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On Saturday the local university was having a fundraiser and so we went there with Maki and her two babies. It was a lot of fun with many stalls selling Japanese food and people trying to get you to part with your money. There was a free tumbola thing which gave prizes depending on the colour of the ball you pulled out. A white one was the predominant one which got you something small like a notepad or box of sweets. I got a blue one. In fact I got two blue ones. The prize was an envelope with something important looking in. We got excited but in fact it was half price hotel vouchers. Not bad, but not only was the hotel in Yokohama (bloody miles away) but the price was 30,000 yen or 150 quid normally. I felt let down and so we exchanged them for the notepad at the end. I love notepads [sad git] Later on there was another prize giveaway by throwing a shuttlecock onto numbers for scores. I cunningly aimed for high scores to get the flowers and got the scores and then we found out that nought(?) to 29 points got you the flowers. I didn`t realise that. I
got 30 and got a pretty useless bag of flyers for upcoming events. Maki`s baby Ryoma
gave it a go and naturally got nothing and so conversely won the flowers. I was beaten by a two year old. It makes no sense.

There was also a flea market going on where the students were selling clothes like Levis and baseball caps and jumpers all for around 200 yen or one pound. I having been only recently paid and in need of clothes pretty much cleaned them out. I bought about twenty items which came to about 20 quid. I bought hats, jeans, t-shirts and thick jumpers with nonsensical english on them. At a flea market you are supposed to barter. They would say 1000 yen and I would say alright and then Reiko would shout out no no no and babble away in Japanese and haggle right down. I am not skilled in this area. Thank you Reiko. I listened and half understood people haggling next to me. Yet when we got back home we found out the jeans were about two inches too short.

To celebrate being paid, we went to Namba in the evening for the first time in a long time and drunk chateau de something wine in a bar. Yes. We got back at about two in the morning. It`s the first time I think since I came to Japan that we have gone out and got drunk. It`s a half an hour train journey into the city centre with another half an hour walk home thanks to no car, expensive taxis and a lack of incoming money for four months. I kind of miss not living in the centre of a town or city like in England and going out drinking but it`s something I can live with. Japan is great.