My first day at work! Well not so much, Okuma-sensei just took me on a tour of the island and then Friday is a half day. I was again impressed by how much the island has. They produce their own rice and sugar (which is also their main export) and also produce some beef. So that combined with the sea, which is very bountiful pretty much provides their food. The Local government and board of education are also a bit overly big, both places had about 50+ staff, perhaps more, in large nice buildings, it's partly the governments way of dealing with unemployment. Japanese work etiquette it somewhat different from the UK, the most important thing is attendance following by everything else. It is not unknown for people to sleep at work, it doesn't seem to be frowned on. So the island is really pretty as the pictures show. The statue shows Shoen, Izena’s most famous son. He left Izena and became King of the Ryuku kingdom about 600 years ago. Not bad for a island boy. The picture of me playing with hay is helping to make a massive rope for the tug of war at the festival tomorrow night. We climbed one of the smaller hills on Izena to get that view of the bay on front of Izena village, there are 4 villages on the island, although I forget their names.