Back from skiing and I didn't really hurt anything except my pride and my wrist. Crashing a lot will do that to a fella. I had a total of 4 days on the slopes. The first day we went to the combined resort Hakuba 47 and Goryu. This is a pretty nice place with two sides of the mountain covered in lovely snow. We also discovered a great scam; if you wait until about 2:00 you'll see the first trickle of people who are done for the day and they go to return their electronic passes for their 1000 yen deposit. Well if you're persistent, you can buy the passes off of the skiiers for abotu 1500 yen, making 3 hours of skiing cost you 500 yen when you get back your deposit. This totally rules. Nothing feels better than getting an unexpected windfall, particularly in Japan, where bargains are few and far between. We did this for two days and i also spent 2 whole days skiing. Overall, it cost me a little less than i had anticipated, which was totally great since my paycheck was a little lower than last month because of all the holidays involved.

We stayed in a cabin sort of thing for the 3 nights. The place was fine except for the terrible stink emanating from the pit toilet. It was a olfactory killing field in the bathroom. I did appreciate the interesting slang that i learned from my british compatriots as a result of the stink. It is truly amazing the variation of the English language between different areas of the world.
The best illustration of this point for the trip was Eddy of Halifax, Yorkshire. It was nearly impossible to understand the guy sometimes. It was truly hilarious. My favorite of his sayings was, "Minging," prounounced ming-en which apparently means something like, "nasty," or "disgusting." The first night Eddy introduced himself to this guy Andy and the interchange went something like this:

Eddy: Nice ta meet ya, Muh neam's Eaddeah.
Andy: Yeah, Andy, and your name is?
Eddy: Iahm Eaddeah, you're Andeah?
Andy: Andy, right, what's your name again?
Eddy: Eeddeah, you knoo Ead!
Andy: Oh, Eddy! Right.

Its just amazing to hear all the diffferent variations in my own language. Pretty hilarious to think of these people as english teachers however. How the fuck are japanese people going to understand them if I can't.