Good Thing I Didn't Go To Hiroshima Today Earlier this month, I told Maruyama-san that I was going to go to Hiroshima city today to finally get my re-entry permit. I was surprised to find out that Tomomi wanted me for a class today! (Usually, there aren't any classes on Wednesday when 3rd years don't have the English elective.) In retrospect, it was probably good that I did not go today; it would have been crowded with people getting their re-entry permits before holiday travel. Because of the morning class, I managed to skip the nursery school entirely. I brought my own lunch, but did I need to? I'm kind of confused about how the lunch-divvying works. It seems like adding or subtracting a person or two would make little difference, though I was once told that I shouldn't eat at the Jr. High on Wednesdays because they haven't planned for me.

Giving People Money My hopes that the Fish and Beer Staff Trip was a freebie were dashed. Although I did not really expect so much for nothing, I wondered why I wasn't asked up front for the money. Maruyama-san told me, however, that I would get $100 back to the $240 I was putting in. They must have spent less than planned. I also, today, paid the same amount for the upcoming staff trip for the Junior High teachers. This is a lot more than I paid for the sumo trip, where I had my OWN hotel room, but who knows, maybe that fish cost a fortune. Well, I'm suddenly poor.

Side Whining I don't know why, but the principal has been irritating me lately. Nothing he's done, but I sense a forced-politeness, hiding-disdain thing, like he's putting up with me, which he is, of course, since the school doesn't really have a choice about putting up the foreigner. Still, isn't he used to it by now? I do adore all the other teachers, though, even the ones that don't talk to me as much. The only one that bothers me is at the elementary school and it is a very subtle thing, just a vibe like she really wishes she did not have to be the one to reign my crazy ideas in. It is not like they are particularly crazy ideas or anything, (and so far, they've seemed to work pretty well) but I don't think she wants to be responsible for me. I find if I ask for her opinion a lot, she is a bit nicer. Her smiles seem sometimes fake, but I can't say she's ever been outright rude to me before and only once has she ever actually stopped one of my ideas and, given my little experience on the matter, she might have been perfectly right in that case. Okay, done whining.

Jeopardy Nosohara-sensei and I continued to work on the Jeopardy class. We seem to have a different idea of what is "difficult" for students. I'll take her word on it any day. After all, it could be my old "but don't they WANT a challenge?" misthinking. Though I am spending a lot of time on stuff she's scrapping. She seems to have a very specific idea of what she wants but I can't quite figure it out exactly. Well, at least she is trying to make the class fun.

Sending Packages I sent off my Christmas packages, including my first ever Package Home. I am even more poor than I was before, but that sea-mail thing is just scary. Besides, I want them to arrive there before the end of the year. Should have done this earlier, but I'm impressed that I actually got it done before Christmas they way my schedule is going.

* * STUPID THING OF THE DAY * * I thought ahead about what to bring to my Final English Conversation Class of the Year party, deciding on Devilled Eggs because they were the easiest. So I bought eggs, mustard (found only one brand,) mayonnaise (much easier to find - the Japanese LOVE mayo,) and other assorted ingredients at the store. If stores carried salsa 9more than one brand, anyway) and corn chips, I might have brought guacamole, but I stuck to deviled eggs. ANYWAY, the point of all this is that I had to buy vinegar, too. They did not have plain old boring vinegar, I had to buy "white wine vinegar." I brought it home and realized I had the exact same thing on the shelf from my predecessor. I figured since I bought it fresh, though, I'd use it. (Does vinegar go bad? How would you tell? Not from the smell certainly...) But that wasn't what was stupid. I had a lot of trouble opening it and I was in kind of a hurry since I had to finish the eggs before class, which was less than half hour away. (I left myself more time to make them, but then I got involved in filling out a mailed JET survey after work. I tend to get kind of carried away in 'comments' fields.) After some fruitless twisting, it occurred to me that since it was 'wine vinegar' maybe I I had to use a corkscrew to open it! I was congratulating myself up until the point that the cork pierced the cap and it turned out to be just a twist off. Err, oops. I destroyed the cap in the process, so had to toss it after I used it anyway.

Really Cute Eikaiwa Party! I found out last minute that I actually had to do a lesson in addition to having a nice last-class-of-the-year party. Luckily, I had some more fractured sentences left and an article from a magazine I had made copies of way back when. I think, if nothing else, I at least gave the impression I was prepared. They tried a little too hard to translate the article word-for-word, but it brought up interesting topics along the way at least. (The article was about three teens who had done an remake of Indiana Jones over 8 summers; the title was "Indy-pendent Filmmakers") Cute post office worker guy showed up about halfway through, despite how busy they must be with New Years cards. Anyway, after the class, we had the party and I can't believe how much people brought! I brought the deviled eggs and some chocolate santas I ordered online, Odagawa-san brought really yummy fresh rice balls (in saran wrap with colorful twisty ties,) Maruyama-san brought a bunch of little triangle-shaped cucumber sandwiches that were at least as good if not better than their convenience store counterparts, Sajaki-san brought crackers and the other lady (she's a regular but I always forget her name) brought chocolate cookies from the store. The newlywed brought his honeymoon pics (and I felt so honored since it was in this very class that we found out he was getting married!) All in all, it was a sweet time (though I could not explain why deviled eggs were called that.) We had our tea and sandwiches, our rice and cookies, and it was worth a full dinner for me. The conversation was nice and light as all six of us sat around the table and I even got a couple small Christmas presents afterward, completely unexpectedly. This lovely night makes up for the fact that I'm having the busiest week ever (the other teachers have too much to do so they keep swapping their classes with English classes) and am in total charge of three full-length classes for my Christmas Lessons on Friday.

Staff Photo A photographer was at school today and all after lunch, was taking pictures of the different student groups and clubs. Finally, about ten minutes before classes started again, we gathered all the teachers together in front of the school. There was a funny moment when everyone wondered what to do with their shoes; our street shoes were at the other entrance and the photo was outside. Because walking all the way back to get our outdoor shoes just seemed silly (and because we were in kind of a hurry) we stepped out onto the front steps in our (gasp) indoor shoes and tried to find a place to stand or sit that was not in the front or the center. Eventually, the photographer lined up everyone since no one would dare claim a central spot except the principal and vice principal. I never know whether I'm supposed to be smiling or not in these kind of pictures. Although it seems like more and more Japanese are smiling in photos, I have been in photos where I'm the only one smiling. Well, I guess I'll find out when we get the yearbook.

That's What I'm Here For... Isn't It? Because of the staff picture, Tomomi-sensei and I were really late getting to class. I kept half wanting to say "I could go up there and do a warm-up or something" but he always seemed right on the verge of being ready. Besides, despite that I have read about warm-up activities a million times, my mind was drawing a blank. Still, if it seems like he can't get to class on time, that I should go up and do an activity until he can make it. That should be the rule. (As long as it's not the 9th graders...)   Editor's Note: As I was reminded later, I'm not actually allowed to be in the classroom by myself, since I myself am not a trained teacher. Even in the Elementary school, the elementary teacher is always present, even if they do not participate much. That at least makes me feel I am not skimping on duties or anything.

The Sakugi Yearbook Nosohara-sensei was kind enough to show me the Sakugi Junior High School Yearbook so I could see where the picture we had just taken would end up. Hardcover and with color pictures, it was a pretty nice yearbook, though I was surprised that the only people who had individual pictures were the 9th graders; I don't recall even seeing all the teachers shown. In my Jr High yearbooks, the layout was similar, but everyone got a picture, even if a piddly diddly black and white one. Though, with all the picture collages in the book, as well as the club pictures, I don't doubt everyone is in there at least once. I even saw a few pictures with my predecessor. I decided that I wanted this yearbook no matter what the cost. Unfortunately, the cost is upwards of 10,000 yen. Yikes. Nosohara explained the price was so high because so few people were at the school. Makes sense. I hope I can still get one!

Tomomi Whining, Believe it or Not I am irritated. I was kind of irritated earlier when Tomomi-sensei specifically asked me to make an activity, but then at the last minute told me we probably would not use it today. I would not have been irritated if he had actually DONE an activity in class instead of his same ol' same ol' routine; there did not appear to be a reason he did not do the game. But what he did today was much worse I thought. For elective classes, I am supposed to be given 15 minutes (actually, I'm supposed to get 20, but I've never gotten 20) to do a conversation activity. This is something I do for EVERY elective class, this is not something I do just when I'm asked, like for Tomomi's class. So I made a pronunciation game. Since that conference last month, I've been inspired to get more serious about pronunciation (The professor on stage said that most Japanese college students he had could not correctly pronounce "A, B, C" "1, 2, 3" or "Thank you very much." He blamed this mainly on Japanese teachers who never bothered to learn how to pronounce English right or don't bother teaching it.) Anyway, since it is the 3rd years, I put a little effort into making it interesting and challenging. I made a tongue chart (that I didn't think turned out too bad) so the students would see what I was talking about when I pronounced the 'L' & 'R', 'B' & 'V' and 'S' & 'TH' combinations. Anyway, Tomomi went overtime five minutes, which is forever in a classroom, which left me ten minutes to explain my game and go over pronunciation. I didn't panic. I mean, it was a relatively simple game. I handed out the sheets and slowly pronounced each letter so they could hear it. I then briefly explained the game until they understood. We had less than five minutes to play, which wasn't very long. I was about to tell them to stand up and do the game (which involved finding a partner who had to essentially guess which word they were saying - 'law' or 'raw' and so forth) when Tomomi says, "I think maybe this is too hard for them. You should pronounce every word first." I was like, um, there's no time to do that because you left me no time. I was not really planning to pronounce every word anyway - that's what the tongue chart was for. I assumed people were looking at it. But I started pronouncing anyway. Even as I got through the first couple, I knew it was silly. I wouldn't get through all the words before class was over the way I was pronouncing them, so I went about halfway up the list and said, "Well, since we're out of time, let's begin." They played for a little less than a minute - getting through the first two sets of words if I was lucky. Anyway, this made me really angry. Why did he think this game was so difficult? I mean it seemed like he was trying to teach them the passive voice in 15 minutes. Maybe pronouncing is harder than I'm giving it credit for, but personally, I think the students will learn better from trying to pronounce it themselves than hearing me pronounce it. Erg.

Taking SMAP Too Far My koto teacher is teaching me a VERY pretty song with little trills and strums and all sorts of beautiful elements. Every time I think I've learned all the different things I can do with a koto, I learn two more. I asked her if the students were also learning this song. She said no, they are doing "Sekai-ni Hitotsu Dake no Hana" by SMAP, apparently arranged for the koto. No! I can't get away from this song! It's EVERYWHERE! Okay, to be fair, I never wanted to play classical music at first when I played piano in Junior High, but I at least wanted a variety of pop music. I wonder what percentage of the population of Japan has this song stuck in their head at any given time.

Christmas in Triplicate Here's my lesson plan for the Christmas Class I was asked to do for the 7th, 8th, and 9th graders:

The Spirit Look how motivated I was today! I actually went outside of my warm house to put up Christmas lights! I wrapped them around my laundry/bike overhang (where there was also a convenient plug, too.) It looked pretty good! One thing is clear, though: two people would have made it easier. After that, I put up my little Christmas Tree and arranged the few presents I had for myself and other people around it. I was having too much fun. I also did lots of chatting online with my brother which was nice because I'm not going to be back home for the holidays.

Don't You Want Me To Be Teased? I Spent Far Longer Than I Should Have trying to find the Harry Potter 3 preview. Correction: I had no problem FINDING it, but my computer refused to play the streamed version correctly despite my decently fast connection. Finally, finally, I found a site that that let me download it solid and not streaming. I was surprised how many sites stopped carrying the preview and linked to the official site instead. It's not like this is illegal. In fact, Warner Brothers should WANT to spread the word and have as many people see the preview as humanly possible. Finding previews and teasers should be the easiest thing in the world - why did they make it hard?

Oops, Wrong Month I woke up this morning POSITIVE that this was the day that we were all meeting at the town hall at 8:30 am to have our picture taken. I had it written on my calendar and everything and was pleased that I remembered. I dressed in a nice outfit, including a suit jacket and drove over. I saw a few people around, but no one from the board of education. At about 8:35, five minutes after the supposed picture, I called Maruyama-san and asked her if today was the picture day. She seemed confused and said 'no, we haven't decided yet about that.' Er, oops. Not sure how I could have been so stupid, I drove back home, got out of the suit jacket (I can't move my arms and wear it at the same time) and looked at the calendar. The event I had been thinking of was Monday, JANUARY 5th. D'oh!

Oops, No One Bothered To Tell Me At the culture center today, it seemed like everyone who called was calling about me, asking what my plan was. I found out that some sort of ceremony was happening at the Junior High today, maybe a graduation party (since it was the last day of classes) at around 1:30. I decided to be good and go early, right after I finished lunch. I came at ten after 1. When I saw Tomomi in a suit near the door, I became suspicious, but when I saw Misawa-sensei in a suit, I was sure something was up. Everyone was hanging out near the door, so I asked what was going on. I did not catch the whole answer, but Moriguchi-san said that I should probably wear a suit, or at least a jacket for this thing, whatever it was. I told her I would go home to change. She said that it started at 2-ish, but they would wait for me. At least that is what I thought I heard and, as I drove the four-minute-drive home, I wondered why she thought it would take me so long to get a suit jacket on. The irony: if I had just kept the suit jacket I had erroneously wore this morning for the non-existent town hall thing, I would not have had to take the trip back home. I ran in the door and the phone was ringing. In a bit of a jumble, I answered with a loud "Moshi, moshi!" I did not hear anything first. Then I heard a hesitant, "Hello?" It was Laura! She was just calling to leave a message, but my home phone does not have a voice mail, so it was good I happened to be home. I tried to give her packing instructions over the brief span of time I had to talk and promised to email answers to other questions (and give her my cell number!) I grabbed the suit and rushed back, even though I theoretically had about a half hour until 2 o'clock. I walked in and Moriguchi-san was at the doorway. "We're all waiting," she said. I did not know what she meant until I walked in the gym. The ENTIRE school including all the staff, teachers, and students were all lined up on the stage, about to have their picture taken, except they were waiting for me. Well, I felt a mix between stupid and angry. A) I did not know it was a picture and B) I thought Moriguchi-san said "2" not "20 after." I ran up to the back stage, got into the picture, and all the picture taking was done in five minutes. (Moriguchi-san was nice enough to move my purse, which I hastily deposited on the gym floor, into the back stage area. Whether this means that the students are untrustworthy or that it would just be more convenient for me, I'm not sure.)

I Am Impressed After the brief closing ceremony (Tomomi made the students laugh a bit; he's the only teacher that does) it was not only cleaning time, it was SUPER MEGA CLEANING TIME. Every single classroom and other room was cleaned over two long hours; all the furniture was moved out of the lunchroom; all the windows and shelves were cleaned; the front was shoveled, students were SCRUBBING THE FLOOR! I surreptitiously took pictures since this was worthy of recording and maybe showing to Jr. High students back home. Instead of using windex (my personal favorite,) students were cleaning the windows of the teachers room with wet newspaper! It sort of worked, but if I had brought windex, I would have shown them a better path to making glass shine. (Though I think the Japanese are too efficient to waste multiple paper towels for that task.) I attacked the staff room again. People seem so impressed but I do not understand why. A. They obviously want me to help clean (principal had to ask me twice) and B. the kitchen is pretty nast, so Conclusion: I'm cleaning the icky, sticky, coffee-stained kitchen. Though I have taken to bringing my own chemicals to do so.

Long, Long Meeting The end-of-the-year meeting was excessively long. It took forever and I wasn't even given an agenda, so I did not feel part of it. One reason I was a bit bored was that I did not bring my normal book stash with me. My clothes for the Jr. High staff trip were filling my backpack instead and, really, any second now, we would all be gathering on the bus and leaving for the staff trip. Any time now. (Looks at watch.) The meeting should be wrapping up. Come on. Oh, side note while I'm waiting: Okumiya-sensei the Japanese teacher is cool: she's a pretty confident and neat rational woman - she walks confident, talks like a city person, not an inaka person, and speaks pretty good English since she's lived in New Zealand (just like me.) I found out, though, that the Walk of hers is actually a pregnant waddle! I noticed just today that she looked kind of bigger than usual and wondered for a moment if she was pregnant before dismissing it. But I had been right. She is expecting and that is why she is not going on the staff trip (where beer will play a key part, I'm sure).

What, no Bus? Around the scheduled time of departure, I wandered around, wondering where the bus was. We were running a little late, but most of the teachers were hanging around, finishing up. After awhile, I followed Misawa-sensei and Inoue-sensei outside. I was offered a seat in Inoue-sensei's van (are we driving to the bus?) and sat next to three other woman and the male math teacher, Matsubara-san. They were making jokes that we were Matsubara's harem. Anyway, it turned out that, since there are so few of us, we are driving up to the ryokan (about 2 or 3 hours north) in two cars. That works fine, too, I guess. Maybe it will mean no beer for breakfast (hee haw) and a heftier refund than the town hall trip which had a chartered bus all the way down to Kyushuu. In the car, people kept asking me if I had ever been to Shimane-ken (Shimane prefecture). HELLO?! I LIVE TWO BLOCKS FROM SHIMANE-KEN! But I was nice and, realizing that all the other teachers lived in Miyoshi not Sakugi, said I had never been this far before.

Now This is Luxury I've never been to a ryokan like this. The lobby looked like a hotel, being HUGE and spacious, with adjacent sitting rooms with grand pianos looking out to Japanese gardens. Someone commented that the hotel cost a fortune after the valet took the van; I wondered how much. Tomomi asked me if I had ever been to an onsen. Surprised by the question, I told him I had just been on the town hall staff trip a couple weeks ago. He seemed really surprised and, actually, he was not the first to be surprised. Do I arrogantly assume everyone always knows what I'm up to and that all my funny habits ("She doesn't drink beer at every possible opportunity?") get passed around town? Maybe I do. Food for thought. After taking the elevator, we found our room cluster at the end. It seemed we only needed three rooms: one for the girls, one for the guys, and one for the principal (unless they were joking about that?) Our room had a main room and a side bedroom. My first thought was, "Oh, who gets the good room." Their first comment was, "Oh, won't that room be lonely to sleep in." There was easily space for six people in our room, though only the four of us girls were using it. It had a lovely sitting area with four comfy stuffed chairs looking out to the ADORABLE town - it was like an old neighborhood of hot spring ryokans nestled between two hills (the expressway overpass crossing above).

The Variety... We chatted for awhile and eventually went down to dinner. I bet, by now, you can guess what we had for dinner. Yes, you are right. Fish and beer. Instead of a table, the eleven of us were seated at trays across from each other (I was across from Tomomi-sensei but he was too far away to talk to.) The waitress was in a kimono and since I was the inept foriegner, kept doing all my meal preparation for me except for the crab legs; I had to get help from the person next to me. The crab meat was really delicious, but just so much trouble to get to. I tried something new for the first time: it was green and stringy, but had the consistency of raw egg. The only information I got about it was that it was "healthy" so I was surprised when I actually kind of liked it. Anyway, I did not enjoy dinner all that much because I was sitting next to two very drunk people who were flirting with each other across from me. Also, Misawa-sensei seemed to have forgotten that I spoke Japanese and kept asking Tomomi-san to translate his questions even though I'd already be answering them. In fact, a lot of people were asking me questions as if this was my first month in Japan ("Do you like Japanese food?" Um, I've eaten the school lunch for the past five months, haven't I? "Have you eaten natto?" Another biggie, but that one is more forgivable since I plan to avoid eating natto (translation: slimy fermented soybean product) as long as possible.) I did find out something interesting, though: Misawa-sensei, who teaches P.E., has to grade the students on their ABILITY, not their effort. He seemed to agree with me that this practice was wildly unfair. Some people (i.e. me) just aren't athletic. I was not in much of a beer mood, though I did drink a little. I was pretty tired and don't like to drink when I'm tired but I was looking forward to the karaoke and the onsen soak afterward.

Sadly we did not karaoke, EVEN THOUGH THE RYOKAN HAD THEIR OWN KARAOKE ROOMS(!) Well, they did seem to be reserved, but still, what's a staff trip without karaoke? We went upstairs to change and had the key problem again because one member of our party had not yet returned from dinner and therefore, we could not leave for the hot springs since we had the key. We had to call her on someone else's cell phone (since she was not answering her own) to ask her to come up. Then we proceeded to put our purses in the safe. I thought they would be secure enough in the locked room, but the others were adamant so I gave them my pocketbook to put in one of the mini-safes, trusting them with the combination. The hot springs were LOVELY. I would have enjoyed them more if I had not been very irked with our drunk companion, who kept stepping on the futon pillows as she stumbled across the room and in general seemed wildly irresponsible. I found out she was only 24 years old, but still, my respect for her has gone to about zero. I'm glad she is just a part-timer and I don't have to see her every day. I don't think I'm as tolerant of drunken behavior than most Japanese.

Gorgeous Hot Spring I went to the onsen with the other two but they seemed to disappear somewhere between the changing room and the indoor shower/hot tub room. I am glad they were with me at the entrance since the signs leading to the men's area and women's area used kanji I had never seen before (though the pink and blue signs might have been a giveaway.) Anyway, after showering, I went straight out to the indoor/outdoor part. When I say indoor/outdoor, I mean that the spring is generally outdoors, but is mostly protected from rain and is covered by high stones or walls so no one can look in. This one was so beautiful, with faux rock, real rock, jungly plants, neat lanterns, wooden tresses, tons of places to sit, the works. It was HOT, though, so I spent more of it only up to my waist (and completely naked of course, like all onsens I've been to so far.) I could hear Misawa-sensei's laughter floating down from above (presumably the men's section.) I kept waiting for one of the other three girls to show up but no one ever did. Where did they go? Or maybe they were there and I did not recognize them when their hair was wet and in a towel (that would be embarrassing, wouldn't it.) Anyway, I was longingly thinking of a nice book read and nice sleep (planning to take a futon that drunk girl had not walked all over) when someone I recognized finally walked in. I asked her for the key, but she said she had given it to drunk girl (seriously, what was she thinking?!) A little nervous, I made my way up, but found the door open. I put on my jammies and got all comfortable. The others came in shortly. They were surprised I was not wearing my yukata robe to bed (which is a nice idea except for the whole robe-opening-in-the-front-if-I-turn-in-my-sleep thing) and asked if I wanted to join them in the guys' room for beer. I probably should have tried to muster the midnight energy, but I was just too exhausted. I had a busy day today and a busy week ahead; I really wanted to get some sleep. Part of me told me I probably should get up, be social and force down some beer, but the idea of having to listen to Japanese jokes I wouldn't understand when I wasn't feeling very social to begin with just did not seem tempting despite I would be getting the opportunity to know my colleagues informally. I lazed out and went to bed. Well, tried to go to bed. My roommates came in SEVERAL times during the night, not to mention a cell phone going off, and I felt like I did not sleep more than a few hours at any one time. Bleah.