Pneumonia

Hey guys!

Today I went on an adventure. I walked all the way from my apartment to the grocery store, bought groceries, then returned home. Sadly, this is the biggest outing I've had in the past 5 days. As I think many of you have heard by now, I'm not feeling so great lately. What started as a nasty cough a month ago has seemingly evolved into pneumonia. Oy. Anyhoo, I'm working hard at getting better, drinking lots of water and laying in bed. I've been well looked after by my friends here, particularly Greg, whose limitless patience and kindness should put him in line for a sainthood. I've also really appreciated the emails from everyone at home, they certainly put a smile on my face. I'm off to the doc's again tomorrow and hoping for good news. I would love to be back at work, and my regularly-scheduled life, next week.

Janessa did Japan

Ohayo gozaimasu!

Strangely enough, I am indeed blogging in the morning, a time of day I rarely see here. I have to be up this early (9 am!) because I must help Janessa pack up and take her to the airport. Sigh, our two-week reunion is drawing to a close, and while a rather substantial part of me would love to jump on the plane with her and see all the people and places I miss back home, having had Janessa here allowed me to catch up on much of the news I'd missed since being in Tokyo and gave my a lovely slice of familiarity to hold on to for the remainder of my stint in Japan.

Like the first week of Nez's trip here, the past week was full of fun and adventure (and-oops- one major disappointment). I have Nez here riding shotgun with me again, so I'll let her begin by telling you about her day in Sengawa.

Hello! To catch you up, Sengawa is the name of the part of Tokyo where Jen works. She had a short day so I rode into work with her and met her fellow Nova teachers (a nice bunch, our Jenny is the only girl!). After exploring around Sengawa a bit and sitting in the local Starbucks listening to Jen's iPod (how I will miss that thing again when I leave!) I went back to Nova. Since Jen had another hour of work left I figured I would be sitting by myself reading but fortunately no one in that branch was working particularly hard that day. I had Jen as well as her workmates Kee and John to entertain me. After the 'work' was done for the day, we headed out for a Sengawa branch party. After some curry, it was off to sing some karaoke! It was a definite hi-lite of my trip, some of the guys really got into it, and the Japanese staff were very cute singing their favourite J-Pop tunes. Jen insists that I didn't really sing but she's so lying! I gave it my all during the group numbers and she and I even teamed up for what can only be described as a haunting rendition of 'Desperado'.

The next afternoon Jen was working again but Greg wasn't so he took me to Asakasa to find a shrine. We never did. I think Greg's navigatory skills were off that day. We did find a Starbucks and after some rather comical ordering woes, we got to just sit around and drink coffee while dishing our respective dirt on Jen. Then we came home and made Jenny a lovely dinner of stir-fry and gyoza (A favourite of mine here).

Saturday was a wash. For real.... it rained all day and Jenny had to work so I scrapped my plans to go looking around parks and watched Tommy Boy instead. Jen's roommate Alyce returned from her vacation to Thailand and Cambodia to find a strange girl (me) sitting on her couch surfing you-tube. Anyway, Alyce is a winner and had some great stories and pictures from her travels. I made Jenny and Alyce some dinner and we watched 'Lost in Translation' which Jen made all the more entertaining by blurting out 'I know where that is' about every 5 minutes.

The best part of my trip was visiting Chris and Amanda in Chichibu. After spending the better part of 2 weeks in Tokyo it was refreshing to see forests and mountains and water. The train ride out to Chichibu is full of breath-taking views and I honestly would never have believed that so many trees could co-exist in a country with so many people. I really didn't get to properly catch up with Mands and Chris when they were home for Christmas so it was great to spend time with them in their element and see how much they really do love it here. We ate okinomiyaki, played some Trivial Pursuit (80's edition), and explored some of Chichibu's top attractions. Oh! We saw monkeys! For real monkeys! Jen and I saw one right beside a 'monkey crossing' sign on the way up some mountain and Amanda was all bummed out that she didn't see him (apparently she has seen no monkeys in her time here). So on the way back down we looked in the same spot and there was a family of monkeys (or at least a group... I suppose they could have just been friends). We stopped the car on a somewhat blind corner of the twisty mountain road and I jumped out to take pictures (Jen thought I would for sure by hit by a car... how would she explain that one to Sue? Run down while photographing monkeys). And then it was back onto the train to Tokyo... I'll let Jenny explain to you Tuesday's plans as well as its reality.

Since yesterday was Janessa's final full day in Japan, we wanted to give her a taste of authentic Japanese culture. Of course, nothing in Japan is more culturally stimulating than Sumo. Fortunately for us, the January grand sumo tournament had just gotten underway. Sumo tournaments are run round-robin style by division. On each of the tournament's 16 days, each wrestler has one fight against another wrestler in his division. The lower level sumos square off first; the highest level wrestlers don't begin fighting until late afternoon. With this in mind, I decided that we could hold off on getting to the stadium until later in the day.

We started our day by heading out to Odaiba, a new-ish land-reclamation development in Tokyo Bay. Its buildings are oddly-shaped and futuristic, their concrete and glass still bright and shiny, but foreshadowing their looming datedness. Odaiba will look like crap in 20 years. However, yesterday, with its bright blue sky and sunshine, was the perfect day for getting a great view of the whole thing by riding the Tokyo Giant Sky Wheel, a ferris wheel that was the tallest in the world until the London Eye openned. Nez has a bit of a fear of heights, but with encouragement she managed to climb that rainbow and get through the ride without any form of panic attack. After the ferris wheel, we headed to another of Odaiba's more famous attractions, Venus Fort, a shopping mall "designed for women" (because most malls are designed for men?). Upon entering Venus Fort, one is meant to feel as though they have been taken away to the streets of an Italian village. There are renaissance statues and fountains aplenty. However, the mall's most striking feature is its ceiling, accross which the "sun" sets and rises every 2 hours, giving the feel of perpetual twilight.

After buying candy at the creepy mall, it was time to cross the city to Ryogoku, where we would be just in time to catch the major sumo action. But when we approached the ticket gate, we made a terrible discovery. All of the unreserved (read: cheap) seats had already been sold out. This being only the 3rd day of the tournament, and a regular working day, I'd not figured on that happenning. Alas, at the very end of Nez's stay, my tour guide credentials were shattered. We did still manage to see a few of the earlier fighters hanging outside of the stadium but that was about it. Although disappointed, we salvaged our evening with a quick trip to Shibuya for some people watching and then headed back to Bubai for our last night of sisterly bonding until the summer.

Twins attack Tokyo! Run for your lives!!!

Hello all,

Today I have a very special guest blogging with me. It's my sister Janessa! She's here visiting me for a couple of weeks in between her midwifery placements. First I'll catch you up on my last, gulp, few weeks, then I'll let Nez tell you what we've been doing since she invaded Tokyo (not unlike Godzilla).

Although Christmas in Japan is enough to make anyone into a humbug, I have to say that it didn't actually suck as much as I'd anticipated. I still managed to open presents on Christmas morning and have a Christmas dinner (albeit spaghetti) with the people that I'm closest to in Tokyo. I also got to go to church for the first time in months! St. Alban's is a lovely Anglican church right in the heart of Tokyo that used a liturgy very similar to the one I'm used to from my chapel days in Halifax, so I felt right at home. We arrived at the church early, prepared for big Christmas Eve crowds. As we approached, we noticed literally thousands of people lining the streets surrounding the church. This seemed slightly odd for non-Christian Japan. The myriads, however, were not there for baby Jesus. They were there to stare slack-jawed at one of Tokyo's gaudiest tourist attractions, Tokyo Tower. Tokyo Tower is a near-perfect replica of the Eifel Tower, although ten feet taller (and, therefore, better). Christmas Eve being the traditional couples' night in Japan (think Valentine's Day), the Tower lights up with little pink hearts and blares j-pop romance ballads. This is apparantly enough to keep the Japanese entranced for hours. Anyhoo, the service was lovely, we sang all the traditional carols, the Christ candle was lit, and I was happily reminded that, even in Tokyo, there's more to Christmas than rampant commercialism.

My greatest Christmas present arrived on December 28th. After an extremely pleasant 13 hour flight, Janessa arrived ready to greet Tokyo with a smile. I'll pass Lappy over to her and let her tell you about her initial impressions of Japan.

Wow... yes, hello to all you fellow fans of Jen out there. I am very fortunate to be doing what I'm sure all of you wish you could, that of course being visiting Jen in Japan. So yes, 13 hours is definitely longer than God ever intended anyone to fly. It's why birds get tired and take rests. When I first got to the airport Jen and I ate dinner at the McDonalds which I suppose was not a very authentically Japanese thing to do but I did have a Chicken McGrill with some sort of dill sauce on it so that's got to count for some roaming outside of my comfort zones. The first full day in Japan Jen and I met up with Greg for a trip to the fish market. That was fun, I don't remember much about the market itself, it was crowded. We ate ramen which was very good. My first attempt with the chopsticks was not so successful but I'm improving.

Day 2 was a lazy Saturday. Jen was a very poor hostess and only managed to show me the Starbucks in Fuchu. Actually our poor Jenny is feeling a bit under the weather so it was good for her to rest. Sunday was a very good day. Jen and I went to the aforementioned St Alban's and I agree, it is a simply lovely little church dwelling. Very cool to encounter other friends o' Jesus in new places. Then Jen and Greg and I had lunch and went to Harajuku and the Meji shrine. I'll show you all pictures (well, the ones of you that I know). I like Harajuku, it's full of so many crazy people and things but sometimes crazy is the best kind.

Sunday night was New Year's Eve. I'm told that it was a great night in Fuchu.... a real festival, a true community event. I wouldn't actually know. I slept through midnight as the jetlag finally caught up to me. Jen and Greg seemed to have a great time (this is what their pictures suggest to me) and New Year's day was loads of fun in Fuchu. I'll turn things back over to Jen for her play-by-play.

Yes, Janessa did bail on us for the countdown to midnight and she missed a pretty darn good show. While I've made my firey contempt of Japanese Christmas quite known, I have to hand it to them, they certainly know how to ring in the New Year. New Year is actually the big winter holiday here in Japan. Offices close, Nova teachers get a week off, and families gather from accross the country to make prayers at their local shrines for health and happiness in the year to come. New Year's Eve we headed for the shrine in Fuchu, which is considerably big and usually a place of respite from the bustle of suburban life. However, that night the place was bumpin'. The long walkway that stretches from the Torii Gate to the main hall of the shrine was packed with stalls selling everything from traditional food like octopus balls to your more western carnival fare (I enjoyed some delicious Hello Kitty cotton candy). There was a banana stand, people hawking Disney merchandise, Nintendo Wiis, and small carved boars (2007 is the year of the boar in the Chinese Zodiac). As midnight approached, thousands of city residents lined up to enter the shrine and pray. There was no audible countdown, no ball dropping, everyone just stood looking at their cell phone screens waiting for 12:00 to strike. When it did, firecrackers went off, a few people cheered, and Greg and I headed out on the road back to Bubai, where an old man passed us on his bicycle and shouted "Happy New Year!".

Twin A again. Jenny and I spent Monday at the shrine and then walked around the Imperial palace grouds and tried to spot the emperor. We took pictures of loads of random Japanese guys so one of them is bound to be him. Tuesday we headed out of the city and went to Kamakura. There we saw Daibutsu, the Great Buddha statue. For any of you who think that Jen and I get along waaaayyy too well, you must spend some time travelling with us. Somehow we kept walking and walking and big Buddha remained 1.3 km away. I can't blame my dear sister, she's probably a better navigator than I, but things got a little testy as she got us lost. So eventually we found him, quite the sight to see. Today Jenny took me to the zoo and the science museum. Many of you appreciate what a dork I am and how exciting these middle school field trip type outings are to me. That's a quick rundown of the first half of my trip. Back to Jen to sign off.

So that's a bit of an update on us. As of tomorrow I'm back to work, but Nez will still be here for another week, so we'll see if we can get up to anything else interesting. So far there are plans to sing Karaoke, watch Sumo, and visit Chichibu in the works, we'll let you know how those turn out!