Wasn't as productive as i'd hoped to be in the past few days, but i still made a tiny bit of progress. to just very very briefly talk about past happenings...

office party - great food, free for me because i'm leaving, wasn't as emotional as i'd thought it/i would be.

meeting some of my graduated kids at the supermarket - pleasant surprise, they've forgotten most of their english, talking to them as former students feels more enjoyable.

failing to catch the nice maths teacher before he left - missed opportunity to say goodbye, feeling guilty, especially because he bought me dinner once before, wish i could have passed him a flag pin at least as a token of appreciation.

car stuff - my colleague isn't buying it back, but a new teacher may want to buy it, if that falls through, my mechanic will probably buy it, so that's a relief.

super condensed summary over! now for the main part of this post - planning ahead for the month of april (and one day left of march). it's honestly quite a big project, and i figure the best way to approach it would be identifying important deadlines, then fitting everything else around those dates. the organization of events is going to be a little rubbish at first, but it should improve towards the end.

let's start with trips i have to make. i've got a health checkup in the city this coming thursday. following that, i'll be driving to ehime to meet a guild member on saturday. i only found out yesterday that he'd be coming by, and i figured since he was already making the trip all the way here, i should make some effort to see him. the last time we met was probably in 2018? 2019? definitely before JET, and not a short time before, either. it's close enough that i can make a day trip out of it, so that's the tentative plan. and of course, there's meeting chemical engineer cousin and her husband in kobe over the weekend of the 13th. the last trip i want to do is to my old supervisor's house, to pass her family some stuff and say bye to them. good thing is that she's still on maternity leave, so i think that's the most flexible one. i'll ask her for the weekend of the 20th as a starting point.

next, school and work dates. my tentative forecast has me working for just 9 days in april. and even then, i have like, 2 days of leave left over. maybe i'll try to fit them in, but it's not a huge deal to me even if i don't get to use them. so the plan is work for 2 days this coming week, where i will meet the new JET supervisor and go to the schools for aisatsu ("greeting", basically saying hello to the new teachers and letting the admin staff know my schedule). my next 3 workdays are the 8th to the 10th, with entrance ceremonies in both secondary schools and meeting the new students for probably only one class. following that, my last 2 days in the schools are the 18th and 19th (one day in each school), and finally my last 2 days in the town hall are the 25th and 26th. these are more "emergency" days, just in case anything crops up last-minute, or if i haven't been able to settle everything before then. i might use the extra leave days there if all the ducks are nicely lined up.

with that laid out, the plan is to slot all the packing, admin, cleaning, etc. into my non-work days. of course, i can do simple things like some errands and light cleaning on workdays as well, but i'm going to plan for a clear separation in case work tires me out more than i anticipated. with that in mind, the tasks i have left are (in no particular order):

- cleaning the house (2 bedrooms, kitchen area, living/dining room, bath and toilet)

- rubbish disposal (burnables, paper, bottles/cans/styrofoam, inorganics, large items)

- finances (credit card stuff, bank transfers, remitting money, closing bank accounts, paying bills)

- packing (including suitcase allocation, maybe shipping things back, selling/giving away things)

- admin/HR (stuff for the new JET, getting the necessary certificates and documents)

- personal (buying stuff back, eating food that i'll miss outside of japan)

those are the main categories, i think. doesn't seem like a lot, does it? but just wait till the submenus are expanded. the good news is i've already made decent headway on some of them, and know what to do for most of the outstanding things. with luck, i don't think anything will come up and catch me by surprise. but then, you know how uncle murphy works. hoping that me just saying that won't already jinx it.

i figure the best course of action is to tackle things in different categories simultaneously, while prioritizing things by date and percentage completion. like, if cleaning is starting to fall behind, then i'll focus more effort on it - that kind of thing. due dates come first, of course! maybe i should set a target level of completeness for each week? just to keep myself on track. this is my current idea for that plan, but i'm sure it'll change as i actually do things:

by 7 april - finish living/dining room cleaning, pack up most of the clothes that i won't need, change credit cards, do one round of special rubbish disposal

by 15 april - finish computer room cleaning (including washing the carpet), stop using credit cards to finalize the payable amount

by 19 april - settle all things in the schools, including saying goodbye to the kids and moving all my things out (will probably finish that before the 19th), transfer money to pay credit card bills, remit money to DBS, close SMBC account, prepare list of house damages/defects

by 26 april - move everything out of the town hall, decide what to leave for the next JET, clean up my area, close local bank account(?), do last load of laundry, clear kitchen area (put all crockery away)

by 29th april (public holiday, may need to do these things earlier) - hand over the car, prepare for house inspection (finish all cleaning), finish all packing, final departure preparations, laundromat visit to wash bigger items

30th april - house inspection, maybe last rubbish disposal, catch my flight

also, suitcase allocation and clothes! i realize that there are clothes that i've literally not worn throughout my entire JET term. those will get thrown away. among them are a couple of items that the ex got me. one more step towards a 100% clean break, as far as material possessions are concerned. the mental/emotional aspect was 100% a long time ago. i didn't realize it, but over the months and years, it seems i bought more clothes than i'd thought. a lot of it is winter stuff (heattech, fleece, gloves), so i'm not beating myself up over it since i really thought i needed them at the time. but as i gained more experience on how to handle winter, i realized that i just need a solid jacket over my regular clothes. that, and good gloves. i MIGHT consider getting a new down jacket here since my old one is kind of thin now, but it's not a must at this point. i figure i can go thrifting in the UK, might save me some money. or maybe just get a puffer vest? anyway, the current suitcase plan looks like this:

bag 1 (soft shell, blue) clothes, odd knicknacks

bag 2 (soft shell, black) clothes (lesser), soft stuff, souvenirs, stationery

bag 3 (hard shell, blue) gadgets, tech stuff, maybe some clothes for cushion

bag 4 (hard shell, green, carry-on) toiletries, change of clothes, documents

bag 5 (messenger bag, personal item) laptop, power banks, whatever else doesn't fit

cardboard box (if i'm shipping anything back) blanket, other bedding, monitor(??)

now that i'm looking at it, i'm just asking myself how i managed to fit everything into 2 suitcases when coming to japan! and that's with me packing souvenirs and JLPT books, too. perhaps i should be more zealous about giving things away, or i should have worked harder to sell them. well, they'll have to fit, by hook or by crook, so i'll make it happen.

ah, laying out a plan felt kind of good. now that i have some idea and timeline, there's something to work towards. i still haven't done much regarding my move to the UK, though, so that's going to be a source of worry. the 2 main things i need to do are buy a plane ticket and figure out accommodation plans for the first month or two. i also applied to 3 more firms - one independent one, and 2 which are under the umbrella of the same law firm (it's confusing). and i still have the original firm to apply to again. best-case scenario is if that firm accepts me. a middle-ground scenario is if one of the other firms accept me. if all these 4 still give rejections, i may really have to do the chemist thing. but...one thing at a time. i'd like to believe that we are never given more than we can handle at once. it's also great practice for me in terms of prioritization and mental resource allocation.

-random thought of the day: Things will work out!-

You've heard of secondhand smoke, but have you heard of secondhand frustration? it's real! although i was on leave, i went in to the town hall today to see about paying some of my bills. because i wasn't confident of speaking about financial/contractual stuff in japanese (lest i unknowingly agree to something), i got help from one of the other staff members. she was on the phone for 45 minutes with my telecom provider! just listening to one side of the phone call was enough to raise my blood pressure. there was back and forth about not being able to pay via invoice/cash, then a suggestion of deliberately not paying the bill for an invoice to be sent, then not being able to have that invoice sent to the town hall...all in all just a massive roundabout leading nowhere. so, the final outcome is that they're asking me to pay using a non-japan credit card. wouldn't you know it - my UOB multi-currency card expires in march. good thing i have my wise card! just hoping that it goes through when i try to change it in april, after this month's deductions have been made. same for the electricity bill, i figure that it would be easier to do it this way. that just leaves the internet, whose customer service is due to call me back early next week. changing credit cards there takes 2 months(!), so they'd better provide some alternative.

after one day of packing, i've gone through about 60% of my clothes, 40% of rubbish/things to throw away, and maybe 30% of non-clothes things to decide whether to bring back or try and sell off. at this point, i'm actually worried that 3 suitcases won't be enough, and i'll need a fourth. not super worried yet, because i can still buy one more suitcase if i REALLY need it. i'll try to avoid that if at all possible. might end up shipping some things back after all.

one piece of good news that came out of going down to the office today is that the colleague who sold me the car in the first place may be buying it back from me, because his eldest son (who just graduated from high school) may need it to commute to work. if he ends up wanting to buy it back, i'll just sell it back to him for the cost of the remaining shaken (COE equivalent), which will come up to about 40000 yen. considering i bought the car for 50000 yen, i'd have basically paid 10000 yen in "rental" to use the car for 3 years! maintenance costs and petrol not included of course, but i think it's a crazy good deal. in the event he's not interested, i'll probably end up selling to the mechanic or any interested buyers on facebook, where i'll probably try to push for a higher price.

from an overall perspective, today was pretty bleh. i think i need to come up with a better game plan for the remainder of the week, and a series of milestones against which i can check my progress. that might give me some direction and perspective on how this whole exercise is going. also, it doesn't help that the house is in a mess. well...more so than usual. i think things (including my mood) will improve as things start disappearing and more space is cleared. there's also one more thing which i'm feeling upset about. it's really minor and honestly not worth the amount of emotional/mental capacity i'm devoting to it, but i'm not going to blog about it here just yet. i'm hoping for a resolution tomorrow, which will allow me to take my mind off it.

-random thought of the day: Cooking project tomorrow as well!-

A few things happened over these past 2 weeks. the absolute number of things isn't that high, but each thing is significant in terms of magnitude, hence the weight of things going on in my head. i'll try to do them chronologically, since i think that'll make the most sense. since it's been a while, do forgive any skips or errors.

first on the list is graduation. i didn't feel too much, seeing the kids in the big school graduate. although i've seen them since i first started on JET, i wasn't really close to the class as a whole. i attribute this both to me being a little standoffish due to being uncertain as to how to handle primary school kids (they were in primary 6 when i first got here), and the class just on a whole not being super engaging. don't get me wrong, there were kids who made it a point to greet and talk to me, and i got along really well with them. but for the other quieter ones and those who switched off upon hearing english...not so much. being quiet/uncommunicative isn't a character flaw, to be clear. it's just that it's going to take more time and effort to get through and form a connection. and this is just my opinion here, the effort isn't worth it in some cases.

in contrast, the smaller school's graduation was way more emotional for me, despite having only 6 graduating students compared to the larger school's 32. also, i didn't see those 6 students until they started in the secondary school, which makes it even more amazing. the kids there are some of the best i've taught in my time on JET. even if some of them aren't good at english, their positive attitudes and willingness to try make teaching them so much more fun. and for the first time in my 3 years and close to 10 graduation ceremonies here, the foreign english teachers were mentioned in the graduating students' farewell address! i wasn't expecting it, and visibly reacted when i heard my name. at that moment, the main thought in my mind was "我没有白疼了他们", or "my love/care wasn't wasted on them". after the ceremony, i passed them the graduation gifts i got them - bag tags with their names embroidered on them. thanks to my OC in army for giving me that idea! the tags are black, with silver embroidery, same as my black belt. it may seem quite self-centred of me, but i chose the colour combination precisely because of that. i hope that having something of the same colour will help to bridge the emotional distance, even if we are physically far apart.

next is the fukuoka trip to meet my friend. it was my first time there, and i was quite impressed with how modern everything is! like, i went to an unmanned train station with literally one platform and trains every half an hour - similar to my train station back here in kochi. the difference is, the small station in fukuoka had a little machine that i could use to tap my card in and out of! no such thing in kochi - cash only, at least as far as i've seen. it amazes me, how vastly the level of development can vary within the same country. then again, having singapore as my standard/reference isn't very ideal in this case. how much can the level of development vary in such a small country?

the main goal of the fukuoka trip was food. well, that and meeting friends. the singaporean JET who was in kochi until last july is now based there, and he invited us over for a belated CNY dinner. granted, his wife did all of the cooking! there was chili crab, emperor's chicken, char siew, and vegetables, with the usual limitation of not being able to get the ideal ingredients that would have been used in singapore. but despite that, the dinner was awesome, and easily the best thing i've had in japan - just for the nostalgic flavours and because someone actually bothered to put in effort to cook for us without expecting anything in return. also at his house, i learnt that one of his colleagues grows chilis and makes his own hot sauce, which by the way, tastes awesome. it was spicy, but there were other flavours, like a sour tang, and something aromatic/flowery. it's really amazing, the diversity of human creativity.

other interesting food experiences include visiting a 牡蠣小屋 (kakigoya - oyster hut), which are vinyl tents set up by oyster farmers/fishers in the winter months. they sell freshly-harvested oysters and provide you a grill on which to grill them. the one i went to was an hour away from the main fukuoka city, and used charcoal in their grills, instead of gas. charcoal supposedly imparts a better flavour. while i normally prefer eating oysters raw, grilling was a nice change! not sure that i'll be grilling them too often though, raw is still my clear preference. i had to open some of the more stubborn oysters too. during my long break between NS and university, i went down several rabbit holes. oyster shucking happened to be one of them. good to know that the knowledge came in useful, even if it is 15 years later! i really think that we should learn more about things that we like/are interested in. oysters are one of my favourite foods to this day despite the food poisoning episode in primary school, so it was only natural that i wanted to learn more about them! i also tried turban shell (sazae in japanese). not my preferred shellfish. for one, it was difficult to extract the meat. also, the internal organs were black. not super appetizing.

in the end, i didn't do the gay bar thing in fukuoka. wasn't really feeling up to paying for overpriced drinks with the possibility of not meeting anyone. i did consider going to a gay sauna for more M18 activities, but wasn't feeling it either. part of it was the fear of rejection, and part of it was not wanting to make the effort get changed and leave the hotel room, especially when i was all nice and comfortable after a bath in the onsen. ah well. there'll be other opportunities, i'm sure!

had my last 2 days of school this academic year on thursday and friday. classes on thursday were casual with not much learning, and friday was basically just ceremonies. nice and relaxing! i was made to stand in front of the students in the big school, along with other staff members who were transferring out. i still have a couple of schooldays in april, but i think they wanted to give me a proper send-off. well...i don't know how to feel about that. one thing's for sure though, i won't be introduced as a member of staff during the entrance ceremony 2 weeks later, and i actually prefer it that way. no point getting the kids ready to have class with me, when i'm going to be in the school for all of 2 days.

this year, there are a fair number of people leaving. all 3 head teachers in the primary schools are being transferred, along with some of the regular teachers. but then, i've been out of the primary schools for so long that i don't really feel too much sadness. in the secondary schools, 7 staff members are leaving, including me. this includes one teacher who's been on medical leave for the past 2 years. while i have my suspicions, i still don't know why for sure. i do find it a waste, though...to study so much and get a teacher's license, only to quit because the job isn't for you. i hope she finds happiness/fulfillment in her next thing, whatever she chooses to do. it kind of scares me, that something similar might happen to me. imagine me getting a graduate certificate in IP, passing all 4 papers for the qualification exams, and then just walking away from a patent attorney career to, i don't know, farm oysters or something. well, i figure that i'll know to cut my losses before that. and even if that exact scenario happens, i'm sure that having the qualification will open up new doors in other ways that i may not see now. in the small school, 2 teachers are leaving. the social studies teacher (more on him later), and the science teacher, who's taught at the school for 10 years and is a stalwart there. 10 years seems perfectly normal in the singapore education system, but it's an eternity in japan as most teachers stay in a school for 5 years or less on average. i feel kind of sad that they'll be going, but then again, i'm leaving too! so it's not like we'd have much time left together even if they weren't transferred, anyway.

last big thing, and then we'll be caught up for events. that's the smaller school's end-of-year party that was held last night. both schools decided to hold their parties on the same date and time, leading to me having to make a choice. i'm so happy i chose the smaller school! there are nice teachers and staff in the big school, just that i feel closer to the teachers in the smaller school. for once, they held it in the next town, and not in kochi city. less time spent on the commute! the food was great, totally worth the 5500 yen. i was particularly impressed by the fried oysters and the stew-type thing, which i was told contained wild boar. didn't taste too different from pork to me, but i guess that's to be expected, seeing as how biologically close the 2 animals are. i also took some time to speak to both the outgoing science and social studies teachers, and gave them a singapore flag pin.

the conversation with the social studies teacher (who's also been the form teacher for the 6 graduated students for the past 3 years) was unexpected, in that he told me how much the kids loved (love?) me. apparently, one of them has been mimicking my walk! i've never caught her in the act, though i'd have loved to see it! he also shared that my presence brought the teachers some relief/less worry, which i think was really nice of him to say. it's nice to get this kind of validation/affirmation. i've been getting this comment a lot recently, that i go above and beyond what's required of me in this job. but to me, it's just something i want to do for the kids. they're nice to me, so i want to spend more time hanging out with them and helping them out wherever i can. again, i feel just a little bit sad that i don't like teaching enough to make a career out of it.

boy, that was a lot, wasn't it? i'm off the whole week next week, so the plan is to finish like 80% of the packing. mainly clothes and other things that i won't need to use in my remaining time here. then there's house cleaning, and finally, settling money matters. should stop using my credit cards in mid-april. i also just learnt that i can pay my credit card bills ahead of schedule by bank transfer. good to know! there are still a few more small things that i have to take care of, but i don't foresee any major hiccups. one exciting recent development is that chemical engineer cousin and her husband are coming to japan! unfortunately, they aren't coming to my neck of the woods (not that i'd expect them to), so i'm off to kobe again to meet them. while we've been keeping in contact fairly regularly over the intervening years (thanks, internet!), i think it's been about 6 years since we've last met in person - which was back in 2018 when i went to visit them in perth. even though we're quite updated on each other's lives, i'm sure that we'll still have a fair bit to talk about. i'm quite excited!

apart from this entire wall of text, there are still a couple of topics i kind of want to mention. but this post has gone on long enough, plus i kind of want to let them stew in my head a little more so i can figure out how to express them better. until next time!

-random thought of the day: Mildly worried.-

52 more days to go, says my countdown timer. i've started amping up the "leave japan" process, in that i've sold off my grocery bike to a nice vietnamese lady. think i just about broke even on it, considering my purchase price and that i delivered it to her in the city. ah well. the goal wasn't to turn a profit anyway, and at least it sold. next time, i'm going to put a higher delivery surcharge...2000 yen for the toll fees, petrol, and time isn't worth it. but yes, that's one thing down out of a list of about...10? 20? it's not much, but it's something.

also completed my first mercari transaction as the seller. it was a bit more complicated than i'd thought, but i got there in the end. the thing that annoyed me was that mercari offered cheaper shipping options that were exclusive to the app, but when i downloaded the app, i still couldn't select them. even worse, they wouldn't release the funds to me after the transaction went through because of some discrepancy in the way my name was registered with the bank. so i did what i thought was pretty smart: converted the balance to in-store points and used them to buy something that i was going to get from amazon anyway. not only do i not incur bank transfer fees (damned japanese banking system), but i also saved a bit because the seller set a lower price than amazon for a brand-new item! there's a point i want to expand on here, about being prepared to pay a certain price vs. finding the absolute best deal possible, but i'll save that for a future post.

i've been looking at the status of my kitchen supplies and ingredients. should be able to finish most of them and not open any new packs that i'd already bought - sugar and cocoa powder come to mind. bought them a few months back thinking that i'd make more stuff for the kids and/or my colleagues, but nah. no need to stress myself out. the last baking project i have in mind is choux pastry. yes, again! the defeat from the last time i tried doesn't sit well with me. if i still don't get it this time, then...i'll try again after a longer break, by which time i'll be in a different country already. one baking project that did go well was a chocolate lava cake, which was easier than i'd imagined! few ingredients, too. think that'll go into my baking repertoire.

like i mentioned previously, i'm starting to dip my toes into the online gay scene a bit more. still maintaining my anonymity, of course, but trying to be more upfront about things like my age, body type, etc. it occurred to me that content aimed at the mass market really pushes an unrealistic image of what an "average" guy looks like. same for girls, i'd imagine. but yes, the thing that i should remind myself of is that people come in all shapes and sizes, and more than the external appearance, it's what's on the inside that matters more. like there was one guy who was really physically attractive, but in one of his posts, he put "i'm bored, chat with me (no old men)" and that just kind of killed it for me. he does realize that he's going to get old too, right? and i guess it's for that reason that i find gay fiction to be a little unbelievable. all the protagonists are tall, handsome, muscles everywhere, and they find a similar person to be their partner. i guess that's why it's fiction/fantasy. also, it's more focused on the sex part of a relationship. seldom (if ever) do people write about the love aspect, like overcoming challenges together, supporting each other, that sort of stuff. maybe i should revisit the idea of writing a book again...

only had 2 days of work this past week. it was test period, so all the classes were pretty slack anyway. things in the smaller school got even better, if that was even possible. the sec 2 kids became even more outgoing and engaged, giving witty retorts to the point where i cracked up laughing myself while trying to get them to focus - my first time ever in 3+ years! even the usually quiet girl contributed some sass. i like it, and just wish all my classes went like that. but as i've learnt, it takes a difficult-to-achieve, special combination of teachers and students for that to manifest. i'm grateful that i got to experience it even once! in the bigger school, some kids were a bit more clingy when i went there, others were more standoffish than usual. they're probably processing my impending departure in their own ways. but overall, class went above average for my favourite class. is that the bias speaking? probably.

another slack week next week with graduation ceremony prep and the actual ceremony taking up most of the first 3 days. regular day on thursday (minus the graduated students), and flying to fukuoka on friday, where i'm supposed to go to my friend's house for a belated CNY dinner and a short holiday. also going to use the opportunity to explore the gay district there. now that i have a better idea of what to expect, i'll probably go in with better preparation and expectations.

-random thought of the day: Add-on post tomorrow, probably!-