The last real day of work is behind me. Seven goodbye ceremonies, seven speeches in English and Japanese, seven big groups of kids all waving and shouting good bye - all done and dusted. Finishing now, getting ready to go home, it feels like I made the right decision to not re-contract. I am heartbroken to leave, but I feel ready. The kids are on summer break, it's warm and green here, I spend my afternoons taking pictures and enjoying life, and I can't think of a more wonderful way to end.

Speaking of taking pictures, I haven't taken many recently - a few here, a few there, but my 50 a day average is taking a hit. I would have loved to take pictures of the kids all sitting in rows listening to me talk, but I think it might not have fit in with the mood of the speeches. The schools I went to in the latter half of this week are schools that I love and have very heavily photographed, so I felt like trying to take pictures of everyone on the grey cloudy last days would do them a disservice. I always immediately know when I have missed good photos by not bringing my camera, but after my last days, I didn't feel like I had missed anything.

What that means blog-wise is that these are the last pictures on my camera. There are only eight pictures here, and then it's up to me to take pictures that I like over the weekend. I have a faculty goodbye party, possibly spray painting a van, and who knows what else, so I would guess that I'll come up with something.

Recently, Mori and the skating crew built a new halfpipe. It was an epic task, taking many months and costing many thousands of dollars, mostly in lumber. Last week they finished it, and before cleaning anything up, before putting away their tools, they had to try it out.


That is a pretty sweet ramp. It gets excellent reviews from everyone who skates on it.


It's going to get a grafitti mural or two on it soon, but for now you can appreciate the beautifully installed plywood.



Last weekend, I met a family of foreigners on the island. It was a long weekend and they were vacationing here, it was a long story but they were brother and sister by different mothers, and her mother lives on the island. We arranged to meet up and have dinner, after which I drove the brother up to the top of the mountain to see the view. It was about 7:30, so it was getting dark, but it was still lovely up there.







For the longest time I have been planning a photo trip around the island at night or late dusk. I generally shoot handheld, whatever grabs my eye, and these last pictures are about the limit of my hand's steadiness. I can do an exposure for a second or two, if I'm braced on something and breathing slowly, but beyond that I'd need a tripod, so shooting at night necessitates planning. Maybe this weekend.

The very next day, Liz came for a visit and we managed to score a totally rainy and miserable day. Video games were played and we went out for some drives, and since Liz has never managed to see the view from the top of the mountain, we thought we'd have a go at that. The top of the mountain was beautiful from my house, with clouds creeping up on it and blowing around. I though were were going to have another amazing view, but by the time we reached the top, the creeping clouds had covered the top, and we found the view erased. This is the second time this has happened.



While I didn't take many pictures last week during the goodbyes, I did take a couple, and I liked this one as a last memory of Kinoe Junior High.

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