I started my new French class yesterday. I am now officially an intermediate learner of French. Three other people from my previous class have continued also. Unfortunately, my mate from South African decided not to continue. She said she wanted to take a break from studying French and resume in January. However, there is some good news. ( Read more... )

The other day I went to meet one of the managers for ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) in a local college. We had spoken on the phone when I had called enquiring about part-time work and he had invited me to come and meet him for an “informal chat” and tour of the college. The college is in Hayes a rough part of London where some of ( Read more... )

I went to the Japan Centre in central London the other day for the first time. I popped in to buy some sauce, as I had decided to cook yakisoba for my family for dinner. I felt very “懐かしい” walking around the centre. It has a supermarket, a nice restaurant, a travel agency and a book shop. The supermarket prices were not as bad as I thought and ( Read more... )

I started the next level in my French class the other day. We had been worried there wouldn’t be enough people to continue the class, but in fact it’s full thanks to some newbies. My new classmates include a girl training to be a nurse, a guy who works for Apple and a rather elderly woman. I haven’t taken a dislike to anyone yet, but it’s bound ( Read more... )

I had my first French class yesterday. There are five other people in the class apart from me; all female. Everyone seems pretty nice apart from one girl who is from Bulgaria. I had to do pair work with her and she was rather sullen and even a bit stand-offish. Looks like I have an early candidate for that one person I have to dislike! Our ( Read more... )

One of the things I wanted to do when I came back to England was try and learn a new language. Initially I wanted to learn German, but I decided instead to try and learn French again. Firstly, I studied French at school and though I hadn’t used it for nearly 13 years at least I wouldn’t be starting from zero. Also, I have some French friends now ( Read more... )

I haven’t updated my blog in a while, so I thought I’d write about something funny that happened recently. This term at the language institute I’ve become friends with a French guy in my class. He recently had a party at his flat for people in our class and some friends from his class last term. The party was a lot of fun; we chatted, played ( Read more... )

I’ve been sick since Wednesday. It started on Tuesday evening when I suddenly developed a sore throat. I thought it was just hay fever, but when I woke up on Wednesday morning my glands were hurting and I felt like shit. So I didn’t go to classes at all that day (fortunately it was just review). It was really bad timing, as we had half-term ( Read more... )

When I was a JET I hardly ever used to watch Japanese TV. The reason was I didn't usually have time in the evenings, as I either had karate practice, Japanese class, or my English conversation class. However, since I've been back in Japan I've been trying to watch more TV. One of my friends at the language institute often recommends dramas for ( Read more... )

Since I’ve come back to Japan a lot of Japanese people have asked me if I’m Indian when they first meet me. I’ve been surprised why all of a sudden I am taken for being Indian. Of course my Dad is from India and I generally take it as a complement, as I’ve heard that Japanese people have positive stereotypes about Indians. To be honest I’ve used ( Read more... )