Leaving for Taipei TOMORROW!
Well, the time is here! We head out for Taipei tomorrow morning.
This week has been busy, despite having only a few classes. Kelly is house bound with influenza (which apparently a lot more serious here... what we call the flu in America is often just a serious cold...erm, or so they tell me), so I've had to exchange money for both of us and get her travelers checks for her. I have probably put in a good 10-15 hours (at least) researching the trip this week, too. I didn't realize how much we had to do until I really started digging into the details on Monday, but I feel like I have a good handle on where we are going and what to expect in each place (in India at least... kinda gonna wing it and just enjoy Taipei).
I booked tickets to fly directly to Varanasi once we get to DEL, so Kel and I are going to try to figure out the Nepal leg of the trip and make decisions from there. We decided to stay at a nicer hotel a little ways away from the Ganges for the first two nights (most of the other hostels we were looking at were on the river), but the place looks amazing, has cheap massages and a ginormous luxury swimming pool. A double room with AC is going to cost us about $10 a night, each. Not bad... just wait until you see the pics of this place.
So speaking of trying to book tickets to Nepal, there are just so many restrictions with traveling in/out of India (or maybe I should say sub-continent!) and with organizing details for going there. You literally cannot get Rupees exchanged in Japan, for example, and it is impossible to book plane tickets from India to Nepal from here. I had to call three different places in India (in addition to internet research) and talked to two travel agents in Japan before i believed it was impossible. I guess I can be stubborn (you should never take a no from someone who doesn't have the authority to give you a yes), but it seems silly. Maybe I am just too spoiled with techn0logy-saavy Japan and America?
The one thing I will say is that doing all the preperation this time around seemed much easier this year than last year. I went to Kobe on Wednesday and did all the currency exchanging and travelers checks stuff at SMBC before I had a question that I had to ask in English. When the guy I was working with told me he couldn't speak English, it dawned on me that I had finished the entire transaction in Japanese (and actually got what I wanted to...). I take the simple route with the language, suck at kanji, and have a lot of vocab to learn yet... but that is not bad.
This has been an expensive week for travel, though. I also locked myself in on a spot for the Pepy Ride Volunteer trip going to Cambodia in March. PEPY (www.pepyride.org) and India were two of my big goals (or on the dream list) when I signed up to come to Japan, especially after Jess did the Pepy Trip in 2004, so I am really excited that it is becoming a reality. My friend Tam and I are doing the program together, so we're flying to Bangkok and taking a train to Laos for a few days of sightseeing before Cambodia. Tam and I can both be type A, but the girl has seen a lot (did Semester at Sea and is pretty adventurous) and I think we'll mesh well as travel partners. I'm going to head out before her at the end of the trip (don't have the vacation time for the Pepy post-tour), but I've decided to do a solo trip to Ankor Wat on the way back to Bangkok.
More on Pepy later, though. The down deposit is paid and the plane tickets are booked, but I've been too busy with India and life here to plan anything else yet. Our first fundraisor will be in January, so I'll have a lot to do for it when I get back from India; I think it will be fun.
School
I've been reluctant to mention it, but there has been a little "battle" in the last few months between my school and I over the nenkyu (vacation time)/ biyokyu (sick leave time) structure and my contract. I still love my work and coworkers, but it's taken up a lot of my time and recently ended in a fair compromise on both ends. I just mention it because I think it is funny that people just do not take sick leave here. They use their vacation time, so it's a struggle when I try to explain that I don't want to use vacation time when I have allotted sick time and really am sick. I hate "pulling an American" but I actually had to get out my contract and ask them to look at Article so-and-so in Section so-and-so to prove there was such a thing as sick time.
In the process, I also discovered that in addition to not using sick time (they generally still come to school, but wear masks or really do use vaca), dental issues are also simply not considered to be medical in Japan (so good luck using sick time if you get your wisdoms pulled or have a dental emergency). It's just a difference in culture and it's not going to change with one little ole me, but it's an intersting concept. My opinion is that if they are putting a metal pole in your head but it's a dentist doing it and you are under, it should still be considered medical... but it really does seem to be a culture difference. Anyways, everything is fine now so I will stop here before I get too political or unprofessional, but it's funny what road bumps you hit. Definately didn't see this one coming, but let me know if any of you ever have similar issues and I'll tell you the rest of the story.
ESS Christmas Party
Yesterday was our big ESS Christmas party. The second grade girls wanted to do it on Thursday so I spread the word to the third graders and rest of the club, but that is the last time I will have a party without a set time (not just "after school"). There was a lot of confusion about when the party was ... and if there even was going to be a party... since people all showed up later than I expected. We were going to bake cookies (my kids still can't believe we don't have "Christmas cake" or eat KFC on Christmas in America... so I wanted to show them one of the traditions we do have), but the cooking club had the kitchen.
Instead, I bought cookies and oranges and we made Christmas cards (some of them ended up being rather romantic... it IS a romantic holiday here, but I was a little surprised to see those ones), listened to carols and watched the movie "Elf" (with Will Farrell) while hanging out. The boys didn't come, but it was a good time, and everyone (including the boys) met up this afternoon to do the Secret Santa Exchange. I saw a lot of watches and even a little piggy bank exchanged. They're so cute!
Alright, I'm gonna get some stuff done before I head out for the day (and the packing extravaganza really begins), but I might write one more post before heading out for the trip. We'll be gone for three weeks and I am not sure what my internet situations will be (definately nonexistant in Nepal), but I will try to get a post up every now and then and am planning to keep track of the intimiate details in between via a good old-fashioned journal (thansk for the leather one, Megs... gonna put it to good use!). More soon...
This week has been busy, despite having only a few classes. Kelly is house bound with influenza (which apparently a lot more serious here... what we call the flu in America is often just a serious cold...erm, or so they tell me), so I've had to exchange money for both of us and get her travelers checks for her. I have probably put in a good 10-15 hours (at least) researching the trip this week, too. I didn't realize how much we had to do until I really started digging into the details on Monday, but I feel like I have a good handle on where we are going and what to expect in each place (in India at least... kinda gonna wing it and just enjoy Taipei).
I booked tickets to fly directly to Varanasi once we get to DEL, so Kel and I are going to try to figure out the Nepal leg of the trip and make decisions from there. We decided to stay at a nicer hotel a little ways away from the Ganges for the first two nights (most of the other hostels we were looking at were on the river), but the place looks amazing, has cheap massages and a ginormous luxury swimming pool. A double room with AC is going to cost us about $10 a night, each. Not bad... just wait until you see the pics of this place.
So speaking of trying to book tickets to Nepal, there are just so many restrictions with traveling in/out of India (or maybe I should say sub-continent!) and with organizing details for going there. You literally cannot get Rupees exchanged in Japan, for example, and it is impossible to book plane tickets from India to Nepal from here. I had to call three different places in India (in addition to internet research) and talked to two travel agents in Japan before i believed it was impossible. I guess I can be stubborn (you should never take a no from someone who doesn't have the authority to give you a yes), but it seems silly. Maybe I am just too spoiled with techn0logy-saavy Japan and America?
The one thing I will say is that doing all the preperation this time around seemed much easier this year than last year. I went to Kobe on Wednesday and did all the currency exchanging and travelers checks stuff at SMBC before I had a question that I had to ask in English. When the guy I was working with told me he couldn't speak English, it dawned on me that I had finished the entire transaction in Japanese (and actually got what I wanted to...). I take the simple route with the language, suck at kanji, and have a lot of vocab to learn yet... but that is not bad.
This has been an expensive week for travel, though. I also locked myself in on a spot for the Pepy Ride Volunteer trip going to Cambodia in March. PEPY (www.pepyride.org) and India were two of my big goals (or on the dream list) when I signed up to come to Japan, especially after Jess did the Pepy Trip in 2004, so I am really excited that it is becoming a reality. My friend Tam and I are doing the program together, so we're flying to Bangkok and taking a train to Laos for a few days of sightseeing before Cambodia. Tam and I can both be type A, but the girl has seen a lot (did Semester at Sea and is pretty adventurous) and I think we'll mesh well as travel partners. I'm going to head out before her at the end of the trip (don't have the vacation time for the Pepy post-tour), but I've decided to do a solo trip to Ankor Wat on the way back to Bangkok.
More on Pepy later, though. The down deposit is paid and the plane tickets are booked, but I've been too busy with India and life here to plan anything else yet. Our first fundraisor will be in January, so I'll have a lot to do for it when I get back from India; I think it will be fun.
School
I've been reluctant to mention it, but there has been a little "battle" in the last few months between my school and I over the nenkyu (vacation time)/ biyokyu (sick leave time) structure and my contract. I still love my work and coworkers, but it's taken up a lot of my time and recently ended in a fair compromise on both ends. I just mention it because I think it is funny that people just do not take sick leave here. They use their vacation time, so it's a struggle when I try to explain that I don't want to use vacation time when I have allotted sick time and really am sick. I hate "pulling an American" but I actually had to get out my contract and ask them to look at Article so-and-so in Section so-and-so to prove there was such a thing as sick time.
In the process, I also discovered that in addition to not using sick time (they generally still come to school, but wear masks or really do use vaca), dental issues are also simply not considered to be medical in Japan (so good luck using sick time if you get your wisdoms pulled or have a dental emergency). It's just a difference in culture and it's not going to change with one little ole me, but it's an intersting concept. My opinion is that if they are putting a metal pole in your head but it's a dentist doing it and you are under, it should still be considered medical... but it really does seem to be a culture difference. Anyways, everything is fine now so I will stop here before I get too political or unprofessional, but it's funny what road bumps you hit. Definately didn't see this one coming, but let me know if any of you ever have similar issues and I'll tell you the rest of the story.
ESS Christmas Party
Yesterday was our big ESS Christmas party. The second grade girls wanted to do it on Thursday so I spread the word to the third graders and rest of the club, but that is the last time I will have a party without a set time (not just "after school"). There was a lot of confusion about when the party was ... and if there even was going to be a party... since people all showed up later than I expected. We were going to bake cookies (my kids still can't believe we don't have "Christmas cake" or eat KFC on Christmas in America... so I wanted to show them one of the traditions we do have), but the cooking club had the kitchen.
Instead, I bought cookies and oranges and we made Christmas cards (some of them ended up being rather romantic... it IS a romantic holiday here, but I was a little surprised to see those ones), listened to carols and watched the movie "Elf" (with Will Farrell) while hanging out. The boys didn't come, but it was a good time, and everyone (including the boys) met up this afternoon to do the Secret Santa Exchange. I saw a lot of watches and even a little piggy bank exchanged. They're so cute!
Alright, I'm gonna get some stuff done before I head out for the day (and the packing extravaganza really begins), but I might write one more post before heading out for the trip. We'll be gone for three weeks and I am not sure what my internet situations will be (definately nonexistant in Nepal), but I will try to get a post up every now and then and am planning to keep track of the intimiate details in between via a good old-fashioned journal (thansk for the leather one, Megs... gonna put it to good use!). More soon...
posted by Brenda Ann Elizabeth McKinney @ 4:05 PM
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