Welcome Inn Reservation Center

Japan has a few very heavy traveling seasons (Obon, Golden Week in May, New Year’s, and school breaks), and if you’ve ever traveled during those times, you know that Japanese people make their travel plans far in advance.

My husband and I once made the mistake of traveling to Kyoto during cherry blossom season with no hotel reservations, and when we asked the tourist office for help finding accomodations, we were able to grab the last room available.  At that point, individuals weren’t even being considered for rooms, and the tourist office was frantically turning away travelers who had assumed that somewhere in Osaka, Kyoto, or Nara there would be room for at least 1 person to fit in.  No such luck.

The Welcome Inn Reservation Center (WIRC) is the answer to the foreign tourists who don’t speak Japanese, but would like to have a little control over their accomodations when traveling.  It’s actually the same system that the Kyoto Tourism office uses when you go ask for them to help you find a hotel.

The WIRC features business hotels, ryokans, minshuku, capsule hotels, and other forms of accomodation (confused? — WIRC explains types of Japanese accomodation).  The accomodations must be priced “affordably”; they can’t charge more than 8,000 yen per single room or 13,000 yen per double room for most of the year.  They also have to be welcoming to foreign guests.

Using  WIRC

The website has recently been redesigned, so it’s more visually appealing and easier to use.  Just choose a region you’re interested in traveling to, then search through the accomodation options.  (Be sure to note if you’ll be traveling during the ON, REGULAR, or OFF seasons, as that can really affect pricing!)  Many of the listings include maps, photos of the rooms, and other important details to help you make your decision.

When you’ve decided on a place you like, click the “Apply Now” button.  You’ll need to fill out some details about your check in/check out time, as well as who will be staying with you.  If you’ve never used this site before, you’ll need to sign up for an account in order to make the reservation.  When you confirm your details, they’ll send a request to the hotel for you to stay there.  Within 3 days you will receive an email saying if your reservation has been arranged.  You can make your payment to the hotel when you arrive.

**Important: When you sign up for an account, you need to give them your credit card number.  Your credit card will not be charged when you make a reservation (you’ll pay when you get there).  However, if you have to cancel your reservation, most accomodations have a cancellation fee and you may be charged.  Since there’s a potential 3-day wait to hear if your reservation has been accepted, be sure to give yourself plenty of time when making travel plans through this website.  Always double-check your travel plans to be sure you won’t need to cancel!

Also, for those of us in Ishikawa, you can see that there’s a pretty sorry selection of accomodations for our region.  This doesn’t reflect the truth of the number of affordable accomodations out here (nor does it mean they’re all foreigner-phobic!).  If you happen to know someone who runs a small ryokan or affordable accomodation, recommend that they add their accomodations to this website!  It’s a great resource and a great way to get their business known to more foreigners.

Stay Warm: Use a Hot Water Bottle

While it’s hard to avoid using electric heaters (space heaters, kerosene heaters, and kotatsu) while at home in the winter, you can reduce your overnight electric use by using a hot water bottle to stay warm in bed. Sold at home-goods stores, the Japanese 湯たんぽ (yutanpo) are hot water bottles made of durable hard plastic and come with a soft cover.

Colorful Hot Water Bottle; image from Amazon.com

Ishikawa AJET’s Casino Royale

Coming to you with another exciting, themed charity event – Ishikawa AJET presents the 2010 Casino Royale Event! Come dressed in semi-formal attire or pay a 500yen penalty. Let’s keep it James Bond-classy so suit up!

Try your luck at Texas Hold’em, Black Jack, Roulette, and Bingo (for the gambling-impaired).

If you are one of the top three chip leaders Lady Luck has blessed – your choice of top prize is up for grabs!

There will be a 2500yen entry fee which covers for your two hour nomihoudai and finger foods. You can buy chips in increments of 100yen throughout the night. So maybe after a few drinks you’ll get a little riskay.

-IshikawAJET

Submit Your Recipe: Ishikawa AJET Cookbook

Photo: Muffet

Ishikawa AJET has decided to create a cookbook!  The aim is to create an English cookbook full of (mostly) healthy recipes that you can easily make in Japan using Japanese ingredients and Japanese kitchen equiptment.

Got a recipe?

Guidelines:

- You need to have successfully made this recipe in Japan.

- Recipes must use METRICS.  Here’s a link to a great online recipe converter.

- Simple recipes are great (ex. making miso from miso paste, making curry from curry roux) because it’s hard to find English instructions for these things.

- Please submit fairly healthy recipes.

- Please submit recipes for speacialized diets, too! (meat-free, gluten-free, lactose-free, vegan, etc.)

- Ingredients should be available to all people in Japan (even those in the remote Noto!).  If you ordered an item from a particular website, please note it!

- If you can provide extra notes, please do.  For example, if you know the Japanese word for an ingredient, please include it!

- The book will be in English, but if you have a recipe in Japanese and don’t wish to translate, some friendly translators have offered to do that for you.

Submit your recipes via email to: leah [DOT] zoller [AT] gmail [DOT] com.    I know she’ll appreciate it!

Deadline for submissions: March 31st, 2010.

Want to help out another way?

- Volunteer to be a taste-tester!  They need volunteers to try out making these recipes in their own home to be sure they’re user-friendly.

- Help out with other aspects (graphic designing, editing assistance, creating an index, etc.)

Contact Leah at: leah [DOT] zoller [AT] gmail [DOT] com

Changes to the 2010 JLPT

As many of you know, the format for the 日本語能力試験 Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT) is changing as of the July 2010 test. There have been plenty of unfounded rumors floating around about the changes, including “you’ll have to write the kanji!” and “there’s going to be a speaking section!”

There is a 70-page comprehensive guide to the changes for the 2010 JLPT available in Japanese only. I’ve consolidated the information here in English.

“Kimodameshi: Taro’s Test of Courage” in Hakusan!

A message from our friendly neighborhood Gart!

For those of you who haven’t heard of the Osugi Musical Theatre, it is a children’s troupe started by a former Ishikawa JET in Komatsu, Gart Westerhout. Children at heart (adults) are also needed for the cast and crew. You’d be surprised how many of your students and their families are involved! Current JETs have gotten involved with performing, stage help, and English coaching for when this biligual group takes the show on the road. Gart and crew are always happy to welcome new volunteers into the Osugi family if you want to get involved. This past year’s show is based on this idea:
-TE
—————————————–
Greetings! Osugi Musical Theatre will perform its original kyogen musical “Kimodameshi: Taro’s Test of Courage” on Saturday Feb 13 at 7:30 pm at the Gakushu Center in Hakusan City, a three minute walk from JR Matto Eki [across the street from the International Salon, attached to the Matto Library]. Only 100 seats in the hall, so book soon, and please tell whoever you can about it [Including Tonya]. Details here - http://osugimusicaltheatre.com The show is a comedy with 16 songs and runs about an hour – good fun for all!  Help us fill the theatre and enjoy an evening of community theatre! Who knows, you may even be inspired to join our haiku musical slated for this fall!

PS – just starting publicity now, so 100 seats still available. please do help with PR, much appreciated.  Please forward this to everyone in the universe!!!

-Gart

Anamizu Kaki Matsuri 2010 穴水町かき祭り

Come try the oysters in Anamizu! (Photo from the Anamizu-machi website)

This year’s annual 穴水町雪中ジャンボかきまつり (Anamizu Jumbo Oyster Festival in the Snow) will take place on January 30-31, 2010. For 1000 yen, you can get a bag of oysters to grill on the outdoor charcoal grills. There will also be a variety of other foods to enjoy. This year, the festival is going to be twice as big as last year’s and will include yosakoi, taiko, musical performances and karaoke as well.

Information

Ishikawa JETs trying to make a difference

This has been organized very quickly, with some amazing folks volunteering their time, energy and resources. Please spread the word, donate what you can and dance the night away for a good cause. Click this link for up-to-date details on the event.

Share Your JET Stories

Photo: Steph & Adam

One of the current Ishikawa JETs is putting together a book about JET stories, in an effort to demystify what it is to be a JET.  Remember back to when you were thinking about joining JET, or you were wondering what it was like to work at your new school.  If you asked a question at orientation, it was hard to get a good answer because “every situation is different” — and the hard part about that is that it’s true.  Every situation is different — so the hope is to share the stories of a few JETs, so you can get an idea of how that experience might differ.

Have a story you’d like to share?  Funny? Inspirational? Frustrating?  If you have a story you think other JETs should hear, please submit it!

If you do decide to participate, you’ll need to fill out a survey with general information about yourself, submit a story that you don’t mind being published, and you’ll participate in a 10 minute interview in Spring.

For more information, or to contribute your JET story, check out the JET Book Project website.

Questions about the project? Email: jetbookproject [at] gmail.com

**Note: This book is specifically about the JET experience, so non-JETs will not be able to participate in this project.  Keep your eyes open, though — you never know when she’ll make another book!

Japanese-Language-Learning Tool: rikaichan

Rikaichan is a wonderful tool for reading the Internet in Japanese. A Firefox add-on Japanese dictionary, rikaichan allows you to scroll over a Japanese word to get the definition, the information for any kanji in the word, the pronunciation, and, if applicable, the verb tense. Instead of spending time copying and pasting from one website into an website-based dictionary, you can just read and scroll!

rikaichan in action

In addition to reading websites or the news, rikaichan is also a great help for making travel arrangements online. For example, when booking a night bus via Willer Travel, you can travel to more locations from Kanazawa by using the website in Japanese rather than in English. On some bilingual shopping sites, the option will come up for cash on delivery if you browse in Japanese. Let rikaichan help you enjoy your life in Japan!

You can download the free rikaichan add-on for Firefox (doesn’t work in other browsers) here. You will need to download both the main extension and one dictionary in the language of your choice (Japanese-English, Japanese-German, etc.).

-Leah