He's taken to make this expression lately-not really sure what it means... 

Hiroki loves to practice swinging-this is at his daycare. 

wow, i did it!

These were taken within the last couple of days- this is what the little boy looks like now.

Carolyn, no problem, pass on my email address.

i hate that...

Everytime I do this late at nighth, I always forget to put stuff in. I was talking about Hiroki and how he likes to hurt me (ok, I don't know if he likes it but he does it alot) and I didn't even mention how when I'm sleepy in the afternoon or at night and fall asleep (or sleeping) and he's doing his best to wake me up, he very often sits on my head. I don't know how he decided that was a good way to wake me up, but I guess it's the most effective way (I always wake up when he does it!) He's a strange little monkey.
Lately I have taken to watching videos on the net while I'm doing computer stuff. It's cool because I have a chance to watch stuff that I have never seen or stuff I like. The site I'm using lets you rate your videos so that it'll play the ones you like again and play ones you think you like. It's fun. I'm enjoying Smooth Criminal by Alien Ant FArm right now, and lots of Red Hot Chili Peppers. I also get to see Johnny Cash's video, Hurt, and Warren Zevon's Keep me in your heart for Awhile, both of which make me want to cry. Apparently I like Linkin Park, too, who knew?
Thanks, Carolyn, for the comment. I really appreciate it. We only went away for a week but due to generally laziness, an uninspired life, and spending more time with Hiroki, I haven't written much at all. I still haven't figured out how to put a recent pic of the boy on line, but I'm going to see if I can do it again soon.
That's all for now. xoxo

back

Hi, it’s been a long time since I sat down and wrote. I haven’t had much to talk about this summer. I guess being away from the school has made me feel more removed from whatever goes on there.
We had a great time in Niigata. Hiroki had a lot of fun and enjoyed being the star of the show. He had a bunch of extra people to play with. I was surprised that he wasn’t all that shy. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that he goes to daycare. Before he went daycare he was much more shy than he is now. He astounds me almost every day in how much he understands, both in English and Japanese. He can’t always respond verbally but I know by his actions that he understands what was said or what he was asked to do. It’s very cool.
I was reading something earlier this week about how having kids is painful…and the author was not referring to giving birth… she was talking about how when they are babies and toddlers they hurt you. I could totally relate to what she was saying. I don’t know how many times Hiroki has come to stand beside me and has ended up standing on me. He is especially good at standing on my feet, grinding his foot on the skin on the top of my feet, usually causing me to do something to get him off me as quickly as I can! Or the headbutts I get, too, are surprisingly painful (who knew babies have such hard heads!). He has got me in the chin, cheek, teeth, and he is very good at getting me in the chest. He thinks it’s funny to scream the word eye while sticking his little finger into your eye as far as it will go. Today he was trying to scratch me while we were playing; he’ s got such sharp little nails that grow so fast! And I can’t count how many times I’ve been bitten while breastfeeding! I guess they don’t realize that they are hurting you-I am sure that he hasn’t got the capacity to empathize with other people yet.
He is also surprising me with his memory. He sings a lot of the time. I am surprised by how many of the words he can remember of different songs. He is pretty much constantly singing or screaming, or talking. It’s pretty funny.
Well I’m going to go for now. If anyone reads this, it would be great if you make a comment (even hi Sheri) just so I know that it is being read. Thanks!

holiday

Hi,
  Just wanted to let you know that I won't be posting anything until next week.  Hiroki and I are off to Niigata for a week.  I'll write more later...

mind block

I think it’s been a week (again) since I was able to get back to this. I have finally decided what my topic will be for that speech that I have to do in Oct (good thing as the deadline is tomorrow). I’m going to do a comparison between Canada and Japan, both the country and the culture, so I think I’ll be able to cover a lot. The whole thing was really stressing me out, I feel some relief in finally having chosen a topic.
One thing we do everyday at the school (or almost every day) is cleaning. The students clean an assigned area of the school for 10 minutes after lunch. At my school, there are 3 grades and each grade has 3 homeroom classes. (My school is relatively small.) Each grade is responsible for a certain area, and that is further broken down into classes. The students from each class are grouped into about 5 or 6 people, and in each room there is a wheel that is spun to show which group is responsible for which area for those 2 weeks. I ‘watch’ the students who clean the hall in front of the staff room. Some of them get the brooms, while a couple of them 1/2 crawl and 1/2 run up and down the hall, pushing a rag to clean the floor. And then there is the most despised position-the person who must use the small broom and dustpan to sweep up all of the dirt. And of course, while the students (and I)are busy sweeping and cleaning, we get to listen to the music being piped in over the loudspeakers-first it’s one of the Sound of Music songs (maybe My Favourite Things?) in Muzak, and then there’s Heigh Ho, from Snow White (also Muzak). It’s quite funny, I think. One time when we were cleaning, the principal came out of his office to talk to the students and to get them to do a bit of extra cleaning. (This was before it became so hot that the students were using brooms to prop themselves up rather than to clean.) To motivate the girls, he said that they will make great brides one day. (I was thinking AARRGGHH!) but the girls were so pleased to hear that. Then he told the boys to be strong and to continue with the cleaning. What can you do?
I don’t know if I have properly explained my job here. Most days, that is days that I am working only as an assistant, I am basically the Vanna White of teachers. The Japanese teachers explain everything in Japanese and I smile and nod. Sometimes I get to model correct pronunciation or to read aloud a new conversation so that the students can here how to pronounce the words. Sometimes I teach the elective English classes, in which I am basically in control and I can decide what to teach. I like these classes more, but they can be frustrating when everyone thinks that they can’t understand English and they are very nervous about trying to understand me. On days when I am teaching at the elementary schools, I become the main teacher and the Japanese teacher is there mainly for crowd control. It’s better for me as the classes are usually consecutive and therefore I seem to spend less time waiting around. Oh well, I can’t really complain. Summer holidays are coming up so soon. Yay!
Hiroki had a lot of fun for his birthday. All of his cousins came over for dinner and cake. He has a lot more fun now with other kids and he does his best to imitate them.
He didn’t really know what it was about but he looked very pleased when everyone started to sing Happy Birthday to him and I brought in his cake. I had been singing it to him for a while so that he would (maybe?) understand what was going on. A couple of days after that, we got a beautiful card from Carolyn and I told him that she had made it for his birthday, and he tried to sing Happy Birthday! He knows some of the words to a lot of songs now and he’ll try to sing a long. It’s so cool.
Enough for now…

some random thoughts

Well, it’s been a while since I was able to get back to this…Last week was pretty gross weather wise. On Wednesday, it was raining and thunder storming so much that the train I take to school wasn’t even running. Atsunobu’s mom very kindly drove me to school, only to have the power go out for about an hour. Needless to say, I didn’t get any computer work done that day. Lately it’s been very hot and muggy. The high today is 32 degrees. It’s not as muggy today but it’s still hot. I am not looking forward to the summer.
When I walk to the school in the morning from the train station I have to walk through the school field. There is a baseball diamond, a soccer field, and a tennis court there. The kids come early (at least earlier than I do, and I arrive at 8 am) to play their sports, as well as practicing after school. As I was coming to school today I was watching the kids in their various states of undress and thinking ‘that just wouldn’t happen in Canada.’ They wear their gym clothes under their uniforms, so when they are finished, they just put their uniform back on over their gym clothes. Remember, even at 8 in the morning it’s about 30 degrees. I am sure that we had to change our clothes every time we did something sports like, at least in junior high school. I don’t remember changing clothes in elementary school…can anyone verify that?
Seeing the kids get changed reminded me of when I was teaching at the kindergarten here and how shocked I was when the kids came to school in their school uniform, only to strip down to their underwear and change into their other uniform. (And of course, before they went home they had to change again!) I was so surprised to see that many 5 year olds standing around in their underwear, another thing that just would not happen in Canada.
I can’t believe that Hiroki is going to be 2 on Sunday. When I look at him lying down, I feel like he has grown so much! I guess he looks tall. If I think about the difference a year has made in his life, it’s astounding. He has started walking, running, talking, both in English and Japanese. He has gone from being taken care of by mainly me, to Atsunobu’s mom, to daycare. I think he has adapted pretty well. Lately Atsunobu’s mom has had trouble convincing him to get in the car to come back home when it’s time to pick him up. They have started to play in the pool lately, a big factor in his unwillingness to leave. Unfortunately, he was sick again on Sunday with quite a high fever and now he’s got some red spots happening. I think we’ll have to go to the doctor once more and see what those are about.
And I haven’t forgotten about putting Hiroki’s pictures on this site. I took some pix and may have downloaded them on to the computer (the camera instructions were in French, the operating system on the computer is Japanese, it’s going to take some time.) I haven’t been able to locate the pix yet on the computer. When I get that worked out, I will put up some updated pictures.
Thank you to everyone who is commenting and sending me some ideas about what to do for my presentation. I have no idea how many people are coming, and I don’t know if I’m supposed to teach them anything. I think it’s supposed to be an opportunity for people who live in the city I work for to come and listen to stuff in English. Apparently we have access to various types of media…
More later.

some announcements

Hello to everyone who might be reading this. I am between classes (as usual) at school and thought I might take this opportunity to do another update. First, I have a couple of questions: Does any remember if we have a nurses’ office at our schools? There is kind of a nurse at every school here (but not really a nurse?) and we were talking. She asked me about schools in Canada and I can’t remember what used to happen if we got sick at school. If anyone can remember and could let me know, I would appreciate it greatly.
Next: Does anyone have a good idea about what I can make a presentation about? As ALTs, we have to take part in a lecture series. We have to lecture for about an hour to an hour and a half. Which is all fine and good but has got me thinking what the hell am I going to talk about for that long??!! One of the teachers last year did Canada, so that’s out. If anyone has any good ideas (no facetious ones, Mike) please let me know…
Also I wanted to say sorry to Mike for erasing your comment about the back of the head thing-I had some trouble with the computer (or the blog company) and anyway, it ended up printing my comment several times. I was erasing them and I guess in the process, I erased yours, too. So sorry.
I took Hiroki to a park on Sunday. It’s already getting to the unbearably hot temperatures, and I thought going to a park were there are some trees and a little bit of a breeze might be a little cooler. While we were there, there was a public announcement made from the area loudspeaker. I think it gets played in the whole community. (There are a lot of public announcements here!) The gist of the message was that someone had gone missing, and so they put out a description of that person. This wasn’t the first time I had heard an announcement like that.　　I have often heard this type of announcement- first the chimes ring, letting us know that there will be an announcement, then a voice over the loudspeaker speaking kind of slowly. Depending on where you are, you can here it very clearly or not at all because of the echoes. With all announcements, they announce which community they are representing, and then they usually announce the name of the person who is missing, along with their age (usually elderly), and then describe the clothes they were wearing. It seems that this happens quite frequently (like almost once a week) in some areas.
There are announcements at other times, too, like at 7 o’clock on a Sunday morning. They are announcing that there is a festival that day, or there is a garbage pick up or that there is a game somewhere and they are inviting us to come and cheer at it. It’s interesting, not always amusing (depending on the time of day).
There are quite a number of noises here-there is a chime at 7 in the morning, just to let us know what time it is. There is a song played at 5pm, I haven’t figured out where it comes from, or what song it is even. Sometimes it is Auld Lang Syne. On a day that there is going to be festival, they will set off fireworks, starting at around 7 am. (Not that you can see anything, it’s during the day.) Also, where I live, I can here the elementary school bell ringing. You pretty much always know what time it is, even if you don’t have a watch.
I just checked the internet to find out about the election in Canada. I feel great relief that Harper didn’t win. Sorry if you are not of the same opinion. I’m going to put a joke here (some of you have read it before) (Harper reminds me of Bush):

While visiting England, George W. Bush is invited to tea with the Queen. He asks her what her leadership philosophy is. She says that it is to surround herself with intelligent people. He asks how she knows if they're intelligent.

"I do so by asking them the right questions," says the Queen. "Allow me to demonstrate."

She phones Tony Blair and says, "Mr. Prime Minister. Please answer this question: Your mother has a child, and your father has a child, and this child is not your brother or sister. Who is it?"

Tony Blair responds, "It's me, ma'am."

"Correct. Thank you and good-bye, sir," says the Queen. She hangs up and says, "Did you get that, Mr. Bush?"

"Yes ma'am. Thanks a lot. I'll definitely be using that!"

Upon returning to Washington, he decides he'd better put the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to the test. He summons Jesse Helms to the White House and says, "Senator Helms, I wonder if you can answer a question for me."

"Why, of course, sir. What's on your mind?"

"Uh, your mother has a child, and your father has a child, and this child is not your brother or your sister. Who is it?"

Helms hems and haws and finally asks, "Can I think about it and get back to you?" Bush agrees, and Helms leaves. He immediately calls a meeting of other senior senators, and they puzzle over the question for several hours, but nobody can come up with an answer. Finally, in desperation, Helms calls Colin Powell at the State Department and explains his problem.

"Now look here Colin Powell, your mother has a child, and your father has a child, and this child is not your brother, or your sister. Who is it?" Powell answers immediately, "It's me, of course, you dumb ass."

Much relieved, Helms rushes back to the White House and exclaims, "I know the answer, sir! I know who it is! It's Colin Powell!" And Bush replies in disgust, "Wrong, you dumb ass, It's Tony Blair!"

And on that note, I think I’d better get to work.

kinda figured it out

Ok I can send photos (I think) now I just need more recent photos to put on...patience is a virtue...

HIroki already bored with waiting for lunch. 

one more thing

Have a look at this...

love hearing from you

Cool! Thanks for sending comments! It was great to hear from you....
I haven't added much lately as I haven't been in front of the computer at work all week. I was at two different elementary schools and a kindergarten. It was lots of fun. How can you not have with tons of screaming kids who are very happy to see you and who are learning the 5 little monkeys song? It was great!
I promise that I'll get some pics up just as soon as I figure out how to do it...It will take me awhile, as I have to figure out the blogger thing as well as the digital camera thing again. Not having a computer for a year made having a digital camera kind of pointless, so I have forgotten how to do all of that stuff. It doesn't help that the os on this computer is in Japanese.
Alot of the time I spend at work in front of the computer is actually me trying to get a look at what's happening in the news in other places. The news here covers what's going on here (in great detail!) but leaves a lot to be desired as far as what's happening every where else. I guess that's fair enough...most places I've lived have been like that. I don't know if you heard the news here about a month ago... a grade 6 female student was killed in school by her so called friend. Apparently they had a disagreement about their home page that they had made together. Her friend killed her with a box cutter/exacto knife. Their teacher noticed before the class was going to eat lunch that the 2 girls were missing, and when they found them, the one friend had slashed the other girl's throat. She apparently called her friend into the other room in order to kill her. It's still totally unbelievable to me.
Hiroki is doing so well. I think he hasn't got a cold right now, but that can change in a heartbeat...He seems to be having fun at daycare. Whenever I say something to him or sing him a song, he says, 'sensei' which means teacher in Japanese. He's saying that that's what happened at school today, or that that's what his teacher said. It's so cute. His teacher plays the organ and sings some songs to them, I guess around the time they are getting ready to eat. When he's at home and sitting at the table to eat, he pretends to play the organ and tries to sing a song. It's really funny. He makes lots of great faces now, too, I'll have to try and get them in pictures. Anyway, we're having fun.

more

More about what’s going on here - Today, as I was walking to school, I saw the garbage police waiting outside to check the garbage of the local residents bringing it to the collection area. Okay, they weren’t really police, but people do have to stand there and check and make sure that the residents are separating their garbage correctly. The first big division of garbage is burnable or non-burnable, and then after that things get a little confusing. Within burnable garbage, there are more divisions of paper, cardboard, milk cartons, and I don’t even know what they all are. Non-burnable garbage can be further separated into plastic, cans, glass, etc (meaning, again, I don’t clearly know). This school is in a different township than where I live, so I don’t know which days are what garbage here, but I sort of have it figured out for Nirayama. I guess that people here have to take turns doing the garbage patrol, while in Nirayama, we have to buy specific bags to throw out the garbage in, as well as write our names on the bag so that if we were to incorrectly fill the bag, it would be left in the garbage collection area with a big tag on it so that we (and all of our neighbours) would know that we did it wrong. Of course, most of the bags that get left behind don’t have names written on them, and I am pretty sure that their owners won’t be going back to pick them up.
At the school, where I had one (!) class today, I am getting used to the routine. I always go into the class with the teacher (I am an assistant, after all), and the teacher says that the class will begin (in Japanese). The class leader (I think it’s the same student every time) then tells the students to stand up, then they are told to stand up straight, and then they say something like ‘please teach us’ and they all bow. Then the lesson begins. The lessons are still predominantly Japanese. I am one of the lucky ALTs, though, because the English teachers in my school can speak English. When class is finished, the leader gets the students to stand up again, then stand straight again, say ‘thank you’ and then bow.
This happens at the elementary school as well. It seems like its part of life here so that the students expect it to happen, but I was surprised at first!

oops

Okay, I haven't figured out how this whole thing works yet. I could only get it to publish some of my stuff so I'm just going to continue where I left off...
f they wear a T-shirt under their uniform, they are allowed to wear a white shirt only. If it has any writing on it, it must be small and there is only allowed to be 1 thing on their shirt. Because , as far as I know, the kids all change for gym in their homeroom as they all wear their gym uniform under their school uniform, I haven't been able to figure out if that means they are wearing 3 shirts or what they do. I have seen the boys change shirts in class but I don't know what they girls do.
If girls wear elastics or pins in their hair, they must be black. It goes without saying, of course, that make up and jewelry is not permitted, including watches. Watches are allowed only on test day.
Hiroki is doing well. He has been sick almost constantly since the beginning of April, when he started daycare, but he is still amazing. He is giving me almost daily reminders that he will be 2 years old soon. (They don't call it the terrible twos for nothing.)
That's it for now...

an explanation

I just wanted to let you all know that I am starting this as a way of keeping in touch with everybody. I'm hoping that you can check out what I've been doing here. You can write comments here, too, so I hope that I will be able to communicate more with you all. I will also put up pictures of Hiroki so that you can see how he's doing as well. I want to try and update this a couple of times a week, so you can check and see what's going on.
I thought I would let everyone know what it is exactly that I'm doing here now. I am an ALT, or an Assistant Language Teacher, based mostly at a junior high school. I go to different elementary schools 5 times a month, as well as a kindergarten once every couple of months.
I have taught in different places in Japan, but never having worked as an ALT before, I really had no idea about what to expect. First of all, one of the big differences is that junior high school students are all in uniform. Shoes are included in this uniform, that is indoor shoes and indoor gym shoes. When they are walking to school, they are allowed to wear whatever shoes they would like to, but as soon as they get to the school, they change into their indoor shoes (in the entrance). (Teachers change into their indoor shoes as well, but ours aren't part of a uniform). Their indoor shoes seem to be colour coded according to grades. All of the shoes are white, but the grade 7s have red rubber enforced toes, while the grade 8s have blue and the grade 9 shoes have green toes. When they go to gym class, they all bring their gym shoes downstairs in their shoebag and change just before going into the gym. I haven't figured out what they do when they have gym class outside yet. Everybody changes their shoes before going to the bathroom as well. You have to take off your shoes and put on the plastic bathroom slippers. That's all I have I been able to figure out about the shoes.
About their uniforms, everything seems to be strictly enforced. If they wear a T-shirt under their uniform, they are allowed to wear a white shirt only. If it has any writing on it, it must be small and there is only allowed to be 1 thing on their shirt.
I can't seem to fit anymore here, so I have to post another one...