お久しぶり

Righto. So it's been quite a while since I got to my blog. A lot's been happening since I last wrote a bit about my trip to the Great Wilds of Cambodia.

I'm going to school online, at the University of Arizona. I want to be a librarian, so I'm taking classes at the snail-like pace of 1 class a semester. If I hit it hard, I'll be done next August. Yay for me.

My time in Japan is almost up. In some ways I'm sad, as i'll be leaving my dojo teammates. But, in other ways, I can't wait to get out of the school. It's driving me absolutely crazy, I know. I think that, ever so slowly, I'm starting to let the lackadasical approach to learning English get to me, and even the thought of going to the school irritates me. I wanted to get another job in Japan, but I don't know that I could handle doing it. I'm ready to be around real people, I think.

So I've been working on my grad. school. Hmmm... what else. Oh yeah, I passed my 2-dan exam for kendo in January, and my 1-kyu exam for Iaido. Yay for me :0)
I'll take the 1-dan for Iaido on the 29th.

Which kinda screwed up my vacation plans. See, I thought that I was going to perhaps get to go to the UK for a job interview. Didn't work out. So now I'm scrambling, trying to find a ticket out of Japan for Golden Week. I've gotten to Tokyo and back, but I can't get any further than Tokyo right now. I really want to go to the Philippines. So right now I'm trying to actually get a cheap ticket to route through Hong Kong, and then go. Believe it or not, it's cheaper to do it that way than to fly direct. I got onto lastminute.co.hk, and I can get a round-tripper for HKD800. That's like $100 round trip US. It's a hella mess.

I took the Foreign Service Exam last weekend. After studying for only 2 months and relying on common sense, I'm altogether confident I didn't pass like I thought I would... but no big deal. So it goes, to quote one of my favorite authors --Kurt Vonnegut.

So with all my studying I kinda stopped bloging. So sorry.

Just read James Clavell's Shogun. Quite the story. Captivating enough that I picked up the continuation, Gaijin, in Fukuoka. Also bought a great new cookbook for Japanese food. Has the Japanese and English together. It's called... 英語で日本料理をつくる, or something like that. I forget what exactly. I tried their miso soup and ginger pork recipes. Very nice.

So, plans for the last 3 months? Other than trying not to go completely insane at work, I've decided to do some travel. I'm going to Okinawa in June, and will try to travel in July. I'm trying (still) to find another job overseas. I'd like to work in either the UK, Singapore, or Hong kong. I'm thinking about applying for a work permit for New Zealand. I've wanted to go, so why not work while I'm there.

They're out campaigning. It's been a constant barrage of Japango since about 9.00. Some of us *were* trying to sleep...