Getting settled...

Zeph has been on vacation this week. Yes 2 weeks into our trip and he gets vacation. Kinda awesome.
Last Saturday he and I went to Higashi Kurume to teach English to Yukiyo's (a friend from church) piano students. This is a job I'll be doing in the future on my own. It's the last Saturday of every month and the kids are from ages 3-12. After our class we went into the city of Tokorozawa and did some brief site seeing and got some good pictures.
Sunday night it snowed!! It was gone by morning but not before Zeph got some pictures (to be posted soon).
Tuesday Chris and Amanda left :( We spent most of the last few days before that playing an awesome amount of Monopoly Deal, eating endless snacks and desserts, playing with Hana-chan and watching Different Strokes. Good times.
After they left on Tuesday we spent most of the day unpacking our suitcases and getting settled into the apartment.

Some random things:

What do you guys know about Rasberry & Mixed fruit Kit Kat??? That's what I thought. They are kinda amazing. There are ridiculous other types of Kit Kat's as well. Green Tea, Banana, Cherry Blossom (in honor of the upcoming Cherry Blossoms blooming) and some others.

Last Wednesday Zeph went to a good Thai restaurant by Seibu Chichibu train station that served good food but an average Pad See Eew (guessing on the spelling)-The lady that worked there saw that his mouth was burning and brought him a free Fanta (a Thai Fanta) and the flavor was Pineapple, Orange-Banana. He said it was "different" when I asked if it was good.

Line drying clothes or pay $6 for a hour dryer across the street??? Line dry it is. We have an awesome washer so I'll learn to deal.

Weather is silly here. Cold one day, raining and warm the next... kinda like LA just more extreme.

Japanese Television: There are no words to describe the craziness that is Japanese television. It's colorful, loud and just so random. We watch it for several hours a day and have no idea what they are saying or what is going on. Except for a half hour at 7PM when they show an abbreviated version of the news cast that is dubbed in English. At 1:30 everyday there is a movie in English. So far there has not been a movie on that rated over a 6 according to IMDB. Here are a couple of movies we sat and watched in their entirety just because they are in English.
Babe 2, Tremors 3, Glitter (yes with Mariah Carrie which rated a 2. something on imdb) and Officer and a Gentleman.

We say "hi" to strangers who look like they might speak English...Why you ask? In hopes they might wanna be friends? Not really. It comes from being linguistically parched. When we see someone who doesn't look Japanese, we see a mirage of English.

Yesterday we began to look at/study Katakana by using our Japanese study book to translate the flyer for our city's local pizza company- Pizza-la. You can compare Pizza-la to Domino's on an off day. A large "Seafood & Special Basil Sauce" pizza (12 small slices) is over $35.

Zeph asked me today if I miss any food back home. I don't quite yet. Cinnamon Toast Crunch a little... mostly because I can't get it here so I've been thinking about it.
He said he does. He misses Sahara- The Mediterranean restaurant on Colorado. Feta cheese, chicken kabob etc;

So next week there will be pictures of our trip so far.

Eat of the week: Asian Garden - Indian cuisine. This place is so good. It's a buffet and the staff are Indian (and they speak english!!) Best Nan you've ever had, curry, veggies, rice soup and free refills.

Word of the week: Kirin - Giraffe... and also the name of a beer.