Day 37 in Japan - Kendo visit

As today was Day 37, and I only have 365 (ish) days here, my time here is officially already 10% over! When I realised that I started to look up air ticket prices to other places in Japan - feel like I haven't made the most of my time so far.

Summer days at a Japanese High School.
The baseball team and the soccer team and the handball team are training here.

So today was my last non-teaching day at Akashi Shimizu. I decided to make the most of the beautiful summer weather and a bit of freedom by heading along to watch the kendo club train. These guys are HARDCORE! They have been training 6 days a week (and a few Sundays) for 3 hours a day over their whole summer holidays. Last week they went to a tournament and said that they did OK. There are a few ni-dans in the group, and the guy who is the best kendoka is a ni-dan at only 16! I think that is impressive, but the teacher, Mizuno-sensei (who is an English teacher who is hilarious) barely cracked his superserious experssion the whole way through. They have one guy who fights in Jodan (where rather than having your shinai - sword - pointing at the other persons throat like normal, you raise it up over your head like you are about to bash them on the head. Then if everything goes right, you bash them on the head).

MIZUNO-SENSEI is a badass! His hakama (pants) fit him perfectly,
he looks cool, and he doesn't sweat, even when it's 40
degrees in the gym. He's so cool.

The video shows Kote-Men-Dou cut practise - that's the places you can hit to score points. The hand/glove (kote), the head (men) and the body (dou). When you hit any of these legal points, you have to demonstrate that it was a deliberate cut, by hitting the ground with your foot, and showing your ki-ai (spirit) by making a spirited noise.

After the break, putting the bogu (armour) back on. 

Don't you hate it when you can only keep one cock? Solution!

Closing ceremony. By now, it was 44 degrees in the gym and they had been
practising for 3 hours with only one stop for drinks.

So after being impressed with the toughness and kickass-ness of the kendo boys, I kept wandering around the school, only to find a group that could match the kendo boys for raw masochism. The rugby boys, who play on a rock/dirt surface for a few hours a day. With tackling and face grinding and eye gouging and and everything else that rugby entails. here is blood and sweat and mud and generally all of those things end up in the same wounds. Seriously ouch.

Rugby on dirt - haven't decided if it's stupid or really cool.

Not too much else of consequence to report on - I recorded the listening test for Akashikita huddled under a doona to muffle out the sound of the air conditioner in the background, cooked chicken burgers for tea (chicken mice is decently cheap here), and Skyped with Mum and Dad.

Food Highlight of the Day: Chilli flavoured potato chips - you know the chips that are cut like hard little French fries? Yeah, them, chilli-flavoured. They are delicious, and don't have too much of the sweet soy tasted that a lot of the chip flavours here have. Very nice hors d'oeuvre.