It's all good

This week has been, for lack of a better word, "standard." That means that it was awesome, I've got some good training done, I've written another speech for a meeting coming up soon, I've entered in some tournaments, I've eaten some pretty amazing food and it's all still great fun. 

I've spent all week writing this speech for a Rotary meeting next Monday。I still get nervous before speeches but this time I am really trying hard to control that. Normally I have trouble eating and get all shaky but not this time. I'm pretty sick of the feeling. So I've practiced hard, I can remember my speech off by heart and it 'should' be fine. Here's hoping for no stutter. I'm simply talking about last months trip to Gifu and Fukushima, it shouldn't be too bad.

Monday's talk

School this week has gone by pretty normal other than that. I did however, find myself in a very familiar situation in physics class.

The teacher wasn't present on this day so he had prepared a video for us to watch. It was an actual video too, like a video tape. Anyway, we watched Mythbusters in English with Japanese subtitles for the period. I loved it! Most of the other kids slept but I was more alert than ever. If you look closely in the next photo, you can see the substitute teacher sleeping in the back of the class. It seems I'm not the only one!

Substitute teacher napping in the back.

We were playing softball for P.E. the other day (we always play softball) but I'm so bad that it's beyond a joke. I always miss the ball when I'm batting or if not I hit it right into the hands of the nearest fielder. When we're not batting, I'm the catcher. The guy who stands behind the batter and catches the missed balls. I can't catch a ball to save my life it seems because I've been hit by it on numerous occasions and every now and then I've caught a good one right between the legs.

But this day I was good. Well good enough to not get out on the first swing. I hit the ball and made it to first base! This was awesome, my whole team cheered for me. The rest of the bases were loaded so someone made it home off my swing.

It was going well. I made it to second base from the next hit. "Yusssssss! Second base!" I thought. I was halfway to home. Lo and behold, I made it to third! I'm not normally to interested in the game but at this point I was excited. Further than I had ever been!

And home! I made it home! I made it back and I was ready to do backflips because I was so stoked. My team high fived me and that was that. I acted as if it was no big deal after that but I was still pretty happy. Shit, I'm still happy now!

obligatory lunch photo
Got some octopus today!(or squid, I can never tell the difference)

I did a bit of calligraphy as well! It's actually pretty good fun.

It says: 武 (Bu or take or maybe even  mu, I don't actually know.) But it pretty much means Warrior.

I'd like to say that was my first attempt but I spent an entire hour writing the same character until I got the above result.

Calligraphy takes a fair bit of time and a another fair bit of patience

Whilst "normal," school is still good. I have so many friends here and it's just the best.

Kendo is picking up even more! This week was a bit tough though. For a few days I wasn't too keen to do it because I was simply tired. But after I started training that feeling of it being a chore went away and it became fun again. The adrenaline is awesome. 

I've said a few times that I love screaming. It's quite hard to not get excited when you're yelling as loud as you can in someones face while they scream back. I'm having a lot of problems with sweat in the eyes, itchy face and sore ears (the mask presses on my ears really hard and it sucks.) but it's not so bad. 

I'm getting better quicker now that I'm getting more involved. I get to do a bunch of practice fights every night so my fighting is becoming stronger. And I love fighting so this is great fun.

I didn't get to go to karate on Tuesday because we went out for dinner. I was a little sad but that's no problem. We were going out to have eel for tea!

Eel! It's pretty tasty

We were out for dinner because my host family's friend was over from America. She was Japanese but spoke fluent English.

It was quite a fun night!
And I didn't get beat up at all!

 I've entered in a bunch of karate tournaments! (Entered/plan to enter)

Firstly there is one in August that I have officially entered in. It is an open styles karate hosted by my home style of Kyokushin. It's going to be good. I'm once again in the heaviest division in the youth boy's group. 70 kg and over, up to 19 years old.

I'm really looking forward to this one. It's rules that I'm fully used to so it should go well! There is anohter tournament in September that I'm planning to enter in. This one is the Toyama prefecture tournament.

So I live in Gifu, right in the middle. Just above Gifu is Toyama. So I'll go and fight there and see how it goes. I came 2nd in the Gifu tournament but I'm stronger now so I really hope I can step up my game. 

The Gifu tournament had over 1000 competitors so I'm curious as to how many there will be in Toyama.

That's in September. In November I will be fighting in the "Zenkoku Taikai" Or "All country tournament." The nationals! This is going to be held in Nagoya inside of this massive stadium or something. I'm actually a bit nervous already. But that's in November so there is plenty of time to get strong.

Besides the karate training, I've also got kendo to build up my stamina. Hopefully I can pull it together bring back a really big trophy!

Today was for the first time in a long time a plain relaxing day. I slept in late and then got a haircut. I walked to the mall to get some snacks and have a look at what was on sale but didn't find too much.

On my way back I came across a shady looking group of guys so I turned my music off so I could stay alert and hear what they were saying. (Paranoid.) 

"Ah shit." I thought as I was walking up to the same crossing as they were. So we stood there waiting for the lights to change. I noticed they weren't speaking Japanese. I remember my last host Dad had told me there were a bunch of Indonesians who had come in to work at the company he works for.

I looked over the street and over the river and saw the building where my previous host Dad works and assumed these guys were said Indonesians and were going back to work.

One of them turns to me and says with a funny accent: "From New Zealand?"

I said "Yes, where are you guys from?"

And sure enough they were from Indonesia! I figured my host Dad must have talked about how he had a foreign kid staying with him and these guys assumed I was the foreign kid. (It's a pretty educated guess seeming as foreigners are so rare here.) 

It was quite an odd encounter. But I had to laugh at myself for the paranoia as I walked home.

That's all I've got for this week! Tomorrow I'm doing a CPR and emergency-thing course with the karate club. Then I think we are having a BBQ at Sensei's. Should be a good day!

Until next time!

The other exchange students and I found that texting with images is pretty fun and this was my best one

The pringle's mustache