Anne of Canadian World, 芦別 (Ashibetsu)

And I thought I had left Canada behind. It turns out I was wrong. A little piece of Canada lives right here in Hokkaido. At least once a year as a probable tax write-off. Complete with gaijin dressed as Anne Shirley and Diana Barry (Gilbert Blythe was nowhere to be found), several punk rock bands, a merry go round and a train (one of these things is not like the other!).


Ashibetsu is the sister city of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island. So naturally, an Anne of Green Gables theme park was required. The park itself is actually quite lovely, once you get past the haunted amusement park feeling. The whole town has kind of a haunted (or at least abandoned) amusement park feel to it. During the bubble, to attract tourism to this out of the way city, they built not only Anne of Canadian World, but also a giant buddha statue, a large suspension bridge, and even a monorail (it sure put them on the map!). No, the monorail isn't open for business either.

Yes, the biggest reason I went to Ashibetsu was to heckle my friends in their pinafores. I also went to participate in the pumpkin festival. That was a really great event -- a group of ALTs came in and assisted with pumpkin carving, pumpkin bowling, face painting and a costume contest. The town bought us lunch and dinner, and the local ALTs gave us a place to crash. All in all it was a good long weekend.

Health and Sports Day Long Weekend

That's right, another long weekend. I spent today hanging out at a small family run onsen with one of my Japanese friends. Maybe not as pretty as some of the onsen in Sonkyo, but really nice atmosphere and good food!

Tomorrow I'm going to test my Japanese skills and train my way to Ashibetsu for the opening of "Canada World". I can't wait to see the Japanese interpretation of Canadian culture. Some ALT friends of mine are going to be dressing up as Anne Shirley and Diana Barry. That's right, "Anne of Green Gables" at Canada World in Ashibetsu. I'll be staying on for the city's pumpkin festival on Monday too.

Don't worry, I'll post pictures when I get back.

Happy thanksgiving weekend! Eat lots of turkey for me!

Recontracting!?

Wow -- I've been here for all of ten weeks, and I got my first batch of information about recontracting for a second year already! The deadline to make a decision doesn't happen until February, but getting the information today was a bit of a wake up call!

Other than that, I had a great day at the Elementary school. I joined in an all school practice of a song for upcoming "Culture Day", and taught the Grade 4 class new animals. They drew pictures of animals they didn't know in English and asked "What is this?". So I got some really interesting things like hammerhead sharks, stingrays, Clione (I only knew the scientific name, which is the Japanese name too, only katakana-ized to be ku ri o ne), scorpions, anemones, snails and anglerfish.

I also had a Hallowe'en class with the Grade 3's. We learned some Hallowe'en vocabulary, and then had a mummy wrapping contest. It was great fun.

Japanese Civil Servant

Yes, I am really a government employee. Along with everyone else, today I went for a physical. Height (166cm -- I wish I'd known my height in centimeters earlier!), weight, blood, urine, sight, hearing, and a chest x-ray. Another chest x-ray. I had to have one before I was hired too.

This is an annual event for everyone employed by the government. It was an interesting experience for me with my minimal Japanese. "Where the hell are your veins?" is something I understand in every language. I also really know left (hidari 左) and right (migi 右) in Japanese now. That eye exam was good practice.

Lazy Weekend

After a long week (no holiday this weekend?! What do you mean?!) I had a nice lazy weekend. I volunteered to go to a picnic for kids that don't usually attend school on Sunday afternoon, so my friend from Pippu who had invited me came to stay at my place on Saturday so we could head out to the picnic together. She studied in Australia and she's younger, so her English is really good and we can talk about interesting things like politics and such. The idea was that we would head out to Sounkyo or thereabouts, but Saturday was once again cold and rainy. Isn't that always the way? It has been nice and warm and sunny all week, but on Saturdays it rains. Boo!

So we stayed in town, went out for ramen for lunch and went to a really interesting spa type place in town. I forget the name in Nihongo, but it was basically lying on a heated stone floor. The floor is about 50C, so you lie on a towel while wearing thick pajamas for an hour. You drink lots of water, and it's supposed to be very purifying. For maximum detoxifying effect, you're supposed to do it three days in a row. I can't wait to go in the winter -- between ramen, the onsen and this place I'll stay nice and warm.

I also found the public bath. It's actually really close to my house, but because I don't read Japanese, I don't know what any of the buildings are. I'll have to check that out next time I don't feel like waiting for my bathtub to fill up (it takes a really long time because it's so deep).

Sunday we went out to a farm where the picnic was held. There weren't many kids there, but there was lots of great food and good company. It was a really nice day. I'm just kicking myself that I didn't bring my camera. I also met a woman that invited me to a Ainu language class. The Ainu are the native people of Japan, but they haven't been treated very well. Only recently was their existence even recognized by the Japanese government. Most of the Ainu villages that remain are very touristy, but I'm interested to attend this class. Mostly because there may also be lessons in traditional Ainu sewing.

A really interesting account of Ainu life that I read is in a book called Unbeaten Tracks in Japan. It's the travel diary of a Victorian woman, Isabella Bird, who goes through northern Japan and Hokkaido by herself and stays with the Ainu for a few weeks. It's a really interesting read because it's from such an unusual perspective. At that time (only 10 years after Japan had opened up to the west) it was unusual for anyone, man or woman, to go to Hokkaido. Although, from the reaction of my Japanese friends, Hokkaido is still viewed as the hinterland.