If I understood what was going on correctly, I'm pretty sure that a group of 3 9th grader girls in one of my middle schools tried to get me to say "boobs" in Japanese some days ago. The word for boobs is oppai, and one of the girls was saying "O, P, I" then she would back up a bit, drop her head and say very quickly, "opai." And after I said "What? O P I?" she again would back up quickly and say "opai." I think I knew what she was doing so I didn't give in, but it was pretty funny.
A 5th grade girl in my elementary school for sure tried to get me to say "poop" in Japanese the other day. She brought up a notebook with the word "unko" or "poop" written in it in Japanese. She pointed to it and asked "Teacher, what's this?" I smiled and said "fuzakenna!" or "fuck off!" with a mild bitch slapping motion and she laughed as she ran off. I don't blame these kids, I might have tried the same thing when I was their age.
I have a farmers tan that I picked up over a month ago and it STILL HASN'T GONE AWAY. It is ugly and annoying. Thank you very much, Japanese sun!
Students around Japan are currently doing two things at the moment. They are getting ready for a culture festival and practicing choir singing. Schools from kindergartens to colleges participate in this culture festival, which basically will see individual classes or groups putting on some sort of show or attraction while other students go through and see what is going on. There will be food, performances, and other things I'm not sure of yet. What really irks me is that my two middle schools are having their culture festivals on the same day, which means I can only go to one of them. I really wanted to go to both, because I really like both schools. It really makes me sad I can't go to both. But, c'est la vie.
My friend is starting his business and has asked me to be his CFO/partial partner. I am super excited for this, but alas, it will be the nail in the coffin as far as a second year in Japan is concerned. Funny, I miss it already.
おっぱい (oppai) (n) (1) (chn) breasts; boobies; tits; (2) (chn) breast milk; (P)
Sunday, October 23, 2011
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Halloween Party, Inside/Outside Shoes
There's a requirement for any chair in a public school in Japan. It must squeak each time you move in it. That is all.
We had a Halloween party last weekend which went pretty well. Got a few Japanese people to come over. We ended up playing a game called King's Game where basically people draw straws (chopsticks in our case) all labeled with numbers 1 through however many people there are minus 1, and that leftover one is labeled as the king. The king gets to command 2 numbers to do anything the king wants, example being "numbers 2 and 5, kiss!" The stuff we did wasn't that wild, and it was ok, although I'd rather avoid it in the future if possible. Karaoke followed and I'd write about it but nothing out of the ordinary really happened.
Even in Japan I can't avoid getting a cold that comes with a cough that won't stop. I had this cough that lasted like a month back in the states around March. I remember what month it was because it was the month of my JET interview. I also have a runny nose that won't stop and I have to empty the tank in between each class. I probably use up 1/3 of a roll of toilet paper for all the snot that comes out. Weeee!
The most exciting news of all, for me at least, is that I found shoes that I think fit! Japan has this "inside/outside shoe" thing going on. If you haven't guessed already, this is where they have shoes that you wear outside, and shoes that you wear inside. They don't like to track dirt in from the outside is my best guess. It's really annoying for me because I have a hard time finding shoes that fit, and the most readily available store that I know of doesn't have a great selection. I found some though and am excited to try them out tomorrow. What's even weirder is that the inside shoes have no real "dress code." This means you can wear practically anything! People will wear full blown out suits with sandals or tennis shoes and this is NORMAL! It's actually kinda nice, save for the whole needing 2 pairs of shoes thing.
And now, for me, because I'm interested in this stuff at the moment:
1 USD = 76.982 JPY
1 USD = 1,152.074 KRW
鼻クソ【はなクソ】 (hanakuso) (n) nasal discharge (aka snot)
We had a Halloween party last weekend which went pretty well. Got a few Japanese people to come over. We ended up playing a game called King's Game where basically people draw straws (chopsticks in our case) all labeled with numbers 1 through however many people there are minus 1, and that leftover one is labeled as the king. The king gets to command 2 numbers to do anything the king wants, example being "numbers 2 and 5, kiss!" The stuff we did wasn't that wild, and it was ok, although I'd rather avoid it in the future if possible. Karaoke followed and I'd write about it but nothing out of the ordinary really happened.
Even in Japan I can't avoid getting a cold that comes with a cough that won't stop. I had this cough that lasted like a month back in the states around March. I remember what month it was because it was the month of my JET interview. I also have a runny nose that won't stop and I have to empty the tank in between each class. I probably use up 1/3 of a roll of toilet paper for all the snot that comes out. Weeee!
The most exciting news of all, for me at least, is that I found shoes that I think fit! Japan has this "inside/outside shoe" thing going on. If you haven't guessed already, this is where they have shoes that you wear outside, and shoes that you wear inside. They don't like to track dirt in from the outside is my best guess. It's really annoying for me because I have a hard time finding shoes that fit, and the most readily available store that I know of doesn't have a great selection. I found some though and am excited to try them out tomorrow. What's even weirder is that the inside shoes have no real "dress code." This means you can wear practically anything! People will wear full blown out suits with sandals or tennis shoes and this is NORMAL! It's actually kinda nice, save for the whole needing 2 pairs of shoes thing.
And now, for me, because I'm interested in this stuff at the moment:
1 USD = 76.982 JPY
1 USD = 1,152.074 KRW
鼻クソ【はなクソ】 (hanakuso) (n) nasal discharge (aka snot)
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Typical Day
When meeting a Japanese person for the first time, this is how a typical conversation starts out:
Me: こんにちは (Konnichiwa) - Hello
J-Person: こんにちは！日本語お上手ですね！ (Konnichiwa! Nihongo ojyouzu desu ne!) Hello! Your Japanese is really good!
Me: *Painful laugh*
It's obvious what's silly about this, right? For the culturally savvy and wondering, you are right. Mentioning that my Japanese is good isn't really a comment about my Japanese, it's an immediate comment aimed at me to make me feel good and thus, feel better about the person I'm speaking to. A rapport builder, if you will. I understand this. Most foreigners here understand this. The thing is, the conversation I gave isn't really an exaggeration. After saying 1 or 2 lines of Japanese, I immediately get complimented on how good I am. I know it's an ice breaker, but there's no real attempt to hide the fact it's an ice breaker, it's just tossed into the beginning of a conversation as conversation fodder. It's just a little weird because that's something you should really save unless, you know, the person's Japanese is actually fairly decent, don't you think? Japanese people, if you happen to read this, please take note, and stop this grossly overused compliment before it's due, or at least, try to hide it better :)
Typical Day
So a typical weekday for me has me getting up at either 7 or 7:10. I get up at 7 if I was too lazy to take a shower the night before, and 7:10 if I did make it.
After that, I leave the house at 7:40 and arrive to school at 7:55. I sit around at my desk trying to look pretty, accomplishing only being pretty useless, while all the other teachers run around preparing for the day. This goes on until 8:50 when the first classes start. I hate morning classes yet somehow I ALWAYS end up with a 1st period. I usually have around 2-4 classes in a day, and I eat lunch around 12:40ish. 5th and 6th periods follow.
School ends at 3:20, after which the students start cleaning the school. Yes, students clean the school in Japan. I walk around and offer help and oddly, no one gives me anything to do usually, so I continue to walk around and talk to any students who aren't scared to death to say anything beyond "hello." This usually amounts to about 0.1% of the school. The rest say hello, sometimes enthusiastically even, then get scared and run off screaming when they figure out words beyond that are coming out of my mouth.
My school day officially ends at 4 (4:15 for elementary school) PM, and I am free to leave, but usually something keeps me around. Some meeting, speech practice, random planning that I don't have much of a hand in after all, or school club activities. I've been going to the table tennis club, but I plan to try and get around to all the clubs eventually. This keeps me around anywhere from 5 to 6:30. I think I've gone home at 4 twice in the near 2 months I've been at the schools.
If I don't have grocery shopping to do I get home, pop open the computer, and usually get hungry and try to cook dinner around 7 to 7:30ish. It's usually rice, some meat and a bunch of veggies stir fried. It doesn't taste very good at all.
Back on the computer, I reply to messages I got during the day on a website called mixi, essentially the Japanese version of Facebook. After that, if I have time and am not too tired, I try to study some Japanese. This usually works around 3 of the 5 weekdays.
I am attempting to sleep around 11. I don't usually fall asleep until around 11:30 to 12. I am very tired the next day, until of course, it comes time to go to sleep.
That is my typical day, and I was going to write more but this turned into a really long post already so I'm stopping now.
Me: こんにちは (Konnichiwa) - Hello
J-Person: こんにちは！日本語お上手ですね！ (Konnichiwa! Nihongo ojyouzu desu ne!) Hello! Your Japanese is really good!
Me: *Painful laugh*
It's obvious what's silly about this, right? For the culturally savvy and wondering, you are right. Mentioning that my Japanese is good isn't really a comment about my Japanese, it's an immediate comment aimed at me to make me feel good and thus, feel better about the person I'm speaking to. A rapport builder, if you will. I understand this. Most foreigners here understand this. The thing is, the conversation I gave isn't really an exaggeration. After saying 1 or 2 lines of Japanese, I immediately get complimented on how good I am. I know it's an ice breaker, but there's no real attempt to hide the fact it's an ice breaker, it's just tossed into the beginning of a conversation as conversation fodder. It's just a little weird because that's something you should really save unless, you know, the person's Japanese is actually fairly decent, don't you think? Japanese people, if you happen to read this, please take note, and stop this grossly overused compliment before it's due, or at least, try to hide it better :)
Typical Day
So a typical weekday for me has me getting up at either 7 or 7:10. I get up at 7 if I was too lazy to take a shower the night before, and 7:10 if I did make it.
After that, I leave the house at 7:40 and arrive to school at 7:55. I sit around at my desk trying to look pretty, accomplishing only being pretty useless, while all the other teachers run around preparing for the day. This goes on until 8:50 when the first classes start. I hate morning classes yet somehow I ALWAYS end up with a 1st period. I usually have around 2-4 classes in a day, and I eat lunch around 12:40ish. 5th and 6th periods follow.
School ends at 3:20, after which the students start cleaning the school. Yes, students clean the school in Japan. I walk around and offer help and oddly, no one gives me anything to do usually, so I continue to walk around and talk to any students who aren't scared to death to say anything beyond "hello." This usually amounts to about 0.1% of the school. The rest say hello, sometimes enthusiastically even, then get scared and run off screaming when they figure out words beyond that are coming out of my mouth.
My school day officially ends at 4 (4:15 for elementary school) PM, and I am free to leave, but usually something keeps me around. Some meeting, speech practice, random planning that I don't have much of a hand in after all, or school club activities. I've been going to the table tennis club, but I plan to try and get around to all the clubs eventually. This keeps me around anywhere from 5 to 6:30. I think I've gone home at 4 twice in the near 2 months I've been at the schools.
If I don't have grocery shopping to do I get home, pop open the computer, and usually get hungry and try to cook dinner around 7 to 7:30ish. It's usually rice, some meat and a bunch of veggies stir fried. It doesn't taste very good at all.
Back on the computer, I reply to messages I got during the day on a website called mixi, essentially the Japanese version of Facebook. After that, if I have time and am not too tired, I try to study some Japanese. This usually works around 3 of the 5 weekdays.
I am attempting to sleep around 11. I don't usually fall asleep until around 11:30 to 12. I am very tired the next day, until of course, it comes time to go to sleep.
That is my typical day, and I was going to write more but this turned into a really long post already so I'm stopping now.
委ねる【ゆだねる】 (yudaneru) (v1,vt) to entrust to; to devote oneself to; to abandon oneself to; (P)
Monday, October 10, 2011
Just a Slight Waver
So a few weeks ago (I just remembered now), we were doing a lesson on "I like ____." The teacher asks "Who likes rice?" and 4 students raise their hand, including the fattest kid in the class. The teacher points to him and says "Oh yeah (insert student's forgotten name here), you LOVE rice, huh!" A bewildered expression immediately fell over the student's face because he didn't understand what the teacher said. I wanted to laugh so bad.
In that same school is a girl who starts crying at the drop of a pin. Almost literally. There hasn't been a day where I haven't heard her cry at least twice. I'm pretty sure she's mentally handicapped in some way, just not sure exactly how.
<start rant>As polite as Japanese people claim to be, they are RUDE ASS drivers. If they don't have to look you in the eye, Japanese people don't feel bad about screwing you over as bad as they can. True story. </end rant>
I went to a BBQ today with a Japanese person I met on mixi. It was pretty fun. Later that day one of the other ALTs asked if I liked Japanese girls. She might try to set me up if I did. Actually I like Japanese girls and wouldn't mind meeting one, but I'm more interested in meeting friends right now, is something along what I said. After I got back home I thought about it a bit more though. If I meet someone and something happens, that'd be cool. Actually the only reason I'm planning to stay 1 year is because there isn't really a reason for me to stay longer. If I got a girlfriend here I'd rethink my 1 year idea, and probably extend it indefinitely. Of course, I'd have to get one before work asks me to resign or not, which I think is in around 4 months. Doable but not likely. It's almost a little disappointing...
不定【ふじょう】 (fujyou) (adj-na,n,adj-no) uncertainty; insecurity; inconstancy; indefinite; undecided; (P)
In that same school is a girl who starts crying at the drop of a pin. Almost literally. There hasn't been a day where I haven't heard her cry at least twice. I'm pretty sure she's mentally handicapped in some way, just not sure exactly how.
<start rant>As polite as Japanese people claim to be, they are RUDE ASS drivers. If they don't have to look you in the eye, Japanese people don't feel bad about screwing you over as bad as they can. True story. </end rant>
I went to a BBQ today with a Japanese person I met on mixi. It was pretty fun. Later that day one of the other ALTs asked if I liked Japanese girls. She might try to set me up if I did. Actually I like Japanese girls and wouldn't mind meeting one, but I'm more interested in meeting friends right now, is something along what I said. After I got back home I thought about it a bit more though. If I meet someone and something happens, that'd be cool. Actually the only reason I'm planning to stay 1 year is because there isn't really a reason for me to stay longer. If I got a girlfriend here I'd rethink my 1 year idea, and probably extend it indefinitely. Of course, I'd have to get one before work asks me to resign or not, which I think is in around 4 months. Doable but not likely. It's almost a little disappointing...
不定【ふじょう】 (fujyou) (adj-na,n,adj-no) uncertainty; insecurity; inconstancy; indefinite; undecided; (P)
Thursday, October 6, 2011
CPR Certified
The other day at one of my middle schools I caught a bad migraine during the middle of first class. I somehow managed to crawl through that and 2 more classes before dying in the health room. Normally I try to carry two migraine aspirin on me because I know that I can get migraines randomly... at least, random as far as I know.
I managed to pick myself up for the last two periods when some firefighters came to the school and taught one of the 9th grade classes CPR. I participated, and if I understood the teacher right, I'll be getting certification for CPR! In Japanese! So for a while, I'll be certified for CPR in both the states and Japan. Right now there's no difference between the two countries, although I know that in the states they are quickly going towards getting rid of the breaths. Not sure how I feel about that, because if the reason I heard for that is true, it's a little silly I think. Supposedly they want to get rid of the two breaths because people in general aren't doing them correctly. It makes sense, and doesn't at the same time. Anyway I'm done digressing!
This is some place that you can do something at (vague description because I don't know if it's a shop/restaurant/barber/etc). Not much explanation needed on why I uploaded it right! This is in a city called Sendai, which is about 3 hours away from me. Good old Japanese people and their use of Engrish!
I'll end by showing you two entries from my students' summer journals. The randomness of the first one is great, while the feelings of the second one should be worth a literal lol.
I went to a bus stop. I cleaned it. I was sleepy. I was tired.
――――――――
We played the last soccer game. Our team lost the game to the Oshima team by a score of 9 to 2. As long as I live, I’ll never forget how bitterly vexed I was.
心肺蘇生法【しんぱいそせいほう】 (shin/pai/so/sei/hou) (n) cardiopulmonary resuscitation; CPR
I managed to pick myself up for the last two periods when some firefighters came to the school and taught one of the 9th grade classes CPR. I participated, and if I understood the teacher right, I'll be getting certification for CPR! In Japanese! So for a while, I'll be certified for CPR in both the states and Japan. Right now there's no difference between the two countries, although I know that in the states they are quickly going towards getting rid of the breaths. Not sure how I feel about that, because if the reason I heard for that is true, it's a little silly I think. Supposedly they want to get rid of the two breaths because people in general aren't doing them correctly. It makes sense, and doesn't at the same time. Anyway I'm done digressing!
I'll end by showing you two entries from my students' summer journals. The randomness of the first one is great, while the feelings of the second one should be worth a literal lol.
I went to a bus stop. I cleaned it. I was sleepy. I was tired.
――――――――
We played the last soccer game. Our team lost the game to the Oshima team by a score of 9 to 2. As long as I live, I’ll never forget how bitterly vexed I was.
心肺蘇生法【しんぱいそせいほう】 (shin/pai/so/sei/hou) (n) cardiopulmonary resuscitation; CPR
Sunday, October 2, 2011
Speech Results
Let's see if I can get this blog up and off before I have to get going today.
The Sendai speech contest went pretty good. My student ended up getting 5th place in the recitation part out of 17, which was good enough for a certificate and recognition on stage. She was happy she got that high, and I think she deserved it. What was stupid is that I had to take paid leave in order to go to the speech. I had to pay my own way to get there and everything else. Actually I don't care about paying my own way, it's that I had to take paid leave when it was obviously a school event for which I spent a lot of time preparing for. Good old Japanese education system. It's full of so many holes it makes Swiss cheese look solid.
They're putting an air conditioner in my apartment in around 2 weeks. Thank you landlord for installing it a few weeks after it'll be worthless for the good part of half a year. At least I have it for when summer strikes! I really hate the humidity...
I am a little jealous of the teachers in my textbooks. Yeah they're all cartoons but all their students are sitting there listening attentively, all the students are interested in the teacher, and the lessons all go really smoothly. I can't blame the students though, I didn't care about class when I was in middle school either.
This is how I wish classes would go. Everyone smiles and listens to what's being said, the students are interested in the teacher, and I'd rather go to work in the morning instead of sleep in. The textbooks paint such a pretty picture, who wouldn't want to come over and teach English to all these bright and wonderful kids!
But this is how it is a lot of the time. Students don't really talk much, and even if I address them in Japanese they run off. It's like they know I've been to Fukushima and they don't want to catch radiation poisoning from me. Ok that was a horrible joke, but explaining it any other way might make their apprehension my fault, and I sure as hell don't want to take the blame :)
Here is a picture of my Japanese English teacher, my student and myself after she won 5th place. I might be being too careful about this, but if somehow my student goes missing and they find a picture of her here, my ass is immediately a suspect, so yeah. Getting 5th place out of 17 people who respectively won their speech contests is pretty good! I'm happy.
Kentucky fried chicken is hella expensive here!
優秀賞【ゆうしゅうしょう】 (yuushuushou) (n) award of excellence; merit award
The Sendai speech contest went pretty good. My student ended up getting 5th place in the recitation part out of 17, which was good enough for a certificate and recognition on stage. She was happy she got that high, and I think she deserved it. What was stupid is that I had to take paid leave in order to go to the speech. I had to pay my own way to get there and everything else. Actually I don't care about paying my own way, it's that I had to take paid leave when it was obviously a school event for which I spent a lot of time preparing for. Good old Japanese education system. It's full of so many holes it makes Swiss cheese look solid.
They're putting an air conditioner in my apartment in around 2 weeks. Thank you landlord for installing it a few weeks after it'll be worthless for the good part of half a year. At least I have it for when summer strikes! I really hate the humidity...
I am a little jealous of the teachers in my textbooks. Yeah they're all cartoons but all their students are sitting there listening attentively, all the students are interested in the teacher, and the lessons all go really smoothly. I can't blame the students though, I didn't care about class when I was in middle school either.
 |
| So nice... sigh.. |
 |
| THE DEVIL CHILD |
But this is how it is a lot of the time. Students don't really talk much, and even if I address them in Japanese they run off. It's like they know I've been to Fukushima and they don't want to catch radiation poisoning from me. Ok that was a horrible joke, but explaining it any other way might make their apprehension my fault, and I sure as hell don't want to take the blame :)
 |
| Yay 5th |
Kentucky fried chicken is hella expensive here!
優秀賞【ゆうしゅうしょう】 (yuushuushou) (n) award of excellence; merit award
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