life here

Friday, May 19, 2006

Testing to see if this works this time...We went out for sushi, obviously it was fresh fish!!

Sunday, May 14, 2006

well hello there

Well, I still alive...just been very busy (and tired) lately. In honour of Mother's Day, HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY to all of the mothers reading this, mine in particular.
I have decided today that I'm going to try and say only positive stuff as I'm worried that I always end up ranting here. Hmmm, what can I talk about...?
I'm feeling more comfortable at work now. I'm still not completely comfortable at the new school, but I am feeling much better now. I can tell because when I went to the elementary for the second time, I was wishing that I was going to my regular school where I didn't feel so nervous.
I am really enjoying teaching with one of the teachers I work with. There's 4 of them; one is burned out, I think and doesn't have much energy for classes. He still calls me by the last ALT's name sometimes, it doesn't really bug me but the students notice and they all think it's funny. Another teacher is pretty stressed out, I think. She has taken a lot of time off lately and she's not doing too well. She's the one I worked with before and I thought she just didn't like working with females, but we were talking and she said that she just doesn't want to commuicate with anyone. Oooh, not good for a teacher. Another teacher is a lot of fun to teach with, he's young and energetic and talks to the kids as much as possible in English. The other teacher is very young, as in this is her first year teaching. She keeps asking ME what to do and what do I think.
So we sing English songs at the beginning of every English class. Unfortunately, it means that alot of songs that I wouldn't choose end up getting stuck in my head. This month's songs are Hello Goodbye, by the Beatles for grade 7 and the handicapped class; YMCA by the Village People for the grade 8s, and the grade 9s are singing Karma Chameleonby, yes, the Culture Club. The Beatles I can handle. YMCA is, um, challenging. I can't believe the words to it-something along the lines of telling a "young man" to go to the Y cause he can have lots of fun hanging out with the guys. Uh, yeah. I don't think the students know the background of the band. :P
THe Culture Club is another song that doesn't make sense to me- as in what could it possibly mean-loving would be easy if your colours were like my dream- red, gold, and green Huh?
Anyway, I was quite pleased with myself this weekend. I got my Feb issue of Canadian Living in the mail not too long ago, and of course it had chocolate recipes in it for Valentine's Day. I looked at a Brownie recipe and thought I would make it, bought chocolate for it. When time came to make it, I really looked at the recipe and thought, Shit! I can't make this! There was 1 cup of butter in it and 2 cups of sugar in it!! So I looked around and found a different recipe that might be a low fat type of recipe for Brownies, it has no butter (oil instead) and less sugar (plus I cut back on the sugar anyway, I pretty much always do) and they are GOOD! They remind me of the President's Choice Bite Brownie that I discovered in Canada in my last year there. Yay! I was really enjoying them. (addicted)this so long next time.
Well, I should probably go to bed. I'll try not to leave this so long next time!

Friday, April 28, 2006

what can I say

Well it's ben a while since I've posted (again). The new school has me worn out. I'm teaching way more at this school than I was at the last one.
I have been to my 2 new elementary schools, too. I have introduced myself so many times it's ridiculous. I should change that-introducing myself is not what gets to me, it's the innane questions that follow it. Not just from the students. Usually the worst offenders are the teachers. They just want to know everything about me because I'm a foreigner, not because they are interested in me. And one lovely teacher decided to put me in a seat in front of everyone while we ate lunch so that all of the students could ask me questions. Here are some of the questions I got last week (from elementary students) How much do you weigh? Yah, like I'd ever answer that, shithead. Do you wear contacts? Me -??? What's your husband's name? Here's where I started to get pissy. First, do the students need to know my husband's name? No. Do they know any of the other teachers' spouses' names? I seriously doubt it. So why does their teacher think that it's okay to have them ask whatever they want?! She didn't ask me if it was okay to ask questions-she just told me. And I'm all for answering questions about my country and culture and the differences, but everyone feels like it's a freee for all to find out everything there is to know about me.
Questions from my junior high school students (who have to ask in English):
How old are you and I politely explain that in Canada that is a rude question and students most definately do NOT ask their teachers that.
What sports do you like? OMG, so many students asked me that question!
Do you have a boyfriend? i smiled innocently and said, "No." (Why do I have a Japanese surname kids???) Then the best one, baby?

Then last week, one of the teachers at the junior high school said, "Oh, can you eat rice?" Uh, WTF? Do you think that Japan is the only country in the world that eats rice. What kind of drugs are you on?!! And then today she asks me," So which of your parents is Japanese, your mother or father?" To which I replied, "Hunh?" to see if she had actually said that. Yup, she did. I explained that I got the name from my husband and she expressed surprise that I as married (even though I had told her that before!)
So what I want to know is, if she thinks I'm half Japanese, why does she ask me stupid things like DO YOU EAT RICE?!
Ok I seem to be ranting again and that was totally not my intention (this time). Seeing as I have to be up for work in less than five hours I had better get myself off to bed. Good night!

Saturday, April 15, 2006

Negative feelings so far

I'm talking about the new school I'm at. Last week we had an assembly for something-I'm not exactly sure, but I think it was to introduce the new grade 7 students to life in Junior high (they no longer have the same teacher every day, they are learning new subjects like English etc). Before the assembly started all of the grade 8 and 9 students were in the gym, waiting for the grade 7s to come in. All of the kids were sitting on the floor, which is usual (gym floor is clean, only gym shoes worn in the gym) All of the kids HAVE to sit in a special way -(taikuzuwari taiku-gym zuwari/suwari-sitting) -legs together, feet on the floor, knees bent. While they were waiting, all of their kids had their heads down. I've never seen this before, so I ask the English teacher why. "Oh," he says, "they are meditating." I'm thinking, ummm, okaaay? Maybe he's joking? But I looked it up in the dictionary and sure enough, they were meditating! WTF is a 13 year old kid going to meditate about. I appreciate that with over 500 students in the same place, there has to be a way to keep them quiet, but I felt like this was a little too much. Some of the teachers were walking around, checking that the kids had their heads down, even if they were just sitting there quietly. Anyway.
Then there's this female teacher who is famous for hating foreigners. Not sure why she hates us, we're not Japanese or something like that. I had to use the uh, facilities and she was already in there. She looks at me and doesn't say anything. (Usual with her.) Then she walks out and turns off the light, stupid cow. I was furious but I decided to just leave it be as I'm so not a stupid game-playing type of person. I just hope that she doesn't pass her attitude on to the kids. I'm Japanese, this is Japan, I don't need English, you should speak Japanese. I have heard this attitude from students and even teachers!
Oh well, on a more positive note there are a couple of teachers that try and speak English to me (other than the English teachers). This is a first.
It's also waaay busier than my last school-lots more classes for me to go to (haven't decided if that's good or bad yet!)
Have a good weekend, I'm going to visit my friend in Tokyo. Looking forward to it, too.

Sunday, April 09, 2006

spring vacation recap in pix

Well, I don't have much to say for now as I'm still sussing out the new school. Can't really say what it's going to be like yet, haven't taught any classes or been around the kids much yet so who knows. So instead of words here are pix of some of the things I did for spring vacation.