July 13, 2009
there’s a flowchart of sorts sitting on my desk on a sheet of notebook paper, courtesy of megumi. i shall reproduce it, because it’s very helpful:
hot day these days
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heatstroke <------ be careful!!
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V
water <-------- I like it
^
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a necessity <3
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every day!
WHICH DO YOU LIKE WATER OR SPORTS DRINK?
The answer: WATER.
Scratch the Southeast Asia. It’s getting too hectic around here, and I don’t have time for the bittersweet reflection anymore. I don’t usually know what I’m talking about, anyways. So, without further ado, I’ll just begin posting student writing at random.
Takuma watched all of the Back to the Future trilogy after learning about Parkinson’s in class and wrote a review. See if this clears up some of the subtle plot issues for you:
The movies are Back to the Future 1, 2, 3.
The movies are story time travel Time machine. Main character Marty travel past. And Marty’s father and mother help. This is chapter one.
Chapter two travel future. Marty travel to help Marty child and the future change past to rob Time machine villain.
Chapter three travel went age. Time machine break and Marty went back future. This movie was opened twenty years ago. This movies was very interesting, because please watch teachers.
Grade: A++
November 5, 2008
“I don’t get it. What do you mean, you’re afraid of animals?”
“I’m afraid of all animals. Definitely all of them.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re scary.”
Ayumi and Nana are walking to school beside me, and as is fairly normal, they’ve taken a break from attempting to speak English and have thus mostly forgotten I’m there. In the process they’ve also forgotten that I understand their Japanese. I didn’t know that Ayumi was afraid of all animals. Because I am bored, I keep listening:
“What about harmless animals, like birds?” Nana is incredulous.
“Unacceptable. If I see a bird on TV, it’s okay, but if the bird looks at the camera, I have to change the channel.”
“What about mice?”
“All girls hate mice.”
“Not me. I love mice. They’re cute.”
“Only Mickey is okay.”
“And Pokemon? They’re not really animals.”
“Pikachu is cute.”
“Is Pikachu supposed to be a boy or a girl?”
“Boy.”
“And what about Anpanman?”
“His name is Anpanman, not Anpanwoman.”
“His head is made of bread. What’s his body made of?”
“Plastic. Just a guess.”
High school students are high school students wherever you go. Not much changes as you cross oceans, and students still have the same wandering, pointless conversations they always do regardless of place. They speak for the sake of filling silence as much as anything else. There is no need for personal breakthroughs or deep meaning. The day before:
Risa: “Do foreigners get acne?”
Mika: “No.”
Shiho: “Of course they do. That’s why that weird Jessica Simpson lady is on those Proactive commercials.”
See? Mostly indistinguishable from American conversations, only with different cultural cues. That’s what makes today interesting. Today was the presidential election. Ayumi and Nana humored me about this and pretended (I think) to be interested, asking once an hour, “Obama win yet?”
When it was all said and done, they asked a more intriguing question: “Now, do you want to go back to America?” I told them I was here for now, then asked them if they wanted to visit sometime. Both shook their heads ‘no’, and when I asked them why, they made gun shapes with their hands and little gunshot sounds. “Don’t want to get shot,” said Ayumi, and the entire time that I was explaining that TV is sensationalist and that it’s perfectly safe to travel to the U.S., I was embarassed.
You can’t blame them, really. They have always known a country with a remarkably low violent crime rate. America’s murder rate is nearly 9 times higher than Japan’s, and it doesn’t help that some of the more popular American TV shows are things like 24, Prison Break, CSI, etc. It seems that the average person I talk to thinks we’re pretty bloodthirsty. They might be right.
A few times a week, strangers ask me where I’m from. I tell them I’m American, and every time I do I’m aware that I’m donning the fabric of these preconceptions. I say, “I’m from Tennessee, in the United States,” and I know that I’m simultaneously admitting to whatever preconceived notions they may have about us. This bothered me more a year ago than it does today, but I can’t say I like it.
The entire point of this is that an hour ago, a man waiting at the car shop beside me asked where I was from. I told him. He replied with: “I have hope for America. I think good days are ahead.”
I agree.
October 9, 2008
Oh man, things have gotten busy.
Believe it or not, I have plenty to write about. I just don’t have as much time as I’d like, nor the will.
I will do better, I will do better. Videos to come as well:
Tomorrow in class I’m trying to bring Halloween to Japan by teaching the kids how to light dog crap in brown paper bags on fire and how to conduct prank phone calls.
September 12, 2008
I don’t really like you. You have made a select list of groups of people that I generally dislike by default, which is admirable in a way, but as I get older I find that people irritate me more often, so perhaps it’s me that needs to do a little soul searching. Either way, I find hypochondriacs to be a drain on society for two primary reasons: 1) The whole self-pity thing is a bit played. 2) It’s manipulative. It’s the domain of those who want to be fretted over, who want to be worried about. It’s a way for people to blame every little miscomfort on a dramatic health crisis, and it’s a waste of about 20 million dollars in unnecessary medical expenses each year.The advent of WebMD.com, Yahoo! Health, and other sites has given these people more misinformation to arm themselves with than I originally would ever have thought possible. Back in the day, the whining of hypochondriacs was mostly limited to the realm of ill-defined but terribly exaggerated phrases like “horrible, awful migraines”, which is not very specific, meaning they couldn’t take it much further than that. Now, those same headaches can chalked up to an arteriovascular malformation, one of the harsh realities of the technology age that fills me with sadness.Exhibit 1: A woman I worked with in an office who would complain of things like “lumbar-vertebrae displacement” brought on by her substandard office chair.
For research’s sake, I went to WebMD and decided to see what (if anything) is wrong with me. You’re given a picture of a human body to click “where it hurts” and a list of symptoms to choose from. It’s hot as hell this afternoon, so I immediately checked off “Excessive sweating”. No problem. I then moved on to “Hunger” and “Food cravings,” as I have almost an hour left until lunch. Because I’m doing this instead of working, I went ahead and added “Easily distracted” and “Poor concentration” as well, then rounded it out with “Difficulty staying awake during the day”. Finally, I realized how depressing and profoundly cynical it is that I’m doing this at all, so I finished with: “Inability to care for self”, “Low self-esteem”, and “Sense of impending doom”.
I would diagnose myself this afternoon as a workplace slacker with a poor attitude towards humanity, but imagine my surprise when WebMD broke the news to me: I have supraventricular tachycardia. Son of a bitch, a potentially fatal heart condition. I saw this on Dr. House.
This is going to be problematic.
March 1, 2008
Today I have lost my finest students to graduation.
Out the window, they’re holding big boquets and failing in attempts not to cry and generally making a big mess out of their parents’ attempts to take pictures, and I’m not going to see that again. Acknowledging the fact that there will be more students (even equally special ones) in the future doesn’t actually help.
They’re still in the parking lot, but they’re already gone. I’m only writing about this in the first place to keep them here a bit longer, to pretend that they’re still happening to me.
February 19, 2008
Out the window, the ocean’s doing this stellar trick where it catches the sunlight just so and scatters it like glitter on the half-hearted waves of the Ariake Sea. It is a beautiful day, and I’d almost forgotten them.
When it’s cold here, this place feels desolate. On the other hand, when it’s pretty, it’s gorgeous. If it would only get warm enough to swim and fish again, maybe we’d have something going. For now, I’ll settle for longer afternoons.
I’m doing this in place of grading papers and tests, hundreds of which I have in stacks covering my desk. You may remember similar behavior from the times I exhibited it in high school, college, and every job I’ve ever held. The students just finished their speaking tests, which are simple enough: they write a relatively brief skit using the grammar and vocabulary they’ve learned during the current term, then perform it in class. The results are varied. These must take place in an airport or on an airplane.
Exhibit One of One:
Flight Attendant: Do you want chicken or fish?
Takuya: Fish, please.
Yuya: Me too.
FA: We don’t have fish.
T&Y: OH MY GOD. CHICKEN PLEASE.
T: How much does it cost?
FA: It 1 dollar.
Y: How much for your smile?
FA: Priceless.
T: I want you.
Y: Me too.
FA: I don’t make the decision. Tell me your good things.
T: I have dog.
Y: I have father.
T: I have my plane.
Y: I love father.
T: Do you love dog?
FA: We are landing in New York. Please sit down.
~ fin ~
Well, at least they’re making an attempt at creativity.
February 8, 2008
Hitomi, one of the freshmen, came back to school today. It took an hour to get a smile out of her, a feat I usually accomplish accidentally within seconds of talking to her by saying something she doesn’t understand, tucking a pencil behind my ear (apparently hilarious), or something equally unfunny. My point is, it’s not supposed to take much to make this kid laugh. She’s not wired for the stoic role. But here she is, head in her hands, staring at the floor, her brightly colored eyeglasses switched for a more conservative pair.
I can’t tell you where she’s been, since apparently I’m not supposed to know. I asked, of course. ”It’s complicated” was the answer.
I was talking with Mayumi when she stepped through the door, who looked at me and said, profoundly: “I am shock.”
A few months ago, a student’s house burned to the ground along the shoreline, just up and ignited like a pack of matches, so donation cans were placed in the classrooms and probably a bit of money was raised. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s probably less than what it costs to build a new house. It’s probably Hitomi, but I don’t know. I’m not trying to be cynical about it; it’s not as if the school can be expected to magically fix something that tragic. It’s the heart of the act that counts, and I’m sure every little bit helped. I’m just saying, we’re charged with the responsibility of helping young people grow into well-developed individuals, but when something of critical importance goes down all I can really do is slip the kid in question some leftover Cambodian money or perhaps some Lilo and Stitch stickers and tell them to “try their best.”
Seriously, what do you do?
January 17, 2008
The last time I took some time out to write about how things were going, it was in the margins of a notebook on a northbound train for Tokyo to meet my family in Narita, a bit of a wasteland only worth knowing the name of because it’s home to Japan’s largest international airport.
My father and sister stayed for about five days, and between traveling with them and going to pick them up I spent something like 35 hours on trains. In this time, I accomplished the following feats:
1) Destroying “New Mario Brothers” for the Nintendo DS in a scant three hours.
2) Beginning and finishing Zadie Smith’s White Teeth, which I suggest you do as well.
3) Sampling some of Kyoto’s finest boxed lunches.
4) Sleeping.
Regardless, my notes look something like this:
I must confess to a mystic fascination with public transportation and trains in particular. There’s something vaguely magical about falling asleep near home and waking up somewhere you’ve never been before. It’s like drinking to excess, only without the hangover and far more expensive. I am a-okay with that.
I had plenty of time to think on the train, and I thought a great deal about work. Plenty of people I talk to regularly seem to forget that I actually have a job that requires most of my time, seeing as all the interesting stories are about doing exciting things in exciting places. Fact of the matter is, at the end of the day, I’m just another sub-par teacher trying to keep a day ahead of everything. It’s not all glorious Japanese hilarity. I wake up every morning and put on a coat and tie and get down to gettin’ busy. With this job comes the inevitable frustrations and complications that virtually all jobs have, but with this one there’s a fundamental difference: if I slack off, if I blow off responsibilities and try to wing everything, it’s not me that gets hurt. Not at all, actually, since I’m under contract. But it’s no good for the kids, and I’ve grown rather attached to them. This startling development has caused me some stress.
I have yet to receive a noise complaint from any of my neighbors, for instance. This happened something like once a week back home. Have I lost the ability to rock? It’s a distinct possibility, one that should shake you all to the bone. I was planning on shredding my way to the forefront as rock’s new savior, but if I’m too busy grading English tests then someone else may have to step up, and I’ll be damned if the world needs another U2 album right now. God help us all. (Or Satan. Whichever is in charge of rocking.)
It’s hardly just that, though. My hair is turning grey. My patience is eroding. I have watched the frustrations of this environment eat at it slowly, then more quickly, until all it takes is one miscommunication too many to put me in a murderous mood. It took me a long time to build up the kind of tolerance for unpleasantries that I came here with.
It cost me more than you think to cultivate the kind of emotional distance from everyday life that allowed me to look cosmic misfortune (or personal screw-ups) in the eye and say: “Oh well. Might as well move on.”
But, somewhere around Yokohama, a realization hit me. In a moment of zen-like clarity I realized whose life I have wanted all along: the good-natured and aging Japanese alcoholic.
You heard me. Think about it.
This is a man whose entire drive from the moment he wakes up until the moment he goes to sleep is to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, at all times. He is functional, mind you; he typically holds a respectable job and shows up. However, he sleeps at his desk when he’s tired, vomits in the streets, and blatantly ignores things that irritate him. He’s long since learned that sweating the small stuff is a waste of time and energy, and the only things that aren’t small stuff are baseball, fishing, and the people he loves.
I’m not saying that sleeping on the job and collapsing in gutters on weeknights are appropriate behaviors to copy, but I am suggesting that a certain kind of apathy is a pivotal tool in preserving mental health.
So here’s to thinking less. Since I wrote those lines, I’ve taken three weeks off of school to travel southeast Asia (more to come on that later), joined a new band, bought a new television (and a new couch from which to enjoy it), and resolved to take more naps.
So far, so good.
And here’s my New Years Resolution: to write more. Much more. Expect frequent updates from here out.