The last week has been crazy. Wed/Thur/Fri I was miserably sick. But my faith in Japanese medicine has been restored because I am feeling better and not in a Dayquil-just-covering-the-symptoms way, but actually healthy. They added an additional class for me at the last minute, I am teaching one of the other teachers because she has an English oral interview coming up. It is really fun, because her English is already so good. Today I had to critique a prospective teacher on her model lesson. It is really hard being so new myself, to offer a lot of criticism. The kids are a lot of fun though, and I'm starting to be more comfortable. Although 10 hour work days are a killer in the beginning.

I am learning how to cook Japanese food! Last night I made miso soup from scratch and used tofu and it was actually edible. Of course the teachers at my school had to tell me 3 times what to add, but it worked.

I love my bike so much! I don't know why I didn't ride bikes all the time in DC. Of course here you can ride on the sidewalk, but it is wonderful. The bike path to my apartment is on the river and is lined with old knarled cherry blossom trees that make it feel very private and secretive almost. I think on my days off I am just going to ride up and down that path for hours.

My new goal is to meet other foreigners in the area, so I have been walking up to anyone who doesn't look Japanese and introducing myself. I met Katie from Australia in Seattle's Best Coffee Shop and two other women from Sydney in Blue Light Cafe. Noone wants to be the first person to approach a stranger, but I will never get to know people around here otherwise. That is part of what I like about moving, I can start over, even in my mind. So while in DC I would never walk up to strangers and say Hi I'm Carissa. Here I can do that because it's part of the new me.

I got a new cell phone! It has a camera and e-mail and everthing else you can think of! The number (for those of you who want to call me) is: 090-1394-2544.