So as I've been hinting at over the last couple of weeks (I think, its been busy lately and I can't keep track of that sort of thing anymore) Today was my schools 20th anniversary event - A World tour. To clarify, each of the different groups of students from around the globe put together a booth with stuff from their homeland and showed off various things about each others country of origin. Mine was the european booth where me, the other english guy and the other european guys who were taking part set up our various bits - I had brought along a video made of various english clips and pieces, which worked out brilliantly as one of the other guys had brought a projector. But The winning piece of our table was my costume - a british royal guard's outfit. The red jacket and silly hat were a smash hit with everyone else, and my stock still posing even more so. Although it also meant I had to take part in the fashion show (I was not the only country to be sporting my local dress, and we all took it in turns to show this off) and for this I had to talk for a bit and explain some of the fashion articles about my outfit. As you can imagine my Japanese wasn't much good.
Other highlights from this event were that the guy who's been looking after me here's daughter was there today to hangout and help out, and it was jolly good to get to catch up with her. A french guy brought along some wine, all of which ran out very quickly. I met a serbian chap who was very friendly. Oh And I sang - one of the volunteer teachers wanted to do a performance of Beatles music, and I had volunteered to help out. We only did a couple of songs but dare I say in no small modesty that I brought the house down. Rock and Roll baby.
Now in order to explain what happened after the event was over I need to go back in time a bit - over the last few months I've been fighting a loosing battle with a bad bout of eczema. Normally it has never been so bad and only in winter, but as I'm and Englishman and was raised in soggy, cold and miserable weather all year round, my body has not been able to cope with the rising heatwave, and my skin even less so. I thought I'd gotten it under control, until one person too many at the office said "Dude what's up with your face?" (effectively) so I decided it was time to take some more serious action.
This action was that after the event was over, the daughter took me to meet with the guy who's been helping me and he took me to a skin care clinic to get it looked at. Apart from being proven right about the climate not helping, the small bit of comfort from this trip was that a) I understood most of what was being said somehow, and b) I finally got some medical strength cream to deal with this eczema. The guy was with me the whole time and it was a big help having him there to smooth over the talking process.
After this, we (he his family and I) went out for a wonderful dinner at a snazzy Roppongi restaurant and I got to stuff my face while catching up and chatting with all of them in turn. As if this wasn't enough fun for an evening, after the meal they took me over to a side street in Omotesando, in order to buy the quality ingredients I need to do home made Katsudon - my favourite Japanese meal of all time. In all Honesty my life out here would be remarkably different if I hadn't met these people.
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