A Riches of Embarrassment!

It has been crazy busy this week at school, but not in any fun or funny way. I had a new student sign up (yay! Money coming into the school makes my manager happy, money makes Geos happy, I am happy because I didn't scare off a potential new student like I felt I have done before. Boo! More work for me) and she comes in at 9pm twice a week, meaning I don't get home until 10:30-11:00 three out of five days a week now. Yuck! And that isn't even the big problem, the big problem is that there are two grocery stores in Tsuruga within walking distance of my apartment. One of them closes at 9, the other at 10. When I don't get out of school until after 10 I have to make sure I already have food at home or got spend 1000 yen for chicken and curry. Which quite frankly I love, but fried chicken every night, even I know that isn't good for you.

Oh, and they closed the Lawson's convienence store that is a block away from my house! That place was open 24 hours and push comes to shove I could always go there and pick up something to eat. But not now! Closed for remodeling is what I have heard, but they closed another one for remodeling and tore the whole building down and now it is an empty lot and has been that way for three months. (yes, closed down the week after I got to Tsuruga for anyone keeping track of time) Biggest problem, I pay my bills at that Lawson's so now I have to walk to the other side of town to pay my bills. Today. Because they are due this week and I won't have time otherwise. Man, hope it isn't raining out.

Speaking of which, got a new pair of waterproof boots! Thanks, Mom!

Check out these badass boots!



Well, one of them anyway. Not enough room in the front of the apt. to photograph both boots at once. Yeah, they are sweet! And comfy too.

Anyway, busy at school. This week was Challenge Kids week where we gave tests to the kid students so they could see their progress. Well, mostly their parents could see their progress. The tests were easy peasy and most of the kids did great on them. Well, that and the fact is that there is one table in my room and it is impossible for me to keep them from cheating. Plus I can't speak Japanese and they are constantly chattering about in their native language. Apparently I have no authority and when I say, "shhhh," or, "No talking," it means no talking in English.

Anyway, the tests went fine for the most part. My pre-school class didn't really feel like taking the test, shocker three and four year olds don't want to sit down and listen to me talk for 40 minutes while they circle things on their paper. Yeah, I couldn't believe it either. I mean, just look at my face, that is the face of shock right there.



Yeah.

One of my pre-schoolers simply circled every single picture on his test, and when that was done he folded it up into a little square and pushed it onto the floor and then proceeded to walk around the class for the next 20 minutes asking when we would sing the "pokey pokey" song (hokey pokey, but come on, the pokey pokey, how cute is that?). Another one simply drew on the test instead of completing the questions. Yeah, so written tests for 3 year olds, not the best idea. In my humble opinion that is.

The real problem with the tests was not administering them, although that was a pain in my ass since I had to speak the whole thing. Geos is cutting costs, in past years they made a cd of the spoken parts but this year left it up to the teachers to speak the whole thing. The real hassle was having to grade the tests and leave feedback for the students. Grading easy, 3-5 minutes per test, adding the evaluations, yeah those take 5-10 minutes per student, so about 15 minutes a test, multiply by 30 tests and suddenly all of my time is being eaten away by grading. Which means I am hurrying to prep for other classes and am basically work working for the entire time I am at school instead of working and having some downtime to get something to eat or go shopping etc. Yeah, very busy week. And while the tests aren't technically due back until two weeks from now allowing for next week for grading as well, my manager got transferred to a different school and was leaving Saturday so I had to get the tests done so she could translate them into Japanese.

Yeah, my manager got transferred back to her hometown this week. It was a good thing, she needed to go home to help her mom take care of their animals. Her mom took a job in another city so she would be gone during the week with no one to look after the pets so my manager had to go take care of em. Yeah, that is weird right, that people in Japan live where they work during the week and then come "home" during the weekend. I have a student who is doing that now, he lives in an apartment in Osaka during the week and them comes home to his family on the weekend. And in his Osaka apartment, no bathroom. Shared bathroom. Eech! Sharing a bathroom with a floor full of other guys, I assume it is like a dorm situation, but lord knows after college, who would want to live like that?

So my manager transferred. She found out about it on Friday and moved Sunday. Yeah, that's a lot of notice. A bunch of us went out on Saturday night to say goodbye to her. That was fun. Honestly, I am going to miss her. She was a good manager and a good person. She was always willing to help me out, not just with work things but with my personal stuff too. Helping me get my mail, showing me how and where to get things done. And besides, she was the very first person I met here.

Also, the JET, the Japanese English Teacher, quit last week. Quit for real. She had talked about wanting to quit for awhile now, and has been "sick" for the last three weeks after the company asked her to stay on through the new year until they could find a replacement. Guess that wasn't what she was looking to do and so she quit this week.

What does that all mean for ol' Alex? I am the old timer in Tsuruga now! After three months. Wow. I know that Geos has a high turnover rate, well once a year pretty much, but this is ridiculous.

Then, on Sunday I went to a former student's wedding party. She got married two or so months ago and Sunday was her party for her friends (and former teachers apparently). I was supposed to go with Steven and therefore have someone to talk to in English. Well, Steven did attend the party but was completely hung over and not in the mood to converse so I was forced to talk to other people. Nice to get outside of the comfort zone. Had to try to make conversation with other people, and Japanese people will tell you they can't speak English, but many many can speak some English and enough to communicate. I met a girl who could speak English very well, and she helped me out most of the evening by translating when there were speeches and helping me to read when ordering booze. In my defense, I can pretty much read Hiragana and Katakana at this point (not Kanji) but it takes me forever to read and then half the time I don't know what the word means in Japanese so still tough to read. However she was helping me out, having a good time, good conversation, she is studying to be an English teacher so that was something else to talk about. Plus, she lives in Tsuruga. That is cool. Ask her if she wants to hang out sometime in Tsuruga, practice English conversation and then Japanese conversation for me. Says she'll have to ask her dad (huh?) because she is only 17 and doesn't have a driver's license yet. Whahuh?

Yup. Hitting on a 17 year old. Smart. Dammit, I told you that I can't tell anyone's age in this country!

Well, soon (but not soon enough) after that embarrassment, the party wound down and most of the people went home or whatnot. But a few people were going to go out and have some more drinks at a bar and my former student, let's call her Nami because that is her name, invited me along.

Of course I wanted to have some more drinks! In this group the only people who could speak English with any kind of ability were myself and Nami so as we sat and drank and ate (in Japan you don't just go out for drinks, you go out drinking and eat too) she was appointed the translator between the rest of the group and myself. There we are sitting in this tiny little room (that is another thing I love about Japan, at most restaurants and bars they have little rooms for each table so you can't see the other parties in the place (which would have been fantastic for my ex who refused to go to places that didn't have other people in them, she didn't trust the quality of food I guess, but she would never be able to tell in Japan. Bwahahaha!) and they just feel cozier, you can relax and have a good time because the only people that can see you are the people in your group. I like that idea a lot.) and drinking and having a good time when one of the guys in the group asks me a question and Nami's face goes red, she doesn't know how to translate it. Or rather, she knows how to translate it, but it is completely filthy and she doesn't want to say it to me. And this then became the game dujour. Tell Alex something inappropriate and make Nami translate it for him. I learned many many dirty words and phrases last night and also saw perhaps the most embarrassed woman in the world. One of the most fun nights I have had since I got here.

All in all, busy week, but good. And Jessica comes this Friday! Very excited! Friendly face from back home! Christmas company! My good friend coming to visit me and we get to go around Japan doing touristy stuff! I can't tell you how much I am looking forward to seeing her and getting to go to Tokyo and Mt. Fuji (even if it is the middle of the winter and we won't be all that close to Mt. Fuji, and certainly not able to climb it).