TL;DR: an eventful week
to recap:
Monday: for Labor Day mom barbecued and i made + grilled seafood & veggie skewers. twaz yum. i kind of came to a decision, though, that i won't become a pescetarian.... instead i'll be a flexitarian/semi-vegetarian of sorts, i guess. i'll still stick mostly to seafood for meat when i want it, but i'll sometimes eat things which have other meat/meat-based stuff as well. i feel bad about it, but I CANNOT LIVE IN ASIA WITHOUT EATING CERTAIN THINGS, I'M SORRY. ;(
Tuesday: i woke up in the morning to an email saying i'd been passed up for the eikaiwa position in Wakayama... which obviously got me started that day on a bad note. i tried to not think about it, though... in the early afternoon i had my interview with Pottery Barn/Williams-Sonoma. the fact that i didn't/don't really want the job aside, i was really nervous. i hate failing at anything i apply myself to, regardless of what the thing actually means to me. anyway, i regret having applied for the job every time i go to the call center because it's a 2hr+ commute each way... had i known the location of the call center before applying (and silly me for not looking that up), i probably wouldn't have applied at all. but oh well, whatever.
the interview itself went amazingly well... the interviewer was really nice and she always gave me immediate feedback on all of my answers, which was unusual but awesome. she really liked the things i said, which made me happy that i'd researched the interview process and prepared as well as i did. all of the Skype interviews i've been doing also helped too. anyway, i was offered the job on the spot, and of course i couldn't say no.... $11/hr (min. wage in Vegas is a shitty $8.25), paid training of 40hrs/week for a month then a guaranteed 30~50hrs/week and in a really laid back work environment? as if i could say no, especially given my current situation. training starts on the 23rd.
that night, i had another (Skype) interview with an eikaiwa in Hitachinaka-shi, Ibaraki-ken. i had just applied to the school that past Friday and received an email asking for an interview on Sunday. :3 the interview was with an American from Seattle who is the manager of the school, which is family owned and has been going for 20+ years btw. i was able to relax a bit more during this interview because the interviewer himself was so approachable and laidback. that was awesome. :) the interview involved many typical questions and a few unexpected ones, which i can't regurgitate atm. the most noteworthy thing, though, was how much information was given to me about not only the job itself but the location of it. none of my previous interviewers had been so forthright with information and so helpful. it was a good interview and i left it wanting the job more than i had before.
Wednesday: i got an email requesting a second interview..! i was so happy, but crazy nervous as well. up until this point i'd never successfully made it to a second interview, so that boosted my confidence a little. at the same time, i was afraid of what a second interview would involve, so i was extremely anxious...
Thursday: the second interview was at 9:15pm and had the same atmosphere as the first interview had, much to my relief. this interview involved mostly hypothetical situation questions, not all of which i had anticipated. i think i did alright, though... again, the interview was packed full of information about the job and Hitachinaka and was really helpful. i wish all interviews could be as much like a relaxed, two-way conversation as the ones with this school have been. anyway, one thing i'd really like to note about this interview is how the interviewer seemed to say things... maybe i'm just being overly optimistic, but sometimes he said things in such a way that sounded like whether or not i would actually get the job wasn't still in question....? like i said, maybe i imagined it! either way, the way he said some things made me feel much more confident about my prospects of getting the job. :)
i just hope i don't come crashing down because of this false hope i may be giving myself...
anyway, the interview ended with him saying that he'll be contacting my references and that i may want to contact them to give them a heads up, so that's exactly what i did when i got off of Skype. i email the Kochi City Board of Education again and this time i actually called them for the first time in 3 years to make sure that they got the email. to my surprise, the same secretary who had been at the BOE for the three years i was there was still there three years later! amazing, since staff is always rotated regularly in Japan. oh, and on top of that she remembered me. :) after that, i went to bed for a few hours and got up again to call one of my favorite JTEs and friends in Japan, Ioroi-sensei. it was really great finally catching up with her. :D and she gave me an update not only on herself but on some of my other friends, too. she said she'd definitely put in a good word for me if the school called her. :)
today: i woke up to an email from the school manager saying that he had spoken with the school's management team and would like to Skype again with me tonight... i'll be Skyping with him in two hours..........
OMG. ;-;
i'm so anxious and apprehensive and 1000 other things. can't get my hopes up... it's better to expect rejection and then be pleasantly surprised if i do get a job offer than to expect an offer only to have my hopes shattered. better yet, i'm trying to stay neutral on the matter all together. at least i have a local job to fall back on financially should this not work out... or so i keep telling myself.
you can be sure an update will come soon.
TL;DR: i got the job at the call center. it's full-time, above min wage and has a month of paid training starting on the 23rd. also, i've had two interviews with an eikaiwa in Hitachinaka-shi, Ibaraki-ken and will be hearing back from them in two hours.....
I'M FREAKING OUT.
Monday: for Labor Day mom barbecued and i made + grilled seafood & veggie skewers. twaz yum. i kind of came to a decision, though, that i won't become a pescetarian.... instead i'll be a flexitarian/semi-vegetarian of sorts, i guess. i'll still stick mostly to seafood for meat when i want it, but i'll sometimes eat things which have other meat/meat-based stuff as well. i feel bad about it, but I CANNOT LIVE IN ASIA WITHOUT EATING CERTAIN THINGS, I'M SORRY. ;(
Tuesday: i woke up in the morning to an email saying i'd been passed up for the eikaiwa position in Wakayama... which obviously got me started that day on a bad note. i tried to not think about it, though... in the early afternoon i had my interview with Pottery Barn/Williams-Sonoma. the fact that i didn't/don't really want the job aside, i was really nervous. i hate failing at anything i apply myself to, regardless of what the thing actually means to me. anyway, i regret having applied for the job every time i go to the call center because it's a 2hr+ commute each way... had i known the location of the call center before applying (and silly me for not looking that up), i probably wouldn't have applied at all. but oh well, whatever.
the interview itself went amazingly well... the interviewer was really nice and she always gave me immediate feedback on all of my answers, which was unusual but awesome. she really liked the things i said, which made me happy that i'd researched the interview process and prepared as well as i did. all of the Skype interviews i've been doing also helped too. anyway, i was offered the job on the spot, and of course i couldn't say no.... $11/hr (min. wage in Vegas is a shitty $8.25), paid training of 40hrs/week for a month then a guaranteed 30~50hrs/week and in a really laid back work environment? as if i could say no, especially given my current situation. training starts on the 23rd.
that night, i had another (Skype) interview with an eikaiwa in Hitachinaka-shi, Ibaraki-ken. i had just applied to the school that past Friday and received an email asking for an interview on Sunday. :3 the interview was with an American from Seattle who is the manager of the school, which is family owned and has been going for 20+ years btw. i was able to relax a bit more during this interview because the interviewer himself was so approachable and laidback. that was awesome. :) the interview involved many typical questions and a few unexpected ones, which i can't regurgitate atm. the most noteworthy thing, though, was how much information was given to me about not only the job itself but the location of it. none of my previous interviewers had been so forthright with information and so helpful. it was a good interview and i left it wanting the job more than i had before.
Wednesday: i got an email requesting a second interview..! i was so happy, but crazy nervous as well. up until this point i'd never successfully made it to a second interview, so that boosted my confidence a little. at the same time, i was afraid of what a second interview would involve, so i was extremely anxious...
Thursday: the second interview was at 9:15pm and had the same atmosphere as the first interview had, much to my relief. this interview involved mostly hypothetical situation questions, not all of which i had anticipated. i think i did alright, though... again, the interview was packed full of information about the job and Hitachinaka and was really helpful. i wish all interviews could be as much like a relaxed, two-way conversation as the ones with this school have been. anyway, one thing i'd really like to note about this interview is how the interviewer seemed to say things... maybe i'm just being overly optimistic, but sometimes he said things in such a way that sounded like whether or not i would actually get the job wasn't still in question....? like i said, maybe i imagined it! either way, the way he said some things made me feel much more confident about my prospects of getting the job. :)
i just hope i don't come crashing down because of this false hope i may be giving myself...
anyway, the interview ended with him saying that he'll be contacting my references and that i may want to contact them to give them a heads up, so that's exactly what i did when i got off of Skype. i email the Kochi City Board of Education again and this time i actually called them for the first time in 3 years to make sure that they got the email. to my surprise, the same secretary who had been at the BOE for the three years i was there was still there three years later! amazing, since staff is always rotated regularly in Japan. oh, and on top of that she remembered me. :) after that, i went to bed for a few hours and got up again to call one of my favorite JTEs and friends in Japan, Ioroi-sensei. it was really great finally catching up with her. :D and she gave me an update not only on herself but on some of my other friends, too. she said she'd definitely put in a good word for me if the school called her. :)
today: i woke up to an email from the school manager saying that he had spoken with the school's management team and would like to Skype again with me tonight... i'll be Skyping with him in two hours..........
OMG. ;-;
i'm so anxious and apprehensive and 1000 other things. can't get my hopes up... it's better to expect rejection and then be pleasantly surprised if i do get a job offer than to expect an offer only to have my hopes shattered. better yet, i'm trying to stay neutral on the matter all together. at least i have a local job to fall back on financially should this not work out... or so i keep telling myself.
you can be sure an update will come soon.
TL;DR: i got the job at the call center. it's full-time, above min wage and has a month of paid training starting on the 23rd. also, i've had two interviews with an eikaiwa in Hitachinaka-shi, Ibaraki-ken and will be hearing back from them in two hours.....
I'M FREAKING OUT.