My Supermarket

I kept meaning to take a picture of this store I frequent, but never remembered until now. It has a great name, but as you can see by the picture, the lighting they choose to use at night doesn't make it seem like such a friendly place.

Camping! In the rain!

I finally went camping. And it rained hard enough to flood the river we were camped near so we had to move our tents. If someone hadn't woken up at 7:00 a.m. and noticed that the water was getting high, we may have been swept down the river. And it wasn't a small river. There was a lot of water- in the morning, none of those sandbars were there. But it was still nice to be camping. We had a good barbeque, met some bored Japanese high school boys, did fireworks and slept in tents in a really beautiful area. It could have been much worse.

The footbridge we had to cross to get to the campground. Only 5 people were allowed on it at a time.


Flower on the riverbank.


Protecting the barbeque pit.


Cairn/target for rock-throwing.

Life in Gifu

Here are some random pictures because I don't have a whole lot to write about right now.

I have been getting tired of the weather this month. It's been overcast, humid, rainy almost every day lately, so I was excited to look out the window of my apartment and at least see some real clouds for a change.


These are kids at my favorite school. One of the girls started crying today when the teacher told them I was leaving. Of course, at age 7, I'm pretty sure she'll forget me as soon as the next English teacher shows up.


I was trying to get a good picture of the kids dishing up their school lunch in their classroom, but he wouldn't get out of the way. It's cute, anyway, and that's school lunch behind him.


Here's the rest of us waiting for everyone else to get their food so we can eat.


Some of my preschool students. They have the best poses.


Some of the other teachers getting ready to tube down the Nagara River. In the rain.


Our Independence Day celebration.