So, rather belatedly, here is a post with photos of myself and some of my students, among other things. It took me about a week to get home, get reasonably settled, and get my wireless connection up and running. At long last, please enjoy some pictures of my students. They were great, and while I do not miss the school, I do miss the great people I had a chance to meet and teach during my time in Japan.

Wednesday's afternoon Discovery class! Tomoko, Hiroko, and Tomoko. The two Tomoko's always made it a bit tough for me to call on the class for answers. ("a... Tomoko? I mean, uh, Tomoko in green?")


Tomoko squared.


Ah, Wednesday afternoon Voyage! This was a funny class. It started out for me as one student, Yasuko, who is the eldest woman in the photo. She barely spoke any English at all, but she was fun to teach. One day, we had 6 students and she was shocked. On this particular Wednesday, however, we only had three students: Yasuko, Maiko and Kaori.


Kaori, Lily, and Maiko


Another great student, Satoko. She was in my Tuesday evening Encounter class most weeks, but after I told her I was leaving, ashe asked me out for lunch at Pastel. I had given her a few simple romance novels to read, and she was doing SO well! After a couple months, she was about 125 pages in, and this with New Years and all that hoopla going on. Very nice woman, and I hope to see her again someday.


One of my kickin' students, Tomoe. Wednesday evening Frontier class, Masaji and Tomoe. Tomoe was absent for a few months, but luckily I got to have two ways classes with her before my departure.


This is Candice's Checkpoint class, asking lots and lots of burning questions!


This was my Thursday afternoon 1st class, Hiroshi. It was a private lesson and always a pleasure to teach.


Kawai!!! These kids were so cute. We have (L-R) Taiyo (the best behaved child in all of Kansai), Haruka, and Kano. They all had class on Thursday afternoon, during my Viewpoint class. Always yelling and screaming and running down the hall. Grrr! Cute when caught in a still, though!


Some random students in the lobby on Thursday night were kind enough to let me take their photograph....


Thursday evening Discovery class, usually with Rieko and Satomi, but on this Thursday only Rieko. This entry makes it look like a I taught a lot of virtually private lessons, but this was an off-week. Usually, I had many more students.


Usually, Thursday nights saw a huge Odyssey class in my room, but the class had been small for a few weeks, what with Michael's upcoming departure. At any rate, on my last Thursday, only Naohiro showed uop, so it was a nice small class for the evening.


Friday afternoon... Should be a lazy day, really, but it always started out with high-energy (or low-energy, somedays) Keita. Here we are: Keita, Anna, and I, in the lobby.


This is my only child student, Keita. I taught him Let's Go 2, which was always... uh... interesting. I was quite happy to have figured out how to teach him, as he was difficult to teach at times.


This is Keita's sister, Anna. She is adorable! I miss seeing her every Friday afternoon. She had a nasty propensity for bumping her head, generally on the hard concrete floor of the school. What a little sweetheart. Oh, Annachan.


This is Keita and his mom, when they were in on Friday afternoon for Keita's lesson.


Friday evening Focuspoint with Yoko. A very sweet woman, who I taught briefly in Viewpoint before she moved up to FP. Always great discussions with her.


Yuki, Michael, and I. Not that we asked him to be in the photo, but that's just Michael's *cough cough* charm, isn't it? Among his happy demeanor and positive outlook, of course.


Friday night Voyage class! Nami, Lily-sensei, Yuki, and Sunju. (Pronounced "sun-jay".) This class was hilarious, although sometimes a bit shy. Sunju was always very funny, and very abrupt. More about Yuki and Nami companies the photos below.


I left my camera at school on Friday night, by accident, and Candichan was kind enough to take some photos for me. So care of chan, here are lots of pictures of the Saturday students.














This is hilarious. It is a gumball machine at an izaka-ya (Japanese style pub) and it costs 100yen PER gumball. That's a DOLLAR for a gumball. And they know that some poor shmuck who's drunk out of his tree will gladly pay it because the gumballs come in rainbow coloured plastic containers. *SIGH* Oh, Japan...


This was, um, hmm on the Sunday night. My last Sunday night in Japan to be exact. This is a night shot of Kobe harbourland, before we managed to find a nice Italian restaurant and sit down for food. Earlier in the day I went out for coffee with Jose (bet Mark would be so scandalized, although I'm inclined to wonder what HQ was thinking when they let him go, and promptly lost almost all of the staff who were so against his presence in the first place. Ah, blessed logic.) Also, got to say goodbye to Jon, since we ended up not staying out too late the evening before, and thus missing his presence in Osaka.


Okay, this is the single creepiest thing that existed in my city in Japan. (Aside from my crappy apartment and the creepy skeezy dogs that lived in the neighbourhood.) This is the Akashi mascot, I don't even know what sort of animal it is. (I think it has a hat?) At any rate, I thought, the rest of the world deserves to see this ugly mofo. Seriously, poor Akashi. I wonder if Barrie has an animal mascot? Probably something ugly and rodent0like as well. I wonder...


Pucker up!


My regular Monday night Voyage class consisted of one student, Tomomi. Very friendly girl.


Also, a Friday night Voyage student. Nami, who was very shy at first, and then got more confident. I believe she was on her way to New Zealand...


This is my Friday night student, Yuki, who came on Monday evening so I could get a photo of her with me. Very cool Jr. HS student. I need to write her a letter, come to think of it...


My VERY last class at Akashi school. This is my Monday Discovery class at night. My students were fantastic. This is Rieko, myself, and Kazumasa. Kazumasa and Rieko were absolutely great, talkative and always curious.


This is the original okonomiyaki with art! I decided, why just drizzle the mayonnaise onto it? Why not make it reflect your name and personality? So, voila, Lily-omiyaki.


This is my last night in Japan, and, as it were, my very last supper in Akashi. Kind of sad, really. Here we are at an Okonomiyaki restaurant, actually owned by one of my students, named Junko. (I think!) Lily, Candice and Keiko.


Here is Candice's rendition of name-on-okonomiyaki. A great new talent on the food-art scene.


This a photograph of my ARC (Alien Resident Card) from Japan. Look at the awful photo! Terrible picture. I didn't get to keep it, though; they made me give it up at Immigration in Japan at Kansai Airport. I had to keep this little thing on me at all times.


And back in Canada...

Life has been interesting! It's been nice eating Canadian food again. I think I have exhausted most of the tried and true foods I was longing for. Lasagna, perogies, turkey and stuffing, primavera pasta, chocolate cake, cottage cheese, bagels and cream cheese, popcorn... More updates to follow.

This is the famous cat, Jakob. She's a rotten bitch, very bad-natured, but generally furry enough and soft enough to make up for her character deficiencies. Here she is, sitting outside on our verandah.


Here's my dad, standig in front of a fallen tree, covered in nice, Canadian snow.


On a walk my dad wanted us to go on, here are the lovely trees and snow out near the Simcoe Board of Education building. Very nice sunny day, despite the wind.