Another year, another (roman) candle

There's no easy way to confront turning 30, especially when you work with kids and are continually reminded of the excesses of youth. It also doesn't help when the day coincides with the town's famous fireworks festival and the date you start your descent into the age of responsibility and home loans is plastered all over the city. I suppose I can tell everyone that the town put on the pyrotechnics for my special day. Just so I could celebrate in style, or at the very least distract myself from the horrible truth, I decided to go to the festival in a new yukata I'd bought for the occasion. No pics, sorry. Poor lighting and all, you see.

Talk about raining on my parade. The festival was fairly damp from the light rain that continued throughout that night, but that's not going to stop the townspeople from having their festival. Aside from the usual chrysanthemum fireworks, there were ringed planets, pokemon balls and my favourite, goldfish. Yes, literally goldfish-shaped fireworks that were totally cute. I wish I could have taken some decent photos, but the lack of a tripod or anywhere dry to stand it prevented me. The largest individual fireworks were last, but the smoke from all the previous charges started drifting downwards because of the rain, and so all we saw was a diffuse glow instead of the actual fireworks. Shame, really. I made up for it by downing a couple of beers and tucking in to some delicious festival food.

Speaking of food, what's a birthday without a bit of cake, eh? In the year since my last, the branch of Fujiya I got my cake from the last time packed up, so I reckon I'd make my own. So here are the cream puffs I made after scouring the net for recipes.

When I was a kid I thought adults had all the answers, that at age 21 a switch in their brains automatically flips and they all suddenly know what to do in any situation. Over the years that philosophy has mutated somewhat. Now I firmly believe that adults are but children in a larger size. There have not been any illuminating epiphanies or sudden surges in wisdom, only a persistent feeling that nothing I've experienced so far will truly prepare me for tomorrow. It sounds rather trite I know, but right now, it's surprisingly apt. It's not all that gloomy though; after all, I made it this far, right? Based on my own rate of situational survival I suppose the odds of making it out of most sticky spots is in excess of 50%, which is as good as it gets, really.

While on the subject of "as good as it gets", I do sometimes worry that this is all there is to life, and that at 30 I really should have more to show for it than I do now. But it's never too late to start planning I suppose, and since I'll probably be staying here for the next couple of years it's an excellent time to think about all the other things I could get to doing after this extended working holiday. Hopefully I've actually learned something about teaching in the last year so i can deal with the next two better. Good students are a joy to teach, but where there are terror tots (14-year olds also count), it takes a lot of patience, Panadol, and as a last resort, apathy, to deal with them.

Meanwhile, I suppose the goal this year is to get out of my cosy one-room apartment more often and see more of this country's sights before I have to pack up and go back to the real world. Travelling within Japan can get frightfully expensive, but there's no better time than now since I'm actually here. Better start saving.