An Enkai, an Illness, and a Dog.

An Enkai, an Illness, and a Dog.

With the new school year and new teachers come to Honjo JHS, it was time for yet another enkai. I was rather shocked to find out that it was happening a mere two weeks after the goodbye enkai (quite the rebound). However, it allowed me to use the following phrase which I had just learned.

二週間ぶり! “The first time in two weeks”, referring to drinking sake with co-workers, that is. And I may not have said/written/understood the grammar correctly in the first place.
We went to a really beautiful restaurant (and ryokan?) in Iwataki. I wish we had come in the daytime and the not-pouring-rain time so I could have walked around the garden on the premises. Instead, we all poured inside the room and sat down (自由席OMG- free seating) and naturally I sat near but not directly next to the fanciable Murakoshi-sensei [from hereon known as “Foxy sensei”] I sat next to the music teacher on my left [Shimizu-sensei] and the math teacher and drinking buddy of mine on my right [Ota-sensei]. I was happy with the surroundings and pleased that after a cup of sake, I was up to speaking some Japanese, answering the usual batch of questions about my hometown, eating habits, cooking abilities, presidential preferences, and love life. Oh, and baseball.
I had been feeling quite under the weather all day… not quite sure why. Mostly the lack of sleep, I had thought. However my feelings of general ickiness kept up throughout the evening, leaving me half conscious for a better part of the dining. Sadly, I couldn’t eat most of my food. This is VERY unlike me. I ignored my death rattle by talking to Foxy-sensei and Shimizu-sensei about the students and music and baseball [hooray for Ichiro, the only thing I know about baseball besides the fact that tight pants have always been my favourite things in the world of athletics.]

After much eating (why do so many dishes have small dead fish with eyes?), we strutted down to a local karaoke/bar named “White Pepper”. It sounded very familiar to me. I then thought that Bryn might come to this bar, which is where I may have heard the name before. Considering for a moment that Bryn’s former JTE was in our company and the lovely bartender had been talking about him for going on three minutes, I decided to invite Bryn to join our ‘fun’. He did so, being the sport he is. After a brief encounter with the not NOT trashed Notani-sensei, he hung out with me in the corner where I shared my half-chair with Aria-sensei [the nurse]. We chatted, wiped the blood from one another’s ears as Kocho-sensei sang his favourite tunes from the 1950’s, and drank whatever it was the bartender kept giving us. Unfortunately I had not foreseen that the gathering of two gaijins in a bar when said gaijins are not of the same gender can only mean one thing – HOT WESTERN SEX (in secrecy). I assume now that everyone things I am dating Bryn. This bodes less well for my romantic takeover of Foxy-sensei, which surely was well on its way. I believe he looked at me once and told me to ‘be careful’ in karaoke. One may recall the last karaoke session with this same set of teachers at the Ine JHS goodbye party. Do I hear wedding bells?

The trip home was no less than terrifying as my ride braved the sheets of rain on the narrow mountain roads of Nii-mura. Finally we arrived at my house, only to have a frantic look for my house keys!

At last, I had found my keys and let myself into my apartment. Only to be followed by some very expensive, Japanese puking. Another first time had in Japan.