きゃろらいんちゃろんぷろっぷきゃりーぱみゅぱみゅ...and other stuff.

Kyary Pamyu Pamyu, a photo by dtk_guy on Flickr.

Last Saturday I stayed behind after the last class I taught to clean up a few things. My co-worker James was teaching his evening class of junior high school students. At some point in his class I heard exclaim "WHAT!!! Kamyu what?!?" very loudly. I heard one of his students say "Kyary Pamyu Pamyu" in her own defense. I sat there and smiled to myself. Yes, it's the woman whose stage name is so out in left field even the Japanese have trouble getting it out of their mouths. Naturally, when I went to a karaoke shop later that evening and found a life size cut out of the (in)famous woman, I took a photo of it and sent it to James. As for the title of this blog entry, the hiragana spells out Ms. Takemura Kiriko's full stage name: Caroline Charonplop Kyary Pamyu Pamyu. I really want to know what processes are running in her head. That name is either pure brilliance or complete lunacy.

Aside from that silliness, we are now in the midst of a winter which doesn't seem to want to let its grip on this city loosen. Unlike last winter, the temperature range has been wider and we've had days of rain and warm weather in between blizzards, winter wind storms and days upon days of continuous snow. It was amusing counting the dump trucks lined up on a street in the old downtown. They were waiting their turn to haul snow out of the area in preparation for last weekend's annual Yonezawa Snow Lantern Festival. All said there were seven of them.

As luck would have it, this year the snow lantern festival weekend coincided with Chinese New Year. So that limited the venues we could book to have our obligatory Chinese New Year party. We managed to find a place nonetheless in spite of the influx of tourists who flowed into the city. Oh yes, "Thank you" to James for delivering his New Year's toast in his grandparent's dialect of Chinese. Well done.

A friend wrote an entry on her blog about why she doesn't enjoy that almost ubiquitous Japanese furniture item, the kotatsu. I, on the other hand, am seated at mine with it turned on whilst my kerosene heater is blasting away in the background. I suspect, but I haven't checked to confirm, the arrangement I've been using this year to heat my living space is less expensive than what I employed last year. Last year I used the wall mounted heater/air conditioner unit quite a bit (along with the kotatsu). This year I've been using a tag team of the kerosene heater and a floor standing electric heater. So far that combination has worked quite well. As for sitting in one spot for the better part of my time spent at home...it's not much different from what I did back in Canada! Such is life.