Minamikushiyama and Shimabara

22/10 Minamikushiyama and Shimabara. On the Friday night Terry, Ria, Charlie-chan, Te-chan and I left for Nagasaki prefecture. It was supposed to be a 4.5hr drive but it was extended a little by a vital things forgotten and by missing a turn-off. The latter was probably my fault as I was gas-bagging too much. Luckily Ria woke up and asked where we were and why were we there. Overall it was a pretty good trip. We stayed at Monica's place who is a NZ ALT that come over at the same time as Ria. Seeing as we stayed up late chatting, I slept in a bit. Unfortunately for Ria, Te Akonga and Charlie woke up at their usual early time. Seeing as there were no plans to do very much I thought I would go for walk down to the wharf. Minamikushiyama is a small fishing town. As you can see I took many photos of the wharf, the boats, the falcon (like) birds that were stalking the fishermen. I thought the mini tractor/trailer vehicle was quite unusual and took a photo of it, mostly to show Cam (my brother). I was returning back to Monica's and every person I walked past asked me where I was from and the other usual questions. They were all so friendly. As I was walking past one the fishing sheds a man came out and signalled me to come over (at first I thought he was waving but then remembered their come here hand signal is upside-down to the western way). In the shed were about 8 fishermen all drinking and eating. It was 9:30 in the morning! They offered me a beer... and obviously it is rude not to drink it. They asked heaps of questions and with my limited Japanese skills we all managed to have a fairly decent conversation. I found out such things as; they get up every morning at 4 to go fishing, this day the weather was too bad to go out and that these men drink this early every day! They asked if I like sashimi. When I said yes they got some fresh fish and made it for me. I watched (and took a picture) so now I will be able to make it myself!! It was soooo good. After that, they asked if I liked lobster. Stupid question. They went and got 2 small lobsters for me. In Australia you'd be fined if you got them this small but in Japan I guess anything goes. They brought up the fact that in Australia it is not allowed and had a good laugh??! So, I had sashimi lobster, which I must say isn't that great but then they cooked one up for me. Oishii!!! Delicious!!! (The photo is of them preparing the lobster sashimi). The head/top half the lobster was still moving as the sashimi was being prepared and even when I ate some it was still moving somewhat. Ewww. After that they made me miso soup made from lobster and then yakiniku. Yeah I was stuffed full. I didn't ask for any of this food, people kept on having short conversation is very fast Japanese, leaving and then returning with all this food. During this whole time they drank copious amounts of shochu and were legless by the end of it. Seeing as they kept on feeding me beers I was not particularly sober myself. I had gone and got Ria and she had some of the Yakiniku and luckily she used the kids as an excuse to return home, it also gave me an opporunity to leave (and sober up). In the afternoon we headed off to Shimabara to where Terry was performing at a charity concert for New Orleans. Terry's performance was great. It was good to hear him sing at a formal occasion rather than singing to the kids while they are in the bath. Afterwards I went out with some local ALTs (from South Africa) and did karaoke. It was such a great night. That night we stayed at Jenny's house. She is an American ALT, we met for the first time that night.
23/10 Jenny made us pancakes for breakfast! She's such a nice girl. The pancakes were really good too. Shortly after breakfast, we headed back towards Yukuhashi. We stopped off at this huge food warehouse called Costcos. It's like a Bunnings but for food. You obviously have to buy things mostly in bulk but they have testers for their meat and fish. Yes, the meat was cooked and the fish wasn't. The Aussie beef was delicious. Aussie beef is the main beef that is here as the Japanese beef is (more) expensive and because of the mad cow disease (I think) they still don't allow American imports. Australia has a big monopoly here at the moment. After that we went home and I had dinner with Ria, Terry, Charlie, Te Akonga and Lisa. We all were pretty exhausted, although Ria was the first to get shut eye as she took a cold a flu tablet and it completely knocked her out!