Rusutsu, Saporro Ice Festival, Bored at Unitas

The last week has actually been pretty eventful, in a good way. Last week I was lucky enough to be included in a trip to Rusutsu (one of the other mountains nearby). Rusutsu doesn't get as much snow as here in Niseko but I pretty sure it is just because Rusutsu is so much steeper, so the snow doesn't hold as well. Having said this, on Thursday me and the boys were still waist deep for a lot of the day. It was a good trip, we had two cars, six guys and a photographer. I haven't seen many of the photo's yet but I have been told they look pretty good.

On Friday I joined the staff trip to the Saporro Ice Festival. It basically entails, lots of snow and ice sculptures, live performances and lots of food stalls. It was a pretty cool festival, all the sculptures were or at least seemed as if great care was taken in their creation and some of them were so intricate I was amazed that anyone would have had the patience.

Might be a little hard to make out but this sculpture has a whole bunch of different animals in it a Bear and a Gorilla being most prominent.

MJ

This was one of the stranger things I saw, a little girl in a galss box playing keyboard. She was good, just didn't really understand why she was in a box?

The other night we were getting a little bored at home. To remedy this we built a little jump out the front of our house, so I took some photo's.

Kenta throwing a 180

There are lots more photo's but my internet is being difficult, so if you wanna see them you'll have to check them out on my Facebook.

It's been a while......

I know, I know I'm getting lazy with this thing already. I'm sorry. So what's been happening?

Aus Day
It went pretty much as I had expected. Lots of drinking while listening to the Hottest 100 (which I only caught the last 10 songs of). Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how I wish to look back on it I did have to work during the day, but I skipped my break so I was able to finish by 3pm. Good timing, I went straight home and cracked a beer, messed around a bit, caught the shuttle and made it to my friend Mitch's in time to catch the end of the count down. Were only 2 hours behind here so I think it was all wrapped up by about 8.

This is Mitch. This photo makes me laugh cause it makes him look like a psycho.

A little off the subject, Mitch takes great pleasure in telling everyone that I am a kiwi for no other reason than that my name is Brett. Or Brit as most fans of Flight of the Concords now like to refer to me. Generally I just go along with it, this has lead to some very amusing drunken conversations. "Gee your accent is pretty good for a kiwi" being one comment that I enjoyed.

So I left Mitch's shortly after the count down. By this point I was truly in the spirit of the day. I was on my way to Wild Bills (Darts doesn't take a break for anyone or anything) but realized that I had gotten a bit over excited and was going to be a bit early. As I stood in the street wondering what to do I glanced to my left and saw a nice looking bar and decided to toddle in. I found myself in a Jazz bar called Half Note, but being early it was almost empty. Unfazed by this is pulled up a pew at the bar and had what I believe to have been a very engaging and insightful conversation with the owner. The details of this convo seem to escape me for some reason, all I can really remember is that he was and old Japanese guy who spoke pretty reasonable English.

After finishing my brew I shook the old mans hand and was on my way. This point in my little adventure gets a little hazy. I know that I was on my way to Bills, but at some point I walked into this Ice bar

I was pretty impressed by this, walked all the way in but saw no one?

I didn't stay in the Ice bar for a drink, mainly because it seem as though the bar was unmanned was a bit strange. So on I went, before long I ran into Melita and Patty.

Patty and Melita, I worked with Melita at the Longhorn in Whistler and Patty is her Boyfriend, also a skier and good bloke.

When I met up with these guys we ran into a restaurant cause a bit of a ruckus and left all within about 5 minutes. From there I think we parted ways and I headed onto Wild Bills.

This is the best Photo of Wild Bills I can find. http://wildbillsniseko.com/ This is they're site it has a nice photo of the inside.

Anyone who has been here would know this bar. For those who haven't, Bills is an instituion in Niseko. It is owned and operated by an American guy named Brett, who is good to talk to and pours heavy. Many actually no all my nights there I end up being pretty intoxicated. Australia Day was in no way an exception to this rule, I was lucky I had the next day off work.

Aussie day, no matter where you are in the world it always seems to go the same way.

Thursday about a week ago

Already becoming really slack with this, but I have an excuse (all be it a poor one). The wireless in my house has been dropping out a lot so I been to lazy, but they cleared the snow around it today and all seems to be good again.

So I had an epic shred last week, it snowed a lot Wednesday night, and Thursday morning was not only my day off but it was also blue bird. I got myself up and was on the first chairlift, probably the first time I have ever done so. Haha, think most people know how much I hate being up early. Herer are some pics I took, was having to much fun to stop and take to many.Me on the chair after my first run, copped snow in the face almost every turn.

This is the view from the top of Strawberry Fields one of the most popular and most filmed locations in Niseko.

Left to right: Anthony, Kenta, Me. Both guys I live with.

The view of the peak, from the top of the bottom chair.

It's ok Mum the day I went skiing here it was so cold that the waterfall would have been frozen.

So as you can see, it was an amazing day, probably one of the best I'll get here.

Wednesdays

Wednesdays are the last day of my working week here in Niseko. They are usually long days, as it is usually pretty quiet and I also usually pretty tired after being out late at Bill's for darts the night before.

The shop, it is freakin' tiny. Will take a better shot when I remember to.


Lachy enjoying the win last night.

Tomorrow is my day off and it is forecasted to puke snow tonight, so it's off to bed early so I can get gnarly tomorrow.

Tuesdays

Usually Tuesdays in our shop are pretty quiet, which is always nice because the weekends are generally pretty busy. Today to fill in the time I went to Kutchan on my break I had to go to the bank, which I was pretty happy to have done on my own but still with the help of a note written in Japanese by Koji.

View Larger Map
This is a map of the area I'm in. The A is Kutchan, and Mt. Niseko Annapuri is where I ski.

I also spent a lot of time researching Ski boots as I am struggling with a but of shin bang at the moment. For those of you who don't ski or don't know what shin bang is, it's basically really sore shins caused by a combination of my boots and me landing awkwardly off jumps.
This is the boot I'm thinking of getting, possibly super cheap through work.

Apart from that my day was pretty relaxed. This always a plus on Tuesdays as it allows me to prepare myself mentally for darts. We (The Ninja's) play every Tuesday, and our record so far is 2 and 2. By my calculations I think this puts us under a little pressure to keep winning if we wanna make finals, but it is possible. Our team (Koji, Lachy, Billy, Kenta and Myself) had a bit of a slow start to the season but are looking as if were just warming up.

Making the most of quiet times at work

As I think I've mentioned when it is quiet at work and boredom sets in my Japanese work mates will usually teach me things. Recently the subject has been Origami. First I learned how to make a paper gun, which basically looks like a triangle that makes a loud noise when you flick it. Then today I moved onto the more complex Crane. I haven't been able to finish it with out checking the instructions at some point yet but I'm close to having it memorized.

This was my first attempt.

2010

The new year has begun, and were almost a week in already. I had kinda lost track of how long I had been gone for (nearly 2 months) still doesn't feel like that long. Only three to go now until I am home again. I feel pretty settled here in Niseko now, or as settled as a Gaijin (westerner) ski bum can be in a Japanese ski resort. Most stuff that I found an effort when I first arrived due to the language barrier are becoming easier, thanks to my senseis Koji and Mai who are helping me learn some essential and not so essential Japanese. A day at work is never that boring when you are getting taught a new language. I think one of the best things about living in a place so different to home is just discovering how the culture and customs here are so similar yet so different, and usually it just makes me laugh.

The weather so far this year hasn't been all that good. We have had a few days where the lifts have been closed or partially closed due to high winds, And not that much snow (By Niseko standards). That always seems to happen at some point during a season, I just hope it doesn't last too long.

I have tomorrow off, so I will be getting my one sleep in for the week. Going to head up the mountain at some point, no rush as it hasn't snowed tonight. So long as the wind has died down a bit by then it should still be good times.