Hokkaido Life: Day 7

Another beautiful day in paradise

Konichiwa. I'n still catching up on blog posts but I am getting closer to being up to date. I promise! Also YouTube will resume as soon as possible. Most likely next week! 

This morning started out perfectly with me in bed until 10am. This morning we had nothing arranged and I was able to catch up on a good amount of sleep, not that I really needed it but it was nice to laze around in bed and not have anything to do. However this is Japan and opportunity and adventure doesn't come to those that lay in bed all day doing nothing at all. In the morning I sorted out my room after all my posters had fallen off the walls because in Japan, sellotape and sticky pads just don't work. I'm going to assume from the heat but when I woke up I looked like I was living in a pig sty. However the night before once my posters were all up, my room felt so relaxing and personalized. 

After finally sorting out the mess that was my bedroom I put all the posters away so that later I could iron them flat so they would maybe not fall to the floor while I am asleep. (Note: It didn't work and the battle to have my posters on the wall is ongoing) In the afternoon we were met by Erika-san who took us to get our residence information sorted at the main office in Abuta where we were also introduced to even more people. In addition we were given our 'new' phones. 'New phones' you ask? Sure.. they were new... if we were still in the 90's :P The phone itself was a standard Japanese style flip phone which I am certain originates from the 90's period. It matches my computer in the Sogo Center perfectly though!

Runs Windows XP but I am pretty sure this the 98 Model

Flipping awesome!

I absolutely love my new phone though and it feels so nostalgic. For the most part of the afternoon we lounged around in the Sogo center having a go on our new computers and occasionally we would have to fill in some forms. One of the most interesting forms we had to fill out was our bank forms which was a real bugger to do. This is because of two things.. my name and also the address of the Sogo Center which had to be written in Kanji. Now believe it or not.. but my kanji was perfect and there were 0 problems. The issue was my OWN NAME WRITTEN IN ROMAN LETTERS!!!! It had to be done a very certain way in block capitals as apparently the bank are very strict. I had to attempt to write my name three times in the correct order 3 times with the correct lettering. It was so mortifying. Though to be fair I did have 5 different names to write because my name is so long :(

One we were finished up in the Sogo center we headed back to the house where we had a couple of hours to kill before the big party. One of the things I made sure to do was to prepare my welcome speech which contained a moderate amount of information in Japanese as I knew we would be presenting it in front of a rather large audience. We had also been told that for the event we should suit up so there was a little bit of a mad dash trying to get the iron working properly without ruining our suits. Though to be fair, my suit was a £45 suit from Primark so I can't see how I can ruin it ;) 

This picture needs to be burnt! D:

With us suited up we headed to the party and boy we were met with a pretty amazing setup. The entire hall had tables set up with food and chairs everywhere and people were steadily arriving. I would put it down at about 40 guests at least who were all Japanese, except for one american girl called Stephanie who works in Abuta. She is part of the JET program, the company I hope to return to Japan with after University. Stephanie was really nice and it was great to have a full conversation in English without it being broken or pausing to try and interpret what each other had said.

Various people gave welcome speeches to the audience and we had Stephanie who speaks very good Japanese, translate for us or in some cases their speech had an English translation written afterwards that summarized everything they said. Unfortunately the mayor couldn't attend which is understandable but the vice mayor was present which was really nice that they take so much interest in the new volunteers. 

Finally the time came for us to do our speeches. I went first and I could feel my knees shaking like mad as I was not used to speaking Japanese in front of so many people, it was even worse that they were natives and could spot every mistake I made. I probably sounded awful but I received a huge round of applause and awe at my speech which made me really happy. In addition we were presented with an array of gifts which included flowers and home made jams. The evening was amazing and everyone was so interested in us. I even received 2 offers to marry someone's daughter! One daughter was even 42.... so as you can see, the Japanese get quite carried away when drinking!   

I also learnt that the Japanese do not stop with just one party and afterwards we headed over to the Guten Tag where people drank even more but I still stuck to cola. There we chatted away all night and had a great laugh but unfortunately we had to leave early due to us having to wake up at 6am tomorrow. I was really impressed with the level of welcome we received and I can't stress enough how grateful I am to the people of Toya. They have shown an unlimited amount of kindness to both me and my partner and I feel as though I am forever indebted to them. Tomorrow is the two day march which I am really looking forward to so I'll leave it at here for now.

I shall post more soon! Thanks for reading! Oyasumi!