thankful

the singaporean JETs have been keeping in touch with each other via mass emails - i love them and really makes me feel closer to home somewhat - and i'm feeling rather blessed at the moment to have been placed in a city proper and to be a city JET to boot.

lots of them have been experiencing things like loneliness and many inconveniences, and i feel so thankful that i have 6 other people in my apartment and about 14 others just a phone call away, and even though there are cultural gaps between the angmohs and i*. it's just great that there are people i know close by (the nearest is living right in the room directly above mine!). **

i guess being a city JET in osaka means that i will never have the chance to experience the type of 'community living' that one in a more suburban or rural area would, i'm really loving the convenience that i have here - i've been to nara, kyoto and kobe, all in the span of.. 5 days? and kobe's sannomiya station is just 290yen away. super damn cheap!

i love the fact that there's a convenience store just 5min down the road, and that i have 3 supermarkets of varying sizes within a 7min cycling distance. and that i can shop for clothes in jusco. and that the bus stop is just opposite the road outside my apartment complex. and that i have a 100yen store and the post office nearby too. and that there's no lack for things to do and places to see in osaka, and that if i want to experience some place quieter, i'm in a pretty nice and quiet residential area with some small parks that are rather quiet in the day.

i dont think i've complained about osaka yet, but i'll remind myself that i have so many reasons not to if and when i feel the need to complain!

 

*: for example, a bunch of them are out checking out pubs in our area and having drinks for the 3rd time in 6 days. we had a major party on friday, and today is monday, and alcohol figures in the picture again. i know that consuming alcohol is part and parcel of angmoh (and japanese and korean and actually even chinese culture but NOT singaporean and i think that's what maters) culture and that they dont view drinking the same way as most singaporeans/i do, i frankly find this rather excessive! i might have gone out with them if i were free this evening, but i'm relieved in a way that i was out with some friends - those whom i met on the hyogo ship programme - today and couldnt make it. i dont really want to do too much damage to my liver, and i'm really not that much into the whole drinking thing even though i do like my occasional - read, occasional - drink like my umeshu and cocktails. and this may be blasphemous to some, but i'm NOT a fan of live music. i like to protect my hearing and would greatly prefer to be able to talk to people without having to shout, thank you very much. i'm really sorry if i sound bitchy here, but urgh! this has to be voiced out somewhere. sorry!

**: i realise that i've yet to say anything about my fellow JETs! despite that little rant above, i think they're on the whole a great bunch of people. everyone has been really helpful and rather friendly (i say rather, cos you can already see who gets along better with who, but really they're all nice), and i think this little bit doesnt do justice to the whole bunch of us. i will talk more about the other JETs, but i dont think i'll do that till i actually know them all a bit better :)