Ridiculously Busy Month

It's been a long time since I've had the time or energy to post anything new, but I have a lot of stuff I want to write about, so here we go.

First off, this past October has been insanely tiring, but also extremely fun. Hopefully things will calm down a bit so I can actually get some rest and clean up the mess I've made in my apartment.

About four to five weeks ago (I can't really remember anymore, and I don't have the energy to look up the exact date), the Kannari Junior High School girl's softball team had a tournament. This was the first time seeing my own students in playoff atmosphere action. In some respects I was actually blown away. These girls meant business. Everyday, I see them practising afterschool for hours on end. They come in on the weekends and and holidays to practise, it's ridiculous really how hard to prepare. Of course it's also mandatory for them to do this, but most of them look like they really enjoy being there and practising hard with their friends.

On the day of the tournament, which I think happened to be on a Saturday, all the teachers had to come to school (and for doing this, I think we got a weekday off, but really it was too long ago for me to remember). I was looking forward to this, because even though it was a "work day", I knew I wouldn't actually be doing any "work". It turns out I was right. I got a sweet seat right beside my kouchou sensei (school principal) and we talked about various things. I had just come back from Sendai, so we talked about kokubuncho and other stuff, it was great. Baseball/softball are the only main sports where you can actually afford to just sit back, relax and enjoy the weather. Don't get me wrong, baseball can be a pretty intense sport at times, but all in all, it's pretty slow, and you can afford to take your eyes off of the match without missing much.

The softball team was again, as I said before, a girls team, but damn they looked pretty strong and athletic. I had never really seen them outside of school, and when they're at school, or in class, they're very timid and shy and easily embarrassed. But on the field, they were intense, serious, yelling out "さあ、来い！" and cheering each other on. Really it was an eye opener for me. I didn't really think I was going to be too in to a softball much between Junior High School teams but when the game started, my eyes were glued.

There was this one girl who I had helped practise for the past month for the annual English speech contest. She was a very shy and timid girl in class, but she was very talented and smart. She ended up getting second prize in my city, and apparently she's one of the top students at my school. However, I had no idea she was also athletic. Batting lead-off and playing shortstop, the way she moved reminded me of Ichiro. Japanese people are really crazy about baseball, and if you didn't know before, baseball is pretty much the most popular sport in Japan (go Daisuke). Another thing that surprised me was the speed and power with which the pitchers threw the ball. Again, these were 14-15 year old girls, yet they were playing at such a high level. My school ended up playing 2 games and winning both easily by over 5 runs. They won the city tournament and were crowned the 栗原優勝チーム. Pretty awesome, because I had no idea they were a powerhouse in these parts. Right after the final game ended, it started raining heavily, so we were all pretty lucky to get the game finished. All in all, I took a few pictures, but not too many, because I was too interested in watching the games with my own eyes. Unfortunately, for another girl team, they didn't have enough players so they couldn't enter the tournament. Those poor girls were instead, given the task of score keeping, and cleaning up the field and transporting equipment, etc. - ouch. Since I was sitting next to the score keeping table, I struck up a conversation with them in Japanese. It was interesting talking to kids from another school.

A couple of weeks later, the teachers had another one of their 飲み会s which are basically drinking parties. For us, it's usually at an izakaya. We usually pay 4000 yen, and we can basically eat and drink all we want. It's pretty cool. I'd have to say that izakaya's are one of my favourite parts of living in Japan (although I'm still not used to sitting on the floor for extended periods of time - my legs usually die on me, and I have to walk awkwardly behind everyone else, when we leave~) The unfortunate thing is that the teachers usually want to leave pretty fast and move on to the next party, so we don't really get our money's worth (at least if it was me, I'd stay longer and drink more, and just head back and save cash, but that's just not how they do it around here.)

All in all, after the izakaya, i had a pretty crazy night. We went to a karaoke bar after the izakaya, then me and an older teacher were supposed to take a taxi back home together, but he ended up giving the driver different instructions. We ended up at another bar/restaurant, met up with the same teachers from before who were having their own little reunion party with other ex-co-workers. The funniest part of it all is that after they were done here, they all headed back to the same karaoke bar, we had just come from. All in all, I got pretty wasted and my wallet took about a 一万円 hit - ouch.

The taxi ride home cost me another 2000 yen (taxis are ridiculously expensive in Japan, so be CAREFUL if you ever come here and wanna hitch a ride on a taxi thinking it's just gonna cost you a few bucks). the last time I was in a taxi, it was around a 40 minute drive, and it ended up costing 8000 yen (80 freaking dollars!). Fortunately, I only had to pay 3000, cuz my friend paid 5000. But still! I've made a promise to myself never to ride in a taxi again unless it's absolutely an emergency and there's nothing else I can do!

I think it's safe to say that I can't trust my teachers anymore. I've never spent money so recklessly in my life. The next time they have one of these crazy nomikai's, I'm definitely gonna keep a better tab on what I'm paying for. damn! japanese teachers work pretty hard staying late everyday and working on weekends/holidays etc., but when they party, they go all out. the strangest thing is the monday after the party (which is usually on a friday), they all show up at school, and it's like nothing ever happened. it's like the nomikai never existed. it's like everyone forgot about it. or maybe they were so wasted, they really dont remember anything that happened (who knows?). there's a pretty big divide with being in the classroom and outside of work. at least it seems that way!

anyways, I think i got a little bit off track there. to get back to the point of why i even introduced the izakaya story, is that since I don't drive, I had to hitch a ride to the nomikai 場所. since my town is, again, the COUNTRYSIDE, and there really ins't much here, all the nomikai's are in neighbouring towns (for example a 30 or so minute drive). so I ended up getting a ride from one of the teachers, who just happened to be the coach of the girl's softball team. in the car, we were talking about stuff. apparently, 20 or so years ago, for his honeymoon, he went with his wife to TORONTO! It looks like he visited Toronto before I did! But it looks like he doesn't remember much, other than the CN Tower revolving restaurant and Niagara Falls. Anyways, to get to the point, he asked me what I was doing over the long weekend
(3 day weekend), and he ended up inviting me to come play softball with the girl's 2007 Kurihara champion baseball team. I knew I had to take him up on the offer. Those girls were intense, and it was gonna be a great opportunity to interact with my kids on a different level. Also, he tempted me with free food - apparently, the girl's parents were gonna be there too, and they were going to make food! Since I can't turn down free food, there was absolutely no chance that I wouldn't be there! The coolest thing was that the 9th graders 中学校三年生 girls who had won the championship also the year before, we were gonna be there too, and they were gonna have a match with the new championship team made up of girls in the 7th and 8th grades (9th graders aren't allowed to compete, and are officially "retired" - interesting system, but I'm guessing it has something to do with the 9th graders needing to prepare for High School entrance exams. So instead of letting them compete in their club activities and sports, they advised to spend all their free time preparing and studying for the entrance exams). The softball coach told me there were a few players on the 9th graders team that couldn't make it, so he would love to have me play in their place on the 9th graders team. This was too cool.

On the day of the softball "party", i showed up in shorts and a long sleeved t-shirt. it was actually pretty chilly out. when i arrived, the girls were already practicing with some of their fathers. the softball coach introduced me to some of the parents. it was nice meeting the kids parents for the first time. they were all really nice and relaxed people. then as the game was between the ninth graders and the championship team was about to begin, the coach told me that i'd have to wait until later to get playing time, as most of the ninth graders actually did show up. watching the 9th graders play against the 7th and 8th graders was pretty interesting. apparently, the year before, they had won the kurihara championship and finished 2nd in miyagi prefecture. this was gonna be a sweet battle. when the 7th and 8th graders won the tournament, the 9th graders were always there cheering them on. 先輩、後輩 relationship. now thye were going to play against each other. i got a front row seat, and walked around taking pictures. the game started out pretty good, but the 7th and 8th graders jumped to a big early lead. the 9th graders looked a bit rusty. i guess they hadn't played in a while, so it figures they wouldn't be able to play as well as they had in the past. 9th graders haven't had bukatsu for a long time. the final score ended up being something like 10-7, and the 9th graders almost never threatened all game long. I found out that mitsuki, a 9th grade girl who I met on the very first day (and who gave me a tour of the school), was the former captain of the softball team. that was pretty cool. I enjoyed watching her play. she reminded me even more of ichiro.

after the game was finished, they had their usual formal game ending ceremonies, and it was time for lunch. the mothers had cooked some delicious tonjiru soup with potatos and all kinds of other delicous vegetables, etc. it was nice and hot as well, since it was such a cold day. i talked to the parents more, and passed around photos of toronto etc. the dads and moms were all pretty nice, cool people. during lunch, the coach told me that I'd get my chance to play now - as part of the "papa team". Japanese people often refer to their fathers as "papa". Sounds kind of strange for us English speakers (sounds like a child's word), but everybody uses the word "papa". I was pretty excited to be joining the "papa team". The afternoon game would be a match between the 7th and 8th grade championship team, and the "papa's plus one ALT". Sweet! He told me to take second base, so I went out there and started practicing with the other "papas." When I was in Toronto, I used to play softball with a church team. It wasn't really competitive or anything like that, but it turned out to be worthwhile practice, because it didn't take long for me to get aqcuainted to my new position at second. we tossed the ball around, I fielded some grounders, threw the ball around the bases and caught some pop flies. It was time to start the game!

in the beginning, the papas took a pretty big lead. soon it was 4-0 with a big inning. I had my first at bat. boy oh boy was it embarrassing! it's true that I had played softball before, but that softball included pitching to your own team.....UNDERHANDED. looking back now, I probably showed have been able to play a lot better before, when the pitches were thrown underhanded, by YOUR OWN teammates! When I went up to bat, against my own student, who yes, happened to be an 8th grade girl!, I thought....yea they're the champions, but she's in the 8th grade, she's 14 for goodness sakes, and I'm a 22 year old guy who's played softball before, I can handle this. I was in for it. The first pitch blew by so fast, it made my head spin. I swung feebly at the ball, probably missing it by a mile. I smiled and laughed, and everyone else did too. This was embarrassing but fun! I took a couple more silly looking swings before hitting a grounder to the shortstop. fortunately enough for me, i was able to beat out the throw, as the first basemen dropped the ball. I ended up coming around to score after the papas hit a few deep balls.
soon, we took an 8-2 lead, and it looked like we had this game in the bag. for softball, we only play 5 innings, and we were in the third inning already. this included a half inning, where all the balls were hit to me, making me involved in all 3 outs. the girls were happy and smiling, saying stuff like "wow, he's great!". i definitely felt cool, even though again, this was SOFTBALL, and I was playing with a bunch of 14 year olds~

as the game dragged on though, the papas began to tire. the girls kept getting hits, while we kept making mistakes! finally we went into the bottom half of the final inning up 10-8. the girls were at bat, and this was their chance to either tie the game by scoring 2, or winning it with 3 runs. we got a couple of quick outs, but suddenly, before we knew it, there 2 girls on base. I was still playing second, but for reason, they subbed in a different papa for right field. this papa, is a really nice guy, and really funny, but he's got to be the most sports-illiterate person around, and he knows it and isn't ashamed of it (which just makes everyone else love him even more, he's just cool, short, stocky, glasses, and really old style clothes). anyways, he was in right field. I guess maybe the regular right fielder had to leave early or they just wanted to give him a chance to play. the next girl smacked the ball over the head of the firstbasemen into right field. this was gonna be trouble. especially with that papa playing right field this inning. the ball bounced right by him, and he ran after it, but when he runs, he seriously looks like a penguin. its so funny, and maybe even kind of cute. I was at second, so i sprinted after the ball, running past the right field papa. i picked up the ball and nailed a throw back to the 3b basemen, who then fired a throw home, nailing the last girl at home for the third out. we had preserved the game, and prevented ourselves from the embarassment of losing to a junior high girl's softball team! the final score was 10-10. after making that play, the papas and mamas were all jumping, and happy, and complimenting me. I seriously felt like a rock star haha. the girls didn't look as happy though.

I'd have to say, since coming to Kannari, this has been one of the best experiences so far - being able to mingle with parents, play some "non"-competitive sports with my own students, and getting to eat tonjiru soup and udon for FREE~

I definitely can't wait until the next softball gathering.