Ice Skating

On sunday I had my first experience of Japanese ice skating. I went to Toyohashi with friends from work for a get together with other teachers. Toyohashi is about 20min south east by train from Okazaki. I hadn't been skating since high school so I was expecting to be a bit rusty on the skates but I managed to stay on my feet the whole time. The rink was new and it was full of people. It was kind of funny and unnerving to watch the Japanese skate because I have never seen so many people fall on their butts at once. In one lap around the ice I would pass about 5-10 people who fell. When I first stepped back on the ice after a break there was a loud collision of two people who slammed into each other and the boards. It made quite a loud noise. The best part was that the people that fell down usually had a smile on their faces and let out a good laugh. At one point the other english native teachers and I decided to make a conga line and all hold onto each other as we skated around. I'm not sure if we got looks because we looked so different or because we managed to make about 5 kids lose their balance and fall down! oooops!

Anyways, I hope all of you in uni are getting through exam season ok. christmas will be here soon enough. I'm off to Phuket, Thailand in about 5 days, so I'll be sure to post some pictures when I get back and fill you all in.