3 Day Post
Tuesday April 14th
Today I had hoped to be busy, but the only English class I was supposed to go to was canceled because the students had to get a medical/physical exam. (I think) So, I spent the entire day at my desk trying desperately to keep myself entertained. Went to lunch with a different set of students, and it wasn't like the deathly quiet lunch yesterday. I sat and ate my lunch, and was digging into the salad of seaweed, cucumber and ham. It tasted a little fishy, so I just figured there was some sort of fish in it. I kept eating, then took a closer look. Not only was there fish, they were WHOLE little tiny fish WITH EYES! They couldn't have been longer than a half inch and were thinner than a chopstick. Immediately I stopped eating it. Because really, I just can't bring myself to eat food that is staring at me! I went back to the teachers room for what seemed like an eternity and 4:45pm rolled around, so I headed out. It rained today, so I took extra care in driving home.
Wednesday April 15th
Today was decidedly more productive then yesterday. I went to a few classes for 2nd years (8th graders) and they were absolutely adorable. Not only were they more interested in the class than the 3rd graders had been, but they were smiling and shouting out answers and seemed interested in me, so I was happy. I had lunch with another group of students and it was delicious. We had Sekihan http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sekihan, chicken and soup. After lunch was the PTA General Meeting so all the students were cleaning. I went to help and on the way Mrs. Adachi and I came across some 1st graders (7th graders) and she asked them to come over and introduce themselves to me. THEY RAN AWAY. Like, RAN IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION. It was crazy! I told Mrs. Adachi that it was probably the only time I'd had boys run AWAY from me LOL. So after cleaning the students went home and all of the teachers went to the meeting, and all the new teachers including myself, had to give a short introduction. Now, by now, I'm pretty used to giving self introductions in Japanese, but this group of people, I wasn't really sure what to say, so I began with Hello, my name is Julie. I'm 24 years old. After I finished saying my age, the whole room LAUGHED AT ME. I paused, in disbelief, wondering what they were laughing at, and then continued with "I'm looking forward on taking this journey. Please take care of me." I left after the introductions to finish a project of putting flash cards and picture cards in order for the second year English teacher, Mrs. Adachi. After I finished putting the card in order, I went back to the teacher's room. One of the secretaries asked me if the meeting was over, and I told her no and then told her about what had happened. Even SHE said that it was RUDE for them to laugh. So, yea. I'm not really sure why....maybe it was inappropriate/unexpected for my to state my age, but still. RUDE. So while we were waiting for the meeting to be over, the secretary showed my how to make myself tea and where to put my cup at the end of the day. When the teachers came back, Mrs. Adachi told me that they were planning a party after work. The party was to meet with the PTA and to acknowledge the outgoing teachers. So this meant lots of drinking and food. So I told her that I would come. After it was decided, the head teachers and other teachers came up to ask how I would go, and what to do because I was going to drink. So we decided that Mrs. Adachi would take me to the party and drop me off at home and tomorrow I would take a train in and walk to school. So we left school around 6pm and went to a large hall with even space. It was formal, it felt like my host sister's wedding reception. There was a lot of bowing and speeches and more bowing. When it finally came time to eat and drink, it is custom to poor drinks for everyone, so everyone was clammoring for the beer bottles so not to be rude. Also, it is considered rude to refure someone's offer of drink, even if your cup is completely full. So you have to take a big enough sip for them to pour more in, then you should take another sip for gratitude. So,there was a lot drinking of beer and juice, and then the first entree of salad came out. After that, came the sashimi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sashimi). So up to this point, I had avoided eating sashimi, because, well, for one, I don't like fish, and the whole concept of raw fish had freaked me out. So, Mrs. Adachi wanted me to try the sashimi, and I thought to myself, why not? When in Rome....don't be stubborn LOL. So after about 3 minutes of holding the Salmon sashimi in my chopsticks, I dipped it in soy sauce and wasabi and put it in my mouth. WOW. OH MY GOSH IT WAS DELICIOUS!!! It didn't taste ANYTHING like I thought it would! There was no hint of fishy-ness, and to be honest, it didn't even taste like Salmon. So, yea. Delicious. I had some tuna and octopus sashimi with the constant refreshment of my beer from teachers and parents. After the sashimi, fried food was brought out including fried chicken, fried cheese wedges and fried octopus (or squid, I don't know) and it was delicious. As the night progressed I drank more and more and the Japanese got more fluent. I don't even know what we were talking about half the time, but the teachers gave up on speaking English, which was good for me. I got a lot of "pera pera" (you're fluent) comments, but the longer the night went on, the more I realized that even though I seemed "pera pera" I didn't feel it. I didn't understand a lot that was said and my polite speech was seriously lacking. I think I still have a long way to go, but I appreciate the fact that some Japanese people think I'm fluent. The night ended around 10pm and Mrs. Adachi took myself, 2 teachers and the head (or principal?) back home. As she was driving to drop me off, we suddenly noticed lights behind us. Now Mrs. Adachi hadn't been drinking at all because Japan has a strict zero tolerance for drunk driving. So we didn't know why they pulled us over. The police officer asked Mrs. Adachi about why she didn't stop at the intersection. So, unlike anything I've ever seen, Mrs. Adachi GOT OUT OF THE CAR AND INTO THE POLICE CAR. I guess this is completely normal! She sat in the police car while he wrote her a ticket. (And for the record, seriously? a ticket for not stopping on a deserted road?) so that took about 15 minutes. Finally she came back and drove a couple more minutes to my place. I felt really bad that she got a ticket because of me :( I got home, talked to Andrew on Skype and checked the train schedule for the next day.
April 16th
Well, either I need to get an actual alarm clock (and not use the one on my non-working cell phone) or I need to go to bed way earlier, because I didn't even hear my alarm go off. Luckily my bladder seemed to know the time because it woke me up a 6:30am. I had wanted to get up at 6am. So I hustled to curl my hair put on some make up and clothes and left my apartment at 6:50am to catch the 7:03am train. So I made it to the station (a 5-8 minute walk) and got on the train. Now, in all of my experience riding the train, the two things that happened to me have never once occurred. The first was when I was exiting the train at my stop. EVERY SINGLE train that I have EVER rode in Japan gets within 3 inches of the platform and are LEVEL with the platform. This train was neither, so I took a step to exit the train and almost completely biffed it. It wasn't a complete epic fail, but I looked silly tripping over my feet, bag and umbrella. Luckily I regained my balance and didn't fall, but I sure made a racket and had everyone starting. So yea, awesome job. The second was when I was leaving the platform out to the street. I had swiped my Suica (a prepay pass) at my start point, and I came to the ticket counter, and there was no machine to swipe my card. Or an attendant. Nothing. No barrier, nothing. Talk about an honor system! You could just walk through and take a train and not pay for it. Crazy. So, I didn't know the way to school by walking so I hung around the station until I saw some students and I not-so-discreetly followed them. When I got to school, it was 7:30am. About 20 minutes before I had to be there. But it was ok, I had some time to relax before classes. Today, I spent almost all of my day in the classroom. Which, I prefer. I was with 3rd grade and then had my first classes with 1st graders. And, omg, the 1st graders (7th grade) were so cute! They didn't speak English, so I did a short introduction and the teacher brought out a picture board with the ABCs on it. So we reviewed it, and then he randomly picked a student to come up and point to the letter and have the class recite the letter. I have never in my life seen this, although I had heard that it happens, sometimes, students get so nervous that they start to cry. The poor boy was doing a GREAT job, but when he went to sit down, HE WAS CRYING!!! I felt so bad for him! It wasn't a scary experience and no one was laughing or anything, so I just couldn't believe he was so nervous that he was crying! So, yea, the day ended and I came home. I have to say I'm looking forward to going to sleep!
Oh and sidenotes:
-I found out why the kids were wearing track suits. I guess that after lunch they have a lot of P.E. classes and then cleaning at the end of the day, so they wear track suits. I had no idea, I always thought they just wore their school uniforms.
-Also, each class has a color. The 3rd graders were shoes with yellow tips and a yellow stripe, the 2nd graders wear green and the 1st graders wear blue.
-This might sound weird, but I love the way that Japan smells. Everything from the classrooms to the agricultural burnings.
-The cherry blossoms are coming off the trees now. It's sad, but I love that the streets is pink from the flowers.
Today I had hoped to be busy, but the only English class I was supposed to go to was canceled because the students had to get a medical/physical exam. (I think) So, I spent the entire day at my desk trying desperately to keep myself entertained. Went to lunch with a different set of students, and it wasn't like the deathly quiet lunch yesterday. I sat and ate my lunch, and was digging into the salad of seaweed, cucumber and ham. It tasted a little fishy, so I just figured there was some sort of fish in it. I kept eating, then took a closer look. Not only was there fish, they were WHOLE little tiny fish WITH EYES! They couldn't have been longer than a half inch and were thinner than a chopstick. Immediately I stopped eating it. Because really, I just can't bring myself to eat food that is staring at me! I went back to the teachers room for what seemed like an eternity and 4:45pm rolled around, so I headed out. It rained today, so I took extra care in driving home.
Wednesday April 15th
Today was decidedly more productive then yesterday. I went to a few classes for 2nd years (8th graders) and they were absolutely adorable. Not only were they more interested in the class than the 3rd graders had been, but they were smiling and shouting out answers and seemed interested in me, so I was happy. I had lunch with another group of students and it was delicious. We had Sekihan http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sekihan, chicken and soup. After lunch was the PTA General Meeting so all the students were cleaning. I went to help and on the way Mrs. Adachi and I came across some 1st graders (7th graders) and she asked them to come over and introduce themselves to me. THEY RAN AWAY. Like, RAN IN THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION. It was crazy! I told Mrs. Adachi that it was probably the only time I'd had boys run AWAY from me LOL. So after cleaning the students went home and all of the teachers went to the meeting, and all the new teachers including myself, had to give a short introduction. Now, by now, I'm pretty used to giving self introductions in Japanese, but this group of people, I wasn't really sure what to say, so I began with Hello, my name is Julie. I'm 24 years old. After I finished saying my age, the whole room LAUGHED AT ME. I paused, in disbelief, wondering what they were laughing at, and then continued with "I'm looking forward on taking this journey. Please take care of me." I left after the introductions to finish a project of putting flash cards and picture cards in order for the second year English teacher, Mrs. Adachi. After I finished putting the card in order, I went back to the teacher's room. One of the secretaries asked me if the meeting was over, and I told her no and then told her about what had happened. Even SHE said that it was RUDE for them to laugh. So, yea. I'm not really sure why....maybe it was inappropriate/unexpected for my to state my age, but still. RUDE. So while we were waiting for the meeting to be over, the secretary showed my how to make myself tea and where to put my cup at the end of the day. When the teachers came back, Mrs. Adachi told me that they were planning a party after work. The party was to meet with the PTA and to acknowledge the outgoing teachers. So this meant lots of drinking and food. So I told her that I would come. After it was decided, the head teachers and other teachers came up to ask how I would go, and what to do because I was going to drink. So we decided that Mrs. Adachi would take me to the party and drop me off at home and tomorrow I would take a train in and walk to school. So we left school around 6pm and went to a large hall with even space. It was formal, it felt like my host sister's wedding reception. There was a lot of bowing and speeches and more bowing. When it finally came time to eat and drink, it is custom to poor drinks for everyone, so everyone was clammoring for the beer bottles so not to be rude. Also, it is considered rude to refure someone's offer of drink, even if your cup is completely full. So you have to take a big enough sip for them to pour more in, then you should take another sip for gratitude. So,there was a lot drinking of beer and juice, and then the first entree of salad came out. After that, came the sashimi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sashimi). So up to this point, I had avoided eating sashimi, because, well, for one, I don't like fish, and the whole concept of raw fish had freaked me out. So, Mrs. Adachi wanted me to try the sashimi, and I thought to myself, why not? When in Rome....don't be stubborn LOL. So after about 3 minutes of holding the Salmon sashimi in my chopsticks, I dipped it in soy sauce and wasabi and put it in my mouth. WOW. OH MY GOSH IT WAS DELICIOUS!!! It didn't taste ANYTHING like I thought it would! There was no hint of fishy-ness, and to be honest, it didn't even taste like Salmon. So, yea. Delicious. I had some tuna and octopus sashimi with the constant refreshment of my beer from teachers and parents. After the sashimi, fried food was brought out including fried chicken, fried cheese wedges and fried octopus (or squid, I don't know) and it was delicious. As the night progressed I drank more and more and the Japanese got more fluent. I don't even know what we were talking about half the time, but the teachers gave up on speaking English, which was good for me. I got a lot of "pera pera" (you're fluent) comments, but the longer the night went on, the more I realized that even though I seemed "pera pera" I didn't feel it. I didn't understand a lot that was said and my polite speech was seriously lacking. I think I still have a long way to go, but I appreciate the fact that some Japanese people think I'm fluent. The night ended around 10pm and Mrs. Adachi took myself, 2 teachers and the head (or principal?) back home. As she was driving to drop me off, we suddenly noticed lights behind us. Now Mrs. Adachi hadn't been drinking at all because Japan has a strict zero tolerance for drunk driving. So we didn't know why they pulled us over. The police officer asked Mrs. Adachi about why she didn't stop at the intersection. So, unlike anything I've ever seen, Mrs. Adachi GOT OUT OF THE CAR AND INTO THE POLICE CAR. I guess this is completely normal! She sat in the police car while he wrote her a ticket. (And for the record, seriously? a ticket for not stopping on a deserted road?) so that took about 15 minutes. Finally she came back and drove a couple more minutes to my place. I felt really bad that she got a ticket because of me :( I got home, talked to Andrew on Skype and checked the train schedule for the next day.
April 16th
Well, either I need to get an actual alarm clock (and not use the one on my non-working cell phone) or I need to go to bed way earlier, because I didn't even hear my alarm go off. Luckily my bladder seemed to know the time because it woke me up a 6:30am. I had wanted to get up at 6am. So I hustled to curl my hair put on some make up and clothes and left my apartment at 6:50am to catch the 7:03am train. So I made it to the station (a 5-8 minute walk) and got on the train. Now, in all of my experience riding the train, the two things that happened to me have never once occurred. The first was when I was exiting the train at my stop. EVERY SINGLE train that I have EVER rode in Japan gets within 3 inches of the platform and are LEVEL with the platform. This train was neither, so I took a step to exit the train and almost completely biffed it. It wasn't a complete epic fail, but I looked silly tripping over my feet, bag and umbrella. Luckily I regained my balance and didn't fall, but I sure made a racket and had everyone starting. So yea, awesome job. The second was when I was leaving the platform out to the street. I had swiped my Suica (a prepay pass) at my start point, and I came to the ticket counter, and there was no machine to swipe my card. Or an attendant. Nothing. No barrier, nothing. Talk about an honor system! You could just walk through and take a train and not pay for it. Crazy. So, I didn't know the way to school by walking so I hung around the station until I saw some students and I not-so-discreetly followed them. When I got to school, it was 7:30am. About 20 minutes before I had to be there. But it was ok, I had some time to relax before classes. Today, I spent almost all of my day in the classroom. Which, I prefer. I was with 3rd grade and then had my first classes with 1st graders. And, omg, the 1st graders (7th grade) were so cute! They didn't speak English, so I did a short introduction and the teacher brought out a picture board with the ABCs on it. So we reviewed it, and then he randomly picked a student to come up and point to the letter and have the class recite the letter. I have never in my life seen this, although I had heard that it happens, sometimes, students get so nervous that they start to cry. The poor boy was doing a GREAT job, but when he went to sit down, HE WAS CRYING!!! I felt so bad for him! It wasn't a scary experience and no one was laughing or anything, so I just couldn't believe he was so nervous that he was crying! So, yea, the day ended and I came home. I have to say I'm looking forward to going to sleep!
Oh and sidenotes:
-I found out why the kids were wearing track suits. I guess that after lunch they have a lot of P.E. classes and then cleaning at the end of the day, so they wear track suits. I had no idea, I always thought they just wore their school uniforms.
-Also, each class has a color. The 3rd graders were shoes with yellow tips and a yellow stripe, the 2nd graders wear green and the 1st graders wear blue.
-This might sound weird, but I love the way that Japan smells. Everything from the classrooms to the agricultural burnings.
-The cherry blossoms are coming off the trees now. It's sad, but I love that the streets is pink from the flowers.