Tokyo (Narita!)

Hey all!
Well, I`ve made it to Japan and gotten to my hotel and gotten my baggage and everything squared away! Despite the initial itinerary confusion, the flights went very well and I managed to sleep a good bit on the plane from Washington/Dulles to Tokyo, so that was good. I chatted up a nice Japanese guy on the way to the gate and got a chance to practice before I actually got into the country, which was good. And the guy I sat next to on the plane was Palauan! Apparently there are only 20,000 or so Palauans left in the world, and he speaks a bit of the language so he taught me some words and phrases. He is an American though, and works for the US Department of Defense with the Army Corps of Engineers, and works very closely with the State Department so we chatted for a long time about his work, and being employed with the government, and that sort of thing. Probably one of the most interesting people I`ve ever met.

When I got into Tokyo, I got through customs very smoothly and found the group with Interac fairly quickly as well. They have us all in this nice hotel not far from the airport, and we`re doing all of our training here as well. My roommate is fantastic--she`s from New Zealand and she`ll be in the same prefecture I will, and I`ve met about 5 or 6 others who will also be in Niigata-ken with me, though not in my city. She showed me pictures of NZ tonight also, and it is just as beautiful as you can imagine. I`ve been thrilled to meet lots of others here from all over the world: I had dinner tonight with three guys from the UK and we discussed plans to go skiing and snowboarding, and there are a couple of girls in my prefecture from the UK and Ireland who might be interested in some winter sports as well.

The hotel is nice, and the food they`ve had for us is very good. It`s been fantastic to get back to eating nikujaga, tonkatsu, Japanese curry, and the like. Also, I`ve been reminded as to why Japanese crepes are amazing. I also had a bit of an adventure in that I got over here with my watch and pulled it out this morning and realized that it wasn`t running. So after dinner at the local mall tonight, I found a camera shop and got the battery replaced, and they`d reset the time and date on it for me and everything. Great people, here!

We had training all day today, and went over some general company guidelines as well as a crash course in Japanese culture, which was a nice refresher. Then we were given some teaching samples in the form of full length actual classes for elementary, junior high, and high school, and it`s been incredibly helpful and encouraging. Also, I signed my contract and got set up with insurance, so things are moving right along.

Anyway, I should probably get to bed as I`m still rather tired from the flight and the training today, but as far as my schedule goes, I have training the rest of this week and then apparently I leave for Niigata-ken on Saturday. Also, I`ve heard that since our contract doesn`t start until the 6th of April that we`ll have all of next week to get settled, meet the principal of our school, and find our way around a bit, so that`s definitely a bit of a nice breather to get acclimated to where I`ll be living.

Hope all of you are doing well! And for those of you that I`m sure are wondering, yes, my hotel room has a heated toilet seat. And since it`s still a bit chilly in Tokyo right now, it is pretty nice.

Good night all! Thinking of you from tomorrow :)