Lots of funny and interesting things have been happening recently, so let’s start with the highlights!

• I went to Mister Donut the other day and was delighted to see they had Pikachu donuts! I was less delighted to see they also had uhh… yellow snow donuts…
  
  

  
• I’m eating lunch with a class of elementary kids which is both fun and tiring. They want to know what EVERYthing is in English –
  Student: “What’s ‘konpyūta’ in English?”
  Me: “…Computer…”
  “Oh… What’s ‘rajio’ in English?”
  “…Radio…”
  “Oh… What’s ‘kokuban’ in English?”
  “Blackboard!”
  “Buroku…mude? Ehhh? That’s too difficult! Whats ‘gyūnyū’ in English?”
  “Milk!”
  “That’s easy! Molk! Molk!”
  “Well… Close enough…”
• One day, an elementary kid came up to me and asked if I knew President Trump. I said no and gave him a face.
  “Ehhhhhhhh?? You don’t know President Trump???” *Looks closer at my face* “Oh, you’re joking. Do you know President Chimp?”
  “Uhhh, no, I don’t.”
  “Ehhhhhhhhhhhh?? You don’t know President Chimp?”
  “No, I don’t. Who is that?”
  “AH. I made a mistake… It’s President Putin! Ahahahahaha!” and he proceeded to run around and tell everyone of his mistake and how funny he was. Oh, these kids.
• In a middle-school class, a JTE asked me what kanji I would have tattooed on me if I could only have one. I replied with 信, which is the first kanji in Shinano and means trust/belief/faith. Then, the JTE asked the students. Half of them looked at my JTE in horror (Japan has a complicated history with tattoos), but one boy immediately said 魚, the kanji for fish…
• Last weekend, I went with a couple of people to an izakaya for dinner. We had delicious yakitori, and when we were settling the bill, I noticed that the receipt had 外国人 on it, which means ‘foreigner.’ I showed it to one of the people I was with and they busted out laughing – “What’s this? We didn’t order any foreigners!” We certainly got a kick out of it!

The weather is definitely getting colder; most of the leaves have fallen off the trees, and we are expecting our first snow later this week. Opinions are divided as to whether or not this is later than normal, but meh. Winter is winter, snow is snow. Even if it IS late, it doesn’t change the fact that winter in northern Nagano means lots of snow haha.

In other news, I spent the weekend in Yamanashi Prefecture visiting Mt. Fuji!

I’ve never seen the mountain up close, so I’d been looking forward to this trip for a while. I was worried it would be cloudy and I wouldn’t get to see the mountain at all in the three days I was there, but luck was on my side! I think the best parts of my trip were a delicious dish called houtou, a specialty of Yamanashi, and a visit to the fifth station on Mt. Fuji. Look forward to posts on these later!

Until next time!