5...

5 more days and I'm free from what descends deeper into my own private hell every day. I get yelled at so much at work, I'm starting to wonder if I'm really just a jerk or an idiot. But on the other hand, I've never been yelled at from any boss who is worthwhile before, so I know I have a decent work ethic. I was also thought highly of by teachers who have more experience than everyone I've met here put together. Was I really just put in a place where nobody cares about improving the status quo? I know that I have a severe fault in my personality by not being able to settle for just doing things the way they are. I feel like I always need to make things better, because very little, if anything, is perfect in this world. I think that striving towards that ideal of perfection is the very thing that makes life worth living. Being content with the status quo simply blinds a person to the imperfections and inequities that eventually cause people harm (or in most cases, already do so). I don't understand how some people can just be happy following orders that they know to be inadequate, and have no qualms about them. Maybe I'm destined to be at odds with the majority for the rest of my life, but I feel it's worth it if I can at least cause some change for the better while I'm around.

Ok, on to some lighter subjects.... As you may know, I've been getting more and more into soccer lately, so the last few days have been awesome. Mexico destroyed Iran 3-1, but that was the only good news as far as results go. The States lost to the Czech Republic 3-0, which may knock them out of contention for the elimination rounds. Japan was doing well against Australia with a 1-0 lead...until they let Australia score 3 goals in 8 minutes to take the match. This is of course aweful when you remember that Japan is in the same group as Brazil, so the other 3 teams are playing for second place in that group. It's not that I had any special affinity towards the Japanese team, but the bane of my existence is Australian, so it would have been metaphorically satisfying to watch them get stomped. Oh well. I guess everyone needs to be on the lookout for the Togo team... I think after reading that article, you will understand that I consider Togo the next keychain I need to find in my ever-growing collection:

I have accumulated an extra 3 Mexico keychains past the one for my collection, so I will hopefully have enough to go around as gifts when I get to Mexico!

Speaking of collections, I was rather sad when I finished my Mario game recently. By finished, I mean completely cleared. I uncovered almost every secret level, etc by myself, which was really fun, but rather sad now that I have nothing else to do in the game. As far as the collections go, I have recently been collecting these little stand-up scenes from the original Super Mario Brothers game:




Next week should be pretty fun. I'll be in Osaka with my friend from Kansai Gaidai, Cleveland, staying for a few days and getting all the gifts I need for everyone at home. I think we're also going to swing up to Kyoto to relax one day also, so that should be a nice way to wind down and leave Japan on a positive note!

The Final Countdown!

Cue that song from some Swedish band! This is officially the (dada duuh duh, dada duhdada)Final Countdown! I have just 10 days of work left. Thankfully, as I've said before, time is flying by at a numbing speed thanks to the fact that I've been so busy with work and everything else. It might also help that I've really been enjoying playing my new video games and reading my biography on Che Guevara. All of this has helped to ease the pain of working with idiots and assholes. I found out that I'm being moved to another branch on Friday because a photographer is coming into the branch I normally work at to get some pictures of everything. I guess this means I'm not an attractive foreigner. Luckily, while the other branch is slightly further away, it's also at a really fun mall, in addition to being pretty slow and the only staff member is actually a decent human being. The mall part isn't such a big deal due to the fact that I have $120 to live off of for the next 8 days, but other than that, it should be nice.

One quest that I have recently taken up is collecting the assorted poker chip key chains that are given away with each bottle of coke/diet coke here. There are 32 different chips, one for each team playing in the World Cup. They seem like they'd be fun to use when I'm playing cards when I need tokens to keep track of various things, so I'm trying to get as many of them as I can before I leave. I'm also trying to find as many Mexico ones as I can to give the family when I get to Mexico. As you will notice from the picture, I haven't found any yet. I feel rather self-conscious when I'm at the convenience stores, so I only look through the coolers trying to find the elusive Mexico key chains for a short period of time before putting the bottles back and settling for some other country.

I am trying to drum up some interest in Soccer, because my future brother-in-law, Hector, loves soccer, as does the rest of the family. They got me a Mexican World Cup jersey, which Christian is wearing in the picture below (along with Hector and Carolina, my future mother-in-law), and I'm starting to get into it. I figure the rest of the world loves the sport, maybe it's not so bad! It can't be as bad as Baseball, that much is obvious.

The next big hurdle is packing everything up. The biggest task is going to be fighting the urge to just leave a ton of stuff behind, which I may end up doing anyways. It just seems easy to leave sweaters and things of that nature behind when I'm moving to a tropical climate. Christian told me I would be able to get by with wearing Sandals, pants, and a nice shirt to work if I get a job as a teacher in Mexico, and that absolutely has to be the nicest thing I've heard yet. After 5 months, I can say with certainty that I am not the type of person who likes wearing a tie and long-sleeved dress shirt everyday. I long to find myself in a cluttered office as a college professor, having freedom to enjoy teaching without the unnecessary restraints of a heartless company watching over me, but that is still years off, so I'll simply have to keep that in mind as a goal and work steadily towards it. For now, I'll have to settle for working on my Spanish so I have an easier time finding a job when I get to Mexico! With that in mind, I'll leave everyone with a countdown that has been adjusted to my newly purchased ticket to Mexico and Karla with her cat, Fido, waving goodbye from their Hammock!