Students like this make my job fun...

I'm cracking up at this kid's writing...

 

'I had a stomachache yesterday. I want to go to toiret. But I can't go to toiret. Because was taking during English class. So I nearly died when I can't go to toiret. I was sad when I can't go to toiret.'

 

'I studied English very hard. But I was solved questions. I have an answer for everything! This is joking. I heard answer. I was very happy!'

Bit of a moan. Sorry.

Things are quiet at school at the moment.  Students are in exams and I'm chilling, 'studying Japanese' (actually I'm read a book.  Motivation I have not, today). 

The only 'work' I've done over the last few days has been answering questions from teachers regarding the accuracy of student answers.  Most of these questions have been pretty genuine, with only the occasional obvious one slipping through.  This has led to much internet research in order to back up my assertions.  The problem with teaching English here is a) they learn American English, which I obviously don't, so sometimes I'm not sure if the grammar is wrong, or just American, and b) often I get questions like 'when using present perfect, why do we need to use 'have + present perfect'?  Which is all Greek to me.  I speak the language, but I never learnt the names of the different bits.  I think I'm doing better than average because I know there are more than three tenses (past, present and future are the only ones I can explain, but I know there ARE more). 

So these questions have necessitated consulting google.  Thank God for google.  Don't know what I would do without it.  In the last few days it has helped me out on the have + present perfect thing, explained when you use 'if I was' vs. 'if I were' and clarified 'do you have a pen?' vs 'have you a pen?' 

Other than that I'm having a bit of a down period at the moment.  I don't think it's culture shock-related, I think it's just a regular old bad patch at work, but I could be wrong.  Currently I'm really struggling to get used to the teaching styles of a couple of teachers who I wasn't working with last year.  Teacher A translates every word I say, while I want to shake her and scream 'these kids have had at least four years of English!  Have a little faith!'  On the other hand, teacher B tells me not to speak slowly for the students, to speak at 'natural speed' ('These kids have had only four years of English!').  I restrained myself from telling her that even she would be screwed if I spoke at regular NZ speed (I struggled to understand Kate when I was home.  Clearly even I struggle with NZ speed now!).  However I made a concious effort to speak a little faster with her and sure enough, a couple of days later she told me she didn't understand what I said because it was too fast. 

Both of these extremes I find a little insulting.  I've spent almost two years over here now and the most important thing about teaching English - or just any communication in English here - is to judge how much your listener is understanding, so you can increase or decrease the difficulty as necessary.  So to have teachers translating everything I say (when I have taught six year olds without any native speaker support), or telling me to speak 'native speed' (when I can see the students eyes glazing when I speak too fast) is frustrating.  They mean well, but they don't know what they are talking about.  Teacher B, being the best at English here, once asked me if I speak differently at school to how I would with native speakers.  It took me a moment to answer, not because I had to think about the question, but because I was a little stunned at being asked.  Of course we do.  The teachers, never mind the students, wouldn't stand a chance if we spoke like we do at home. 

To continue my whine, teacher B also was super annoying before class, with the best of intentions.  I had given out the lesson plan the week before and printed the 320 student copies the day before.  Then the morning of class, she was reading through the lesson plan and had lots of questions and suggestions for the lesson.  Feedback... great.  Feedback when it's too late to easily change the plan... super super annoying.  Next time I will be careful to run the plan past her BEFORE I print off all the handouts etc.  Most of her ideas are good and I apply them to the other classes too.  But... this sounds terrible, but I feel like it's a power struggle in her class.  She is trying to lead the class.  Fair enough, because it's officially her class and she is officially the teacher.  But I'm also trying to lead the class, because it's my lesson plan, I'm used to leading the classes I plan and, dammit, I'm the one that understands the activities I planned!  I had a super super frustrating class when she was trying to help me explain the map activity, but she didn't really understand it herself and was trying to over-explain to the students and we ended up wasting a lot of time, for no discernible benefit.  Retrospectively, it might be because there was no 'correct' or 'model' answer that it's a difficult activity for the teachers to get their heads round.  Because the students have actually done really well with it. 

To go back to teacher A (the one who translates everything), I think I will give it one more week and if her level of translation doesn't change, I need to say something.  I'm not sure if it's better to speak to her quietly on her own, suggesting we up the challenge for the students, or if I should stand up in an English meeting and suggest that we need to up the percentage of English spoken in ALL the English classes and suggest that translations are only given for the students when they ask for them (they all know 'once more' and 'Japanese please' isn't hard!).  Any suggestions on how to do this nicely?  It's driving me insane and I think Jeff will make me sleep on the couch if I complain about her once more... 

Sorry this turned into a big moan.  I guess it's what's at the fore of my thinking at the moment, so it was inevitably going to come out in this blog.  Sorry about that. 

In all fairness (as I protest to Jeff), it's the first time I've felt really negative about my job.  Usually I love my base school and had pretty cruisy teachers.  But I guess I'm used to running the classes and two teachers suddenly putting the 'Assistant' back into 'Assistant Language Teacher' is hurting! 

Oh, last thing.  I've just been told that at the school festival on the 16th the English club can do something if they want.  Actually we should have submitted an application ages ago, apparently.  Only I'm always behind the times (not being able to read the newsletters!) and our older student who was supposed to be our rep at those meetings never actually attends anything, so we had kinda dropped off the face of the earth.  So we now have three weeks to pull something together, when we only meet once a week!  Yikes!  The deal is we will have a space - a classroom I think - to decorate so parents and students wandering around the school can go and have a look.  We will not be there ourselves.  Previous groups have done things like 'how do you say this in English?'  I'm drawing a blank right now.  Does anyone have any suggestions?  I have three girls who I meet with once a week, limited time and limited resources.  What can we do?  All suggestions appreciated! 

Hope you're all having a good week.  I'll try to be more positive on my next update!  It probably doesn't help that I'm trying to study for this test in July and the more I study the more I realise I'll never get my shit together on time!  Not a good feeling!

Anyway, have a good day.  xo

New ways of cleaning

Just a quick note... during cleaning time I had an amusing conversation with a student.  She was using the vacuum cleaner and I told them that vacuum is the American name, but that the English name is hoover.  I told them I always call it a hoover because I can't spell vacuum. 

The student working the vacuum (who kept telling me 'my vacuum, my vacuum!' the whole time.  I think she meant 'I'm vacuuming') said, 'me, me, me can!' and picked up the whiteboard marker.  As I expected, it started with a 'b'.  I was about to correct her when I saw the rest of what she was writing: 'bakyuuuuuuum!!'

I was cracking up as she made me say it with her ('Let's say!  'bakyuuuuuuum!!' 'bakyuuuuuuum!!').  Ah my kids are funny. 

Fukuoka and kanji

Oh my, almost a month since I last updated!  I deserve a slap!  But I won't do it myself, because that would be a bad look in the staffroom... 

There are two main things you all probably need updates on: Fukuoka and Japanese tests.

Background info: for those that don't know the Japanese holiday system (you mean you didn't learn that at achool??), there is a week known as 'Golden Week', where there are three public holidays in the week.  I believe it has been arranged like that so that the Japanese can, by taking off the last couple of days, take a nice long holiday while the weather is condusive to travel.  Although they have a New Year's holiday and a summer break, the first is freezing cold and the second is so hot you risk fainting if you leave your airconditioned apartment.  Hence, Golden Week. 

For this Golden Week, Jeff and I went down to Fukuoka.  Fukukoka is the largest city on Kyushu island, the southernmost island of Japan.  It was our fist time hitting Kyushu and was a very important step - the last of the four islands for us to visit!  We had heard lots of great things about Fukuoka so we were pretty excited.  As a bonus, a woman who was a homestay with my family when I was a wee thing lives in Fukuoka.  Ruriko had recently found me on facebook, so we arranged for Jeff and I to meet up with her and her family when we visited Fukuoka. 

In the interest of not taking forever to tell you about our holiday (because I have a huge stack of student journals next to me, waiting for me to check them!), I'll try to make this pretty brief.  On the downside, there was a misunderstanding wtih the hotel booking.  I believed I was booking a regualar Japanese double bed (always described on English websites as a small double).  I wasn't.  When they said small double, they meant by Japanese standards.  By our standards it was a king single.  Jeff+Charly+king single = feckin' uncomfortable sleep.  Sorry to go on about this, those that have already heard my laments on facebook, but I worked a couple of days, then spent three nights in that fricking uncomfortable bed (waking up to feel where the edge was every time I needed to roll over!) and now I'm working a six day week, so I'm feckin' knackered.  This is, of course, a bad premise to a holiday.  It's always hard to enjoy yourself when you're super tired and just want to lie on the floor/park bench/sand/train seat/basically anywhere and sleep!  As such, we found Fukuoka... not bad... but a little disappointing.  We agreed we had both heard it hyped up a lot by people, so I'm not sure what we were expecting.  As it turned out, it was a city with lots of malls and not much for tourists other than shopping.  Which was an issue as we are trying to save money and didn't want to buy much.  It turns out it is a sister city to Auckland, which seems a pretty fair assesment of it.  I think it would be a lovely place to live, very convienient with everything you could wish for in a city, without the ridiculous size or impersonality (is that a word?) of somewhere like Tokyo.  Actually Fukuoka and Auckland are also similar population-wise.  But... like Auckland, there's not that much to do if you're just a visitor hanging in the city for a couple of days.  Except for eat ramen (in Fukuoka that is, not Auckland).  So we ate ramen.  A lot of it.  It was awesome.  So awesome words can't describe.  When you're tired and hungry from wandering round the city all day, not much can beat a good bowl of pork-broth ramen noodles and a big bottle of beer.  Bliss. 

On the positive side, we caught up with Ruriko.  And it was almost as awesome as Hakata ramen.  :D  Ruriko and her husband both lived in NZ for seven years and their daughter was born there (so she has an NZ passport and is legally a Kiwi, despite being very shy with her English!).  When they couldn't get permenant residency, they moved back to Japan, where they had a son (who we didn't meet because he was at judo practice!).  Ruriko and her family met us at our hotel.  They took us out for lunch, then took us to a famous shrine.  The shrine was very beautiful and all, but the highlight for me was when they showed us how to buy a slip of paper that told our fortune, then they translated for us.  Finally, we got to fold our 'fortunes' into a strip and tie it to the huge bamboo fish frames lining the path.  Ok, that sounds really hard to picture so I'm going to try to load up a picture...

Wow... that was a big fail.  I'll load pictures to facebook and you can go there if you're struggling to picture me with a big paper fish... 

Usually when Jeff and I visit a shrine it's not a very interactive experience, so this was fun.  After the shrine, they took us to look at the beach and Fukuoka Tower.  Fukuoka Tower is a tall, hollow triangle, specifically designed for sightseeing, I assume.  You take the elevator up to the top, where you have 360 degree views of the city and the ocean.  Ruriko pointed out her apartment (sea views!  Nice!) and we took lots of pictures.  The sea there is not great for swimming (we assume.  Because no-one was swimming.), but it was a 'real' beach, with sand and rocks and water.  It was so lovely and peaceful, looking out at the distant islands, that Jeff and I came back the next day. 

So, all in all, Fukuoka was a bit disappointing, but we had a great time with Ruriko and family!  Jeff and I would like to get back to Kyushu to explore the rest of the island.  If we manage it, I would steer clear of Fukuoka this time - unless Ruriko is free to catch up again, because when you're travelling, not much beats hanging out with the locals! :D

Ok, so the second thing you should know is about Japanese tests.  There is this test, called the JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test), that is internationally recognised.  On July 1st Jeff and I will sit N5, the easiest level.  For Jeff, it should be pretty straightforward (assuming he can read fast enough to answer all the questions in the relatively short time allowed!), but for me it is a huge challenge - especially with the short amount of time I have until the exam.  However, I'm seeing this as a warm-up.  As Jeff is probably more suited to trying N4, he can do this one first, so that he can use it as preparation for the N4 in December.  For myself, I will attempt it in July with every expectation of failing (bad attitude, I know!), so I can see how I am going on the different sections (I'm very worried about the grammar!) and know what I need to work on more in order to pass the N5 in December.  It's not that I'm not going to give it my best shot this time, but I don't want to be really upset at failing, throwing in the towel and swearing to never study another word of Japanese (not that I would ever throw a frustration tantrum...).  So when you ask me later how I did, if I tell you I got a 45% average, don't commiserate - congratulate me on being only 5% off passing next time!  Yay!  Maybe if I keep reminding myself of this attitude now, I won't cry myself to sleep every night for a week when I get my 'Fail' grade!

Anyway, that's about it.  I should go check some English Journals now.  It's the first batch I've collected and there has been a general misunderstanding - 1 topic, 5 sentences has been generally misunderstood as 5 topics, 1 sentence.  As you can imagine, that's not stimulating reading.  Guess we have to start somewhere!

Hope you are all well xoxoxo

I'm a teacher again. Finally

This week I finally started teaching again.  I had no idea it would take so long to get back into classes - I was all ready to teach the day I got back from NZ (over two weeks ago).  But no, that was a foolish assumption based on not being able to read the schedule in Japanese!

Anyway, I'm finally back into it this week.  I've just been doing lots of self-introductions (luckily I don't sleep talk, or I'm sure Jeff would be hearing about my NZ slideshow all night...).  I've had some good teacher changes and some disappointing ones, but on the whole I think I've traded up. 

At my visit school I lost my favourite teacher and my most difficult teacher - they were replaced by two lessons with an old guy.  I was told (warned?) that he was quite 'traditional' in his teaching (this is sometimes a byword for lots of grammar, inflexibility and most instruction in the class being in Japanese).  He didn't seem quite up with the play - clearly not always following what I was saying, so if I needed help with a translation or something I would need to rephrase the question - but that's not unusual with teachers that are not yet used to me and my accent (I guess it's tiring at first, getting used to an accent that's not American!).  But after class he told me about his summer house in the mountains, close to our wee Jinseki place, and how he wants to invite Jeff and I up for a BBQ.  A bit later we ended up having a big discussion about... what else... classic English literature!  One of his favourites is Wuthering Heights.  Of course the elderly Japanese bloke likes Wuthering Heights...  So we traded a few writers names and had a really great chat.  Cool!  :)

Currently I'm waiting for the students to turn up in the computer room adjoining the staff room. If I am correct (and I may well not be, because the schedules change as fast I can read them) it is cleaning time now and some students should be turning up for me to oversea hoovering and sweeping the computer room.  But... no-one is coming, so perhaps not?? 

Anyway, until I finish work I should start planning some activities for the English club.  Currently I have three kids (officially four, but the boy showed up 0/2 times, so I'm assuming I've seen the last of him).  So my students who come are three little ichi-nensei (first year) girls.  One was so nervous she almost talked herself out of coming to the first meeting!  Of course when she DID turn up and recognised another first year buddy, she was very excited. 

My third student is a later addition (she signed up this week, so wasn't at last Friday's meeting).  I feel bad for being so excited about this third girl joining.  She is our little cancer kid.  I have no personal knowledge of her cancer - I mean, I don't even know if she has beaten it or still gets treatment - but I know what type of cancer it is, plus it's obvious when you look at her that having cancer and the necessary treatments as a child has stunted her growth, given her thin hair and caused one leg to be bowed.  It's really stupid but because of my sister's cancer experience (although I know she was an adult then, albeit a very young one) and my experiences with Camp Quality (for those that don't know, a camp for kids with cancer), I feel this ridiculously strong connection to this little girl.  I know it's stupid, that in her eyes just spending a couple of weeks hanging out with sick kids wouldn't give me any real understanding of her situation.  But I can't help but feel that when we talk there will be this strong understanding.  I literally keep having to remind myself that she doesn't speak English, that getting cancer does not immediately gift one with fluency in English.  But it doesn't help that cancer kids are super mature and used to being thrown into adult conversations and trying to understand far more than they really grasp, so when I was speaking to her she had this very self-assured way of nodding and answering in the affirmative whenever I asked if she understood.  I was rushing at the time (busy decorating the windows with my spring-themed pictures - thanks for the facebook suggestions!), so I didn't actually ask her anything about herself or have a chat with her.  In all honesty I was also a bit flustered at finding out that the student I feel I have a special (although logically I know it's stupid) kinship with had come to join my English club!  So that means Friday will be my opportunity to actually find out how much English she knows.  Looking forward to it!

In a further note to that, when I told one of the English teachers that this kid had joined the club, the teacher told me that the student is interested in finding out how her condition would be treated in other countries (so I guess I can assume she is still sick?).  The student hasn't spoken to me about it yet (obviously), but I'll try to start researching it for her...

Anyway, if anyone has any suggestions for what you would want to do if you were a 15 yr old Japanese girl trying to learn English, let me know! 

Charly xo

Back in the land of shoes

Well, we're back from our trip home.  It was great seeing everyone, including meeting a few important new people!  (Shoutout to Ethan Bishop who kindly modelled on the lawn for us, even tearing up a flower to keep my camera happy - what a natural!)

The trip home turned out to be much, much more difficult than the trip here.  First off we got to the airport about half an hour after we had intended to arrive.  Turns out the new motorway isn't quite as fast as we counted on...  However, that didn't seem like TOO big of an issue until we stepped inside and saw the line.  The queue of people waiting to check-in to Air NZ flights wound through the official queuing lane, then trailled across the depatures hall, all the way up to arrivals.  When we joined the line we were so far up that we couldn't hear the announcements and we were standing next to a screen giving flight arrival info (took me a confused minute to figure that out).  Our only consolation was the number of Japanese people standing in queue before and behind us - clearly we weren't the only ones worried about making our flight.  The line turned out to be a mere standing place - we stood in one spot waiting until an airport official came running up calling out to all people flying to xyz to get to counters a, b and c immediately.  We waited, knees bent ready for the sprint, until they told all people going to Osaka to get to counters 14-17 and we raced up there, destroying barriers in our path (I couldn't be bothered re-assembling them behind us, we wanted to check-in asap.  I figured whoever made the f*ckup that was that queue could fix the damn barriers!). 

At security I was super agitated when I set off the machine with my bangles and had to go through a second time, then got randomly picked for the search with the hand-held machine.  I may have given the woman a hard time initially.  It didn't help that I was wearing my new heels as they were the heaviest shoes I had with me and they were already hurting after our long wait and subsequent race through the airport. 

After I finally got free of security we went to our gate as fast as my heels would let me and arrived with a few minutes before boarding.  Phew! 

The flight went well, with me having a ridiculously deep sleep for about three hours, maybe more.  Don't know what caused it, but that sleep could only be described as 'primo'.  None of this shifting half sleep where you wake with a crick in your neck! 

However, towards the end of the flight, Jeff pointed out all the white caps on the waves below us.  Sure enough, as we got lower the plane started to rock around and some girls behind us started screeching every time the plane lurched.  I wasn't scared, but I did start thinking about the sick bag in the pocket in front of me.  The pilot spent a long time carefully lowered us down to the runway and when we hit the tarmac great clouds of smoke billowed up from our wheels - clearly we were braking hard.  In all fairness, I think the pilot did a good job in horrible weather, but it was certainly the most uncomfortable landing Jeff or I had experienced.  As we switched on our cellphones we found out that we were lucky to have got there okay, and that many flights had been cancelled due to the weather conditions. 

From touchdown, we had about 45 minutes to collect our luggage, get through customs, buy our tickets and get on our bus.  It sounded plenty of time, but if we missed that bus we had about two hours to wait for the next bus, which would make us too late to get our train, which would mean we would have to stay the night in Okayama, which would make Jeff late for work the next day. 

Anyway, we got through immigration quickly and raced up to collect our luggage.  Which wasn't there.  We waited and waited and waited.  We weren't the only ones waiting, which was some comfort, but knowing how disorganised Auckland airport had been, we both agreed there was a high chance our luggage had been put on the wrong flight.  We also agreed that missing our bus because our luggage had gone to the wrong city would suck.  Our bus was leaving at 6:05pm and we watched the minutes tick past on the clock above the luggage conveyor belt.  Finally, at 6:03pm, we spotted our bags.  I guess the wind that made it hard to land, then rocked the whole plane as we disembarked, must have made it hard to unload the luggage.  I said to Jeff we would never make it, but he wanted to try.  If we were going to do this thing, we were going to do it properly, so I took off my heels and we started pelting down the airport with me trying not to slip over in my fluffy stockings.

We zoomed through customs (I'm pretty sure we were supposed to declare that salami somewhere??) and ran out the door, with Jeff pushing aside some old guy who was going for a casual stroll in the middle of the exit and me crashing into a woman's trolley.  They seemed miffed, but I'm sure as they saw us running out the door, me in my miniskirt with shoes in hand, they probably got the message that we were in a SERIOUS hurry. 

We got a horrible shock when the door to outside opened to reveal lines and lines of people waiting for the buses.  I've never seen more than three people lining up there, but this time there was the best part of 100 people between us and our bus.  I took the trolley while Jeff pushed through to find out what was happening.  I took the opportunity to fish my flats out of my suitcase, to the visible relief of the Japanese people staring at me standing shoeless on the concrete (sorry ALTs, I've just taken the foreigners cause in Japan back at least 10 years!).  Jeff waded back through the crowd to me, to tell me that they were lined up for a different bus and that I should take the bags to the bus while he went back to grab us tickets.  Easier said than done.  I scooted along until I found a point where the line thinned a little, then 'sumimasen'ed my way through the crowd.  The Japanese laughed and commented 'sugoi!' (great!) when they saw me pushing my trolley with the three suitcases and my handbag.  Despite the urgency, I was very tempted to try to yell 'two people!' over my shoulder as I ran up to the bus. 

The super helpful guys by the bus loaded our suitcases, then told me to get onto the bus.  At least four times.  As far as they knew I just didn't like to travel light, but I knew I needed to stall the bus to allow Jeff to get back with our tickets.  Luckily people here get out of Jeff's way fast (I wonder why??) and I only had a few minutes of being told by the luggage guys to get on the bus while the driver asked me for my ticket and I gestured vaguely across the crowd saying, 'my husband, my husband'. 

On board the bus finally, we left the airport a little late, but very very happy to have made our bus.  At the other end we had, again, about an hour between our bus arriving and our train departing, so we relaxed back to read with our legs crossed (we both needed the loo, but hadn't had time at the airport for obvious reasons). 

However... the same storm that caused our rocky landing meant the bus was very delayed.  We pulled into Okayama Station with two minutes before our train left.  This time we both knew there was no way, short of teleportation, that we would make that train (and with teleportation we wouldn't have bought tickets, so we wouldn't be able to exit at the other end).  I sat in the bus stop with the luggage while Jeff went up to check our train options.  He came back to say there was another train to Fukuyama, but nothing to our stop.  At that point we could either stay the night in Okayama and take the train tomorrow morning (making Jeff late for work.  Luckily my school had a day off anyway), or take a train to Fukuyama and taxi it from there.  I vied for the second option, partly because it was cheaper, but mainly because I was suddenly dying to have a morning where I didn't have to repack my suitcase. 

After all our efforts to get home fate finally smiled on us and the train turned out to go onwards to the stop by my apartment - although Jeff suspects that perhaps they don't usually stop there, but did it to accomodate us because we were asking for the Bingo-Akasaka train. 

At the train station the plan was for one of us to go down to the apartment and get my car, so we could load the suitcases and drive them home.  It's only about a km from the station to my apartment, but Jeff's suitcase has bung wheels that only veer left, so he has to carry it, and mine has a broken handle so you have to hang onto the cloth handle, which means it constantly bangs your heels and slides your heels out of your shoes.  How I envy the Japanese with their beautiful matching, monogrammed luggage sets.  We only use out suitcases for the trips to NZ, so it doesn't seem worth investing in new ones, but at midnight at the train station new suitcases seemed like a bloody good idea! 

Anyway, at the station it was agreed I would stay with the bags while Jeff went down to the car.  For once I think we were both arguing to do the walk - Jeff feared falling asleep while I wasn't looking forward to the cold  However, as Jeff disappeared round the corner, an angel appeared.  The angel was disguised as a taxi driver, in an empty taxi.  Gratefully we threw our bags in the boot and jumped in the car.  For the grand total of 640 yen (about $10), we were delivered to our front door in only a few minutes.

And there ends the grand tale of our travel home.  Sometime before 1am Jeff finished his shower and I finished my toast (priorities!) and we fell into our futon, fast asleep (in case you're grossed out, I made up for not showering before bed by washing my sheets the next day!). 

Wednesday I spent doing laundry.  An incredible amount of laundry.  There was our holiday clothing, all the new shopping we had done, a full load left from before we left and two huge bags of stuff Emma gave me just before we left.  I did do other things too, but my day was at least 80% laundry. 

Today was my first day back at work.  I was really surprised to find no-one commented on my newly dyed hair.  It looked so strange before I went home that I expected lots of comments on the change.  But after having a good look in the mirror I decided that maybe it's because it does look kinda natural right now - just the right amount of yellow to the blonde to look right with my skin.  So maybe it's so natural-looking that they have forgotten what my hair was like before (Jeff reckons he forgets my previous hair within two days of a change!).  Alternatively it looks bad and they are just trying to be polite and avoid commenting :P 

The other surprise today was all the staff changes.  I had forgotten that when I returned there would be lots of new teachers here.  I was particularly struck by the number of young teachers we have in our school - although of course 'young' is relative and they may be 45 for all I know.  Maybe I should use the term 'babyfaced' instead.  The best news with the staff changes is that my grumpy old supervisor has left (no more summer BO!) and my friend Wasada-sensei, who sits next to me, has become a full-time teacher and has been given the job of supervising me.  Considering she is always the one who gives me the heads up on what's going on, translates emails for me and helps me filling out any forms I need to do, it's nice that she will finally get the credit for it!  I have finally joined the ranks of ALTs with cool supervisors.  Yay! :D

Hope you are all doing well.  To my NZ peeps who I caught up with, it was lovely to see your beautiful faces (particularly that especially beautiful bride!) and to those I didn't manage to see, I'm so sorry we couldn't meet up and hope we get to see each other in October.  xo

Marmite and tattoos

I just wanted to make a couple of observations here. 

Firstly, in staff meeting this morning I was pondering my changing attitude to my tattoo here in Japan (because staff meeting is entirely in Japanese, it's amazing the things I think about while the vice-principal informs us of all the serious stuff going on.  Last week I nodded and smiled eagerly because they were talking about Onomichi - a place I know and love.  Turns out they were talking about a train crash in Onomichi and how we didn't know yet if any of our students had been injured.  So smiling was not the right thing...??).  Anyway, today I thought about tattoos.  Before I came I was concerned by how many people talked about the inappropriateness of tattoos here in Japan and the need to cover them up.  As such, I always was careful to wear my watch with the super chunky band that covers my tattoo.  But over my time here I've slowly started to move from a 'when in Rome' mentality to a 'this is my culture, deal' attitude.  Although I obviously don't want to scare any old ladies and I will always cover it at school, I also think more about how I am a cultural representative so it's a good thing if the Japanese can learn from me that I can have a tattoo WITHOUT having gang affiliations! 

I guess one of the big moments for this came when some students at my visit school noticed a bit when my watch strap moved.  To shut them up I told them what it was, but told them it was a secret.  I make the assumption that they told the rest of the class immediately after I left the room and that, by now, the whole school, teachers included, know about it.  But you know what?  The sky didn't fall.  The subject was never brought up again.  Either I found the only three 16 yr olds capable of keeping a secret, or the youngsters here are a lot more savvy about foreign ways than the older folks believe. 

Since that little episode, I've been much more relaxed about it.  I will go to the supermarket 'uncovered', even the one right next to my house only just down the hill from school.  And I no longer get heart palpitations if my watch strap moves while I'm at school. 

Now for my other topic... Marmite.  Marmite currently consumes about 87% of my thinking.  You know all the stats on how blokes think of sex every 4 seconds?  That's me with Marmite right now.  I can't believe the timing, that the shelves are being cleared the week before I come home to stock up!  I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the Marmite gods will smile on me and I will be able to get hold of some...

In other Marmite news, I have converted one of my students!  It was a farewell afternoon tea for the English club kids.  I thought I should do something New Zealandy, so I took crackers and Marmite, plus some Japanese choccie biccies for a backup.  The crackers were like Snax and I spread a thin sliver of Marmite on each.  I didn't expect them to eat more than one each, but one girl, a vegan, couldn't get enough of them!  This student is very unusual.  She plays guitar, writes her own songs, is passionate about animal rights and is going off to music school because she wants to work in the industry.  When her class each asked me a question after my self-intro ('What is your favourite food?', 'What is your favourite colour?', 'Do you like Japan?'), her question was 'Does NZ have an SPCA?'  I happened to have an SPCA shopping bag Mum had left me when she visited, so I gave it to the student.  She was super delighted and has told me she will take it to university with her, as it's her favourite bag.  It's wonderful when you can give these little gifts that mean so little to you, but mean so much to someone else! 

Anyway, today she emailled me that she has bought Vegemite (I had told her about the local import store stocking it.  She also said she had bought Marmite, but that may be a miscommunication.  If she really has got Marmite, I'm going wherever the hell she went to get it, asap!).  She wanted to know what 'recipe recommendations' I had.  I said on toast, with either avocado, cheese or egg.  If anyone else has any suggestions, please let me know.  Although I believe I am rather... undiscriminating... with my Marmite usage.  For example, when Jeff made pancakes, I had a delicious Marmite and cheese pancake.  It was awesome.  I'm drooling in memory of it.  But if anyone does have any other suggestions for usage, I'm sure my little vegan would appreciate it! 

Hope you're all doing well and having a good week.  :)

NZ countdown!

Four sleeps till NZ!  Well, four for Jeff, because he can't sleep on planes, but five for me.  If I can get over my excitement about NZ wine on a plane to go to sleep! 

Things are pretty sad at school at the moment.  Out of the 12-odd English staff, around half are part-timers, so I assumed they would be staying at our school.  Turns out that for various personal reasons, most of them are leaving!  The teacher whose classes I find the easiest to teach is leaving, having only been here as a long term temp while another woman had a baby.  The woman that I did dinner with last year (and will again on Wed) is leaving for a junior high school.  Another teacher, who tried so hard to be friends that she went and watched Black Sheep to report back on it, mentioned today that she won't be here next year.  This sucks!  At this stage there are still three teachers that I'm friends with who aren't leaving, but two of the three may hear bad news on Wednesday.  Well, it would be bad news for me.  No idea how they would feel about it.  I'm pretty sure Kanmuri-sensei doesn't want to leave after eight years here (don't quote me on that number.  It's somewhere between six and ten), but she is also very very unusual in having been left in one spot for so long, so I think those eight years mean she is extremely likely to be shifted.  Often teachers are shifted every two or three years. 

I went to my supervisor today to try to get any information available on my teaching situation next year.  I had written out a list of questions that I tried him on.  Unfortunately he is of the class of human that, if he doesn't know the answer or doesn't understand the question, tries to give you an answer that sounds right, irrespective of its accuracy.  Nevertheless, I'm going to assume about 2/3 of what I was told will be correct.  According to him, I will continue to teach in the projector room (the rainforests of the world should rejoice in the saving on printing!), I will continue to visit Tode High on Tuesdays, there will no longer be a second ALT that I need to prepare a lesson plan for and I will be teaching both first and second year students.  The good news is that teaching second years will give me more on my schedule.  The bad news is that when I teach first years, the lesson topic is entirely my own choice.  This makes no sense to me, as I could give them great lessons on speaking about the moon in English, but it wouldn't help them in exams or everyday conversation!  Despite the fact they won't have a textbook, I think I'll run through the same type of topics they covered in the textbook anyway, just to give me SOME kind of guideline to work with!  Of course the freedom of spending the lesson however I like will be nice, but it also involves much more THINKING when I don't have a topic to cover with the students. 

Tomorrow (Tuesday) is a public holiday, so Jeff and I are having a Cleaning Day.  That way we can return to a nice clean, sparkly house.  On Sunday we got a head start, cleaning the kitchen (we even cleaned under the stove, Mum!).  Of course the problem with that was that Jeff then cooked spag bol.  There is no concensus on who dripped mincey tomatoeyness on the clean stove, but the fact is the lovely clean stove had to be hastily wiped down to preserve it's freshly cleaned allure!  Hopefully cleaning the floors and bathroom when Jeff has only one more night in the house will be safe.  As long as he doesn't decide to shave his head in the middle of the kitchen floor, or the hamster spit seeds all over my back and the tatami (it's happened before... The hamster thing, not the Jeff thing...), we should be good. 

After our Cleaning Day we have two days of work before heading towards the airport.  On Wednesday night we will stay in our seperate apartments, finalising packing.  Well, Jeff will stay in Jinseki so he doesn't get swallowed by my packing and accidentally zipped into my suitcase.  My technique requires much space.  In my defence, Jeff has been struggling to figure out what to take to NZ.  He told me he was wondering if thermals were necessary, to which I asked if he had ever worn thermals in NZ?  Sheepishly he said no, he hadn't, but that he couldn't remember what NZ was like.  My slightly homesick response was, 'Comfortable.  NZ is always comfortable.' 

Also on Wednesday, I will go to dinner with Inohara-sensei, one of the part-time teachers who is not returning.  I told her I didn't have much money at the moment so I couldn't come if it was going to be too expensive.  She got back to me today to tell me it was 3000 yen (roughly $45), but that if I couldn't afford it the cost would be shared round the other people going to dinner.  Of course not having money because I'm saving it to take it home is not a suitable reason for expecting others to pay your dinner.  BUT I can't get out of it on financial grounds because they said they would pay if I couldn't.  Awkward.  I guess I would still go, even if I wasn't in this tricky situation, just because Inohara-sensei is lovely and I want to stay friends with her even now she is not teaching with me, but it would have been nice to have the option.  I was hoping for a cheap dinner.  It's less that I mind the cost, but that a delicious okonomiyaki costs about 700 yen, a tasty burger and chips costs about 1000 yen, an acceptable Italian meal costs about 3000 and an edible huge traditional meal of sashimi and sliced sea slug costs about 6000 yen.  See where I'm going with this??  In Japan, how much I pay for a meal is a fairly good inverse indication of how much I'll enjoy the meal!  Hence I'm concerned about paying 3000 at somewhere pretty Japanesey.  I'm super super sick of paying lots of money for food that turns my stomach when I eat some simply to be polite! 

Of course, it may be one of those wonderful buffets (ask Steve or Geoff and Sandra about them!) where you can eat what you feel like, Japanese or Western.  That I would enjoy.  But I'll just have to wait and see... 

Speaking of food... in ten minutes I can leave here.  I am heading down to my apartment, where I will hoover the floor before packing the car and driving up to Jinseki.  On the way I will stop at the supermarket to buy our gourmet dinner of... supermarket salad.  Having said that, anyone who has spent any time in Japan will understand that you can buy all kinds of decent food at the supermarket, so I will have a choice out of about five different salads, or another five different traditional Japanese vegetable dishes.  Pretty good for a meal on the run - sure beats Maccas!  The only catch is I always get distracted by the fried goodies and often accidentally get myself a potato crochette or some pumpkin tempura.  Makes the salad idea a bit less healthy! 

Tonight, wish me the strength to buy supermarket dinner without buying anything fried, no matter how good it all smells!

Coin collecting

But... some good news to follow that up...

I just managed to get a lucky coin!  It's a special 500 yen coin, released last year.  Usually they are gold with 500 written across them, but this one is gold around the edge, with a silver inside and a picture of a castle in Kyushu.  A student had it, but she needed to pay some bill at school, so she reluctantly handed it over.  The teacher who was paid, who needed to pass it on to the school office showed me and explained about it.  I convinced her to let me swap it now I have in my possesion this special coin!  It is in a different part of my wallet so I don't accidentally spend it! 

Now I will attempt to add the picture...

Success!  Now you can all be envious of my awesome new coin. :D

Holiday - oh no, NOT holiday...

Hey there,

Prepare... I'm about to have a moan!

On Thursday the 1st my school had their graduation ceremony and on the 2nd the students started exams. I asked two (note that, not one but TWO) teachers if we have classes after exams. Both said no, there are no more classes.

Guess what? In a conversation on a totally different topic with Nakamura-sensei, she mentioned the classes running next week and the Monday of the following week. Wtf??

I know it shouldn't be a big deal, because I'll just play some games and maybe get them to write a paragraph, so it doesn't require any big prep or anything. But I THOUGHT I was on holiday! I thought I wasn't teaching all month, so I had plenty of time to catch up on my marking, prepare classes for next school year (has to be done early because I'll be teaching first day back after NZ), make resources, study Japanese, work on my infamous book and do all the little planning/sorting things involved in a new school year.

It's not like I don't have enough time to do it during exam week, but if I had known I only had that week, I would have done more on my To Do list instead of relaxing, writing blogs and books and doing less important stuff!

As it is, I feel totally ripped off. Here I was, enjoying my holiday, when I find out I was under false impressions... I am not, in fact, on holiday! Instead, I have been squandering a small break in my schedule!

*** Interlude ***

I just had a conversation with the teacher who informed me last year that I'll be teaching from a grammar textbook and that I may be teaching classes of 40 students. The good news is that my classes will be staying at 20 students (although it's not officially okayed by the Board of Education yet), while the bad news is that I'm only going to see them every second week. That sucks because currently I have a great schedule - two or three classes a day (with the occasional four, usually at Tode High School), with a total of 12-14 classes each week. But there are lots of ALTs out there who spend most days twiddling their thumbs, considering a two class day as a heavy workload. They get bored stupid, so I really really don't want that! Of course, there is a chance they will therefore get rid of the second ALT at this school and have me five days a week, but considering I have no idea why they swap me out for one day a week, I also don't know what would induce the Board of Education to keep me here all week.

The other bad news (which will sound familiar to Jeff), is that all the big changes will be announced by the Board of Education on next week, Friday. In theory, this leaves all the teachers two weeks to prepare for the new school year. This is not much at all, considering the changes we will hear include which teachers are being moved out of the school; whether our 20 student classes are approved; and for me which schools I will be posted at and which days of the week. I had assumed my schedule wouldn't change, but if Myoodai is dropping from 14 ALT classes a week to only 7, maybe they will keep me here all the time. I don't know... Seven classes a week BEFORE removing the ones Sam will teach... that's so few!!

Anyway, the result of that situation is that while most teachers have two weeks to get organised, because we are leaving for NZ I will have only three working days to plan my lessons and figure out what I'm doing. I have been told that my textbook is being revoked and, if I understand correctly, I can teach a totally textbook-less class. I asked if I could then follow the lessons I was teaching this last year (because I never had the students open the textbook anyway) and was told that the third year teachers were going to formulate a plan for what they wanted taught in first year. Fair enough, but they will probably do that while I'm in NZ. Class starts on the 2nd of April, when Sam will be teaching a lesson according to my lesson plan, but I will still be in NZ. So I need to have that first lesson ready to go before I leave. I guess I'll just have to make an intro lesson that is based on writing self-introductions and introducing the ALT. Nothing related to the course because I won't have a clue what they will need me to teach.

Hmm... only just occured to me that when I say Sam will be teaching on the Tuesday I'm in NZ, I'm making an assumption based on this year's schedule. It may just be me missing a class. Gah, I hate this period of the year! I know Jeff is made just as antsy by it, waiting on tenterhooks to find out a) how/if his schedule is changing (it's not) and b) which teachers are changing (he has his fingers crossed regarding a few teachers). We have had several conversations about how we could never be Japanese teachers, getting passed around from school to school with minimal warning and no say as to where you go!

Sorry about that moan there! In case you haven't noticed we are super homesick and can't wait for our holiday!!

 

Hope you're all doing well.

Charly

Procrastination

Procrastination.  It's a bad thing.  Usually.  Except sometimes, you're so busy procrastinating one thing, that you do lots of other useful things.  Like when Jeff was studying.  I was so sad when he finished his 499 paper, because the house was spotless when he was supposed to be worked on that project.  And today, I should have spent all day catching up on the Japanese study that I'm about three weeks behind in (test due next week).  Have I looked at my Japanese today?  No.  But you know what?  I've done about four pages of editing/writing on my blog/book (need a catchier title for that...), something I haven't looked at in months and months.  2,069 words today, thank you very much.  And I'm very, very pleased with myself. 

Just to clarify, that's not because my writing was brilliant or that the thing is looking so polished - there is still a lot to be done.  I view this project as like peeling an onion.  Or painting a wall.  But something with layers.  Oh, stripping a wall and then repainting, that's what it's like!  I'm currently taking out real names, glossing details and noting or plugging holes in the story.  But I'm very pleased with myself because even if it takes me ten years to finish this thing, every little bit I do on it gets me closer to my goal of having written a completed book.  Even without publishing, it would be exciting to say I had written a book! 

That's all I had to say right now...  I'm off to photocopy the grammar points of my Japanese book and jump straight to the test without doing any of the activities or learning any of the new grammar.  Not ideal, but better than just giving up.  I have severe doubts about whether I'll bother signing up for the Intermediate course next year.  At least I don't have to worry about failing this Beginner course - firstly I have Jeff to check my tests for me, and secondly Jeff has the old tests, so when he's not sure of the answer he checks the answer schedule!  Although it does take the fun out of receiving your grade when you already know it'll be 100!  Having said that, I have found that studying by discussing it with Jeff is a really great way to learn and remember the new Japanese.  I find it very hard to remember stuff when I've only read it, so speaking and discussing it means I remember much better.  That's in case anyone wanted to accuse me of straightup cheating ;)

Hope you're all doing well.  I'm enjoying my break from classes and am counting down till we return to NZ!  Yay!

Graduation

Hey there,


This is a just for me to share a student's work with you, as I feel I've been overdoing it on facebook lately! 

This is one of the better answers I received - very few mistakes.  But is this what's to become of my intelligent students??

Tell me your favourite part of Japanese culture:

I like the loyalists in the last day of the Tokugawa Shogunate.  There is a lot of man who rise to greatness in turbulent times.  One of these guys, I like Yodo Yamauchi.  He was heavy drinker.  He always drunk sake.  I wanna be like him. 


Oh man!  lol 

Today was graduation day.  I was prepared for one hour of sitting in the freezing gym listening to presentations in a language I don't understand.  It was two and a half hours.  I finally ducked out for a toilet break after two hours, deeming disturbing everyone to be preferable to wetting myself. 

I noticed many of the parents, students and teachers taking naps during the presentation, but I couldn't overcome my cultural notion that sleeping during important ceremonies (or, indeed, sleeping during work hours at all) is a total no-no.  However, I had to question the Japanese love of overlong, overformal ceremonies, when they also love to nap anywhere, anytime.  Surely one cancels out the other?  Let's just skip to the chase and save ourselves an hour and a half of pomp, hey? 

However, today I learnt an important Japanese fashion lesson.  Apparently to be a woman dressed formally here, all you need to do is wear a black jacket and pin a huge fabric flower to your lapel.  Bonus points for glitter, lace, pearls, or anything big enough to pull your top so it's lopsided.  On one woman, it looks nice.  On a whole tribe of women, all decked out in flowers of varying pastel shades with the odd metallic from the ones under 40, it looked ridiculous. 

Personally, I felt stink that I had nothing special to wear today.  Various outfits in my wardrobe are suitably formal so that I didn't feel underdressed, but it would have been nice to do something special when everyone else was looking so smart.  So now I'm wondering if it's taking the piss if I get myself a nice black tie.  I used to have Dad's black silk one on a permenant loan (he stole if from a Coke advertising set, so he couldn't complain too much!), so I'm thinking of getting my own.  Then I can slap on a nice black tie with a white shirt and look suitably formal without having to go all Japanese with a pin-on flower.  Opinions... is that rocking the boat crossing gender clothing norms, or just being acceptably non-uniform (which is what us foreigners do best!).

Ok, I'm going to head home now.  I am pretty sure (haven't been told officially or anything) that I have no more classes for the school year.  Which means I have three weeks to catch up on journal marking, Japanese study and all the other odds and ends that have been accumulating.  And after that three weeks... NEW ZEALAND!  Yay! 

The only downside is that we have no downtime between getting back to Japan and starting work (I think I'll miss the first two days or something.  On the bright side no opening ceremony.  Yay!!).  That means I'll have to prepare some lessons and stuff so I'm all ready to go.  I still don't know what textbook I'm using and whether I'll have 20 students or 40 students per class.  Obviously that changes things a bit...  But I'm very excited about being able to train them from the start.  I'll give them all a piece of paper with common classroom requests and phrases.  It will include things like 'make a circle', 'where is it?', 'please read it' and other things they should totally know from junior high school but have forgotten or pretend not to remember.  Grammar points to cover early will be that 'Are you ready?' cannot be correctly answered by 'Ok' and that 'I like baseball.  Because it's fun.' is not, in fact, two sentences.  No matter how badly you are trying to hit the five sentence minimum.  I will also clearly establish my expectation that they will bring their notebook to every class and that they will stick loose paperwork into their book or folder.  Then, if they don't comply with those things and get caught out, they will be performing Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes to the class. 

It's been hard taking over from someone else mid-year, when I have no idea what type of classroom expectations he had or what type of classroom commands he used.  As he was American, I think a fair number of the common commands and phrases would be different.  Anyway, clean slate with these students.  And because I'm staying for another year, I'll be taking them right through.  I will start the journal writing exercise early with them (my recent experiments with it suggest it will be highly beneficial writing practise) and I hope to see the new students do better than the group that have just finished their first year.  The school has been trying to fix an issue with English scores dropping, so I'm excited to potentially make a positive impact with instilling English journals.  Even if they only improve by 3%, 3% each times 280 odd students is... well, a lot of percent!  Writing it like this, it sounds egotistical/overly enthusiastic to think I can fix an issue a whole school is grappling with, but I really think regular writing practise in an informal format (eg. not just practising set phrases for the exam) could make a real difference in students enjoyment and understanding of the language. 

Well, you'll hear all about it if I pour my heart and soul into this idea and it doesn't take off.  And by 'heart and soul' I mean spare time and lunchbreak! 

Hope you're all doing well.  NZ... see you soon!!!

Two Years

Hey there,

While we haven't been very subtle about it - posting on facebook etc - for those of you that missed the exciting event, Jeff and I have been married for two years!  I always used to think (oh, naive child!) that marriage just HAPPENED, that you fell into it and as long as noone slept around, that was it for a successful marriage.  My own parents recent marital issues have proved to me how incorrect that attitude was.  When we were dating I viewed dates as just that.  It was always a mildly surprising reminder of how long we'd been hanging out together and an excuse to go out for dinner.  Now I'm married I view it as a whole different story.  Our culture (and my recent family problems) is so full of news about divorces and marriages gone wrong that while Jeff having been my boyfriend for four years seemed like just a date, Jeff having been my husband for two years seems like an achievement!  (And this touching little entry of mine is no time for any smart-arse comments about Jeff, thankyou!  That goes for both sets of parents and Shelley :P )  (Note: I've long wondered about mentioning Mum and Dad's recent issues on here.  I held back while it was in the thick of it, but I think most of you in NZ have heard Mum talk about it and if you're over here, you may well have heard me mention it.  It was a pretty traumatic time all round, but now it seems like if the relationship lasts, it'll be a much, much more mutually rewarding one than the last few years.  There have been important lessons learnt all round, even if there were things like 'don't let your parents stay in your tiny Japanese apartment when they're supposedly seperating'.  :P  It's ok parents, you're still allowed back xxx)

Anyway, we had a really fun night.  I got dressed up in a new dress from Singapore, put my heels in my handbag and we walked up to the train station.  I changed shoes on the train and we went wandering round the centre of town looking for somewhere to have dinner.  The place I had chosen wasn't open, so we ended up at Italian place we had been to before (and therefore knew it was good).  I had a yummy white wine (actually no idea what it was... the 'English' menu was actually Italian.  Because those two are pretty much the same...) and Jeff had some imported beer.  Not the one he ordered, but one he likes even more, so that was ok.  We had bruschetta (translated as 'toast on tomato') and a wee cheese plate to start (oh blue cheese how I love you!), followed by pizza and pasta.  It was all very tasty and a thoroughly enjoyable night, concluded by another meander through the wee streets of bars and restaurants, lit by strings of blue fairy lights, back to the station. 

In other news, I wanted to tell you about an exciting wildlife experience I had a week or so ago.  I was driving along a country road in Jinseki, at about 4pm, when a big bird flew overhead and settled on the power line on the side of the road.  I did a double take, going "Was that...?"

I turned around and drove back, and sure enough it was a huge white and brown owl.  It turned its head to stare at me.  I fumbled round the car looking for the camera (I had left it on the table at home) and finally fished out my cellphone.  By this point it decided I was enough of a concern to move further down the road.  I followed it, inching along in my little Dihatsu Mira.  I managed to click one crappy photo, enough to show that its foliage was perfectly blended to the bare sticks and snow of the background (by that I mean you can't see it on the photo.  At all).  Finally it turned its big dark eyes away, spread its wings and flew away across the snow covered rice fields.  Amazing!!

I hope you're all doing well, wherever you are atm.  If you're in NZ, hope to see you in three weeks!!!

Almost two weeks

Almost two weeks since I last wrote... how does that happen?  I'm convinced I write really often, when pressed saying I write once or twice a week, but it's actually much, much less than that! 

In all fairness, lately I've been pretty busy.  The school speech competition is on this afternoon so I've been working late every day for the last couple of weeks to coach the students.  Unfortunately it also coincided with the upcoming exam (Mar 2nd), which I was required to write a portion of.  The Listening section was ok - I did the same thing last exam - but I really had no idea what was required of me for the Writing section.  Usually the instructions are all in Japanese, so even looking at old exams wasn't super helpful.  However, in looking through old exams I remembered that last time the teacher had borrowed one of my old in-class vocabulary quizzes and included that in the exam, so I thought maybe that's what the teacher organising this one was on about.  He was super unclear, but I made a new vocab quiz and handed it over.  He hasn't come back to me with any changes necessary, so I guess it was ok... 

The only problem is, the teacher I was working with last exam is very confident.  When I first started I got a bad impression of her because she changed my lesson plan, which had a follow-through effect of meaning that in following lessons, her classes had covered different stuff and in a different order to all my other classes, so I needed to make adjusted lesson plans for her group, when everyone else follows the same plan.  BUT I quickly came to realise that she's confident because she's good and she's willing to tell me what to change because she knows her students capabilities.  In a short time she became one of my favourite teachers to work with.  As such, when my exam questions were too hard/easy she was perfectly happy to come back to me and tell me what to change. 

On the other hand... the teacher maknig the exam this time is a shy little bird of a man.  I know it's not the first time I've scared a bloke, but I'm not used to also feeling physically imposing when working with a guy.  He is a slender, quiet man, almost a head shorter than me.  I think his English is good, but he's so busy talking around the subject instead of being blunt and he would never be rude enough to tell me he disagreed or didn't understand, so I find him really hard to communicate with.  He is one of those people that is so busy trying to be agreeable that it's very hard to find out what they want from a situation.  As such... I have no idea if that was what he wanted or not.  But I'm guessing that will be what goes in the exam! 

Yesterday was a relatively uneventful day at Tode.  I'm not sure why I always end up blogging about Tode.  Perhaps because it's only my visit school I feel less disrepectful talking about them,  Or maybe it's because I don't lead the lesson so I get to observe (and comment on!) the teaching of others. 

Anyway, yesterday I DIDN'T scream at my teacher who compulsively translates everything, although I was fantasising about it.  I admit I did snap out "I said I will read it three times, so I will read it three times" when he cut me off after once to translate the question for the students and ask a student to answer the question.  If he is going to translate it for the students (and sometimes write it on the board), why does he bother preparing me with the question in English, but deletes it from the students handout?  I assumed the point of the exercise was listening practise (and English practise), but when he's translating and writing, I wonder why he doesn't save himself the time and leave it on the kid's handouts in the first place... 

But I am trying to work in little ways to challenge the kids, even if he is busy undermining his own teaching.  I do simple things, like walk around the class to check the students have their textbooks open and at the right page (about a 50% hit rate); tapping their book during listening exercises to draw their attention to the fact they should be listening and writing, not talking or reading a comic; and my latest one being reading the question three times to allow the kids who want to try to get a good listen to the English and take a guess at the answer before the teacher translates it for them. 

The other thing he does that drives me crazy is he tells the students who he will ask to answer BEFORE we do the exercise, so only the student(s) who will be called on ever bother listening.  I can't blame the students for being so lazy when he never, ever challenges them, but it will really affect them when they change to a different teacher next year. 

In the next lesson, with the teacher who often displays an assumption that Japanese culture is world culture ("You don't bow, even if you're really sorry??"), he again didn't really know how to use me.  Two weeks ago he had asked me to prepare a slide show on 'travel', which I narrowed down to castles (I think I mentioned it on here?).  Anyway, last week he was actually absent, but nobody told me on the assumption that he told me the week before, which he HADN'T.  So I had this super awkward conversation with a relieving Japanese teacher, where I was trying to ask if he wanted me in the class but couldn't work out the Japanese to manage.  All the English teachers had buggered off somewhere and there was no-one to ask for help.  Finally I told him I would do my 20 min castles talk, by which time some English teachers were back in the office to be our translators.  Considering there was no translator during the talk, it was pretty successful.  I asked the kids if they knew a certain building and they all agreed they didn't.  Then I showed a picture of inside - and they all successfully identified it with a scream of "Harry Potter!"  Yes, it is the set of the hallways next to the courtyard in that internationally popular film! 

Anyway, this week the teacher never mentioned his having been absent and never brought up the slideshow at all (I thought I would be showing it again with translation this time).  Instead, he asked me to come in 15 minutes late because the kids had a test.  When I arrived, they were still busy doing the test.  Finally the teacher asked them to do an exercise in pairs.  There was an uneven number, so I went and sat in the spare seat to work with the students.  I don't know if it was because I was sitting with the kids so the teacher forgot who I was, or whether because I was tired I was understanding less Japanese and body language than usual, but the teacher kept giving instructions then looking at me expectantly.  Only problem, the instructions were all in Japanese.  I was too tired to be very helpful, just following the students or looking at him quizically until he threw out a page number of something English.  He clearly had no idea he was doing it, because he never apologised or anything.  Just gave me strange looks when I gave him my "you know I don't speak Japanese, right?" face. 

In my last class, I had an amusing experience (apologies if you already read this on facebook).  Three kids were discussing my hair colour and the difference between the dyed ends and the regrowth on top (a year's worth of regrowth, yikes!).  I explained the top was my natural colour, that I only had it dyed in NZ.  One boy (who looks like he spends a good two hours with the straighteners every morning!) scrutinised me, then declared it was 'pudding coloured'.  I thought that was so funny!  (For clarification, for those that are not up with Japanese culture, 'pudding' is the consistency of the old Instant Puddings that parents used to make when we were young, with the flavour of creme brulee.  Likewise creme brulee colour.  Oooh... 'creme brulee' hair... I might have just invented a new colour!  I can sell it to L'oreal and make millions!) 

Anyway, I totally cracked up, and the class did too.  Only I was laughing at the pudding hair colour, while I think the class was laughing in surprise at seeing how much I was laughing.  Whatever, it was totally a laugh-with, not laugh-at, because Japanese students are way less malicious than Western ones.  Back home teenagers are nasty things (apologies to Laura if you read this!).  That sounds dramatic, but you know what I mean.  Looking back as an adult, almost all the behaviour I'm ashamed of occurred when I was a teen.  Occasionally I torture myself by reading old diaries.  I can never decide whether I was lucky to have friends, behaving like I did, or whether the question is why I hung out with some of the people who behaved like they did!  So I'm not saying you're a bad person for being 16 years old, Laura, merely that you are not quite as good as you are at 11 or 22...  :P

Well, this got super off track (although it does raise an important theme all ALTs can tell you about - the NICENESS of Japanese teens), so I will stop here! 

Hope you are all well and I will try to blog again next week!

Jeff's birthday

Sorry that may not be a very appropriate title - I don't have much to say about Jeff's birthday but I have no idea what I intend to tell you in this update.  Not that that concerns me.  I usually think I'm going to write about one thing, title the post as such, then only remember to mention that thing at the end (because I re-read the title). 

As for Jeff's birthday (29!), the one thing I wanted to report was that I got him an All Blacks polo.  Jeff was pretty stoked, as expected.  The most exciting thing was that it FITTED.  None of this trying to squeeze into XXL (or is it LLL?  I get confused...).  I really went out on a limb to get it.  He had been talking about wanting one for ages, so I thought if he knew I was doing online shopping he would immediately realise what I got him.  And he would have to know, because my credit card is now an ex-credit card (my old one got changed for a new one, but the new one never turned up - either lost in the mail or lost at my parent's place.  Not that I knew until a couple of months later when I was trying to book Malaysian trains.  Whatever the case, I told the bank to just cancel it asap). 

Anyway, I decided to pretend I had bought something here, but borrowed Mum and Dad's credit card.  To make this convincing, I then had to work late, while pretending I was at the mall (I hid in the storage cupboard when he called, as I hoped the echo would sound like the mall bathroom, because my office doesn't have the blaring mall music!).  I also hid some money in the wrong compartment in my wallet, so it looked like I had spent it.  Sitting at work mucking around on my laptop I had to remember NOT to sign in to facebook, because that would have been a total giveaway that I wasn't where I said I was!  (no, I don't have a fancy iphone!)

Mum and Dad's credit card turned out to be the most difficult part.  Dad's sausage fingers typed in some wrong numbers, so when I went to buy, it didn't work.  I then spent about three hours sitting at work long after I should have gone home waiting first for some family member to come online and rescue me and secondly to physically fetch the details (Laura misunderstood my 'need now' for a 'need soon' and left me hanging for an hour or so while she facebooked or something :P ).  That sounds overdramatic, but I had an online voucher for Hallentsteins (where I bought a few other wee gifts too) and if I logged off to wait at home I would have lost my voucher.  So I was going to sit at my work desk until midnight if I had to, to get my 20% discount!!  While that may not be altogether practical, I was digging my heels in! 

The last slight complication was that I wanted the boxes delivered to my school (again, obviously, so Jeff didn't know about them).  I asked a teacher for the school address so I could have something sent here.  She looked unsure and went to phone the office and ask.  She came back to me saying that the office couldn't give out that information, that it was private and teachers couldn't do that, that we had to use our own.  I wasn't sure WHAT was going on, but it was pretty clear there was some major miscommunication going on.  I tried to rephrase my request, explaining my letterbox at my apartment was too small to put a parcel in, when the penny dropped.  "Oh, you don't want an email address?"  "Ah, no, like the physical address."  I thought that was so strange, that when I used the word 'address', there had been an assumption I meant email!  Anyway, another phone call was made, I was given the school's address and the packages were delivered with no further drama. 

In the end Jeff was totally surprised and I managed to not say anything to give the game away - even though there were a couple of close calls (you know where you're several words into a sentence when you realise you can't mention that thing...).  Not surprising when you look at how much I went through to secure his presents! 

As for Japan...  We are not doing AWESOMELY atm...  We seem to be paying money hand over fist, although we are not sure why.  Of course, the parking drama didn't help.  Neither did the 20,000 yen I was told I owed a couple of days later (2,500 per month for the time that I've been in my apartment.  Only they never mentioned it until now, so I got hit with a hefty sum!).  Apparently it covers communal stuff like outdoor lights and sewage.  By that point I just sighed and handed over the money.  Well, not quite.  I had to go to the bank to get out more to pay a bill like that, but there was no way I could get around it.  I just wish I had been warned!  Of course, it's always the way - when you are trying your hardest to save, all those annoying, unexpected and unnecessary bills crop up (just before we left NZ was the last time we felt like this - we needed all our money for Japan and I went and pranged the car!).  A month and a bit from NZ, when we really want all our extra $$ to put in our savings account, we feel like we are pouring our money down the drain.  Jeff is further frustrated by the high NZ dollar - the highest it has been against the yen since we came to Japan.  Not the ideal time to be bringing home large amounts of cash!  We will probably investigate that ASB foreign currency account, so we can bide our time. 

It's been a funny time, since we got back from Singapore.  All the ALTs talk about is who is staying and who is going.  Several of our good friends are leaving, so next year will be quite different.  We are bad enough at meeting up with and staying in touch with people, but with two of the ALTs we see the most of leaving (Emma - our 'neighbour' only half an hour away and Gabby - the other ALT who came in at the same time as us and brought her lovely family), we are going to have to make an effort to socialise more with some of the newer ALTs.  Although I suspect the ALTs who started in my year who are staying for a second year will be in the same boat.  It seems like lots of ALTs are leaving after their first year this time round, so those staying for a second year will probably also be looking to shake up their social circles (yup Katie, you still need to get back to me about Indian!). 

It feels like a sad time, actually.  The winter makes everyone a little down and we are preparing to farewell lots of good friends.  Plus most of us have signed (actually, I think today is the final day to make your decision!), whether we signed to say we are staying, or signed to say we are leaving, and everyone is now having doubts about their decision.  There will, inevitably, be people who, come August, will leaave wishing they were staying, or will stay wishing they were leaving.  For us, it seemed like a no-brainer - we are finally on a good salary and I'm enjoying the new job.  But then (after we had signed!) Jeff pointed our that if we leave after three years, we are currently only halfway through our time here.  Because we are signing now for the third year, we FEEL like we are already two years in.  But Jeff's point about being only halfway now was a little scary.  It's always hard feeling like you have commited to something for a long time (my contracted one year in America was much, much harder than my here-and-there ten months in Europe) and it feels like we have been in Japan for such a long time already.  Who knows how we will feel about the place in another year and a half! 

Hmm... just heard an intense three teacher discussion.  All I could pick out was my name and Monday.  Repeated a bunch of times.  Who knows... 

Ok, time to get myself ready to teach.  Have a good day all. 

Culture shock part II

So here I was thinking my culture shock weekend was in the past... when the issue of Jeff's parking comes up. To try to keep the saga brief, here is the bullet-pointed story:

* I have to pay to park at my apartment.
* Jeff was parking there too on the two or three nights he came down.
* We received a notice that ONLY those who had paid were allowed to park there.
* Jeff parked at the supermarket and got a notice on his windscreen.
* I told my school that they needed to sort somewhere for Jeff to park.
* They came back to me with a carpark. For 3000 yen ($50) a month. That he will be using two nights a week :S
* Today I was told I also need to pay a one-off fee of 3000 yen to the real estate agent.
* Today I was also told I need to pay the full 6000 in the next two days.
* Today I was also told I need to pay a fee to transfer the money.
* Today I was also told that I can't set up an automatic payment to a private company and therefore must go to the bank to pay every month.
* Today I was also told that I must take an hour's leave to go down to the bank with my supervisor to pay.

I'm picking I don't have to go into the details of why this is very very frustrating.

Oh, ok, the one bit of backstory you need to know (if you're not already Japan-savvy) is that if you need to go on holiday, you take holiday leave. If you need to go to the bank, you take holiday leave. If you get sick, you take holiday leave.

Between our Christmas holiday trip and our upcoming trip to NZ, I have only two days of leave left. Hence I got rather panicky at being told I needed to take some of that to go to the bank ("it's only an hour", "but then, if I get sick and need to take the day off, I have to come to school and throw up for an hour!"). Finally I just said no and went online to get detailed instructions on how to do payments from the ATM. Now I just have to race to the ATM from work to make sure I have plenty of time to work this out!

I should be doing some Japanese study now but I'm just feeling kinda stressed and jittery. It's not like the sky will fall if I don't accomplish this payment tonight, but it does mean a long day tomorrow coming back to Myoodai after teaching at Tode to get my supervisor to help me do the transfer. I'm determined not to need him though!!

It's just super frustrating that my school wants me to take time off for this when they had to do almost NOTHING to set me up when I first got here. Really, they took me to my apartment, that was it. And now they are saying I need to take leave to do this because it's 'personal'. Umm, actually they took me on as an employee knowing I had a husband and knowing that my family is part of their responsibility!! Pain in the freaking ass!!!

Ok, calm down Charly. Not making anything better by getting frustrated at Japanese beauracracy! Hope you're all having a less frustrating day than I am!

Culture shock

I gave Jeff a bit of a fright on Saturday night.  We went out for ramen (noodles in broth) for dinner.  As we started approaching the restaurant I started feeling a bit unwell, something related to overly tight shoulder muscles from my new workout routine and a car seat made for narrow Japanese shoulders.  Inside, I couldn't remember the name of the ramen I usually order (one loaded with sprouts and other veg) but we thought the 'Stamina ramen' looked right (and a healthy high veg diet gives you stamina, right?).  We were wrong.  Very very wrong.  It came out with the noodles wrapped round a fatty piece of bone, with a raw egg cracked on top.  I looked at the globules of fat floating on the surface and watched small bits of fattiness break off the bone in the centre and my stomach turned.

I had already spent the previous evening at a work function where I pondered the philosophical question: why is it that the more I spend on a meal, the less I like it?  My hugely expensive work dinners are always full of 'delicacies' that I struggle to swallow.  At this particular dinner things kicked off with sliced sea slug.  Other particularly memorable foods included the obligatory sashimi platter, with several different types of fish, octopus, a whole raw fish and a shell with stuff that even the Japanese didn't know what it was; and a fried chicken dish.  What part of the chicken I can't tell you.  I have learnt not to eat chicken in Japan, but I took the smallest piece to be polite and immediately regreted my decision.  It was very thick fat with maybe a bit of cartilage going on.  My chewing didn't penetrate and I realised there was only one thing for it - it was going down whole with my oolong tea.  I was thankful I had been 'training' by swallowing four big supplement pills at once, but even so it took me several attempts (and possibly some odd noises, crossed eyes and a purplish facial colour) before I succeeded in swallowing the offending piece of meat.  After that I ate a big piece of salmon sashimi because, relative to that, a big piece of raw, but fat free, meat seemed refreshing. 

Anyway, when I sat in front of this big steaming bowl of fattiness, the previous evening's efforts came back to me in all their horror.  I managed to eat out the noodles - just - and made it out to the car before I had a meltdown.  Jeff paid up and came out to find me super upset in the car.  After several bottles of iced tea to take away the taste and soothing talk about how everyone suffers culture shock sometimes failed to assuage the tears, Jeff started rustling around in the back seat.  "I know what you need!"  He put something small and white in my hand.  "It's moment's like these you need Minties!"  I couldn't help but laugh.  He had bought them at the Singapore airport when we found a wonderful wonderful store that stocked Whitakers, licorice allsorts and Minties.  And who knew advertising could be so right?  A little Minty piece of home was exactly what I needed! 

I'm going to miss my 3rd years!!

Jeff and I have discussed many times how perfect it is that I was placed in a high school.  Although I maintain I was getting better at playing with little kids (not without work - playing with small children does not come naturally to me!), there is no doubt that Senior High School is the best place for me.  In that vein, my third year (last year before Uni) class was my favourite because I could really have a conversation with them and I didn't have to behave like a teacher.  So I was really really sad when my teacher told me on a Friday, a couple of weeks ago, that the next class would be our last lesson with them!  From here on, they just have special study sessions preparing for the entrance exams for the university(s) of their choice.  I had no idea and I was so gutted!  I put together a class revolving around music (Harry and Laura's Cabaret performances and a Brooke Fraser music video) and photos (pictures from our Singapore and Malaysia trip).  I think they really enjoyed it, but it was only half the class because some were already busy cramming.  Also, being caught unawares, I didn't think to prepare any goodbye message or anything, or hand out my email address which I intended to do in the hopes they would be encouraged to keep up the communication and travel.

However, just now I had a student come in with a green polkadot envelope.  Inside was a really cute card with a message for me:

Dear Charly
Hi!  I'm Mina Sato.
Thank you very much for a year.  I enjoyed playing Charly's class very much.
I am sad to graduate from high school.
But I am looking forward to going to university.
I will study English harder in university and I want to be an English teacher.
Good luck to Charly!  I love you <3
Mina Sato

Aww!!!  No wonder I miss that group! 

Also... can I just point out to all those who suggest I am a mean teacher and am always hard on my students (Jeff and parents!), she likes 'playing' Charly's class!  See, I knew I was a fun teacher.  Sometimes.  If you're not 16 and talking when I'm talking.  lol. 

In other news... tonight I'm meeting my potential 'new friend'.  It feels about as lame as it sounds, but it's a woman we met at a restuarant who happens to live close to my apartment.  She teaches English at a community centre and was trying really really hard to talk to us when we were at dinner, so when she gave me her business card (standard practice when you're introduced to someone here), I felt bad for not having anything to return and gave her my email address.  Later she contacted me and although the organisation has been super awkward (when I said I was free all week I forgot to explain that I'm in Jinseki at the weekends, she understood 'not busy except for next week' to mean I was free next week, she wanted to meet at 2:30 when I am very very at work, etc), we finally settled on this afternoon, 4:30pm, at the McDonalds by my apartment.  From our previous conversation I have reason to believe I will be inundated with vegetables from her parent's vege patch - whoop whoop! 

I felt a little like I was just going to be helping a stranger practice their English when their are plenty of other people I would like to spend time with, both ALT friends and teachers at school I would like to be friends with outside of school.  But as Jeff pointed out, I should make the effort because it would be great for me to have a local friend.  Which sounds stupid, but in winter we are spending about three nights a week apart, so he's right, it would be good to have someone local in case I'm bored, lonely or have a problem.  Plus, if I can muster up the energy and courage, she might be willing to let me practise my Japanese on her, too. 

Jeff and I had a big talk last night about how hard it is to actually get the spoken practise because it's really nerve-wracking trying out new language when you have no idea if you're saying the right thing or not, and most of the time we work with English teachers so we can get away with only using English.  If anyone had told me I would almost never practise my Japanese while living in Japan, I would never had believed them!! 

Hope you're all doing well and that you are getting some nice weather. 

Two months till NZ, yay!

Training, Snowboarding, etc

Last week we had our ALT training in Hiroshima, from Tuesday to Thursday.  I fear I gave the Wednesday rather harsh marks in my assesment - mainly because my supervisor turned up and TOTALLY cramped my style!  In all fairness, I think every high school supervisor came, but I was unprepared for the shock.  The first I had heard of his possibly coming was Jeff pointing out in an email that our supervisors were invited.  When the weeks passed silently and my supervisor never said anything to me, I assumed he had declined the invitation.  So I did a huge double-take on Wednesday when I walked down into the stairs into the auditorium and two steps after passing Tanto, my brain registered what I had just seen.  Jeff had expressed a desire to meet this amazingly surly and sour man I worked with, so I called Jeff back to introduce him.  As Jeff has promised he would, he shook Tanto's hand and thanked him effusively for being so helpful to me.  Smartarse. 

I was moaning about him and trying to hide (apart from anything else, I was letting my wrist tattoo get a few day's fresh air, wearing my thin loose watch instead of my huge rubber one cranked up tight so it covers everything).  Jeff pointed out that for the workshops we were split into several rooms and then into several groups, so there were minimal chances I would be in his group.  So Jeff had to work hard not to fall about laughing when he saw Tanto was in our room and - you guessed it - in my group. 

For the first two workshops we were in a group of four - Tanto, myself and two other ALTs.  I noticed that after Tuesday, speaking only to native speakers, our speed of speech had really picked up and the JTEs (Japanese Teachers of English) were really struggling to follow.  So I purposefully busted my ass asking Tanto questions, slowly with simple English, during the ALT discussion, to try to make sure he felt he was adding to the conversation.  It was super awkward because often you could see he had prepared an answer to the original question or discussion point, so his answer didn't even fit my question, but the other two ALTs were really good about taking his comment and making a big deal of it.  It felt a little like babysitting, to be honest.  Trying to find the balance between patronising and ignoring! 

For the last workshop, we were with two other high school ALTs and their JTE supervisors.  This time one of the other ALTs was sitting between Tanto and I, so I felt relieved of the pressure to spoonfeed him bits of conversation and try to make him interact like a NORMAL person.  Luckily for Sophie, sitting between us, he must have showered that day because his body odour was under control.  During that conversation, Katie, Sophie and I talked quickly and didn't make any extra effort to include the JTEs.  Having said that, both the other JTEs did add things to the conversation, particularly explaining the Japanese holidays that were our 'lesson planning topic.'  The woman was trying to be really helpful while the older bloke cracked a few jokes with a big grin.  Tanto?  He sat in stony silence the whole time.  Not a word.  Due to the seating arrangements, I couldn't see him, but I wouldn't be surprised if he had his eyes closed.  Yup, he's that special.

Before that last workshop, in the toilet queue, Katie had laughed at me about my antisocial supervisor being here - he's getting famous!  She commented on 'wanting to meet him'.  When I came back into the workshop room to realise she was sitting with the delightful Tanto and I, I couldn't help but laugh.  I was feeling too tired from the last two workshops to do a 'Oh Tanto, please meet my friends Katie and Sophie', so I just did super obvious rolling eyes  to my right to indicate 'that's the one!'  Katie gave me a grin and her supervisor, sitting opposite me, gave me a puzzled look. 

Other than that, the training was good fun.  It was a good chance to hang out with the ALTs we have been meaning to but haven't got around to catching up with since August, find out who is staying another year and catch up over drinks and ugly sweaters.  Apologies if I already mentioned the sweaters, but the drinks and dinner evening was themed 'Cosby sweaters'.  Jeff went for a subtle black, purple and green (very authentic, I'm pretty sure Dad used to teach in one like it...) while I went for a brown and aqua one that had been knitted by someone with commitment issues - every row seemed a new pattern.  Jeff and I were big fans of the theme - obviously cheap and weather appropriate, it also provided bundles of fun both shopping (picture Jeff and I laughing our heads off trying on the ten ugliest sweaters we could find in front of an op-shop mirror, while other shoppers avoid us in case our clothing taste is infectious), then wearing them at the bar.  Everyone had made a real effort and there were some truly amazing sweaters.  Lots of 80's cool - and some 'wasn't even cool then'.  It was a good night.

Of course, anyone who has anything to do with funding might be wondering if I actually did anything but socialise during the training.  However, I did get some good ideas - particularly one JET's suggestion of having students keep a journal where they add an entry each week and they get more stamps for more entries.  I think it is BRILLIANT because my school is so worried about my students grades that they are changing me Oral Communication textbook for a Grammar one (ugh!), so I think regular composition will be EXCELLENT practise.  Of course, more importantly, I'm excited because I think my students will LOVE writing these entries because I'm going to be heavy-handed with stickers, stamps and coloured pens in my marking and replies.  Considering my students will do anything for a stamp on their sheet (a full sheet and they get a paper certificate... nope, still don't get the attraction!), I think I'll get some great compositions for shiny stickers!!  I have high hopes for this - particularly because the teachers will be really behind me in an effort to get their students grades up. 

Having mentioned snowboarding in the title I should refer to it here...  On Saturday Jeff and I made it to the mountain for our first boarding this winter.  I was blown away how well Jeff did - I think he even managed to not bail on his first run!  That's terribly worded, but you know what I mean.  He is such a little sports freak that I don't think he's gone backwards at all over the year - I think he has picked up exactly where he left off.  He cemented his incredible first day by going over a jump with a dip between the takeoff and landing, so you have no choice but to get considerable air.  He didn't land it every time, but he had about a 50% rate.  As for me, I had a play around trying some other things I remember from my Ruapehu lesson years and years ago (hmm... was when Jeff and I had been together a short time, so actually about five years ago!), doing a little turny thing up the mountain and leading away on the other foot (feels like trying to use your knife in your left hand!) and jumping random lumps of snow.  I am slowly acknowledging a fear of jumping despite all my protective gear and snowboarding is starting to feel horribly like horseriding, where I knew that my own nerves were making me mess up and the more nervous I got, the more I messed up.  Vicious circle.  But when you are nervous of jumping your horse any higher, you turn to other pursuits - games, trekking, dressage, etc.  So I want to figure our some other things I can do on my board that will help me improve without riding off mini cliffs.  Besides, Jeff's getting good at that and... err... I wouldn't want to steal his thunder. 

Actually the other thing I want to do this winter is try skiing again.  I haven't done it since I was 17 - when I went to Ruapehu with Emilie (Anderson) and her mum - but I skiied a fair amount when I was a kid, so I'm curious how much the muscles still remember.  I just hope it's not like riding a bike, because I suck at that...

Charly