3/17

Only had another 15 hours to sort everything out before leaving Japan, but there were so many things to do.

1. Thought there might be power outage today, so this morning we rushed to the bank to withdraw all our money in the account.

2. Had to print out some thank you msg for all the teachers and co-workers & write down the reason for quitting the job.

3. Rushed to the cell phone company to change the contract to the cheapest option. It took forever...

4. Bought 5 boxes of thank you presents for the office and teachers. 6 bottles of sake as thank you present for the supervisors.

5. Dropped off thank you present to my doctor.

6. Went to my junior high to pay off my lunch fees and thank all of teachers.

7. Supervisor came to check on my apartment & and more cleaning needed to be done. Getting rid of the garbagges in Japan is more difficult than you can imaging. I had to take everything apart and seperate them in burnable / unburnable/ recyclable plastics/ dangerous/ paper/ paper boards/ pet bottles/ cans/ bins.


8. Went back to my office for the last time to drop off anything that needs to be give away. Made a small leaving speech.

9. Mark took us to drop off our rental car. Used up 2 hours just to drive there and back.

10. Had the last dinner with Mark.
(My last meal of Sapporo ramen and the best gyoza in Nagaoka.)



11. Went back to the apartment for last minute packing & book taxi.

12. Finally, took the taxi to the night bus terminal at 9pm and headed for Osaka station.

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It takes 10 hours ride to get from Nagaoka to Osaka
Just when we were about to board the bus, Mark get us his handmade cards & Yoshikawa-sensei gave us her handmade bento so we can have some food on our long journey home.
Everyone was crying, it was the saddest moment that I haven't encountered for a long time.

3/16

There are no more rice or toilet paper in the markets anymore.
Things are looking worse.
Some cities in my prefecture detected abnormal levels of radiation.

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Quit the job today.
Have to clean up the WHOLE apartment & move out & finish all the paper work & cancel my internet/ phone contract & bring back my rental car & pack my luggagues in 2 days.

Panic Panic Panic

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Suddenly, Chris and I are going our seperate ways as he will be flying back to London.
I hope this situation won't last too long.

3/15

More panic shopping today.
Nozawa-sensei said that seaweed will prevend unclear poison, so we bought lots seaweed today.
Bought more canned food, drinks, masks, toilet paper, bag of rice, pickles.

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Victims from Fukushima started to evacuate to our prefecture.
Black out in our prefecture starts.

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Booked a flight ticket to Taiwan leaving on Friday.

3/14

Although supermarkets are ok, there are not much food in the convenience stores.
Most of the food in convenience stores have been redirected to the disaster areas.

3/13

Chris: You spoke Chinese last night when you were sleeping.
Me: Did I? I thought I was dreaming.
Chris: No it wasn't a dream. I was like, Sabrina...Sabrina! You are speaking Chinese.
Me: What did I say? Did I sound angry?
Chris: I don't know. I can't understand.

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Today we still feel a bit nervous in the morning.
But we calm down a little.
Mark phoned to invite us out for coffee.
It was good to go out and get away from all the news from TV and Internet.

It was also surprising to see lots Japanese hanging around the shopping mall shopping and walking around.
They don't seen concerned about their own country's disaster.
Rather, they all seem to enjoy their own time.
It's unbelievable how indifferent they are.
There's no people donating money and no presence of charity organizations at all.
I remember when 921 happened in Taiwan, there were so many charity organizations raising money and people donating money too.
It is true that people in Japan only mind their own business.

Us 4 foreigners thought about doing a bake sale and raise some money for the disaster if we are allowed.

3/12

After the I woke up around noon, I turned on the TV only to find out that the situation got worse... Realised that where I live had a magnitude of 6 earthquake last night.
Not only were there more big earthquakes happening, but the nuclear plant was down...
Although the nuclear plant that was about to explode was located in 福島 We actually have a nuclearn plant in 長岡 too. Very close to the place I live... Good thing the earthquake at my place was not as serious.

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After watching the news, Chris and I actually thought of leaving the country. So we drove to the nearest travel agency trying to book a ticket escaping to Taiwan. Unfortunately flights are fully booked... So we gave up on that idea...
Then we went to the cash machine and withdraw lots cash & fill the car up with full tank petro & went to supermarket and began panic buying.
There seems to be a lot of people panic buying too... supermarket was full of people and long line up.

We decided maybe we will drive down to the south for the weekend to stay away from nuclear explosion. We phoned Mark to ask him what he thought about our nuclear escape plan, but Mark didn't seem too concerned.

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By the evening, they have increased the evacuation near the plant to 20km.
My uncle on facebook was like "it's leaking now!!!!!" "Drive away! Go as far as you can!"
So yeah... Chris and I started to panic even more. We packed our luggage and my mom phoned and said "take your passport too!!!"
And then I phoned my boss telling him that me and Chris might go away for a long weekend. And my boss was like "NO! Stay where you are. Don't move!" I wasn't going to listen to my boss anyway if we really had to escape.
God... it was so tense! Never thought such thing would happen to us. We even thought of quiting our job and never returning to Japan again.

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However, although we were all packed, we didn't go anywhere because the news said that the nuclear plant has become more stable but if it did still explode, we could be in danger... depending on where the wind would blow!!!...

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At night, another earthquake notice was announced. Location was 新瀉縣 again...
Me and Chris thought we should all evacuate to the bedroom because there's no other funitures and obsticles. We turned off the heater and just sat on the ground watching the news from the bed room and waiting for the earthquake to happened...
We were waiting & waiting & waiting, but it wasn't coming...

Me: I want to go brush my teeth. And go to sleep...
Chris: No, you should wait...
Me: urg... but's the earthquake is not coming!!!
Chris: be patient.
(after a while later)
Me: The earthquake is never gonna come... maybe it's a false alarm. Can I go brush my teeth now...
Chris: um... these things should happen really quick after the warning... let me check the computer.
(after checking)
Chris: oh... it happened already... it was only magnitude 3. (so we didn't feel the shake)
Me: ok...can I finally go brush my teeth now?
Chris: ok, but I am coming with you just in case.

(when we are ready to go to bed)
In my bedroom I have sliding door on all the 4 walls = surrounded by doors from all sides.
Chris: we should open the living room door so it doesn't fall on us and move away from the ceiling light.
Me: ok.
Chris: Maybe we should move the futon closer to the kitchen door too.
Me: why...?
Chris: because if the door actually come off it would hurt less if we are closer to it.
Me: Ok. Oh, we should put our coat next to us.
Chris: Ok, I will get it.
Me: Oh... my scarf too. And my car key & my cell phone & and glasses.
Chris: Ok! I should get my wallet too.
Me: where should we put our glasses...? Don't want to step on it when I can't see.

Now thinking about it, our conversation was kindda funny.

3/11

When the earthquake happened, I was at my junior high school.
It was cleaning time after school.
I was swipping the floor so I didn't really notice the shake.
Then I felt dizzy... I thought maybe because I was bending down to clean.
Then the vice principle was like..."it's shaking! it's shaking!"
Everyone looked up, and we saw the lights swinging above us.
I was actually excited about the earthquake. But it lasted for a long time, so we realized that it might be something serious.
The principle made an announcement that all the stove should be turned off and every student should go back to their classroom.
The teachers all had a meeting and decided that the kids should leave school earlier.
After the announcement was made, all the kids were so happy that they can go home early.

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At night the earthquake happened a couple times.
One of them was 6 on the scale. I could hear the pots in the kitchen knocking against each other and the cutting board fall off. Which was actually scary.

I want to be like her!

When I was in Waseda, my Japanese instructor told us that she has been to 52 different countries. At the time, I thought that must be an exaggeration on her side. I was wrong.
I read her blog from time to time.
As I was reading her entries recently. I was amazed at how much places she has been to, and how much things she has experienced for the past year (2010).
In her last December 2010 blog entry, she mentioned that within a year, she has been to 11 countries abroad, travelled to other places in Japan 12 times, and stayed in onsen resort 12 times as well.
This year 2011, she has already scheduled to visit 5 other countries within the first half of the year.

Just a little information about my instructor:
She teaches Japanese at Waseda's Japanese language program (don't think she's a prof.)
She's about 50.
She's single.
She owns and lives in a very nice condo in Tokyo(She once invited everyone from my class to go to her place for tea).
She spent 1/2 of her income on travelling (as mentioned in her blog).
Most important, she really enjoys her work and her life!

I haven't seen anyone of any age as activie as her.
I really really envy her free spirit and courage.

3/6

Check out this article...
I find it entertaining to read the comments below.
All I have to say is shame on her.
http://www.montrealgazette.com/business/Teaching+English+Culture+shock/4348511/story.html