わたし の しゅうまつ- My Weekend

I had a really great weekend, maybe the best so far since coming to Japan. It started off with lunch at Ezoesan's house with May. Ezoesan is a now-retired nurse who used to work at the Genbaku Hospital and who befriended May and me back in September. It was possibly the best Japanese meal I have had. It was really wonderful. Exquisite, even. Also, she showed us how to do the tea ceremony. For the first time I felt I was getting quite deep into Japanese culture, which was a nice feeling.

The opera on Saturday evening was fantastic too. It wasn't a performance of the entire Madame Butterfly opera, but kind of an ensemble. There were three main vocalists, two soprano's and a tenor (the tenor and one of the soprano's were Korean and the other soprano was Chinese), as well as three pianists, an violinist/violist, a clarinet player and a group of chorus singers. The show opened with 18 kimono-clad women on stage singing the chorus. It was truly amazing. The clarinet player was the best I have ever seen. I was glad to see his talents were being rewarded with an excellent solo. Of the two soprano's, the Chinese woman was the most skilled, but the the Korean woman, wow. Her voice... her voice just melted into you. Her name is Chun Sonmi, if any of you want to look her up. My favourite performance of the evening was the tenor's rendition of a traditional Korean folk song. He was clearly enjoying singing it, which makes all the difference.
Sunday started bright and early with an inter-departmental volleyball competition at the hospital. May and I went with the intention of just watching and cheering on our friends but, well, one thing lead to another and we ended up playing in a match. I had never played volleyball before in my life and there I was is a tournament game. Naturally, I was appalling. Fortunately, the game didn't last long and May and I didn't let ourselves get dragged into another one for the rest of the day. We enjoyed the cheering part, and a lot of the hospital staff brought their kids along so we got to play with them too.

After much hilarity during an MSN conversation with my friend online and after running 10km 2 minutes faster than my previous time (woo!), I had my monthly phone call home. Although one of my brothers and my Mum couldn't be there, I still had a lot of fun talking to two of my siblings and my Dad. There was lots of laughing, initially at the huge time delay between each person finishing a sentence and the other hearing it. Speaking to them made me realise something: I am happy here. Before I was fine, but now I am happy.

I only have a four day week at work this week since it is a national holiday in Japan on Friday. May and I have plans for pretty much every minute of the three-day weekend. I'll talk more about that later though. Oh, one last thing. May informs me that today marks 100 days of our placement remaining here in Nagasaki. That doesn't sound like a lot does it? That's all for now; Got to get back to work.