Decemembered

Here's an update without the usual heart-wrenching pathos, thought-provoking themes, and literary sleight-of-hand that usually characterizes my blog updates. It is, if you can believe it, a collection of mostly-pointless unrelated blurbs. Shocking, right?

Last week I posted about the Sapporo Orientation. I then proceeded to get snowed out of Monbetsu, and had to stay overnight in Asahikawa as the major expressway that runs through the mountains was closed due to blizzard. It looked like this outside:



I actually took this picture because of the political poster, which is my favorite one in the world and features an older Japanese guy leering like he just saw Sailor Moon's panties. You can't really make it out that well in this picture, but it's really the worst-advised political portrait I've ever seen. Regardless, it also serves to show that it was very snowy! Note the person in my side mirror, who will soon try to pass me because I have the audacity to only speed by 10km in a blizzard.

On the plus side, I got to eat some delicious curry.



This particular restaurant, CoCo Curry, allows you to add on spiciness levels to your curry for extra money, up to a spiciness of level 10 for something like an extra 500 yen. To go beyond level 5, however, you need to have a card proving you've eaten a level 5 before and didn't die or sue anybody (the menu includes the gastronomically ominous phrase, please consider the consequences). Since I'd never been to this restaurant before, I had a five. It was delicious, but I don't think I'm in any hurry to go up to a ten just yet.

Back in Monbetsu, I finally got to try my hand at ping-pong in an environment other than an elementary school. As it turns out, the school is the probably the right place for me. I went to the local sports center on Tuesday, which is when the Church of Ping-Pong meets, and when it became evident that I was no match for anybody there I was kindly and gently schooled in the proper art of the game for two hours.

Linguistic note: When I went to the sports center to ask about it, I was told that the "Ping Pong Kyoukai" meets on Tuesdays. At this point, "kyoukai" meant "church" to me; so I thought that's what the guy said. I later discovered that a homonym for "kyoukai" is "society", which makes more sense but is less entertaining.

This weekend I once again went to Asahikawa, because I never learn. I had dinner with friends and failed at bowling, but made up for it by being able to reap the bounty of Kaldi, the local foreign foods store:



Mangoes, Mac n Cheese, and cayenne pepper. Yum!

Lastly, I turned in my form today indicating my intent to seek re-contraction for 2011-2012. So, Monbetsu until July 2012! Hooray!

Mid-Year Conference

This week, I headed out from Monbetsu to go to Sapporo for the annual two-day mid-year conference.


From this:



To this:



Mid-year conference (MYC) is a two-day all-prefecture meeting for ALTs. We cover business concerning the prefecture's JETs, like the upcoming establishment of regional advisors to supplement the single prefectural advisor. We also run workshops and discussions of teaching and living matters, which were pretty hit or miss. And of course, there's a great party.

Sapporo is a bit of a hike from Monbetsu, so I don't get out there very often. It's nice to take the opportunity to really enjoy myself; Sapporo is a cool city. I'd like to share some pictures from around town.



This is probably the worst picture that's ever been taken of Sapporo Tower (my camera is broken and I'm relying on my cell phone). This is similar to the famous Tokyo Tower in, uh, Tokyo, but it's smaller and it's in Sapporo. The city is laid out in a grid, with intersections labeled in relation to the tower; for Japan, this is the height of convenience and navigational ease.



Much of downtown Sapporo is connected by a network of underground shopping streets. These areas are meant to keep the city walkable in winter, and are also great parts of the city in their own right; they are always packed with people, and are lined with shops of all kinds. There's a lot of cool things to be found down here, if you can navigate the maze.

Sapporo also contains a large Don Quixote, a store that sells, well...



Just about everything, laid out in a fashion completely incomprehensible to any foreigner. Designer knockoff clothing shares aisles with car stereos, and the grocery section segues directly into the marital aides department. The main Don Quixote in Sapporo is five floors tall, and should be explored simply as an experience unto itself. It also carries a lot of "Cube Mouth Mickey" items, which is a popular franchise in Japan that makes me feel vaguely uncomfortable:



Yeah, I don't really get it.

Sapporo also has great food. Popular among us foreigners is Taj Mahal:



So delicious I ate there two nights in a row and wasn't even ashamed.

That's about it for the pictures - luckily, no pictures exist showing at the party that night, as far as I know. Lets hope it stays that way.

The Winter of our English Content

On the tail of Thanksgiving, winter has finally come - sort of. A single day of heavy snowfall, blanketing the town on Monday, has given way to melting today. We get one day of winter wonderland before moving into the grey and slushy middlingly-cold that's all too familiar to anyone who's ever been to North Dakota or Minnesota between March and June. Here's hoping it's just a fluke!




Additionally, here's a short conversation that played out in class today:

Me, In Japanese: "In Middle School you'll have homework in English class, so it's a good idea to practice writing now."
Student, in English: "OH MY GOD!"

Nothing can terrify Japanese students like English. I think I give them nightmares.



That last picture is of Temple Dog, who lives next to the lot where I park my car. He's called Temple Dog because he lives in a temple, and is a dog. I've never been accosted by demons of any sort near that parking lot so I think Temple Dog is doing a good job.

Thanksgiving: The Fattening

Being an American is similar in many important ways to having herpes. Among the myriad similarities is the fact that once infected, you're a carrier for life. It was in this spirit that I decided a good thing to do would be to invite an improbably large group of friends to my apartment and to cook two Thanksgiving turkeys, something I've never done before.

I'm still waiting for the pictures to come in but my kitchen looks like this right now:



Here's a picture of some food that I stole from Justin:



And we looked like this:



Look at all those foreigners crammed into my apartment! Who needs fire codes, anyhow. Despite a harrowing all-day journey, everything turned out well and everyone was made comfortably bloated. After eating, we all headed out for a night of dancing and karaoke, which I'm not really looking forward to seeing pictures of (although I'm sure I will). God bless!

Good luck 2011 applicants!

Yesterday was the deadline for US applicants to submit their initial applications for the JET Program for 2011. I just wanted to post a short update and say, good luck! My best advice now is to find something to keep yourself busy, and to apply for other things and make plans for if you don't get in - the JET application takes forever, and it really helps to pass the time. And the unfortunate reality is that many otherwise qualified applicants won't get in, simply because there aren't enough spaces for everyone CLAIR would be willing to hire. So don't put all your eggs in one basket!

Nevertheless, I hope this blog has been a help to applicants and that I'll see some of you in August! Good luck everyone!

Travels, Pt. I

This update will be something of a dumping ground for various pictures I have floating around from October. Chronology and relativity will be a bit strained, but hey, it's an update.





This is Asahidake, the highest mountain in Hokkaido, and the surrounding area. We traveled here for a friend's birthday and spent the day hiking and going up most of the mountain. At Asahidake, one rides a ropeway most of the way to the treeline, and then kicks around up at the top. Asahidake is an active volcano, and is full of vents belching sulfur. I'm still waiting for a bunch of pictures from this trip, because certain people are very slow at updating them. No names. This was in early October.



This is what's known as a ryoukan, a Japanese-style inn. The Monbetsu Crew traveled to Furano, Land of Lavender, for an ALT conference and we stayed here overnight. Ryoukans are meant to be fairly old-fashioned, and more involved than a standard hotel stay. You get a single tatami (rice straw mat) room like this one, with fold-out futons for sleeping on. They are actually wonderfully comfortable. With the normal stay, you get dinner and breakfast at the inn, and have a good soak in the tub before bed. More like a traditional resort than a hotel, ryoukans are popular in secluded areas but can also be found in cities, like Furano.



Nothing terribly exciting. Waiting for the bus to go home from a small town on the outskirts of Asahikawa, after a long weekend.

Finally, a special preview of my upcoming Halloween update:



Buddhist pilgrim. The effect is better when I have my staff, but it will have to wait.

On The Road in Hokkaido

Sorry for the complete lack of updates in October! I've been quite busy, and I'm still waiting for some pictures from other peoples' cameras. Over the next week or so I'll try to get through a backlog of updates I meant to post, but didn't get a chance to. October was busy!

Today's update is actually from this week. At long last, I've got a car! I present the Daihatsu Opti, on a rare clear day:





I picked up this bad girl two days ago for a great price, and it's been quite fun tooling around in. The universal comment I get is "It's so cute!" Look at the size of those little wheels! In Japan, cars are classified as "Light" (yellow plate) and "Regular" (white plate) vehicles. The classification is mostly based on engine displacement, along with a few other restrictions. Light cars, like mine, have several fees lowered and bureaucratic hoops removed to encourage people to drive them. This is great! The downside is that they are clown cars. I can fit in just fine, and I can fit one other person of not-exceptional height, but anybody in the back seat is going to have to get comfortable with new methods of folding themselves. They can consider it a cultural experience.

I'll be taking her out for out first road trip this weekend, to go volunteer at a kids haunted house a few hours away. I will try to get pictures, as well as post later about the Halloween experiences I've already had in the last week or so.

As for the weather, it's been getting quite cold, in addition to a pretty dismal amount of rain. We had some snow a while back, but nothing that stuck; further inland, however, there's a good deal of snow on the ground. Winter is on it's way!

A Week in the Life

As application season is upon us, and I have some time on my hands, I thought I'd write up a post about what a typical work at week looks like for me. I'll be doing a writeup of my week, as it's a pretty average one and gives a good idea of what I generally do for work. As always, potential applicants should remember that lovable JET mantra - Every Situation is Different! My situation, specifically, is teaching at seven different elementary schools. Here's how it plays out:

Monday

On Monday I went to Persimmon Elementary School (names change to protect the innocent). Persimmon is one of the largest elementary schools in town, with several hundred students. This was my second visit; on average, I visit about twice a month.

Since Persimmon is a larger school, I teach only fifth and sixth year students. English is more commonly taught in this age bracket than to younger students, and beginning next year these students will have a mandatory period of English study - something like 20 hours per semester.

My first period at Persimmon is free, and I spend it in the teacher's room preparing and drinking a really amazing amount of green tea. Second period I teach one of the 5th grade classes. Normally, in my first visit to a class I give a self-introduction and ask the kids to introduce themselves to me in simple English - name, something they like, things like that depending on the level of the class. On my first visit to this school, however, the fifth graders spent the entire time asking questions. Because of this, the class today consists of practicing self-introduction vocabulary and then delivering the self-introductions. It's a large class, so this takes most of the period.

Third period is the second group of fifth years. They ran out of time in their first lesson as well, as we do the same thing as the first group - self introductions. I wad up a piece of paper and pass it to a student, and have them introduce themselves. After they are done, they can toss it to a classmate and then sit down, and in this way it becomes more interesting for them than just going down the rows.

Fourth period is the first group of 6th years. The 6th years are significantly more reserved than the 5th years, and so we had plenty of time to do their introductions last class. Today's lesson, then, is going over the standard Daily Practice that I conduct whenever a class starts. This consists of greetings ("Hello class! Hello Tony!") and a few standard questions - How are you? How's the weather? What day is it? This gets the kids ready for English period, and was inherited from the previous teacher. Since I'm the first ALT at Persimmon, though, this needs to be learned anew. We spend the class going over the question "How are you?" and its various responses, and playing games to reinforce the vocabulary - the hot-potato idea from the fifth years worked well, so I do it again to make the students ask and answer the target vocabulary.

After fourth period is lunch. In Japanese elementary schools, lunch is carted into the classroom and the students serve each other and eat at their desks. I eat the kids' lunch with them, changing classrooms each time. Today is with the fifth years. Another quirk of Japanese school lunch is that it is generally accompanied by music - the Austin Powers theme today, for example.

After lunch is a free period, in which the kids mostly run around screaming. I go outside and play soccer with the students, which is a bit confusing because they manage to have four distinct games going on a single field. This results in quite a few eight year olds getting whacked in the back of the head, but they don't seem phased. The students expect me to be a natural star at any sport, and luckily I have a good ten inches at least on them so I don't usually let them down too badly.

Fifth period is the other group of sixth years, covering the same material as the first group. I have one more free period after this, and then the kids go home. I meet with the teachers and we plan our next lesson, and I go home.

Tuesday

Every Tuesday I go to Starfruit Elementary, one of my two set schools. It is a small-ish school, the smallest of the "big" schools I visit - it has all six grades, but some classes as small as four students. At Starfruit, I teach every grade - which classes I will do in a given day depends on the day. This week, I'm teaching the First, Second, and Third-year students.

My first three periods are free. I write, prepare materials, and drink a lot of green tea. Fourth period I start in on the first-years. This is the only school where I work with kids this young, which is a bit intimidating, but the key to the really young kids is just to have a lot of energy. This is my second time working with them. Our lesson for the day is introducing vegetable vocabulary. I first go through the flashcards, covering them with my hand and then slowly revealing the picture so the kids can guess what the item is - these are farm kids so they actually are familiar with things like cucumbers and kale. As we uncover each card we repeat it several times and then stick it up on the board. Once the cards are all revealed and drilled, we put them on the floor and the kids play karuta. Karuta consists of kids sitting in a circle with cards in the middle. The teacher says a word, and the first kid to slap the right card gets to keep it. This is a great standby game that can be applied to anything, and the kids are always excited to play it. We do this a few times and then the cards go back up on the board. Now I have the kids close their eyes, and then take away a card - the kids have to say which card is missing. This is a good activity because it gets the kids to actively say the words without prompting or repetition. They freak out when the game goes on and eventually more than half the cards are taken away. For the last time I hide the cards around the room and the kids run around trying to find them (hiding things from people that are two feet tall is really easy). The class is over and I have lunch - today is with the 4th years.

Fifth period I have the second years. The same rules apply as with the first years, for the most part - lots of energy. I meet with them more frequently than with the first years, so we continue an animal lesson from last week by introducing some new animals that live on a farm (again, most of these kids live on or near farms, so its pretty applicable to them). We play karuta with the cards, and then go over the sounds animals make - some of them are quite different from in Japanese (Pigs in Japan say buuu, buuu). Then we introduce the song Old MacDonald - a song the kids know in Japanese. We sing the first verse in English and the class is over. We'll continue next week with adding animals.

The last period of the day is third years. We've been doing family vocabulary, and last week the kids drew pictures of their families. We finish the pictures today and introduce them to the class - "This is my father, Hiroshi. This is my brother, Kenta," etc.. At the end we have some time left, so we talk about various animals we have at home - kids are always surprised to hear I have five dogs back in America. After class I plan out the next week's lesson with the relevant teachers, and head home.

Wednesday

Wednesday I head to Cantaloupe Elementary. Cantaloupe is my other regular school, and I go there every Wednesday. It's a larger school, like Persimmon, and like Persimmon I only teach fifth and sixth years here. First and second periods I have fifth years, and we finish up a month-long unit on actions - learning words like Run and Climb and grammar like I Like To and Do You Like To? The culmination of this lesson is a game in which kids get a sheet full of actions and have to walk around and ask each other if they like doing those actions - the goal is to find a yes for every action. Since Cantaloupe is a larger school, games that involve students interacting with each other work better than ones that are between teacher and student, as those activities tend to leave the rest of the class idle for a long time (you do not want to deal with bored ten year olds). This activity, and the preparation for it, takes the whole class period.

Third period is the first of the sixth grade classes. At Cantaloupe, the sixth year teachers give more guidance in class content, as compared with some other teachers at other schools. Today we continue a lesson from last week in which the students cut out cards for the alphabet and played karuta with them. The twist this week is that instead of just using letters, we use whole words, so the kids have to really practice listening to pronounciation. This lasts the whole period. Fourth period is free, and fifth is the other sixth year class.

Thursday

Today I drove out to Watercress Elementary. This is one of my smallest schools, lying in a small community about ten minutes out of Monbetsu proper. With only six students, lessons at Watercress have to take a different form, but I really enjoy going there. Its also one of the schools that I don't go to for an entire day - instead of showing up at 8:00, I go to the Board of Education until 10:00 and then drive out.

Watercress' students are divided into two classes - a class of three third years and one second year, and a class of three fifth years. The school was once larger, and included middle school students, but the population shrinkage in rural Japan has hit this community and it is now at its smallest size ever. Outside the school are the remains of the Watercress train station, which saw it's last train in 1985. Despite all this however, the school is well-funded and housed in a building just five years old. The students are also much closer than in the larger schools, seeming more like a family than like schoolmates. I visit Watercress around twice a month.

The teachers at Watercress plan the lessons beforehand, so I just have to follow my script. With the second and third years, we practice some set English phrases - look! Wake up! Good morning! I'm hungry! They show great enthusiasm for this. The fifth years are working on shopping activities, and today they take turns running a "shop" in the classroom and serving the other students. They learn vocabulary for various foods, and things like "One ____, please" and counting vocabulary for money. Last time I visited, we spent the fifth period after lunch picking beans from the school garden. They were delicious. Today I play "badminton" with the kids, in a variation that involves four players and no net. They are delighted with my attempts to use the racket like a sword (which does not work very well).

Friday

Tomorrow I am not scheduled to go to a school. The schools all hammer out their schedules at the beginning of the academic year, in April, and there are days when I don't have one to go to. On these days, I work at the Board of Education office, and generally make supplies and materials for future classes.

This has been really long, but hopefully informative for anyone interested in what an average day on JET is like. Again, this is just my experience - some people spend all their time at one school, some visit all levels of school, and some take different roles in the classroom.

A Guided Tour of the Monbetsu Party Palace

As I am having friends over tonight for a delightful dinner, I actually cleaned my apartment. This is something of a first. I took this opportunity to take some pictures to share with those who haven't experienced the glory. If you are a prospective JET, this represents something like what you might end up with but as always, ~every situation is different~

My apartment is up on the fifth floor of a building owned by an elderly couple who also run a store downstairs. When you ascend the stairs the interior looks like this:



Charming! The interiors, however, are much more serviceable. You come in through the "genkan", a feature of Japanese homes where the floor is raised shortly after entering the house, leaving a small sunken area to take off your shoes in. From here you go straight ahead into the main living room area (click for larger pictures):



On the right you can see my bedroom (and prized vuvuzela), which is attached to the living room directly. You could hang a curtain if you wanted to. Another shot:



The blue pillows are the bed are zabuton, or Japanese butt pillows for sitting on the floor. I'm having company over so I have them out and ready to go. Also in the bedroom, you can see the traditional Japanese rice-straw tatami mats on the floor.

The kitchen is attached to the living room next to the entrance area. Here's a picture from the living room looking back towards the door:



To the left is the doorway area and the sunken genkan. Off to the left is the bathroom and toilet (different rooms!). There's also a washing machine visible in the kitchen. Additionally, although you can't see them, there's about eight different trash cans in there. The Japanese have a thing for trash sorting.

Hope you've enjoyed your tour of my apartment! Please come again when its covered in papers and clothing.

Kancho to the heart pt. 2

I have suffered my greatest personal disappointment thus far in Japan.

As you may be aware, karaoke is one of the factors that holds Japanese society, like a layer of duct tape on a high-powered engine valve (or something, I don`t know cars). Since JETs are masters of cultural adaptation, we tend to do our duty and adapt to the culture of karaoke with great enthusiasm. It was in this spirit that I went with friends to karaoke in Asahikawa this weekend. Far from a normal outing, however, this trip was special; I had recently been practicing a new song, with which I planned to blow everyone out of the water and most likely launch an multinational music career.

The song was Come Sail Away by the incomparable Styx. If you don`t know the song, look it up on Youtube and you`ll probably recognize it. It has all the elements I like in a karaoke song; namely, it`s extremely theatrical and dramatic, and the bulk of the vocals are well beyond my actual range. Needless to say, I was quite excited to have a chance to bust out my new song.

We got to the karaoke box, began queuing up songs, and I looked up my song and... nothing. They had Styx, but not Come Sail Away, so what`s the point? I was ruined. In despair I ended up doing Wolfmother - Woman, which turned out to be one of those songs I like in real life but which has two lines and a two-minute guitar solo. Not the best choice for karaoke.

Despite this terrible setback, I still managed to have a good long weekend (monday was Respect for the Aged day, a national holiday) full of shopping and food. I tried soup curry for the first time, which is sort of a Japanese vision of what Indian curry might look like. I also bought a vuvuzela, cementing my place in the world as a hipster three months past current.

This week is a short week, with Monday being a holiday and Thursday being another. On Friday, I`ll be playing ping-pong at one of my schools, something I`ve developed quite a taste for against all odds. Updates to follow.

Like a kancho to the heart

Long gap since my last post - I've been busy. Here's an update with some pictures, though!

Last weekend, myself and a slew of other JETs traveled north to attend to the Northern welcome party, in a town (village(intersection)) called Nakagawa. Nakagawa station, three hours into the mountains, looks like this:



We arrived Saturday afternoon and proceeded to dick around the town and set up camp before nightfall, at which point we hit the hot springs (pictures omitted) and commenced doing the sorts of things adults generally do while camping.

In the morning, several JETs had signed up for the local festival, which entailed many spirited rounds of log-pushing. Log-pushing is essentially a tug-of-war in reverse; teams hold on to each end of a large log, and attempt to push the other team out of the playing area. I didn't get to take any pictures of it, but this poster sums it up:



Hooray! One of the JET mens teams managed to make it to the semifinals, which was probably due to their fetching lumberjack costumes.

Here's some other random pictures from the train ride back and the night in Asahikawa before heading back to work:




In other news, I had my first experience with "kancho" today. For the blessedly unversed, kancho is an important part of childhood in Japan and is enjoyed by boys and girls of all ages. It consists of clasping the hands together with the index fingers outstretched, and then attempting to ram the resulting projectile as far up the rectum of any given adult as you can. Yeah, I don't get it either. I knew about kancho previously, but today was my first time having a kid actually go for it. It's not a one-time thing, either - this kid was really earnestly dedicated and it's quite hard to keep an eye on a specific 8 year old when you are surrounded by thirty of them.

Ah, Japan.

First Day Part 3

This post is a continuation of the previous one, in which I describe my first three days on the job. This is the good one! Still no pictures, however.

My third day teaching called for me to travel a goodly ways out of town to a school of six students. When I entered, I encountered a flying hug from a third year student, and was made to play some kind of dodgeball derivative for fifteen minutes before I encountered my first (of two) teachers.]

This day was my best yet - the kids were very warm to me and to each other. The nature of such a small school meant that the kids were like a family - the older ones help the younger ones out and theres not as much conflict as I would have expected, even in ball games that would otherwise have a potential to get ugly (dodgeball with 12 year olds and 8 year olds together). This was also my second Japanese school lunch, which is great except for being forced to down a whole carton of whole milk. The kids are really vigilant about this, so you can't cheat.

Things are looking up now - I'm much more confident in my ability to plan and run classes, and this week I will be doing my first repeat class - ie not self-introductions.

On the Job

Subtitle: Yes, I actually do work occasionally

This week marked my first week of actual on-the-ground classroom teaching with real, live children. An apt way to imagine this would be a boxer's first big fight, except in this case I still have all my teeth and there is less blood. I visited three schools this week, and I'll cover them in order.

DAY 1

I began the week at my school the farthest away from town, about a half hour drive. While I had had some meetings with teachers prior to this session, my meeting with the teacher at this school was scheduled to take place when I got there - right before I was to teach. I wasn't nervous at all, that would be silly.

For my first class at any school, the obvious topic to cover is myself. The kids are always excited to have a new assistant teacher in the classroom, and always have lots of questions ranging from the predictable ("Do you have siblings?") to the esoteric ("What is your favorite insect?"). Since I am in elementary schools, my introductions are in both English and Japanese.

I knew all this going in, but I didn't really have a clear idea in mind about how, exactly, the 45 minutes would go by. I didn't know how the kids would respond to things, or how long any given activity or segment would take. I also didn't know, being new, where the kids were at regarding English or what subjects they had recently been working on.

The teacher met with me and we worked out a rough plan of attack. First, I'd introduce myself and my state, and a few other simple details of myself. Then, the kids would ask any questions they had about me. After this I'd get a simple self-intro from the kids, using English they had worked on earlier - primarily, names and likes. After this, since the kids had been working on numbers and times, we had a simple activity planned using a clock and various activities throughout the day ("What time do you get up? What time do you take a bath?"). We wrapped up with a game of bingo using numbers.

I'll be honest: I don't actually remember this class very well. I was suffused with terror and operated on auto-pilot; I have a vague sense that I was not very good. The kids were great, however, and there were no major disasters. My self-introduction, which I had pegged at perhaps five minutes, took about thirty seconds. The kids probably wondered if foreigners always have such confused smiles on their faces.

The class ended, however, and while I didn't do a great job the kids didn't seem too put out. I took my leave of the school and felt marginally more comfortable about the next day, since I had 1) met with the teacher previously and 2) had now had invaluable classroom experience, and knew a bit more of what to expect.

DAY 2

Day 2 took me to a school in town, with about forty kids between grades 1 and 6. I was scheduled to teach the 5th grade class that day, and we had previously worked on my self-introduction activities. While waiting for the class to start, however, I thought about the previous class and decided that perhaps my preparations were not adequate. I quickly came up with a game of charades in which the children could guess and ask what sports I liked, a common question in the introduction. This time, I felt a bit more level-headed, and the class was a success; we did have extra time so I was glad to have prepared an activity. The kids seemed quite happy.

I was scheduled to spend all day at the school, so I ate lunch with a class of students later in the day. In Japanese schools, students eat lunch in their homeroom classrooms, where they spend most of the day outside of breaks. The desks were clearly not designed for adults. The kids in the classroom were quite excited to have me eating with them, however, and peppered me with questions and explanations of the classroom. After lunch, the children clean up their places and then have a period of cleaning their classroom; older students also clean the school halls and other locations on a rotating basis.

After lunch, my assistance was requested as a native speaker example for the 6th graders. In Japan, English instruction is not required of elementary school students, but beginning in April 5th and 6th graders will be required to attend 20 hours of English classes per semester. For this reason, 5th and 6th grade class schedules are beginning to resemble the more rigorous curricula of the middle and high schools. ALTs like me are now in demand in elementary schools for this reason, as many teachers in those schools have not had post-secondary English instruction and are often not confident of their skills. For this class, I was asked to read passages from the book so the kids would have a native speaker's pronunciation to model after. I did manage to spice up the class by having the kids use the English they had practiced that day to guide me out of the classroom with my eyes closed (I only ran into one desk).

After this class, I was asked if I wanted to go practice with the kids for their "marathon" (a generic term for any kind of distance running event). I said "sure!" and thought myself that a bunch of ten year olds can't really be running that far. I heard 1.5 kilometers, and since I'm a big dumb American I don't really know how far that is. The answer is that it's not far, but it's farther than an out-of-shape guy like me can run without wanting to die. My legs still hurt three days later!

At the end of this day, I waved goodbye to most of the kids as they left, and consulted with the teachers about our next meeting. I felt much better about how the day had gone than I had about the previous one, and much more sure that I wasn't actually here by mistake.

This post has gotten quite long, and is already my second of the day, so I believe I'll save the third day (today) for another post. Suffice to say, it was the best one so far.

Get Your Obon On

At the end of last week, shortly after coming back from Sapporo, I participated in Mombetsu's Bon Odori, the three-day dance at the centerpiece of the nationwide Bon festival. Wikipedia states that Obon is

a Japanese Buddhist custom to honor the departed (deceased) spirits of one's ancestors. This Buddhist custom has evolved into a family reunion holiday during which people return to ancestral family places and visit and clean their ancestors' graves, and when the spirits of ancestors are supposed to revisit the household altars. It has been celebrated in Japan for more than 500 years and traditionally includes a dance, known as Bon-Odori.

What this means, in practice, is that the whole town gets together and stomps around in the street and yells a lot and drinks. Literally everybody comes. Some people go in costume, and we had guests including Lady Gaga re-imagined as a Buddhist deity and Michael Jackson (complete with, inexplicably, an entourage of children). Pretty much anything goes, as long as you more or less follow the very simple guidelines of the dance and are loud. It looks like this:



Of course, I wanted to really get involved as much as possible, which required the help of two separate people:



Whew! The dance goes for about an hour and a half, with a few hundred people going around in a circle and the rest standing around observing. I wore traditional Japanese sandals for the dance, which during that hour and a half implanted themselves in my feet in a manner that would be the envy of aspiring piercers anyway. They haven't healed yet.

Sapporific

From Sapporo

This week was the Hokkaido JET orientation at Sapporo, the main city around these parts. Around 100 of us convened in Sapporo, a 4.5 hour bus ride from Mombetsu (pictures above). The days were spent learning about things like tiny Japanese cars in winter (they work, apparently) and hot spring etiquette (don't put your head under water and blow bubbles). Our orientation was hosted at the Akarenkan, a 150-year-old governmental building that translates directly to "Red Brick Building".

From Sapporo

After work, of course, came the important work of socializing with our fellow new teachers. Here's Sapporo at night, seen from the top of a ferris wheel on top of a shopping mall:

From Sapporo

And all around good times were had. Right after returning on Wednesday, we had to jump feet-first into our schools and into the Bon dance festival, but that will be covered in another post. In closing, here's a giant spider at a bus station waiting to snare children. Enjoy!

From Sapporo

Bombs at Noon

The Mombetsu ALT Krew (holla) went out on the town last night to see what could be seen. The week before had been long and harrowing, so it was time to end on a high note. We began our night at a local block party/festival/karakoke blowout. I didn't take any pictures, because I was busy eating yakisoba (lit. burned noodles) and yakitori (lit. burned chicken). I passed on the yakiika (burned squid). Like everyone else in the world, the Japanese know that it's not a proper party without beer and fire.
We met some friends of the departed ALTs, who introduced themselves to us and insisted that we treat them as family. Although you can never be completely sure, I believe that we were drafted into the local team for the upcoming Bon-Odori, a three-day festival that features townsfolk prancing around in costumes and dancing. The fact that we don't know the dance didn't seem to make much of a difference. One lady invited us to come to her with any problems we may have, as long as they didn't involve women or money. Fair enough! One family also noted that they frequently host exchange students (in Mombetsu?) and that a new high school student from America would be arriving soon. I believe we're having a party.

We went out and hit the mean streets of Hamanasu-doori afterwards, where Mombetsu's nightlife lives. At a friend's grandmother's bar, I was given my own bottle to come back to. A couple of bars and clubs later made it a good night. No pictures of this because, well, thats not really cool. Here's some random pictures of Mombetsu from this morning though:



Today is dedicated to cleaning. Tomorrow at 7 we get on a bus to Sapporo for three more days of final orientation, at which there will be no drinking or entertainment whatsoever. After I get back, classes begin along with the Obon festival mentioned above. Good times ahead!

Also, the title of this post is inspired by the fact that the city hall uses it's air raid siren to announce noon every day, even on weekends. And the title of the last post was referring to a particularly tortured mispronunciation of "clerk".

"This is Tanaka-san. She is crack."

Today, ALT #2 and I got to escape the steam bath of the office to go for a drive (I keep thinkng of this whenever I'm there). We went around town to visit and tour our various schools. For the most part, the English teachers were gone on summer break, with the Principles or Vice-Principles manning the fort. I was offered tea at every school, and had to use the bathroom three times.

Seeing all of the schools was a really good experience, even if all the students and teachers were missing. I was able to set up pre-class meetings with several of the schools, so that I can ascertain what they are looking for from me and what the kids may be expecting. The schools run the gamut from 50+ year old ruins full of ghosts to incongruously new buildings in the middle of rice fields, and students range from 250+ to one school with a whopping total of three. One thing every school had in common was a level of support that was, to an American, shockingly high. Even schools in the middle of nowhere with more staff than students had up-to-date personal computers for the kids and large-size LCD screens for lessons, and music and art rooms were universally well-supplied. One school invited me to use their drumset "Any time," which would be tempting if the school wasn't 35 minutes away.

I am settling well into life here, and next week I'll be heading to Sapporo for Hokkaido orientation. After that, it's time for the kids to come back. I'm looking forward with trepidation and excitement.

Hokkaido is the Land of Lies

Yesterday was the day of two notable occurances - it was the hottest day on record in Monbetsu in the last 30 years, and it was the day the ALTs met the Mayor for some prime media face time. Since this was a big deal, we wore suits. As I believe in being prepared, I looked up "Heat Stroke" in the dictionary before I left. Sleeping was completely unbearable, as the Japanese don't really believe in AC (good for them, but I would have killed to have it for a night or two). I came to Hokkaido specifically to avoid the heat further south, so this is not a particularly charming course of events for me.

We also went out on the town for some drinks with the area JETs and friends, as my two predecessors are leaving town today. From here on out, it's just me and the new guys. Here's to an exciting new year in Monbetsu!

Exquisite Japanese Cuisine

This is the heart of Japanese fine dining - deep in the mountains, past the veils of mist, you enter a tiny restaurant that has never had a name and find... hamburger sashimi.

In other news, I had my first lesson driving a stick shift and although I tried my hardest nobody died.

First Day on the Job

After my less-than-stellar introduction to the staff at the Board of Education, I was determined to make a splash on my first full day at the office. Since I arrived in Monbetsu on a Thursday, I was asked to come in the following Friday. I got up early and made sure I was dressed to the nines, despite the relaxed summer dress code, and went in about fifteen minutes early. Thanks to a tip the night before from my apartment's previous occupant, I had prepared a short introductory speech; I was fully prepared to make up for my lackluster and jet-lagged display from the day before.
Japanese offices are set up as clusters of desks in an open room. The entire Monbetsu Board of Education (BoE) staff resides in one room, with the exception of the superintendent, who has his own office. The three below him have their own desks along one edge of the room; everyone else has desks in clusters according to department, with the head of that department seated at the end of the cluster. My desk is next to that of the other JET, who hasn't arrived yet. Unlike in an American office, no cubicle walls or other dividers separate desks from each other; the idea is to foster open communication and group spirit.
Shortly after arrival, a few of the higher-ups talked for a while about current events. I couldn't understand what they were talking about, but it seemed pretty long considering that school is not currently in session and it wasn't about me. After this, everyone in the office talked briefly about what they were up to... and then it was my turn! I've never been more thankful to have prepared something in advance. After this, it was time to begin the workday.
My normal schedule, once school begins again, will be to show up at the BoE on mornings that I don't teach early classes, and stay there until I leave for classes. On some days, I won't go at all, and on some days when I don't have classes I'll stay there all day. Since school is currently out, I get to stay at the office all day long for the next two weeks. Terrific!
After lunch, I got taken out to see to some of the necessary paperwork I had to complete. I applied for my official Foreigner Card©, which proves to the police that I'm not a Russian gangster (in theory). I changed the name on my apartment from my predecessor's name to my own. We tried to open a bank account, but discovered that the Foreigner Card would have to go through first... not a huge deal, since I won't be getting paid for a month and a half. Most importantly, I got a cell phone! Not having had a functioning cell for the last week had been very uncomfortable to me, and now I get to puzzle out all the various bells and whistles ubiquitous to Japanese cell phones. So far, I know that my phone will track how many steps I've walked, and can be set to automatically broadcast my blood type (Japanese equivalent of horoscopes). The wonders of the modern age.
Tomorrow I'll go back into the office and start my first proper full week of work. At some point, I'll be taken out and shown how to drive a manual transmission, and later this week the other new ALT will be arriving. Exciting times in the city of Monbetsu! Next time, I'll talk about my introduction to the official Drinkin' Street here. Until then!

The Road to Monbetsu

Finally, thousands of miles and more than a week later, I've arrived at my new home in Monbetsu, Japan. No picture or description can ever truly communicate a place, but this is the view outside my window this morning:



But that's getting ahead of myself. When last I wrote I was in Shinjuku, in Tokyo. From there, the Hokkaido JETs flew out on Wednesday morning to Shin-Chitose airport, near Sapporo. Sapporo is the biggest city in Hokkaido, with a population of two million, it was here that I met my new boss and my predecessor. We stayed there for a night before heading out the next day for Monbetsu. Our hotel was the aptly-named "Swanky Hotel", which presents rooms that look like this:



Swanky indeed! We went out to a "Genghis Khan" restaurant, in which you grill strips of lamb over a fire at the countertop. The proprietor sticks a piece of fat on top of the grill to keep it greased up. Not knowing what this was, I was halfway through my second piece before she advised me not to eat it ("This is really chewy, whatever it is", I thought). We then hit the beer gardens, which is exactly what it sounds like.

The next day my supervisor and I got on a train for Asahikawa, where we changed over for a bus bound for Monbetsu. Although it took quite some time, this ride really allowed me to see some of the heart of Hokkaido, passing through gorgeous mountain roads and minuscule farming villages.



At this time, I finally felt I was getting somewhere - going deep through these isolated villages on the way to our eventual destination, my new home. We arrived in the afternoon, and I was given the harrowing experience of being introduced to the office right away upon arrival. I went to work the next morning, but this will have to be covered in my next update.

I'm in my apartment now, but not quite moved in yet; I've explored the town a bit, but not yet made it my home. It's only been two days, however, and I'm looking forward to the weeks and months ahead greatly. My new coworker, the middle school ALT, will arrive next week; I'm looking forward to meeting him, and having someone around going through the same process I am. This is the biggest adjustment from Tokyo Orientation; I'm no longer part of a huge and aimless herd of folks in the same situation as me. I'm on my own now, which is scary and exhilarating. Of course, I've been getting a lot of help, but I'm not longer just a face in the crowd. Now I'm home.