Happy アメリカの建国記念！

The title basically means "Happy America Foundation Day" (literal translation) or "Happy Forth of July!"

I was going to make two separate entries for the past few days, but I decided to combine the two.

First off, I went to Utsunomiya Wednesday with Brian to his English conversation school he works at. His last working day is only in a few weeks as he prepares to leave to go back home and his employer is looking for another person to potentially replace him when he leaves. So, basically the job consists of just having English conversation with people. It's not teaching English per say, but if a "student" has questions about English and such, we are supposed to answer them. She's looking for a someone to potentially teach/converse with people from the beginner level and up as Brian is currently not teaching beginning level students right now. So I go in next Wednesday for a "final interview" where I show my "teaching" ability to the employer. I don't know how well I can simplify myself as I have the "technical" mindset, but I'll see how hard I can try.

Anyway, for today's entry, it's officially the Fourth of July in Japan, and what way to celebrate that is with fireworks (hanabi). Everyone seemed to have their own separate plans, but Rin, Hiro (michan) and I were trying to round up people for a fireworks show on the Omoigawa River. Beth, Akira, and Kyuu would also be along, but we were trying to see if Brian and Yoshiko also had any plans. However, we assumed they had plans already, so we decided to go to the track next to the Omoigawa River and near the school to light off fireworks. We went to family mart to purchase the fireworks, but we decided to wait until Akira got off work. When we finally got to Omoigawa River and started launching fireworks, it was about 11PM. The fireworks weren't too incredibly powerful, but did the trick. One of the bigger fireworks was a dud, but Hiro nearly burned most of the casing off and it could have exploded on it's own. Beth and I realized that we were incredibly cautious around the fireworks when Hiro, Rin, and Akira were pretty involved and were doing things with fireworks that could have been bad (like aiming the flames around other fireworks not set off already). Anyway, it was fun and it's strange to celebrate something so unique to your culture and life in another country.