Christmas holiday part 1

Ok so maybe just maybe it's been a little too long since I updated my blog. I apologize. To noone in particular, but anyways. :P So right now I'm on the bus back from Hiseko Ski Resort, Hokkaido (Japan obviously), heading towards Chiseko airport in Sapporo after an awesome 4 day skiing holiday. Yes, that's right, I was skiing. No, sorry, nothing broken. Just many tired muscle groups (there seem to be an awful lot of those weird things in my body now... muscle groups... strange stuff), a few tired and twisted joints, etc., and a smile on my face. I'm happy to report I can now stand upright and move down an incline on skis. Without falling. Too much. :D Whether or not we call what I can do “skiing” is another story...

We (a friend and I) arrived on Tuesday after a pleasant flight from Kobe airport. 2 hours flying to Chiseko airport, and 4 hours bus ride to Niseko ski resort later, we were there. At last. :D The site was just amazing to me!! So much snow!!! I must have driven all the people on the bus mad with all my excited cries of glee of “Look! More snow!!!” (And when the entire landscape is covered in snow, believe me there's room enough for much excitedness! We stopped after about 1h30min on the bus at a nice roadside center with restrooms, restaurants, and touristy things. I wasn't interested. My eyes saw only mountains and mountains of snow (not to mention mountains with snow). I could have probably been left for a few days playing in the snow, stomping in this heap, blowing over that one, dancing circles around yet another one... I had never seen so much snow in one place in my life! So much fun!!! Sadly we only had a 15 minute break, so I had to eventually get back in the bus... I should have fought them off – I'm sure I could have taken them... there were only what? 15 of them? Pfff easy...

Anyways...

And then we checked into Hotel J First. Very fancy (how do you spell lany / larny / lawny / laanie / I give up). We managed to get all the way to our room and have a quick look around before we busted out our laptops and connected to the wireless internet. Had a chat to some friends and family on skype before we decided to move on. We headed straight over to the lift and bus pass stall and exchanged our coupons from the travel agency for our passes, then went and collected our skis, poles and boots from the rental place. Luckily it wasn't just me at the rental shop, as it turned out the skis needed adjusting. I would never have known that... 2 flat bits of wood on my feet, 2 spiky poles in my hands, and big plastic snowproof boots on my feet were all that I went in looking for...

After that we finally hit the ski slope. Well lets just say my first attempts were... er... slow. And I think a certain friend with a huge amount of patience was quite well tested :P But I eventually managed to pizza-slice my way down the hill (my stance resembled a triangular pizza slice in that my toes were permanently welded together to keep from moving at any speed beyond snail-pace, while my heels were going elsewhere. I wasn't always quite sure where they wanted to go...). From time to time I switched to something healthier, and looked a little more like tossed salad, but I always managed to get up in the end. Eventually. Sometimes with only minor assistance from aforementioned patient parties.

And then I discovered that we had actually only done half the hill, and that the top half was even steeper than the last. Sigh. Romans pizza should hire me... I was eventually able to stay upright and not wedge my toes together permanently, which I felt was quite an achievement.

Of course later that evening when I was managing to move down the nice beginners hill quite easily (you go down the same hill that many times, and I'd like to see you not know how to...). So it was decided I should try something a little more challenging... not that I was too happy with that, but I gave in thinking it couldn't be that bad. Yeah, I know, you already know what's coming, but wait... We found a ski lift that seemed (nice word that eh? Seemed...) to go to the top of quite a nice little slope with a mildly steep slope and a lot of room at the sides to mess up. So we got on the cable car and went up to the top of that hill. And then went up some more. And then some. And after that... well we were both kind of wondering how long it would be until we could hear the harps playing... The higher parts of the lift had been hidden in misty snowy stuff, so it was impossible to tell from where we had been how high the lift really went, but by the time we got there it seemed obvious this was not meant to be a particularly easy run... Well I がんばりましたd as much as I could (gave it my best shot basically), but after about the 50th time of panicking and landing on my backside, I decided enough was enough and I was going to walk the rest of the way. Only to have a guy ski up behind us to tell us that he was the last person on the hill checking to see that everyone finished, as the lights were going off soon. :(

The snowmobile ride was fun, but the siren was a little embarrassing...

Dinner was really good, and the おんせん (hot water bath (onsen)) was also quite welcome, but I feel I should mention that WOW that thing is hot! Hehehe. Oh, and the massage chair afterwards was awesome. :D

Skyped some more people afterwards when we were back in the room, and went to bed around 12:00ish. I'll save the next few days for the next (few) post(s), as I've already written so much...

Another post that I wrote ages ago and forgot to post. Sigh.

So it seems tomorrow is going to be a super busy day... 6 periods, then hitting 三宮 tomorrow night (as always). Me thinks I'll leave the laptop at home for a change, as I'm not going to get any chance to use it! Oh well, sorry my pretty...

So today I had one of the ninensei teachers say something about me in the staff room, and he could tell by my face that I hadn't understood a word... so he tried saying it a different way, and I still didn't understand... Until finally he says in beautiful English “We all want Greg.” Well I must say that's quite the proposition... all of them?? I mean, I know I'm popular and what-not, but I mean really! :) Luckily one of my JTEs was around to explain that last night, they had to do some rescheduling for my sake, and it was very difficult because so many of the teachers needed me in their classes. Nice to know I'm needed ( / wanted).

I got some emails typed this morning which is good. Also got back on track with my cellphone emailing – it's been far too long since I sent out random “have a nice day” morning emails. Got quite a few responses back though, so obviously they've missed me. :D Will make an effort to make up for it in the next two weeks, before everyone disappears for holidays all over the world (literally!). It was nice knowing you, thumbs...

But seriously though, it dawned on me today that after my Christmas holiday, it's going to be very quiet in Kobe... SO MANY people are going away for quite extended holidays. I think I'll go type up a mass email to find out what people's holiday plans are, so I know who I can hang out with when I'm back. :D

Good idea... Oh and I just thought of an awesome idea for my kids and myself as well. Hooray! :D

Ok the day has just ended (well classes anyways) so I'm going to stop for now. :)