Congratulations!!

We celebrated her success in finding a job in Japan with good steak.

Noro-kun visited us on Sunday

Noro-kun from Fukuoka came to JIU on Sunday and met with his seniors who are at JIU now. Daiki drove him to Narita Airport in the afternoon.

28th Speech Contest

The 28th Speech Contest for Commercial High Schools in Chiba was held at JIU on Thursday. The students did very well and I wish good luck to the ones who will be representing Chiba Prefecture in the nationals in January.

The champions.

Participants interacting with JIU students and faculty members after the contest in the Center for Language Education.

Ryuto came visit!

It was nice seeing how Ryuto is growing so fast and so healthy! Unfortunately Mikuni-san is moving to Ibaraki so we won't be able to see each other that often anymore, but I was so happy the whole family came to say good bye.

Typhoon #15

Wow! The wind, the strong wind! All classes were canceled today because of the powerful typhoon that went through this area--more specifically all over Japan. It is still very, very noisy outside and I was sad to hear some people have died.

Dinner at a Taiwanese restaurant with my Taiwanese students

I was wondering where I should take my students from Taiwan for dinner and decided to go to Yutaka especially because I thought when the girls tell people they are from Taiwan, they'll be asked if they've been to Yutaka--one of the most popular restaurants in town. I think they enjoyed the meal.

Tsukasa made me two shirts

Tsukasa made me two shirts that I plan to wear when the temperatures go down a bit. They are very stylish and I love them!

Back in Japan

Life has been pretty hectic since I returned to Japan. Besides dealing with jet lag, I had to manage the very little time I had to prepare for the start of the semester. Our fall matriculation ceremony was held on Thursday and classes started Friday morning. We do not have as many international students as we did last year, but we welcomed almost 300 new students from our sister universities from all over the world. There was a party to celebrate the start of a new "gakuyukai" for the Norwegian students on Thursday.

On Wednesday I met my very first student from Takao, Taiwan (photo/left). She lived in South Africa for a number of years and she is joining the All-English Program in my department. She is a good speaker of Japanese and I hope she'll have a great year here. To my surprise I found out her hobby is photography and she has a Canon G12! (I have a G11.)

Professor John Howes

UBC and Chinatown on Saturday