Thailand post Finally!

So: This post is going to be in explanation form. Lots of stuff has gone on so I’ll describe my pre, present, and post dealings of my Thailand Vacation.
December 18th: Ben’s Going Away Party/BOE end year Enkai: So although it was the first and down right miserable snow storm of the year we still had an Enkai. Yuko picked me and Ben up and we all headed to MoMo bar for the party. The selection of food was pretty good, but I didn’t eat much. I think the weather killed my appetite in all honesty. However the company was good, and after lots of food and drink I played a game of pool. Me and Jack ended up winning (though with little help from me) and I was super excited about it. I blame the alcohol XD! After that it was simply more mingling and I was showing a picture of my cirque du soilel makeup to some of the women at the party and my supervisor walked over. It was obvious he has enough drink on him because his comments were truly uncensored. He took a look at the camera and then looked at me very sincerely and asked if he could kiss my picture. I just burst out laughing while the other women tried to apologize on his behalf. Once the main party went down, a few of us trudged through the snow and found a karaoke place, and that’s where we stayed for another hour or two. A group of Japanese ppl were across with us, and we cheered each other on the whole night. On top of that I had to go and save a few songs for ppl cause it was songs that I suppose they thought they could sing and was wrong. That and the Japanese girl in my group was all over me. I blame alcohol XD When it was time to leave a guy from the other group said that he wanted me to sing Beyonce. Does this surprise me? Not at all!!!!! He complimented my voice and we all went out separate ways!!!!!
December 19th: Kathy’s Surprise Party!
Synopsis: I met up with a few friends and we all gathered the food and the White Chocolate Birthday Cake (which was beyond fantastic) and waited outside her home, while her husband went inside to throw her off. After that he cut all the power and we all came in singing happy birthday to her. She was half surprised (which I hear was a massive achievement) and we all laughed. After that we all merely sat around the dinner table and talked and joked for the remainder of the party. It all ended in many reciting of cheesy knock knock jokes and Chuck Norris quotes.
December 21st: Yes, I got ill, went to this hospital, got medicines after some tests, went home, and I am fine. THE END P.S. No worries
December 22nd: Late Night Enkai before a day of travel! I arrived at the Unazuki Hotel where the Enkai was to be hell, but not without slight freak out. I had NO clue where this place was and thankfully GPS saved the day. It was really high up into the mountains but if I saw the place in the day I’m sure it would have looked beautiful. I sat next to toshi my JTE and we had dinner. It was nice. Everyone was nice and allowed me to see how the staff was like outside the work place. So now I can say I like the staff almost as much as I loved the students at Koshino. I was even invited to a new year’s party whenever that will be. I ended up winning some gloves and some shoes(that I couldn’t wear lol) and then said goodbye to everyone after only being there a little under 2 hours.
It was time to head down the mountain of death back to Kurobe and the train station. Thank God for GPS and the IPhone. I managed to get back in plenty of time, and took my time instead of speeding in such horribly snowy conditions. From this point me and Rosa hopped on the train and had over a full day of travelling on multiple types of transportation when we reached our final destination, Thailand!, the next evening.
December 23rd: Arrival
• Coconut products workshop: T’was a fairly long drive before arriving to the Floating market, and so we stopped for around fifteen minutes at this rest stop which sold mainly coconut products. While here I tasted sugar made from Coconuts and it was pretty good. One thing that I’ve learned on this trip starting with this stop is that when it comes to Thai’s coconut products, I find them pretty good. Otherwise I’m still adverse to coconut flavored things in general.
• Floating Market: So the floating market was really fun and really expensive. A bunch of vendors and shops are all on boats on the edges of a long canal way, and people ride along the canal in gondolas looking at the goods from the shops. If you see something you like, you point and they’ll pull you in and try to sell to you. I did my best to haggle along with my friend. We lowered prices but found out the next day we were spending waay more than we thought. It’s ok though, it was a fun experience and I ended up with some neat bags and omiyage for people.
• Lunch far into Thai mountains: We drove and drove and drove and then…. We made it to this restaurant looking over the river. I’m not sure what province of Thailand we were in but when you looked out into the distance it looked just like it would in the movies. A scene right out of Tomb Raider or Anaconda when the crew was drifting down the river with all the verge around them. In any case this is where we had our meal and this was the scenery offered while we ate. It was great ^^ .
• Elephant ride: After lunch they decided that it would be a good idea to go ride some elephants and so we did. A guy came over, was like hop on and me and Rosa got on after squealing like girls (which is soo unlike me) and feeling like we were going to fall the hell off. Either way we managed to get on we went trekking for about 20 minutes we were lead back to the starting point and got off the elephant. It was a nice experience and there were some really nice pictures taken of us. Next task is to ride a camel in Egypt! ( just give me a year damnit! I will pull this off)
• Dinner and Traditional Thai dancing: Time for dinner, and it was in a rather danke ass place. Very pretty and very traditional. While having a rather delicious meal and a very very strong long Island Ice Tea the performers came on and did several acts of Thai Traditional dance. It was very interesting to watch. They are very particular about hand position and fluidity. The costumes were rather dazzling as well.
• The BOY GIRL SHOW!: Soo to top of the evening we went to this cabaret lady boy show. If you have heard anything about Thailand they are pretty famous for lady/boy shows, and I found out why. Those men are ridiculously pretty, and some are damn right sexy. Like I’d do you, and I’d have to feel extra bad because you are a guy posing as a girl who I think is sexy as a girl ! O.o That is all kinds of messed up, but I digress, if you go to Thailand going to a LadyBoy should be on your check list to see.


December 24th: Day two: Bangkok
• Former Grand Palace: Sooo today was the lets go look at all the fantastically designed buildings with its bejeweled columns and roofs. We took a look at the entirety of the former grand palace. The former grand palace isn’t simply called that because the current king lives elsewhere, it’s also because the former king was either killed or committed suicide so the palace was no longer a place a king could rule from. The current grand palace do not allow tourist( which seems like a good idea) so we just looked at it from a far.
• Wat Po and Wat Arun: Wat Po is probably one if not the most famous attraction in Bangkok Thailand. The building with the large gold reclining Buddha. The reason for its reclining position means that the king of the time is dead. Wat Arun was built by another king and it represents the sun.
• Jewelry Presentation and Duty Free Shopping: Well considering I’m not a huge jewelry fan, or one who goes around shopping for such this was an interesting change. My friend I were shown a short presentation about how Thailand was famous for particular jewels namely sapphires and rubies. After that we were lead to a showcase room where you could purchase jewelry. The jewelry was quite lovely, but what impressed me more than anything was that everyone in that place could speak upwards to five languages. I just kept listening to people switch in between languages when focusing on different customers. Needless to say since I was there I did a “when in Thailand” gesture and bought a blue topaz ring which stones were in the shape of a flower. After that they shipped us to this huge mall filled with ever name brand shop one could think of. The perk was there was no tax on anything, hence called duty free shopping. Though it was interesting I found no need to shop there because all the stores were foreign name brands and items I could get elsewhere. I inquired about the people who shopped in this mall and was informed that about 80% of its shoppers were foreigners, basically telling me that the average or even a bit more well off Thai person could not afford this mall.
• Light up: Not as thrilling as I hoped it would be, but basically it was going around seeing all the palaces we saw that morning lit up at night. Would have been cooler if we could roam through but it was a look from the car window situation, so no pictures of that event was to be had.
December 26th: Phuket , A day at the Beach!
• Beach Times: Oh yes, so although I really hate wearing bathing suits it was worth it to go to the beach. One of the fun parts of the whole situation was that we took a speed boat to the island where we were to go swimming. I really REALLY wanted to go parasailing, but I didn’t have money nor did my company feel up to it. I look back at it now, and I sooo should have done it anyway XD. Oh well.. I’ll go to another awesome place and partake in such activities. After we got out we went and lounged on the beach and swam for the next few hours. Trully the clearest water I’ve ever seen. It was so beautiful. One of those moments where I wake up out of the haze that is Anita and realize that I am in a wonderful place. Another fantastic acquisition while in at the beach that day a girl I said hello too. We ended up talking a bit and I found out that she was from Hong Kong (her English being good cause she was raised in Canada). Here we switched info, and now I have a friend in Hong Kong. She told us that we should come and visit, and I’m all about China, and making international friends… hell just making friends!!
• R&R with the Discovery Channel, room-service and pastries!: There wasn’t much planned for the rest of the day once we arrived at the hotel around five. Instead of running around it was time to just relax. So after showers and getting our things packed up for the next days late night departure we watched some serious discovery channel. I don’t know about you but the discovery channel is hot shit, and it always has been. Since I don’t normally watch TV in the first place nor do I have a chance to watch American TV while in Japan it was a nice change. On top of that we purchased yummy pastries (one get one for free hotness! btw  ), and ordered room-service. It was a really relaxing evening.
December 27th: Ayutthaya and homeward bound:
• Cruise: Okies, so instead of taking a car we ended getting up early and taking a cruise boat down the river. It took three hours to get to Ayutthaya, but in that time we were fed fantastically. Just the food was awesome. And tea as well. Along with the fact we got to see a lot of sites from the boat and video/pictures were taken. On top of this we became cool with a group of Japanese tourists one of whom could speak pretty good English. We found out they were teachers like us in another prefecture and that they hand an ALT at their high school as well. They were really nice, and would be the group we travelled with for the remainder of the day’s activities.
• Summer Palace: A resting palace for the kings of Thailand to go during the summer months. It was a rather beautiful place, but rarely used in these days. The architecture here was the closest thing I saw to resembling western architecture and yet it was still very Asian. It reminded me a little of France and the gardens around Versailles. We walked around and looked at all the major points of the grounds however this day was the hottest day and I was semi miserable from the heat. I didn’t let it dampen my spirits, it was just made having fun a bit harder to accomplish (though it was thoroughly accomplished ^^ )
• Historical Heritage sites: For the remainder of the day our group visited an historical Japanese settlement and a lot of the first Thai palace ruins. It was fun to look at but it was so hot. XD Nevertheless I had a good full day of this until it was time to head back to the airport and board the plane back to Japan.
December 28th: Start of food poisoning !!!!..... wait >.>

Weekend of the Phage

Sooo it was finally tine for Phage( a.k.a Aaron Quade) to come visit my neck of the woods and so on January 9th in the early part of the afternoon I picked him up from Kurobe train station and immediately went for lunch. I took him to a place not too far from my house known as きときとすし(KitoKito Sushi). Though I am use to the sushi here in Kurobe, I bragged to him that we had some of the best. Once he tired the sushi he nodded in confirmation and continued eating. After talking, catching up and expressing how tired we both were Phage had ten empty sushi plates piled in front of him and a full stomach. After lunch we went back to my place and chilled for about an hour or so. It wasn't long before it was time to drive to Uozu (the town over) and meet up with people at Indira for dinner. To my surprise and delight pretty much everyone showed up for this get together and in all there were about fourteen of us there. It was good times indeed, talking about random things and introducing Phage to my friends. Also things tend to go well when you have delicious Indian food in your stomach as well. After successfully filling up most continued on with the night and made their way over to SunPlaza and to the karaoke place. Karaoke as always was entertaining, and it lasted about three hours. I even tried out or attempted to try songs I never sing before. Simply so I wont be singing he same thing every time I end up going to Karaoke! So that was our night. Gotta home around 12:30 and after some random foods and talkins we hit the bed.
January 10th
So this was a sloooow day. Got up alittle before noon, and stayed in the bed chatting with friends on AIM from the the states while Phage studied for his kanji final. Nevertheless this held our attention until Mabe hopped on skype and then for the next two or so hours we spoke with him and the others that happened to be at his house(for movie night) or stop in ( Steve, Renaldo, Andrea, and Vincent). Needless to say we didn't actually get out of bed till roughly 6pm and that was mostly because the need of food was dire. Originally we were going to get more sushi ( because Phage could not get enough) but the line was nearly out the door. So instead of doing that we went to Pizza Jamboree and had pizza there. One we ate I took him to the local game store and we wandered the place for nearly two hours, thirty-five minutes were devoted for looking through the porn sections. Truth be told the art in that section was fantastic. Then again bad draw hentai just seems like a bad idea, least for selling purposes anyway. After a few things were purchased ( and no, no hentail was bought) we hit up the convience store grabbed a few things and headed back home. Once home it was a combination of playing video games (Heavenly Sword and Folklore) and chatting it up with Mabe until nearly 6am in the morning. I was then were we figured sleep should happen so we could get up and get Phage to the train station to return to Osaka.
January 11th
Early morning for a late night. Slowly we headed out at noon to try sushi AGAIN. Luckily for Phage they were able to take us and sat us at the bar. The men behind the bar were quite fun to talk to and were very pleased with us American gaijin for some reason. I'm glad it happened since was the last bit of Toyama Phage was going to see. Once we finished I drove him to the train station, wished him good luck on finals and his travels, and farewell. Hope you had a good time Phage!!!

New Years! Welcome 2010!

December 31st-January 1st:
So since I’m back at work (bleh!), and this is just opening ceremony day I have one class at the end of the day to teach. With this free time I feel it’s the opportune time to punch out the New Years entry before I get lazier than I’ve already become. I decided to head to Takaoka for Nicole and Ryan’s New Years Eve party and crash at their place. At this point I was still on the not so good side when it came to my recently acquired food poisoning. Nevertheless after being in the house for two days growing mushrooms I made myself get dressed and go. I got there and was one of the first to arrive but that didn’t last long before several more people poured in with snacks and things to drink. Seeing as I was sick I stayed on the safe side and simply quenched my thirst with soda (a poor replacement for alcohol I know) and ate the snacks (in which I chipped my filling on >.< ) After a while of hanging about we walked to the shrine to give a new years prayer. It was funny because there was supposed to be fireworks. What happened was two minutes before midnight a few fireworks went off and people started bowing and talking to each other. We all starred at each other like deer in headlights until Nicole finally broke the silence and said “ I guess this is when we hug??”, we all laughed and wished each other an happy new year. Though anti-climatic we gave our offering and prayer then headed back to the apartment to drink and chill for the rest of the night. There was also a paper came we played that was quite amusing. Everyone gets a piece a paper and writes a sentence of anything they choose on the paper. Then they pass it clockwise to the next person who has to then draw the sentence. When he/she is done drawing the picture, they fold down the sentence part and pass it again. This person then tries to write a sentence based on the picture alone, and so on and so forth for how ever many turns there are people. When you finally get your paper back you unfold it and look at what it has become. You get quite hilarious results and it’s a fun game. Around 3am everyone was tired and thus crashed. Though I had a good time Japanese New Year has nothing on a good ol’ American New Years party.

January 1st – January 3rd:
I spent 4 days crashing at Nicole and Ryans place. First day being I was tired and there was a small blizzard outside. The second day because Mat and Kelly came over and we all had a little bit too much fun being terrible at Mario for the Wii. Went out for yummy food and the simple fact that train run early and thus after a point there is no way to get home. On the final day (Sunday) we went to the mall and that’s when I got to see the movie AVATAR. It was a great movie, and the graphics were stunning. I would love to see it again. The only problem is it cost me 17bucks to see it once, and it wasn’t even 3D because that is an extra 3 bucks just to get the 3D glasses. I will see about going again, but the price to see any movie really makes me cry inside. XD

So in short! (for once) that’s how I brought in the new year!