Oh, btw, to clear up some confusion, everything that's said in here or my other blog entries is mainly all in Japanese. The kids respond to me in Japanese and I say and gesture in English. Well, I mainly talk Japanese at the nursery, but everywhere else is English. Except with the teachers. Just assume that everything that is said in here is in Japanese, kay?
Aug. 28
Again, I had no classes today at the middle school. So majority of the time I ended up planning lessons for other classes etc. Before lunch time one of the teachers invited me to go eat lunch with the 3rd graders, but I totally forgot about it at lunch. He didn't say anything to me until I passed him in the hallway after lunch and was like "Oh shit! I was supposed to eat with you guys!" I felt soooo bad. But I feigned miscommunication in Japanese... He asked me "Did you not understand what I said or did you just get the times mixed up and all?" I just apologized profusely to which he said it was okay and went on his way... I really felt sorry. But I went upstairs to talk to the kids afterwards. They were all getting ready to go down to the 2nd floor for Music class. I thought it was instruments like band and all, but it's like chorus. I was soooo freakin amazed at their voices! They all can sing! And they had a special guest teacher come in to teach them. She's a pro! I was amazed with the way she taught them, it was like voice training basically. No wonder the kids are so good at singing! And majority of them can also play the piano like masters! My mouth just dropped at this amazingness. I couldn't believe it!
Anyways, after the class was over I went downstairs and found out that only the office personnel were in the room because everyone else was having meetings with teachers from all over the neighboring cities and towns. Then later Shibata-sensei told me about the other ALTs who live in the two cities right next to me! I was like "YES! Close ALTs!" And they're guys too....so i hope they're hawt. haha. >D Then afterwards from Aug 29th-30th I did absolutely nothing except for watching "24 Hour Television" which is a special that SBC (I think it's SBC) puts on that has famous people host the show for 24 hours and they show unfortunate or amazing people and bring them on the show. It's kinda a charity event....for 24 hours....and it airs on TV for that long. Seriously. I wanted to stay up to watch it the whole way, but then figured it's not worth it.lol I also spent the weekend making my home spotless and trying to think of ways to decorate my place. I think I'll go for like a natury theme with glass. =P
Aug. 31
Yay nursery day! And today I don't have to teach because they are having a special performance for the kids today! And the kids from the other nursery are also coming to visit for the show. I changed quickly into my jeans and t-shirt as that is the norm to wear at the nursery since kids will run at you and jump you and pull your clothes...=P All the kids had gathered in the large playroom and as soon as they saw me walk in they smiled and held out their hands for me to hold! Seeing their faces light up like that my breath stopped for a bit because I was soooo HAPPY!! >V< Children make me all weird I think...lol haha. Especially when I saw little Ikuma's face like that made me really happy cuz he's just soooooo cute! WAH!
So I sat in the back and watched the little show. It was a super genki middle aged lady with props and stuff for the show. It was really interactive and the kids loved it! I thought it was absolutely adorable. I wanna be able to teach like that. But then I'd have to be really weird for that. >D She had three stories that she told via a variety of props. The first one was via random papers and singing and hand motions, the second one was via a cardboard box theater which was very very creatively made, and the last were large animals made out of glued together cardboard about a story of a baby elephant that traded it's body parts with other animals for a day....strange and perverted I know.
Afterwards I helped clean up and then went to eat lunch with my beloved Sakura class (the 5-6 year olds). Ayaka saw me, ran to me, and basically glomped me. lol I actually almost fell over because 2 other girls then did the same thing to me while I was still being held on to by Ayaka...lol They all had little bentos that their parents made for them because the lunch lady was not making any foods that day. So the head teacher Yuuko-san made me a bento!!! I was so amazed and thankful! This lady was soo nice. She made me two onigiris (hand made onigiris!!!) fried shrimp, two sausage patties, two tamago yakis (the sweet egg sushi thingy), brocolli, and oranges and kiwis for desert. She put all of that in a little yellow Miffy bento box. And she said I could keep the bento box! I was so grateful to this woman! If it wasn't for her I wouldn't have a lunch or a cute little bento box! She also gave me a bottle of tea and the wrap for the bento! THANK YOU!!!!
Ayaka took me by the hand and the kids formed two little neat lines in which I followed in the back with Ayaka. It was so cute, all the little kids would find their friends or partners and hold their hands. As usual Sho and Sho or Sho-Sho were together, they even placed their seat mats outside next to each other. Seriously, the best of friends. haha. I can see this turning into some weird love story in the future for those Yaoi fans out there. =P Before we all fully left the class, Asahi-chan started crying for some reason in which I stayed behind to see what was wrong. Honoka-chan and Ayaka-chan also stayed behind to help me with her. The two little girls tried to calm Asahi-chan down too. I'm not sure how it works with little children, but the way they comfort each other here in Japan is the same way an adult comforts young kids except the kids do it to each other. They speak in that same tone. I really wasn't sure what was wrong as I've noticed that little kids usually cry for no reason on the occasions. So I just made sure she was okay and let the other girls do the talking because they knew what they were doing somehow. I was quite amazed by this. The kids don't just stare at each other or feel awkward or uncomfortable; they go to see what's wrong with the other kid and tries to comfort them. It was a pleasant surprise and I'm beginning to learn a lot from these children. So we finally were able to leave the class the four of us, each in a pair and in a two lines. hehe. Even if it's just 4 of us the kids still abide by the pairage thing.
Outside, the little kids spread their seat mats and took out all their little bentos. It was amazing looking, those bentos! The parents really take their time to make the bentos look special! All the kids were really proud of their bentos too and would show them to me. I really wish that we had that too in the states where it's not just sack lunches, but these really cute luncboxes filled with a vareity of goods for a well balanced diet. My JTE's were actually really shocked to hear that we have lunches in brown paper bags and that it consists of a sandwich, veggie dip packs, an apple, and some kinda sweet...they were like "WhA?! No bentos!??" lol =P I have to admit, the bentos do make the food look tastier and taste better. Nagomi-chan also came to sit near us. She's also one of my favorites because she's so open and she'll be such a stunning beauty in the future. As we were eating the kids would talk to me in which I wouldn't understand a word they say and just nod...lol The kids would look at me and i'm not sure if they want an answer or some kind of response to what they were saying because I don't know what they're saying. I would then just be like "oooo" and that's it. lol Then they would just give up saying stuff to me for a second and then say something completely different. hahah. Ah children and their short attention span. Tama-chan (the teacher for Sakura class) told me that it's okay if I don't understand them because children will forget what they said to you anyways and forget that you didn't understand them and keep talking to you. LOL So okay. XD
Afterwards I went back in the classroom to see all the kids getting their futons for the room for naptime. Oh! Btw, I met the two occasional kids who come to Sakura class. They're these two little boys that I can already tell will look absolutely handsome in the future. I was quite surprised to see them and they were me. They would talk to me for a little bit and then in the middle of the conversation be like "誰？”"Who are you?" I'd tell them my name and they'd say "あ。わっかた”"Ah, I understand." Heheh. So cute. Sakito is one of the boys who is the tallest in the class and has such an adorable face minus all the runny noseness. lol The other one is Ryosei or Ryoshita (I'm not sure which one it was. Trying to remember everyone's name is super difficult) and his wavy half shoulder/half neck length hair is prime for making into Ikemen style. =P As I bent down to see what was wrong with Aoi because she looked disgruntled Ayaka ran up from behind me and jumped on my back. And I almost fell face first to the ground in front of me. My hands saved me as well as me being close to the ground to begin with. haha. Anyways, Aoi wouldn't say anything for a while and I noticed that she started crying. Oh no, what was wrong now. She wouldn't say anything for a while and when Tama-chan came over to see what's wrong she said everything while crying....as if I couldn't understand her already. I just kept rubbing her back and her head for comfort. Sakito kneeled down in front of her to say sorry for having done something, which I'm not sure what. Something about his butt in the bathroom....And then Tama-chan said it wasn't because of that. It was because he had accidentally kicked Aoi's head as he was walking around before naptime. She was lying down already. So I just kept hugging her until she felt better cuz I wasn't sure what else to do. I then bid goodbye to all the kids and left to go change to leave for the elementary.
At the elementary I had no classes today. In fact I don't have classes all this week because it's short days. And plus all this week is parent-teacher conferences. So there is no time for English class. I just ended up wandering over to the 2nd grade class. They're pretty use to seeing me now as well as the teacher. Haha, I love that class. All the kids saw me and got excited. I love that my presence causes such a ruckus. haha. I feel like the popular kid at school and everybody whispers about me when I pass by...which they do by the way. I hear them. >D One of the little girls passed by me and handed me a sweet smelling perfumed tissue. I was like getting high off of it, it was so good smelling. I gestured to the little girl that I really liked it and she came over after class to give me the whole pack. I was ecstatic. Hah. After class ended I walked over to the student's entryway to see the kids off and some of the students who didn't know I was here saw me and yelled my name and ran to me for a hit me in the chest hug. I better start getting used to the pain...lol Two of the girls who did that to me, grabbed the fatty parts on my arms or as I like to call them, my wings. They thought it fun and funny to squeeze them. I wasn't offended or anything, I just laughed about it and squeezed their arms. And all I felt was muscle....that's the girl's volleyball group for ya....lol I just thought the whole thing was funny. =P And I realized that I really really need to lose weight and work out more. The boys would run up to me and give me high fives. They're at the age where hugging me is a gender issue...boo..and I like hugging little things too.
Some of the little boys had already changed for baseball practice, they looked so cool! As they saw me they would all say "Theresa-sensei bye bye!" Some of them have also already become really friendly with me and just call me Theresa. And another little boy in 2nd grade, before leaving, decided to give me a back massage. I don't know why, but I really appreciated it and liked it alot. haha. He was really good at it too. And then one of the boys who had shoulder length ikemen style european wavy hair and I believe is in 4th or 5th grade came buy and gave me double high fives and held my hand for a bit. He asked me if I remembered his name...I just stared at him for a little while and then looked painful as if I was scouring my head for his name. He just sighed and was like "It's Yuushin", smiled and then left. He's also going to grow up to look like a total hottie along with Ryo and Shinpei. I just know it. Well, they'll be in Junior high soon and hopefully I'll be here long enough to see them to high school. That would be awesome. I can be like "look! I brought you up well!" Haha, like a proud mother.
When all the students have gone and left I went back into the teacher's lounge/office and scurried around for a bit since no one was in there because of parent teacher meetings. I discovered a secret room hidden behind the meeting table!!! It was amazing! It was a large tatami room with pillows and a small desk and held lots of craftwork. Kikuchi-sensei (the curriculum coordinator whose English is actually not bad) saw me looking in at it as he came in a gave me quite a shock when he started talking about it to me because I didn't notice him behind me peering in as well. LOL I had thought that no one was going to be here. He told me the room is a resting place to chill and change clothes when needed. But not to sleep. Aww man. heh. Anyways when the teachers finished their meetings and came back, aside from the 2nd grade teacher and the helper, they were surprised to see me because they weren't sure when I had came in. I got there when 5th period had already started.
Hisakawa-sensei was in an awfully genki mood and was super cheerful with me. I just went along with it. He's usually pretty cool anyways; he was just even better today. We discussed about what we were going to do for the next class and I was ready to belt out a lot of games to do. But I have to incorporate the textbook, which will be a little difficult, but I'll try. For my adorable students かわいい生徒たちのために I will try. Then Watanabe-san was also very genki today. I'm not sure why today, but everyone was really happy like. lol And he discussed with me about teaching the students an easy hip hop routine to perform at their festival. It's going to be to Exile's "Carry On". It's not really hip hoppy, just really happy like. So I'm not going to put in anything too gangsta. haha. It's a good song for elementary kids because it's so happy and energetic so my routine will be more like pop.
Then a lady from the picture book library/museum came by with a huge delivery of rental picture books. They rotate the books that come in and out every couple of months. And since all the teachers were in the office everyone decided to help out. We carried these super heavy boxes from the car onto a a very large home depot like cart we had and then shipped them up the lift to the second and 3 floors. Yes, all the schools have a lift that takes up all the school lunches. It's pretty cool. The teachers asked me if I wanted to ride it up. I was just like "けっこです”"Nah, it's okay." We went up to the 3rd floor and seperated the boxes into different rooms. Then one of the younger female teachers got on the large cart and then all the young female teachers wanted to get on. Haha, I was one of them. Watanabe-san told us all to get on and he would push us down the hall. And as we passed another female teacher she hopped on as well. So just imagine a bunch of teachers in the elementary school's empty hallway dressed in business attire on a large moving cart and one male teacher pushing the cart zooming down the hallway. It was so much fun! We all just kept exclaiming at how fun it is. Haha. I liked it quite alot and it was a special moment shared by the teachers where the students couldn't see. Haha, what teachers do after all the kids have gone home. For some reason that really helped me bond with the teachers too. lol Anyways, afterwards Watanabe-san was like "Oh one of these days you have to come over to my house for dinner! My wife insists that you come and she wants to practice English with you too. And it's not going to be just me at the house so you don't have to worry" And he laughed at that last statement and I just laughed nervously along. haha. cuz I really don't know what to do with those statements because all the men here say that when they invite me over to their houses. lol I guess they don't want me to feel like they're going to molest me or something. hehe. I still have yet to go to anyone's house even though they've all extended invitations...I need to one of these days. Maybe before hard winter strikes I will. Take them up on their offer of free food. XD
So otsukare-sama for reading again! It's a rather long post again this time. hehe. And I've really just been into listening to K-pop and US hip hop lately. I feel like a gangsta teacher...haha. Kay, luv ya'll!
Monday, August 31, 2009
Thursday, August 27, 2009
My new car!!
Aug. 26 Wednesday
So after separating all my freakin trash and throwing it out for the people to pick up, I left to go to the middle school. I really hoped I separated it right. Because if not I`ll get my trash back with a large red tag on it that has a big white X for “you separated me wrong, bitch!” ...eheh…that`s what happened last time with not taking the caps off the plastic bottles. So I got to the middle school just in time before the morning bell rang. I saw a lot of my students running out with a bunch of traveling bags. I was like what`s going on?!! So I went inside put my stuff down and saw some teachers heading outside to where the 2nd graders were standing around with their luggage. I asked Iwata-san and she told me that the students were going on a trip and the teachers were sending them off. NOOOO!!!! My beloved second graders! They`re my favorites! Aww…I wish I could go with them and not go to school too… All the 3rd years also came out to say goodbye. And I have to say that the 3rd year boys look pretty good in their normal clothes. Yes yes, I know, they`re technically 9th graders in high school so I shouldn`t even be looking at them. But they`re already on their way to being total hotties. I can`t help but evaluate. lol I`m not a predator I swear. =P So as they left on their bus it was a tearful-well not really- good bye with lotsa waving. Then the 3rd years went to go pick up trash around campus as part of their morning once a week class of sorts. But I was like "What trash?! Where is it?!" It`s super clean so I doubt there was anything for the kids to do.
When 2nd period came along I went up with Shibata-sensei to teach the 3rd years as the only 2 classes left here are the 3rd years and 1st years. So I feel like a tape recorder in this class. There`s really not much for me to do as I just say words/sentences in English and have the students repeat after me. The rest of the class is all the teacher. But after class I got to talk with some of the students. And I found out that one of the girls liked Mr. Children! I was so happy and so was she! We started talking about it and she said if there`s a concert she`ll tell me! ^^ Another girl came up to me to talk about Arashi. Haha, it was fun. I went back downstairs and did almost nothing except chat with the teachers and go online. Yes, I had no more classes for the rest of the day. So at lunch I ended up wandering around the school and went into the 3rd year class to talk with the people. They`re still a little weary of me, but for the most part they`re warming up. When thebell rang that signified the end of lunch I walked out to find the popular boys of the class lounging outside besides the staircase. I think that`s their fav hang out spot. Anyways I was like "It`s not time for you to go in yet?" And they just stared at me for a little bit. haha. So I pointed to my watch and reittirated. They then understood and was like 5 more minutes! lol And went back to lounging. Haha, I can just see them being the bad boys of the high school now..lol
So I then just returned to my office and continued drawing my art on my post box. It`s taking longer than I thought it would. Seriously. But I finally finished it and all the teachers came over to take a look at it. lol They were amazed. XD So in the afternoon since there was absolutely nothing to do, Sakurai-san and Iwata-sensei invited me to ride over to the high school for some veggie shopping! I was like hell yeah I`ll go! So we rode our bikes out to the high school. It was such a nice day today and the 3 of us had some pretty funny conversations. I really cherish times like these. It`s lovely. So we got to the high school and they were selling eggplants and green bellpeppers outside the agriculture classroom. They just had them sitting outside with a canopy over them and a little can to put money into. The things were ridiculously cheap! Like seriously! One eggplant or bellpepper was only 50yen!! 50 yen for one!!! I bought two fat eggplants. And one of them had a penis-shaped extension sticking out of it!! Wahahaha. I took a picture of it and I just had to buy that one because it was just so absurd looking. Heheh. Iwata-sensei (the super cute female teacher) tried to be more civilized and said it looked like a tengu...but Sakurai-san and I both still think it`s a penis...>D Anyways, we went back and that was the end of my day in school.
After school, though, I decided to ride my bike around town for fun. It`s quite relaxing especially when the sun`s not beating down on you. It`s nice and sunsetty but darker because the sun was already covered by a lot of clouds. I like that. So I rode around a couple of back alley areas to get to know the area better and discovered a pen where 3 ponies were grazing! Cute fat little things! And there was a little girl standing there staring at them as well who turned out to be one of my younger elementary students! She saw me and said hi and ran over to the house next door to get a 1st grade boy to come say hi to me. Hehhe. I ended up feeding the ponies tufts of grass with her. Then 3 more girls from 5th grade rode their bikes over and was super surprised to see me there. haha. They were like "Wha? Theresa-sensei?!" They had bowls of leftover fruits and veggies to throw into the pen for the ponies. I fed them too! So cute and fat! And the little kiddies were having fun too. Then their grandma came and talked to me for a little bit and told me there were more horses down yonder. It was alrady 6pm so I bade everyone farewell and rode over the the horse ranch to see them. There were about 7 horses. 2 in each pen and 1 lone one. I then rode around more and met some old people and started talking to them. I love talking to old people, though I don`t understand a word they say sometimes...lol I baked one of the fat eggplants for dinner with beef steak strips. Yummers.
Aug. 27 Thursday
Off to see Mr. Gorgeous at the high school. I taught the 3rd year oral class and 1st year English class with him today. Though I felt like a tape recorder for a little bit. The students have started to warm up to me more so I`m happy. The first year students are really lively but the 3rd year class is totally dead....I`ll think of something for them to do like getting up and moving around. Anyways, so afterwards I went back into my office desk area and just sat and did nothing again. Well, actually, I tried thinking of something active for the students to do...but I`m not sure if what I thought of was too basic or something. Because their English level isn`t as good as I think it could be. So I think I`m just going to play some kind of self-intro game.
So Mr. Gorgeous would periodically come over and pull up a chair next to me and talk with me. I really really enjoy that because just being close to him makes me squeally. haha. I`m such a sap. And I get to know more about him. Heh, anyways around lunch time I went over to the elementary to eat lunch with the 6th graders. This is my first time meeting them. I went up to eat lunch with the kids and sat in one of the boy`s regular seat while he went to go do something else. I sat across from Ryo (the boy I met at the bonodori) and next to Shinpei, and diagonal from Kana. My goodness, Ryo is going to be an absolute hearthrob when he grows up, no joke. He`s outgoing, sporty, has the hair, and you can totally tell by his looks that he will look absolutely handsome as he gets older. Such a cutie. Same with Shinpei. Absolute cutie! His hair is cute and he wears little black frame glasses. It makes him cuter! Doesn`t really speak to me too much but loves to laugh when I talk to him and helps me with opening packages of my foods. I was a retard and couldn`t open a bag that contained my bread...lol He laughs a lot and I quite like that. Kana`s english listening ability was excellent for her age and grade. I was so impressed with her and so were the boys at our table group.
After lunch I went back downstairs as there was an hour before I started 5th period teaching with them. So I went down and just chilled for an hour before going back up. One of the boys from the 6th grade class saw me coming and shouted to the others "She`s here!" and then came out and said that right now I can`t go in because everyone`s cleaning. So I just hung around outside and played with the random stuff they have out in the halls with this cute little boy. He would periodically go to check on the class and finally, I was able to go in. As I walked in the students started clapping and on the board in big colorful letters with multitudes of drawings and pictures was "Welcome Ms. Theresa!" I was absolutely stunned and overjoyed. All I could say was "OMG, subarashii!" I love this class!
I then started to do my self-intro with the projector and then started taking questions from the kids. The kids were happy that I love video games and anime. Something to talk to them about. And the girls were really happy that I like the HYD drama Japanese version. Then we played a game that involved my likes and dislikes. And then aftewards we played a tiring game of simon says. I totally wore the kids out because I made them do physical activities such as sit down and then getting up and then sitting down and then getting up for 5 times. Haha. >D It was funny and the kids absolutely loved it. Will play this game again that`s for sure. Then that was the end of class.
I went back to my office desk and discussed the next class activities with the teacher. The problem is that there is a textbook I have to follow so I can`t really do much games or anything like that independently. It`s sad. >.< But it`s okay, I`ll try my best with the kids. So then all the teachers left me again to go have their meeting and so I decided to wander around the school until I heard some students voices. I found a couple of girls in the gym playing volleyball. When they saw me they were like "Theresa-sensei!!!" And ran over to me and hugged me! Such a wonderful feeling to be loved like this!! They asked me if I wanted to play hide and seek (kakurenbo) so I was like yeah! lol We played for a little bit, but when the actual warm up time for the little volleyball club started I joined in on it as well. It was fun and the kids seemed to love having me there. I`m glad.
At 4 I went to the BOE to get my car!!! It`s finally here! I`m so happy! My little white box car! I will take pictures of it when the days aren`t rainy. It`s so cute and perfect. But the wierd thing is I didn`t feel any nervousness or weirdness having to drive on the opposite side. It was like the most normal thing in the world! I drove it like I drive in the states except opposite side. Although I did have problems with the blinkers and wipers being on opposite sides though. haha. Su was just as happy for me as I was with my car. I decided to take her to Shibetsu to eat dinner with me in my new car! We were both so excited to finally be able to go to the next city in a car freely! Hahaha. We first drove around the city to explore and then went to the supermarket to buy foods for cooking. We went to the little "hillside box" restaurant. And their softcream was soooo good. I had their macha topped softcream. Su and I talked about a lot of things and gossips. Like about the secret relationships people and teachers were having at the town hall, high school, middle school, and elementary. So funny and unexpected! But as I figured, Mr. Gorgeous does have a girlfriend...or that is what Su heard as a rumor. She could be wrong...lol But someone that wonderful has to of course have a girlfriend already. >.< boo... Anyways we drove back home in the super dark and I felt accomplished. Hahah. yay for today!
Otsukare-sama for reading! Thanks!
So after separating all my freakin trash and throwing it out for the people to pick up, I left to go to the middle school. I really hoped I separated it right. Because if not I`ll get my trash back with a large red tag on it that has a big white X for “you separated me wrong, bitch!” ...eheh…that`s what happened last time with not taking the caps off the plastic bottles. So I got to the middle school just in time before the morning bell rang. I saw a lot of my students running out with a bunch of traveling bags. I was like what`s going on?!! So I went inside put my stuff down and saw some teachers heading outside to where the 2nd graders were standing around with their luggage. I asked Iwata-san and she told me that the students were going on a trip and the teachers were sending them off. NOOOO!!!! My beloved second graders! They`re my favorites! Aww…I wish I could go with them and not go to school too… All the 3rd years also came out to say goodbye. And I have to say that the 3rd year boys look pretty good in their normal clothes. Yes yes, I know, they`re technically 9th graders in high school so I shouldn`t even be looking at them. But they`re already on their way to being total hotties. I can`t help but evaluate. lol I`m not a predator I swear. =P So as they left on their bus it was a tearful-well not really- good bye with lotsa waving. Then the 3rd years went to go pick up trash around campus as part of their morning once a week class of sorts. But I was like "What trash?! Where is it?!" It`s super clean so I doubt there was anything for the kids to do.
When 2nd period came along I went up with Shibata-sensei to teach the 3rd years as the only 2 classes left here are the 3rd years and 1st years. So I feel like a tape recorder in this class. There`s really not much for me to do as I just say words/sentences in English and have the students repeat after me. The rest of the class is all the teacher. But after class I got to talk with some of the students. And I found out that one of the girls liked Mr. Children! I was so happy and so was she! We started talking about it and she said if there`s a concert she`ll tell me! ^^ Another girl came up to me to talk about Arashi. Haha, it was fun. I went back downstairs and did almost nothing except chat with the teachers and go online. Yes, I had no more classes for the rest of the day. So at lunch I ended up wandering around the school and went into the 3rd year class to talk with the people. They`re still a little weary of me, but for the most part they`re warming up. When thebell rang that signified the end of lunch I walked out to find the popular boys of the class lounging outside besides the staircase. I think that`s their fav hang out spot. Anyways I was like "It`s not time for you to go in yet?" And they just stared at me for a little bit. haha. So I pointed to my watch and reittirated. They then understood and was like 5 more minutes! lol And went back to lounging. Haha, I can just see them being the bad boys of the high school now..lol
So I then just returned to my office and continued drawing my art on my post box. It`s taking longer than I thought it would. Seriously. But I finally finished it and all the teachers came over to take a look at it. lol They were amazed. XD So in the afternoon since there was absolutely nothing to do, Sakurai-san and Iwata-sensei invited me to ride over to the high school for some veggie shopping! I was like hell yeah I`ll go! So we rode our bikes out to the high school. It was such a nice day today and the 3 of us had some pretty funny conversations. I really cherish times like these. It`s lovely. So we got to the high school and they were selling eggplants and green bellpeppers outside the agriculture classroom. They just had them sitting outside with a canopy over them and a little can to put money into. The things were ridiculously cheap! Like seriously! One eggplant or bellpepper was only 50yen!! 50 yen for one!!! I bought two fat eggplants. And one of them had a penis-shaped extension sticking out of it!! Wahahaha. I took a picture of it and I just had to buy that one because it was just so absurd looking. Heheh. Iwata-sensei (the super cute female teacher) tried to be more civilized and said it looked like a tengu...but Sakurai-san and I both still think it`s a penis...>D Anyways, we went back and that was the end of my day in school.
After school, though, I decided to ride my bike around town for fun. It`s quite relaxing especially when the sun`s not beating down on you. It`s nice and sunsetty but darker because the sun was already covered by a lot of clouds. I like that. So I rode around a couple of back alley areas to get to know the area better and discovered a pen where 3 ponies were grazing! Cute fat little things! And there was a little girl standing there staring at them as well who turned out to be one of my younger elementary students! She saw me and said hi and ran over to the house next door to get a 1st grade boy to come say hi to me. Hehhe. I ended up feeding the ponies tufts of grass with her. Then 3 more girls from 5th grade rode their bikes over and was super surprised to see me there. haha. They were like "Wha? Theresa-sensei?!" They had bowls of leftover fruits and veggies to throw into the pen for the ponies. I fed them too! So cute and fat! And the little kiddies were having fun too. Then their grandma came and talked to me for a little bit and told me there were more horses down yonder. It was alrady 6pm so I bade everyone farewell and rode over the the horse ranch to see them. There were about 7 horses. 2 in each pen and 1 lone one. I then rode around more and met some old people and started talking to them. I love talking to old people, though I don`t understand a word they say sometimes...lol I baked one of the fat eggplants for dinner with beef steak strips. Yummers.
Aug. 27 Thursday
Off to see Mr. Gorgeous at the high school. I taught the 3rd year oral class and 1st year English class with him today. Though I felt like a tape recorder for a little bit. The students have started to warm up to me more so I`m happy. The first year students are really lively but the 3rd year class is totally dead....I`ll think of something for them to do like getting up and moving around. Anyways, so afterwards I went back into my office desk area and just sat and did nothing again. Well, actually, I tried thinking of something active for the students to do...but I`m not sure if what I thought of was too basic or something. Because their English level isn`t as good as I think it could be. So I think I`m just going to play some kind of self-intro game.
So Mr. Gorgeous would periodically come over and pull up a chair next to me and talk with me. I really really enjoy that because just being close to him makes me squeally. haha. I`m such a sap. And I get to know more about him. Heh, anyways around lunch time I went over to the elementary to eat lunch with the 6th graders. This is my first time meeting them. I went up to eat lunch with the kids and sat in one of the boy`s regular seat while he went to go do something else. I sat across from Ryo (the boy I met at the bonodori) and next to Shinpei, and diagonal from Kana. My goodness, Ryo is going to be an absolute hearthrob when he grows up, no joke. He`s outgoing, sporty, has the hair, and you can totally tell by his looks that he will look absolutely handsome as he gets older. Such a cutie. Same with Shinpei. Absolute cutie! His hair is cute and he wears little black frame glasses. It makes him cuter! Doesn`t really speak to me too much but loves to laugh when I talk to him and helps me with opening packages of my foods. I was a retard and couldn`t open a bag that contained my bread...lol He laughs a lot and I quite like that. Kana`s english listening ability was excellent for her age and grade. I was so impressed with her and so were the boys at our table group.
After lunch I went back downstairs as there was an hour before I started 5th period teaching with them. So I went down and just chilled for an hour before going back up. One of the boys from the 6th grade class saw me coming and shouted to the others "She`s here!" and then came out and said that right now I can`t go in because everyone`s cleaning. So I just hung around outside and played with the random stuff they have out in the halls with this cute little boy. He would periodically go to check on the class and finally, I was able to go in. As I walked in the students started clapping and on the board in big colorful letters with multitudes of drawings and pictures was "Welcome Ms. Theresa!" I was absolutely stunned and overjoyed. All I could say was "OMG, subarashii!" I love this class!
I then started to do my self-intro with the projector and then started taking questions from the kids. The kids were happy that I love video games and anime. Something to talk to them about. And the girls were really happy that I like the HYD drama Japanese version. Then we played a game that involved my likes and dislikes. And then aftewards we played a tiring game of simon says. I totally wore the kids out because I made them do physical activities such as sit down and then getting up and then sitting down and then getting up for 5 times. Haha. >D It was funny and the kids absolutely loved it. Will play this game again that`s for sure. Then that was the end of class.
I went back to my office desk and discussed the next class activities with the teacher. The problem is that there is a textbook I have to follow so I can`t really do much games or anything like that independently. It`s sad. >.< But it`s okay, I`ll try my best with the kids. So then all the teachers left me again to go have their meeting and so I decided to wander around the school until I heard some students voices. I found a couple of girls in the gym playing volleyball. When they saw me they were like "Theresa-sensei!!!" And ran over to me and hugged me! Such a wonderful feeling to be loved like this!! They asked me if I wanted to play hide and seek (kakurenbo) so I was like yeah! lol We played for a little bit, but when the actual warm up time for the little volleyball club started I joined in on it as well. It was fun and the kids seemed to love having me there. I`m glad.
At 4 I went to the BOE to get my car!!! It`s finally here! I`m so happy! My little white box car! I will take pictures of it when the days aren`t rainy. It`s so cute and perfect. But the wierd thing is I didn`t feel any nervousness or weirdness having to drive on the opposite side. It was like the most normal thing in the world! I drove it like I drive in the states except opposite side. Although I did have problems with the blinkers and wipers being on opposite sides though. haha. Su was just as happy for me as I was with my car. I decided to take her to Shibetsu to eat dinner with me in my new car! We were both so excited to finally be able to go to the next city in a car freely! Hahaha. We first drove around the city to explore and then went to the supermarket to buy foods for cooking. We went to the little "hillside box" restaurant. And their softcream was soooo good. I had their macha topped softcream. Su and I talked about a lot of things and gossips. Like about the secret relationships people and teachers were having at the town hall, high school, middle school, and elementary. So funny and unexpected! But as I figured, Mr. Gorgeous does have a girlfriend...or that is what Su heard as a rumor. She could be wrong...lol But someone that wonderful has to of course have a girlfriend already. >.< boo... Anyways we drove back home in the super dark and I felt accomplished. Hahah. yay for today!
Otsukare-sama for reading! Thanks!
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
And today was going so well....
Aug. 25 Tuesday
Day where there is absolutely nothing required of me to do at the elementary school. I went to the school, sat down, and started reading books about activities I can do with elementary kiddies. There was no class scheduled for me to teach today. So I was pretty much free to do whatever from 8:30am until 1pm. So I sat there for a little bit and then remembered that I wanted to make a little mailbox so that the children can leave me messages/questions/suggestions. I looked for a cardboard box, measured everything, took a knife, and started cutting away. The couple of teachers who came in all looked at me oddly because I was in the office cutting away at a cardboard box. lol Some of the teachers asked me what I was doing and when I told them they were like "wow! That's a good idea!" And then others just didn't bother...let the foreigner do what them foreigners do..lol haha. Anyways, I finished with the cutting and started drawing crap on paper to paste onto the box, but I got a little restless and decided to take a break. I got up to go to the bathroom and ended up chatting with the super nice nurse lady in her office. Such a wonderful woman. Reminds me of my grandma. I then ran into the teacher who invited me to make parfaits yesterday who then invited me to make bead shapes with the mentally challenged students, of which there were 3. It was fun working with them making the little bead thingies that I really wasn't even sure what it was.
Afterwards I went downstairs and ran into the 2nd grade pregnant teacher who invited me to go see what the kids in her class were making in the large playroom. They were making boats out of milk cartons and were going to test them in the pool and try to ride them!!!! Sounds so fun! I wish we could've done that back in 2nd grade...Anyways, all the little kids were seperated into mini groups and all did their part in organizing the cartons, stapling them shut, taping them, and gathering more cartons. These kids were actually really efficient and clean workers! I was seriously impressed! I would walk around to each group and sit and have each of them teach me how to do it. Very patient these kids were with me. And they really seemed to enjoy my company. Or so it seems. Like I said, the girls seemed to respond to me more than the boys. Although the boys in 2nd grade were also really talkative with me. I think the boys 4th grade and under are still in the stage where gender is not too big of an issue. They were all really receptive with me. 5th graders were a little bit more shy, and I'm assuming 6th grade is just gonna be about the same as junior high boys. Ah, puberty.
So after a little while of playing with/helping the students I went back to my office desk and continued with my mailbox project. -on a side note, I just remembered that I forgot the thing at the school and can't finish it tonight..I'll have to make a trip over there to get it.- When lunch time came around I helped the other teachers in the office to serve the lunch. It was a piece of salmon steak (not really that big) fried tofu salad, and miso sponge soup with the purple colored mixed rice. It was very filling and lately, I can't eat too much rice because I've been getting full really easily. I don't know why though. Anyways as soon as I was done eating and washing my dishes I went to visit the 2nd graders. I watched as they all neatly seperated their trash, waited in line to stack their bowls in the right areas and put their tables back the way it originally was without directions or yelling or too much noise. It was an amazing sight to see. 2nd grade kids can do this?!
So after they were done with all that, they all crowded around me and asked if I can play with them. I was like "sure!" ^_^ I can always play with kids. They were like "where do you want to play and what?" I told them anything. So they said to go play with them outside. I was then thinking "oh shit! I only have heels!" But then decided to bite the dust and where my heels out to play with them. It was actually kinda funny, the situation. There are two seperate doors: one for teachers that has our lockers next to them for our shoes and whatnot, and one for the students for their stuff. And so as I was getting my heels on, the kids were plastered outside against the teacher's glass door like little zombies restlessly waiting for me to come out. lol It was quite amusing to see. =P As I ran out the little girls grabbed my hand and started steering me in the direction of the swings. On my way I passed by the little boys who were playing basketball and well on their way to become all-stars. The boys were like "Theresa-sensei! Let's play basketball!" I would say "Yes! Let's play Basketball!" And then get pulled away by the little girls towards the swing. A couple of the boys would then follow us and bring a soccer ball to play with. All the little kiddies wanted me to push them on their swings and would keep calling my name to do so. I tried my best to accomodate them all. And then the little boys called me over to play soccer with them...in my heels...so of course I did. Ah, the sacrifices I make for these children. ^^;
The school bell rang indicating that it was time for the kids to go back in. I waited behind until all the kids had gone ahead except for 3 girls that stuck to me like mochi. 2 of them were originally holding my hands as we walked back and one was behind me. But the little girl on the left asked if the girl behind me wanted to hold my hand and she would hold the girl's other hand so she would not be left behind. I was amazed and touched by the maturity and sincerity of that one sentence. These Japanese kids are teaching me new things everyday about leading a good life. I can really learn alot just by being with children. Their innocence and sincerity is what makes them such great people. Anyways, as we walked back and swung our hands up and down we sung the alphabet song because they all knew it. I was amazed. They even knew the part: "Now I know my ABC's. Next time won't you sing with me." Even the 5th graders didn't know that part! When we reached the student's doors they turned around and asked me how long will I be here for. I told them 2-3 years. And immediately they turned sad and wondered why such a short time. I told them to not think about that and don't worry. For these few years I will always be there to play with them and be with them when they need me. And it made me think about my future for a little bit. But it was just a passing breeze.
By that time, I really needed to make a move on to go to the high school or else I would be late. So I bid everyone goodbye at the elementary and headed off to the high school on my bike. When I arrived it was before 1:15 which was the designated time. I literally gave myself a pat on the back for making it on time. As I parked my bike I heard some boys on the second floor calling my name. I looked up and over and saw a couple of the boys hanging out the windows to say hi to me. haha. It was cute! I guess they saw me ride in on my bike. I walked into the teacher's room and said a hearty "konnichiwa" and just got blank konnichiwas and odd stares...I was wondering what was wrong. I sat at my desk confused until Mr. Gorgeous came over to my desk with a schedule in his hand....And I dreaded something. He showed me the schedule which said I was supposed to be at the high school in the morning. But my original schedule said I would be at the elementary and even my supervisor told me that I would be at the elementary this morning. So I was very confused and now know why all the teachers were looking at me weirdly. It was because I was supposed to be there this morning but was given the wrong info! I felt so bad and apologized profusely. Mr. Gorgeous said it was fine and that it wasn't my fault now that he knows what happened and explained it to the head teachers for me. He wasn't angry or anything with me at all. Just sweet and level headed. After that the teachers went back to being normal with me. I was so scared for a while! I was like "please don't hate me and ostracize me!!" >.<
It was still lunch time at the senior high and so I decided to walk around the hallways. I bumped into a lot of students to which majority had no idea who I was until I said "Hello/Hi, nice to meet you!" And then they would laugh and say hello back. Some of the students would stare at me for awhile because they weren't sure who I was. I guess cuz I'm shorter than all of them and kinda look like them...There were a group of girls that looked a little gangster who I thought were going to beat me up when I said hello to them. They just gave me these cold stares and then once they realized I was the ALT laughed and said hello back to me. I was so relieved. ^^; lol Some of the female students would pass by me and said I was "kawaii". Heh. I would even poke my head into some classrooms where the cool kids were hanging out and say a big hello to them to which they responded with blank stares of confusion and a silent awkward moment. lol And then I left them...lol As I walked down the corridors the boys who I was supposed to teach today saw me and were like "Are!?" and would laugh at me. I think it was because I didn't show up to teach them and am now here....lol Everyone would laugh at me as I said hello or hi to them. It was a jolly feeling. I don't think many teachers walk around like this during their lunch time. I just really want to get to know the students and check out if there are any hot ones of which there are...I just don't teach them. They're all in 2nd grade.
And when I went back downstairs to wander the halls down there I ran into a very important man of whom I still don't know who he is. He just introduced himself to me in English and said something about the prime minister. I knew there were special visitors today, but I wasn't sure who they were. His English wasn't terrible, but I couldn't really understand him that well. I just did a very normal greeting with no flourishes or formalities to a very important man...eheheh....I hope he doesn't remember me...>.> Anyways, come 4pm I left the school partially because everyone had gone to a teacher's meeting without me (which is fine because I wouldn't have understood it all anyways) and it was my off work time. As I was about to leave I heard different boys calling my name this time. I looked up and over and 2 boys were leaning out the 2nd floor window trying to say bye to me. I smiled/laughed and waved and said bye. They kept saying bye to me as I was riding my bike off the campus and around the corner. haha. It was cute and funny. The boys at the school are really interactive. The girls a little quieter. I guess puberty is over huh?
I saw two of the high school boys walking home as I was biking back and decided to bike over to them and say bye. They were really surprised to see me and just did a shocked goodbye. And I rode on ahead. I then heard running footsteps behind me and looked behind to see the boys running behind me. I stopped and wandered what they wanted. They ran up to me and stopped and said a breathless "goodbye Theresa" and that was it. lol That was their whole purpose of running up to me. haha. So cute and funny. And I realize that they actually live near me! Anyways, it was a good day until I had found out that I missed a class, but then the students made up for it. hehe. ^_^
Otsukare-sama for reading! Thanks for keeping up with me btw. I appreciate it muchos. If you guys have any suggestions for games using English or lesson ideas or whatnot, just post it and I'll be much obliged! Luv ya al!
Day where there is absolutely nothing required of me to do at the elementary school. I went to the school, sat down, and started reading books about activities I can do with elementary kiddies. There was no class scheduled for me to teach today. So I was pretty much free to do whatever from 8:30am until 1pm. So I sat there for a little bit and then remembered that I wanted to make a little mailbox so that the children can leave me messages/questions/suggestions. I looked for a cardboard box, measured everything, took a knife, and started cutting away. The couple of teachers who came in all looked at me oddly because I was in the office cutting away at a cardboard box. lol Some of the teachers asked me what I was doing and when I told them they were like "wow! That's a good idea!" And then others just didn't bother...let the foreigner do what them foreigners do..lol haha. Anyways, I finished with the cutting and started drawing crap on paper to paste onto the box, but I got a little restless and decided to take a break. I got up to go to the bathroom and ended up chatting with the super nice nurse lady in her office. Such a wonderful woman. Reminds me of my grandma. I then ran into the teacher who invited me to make parfaits yesterday who then invited me to make bead shapes with the mentally challenged students, of which there were 3. It was fun working with them making the little bead thingies that I really wasn't even sure what it was.
Afterwards I went downstairs and ran into the 2nd grade pregnant teacher who invited me to go see what the kids in her class were making in the large playroom. They were making boats out of milk cartons and were going to test them in the pool and try to ride them!!!! Sounds so fun! I wish we could've done that back in 2nd grade...Anyways, all the little kids were seperated into mini groups and all did their part in organizing the cartons, stapling them shut, taping them, and gathering more cartons. These kids were actually really efficient and clean workers! I was seriously impressed! I would walk around to each group and sit and have each of them teach me how to do it. Very patient these kids were with me. And they really seemed to enjoy my company. Or so it seems. Like I said, the girls seemed to respond to me more than the boys. Although the boys in 2nd grade were also really talkative with me. I think the boys 4th grade and under are still in the stage where gender is not too big of an issue. They were all really receptive with me. 5th graders were a little bit more shy, and I'm assuming 6th grade is just gonna be about the same as junior high boys. Ah, puberty.
So after a little while of playing with/helping the students I went back to my office desk and continued with my mailbox project. -on a side note, I just remembered that I forgot the thing at the school and can't finish it tonight..I'll have to make a trip over there to get it.- When lunch time came around I helped the other teachers in the office to serve the lunch. It was a piece of salmon steak (not really that big) fried tofu salad, and miso sponge soup with the purple colored mixed rice. It was very filling and lately, I can't eat too much rice because I've been getting full really easily. I don't know why though. Anyways as soon as I was done eating and washing my dishes I went to visit the 2nd graders. I watched as they all neatly seperated their trash, waited in line to stack their bowls in the right areas and put their tables back the way it originally was without directions or yelling or too much noise. It was an amazing sight to see. 2nd grade kids can do this?!
So after they were done with all that, they all crowded around me and asked if I can play with them. I was like "sure!" ^_^ I can always play with kids. They were like "where do you want to play and what?" I told them anything. So they said to go play with them outside. I was then thinking "oh shit! I only have heels!" But then decided to bite the dust and where my heels out to play with them. It was actually kinda funny, the situation. There are two seperate doors: one for teachers that has our lockers next to them for our shoes and whatnot, and one for the students for their stuff. And so as I was getting my heels on, the kids were plastered outside against the teacher's glass door like little zombies restlessly waiting for me to come out. lol It was quite amusing to see. =P As I ran out the little girls grabbed my hand and started steering me in the direction of the swings. On my way I passed by the little boys who were playing basketball and well on their way to become all-stars. The boys were like "Theresa-sensei! Let's play basketball!" I would say "Yes! Let's play Basketball!" And then get pulled away by the little girls towards the swing. A couple of the boys would then follow us and bring a soccer ball to play with. All the little kiddies wanted me to push them on their swings and would keep calling my name to do so. I tried my best to accomodate them all. And then the little boys called me over to play soccer with them...in my heels...so of course I did. Ah, the sacrifices I make for these children. ^^;
The school bell rang indicating that it was time for the kids to go back in. I waited behind until all the kids had gone ahead except for 3 girls that stuck to me like mochi. 2 of them were originally holding my hands as we walked back and one was behind me. But the little girl on the left asked if the girl behind me wanted to hold my hand and she would hold the girl's other hand so she would not be left behind. I was amazed and touched by the maturity and sincerity of that one sentence. These Japanese kids are teaching me new things everyday about leading a good life. I can really learn alot just by being with children. Their innocence and sincerity is what makes them such great people. Anyways, as we walked back and swung our hands up and down we sung the alphabet song because they all knew it. I was amazed. They even knew the part: "Now I know my ABC's. Next time won't you sing with me." Even the 5th graders didn't know that part! When we reached the student's doors they turned around and asked me how long will I be here for. I told them 2-3 years. And immediately they turned sad and wondered why such a short time. I told them to not think about that and don't worry. For these few years I will always be there to play with them and be with them when they need me. And it made me think about my future for a little bit. But it was just a passing breeze.
By that time, I really needed to make a move on to go to the high school or else I would be late. So I bid everyone goodbye at the elementary and headed off to the high school on my bike. When I arrived it was before 1:15 which was the designated time. I literally gave myself a pat on the back for making it on time. As I parked my bike I heard some boys on the second floor calling my name. I looked up and over and saw a couple of the boys hanging out the windows to say hi to me. haha. It was cute! I guess they saw me ride in on my bike. I walked into the teacher's room and said a hearty "konnichiwa" and just got blank konnichiwas and odd stares...I was wondering what was wrong. I sat at my desk confused until Mr. Gorgeous came over to my desk with a schedule in his hand....And I dreaded something. He showed me the schedule which said I was supposed to be at the high school in the morning. But my original schedule said I would be at the elementary and even my supervisor told me that I would be at the elementary this morning. So I was very confused and now know why all the teachers were looking at me weirdly. It was because I was supposed to be there this morning but was given the wrong info! I felt so bad and apologized profusely. Mr. Gorgeous said it was fine and that it wasn't my fault now that he knows what happened and explained it to the head teachers for me. He wasn't angry or anything with me at all. Just sweet and level headed. After that the teachers went back to being normal with me. I was so scared for a while! I was like "please don't hate me and ostracize me!!" >.<
It was still lunch time at the senior high and so I decided to walk around the hallways. I bumped into a lot of students to which majority had no idea who I was until I said "Hello/Hi, nice to meet you!" And then they would laugh and say hello back. Some of the students would stare at me for awhile because they weren't sure who I was. I guess cuz I'm shorter than all of them and kinda look like them...There were a group of girls that looked a little gangster who I thought were going to beat me up when I said hello to them. They just gave me these cold stares and then once they realized I was the ALT laughed and said hello back to me. I was so relieved. ^^; lol Some of the female students would pass by me and said I was "kawaii". Heh. I would even poke my head into some classrooms where the cool kids were hanging out and say a big hello to them to which they responded with blank stares of confusion and a silent awkward moment. lol And then I left them...lol As I walked down the corridors the boys who I was supposed to teach today saw me and were like "Are!?" and would laugh at me. I think it was because I didn't show up to teach them and am now here....lol Everyone would laugh at me as I said hello or hi to them. It was a jolly feeling. I don't think many teachers walk around like this during their lunch time. I just really want to get to know the students and check out if there are any hot ones of which there are...I just don't teach them. They're all in 2nd grade.
And when I went back downstairs to wander the halls down there I ran into a very important man of whom I still don't know who he is. He just introduced himself to me in English and said something about the prime minister. I knew there were special visitors today, but I wasn't sure who they were. His English wasn't terrible, but I couldn't really understand him that well. I just did a very normal greeting with no flourishes or formalities to a very important man...eheheh....I hope he doesn't remember me...>.> Anyways, come 4pm I left the school partially because everyone had gone to a teacher's meeting without me (which is fine because I wouldn't have understood it all anyways) and it was my off work time. As I was about to leave I heard different boys calling my name this time. I looked up and over and 2 boys were leaning out the 2nd floor window trying to say bye to me. I smiled/laughed and waved and said bye. They kept saying bye to me as I was riding my bike off the campus and around the corner. haha. It was cute and funny. The boys at the school are really interactive. The girls a little quieter. I guess puberty is over huh?
I saw two of the high school boys walking home as I was biking back and decided to bike over to them and say bye. They were really surprised to see me and just did a shocked goodbye. And I rode on ahead. I then heard running footsteps behind me and looked behind to see the boys running behind me. I stopped and wandered what they wanted. They ran up to me and stopped and said a breathless "goodbye Theresa" and that was it. lol That was their whole purpose of running up to me. haha. So cute and funny. And I realize that they actually live near me! Anyways, it was a good day until I had found out that I missed a class, but then the students made up for it. hehe. ^_^
Otsukare-sama for reading! Thanks for keeping up with me btw. I appreciate it muchos. If you guys have any suggestions for games using English or lesson ideas or whatnot, just post it and I'll be much obliged! Luv ya al!
Monday, August 24, 2009
I Just Wanna Squeeze 'em!! =P
Before I begin, I just need to tell you all that if you haven't read the other ones before this post, and if you want to, please read them as well. Those other ones I really didn't tag people, so no one was informed of them. I'm not going to tag everyone after each post cuz it takes too much time; only on some posts I will tag just to inform you that I've updated in case you are still keeping up with my boring life. This is only if you are still interested in reading my blog. If not, then you don't have read it at all, you can just ignore this. ^^ I'll try to post every night or every other night in case you want to know when to check. Thank you!
Aug. 24 Monday
Day of madness! I came out of my house to get my bike to ride to work to then realize that my bike was not in my garage... I freaked out and was like "oh shit! Did someone steal it?" And then I realized I had left it at the B&G gym yesterday and took a car with Satomi. =P eheh. So I just walked to work. It only takes me 10minutes without running. I made it just in time before the morning bell rang. But usually when the bell rings the chairman comes out of his office to say hello to us, but today he wasn't there. So everyone in the office just awkwardly stood for a little bit and then turned around to each other to say ohayou gozaimasu and sit back down. It was kinda funny looking. So I did some errands this morning with Su before heading off to the nursery at 10am. And that included buying my car, which turned out to be 190,000yen instead of 150,000yen like I thought. But the extra 40,000yen is for the recycle fee, the owner change fee, and taxes. So it's still a pretty good price I think for a 4wd, automatic, including shakken and winter tires.
So at 10am Su dropped me off via car at the nursery and was wonderful enough to go and get my bike and ride it to the nursery so that I would have it later. So amazing! I love my supervisor! Anyways, so at the nursery I set my stuff down and walked into the large playroom where everyone sat waiting for morning announcements. Such good well disciplined children! I couldn't believe my eyes seeing that. All the kids were from 1-6 years old yet they all sat two by two in 2 little columns that represented each class. They didn't scream or run around or get out of line or anything. Just sat in their little areas and mildly talked with each other. It was amazing! I've never seen kids being able to do that in the states! And then when the teacher was doing her morning announcements and telling everyone to make sure they take care of their bodies and stay clean and do the cleaning and stuff all the children would all answer in unison with a loud "hai!" I was sooo impressed. Anyways, the little kiddies saw me walk in and looked really happy and smily and would keep smiling and waving at me. It was the cutest thing ever!!! And then I noticed little Ikuma who is in the Sakura class. Oh, on a side note, the classes are all seperated by flower names and their age. Sakura is 5-6 year olds, Sumire is 3-4 year olds, Tulip is 2 year olds, and then there is the 1 year old class which I don't really know their flower name. It's really cute. The kids would refer to themselves as that class too. lol
Anyways, little Ikuma was the one of the little boys I played with yesterday and who said the line "it would be better if you came to my granpa's house to play with us" or something like that. I love the boy. He's adorable! But he didn't know I was the teahcer yesterday. So when he saw me and I introduced myself to the whole nursery he was like "...wha!? You're the teacher?! I played with you yesterday right?" To which I nodded and said I remembered him. I taught his class today which is the Sakura class. ADORABLE!!!!! I JUST WANNA SQUEEZE THEM ALL!!! SOOOOOO CUUUUUTTTTEEEE!!! The minute I got in there all the kids pulled me over to play connecting blocky things with them. Their hands are so small and their little bodies are the best to hug cuz it's so small and cute and like a doll's. I tried to hug them every chance I got! Best feeling ever being hugged by little babies like that. And they would vie for me attention so it was very difficult trying to pay attention to one kid while the other one was talking to me as well. We just did little introductions and I was impressed with how much English these kids knew. The knew how to say "Hello! My name is..." And so they did that. But I had to speak in Japanese with these kids majority of the time because they don't really understand English at all except for those impressive few words.
And for the record, I can't understand kid Japanese whatsoever. Everything they told me I would just nod or say "sugoi!" or "Wow!" or "oooo" and pretend that I knew what they were talking about. But I think I'm learning alot of Japanese from these little kids actually. They're surprisingly very patient with me and are willing to teach me Japanese words. At lunch after all the tables were set up the kids waited for me to decide where I was sitting and then would fight over who sat next to me. hehhe. So adorable their little chairs and backpacks. They all brought their own utensil set and cooked rice. We talked about the most random things, and half the time I don't even understand them. They're just cute to look at and poke. After they were done they automatically helped to clean up the tables and then go to the bathroom. I stayed with some of the kids and read a little story/picture book in Japanese. Man, my Japanese has been sucking lately because as I read the book I had to pause several times to make sure what I read was one word and not two or a run on sentence..lol =P And then all the kids helped to grab their futons to lay out in a clean row on the floor. I said goodbye to all of them and then left to go to the elementary.
I arrived at the elementary during lunchtime so there was some free time for me to walk around and see what the kids were up to. I mainly hung out on the first floor and as I walked along the corridor I hear alot of kids point at me and say "Theresa-sensei!" And some of them would even run up to me and grab my hand. XD I love that quite alot actually. I'm a sucker for children. >D Some of the kids were really surprised to see me and weren't sure how to act around me, but majority were really genki and outgoing. I walked towards the end of the corridor where there was a crowd of kids who were from the 2nd grade class standing around outside the room playing. The moment they saw me they immediately crowded around me and grabbed my hand to play with me. Too bad, I don't teach this class. I would've loved them. Their teacher came out to say hello to me. She's a very cute woman who was pregnant. And absolutely sweet and nice.
When 5th period came along I went to go teach the 5th grade class with Hisakawa-san. I think I really surprised him actually. Normally when I'm with the teachers I'm pretty quiet and reserved because I still don't know exactly how to act around them and am sometimes a little nervous. But when I with students and children I just let loose and go crazy. I basically throw my pride away when I'm teaching kids. And I think that's the only way to do it if you really want the children to love learning and love you. If you keep up an ego or a cool demeanor the children will think you're cold and unwilling to play with them. But if you act stupid and super happy like they are more receptive of you and will play with you. And that's what happened. My self intro was me being silly and doing wierd actions to describe my hobbies. The kids laughed at me and everything. They were all really excited to meet me and talk with me especially the girls. The girls all seem to really be willing to talk to me I think because I'm a female ALT this time. lol =P Yeah, so I played games with them and stuff that used ENglish and at the end of the class since we still had some free time I had them sing me the alphabet song. And then said goodbye and went back to my office area. As I left I heard the Hisakawa-san say "wah, subarashii da yo ne" Haha, yeah I think I really surprised him. I think most of the teachers weren't expecting much from my demeanor when I'm around them, but I think after this, their views of me will change little by little I hope. I just need to work on being fun with the teachers as well...lol
Some of the super nice female teachers invited me to go to the afternoon club activities with the home-ec club. The students were from 5-6th grade and one 2nd grader joined us. So tiny! So they made parfaits! I was excited! Free parfait time! And it was delicious. By that time I was already super tired, so my energy wasn't as high as it could've been. I need to go to sleep earlier. It's taking a toll on my attitude and genkiness with the kiddies. After that I returned back to my office desk to do nothing. Hisakawa-san came back into the office a little while later and his attitude towards me was quite different. haha. He treated me with more respect and normality. He said my way with the children was excellent! I was sooo proud and happy to hear him say that because I want to get to know him better and show him how I really am instead of this weird reserved me that he sees. And then Watanabe-san (the 6th grade teacher) says that he wants me to teach him and some students a 3-4 minute hip hop routine to perform in their little festival in October. I was more than happy to do so, so I told him to choose a song he likes and I'll choreograph something for them. I'm not sure how good I can be, but I will try my best.
In the evening today was the Sayonara party for the 5 exchange students that were here or as I like to call them 'my girls'. We seriuosly became the best of friends in the short one week that they were here. We bonded so well because we all spoke chinese mandarin and cantonese. I love these girls so much and wished they were here longer. But they have to get back to school in Tokyo. I actually arrived 20 minutes late because I thought it started at 6:30, but it started at 6pm. So I sneaked to the back of the room and sat with the Taiko club at their table. The taiko club was there and allowed us to play on the drums and stuff. We also did a little bonodori dance around the room. It was so cute seeing the principals and chairmans dancing the bonodori. Afterwards was a lot of tearful goodbyes and hugging and exchanging of emails and numbers and pictures. I will never forget these wonderful girls and will definitely visit them in Tokyo when I get the chance! XD ^O^
Anyways, off to sleep now. I need it for tomorrow...lol Otsukare-sama for reading!
Aug. 24 Monday
Day of madness! I came out of my house to get my bike to ride to work to then realize that my bike was not in my garage... I freaked out and was like "oh shit! Did someone steal it?" And then I realized I had left it at the B&G gym yesterday and took a car with Satomi. =P eheh. So I just walked to work. It only takes me 10minutes without running. I made it just in time before the morning bell rang. But usually when the bell rings the chairman comes out of his office to say hello to us, but today he wasn't there. So everyone in the office just awkwardly stood for a little bit and then turned around to each other to say ohayou gozaimasu and sit back down. It was kinda funny looking. So I did some errands this morning with Su before heading off to the nursery at 10am. And that included buying my car, which turned out to be 190,000yen instead of 150,000yen like I thought. But the extra 40,000yen is for the recycle fee, the owner change fee, and taxes. So it's still a pretty good price I think for a 4wd, automatic, including shakken and winter tires.
So at 10am Su dropped me off via car at the nursery and was wonderful enough to go and get my bike and ride it to the nursery so that I would have it later. So amazing! I love my supervisor! Anyways, so at the nursery I set my stuff down and walked into the large playroom where everyone sat waiting for morning announcements. Such good well disciplined children! I couldn't believe my eyes seeing that. All the kids were from 1-6 years old yet they all sat two by two in 2 little columns that represented each class. They didn't scream or run around or get out of line or anything. Just sat in their little areas and mildly talked with each other. It was amazing! I've never seen kids being able to do that in the states! And then when the teacher was doing her morning announcements and telling everyone to make sure they take care of their bodies and stay clean and do the cleaning and stuff all the children would all answer in unison with a loud "hai!" I was sooo impressed. Anyways, the little kiddies saw me walk in and looked really happy and smily and would keep smiling and waving at me. It was the cutest thing ever!!! And then I noticed little Ikuma who is in the Sakura class. Oh, on a side note, the classes are all seperated by flower names and their age. Sakura is 5-6 year olds, Sumire is 3-4 year olds, Tulip is 2 year olds, and then there is the 1 year old class which I don't really know their flower name. It's really cute. The kids would refer to themselves as that class too. lol
Anyways, little Ikuma was the one of the little boys I played with yesterday and who said the line "it would be better if you came to my granpa's house to play with us" or something like that. I love the boy. He's adorable! But he didn't know I was the teahcer yesterday. So when he saw me and I introduced myself to the whole nursery he was like "...wha!? You're the teacher?! I played with you yesterday right?" To which I nodded and said I remembered him. I taught his class today which is the Sakura class. ADORABLE!!!!! I JUST WANNA SQUEEZE THEM ALL!!! SOOOOOO CUUUUUTTTTEEEE!!! The minute I got in there all the kids pulled me over to play connecting blocky things with them. Their hands are so small and their little bodies are the best to hug cuz it's so small and cute and like a doll's. I tried to hug them every chance I got! Best feeling ever being hugged by little babies like that. And they would vie for me attention so it was very difficult trying to pay attention to one kid while the other one was talking to me as well. We just did little introductions and I was impressed with how much English these kids knew. The knew how to say "Hello! My name is..." And so they did that. But I had to speak in Japanese with these kids majority of the time because they don't really understand English at all except for those impressive few words.
And for the record, I can't understand kid Japanese whatsoever. Everything they told me I would just nod or say "sugoi!" or "Wow!" or "oooo" and pretend that I knew what they were talking about. But I think I'm learning alot of Japanese from these little kids actually. They're surprisingly very patient with me and are willing to teach me Japanese words. At lunch after all the tables were set up the kids waited for me to decide where I was sitting and then would fight over who sat next to me. hehhe. So adorable their little chairs and backpacks. They all brought their own utensil set and cooked rice. We talked about the most random things, and half the time I don't even understand them. They're just cute to look at and poke. After they were done they automatically helped to clean up the tables and then go to the bathroom. I stayed with some of the kids and read a little story/picture book in Japanese. Man, my Japanese has been sucking lately because as I read the book I had to pause several times to make sure what I read was one word and not two or a run on sentence..lol =P And then all the kids helped to grab their futons to lay out in a clean row on the floor. I said goodbye to all of them and then left to go to the elementary.
I arrived at the elementary during lunchtime so there was some free time for me to walk around and see what the kids were up to. I mainly hung out on the first floor and as I walked along the corridor I hear alot of kids point at me and say "Theresa-sensei!" And some of them would even run up to me and grab my hand. XD I love that quite alot actually. I'm a sucker for children. >D Some of the kids were really surprised to see me and weren't sure how to act around me, but majority were really genki and outgoing. I walked towards the end of the corridor where there was a crowd of kids who were from the 2nd grade class standing around outside the room playing. The moment they saw me they immediately crowded around me and grabbed my hand to play with me. Too bad, I don't teach this class. I would've loved them. Their teacher came out to say hello to me. She's a very cute woman who was pregnant. And absolutely sweet and nice.
When 5th period came along I went to go teach the 5th grade class with Hisakawa-san. I think I really surprised him actually. Normally when I'm with the teachers I'm pretty quiet and reserved because I still don't know exactly how to act around them and am sometimes a little nervous. But when I with students and children I just let loose and go crazy. I basically throw my pride away when I'm teaching kids. And I think that's the only way to do it if you really want the children to love learning and love you. If you keep up an ego or a cool demeanor the children will think you're cold and unwilling to play with them. But if you act stupid and super happy like they are more receptive of you and will play with you. And that's what happened. My self intro was me being silly and doing wierd actions to describe my hobbies. The kids laughed at me and everything. They were all really excited to meet me and talk with me especially the girls. The girls all seem to really be willing to talk to me I think because I'm a female ALT this time. lol =P Yeah, so I played games with them and stuff that used ENglish and at the end of the class since we still had some free time I had them sing me the alphabet song. And then said goodbye and went back to my office area. As I left I heard the Hisakawa-san say "wah, subarashii da yo ne" Haha, yeah I think I really surprised him. I think most of the teachers weren't expecting much from my demeanor when I'm around them, but I think after this, their views of me will change little by little I hope. I just need to work on being fun with the teachers as well...lol
Some of the super nice female teachers invited me to go to the afternoon club activities with the home-ec club. The students were from 5-6th grade and one 2nd grader joined us. So tiny! So they made parfaits! I was excited! Free parfait time! And it was delicious. By that time I was already super tired, so my energy wasn't as high as it could've been. I need to go to sleep earlier. It's taking a toll on my attitude and genkiness with the kiddies. After that I returned back to my office desk to do nothing. Hisakawa-san came back into the office a little while later and his attitude towards me was quite different. haha. He treated me with more respect and normality. He said my way with the children was excellent! I was sooo proud and happy to hear him say that because I want to get to know him better and show him how I really am instead of this weird reserved me that he sees. And then Watanabe-san (the 6th grade teacher) says that he wants me to teach him and some students a 3-4 minute hip hop routine to perform in their little festival in October. I was more than happy to do so, so I told him to choose a song he likes and I'll choreograph something for them. I'm not sure how good I can be, but I will try my best.
In the evening today was the Sayonara party for the 5 exchange students that were here or as I like to call them 'my girls'. We seriuosly became the best of friends in the short one week that they were here. We bonded so well because we all spoke chinese mandarin and cantonese. I love these girls so much and wished they were here longer. But they have to get back to school in Tokyo. I actually arrived 20 minutes late because I thought it started at 6:30, but it started at 6pm. So I sneaked to the back of the room and sat with the Taiko club at their table. The taiko club was there and allowed us to play on the drums and stuff. We also did a little bonodori dance around the room. It was so cute seeing the principals and chairmans dancing the bonodori. Afterwards was a lot of tearful goodbyes and hugging and exchanging of emails and numbers and pictures. I will never forget these wonderful girls and will definitely visit them in Tokyo when I get the chance! XD ^O^
Anyways, off to sleep now. I need it for tomorrow...lol Otsukare-sama for reading!
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Jump Rope, Tug-of-War, and Yakiniku?! Oh My!!
Aug. 23 Sunday
Ahahaha, so today is sunday, yes it is. And I was hoping to get a bit of shut-eye to make up for the lack of sleep I keep having these past few weeks. But bright and early in the morning Su calls me and tells me that there is the Kenbuchi Summer festival at the B&G gym across from the high school and I am supposed to participate in the festivities...Don't you just love last minute calls like this? Well, I suppose everything is actually pretty last minute here all the time. The activities that I'm supposed to participate in are the friendly neighborhood competitions that include the long jump rope, where there's a whole bunch of people lined up to jump at the same time when the rope comes around, and the tug-of-war. I was apparently signed up for both and I didn't even know. But immediately upon arriving there with Su on my bike there were alot of stares from everyone around the area. Apparently they all already knew who I was...lol I heard alot of kids saying "Theresa-sensei da!" I love hearing that because it's the voices of my beautiful adorable children. None of the older kids were there, just the preschool and elementary kids which was totally fine by me. They were already quite the handful to deal with. =P
Then when I walked into the gym 3 of the exchange student girls were there to greet me like old girly friends where you run up to each other and squeal and clasp hands..lol I kinda missed doing that. haha. Call me sappy. Anyways, they said they weren't participating so they would come around and take pictures of me losing the competitions...heh. And also when I walked in I saw a shit load of people staring at me as well as a bunch of "AH! Theresa-sensei da!" and kids running up to me and suddenly chatting with me. It's as if they've known me for a long time! I was soooo happy and exhilirated to see these children do that! So the teams were separated into which neighborhood you lived in. I lived in 仲町 (nakamachi) neighborhood which means the friendly neighborhood. haha. But this is Kenbuchi town exclusive so all the adults from Kenbuchi were there.
I sat down to wait my team's turn to go jump roping and a bunch of the little kids would come or run over to me and sit next to me and start talking to me..lol I loved it. I felt so popular. Haha. =P They would then tell their parents about me and the parents would give me a nod of acknowledgment. Now the whole town knows who I am. >D None of the kids knew i was participating. Actually no one knew I was except for my team. And so when I got up there with my team for a practice run I heard alot of people or mainly the kids go ”あれ？あれはテレサー先生だろう？あ！そうだ！テレサー先生だ！テレサー先生, 頑張れ！” Translation: "Eh? Isn't that Ms. Theresa? Yes it is! Go Ms. Theresa!" I felt full of pride then and felt that I must do my best. But everyone kept trying to get my attention from the side to say good luck to me and some of the town hall guys also called to me to say hi and good luck and that totally distracted me so that I didn't even notice the rope coming around and was side swiped by the rope stopping it's loop around. eheheh. ^^; Needless to say, the whole gym was laughing at me. Well, I suppose that broke the ice with alot of people. Our team lost because we suck at this kind of stuff apparently. haha. No cool Theresa-sensei now.
Btw, as I was sitting there waiting for my team's turn I watched the other teams go and some of them had some pretty decent looking boys on their team. They must either be in college or in their mid to late 20's. Or they could be older and just look that good. Anyways, so next up was tug-of-war which was a complete failure. I ended up cheering for my children's parent's team since they would announce it to me proudly whenever the parents would be up there. Afterwards, I went outside with Su and Mago-chan to get my little prize for participating in the thing which was two beautiful towels, a tumbler, and a pack of hand soap from Shiseido. That was actually pretty amazing! And then I went to grab my bag of yakiniku and veggies to take with me to the town hall to cook up. It had a tray of fat sliced beefsteak, a bag of genghis khan, and a bag of assorted veggies. The yakiniku was held at the townhall garage with the 5 exchange girls and their host families. I came to love these girls dearly and definitely want to hang out with them more often. Ike has got to be my fave girl because she's so out there and touchy feely and open. There's always got to be one of them in the group right? XD And then Sho is the more mature calm one. And the other girls fall in between.
The yakiniku was amazing and bountiful! There was so much leftover in the end. I was able to take some home with me to cook up! yay free dinner! But after the girls and I finished eating we decided to go play with 3 of the four little kids that were there. the 3 kids had two boys and the youngest was the little girl. The boys were the most lively and mischievous. We played tag, hide and go seek, and searched for giant cockroaches which was horrifying for me. lol The kids were so small and so cute! They were between 3-5 years old. I melted immediately when they grabbed my hand to play with them. And I played with them like I was a little kid. That energy that I had when I was in Tomo Modern is still goin as I was the only one left standing of all the other girls. haha. Woo! The kids caught on that i like to play and would constantly try to pull me to play with them. Heheh. >D And then they would shake their butts which was the CUTEST thing in the world!!!!!! At the end of it all, when we were about to go home the little boys ran over to me and said what car am I taking. I told them i'm going home in Satomi's red car and they pulled me down to their eye level and said "Do you know what would be better? Coming into grandpa's car to come with us to grandpa's house!" and smiled and hugged me. I MELTED COMPLETELY!!!!!!! WAAAAAA!!!! >>>>.<<<<<<<
I definitely would've loved to go with them and play with them some more, but honestly I was dead tired from all the festivities that day and then running around with the kids...I just couldn't do anymore. So I told them that I couldn't today but would definitely do so next time. I picked them up and threw them up and down for a little bit for the last time before their parents scolded them for tiring me out. heh. And when I said bye to one of the boys he just came over to hug me and I picked him up and hugged him tightly before leaving. The parents found out that I would be working at the nursery tomorrow with the kids so all of them said yoroshiku onegaishimasu to me before leaving.
After that I just helped Satomi and Eda clean up stuff and went back home happy and full with my bag of raw meat to cook for tonight. Yes, more HYD Korean version! Otsukare-sama for reading! Pictures are posted!
Ahahaha, so today is sunday, yes it is. And I was hoping to get a bit of shut-eye to make up for the lack of sleep I keep having these past few weeks. But bright and early in the morning Su calls me and tells me that there is the Kenbuchi Summer festival at the B&G gym across from the high school and I am supposed to participate in the festivities...Don't you just love last minute calls like this? Well, I suppose everything is actually pretty last minute here all the time. The activities that I'm supposed to participate in are the friendly neighborhood competitions that include the long jump rope, where there's a whole bunch of people lined up to jump at the same time when the rope comes around, and the tug-of-war. I was apparently signed up for both and I didn't even know. But immediately upon arriving there with Su on my bike there were alot of stares from everyone around the area. Apparently they all already knew who I was...lol I heard alot of kids saying "Theresa-sensei da!" I love hearing that because it's the voices of my beautiful adorable children. None of the older kids were there, just the preschool and elementary kids which was totally fine by me. They were already quite the handful to deal with. =P
Then when I walked into the gym 3 of the exchange student girls were there to greet me like old girly friends where you run up to each other and squeal and clasp hands..lol I kinda missed doing that. haha. Call me sappy. Anyways, they said they weren't participating so they would come around and take pictures of me losing the competitions...heh. And also when I walked in I saw a shit load of people staring at me as well as a bunch of "AH! Theresa-sensei da!" and kids running up to me and suddenly chatting with me. It's as if they've known me for a long time! I was soooo happy and exhilirated to see these children do that! So the teams were separated into which neighborhood you lived in. I lived in 仲町 (nakamachi) neighborhood which means the friendly neighborhood. haha. But this is Kenbuchi town exclusive so all the adults from Kenbuchi were there.
I sat down to wait my team's turn to go jump roping and a bunch of the little kids would come or run over to me and sit next to me and start talking to me..lol I loved it. I felt so popular. Haha. =P They would then tell their parents about me and the parents would give me a nod of acknowledgment. Now the whole town knows who I am. >D None of the kids knew i was participating. Actually no one knew I was except for my team. And so when I got up there with my team for a practice run I heard alot of people or mainly the kids go ”あれ？あれはテレサー先生だろう？あ！そうだ！テレサー先生だ！テレサー先生, 頑張れ！” Translation: "Eh? Isn't that Ms. Theresa? Yes it is! Go Ms. Theresa!" I felt full of pride then and felt that I must do my best. But everyone kept trying to get my attention from the side to say good luck to me and some of the town hall guys also called to me to say hi and good luck and that totally distracted me so that I didn't even notice the rope coming around and was side swiped by the rope stopping it's loop around. eheheh. ^^; Needless to say, the whole gym was laughing at me. Well, I suppose that broke the ice with alot of people. Our team lost because we suck at this kind of stuff apparently. haha. No cool Theresa-sensei now.
Btw, as I was sitting there waiting for my team's turn I watched the other teams go and some of them had some pretty decent looking boys on their team. They must either be in college or in their mid to late 20's. Or they could be older and just look that good. Anyways, so next up was tug-of-war which was a complete failure. I ended up cheering for my children's parent's team since they would announce it to me proudly whenever the parents would be up there. Afterwards, I went outside with Su and Mago-chan to get my little prize for participating in the thing which was two beautiful towels, a tumbler, and a pack of hand soap from Shiseido. That was actually pretty amazing! And then I went to grab my bag of yakiniku and veggies to take with me to the town hall to cook up. It had a tray of fat sliced beefsteak, a bag of genghis khan, and a bag of assorted veggies. The yakiniku was held at the townhall garage with the 5 exchange girls and their host families. I came to love these girls dearly and definitely want to hang out with them more often. Ike has got to be my fave girl because she's so out there and touchy feely and open. There's always got to be one of them in the group right? XD And then Sho is the more mature calm one. And the other girls fall in between.
The yakiniku was amazing and bountiful! There was so much leftover in the end. I was able to take some home with me to cook up! yay free dinner! But after the girls and I finished eating we decided to go play with 3 of the four little kids that were there. the 3 kids had two boys and the youngest was the little girl. The boys were the most lively and mischievous. We played tag, hide and go seek, and searched for giant cockroaches which was horrifying for me. lol The kids were so small and so cute! They were between 3-5 years old. I melted immediately when they grabbed my hand to play with them. And I played with them like I was a little kid. That energy that I had when I was in Tomo Modern is still goin as I was the only one left standing of all the other girls. haha. Woo! The kids caught on that i like to play and would constantly try to pull me to play with them. Heheh. >D And then they would shake their butts which was the CUTEST thing in the world!!!!!! At the end of it all, when we were about to go home the little boys ran over to me and said what car am I taking. I told them i'm going home in Satomi's red car and they pulled me down to their eye level and said "Do you know what would be better? Coming into grandpa's car to come with us to grandpa's house!" and smiled and hugged me. I MELTED COMPLETELY!!!!!!! WAAAAAA!!!! >>>>.<<<<<<<
I definitely would've loved to go with them and play with them some more, but honestly I was dead tired from all the festivities that day and then running around with the kids...I just couldn't do anymore. So I told them that I couldn't today but would definitely do so next time. I picked them up and threw them up and down for a little bit for the last time before their parents scolded them for tiring me out. heh. And when I said bye to one of the boys he just came over to hug me and I picked him up and hugged him tightly before leaving. The parents found out that I would be working at the nursery tomorrow with the kids so all of them said yoroshiku onegaishimasu to me before leaving.
After that I just helped Satomi and Eda clean up stuff and went back home happy and full with my bag of raw meat to cook for tonight. Yes, more HYD Korean version! Otsukare-sama for reading! Pictures are posted!
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Woo dancing!
Aug. 21 Friday evening
So, here is my continuation of what happened this evening. The enkai for the middle school was held on the second floor of Yamamoto-tei and it was just us teachers and the principal and vice. Oh, btw, the principal has the most free time out of all the staff members there. Seriously, I think he just sits in his office and watches TV or mows the lawn...he doesn't really do anything. He's like a sweet old man figurehead. The vice is who does everything and is called the head teacher as well. He is the most busiest and actually is in charge of everything that goes on. So when I got there, it was perfect timing that I arrived when Masutani-san arrived being dropped off from her car. Masutani-san is the music teacher. Her son, Kenshin, is in my preschool that i teach at and is absolutely adorable and mischievous. lol He got out of the car to say goodbye to his mom and saw me and ran behind his mother...lol I think he remembers me as the lady creepily smiling at him when I visited the school. =P I can't help but just stare and smile at little kiddies, they make me happy. ^O^ His mother tried to tell him to say goodbye to me too, but he just kept hiding behind her and peering out to look at me and shyly smile. lol I just kept smiling at him and said bye. Finally as I was about to enter the door, I heard a little "bye bye" from Kenshin. I was soo happy. Little thingies make me happy like that. lol
So at the enkai I sat in the middle (the seat of honor) across from one of the younger guy teachers. My JTE (Japanese teacher of English) sat at the other end of the table. The atmosphere was still very chill and relaxing. Different from the other enkais. Iwata-san sat next to me to the right. She's so beautiful and cute. My new idol. lol Sakurai-san also sat across from me. He enjoyed being able to see a row of women sitting in front of him. He likes women to say the least. That's why he's super friendly with me. haha. I like the man. He's sweet and cute. And doesn't cross the line, which is important. AND! He's the one who did the Darth Vader shrub. I need to get a picture of that. heheh. Everyone was super chill and we talked alot about stuff. In fact this enkai was my best one yet because I talked so much in Japanese with all the other teachers cuz they were so super friendly! I just couldn't help it. I love the junior high teachers as well as the students!
After eating we played a game of Jeapordy, Kenbuchi style. The questions were on Kenbuchi, Hokkaido, famous people, sports, and the ALT (which is me) lol. The ALT questions were actually pretty hard if they didn't directly ask me. That morning one of the teachers interviewed me becuase he said it was for some kind of quiz. Now i know it was for the game. It was stuff like "what was the first impression she had when she came to Kenbuchi? or What foods was she surprised to eat?" ...yes, I actually forgot some of the answers to them myself. lol Anyways, it was loads of fun and I enjoyed it very much! That night was awesome.
Aug. 22 Saturday
Woooo! Bonodori day! In the morning I did absolutley nothing and just slept in till late. I was soo tired the night before and having a day off is wonderful. Well, I had to go buy food from the local conbini because my gas stove wouldn't work for some reason. And at the conbini as I was heading out after buying stuff, I saw a student in her PE track suit uniform. I wasn't exactly sure if she was my student, but upon passing her she noticed me and said a quick "konnichiwa". I was a little surprised but I said the same thing back. It's nice to be greeted by your students. On my way back it was pouring rain. And I had a bike....Yes....I got wet. >.< But it was part of the fun experience. When it stopped raining and I went to walk around outside, I saw a couple of kids playing around, but I wasn't sure if they were my students so I just stared at them. lol But they looked up and saw me and was like "ah! It's Theresa-sensei!" And then the other kids would look over and see me and say the same thing or "honto da". And that's when I know that they are my students and would say hi back and wave. I need to just assume that all the kids in this town are my kids...which they are except for maybe half of the babies cuz I only teach at one nursery.
At 4pm I went over to Satomi's apt. to try on her yukata that she let me borrow. It was a navy colored yukata with sunflowers all over it. It was cute! Her grandma actually made it! So I was very honored to be able to wear it. ^_^ She's so nice. And her apt. was super plush. It's not that much bigger than mine, but she made it awesome looking. That's how I want my apt. to be like to. To feel homely and happy. Anyways, it took us a good 45 min to put on my yukata. lol We kept loosening it and then tightening it and then having problems with how to tie the obi (the bow are). But afterwards I went back to my apt. and watched some Korean Hana yori Dango to wait for Satomi to be finished with whatever she was doing and come over and get me so that we could walk over to the Obon odori place together. I'm stuck on the korean HYD right now. Although, the boys aren't as hot, the happy feeling's still there.
At 6pm Satomi in her cute little yukata came to get me. We ended up driving over there because it would take to long to walk in our yukatas. lol Upon arriving there I saw my taiko group and Tanaka-san. The man is so cool. If I had a husband like that, I would be so proud. =P I'm sure his wife and kid are. His son by the way said he's very happy that I still remember his name when I was teaching his class. I waved to Tanaka-san and then kept on walking over to the gym to meet up with the 5 exchange girls. On my way over there I heard alot of "Ah! Theresa-sensei!" from the kids. lol I felt popular. XD Some of the kids would also come over to me and say hi. I loved it. The kids here are so friendly. Well, mainly the junior high and elementary kids. The high schoolers were a little bit more distant and I really couldn't recognize them outside of their uniforms. They usually look pretty different.
The exchange girls looked sooo cute in their yukatas and we all gathered round to take pictures. They're like my new best friends in this town. I wish they could stay longer, we would've really hit it off mainly because we all speak mandarin and cantonese. And we had a giant fan that said in Japanese 'international exchange students team' and had pokemon all over it...lol I don't know why our symbol was the pokemon. But okay. I felt like I was back with my friends in the US where we were all touchy feely and super nakayoku. I do miss it. Being super friendly with people like that. I miss it quite a lot. I love hugging and grabbing each other and being silly and playing with each other like I did with the girls because they were like that as well. I really missed the overfriendliness feel. lol I couldn't help it and immersed myself into their group. I was treated like part of them as well. So I really appreciated it. Anyways we took lotsa pictures and whatnot. And then we headed over to join the main festival.
To describe this festival: it's basically a dance for the dead competition. Obon is to honor those who have passed away, and this dance is supposed to do that. However, the one in Kenbuchi is a special case as it is a competition between the neighboring cities and whoever wishes to join in from this town. So people from Shibetsu and Wassamu were there too. Everyone had little costumes of their own. It was so cute! I saw old people dressed up as bees, middle aged people as sheeps, and a group of Korean people dressed in historical Korean clothing. There were alot more groups all creatively dressed. It was like Halloween basically! So cool! I need to get the pictures from the town hall peoples. I couldn't take pictures because I was dancing. haha. My group was just a bunch of girls and some guys in yukatas. And as I was dancing I heard a lot of people go "Ah! Theresa-sensei da! Theresa-sensei!" Basically, all my kids were there. It was a good chance to meet more of them. Or all of them. They were also all in little teams and were dressed up in various costumes. SOOOO CUTE!! And I felt popular because everyone was calling my name and saying hi to me. The kids would also then call their parents over to introduce me...lol So I think I know the whole town now. I drew attention from alot of people because everyone was telling everyone about me...lol
My 2nd year Junior high girls are the best. They came over to say hi to me and when they saw me dancing I heard alot of them say "kawaii". lol But since we were dancing in large cirlces with many rings such as the inner, middle, and outer rings, i would constantly be dancing besides my students. That gave me the chance to say hi to them and look like a normal person since I was dancing and being silly. I guess that made the students feel more comfortable with talking to me. The dance went on for 2 hours. And we really danced for two hours!! My hands were so numb from clapping so many times and my feet were ready to collapse under me. But it finally ended and i decided to go with Satomi to get crepes. Along with her was a boy named Fuuga. Cute 1st year high school boy. And he was very willing to speak in English with me. I can tell he will be a cool guy when he gets older. Speaking of that, alot of my Elementary boys definitely look like they will grow up to be pretty hot and cool-like. Too bad there's not that many of them now in high school. The elementary boys already look like they would be pretty awesome except for the fact that they're still little kids. =P I'm not a predator I swear. lol I just think they're adorable.
As we were waiting in the long-ass line for crepes alot of the elementary students would come over to me and say hi and talk to me. I was extremely happy! The girls had no reservations with coming to talk to me. But I think it's because we're the same gender. lol If I was a boy, the boys would be much more outgoing with me than the girls I believe. But it's been a while since they've had a girl ALT so I think the female students were excited. lol I'm glad. The little girls were so genki and everything and some took pictures with me and introduced me to their parents. heh. And then the little boys would hustle each other about who should say hi to me. lol I think they were nervous. But one group of little boys standing behind me in line shoved the cutest one in front of them to say hi to me. XD lol It was kind of funny seeing that. He was pushed out in front and then said "Theresa-sensei" really loudly. Haha. And then the boys were like "you did it!" LOL I thought that was so cute! I smiled, said hi, and waved enthusiastically. And then I asked for each one's names. I mainly said this all in Japanese because I don't think they understand my English. Only the junior high kids can. Even the high school kids' english isn't as great as junior high. But we will work on that. You know, trying to remember about 300 or so kids' names, plus the teachers, plus the town hall faculty is really difficult! I'll try my best, but I'm pretty sure I'll have to ask the kids again. Ganbarimasu!
After the festival ended there were fireworks! That was cool! And after the fireworks ended I ran over the my new favorite group of junior high school girls to say bye. They were so happy to talk to me! And i was curious with what they were eating. The girls asked if I wanted to try some and held up the food with chopsticks in front of my mouth. So I just bit it off directly from them. I was so happy to share that moment with them. New bonding time! ^_^ heheh. It was pretty good. It's called imo-dango. No, the dango isn't emo or anything like that. It just means that it is a potato ball that was grilled with sauce on it. I made them laugh a little and then ran off to join Satomi to go to the nomikai (drinking party) for all of the exchange students and the rest of our group. Oh! Btw, we won 5th place! 20,000yen! Not bad! ^o^
Again we were on the second floor of Yamamoto-tei and again more alcohol...I swear, all I do here is drink. But this time I refrained from drinking beer and just had Calpis-sour and a peach cocktail of sorts. ANd it was hot pot to eat for tonight. Yummy and filling, but eating in a yukata was kinda uncomfortable and hot. I had a jolly good time talking with the girls. We were talking about love lives, what kind of guys we like, and stupid funny things all in Chinese. So on the occasions I would turn to Satomi to explain to her what we were talking about otherwise I felt a little bad that they were being left out. The girls were so loud and boisterous because of the alcohol. I controlled myself pretty well I think because even though it was an enkai and wierd behaviour is allowed, I still think that people will judge me if I act stupid since I'm the teacher. So I kept myself pretty level headed but had fun talking with the girls at the same time. I was so ecstatic to do so.
At 10 everything finished and the girls decided to go down for nijikai to sing karaoke and have fun. I was too tired and wanted to change out of my yukata so Satomi and I left first. Besides, I have more festival stuffs I have to do the next day so I'm heading off to sleep even though it's almost 2am right now. I have 7 hours before I need to wake up. So I will end my post here for tonight.
Otsukare-sama for reading! I will I will I will have pictures posted by the end of this week. Love ya!
So, here is my continuation of what happened this evening. The enkai for the middle school was held on the second floor of Yamamoto-tei and it was just us teachers and the principal and vice. Oh, btw, the principal has the most free time out of all the staff members there. Seriously, I think he just sits in his office and watches TV or mows the lawn...he doesn't really do anything. He's like a sweet old man figurehead. The vice is who does everything and is called the head teacher as well. He is the most busiest and actually is in charge of everything that goes on. So when I got there, it was perfect timing that I arrived when Masutani-san arrived being dropped off from her car. Masutani-san is the music teacher. Her son, Kenshin, is in my preschool that i teach at and is absolutely adorable and mischievous. lol He got out of the car to say goodbye to his mom and saw me and ran behind his mother...lol I think he remembers me as the lady creepily smiling at him when I visited the school. =P I can't help but just stare and smile at little kiddies, they make me happy. ^O^ His mother tried to tell him to say goodbye to me too, but he just kept hiding behind her and peering out to look at me and shyly smile. lol I just kept smiling at him and said bye. Finally as I was about to enter the door, I heard a little "bye bye" from Kenshin. I was soo happy. Little thingies make me happy like that. lol
So at the enkai I sat in the middle (the seat of honor) across from one of the younger guy teachers. My JTE (Japanese teacher of English) sat at the other end of the table. The atmosphere was still very chill and relaxing. Different from the other enkais. Iwata-san sat next to me to the right. She's so beautiful and cute. My new idol. lol Sakurai-san also sat across from me. He enjoyed being able to see a row of women sitting in front of him. He likes women to say the least. That's why he's super friendly with me. haha. I like the man. He's sweet and cute. And doesn't cross the line, which is important. AND! He's the one who did the Darth Vader shrub. I need to get a picture of that. heheh. Everyone was super chill and we talked alot about stuff. In fact this enkai was my best one yet because I talked so much in Japanese with all the other teachers cuz they were so super friendly! I just couldn't help it. I love the junior high teachers as well as the students!
After eating we played a game of Jeapordy, Kenbuchi style. The questions were on Kenbuchi, Hokkaido, famous people, sports, and the ALT (which is me) lol. The ALT questions were actually pretty hard if they didn't directly ask me. That morning one of the teachers interviewed me becuase he said it was for some kind of quiz. Now i know it was for the game. It was stuff like "what was the first impression she had when she came to Kenbuchi? or What foods was she surprised to eat?" ...yes, I actually forgot some of the answers to them myself. lol Anyways, it was loads of fun and I enjoyed it very much! That night was awesome.
Aug. 22 Saturday
Woooo! Bonodori day! In the morning I did absolutley nothing and just slept in till late. I was soo tired the night before and having a day off is wonderful. Well, I had to go buy food from the local conbini because my gas stove wouldn't work for some reason. And at the conbini as I was heading out after buying stuff, I saw a student in her PE track suit uniform. I wasn't exactly sure if she was my student, but upon passing her she noticed me and said a quick "konnichiwa". I was a little surprised but I said the same thing back. It's nice to be greeted by your students. On my way back it was pouring rain. And I had a bike....Yes....I got wet. >.< But it was part of the fun experience. When it stopped raining and I went to walk around outside, I saw a couple of kids playing around, but I wasn't sure if they were my students so I just stared at them. lol But they looked up and saw me and was like "ah! It's Theresa-sensei!" And then the other kids would look over and see me and say the same thing or "honto da". And that's when I know that they are my students and would say hi back and wave. I need to just assume that all the kids in this town are my kids...which they are except for maybe half of the babies cuz I only teach at one nursery.
At 4pm I went over to Satomi's apt. to try on her yukata that she let me borrow. It was a navy colored yukata with sunflowers all over it. It was cute! Her grandma actually made it! So I was very honored to be able to wear it. ^_^ She's so nice. And her apt. was super plush. It's not that much bigger than mine, but she made it awesome looking. That's how I want my apt. to be like to. To feel homely and happy. Anyways, it took us a good 45 min to put on my yukata. lol We kept loosening it and then tightening it and then having problems with how to tie the obi (the bow are). But afterwards I went back to my apt. and watched some Korean Hana yori Dango to wait for Satomi to be finished with whatever she was doing and come over and get me so that we could walk over to the Obon odori place together. I'm stuck on the korean HYD right now. Although, the boys aren't as hot, the happy feeling's still there.
At 6pm Satomi in her cute little yukata came to get me. We ended up driving over there because it would take to long to walk in our yukatas. lol Upon arriving there I saw my taiko group and Tanaka-san. The man is so cool. If I had a husband like that, I would be so proud. =P I'm sure his wife and kid are. His son by the way said he's very happy that I still remember his name when I was teaching his class. I waved to Tanaka-san and then kept on walking over to the gym to meet up with the 5 exchange girls. On my way over there I heard alot of "Ah! Theresa-sensei!" from the kids. lol I felt popular. XD Some of the kids would also come over to me and say hi. I loved it. The kids here are so friendly. Well, mainly the junior high and elementary kids. The high schoolers were a little bit more distant and I really couldn't recognize them outside of their uniforms. They usually look pretty different.
The exchange girls looked sooo cute in their yukatas and we all gathered round to take pictures. They're like my new best friends in this town. I wish they could stay longer, we would've really hit it off mainly because we all speak mandarin and cantonese. And we had a giant fan that said in Japanese 'international exchange students team' and had pokemon all over it...lol I don't know why our symbol was the pokemon. But okay. I felt like I was back with my friends in the US where we were all touchy feely and super nakayoku. I do miss it. Being super friendly with people like that. I miss it quite a lot. I love hugging and grabbing each other and being silly and playing with each other like I did with the girls because they were like that as well. I really missed the overfriendliness feel. lol I couldn't help it and immersed myself into their group. I was treated like part of them as well. So I really appreciated it. Anyways we took lotsa pictures and whatnot. And then we headed over to join the main festival.
To describe this festival: it's basically a dance for the dead competition. Obon is to honor those who have passed away, and this dance is supposed to do that. However, the one in Kenbuchi is a special case as it is a competition between the neighboring cities and whoever wishes to join in from this town. So people from Shibetsu and Wassamu were there too. Everyone had little costumes of their own. It was so cute! I saw old people dressed up as bees, middle aged people as sheeps, and a group of Korean people dressed in historical Korean clothing. There were alot more groups all creatively dressed. It was like Halloween basically! So cool! I need to get the pictures from the town hall peoples. I couldn't take pictures because I was dancing. haha. My group was just a bunch of girls and some guys in yukatas. And as I was dancing I heard a lot of people go "Ah! Theresa-sensei da! Theresa-sensei!" Basically, all my kids were there. It was a good chance to meet more of them. Or all of them. They were also all in little teams and were dressed up in various costumes. SOOOO CUTE!! And I felt popular because everyone was calling my name and saying hi to me. The kids would also then call their parents over to introduce me...lol So I think I know the whole town now. I drew attention from alot of people because everyone was telling everyone about me...lol
My 2nd year Junior high girls are the best. They came over to say hi to me and when they saw me dancing I heard alot of them say "kawaii". lol But since we were dancing in large cirlces with many rings such as the inner, middle, and outer rings, i would constantly be dancing besides my students. That gave me the chance to say hi to them and look like a normal person since I was dancing and being silly. I guess that made the students feel more comfortable with talking to me. The dance went on for 2 hours. And we really danced for two hours!! My hands were so numb from clapping so many times and my feet were ready to collapse under me. But it finally ended and i decided to go with Satomi to get crepes. Along with her was a boy named Fuuga. Cute 1st year high school boy. And he was very willing to speak in English with me. I can tell he will be a cool guy when he gets older. Speaking of that, alot of my Elementary boys definitely look like they will grow up to be pretty hot and cool-like. Too bad there's not that many of them now in high school. The elementary boys already look like they would be pretty awesome except for the fact that they're still little kids. =P I'm not a predator I swear. lol I just think they're adorable.
As we were waiting in the long-ass line for crepes alot of the elementary students would come over to me and say hi and talk to me. I was extremely happy! The girls had no reservations with coming to talk to me. But I think it's because we're the same gender. lol If I was a boy, the boys would be much more outgoing with me than the girls I believe. But it's been a while since they've had a girl ALT so I think the female students were excited. lol I'm glad. The little girls were so genki and everything and some took pictures with me and introduced me to their parents. heh. And then the little boys would hustle each other about who should say hi to me. lol I think they were nervous. But one group of little boys standing behind me in line shoved the cutest one in front of them to say hi to me. XD lol It was kind of funny seeing that. He was pushed out in front and then said "Theresa-sensei" really loudly. Haha. And then the boys were like "you did it!" LOL I thought that was so cute! I smiled, said hi, and waved enthusiastically. And then I asked for each one's names. I mainly said this all in Japanese because I don't think they understand my English. Only the junior high kids can. Even the high school kids' english isn't as great as junior high. But we will work on that. You know, trying to remember about 300 or so kids' names, plus the teachers, plus the town hall faculty is really difficult! I'll try my best, but I'm pretty sure I'll have to ask the kids again. Ganbarimasu!
After the festival ended there were fireworks! That was cool! And after the fireworks ended I ran over the my new favorite group of junior high school girls to say bye. They were so happy to talk to me! And i was curious with what they were eating. The girls asked if I wanted to try some and held up the food with chopsticks in front of my mouth. So I just bit it off directly from them. I was so happy to share that moment with them. New bonding time! ^_^ heheh. It was pretty good. It's called imo-dango. No, the dango isn't emo or anything like that. It just means that it is a potato ball that was grilled with sauce on it. I made them laugh a little and then ran off to join Satomi to go to the nomikai (drinking party) for all of the exchange students and the rest of our group. Oh! Btw, we won 5th place! 20,000yen! Not bad! ^o^
Again we were on the second floor of Yamamoto-tei and again more alcohol...I swear, all I do here is drink. But this time I refrained from drinking beer and just had Calpis-sour and a peach cocktail of sorts. ANd it was hot pot to eat for tonight. Yummy and filling, but eating in a yukata was kinda uncomfortable and hot. I had a jolly good time talking with the girls. We were talking about love lives, what kind of guys we like, and stupid funny things all in Chinese. So on the occasions I would turn to Satomi to explain to her what we were talking about otherwise I felt a little bad that they were being left out. The girls were so loud and boisterous because of the alcohol. I controlled myself pretty well I think because even though it was an enkai and wierd behaviour is allowed, I still think that people will judge me if I act stupid since I'm the teacher. So I kept myself pretty level headed but had fun talking with the girls at the same time. I was so ecstatic to do so.
At 10 everything finished and the girls decided to go down for nijikai to sing karaoke and have fun. I was too tired and wanted to change out of my yukata so Satomi and I left first. Besides, I have more festival stuffs I have to do the next day so I'm heading off to sleep even though it's almost 2am right now. I have 7 hours before I need to wake up. So I will end my post here for tonight.
Otsukare-sama for reading! I will I will I will have pictures posted by the end of this week. Love ya!
Thursday, August 20, 2009
First day of teaching
Aug. 20 Thursday
Hey! So today was the first day of teaching. It was basically a lot of self intro speeches. Today was first to the high school with the handsome teacher. He is so sweet and kind and tried to make me feel better about teaching and stuff cuz I guess I looked really nervous, which I was btw. I did 2 self intros: one for the 3rd grade (12th grade) ENglish class which only had 13 students and one for the 1st grade (10th grade) English class which had 33 students. The 3rd grade one had only 13 because the other kids were in agriculture class. This is an agriculture school after all. I saw the 2nd grade class. Their boys were cuter. =P But the third grade boys had 2 that I absolutely loved because they were so open and happy to speak English with me. I like that. The other kids I will have to do my best with when they don`t speak that much to me. Ganbarimasu! It`s alright, hopefully they will warm up to me. Everyone was still a little weary of me, but I was also super tired from the orientations and couldn`t really be as genki as I normally am. Which I kind of regret. But it`s okay, I`ll make it up the next couple of days. The second 1st grade class was about the same. I did my self intro with pictures and stuff and then kids did their own self intro and then we played pictionary. It took up the whole 45 minutes. Oh, and the teachers in the high school were pretty good. It was a little quiet in the beginning, but I would go up to each teacher, introduce myself, and try to remember their names. So, hopefully, they liked that and warmed up to me a little bit. But yes, the handsome teacher tried to make me feel better about each class.
However, it did astonish me at the lack of attention the students seem to give to the teachers. And their actions were something I totally wasn`t expecting, but at the same time I did. The people at JET did warn us about stuff like this happening, but I didn`t know how exactly did these things work. The students would just get up and walk to one side of the room to talk with another student while the teacher was still talking. No reservations! I was surprised. I knew that students would also talk in class while the teacher`s talking, but not to this degree. It was a little astonishing. I felt a little uncomfortable like that, but since all the classes at the high school were kinda like that, I just gave up and gave in to it. That just seems to be normal and the teachers are okay with it too...o.o
Afterwards I headed over to the elementary school for lunch. I had lunch in the teacher`s room with a couple of the other teachers. It was excellent. I had vegetable soup with small pieces of bacon in it, wakame salad with corn, a link of sausage, and a piece of something that seems like french bread. It was very healthy and the right portion. Actually I thought it more than I would`ve liked, but i didn`t want to seem rude and not eat it all. So after eating the head teacher told me that I would be doing a sudden self intro speech in front of all the students of the school in the gymnasium. I was like "WHA!??" I was totally not prepared and they sprung it on me last minute. So all the kids gathered in the gym and waited in their little lines all neatly and quiet. Very well, disciplined students. So the vice principal introduced me to everyone in the school and then had me go up on the stage and say hi to everybody. So I did a self intro speech to about 100 or so elementary students. It was nervewracking. I gave the speech in English first, but then in Japanese because no one would understand me. I`m pretty sure I messed up several times too...lol
Anyways, after that the class representatives would come up and present a mini speech to me in Japanese or English. It was very cute. Afterwards, I just went back to the teachers`s room and just sat in there. The other teachers left me to go have a teacher`s meeting in another meeting room, so it was just me and the secretary/OL left in the room. Not to say the least, but I managed to befriend the secretary so that she gives me extra foods and drinks and stuff now. I talked to her quite a lot. She was super nice and easy to talk to. Then the two female teachers that I would be working with, one for 3rd grade and one for 4th grade, walked in and we decided to talk about what I wanted to teach. At first they were both very reserved, but after I chatted with them a little about their daily lives they loosened up a bit. They said I can teach whatever I wish to teach to their kids, so if I`ve thought up of something this weekend I will report to them next week. At around 3pm the man from the Asahikawa pan-ya-san came along selling bread. They were soooo oishii looking I just had to buy one. I bought mini loaves of bread. They were literally mini sized. Like a giant loaf, but made smaller. So I sat there and didn`t talk very much because there was very little to talk about with the other teachers and it was a little awkward for a little while. At around 4 I was able to go back home, and so I did. And it started raining like crazy outiside! Even though, I still rode my bike to Aoi to eat dinner. Yay miso ramen. I must sleep, I`m dead tired.
AUg. 21 Friday/today
Today I was super genki! Genki beyond belief. I`m stationed at the junior high all day today. But it`s fine. Junior high is actually my favorite place to be. The atmosphere is just so much more relaxed and happy like. Everyone`s just so much more outgoing and fun here. Even the principal and the head teachers are really awesome. I also had to do a self intro thing in a large ceremony here. Although there aren`t as many kids as in the elementary so it wasn`t as bad. Maybe because I was super lively that all the kids caught on to my liveliness. lol The kids here are so much more open! ^^ All the teachers here are so much cooler too. Awesomeness.
So my first class was with the 2nd year kids which my taiko instructor`s son is in. My new favorite class. Everyone`s so willing to participate and talk to me and be happy and fun. I loved it! I did my self intro with pictures once again and listened to everyone`s self intro of themselves. THey asked me random questions too. lol After class as I was getting stuff off the chalkboard that I pinned pictures on, the female students came up to me and started talking to me and looking at more pictures of my house. I was soooo happy! I was actually quite ecstatic that they came up to talk to me. Like i said, maybe it was because I was pretty enthusiasitc that my energy fed off to them. Everyone was pretty cool. I talked to them and asked for their names. Such great kids. ANd I swear, their English is a hell of alot better than the high school kids. Seriously. They were good. And not to mention that the Japanese English teacher was also very enthusiastic about teaching. He was soo awesome! I want to be more like him when I`m teaching. Perfect role model.
My next class was with the 3rd graders, less enthusiastic, but we will work on that. Actually, before that I met the 5 other exchange students from Taiwan, CHina, and Hong Kong who will be here for this week. 5 beautiful ladies who are all graduate school students in Japan so their Japanese is super fluent. We immediately bonded. It helped that I spoke their language as well. And they were all pretty close to me in age. Yay for that. They sat in on our ENglish class which was a little bit of a jama, because then it took up a little of our time in class. They`re awesome girls, but by being this way it was harder for me to bond talk more freely with the students. For lunch I ate with the 1st year kids and some of the exchange girls ate with the other grade levels. The first year kids didn`t really talk very much, but I tried my hardest with a mixture of Japanese and Englihs. They were very shy and didn`t really speak English so I had to use Japanese most of the time. Hopefully, the kids will all warm up to me soon and hopefully I wont be dead tired all the time like this week. This weekend is used for good sleeping time... Oh, btw, the lunch was delicious. It was pork curry, milk, and anin tofu. Soo healthy and good. The portion however, was still too much for me to eat. I think I`m becoming Japanese in terms of food portions. lol =P
Anyways, I`m still here in school on my laptop typing away and stuff and apparently there`s going to be an enkai tonight at 6:30 for me. This sprung up last minute. I was hoping to go to sleep and chill and do nothing tonight, but this is fine too. I do like spending time with the junior high teachers. They`re cool. Well, anyways, more info on that will come up tomorrow most likely. or later tonight.
Otsukare for reading! ^^
Hey! So today was the first day of teaching. It was basically a lot of self intro speeches. Today was first to the high school with the handsome teacher. He is so sweet and kind and tried to make me feel better about teaching and stuff cuz I guess I looked really nervous, which I was btw. I did 2 self intros: one for the 3rd grade (12th grade) ENglish class which only had 13 students and one for the 1st grade (10th grade) English class which had 33 students. The 3rd grade one had only 13 because the other kids were in agriculture class. This is an agriculture school after all. I saw the 2nd grade class. Their boys were cuter. =P But the third grade boys had 2 that I absolutely loved because they were so open and happy to speak English with me. I like that. The other kids I will have to do my best with when they don`t speak that much to me. Ganbarimasu! It`s alright, hopefully they will warm up to me. Everyone was still a little weary of me, but I was also super tired from the orientations and couldn`t really be as genki as I normally am. Which I kind of regret. But it`s okay, I`ll make it up the next couple of days. The second 1st grade class was about the same. I did my self intro with pictures and stuff and then kids did their own self intro and then we played pictionary. It took up the whole 45 minutes. Oh, and the teachers in the high school were pretty good. It was a little quiet in the beginning, but I would go up to each teacher, introduce myself, and try to remember their names. So, hopefully, they liked that and warmed up to me a little bit. But yes, the handsome teacher tried to make me feel better about each class.
However, it did astonish me at the lack of attention the students seem to give to the teachers. And their actions were something I totally wasn`t expecting, but at the same time I did. The people at JET did warn us about stuff like this happening, but I didn`t know how exactly did these things work. The students would just get up and walk to one side of the room to talk with another student while the teacher was still talking. No reservations! I was surprised. I knew that students would also talk in class while the teacher`s talking, but not to this degree. It was a little astonishing. I felt a little uncomfortable like that, but since all the classes at the high school were kinda like that, I just gave up and gave in to it. That just seems to be normal and the teachers are okay with it too...o.o
Afterwards I headed over to the elementary school for lunch. I had lunch in the teacher`s room with a couple of the other teachers. It was excellent. I had vegetable soup with small pieces of bacon in it, wakame salad with corn, a link of sausage, and a piece of something that seems like french bread. It was very healthy and the right portion. Actually I thought it more than I would`ve liked, but i didn`t want to seem rude and not eat it all. So after eating the head teacher told me that I would be doing a sudden self intro speech in front of all the students of the school in the gymnasium. I was like "WHA!??" I was totally not prepared and they sprung it on me last minute. So all the kids gathered in the gym and waited in their little lines all neatly and quiet. Very well, disciplined students. So the vice principal introduced me to everyone in the school and then had me go up on the stage and say hi to everybody. So I did a self intro speech to about 100 or so elementary students. It was nervewracking. I gave the speech in English first, but then in Japanese because no one would understand me. I`m pretty sure I messed up several times too...lol
Anyways, after that the class representatives would come up and present a mini speech to me in Japanese or English. It was very cute. Afterwards, I just went back to the teachers`s room and just sat in there. The other teachers left me to go have a teacher`s meeting in another meeting room, so it was just me and the secretary/OL left in the room. Not to say the least, but I managed to befriend the secretary so that she gives me extra foods and drinks and stuff now. I talked to her quite a lot. She was super nice and easy to talk to. Then the two female teachers that I would be working with, one for 3rd grade and one for 4th grade, walked in and we decided to talk about what I wanted to teach. At first they were both very reserved, but after I chatted with them a little about their daily lives they loosened up a bit. They said I can teach whatever I wish to teach to their kids, so if I`ve thought up of something this weekend I will report to them next week. At around 3pm the man from the Asahikawa pan-ya-san came along selling bread. They were soooo oishii looking I just had to buy one. I bought mini loaves of bread. They were literally mini sized. Like a giant loaf, but made smaller. So I sat there and didn`t talk very much because there was very little to talk about with the other teachers and it was a little awkward for a little while. At around 4 I was able to go back home, and so I did. And it started raining like crazy outiside! Even though, I still rode my bike to Aoi to eat dinner. Yay miso ramen. I must sleep, I`m dead tired.
AUg. 21 Friday/today
Today I was super genki! Genki beyond belief. I`m stationed at the junior high all day today. But it`s fine. Junior high is actually my favorite place to be. The atmosphere is just so much more relaxed and happy like. Everyone`s just so much more outgoing and fun here. Even the principal and the head teachers are really awesome. I also had to do a self intro thing in a large ceremony here. Although there aren`t as many kids as in the elementary so it wasn`t as bad. Maybe because I was super lively that all the kids caught on to my liveliness. lol The kids here are so much more open! ^^ All the teachers here are so much cooler too. Awesomeness.
So my first class was with the 2nd year kids which my taiko instructor`s son is in. My new favorite class. Everyone`s so willing to participate and talk to me and be happy and fun. I loved it! I did my self intro with pictures once again and listened to everyone`s self intro of themselves. THey asked me random questions too. lol After class as I was getting stuff off the chalkboard that I pinned pictures on, the female students came up to me and started talking to me and looking at more pictures of my house. I was soooo happy! I was actually quite ecstatic that they came up to talk to me. Like i said, maybe it was because I was pretty enthusiasitc that my energy fed off to them. Everyone was pretty cool. I talked to them and asked for their names. Such great kids. ANd I swear, their English is a hell of alot better than the high school kids. Seriously. They were good. And not to mention that the Japanese English teacher was also very enthusiastic about teaching. He was soo awesome! I want to be more like him when I`m teaching. Perfect role model.
My next class was with the 3rd graders, less enthusiastic, but we will work on that. Actually, before that I met the 5 other exchange students from Taiwan, CHina, and Hong Kong who will be here for this week. 5 beautiful ladies who are all graduate school students in Japan so their Japanese is super fluent. We immediately bonded. It helped that I spoke their language as well. And they were all pretty close to me in age. Yay for that. They sat in on our ENglish class which was a little bit of a jama, because then it took up a little of our time in class. They`re awesome girls, but by being this way it was harder for me to bond talk more freely with the students. For lunch I ate with the 1st year kids and some of the exchange girls ate with the other grade levels. The first year kids didn`t really talk very much, but I tried my hardest with a mixture of Japanese and Englihs. They were very shy and didn`t really speak English so I had to use Japanese most of the time. Hopefully, the kids will all warm up to me soon and hopefully I wont be dead tired all the time like this week. This weekend is used for good sleeping time... Oh, btw, the lunch was delicious. It was pork curry, milk, and anin tofu. Soo healthy and good. The portion however, was still too much for me to eat. I think I`m becoming Japanese in terms of food portions. lol =P
Anyways, I`m still here in school on my laptop typing away and stuff and apparently there`s going to be an enkai tonight at 6:30 for me. This sprung up last minute. I was hoping to go to sleep and chill and do nothing tonight, but this is fine too. I do like spending time with the junior high teachers. They`re cool. Well, anyways, more info on that will come up tomorrow most likely. or later tonight.
Otsukare for reading! ^^
More Sapporo!
Aug.17 Monday
First day of orientations. We met up with Miki right when we got to the building where the orientation was held! Yay Miki! The building's pretty cool looking. It's called Akarenga and it's this giant brick building that looked super old and like those old school buildings. It's actually the former Hokkaido Gov't building. Now it's a place for tourists to come visit and for JET to hold their orientation. So we got a couple of tourists that would wonder into the JET orientation area and peek in ignoring the signs that say don't enter. Well, who could resist seeing all these foreigners in one room. lol I admit it was an interesting site to see: 100 or so well dressed business style foreigners in one huge room or just milling around together. We looked like tourists except we knew what we were doing of sorts...lol Oh, there were a shit load of tourists from Taiwan and Hong Kong in Sapporo while we were there. I guess it's tourist season for the Asian countries. Anyways there was no AC in the room, but luckily the building has some sort of way of keeping cool. And plus all of us were in "cool biz" meaning no ties or extra jackets or anything. Super casual American style business wear.
So the first day was the basics: intro on the orientation, info about HAJET, and first few months of Hokkaido life and regional meetings. And there was a lot of cell phone number exchanges. =P Anyways being able to see everyone on that first day was awesome. In the evening there was a huge enkai held for everyone. It was held at the super famous Sapporo Beer Garden which was this huge 3 story building that served only Genghis Khan and alcohol. It was 食べ飲み放題. It was quite a lot of food, but so much fun. We were on the 3rd floor I believe and it was like a balcony area. The middle is totally open so that it opens up to the 1st floor. Basically the balcony lined the circular room and in the center you could look all the way down to the 1st floor. It made the place seem huge. Anyways, leave it to us foreigners that whenever some group was cheering downstairs we would also start cheering for them. The entire 3rd floor of foreign teachers cheering and yelling loudly to support the Japanese groups of peple downstairs. I don't think that it's normal for Japanese people to do that. So all the other people on the 1st floor would constantly stare at us or they would try to get us to do it again. lol We were all pretty much filled with alcohol, so it didn't matter. lol Oh, and I got pictures with the semi-cute looking waiters. Thanks to Collin. He knew I thought they were cute so he would ask them to take pictures with me. lol I felt so embarrased and ready to pass out standing next to one of the really cute waiters. I don't know why, but all the waiters who work in beer garden are pretty cute looking. I definitely liked looking at them. XD
Afterwards, Collin, Miki, and I walked around the area and found the Obon festival going on in the middle of Odori Koen. We decided to join in on the Bonodori or Obon dancing. We got into the dance, and then all of a sudden the music sped up and ended...lol We decided to get in to the dance earlier the next day it was held.
Oh, btw, the mascot of Hokkaido is this thing called marimokkori まりもっこり. Basically it's a ball of algae that they made into looking like a man with a boner. =P Marimo means the ball of algae that's super famous here in Hokkaido's Lake Akan, and mokkori means an erection. So it's a play on words or a pun. So yes, a ball of algae man with an erection. I love Hokkaido. They even have a girl version too. Although I'm not exactly sure if it means the same thing. lol Oh and there's also the pun deriving from the work Hokkaido which is Oppaido. Oppai means breasts, and so there are little keychains in the shape of Hokkaido with boobs sticking out of the middle. Ah...XD This island is funny. Look "Marimokkori" up on google or something. You'll see what I mean about that. And also look up mameshiba. My new favorite character! >.< It's so cute yet strange at the same time. But then again Japan's known for that. They're beans with dog ears and a face on them and say the weirdest random trivia info while someone's trying to eat. WATCH THE CM's! They're hilarious!
Aug. 18 Tuesday
Second day! So today was the beginning of our language session. I was in the intermediate class because I wanted to learn more about Hokkaido-ben and surprisingly there were alot of different words they use here! I didn't know that. For example: instead of ごみを捨てる、it'sごみをなげる、かわいい＝めんこい、つかれた＝こわい、こわい＝おっかない。And people here end their sentences with -べ. Yeah there are a lot more words that are different and sentence endings and stuff, but all in all, it's not too different from hyojungo.
For lunch today we went to eat some really awesome tasting ramen. The miso ramen was sooo good. And only about 600yen. Then back to more orientations. I went to one called women's issues in Hokkaido. =P It was an interesting one. And one where women spoke very freely about stuff. lol I quite like these times, cuz it's pretty funny.
In the evening we went to the bonodori earlier this time so that we could dance in it this time. The dance is fairly easy it's 6 steps that repeat over and over again in a large circle. We just learned it from all the ojii-chans and obaa-chans that were dancing in kimonos around us. We stayed from 8pm until 9:30. Yeah a loooong time. During the entire time, the music doesn't stop: the singers keep changing, the taiko players keep switching as well as the flute players so that no one gets tired out. I sat next to this one old lady who was super friendly and would constantly talk to me about how her family's in the taiko group performing and how great Sapporo is and ask me questions about who we were. It was a very fun experience and allowed me to become even more confident in myself in front of alot of people. Cuz this was a dance that circulates in front of a lot of people. Anyone can just join in if they walk in the circle. It was so much fun that night! I enjoyed it quite a lot.
Aug. 19 Wednesday
The last day in Sapporo. >.< Sad day, last day with everybody. Today we did a scavenger hunt with our language groups which was super fun and exciting because it was funny to see so many of us business foreigners in little groups walking around Sapporo in search of random stuffs. Oh, and we found this huge ass post office! It was seriously humongous! 6 stories! I'll post a picture of it soon. It was the largest post office I've ever seen in my life! And we also found the foreigners market where they sold foreign food from all over the world. Ah, good to know where I can find decent peanut butter.
There was a festival at the Akarenga today so we decided to eat there for lunch. I bought a Croquette and an order of Moai which is a hunking peace of chilean sparerib sold by these guys who were from Chile. Of all places, Chilean food in Hokkaido. It was soooooo delicious and filling. After lunch we got on buses to go to the Hokkaido Historical museum. It took us exactly half an hour to get there and we only had half an hour to look through the museum. So it was a power tour. Afterwards we went to the historical village of Hokkaido. The place was pretty cool. It had all four aspects of Hokkaido life: mountain village, fishing village, farming village, and the towns. It basically had buildings that were constructed to look like the old original ones located throughout Hokkaido and the place was made to be as realistic as possible. For example, the mountain village was really in placed in a mountain like setting, the farming village came complete with farmlands and stuff, and the fishing village had a mock sea/pond. That was cool. Miki and I trekked through the mountain area and totally thought we were lost because there was no one else around us and it was very quiet. It was super foresty and everything and wet and misty like. So we freaked a little bit. haha. But we got back safely. And we bought soft cream! No resistance! lol
That night as we headed back it was Stephanie's birthday so Collin, Miki, and I took her out with us to eat huge things of tonkatsu before Miki and her left on their buses back home. I stayed until 8pm with Collin shopping for stuff and omiyage and then left for my train back home too. The Super kamui train was super nice! I felt so comfy sitting in there. I didn't want to get off. I just wanted to stay there and sleep on it all night. But alas, I arrived back home. Thankfully, my apt. is still clean and happy and not swarmed with bugs or anything. =P It's all good.
Otsukare for reading again! Pics will be posted soon with those cute guys I mentioned from the Beer Garden. ^_^
First day of orientations. We met up with Miki right when we got to the building where the orientation was held! Yay Miki! The building's pretty cool looking. It's called Akarenga and it's this giant brick building that looked super old and like those old school buildings. It's actually the former Hokkaido Gov't building. Now it's a place for tourists to come visit and for JET to hold their orientation. So we got a couple of tourists that would wonder into the JET orientation area and peek in ignoring the signs that say don't enter. Well, who could resist seeing all these foreigners in one room. lol I admit it was an interesting site to see: 100 or so well dressed business style foreigners in one huge room or just milling around together. We looked like tourists except we knew what we were doing of sorts...lol Oh, there were a shit load of tourists from Taiwan and Hong Kong in Sapporo while we were there. I guess it's tourist season for the Asian countries. Anyways there was no AC in the room, but luckily the building has some sort of way of keeping cool. And plus all of us were in "cool biz" meaning no ties or extra jackets or anything. Super casual American style business wear.
So the first day was the basics: intro on the orientation, info about HAJET, and first few months of Hokkaido life and regional meetings. And there was a lot of cell phone number exchanges. =P Anyways being able to see everyone on that first day was awesome. In the evening there was a huge enkai held for everyone. It was held at the super famous Sapporo Beer Garden which was this huge 3 story building that served only Genghis Khan and alcohol. It was 食べ飲み放題. It was quite a lot of food, but so much fun. We were on the 3rd floor I believe and it was like a balcony area. The middle is totally open so that it opens up to the 1st floor. Basically the balcony lined the circular room and in the center you could look all the way down to the 1st floor. It made the place seem huge. Anyways, leave it to us foreigners that whenever some group was cheering downstairs we would also start cheering for them. The entire 3rd floor of foreign teachers cheering and yelling loudly to support the Japanese groups of peple downstairs. I don't think that it's normal for Japanese people to do that. So all the other people on the 1st floor would constantly stare at us or they would try to get us to do it again. lol We were all pretty much filled with alcohol, so it didn't matter. lol Oh, and I got pictures with the semi-cute looking waiters. Thanks to Collin. He knew I thought they were cute so he would ask them to take pictures with me. lol I felt so embarrased and ready to pass out standing next to one of the really cute waiters. I don't know why, but all the waiters who work in beer garden are pretty cute looking. I definitely liked looking at them. XD
Afterwards, Collin, Miki, and I walked around the area and found the Obon festival going on in the middle of Odori Koen. We decided to join in on the Bonodori or Obon dancing. We got into the dance, and then all of a sudden the music sped up and ended...lol We decided to get in to the dance earlier the next day it was held.
Oh, btw, the mascot of Hokkaido is this thing called marimokkori まりもっこり. Basically it's a ball of algae that they made into looking like a man with a boner. =P Marimo means the ball of algae that's super famous here in Hokkaido's Lake Akan, and mokkori means an erection. So it's a play on words or a pun. So yes, a ball of algae man with an erection. I love Hokkaido. They even have a girl version too. Although I'm not exactly sure if it means the same thing. lol Oh and there's also the pun deriving from the work Hokkaido which is Oppaido. Oppai means breasts, and so there are little keychains in the shape of Hokkaido with boobs sticking out of the middle. Ah...XD This island is funny. Look "Marimokkori" up on google or something. You'll see what I mean about that. And also look up mameshiba. My new favorite character! >.< It's so cute yet strange at the same time. But then again Japan's known for that. They're beans with dog ears and a face on them and say the weirdest random trivia info while someone's trying to eat. WATCH THE CM's! They're hilarious!
Aug. 18 Tuesday
Second day! So today was the beginning of our language session. I was in the intermediate class because I wanted to learn more about Hokkaido-ben and surprisingly there were alot of different words they use here! I didn't know that. For example: instead of ごみを捨てる、it'sごみをなげる、かわいい＝めんこい、つかれた＝こわい、こわい＝おっかない。And people here end their sentences with -べ. Yeah there are a lot more words that are different and sentence endings and stuff, but all in all, it's not too different from hyojungo.
For lunch today we went to eat some really awesome tasting ramen. The miso ramen was sooo good. And only about 600yen. Then back to more orientations. I went to one called women's issues in Hokkaido. =P It was an interesting one. And one where women spoke very freely about stuff. lol I quite like these times, cuz it's pretty funny.
In the evening we went to the bonodori earlier this time so that we could dance in it this time. The dance is fairly easy it's 6 steps that repeat over and over again in a large circle. We just learned it from all the ojii-chans and obaa-chans that were dancing in kimonos around us. We stayed from 8pm until 9:30. Yeah a loooong time. During the entire time, the music doesn't stop: the singers keep changing, the taiko players keep switching as well as the flute players so that no one gets tired out. I sat next to this one old lady who was super friendly and would constantly talk to me about how her family's in the taiko group performing and how great Sapporo is and ask me questions about who we were. It was a very fun experience and allowed me to become even more confident in myself in front of alot of people. Cuz this was a dance that circulates in front of a lot of people. Anyone can just join in if they walk in the circle. It was so much fun that night! I enjoyed it quite a lot.
Aug. 19 Wednesday
The last day in Sapporo. >.< Sad day, last day with everybody. Today we did a scavenger hunt with our language groups which was super fun and exciting because it was funny to see so many of us business foreigners in little groups walking around Sapporo in search of random stuffs. Oh, and we found this huge ass post office! It was seriously humongous! 6 stories! I'll post a picture of it soon. It was the largest post office I've ever seen in my life! And we also found the foreigners market where they sold foreign food from all over the world. Ah, good to know where I can find decent peanut butter.
There was a festival at the Akarenga today so we decided to eat there for lunch. I bought a Croquette and an order of Moai which is a hunking peace of chilean sparerib sold by these guys who were from Chile. Of all places, Chilean food in Hokkaido. It was soooooo delicious and filling. After lunch we got on buses to go to the Hokkaido Historical museum. It took us exactly half an hour to get there and we only had half an hour to look through the museum. So it was a power tour. Afterwards we went to the historical village of Hokkaido. The place was pretty cool. It had all four aspects of Hokkaido life: mountain village, fishing village, farming village, and the towns. It basically had buildings that were constructed to look like the old original ones located throughout Hokkaido and the place was made to be as realistic as possible. For example, the mountain village was really in placed in a mountain like setting, the farming village came complete with farmlands and stuff, and the fishing village had a mock sea/pond. That was cool. Miki and I trekked through the mountain area and totally thought we were lost because there was no one else around us and it was very quiet. It was super foresty and everything and wet and misty like. So we freaked a little bit. haha. But we got back safely. And we bought soft cream! No resistance! lol
That night as we headed back it was Stephanie's birthday so Collin, Miki, and I took her out with us to eat huge things of tonkatsu before Miki and her left on their buses back home. I stayed until 8pm with Collin shopping for stuff and omiyage and then left for my train back home too. The Super kamui train was super nice! I felt so comfy sitting in there. I didn't want to get off. I just wanted to stay there and sleep on it all night. But alas, I arrived back home. Thankfully, my apt. is still clean and happy and not swarmed with bugs or anything. =P It's all good.
Otsukare for reading again! Pics will be posted soon with those cute guys I mentioned from the Beer Garden. ^_^
Monday, August 17, 2009
Sapporo!! We have arrived.
Aug. 16 Sunday
So today was the day I headed off to Sapporo. I got on the 9:20 train to get to Asahikawa at 10:15am. I ended up chatting with an old grandpa who had lost an arm at the train station as we waited for the train to come. He also helped kill the bee that was bothering me and wouldn't leave me alone. Such a nice old man.
I arrived at Asahikawa and decided to go to the coffee shop/cafe next to the station to sit and wait for Collin to arrive as we were going to go down to Sapporo together. And after 2-3 weeks of not seeing him, I was very glad when he showed up. Yay! We bought round-trip reserved seat tickets on the Limited Express Super Kamui from Asahikawa to Sapporo and back. It cost each of us $60. On the train, Collin and I whipped out our DS's and played Mario Party the entire time. hehe. Occasionally, I would look up to look out the windows to see greenness which slowly turned into cityscapes as we neared Sapporo. It's interesting to see so much more city life than what I've become used to. It tooks us 1 1/2 hours to get there. When we got to Sapporo I was just amazed!!! It's such a beautiful city! It's got the business and largeness and urbanization of Tokyo without being a sprawling metropolis. It's serene in some way even though there's so many people about and buildings and cars and technology, but there's something about this city that just makes me feel wonderful to be here. I think I might oddly enough prefer Sapporo to Kyoto after being here. It's such a wonderful seeming place! I don't know why, I just feel something here. The buildings are so beautiful and romantic unlike Tokyo's gaudy technology plastered buildings. I have to say, I already love Sapporo.
So anyways, we walked over to the Keio Plaza Hotel (which is like a super posh 5-star hotel for business people) to check in. I don't know how JET always seems to get these crazy expensive hotels for us for cheap rates, but maybe because we're gov't sponsored that we get to be in such nice places. Actually, I didn't have any reservations for tonight. I'm only staying in the rooms for two nights from the 17-19th. But I didn't want to come to Sapporo on the 5am train to get here by 9am on the 17th to make it on time for the registration/check in for the orientation. Because if I were to stay in the hotel, the money would be out of my own pocket instead of the money that the BOE gave me which was about 34,700yen to spend on the room and foods. The room costs about $60 a night and it's AMAZING!! I was originally thinking to save money I would just bite the dust and take the early morning train on the 17th. But Collin was sooo awesome and said that I could just stay with him in his room for the night of the 16th so that I wouldn't have to pay! YAY COLLIN!!! Seriously, much appreciated! I'm in his debt for that.
So this room is seriously amazing for one person. It's a little small but has everything a traveling businessperson would ever need and has the best in technology and everything!! IT"S AMAZINGLY CRAZY!! The TV is high tech and the bed is beautiful and apparently the guys' rooms all come with a massage chair whereas the womens' rooms come with a desk that has a secret mirror compartment for putting on makeup or hiding jewelry, stuff like that. It's kinda neat and each room is decorated differntly. The guys' rooms apparently are more plain looking whereas the girls' rooms are more artfully decorated and the bed is much more plush looking with extra accessory pillows just to look good. Heh, they know how to cater. But I would've liked the massage chair as well. That would've been nice. However, it does look tacky being in the room compared to the more artsy chair that's in its stead in my room.lol Oh Japan. Gender differences. =P The bathroom is also crazy nice with cool technology and an opaque window that seperated the bath from the bedroom. It may seem like people outside of the bathroom could see inside to the shower, but it actually doesn't show very much at all. It's just a nice addition for ambiance I suppose. Although I was a little iffy about the window at first, but it's fine.
So we put our stuff down and decided to go out to find a ramen-ya-san cuz we were starving. We walked around towards the botanical gardens area where there is like nothing because we walked down the wrong way. But we didn't know that so just kept walking. We passed a recycle shop that sold cheap-ass awesome things! Though i don't think I can haul that stuff back with me to Kenbuchi. I wish we had something like that. That would be nice. We finally found a small little broken down ramen-ya-san which was run by an old crazy lady who immigrated here from China when she was a kid. She talked about weird things and how she hated the Hokkaido Ham Fighters and was Osaka all the way....lol The miso ramen was sooo good! But so much noodles! I was ready to burst.
Afterwards, we decided to walk around the city and see some places. We ended up going to all the nearby dept. stores and playing games at the NAMCO arcade. We played Pachinko for a little bit and then spotted this wierd machine that was called Love Jungle: The jungle of spice. o.o that looked like the Jurassic Park game where you sit down and shoot the screens and stuff. It's like a game that measures your compatability with each other by how much things you kill...lol Then we played Taiko no Tatsujin and then wandered over to the Pokemon Center. We then played some of the crazy crane games and got some Haagen Daz ice cream from it! Well, Collin got it, but we shared! ^_^ Yay! It was cookies and cream! It's been so long since I've had that flavor. hehe.
We soon got hungry and decided to go get some food. We walked over to an outdoor food place that was temporarily set up for the summmer in front of the Sapporo Station. It was 3 types of meat: Lamb, Pork, and Beef Shabu Shabu 食べ放題/all you can eat! SOOO GOOD! SOOO MUCH FOOD! I was in love with this place, but it will only be open until the 21st. As we sat and ate Collin noticed these two girls who were sitting behind me kept looking over at us. We theorized that either they were checking out Collin or they were lesbian and checking out me. He thinks it's most likely the latter one. haha. That would be funny if it was. =P We decided to then walk some more to walk off the food we ate. And then finally came back to the hotel, whereupon we played more games on the DS before going to sleep. It was soo much fun today! I love this place and the way this week is starting off. I couldn't wait to see everyone the next day.
So I'll write more concerning today's events, which is the day that I'm writing yesterday's occurrences more tomorrow. I'm tired out today and I have to wake up early tomorrow for more orientations. 12am now. Good night!
So today was the day I headed off to Sapporo. I got on the 9:20 train to get to Asahikawa at 10:15am. I ended up chatting with an old grandpa who had lost an arm at the train station as we waited for the train to come. He also helped kill the bee that was bothering me and wouldn't leave me alone. Such a nice old man.
I arrived at Asahikawa and decided to go to the coffee shop/cafe next to the station to sit and wait for Collin to arrive as we were going to go down to Sapporo together. And after 2-3 weeks of not seeing him, I was very glad when he showed up. Yay! We bought round-trip reserved seat tickets on the Limited Express Super Kamui from Asahikawa to Sapporo and back. It cost each of us $60. On the train, Collin and I whipped out our DS's and played Mario Party the entire time. hehe. Occasionally, I would look up to look out the windows to see greenness which slowly turned into cityscapes as we neared Sapporo. It's interesting to see so much more city life than what I've become used to. It tooks us 1 1/2 hours to get there. When we got to Sapporo I was just amazed!!! It's such a beautiful city! It's got the business and largeness and urbanization of Tokyo without being a sprawling metropolis. It's serene in some way even though there's so many people about and buildings and cars and technology, but there's something about this city that just makes me feel wonderful to be here. I think I might oddly enough prefer Sapporo to Kyoto after being here. It's such a wonderful seeming place! I don't know why, I just feel something here. The buildings are so beautiful and romantic unlike Tokyo's gaudy technology plastered buildings. I have to say, I already love Sapporo.
So anyways, we walked over to the Keio Plaza Hotel (which is like a super posh 5-star hotel for business people) to check in. I don't know how JET always seems to get these crazy expensive hotels for us for cheap rates, but maybe because we're gov't sponsored that we get to be in such nice places. Actually, I didn't have any reservations for tonight. I'm only staying in the rooms for two nights from the 17-19th. But I didn't want to come to Sapporo on the 5am train to get here by 9am on the 17th to make it on time for the registration/check in for the orientation. Because if I were to stay in the hotel, the money would be out of my own pocket instead of the money that the BOE gave me which was about 34,700yen to spend on the room and foods. The room costs about $60 a night and it's AMAZING!! I was originally thinking to save money I would just bite the dust and take the early morning train on the 17th. But Collin was sooo awesome and said that I could just stay with him in his room for the night of the 16th so that I wouldn't have to pay! YAY COLLIN!!! Seriously, much appreciated! I'm in his debt for that.
So this room is seriously amazing for one person. It's a little small but has everything a traveling businessperson would ever need and has the best in technology and everything!! IT"S AMAZINGLY CRAZY!! The TV is high tech and the bed is beautiful and apparently the guys' rooms all come with a massage chair whereas the womens' rooms come with a desk that has a secret mirror compartment for putting on makeup or hiding jewelry, stuff like that. It's kinda neat and each room is decorated differntly. The guys' rooms apparently are more plain looking whereas the girls' rooms are more artfully decorated and the bed is much more plush looking with extra accessory pillows just to look good. Heh, they know how to cater. But I would've liked the massage chair as well. That would've been nice. However, it does look tacky being in the room compared to the more artsy chair that's in its stead in my room.lol Oh Japan. Gender differences. =P The bathroom is also crazy nice with cool technology and an opaque window that seperated the bath from the bedroom. It may seem like people outside of the bathroom could see inside to the shower, but it actually doesn't show very much at all. It's just a nice addition for ambiance I suppose. Although I was a little iffy about the window at first, but it's fine.
So we put our stuff down and decided to go out to find a ramen-ya-san cuz we were starving. We walked around towards the botanical gardens area where there is like nothing because we walked down the wrong way. But we didn't know that so just kept walking. We passed a recycle shop that sold cheap-ass awesome things! Though i don't think I can haul that stuff back with me to Kenbuchi. I wish we had something like that. That would be nice. We finally found a small little broken down ramen-ya-san which was run by an old crazy lady who immigrated here from China when she was a kid. She talked about weird things and how she hated the Hokkaido Ham Fighters and was Osaka all the way....lol The miso ramen was sooo good! But so much noodles! I was ready to burst.
Afterwards, we decided to walk around the city and see some places. We ended up going to all the nearby dept. stores and playing games at the NAMCO arcade. We played Pachinko for a little bit and then spotted this wierd machine that was called Love Jungle: The jungle of spice. o.o that looked like the Jurassic Park game where you sit down and shoot the screens and stuff. It's like a game that measures your compatability with each other by how much things you kill...lol Then we played Taiko no Tatsujin and then wandered over to the Pokemon Center. We then played some of the crazy crane games and got some Haagen Daz ice cream from it! Well, Collin got it, but we shared! ^_^ Yay! It was cookies and cream! It's been so long since I've had that flavor. hehe.
We soon got hungry and decided to go get some food. We walked over to an outdoor food place that was temporarily set up for the summmer in front of the Sapporo Station. It was 3 types of meat: Lamb, Pork, and Beef Shabu Shabu 食べ放題/all you can eat! SOOO GOOD! SOOO MUCH FOOD! I was in love with this place, but it will only be open until the 21st. As we sat and ate Collin noticed these two girls who were sitting behind me kept looking over at us. We theorized that either they were checking out Collin or they were lesbian and checking out me. He thinks it's most likely the latter one. haha. That would be funny if it was. =P We decided to then walk some more to walk off the food we ate. And then finally came back to the hotel, whereupon we played more games on the DS before going to sleep. It was soo much fun today! I love this place and the way this week is starting off. I couldn't wait to see everyone the next day.
So I'll write more concerning today's events, which is the day that I'm writing yesterday's occurrences more tomorrow. I'm tired out today and I have to wake up early tomorrow for more orientations. 12am now. Good night!
Saturday, August 15, 2009
All in a day's work. =P AND! I have a cell phone!!
Aug. 14 Friday
So today, Su and I snuck out of work to go play in Shibetsu city. +P I love this woman. We snuck out on the pretext of me going to tell the car dealers what number I want to put on my license plate, which was true by the way. We did that after we came back from Shibetsu. lol So yes, she was like "don't tell anyone" lol. She wanted to be able to just kick back and relax on a day of work one of these days and she said today will be it. lol So me needing to do errands for my car was the perfect excuse for her. We also went to a little festival the michi no eki was having. haha. Secretly sneaking out of work and going to a festival and the next city is pretty awesome. I actually needed to get some more household items that I couldn't get in Kenbuchi. So Su decided to take the company car out. Again, driving was hilarious and dangerous at the same time. She didn't know how to turn on the AC either. I had to help her out several times while she was driving and I haven't even started driving Japanese style yet. I seriously love my supervisor.
Anyways, after 2 hours we returned back to the BOE...lol no one questioned us. Su said if anyone asks it was because I needed to do some extra things and no one would assume anything because I'm the foreigner. LOL At 12 i went home like usual. However, I heard that the player dude came looking for me at around 4pm...Su told me she just said that I had gone home and wondered why he was looking for me and assumed the worst. lol great. Almost done with Goong.
Aug. 15th Saturday
Well, today is ohaka mairi day. So everyone returned back to their respective homes to visit their loved ones' graves. But I had to go get my cell phone today. So Su decided that we should go to Asahikawa since I wanted a soft bank phone. She called up Watanabe-san who is one of the younger people who work in the town hall. He's so sweet and nice. AND! He drives a sexy sportscar as well. What's up with all these guys and having sweet cars! I'm a sucker for hot cars as much as I do not wish to admit it... Seriously, the other day I went to work on my crappy little wonderful bike and saw some Fast and the Furious style cars in the parking lot. Apparently, they're all owned by the young guys who work there and all the girls have cute round box shaped cars. I really want to know the owners of those cars. They were hot. It's weird seeing those kinds of things here in this little town. I'm shocked and pleasantly surprised as this town reveals itself to me little by little.
Anyways, Watanabe-san also looks much cooler in his normal clothes compared to work clothes. I like seeing people in work clothes and then changing into their normal clothes. So much cooler. OLs, however, just look good all the time. lol
So he drove us all the way to Asahikawa and since Su had to go do ohaka mairi Watanabe-san decided to accompany me to go buy a cell phone. Woo! Awesome dude. We first went to DoCoMo to look at the phones, then AU, then Softbank....in the end, I ended up with DoCoMo...Yes, I cracked and bought a $400-something phone...But it's got everything I could possibly need. And it's the newest model and it's one of the cheaper ones. Well...as cheap as a cool white flip phone that comes with a TV, 8.0megapixel camera with flash, gps, internet, and mp3 player can be. XD I quite like it. I actually was thinking about getting the $500 one because it was so much cuter and had these crazy light illuminations on it. But it was one of the more expensive ones and the camera wasn't as good. It just had extra pretty things, like the ligthing and background. I decided to choose cheap and functional over expensive and cute. Mine's still pretty cool looking though. The screen's pretty big too. It took him and I 2 hours to figure everything out and the plan and stuff. Yappari, Softbank plans are cheaper, but their new phones aren't as cool. DoCoMo still has the best looking ones. AU was almost out of all the phones I liked there, which was one....so that was out of the question. In the end I pay about $50-$60 a month up to 2 years and that money includes everything: the plan, the cell phone, internet, mail, insurance. Not too bad. I could've bought a cheaper one, but I was thinking I will be here for 2 years at least so minus well get a phone that I really like. And it works in the states too! ^_^ I'm so thankful to Watanabe-san for helping me. If I did this alone I would not know any of those terms.....
Afterwards we went our separate ways as he needed to go home and I was going to wait until Su was done at 2 to meet her. So I basically just walked around the dept. stores and ate at Lotteria for lunch. Mmm little bacon cheeseburger and a little round fried potato. Not the healthiest, but eating it in Japan still makes it feel healthier than in the states. And the portion was perfect for how small it looked. At 2 I met up with Su, saw a bunch of somewhat hot scraggly guys with camping/traveling/hiking gear or large-ass backpacks walking over towards the station, dumping their stuff on a nearby wall and then walking away.And it had been raining and they didn't have umbrellas. So they were soaked. I didn't think too much about them as they didn't look too well. lol
Su and I took a bus to the Aeon/Jusco mall... I'm not exactly sure how to describe it, but i guess a mall would be the closest thing to it. It was ginormous!! My gawd, I have never been in one of these and didn't expect it to be so huge! It had everything! And it was cheap! I know I'm coming here to buy alot of my stuff in the future. Geez, it was seriously amazing. Like a mall, except cleaner and more high class looking. HUGE! My new favorite hangout. And for some reason whenever I talk to Su and whenever I start my sentences with "Actually," she gasps and goes "eh!?" And I laugh and say, "why do you keep doing that everytime I say 'actually'?" She replied "It's because I start thinking of disasterous or weird situations that'll happen around you or have happened around you whenever you start your sentences that way." I just couldn't stop laughing after that and said "Am I such a crazy person that you immediately always jump to weird conclusions when I say 'actually...'?" She just said "I can't help but think that way." She's awesome. >D
At around 5pm at the train station we met back up with Watanabe-san and Satomi who I actually randomly met this morning on the streets as I was walking around...lol small world. And we decided to go eat at a place called Beer Garden! I mean, how awesome is that? BEER GARDEN!! Yes! lol I'm not so much a beer fan so I usually only drink one glass/mug/pint. But lately I've been really liking Japanese beer. It's not bad actually. But I still always just drink one and then order oolong cha after. But the place was on the roof and all the waiters and waitresses were dressed as baseball players from the famous Hokkaido Ham Fighters team. Don't ask me why they're called Ham Fighters...I'm still trying to figure that out myself. Anyways, it was a Genghis Khan place so guess what they have there? LAMB YAKINIKU!! Lamb yakiniku up the wazoo. All different kinds. I love it here! But I'm seriosly getting fat... The view from the roof was amazing as well! Just awesome! But the smell still sticks to your clothes. We sat and gossiped about the town hall people for awhile afterwards to wait out the time for the next train for me to go back home. And then Watanabe-san payed for more than half of the meal! I thought we were all paying seperately, but he payed 5000yen and told us to just 1100yen!! That's crazy! I was like you can't do this! I'll pay you my share! But he was like, no you're a guest here in Asahikawa and we live here, so you don't need to. I can't get over how nice people are here. And then when we went to Lotteria to buy shakes he paid for mine too! NOOOOOO!!!!! I feel bad when people do this for me! Grateful, but bad at the same time! Tooo nice!
Anyways, as we were eating and gossiping Satomi asked if we wanted to go eat ramen later. I was like "WHA!??" We just had lamb Yakinku!!!! Su and Watanabe-san were like 'that's not a bad idea!' I just couldn't understand how they could still eat!? I was stuffed like crazy and was ready to burst! Seriously, "WHAA!???" How do Japanese girls stay so skinny but eat like this? I can't fathom how this works? Fast metabolism? Bulimia? WHAT?! Anyways, as I was sitting near the window drinking my shake I noticed a bunch of hot guys dressed in cool clothes come from somewhere and realized that these were the same guys who had come to dump their hiking/camping gear at the station and who were wet and scraggly! I was like "Damn, they clean up well!" They did not really look the same except for those huge back packs. And it was a shit load of them too. Like I would say 15 people? A nice large group of good looking guys who did some hiking and changed from gruff wild man to hot refined gentleman. Nice.
So as we were talking we brought up more scandals and gossip within the town hall and, like I said, this town of Kenbuchi has more to offer than I ever thought it would. lol So many things going on within the little confines of my townhall. And yet again, I got more warnings from Satomi and Watanabe-san to be careful of the town player. He's seriously bad is what I keep hearing. I asked why is he so bad. Satomi said that all the girls in the town hall have been victims and explained to me all that he does and the processes that all of the girls had gone through. Su even got kissed by him which left a traumatic scar for her as she says...lol Satomi said that he will constantly come visit you and try to get your number and when he does, will send countless messages to you etc. He will also try to come over to your house. She told me that if he ever asks just tell him I don't have a cell phone yet. And to never be in an area where there's no one around because he'll take that chance. Hmm...I've already been kinda weary from him, but now I'll be super careful and paranoid when he's around. >.<
The three of them waited with me for 2 hours until my train came! They're soo great and amazing!! I had fun chatting with them about random crap and gossiping about life in Kenbuchi. Well, I mostly stayed quiet and just listened, only saying a few words in some things and gasping and laughing at others. Tonight was a good night. Now I have to pack up stuff for the Sapporo Orientation tomorrow through the 19th. So I might not have time to post anything up during those days, but I'll make mental notes of anything amazing that happens.
otsukare!
Oh, fyi, my cell number is: 090-2697-1987
My address in Japan in case anybody wants it is:
北海道上川郡剣淵町仲町4番２－1号
Nakamachi 4-2-1, Kenbuchi-cho, Kamigawagun, Hokkaido 098-0338.
So today, Su and I snuck out of work to go play in Shibetsu city. +P I love this woman. We snuck out on the pretext of me going to tell the car dealers what number I want to put on my license plate, which was true by the way. We did that after we came back from Shibetsu. lol So yes, she was like "don't tell anyone" lol. She wanted to be able to just kick back and relax on a day of work one of these days and she said today will be it. lol So me needing to do errands for my car was the perfect excuse for her. We also went to a little festival the michi no eki was having. haha. Secretly sneaking out of work and going to a festival and the next city is pretty awesome. I actually needed to get some more household items that I couldn't get in Kenbuchi. So Su decided to take the company car out. Again, driving was hilarious and dangerous at the same time. She didn't know how to turn on the AC either. I had to help her out several times while she was driving and I haven't even started driving Japanese style yet. I seriously love my supervisor.
Anyways, after 2 hours we returned back to the BOE...lol no one questioned us. Su said if anyone asks it was because I needed to do some extra things and no one would assume anything because I'm the foreigner. LOL At 12 i went home like usual. However, I heard that the player dude came looking for me at around 4pm...Su told me she just said that I had gone home and wondered why he was looking for me and assumed the worst. lol great. Almost done with Goong.
Aug. 15th Saturday
Well, today is ohaka mairi day. So everyone returned back to their respective homes to visit their loved ones' graves. But I had to go get my cell phone today. So Su decided that we should go to Asahikawa since I wanted a soft bank phone. She called up Watanabe-san who is one of the younger people who work in the town hall. He's so sweet and nice. AND! He drives a sexy sportscar as well. What's up with all these guys and having sweet cars! I'm a sucker for hot cars as much as I do not wish to admit it... Seriously, the other day I went to work on my crappy little wonderful bike and saw some Fast and the Furious style cars in the parking lot. Apparently, they're all owned by the young guys who work there and all the girls have cute round box shaped cars. I really want to know the owners of those cars. They were hot. It's weird seeing those kinds of things here in this little town. I'm shocked and pleasantly surprised as this town reveals itself to me little by little.
Anyways, Watanabe-san also looks much cooler in his normal clothes compared to work clothes. I like seeing people in work clothes and then changing into their normal clothes. So much cooler. OLs, however, just look good all the time. lol
So he drove us all the way to Asahikawa and since Su had to go do ohaka mairi Watanabe-san decided to accompany me to go buy a cell phone. Woo! Awesome dude. We first went to DoCoMo to look at the phones, then AU, then Softbank....in the end, I ended up with DoCoMo...Yes, I cracked and bought a $400-something phone...But it's got everything I could possibly need. And it's the newest model and it's one of the cheaper ones. Well...as cheap as a cool white flip phone that comes with a TV, 8.0megapixel camera with flash, gps, internet, and mp3 player can be. XD I quite like it. I actually was thinking about getting the $500 one because it was so much cuter and had these crazy light illuminations on it. But it was one of the more expensive ones and the camera wasn't as good. It just had extra pretty things, like the ligthing and background. I decided to choose cheap and functional over expensive and cute. Mine's still pretty cool looking though. The screen's pretty big too. It took him and I 2 hours to figure everything out and the plan and stuff. Yappari, Softbank plans are cheaper, but their new phones aren't as cool. DoCoMo still has the best looking ones. AU was almost out of all the phones I liked there, which was one....so that was out of the question. In the end I pay about $50-$60 a month up to 2 years and that money includes everything: the plan, the cell phone, internet, mail, insurance. Not too bad. I could've bought a cheaper one, but I was thinking I will be here for 2 years at least so minus well get a phone that I really like. And it works in the states too! ^_^ I'm so thankful to Watanabe-san for helping me. If I did this alone I would not know any of those terms.....
Afterwards we went our separate ways as he needed to go home and I was going to wait until Su was done at 2 to meet her. So I basically just walked around the dept. stores and ate at Lotteria for lunch. Mmm little bacon cheeseburger and a little round fried potato. Not the healthiest, but eating it in Japan still makes it feel healthier than in the states. And the portion was perfect for how small it looked. At 2 I met up with Su, saw a bunch of somewhat hot scraggly guys with camping/traveling/hiking gear or large-ass backpacks walking over towards the station, dumping their stuff on a nearby wall and then walking away.And it had been raining and they didn't have umbrellas. So they were soaked. I didn't think too much about them as they didn't look too well. lol
Su and I took a bus to the Aeon/Jusco mall... I'm not exactly sure how to describe it, but i guess a mall would be the closest thing to it. It was ginormous!! My gawd, I have never been in one of these and didn't expect it to be so huge! It had everything! And it was cheap! I know I'm coming here to buy alot of my stuff in the future. Geez, it was seriously amazing. Like a mall, except cleaner and more high class looking. HUGE! My new favorite hangout. And for some reason whenever I talk to Su and whenever I start my sentences with "Actually," she gasps and goes "eh!?" And I laugh and say, "why do you keep doing that everytime I say 'actually'?" She replied "It's because I start thinking of disasterous or weird situations that'll happen around you or have happened around you whenever you start your sentences that way." I just couldn't stop laughing after that and said "Am I such a crazy person that you immediately always jump to weird conclusions when I say 'actually...'?" She just said "I can't help but think that way." She's awesome. >D
At around 5pm at the train station we met back up with Watanabe-san and Satomi who I actually randomly met this morning on the streets as I was walking around...lol small world. And we decided to go eat at a place called Beer Garden! I mean, how awesome is that? BEER GARDEN!! Yes! lol I'm not so much a beer fan so I usually only drink one glass/mug/pint. But lately I've been really liking Japanese beer. It's not bad actually. But I still always just drink one and then order oolong cha after. But the place was on the roof and all the waiters and waitresses were dressed as baseball players from the famous Hokkaido Ham Fighters team. Don't ask me why they're called Ham Fighters...I'm still trying to figure that out myself. Anyways, it was a Genghis Khan place so guess what they have there? LAMB YAKINIKU!! Lamb yakiniku up the wazoo. All different kinds. I love it here! But I'm seriosly getting fat... The view from the roof was amazing as well! Just awesome! But the smell still sticks to your clothes. We sat and gossiped about the town hall people for awhile afterwards to wait out the time for the next train for me to go back home. And then Watanabe-san payed for more than half of the meal! I thought we were all paying seperately, but he payed 5000yen and told us to just 1100yen!! That's crazy! I was like you can't do this! I'll pay you my share! But he was like, no you're a guest here in Asahikawa and we live here, so you don't need to. I can't get over how nice people are here. And then when we went to Lotteria to buy shakes he paid for mine too! NOOOOOO!!!!! I feel bad when people do this for me! Grateful, but bad at the same time! Tooo nice!
Anyways, as we were eating and gossiping Satomi asked if we wanted to go eat ramen later. I was like "WHA!??" We just had lamb Yakinku!!!! Su and Watanabe-san were like 'that's not a bad idea!' I just couldn't understand how they could still eat!? I was stuffed like crazy and was ready to burst! Seriously, "WHAA!???" How do Japanese girls stay so skinny but eat like this? I can't fathom how this works? Fast metabolism? Bulimia? WHAT?! Anyways, as I was sitting near the window drinking my shake I noticed a bunch of hot guys dressed in cool clothes come from somewhere and realized that these were the same guys who had come to dump their hiking/camping gear at the station and who were wet and scraggly! I was like "Damn, they clean up well!" They did not really look the same except for those huge back packs. And it was a shit load of them too. Like I would say 15 people? A nice large group of good looking guys who did some hiking and changed from gruff wild man to hot refined gentleman. Nice.
So as we were talking we brought up more scandals and gossip within the town hall and, like I said, this town of Kenbuchi has more to offer than I ever thought it would. lol So many things going on within the little confines of my townhall. And yet again, I got more warnings from Satomi and Watanabe-san to be careful of the town player. He's seriously bad is what I keep hearing. I asked why is he so bad. Satomi said that all the girls in the town hall have been victims and explained to me all that he does and the processes that all of the girls had gone through. Su even got kissed by him which left a traumatic scar for her as she says...lol Satomi said that he will constantly come visit you and try to get your number and when he does, will send countless messages to you etc. He will also try to come over to your house. She told me that if he ever asks just tell him I don't have a cell phone yet. And to never be in an area where there's no one around because he'll take that chance. Hmm...I've already been kinda weary from him, but now I'll be super careful and paranoid when he's around. >.<
The three of them waited with me for 2 hours until my train came! They're soo great and amazing!! I had fun chatting with them about random crap and gossiping about life in Kenbuchi. Well, I mostly stayed quiet and just listened, only saying a few words in some things and gasping and laughing at others. Tonight was a good night. Now I have to pack up stuff for the Sapporo Orientation tomorrow through the 19th. So I might not have time to post anything up during those days, but I'll make mental notes of anything amazing that happens.
otsukare!
Oh, fyi, my cell number is: 090-2697-1987
My address in Japan in case anybody wants it is:
北海道上川郡剣淵町仲町4番２－1号
Nakamachi 4-2-1, Kenbuchi-cho, Kamigawagun, Hokkaido 098-0338.
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