A Quick Rundown

Been real busy recently.

Seems like I'm gonna be busy until the summer time, with Nick's wedding and the Hawaii trip right before that, and right before that, the exploratory Yamaguchi surf trip with Keoki and Steve. Work is pretty exciting too, we have a Hungarian exchange student that's gonna be with us for an entire year, going to classes and living the Japanese life. She doesn't speak a word of Japanese though. No surf recently. Did have a basketball tournament though, we were humbled in the championship game. Here's some pics and quick captions/stories behind 'em.

Had our area basketball tournament the other day. Because we had won our C-level league at the last tournament, we were moved up to the B-level. First game we were lucky to pull the other weak team, and beat them. Then proceeded to get murdered in the championship. I got a lot of points, but all after the game had already been decided. (We started the game down 19-0!)

The pictures above are from the tournament after party. It was held at the team captain's house, Ryuuji. He has that keychain, and is unsheathing the sword up top.

These are from the other day. I had gotten off work early and wanted to check out the surf, even though I knew it was only going to be knee high. The second picture is me reacting to the light changing and missing the picture of the landscape I was about to take.

Slid up to Kokura this past weekend to get nots with the boys, and Ash. After talking trash about everything from OIA/BIF/ILH rivalries, if smoothies are gay or not, and my impregnable trump strategy, I got really drunk and passed out.This is the only picture I feel comfortable showing.

Mongolian Studs

The other night, a couple of friends and I hit up a Mongolian restaurant. The story, in pictures.

Where the trouble started.

The first level.

Mongolian, (probably not actually).

Level two. Points of interest: And1 shorts rolled up, ridiculous headonly tan. And, I don't know how Brent got that last shot.

My dad would be pissed...I let him get the wrist angle. Lost.

Satoshi's Wedding

This past Saturday, a good friend of mine, 聡 (Satoshi), got married to his long time girlfriend, ゆき (Yuki, don't know her kanji). I know Satoshi from my basketball team, the G Suns. He's the resident big man on the team, and always throws nice outlet passes.

This also happened to be my first real Japanese wedding. I had been to a bunch of 二次会's (nijikai - wedding reception-type party) before, but I had never been close enough to the couple to actually be invited to the real thing. There's a lot of etiquette involved in a Japanese wedding's preparation (RSVP, special envelopes, real polite language), so I was kinda surprised to see the actual ceremony.

(On a side note: I had talked to my boy Nick Riley about this a while ago, but somewhere along the line, we had become Japanese snobs. In the sense that, when we came to Japan, we didn't know one Japanese phrase. To be honest, I am pretty proud of my Japanese, but I really shouldn't be critiquing other foreigners' Japanese, as there are other people who are ridiculously better than I am - Joel, Sean, Tim. But, when I hear someone say they are very good at it, and then proceed to be terrible...it's like nails on a chalkboard. Really.)

The wedding had Western and Japanese elements to it, which was cool. What was interesting though, was the Japanese interpretation of the Western style wedding. In the chapel, there was an American pastor, who was doing the service in Japanese, which was pretty interesting. (See above.) What is lacked though, is the solemnity of a traditional wedding. The entire time cell phones were out, pictures being taken, conversations held. I was a little surprised, but, when in Rome.

After that, we moved on to the reception, which was awesome. Satoshi and Yuki were seated at the very front of a big ball room, with all the guests seated by affiliation. (I was with the ballers.) There were slideshows, speeches, crying, and the team had a little routine set up. Our point guard, Ryuji, got a golden basketball and had all of the team members sign it. (I signed, we gotta protect the lane!). We lined up around the room, and passed it around to all the members until finally, it got to the front where Satoshi was sitting, and the captain of the team handed it to him, saying, 'For your special day, since you lost your balls, heres a golden ball.' It was awesome.

After that, we headed to the afterparty, from where things get a little blurry. A bunch of stuff went down, but these were the only things that I got pictures of. Good times.

Brent's Week of Nonsense (and The Many Faces of Karaoke Clint)

Brent, hollering. Me, trying to hang on.

Brent, the ALT from the year before, came back to Fukuoka to see the graduations of the school's he was teaching at. He was hanging out at the spot for about a week, and literally everyday we did something. I, at various points during the week, literally felt myself getting fat. There aren't enough pics to document all that went down, but this is the general feel of it.

KARAOKE FACES

It was pretty much a week of drinking, laughing, and not sleeping. Great times.

3 on 3 Tournament

Morning of the tournament.

Ok, here we go. These two guys, Kenya and Masao, are on the team I play with every Wednesday, the really good team. They invited me to play in this open 3 on 3 tournament, where anyone can come out. I had been pretty tired cuz of Brent's prolonged stay in Fukuoka (more on that later), but had a decent tournament. We lost in the first round of the playoffs after going undefeated in pool play. Sucked. Here's some pics.

Here, after the tournament, I taught the guys these terms: Splash/Money/Milk (referring to jumpshots), and 'Get off me!'/'Get up!' (used when owning).

Got a lot to get up, so that's it for this. (This ramen was excellent by the way).

Weekend Update

This is what was on my desk after the long 3 day weekend. 中田先生 is nuts.

Hiroto and Yuki's Wedding Afterparty

Just an awesome couple to hang out with, really complement each other. Both are really good looking too. Small kine jealous...nah nah nah.

Things started off ok, small kine blurry.

Me lookin' at me.

What I ended up taking pictures of. I think she's taking a shot. Or cake.

Graduation

(Pics to come.)

This was the first group of kids that I had ever seen all the way to graduation. Usually, our graduations are pretty good, but this year's one was unbelievably good. Probably a quarter of the kids were crying their eyes out. I was hugging like crazy. Almost popped a tear out when the basketball team captain came by. He was already buss before he got to me, but when he saw me, he wailed, 'クリントン, ヤッだ！'. I had a heave in the chest, watery eyes (think of when Mufasa died), but was able to hold it together. Good day.

Graduation Nomikai

That cake in the picture was crazy delicious. Had a really good nomikai, and then went on the after party, then the after after party. Two of the senseis that had their kids graduate I had known since I first came to Japan, so we had a good time drinking and talking.

Monday (代休 - Day off)

Sleep. And clean.

All in all, two nights, a combined 3 hours of sleep. Still recovering now.

And just for fun -

He's doing well.

Weekend Wrap-Up

I had a pretty excellent weekend. Basically surfed all weekend. On Saturday, went to Karatsu with 中村先生, who I am finding out, is one of the baddest dudes on the Kyushuu surf scene. He always longboards, (if you look at the picture above, you can see him practicing his steps), but he's well known for his short board prowess. We surfed for like 7 hours, then went home, had Keoki come out, and got some drinks.

This is what your hand looks like after you run into a bushcovered wall with your bike after drinking plenty beers.

Went surf again on Monday with 山口, (I had Daikyuu), was alright. Didn't spend so much money, which was good, considering the amount of fun I had.

Let's get this week started.

The Only Way To Turn 25

This weekend was pretty awesome. Here's how it broke down.

Friday Night - Stayed in, but also built my surf rack for my bike. Was so excited when I had finished it that I jumped outside in my pajamas and rode around. I'll get pics up of that later.

Saturday Morning (Birthday) - Surf Karatsu with 山口, 徳永, and 渡辺. It was really good, head high and slow to break with not a lot of people out, and it didn't seem cold at all. The worst part of snow surf though, is changing out of the wetsuit into the cold. You've got about 5 minutes of unbearable cold to deal with. I lost all feeling in my hand for a good 10 minutes it seemed like. Here's some pics and videos.

Dying from the cold.

It was my birthday, so they took me to the famous "からつバーが” (Karatsu Burger). It was aite, a little too expensive. Kinda like a bigger White Castle burger.

Here's us right after we got into the car and turned on the heater (translated):
Ah, that was fun! (It's cold.) I didn't think we would have as good as conditions as we did. ~ Oh yups, look, my eyes are all swollen again! (Why is that?) Why is that huh? ~ (Ahhh, it's cold.)

Here's us, outside of a Seven Eleven after we bought some hot drinks.
(Translated): Me: What's this? (gesturing to snow)
山口: What's this? (makin' me look dumb)...
Me: OK, final word.
山口: Final word? You the best!
渡辺: That was fun!

Saturday Night - Was out in the city running errands, went to my favorite bar to hang out, Bingo Love. Had dinner and couple drinks there, met a couple of cool people, then called Lena up to jam. (Stealin' pics from Facebook for this). Had a great time. Here's some pics.

Wasn't sticking, but it was nice.

Cute little girl that made a snowman.

Made sure to have a couple of these. (Shout out to Drew and Derek on this).

With the ladies at Morris Pub.

Me explaining how good I am at Foosball.

And not backing it up. (I did beat this guy though).

Jammin' with Lauren, who may or not have wanted to jam.

Sunday Morning/Afternoon/Night - Ordered pizza. Ate pizza. Slept.

Excellent.