Whoops, I wrote this on Friday afternoon but forgot to post it before I posted about my weekend, lol. Well, you're all smart, so I'm sure you can work it out. Gomen!

Last week slowly drifted by. Nothing terribly exciting happened, which, on the up side, meant that it was nice and peaceful! I got a bunch of new games on Tuesday night, I think it was, including Assassin's Creed, Call of Duty 4 and Bioshock. I played quite a bit of AC and completed CoD4, although I wasn't overly impressed by either. Both are beautiful to look at, but AC is very repetitive and could have done so much more with the innovative concept, and CoD4 lacks innovation and has the same old cheap CoD gameplay feel. I haven't played Bioshock yet but I'm hoping it's good. Anyway, I suppose these games being pretty average is a good thing, because it means I don't want to play them all the time, hehe. Hooray for a balanced lifestyle.

I ended up going to badminton on Wednesday night, and it turned out to be a great session. I hadn't gone the week before thanks to the gash on my leg, and although I didn't play so well during practise, I actually somehow played quite well during the games. So I was very happy! Maybe I'm finally relaxing a bit more. After a few games of doubles I followed Ewan's recent lead and challenged Daichi to singles. I led up to my 12th point but then he came back and eventually beat me, hehe. I also challenged Ewan and narrowly beat him, which I was quite proud of, but his knee was sore so I think he should be able to beat me normally :)

Thursday night was Minato-ya night so I whizzed off down at around 8pm and caught up with Yoko and Kazu the Gay, who were already there. Ewan also dropped in, being too tired for futsal after his efforts at badminton the night before, and Kazu came by at around 8:30pm. We had some great conversations and I realised how much I'd really missed hanging out with them all. Eventually we started talking about the wine and cheese night the Sunday before, which I hadn't been able to go to. Partly because there was still heaps of cheese left, partly because Ewan already wanted to hold a dinner for some of his other friends and partly because I'd missed out on the last one, he decided to host another wine and cheese party at his house again this Sunday night. So that's something to look forward to! :)

Tonight is the English teachers' enkai, which I'm mostly looking forward to. The English enkais tend to be very different to most of the enkais I attend, primarily because hardly any of the English teachers drink. They either have to drive, have the "Asian drinking gene" that means one drink literally knocks them out, or simply choose not to. Which really does make for an ... interesting ... time, especially given we are in a country where alcohol plays a much more important cultural and social role than in the West. That probably sounds a little strange, so let me explain.

Aside from the obvious mind affecting qualities of alcohol that help to make people a little more open, I think that the presence of alcohol represents a clear distinction between work and personal life for Japanese people. By drinking, they seem to switch into "Personal Mode", where the strict rules of the working environment no longer apply. As a result, they tend to become much more friendly and chatty, seem to be able to say what they think and feel without fear of reprisal and are generally much more open to various topics and even just having conversations that would never occur otherwise. Which is really pretty important because, as bad as it sounds, it seems to be one of the few ways to get to know them personally. The fact hardly anyone drinks at the English enkai means that this cultural 'switch' to Personal Mode doesn't happen and the conversation tends to be very dry and work oriented.

With that said, though, I'm sure it'll be an ok night! The food will be great and I can practise my Japanese, at the very least. Enkais always finish like clockwork, too, at 8:30 or 9:00pm. So I can probably drop in at Saion on the way home, hooray! Then tomorrow is Ultimate Frisbee in Himeji from 2:30 (w00t!) and then the birthday party at night. Sunday is now the wine and cheese party and I might use the spare time in the morning to catch up on some sleep and chores, play some games and maybe even do some much overdue maintenance on my bike.