Sound off!

Actually, let's keep talking about the cold.

Here's the thing: when you get into this program, or another ALT program, and you're packing to come to Japan, don't be like me. Don't say, "Oh, I'm going to a warm area, I don't need super-warm clothes. I can just layer these summer tops!"

Don't be like me back in the summer (i.e., an idiot). Don't be like me then, or you will be like me now, and you will hate yourself for it.

You see, things that are true:

1) Beppu is relatively warm (compared to, say, Nagano, yes, I know.)
2) Beppu is warmer than New York (I am asked about this 20 times a day.)

Things that are also true:

1) When people say "there is no insulation or heating in Japan," they mean there is no insulation or heating in Japan.

Or, as I put it to several of my coworkers: Yes, New York is colder. But in New York, we're not cold

ALL

THE

TIME.

I'm cold on the walk to school. I'm cold when I get to school. I'm cold sitting at my giant metal desk. I'm cold when they open the windows in the middle of winter, because they do that here. I'm cold when I walk home. I'm cold when I sit in my room, even next to my tiny space heater. I'm freezing when I go into the bathroom or hallway/kitchen area. I'm sometimes so cold in the middle of the night that I wake up of cold.

In fact, basically the only times I'm not cold are when I go to night school, which turns its giant kerosene heater to levels of crazy, or when I'm standing in the shower with all the hot water on.

As I said on my Facebook: I think I have a tendency to seem kind of disaffected sometimes -- it's a New York/Jewish/ex-goth/Ivy League thing -- but anyone who doubts my commitment to Sparkle Motion staying here should have seen me half an hour ago, when I went into the bathroom to take a shower and almost started crying it was so cold.

But I have to admit, a lot of this would have been mitigated if I hadn't been an idiot in the first place and just brought some warmer freaking clothes with me. Or believed my predecessor when she told me that the fan heater was totally sufficient for winter. Of course, she was from England, and I hear people are all insane there, too.*

*Disclaimer: I love English people and the insane.

I will say one thing that is also true about Japan, though. You hear all the time about how nice Japanese people are, and sometimes that's just not true at all, but sometimes it really is. To wit: today I was at the store, stockpiling on long underwear-like items with names like "Inner Heat," when a woman came over and shoved a piece of yellow paper into my hand. I blinked at her uncomprehendingly. She jabbed at it.

"This, use this one," she said, pointing. I realized it was a coupon flier, with several of the coupons X-ed out, but several more that were still usable and totally applied to my purchase. I saved a bunch of money! She ran off before I had a chance to thank you, so thank you, random woman!

I tried to pay it forward and give the flier to someone else, but no one else seemed to be seriously shopping, and the one woman I tried already had one, so I guess the universe wants me to be a greedy bastard for now.

Anyway, that was a tangent, and none of this was actually the point of this post. Oops. What I really wanted to do was put up a straw poll and/or recommendations list for myself and interested readers.

So! My fellow Oitans/temporary Nihonjin, what are you doing to beat the hea... wait, no. Dice the ice? Cheese the freeze?

Ooh! Kill the chill!

...Anyway, for dummies like myself, let us know your favorite methods for making it through the winter.

Snoooooow! Snoooooooow in Beppu!

...Just thought you should know.

That's the view from my window now. For contrast, let's see what it looked like back in my first post:

Ah, summer.

It's actually snowed a few times -- way more than I'd expected -- but this is by far the most we've had. Come on, universe! I thought this place was supposed to be warm!*

Some advice for that future JET who comes to Oita: after December 1st, a great way to bond with your coworkers is to huddle around the kerosene heater at school, stick your hands under your arms, and mutter: "Sabii na**" over and over again. Not only will you have the shared experience of being bone-chillingly freezing, but they'll get a kick out of your attempts to speak the lingo.

*Incidentally, it turns out that not only is Kyushu not warm AT ALL during the winter, but because of the dreaded Japanese lack of insulation, I have been woken up in the middle of the night four nights this week from being so cold. With all my blankets and the heater on.

**This is real Oita-ben/Oita dialect. "Samui" is Japanese for cold. In typical slang, it's normal to hear "samii" instead. In Oita-ben, it becomes "sabii." The more you know star! I love dialects, so I have been very interested in learning Oita-ben. The teachers are very helpful because they find it hilarious.

Anyway, have a few more pictures:

 

Fun! I'm going back to bed.

Life in a Sub-Tropical-ish Climate

Now, I'm sure this isn't unique to Beppu.

But I can safely say that this is the only place I've ever lived where I've been able to see both this:

You possibly can't tell because of the terrible photography, but this is snow on Mt. Tsurumi.

A slightly different, yet equally terrible, angle.

 And this:

Freaking palm trees!

...during the same walk to the same school on the same day.

Weird.

It's like that all over the place. Only maybe a third of the trees here are deciduous, so totally barren sticks are standing in the middle of lush, full greenery in the middle of December. It's very jarring to someone who's used to seasons that look more like seasons.

PS: Some bad stuff happened this week, so I took some crummy photos to take my mind off of it. Nothing life-altering (I hope, I should say, since it's not over yet), and I'm not going to talk about it here beyond that, but if you have a free moment, think some good thoughts at me and mi familia, okay?