Finally!

Well, we finally got our internet and its nice to talk to people after what seems like months. Training is going well, though very tiring. We have a hour and a half commute to our training school (one way) as well as demonstrations at least once a day that we need to prepare. Our apartment is pretty sweet and is about twice as big as I feared it was going to be. We have cooked a bit at home, but have also been going to a lot of ramen shops, udon shops and other neat restaurants (everything is delicious!). We also checked out a kaiten sushi restaurant in which sushi comes around on conveyor belts and you just grab whatever you want to try. The sushi comes on different plates, and each color costs a different price (usually between 100 and 500 yen). At the end, they count your plates and you pay.

We were able to check out a short taiko drumming presentation the other day on our way to work which was really neat. Though they were amateurs, they were extremely good. It appeared to be some competition that lasted all day, so we were kind of bummed that we had to go to training. We went to our first izakaya (the Japanese equivalent to a pub or a bar) on Thursday and that was also quite the experience. I was quite uncomfortable the entire time because the tables are made for short Japanese legs which I do not have (one of the waitresses commented "Oh, nagai ashi!," which means, "Long legs!," when she saw me trying to fit). Luckily they had some amazing chicken wings. Yokkaichi (where we are living) is pretty sweet too, though people are NOT used to gaijin (foreigners) at all. As they drive/walk/bike by they stare like we are doing something outrageous. Today when we were walking back from getting groceries two girls ran into Caitlyn on their bike because they were kind of staring at me. It was funny.

Now I am going to attempt to post some pictures of our apartment and things around Yokkaichi.

5 minutes later: Awesome I just deleted all of the pictures. Well, we should have some up soon.

Toodaloo,
Chad and Caitlyn