Killing time and a request for help.

A quick update while I wait for my ride to work.  Not much going on though.  Had some guests yesterday where the husband was Spanish or Indian,  I think Spanish,  but it turns out he could speak five languages.  I can barely speak one so needless to say I was quite impressed. 
Lately our lunches have been more busy than our dinners,  so it certainly does seem people are spreading the word.  Either that or all the work Asuka does on the Facebook page is really paying off.
Getting closer and closer to the day when my mom comes for her visit,  and running or of ideas of where to take her.  Any one out there no any good,  inexpensive places to take a tourist?  Comment with some suggestions for the Tokyo,  Karuizawa,  Kyoto and Osaka area?  That's most likely where we will be going. 

Merry Belated Christmas and Happy Current Year

As the title suggests, we have been quite busy over the holidays here. I take it to mean that word of the awesome Canadian guy has spread and everyone wants to come see and or laugh at him.

It's finally slowing down here now that the holidays are all over but like everywhere there are still a few stragglers that show up at the tail end of everything. But for the time being we have zero guests staying with us so we only have to be concerned with lunch now. That gives me almost two days off.  Not quite but I'll take it.

On that note we here at Hoshinoko in Karuizawa wish you all had happy and safe holidays and we look forward to seeing you in 2014!

First snow and new Visa

Well we've finally got some snow here.  Not much,  maybe a couple inches but that's usually all we get here in Karuizawa anyway.  I am finding that I enjoy shoveling snow lately.  I think it is because it reminds me of being back in Canada. All this snow and Christmas hooplah is kind out making me homesick lately.  Luckily I have beer and my games to make me feel like I'm home so that's good. 

The other week my wife and I made a trip to Nagano City to renew my spousal visa.  It's hard to believe that in two weeks I will have been in Japan for a whole year. Time never went by this fast in Canada that is for sure.  Along the way we stopped at one of my favourite stores; Book-off.  It's a discount store for used manga,  books,  cds,  dvds and games.  I always seem to find some old gems that I couldn't in Canada.  
We also stopped by a temple where we went into a very dark hallway under ground and had to search for a door knob on the wall.  If you touch it means good luck for you.  It wasn't that hard to find what with the line up of tourists ahead of us,  but it was still fun to wander in the pitch blackness. 
On our walk back to the train station we also passed by the 1998 Nagano Olympic torch and a little podium they set up.  I couldn't resist posing. 

Curling tournament

Well,  the big news this week is that I decided to join the IAK  curling team this season. It's strange for me because the only previous experience I have had with curling is switching the channel and saying,  "where is the hockey game?".
But now I'm on a team of players with at least some experience,  although there are other beginners.  Thankfully I am not the only one bringing the team down.
We also missed the beginners league by a few months so we are in a competitive league this time around. Our first match was a 9-0 loss.  I feel better about it after finding out one of their players was a former junior curling champion for all of Japan in 2012.
So once I figured that out,  I decided that we needed to do some practicing.  So far we (Asuka and I) have had two practice sessions and I am getting slightly better,  though I have yet to understand how to correctly estimate how much power to use and I still haven't gotten my balance together for sliding across the ice.  I'm so wobbly still! 
Our next game is Tuesday night and I'm not sure but I think it might be against last year's Nagano championship team. 
Never enough practice.

After work yesterday the wife and I met up with her friend Emi and her boyfriend for a trip to Komoro.  We enjoyed dinner at a Chinese restaurant where I tried my very first lemon sour and some liquor from China.  It was a weird taste,  almost like a combination of tea and whisky but I found it enjoyable. 
Later that night at the train station I found my kanji reading skills have slightly improved. At the ticket purchasing computer I was able to read the two selections for Karuizawa!  Yay me!
Also, I was supposed to be practicing a few songs on guitar to play rhythm guitar with the IAK band at our upcoming Christmas party, but with work and the pension I really haven't had time,  so I think I won't be playing with them this year. 

Winter is coming

Last week I went to one of the shougakkos (elementary schools) in town to talk to the English Club about Canada.  Armed with Asuka's Canadian landscape picture book and an mp3 of our national anthem I arrived ready to talk. Needless to say I was woefully unprepared.  After participating in a brief exercise to help them practice asking directions in English,  I began to bombard them with as much unorganized information as I could throw at them.
I'm not sure which was more scary; the surprising accuracy of what I said, or how the children seemed to listen so enthusiastically,  although they maybe only understood every third or fourth word I said.

Other than that,  winter is beginning to show up here in Karuizawa. Each night after work the temperature had been hovering around zero degrees and we have even gotten some snow on top of Asamayama.  (Asama Mountain,  an active volcano.) No snow as of yet has stuck to the ground but I am sure it will soon.

It's a small world.

This past weekend,  we had ourselves some Canadian guests.  Not just from Canada but from Whistler British Columbia.  Only 30 minutes from my home town. 
       They had come to Japan as supervisors for a student exchange program with about ten students spending a week with host families and I apse just soaking up the culture of rich  resort town of x Karuizawa.
       The real surprise came when I found out that one of our guests' husband is a semi frequent customer at the store my mother works at. So they know each other somewhat well.
         Other than the Canadian connection,  Hoshinoko has just finished hosting some competitors for a rained out tennis tournament, and our lunch service has become quite popular lately.  Often we find ourselves with around ten guests a day. Though lately we have been slow due to the typhoons (hurricanes) passing close to Japan.  We don't get much effect here other than lots of rain, but it is enough to stop people from going out. 
     That's about it for me.  Until next time,  stay classy Internet.