支笏湖

Went to a nearby large (natural!! Not man-made!!) lake, called Lake Shikotsu. The weather was nice, it was warm, so it made for a good day.

Shikotsu is a really deep lake, caldera lake, formed by a volcano several tens of thousands of years ago. There are three volcanos (two active and one dormant) ringing the lake, all 'children' of the volcano that created the lake itself.

We saw the oldest railroad bridge in Hokkaido. Sort of. It's no longer a railroad bridge, but now a footbridge that has been moved twice. It serves to cross the Chitose River as it flows out of the lake. We also saw some really nice onsen hotels. Maybe we'll go sometime and stay the night. Looks expensive, though.

Oh yeah! We went out on a swan boat. That's the first time I've done that in...no idea how long. Probably sometime in Chicago on the lagoon in Lincoln Park. Maybe.

Of course, there are photos.



The above mentioned bridge, as seen from the above mentioned swan boat.



Chiemi on said bridge.



The water of Lake Shikotsu. It's incredibly clear. And apparently really deep.



Some purple flower. I know, right?



The plaque is an original, and it indicates that it was made by a company in England in the late 1800s. The lake and Mt. Eniwa (right side, background) in the background.

So, as you probably know by know, I started a new job this past April. I am now working at a fairly large professional post secondary school. Technically, it's two schools, but the two share a campus and offices. We have all sorts of majors, the majority being related to medical fields. There are others as well - most notably the pet service/animal handler major, which is majority of the smaller of the two schools.

And I am the English department. I'm a teacher without a department. Which has both pluses and minuses. It means that I have a fair amount of freedom. But it also means that any problems that come up? I have to solve them. And just about anything English related? It ends up as my responsibility, with a few notable exceptions. There are, apparently - I've never met them, other part time teachers who teach English for the major type classes. Presumably, these teachers are more familiar with the specific fields and the sorts of medical English required.

As the only full time English teacher, and the only one teaching basic conversation classes, I have somewhere between 13 and 18 lessons a week. Each lesson is 90 minutes, and each one is only once a week. Which means, I have to keep track of approximately 15 classes at any given time. The plus of this is that I get to meet a lot of students and any problem students? I only have to see them once a week. The down side is that I frequently feel slightly unprepared or confused about which class I'm about to teach. It's getting better as I'm getting more and more accustomed to everything.

Honestly, even given these minor stresses and headaches, overall, this job is pretty near ideal for me. At least for the time being. The other teachers are friendly, and I have gotten to see all sorts of things up close and personal that I would normally have no reason to see up close and personal. An emu. A Patagonian mara. Prosthetic limbs. An ambulance.

And the students are, by and large, interesting and entertaining. There are a few problem individuals, and a few difficult classes, but by and large, they are fun to teach. I really like teaching this age group. So, unless something goes horribly wrong, I imagine I'll be hear at the very least a few years. Maybe a longer.

Doesn't hurt that Sapporo is a 20 minute train ride, and Shin-Chitose airport a 10 minute train ride away.

As I'm here in a new city, I just felt like it was time to move blogs. There are various reasons, and what with all the issues facing Facebook recently, I don't really feel like doing too much there. So, here I am. And here you are, hopefully.



It's spring in Japan, and that means...SAKURA!

It's cherry-blossom season. It has come really late here in Eniwa. As such, here are the obligatory sakura photos. (Click on a photo to go to my Picasa photo album.)



This is the man-made stream that runs through the park behind my school. Chiemi is on the bridge, looking at the little waterfall.



Here's the pond in said park. It looks nicer from a distance than from close up. It's not the cleanest water.



View of the bridge and some of the blossoms.



Same shot, different F-stop.



Along the path I take to work everyday.



Flowers and sparkles.



Back at the mini-waterfall.



Here's the tallest building on my school's campus, with Eniwa-dake (site of the 1972 Sapporo Winter Olympic downhill skiing) to the right and Mt. I-don't-know to the left in the background.



This photo is not in Eniwa, but rather up in Furano, a city a few hours north of here. The town happens to have been the setting for a very long running TV drama called 北の国から (Kita-no-Kuni-kara - From the northern country). It's a picturesque city set amongst several mountain ranges.


As far as things at work and the like, everything is going quite well, and I'm really getting into the swing of things and am enjoying things generally, though there are some days, looking ahead at my schedule come fall, that I am dreading. If nothing changes, I will have 7 teaching hours a day on several Wednesdays, along with 6 hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

I hope to write more here in this new blog. Hope to see you all here.