Worst Bloggers Ever

We are sorry for the gigantic gap between posts. The last two weeks have flown by…

On a Friday night we headed up to the church to participate in a scavenger hunt. It was an hour of racing around Mito taking pictures, solving riddles and feeding the homeless. The boy’s team won but we only have pictures from the (better) girl’s team…

Staci took some pictures of her school…

This is her English corner with all of her supplies. She cycles around to all of the classrooms to teach her lessons. Of course she does have a desk in the teacher’s room…

This is one of said classrooms. The students learn, eat and sometimes have recess inside these rooms. One of my favorite details is the curtain on the chalkboard…

Last Monday we both left work early to get our gaijin cards. I came home to find a fridge full of food and Staci and the Kajiyamas setting up our Internet. We drove to City Hall and picked up our cards and set up bank accounts. After that we went to K’s (an electronics store) and got our cell phones…

Saturday we spent the morning making calls on Skype to our families. Then around 9 AM our new bed was delivered! It sits a luxurious 6 inches off the floor and is completely AMAZING! We also cleaned the church and had dinner with some great friends. Here’s the bed…

And KFC for dinner...

Sunday, after church, we went shopping at a mall in Hitachi with some friends. We found our new favorite store! And we bought some “cool max” items for summer. Bring on the rainy season…

Golden Week!

As promised, here is a link to a video tour of our apartment. Enjoy…

Apartment Tour

These last three days have been very fun as we celebrated Golden Week (with 3 days off work).

Monday, we rode our bicycles with some fellow AETs out to Lake Senba. There we enjoyed a picnic, various sports and had fun with some total strangers.

Later that day we indulged in the Japanese art of Karaoke. We laughed and effectively desecrated a number of great songs. Here we are showcasing our charisma…

Tuesday, we went to Starbucks on the way to the bus station. Our bus ran late and thereby changed our plans of spending the day with friends. We made it to the church and decided to call our families instead. We ate lunch from a bakery in Mito Station and took this opportunity to explore downtown Mito. Personally, I was fascinated by the fascination with “vintage” clothes (the late 80’s – early 90’s). I could sell my old boy scout uniform for at least 5000 yen.

That night we were picked up by Joel and Sasha and given a grocery store tutorial. Sasha then made a delicious dinner and we spent the night swapping stories and getting to know each other better.

Wednesday, the Kajiyamas picked us up around 9 and we were off…to somewhere. We did not ask and just let it be a wonderful surprise. About an hour later we arrived somewhere around Hitachi for the Boys Festival. Families, that have boys, display carp flags of various colors and sizes (red = mom, black = dad, etc.) We crossed a bridge and took the opportunity to snap a photo over the Valley of the Dragon god…

We stopped for lunch at a place that had amazing tempura and polished it off with an ice cream cone. We then drove by the coast and went to a huge shopping mall called “Fashion Cruise”. Our Japanese mama bought Staci some shoes, but we could not find any in my size. They just laugh when you ask if they have 30 cm shoes.

Great Golden Week!