Minasan Konnichiwa!
At the end of my year of student teaching, a handful of students wrote me good bye/thank you notes and several of them said, "Ms. B, you have the most patience out of any teacher I've ever known". While that may be an exaggeration on their part, I must say that I do have a fairly high level of patience, especially when it comes to instructing. Well, the time has come to truly employ this gift of exceptional patience because I'm going to need it here. It's not the people (because I love working with everyone here) and it's not the students (because they are so freaking awesome)...it's the language barrier! Surprise, surprise. I recognize that I've only been here for two weeks so I'm not expected to be fluent, but I can't imagine how challenging it must be for people here every time a new CIR comes in. Patrick wouldn't call himself fluent, but he's pretty damn good. He can hold conversations and people understand him. And now they have me: barely able to handle simple ritual sayings (like at the beginning and end of dinner) and blankly nodding and smiling as they rattle on in Japanese. I know I'm being a little dramatic here and I know I'll get it eventually. I just hate not rising up to the expectations of the person before me.
So my first week of work is officially in the books. Like I've mentioned in previous posts, I've been busy with more practical specifics rather than actual work. I'm juggling setting up for the G-Fest July trip and trying to settle in to my new home. But it's been pretty awesome because I have some stellar people here helping me out on all of that. It's been a week of firsts for me...
Tuesday was my first business trip to Aomori City. About five hours of driving for five minutes of business (for me, anyway). I applied for my re-entry permit and it was granted! Woo hoo! The rest of the day was spent sight-seeing, shopping and eating. The weather was forecasted to be thunderstorms all day and I was disappointed to be greeted with just overcast skies. Boring. I did, however, get to see my very first "big" Buddha at a temple near Aomori, which was very cool. If I wanted my fortune told to me, however, it was gonna cost me: 100円...at least. It has been quite an experience learning about Buddhism rituals, even though I'm sure we went over it at some point during my high school career.
Over the past couple of days, I've met my two nursery school classes and my two English conversation classes with grades 1st through 6th. I absolutely fell in love with the kids from the two schools in Takko and Kamigo. They are beyond adorable and I had the pleasure of going on an all-day field trip with them today to Lake Towada. It wasn't so much the actual trip (seeing that I've been there three times now and there's only so much to see at Lake Towada), it was spending time with the kids. Well, their English is as limited as my Japanese so conversation was pretty much constrained to them rattling over questions in Japanese and me responding with "Hai" and a smile. I decided that not only did I realize that I could handle raising a child (not right this second, of course), but I would most definitely consider adopting a child from Japan. Please don't judge. From hiking through Oirase Gorge to getting caught in a thunderstorm on the beach at Lake Towada, we had an awesome time. And to top this all off, at one point the kids took their handkerchiefs and tried wiping the freckles off of my face. A-dorable.
So the two weeks of welcome/sayonara parties have finally come to a close - my liver will learn to adjust. It's funny how my Japanese somehow improved while under the influence and dwindles back to its normal level of suckiness when I'm back to normal. I enjoyed an awesome night with our section from yakuba and Garlic Center with lots of alcohol and karaoke (my favorite!). The party even came with an after party! I'm excited for the coming year.
However, this weekend may be the last weekend of fun before coming back home in July, so I better enjoy it! We leave tomorrow, bright and early at 8am! Tokyo Disney is the first on the list, and then a night out on Tokyo. Saturday will be a day at Kamakura (beach!!) and a night in Shibuya, Harajuku and perhaps meeting up with a friend from junior high school. Sunday is the Fujiki Fish Market followed by I don't even know...and then the fun ends on Monday :(
Minsasan mata ne!
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