桜

Before I went to Kyoto, everyone was telling me that I'd chosen the right season to go.

And they were spot on.




The cherry blossoms were beautiful. They weren't all quite out in full bloom yet - I can hardly imagine sightseeing next week with all the tourists and hanami parties that will be stampeding the temples and the parks. It would be unbearable. So I'm glad I was there slightly before.




I know some of them look a bit bare. But use your imagination! When they're in full bloom, they're gonna be stunning.



I never tire of looking at sakura. My friend said it's because they're pink and pink is my favourite colour! LOL! I just think they're so beautiful! I walk around and when I see them proudly standing there in their full blossoming glory, it just makes me sigh, stop and stare at them. And I love watching lil' Japanese old people run over and peek out between the flowers.

So cute.

xx

Happiness

I've just finished 'What Should I Do With My Life' by Po Bronson.

And it's led me to ask myself if I'm happy. And if I'm doing what I'm doing because it's what I WANT to do.

The career path I'm looking at is gonna take years to get into - rather, the status I wanna be at is gonna take years to reach.

I see school friends getting married and having children. I'm so far from being at that stage right now, but it's also something that I've been thinking about more and more. I'm absolutely surrounded by happy couples, people holding hands, people being invited to weddings and christenings and it does make me sad to think that I'm no way near happiness on that level. It doesn't mean that I don't want to be there - it just hasn't happened yet.

Tokyo is my fresh start. Tokyo is my chance to reinvent myself and start doing the things that I want to do to advance my career.

Anything that comes with that is a bonus.

Failing to Move On

Four months on and it still hurts as if it happened yesterday.

But now I've realized that I can't let this keep hurting me the way that it has been.

The biggest problem? I'M the one that's stopping myself from moving on.

Why?

Because I don't want you out of my life.

I just don't know how to move on AND have you in my life.

Does it have to be one or the other?

Is there a way to have both?

Please help me move on.

I can't take this suffering anymore.

xx

京都

LOVED it. Loved it, loved it, LOVED it.

Out of all the cities I've been to in Japan, Kyoto is my favourite by a MILE. I can't believe I've been here for nearly 2 years and I've only just made it there.

I was there for 5 days and it was absolutely freezing. If it wasn't for the sakura, I would've thought it was winter. Everyone was wrapped up in scarves, gloves and hats and it even snowed a little bit one day. And there I was with a case full of T-shirts! Obviously I had to go shopping for some warmer clothes! Hehe!

Kyoto is absolutely beautiful. It is so culturally rich and has gorgeous streets, awesome nightlife, and a great shopping area. I was super impressed with the bus system. You could get unlimited travel for 500yen a day and the city is so well connected and the buses were so easy to use - it was awesome! I had more bus rides in 5 days than I've had in years. It was really cool as well because the bus stops had this progress thingy where you could see where the bus was up to 4 stops before you were getting on. So you know exactly when the bus is gonna arrive.

I absolutely exhausted myself sightseeing and going out every night. With the exception of the first night, I averaged about 3.5 hours of sleep a day. My legs and feet were screaming at me to rest but there was so much to see and so little time and a LOT of walking! I was hitting up an average of 5-6 places a day and spent the afternoons wandering around the shops and the little side streets which were absolutely gorgeous.

I had such a blindin time. Seriously. After Shikoku, I just enjoyed the trip SO MUCH and being back in Saga has made me realise how desperately I needed that break. So badly. I loved it so much, I started thinking about whether I'm making the wrong decision moving to Tokyo. Then I got my focus back. I adore Kyoto and I know I could happily live there, but the opportunities I need to kickstart my career are in Tokyo. But I think I will still keep an eye out to see if anything crops up in Kyoto as well. I'm not in any rush to go back to England, so it wouldn't hurt to make a stop there for a while. ut if I did, it would have to be something relevant to what I want to do. That's the condition.

I also got to catch up with a friend that moved there a few months back. Don't even get me started on how great it was to see him. I had such a fantastic time - I knew it was gonna be a great trip. I will definitely be making a stop there again. Definitely.

LOVED it.

Plenty of pics to come.

Bear with me!

xx

When your mind wanders.....

i luv u

u don't luv me

u broke my heart

and u are still hurting me

why do u lie to me?

i beg u to tell me the truth

i'm on a path to self destruction

and it's all your fault

i can't forgive u

i want to forget u

but i can't stop loving u

i'm fucked

四国

Iya Valley, Kagawa Ken

Last weekend (the long one), I went on a road trip across Shikoku.

Never try and do it in 3 days.


Okobe Gorge, Kagawa Ken

I was really surprised when I was reading up on Shikoku - I didn't realise that there was so much to see there. The problem is, we had serious time limitations and I often got outvoted and as a result, missed the best bits of the island. We did get to make a stop in every prefecture though.

Shikoku is a seriously inaka island. Very mountainous and pretty. But it's the kind of beauty all over the island and it gets boring very quickly. The nightlife is absolutely terrible! Well, I shouldn't say that because we only saw it in Takamatsu and Koichi. Koichi wasn't bad actually - but that night out got cut short because people were feeling tired. Boooo!! There are definitely things that are worth seeing - Matsuyama and Iya Valley for example, but it wasn't the trip I was expecting it to be.


Ritsurin Park, Takamatsu

It's always a risk taking a trip with people you don't know. But on a road trip it's worse because you never can get any time away from the people that you are travelling with. A trip like this can either be awesome or fail miserably. I think you can tell from the tone of this which category this trip fell into.


Ritsurin Park, Takamatsu

But I don't really want to get into that too much. LOL! The pics are all up on FB. There was nothing that really stood out to me to want to blog about it in more detail. I mean, I'm making it sound terrible but it was something that I really wantd to do before I left Kyushu. And now it's done.

More Farewell Presents

I got given some gorgeous, luxury chocolates today.

They were given to me by the TT. She's the woman who helps out in the 1年生classes, meaning that 3 times a week, a class of 30 has 3 English teachers at the same time.

This TT was really nice. She tried really hard to speak English with me. She may be working towards teaching English, but her own is....well, I don't want to say poor, but she has a lot of work to do. I found out that from August she may actually be at my school full time. Although I won't be here to see it.

It's really nice of her to give me such an expensive parting gift. And her message was incredibly sweet. She thanked me for my help and kindness. Then she went on to say that she admires my genkiness and control of the classroom (she has a very meek voice) and also thanked me because I'd given her a total of 24 (she actually counted?!) different ideas for classes that she wouldn't have been able to come up with by herself.

That's when I started to realise just how hard I've worked over the last couple of years. I really have worked my arse off. Preparing classes, making materials, scrutinizing films to find appropriate scenes for various activities....

お疲れ様ジェイド!!

Haha!

I will miss her though.

xx

R.I.P

I've just been reading online about Jade Goody.

I can't believe she's dead.

I didn't follow her cancer battle, but I did hear about it and felt very emotional. I just felt so sorry for her.

I remember when she first entered the Big Brother house. Like everyone else, I was thinking 'Oh My God, is this girl for real?!' At first I disliked her because she 'tainted' my name. Everytime I met someone new and told them my name, they would say 'As in Jade Goody?'.

But I started to warm to her. I loved the fact that she never pretended to be intelligent. But in actual fact she was - she just didn't have the general knowledge! The stuff that came out of that girl's mouth had me cracking up! Right down from thinking that East Anglia was abroad to thinking a strawberry was a vegetable.

She didn't win the show - but she should've done. That didn't even matter. Getting through all the jokes and the ridicule, she had the last laugh and became reality TV's most successful star. She set up her own businesses, she brought out a perfume (which actually smells pretty good), wrote a book, had her own TV show and appeared in a load others. She became such an inspiration and more and more people started to admire her. Including me. The way that she has come out of all this shit that she got herself into is incredible.

And yesterday she died. At the age of 27. Only one year older than me. On Mother's Day. Her poor kids.

It's really got to me actually. She died battling cervical cancer. I remember when I was 18 I found a lump in my chest. It turned out to be nothing but it was a very scary time. And I'm reminded of the way I felt when I found it everytime I look in the mirror and see the scar.

It's one of those things that you think will never happen to you. You think that cancer happens in people who have unhealthy lifestyles - who smoke, drink, do drugs - whatever. But the scary reality of it all is that it can strike ANYONE at ANY age.

Like I said, I haven't followed the battle. But it has been all over the press since she was diagnosed and I have spent the evening catching up with newspaper archives and watching TV appearances on YouTube. It's not like I was her biggest fan or anything but the clips and the tributes have deeply saddened me.

Maybe because my state of mind isn't in the right place today either.

But I believe that she has been a great inspiration in her short life. People make mistakes - of course they do. She was cussed out hard for allowing the press so much coverage of her final days but she was making money for her childrem. People do great things and she has really managed to turn her life around and achieve amazing things post BB.

It's got to me. Or for some reason that I haven't worked out yet, I needed an excuse to cry.

R.I.P Jade Goody.

xx