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August 13th
It started out as a normal day, I was sitting at my desk studying the hell out of my Japanese textbook when one of the two English teachers who has not yet introduced himself marched over and began mumbling to me incoherently in English. Unfortunately, I can’t think of a nickname that fits his eccentricity in a more flattering way, so for now I’ll call him mumbles-sensei.
Anyway, he understands English at what might be a higher level than any of the other teachers, but speech wise...well...he’s an eccentric old man and I like him. I figured out he wanted me to go see the gym with him, which I’d already seen, but he wanted to take me anyway so I went.
I got to see badminton and handball. What the heck, have you ever even heard of handball? Apparently it’s like basketball and soccer together, and I thought it looked really badass. I guess it’s not very popular in Japan, but our school managed to put together a team. I think the boys on the handball team have been among the most excited to meet me yet lol
On my way back out, we passed the kyuudou (traditional Japanese archery) area and I mentioned I’d been wanting to see them. Before I knew it, we were on our way outside! As it turns out, the kyuudou arena is a little house with open windows that leads to a fenced-off grassy knoll with tiny little targets at the end. It’s the coolest thing I think I’ve ever seen, sports wise. The kids noticed me and immediately invited me in, offering me a special cushion to kneel on away from where the waiting archers sat on athletic mats. Several of them were very excited to speak to me in English and they all conferred amongst each other to figure out the English questions for what they wanted to know about me. They offered me a chair to sit in, but I didn’t want to be “that American,” so I refused at first, but eventually I had to take them up on it because my feet were falling asleep. I went back on my knees to ask them some questions in return, but my legs really suffered for it. I’m glad I didn’t end up falling over when I got up.
Occasionally the tennis players would peek in to eye the encounter jealously.
Anyway, the students were great and I’m not sure there’s anything cooler than kyuudou, except maybe kendo. They all wear white yukata-style wrapped shirts with the big skirt pants of traditional flair. It’s They fire 3 foot arrows from stringed 6 foot bows. It’s very formal, body language-wise. To shoot, they approach the window holding one end of the arrow to their hips like regale tail feathers. They settle perpendicular to the window and draw the string back above their heads. Slowly the pull it down so it almost brushes their cheeks, and when they release, they let the bow flip orientation in their hands. If someone hits the target, they all shout “Yosh!” Apparently they’re practicing several hours a day, wave after wave of archer, because there’s a big tournament next month.
I think I might try to join this club. I’ve always had a soft spot for archery, and I’ve been stalking club members all week lol
When I got back to my desk, I was just about thinking I would leave since it was about noon and that was the time they told me, “unofficially, that is officially when you can leave until school starts,” when suddenly the vice principal approached me.
“Stephanie-san, what do you plan for lunch?”
“Hm. I don’t know yet.”
“Well, lunch is an hour, so you can go home if you want to!
...Ok, so does that mean I should come back? I think it does. So for lunch I ran home to eat some Japanese yogurt (which really tastes more like cream cheese than yogurt) and instant ramen (which really tastes a lot better than U.S. instant ramen).
I was prepared to stick around for a little while, but I ended up staying all the way until 5:30 even though technically even my work day during standard school days ends at 4:30. I’m prepared to stay way late into the night, as is Japanese custom, during regular days, but during vacation? It majorly screwed up my plans, to say the least, since I’d planned to do laundry, grocery shop, pick up supplies for the apartment, exercise, and clean the be-jesus out of this place. It ended up being all right though.
About an hour into my return, the vice principal came back to talk to me. He started talking about his English studies, and when I tried to ask him where he was learning English, he said, “Right here! With you!” Lol Right on! New student. So we ended up talking for several hours. He went over my Japanese textbook, making sure to teach me a little Japanese, and then reversed the exercises to English. We talked about our families, which are the same in number of people and ages, and I taught him “snow blower” and “lawn mower” in honor of my dad lol Apparently his son lives in New York, so we talked a lot about Skype, time differences, and homesickness.
Talking with him made me realize I have a lot to learn about Japanese pitch accents. Japanese isn’t a tonal language, but there are certain words that change meaning when they’re inflected differently. I know nothing about that at this level of Japanese and no one ever really talks about it in linguistics, except for in passing. Anyway, we had a long chat and he ended up facilitating some relationships between me and some other teachers. It really helped break the ice. It’s good to make friends with the vice principal, I think. I even showed him the kanji translation game on my DS and he was fascinated, though I’m not sure why, since he was using an electronic dictionary that I’m sure cost a lot more money. I think he just liked the stylus :) Another fun time was explaining parts of the leg. In Japanese it’s just all “ashi,” they don’t discern between leg or foot or anything. This reminds me of how, in Spanish, there are different words for the inside of the ear and the outside of the ear. One of the wonders of language variation – there are multiple acceptable way to handle things and it doesn’t affect the communication of the speakers.
Today I also realized that I will probably get a lot of attention from the students in the teacher’s office, considering my desk is closest to the door and also facing it.
When I got home I immediately started some laundry. Unfortunately since everything needs to hang dry and it’s rainy out (and night time) I had to hang things all over my apartment and set up some racks and fans. Unfortunately, even after an entire night out with the fans on, things were still damp. I’ll probably have moldy clothes :( Additionally, I left the windows up so there would be airflow and it rained onto my unfinished wood window sills and floors...shit.
While I was making sesame rice with pork, my neighbor ALT knocked on my door to invite me to the movie rental place with him. I declined because of everything going on just then, but said I’d stop by later. We took a short walk again later, and now it’s just me, my odds and ends, and my blog.
As of today, I have successfully identified two more mystery items as sweet bean jelly (DELICIOUS) and fever heating pads for the forehead. I’d promised myself that I’d start going to bed earlier, since I’ve been staying up so late – but it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.
It started out as a normal day, I was sitting at my desk studying the hell out of my Japanese textbook when one of the two English teachers who has not yet introduced himself marched over and began mumbling to me incoherently in English. Unfortunately, I can’t think of a nickname that fits his eccentricity in a more flattering way, so for now I’ll call him mumbles-sensei.
Anyway, he understands English at what might be a higher level than any of the other teachers, but speech wise...well...he’s an eccentric old man and I like him. I figured out he wanted me to go see the gym with him, which I’d already seen, but he wanted to take me anyway so I went.
I got to see badminton and handball. What the heck, have you ever even heard of handball? Apparently it’s like basketball and soccer together, and I thought it looked really badass. I guess it’s not very popular in Japan, but our school managed to put together a team. I think the boys on the handball team have been among the most excited to meet me yet lol
On my way back out, we passed the kyuudou (traditional Japanese archery) area and I mentioned I’d been wanting to see them. Before I knew it, we were on our way outside! As it turns out, the kyuudou arena is a little house with open windows that leads to a fenced-off grassy knoll with tiny little targets at the end. It’s the coolest thing I think I’ve ever seen, sports wise. The kids noticed me and immediately invited me in, offering me a special cushion to kneel on away from where the waiting archers sat on athletic mats. Several of them were very excited to speak to me in English and they all conferred amongst each other to figure out the English questions for what they wanted to know about me. They offered me a chair to sit in, but I didn’t want to be “that American,” so I refused at first, but eventually I had to take them up on it because my feet were falling asleep. I went back on my knees to ask them some questions in return, but my legs really suffered for it. I’m glad I didn’t end up falling over when I got up.
Occasionally the tennis players would peek in to eye the encounter jealously.
Anyway, the students were great and I’m not sure there’s anything cooler than kyuudou, except maybe kendo. They all wear white yukata-style wrapped shirts with the big skirt pants of traditional flair. It’s They fire 3 foot arrows from stringed 6 foot bows. It’s very formal, body language-wise. To shoot, they approach the window holding one end of the arrow to their hips like regale tail feathers. They settle perpendicular to the window and draw the string back above their heads. Slowly the pull it down so it almost brushes their cheeks, and when they release, they let the bow flip orientation in their hands. If someone hits the target, they all shout “Yosh!” Apparently they’re practicing several hours a day, wave after wave of archer, because there’s a big tournament next month.
I think I might try to join this club. I’ve always had a soft spot for archery, and I’ve been stalking club members all week lol
When I got back to my desk, I was just about thinking I would leave since it was about noon and that was the time they told me, “unofficially, that is officially when you can leave until school starts,” when suddenly the vice principal approached me.
“Stephanie-san, what do you plan for lunch?”
“Hm. I don’t know yet.”
“Well, lunch is an hour, so you can go home if you want to!
...Ok, so does that mean I should come back? I think it does. So for lunch I ran home to eat some Japanese yogurt (which really tastes more like cream cheese than yogurt) and instant ramen (which really tastes a lot better than U.S. instant ramen).
I was prepared to stick around for a little while, but I ended up staying all the way until 5:30 even though technically even my work day during standard school days ends at 4:30. I’m prepared to stay way late into the night, as is Japanese custom, during regular days, but during vacation? It majorly screwed up my plans, to say the least, since I’d planned to do laundry, grocery shop, pick up supplies for the apartment, exercise, and clean the be-jesus out of this place. It ended up being all right though.
About an hour into my return, the vice principal came back to talk to me. He started talking about his English studies, and when I tried to ask him where he was learning English, he said, “Right here! With you!” Lol Right on! New student. So we ended up talking for several hours. He went over my Japanese textbook, making sure to teach me a little Japanese, and then reversed the exercises to English. We talked about our families, which are the same in number of people and ages, and I taught him “snow blower” and “lawn mower” in honor of my dad lol Apparently his son lives in New York, so we talked a lot about Skype, time differences, and homesickness.
Talking with him made me realize I have a lot to learn about Japanese pitch accents. Japanese isn’t a tonal language, but there are certain words that change meaning when they’re inflected differently. I know nothing about that at this level of Japanese and no one ever really talks about it in linguistics, except for in passing. Anyway, we had a long chat and he ended up facilitating some relationships between me and some other teachers. It really helped break the ice. It’s good to make friends with the vice principal, I think. I even showed him the kanji translation game on my DS and he was fascinated, though I’m not sure why, since he was using an electronic dictionary that I’m sure cost a lot more money. I think he just liked the stylus :) Another fun time was explaining parts of the leg. In Japanese it’s just all “ashi,” they don’t discern between leg or foot or anything. This reminds me of how, in Spanish, there are different words for the inside of the ear and the outside of the ear. One of the wonders of language variation – there are multiple acceptable way to handle things and it doesn’t affect the communication of the speakers.
Today I also realized that I will probably get a lot of attention from the students in the teacher’s office, considering my desk is closest to the door and also facing it.
When I got home I immediately started some laundry. Unfortunately since everything needs to hang dry and it’s rainy out (and night time) I had to hang things all over my apartment and set up some racks and fans. Unfortunately, even after an entire night out with the fans on, things were still damp. I’ll probably have moldy clothes :( Additionally, I left the windows up so there would be airflow and it rained onto my unfinished wood window sills and floors...shit.
While I was making sesame rice with pork, my neighbor ALT knocked on my door to invite me to the movie rental place with him. I declined because of everything going on just then, but said I’d stop by later. We took a short walk again later, and now it’s just me, my odds and ends, and my blog.
As of today, I have successfully identified two more mystery items as sweet bean jelly (DELICIOUS) and fever heating pads for the forehead. I’d promised myself that I’d start going to bed earlier, since I’ve been staying up so late – but it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.