The beginning of the end
Konbanwa, minna... This is your captain, Sean, speaking. We're cruising at a height of about 4 meters above sea-level, and it's a cool, calm night in the semi-tropical "paradaisu" that is Fukuoka. I'm sitting, listening to some Chemistry, waiting for my laundry to finish so I can go to sleep. I started the long-ass project of getting me ready to leave the land of the rising sun, Japan. And boy, is it ever a process. The first step: cleaning and packing my room into two suitcases. Now, obviously, since I'm actually not leaving for another 16 days or so, packing fully is pretty much impossible at this point. I still need the better part of my clothes, toiletries, and general entertainment stuff, like CD's, books, manga, and writing utensils. Being as that's the case, I can only really pack stuff I don't need. So, most of the bought souvenirs have been put in a suitcase. All unnecessary papers are now in a box to be incinerated. Quite the box, as it is. I blame Jo-sensei, mostly. It is the paper of countless dittos, and hand-written homework from hours and hours of that woman's classes. I'm really happy, though. I learned so much from that woman, and in a relatively short amount of time. Nothing to really complain about, except that it's a lot of paper to get rid of. I kept all the papers that I could to help the next student to come to Seinan. Stuff like the "making a bank account" paper, and the book that welcomes you to and explains Fukuoka. Granted, they'll probably get that stuff from Seinan when they come here, but that's ok. I figure they could still look over it for review or something. Amazingly, a lot of my stuff is going to be given away, or thrown away. I have an extra pair of bath slippers which went to Chang (new Korean guy), as well as my Christmas tree and some soap that some other recently returned student bequeathed to me. The room looks a lot better, without all the crap on the floor.
However, as expected, it's really sad, even though there is still a lot of time. I mean, if I think about it, Leigh spent less time here than I have left, and that was a long time filled with a lot of memories. So, though the bulk of my stay is gone, it's far from fully disheartening. So, I'm just distracting myself a little and writing a small update concerning the things that have happened since the last update. Aside from the leaving preparations, I've been pretty darn busy. This week is the "teaching" week that I've been waiting for since mid-May. I was expecting a little more difficult in the way of teaching, but it's been pretty easy. I've spent nearly 8 hours to date teaching children to make slime. Sounds kind of useless, right? Au contraire, mes amis. It might be simple, but even words like "pour", "add", "food coloring", "borax", and "mix" are not part of the little children's vocabulary. So, a nice fun activity where you can make gooey, stretchy slime can be really useful to learn new vocabulary. I've been teaching in Kamo, an area about 5 minutes by car (if there wasn't any traffic) from the I-house. Mimi, the woman who hired me, actually studied in high school in Alabama, of all places. So, her English is really good, and her little son Haru switches freely between speaking in English and Japanese. It's actually really suprising, and something that I think more parents should do with their children. The kids learn so very fast, and being bilingual is most definately a useful world skill.
Apart from teaching craziness, I've been spend most of my free time either with Okaasan and with Tyson. Okaasan and I went the other day to get a fan for her daughter, who has recently moved out of the house. So, we ate in Tenjin first at a buffet (didn't realize there was a buffet in the area) style restaraunt. Had ice cream, so I had two small dishes. Then, off to Best Denki (Best Electronics) to buy a fan, complete with its own remote control. I'm really happy I got to help, because I got to ride on the new subway line. In Febuary, the city of Fukuoka unveiled the new Nanakuma line of the subway. Now, it's possible to get to areas such as Fukuoka University (Fukudai) and areas before only accessable by bus. The bus system, by the way, is insanely more complicated than even the RIPTA system, which is still pretty complicated when you don't know how to use it. Here, the busses go across the city in some unusual patterns, and following the timetable to go anywhere other than a straight line from your current position is a chore. I can only imagine how difficult it is for Fukudai students to get to important parts of the city with the busses. Anyways, the new subway line is really damn clean, and there is no space blocking the driver from the rest of the cars. So, while going to the area that Aily (Okaasan's daughter) lives in, one could see the tracks in front of them. Pretty cool, in a little kid loves exploring the world kind of way. We gave the fan, walked across the Fukuoka University campus, and came back home.
On a lesser but much important point, we (Tyson and I) were invited to Eriko's house for lunch the other day. Eriko, if she hasn't been previously mentioned, is one of the students headed to Tyson's school. She invited Aki, another girl whose name I can't remember, Tyson, and myself to eat at her home in Akasaka. Akasaka is the area just outside of Tenjin, and as expected, the apartment was pricy and big. Must have cost quite the pretty penny to rent. Her mom was really nice, and made a variety of different foods. Most of them were somewhat "ethnic", being from Vietnam, Thailand, or such. There was pasta and vicchisoie (cold French potato soup), some sort of spring roll, yakigyoza (fried dumplings), fried rice, and coffee jelly for desert. She definately went through a lot of trouble for it, and it shows. It was nice, talking about American culture and stressing the importance of studying it before they go there. They, being Japanese students, are much more concerned with the English, but the language comes with being in the country. The culture is definately necessary, and will help the culture shock's severity be less so when they get there.
Well, folks, that's about all we have time for today. Tune in next week for the fantastic conclusion to...
Sean
However, as expected, it's really sad, even though there is still a lot of time. I mean, if I think about it, Leigh spent less time here than I have left, and that was a long time filled with a lot of memories. So, though the bulk of my stay is gone, it's far from fully disheartening. So, I'm just distracting myself a little and writing a small update concerning the things that have happened since the last update. Aside from the leaving preparations, I've been pretty darn busy. This week is the "teaching" week that I've been waiting for since mid-May. I was expecting a little more difficult in the way of teaching, but it's been pretty easy. I've spent nearly 8 hours to date teaching children to make slime. Sounds kind of useless, right? Au contraire, mes amis. It might be simple, but even words like "pour", "add", "food coloring", "borax", and "mix" are not part of the little children's vocabulary. So, a nice fun activity where you can make gooey, stretchy slime can be really useful to learn new vocabulary. I've been teaching in Kamo, an area about 5 minutes by car (if there wasn't any traffic) from the I-house. Mimi, the woman who hired me, actually studied in high school in Alabama, of all places. So, her English is really good, and her little son Haru switches freely between speaking in English and Japanese. It's actually really suprising, and something that I think more parents should do with their children. The kids learn so very fast, and being bilingual is most definately a useful world skill.
Apart from teaching craziness, I've been spend most of my free time either with Okaasan and with Tyson. Okaasan and I went the other day to get a fan for her daughter, who has recently moved out of the house. So, we ate in Tenjin first at a buffet (didn't realize there was a buffet in the area) style restaraunt. Had ice cream, so I had two small dishes. Then, off to Best Denki (Best Electronics) to buy a fan, complete with its own remote control. I'm really happy I got to help, because I got to ride on the new subway line. In Febuary, the city of Fukuoka unveiled the new Nanakuma line of the subway. Now, it's possible to get to areas such as Fukuoka University (Fukudai) and areas before only accessable by bus. The bus system, by the way, is insanely more complicated than even the RIPTA system, which is still pretty complicated when you don't know how to use it. Here, the busses go across the city in some unusual patterns, and following the timetable to go anywhere other than a straight line from your current position is a chore. I can only imagine how difficult it is for Fukudai students to get to important parts of the city with the busses. Anyways, the new subway line is really damn clean, and there is no space blocking the driver from the rest of the cars. So, while going to the area that Aily (Okaasan's daughter) lives in, one could see the tracks in front of them. Pretty cool, in a little kid loves exploring the world kind of way. We gave the fan, walked across the Fukuoka University campus, and came back home.
On a lesser but much important point, we (Tyson and I) were invited to Eriko's house for lunch the other day. Eriko, if she hasn't been previously mentioned, is one of the students headed to Tyson's school. She invited Aki, another girl whose name I can't remember, Tyson, and myself to eat at her home in Akasaka. Akasaka is the area just outside of Tenjin, and as expected, the apartment was pricy and big. Must have cost quite the pretty penny to rent. Her mom was really nice, and made a variety of different foods. Most of them were somewhat "ethnic", being from Vietnam, Thailand, or such. There was pasta and vicchisoie (cold French potato soup), some sort of spring roll, yakigyoza (fried dumplings), fried rice, and coffee jelly for desert. She definately went through a lot of trouble for it, and it shows. It was nice, talking about American culture and stressing the importance of studying it before they go there. They, being Japanese students, are much more concerned with the English, but the language comes with being in the country. The culture is definately necessary, and will help the culture shock's severity be less so when they get there.
Well, folks, that's about all we have time for today. Tune in next week for the fantastic conclusion to...
Sean