New entry, but this will probably be a tad short. I know, and I'm sorry, but I STILL don't have internet in my apartment, so I'm reliant on the West Coast coffee shop here. God bless Seattle.

So, yesterday I was on the train from Nishi shimachi (my station) to Akashi, where my school is at, and where I was meeting up with Tomoe, one of my upper level students, to go shopping. I saw this bling lady, with a golden retriever. This is WEIRD in Japan. Most dogs are tiny little things. Shitsus (shisu?), chihuahuas, etc. A lot of them have sweaters on, poor bastards. I wouldn't even wear a sweater in this humid disgusting weather, and yet pets are forced. Anyways, this poor HUGE dog also had an equally huge outfit on. It was similar to a clown outfit, kind of pink in colour, with tiny dots all over it, and these weird elasticized and frilly cuffs. *shakes her head* WTF. I guess this woman had the "I'm blind" excuse, but still. Someone probably helped her purchase this get-up for her pooch. Accessory to the crime. *sigh* People can be so cruel.

It's been a whole week at my school in Akashi, and things are getting slightly easier for me. Lesson planning takes absolute ages, so I'm working hard on that, and it's still a very lonely place to live. Expensive as a ... too. I went to Sannomiya yesterday and on Friday, too. Friday was for Thai food with some other foreign teachers. That was enlightening. Apparently, lots of people have been leaving Japan lately. Makes me feel a little less terrible about being so homesick that I contemplate plane tickets daily. (Seriously, I kid you not.)

I'm in the new apartment these days, though, which helps a bit. The apartment itself is quite livable, albeit quite small. I expected it to be tiny, so that's fine. I put up some scarves to decorate. Once I get the internet in a reliable way, I'll post some photos of my apartment, tiny little spot that it is. It's mine, at the very least. Someplace to hang my hat. (I don't even have a hat, it doesn't get that cold here. Like 0. Cry me a river. You should see the look of terror that appears of my students' faces when I tell them about how cold Ottawa is in winter. Yeah, that's right. -30 plus windchill. Sometimes -35, when you're lucky and it's the middle of the night.)

the kitchen is unbearably small. One burner, a sink, a fridge (that's about 1.5 feet squared) and a tiny shelf. THAT's the kitchen. Cooking in there is hellish. So not worthwhile. Apparently, all Japanese kitchens are small. It makes me miss my spacious homeland. I will definitely have different eating habits when I return to Canada, but I ALMOST miss the kitchen in my rathole apartment on College Street in Toronto. Almost. Not quite, though. My roomie was way too psychotic for me to actually miss it. My apartment is smaller in sum total than my bedroom was there. Eesh.

I'm planning on seeing if I can find the Toys'R'Us in Akashi if I have time once I leave this cafe and buy train tickets and everything. Maybe I'll go purchase tickets first and then wander about semi-aimlessly, searching for stuffed animals. (Don't ask.

I bought speakers yesterday in Sannomiya. They're smaller than my fist, each, and white, and they cost me about $55 but they sound quite nice and I figure they're tiny enough to leave with me when I go home or travelling. It was really nice of Tomoe to invite me. We went to the street markets, she showed me a couple import stores for when I just need honey or cereal or granola or A&W root beer. Also, went to Daimaru, this huge Japanese department store. It has Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Hermes... you name it. But luckily, also some semi-reasonably priced items. I bought some imported french body wash (orange flower and orange oil) since I can actually read French. Maybe I should've gone back to France. Or to Spain? Maybe next year, maybe after my masters. Who knows; we shall see in time where life takes me.

I'm having a lot of those little bouts of "What am I doing here?" and "What the hell was I thinking?" lately. Maybe it's my quarter life crisis? Haha. I think that's a silly term, given you can probably reach a crisis point anytime in your life. This is probably not even crisis-level, really. It's just brand new. When I was 15, it was only 3 months, and I *sort of* spoke the language. Now, I'm 23 (When did that happen?) and it's a year and I can't read or speak the language. It makes life a lot more difficult, but maybe it'll do me good. Someone left a post (grrr to anonymous posts) about how stable people sometimes need a little chaos in their lives. I don't disgaree. I'm just not sure if this level of chaos is healthy. (I can't even get medications when I need them, because I can't read the labels. That seems mighty bad to me.)

Anyways, it's almost 1:00pm so I need to get my ass up and buy some train tickets to Sannomiya and see if this mysterious Toys'R'Us is somewhere around here. Wish me luck.