Click here for greetings from Naeba! Here we are at the tippy top of the mountain. It took us just under 10 minutes to ski down it and it took us about 40 minutes to snowboard down it! Woah. Needless to say, we were both stiff as (snow)boards the next day. Ha ha ha. Hoo

Dude. Click here and check out Jonny's mad skills!

Jonathan picked it up faster than I did, though. He was SHREDDIN the slopes!

On the second day, we attempted snowboarding. A half-Jamaican, half-Wisconite guy named Dane took me up and down the hill a couple times and showed me the basic moves. It wasn't long before I was switchin and belly-rollin and...stuff.

Watch this clip. Deep thoughts during our lunch break from the slopes.

What a swell-looking coupla ski hotties!

Just this last weekend (April 1-3), Jonathan and I went skiing (and snowboarding, woo hoo!) in Naeba in Niigata. It's pretty far north of where we live. We went with the Tokyo Outdoor Club. We took a bus overnight from Tokyo to Naeba and arrived in Naeba very cramped and sleepy at about 6:30am. We hit the slopes at 8am and skiied until evening. It was so beautiful! The weather was really warm. It made the snow a bit slushy, but still pretty good conditions. We stayed in a hostel-esque lodge area near the mountain.

Suzuki Rie and me. She has become a good friend. Her husband owns a thai food restaurant in Chiba that serves really good food. She likes to see movies in the theater, so sometimes we go see movies together. She doesn't speak much English, so she helps me learn Japanese.

Maeno-san and me. She is one of the piano teachers who works at Frontier and also one of my students. They all took me out for lunch to a fancy French restaurant on my last day.

Naoko and Monami. They are sixth graders. It took them a while to warm up to me. They were finally starting to feel comfortable around me when I decided to leave.

Here are some of my older students. This is Rika. She's 17 and is starting her senior year of high school. She just got back from a 2 week trip to the states to do a homestay.

Me and Riko. She gave me a coffee mug with a bunny stuffed inside.

Asuka contemplates giving me a smoochie.

Me and Ayano and Asuka. Ayano was special to me because she gave me God's grace one day. Last August or September I was really depressed one day and felt stressed about my job and about life in Japan and I was praying for comfort and peace and when I came to work that afternoon, Ayano was their with her Mom signing up to take my class. While her Mom was talking with the staff, Ayano came up to me with a pink ball, held it out to me, looked me straight in the eye and said, "kore wa?" ("What's this?") It was so precious. I told her, "it's a pink ball." she repeated, "pink" and the proceed to point to things all over the room asking, "kore wa?" I don't know why she had such an affect on me, but I looked forward to seeing her every Thursday because she always sparkled up my morning.

This is Natsumi. She's the little sister of Yasuhiro, one of the boys in my class. She's about 8 months old. She's so fat and so cute.

Me and Yui. Kaito in the background.

This is Kaito. This kid was so smart, but he hated actual class time. It was terrible. Before class "started" I could teach him anything. But after we officially started class, he'd run around and scream and cry and hit his mom. It was so obnoxious and disruptive. He took all my energy. Here he is romping about in one of his mischievous moods. He just ran out from hiding behind those coats. SO cute...but a real handful.

Masahiro and his brother Yuta present me with farewell flowers.

Masahiro and Yui wait in line for a piece of candy.

Here we are singing the "Goodbye Song" at our last class together.

Here are MORE little kid photos! It's hard to get enough, isn't it? These are from my last two days of work at Frontier. It was hard to say goodbye to so many kids that I got attached to. I was given some really precious things from the mothers. Many of them made me little books with pictures and letters so I could remember their kids. It was really touching.

As of April 1, I am the new Assistant English Language Teacher for an all girls high school located near my home. It's pure chance that it's so close to my home, so I'm really thankful for that. The school has a rigorous and challenging academic program and is apparently ranked 2nd in the prefecture. They are a difficult school to be admitted to, so it's a great place to teach at. My official first day doesn't start until April 11, but today I went to the school to meet the teachers I will work with and I met the principal and vice-principal. I am so nervous about making some kind of cultural faux pas or something. But everyone today treated me with a lot of friendliness. I am really stoked about the challenge of this position. It's a great situation! Here I am standing in front of the grounds of the high school. The sign above me displays the school's name, "Chiba Jyoshi Koukou" (Chiba Girl's High School).

This is a Happy Easter card that my students Mitsuki and Yamane made for me. They are from a Christian family in Japan, so they celebrate Easter. It was nice to have this greeting. One night, a few weeks ago, their grandfather asked me, "do you know any hymns?" and I said, "Of course." He pulled out a hymnal in Japanese and pointed to one. Then he started singing. I recognized it as "What a Friend We Have in Jesus." His wife and granddaughter joined in, and I was able to read enough of the words to sing along. It was a really cool, unexpected, and comforting moment.

Bridge construction taking place near one of the schools I worked at. I just thought it was an interesting scene.

Kampai!

Who's taller? Who has to crouch lower to fit under the ceiling beam?

At the end of February, Jonathan stopped teaching this class of adults in Kimitsu. They were very sad to lose him as a teacher, but it's too far away from our new place. They had a nice going away party for him.

Here are two views from a bridge overlooking the highway that is very near our apartment. If you look in the distance, just above center in this photo anad immediately to the right of the tall antenna structure thingy, that is our apartment building.

Climbing trees in the park.

Across the street from the station - an old house or business and a bicycle parking lot.

Jonathan considers purchasing a ticket...

On the tracks of one of the smaller nearby stations.

On Easter Sunday, the weather was really nice. Jonathan and I took a long stroll around our neighborhood. I think you can guess what this sign is advising.

After our day of paragliding, our group drove to the top of the mountain to take in the view.

Couples photos!

Our cool instructor. An incredible, athletic, old guy who would spring around like tigger making sure everyone was doing stuff properly.

Wahoo! This was so much fun. I was flying, man. It was incredible. I was able to do it twice. I sorta crash landed both times, but it was so much fun.

Watch this clip! Here's some live footage of Jonathan and I in action.

My turn...

All right! He's in the air! (I'm getting tired of writing these cheesy captions. Forgive me for how lame they are.)

With a helpful yank from the instructor, he's ready to go.