Last train winner

Sometimes on the last train, Japanese people are not afraid to strike up convo. it happened to me twice yesterday. Anyway while I was with my friends. This guy started to exercise his English but we kind of ignored him as he was a lil tipsy and we didn't have time for him.
I felt sorry after dissing his high 5 . SO I asked him a question just to help him out. What follows is detailed below.

Me : How tall are you?

Tall Japanese guy : 187 cm (Yes we do cm here)

Me : Wow, really tall .(taller than me)

Tall Japanese guy : Yeah,how tall are you ?

Me: 183cm

Tall Japanese guy : Oh. I'm TALLER than you. I'm the winner. I'm the winner.

He continues in this mocking tone which irritates me a little.Plus his friends were giggling and he was trying to show me up.

Me: How many centimetres are you ?(Pointing to an area of my anatomy)

Tall Japanese guy: (Looking confused) says nothing

Me: WINNER !!! WINNNER !WINNER.

Japan has Valentine's day backwards

So yeah! In comparison to the west Japan does have it backwards but it's a good thing. Instead of the guys spending money buying gifts for the special person in their life and taking them out for over priced meals, Japan has it that the ladies get the guys chocolate and apparently the ladies do all the work, dates and stuff.

I did get some chocolate for all my female teachers at school but that was just to add more height to the towering gentle man image I have constructed of myself.

It is 18:12 pm and I am freezing at home typing this up so I am obviously not going on any dates BUT I did get some chocolate at school which is a result.


There is another day (White day)when the guys get candy/sweets whatever for the girls in return so I guess I'll have to purchase some stuff in return  but I don't know nothing about that yet.

Legally beat them

When I told her what I was going to do I thought she would have an objection, but she told me she was interested to hear that I was going to take part in a Judo PE lesson with her form class and even came and took pictures.

I had wanted to join in training with the Judo club but for some reason or another I hadn't made it. Kawara the Judo Sensei told me I should join the first years for a lesson and that he would bring in his own Judo gi for me. He stressed the length of the arms and legs may be short and this was no exaggeration. It was also a bright blue one which contrasted heavily with all the various shades of white gis the students had. You could tell which students had hand me down gis as theirs were bordering on a creamy yellow colour.  

I walked to the Dojo with a nike pro t-shirt so all my students were in double shock first reaction "Ariyo da!!!" - It's Ariyo. followed by "wow, sugoi(great), tsuyoi (strong), macho baby" etc. They were all excited that I joined in. I was surprised to see two other teachers with their black belts. I never even knew they did Judo.

Kawara sensei passed me the blue gi and Akurai sensei helped me get the obi (belt) on. Orai sensei lead the class through the introductions and I joined in ,as Orai sensei put it, as a foreign exchange student. We warmed up and practiced Ukemi which are breakfalls which I picked up after a while. We practiced a few pin techniques, only Kawara sensei and one of the giant first years( a member of the Judo team) managed to escape my hold.

Finally we had a challenge type sparring round. I was surprised at how many students were willing to fight me. I'm a big guy in Japan and according to my JHS first years I'm a titan. I kicked all of the kids asses, some were easier than others but they all went down. I had a try with one of the teachers and that was a stalemate. I really enjoyed it, might be something to learn ( get my first black belt not from H&M ).At the end of the class all the students bowed and thanked me for coming.

On leaving the gym the class from which I have students that cause me a problem came in. How I wish I had them during judo would loved to have thrown some of those guys around.

Nothing stays the same

no relation to any of the content but I drew it.

Hmm. I feel like there is so much I could talk about. I regret that I haven't updated this. School life has been fun so far. I had my last day teaching at my elementary school last week and that was an indication that I have been here a while.

I have been in a speech contest, had my bike stolen and recovered. Ups and downs turn arounds been in Typhoons countless amounts of earthquakes cat cafes all nighters conflicts of interests, interesting conflicts.Hot like fire and cold like ice. I even had a box beard. I'm In the middle of a 12 week fitness challenge and realise that hitting the blog will help me remember this stage of my life  and allow me to reflect more. So many interesting stories get forgotten or put to short term memory and then deleted.

I think I'll try and go back in my memory banks and fill you in on some things.

Like my bike.