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9/16
Now that I’ve taught with all the teachers, I can’t help but expect the real cold shoulder from Ichi and Mick-sensei (or Batman as I’ve begun to call him behind his back). I find this upsetting. They both kick me out of the classroom when I’m done with my activity. They’re both proud men, so I suppose that makes sense, they may feel like they’ll embarrass themselves in front of me with their English, but somehow I don’t think that’s it. And so, I have less respect for Batman.
Mumbles-sensei is great because he doesn’t care what we do in class, so he uses his insecurity to give me free reign, which has lead to some hilarious Q&A sessions (though I did get the “what are you hips, waist, bust measurements?” from a boy today, fortunately for his sorry ass he changed his question when I asked him to repeat it). Even K-sen kicks me out, but at least he’s warm in the classroom. Shadow-sensei is the real surprise, however. He’s probably middle of the road as far as English skill goes, but he has me stick with him the whole time and we team teach together. I’m very pleased and I respect him a lot for that.
I’ve been meeting with a lot of kids for the big English competition, even though it doesn’t start until next school year lol. Literally, the last competition just ended a month ago! I finally know all the rules though, that was a big pain.
Cooking wise, along with my huge-ass pot of curry, I made what I call “Pizza Tofu Rice,” which consists of sticky rice with a tomato-sage-garlic-cinnamon sauce with tofu squares and cheese melted on top. It’s AWESOME. I’m so glad to have found something easy and delicious that I can make in Japan! Also, I don’t need to use much tomato paste, which is good because it’s expensive here. Another easy and delicious meal I made was pork miso nasu, I made little pork meatballs and stirred them in a miso sauce over baked eggplant. With my fried onigiri and shimeiji tamago, I almost have a full week of legitimate homemade meals that are more complicated the sandwiches! :D Not like I ever eat sandwiches here though.
But all is not sunshine and rainbows. I had my second meeting with the International Club and there were a good 8 new people there. Among them was a girl who seemed excited about me, but is otherwise what I’d describe as a “delinquent.” The Pred had told me she was a cool girl but she had an attitude and she once wore a necklace of bleeding plastic bear claws (?). She was very nice and she’d been nice when I met her in class that afternoon, but as I taught the lesson she looked really upset and grew less and less cooperative to the point where I walked over and asked her to do something and she just shrugged and smiled and ignored me.
I got the sense that the class was a little too bookish for their tastes and I resolved to put more fun games in. But I don’t consider it entirely my fault, the Pred said “make a lesson plan,” and K-sen had said “make a lesson plan,” and last week no one said anything, so I figured it was ok. The kids from last week are really academically aggressive, so y’know, whatever.
And then the delinquent hurt my feelings. I was talking to the club president who was being kind of strange, he kept repeating himself without giving me any information. I just kept thinking “you sound stupid. Why are you saying this stuff once, let alone over and over?” That should’ve been the indication for me right there - as soon as I start wondering why someone sounds so stupid, that usually means they’re trying to say something negative. I’d noticed the delinquent girl hanging around just out of our conversation circle. She’d gone to talk to K-sen and come back, I was kind of waiting for the club president to shut up because I wanted to catch her before she left so I could tell her next week would be more fun. Finally, the kid stopped talking and the delinquent girl actually came to me.
She flagged me down and looked at her handout like she was going to ask me a question about something we’d learned. Boy was I wrong.
“Stephanie. I hate this club now. I hate the club that is like class. It’s bad. I want talk. We should be…circle. I hate this.”
Well, shit.
I told her I figured she’d been upset based on her face and I apologized, promising things would change. I was kind of upset, so ordinarily I wouldn’t have been so self-deprecating, but I’d already prepared this speech in my head so I went with it in my surprised state. Fortunately she did go on, “Stephanie is not bad! This is bad.”
I was feeling kind of emotional to begin with, so I was pretty hurt. I knew she liked me, she’d been in the awesome class the other day when I made all the students fall in love with me. Still, I couldn’t help but feel sheepish like everyone was going to think I sucked now. I wish her delivery had been better, but all things considered that’s all she could do, barely being able to speak English, let alone politely.
I went straight home after that, which I’m glad I was able to do. It ruined my trip home and the first few hours of my night. Eventually I shook it off, but I’m sure there’ll be lingering feelings of embarrassment and bitterness. I’ve always been a sensitive person, after all. I gotta be able to shake this kind of thing off though: Welcome to Teaching.
Now that I’ve taught with all the teachers, I can’t help but expect the real cold shoulder from Ichi and Mick-sensei (or Batman as I’ve begun to call him behind his back). I find this upsetting. They both kick me out of the classroom when I’m done with my activity. They’re both proud men, so I suppose that makes sense, they may feel like they’ll embarrass themselves in front of me with their English, but somehow I don’t think that’s it. And so, I have less respect for Batman.
Mumbles-sensei is great because he doesn’t care what we do in class, so he uses his insecurity to give me free reign, which has lead to some hilarious Q&A sessions (though I did get the “what are you hips, waist, bust measurements?” from a boy today, fortunately for his sorry ass he changed his question when I asked him to repeat it). Even K-sen kicks me out, but at least he’s warm in the classroom. Shadow-sensei is the real surprise, however. He’s probably middle of the road as far as English skill goes, but he has me stick with him the whole time and we team teach together. I’m very pleased and I respect him a lot for that.
I’ve been meeting with a lot of kids for the big English competition, even though it doesn’t start until next school year lol. Literally, the last competition just ended a month ago! I finally know all the rules though, that was a big pain.
Cooking wise, along with my huge-ass pot of curry, I made what I call “Pizza Tofu Rice,” which consists of sticky rice with a tomato-sage-garlic-cinnamon sauce with tofu squares and cheese melted on top. It’s AWESOME. I’m so glad to have found something easy and delicious that I can make in Japan! Also, I don’t need to use much tomato paste, which is good because it’s expensive here. Another easy and delicious meal I made was pork miso nasu, I made little pork meatballs and stirred them in a miso sauce over baked eggplant. With my fried onigiri and shimeiji tamago, I almost have a full week of legitimate homemade meals that are more complicated the sandwiches! :D Not like I ever eat sandwiches here though.
But all is not sunshine and rainbows. I had my second meeting with the International Club and there were a good 8 new people there. Among them was a girl who seemed excited about me, but is otherwise what I’d describe as a “delinquent.” The Pred had told me she was a cool girl but she had an attitude and she once wore a necklace of bleeding plastic bear claws (?). She was very nice and she’d been nice when I met her in class that afternoon, but as I taught the lesson she looked really upset and grew less and less cooperative to the point where I walked over and asked her to do something and she just shrugged and smiled and ignored me.
I got the sense that the class was a little too bookish for their tastes and I resolved to put more fun games in. But I don’t consider it entirely my fault, the Pred said “make a lesson plan,” and K-sen had said “make a lesson plan,” and last week no one said anything, so I figured it was ok. The kids from last week are really academically aggressive, so y’know, whatever.
And then the delinquent hurt my feelings. I was talking to the club president who was being kind of strange, he kept repeating himself without giving me any information. I just kept thinking “you sound stupid. Why are you saying this stuff once, let alone over and over?” That should’ve been the indication for me right there - as soon as I start wondering why someone sounds so stupid, that usually means they’re trying to say something negative. I’d noticed the delinquent girl hanging around just out of our conversation circle. She’d gone to talk to K-sen and come back, I was kind of waiting for the club president to shut up because I wanted to catch her before she left so I could tell her next week would be more fun. Finally, the kid stopped talking and the delinquent girl actually came to me.
She flagged me down and looked at her handout like she was going to ask me a question about something we’d learned. Boy was I wrong.
“Stephanie. I hate this club now. I hate the club that is like class. It’s bad. I want talk. We should be…circle. I hate this.”
Well, shit.
I told her I figured she’d been upset based on her face and I apologized, promising things would change. I was kind of upset, so ordinarily I wouldn’t have been so self-deprecating, but I’d already prepared this speech in my head so I went with it in my surprised state. Fortunately she did go on, “Stephanie is not bad! This is bad.”
I was feeling kind of emotional to begin with, so I was pretty hurt. I knew she liked me, she’d been in the awesome class the other day when I made all the students fall in love with me. Still, I couldn’t help but feel sheepish like everyone was going to think I sucked now. I wish her delivery had been better, but all things considered that’s all she could do, barely being able to speak English, let alone politely.
I went straight home after that, which I’m glad I was able to do. It ruined my trip home and the first few hours of my night. Eventually I shook it off, but I’m sure there’ll be lingering feelings of embarrassment and bitterness. I’ve always been a sensitive person, after all. I gotta be able to shake this kind of thing off though: Welcome to Teaching.