To be or not to do

Today at lunch I noticed that the male teachers I was sitting with were wearing suits. When I asked one of them about it he said it was because the students have a test today. The teachers have to wear suits for the formal end of season tests. I’m not sure why I never noticed it before.

In regards to the test, one of the English teachers asked me if this was correct:

Who is the teacher who teaches you math?

Ms. Inaba does.

I told him that this sounded strange, but I tried to explain why this English might not be correct. It occured to me that in English, answering a question using “to be” verb with “to do” verb sounds strange. The question should be answered:

Ms. Inaba is.

Thus:

Who teaches you math?

Ms. Inaba does.

makes sense, while the aforementioned does not. Or, it is nonsensical.

I do not understand. I am confused.

The “to be” verb unnecessarily muddies our language, in my opinion, but who am I to argue with the lexical capabilities of a history of collective thought?

A Delivery

[Knocking on door]

Delivery Man: “A delivery for you.”

[Pearl opens door]

Pearl: “Good evening, how much is the package?”

Delivery Man: “Ah, you already paid in advance so just sign here please.”

Pearl: “Okay.”

Delivery Man: “You can speak Japanese?”

Pearl: “Yes.”

Delivery Man: “Thank you very much for your business.”

Pearl: “Okay.”

[Pearl closes door]

–The End–

Paranoia and Curiosity

I am finally beginning to understand the JETs I met when I first got here, mainly the ones who, at the time, seemed crazy to me. They were paranoid, frustrated, loved what they were doing but clearly needed to relax.

I understand them because I can tell I am becoming one of those people. I just wish for once, that the teachers I work with, whose job is to teach English, actually understood what I am saying. Even if I use the slowest and simplest words possible, it doesn’t work. I am afraid to use Japanese because I believe that if I did, they would never speak to me in English. Half of them don’t anyway. I don’t want to lose my identity to my language. It strikes me the most benign of situations and yet somehow so difficult for me to understand and fix.

Recently some students have been creating surveys to give to the English teachers for a special class project. I was sent a survey from a different middle school comparing my hometown to this town in convenience, and under the question, “What is inconvenient about this town?” I wrote that “I don’t go shopping very often because people stare at me”. After sending it, I began to wonder if this answer was too candid, or I had done something bad.

I’m always wondering if my reactions are right or wrong, if going from my gut is wrong, and it bothers me. I can’t intuit situations and use what is familiar to me to understand them. I wondered if I should have said “I don’t go shopping because everyone is curious about me.” This is what they always tell me to explain it, that they are curious about me.

Happy Birthday

Today’s my birthday. Yay, I’m 25.

Today I figured out a new way to study Japanese that, for some peculiar reason, didn’t occur to me before. I take my homemade flashcards from words I gleaned off of quiz websites and run 5 or so cards, then I rerun that same 5 cards several times very fast mouthing the reading and thinking the English meaning in my head. Then I add another 5 cards and run them the same way.

The difference in this method is the speed at which I have to recall them; if I can’t recall them immediately I move them back to the original pile. I’m at a little bit of a crunch for time before the JLPT 2 and already this method is helping me learn faster. I’ve decided to also apply this method to my bass practice and see that I can’t make similar progress.

I had one class today. The students refused to say the class greetings in English, which they are required to do. In rare form, I got angry at the end of class and told them they were rude.

After living here for a year and understanding the attitude that produces such disregard for English, and hearing the students mumble about “foreigners” and how similar and ignorant we are when I am standing up in front of them during class, it is difficult for me to see such behavior as simple adolescent antics. When you live here, you become English, and disregard for it becomes disregard for you. I see it as a product of this society as a whole and it infuriates me.

I’m translating an opinion piece I found in the newspaper written by a Japanese as a call to other citizens to abandon this cultural attitude; more on this later when I’m finished with it.

Really, I love living here most days, I really do. Tonight my friends are throwing me a birthday party and I feel lucky. I’ve never been thrown a birthday party by my friends before.

Who touched me?! Was it you??

I don’t often post about my classes, but I had an interesting one just now.

This particular class has three very noisy students who try very hard to be the best class clowns ever; their efforts are loud but usually focused, so it doesn’t totally disrupt the class, it just makes a difficult atmosphere, one which I have little control over as an assistant teacher.

Today it became obvious to me that what appeared to be simple class-clowning was actually having a very negative effect on the class. A game which had been tried and tested very successfully in several other classes went pretty poorly in this one. The game involves running from the front of the room to the back to grab a fly swatter, and running to the front again to swat at “A” or “AN” written on the board. They choose one or the other based on whether the word I call out begins with a vowel sound or not.

It’s a really fun game when they run. But for some reason they didn’t feel the need to run, there was no competitive spirit in the class, and most of them just walked to the back to get the swatter and then slowly walked to the front to swat a letter. It’s pretty rare that I can’t get the kids competing with each other, it’s the hallmark of most of my activities in fact because it’s so easy, so when they won’t compete it’s a sign to me that something is very wrong.

In this case, I have a feeling that they had given up competing because they were always competing with the distraction from the noisier students. No one could root for them if they tried hard because everyone was busy looking at the three trying to get everyone’s attention. Any effort would go completely unnoticed.

Luckily the class was saved by the game I have yet to ever see fail, 7 Up. The psychology of this game couldn’t BE any more brilliant. The English is simple too so they’re not intimidated by it.

In case you never played 7 Up when you were in elementary school, seven people stand at the front and the rest of the students sit with their heads down and thumbs up. The seven students at the front then quietly pick one student each by gently pushing their thumb down. The teacher calls out “Heads Up, 7 Up,” and the students whose thumbs were touched stand up and try to guess who touched them with the question: “Was it____?”

It worked wonderfully as always, the noisy kids had to shut up and I even got smiles out of a couple of the mopey ones. Using a foreign language isn’t fun when it’s embarrassing, but it’s fun when you’re communicating something. The object of this game is to find out who touched you, using English is auxiliary.

If it is possible to infuse that idea into all foreign language classes, the job of teaching a foreign language is a lot easier.

(Addendum: My other class today was similar with a pair of noise makers. This time it was different though, they were actually very funny and class was a lot of fun. Perhaps the difference was that they didn’t make any teasing or negative comments to any students, whereas the noisy students in the first class did.)

Town Beautification

Yesterday morning I found this mysterious box on my front doorstep.

This note was in my mailbox:

[Circular Publication]

2007, October 1st

Bunsui Elementary School District “Making a Town Council” News

(Environment Beautification Committee)

–Decision to develop the “Lots of Flowers Campaign,” in aiming for the goals of the “Exciting Niigata National Policy” set for 2009–

In order to meet the goal of “A Town Made Graceful by Flowers”, we have prepared planters and tulip bulbs for each of the 3,000 households in 48 residential districts. We expect that you can have fun planting these seedlings.

Distribution was made to 1,500 households in 2006, and 1,500 households in 2007, meeting a standard set in accordance with our budget.

We entrust that each household will comply with this arrangement.

I feel strange; on one hand I think this is brilliant policy and something that I should have seen done in American neighborhoods a long time ago. I’m certain it will make a more liveable, beautiful environment.

On the other hand, I am entirely intimidated by this little box and its contents.

How the heck do you plant tulips?!

Damn you, DS Lite

If you’re like me, it’s the stuff that absolutely repulses you at first exposure to that inevitably becomes the stuff you want the most. Or maybe that’s just me.

My first contact with the Nintendo DS occurred about half a year ago when I happened to step onto a cabin on one of the major train lines in Tokyo in which every conceivable surface was plastered with ads imploring me to buy it. I swore to myself I wouldn’t give in.

But then my friend let me play a kanji recognition game on his convenient, reduced-size DS Lite, and I became addicted. The game system’s hype has since diminished and I was able to purchase my navy blue one at a used electronics store. Now I can tap away my time while waiting in line or on the train like every other plebeian on this island.

I tried to hate you Nintendo DS Lite, I really did. But then you had to go and have all sorts of useful games and programs like dictionaries, kanji quizzes, learn foreign languages, recipes, business etiquette, brain teasers, AND MORE!!!! Argggghhhhh!

Look! I have to write the number 5 the way Japanese people do in order for the computer to recognize it, with the top in a left-to-right stroke. In written Japanese, all horizontal strokes must go left-to-right; I separated it on the screen to exaggerate this odd finding. The computer thought I was writing a 9 when I wrote 5 the way I normally do. Isn’t it cuuuuute!

It sure beats watching crystal clear digital TV for free on my cell phone while waiting for the bullet train.

Plebeian I tell you!! b^_^

Blue Sky and a Doctors Visit

Today I had to go to the doctor for a minor recurring issue. The first time I went to the doctor about this, I was in and out of a very crowded office with medicine in my hand 1 hour and $15 later, no paper filing necessary. Today it wasn’t crowded so it took 30 minutes. Japanese universal healthcare enables me to do this as well as go to any hospital in the country I want. It also costs me less in taxes than American insurance did out of my pocket.

Because Japan doesn’t invest in warfare and “helping” developing countries, its citizens get cheap and very effective healthcare. I’m not sure why countries like Canada fail at universal healthcare, but Japan seems to have a handle on it.

Although, I suppose all that giving the U.S. does is some kind of altruism because after all, the best way to control someone is to give them money.

Whoops, I meant the best way to help someone is to give them money.

The doctor visit was over so fast, I had some time before I needed to be back at work to take the above pictures of the fields around my home.

The sky is so blue it astounds me. This was the calm before the typhoon hitting tonight.

Sado Island

Last weekend I went to Sado Island to see the taiko drumming group Kodo, at their Earth Celebration concert.

Sado has some of the world’s most interesting underwater creatures living deep in the waters that touch this incredible coastline.

I went snorkelling for the first time at this unusually calm cove:

I was scared because it was probably my fourth time ever swimming in the ocean. There were lots of baby pufferfish in the water and they were adorable, speckled black on yellow. The seaweed was a succulent green and blue and danced in the water surrounding it.

It really is like another world under there. I want to go again very much.

High quality photos at flickr here.

Shoji Repair

I had an accident a while back where I tripped and fell into my shoji window, breaking a hole in the paper. Shoji windows are frames covered with very thin, translucent paper that act as a window shade. When this type of accident happens, one must remove the frame and repair it. Repairing it is very easy.

This is a shot of my room, showing the removed window. The window is resting on a set of sliding doors which are also easily removable.

An aside about the room; above the set of doors there is a wide frame. This frame has space between it and the wall at the top, so I can hang small hooks over it and hang anything I like from them, such as laundry or my coat. It’s extremely useful. The ceiling lamp, like all ceiling light fixtures, has high-medium-low brightness settings which are adjusted by pulling the chord.

Fixing the hole in the paper can be done by replacing the entire sheet of paper, or by covering it with flower-shaped paper seals. I picked mine up at the local 100yen store (like the $1 store in the US) and covered the hole without intentionally trying to make anything nice-looking. This is how it looks now:

It’s actually quite cute from a distance. It’s things like this that make me recall the lamenting I heard from a U.S. design student after a trip to Japan, wondering how they could justify spending years hitting the bar so low at the university, when there are people setting it so high elsewhere in the world.