Off to the village…

After another western breakfast (this time the potatoes were scalloped) each prefecture gathered their members together to head off to their respective… prefectures.  Those further away had to take planes to their places, and most of the planes were small and they could only take so much baggage with them so they were forced to ship the rest.  I, along with my other Saitamans (I’m not sure what people from Saitama are officially referred to but Saitaman sounds cool) took a 2-hour bus ride to the prefectural board of education.  We were all dressed up in our suits because we were told to make good first impressions with our supervisors but man was it hot.  On top of that we were lugging our luggage around.  The way we were introduced to our supervisors was sort of like an arranged marriage.  First there were a few speeches welcoming us to Saitama.  Next, each person’s name was called, and they would stand up and walk to the front of the room while their supervisor was doing the same.  They would bow and/or shake hands with each other while everyone else watching was clapping. 

After collecting my bags and my supervisor (a little middle-aged Japanese woman), we were picked up by the vice-principal of my base school.  (Base school because I will be teaching at another high school as well.)  It was about an hour and a half drive to my little town and we stopped for lunch at this soba house.  If I remember correctly, the first thing we did when we got into town was go to apply for my alien registration card (Gaijin card).  I was told to bring some passport sized pictures with me but I only brought 3 leftover pictures that were all different.  They required 2 identical ones.  So we drove to the convenience store and I took out some pictures in the photo booth outside.  After filing the application, I was taken to the school to meet some of the staff and to get my apartment paperwork organized.  Several signatures and $2000 later, I had the keys to my apartment. 

My first thoughts were “whoa small” and “smells funky.”  I missed the Keio Plaza Hotel.  I didn’t really have time to settle in yet as I was taken to the grocery store to pick up some food for dinner and breakfast the next day.  I bought a bento box for dinner and bread and peanut cream for breakfast.  Unfortunately, peanut cream is nothing like peanut butter.  It’s pretty much a sugary cream with peanut flavour.  After dinner I started to unpack the stuff that was left to me by my predecessor and threw everything in the sink to be washed.  But I didn’t have dish soap so it would have to wait.  I also set up my laptop and realized I had no internet and no shows or movies on my laptop.  So I set up my “bed” and went to sleep. 

So much for an exciting start.