| Wednesday, June 06, 2007 |
| Kobe! |
 Kobe Recontracting Conference, take 3: rumour has it that the JET Programme is losing lots of funding and might collapse. I'm leaving soon anyway so don't care much, but this means I got "paid" (over-reimbursed for traveling) way less to present this year than last year, and didn't even get my own room in the hotel! Jerks. It was fun, though, and I hope I sounded more professional and less nervous. My proposed topic (volunteering, what else?) also wasn't deemed important enough to get its own panel, so I had that as a bonus topic after the real sessions were over, and talked instead about Life As a Second Year JET. I could point out right now that *every single person* at that conference-- by definition--was about to become such a JET. Thus, neither special nor marginalized segment of the society at hand, but at least my rooms filled up.
Our Fuzzy Peach newsletter boys have published some good variations on this patented style: Life as a Punk-Rock JET, Life as An Accident-Prone JET, and so on. If I wanted to focus on something that channelled the bizarre-o energy of my senior year English Lit seminar, it would be Life As a One-Armed African-American Lesbian Blind Poet of the Harlem Renaissance 2nd Year JET. That's like quintuple-marginalized, seriously. All you straight-up 2nd year JETs can't understand such hardship. But I guess that probably wouldn't reach the masses.
 Kobe has: subways, trains, lights, restaurants, bars, clubs, fashionable people, and everything else that Okayama lacks. I arrived on Sunday, and stayed in a nice little business hotel like the nice little businesswoman I pretend to be, before switching over to the Portopia. The conference time itself was stressful and overwhelming in regards to sheer numbers of gaijin, but that made going out much more exciting. Stayed out late basking in the bright lights and Redbull/vodka charms of the city, but had to be bright and shiny for morning session. Harborland is the place to go for restaurants at which you can admire the harbor, preferably while eating meat. Couldn't do the latter, so instead celebrated the end of my conference duties on Tuesday with beers and squid legs at Bikkuri Donkey (Surprise! Donkey) chain, which is like TGI Fridays without the annoying waiters, and far less flair. (Also, there's just one small donkey statue, by the cash register. If I ran it, there would be a donkey that actually surprised every patron. BIKKURI! Donkey, my ass.)
Had some fantastic meals, including the ultimate salaryman-sushi joint, which featured a guy who looked just like Jabba The Hutt, except wearing a suit, using chopsticks, and spewing incomprehensible Kansai-ben. Went for a lunch with the other presenters at an organic/vegetarian cafe for soy milk quiche and pecan pie and dandelion coffee. I don't know quite what I was eating, but it was heaven on a (fair-trade hand-carved) table. Shinkansened home on Wednesday, nearly in time for school, and have been swamped since then with classes and plans and things to do. Might be recovered by next week...
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posted by Raychaa @ 9:19 PM  |
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| 2 comments: |
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What I wouldn't give for some Donkey Beer....
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I think the 'surprise donkey' is ground up in their famous hamburg steaks. I mean, why not? Horse is a delicacy, right?
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Name: Raychaa
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About Me: “No man, not even a doctor, ever gives any other definition of what a nurse should be than this - 'devoted and obedient'. This definition would do just as well for a porter. It might even do for a horse. It would not do for a policeman.” (Florence Nightingale)
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What I wouldn't give for some Donkey Beer....