Sexy girl weekend.
I thought we had something ...
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Just be Nice to Me
I am sick.
With what you ask?
Everything.
Mostly that nasty winter feeling of near death.
I have been coming home this week and getting right under that kotatsu. Sometimes the kotatsu can be a problem. I cannot leave it. I am hungry or I kind of have to pee ... I just do not want to get out from under that kotatsu. Life is cold and hard when you have to leave the kotatsu.
While under the kotatsu I drift in and out of consciousness, Japanese TV in the background and an occasional internet interaction via one of my favorite networking devicies.
The other day I rolled over on my glasses (while enjoying the lack of consciouness under the kotatsu). After I bent them back into shape the right side is all wobbly.
So I sit at work and wobble my glasses back and forth all day.
Between all these extreme hardships I am faced with here in Japan I am pulling it together to get genki for the 45 minutes I have to teach a class.
And for some unknown reason the classes I have taught the past two days have been off the chain.
Wednesday morning I had no real lesson plan but I did have a bag of stuff.
I combined blindfolds, construction paper and the students working knowledge of monsters to create a successful lesson for my typically least successful class.
Today I am dreading the dinner I will have with a bunch of my adult students. It means I will have limited kotatsu time. And they spent last week making speical arrangements so I could get drunk and not have to drive home.
When Japanese people get drunk they do not mess around. It is similar to a bunch of 8th graders getting a case of Milwaukee's Best. No holds. No thinking. Just drinking.
So this morning I pull it together to teach two classes. After the second class the 3rd grade teacher comes up to me and says, "Caity ... when you ... return to ... home country ... I think maybe you should ... be ... TEACHER."
I blushed, said thank you, and felt real good.
Everyone deserves people to be nice to them. But I am really into it this week.
Send me your address, we can make Valentines Day cards or other gestures of overseas love.
Either way, just be real nice to me until it stops raining and my next vacation is a reality ... not a daydream.
With what you ask?
Everything.
Mostly that nasty winter feeling of near death.
I have been coming home this week and getting right under that kotatsu. Sometimes the kotatsu can be a problem. I cannot leave it. I am hungry or I kind of have to pee ... I just do not want to get out from under that kotatsu. Life is cold and hard when you have to leave the kotatsu.
While under the kotatsu I drift in and out of consciousness, Japanese TV in the background and an occasional internet interaction via one of my favorite networking devicies.
The other day I rolled over on my glasses (while enjoying the lack of consciouness under the kotatsu). After I bent them back into shape the right side is all wobbly.
So I sit at work and wobble my glasses back and forth all day.
Between all these extreme hardships I am faced with here in Japan I am pulling it together to get genki for the 45 minutes I have to teach a class.
And for some unknown reason the classes I have taught the past two days have been off the chain.
Wednesday morning I had no real lesson plan but I did have a bag of stuff.
I combined blindfolds, construction paper and the students working knowledge of monsters to create a successful lesson for my typically least successful class.
Today I am dreading the dinner I will have with a bunch of my adult students. It means I will have limited kotatsu time. And they spent last week making speical arrangements so I could get drunk and not have to drive home.
When Japanese people get drunk they do not mess around. It is similar to a bunch of 8th graders getting a case of Milwaukee's Best. No holds. No thinking. Just drinking.
So this morning I pull it together to teach two classes. After the second class the 3rd grade teacher comes up to me and says, "Caity ... when you ... return to ... home country ... I think maybe you should ... be ... TEACHER."
I blushed, said thank you, and felt real good.
Everyone deserves people to be nice to them. But I am really into it this week.
Send me your address, we can make Valentines Day cards or other gestures of overseas love.
Either way, just be real nice to me until it stops raining and my next vacation is a reality ... not a daydream.
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Currently Reading:
Hokkaido Highway Blues: Hitchhiking Japan, by Will Ferguson.
Funny tale of a once was English teacher in Japan who decides to hitchhike from Kyushu to Hokkaido.
He spends a brief amount of time in Shikoku (where I live).
I live in Ikeda, a town near the very small city of Miyoshi. When coming from Ikeda, before you get to the Miyoshi area you drive through Mino town.
About twenty years ago Ferguson was on these same roads and came upon the place I call home from "the expressway [as it] twisted and writhed to offer [...] various angles of the lnland Sea, but all [he] saw was urban desolation. [...] [He] came upon Mino Town, pooled in a valley rimmed with mountains and dotted with lifeless ponds."
Ferguson describes northern Shikoku as a place "like all human constructs, [...] a mix of genius, enterprise, and stupidity."
Oh Shikoku.
Once you live here you get a sort of Shikoku pride.
In Laos I meet a Japanese girl from Ehime, another prefecture of Shikoku. When it was discovered that we all lived in this area there was a small of amount of jumping in place and repeating the word, "Shikoku, Shikoku!".
In this bleak weather I have to remind myself of the things that I am beginning to take for granted.
Nights like tonight. When it is not raining the stars give a little bit of light in the maze that is the walk from my car to front door.
Funny tale of a once was English teacher in Japan who decides to hitchhike from Kyushu to Hokkaido.
He spends a brief amount of time in Shikoku (where I live).
I live in Ikeda, a town near the very small city of Miyoshi. When coming from Ikeda, before you get to the Miyoshi area you drive through Mino town.
About twenty years ago Ferguson was on these same roads and came upon the place I call home from "the expressway [as it] twisted and writhed to offer [...] various angles of the lnland Sea, but all [he] saw was urban desolation. [...] [He] came upon Mino Town, pooled in a valley rimmed with mountains and dotted with lifeless ponds."
Ferguson describes northern Shikoku as a place "like all human constructs, [...] a mix of genius, enterprise, and stupidity."
Oh Shikoku.
Once you live here you get a sort of Shikoku pride.
In Laos I meet a Japanese girl from Ehime, another prefecture of Shikoku. When it was discovered that we all lived in this area there was a small of amount of jumping in place and repeating the word, "Shikoku, Shikoku!".
In this bleak weather I have to remind myself of the things that I am beginning to take for granted.
Nights like tonight. When it is not raining the stars give a little bit of light in the maze that is the walk from my car to front door.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Even if I hated it I would stay another year.
My unoffical motto about recontracting, for another year in Japan once was, "even if I hated it I would stay another year."
But I take that back.
A more accurate statement would be, "Only if I hated it would I not stay another year."
The Board of Education (BOE) I work for has been asking me when I am going to come to the office to sign the recontracting papers.
They are due the 8th of Febuary, but most BOE's like to get them in early to figure out budget stuff.
So I geuss I am recontracting. I have told myself that I am going to go there on Friday to sign the papers.
I am in no hurry to make things more convient for my BOE. This is the BOE that does not subsidize any of my rent, or pay for my car, or take me out to dinner, or even anwser my questions- all things that many other JETs BOE`s do for them.
I told myself I got over that awhile ago. There is nothing I can do about it. And it is not like my life is really hard or something.
I went out to dinner with another JET`s BOE supervisor and she was shocked to hear about how little my BOE does for me. She seemed truly concerned (the way any good Japanese woman would be).
I told her that over the past few months I have figured out who will help me out. And I have been invited to numerous dinners and various other, sometimes annoying and somethimes fun, Japaense things.
It all just took a minute to figure out.
And that is a reason I want to stick around a little bit longer ... there is only more figuring out to be done.
That and the fact that I seriously love my kotatsue like I have never loved before.
Before I leave this country I would like to know that I have saved enough money to get a kotatsue in the States. Financially I am not there.
Also, I really do not feel like being in the States for the next election.
Japanese people like to talk about American politics and they are all routing for the democrat.
Most of them are for Obama.
I have successfully turned all the adults in my conversation class to be Obama supporters.
Sometimes in the States I would run into those sneeky republicans or super crazy Christains.
I would think I had made a grown-up friend. I would be feeling real adult because me and this other adult, who I randomly meet, would be talking and I would think we were real cool. Then that adult would sneek in that sly conservative or super Christain remark.
And I would be sad for America.
And my sister will be in Asia another year and who knows who else might move over to this part of the world.
I have sort of been waiting for a sign from God about this recontracting thing. I told myself I would not make any sort of final decision until I got back from south east Asia.
I thought that when I got back that God would tell me in a really obvious way what my decision should be.
The only thing I have noticed about my return is that the sun never shines in January and I am not feeling moved to study that damn language I thought I would want to study upon return.
But I think I have been planning to stay two years all along.
The past months have gone by so quickly and I cannot imagine how fast the next few will go too.
When I first got here I had planned to take a trip back to the States in the Spring. Now that just feels too soon. And Summer in America might be the best thing in the world anyways.
I do feel positive about recontracting. I could have never in my wildest dreams imagined to be so lucky to do as much traveling and exploring as I have done since I have been in Japan. And such travel and exploration really is an art, something I would like to spend much more time mastering.
To quote others, "6 months down and 18 (or more) to go."
But I take that back.
A more accurate statement would be, "Only if I hated it would I not stay another year."
The Board of Education (BOE) I work for has been asking me when I am going to come to the office to sign the recontracting papers.
They are due the 8th of Febuary, but most BOE's like to get them in early to figure out budget stuff.
So I geuss I am recontracting. I have told myself that I am going to go there on Friday to sign the papers.
I am in no hurry to make things more convient for my BOE. This is the BOE that does not subsidize any of my rent, or pay for my car, or take me out to dinner, or even anwser my questions- all things that many other JETs BOE`s do for them.
I told myself I got over that awhile ago. There is nothing I can do about it. And it is not like my life is really hard or something.
I went out to dinner with another JET`s BOE supervisor and she was shocked to hear about how little my BOE does for me. She seemed truly concerned (the way any good Japanese woman would be).
I told her that over the past few months I have figured out who will help me out. And I have been invited to numerous dinners and various other, sometimes annoying and somethimes fun, Japaense things.
It all just took a minute to figure out.
And that is a reason I want to stick around a little bit longer ... there is only more figuring out to be done.
That and the fact that I seriously love my kotatsue like I have never loved before.
Before I leave this country I would like to know that I have saved enough money to get a kotatsue in the States. Financially I am not there.
Also, I really do not feel like being in the States for the next election.
Japanese people like to talk about American politics and they are all routing for the democrat.
Most of them are for Obama.
I have successfully turned all the adults in my conversation class to be Obama supporters.
Sometimes in the States I would run into those sneeky republicans or super crazy Christains.
I would think I had made a grown-up friend. I would be feeling real adult because me and this other adult, who I randomly meet, would be talking and I would think we were real cool. Then that adult would sneek in that sly conservative or super Christain remark.
And I would be sad for America.
And my sister will be in Asia another year and who knows who else might move over to this part of the world.
I have sort of been waiting for a sign from God about this recontracting thing. I told myself I would not make any sort of final decision until I got back from south east Asia.
I thought that when I got back that God would tell me in a really obvious way what my decision should be.
The only thing I have noticed about my return is that the sun never shines in January and I am not feeling moved to study that damn language I thought I would want to study upon return.
But I think I have been planning to stay two years all along.
The past months have gone by so quickly and I cannot imagine how fast the next few will go too.
When I first got here I had planned to take a trip back to the States in the Spring. Now that just feels too soon. And Summer in America might be the best thing in the world anyways.
I do feel positive about recontracting. I could have never in my wildest dreams imagined to be so lucky to do as much traveling and exploring as I have done since I have been in Japan. And such travel and exploration really is an art, something I would like to spend much more time mastering.
To quote others, "6 months down and 18 (or more) to go."
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