Bellybutton gazing

Sendagaya address-plate

Today is Hanami Party day. 16 degrees and sunny. We're all congregating at Inokashira Park in Kichijoji for a day of cherry blossoms, cricket (assuming we can set up stumps among the cast of thousands) and libation (watch this space for dodgy drunken photos)...

Have been busy organising the China trip (6 sleeps!), getting visas, tickets, accommodation. Thank you to everyone who recommended stuff to do - it pretty much cemented the ideas I already had in mind. Staying at the Grand View Garden Hotel for the first few nights, and playing it by ear after that.

As our tenure in Japan is coming to an end, everyone invariably asks me, "So what are you going to do for a job in Australia?" My response is usually, "Ummmmm, not HR?" Because really, that's all I've come up with. I'm toying with the idea of going into Corporate Training, a strange hybrid of HR and teaching I guess, but I know I will probably not get the same 1) salary or 2) level of enjoyment.

There has been a bit of a tendency among the non-teaching ex-pats in Japan to look down on English teachers. Comments like "Do a grad degree and get a real job in Japan" have been bandied around on some forums I've read, but man, I had a "real" job in Australia, and it kinda sucked. English teaching fuckin' rocks the house. We've had a great lifestyle, and for what we're doing we've been paid damn well for it.

And there's no way in hell I'm going into the Australian Education system which was another possible avenue, and truth be told I quite like the corporate atmosphere, as long as I don't have to do the suck-suck job of mediating between management and employees ('cos we all know who gets shafted).

There's always writing and photography, my two main passions, but I can't imagine doing either for a job. It would just take all the fun out of them if my livelihood depended on them. And I'm not prepared to sell my soul to compromise on either.

So quandary, people, quandary.

Maybe I should just pop out a couple of bubba-cheetas and be a stay-at-home mum, catching up for coffee with our other thousand friends who've decided to get preggers in the last year. Or not.

Maybe I need to think about this some more...