Waking up each day...

I asked Paul to accompany me this morning to the Chuo hospital and saw a 耳鼻咽喉科 (ear, nose, throat) doctor and got some proer medicine for my problems.
Now that's taken care of, hopefully I can breathe better and sleep better.

The shami is pretty much part of my morning routine now, so is the kanji revision.
Next thing to add to it is the exercise part, and maybe a bit more Japanese study.

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I've been getting up relatively early (before 9am) the past few days and have been practicing on the shamisen each day.
I also go through a bunch of kanji on this iPhone application each day.
This morning was quite nice and cool
so we went out for a jog along the river.
I feel good.

Hopefully I'll be able to continue this routine.

I really want to achieve these three things before my birthday next year:
- shed a few kilos of flab and have better toned arms, stomach, butt etc.
- be able to play a whole song on the shamisen without hitting the wrong notes or messing up the timing
- pass the JLPT

And if it's not too much to ask, I'd also like to:
- get a new, better paying, more satisfying job.. and start saving
- move somewhere with outside space (balcony or tiny yard space... just need something more than just having the back door open to a parking lot!)

I don't think it's impossible to reach these goals, I just need to work really work and stay focused I guess.

For the shamisen and Japanese I have started a new blog to motivate myself. It's titled 三味線と日本語と私 - Shamisen and Japanese and Me. I post entries primarily in Japanese, but I have been typing translations for all the posts I've made so far.

I think I may have hit the bottom of my rut and slowly climbing out of it.

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With the string of days of I had for most of the week, I was able to cook up a lot of stuff I'd been wanting to make for a while.

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Been somewhat consistently studying kanji, thanks to the program we bought on iTunes.

Anderson's coming to visit around early November so I am rather excited about that. It means I can't put off cleaning up this place for much longer. I can't wait till we have a tidy-ish place!

Another thing I'm excited about is my shamisen. I just got a call from the takkyubin guys saying they'll deliver it around 13:30. Yay!!

I'm hoping to get into a regular routine of an hour of exercise and/or an hour of shamisen practicing in the morning, plus an hour or two of studying each day.

Going out for a jog 3 mornings a week and shammying 3 or 4 mornings a week would be ideal.
Most of the studying I do will probably be done on my long train rides to and from work.

I'm going to concentrate on cleaning up the downstairs areas and changing and all the bed sheets and stuff. Doing a lot of washing today. Make hay while the sun is shining ne.

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Paul's out all day today in Kiyosato (highlands in Yamanashi) to play tennis and have lunch and dinner with Kazumi, Shawn, Ayaka and Maiko.
I was meant to go too as it's kinda for Kazumi's birthday.. but one: I'm not feeling too good, and two: I really need to get this place tidied up because with the all this stuff just sitting around gathering dust it'll just make my asthma an skin worse.

I went to the hospital nearby before work yesterday morning and was totally unimpressed with the doctor there.
He clearly was not familiar with asthmatic patients and didn't really give me an examination or diagnosis either; he just asked me what was wrong and what medicine I needed.
I guess its not his fault if its not his field of specialization. At least he pointed me to another hospital that has respiratory specialists. I am breathing a bit better now after being on the misty stuff for about 10mins and also have been using serevent.

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Didn't get as much of the stuff I'd intended to do today as I'd hoped but got quite a bit out of the day anyway.

I couldn't sleep very well last night so I was rather tires this morning and slept in till around 10.

We went out for an early sushi lunch and picked up a few cool t-shirts from Uniqlo afterwards before heading down to the newly opened Round One for some karaoke fun.

After saturing our appetite for singing we headed back to Apita and got some super cute sockies then came home with groceries and I started on the chicken.

The chicken was a little overcooked but nonetheless very very tasty. I am so full now.

Glad we went out for that run along the river before dinner, that should help balance the high meat consumption a little bit at least (hopefully.)

I sent out my application and papers for the economic stimulation package today so hopefully I get the 12000yen deposited into my bank account soon.

I'm gonna use that to get myself a nice little present... I'm gonna get a shamisen!
Since I'm only just starting out and still in a financially tight situation, I'm gonna just get a cheapie little one to practice with until I can actually play something and have a little bit more to spend before I get a tsugaru shamisen (bigger, cooler sounds and more expensive with a starting price of around 40000yen.)
I'm so excited!

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location: Japan, Yamanashi-ken

mood: tired

Yes, I still use this website, I'm just overly lazy.. and have been preoccupied with stuff.

The trip in Yakushima was awesome even though it was too cloudy too see the whole solar eclipse thing happening. It really is a beautiful place. The four-day hike was both wonderful and terrible; the scenery was awe-inspiring and everything, but the climb up and over the highest peak on the island really tested my limits.

Since the trip to Yakushima, I haven't been to hula or belly dance lessons. It was either no time or no energy...

The weeks preceeding and following the trip have been rather hectic to say the least.

I have decided that my work schedule totally sucks! All three of my schools are now six-days-a-week schools. What that means is I get a long weekend once a month and the rest of the time I only get Sunday off.

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Finally I am with Paul again in Yamanashi. While I definitely miss Kagoshima, it is great to be under the same roof together again.

I had a taste of living alone for the first time in my life and have found certain aspects of it not so after all. It's hard to be so far apart though, so I don't think I'd ever want to go through something like that again.

The apartment is really messy at the moment because of luggage and boxes and generally lots of stuff everywhere.. need to do some more aggressive turfing I think.

Not sure why I can't sleep.
Maybe it's because of the milky tea I drank just before work (around 4ish)..
Maybe it's the herbal tea I drank when I got home.. or both..
It could be the bed and/or heavy dooner draping over my side of the bed..
Could also be because of the increased background noise; there seems to be a lot more cars going by ( even at this hour..)
Needless to say, there's a lot going through my mind as well; new neighbourhood, new schools, new people, finances, skin trouble... etc.

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Aya came down to Kanoya today so she picked me up from the hotel after work and we went for dinner this izakaya near her mother's dance studio.
It's so much better with her than with Ayumi an Saori because neither of us smoke or drink so we just have a good time chatting and having a laugh (all sober and smoke-free).

After dinner we went to karaoke, we got the the self-serve soft drinks course and there was all you can eat soft serve!! Frank ended up coming along with us and he kept going back and forth getting ice cream after ice cream.
It was quite a bit of fun, and we didn't even have to pay (as Frank was feeling generous..) yatta! \(^-^)/

Just one more class tomorrow and I can go home! Yay!
And on Monday I get to go to Yamanashi and see Paul!!! Wish I could go right after work tomorrow.. but there's a stupid staff meeting on Monday, otherwise I would have booked my flight to go up there on Sunday.
It's only gonna be four days this time but any time together is better than no time ne?! I'm really glad I was able to get the time off to go stay with Paul, so glad.

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I am really tired.... but the heavy snorer next door is making such a huge racket it's driving me nuts!
This is just another reason (on top of many others) Kanoya sucks, big time.

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Made it.. now I have another hour to kill before the bus to Kofu comes.

I wondered around hoping to find a Mac Donalds somewhere or a nice cafe. However, walking in the wrong direction and not wanting to go far did not help.

Anyway when I finally stumbled upon 2 sandwich cafe places in the underground subway area, I walked into the one that seemed like it was a smokers joint, unfortunately I realized that too late so I quickly gobbled up my half a sandwich and orange juice and ran for my life. ( well the last bit was a little exaggerated but you know...)

To add to my frustration, there were signs everywhere saying that this area (the street) is a non-smoking zone!! I guess that's how they get their customers...

I am now sitting on the aide of the street in the cold waiting for the 8:10 bus to arrive. And this little sitting spot was not easy come by either as it had been raining so everywhere is wet.

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Finally got the phone to connect properly onton the mobilepoint network at Mac Donald's, so I'm really taking my time with my "Happy Set" here.

Got up early-ish and went to the onsen, but my room was ripped apart still because the cleaning lady was taking her time. I guess people usually leave the hotel in the morning and go back in the evening..

Anyway, just got a call from Frank to go have lunch with Troy at Bond's; I'm just going to order hot chocolate.

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I've received the last of the weekend photos on Yo's camera, still waiting for Bachiko's.

I should think about finishing my posts about their trip down here soon, but I have to head out in about 10 minutes.
I'll do it when I get home.

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