ネイティブが教える英会話のジェムスクール☆Teachers☆

Received some excellent news last week! One of the new teachers at my job wants to play D&D, so it looks like our merry band of adventurers will grow from four to five - which to be honest is probably the optimal number of players for a DM/GM to manage effectively without a lot of practice.

Since the party does not currently have a healer, I've talked to the new teacher about either being a Paladin or Cleric. With the party composition as it is now, I would much prefer a Cleric for their ability to heal a little bit more frequency wise, but a paladin does make for a good tank/healer mixed in case our barbarian goes down and we still need be able to deal decent damage per attack.

I'm planning on having the new teacher's character enter in the town of Phandalin, where the party will be headed next after they leave the cave they're currently in.

I'm definitely stoked to have another teacher with an interest in Dungeons and Dragons, given that it occupies both a huge part of the media I consume on a daily basis (mostly in podcast form) and free time.


  

On Christmas Eve, some friends and I went to Imabari and camped on the beach. We had a really good time, but it was very windy that night so we kept waking up. But it was still fun and I want to go again soon! Do you like camping?


  

Sweet azuki beans and little pillows of mochi. It was absolutely wonderful. A real pleasure I was glad to have. I'm a big fan of the winter sweet treats Japan has around new year. This one was particularly sweet. The chef serves it with something sour which I think really changes the dish. Between the super sweet spoonfuls, you get a reprieve with the salty seaweed on the right.

Give it a try  

I have lived in Japan now for 4 winters and this is by far the coldest winter....and the windiest!! This week while I was driving on the express highway, I felt like I was driving through the prairie in the state of Wyoming back in America, which is know for it's wind that will regularly blow over semi trucks.

Wyoming does out snow Takamatsu. I have yet to see any snow actually stay on the ground here. It melts first. However, as the picture indicates, there are many areas of Japan that do rival America! The picture I posted here is a Snow Corridor in the Northern Japan Alps, Tateyama. That's an awesome picture that would make even Americans that live in the Rocky Mountains impressed!!
  

My work computer was somewhat powerful, but parts of it were getting a little bit old.

About two weeks before Christmas, I did a regular software update and my computer started making a noise like an airplane trying to take off. The drivers for the old hardware I had didn't exist anymore, so the manufacturer forced me to 'upgrade' to a driver for the new hardware. I tried to roll back to the old driver, but it kept updating automatically.

The problem was in the graphics card, and I had become used to a two-screen setup to teach effectively online, but this didn't work anymore. And the noise my computer was making made it hard to teach as well.

Fortunately, there was a Christmas/New Year's break, so I didn't have to teach many more classes with a loud, broken computer. It wasn't enough to just replace my graphics card; I actually ended up having to replace my motherboard, processor, RAM, and power supply. I practically had to rebuild the whole computer - at least all the important and expensive stuff. I was able to keep my case and hard discs, so at least I didn't lose any data or have to reinstall my operating system.

It took quite a lot of time, money, and effort to get all the parts and install them myself. For most of a day, I couldn't get it to work, and I was panicking that I had just wasted hundreds of dollars. So I took it all the way apart again and rebuilt it a second time, and now it's working fine. I'm relieved, and excited to be able to get back to work.

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Slang time!

In English, especially among technology enthusiasts, 'brick' is sometimes used as a verb similar to 'break'.

"That driver update bricked my graphics card," means 'it caused my graphics card to behave like a brick' i.e. a hard, heavy block that doesn't do any useful computing.

Thanks for reading!  

The other day I was taking a walk around the pond at the wonderful Takinomiya Park in Niihama. There are many signs around the park that say, "Caution! Wild Boars!", but I never thought I'd actually run into one myself!.

Well, I was almost done walking around the whole pond when I heard a rustling in the bushes, and then an a loud snorting sound–*SNORT*. I stopped in my tracks. Maybe it was just that goose that flew into the pond? So I kept walking forward, but I heard more rustling in the bushes, and then I SAW IT! To my left was a big ol' wild boar sniffing in the grass about 50 meters away!

I was scared the boar would charge at me to I carefully walked out of sight and then ran the short rest of the way out of the park.

Have any of you had an encounter with a wild boar? Was it scary or not so scary?

  

My best friend convinced me to buy a new frying pan. I've been learning a lot about cooking. The pan you use can make or break a dish. My old drying pan was scratched because I used metal spatulas on it. I figured that a new pan would be very expensive.

I went to a small home shopping center, and found myself staring at a dozen frying pans. They were not as expensive as I feared.

While my friend was visiting, we cooked a lot of things in that pan. It was quite amazing! I was glad that I had purchased a new lid as well. It was such a simple thing, getting a new pan. It's given me one less thing to worry about when cooking.   

Over the winter holiday, I went camping on a beach in Imabari. It was my first time camping in Japan and I had a great time. It was extremely scenic and will definitely go down in the books as one of the most memorable and alternative Christmases that I have experienced.

Of course, there were a few shenanigans, but there is no such thing as a perfect camping trip. Also, the best stories come from when things go wrong.   

Holiday meal traditions are nothing new and in most all cultures, they are significant to expectations--being symbolic of the future. One could say that the New Year meal traditions in the US have been heavily influenced by Southern (Southern United States) traditions. A New Year's Day meal should consist of black-eyed peas, collard greens, corn bread, and pork. Each food is symbolic of things hoped for in the new year.

Black-eyed peas = Wealth
Collard greens =Fortune
Cornbread= Gold
Pork = Prosperity

Whether you believe in good luck or not, a New Year's meal is a tasty tradition!



  

I can be said that holiday traditions involve the 5 senses, especially the sense of smell--especially during the Winter holidays. In the U.S. foods are at the top of the list. Hot chocolate with marshmallows, peppermint candy, cookies, ham, pies...the list goes on. I miss the familiar smell of cinnamon and nutmeg as a sweet potato pie bakes in the oven. I miss the smell of a freshly cut, pine, Christmas tree. Most of all, I miss the warm hugs of loved ones. It is amazing how a scent can evoke a memory or emotion. What's your favorite scent? Maybe we can find it in a candle.




  

So, yesterday, I had my fellow teachers over to my apartment for what is called a session zero in the world of table-top RPGs. During which we discussed such things like how often and at what time do we meet for each session, roleplaying expectations, etc. We also did character creation, which for new players, is always the most time consuming.

After we completed a discussion of expectations and such we moved on to playing the intro to a pre-written module, so the new players could understand the rules and get more comfortable with playing the game. And I must say that the first real play session went absolute amazing; I have a wonderful group of players and their characters are very funny and I have no doubt that as the campaign progresses, their characters and how they portray them will change. I look forward to seeing that progression. =)




  

Over Christmas break, I went with some friends to a theme park in Marugame. We got to look at Christmas Lights, ride some rides, and have some food. It was a good time! What did you do for Christmas?


  

I found it.

After 3 years seeing the seto-uchi I finally caught a glimpse of the Pacific ocean. We usually see specs and blocks and blobs or little islands. Seeing nothing but flat blue salty water was a a little unsettling. That's how it is for most of the world, though! I should get over it.


Some suuuuper crazy dude called john Manjiro is from around here.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nakahama_Manjir%C5%8D


The aquarium was cool too.
  

I love walking places and taking walks for exercise, so of course I have been doing a lot of walking since I arrived in Japan. Today, I will share with you one upside (good thing) and one downside (bad thing) I've found about walking in Japan (and specifically, I live in Niihama).

One bad thing I've found about walking here in Japan is that when you are on a narrow street, you are usually the only person walking while many cars pass you by. I was surprised to find that driving cars seems to be as popular in Shikoku as it is in America. I thought more people would be walking here (although biking seems fairly popular).

On the other hand, I love these long wide paths made specifically for bikes and pedestrians (walkers) that go on for kilometers and kilometers. I took a picture while walking on one of these wonderful paths. They are so peaceful and you get to see a bit of nature and everybody's beautiful gardens as you walk by. I wish we had more paths like this in the United States.