A Night of Beauty, Sights, and....KARAOKE!!!

Greetings from a rainy Wednesday Tokyo morning! Last night was probably one of my favorites so far. After school, Jen and I met up with Mr. Suzuki (the school principal - 'cocho sensei' in Japanese) and Akira (the program director). We took a taxi to a train station and took the train to the World Trade Center building. There Mr. Suzuki bought us passes for the "Night Lights Bus Tour." This was fortunately done in all English, and we were with people on the bus tour from Australia, U.K, Germany, and the US. The tour guide was a little sweet old Japanese man, with some GOOD JOKES!!! One of the first places we stopped was a very fancy and elite top floor restaurant in the Washington Hotel. The food was very authentically Japanese, and soooo delicious! Although my chopstick skills are still not perfected, they are better than what they used to be. After that, we went to "New York City." We saw the statue of liberty and beautiful skyline views of Tokyo from Tokyo Bay. We got to cross the Rainbow Bridge to get there, which is somewhat similar to the big bridge in San Francisco. Words and pictures can not even begin to compare to the beauty we experienced standing there, taking it all in. It truly was a sight to see. Everywhere you look, as far as the eye could see, beautiful buildings were illuminated, reflecting off of the water, dinner boats in the bay, the shining Rainbow Bridge and the Statue of Liberty standing firm, reminding me of home. :~) I am sure that the pictures could not even begin to describe what we saw. Our bus tour ended going through the shopping district and then up to the 52nd floor of a building to truly see a 360 degree night view of Tokyo. My pictures didn't all turn out the greatest, but I have the "real thing" engraved in my head for eternity. What a wonderful bus tour.

After the trip we took a taxi back to Hatagaya (where our hotel is). I got the chance to practice every Japanese expression with the taxi driver, who said that he could understand me very well. My students--I will be teaching you all of the phrases that I know when I return, so that you can impress your parents! :-)

In Hatagaya we went to a karaoke bar. Let's just say that I haven't laughed THAT HARD in a very long time. I had to wipe away tears--that's how hard I was laughing. Karaoke here isn't what it is like in the States. In the States, you usually get up on stage in front of everyone at the place where you are and sing. Here, you get your own private room with your friends. In the room there are two couches and a coffee table in front of you. You can order food and drinks. And then you KARAOKE!!! You have a little digital screen that you can type in the name of the singer or song you want to sing, and then the words come up on a TV screen in front of you and you go at it! There are microphones and a sound system, and you take in instruments like tamborines and maracas to play while other people sing. And man, are the Japanese ever INTENSE about karaoke! They really think that they are rock stars!!! It's soooo funny! I took a LOT of videos about our time at karaoke. Hoping to go one more time before we leave. We had such a fun time.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that in the afternoon yesterday we were able to tour a local elementary school. I LOVED IT! My students--you are really enjoy seeing all of the pictures I took from that school. I even took a video of the students counting in English as they practiced some Japanese caligraphy. There were a lot of similarities to American elementary schools, but even more differences. It was a wonderful time to see the teaching styles and school layout of a school halfway around the world.

Well we're off to Japanese class right now, to learn some more phrases! I will try to post some pictures from yesterday and last night soon. I trust you are all doing well in the States! See you in about 6 days! :-)