My intense boredom and slow onset of insanity has made me decide that I need to pick up some hobbies.
Numero Uno – I’m going to start drawing again. I took a class in high school, and I wasn’t that bad at it, so I figure I’m going to start up again. I was watching some tutorials on youtube and I learned how to draw a circle, a cylinder, and a cone. The next thing I started to practice was shading a sphere. Now this was difficult. It always came out as shit. But it was perfectly round. It reminds me of what a girl’s poop might look like if girls pooped. But because girls don’t poop, it’s all left to my fantasy, not imagination, fantasy.
Numero Dos – I’m going to start playing guitar. After one 1-unit class that I got a B in, I think I’m ready to start my career as a heavy metal acoustic guitar player, who only plays love songs to women who can’t understand English lyrics. If John Lennon could do it…
Let’s Rock and Rice!
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Student Ramblings
November 13
Sunny
The past few days have been very interesting at school. Like most of the other male teachers here, I am the object of most of the female students’ affection. They love to come into the school office just to say “hi” in English, and wave, and be slutty.
Sometime last week, a couple of girls game in and started talking in Japanese about me being cute. The Vice-principal was standing there and started to translate, telling me that the girls were saying how I’m “Pretty.” Now this d-bag’s English isn’t that bad, and I know he knew what the actual translation was, but I think he was trying to deter, according to his imagination, my intentions of molesting my students. Now I don’t know how many more times I have to defend myself, but they are just WAAAY TOO OLD. So because he decided to use that translation, which he made the girls completely aware of, I have those girls and others coming in and telling me how pretty I am. They wouldn’t be saying that if I showed them my balloon knot.
This week, I used a game for my 7th grade students. It was originally called Thief, but because the Japanese can’t say the “TH” sound (comes out as “Z”), Robber became the new name of the game. But these kids can’t say robber either. Instead they were saying “lover.” Now I think this might be one of those things where you had to “Be There,” but it was hilarious. Just imagine…a bunch of prepubescent boys and girls who struggle to keep their eyes open, almost as if there are anchors tied to their eye lashes, laughing and giggling and picking their noses and putting their hands down their pants and eating rice. Ridiculous right? I lived that. I lived that shit. Spect.
Today, there was one kid who was being completely masochistic. Again, like most schools, there are good boys and “naughty” boys. The naughty boys will literally get up in the middle of a lesson and sit in the back of the classroom where all the backpacks are. This little dude was one of those boys. But instead of just sitting in the back, he decided to sew. Now I know that i’m able to sew, and people laugh, but it is legitimately a good skill to know. However, this kid was doing it instead of paying attention in English class. So he was basically choosing to do something that he won’t need to do when he gets older, because he’ll have a woman (As a wife or a slave, I don’t know. But nonetheless, he’ll have a woman to do that stuff.), instead of learning something that will help him get mad bitches, who will probably know how to sew too.
After he was done sewing, he put all of his needles into his sleeve. Then he started poking himself with the needles, until they would stick right out of his arm. This whole time we’re playing Doctor…er I mean Robber, and I’m wincing and laughing. WTF is with this kid. Is he gay?
Cultural Note:
1. Masochistic – The condition in which sexual gratification depends on suffering, physical pain, and humiliation.
Sunny
The past few days have been very interesting at school. Like most of the other male teachers here, I am the object of most of the female students’ affection. They love to come into the school office just to say “hi” in English, and wave, and be slutty.
Sometime last week, a couple of girls game in and started talking in Japanese about me being cute. The Vice-principal was standing there and started to translate, telling me that the girls were saying how I’m “Pretty.” Now this d-bag’s English isn’t that bad, and I know he knew what the actual translation was, but I think he was trying to deter, according to his imagination, my intentions of molesting my students. Now I don’t know how many more times I have to defend myself, but they are just WAAAY TOO OLD. So because he decided to use that translation, which he made the girls completely aware of, I have those girls and others coming in and telling me how pretty I am. They wouldn’t be saying that if I showed them my balloon knot.
This week, I used a game for my 7th grade students. It was originally called Thief, but because the Japanese can’t say the “TH” sound (comes out as “Z”), Robber became the new name of the game. But these kids can’t say robber either. Instead they were saying “lover.” Now I think this might be one of those things where you had to “Be There,” but it was hilarious. Just imagine…a bunch of prepubescent boys and girls who struggle to keep their eyes open, almost as if there are anchors tied to their eye lashes, laughing and giggling and picking their noses and putting their hands down their pants and eating rice. Ridiculous right? I lived that. I lived that shit. Spect.
Today, there was one kid who was being completely masochistic. Again, like most schools, there are good boys and “naughty” boys. The naughty boys will literally get up in the middle of a lesson and sit in the back of the classroom where all the backpacks are. This little dude was one of those boys. But instead of just sitting in the back, he decided to sew. Now I know that i’m able to sew, and people laugh, but it is legitimately a good skill to know. However, this kid was doing it instead of paying attention in English class. So he was basically choosing to do something that he won’t need to do when he gets older, because he’ll have a woman (As a wife or a slave, I don’t know. But nonetheless, he’ll have a woman to do that stuff.), instead of learning something that will help him get mad bitches, who will probably know how to sew too.
After he was done sewing, he put all of his needles into his sleeve. Then he started poking himself with the needles, until they would stick right out of his arm. This whole time we’re playing Doctor…er I mean Robber, and I’m wincing and laughing. WTF is with this kid. Is he gay?
Cultural Note:
1. Masochistic – The condition in which sexual gratification depends on suffering, physical pain, and humiliation.
Sick For The First Time In Japan/ Halloween Party
Saturday Nov. 8th
Cloudy
In the past few days I’ve been feeling sick. I must have caught something after the Mid Year conference. It must have been starting at 530 and ending at 1 that really messed me up. That and all of the rufie coladas I unintentionally consumed…probably. But I started feeling bad on Thursday night after a job and dinner. Because I felt like crap, I made sure to go to the 7 eleven to get a “sickness” mask. I roll over to school and walk into the Friday morning staff meeting, and immediately the Kyoto Sensei gives me a look like, “Man, you are not THAT Japanese. Take that thing off you fool.” Then he asked me if I had a fever in Japanese and I nodded, walking over to my desk. “Its all part of the plan.” I wanted to make them think that I was sooo into work that I would not call in sick and just do it, that's what she said. But I think I screwed up when I started looking for information on Japanese Driver’s licenses because I’m thinking about getting a scooter. Rothwell insists that scooters are “Camp,” but I’m sure that once I get one, people will be “keen” on getting them too, at least the ones without cars.
Last night, despite the accumulation of phlegm and disgustingness, I decided to go to the Halloween party at EstEst. Now I didn’t really want to go, but because I had waited to use my Pooh-San costume, I couldn’t not make an appearance. First thing I hear when I get in there is “KAWAII!” from some random Japanese women, but the bartender had also managed to get a full body Pooh-san costume too. I told him, “Well…one of us has to go change.” But because the guy doesn’t speak Japanese, he just gave me the stink-eye all night. The other bartenders were all dressed in drag. Now I was very confused, because a lot of them actually looked like women… and I had a boner… NOT. But seriously I wanted to bang them…ummm.
I went home early, after spending 25 bucks on ginger ale and one cassis orange, and passed out when I got home. This morning I woke up feeling worse than before. I think I’m completely useless when it comes to living by myself. I was telling this to one of the other JETs last night. My apartment is always in a state of utter chaos. I have to lay my clothes on the couch, my desk, dresser, and because that space is very limited, they also go on the ground. Being at home and living in the house, or the apartments before, I was completely fine. Maybe because you have to consider everyone else you live with, and how they don’t want to have your boxes in their face. All up in that. Their fricken face.
Cultural Notes:
1. Mid-Year Conference – Conference where all the JET’s in the prefecture meet up and discuss things pertaining to our roles as assistant teachers.
2. Sick Mask – A white mask that covers your mouth. Usually seen worn by doctors, and Chinese people with SARS.
3. Camp – Homo-sec-sual.
4. Keen – To like/want/willing.
5. Kawaii – (Kuh-why-ee) – Japanese translation of “cute.”
6. Pooh-san – (Poo-Sah-N) – The name that Winnie the Pooh goes by in Japan.
7. The House – Zeta Beta Tau Fraternity House. 742 W. 28th St., Los Angeles, Ca 90007
Cloudy
In the past few days I’ve been feeling sick. I must have caught something after the Mid Year conference. It must have been starting at 530 and ending at 1 that really messed me up. That and all of the rufie coladas I unintentionally consumed…probably. But I started feeling bad on Thursday night after a job and dinner. Because I felt like crap, I made sure to go to the 7 eleven to get a “sickness” mask. I roll over to school and walk into the Friday morning staff meeting, and immediately the Kyoto Sensei gives me a look like, “Man, you are not THAT Japanese. Take that thing off you fool.” Then he asked me if I had a fever in Japanese and I nodded, walking over to my desk. “Its all part of the plan.” I wanted to make them think that I was sooo into work that I would not call in sick and just do it, that's what she said. But I think I screwed up when I started looking for information on Japanese Driver’s licenses because I’m thinking about getting a scooter. Rothwell insists that scooters are “Camp,” but I’m sure that once I get one, people will be “keen” on getting them too, at least the ones without cars.
Last night, despite the accumulation of phlegm and disgustingness, I decided to go to the Halloween party at EstEst. Now I didn’t really want to go, but because I had waited to use my Pooh-San costume, I couldn’t not make an appearance. First thing I hear when I get in there is “KAWAII!” from some random Japanese women, but the bartender had also managed to get a full body Pooh-san costume too. I told him, “Well…one of us has to go change.” But because the guy doesn’t speak Japanese, he just gave me the stink-eye all night. The other bartenders were all dressed in drag. Now I was very confused, because a lot of them actually looked like women… and I had a boner… NOT. But seriously I wanted to bang them…ummm.
I went home early, after spending 25 bucks on ginger ale and one cassis orange, and passed out when I got home. This morning I woke up feeling worse than before. I think I’m completely useless when it comes to living by myself. I was telling this to one of the other JETs last night. My apartment is always in a state of utter chaos. I have to lay my clothes on the couch, my desk, dresser, and because that space is very limited, they also go on the ground. Being at home and living in the house, or the apartments before, I was completely fine. Maybe because you have to consider everyone else you live with, and how they don’t want to have your boxes in their face. All up in that. Their fricken face.
Cultural Notes:
1. Mid-Year Conference – Conference where all the JET’s in the prefecture meet up and discuss things pertaining to our roles as assistant teachers.
2. Sick Mask – A white mask that covers your mouth. Usually seen worn by doctors, and Chinese people with SARS.
3. Camp – Homo-sec-sual.
4. Keen – To like/want/willing.
5. Kawaii – (Kuh-why-ee) – Japanese translation of “cute.”
6. Pooh-san – (Poo-Sah-N) – The name that Winnie the Pooh goes by in Japan.
7. The House – Zeta Beta Tau Fraternity House. 742 W. 28th St., Los Angeles, Ca 90007
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Mid-Year Conference
The mid-year conference was Tuesday and Wednesday of this week. It was awesome. Seeing all of the other ALT’s was very refreshing and lots of fun, because the only time I ever see them is when we rock out with our socks out. I did the standard, get really drunk and black out, but what I haven’t done in a while is act like a total freshman in college who went to his first party and had his first sip of alcohol. Or a high school girl who goes anywhere where there is alcohol. I was carried back to my room, but mislead my caretakers to a different hotel, until I was finally whisked away to the correct place, where I didn’t know my hotel room number, and spent the night on the floor of a kind woman’s room, and had pictures taken of me in a zombie like state, completely passed out with my eyes open. I’m very disappointed in myself.
The thing I think that made this conference completely awesome were the quotes that I heard. The first speaker was a Japanese John Hammond look alike from Jurassic Park, with an almost spot on accent. He at one point said during his completely dry speech that, “I’m getting a little dry. I might be getting excited.” The next quote was by a past ALT who became a professor at a Japanese university. He said something like “If you teabag too much…the teabag will get exhausted.” There was a woman, who is also the same person that took care of me the dreadful night before, who is a mother, and supposed to be somewhat more mature than some of the ALT’s, who burst out laughing. It made the whole thing even funnier because its one of those contagious laughs where everyone will start laughing if you hear her. Which everyone did.
The last one, which was undoubtedly the funniest quote, was this guy said something along the lines of, “I love meat, I LOVE IT!” “I substitute meat with NUTS!” and, “I need to get my PROTEIN FIX!”
I was also practicing my Australian accent and discussed the commercial fishing of sharks in Australia. In addition to that, I picked up some new Australian slang, like “Bushpig”, and “Rooting.”
Cultural Notes:
1. Teabag – No description necessary
2. Meat loving, Nuts, and Protein Fix – No description necessary
3. Bushpig – A really fat and ugly woman
4. Rooting – Bang Sesh
The thing I think that made this conference completely awesome were the quotes that I heard. The first speaker was a Japanese John Hammond look alike from Jurassic Park, with an almost spot on accent. He at one point said during his completely dry speech that, “I’m getting a little dry. I might be getting excited.” The next quote was by a past ALT who became a professor at a Japanese university. He said something like “If you teabag too much…the teabag will get exhausted.” There was a woman, who is also the same person that took care of me the dreadful night before, who is a mother, and supposed to be somewhat more mature than some of the ALT’s, who burst out laughing. It made the whole thing even funnier because its one of those contagious laughs where everyone will start laughing if you hear her. Which everyone did.
The last one, which was undoubtedly the funniest quote, was this guy said something along the lines of, “I love meat, I LOVE IT!” “I substitute meat with NUTS!” and, “I need to get my PROTEIN FIX!”
I was also practicing my Australian accent and discussed the commercial fishing of sharks in Australia. In addition to that, I picked up some new Australian slang, like “Bushpig”, and “Rooting.”
Cultural Notes:
1. Teabag – No description necessary
2. Meat loving, Nuts, and Protein Fix – No description necessary
3. Bushpig – A really fat and ugly woman
4. Rooting – Bang Sesh
Halloween
For Halloween lessons, I would wear a costume. The first one I wore was a pirate mask, but the mask itself had arms and legs. So my head became the entire body of the pirate. The kids thought it was funny. The second costume I wore was a penguin pokemon. It was a hooded cape, and barely went down half my back. The kids and the teachers thought it was great. One of the teachers even took a picture of me, using it to touch herself later.
The second to last costume that I wore was basically the best of what America has to offer. I got really tight ripped up 501’s with a picnic table shirt, trucker hat, sunglasses, and well-placed fake facial hair. I became a totally different person, and people couldn’t recognize me at first. And the last costume I’m going to wear, because the Halloween Party in Iwaki is on the 7th of November, is a huge, full body Winnie the Pooh costume. It looks like kids pajamas, because the crotch is very low and there is a hood with a Pooh Face. Sooo many bitches. Unfortunately, I didn’t eat as much candy as I normally do, but I coped with it.
The second to last costume that I wore was basically the best of what America has to offer. I got really tight ripped up 501’s with a picnic table shirt, trucker hat, sunglasses, and well-placed fake facial hair. I became a totally different person, and people couldn’t recognize me at first. And the last costume I’m going to wear, because the Halloween Party in Iwaki is on the 7th of November, is a huge, full body Winnie the Pooh costume. It looks like kids pajamas, because the crotch is very low and there is a hood with a Pooh Face. Sooo many bitches. Unfortunately, I didn’t eat as much candy as I normally do, but I coped with it.
School…sucks?
So it’s been about three and half months since I got here, and I’ve been to all four of my schools. However, for the first 3 months of that time, I didn’t teach at my base school. It wasn’t until last week that I even started. The teachers don’t know me, and don’t care, and the same goes for the students. The teachers give me the cold shoulder or really make it awkward. Not getting invited to enkai’s and just being treated as someone who doesn’t belong makes you wonder why these people even asked for another English teacher.
To try and resolve this, I did what you do when your girlfriend gets angry at you. I bought them stuff. Because as most of us know, the key to a woman’s heart is your wallet. So I bought them candy and omiyage from Fukushima City, the capital city of our prefecture. I also dressed up on Halloween as a Pokemon, while walking into the standard Friday morning staff meeting. All of the teachers started laughing while the Prinicpal and Vice Principal just looked at me like “W-T-F dude? WTF?” None of them realized it was Halloween day, so they were shocked. I think I smelled something in the School Nurse’s pants too, she might have been really startled, or just laughed really really hard.
Everyday is a struggle, and it’s starting to wear on me, but I’m ganbarimasing, so hopefully it turns out ok soon.
Cultural Notes:
1. Enkai- (En-kai) – Japanese drinking party. Usually consists of unlimited food and drinks, where you get to see the more casual side of your colleagues.
2. Omiyage – (oh-me-ya-gay) – Gifts given to colleagues by someone who went on a trip out of town.
3. Friday Morning Staff Meeting – Pretty sure that every school has it, but a school meeting where all of the faculty gather in the staff room and have a huge meeting.
4. Pokemon – Gotta catch’em all
5. Halloween in Japan – According to the vice principal, brought to Japan about 5 years ago. Still not widely observed by many, but making its way up there.
6. Ganbarimasu – (Gone-bar-ee-ma-sue) – To try one’s best
To try and resolve this, I did what you do when your girlfriend gets angry at you. I bought them stuff. Because as most of us know, the key to a woman’s heart is your wallet. So I bought them candy and omiyage from Fukushima City, the capital city of our prefecture. I also dressed up on Halloween as a Pokemon, while walking into the standard Friday morning staff meeting. All of the teachers started laughing while the Prinicpal and Vice Principal just looked at me like “W-T-F dude? WTF?” None of them realized it was Halloween day, so they were shocked. I think I smelled something in the School Nurse’s pants too, she might have been really startled, or just laughed really really hard.
Everyday is a struggle, and it’s starting to wear on me, but I’m ganbarimasing, so hopefully it turns out ok soon.
Cultural Notes:
1. Enkai- (En-kai) – Japanese drinking party. Usually consists of unlimited food and drinks, where you get to see the more casual side of your colleagues.
2. Omiyage – (oh-me-ya-gay) – Gifts given to colleagues by someone who went on a trip out of town.
3. Friday Morning Staff Meeting – Pretty sure that every school has it, but a school meeting where all of the faculty gather in the staff room and have a huge meeting.
4. Pokemon – Gotta catch’em all
5. Halloween in Japan – According to the vice principal, brought to Japan about 5 years ago. Still not widely observed by many, but making its way up there.
6. Ganbarimasu – (Gone-bar-ee-ma-sue) – To try one’s best
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