Fukutsu, city of approximately 56,000 people. Formed in early 2005 by the combination of two towns - Fukuma [where Sandy and I lived when she did JET] and Tsuyazaki. I live in the Tsuyazaki part of Fukutsu, and as the towns just merged, the regional identities and identifications are still pretty strong.
Tsuyazaki is the more rural area, only about 15,000 people as opposed to Fukuma's 41,000 or so... so it's a little bit "inaka" [country] as they say in Japan. But mostly it's kind of a beach town. It has that feel to it. Fishing and farming and beach life. A bit more mellow than what most people imagine Japan to be. Seeing folks wandering about in tank tops and sandals is not completely uncommon. Which suits me just fine. Of course you also see things like girls in ultra mini skirts and high heel platform shoes pedaling away on their bike heading god knows where. And in the next minute see the middle aged lady biking or tending garden in 90 degree weather wearing long sleeves and gloves. And a sweater. You tend to notice these weird cultural contrasts when you're somewhere other than where you were brought up...
Anyways, the two pics are actually the same area [you've got to turn the second one 90 degrees counter clockwise to see how they match up]... but the first one, if you look carefully, is annotated with such fascinating things as - the location of our apt, the nearest "conbini" [the 7-11], the closest supermarkets, train stations, dry cleaners, location of the Board of Ed, the schools I'll be teaching at, the 100yen store [think "dollar store", but vastly superior], the location of our apt 4 years ago and other such things one needs to locate to survive straight away.
Laugh if you must, but that's what I spent my first morning of "work" doing.
And I got paid for it too.
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