Pregnancies and Scaling Mountains

Nothing particularly new or exciting as of late.  Just keeping up the same old rhythm of waking up, working, coming home for dinner, then going to bed to do it all again the next day.  I don't mind long work days.. in fact a 12-hour work day is quite normal here.  But my Other Job is just plain unpleasant, which makes getting up for work in the mornings a bit of a chore.  And it's not just me.  There have been many people who've quit because of multiple issues with the company.  Keep in mind that I am actually a replacement for the teacher who was in charge of the 3-year-old class because she quit, and in the past couple weeks alone there has been a great exodus, with four teachers leaving.  There's been some murmurs and I have a feeling there will be one more soon.

Not me though.  I've dealt with unpleasant jobs before, and there's just a few months more left that I have to deal with.  When I first started my Other Job, Roomie asked how long I had to work at that place and I replied, "About eight months."

To which she exclaimed, "Eight months, that's a long time!  That's like, having a baby.  You could be pregnant that whole time!"

So it's been our running joke that the Other Job is my "pregnancy".  I'm getting sick all the time at that place, so we've been calling it "morning sickness", or she'll ask me if I think I can make it to term and I'll reply, "Yeah, I don't think I could go through with an abortion."  Sometimes I'll say, "I'm sick of being pregnant!" and she'll offer some encouragement and say, "Just a few more months, then you can give it up for adoption!"  Probably offensive jokes to some, but it always gives us a laugh.

I contracted a pretty bad cold at that place about a month ago and have had a cough ever since.  The first two weeks were pretty bad, to the point where I would dry-heave and nearly throw up from coughing fits.  Went to the doctor finally and got a round of meds to take.  They helped significantly, but I'm still coughing stuff up.  All of us teachers are always sick at that place, I wonder how long it'll take to fully get rid of this cough..

In some more exciting news- did some mountain climbing yesterday!  Went to Mount Takao, which is very close to Tokyo, and not an extremely huge mountain so it's do-able for people like me who are not regular mountaineers.  The plan was to do it last weekend but with the typhoon rolling in we pushed it to this weekend.  It was me, Roomie, our friend C-chan and a two of her long-time friends.  There was one more of her friends who was supposed to come but he got tied up with work so he couldn't make it.  The five of us met in Shinjuku and relaxed in Starbucks for a while, waiting to see if he could make it, but 11am rolled around and there was no word from him so we headed off for the mountain. 

It was very nice weather-wise.  Partly cloudy, not hot and not rainy.  We got a bit sweaty along the first stretch, but after we got used to the climb we weren't breathing so hard or sweating so much, and it was fairly nice going after that. 

We had chosen a couple different trails we wanted to take on the way up and down to see certain things like the monkey park, the bridge, and the waterfall, but somehow kept taking the wrong paths whenever the trail branched off.  We did pass by the monkey park but didn't go in because we didn't want to pay for the admission, lol.  We also did make it to the bridge on our way down, but somewhere along the way we strayed from the main trail onto one that was more off the beaten path, and ended up on the other side of the mountain from where we wanted to be!  Luckily we found a bus stop to take us back around to the train station, but not before C-chan, Roomie, and I tried our hand at hitchhiking.  There were many cars that slowed, but I think once they saw our group of five they would decide that was too many and pass us by. 

By the time we got back to the station it was dark.  We freshened up before heading back to Shinjuku to find someplace to eat for dinner.  We decided on Indian food and enjoyed our yummy curry while chatting away. 

C-chan, Roomie and I had a bit of issues trying to get on the right train back home, I think because we were all so tired!  We were running up and down stairs from platform to platform trying to catch the appropriate train.  It took us about five tries and we were laughing so hard at our stupidity!  But luckily we made it in the end.  Definitely a good day, and I think we're all agreed on another excursion again soon.  :)