Happy Halloween...

I've heard of how Halloween in Shibuya is a crazy annual event.

Last night, I got to experience it and it was indeed crazy, crazy fun! I'm not sure how Halloween turned out to be such a big thing in Tokyo but man, they do celebrate it big time!

Good thing Edsel was in town and really wanted to check it out. Otherwise, I'm sure I would've missed it. Just how prepped was Edsel for the event? He had four costumes. LOL! I invited my friend Dean to join us. Thankfully, he was free.

The three of us started the night as a onesie crew and ended the night as Donald Duck, a Minion, and Harry Potter. Lol! Thanks, Edsel!

My plan was to catch the last train since I had work this morning. I ended up catching the first train instead. Hahaha!

I got home at 540AM, slept for 2 hours, and THANK GOD!, woke up in time for class.

What a crazy, fun night!

Konnichiwa, Edsel...

For the first time, I closed four lessons in the evening.

The reason was I wanted to meet Edsel earlier. He arrived this afternoon. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to fix my schedule properly because I didn't know Edsel's itinerary.

Thankfully, it wasn't very busy at the center today and I got permission to close my four lessons since they were not booked.

The only downside was it was raining. And it was chilly.

Still, Edsel and I met up for dinner at Ginza. After that, we walked over to Yurakucho and I took him to this row of izakayas. It was still a fun night. We had to call it a night early because I have work tomorrow. Also, we couldn't do much because of the rain.

Tomorrow night will be epic though.

Rush rush Tuesday...

I had a bit of an emergency today.

Really, really thankful for the kindness of people.

Last night, I did a bank transfer for my rent pay. I thought everything went well until I got an email this morning that the transaction was not successful.

On any other day, I would've been relaxed because I usually have that free hours before my afternoon/evening work starts. But today, I had a training until 4PM. My next lesson was at 530PM. I had to rush from Nishi-Shinjuku to Tokyo Station hoping that the bank was still open.

Upon reaching the bank, I was close to panicking because it was already 420. Thankfully, two bank staff helped me set up the online payee account correctly and we were able to send the payment again.

I thanked them a million times looking like a stupid gaijin but I was just really grateful. From Tokyo Station, I walked as fast as I could to Otemachi to reach my learning center just in time for my lesson.

Thank you to the kindness of people, really. Thank you to Lordy for always looking after me.

Singapore Chicken Rice in Tokyo!!! :D

So, I saw this while my visiting friend and I were looking for a lunch place near the office. Haha!

If not for my friend, I wouldn't have discovered this mini-weekend market near the office. It's a short walk away from the office and there are several food stalls and cutesy ornaments and knick knacks being sold.

I was pleasantly surprised when I saw this food truck. Haha! I defo wanted to try it. However, my friend obviously wanted to eat at a proper restaurant. Hence, we kept on walking and I led him to Rose Bakery. Hahaha!

Definitely, I will try the chicken rice one of these days. It's about SGD10.

Singapore, you really miss me, don't you?! Haha!

Extra thankful...

Extra extra grateful today. Thank you for all the greetings. I had very simple dreams growing up. Never did I imagine myself traveling overseas, living and working outside of the Philippines, and so on. I'm not sure what I did right, but I'm grateful. Today, my prayer/wish is for your prayers be answered and/or your wishes be granted. ありがとうございます。

Wednesday thoughts

Today was a really good day.

It was really tiring, but at the same time a fulfilling one.

In the morning, I had a lesson with Hiro. I've met him a few times. Funny guy, learning English for his work.

Today he brought slides for a prezzo he was going to give tomorrow. It's a short prezzo but he wanted to practice and have the slides checked.

The topic was technical, but I somehow managed to understand it. Lol. Hiro also practiced his presentation.

This evening, I was so surprised when I saw that Hiro booked another lesson. It was a pleasant surprise because I really wanted him to practice some more. Thankfully, I didn't close my late evening lesson and it didn't get booked by another client.

As Hiro made his way to my teaching area, we both burst out into laughter. Maybe because we just saw each other in the morning.

Anyway, he showed me his updated slides. He followed most of my recos. We also did another rehearsal and it was good.

I had a tiring day today, but at the same time, I was happy to have been of assistance to Hiro.

Teaching really is fun.

Beautiful words...

"Pray continually and never lose heart."

Beautiful words from today's Gospel.

He always knows how to respond to my prayers. Thank you, Lordy.

Random post...

For the first time yesterday, I felt lonely for a short period.

It's Saturday night, work was over and I was on my way home.

I was looking at the videos on my phone and I came across a few videos of the Friday nights SG friends and I went clubbing. Those were really fun times. In particular, I enjoyed the spur of the moment clubbing nights.

After Tipz left for Aus, our former party of three (Tipz, me and Jon) because a party of two (me and Jon). On more than one occasion, Jon and I would agree to meet up after work for a round of drinks at Neil Road. That round of drinks would turn out to be an all-nighter (sort of).

When I moved here to Tokyo, I didn't really have time to think about Friday night clubbing as I was preoccupied about other things.

Now that things are starting to have some semblance of normality, I have more time to feel other things. Lol!

I'm quite certain that last night was just one of those random moments of loneliness. I should keep myself busy to meet more people (hopefully) or just so I don't have to feel that "alone" feeling.

Happy Friday...

I have not been writing for a few days.

It's because I've been busy.

Finally, found a Japanese class I like. Every week, I now attend three Japanese classes. It's not enough though. I defo have to find opportunities to practice and study outside of the lessons.

Other than that, the other thing I had to deal with this week is the cold weather. Temp has dropped to 14 degrees. Now, for someone who's lived all his life in tropical countries, 14 deg is already freezing. I dunnp how I 'll survive winter. Lol.

Furthermore, it's prolly because of the cold weather, I woke up a few nights ago with a painful right knee and an inflammed right foot. Hello, rheumatism? Thankfully, the painful part was not as excruciating as my usual gout attack. I managed to walk, at a glacial pace, to get to wherever.

This morning, it was much better. Whether it's the medicine I took or the holy water from Lourdes pr the intercession of the saints, I dunno. I'm just grateful it's much better now.

To end this post, something nice to share.

My manager approached me earlier just before I left. Turns out he spoke to one of my usual clients to ask for feedback. The client is one of my faves. This client is so dedicated to learning English but I think is spending too much time overthinking things. I want to help really. I told my manager this and what I've been doing. My manager just said to keep doing what I'm doing. He also said the client likes me and thinks I'm doing a good job. Yay.

Hope to get more similar clients. God knows I need it for economic reasons.

But yeah, the feedback made me happy.

Holiday today...

It's a holiday! No work, yay!

I am working on some things though. Hehe!

Whee!

Sun is out again!

Good morning from Otemachi!

The sun is out again today so yay!

Nice Wednesday...

Today was a good Wednesday.

In the morning, I decided to go to Waseda to check out another Japanese class run by volunteers.

So far, this was the best class I've attended. There are two of us in the group. The other student - a British lady - was about the same level as I am. That was great because our pace was in sync. Aside from that, the teacher was awesome. She was patient. She adjusted her speed of speech to our level. She used a variety of teaching techniques to go through the lesson.

I will defo go back next Wednesday.

After the lesson, I took the train to Kudanshita and walked to nearby Jimbocho. This was the other highlight of the day.

One of the people I follow on Instagram is @garcons_shi. I'm not sure how I stumbled upon his IG account. What I do know is that I followed him as soon as I saw how much of a CDG fan he is.

A few days ago, I messaged him on IG to ask if he was up for lunch. I didn't expect a reply because first, we don't really know each other; second, why would he want to meet up with me. LOL! So, I was really surprised when he agreed to meet up.

He's a nice guy. Of course, he noticed that I was wearing CDG Shirt. I had to wear one because I was meeting him. And besides, why else did I buy all these shirts if I won't wear them.

Anyway, we walked over to a curry rice place nearby. It turns out it was his fave. This is one good thing about being friends with locals. They always know where to go. We had a nice lunch.

The only downside was that we had a limited convo because my Japanese is soo bad. I wanted to ask him so many things and tell him how much I adore CDG but I had to make do with the few Japanese words that I know. Of course, he was also apologetic about his own English language skills.

Still, it was a good meetup. It strengthened my desire to learn the language faster and it also made me want to meet more people, I hope I do.

Beautiful Sunday...

Today was a good day.

I had three good lessons in the morning. Before heading to the office, I attended Mass at St. Ignatius. The Mass readings today is just beautiful. It was about faith and the importance of keeping the faith.

After work, I decided to go jalan jalan at Ginza. There was a store I wanted to check out. Sadly, they don't have brand I was looking for. Oh well, it was also good because that meant saving money. Haha!

From Ginza, I took the train back home.

The sun was out the entire day (yay!) so I took advantage of it. I did my laundry, I went to the grocery, and I guess the best part was being able to go for a short jog by Arakawa River. The heavens blessed with me a gorgeous sky painted with hues of blue, red, and pink. Hehe!

It's been a while since I last went for a jog. I'm grateful that my knees were okay. Haha!

After the jog, I headed back home, took a shower and did some more chores - folding clothes and ugh, my most hated chore - pressing clothes. But what to do. Haha!

Hope your weekend was great.

Sigh, sigh...

Tonight, I did something that I rarely do.

As I wrote in a previous entry, I found language class run by volunteers. It's my third time attending the class. Usually, the class is two hours. By the end of the first hour, I made up some lame excuse that I was not feeling well, said "sumimasen," got up from my seat, and left without looking back.

I was growing frustrated with the way the lesson was being conducted. I didn't feel that there was no real learning happening. First off, I couldn't understand what the instructor was saying. The instructor spoke at a natural speed so it was pretty difficult for me to catch everything. I know it wasn't just me who felt that way because the other two people I previously attended the class with also felt the same thing.

Next, I was being made to read the textbook. Sure, there's no problem with that because it's great reading practice. However, after I finish reading a line, I was just being asked, "Wakarimasu?" I say yes and I'm asked to read the next time. The thing is I can read the book on my own time. The reason I chose to go to a class was so that I can learn things outside of the textbook.

Then, there was the rapport. I tried to be friendly and all, but I felt the instructor also felt awkward. And I also felt bad for the instructor because I got the feeling that the instructor would've preferred a person at a higher intermediate level.

So, I decided to get up and leave. At first, I thought of finishing the entire lesson but I realized that at my age, I shouldn't have to put up with certain things. My only regret was that I hope the other two people in the group feel that I left because of them, because it wasn't. Seriously. I just felt I was being a burden to the instructor. I also don't blame the instructor because it's all volunteer work. The fee I paid was peanuts so I have no right whatsoever to complain.

Hmm, I do know my points are valid because I am in language teaching. True, I may be a newbie but I think that after 143 lessons, I may know a thing or two about it.

So now, I have to look for another class to attend. Or maybe I should go ahead and sign up for a "real" class. If I do plan to live in Japan for a long time, I do have to make the investment.

Anyway, I had two thoughts as I made way to the train station. First, I'm going to get that sinful ice cream from 7-11 to feel better. Second, I hope I never ever make any of my students feel the way I did tonight. My prayer every single day before I start my lessons is to be guided to be the best possible ELT that I can be.

End of semi-rant.