CHINA!

Well, in 7 hours im leaving for China. I will be there for the next 18 days. I plan on going to Hong Kong, Beijing, Macau, Xian, and Guongzou. I will post if i can, but i dont think the Chinese government allows access to this blog company. Maybe in Hong Kong i can update. I hope everyone (especially my family) has a Merry Christmas, and a safe Happy New Year!

12 Day of Christmas

On the 12th Day of Christmas, my true love told me the importance of, the 12 school children at a monument. Here they are at a children's memorial in Hiroshima. There was a child who was injured from the A-Bomb attack and at the time it was believed if a child folded 1,000 Origami Cranes, they would be healed. So she started folding in the hospital. She died after making a few hundered. Now, classes make 1,000 cranes and bring it to the memorial.

11th Day of Christmas

On the 11th Day of Christmas, my true love photographed, my Japanese baseball team.

GREAT news on my team. We won our city league out of 25 teams. So starting next season, we have been promoted and will be playing in the State league! I'm really excited, and really nervous. I was already put in some of the most tense situations of my life playing games with people i cant communcate with. Now the stakes are even higher next year!

10th Day of Christmas

On the 10th Day of Christmas, my true love told me not to touch, 10 Samurai swords on a wall.

9th Day of Christmas

On the 9th Day of Christmas, my true love was with me, when we opened 9 Christmas gifts. We did this in the company of Amy.

8th Day of Christmas

On the 8th Day of Christmas, my true love when with me, to a castle with 8 wooden roofs. This is Himeji Castle. This is a world Heritage site near Osaka. Yuning and I went there for a lunch picnic.

7th Day of Christmas

On the 7th Day of Christmas, my true love photographed, 7 Improvers improvising. Here the "Pirates of the Dotombori" take to the stage spreading laughter to all in Osaka. check out www.piratesofthedotombori.com for a revamped website. Or just click on this post title.

6th Day of Christmas

On the 6th Day of Christmas, my true love told me to do, a six minute jog to the ropeway station!

This was on Miyajima Island in Southern Japan. And we didn't run, not even a little.

5th Day of Christmas

On the 5th Day of Christmas, my true love took a picture of, 5 little origami insects reading tiny origami textbooks.

4th Day of Christmas

On the 4th day of Christmas, my true love told me to look at the, 4 Wa-Daiko Drums. These were a collection of Japanese Drums (aka Wa-Daiko) that we saw in Hyogo. Although I have an extensive drumming past!....I refrained from playing these!

3rd Day of Christmas

On the 3rd Day of Christmas, my true love pointed out to me, 3 bamboo cups on a stick. This was in Hiroshima. the cup is used to wash your hands before entering the temple. You find these "sinks" all over the place, i always think they look really cool.

2nd Day of Christmas

On the Second Day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, two beer pong playing Japanese friends. Recently I threw a party for some friends and I took it upon myself to teach them some American drinking games. I don't have a ping pong table, so I used one of my doors! It was a fun party!

1st Day of Christmas

On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, a giant wood rice spoon.

I went to Miyajima, famous for it's large tori gate and apparently rice spoons. They were being sold everywhere. In Japan, Miyajima is considered the most beautiful place during the autumn season, and i would have to agree.

I'm starting the 12 days of Christmas a bit early. It's 12 days until Yuning and I leave for China, so I thought i'd start it now.

12 days of Christmas

Well, it's that time of year again. I will be doing the "12 Days of Christmas Japan edition" again. I wanted to do it for China since i will be there then, but Yuning informed me that the Chinese government won't let me use the Blogger website in China due to their strict laws.

I will try to do it each day, but it might get hard, so have patience! Tell your friends, there should be some good pics. If you want, check out the archive for last year's 12 pictures!

Comedy Auditions

Well my comedy group just had auditions today. It was great. Consider that my group was started a year ago (almost to the day). Today we had 9 people audition to be in the group. There was a lot of energy and a variety of skills. It was so fun to see the group grow and it is really taking off!

Awaji Field

Awaji Field
Originally uploaded by mtstaffa.

This weekend I went with some friends from work to another island in Japan to play in a soccer tournament. We had never practiced together and played against teams that pratice and have their own uniforms and warm ups! We did great. Out of 15 teams, we ended up ranked 4th after the first day. We played 4 games and won the first 3. After securing a spot in the playoffs the following day, we played a bit lazy and lost the last game.

Then the next day we lost 1-0 in the quarterfinals. It was a tough but fun game. I was honored in the game. I was the only American on the team. The rest were British, Australian and Italians, yet i was elected to captain the team. My hard play the first day payed off and it was nice to see others recognize it. It was a great weekend.

Hiroshima Park

Hiroshima Park
Originally uploaded by mtstaffa.

Here is a picture of the A-bomb Memorial site in Hiroshima. It was a beautiful park. The weather was great, the leaves were changing. Overall it was a peaceful place with a well designed memorial that was more informative about the effects of nuclear bombs and less anti-American like the Vietnam war memorial was. (For clarification, the Vietnam memorial I am referring to is the one I visited last year in Ho Chi Minh City in South Vietnam).