I just finished delivering my first speech in Japanese to the 100 teachers of my main school! It was nerve wracking and I think I slaughtered the beautiful Japanese language but everyone laughed and clapped so I think they were at least pleased at my attempt. This was a good practice run for the much longer speech that I have to give to the entire school of 1200+ students on Monday during the opening ceremony. I am so nervous I could die. I hate public speaking and to do it in another language that I have never spoken before is incredibly daunting, and there are sooooo many people! I just want to get it over with because it will consume my thoughts until it is over. But the torture doesn't end on Monday, I have to give two more speeches to the staff and students at my second school`s opening ceremony on Tuesday. I also have to give about 15 lessons just to introduce myself to the kids. It has been a challenge to create a full 50 minute lesson where I talk about myself because I don`t think I am all that interesting but hopefully they will enjoy the games I have come up with. Since these lessons will be in a classroom setting I am not nervous about these ones. But the other speeches I have embarrassing nightmares about.
The teachers were poking fun at me because one of the things that I am teaching is public speaking and debate. I don`t think I am the best person to teach this subject matter considering I become a hyperventilating, sweaty, blabbering mess when I have to speak in public. Hopefully I can get my pronunciation just right and they will think I`m cute and forgive me for any mistakes I have made. That`s how I have gotten through most of my life...my high pitched sweet voice can get me out of virtually any situation.
Wish me luck!!
Today I woke up and found that many of my former Calgary Science School students had left comments on my blog. It made my day to hear from them and read their cute comments. I am happy they still remember me and it means so much to me that they took the time to read and comment, I hope they know how much I miss them.
If 7.2 is reading this now, I just want to let you know that you guys are an amazing bunch of kids and I will be sure to tell my Japanese students about all you!
Thank you so much Mr.Fawcett and 7.2 for brightening my day! I love all of your comments. I hope you all had an amazing summer and good luck with this upcoming year! Don`t be Bossy Betty`s or Off Task Oscar`s!
I finally got a phone today and it feels awesome to be connected again. Although I was kind of getting used to not having a phone it is great to have one to coordinate plans with people and catch up with people from home.
The little dog mascot of the phone company is really popular here. His name is Otasan which means father and he has conversations with Tommy Lee Jones in commercials. It is all very random, cute, and endearingly Japanese.
I got a free beer glass with Otasan's face on it. My supervisor loved it so I gave it to her.
The moment I got my phone I downloaded all of my necessary apps to tweet, instagram, and waste an hour on Facebook. Oh boy, I am a phone zombie again.
The best thing about having this phone is that I have GPS again! I can access train schedules, and create a route to anywhere my heart desires. Traveling Japan just became a lot less daunting. This comes at the perfect time because I am planning a trip to Kyoto for fall and a possible trip to Tokyo in November. Exciting times!
I had to open a bank account today and man was it a long process. I am so thankful that my supervisor took me because it would have been impossible for me to understand all of the foreign paperwork.
The one part that took forever was when they told me I had to write my name, address, and school address in complicated Kanji characters. I felt like I was writing in hieroglyphics and I was gruelling slow. My characters looked wobbly like I was in the first grade practicing letters. I had to repeat the process for four different forms. I messed up once and had to restart the longest form. I felt like a horrible gaijin for making my supervisor wait while I filled out these forms. But I did it and now I have the Kanji for my address and school engrained in my muscle memory. Good thing I decided to start learning Kanji last week, I had some familiarity with the characters and I could pick out patterns to make the characters easier to draw. I was impressed that what I had learned actually stuck.
Oh, and another thing that impeded the speed of the process was that my name confused everyone. First of all, my last name baffles them because it doesn't sound at all how it looks, and second, Japanese people don't really have middle names and I have two of them. The bank teller kept mixing up the names and having to resubmit forms because no one understood which one was my first name. Yikes!
Tomorrow I am going to get my phone, which I hear is another long process, but I think that my supervisor can fill out some of the forms so it hopefully won't take as long.
I am almost a real person again with an address, a bank account, a job, and tomorrow a phone!
They have hipster glasses at the bank you can use if your vision goes cross-eyed from trying to write in Kanji for too long, or you just want to try to pull off the nerdy-librarian-chic look while you wait for your bank card.
No, this isn't a souvenir from Disney, it's my bank book! Everything is so darned cute in Japan.
Although I have been told that Japan is a very safe place and that many people never lock their doors, I always lock the door when I leave and before I go to bed. However when I am at home I often forget to lock the door behind me when I come inside. Yesterday a complete stranger burst in to my house and walked into my living room. Thankfully he was not a psychotic killer, he was looking for Kate (the girl that lived there before me). We were equally as confused and startled at the sight of each other. He tried to walk around looking for her and I tried to tell him in Japanese that she does not live there anymore. I ushered him outside and he apologized and awkwardly left. Sometimes I walk around my house scantily clad because it is way too hot for clothes, but luckily I had just come home from the supermarket and was fully clothed! This is definitely a reminder for me to lock my door at all times. I was not expecting anyone to come inside my house without knocking...lesson learned.
My first piece of mail arrived today and it was my eagerly awaited residence card! Wooooohoooo....This means I can get a phone this week. People at home prepare for much texting, tweeting, and instagramming :)
My friend Will is auditioning for a part in the JET charity musical. He came all the way from Sado to go to the Niigata city auditions so he stayed with me. I had a full house this weekend with Sabina, Stephanie, and Shaun as well. I love the company and it is fun to take people out in the city and show them things that I have discovered.
In an attempt to help him choose an audition song we YouTube'd all of our favourite childhood Disney songs! With a little wine to warm our vocal chords we were soon belting out the tracks of our youth. YouTube is great to start conversations with people that you are getting to know and a person's video choices are very revealing about the type of humour they have. We abandoned Disney after awhile and just took to looking up our favourite ridiculous clips. The company of friends is such a wonderful thing. For the first time since I have been in Niigata, I laughed without constraint. We all had the out-of-breath, teary-eyed, full-body laugh that is incredibly infectious. It is the type of laughter that feeds the spirit of friendship and nourishes a heart missing home.
I anticipate many fun times will be had in my apartment that feels a little more like home everyday.
So I almost accidentally set my house on fire and it just occurred to me that if I need to call 911 or in Japan 119/ 110 that I don't have a phone and have no idea where a pay phone is.
My alien (resident) card needs to make an appearance asap so I can get a phone, a bank account, and my own internet set up.
Let's hope I won't have an emergency, start a fire (again), or need police assistance while I don't have a phone (or ever).
The English summer camp seminar was super fun! Students were eager to speak English and genki levels were at an all time high. The ALT's were all from the Niigata prefecture and it was awesome to be able to get to know them better and learn teaching methods from those who have been here for more than a year. That is a picture of my friend Will and I in front of the Aole building in Nagaoka where the seminar was held.
I'm pretty sure I'm going to love Japanese students, all of them are so sweet. At first I was a bit nervous to teach high school but through my interactions with them so far, I have found them to be quite different from kids back at home.
Japanese students have an innocence and naivety that high school kids from home seem to shed much sooner. Thats not to say that they are immature, they just have a much more shy, sheltered, and child-like demeanor (at least in class) than students from home. They stay kids for so much longer here.
I give so much credit to the students who attended the seminar. Although they were extremely shy and nervous to speak English and make mistakes, they bravely created skits and presented speeches in front of 200+ people. Heck, I am super nervous for the small speech that I have to give in Japanese at the beginning of the school year. These kids volunteered to go to this seminar and put themselves out there in a way that was incredibly endearing. They were courageous and super funny. I loved how earnest and heartfelt their speeches were. The ideas were simple but there was something so touching about the way everything was presented. I ALMOST cried during a few of the speeches...but happy crying this time! I am such a sucker when it comes to kids who love to learn. The kids were so grateful to be there and they all seemed to have fun. At the end of the seminar every kid wanted to take pictures with all of the ALT's and my face hurt from having to smile so much.
Some of the funniest things that my students said to me:
Thank you so much for being so cute!
You make very good teacher because you are so cute!
Are you in a J-Pop band? You are so cute!
Ah you are from Canada...do you know Justin Bieber? He would like you because you are so cute.
Wow, you have so many pictures of yourself!
How come you have so many pictures of cats?
You are beautiful like sakura and cute as cats.
If anyone wonders why I got into teaching, it's because of the constant flow of compliments I get from students. My self esteem has never been higher.
Just one more week and I will be back in the classroom! Hurray!!
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