Currently at the Raleigh-Durham airport, waiting for my flight to Chicago to arrive.
It's been a fun, hectic, crazy three weeks here in America, and I'm not looking to the long, bumpy flight to Japan. But I'm ready to be back in Kyoto and for things to get back to normal again. Oddly, I made a lot of new online contacts in Japan while I was in the States, so I imagine I'll try to reconnect with them once I'm get situated.
Anyway. I'm alive so far and have lots of pictures to share.
Until next time.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Monday, January 4, 2010
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Still Here
So I haven't updated in awhile. I'm terrible I know.
I've attempted to post several times, though I always end up making a long-winded post and never really finishing what I attempted to write.
So I guess this time I'm going to try and keep things shorter and just update with WHATEVER. At least to get things flowing again.
Anyway, in America now, currently with Zack at Panera stealing free wi-fi and updating. Just here for the holidays and then heading back to Kyoto January 9th. I'm excited!
Holidays went well. Sort of. Minus the nasty weather, but otherwise I'm alive, fat, and happy.
Need to post pictures sometime. I'll try to get started on that.
Anyway, until next time.
I've attempted to post several times, though I always end up making a long-winded post and never really finishing what I attempted to write.
So I guess this time I'm going to try and keep things shorter and just update with WHATEVER. At least to get things flowing again.
Anyway, in America now, currently with Zack at Panera stealing free wi-fi and updating. Just here for the holidays and then heading back to Kyoto January 9th. I'm excited!
Holidays went well. Sort of. Minus the nasty weather, but otherwise I'm alive, fat, and happy.
Need to post pictures sometime. I'll try to get started on that.
Anyway, until next time.
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Even Monkeys Fall
Absolutely exhausted at the moment. Lack of sleep, combined with pouring rain and a long track to my farthest school does not a happy boy make. Though I’m impressed with my bike skills; riding through the pouring rain, one handed with a wind blown umbrella, jeans soaked with rain, dodging businessmen and school children and dressed-to-impress housewives and young bachelors/bachelorettes. During my job interview, I was asked what I would bring back from Japan should I return back to America.
I’m beginning to think it’s extreme biking.
Only one class today I’m told. I have no idea what I’ll be doing with the rest of my hours here. I really prefer more work at my good schools whenever I can since it speeds up the day for me. In the meantime I generally find myself sitting around reading or typing up a blog entry. Once in awhile I try to study Japanese—I received some books and CDs for studying Japanese, but since I don’t have earphones for my computer yet, I haven’t really had the opportunity to listen to them while at work. Once I’m at home, I don’t find myself interested in studying anymore. Lately, I’ve been interested in getting a subscription to Japanesepod101.com. I don’t know if it’ll be a waste of money, but maybe it’ll help me more with studying habits. Earphones are definitely a must first.
---
Class went well. Then again, I only had one student in class today. Three teachers and one student is a little overkill, but I liked it otherwise. Teachers here in Japan have a habit of standing and being very professional with their students, and generally I play the role of an obedient assistant, standing along with the teachers unless otherwise told to sit. But with just one nervous student in my morning class, I wasn’t really out to impress anyone, or to intimidate the student any further. So I plopped myself down next to her, flashed a big, happy smile, and proceeded to ask her general questions: “What is your name?” “How old are you?” “What do you like?”
This went on for a little bit until she read her introduction speech and I read mine. Afterwards, I showed her my usual introduction pictures, mostly about food, friends, and Halloween. She had this great wide-eyed look of interest at what I was showing her, which made me happy. Shortly after our introductions, we began to learn the lyrics to Bob Dylan’s song “Blowin’ in the Wind.” Now, I never really thought I’d have to sing so much in my job, but I do it quite often these days—songs from The Carpenters, The Beatles, and John Lennon. I generally tend to like doing it, since it breaks the monotony of repeating vocabulary and sentences. Still, it was a pretty straightforward task. I had a few confused moments with the rhythm of the song—I’m not much of a Bob Dylan fan and I had really only listened to the song a handful of times. Otherwise, it went well and hopefully the student learned what she was supposed to from it.
---
Somehow today is flying by pretty quickly, despite only having one class. During lunch I decided to hang out with the students for a change and try to strike up English conversations with them. Most of them gave me confused faces; I had two girls laughing ridiculously when I was asking about their lunches. I slid away after that and headed toward a group of boys to see if my luck was any better. Thankfully an English teacher was sitting with them, so I joined her on the floor. The boys weren’t too much better about speaking English, but at least they weren’t falling over themselves laughing. But somehow they managed to disappear on me one by one and I ended up being left alone with the teacher.
The teacher suggested I head upstairs to talk to the girls (AKA: my random fan club). Apparently they were working on their play for the school festival to present to the seventh and eighth graders. I agreed to go, since I didn’t have much else to do, and walked upstairs. I quietly snuck into the room, although my entrance distracted them anyway. Their play had something to do about eating well. At what angle they were coming from, I’m not very sure. Healthy eating? Don’t starve? Don’t eat food when you’re not supposed to?
After they finished recording their play, they went straight back to eating their lunch. I tried to make simple conversations with them—“What are you eating?” “Who made it?” “What will you do this weekend?” Generally the conversations are one-sided, so it’s always a struggle to get out of the awkwardness of it. In an effort to get them comfortable speaking to me, I decided to ask them to teach me Japanese.
Usually when I ask this, I get very typical responses. “Konnichiwa” “Sayounara” “Itadakimasu”—polite greetings and expressions I already know. In a surprising move, one of the students started teaching me Japanese proverbs. Now that was interesting, I thought. First the student taught me “isseki-nichou.” She did her best to explain it, although I ended up becoming confused by her long explanation. I eventually told her to write it down so I could actually see the proverb.
Once I saw the kanji (一石二鳥) I immediately knew what she was saying. “Two birds with one stone.” I had seen this expression before in written Japanese so I told them we have a similar expression that means the same thing. I wrote it on the whiteboard in English for them and asked them to remember it. After that, they taught me another Japanese proverb.
猿も木から落ちる
saru mo ki kara ochiru
We don’t really have a very good English equivalent for this (the only thing I found in my dictionary was “Even Homer sometimes nods”), so I had to literally translate it. The saying came out to be, “Even monkeys fall from trees” which I think is suitable as it is without an English equivalent. The girls didn’t go into depth about the explanation; they probably assumed I knew what they meant when I started translating it. Still, I think the idea behind the proverb is that everyone can make mistakes. I’m not sure about the direction of the proverb though. Does it mean to watch out for mistakes? Or does it mean to not worry about mistakes?
Regardless, I think I’ll remember these from now on and appreciate the challenging Japanese words.
I’m beginning to think it’s extreme biking.
Only one class today I’m told. I have no idea what I’ll be doing with the rest of my hours here. I really prefer more work at my good schools whenever I can since it speeds up the day for me. In the meantime I generally find myself sitting around reading or typing up a blog entry. Once in awhile I try to study Japanese—I received some books and CDs for studying Japanese, but since I don’t have earphones for my computer yet, I haven’t really had the opportunity to listen to them while at work. Once I’m at home, I don’t find myself interested in studying anymore. Lately, I’ve been interested in getting a subscription to Japanesepod101.com. I don’t know if it’ll be a waste of money, but maybe it’ll help me more with studying habits. Earphones are definitely a must first.
---
Class went well. Then again, I only had one student in class today. Three teachers and one student is a little overkill, but I liked it otherwise. Teachers here in Japan have a habit of standing and being very professional with their students, and generally I play the role of an obedient assistant, standing along with the teachers unless otherwise told to sit. But with just one nervous student in my morning class, I wasn’t really out to impress anyone, or to intimidate the student any further. So I plopped myself down next to her, flashed a big, happy smile, and proceeded to ask her general questions: “What is your name?” “How old are you?” “What do you like?”
This went on for a little bit until she read her introduction speech and I read mine. Afterwards, I showed her my usual introduction pictures, mostly about food, friends, and Halloween. She had this great wide-eyed look of interest at what I was showing her, which made me happy. Shortly after our introductions, we began to learn the lyrics to Bob Dylan’s song “Blowin’ in the Wind.” Now, I never really thought I’d have to sing so much in my job, but I do it quite often these days—songs from The Carpenters, The Beatles, and John Lennon. I generally tend to like doing it, since it breaks the monotony of repeating vocabulary and sentences. Still, it was a pretty straightforward task. I had a few confused moments with the rhythm of the song—I’m not much of a Bob Dylan fan and I had really only listened to the song a handful of times. Otherwise, it went well and hopefully the student learned what she was supposed to from it.
---
Somehow today is flying by pretty quickly, despite only having one class. During lunch I decided to hang out with the students for a change and try to strike up English conversations with them. Most of them gave me confused faces; I had two girls laughing ridiculously when I was asking about their lunches. I slid away after that and headed toward a group of boys to see if my luck was any better. Thankfully an English teacher was sitting with them, so I joined her on the floor. The boys weren’t too much better about speaking English, but at least they weren’t falling over themselves laughing. But somehow they managed to disappear on me one by one and I ended up being left alone with the teacher.
The teacher suggested I head upstairs to talk to the girls (AKA: my random fan club). Apparently they were working on their play for the school festival to present to the seventh and eighth graders. I agreed to go, since I didn’t have much else to do, and walked upstairs. I quietly snuck into the room, although my entrance distracted them anyway. Their play had something to do about eating well. At what angle they were coming from, I’m not very sure. Healthy eating? Don’t starve? Don’t eat food when you’re not supposed to?
After they finished recording their play, they went straight back to eating their lunch. I tried to make simple conversations with them—“What are you eating?” “Who made it?” “What will you do this weekend?” Generally the conversations are one-sided, so it’s always a struggle to get out of the awkwardness of it. In an effort to get them comfortable speaking to me, I decided to ask them to teach me Japanese.
Usually when I ask this, I get very typical responses. “Konnichiwa” “Sayounara” “Itadakimasu”—polite greetings and expressions I already know. In a surprising move, one of the students started teaching me Japanese proverbs. Now that was interesting, I thought. First the student taught me “isseki-nichou.” She did her best to explain it, although I ended up becoming confused by her long explanation. I eventually told her to write it down so I could actually see the proverb.
Once I saw the kanji (一石二鳥) I immediately knew what she was saying. “Two birds with one stone.” I had seen this expression before in written Japanese so I told them we have a similar expression that means the same thing. I wrote it on the whiteboard in English for them and asked them to remember it. After that, they taught me another Japanese proverb.
猿も木から落ちる
saru mo ki kara ochiru
We don’t really have a very good English equivalent for this (the only thing I found in my dictionary was “Even Homer sometimes nods”), so I had to literally translate it. The saying came out to be, “Even monkeys fall from trees” which I think is suitable as it is without an English equivalent. The girls didn’t go into depth about the explanation; they probably assumed I knew what they meant when I started translating it. Still, I think the idea behind the proverb is that everyone can make mistakes. I’m not sure about the direction of the proverb though. Does it mean to watch out for mistakes? Or does it mean to not worry about mistakes?
Regardless, I think I’ll remember these from now on and appreciate the challenging Japanese words.
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Unmotivated
Still haven’t really been in a writing mood lately. Not sure what’s hit me all of a sudden, but maybe it’s because nothing terribly exciting has been happening. But, I’ll do my best.
At the moment I’m at attending one of my least visited junior high schools. I’m only here for a week and afterwards I won’t be here again until another year. Kind of strange really—why not spread the days out? I feel like I’m more of a guest at the moment, on a temporary visit. Still, regardless, all the staff members here are very quiet and nice, and I really like the English teachers here so far. Calm, happy, down-to-earth people. I wouldn’t mind working here more often if I had more a say so.
Ah well.
Recently I was a judge in a speech contest. It wasn’t really my decision; I was unwillingly “nominated” by the Kyoto Board of Education. Still, I always kind of envisioned the contest as something moving and inspiring—young students trying their best to speak English fluently and proficiently, much like how I feel about Japanese.
Of course, the way you think something is and the way it actually is, are of course quite different.
The contest, for some reason, was held on a Sunday. Why a Sunday, I don’t know, but it already put a dent in my enjoyment factor. Furthermore I was fairly tired from the previous night. I had trouble sleeping and I had to wake up around 7:00. That’s more of my problem than the contest’s, but having to wake up early on a day I usually have off is never really enjoyable for anyone I think.
We had a brief meeting beforehand; everyone introduced themselves one at a time unnecessarily to people that probably wouldn’t remember who or what they do. I suppose it was all out of politeness, really. Or maybe it was more of a headcount than anything else.
We later moved towards the school gym, but briefly headed to another room nearby to discuss what our roles were as the judges. A fellow JET and I were designated to handle judging plays. Of course, that wasn’t going to happen until much later in the day—so what do we do until then?
Before anything too serious started, I greeted my base school English teachers and the English Club. I wanted to say a quick hello and to wish them all luck. For some reason I asked the whole English Club if they were nervous. Of course, only two of them were actually participating in the event. I was already aware of this before, since I helped only two students practice their speeches during our Friday club meeting. The students kind of gave me an unsure stare, and eventually a teacher commented saying that the club members were all there to support the other two.
Ah. Whoops. Oh well. My clumsiness never ceases to amaze me.
Now, the polite thing to do when you have nothing to do as a judge is to watch the other events. There were two speech recitations, a small intermission skit, and the last block being original plays. I stayed for the first recitation event, and even saw one of my students from my base school go up to recite. I gave her a big smile and hoped for the best.
She ended up making the same pronunciation mistakes she did during our practice session. I laughed on the inside—not necessarily at her (although she did say “little girl” and “little boy” in strange way), but mostly at how pointless my help had been. I can’t help anyone in a day. It takes a lot more time than an hour’s worth of English Club.
After the first recitation event was over with, it was lunchtime by then and we all decided to head out somewhere to eat. Originally we were interested in ramen, though the shop someone suggested was closed that day, so we all agreed to Indian after that. Unfortunately for me, the restaurant we went to was a little expensive—about $10 dollars a plate (which isn’t terrible—rather normal for Kyoto), but I only had about $5 dollars on me. I really didn’t want to borrow money again from the other ALTs, so I just decided to pass lunch instead.
I ended up getting a lassie (a sweet yogurt drink) and waiting for everyone to finish eating. The meal everyone had didn’t look that impressive anyway and I didn’t feel like I was missing out too much. Though afterwards, when we returned from the restaurant, I did eat my fill of leftover fruit sandwiches and snacks in the judge’s room. It satisfied me until dinner, anyway.
The play part of the contest was… interesting. There were four performances in total, each ranging from about 8-15 minutes. The first was rather impressive, just in the sheer number of people alone. A total of 40-some students arrived to perform, each having a speaking role of at least one student. With that many students, your play had to be a well-oiled machine or you were going to flop.
Needless to say, the play was a well-oiled machine. I didn’t have high hopes for a play called “The Color of English”—I immediately thought “black and terrible as the darkest night” personally—but the students ended up impressing me fairly well and they only had a few minor flaws.
The other three plays… not so impressive. Some of the English was just terrible to the point that I had no idea what was being said. I was probably the hardest judge then; my scores were very low for most of the other plays. Originally, during the competition, I felt like I needed to take the judging seriously—if you’re participating in an English-speaking competition, you need to be clear in what you say. The other performing students were incomprehensible, and to me, weren’t really fulfilling the goal that the competition was promoting.
Looking back on it now, I realize the competition wasn’t really about being able to speak English decently. Really, it was event to encourage students to speak English. Whether the students won gold or silver or bronze prizes didn’t really matter—none of it really mattered. What middle school kid is going to care about a $5 dollar trophy when they’re all grown up? Not many, I would imagine. So while I would’ve liked the students to speak more clearly, I think the next time I have an opportunity (read: forced to) judge a contest, I’ll adjust my expectations.
The boyfriend hit the nail on the head, I think.
“Those kids won’t stand a chance,” he said. He was referring to my strict teaching then, when I tutored him in Japanese. Maybe he was right in a way.
At the moment I’m at attending one of my least visited junior high schools. I’m only here for a week and afterwards I won’t be here again until another year. Kind of strange really—why not spread the days out? I feel like I’m more of a guest at the moment, on a temporary visit. Still, regardless, all the staff members here are very quiet and nice, and I really like the English teachers here so far. Calm, happy, down-to-earth people. I wouldn’t mind working here more often if I had more a say so.
Ah well.
Recently I was a judge in a speech contest. It wasn’t really my decision; I was unwillingly “nominated” by the Kyoto Board of Education. Still, I always kind of envisioned the contest as something moving and inspiring—young students trying their best to speak English fluently and proficiently, much like how I feel about Japanese.
Of course, the way you think something is and the way it actually is, are of course quite different.
The contest, for some reason, was held on a Sunday. Why a Sunday, I don’t know, but it already put a dent in my enjoyment factor. Furthermore I was fairly tired from the previous night. I had trouble sleeping and I had to wake up around 7:00. That’s more of my problem than the contest’s, but having to wake up early on a day I usually have off is never really enjoyable for anyone I think.
We had a brief meeting beforehand; everyone introduced themselves one at a time unnecessarily to people that probably wouldn’t remember who or what they do. I suppose it was all out of politeness, really. Or maybe it was more of a headcount than anything else.
We later moved towards the school gym, but briefly headed to another room nearby to discuss what our roles were as the judges. A fellow JET and I were designated to handle judging plays. Of course, that wasn’t going to happen until much later in the day—so what do we do until then?
Before anything too serious started, I greeted my base school English teachers and the English Club. I wanted to say a quick hello and to wish them all luck. For some reason I asked the whole English Club if they were nervous. Of course, only two of them were actually participating in the event. I was already aware of this before, since I helped only two students practice their speeches during our Friday club meeting. The students kind of gave me an unsure stare, and eventually a teacher commented saying that the club members were all there to support the other two.
Ah. Whoops. Oh well. My clumsiness never ceases to amaze me.
Now, the polite thing to do when you have nothing to do as a judge is to watch the other events. There were two speech recitations, a small intermission skit, and the last block being original plays. I stayed for the first recitation event, and even saw one of my students from my base school go up to recite. I gave her a big smile and hoped for the best.
She ended up making the same pronunciation mistakes she did during our practice session. I laughed on the inside—not necessarily at her (although she did say “little girl” and “little boy” in strange way), but mostly at how pointless my help had been. I can’t help anyone in a day. It takes a lot more time than an hour’s worth of English Club.
After the first recitation event was over with, it was lunchtime by then and we all decided to head out somewhere to eat. Originally we were interested in ramen, though the shop someone suggested was closed that day, so we all agreed to Indian after that. Unfortunately for me, the restaurant we went to was a little expensive—about $10 dollars a plate (which isn’t terrible—rather normal for Kyoto), but I only had about $5 dollars on me. I really didn’t want to borrow money again from the other ALTs, so I just decided to pass lunch instead.
I ended up getting a lassie (a sweet yogurt drink) and waiting for everyone to finish eating. The meal everyone had didn’t look that impressive anyway and I didn’t feel like I was missing out too much. Though afterwards, when we returned from the restaurant, I did eat my fill of leftover fruit sandwiches and snacks in the judge’s room. It satisfied me until dinner, anyway.
The play part of the contest was… interesting. There were four performances in total, each ranging from about 8-15 minutes. The first was rather impressive, just in the sheer number of people alone. A total of 40-some students arrived to perform, each having a speaking role of at least one student. With that many students, your play had to be a well-oiled machine or you were going to flop.
Needless to say, the play was a well-oiled machine. I didn’t have high hopes for a play called “The Color of English”—I immediately thought “black and terrible as the darkest night” personally—but the students ended up impressing me fairly well and they only had a few minor flaws.
The other three plays… not so impressive. Some of the English was just terrible to the point that I had no idea what was being said. I was probably the hardest judge then; my scores were very low for most of the other plays. Originally, during the competition, I felt like I needed to take the judging seriously—if you’re participating in an English-speaking competition, you need to be clear in what you say. The other performing students were incomprehensible, and to me, weren’t really fulfilling the goal that the competition was promoting.
Looking back on it now, I realize the competition wasn’t really about being able to speak English decently. Really, it was event to encourage students to speak English. Whether the students won gold or silver or bronze prizes didn’t really matter—none of it really mattered. What middle school kid is going to care about a $5 dollar trophy when they’re all grown up? Not many, I would imagine. So while I would’ve liked the students to speak more clearly, I think the next time I have an opportunity (read: forced to) judge a contest, I’ll adjust my expectations.
The boyfriend hit the nail on the head, I think.
“Those kids won’t stand a chance,” he said. He was referring to my strict teaching then, when I tutored him in Japanese. Maybe he was right in a way.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
A Quick Update
Just wanted to say that things are well at the moment. For the most part anyway.
I have Internet access now and I've been eating up all my time with that. Music, movies, chatting with friends.
Halloween went by fairly simply. We had the party, but I ended up buying mostly premade food. Custard cakes, pumpkin cake, apple juice... things like that. Overall the potluck was pretty tasty and I still feel pretty gross from everything I ate then.
Anyway, not in my writing element at the moment, but at least I'm officially back online. Keep your eyes peeled.
I have Internet access now and I've been eating up all my time with that. Music, movies, chatting with friends.
Halloween went by fairly simply. We had the party, but I ended up buying mostly premade food. Custard cakes, pumpkin cake, apple juice... things like that. Overall the potluck was pretty tasty and I still feel pretty gross from everything I ate then.
Anyway, not in my writing element at the moment, but at least I'm officially back online. Keep your eyes peeled.
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