Important things first:

I went to the immigration office again and


I HAS A 3 YEAR VISA NOW!!!!!!!! HOMG!!!!!


After all that happened last year, I never ever thought I would be able to get a 3 year work visa, but I DID!!! And I'm sooooooooooooooooooooooo happy right now (*___*) .....
Actually ... now I have to rethink about my future, I guess. I didn't have any real plans yet, but I was like: Uhm ... so maybe I finish my next year and then go back home, but maybe I wanna stay longer, dunno ..... BUT THAT'S SUCH A GREAT CHANCE HOMG!!!
*calms down*

Anyway, I went there with one of the new teachers (who also needed to go to the immigration office for visa stuff), so I decided to do some sightseeing with him.
We went to Hofu City (防府市). It was not my first time there, but my first time that I actually did something else than shopping XD



On our way from Hofu Station to our first sightseeing destination. I thought that building's architecture was quite interesting and I also liked how the sky is reflected :)



You know by now that I always take photos of these thingies no matter where I go, right? XD



Reached our destination #1: the Hofu Tenmangu Shrine.
It's one of the three great Tenmangu shrines in Japan. I've been to the one in Fukuoka (Daizaifu Tenmangu) just a while ago and the third one is in Kyoto, so maybe I'll have a chance to go there in spring (^-^')>
As you can see there were construction works going on (-___-') .... I'm really not lucky with these kind of things lately, huh?



The weather was nice (luckily), but supercold! That's why in the end we decided not to go to Hiroshima, but to Hofu.



Just like in the Tenmangu in Fukuoka there was a bull statue here as well. You should touch it, it works like a lucky charm thingie if I remember that correctly (^-^)>



That's probably my fav photo of today (*_*)v



As I already wrote in the Fukuoka entry, the "God of Study" is enshrined in Tenmangu Shrines, so a lot of students come here in order to wish/pray for passing their exams.



On our way to our next destination: I saw it and loved the colors. Also, please note the "Brain" XDDDD
(Mr. Brain? XD)





We arrived at our 2nd destination: the Suo Kokubunji Temple
It was not that interesting, though. And we were the only visitors at that time.
A Japanese person who was obviously working there came closer and asked us to fill out a questionnaire.
The funny thing about it was, that (as some of you already know) my coworker looks Japanese (well he is, but he's grown up in America), but can't speak Japanese at all.
So when I suddenly started speaking in Japanese, that guy was COMPLETELY confused! XDDDDDDDDDDDD
I guess it's rare to have a Japanese person who can't speak Japanese together with a foreign person who CAN speak Japanese XDDDDDDD
And that was not the only time it happened today XD



While walking around the temple I took some random shots.







On our way to our last destination we came across a small shrine, so we just stopped by there as well.



Our final destination was a Japanese garden: Lord Mori Garden.
Although it's winter the garden was still very beautiful and worth the entrance fee (*__*)v



I love how the sunlight is sparkling in the pond (*__*)v







I remember those deer laterns from Nara, I wonder if they stole it from there XD







Mama tree and baby tree (*_*)



The garden was really awesome! I tried to imagine how it'll look in spring or autumn (*__*)









On our way back we saw that random hole in the middle of the street .... plus that leave. I wonder why there was a hole. Earthquake?



A little bit late, but finally we ate lunch (*___*) and it was really cheap and good <3333



Very strange sculpture in front of Hofu Station.





Of course, we also went shopping (*__*) I found two movie pamphlets of "Ningen Shikkaku" and "Liar Game" - I intend to watch both <3 Yay, posters for free <3
And I also saw that the newest "Cinema SQUARE" is featuring TWO of Toma's upcoming movies, so I couldn't resist (*_*) ... but why do these types of magazines always have to be sooo expensive? (x___X) GRAH!~



We also stopped by at Softbank (hullo SMAP! ). The new teacher needs a cellphone soon and my 2-year contract will expire soon, so I have to think about what to do next.
Now that I have a 3-year visa, I might just sign up for another 2 years and get a new cellphone.
I wanna have this one, but I couldn't see it in the shop and it's also not in their catalogue (yet). I wonder why ;o; .....



Although that handset would be interesting as well, but I really want that other one!




A side note, I bought body OIL today and hope that it will help against my superdry skin (yah, Japanese winter dries you up) (ノ_-;)

An important note: As some of you know my laptop has been acting up a lot lately!
I really don't know what to do with it anymore! I don't even know anymore if it's hard- or software problems or both.
My laptop is 5 years old, I spilled water on it a while ago (October 2009), but everything seemed to be okay.
Last formatting was performed in April last year.
To describe some of the problems:

• Keyboard: When I try to type something, the keyboard often can't keep up, skips letters, switches to CAPSLOCK without me doing anything etc. It's not always like that, most of the time it happens after the laptop has been running for a while. Because of that it was a REAL HASSLE to type this entry!!!! AAARRRGH!!! (-___-')


• USB: That just happened yesterday, though. As soon as I move my laptop a little bit the two things connected via USB have to be "reconnected". Especially the external harddrive seems to get "kicked out" often now. Maybe the cable is broken? But then again .. hmm ...


• WEIRD: after that typing problem has been going on for a while the computer starts acting up even more up to the point where I can't copy things anymore (it will just highlight everything etc.) - which is usually the point when I restart it. After restarting everything it's okay for a while.


• WHAT TO DO: So I've been using programs like AntiVir, Spybot Search&Destroy, CCleaner etc., but they all can't find any problems, so that doesn't really help. I just have no idea what else I still could do. Should I just format and see what happens? And if it's still not working, buy a new laptop (without a German ä,ü,ö,ß - keyboard?) .... byebye moneyZ??!!!! ..... Any experts here that can help me maybe?? ARGH!!!

Okay, but all in all it was a good day and I wanna be happy for a while, has been very busy lately anyway, so I think I need that moment of happiness ..... *ignores that bitch of a laptop*

Thanks for reading, thanks for wishing me luck for today - obviously it really helped!

バイ☆⌒ヽ(*'、^*)chu