Those crazy kids

The vice principal said, "Pam-chan, Ohayo" today! Which is very informal which means he clearly knows that he reminds me of my dad and has gladly taken that role upon himself. Awwww...

I'm trying to think of the funny things my kids have said this week...here are a couple...

So when each kid does a speech, the other kids have to write comments like "Nice clear voice" or "Thought-provoking" (I love when some of them write "heart-warming" or "influential" when some kid just talked about how he likes being in the table tennis club). Yesterday one kid wrote "Don't touch me!" I have to read them out loud so of course I start laughing when I have to say that one! Another kid wrote "So-and-so is so cute! I love her!" which luckily, was written by another girl.

And this is an old one, but it makes me smile. I asked them to fill out sheets about themselves, like favorite movies and how many siblings they have, etc. And the last question is: Do you have anything else you would like to share? And one kid writes, "My lunch." Which I thought was great.

OK, off to dress up as Carmen Sandiego!!! (My sister thought I said "Carmen Miranda"- I haven't written her back yet, so right now she totally thinks I'm dressing up like this:

http://www.hatsinthebelfry.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000001/glitter_carmen_full.jp

Happy Halloween people!

Some random photos...

So, apparently some things in Japan are still a little gender-biased...and we womenfolk had to stand and watch while the mens pulled this giant floats for the Otsu (yes, el capital aka where Hiro Nakamura on Heroes is RIGHT NOW!) Matsuri (Festival)! However, as you can tell, we were having a pretty kickass time. From left to right: Megan (a JET from Cali), Rie (a very cool local, she works in tourism), Haruko (a JET from Virginny), Kaori (a crazy local who will soon be moving to Las Vegas- exciting but sad), and last but not least, my new BFF Emi (another local).

See, don't they look all tired and hung over? The pointer is John (JET from Britain, he has an awesomely hard to understand regional accent), the middle guy is Jon (JET from...Delaware? I think, he cheerleaded...or is it cheerLED?...in college so I love making him fun of him about it, though he could probably kick like anyone's ass), and the last dude is James (also a JET from England, but he has a posh accent).


The reason for their tiredness! What you can't see is the giant trunk of squid and beer at the back, which the men pillage every half hour or so. Yes- drinking heavily and consuming seafood while operating large floats...it makes sense, no? You can sort of see the cute little boys playing their instruments in the float- Megan and I kept trying to make them laugh, and we made one give a Mona Lisa smile- which was as good as gold to us!

This was my bulletin board before it become Halloween-ized! It's basically all about New Jersey and New York. The vice principal (who, by the way, totally looks like Japanese version of my dad! Sometimes I even feel like calling him that, but I think he'd be a little weirded out.) said he found it "enjoyable." Other reviews ranged from "Nice" to "Interesting" to "It blew my f*cking mind."

This is Azuchi! It's a small town in the south of Shiga with a lot of archaeological sites. A bunch of us went biking around the random fields checking out Azuchi Castle (be warned, there's nothing actually there- just a bunch of stones- the foundation- but an amazing view of the surrounding cities!). We also did a LOT of biking. I also got injured when my leg collided with someone else's pedal and I still have the bruise!



Here we are inside this crazy ancient hut thing. It apparently said you weren't supposed to go inside, but we're crazy gaijin (see Jamie's impression of "craziness") who don't know any better! By the way, this is Jamie, Jessie and Elisa. Elisa lives in Azuchi and did her degree in Japanese Archaelogy so she was all helpful and gave us a tour of her town!

Drama, Drama

Yeah, Lux, apparently my anger did not go unnoticed by my students... every person (i.e. you and two other JETs here) I've told that story can't imagine me being angry! But oh, I can be.

So I was talking to some of my students today and they asked me straight out what I thought of the teacher that I got angry at and I was like uh...He's nice, he's nice, but... and they were like BUT! And we all just kind of laughed. Hopefully this will blow over soon- note to self: never display emotion again.

But today was our English Club Halloween party! I dressed as Carmen and the students laughed, we played Halloween hangman, and then we ate large quantities of candy. There's this Japanese brand of candy where it's these little packets of chocolates in different shapes (like really tiny tic tac sized chocolates) and apparently everyone (i.e. a group of 15-17 year old girls) loves 'em!

So I wrote this yesterday and didn't post it cos I wanted to reply to all your posts, but I realised I can do that within the posts! Woo hoo!

Today was good cos I overhauled one of my first grade lessons (I mainly teach the first grade-aka 10th grade in the U.S.- and the second grade-aka 11th grade) to make it more clear and I think it went over really well! I was having trouble explaining the steps of a pair argument (we're doing "Introduction to Debate" right now), so I made up all these magneted signs and put them together. It was time-consuming, but fun! And lucky too, cos today was the day (I had completely forgotten) when about 8 of the other teachers and the principal and vice principal came to observe my class. It was weird having them all in there, but apparently it went really well! And last week, the "head JET" (aka the returning JET who works in the Prefectural Board of Education Office) came to observe with the principal and vice principal and that close went well too. So despite the fact that I fall down in class (happened twice yesterday!), forget to mark things, and showed up (once) without a lesson plan, I don't completely suck as a teacher. Yet.

Anyway, I'm so psyched that you guys are actually wading through my endless sea of words. And that your (well at least Kat, Lakshmi, and Christina- Lux, you've been inspired us!) blogs have been updated too- lots of reading.

OK, it's about 6:30 pm, so I'm gonna head to bed- this week has tuckered me out! And tomorrow is the big Halloween party- apparently it's like the craziest party in Shiga...I guess we'll see.

Oyasumi!

Oyasumi Nasai Indeed

Yay! It's so good to know that you guys are actually reading it- I look forward to reading your blogs too, so we can keep in touch with each other via my favorite method, internet stalking.

So not much today, school was a bit rough as my first new lessons (I do the same two lessons about 12 times apiece) didn't go as smoothly as I had hoped. The best is when I got angry with my supervisor, who kept going "But how?" when I asked the students to form groups. He wouldn't listen to my explanation, so finally I just started angrily moving desks (the kid whose desk I moved looked super shocked as he sat there deskless in his chair) into groups saying it wasn't that hard. But luckily the moment passed! I love my job- I'm in a great situation, smart students and super nice teachers, but sometimes I get really frustrated! Especially since I had worked really hard the past three days on those lessons! Sigh.

OK, then after school, went shopping with Andrew the Brit-Australian and Elisa the multilingual Italian at Omi-Hachiman, which is about the closest to Paramus we've got in Northern Shiga! I got the rest of my Halloween costume (Carmen Sandiego- pics of course to be posted in a few days!) and we ate crazy amounts of food.

OMG, we went to Baskin Robbins where they have the BEST ice cream flavor! It's called "Baseball Park" and it's caramel ice cream with chocolate covered pretzels, peanuts, and caramel popcorn. There might be other stuff too. I love it!!! Though I've convinced others to try it and one described it as "tasting like the bottom of a trash bag." Lies!

I also learned that saying "Oyasumi nasai" ("Good night") has a different meaning in Japan. So when I was saying what I thought was a simple "Good night" to the cashiers at Family Mart, there was a reason why they gave me weird looks! Apparently it's something you say to the rest of your family before all of you go to bed...

Which is what I should do as it's almost 2 am and I have to wake up in less than 4! Dang. Sorry this is so long- next time there will be more pictures!

I figure I'll start from the end

Hey, so this is my first post. I'm a little rusty at this whole blog thing, because I haven't had a blog since, well... ever. Therefore, it might suck at first, but I'll try to make it better! I figure I'll just post a bunch of random pictures and let them speak for themselves!


This is my bike- I didn't really know how to ride before (never rode outside of a park before!) so I spent the first couple of weeks teaching myself in the park nearby my apartment. I fell into the bushes on my first try, but luckily there was an elderly woman zooming by on her bike and a fashionable young couple to offer a helping hand by openly laughing. Oh what a silly foreigner I am! But now I can ride on the street- yes!!!

This is the view from the park- check that out, it's Lake Biwa! aka the Mother Lake, the biggest body of water within Japan! Hence, Shiga, my prefecture is nicknamed the "Bellybutton of Japan." And so it is.








Karaoke in Maibara! Not sure if you can tell but those are red velvet walls baby! This is pretty much the coolest karaoke bar ever- it's some guys converted garage out in the middle of a rice paddy. The decorations are amazing and each song is only 100 yen! (Less than a buck- it's about 115 yen to the dollar)












We did a bit of bowling in Minami Hikone (South Hikone) at a wonderful shopping center called "Viva City." However, it is generally pronounced "Viva Shitty" which is sad, since it's got so much to offer! On the left is our scoreboard- all our names are written in hiragana! I'm first (Pamera), then it's Nikoru (Nicole), Tara (Tara), Andoru (Andrew), and Kurisu Tofu (Chris Tofu)! Tara shows off her pair (of bowling balls) while Andrew tries to look away. Both are from London, but Andrew pretends that he's actually from Australia.


This is my high school! Apparently I'm not supposed to say the name of my school, but here it is- isn't it pretty!? Check out that garden! Wait til you see the "water fountain"- it's awesome!

And on the right, it's what I pass by on my 20 minute walk from the train station to school- that would be a rice paddy, yessiree! It's actually quite pretty-I still can't get over all the open sky and the mountains in the not too far distance.

More pics to come soon- but hey, it's a start, right? Hooray!