Mushi-atsui (in Japanese: humid and hot)

July has been a rather interesting, busy and very wet month. The Japanese wet season goes for about a month (plus or minus - currently "plus"), and is mostly cloudy and lots of rain with a few storms. And humid. Very, very humid. It's quite pleasant while it's raining, but as soon as it stops, the humidity shoots right up. Now that we're nearing the end it's starting to get more hot, but less humid. I always have an umbrella with me, usually a very small one, but when I'm expecting rain I take the big one. Finally got a clear umbrella - have always wanted one, but it's never really rained enough, and I could never justify having more than one. Yesterday, I got caught in the rain - I had my big brolly, but the rain was going horizontally. Hmm, ended up rather wet! When I got home we realised that one of the windows and balcony door were open, so the apartment was a little wet too.

In news apart from the weather:

I'm changing schools for the next year. I'm going to a senior high school. I'm looking forward to it - it's closer to where I live, the students are a bit older and I will be helping with the English club after school. It was really sad saying goodbye to my teachers and students, but I'm looking forward to a slightly different challenge.

Our Aussie friend Cheng went home this week, we're going to miss him at our saturday card games (esp as he's an awesome cook!) but a new Aussie guy will be taking his apartment soon, so we look forward to meeting him.

Summer is festival time in Japan, so in anticipation I bought a yukata (summer kimono) to wear. It's surprisingly complicated to put on, and the shoes don't really fit, but it was fun to wear.

I ended up getting a distinction for my uni subject, and at this stage I'll be doing 2 subjects this semester.

Anyway, hope you're all going well and enjoying the cool.