Sunday, December 25/05 until Tuesday, 1/10/06, I will be in Seoul, so there will be no updating.

Saturday, December 24, 2005 Fair

　The weather has improved. Good. My throat is still itchy , but I decided not to go see the doctor because I felt O.K. this morning. Rgiht now I am in the process of packing for tomorrow. I will take a shower at night before going to bed. My wife will help pack the clothing, using "compression bags." Our younger son lost my wife's bike key the other day, so I broke the old lock and put a new one on it. I did the rest of the shopping at the supermarket.

Friday, December 23, 2005 Cloudy

　I did a lot of shopping in the morning-cat food, gasoline, etc. In the evening, too, my wife and I did some more shopping-all the necessary clothing for my trip to Korea such as gloves, underwear, and the suitcase with castors. I will do the packing tomorrow night. Our two sons are eating out somewhere. I gave them a little money as a Christmas present.

Thursday, December 22, 2005 Cloudy and so windy.

　According to my son's friend, who recently came back from Korea, Seoul is extremely cold. It is not just cold, but it is biting cold. I will have to buy thick underwear. So much was on my mind I totally forgot about New Year's cards. Well, maybe I can write some when I get back. Just take it easy. I got an apple pie from a confectionary called Kosari.

Wednesday, December 21, 2005 Cloudy and then a little rainy.

　I have a bit of a chill. Too bad because I will be leaving for Seoul soon. It will be a lot colder there. There was a Teachers' Union year-end banquet this evening. Taking three hours off, I attended it. There were twelve of us there―almost all the members. I was a little drunk, not so tipsy、though. I did not go to karaoke. Seven or eight of us did.

Tuesday, December 20, 2005 Fair

　My upper right teeth aching a bit, I went to the dentist, because I did not want to have a toothache in Seoul. This morning I made my son coffee before he drove to work. My wife has worked for nearly nine days without taking a day off.She seems to be tired. Today's Korean language school's class was the last one this year. On the way home from this class I felt very tired. I may have caught cold. I now have a bit of a sore throat.

Monday, December 19, 2005 Cloudy

　The school was a zoo today with procrastinators here and there in the teachers' room. If they make it this time, they will do the same thing next time. When and if they go out into society, they will be in trouble the way they are now, so I have mixed feelings about this situation. I think it is wrong for teachers to just give students answers only without having them understand the process. It does not do them any good. Such teachers are no good teachers.

Sunday, December 18, 2005 Cloudy

　Although I took an hour off this morning, I barely made it to the station by bicycle, because before leaving for work, I did some household chores. Besides I had to take out the bulky trash. Also as I stayed up until late last night, I was so sleepy and tired. At work I had to take care of some students who came to me for help at the last minute. Procrastinators can work only under pressure. Though helping them with their English is part of my work, I cannot force them to change their habit or nature.

Saturday, December 17, 2005 Cloudy, occasionally rainy.

　After driving my wife to work, I took a shower and went to the English conversation class, but there were only two participants today. Due to this cold and wet weather? In the afternoon I resumed watching the Korean drama "Into the Storm," and it was well past midnight that the whole story ended. I spent more than 12 hours watching it.

Friday, December 16, 2005 Cloudy

　There was an inspection today at work. The office clerks and the bosses looked busy all dressed up. In the teachers' room were students who came to hand in their assignments at the last minute. Procrastinators never mend their ways if they can make it the way they are. In the future they may find themselves in big trouble.

Thursday, December 15, Cloudy

　The electronic dictionary I got the day before yesterday really comes in handy. Characters, letters, and Hangul are big and legible. To me it is worth it. At today's Human Rights Committee conference next year's pamphlet was OK'd. I will probably have to take 300.000 yen or so to Korea because the yen is so weak now.

Wednesday, December 14, Fair

　The "study abroad" insurance policy arrived tonight. It is just a sheet of paper. There was a booklet, too. I will read it through later. Today I was on soccer club duty until 6:30 p.m. , by when it was dark enough to need the flood lights. I did a little shopping at Korea Town this afternoon-( ) and soul. When I got home, my wife was asleep. She said, sending me a mail, that she was so sleepy she would take a nap..

Tuesday, December 13, 2005 Cloudy

　The average temperature in Seoul is said to be even below zero now. I wonder if I can survive that kind of cold weather when I go there in two weeks' time. The other day a Kyoto junk school teacher, a young college student, stabbed one of his junk students, a sixth grader, to death. These days bizarre incidents like this happen one after another. I wonder why that is.

Monday, December 12, 2005 Cloudy and extremely cold.

　I wore my gloves for the first time this winter, thinking that it might be so cold as I rode my bicycle to the station, and so it was. Also the platform of this train station is out of the question. It catches lots of wind after the old houses around there were torn down. I believe this town development project is a failure in terms of the movement of air in this area. It is too dangerous for old people and physically handicapped people on windy days like this- needless to say, when the surface is frozen. This new environment is not kind to weaker people. Another "" world.

Sunday, December 11, 2005 Cloudy

　Glad that the school festival is now all over. I am not good at history, but this time I needed to do some historical research, but the teamwork was very good, so it was not too much of a burden. During the festival. I helped a student with her English. There was a phone call from a homeroom student, saying he would come see me. I was waiting for him in vain. He never showed up.

Saturday, December 10, 2005 Cloudy

　We members of the Human Rights section did the preparation for tomorrow's school festival. I went to work early and did the necessary recording. We carried six panels from the warehouse on the school grounds to the seventh floor. I prepared the arrows to indicate the route so that visitors could see the exhibits smoothly.

Friday, December 9, 2005 Cloudy

　There seems to be a rental mobile phone which I can use overseas. If possible, I want to rent one when I go to Korea. I will have to check it out. Today is our bonus day. Now it is a very small one, though. My father-in-low in the hospital is getting even worse. Tomorrow I will have to go to work to prepare for the school festival.

Thursday, December 8, 2005 Cloudy and rainy.

　This morning before going to work I dropped by the bank and paid for the travel insurance and sent the application form. On the train was a group of high school kids blocking the way but they never seemed to care at all. Today's conference was unnecessarily long, too. How come this happens all the time here? Are they really thinking about students' well-being?

Wednesday, December 7, 2005 Cloudy and cold.

　Today I attended a teachers' education session on human rights. Needless to say, human rights are a really important subject, but ironically enough those who assert their own rights often disregard others'. What they must learn first is etiquette. The exhibits of the human rights museum we visited were excellent. It is worth visiting again.

Tuesday, December 6, 2005 Rainy

　The sign language circle had a Christmas party at the usual bank. I was not able to attend it, but this morning I acted kind of as an usher at the door. This afternoon at the Korean language school representing our class, I handed a year-end gift to our Korean teacher, saying some words of thanks in Korean, but while doing it, I forgot the words and broke into a cold sweat.

Monday, December 5, 2005 Cloudy

　On my way home from work the train stank of drunk men's breath. This reminds me of my father, who would sometimes come home drunk. I did not like it as a child. Charismas songs were heard in town today. Charismas is coming, and when it does, I will be finding myself in Seoul, my very first visit to Korea.

Sunday, December 4, 2005 Rainy

　On the way to work this morning, on the train was a young man sitting with his big shoulder bag next to him occupying a lot of room. He was dozing resting his head on his umbrella in front as a support. Although he was young, his stomach stuck out and he looked rather sloppy. It is not that he had no manners, but that he had nothing to do with the outside world.

Saturday, December 3, 2005 Cloudy

　This morning's two-hour English conversation session first centered around the recent murders of two elementary schoolgirls-one in Hiroshima and the other in Touching. Nowadays There are many Louisa fetish young people all over the world. Is it due to the Interned?

Friday, December 2, 2005 Cloudy

　Although I am now doing a bit of research on the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I am not much of a historian. I think I should let facts tell their stories. Biased data are too dangerous. On the way to work, I dropped by a bookstore to buy a book entitled "A History Textbook Read by American Elementary Schoolchildren."

Thursday, December 1, 2005 Fair

　I did a lot of Net-surfing, reading information about the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I need a typical American history textbook used in American schools. My father-in-law's condition is getting worse the way my wife sees it. He has some infection and and is inhaling oxygen. Again I have a pain in the right shoulder. Is it another "fifty-year-old shoulder" pain? I hope it is not from my neck.