e-mails and such. Some of the JETs went out for karaoke or sushi on those two nights, but we ended up accidentally being the party poopers of the bunch. On Monday night we had plans to meet up with JCF (JET Christian Fellowship) for some downtown Tokyo fun, but we took a “catnap” at 4PM and didn’t wake up until 9...oops. The next night we were asleep by 8:30. Such sleepyheads! We did, however, get to enjoy some authentic conveyor belt sashimi on the second night. Some of them were really tasty, but we lost our appetites with the eel and raw salmon fillets. 

After all the Tokyo orientation madness wound down, we caught a flight to Ishikawa, our prefecture, on Wednesday morning. Another exhausting travel day. It was only an hour long flight to Kanazawa, but that wasn’t even the half of it. Our supervisors met us at the airport with adorable homemade signs and swept us away to take care of all kinds of official business. First we went to City Hall to register for our alien cards (I’M AN ALIEN!), then to the bank to get an account, then to the cell phone shop, then to our respective schools to meet our colleagues, then to our apartment to meet with our landlord and pay key money, then to the supermarket to stock up on groceries, THEN FINALLY home. The kicker was, we encountered a problem at virtually every one of these stops. As if being a gyjine in Japan trying to get a bank account and a cell phone isn’t complicated enough, the government just changed the alien registration system about two months ago, so everyone’s still lost trying to figure it out, AND my last name doesn’t match Daniel’s on my passport--it still shows my maiden name. So no one would believe we were married. Uff da. 

Good news is, we have both successfully acquired bank accounts, registration cards, and cell phones--woohoo! Unfortunately, we can’t make calls outside Japan, but hey, at least we’re in the loop here in Japan! 

After our looong day on Wednesday, we were instructed to show up to work at 8AM the next day for a full day’s work. Yikes! Omote-Sensei, my supervisor here, told me he would send a couple students to meet me at the apartment and walk me to school. How nice! Daniel and I crashed at 8:30 once again. 

I was escorted to Izumigaoka High School by two first-year students, Anna and...darned if I can remember her name. Matsui, maybe? Anyway, they were incredibly polite and also nervous to be practicing their English on a real live American. I gave them little omiyagae (Japanese “gift”) bags filled with Starburst candies, Celestial Seasonings tea bags, and an American flag pin. It seemed like a pretty silly gift if you ask me, but the girls were STOKED. They asked me a few questions about America, including some Lady Gaga inquiries, and I asked them a little about their school, their hobbies, and life in Japan. It was sweet. And their English is terrific! 

I spent that day and Friday settling into my office, meeting teachers, getting familiarized with the school, reading over my contract, fishing through papers, and best of all, socializing with the ESS students. ESS is the English Speaking Society--one of the most popular after-school clubs at Izumigaoka. The students are currently on summer vacation, but the ESS students still show up to school every day--all day--to practice for the big debate competition happening on August 19th. The winning team gets to go to Disneyland Tokyo, so the stakes are high.

These kids are really amazing. So polite, so welcoming, so hard-working and independent. They took me on a tour of the campus my first day, then threw me a wonderful welcome party with Japanese snacks, some hilarious games, introductions, and last but not least a speech…made by me...for which I was given about 30 seconds preparation time. It all turned out just swell though. I told them a little about America, my family, Daniel, and my travels so far, then I practiced a few of my painful Japanese expressions on them, and they loved it. Also, I told them I liked Ichiro, and they went nuts. 

I observed some of their debates and seriously, these kids are more articulate than I ever was in my college debate class, and I was speaking my native language. Ha! The topic was “Japanese universities should change their academic year to start in September” (currently it starts in April). They did phenomenally. Students approached David (my fellow ALT) and me and shyly asked us to correct their English, polish their arguments, and guide their pronunciation. Never have I met such eager, devoted, and intelligent high school students. Way to go, Japan! 

I brought in some pictures on Friday of the wedding, and I’ve never felt like more of a celebrity. The kids went crazy over them! They said the pictures looked like they came from a magazine. They were curious to know what kind of “red building” was in the background--funny, I guess they don’t have too many barns in Japan. David showed them postcards of his hometown in Ireland and they loved that too. (Oh, and yes Cassie, David’s got a great brogue). 

The teaching staff at Izumigaoka also seems pretty spectacular. Most of them speak at least some English, so I’m able to carry on conversations with them. They have taken such wonderful care of me since I got here--filling out paperwork for me since I can’t read anything, taking me to the cell phone shop and interpreting for me, bringing me home grown tomatoes--what a welcoming culture. There’s an expression here, “yoroshiku onegaishimasu,” which has come very in handy so far; it means “thank you in advance for taking care of me.” 

Daniel and I have been welcomed and cared for, indeed. Japan is such a humble, kind culture. It’s really quite different. Of course, we have run into a fair share of frustrations as well. The language barrier is a daily frustration (which is why we are beginning our private language courses ASAP!), and certain cultural practices just don’t make sense to us. We have pretty much been hungry since we got here, since everything is served in such tiny portions, and because eating everything with chopsticks proves a very tedious, hand cramp-inducing experience. I usually give up about midway through my bowl of noodles. Grocery shopping’s a hoot; we just take a guess at most things and see what we end up with. 

I can’t remember people’s names here for the life of me. It’s so embarrassing. “Remind me of your name again, Sensei?” “Asami.” “Ah, yes, Asami. Thank you….wait, what was it again?” “Asami.” “Oh, of course. Asami. Got it. 

….I’m so sorry. One more time, please?”

The good news is...I CAN TELL ALL MY STUDENTS APART! :) 

Haha. Anyway, thank you so much for reading this very long-winded blog. It honors us that y’all care enough to keep up with our adventures. We appreciate your prayers--right now I’m feeling pretty homesick despite all the wonderful adventures we’ve been having. So prayer for continued adaptation and settling in is much appreciated! If you’d like to get ahold of us, e-mail is the best option. Mine is jakenneston@gmail.com and Daniel’s is dkenneston@gmail.com. 

In case you get the urge to send us a pet kitty or anything else, here’s our address:

Kenneston

Grand Heights Yayoi #205

Yayoi 3-7-14

Kanazawa, Ishikawa, 921-8036

Japan

DISCLAIMER: You may want to send a postcard or letter to this address first, since we haven't gotten any international mail here yet, and we don't know if the post office will be able to figure it out.  Please, hold the flatscreen TVs and gold bars until we're sure we'll be able to get them.  Thanks!

I will have Daniel write the next blog so you can hear about his adventures. We miss you guys and hope all is well. Until next time, 

Sayonara, Adventurers!  And “arigato gozaimasu” for reading!