August 7, 2011
What a week!! Of course the day before I start work there is a 6.1 earthquake at midnight, which has now completely messed up my sleeping pattern. This whole sleeping on the floor thing really blows. If a thin, slightly padded mat was a sufficient bed, don't you think more people would have them? I don't like the fact that if I roll over...I can keep going until I hit the wall and not notice. Falling off a bed and onto the floor is a much better way to learn self-control. I miss my broken bed...
My job this week was to follow around Tim, my trainer. He's actually a foreign teacher trainer at the training facility, but he was filling in as an emergency teacher for the last couple weeks. So the first day I followed him around like a lost puppy, making sure I didn't miss anything. Pretty sure I tried to follow him to the bathroom.
I met so many students this week, I'm never going to remember them all. I can't remember which ones are mine! Each day I would teach another lesson and by Saturday I was teaching 4 lessons for the day...which I found out is only half of what I would normally be teaching on a Saturday. When we had some down time, we discussed what I can do to improve. Something about those trainers..they're too nice. They always ask you to critique your own lessons. Self-reflection is great and all, but don't just agree with me. I thought my lessons went well even though I stalled every five seconds to look at my notes, I never finished a lesson, and I'm pretty sure I called everyone by the wrong name. But Tim said it was great. I bet the trainers would agree with me if I said I sound just like Mariah Carey when I sing, just because they can't say anything negative.
A couple funny things happened this week:
1) We have these main cards--which are flash cards with target vocabulary words on them and pictures. One of the cards this week was "look" and it had a picture of a cat looking through a magnifying glass at a coiled snake. So..one of the kids said to another in Japanese, while pointing at the coiled snake, "うんちみたい [oon-chi-mi-tah-ee]" Simply translates to, "looks like poo". See, the problem with this job is that I can understand Japanese, but I am not allowed to let the kids know that I understand. I tried everything to keep myself from straight up laughing in this kid's face, but it was no use.
2) My third day of teaching some lessons and I had a group of five girls who are about 5 or 6 years old. Cute little things. I guess I am supposed to give out stickers at the end of class, but I felt so rushed and pressed for time that I forgot. One of them didn't. She kept commenting in Japanese, "we didn't get a sticker...where's my sticker?" Sorry kid...next week. Only if you're good.
My coworkers took me out for a welcome dinner. We went to this "American" pub called Bronx Cheer. My manager and one of the JTs could only stay for a half hour because they had to catch the last train, but it was nice to talk with everyone outside of work. I'm excited to get to know everyone better. They all seem very nice!
Other exciting things this week: I got a phone! An iphone! I went to the store with one of the JTs on Monday, but it was too late in the day to get a phone, so we just discussed plans and such. I went back on Thursday and got it myself. I'm so proud. Yay Japanese Immersion! You got me a phone plan.
Now that the first week is over...we have another week off for Obon (holiday for ancestors). I don't have any friends and I don't know where to go...so..we'll see what happens..Way to throw a vacation on us after one week of work. I'm going to expect this more often. Well, until next time! またね!
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New Vocabulary:
~蛇 heh-bee snake
~うんち oo-n-chi poop
~見る me-ru to look
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