This weekend started off badly. The power adapter for my laptop failed and I had to go down to Osu and find a new one. The search seemed hopeless at first, but I was really relieved to find one that had just the right specs and fit perfectly, in this grungy old electronics store down the alley. It would have been bad, because I depend on this thing for making my lessons, and I really don’t feel like going back to doing them manually.

Then, today I went to Ichinomiya City ( 一宮市 ) for a free Japanese lesson. Every Sunday, about 50 volunteers get together and teach Japanese to whoever wants a lesson. Out of maybe 40 gaijin there, there were only two Americans, so that was very nice. My teacher for the day turned out to be an 18-year-old high school student, so it was a little different. It was a very good lesson, though, because even though she could speak English, she really did her best not to use any during the lesson. My only complaint is that it was pretty loud in the room, so my meager Japanese listening skills were really tested. This is a really good deal, and next time I think I’ll bring some Japanese articles in to discuss. After the lesson, there was a potluck party, and we did bingo and played some games. It was ok, except there was this one song “Banzai” by Misa, a repetitive song in and of itself, which they literally played ten times in a row. I got really annoyed, which was great because I haven’t been annoyed like that in a long time, so I was due. Umeda-san, this guy I met a couple of weeks ago at a Nagoya International meet-up, was one of the volunteers and was kind enough to give me a ride up there. 梅田さん、ありがとうございました。

Oh, so last weekend was probably the last chance to see any 紅葉 (kouyou), or autumn leaves, around here. So I did manage to make it down to Heiwa park and take a few pictures. Very few. I’m very disappointed in the amount of pictures I took of this beautiful aspect of Japan. I did see a few leaves in the last few weeks, though, just didn’t take enough pictures. For some reason, it feels a lot different than the leaves in, say, New England. Not better, not worse, just different.