It's been a while since I've posted, but I haven't been doing all that much. I've spent most of my days sending resumes and looking for a job. Other than that, here is what I've been up to the past two weeks...

We've been going to Japanese class, as usual, and we now have only two classes left! These last 10 classes have gone by so fast! It will be sad to think we won't see Keiko anymore...

Last Friday, Nick took the day off, and we toured the Imperial Palace grounds. The grounds around the Palace can only be toured by reservation, but I was surprised how many people were in our tour. When I think of a tour group, I think maybe there will be 20 people at most. Not so in Japan! I don't know why I was surprised. Here is a good picture of our tour group.

The tour was very interesting, and the grounds were beautiful -- even though it was drizzling and cold. We were given audio devices that gave us the tour in English while the tour guide spoke in Japanese. These were very nice, until the batteries ran out halfway through the tour. Oh well, what can you expect for free?
(The second picture is the Imperial Palace -- not very impressive looking is it? It is actually much, much bigger than it looks!)


(The guard yelled at Nick and I when we took this first picture. Apparently you aren't supposed to stop on the bridge and take a picture. I would have known that if my batteries hadn't died.... hellllloooo.)


After the tour we went to look at some fountains across the street from the Imperial Grounds. While we were there, some crazy Japanese guy came up to us and started talking (in English) non-stop. He looked normal, but he definitely had some issues. He kept saying the same things over and over again and dancing and talking, something about that he wasn't trying to steal me away and then dancing and then he kept introducing himself and shaking Nick's hand. We finally managed to get away from him and ducked into the subway and went to Takodanobabba.




We went to Takodanobabba to visit the English bar had gone to with some of Nick's co-workers while Gianne was here, called The Fiddler. Unfortunately, the Fiddler did not open until 6pm, so we ate lunch at Wendys and sat in the Harley bar around the corner for a bit, and then went home.







Saturday we stayed in, but Sunday we went to Tokyo to visit the Japanese Sword Museum. I certainly learned a lot about Japanese swords and the sword-making process, but the museum was much smaller than I thought it was going to be, so it didn't take long to tour.


On the way home we stopped in Machida and went to TGI Fridays for lunch/dinner.

Today I am going to HK5. After today, I will only have two more of those left as well. Last week Ken talked about having some kind of going away party for us this Saturday, but I'm not sure if that is still in the works or not.

Here's the latest flower:

















That's it for this edition! 20 days to go!