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The Bad News

On Saturday, I’ll be kissing Japan, and this blasted job, behind.

One of those I will really, really miss. And to the other I will say, “thanks for the memories, though I could have done without all of them!”. Still though, when asked by a friend what I would miss most about Japan, I said, “my kids”. This, of course, is recognized by all other ALTs (“teachers in general”, most likely) as “the kids I teach”. Or “taught”, in my case.

If ever there was a time to sigh, now would be it.

*sigh*

I definitely had my share of troubles, but I don’t want any future ALTs to be horrified upon finding that their predecessor’s website is practically saying, “abandon hope, all ye who enter here”. Nono, nothing like that. It was personal issues that drove me away ( to an extent…). It seems I’m just a bit too ornery for this lifestyle.

I’m not looking forward to leaving. I’ll be saying goodbye to good friends who’ve braved the ALT journey with me through the highs and lows. And there is a veritable plethora of inside jokes that I find terribly humorous now, and every unsuspecting person I meet will be subjected to them for, what, the next ten years? Something close to that.

And of course, there’s my boyfriend. *shock!* Yes, I’ve been dating him for a while, but I’ve always made sure to not bring romantic relationships (as well as politics and religion) into this blog. But I feel it would just be wrong not to mention him in this situation! We are going to be silly and try to keep this going while we’re apart. He’s got at least another year here (he’s also an ALT), but what with my upcoming plans, hopefully everything will conveniently work out anyways.

Oh, this ever-changing life! I wonder what new twists the future holds for me now.

I’m trying to stay positive here!  …nonetheless, it’s kindof failing.

A JHS ALT Heaven-Sent

I have several links posted for sites that have activity ideas for teaching English.  They’re good, though usually cluttered, and geared towards eikaiwa teachers.  Which sucks.  Because I am ALT!  Mighty ALT!  Who works with JTE (sometimes)!  Mighty JTE!

So check this out! (can’t shake the thought of an 80′s saturday morning commercial voice saying that…)

I just got an e-mail with a forward by CLAIR themselves about a volunteer-based website designed specifically with the ALT in mind.  It is a database of lesson plans, worksheets, and an awesome link page (if only I had found the flashcard links section sooner…drew sooo many of them!!).  Sooo, being the kind samaritan that I am, I am posting it here.

Englipedia.com is a site founded by an ALT, with the ALT in mind.  Read the “About Usについて” section to get a feel of how this site came about.  It’s made to run fast on ancient equipment (the part about us having to use the fifteen-year-old computers is truuue).  Speaking of crappy computers, mine won’t display the thumbnails for any of the worksheets, but not a problem, since I can still load the full pages when clicked (yokatta~!).

There’s even a section that shows activities that match the textbook you’re using (and if they don’t, be nice and post them).  I’m using the Sunshine series, and only the book for the third-years is posted.  Not a problem, though, since that’s the teacher I sit next to.  What?  You’re saying that I should be “nice” and post the first two?  Sorry kids.  The “nice” died out long ago in me.  Now all that’s left is a bitter and hollow husk…

…

So yay!  Visit the site!  It’s well worth the visit.

And, wow, I kindof feel like a jerk for adding this as a footnote to a post about the awesomeness of another site, but…yeah.  It deserves love, too!

This Sendai Education website actually DOES have activities for all of the Sunshine books and has a very similar structure to Englipedia.  And complete lesson plans!  Love!

They both deserve your perusal.  楽しんで。 Enjoy.

Right.

Did I tell you guys that I didn’t re-contract?  Yeah, that’s right.  I didn’t.

• No more sitting around trying to look busy (actually gave that up a long time ago).
• No more glare contests with Boss Man.
• No more feeling incredibly silly for not studying any Japanese at all while at the same time building killer listening skills (like, they’re awesome).
• No more going, “gee, I wonder what they’re saying”.
• No more going, “gee, I wonder what’s written on the board”.
• No more going, “gee, I wonder where everyone went”.
• No more magazines dedicated to any geeky thing I want.
• No more 回転寿司 (“kaiten zushi” ->conveyor belt sushi) on the cheap and delicious.
• No more プリン (“purin” ->pudding…or more honestly, flan) that I love from said conveyor belt sushi place.
• No more ordering soup and getting a giant fish head in it (that was interesting).
• No more being patted on the belly by students.
• No more getting boy students in trouble because of their セクハラ (“sekuhara” ->sexual harrassment), whether I meant to or not (I have been told worse than “I am a sex machine”, which is what got them in trouble).
• No more moderately big brick of a house to call my own.
• No more being a celebrity in my little town.
• No more feeling like I can act girly even though I’m only getting older.
• No more neighbor children using my dirt to make “katsudon”, “cake”, and “pudding”.
• No more feeling like an aggressive American.  Soon I’ll just be aggressive :)
• No more kawaii-bombed EVERYTHING (this will be missed, btw)
• No more “すごい”s EVERY TIME I drink alcohol faster than a sip.
• No more feeling second-class.

YES to

• nacho cheese chalupas!
• understanding what’s being said around me…at long last!!!
• taking my turtle back with me!  His carapace is longer than four inches, so…
• having everything gardening-related written in a language I know!!!  With lots of books to help me!!!!!  And people to explain things at nurseries in detail in my native tongue!!!!!
• books that only cost a small fortune
• being able to show off cleavage without feeling like an absolute hooker.
• pants that fit.
• SHOES that fit!!!!
• travelling on the interstate without having to spend your life savings on expensive tolls
• feeling like a valued member of society
• being that person who might not be able to tear herself away from the Japan “glory days”

hmm…

Just Looking Out For My Health

There was a miscommunication yesterday where a teacher thought that I was deciding to cancel on the graduation banquet.  She went ahead and cancelled, and I found out today, after deciding that I would gambare through it after all.  I was all OMG!  She was all OMG!  Then I really began to think about it.  If I was already successfully cancelled out of it, perhaps I should just not go.

And so, I’m going to verify the cancellation of my reservation for tomorrow’s banquet (aka “enkai with chairs”) on grounds of doctor’s orders.

After telling me that all tests ran came back negative, my doctor is convinced that all my problems stem from my being 20 pounds overweight.  He is determined that I need to lose at least those 20 pounds, if not the mythical 40 pounds.  I say he’s crazy very optimistic (as far as 40 pounds are concerned), but I’m still trying to stick with this whole “small servings of generally healthy foods” and “as little alcohol as possible” deal.  Keeping a food diary and all.  No fun at all.

The real reason why I don’t want to go to the banquet is because the only way to survive is by drinking myself into a stupor so the pain dies enough to practice some “nomunication”.  If you’re not familiar with the term, it is used to describe the “ability” for Japanese people to suddenly speak “English”, and people like me to speak “Japanese”.  It’s taken from the Japanese word 飲む　*nomu*, which means “to drink”.  That sounds so depressing right now, just that by itself should be a good reason not to go.  Lots of messages sent via secret texting to friends under the table usually go as follows:

• Oh my god doom enkai sucking life out of body!!!*crying emoticon*
• the pain it hurts so much ohmigod kill me now
• shoot me in the head make it stop
• must gambare and drink more!!!!! *emoticon of beer* dtykgbuvtfrcytrfyu

And I save about 6000円.  That’s not bad. 

Yeah, and so on that note, I’ll just take it easy tomorrow (after graduation).  Perhaps I’ll do some gardening.  *sigh*  But at least this way I won’t have to worry about any drunken brawl with boss men.  One thing’s for sure, this time in Japan has given me a whooole lot of stories to tell.

 And the closer it gets to the end of the day, the more I’m wanting to go to it anyways.  Hahhah!  That’s funny.  Always a glutton for punishment.

…But Where Does One Begin?

I went father home with my mother.

I ate onabe beautiful onabe. I today hot.

I friend school. I many ran

I homeworkad my room pretty late a for ther from workhard want Iam.

I it saw I am Regend. interresting

I ate keaku.

I cooking homo sister night.

I wented a grandpa’s home.  I witched the TV.  I stadyed math.

I wrote my room today. I’m very so that fired Though, a little by littel oh!! Glad. Happy.

I clern my homp

I stady Engrisy.

I my family sister Bar th day.

I playd sumou with my baseball taday.

I ended homeworks.  I pleasure tomrrow.  I pleasanted today.

Varying degrees of First-Year (7th grade) English from winter journals.  It was my job to correct them as much as possible in the tiny amounts of room left over.

Here’s an example of the finished product.  Minimal red ink, as you can tell.

Most of the time I’m simply pondering how to best make a coherent sentence with the same basic structure the students gave me (in order not to break their spirits so early into the game).

If you’re not an ESL teacher, you might not appreciate that the horribly mangled, long ones were the ones that probably had the most effort put into them.  Because they were trying to go beyond what they had been taught.

But no. Sadly, they don’t talk to me in the same sentence patterns. They’re usually shocked into silence as soon as I ask them “How are you doing?” after we’ve said hello to each other. It would be funny if it wasn’t so sad.

I swear to…

Gah!  So I’m back from restarting the school computer because I couldn’t get out of the Katakana/hiragana mode I accidentally put it in with some random quick key move I pulled off.  That last post was full of katakana because I was trying to find the magical quick key sequence to get it back to being normal…though it was not to be found.  And no, toggling back and forth using the kanji key didn’t fix anything.

It’s just SUPER FREAKING FUNNY that it happened as I was going to write a rant about how much I hated Japanese keyboards because (besides the horrid placement of the ” and ‘ keys) I had accidentally hit some quick key sequence that made letters automatically capital.  I just wanted to bang my head against the desk.

You know…before it switched to Japanese on me.

Oh, how you pain me so, computer!

Doing Laundry At School

Well, all the teachers are watching or giving demonstration classes, so, once more, I’m left all alone in the teachers’ room.

Oh, what’s a girl to do?

Play the DS, apparently.  But, oh my!  The DS strap was all dirty, so I decided to wash it.

On the right, double-bagged oolong tea.  I like it strong!  On the left, laundry!

Those mugs were both acquisitions from the first trip to Universal Studios: Japan.  JAWS and Peter Pan.  I love them both (and yes, I do keep two mugs,a spoon, and chopsticks at my desk at all times…don’t you?)!

Shame I didn’t have a “before” picture of the strap, because it was daarty!  Living in my purse can do that to a pure white strap.

Just wanted to share.

Marketing Ploys At Work

Well, well!

Look what I found in the most visible part of my middle school, tacked onto a door, blatantly visible, right upon entering the school!

ザ・シンプソンズ MOVIE

How it was able to be displayed so prominently in a school of learning is the message found on the blue part of the poster.  It basically says to “sleep early, wake up early, and eat breakfast”.  There may also be some talk of a contest or something below that, but I couldn’t really decipher it.

Picture quality is lacking because, yeah, I took it with my cellphone.  It’s a 3 megapixel camera, but I always have it set to full screen resolution of my phone, ’cause I usually only take pics on it for the sole purpose of making them my keitai’s background screen.

So anyways, yeah.  Nice marketing scheme.  My school probably has no idea what the movie’s about (let alone the kids), but that’s cool.  The Simpsons are only really known here because of some CC Lemon commercials (google “cc lemon simpsons”…I’d do it for you but all the good sites are blocked at work…confoundit!).

School Marks

Right before class started, a small group of boys were busy at work, marking on each others’ faces with black markers.  It was a jan ken pon (paper scissors rock) match gone bad, and by the time the bell rang, they were all marked up, one having the full deal with a れ on one cheek, a ん on the other, small scribbles on his forehead, and a full  scribbly beard.

The bell having rung, they all rushed to the bathroom, conveniently located across from the classroom.  Only one was able to start washing his face as the teacher yelled for them to come back.  I told the teacher, “I hope it’s permanent marker!”.

The one boy had been able to remove all but a shadow of the X marks from his cheek.  But the ”bearded” boy…

He walked back into the room, not having had a chance to wash any of the marks off of his face.  He kept his hand over his “beard” as he took his seat.  He eventually felt less self-consious and took his hand down, only to put it back up when I kept laughing (he’s one of the more popular, loud kids in class, and this humored me to no end).  We played a hot potato game, and when the music stopped on him (you have to answer a question when that happens…and it was totally my fault that the music stopped at him…I’m cruel), his hand shot right back up.

The lesson of the day focused on “____ look(s) _____.”  Marker Boy tried out his new English by saying a few key phrases, such as, “you look old!”.  The teacher told him that it sounded funny coming from such a weird old man.  Another student turned around and told Marker Boy, “you look バカ!” (a seriously well-placed line *which means “you look stupid!”*).  We laughed.

Throughout the class, he stopped caring as much.  Nonetheless, near the end of the period, when another teacher slowly walked past the classroom, looking for trouble-makers (I can only guess, what with the prowling-ness), the English teacher pointed out that the student’s face had become bright red.

You’d think that after an entire class full of mockery, the first thing he’d do once the bell had rung would be to wash off his face.  But, hey, there were markers, and it wouldn’t be so embarrassing if others looked like him, right?  By the time I left, several other boys were already fully markered too.  Markered lines under the eyes.  Outlined noses.  swirls on cheeks.

Why did I leave my camera at home today?!?

Rest Assured

Don’t worry Mom.  In case you die while I’m in Japan (please don’t), I won’t have an excuse to miss your funeral, because I joined the JET Fund.  It helps us hapless JETs get back home, short notice, in case of a death in the family or other emergency.

Just wanted you to know! :)