As ordinary as any other; also, Gaijin life.

I thought that i'd do a bit of a 'day in the life', just for shits and giggles. Give you a bit of insight into what is actually happening over here in this strange little place.

Khan's day, 21st Feb 2007

6:15am - 6:59 am Wake up, shower, shave, then walk to the office to punch in to the timeclock. After this I had approx 15 min to go to staff kitchen to eat a bowl cereal and back home to brush my teeth (Approx distance from bed to office to staff kitchen is around 50m).
7:00 am - 9:00am Start to prepare for the 100+ students who will shortly be arriving for a buffet breakfast. When students arrived we need monitored the levels of all food and drink, restocking everything, making conversation with the students and posing for quite a few photos. Yes, I am a super-star now I am in Japan!
9:01am - 9:30am Today two workmates and myself we requested to appear in a 'movie' for a visiting group of university students, it was pretty much just a film to tell the students all the different things about British Hills. Once again, now i'm famous. Big in Japan as they say.
9:31am - 11:30am After my Japanese acting debut we returned to clean up the refectory (yes, it's a funny word) and eat a proper breakfast. Then set everything up for lunch. Cleaning tables and setting knives and forks. Luckily there was no polishing of glass or cuttlery today.
11:31am - 1:00pm Normally as I am on a B shift today I would finish at 12 and be able to go snowboarding, not today. I stay back till 1pm, which means I get to repeat breakfast type situation with the same junior high school girls. More conversation and of course photos.
1:01pm - 1:30pm Quick lunch in the staff kitchen, today they had some vegetable tempura. At least I think it was vegetable...
1:31pm - 2:00pm Back home, change out of the monkey suit and fall asleep on the bed for half an hour.
2:01pm (ish) - 3:00pm Walk over to swimming pool, today I swam only 10 laps (relax, it's a V small pool!) then went into the sauna, plunge bath, mineral pool and finally spa. I know, sucks to be me!
3:00pm - 4:00pm Workout while listening to music, staring out at the snow. We have an exercise bike and some weights so i'm trying to stay in shape. I miss my bike!
4:00pm - 5:00pm This is where we are currently. Just messing about on the internet, making my life sound interesting.
5:01pm - 8:30pm In a little while i'll put the silly clothes back on, inhale a quick meal and go start to set up for dinner. Tonight I might be doing table service as well as buffet. It's pretty quiet here at the moment so not too many private guests.
8:31pm - ? Pub-u. For a beer-u. Marika is off at 10pm tonight so might watch a movie or something.

Well there you have it, no day so far has been like today and I imagine tomorrow will be different again. We're off snowboarding on Friday which is cool, it's very sunny here at the moment though so not sure what conditions will be like. Then again it can dump all night and you'll wake up with 50cm of snow at yr door so i'll wait and see.
Thanks for being interested, smell you later.

Cabin fever

Today was the first time since we arrived that Marika and I were able to leave the mountain where we are living / working to go and see a tiny part of Japan and pick up some much needed supplies. We took a shuttle bus to the town of Shirakawa which is about 40 minutes away. We had heard rumours about this magical place called the 'hundred yen store', which was full of amazing and handy things to buy. Well, you can imagine how happy we were, everything from coat-hangers to sesame snacks. Even a little note-pad for my Japanese phrases! We also swung past the foreign food store for some staples so we can make some of our own food every now and again, recently there has been a little unrest amongst the 5 vegetarians which ended in a letter to management. Suffice to say there has been greater choice for us which is great, however it's still not a huge range and fresh vegetables don't appear too often so a little cache of our own doesn't hurt.
Of course I also bought some Japanese beer.
We've not had too much snow over the last few days so we're trying to make our own fun during our free time, Marika and I went with our mate Tom to build a few jumps to practise on, as well as scoping out a little 'back country' within walking distance of our staff-accom.
On the work front i'm getting more confident with being a waiter, the other night I had to serve a table who had a bottle of Dom Pérignon which made me pretty nervous, the bottle cost more than I would earn in a week.
We're both trying to work on our Japanese but it's not so easy being surrounded by gaijin and being strictly prohibited from talking in anything other than english to guests. C'est la vie eh?

snow fairies

The snow fairies visited last night...it was quite difficult getting out the front door this morning and I fell into knee deep snow trying to find my way to the office... not to mention trying to make my way to the pub this morning as some kid thought they left their glasses in there and ending up on my ass sliding down the stairs covered in 2 foot of snow as I misjudged where the second one was...ugh... Now where there was grass last week there's now 3 foot of snow...no shit!

I'm hoping the fairies visit again tonight as I am heading up to the hill tomorrow morning...
Not much else to report as we still haven't got off the hill...

Ooohhh learning a couple of new Japanese phrases...
Phonetically: Sodessneigh...Gochesosamadeshta! and im not sure if i mentioned this but etto is Japanese for um...

Anyway I'm going to bed now, need to be bright and fresh for the morning...gonna try doing switch lots tomorrow...watch out hips...

Fresh powder and more photos.

I Just thought i'd drop in a quick update in as I have the day off from work. Marika and I went snowboarding this morning with one of our workmates. It has been snowing fairly consistently for the past two days so it was pretty exciting, although as it is a 'bank holiday' here there were loads of people around. The snow was pretty sticky and slow but we managed to find some fun anyway, all that time in Nakiska has taught us to appreciate ANY new snow! There is a nice little park as well as a boarder-X with some smallish jumps which are good for us to practise on. We are still looking into buying a season pass each but at the moment we are borrowing ones from other workmates, we gaijin all look the same so it doesn't really matter that they all have photos on them! Think we might go again tomorrow.


Yesterday we rented a pair of boots each and went for a walk around the British Hills grounds, ther is actually a few foot of snow covering most of the ground in the bushland behine the staff accom even though a lot of it has already melted away. We walked over to a lookout where you can usually see Lake Hattoriko but it was snowing and the visibility was pretty bad. Along the way we came accross this sign which we thought was kind of amusing, anyone like to let us know what it means? Gabe, i'm looking at you! Apparently the hotel is hiring out 'bear-bells' to guests to take with them when they walk nowadays,
due to the heat a few of the bears have already come out of hibernation, i'm not sure i'd like to announce my presence to the bears like that.

Work has been pretty busy these past few days, i'm also coming to terms with the fact that I am now a waiter. I've never really had an inclination to work in hospitality before, not sure that I will again either. We've had a few long days but the overtime will help fund the rest of our trip. I'll be sure to post and let you all know the first time I drop a stack of plates or spill hot soup all over a guest as well. Marika does look like an air-hostess but seeing as I have to wear a vest and tie I suppose I should shut my mouth. Yes, we will post some photos of us in our monkey suits ASAP.
Well, I think it's time for me to go swimming. I'm trying to stay fit while i'm here which is proving to be quite an effort considering my limited diet. I will stay strong! For a month at least...
Drop us a line some time soon, love to hear what's happening back home.

Adjustment and bruised foreheads

Well we're adjusting a little bit to the old hospitality gig...Khan is very excited that he can now carry 3 plates and 4 soups...and I've got pages and pages of notes of procedures and tidbits that i have to now about the place...my head is about to burst with all this information...not to mention trying to pick up a bit of the language at the same time...especially as the computers i have to work with are not only Windows 98 machines but they run a Japanese version of the operating system so everything is in Kanji! It's really testing my memory trying to remember which button or which menu item i need to choose... So retarded seeing as the people who use those computers all speak English...
Not to mention the ADSL internet connection that the whole hotel, including staff house, office and god knows who else use which is retardedly slow and often goes down as the system is old and they don't want to spend money on upgrading...
But reception is kinda funny, the school girls want to get their photos taken with you and ask you all sorts of funny questions and you have to sit through them reading to you from their 'Present book'.
Khan reckons i look like an air hostess as i have to wear this stupid scarf thing around my neck. i'm trying to convince Khan we should get our photo taken together in our uniforms cos we look so freakin' hilarious...

Anyways, we had an induction by fire last night, literally...
There was an accident and emergency themed party at the pub...some of the costumes were great considering what little we had to work with...Khan had a box of band aids and proceeded to stick them all over his face, me i went for the intellectual costume, I was an accident waiting to happen...
So the baptism by fire was Drambuie shots lit on fire whilst holding it in yr mouth. Very warming...but apparently you have to be careful not to spill it on your lips otherwise it really hurts...see photos below...so everybody got suitably drunk me forgetting the fact that i had to work at 6:45 this morning, running to the bathroom from reception as i thought i was going to chunder and i didn't think they'd appreciate it all over the antiques and expensive looking rugs...
god why don't I ever remember, beer before liquor...never sicker...
The bruising...yes, I found this at lunch time when my eyes weren't as bleary anymore... right in the middle of my forehead I have a bruise where Khan stuck a sticky dart on my forehead...he also found he had some on the side of his head...those things need warnings on the packages...

We haven't been snowboarding again yet but the weather hasn't been very good and I'm not sure how much longer the snow is going to stay around for...we're probably going to buy a season pass anyways as day passes cost us 2100 yen and the season pass 15000 yen so with me doing a fair few late shifts, it means I can head over to the hill in the morning get in a few runs and then catch the shuttle back to start work at 1. Sweet...

Swanky bedclothes from the 'business hotel'.	Khan in his snowboard bag.
The ski-resort from British Hills.	Flaming Booze.
Band-aid face and bandage boy.	Our little room.

Little Britain

Ok, so it's just as funny as we all thought...Yes, everything is like the pictures on the website, and the funniest thing is that a lot of the school kids that are staying here have Harry Potter like cloaks so it's like we've stepped back in time and are living in England...except that they're all Japanese kids...

We both start work tomorrow. I'm working reception and Khan is working in the 'Refectory' which looks so much like the big food hall out of Harry Potter it's not funny...I think what he'll be doing there will be serving food and the likes. Me, sitting behind a big oak desk signing people in and out...We're not allowed to speak a word of Japanese to the guests so, practising our Japanese is a little hard. We've learnt a few phrases here and there but there are so many ways to say things with different levels of pliteness it's just frustrating to try to remember the all, especially with my sieve-like memory...

Everybody here so far has been great. They're very accomodating and love to have new people, i think the isolation has got to a few of them, apparently they get very excited when there's new people coming and there are so many names and faces to rememeber, some British, some Irish, some Aussies and a lot of Japanese who we can practise our Japanese with whilst guests aren't around...

Luckily both Khan and I got today off so we took the opportunity to go visit the local ski hill at which we get half price lift tickets and a shuttle bus takes us fromt he hotel to the resort and back again in the afternoon.

Fuuuuunnnn...oh god I've missed the feeling of snowboarding...the hill is a small one, not very steep but there's fun bits here and there...it's like riding a bike so by the first run we were back...I think I'm going to focus a lot more on technique now and gonna try hitting the park a bit more...just cos there's not that much terrain and i kinda wanna challenge myself to get better...Apparently, it's been a bit light on for snow this year, they were saying that around the grounds of British Hills it's usually about 1.5-2 metres deep but it's only about 80-100cms...I have no idea what it was at Grandee Hatoriko as everything was in Japanese...

Sorry no photos as we forgot the camera, and i haven't had a chance to take photos of British Hills yet either...I will soon, i promise...

Anyways, got back from snowboarding and have decided we're going to use the facilities to their fullest and went and had a swim, jacuzzi and sauna...noice...
okies and now we're going to have a beer in ye olde pub...so must go...

By the way, neither of us can receive sms's or phone calls but we do have a phone in our room. Soooo, if you wanna call us and speak to us, the number is 81-248-85-1313 and then somebody will answer most likely in Japanese, don't freak, just say "4012 please" and they'll put you thru...otherwise email us...or send us nice stuff to: Khan and Marika c-/ British Hills,
1-8 Aza Shibakusa, Ohaza Tarao, Ten-ei Mura, Iwase-Gun, Fukushima-Ken 962-0622, JAPAN

thanks to those emailing and commenting, it's really nice to know somebody is reading our rants!

Now vending...everything!

We made it.

Honestly I can't think of anything i'd like to do for 10 hours straight so certainly being on a plane wasn't exactly 'big fun'. Marika watched 3.85 movies and we ate 4 airline curries.

Today after we had an induction for our new 'jobs', Nightmare! More about that later. This afternoon we were able to spend a little time with my brother Gabe which was great. We visited Shinjuku, Harijuku and Roppongi. We saw the crazy dressed 'Cosplay' kids and the hundreds of photographers buzzing all around them. Ended up eating Indian curry for dinner (after a major lunchtime debacle), vegetarianism is sure going to be fun.
Off to our hotel tomorrow so will post again soon. Now, it's Biru'o'clock.