Sparkling girl brings about a revolution!!

Phew, what a few days. Three parties in four days finally caught up with me this morning in spectacular fashion. Sleepily fumbling for my alarm, I make the rookie error of thinking "Just a few more minutes in bed...". That was at 6.45 AM. Next thing I know, my JTE is calling my name through my letter box. "Jim! Jim! Daijoubuka?" I roll over and look at my watch. It's now 9AM. School started an hour ago. SHIIIIIT. Still in yesterday's clothes, I hurriedly put my shoes on, dash out the house and bounce off to school. Of course, everyone's heard the news. And everyone thinks it's hilarious. Even our Kendo Teacher, who usually terrifies the hell out of me, is laughing and asking me if I'm alright. Then when I tell him it's because I went out drinking until God knows when, he bursts out laughing and pats me on the back. Banter.

The reason for the Monday night enkai itself was hilariously tenuous. The delivery of the news went a little something like this:

JTE: "Jim-sensei, we're throwing you a leaving party on Monday!". 

Me: "Umm, WHAT? Where am I going?!"

JTE: "Huh? Ohhh, sorry, I mean a welcome party!"

Some pretty damaging mis-translation going on right there. And, considering I arrived in August and it's now almost December, nobody was fooled by this thinly-veiled excuse for a piss-up. Not that it stopped any of us. And, yet again, I managed to carry it on to a san-jikai. Somewhere along the way, the Japanese teachers I was drinking with found themselves obsessed with the word "kinky". "WE ARE KINKY BROTHERS". "I AM TOO KINKY" were some favourite one-liners. And they were English teachers, so they knew exactly what they were saying!

***

The weekend before was a similar story of excess. Me and Erika had been planning to go to fancy-dress karaoke for a while and, when we finally did, months of anticipation built up into a costume FRENZY. This being a little too public a forum to air some of the pictures that resulted (most notably me as a playboy bunny)... here's a slightly more vanilla depiction of our night's activities. If you've got me on Facebook, you'll know what I'm talking about. If not... sucks to be you!

In other news, I also managed to get my Japanese Driving License at last! Three hours of interviews, eye-tests and form-filling later (all the while accompanied by my Japanese Translator who refused to take any payment for his services!), I was presented with my licence:

On top of that, I got my Re-Entry Permit stamped into my passport so that, when I go to China this Christmas, I can get back into the country! PRODUCTIVITY FTW. Yep, them's the Christmas plans alright. I'm going to be spending a few days in Hong Kong with Tiffany, a friend from university, then am swinging on over to Beijing, where I'll spend Christmas and New Year's with Claire, another university friend. Woop woop!

(Oh, and in case you're wondering what the title of this post is about... it was the super-cute phrase written on one of Erika's towels! Kawaiii, ne?!)