. . : : Japan takes the QUEEN : : . .

i saw my first kimono in Mutsu the other night when I was at the karaoke bar. i have been here almost 7 months and I finally saw someone wearing a kimono. i've seen people wearing kimonos in other cities, but not here. it was dark so i didn't get a chnace to check it out. one of my teacher friends has to go on stage tomorrow, so she told me that she will wear a kimono.

today was the graduation rehearsal...i'm sure if I was graduating, I would find it a large percenetage more enjoyable, but i'm not graduating, so it was BORING! I found out that all graduations in Japan are on March 1st, so everyone who works at a HS had to work today (some people, yesterday too!). Haven't found out the significance of March 1st yet, if any at all. If I understood most of it I probably wouldn't be as bored, also if I was warm, I wouldn't have been as fidgety. They didn't have any heat on in the gym. They claim that they will heve heat tomorrow for the actual event...we'll see.

Sometimes, I want to say to my school, Hello, I speak English. Hello, I've lived in America. Hello, I have travelled outside of my hometown and country. In addition to their regular sister city visit in October, some people from the sister city are coming to visit in May. There's a committee to plan everything...but am I on the committee?...of course not. What will most likely happen is that they will constantly come back and forth to ask me questions about things they don't understand. Then as time grows nearer, I will begin to see what they want to have the students do for the visitors. Then I will be asked to help at the last minute or on the day of (like usual) when the program is already decided. LIke the sister city visit in October, I have to basically ask questions in order to make sure that I am prepared for things. Leave it up to them, I don't think I will get info until things have been completely decided. I don't mind that normally, but if you want to do things independently, do so until the end. Don't come at the end where you * INSERT GAIJIN THAT SPEAKS ENGLISH to authenticate the program.

to make the room warmer, people put a pot of water on top of their heaters. well the same heater that served as a cookie warmer now has my pot of water on it. since my range [otherwise known as a stove] doesn't work with the heat on (and if I turn it off earlier for it to cool down, I get too cold), I decided to use the water that get MIGHTY hot for my little heater bottle that I put in my bed everynight to keep me warm...whew...now that was one big run on senetence...whew.........

tomorrow is a day that comes only 1 time every four years...Tick Coleman's Birthday...and it's a Leap (Year) Day. I will spend this wonderful day at work. But, it's a Sunday *crazy questioning look*...it IS! on Friday, my supervisor came with the Takeyah-sensei, let me give you the schedule for Friday. After my quzzical look, I told him that I had no idea of what he was talking about. He said, On Sunday we have to prepare for graduation on Monday. I said, Well no one told me that...do I get daikyu? [daikyu: either pay or a day off to make-up for the overtime that you worked] He later comes back to give me the schedule that goes from 8M to 5PM, but we have Monay and Tuesday as half days (sort of...we have a party Monday after school that is basically mandatory along with the mandatory 5,000YEN they took out of my pay)....

In true J style, the partcipants from the play all went out last night. I had a really nice time at the restaurant and we were even able to explain the things I could eat to the cook. We watched a little bit of the rehearsal practices, then we watched a video recording of the play. It was really nice and I had good time playing my role. Of course the students were mad excited that I was in the play. My supervisor (along with everyone else) was impressed with my Japanese. IT was hilarious, and one thing I must give J folx props about....they do not mind acting a fool or looking strange in front of people. The teachers danced and acted with a lot of effort.

After the dinner party, we then headed to the ni jikai, the second party. This place was one of the places where if you walk by all you hear is the mumurs of karaoke all night....that was ME all night. Not only me b/c a lot of other teachers sang songs too. Like the US, they have what they call "Babylon" which is a line dance comparable to the electric slide. So when the actual song "By the Rivers of Babylon" comes on, everyone stands up and dances. I think yesterday was my first time seeing people in Japan dance. We ended by singing "Sakura" which was the theme song for the play that we did earlier.

Then we left there and headed two places over to a place called Nebuta (a reference to the nebuta festival, etc. which is popular in J). It's san jikai (third party) time. At this place was izakaya style so we just sat around and talked and ate. By the time we left there, it was after 3AM, and I was beat...for REAL!

I lost 3 pairs of socks, a shirt, and a laundry bag to mold today ...... ggrrrrrrrrrr..... Living in J, it really is good to have two people. Fighting the mold is a job within itself. Imagine if I had a house it would be over.

GRANOLA MONOLOGUES
I reminded myself of a college student today. My lovely friends sent me VEGAN COOKIES last week (along with other wonderful treats). I decided that I wanted warm cookies. I don't have an oven, so I put a cookie in a piece of foil and put it on my new heater. That heater is no joke...it burnt my first cookie, but the second time, it felt and tasted like it was fresh out of the oven...YATTA!

san ji ni ju yon un desu It's 3.24 AM, and I am just getting in from the sanjikai...thought I was going to post, but I'm too tired

today I graded the ni nensei (2nd year/11 grade) writing assignments. Some of the students had mad jokes in their papers. The assignment was the same generic "writing" task where they have to write 10 sentences about a subject (and in most cases, the JTEs basically re-write their exams for them) and then write or say it in class. Their paper was on "Prohibiting Smoking in Public Places". All of them had the same ideas etc...except one staudent who came with the...


I agree with the idea to prohibit smoking in public...b/c there is possibility that the pick aninny takes fire...


I chuckled laughed at that one while I was at my desk. I usually do not laugh at the student writing but this sentence just caught me by surprise. Overall his essay didn't make a lot of sense, so he got a low score. I later found out that he was one of the only students who didn't do a rough draft vefore taking the exam...he just went hardcore and freestyled it...

My supervisor came to me the other day about trying to translate a sentence from Japanese to English. That's not new. He explained what he was trying to say in this way: Both of the student's parents died when she was young. She was doing the mini-essay on "I Job I Want to Have" and her job was being a mother. Since she was orphaned at an early age, she has never really had her mother's cookin so she wanted to be a great cook. So my supervisor came to me with:

I wasn't do it.

Initially I didn't understand what she (and he) wanted to say with that sentence. He said it was difficult to translate b/c she didn't want to insult her mother by referring to that fact that she was not around. So I suggested:


I want to be a great cook because my mother wasn't around to do it for me.

I want to be a great cook because it wasn't done for me.

I want to be a great cook because there wasn't anyone to do it for me.



He didn't like those b/c they were too direct and un-Japanese. I told him, well, we are trying to use English so it may have to be direct b/c it's not Japanese. He asked if we could use his initial translation I wasn't do it. I flat out said, No because that is not a sentence. WE bothe decided that it was difficult. So I one of my last comments was You have to decide if you want her to use English or not. She's supposed to be writing in English and that sentence is not correct English. If she uses that statement, it will be incorrect. If the other statements are too direct then she may have to write in Japanese. I am not sure how that would work b/c this is an English class. You decide. Part of learning the language is dealing with the culture of the language. Students have to learn that aspect. In English people will not think that she is disrespecting her family. I understand that in Japanese you wouldn't say something like that, but this is English. After that, he ended up going with:

I want to be a great cook because no one was there to do it for me.

In Japanese, many (if not all things) seem to be indirect. Which makes translation difficult. Somehow, what they wanted to say translated to I wasn't do it. Having to explain that to an English teacher is interesting. (It's just like exams and assignments...don't give it to them b/c they cannot figure out how to say it in Japanese or they don't want to talk about it.) Things have to be said indirectly or else it's not proper Japanese. There are many things that cannt be said in Japanese, not b/c people don't want to say it, but b/c the words (or forms of the word) do not exist to do so. All of this is part of the learning process...

ALMOST reached a point of frustration today, but I realized where I was, then decided to rethink the ramifications of spending that bit of energy on frustration. Today we gave the ichi nensei (1st year students/10 graders) their Oral Communications/Language Laboratory English Exam. I almost fell asleep b/c all we (JTE1, my supervisor and I) did was sit there an watch them. All 3 of us.

Since I am THE (native) English speaker at my school, my job during exam time is to grade papers that have to do with speaking and writing in English. Cool....it gives me something to do. On the exam the students had to read a 10 sentence essay (that's what they called it?) about "The Job I Want to Have". Great topic and we just covered a lesson on jobs and things like that, so they have enough vocab to write about it. The key thing is that they were given that part of the exam about a week and a half ago so they can basically complete it before the exam and just recite and record it on exam day. Cool...I'm used to that by now.

Fast forward a couple hours to when I am grading papers. Now here, ladies and gentlemen, we have ichi nensei Intensive English course students, meaning they have taken English for three years. In there essays, we are finding words and phrases like,


...largely because of...

...communicative skills...

...related to the field of...

...the list goes on


That's wonderful! The issue is that these students written and oral communication abilities range from pre-K to 1st grade. So I KNOW there is no way they came up with a lot of these things on their own. That's cool! The main issue is that after I grade all 40 papers, it is clear to me that 75% of the "student written" essay were written by JTE1 and my supervisor. Considering that I am grading on Pronunciation, Accuracy & Clarity, Emotion, and SEntence Structure, anyone can see that THIS is a problem. How can you give students an examination, give them the exam ahead of time, write the exam for them, then grade it like you didn't just do it for them?!? WHAT is going on!?! Do they really believe that they are helping the students learn English, by having them feel that it is okay to write their sentences in Japanese only, then the English teacher translates it for them and adds words that the the teacher probably has to look up. HOW are they supposed to learn English. Needless to say, that part of the exam in its initial design was pointless. I think if we just wanted them to recite someone else's work, it would have saved a lot of energy on my part (specifically two hours) listening to all of the recordings and grading each persons sentences, if we did so. I mean, there were even some students who only wrote 1 sentence and all of the other handwriting on their papers was JTE1 or my supervisor. Out of 10 points, in the sentence structure part, most students got 3 or lower. I really just gave that to them, b/c they all deserved zeros. I was completely disappointed in the teachers too!

THIS is HOW and WHY students go through the school system without ever having to learn anything...b/c academic advancement, achievement, and progress (graduation) is NOT based on academics. The entire class can fail and everyone moves right on to the next year without the foundation...which is why most of the students after 5 years (3 years in junior high school and 2 years in an ENGLISH INTENSIVE high school program) cannot even understand and communicate on the level of 3rd graders when they go on the school trip.

But...I'm not frustrated yet ;)

okay, so maybe I was trippin'. a half hour after i hist the "post & publish" button, i turned off my stove [heater] and decided to try the range [stove] one more time before i went to bed AND it WORKED! I think that my stove may have a sensor or something on it. kerosene heaters give off a whole bunch of fumes, thus the high you get after sitting in a closed room too long. i have my heater in the center of my kitchen, so i think that's the problem. if I want to cook, i have to do it before i put the heater on! i came home tonight an i put the stove on with no problem.

i cannot get my range/stove to work! what is going on!? i want to eat FOOD! :( I want to eat.... wwwwwaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh! I've been here for 7 months, why is it now that I can't get my stove to work. it was supposed to be brand new.

it felt good tonight not having to do the 4m dash through the kitchen to the WC and shower! my heater is working wonders in my apt. for the first time, my entire apt felt comfortable.

on the other hand, now my range [stove] is trying NOT to light. i need to boil some water for my heating pad....grrrr....

wouldn't be easier to teach the students?! (As opposed to not teaching them and them not studying, then giving them the exam ahead of time so they can mememorize it) So when test time came, we wouldn't spend SSSSSOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO much time tweaking the exams and making them easier so that that average students doesn't fail....

although, I kind of get to relax during exam time. it is bothersome b/c the method is just, for lack of a better word, CRAZY! of course, the main advocate for testing the students only on things-we-definitely-know-they-know is JTE2. We spend time discussing the test. We made it super easy. Although its is an Oral Communications class, I had to convince him to put a listening/speaker part on the test. I typed it up, then this week he comes back and wants to make a change. Cool! But teh not cool part is that he wants to change it b/c he feels that the super-easy part is not easy enough for the students.....whatever!

now that they realize that they are responsible for providing my heater, it`s OH! Takeyah-sensei, we have a heater here at the school that you can borrow. It 's new! My old heater had been acting up for about two weeks. A week before last, I told my supervisor about it, but he forgot about it. It had been going from working to non-working status all week. I told him about it again last week and we took it to Super Denkodo (like a Circuit City). The first thing my supervisor said to me, was You might as well buy a new one instead of getting this one fixed A new heater is like $200 and UP and UP and UP. These aren`t heating systems, all of them are portable kerosene heaters. He always recommends that I buy new stuff all the time. The thing about it is that I don't think he's aware of the different things that they are supposed to provide for me. A heater is one of them. So after looking at a couple new heaters, I decide to get the old one serviced only if it will cost 5,000 YEN or less. If It cost more, my supervisor suggested that I BUY a new one. I said COOL. In the meantime, I sat under my kotatsu all weekend b/c I didn`t have another heater.

So today, I hit my supervisor with the

I think you need to contact the Prefectural BOE about paying for my heater. My contracting organisation is supposed to provide an apartment with a heater. So if the old one needs to be fixed or if I need a new one, they need to pay for it

Supervisor: Oh, well there is a heater at the old apratment

Me: Cool. Is it working and is it small enough for my apartment? And how old is it. I don`t want to bring it to my apartment if it's not working.

Supervisor: I don`t know. I'll have to check

[insert nosy JTE to assist in getting things situated, b/c I KNOW that he doesn't want me to be unhappy b/c he wants me to do training workshops this summer]

Me: Okay [back to work figuring out my summer travel schedule]

[minutes later]

Supervisor: Takeyah-sensei, you can borrow a heater from the school. It's new

See this is where I am like, *in my head* for two weeks I have told you about my heater and now that you realize that you all have to pay for it, miraculously a heater appears. But anyway, at least I'll be warm now

I did tea ceremony with the girl scouts yesterday. One of my yoga classmates, who has been a girl scout in Mutsu City for 40+ years, invited me to attend. In true girl scout style, we did arts and crafts and then we did tea ceremony. Tea Ceremony is no joke. There are mad rituals and rules behind it and it takes a lot of studying to master it. The last time I did tea ceremony was maybe 7 years ago in undergrad. It was in the US in Japanese club and hardly even as detailed as what we did yesterday. I would really be interested in learning more about it. Part of the tea ceremony is eating little Japanese sweets...but if you know the J pallette, they are hardly sweet.

After tea ceremony, my friend invited me to her house where she gaveme food to eat and then I stayed and talked with her daughter for a while. Although I have been here in J for a while, I am sometimes surprised at teh age of the people that I meet. It's not really their appearance that makes me think they are young, but just our conversation. I think a lot of it is due the fact that most people do not go outside of their ken or even town, so their experiences are limited. This happened yesterday with my friend's daughter, but it also happened the other day when I went into this store. I usually frequent it b/c it seems nice, although I can't fit most of the women's clothes and it definitely has an urban-influence flavor. So I am talking to the dude who owns it, like usual, and he shows me a picture of his son... kawaii...his sone is 8! I was surprised b/c all of this time I have been coming to the store to talk to the dude, I thought he was about 25-28. I found out that he is 35! Some of it may be due to the language difference and I also think of as general maturity b/c see the similarities when I talk to my students at the school. It is hard to believe that some of them are over 12...but most of them are 16 - 18.

I taped another radio show...this one focused more on travelling and what we learned from our parents. It was a good change of topic. After the last show, I know a significant number of know a lot more about me here in good ole Mutsu.

GRANOLA MONOLOGUES
last night I went to yet another dinner where I paid but hardly ate anything :( this one was with a whole bunch of JTEs from around the ken that did a group seminar/workshop last summer. I happened to arrive in Mutsu and attend their workshop on the last day of the 2 week program, so I became part of the group. Normally, the "non-eatingness" is b/c folx forget about the fact that I am a vegan or the people at the restaurants do not understand. But yesterday was the kind of Japanese dinner that I usually do NOT frequent. They order a whole bunch of dishes, and everyone eats what they want. The problem is that most of the dishes have dobutsu [animal] of some sort in it. So I get stuck not eating while everyone else is chowing down on a whole bunch of food. Ahead of time the organizer said that if I came and I didn't really eat, I wouldn't have to pay the full amount, demo mochiron [but of course] when it came time to wrap things up, I was till asked for 2500 YEN, even though I had a few furai- potato and a bit of supa-geti....but hey what's new....time to start rejecting some offers for dinner...

i don't like when people "enhance" stories for their benefit...it's not cool

I didn't get home until 1AM this morning...in Mutsu! Imagine that. After my adult Eikaiwa, one of my students invited me to go to Rocky's Yaki Tori [grilled chicken], so I decided to go. Rocky is a radio host and his palce is an izakaya : Japanese style pub. He is the one who I taped teh radio show with a couple weeks ago. As a matter of fact, it aired and the student who invited me to go to Rocky's was a classmate of him at Tanabu HS (30+ years ago). So here I am in Mutsu City around 8:30ish in teh evning hanging with folx who went to my school like 30 years ago (when we got to Rocky's, there was another vintage student from their class there as well). This really speaks to the fact that most folx don't go too far from here. But anyway... I got the usual 'body' commentary and then Rocky tried to jokingly suggest that I marry his classmate since he was still single (and commented on my `beautiful apprearance').

Rocky called a friend that we have in common (JTE from my school that I hang with) and then my student called another student who came with her husband. We all ended up staying at Rocky's til 12:30A talking about all kinds of stuff. It was a lot of fun, but I was ssssoooooooooooooooo tired when I left there. I just went home and got in the bed.

rewinding just a bit...I was so happy yesterday after school. Some of my ichi-nensei girls came after school just to talk. We talked for about an hour and I was really impressed with them. They initially asked, Takeyah-sensei, what can we do to improve our English? THAT was the first time that students approached me about improving their English. It was a ood opportunity to talk to them and they asked questions about different things. This particular group of students (most of them in English Club) will be very successful and they will definitely have a graet experience when they go to the US on the school trip in October...after speaking to them, I had a smile on my face....

I was asked this morning to (co)teach a lesson on writing during the first period. It was for my ninensei (2nd year students) class. They have been taking English for 5 years. They take English in school 9 classes (8h 15min) per week. So why is it that today, the 2nd to last class period of the semester are they JUST learning how to write a paragraph? To make matters a smidge worst, the lesson was for their writing class. Some of the classes run together for me (in terms of focus, objective and structure), so I didn't even know that the class was a writing class until the end when I asked the JTE, Do the students have a writing class? . Of course his response was, this is their writing class... A half-hour is not enough to teach these students how to write. My questions are: What have they been doing all semester long? Maybe they should have learned this in the beginning of the semester or how about in April, when they first started taking writing?

The JTE said that not too many of the students get a chance to write, so in his class he tries to include something on the exam....*question mark over my head* Right?! This is a WRITING class dude, that's where the focus should be. Plus, how is putting writing on the exam most effective if the students do not write all year long except for on the exams (3 times a year).

It comes down to the teachers...I know for a fact that I couldn't give many of the JTEs the same assignment. Most of them would have difficulty trying to write a paragraph supporting or opposing an idea. Today's class reinforces my mission to try to teach an elective next year....let me begin to PLAN, DRAFT and REVISE my ideas....

in a matter of minutes, the snowflakes have just turned to snowdrops! This snow is no joke!

About 75% of the room was sleeping to day! I was fighting not to be among them. I just got out an International Understanding Lecture that they had for the Intensive English Students. The woman, from a university in Aomori city, talked about her experiences in Kenya and India. It was in Japanese, so there was not much that I could concentrate on. I understood some things she said, but in general, it was all a blur.

At the beginning of her presentation she had the students write down as many African countries as they knew. To my surprise Trinidad & Tobago was one of them. While I was happy that the students remember Trinidad & Tobago, I raised my eyebrow, b/c it's NOT! I have done so many self-intros and presentations about myself, drawn so many maps, had so many discussions and they still think T&T is in Africa! The bad part was that the woman doing the presentation on Africa said that it was correct, the students' talking drown out my 'no, that's not right', so I didn't even bother trying to elaborate.

It's snowing like nobody's business outside....and to think, just yesterday morning I said to myself Hmmm, it's kind of warm outside today. Maybe spring IS here!...yeah right!....

I had some crazy dreams last night. Mochiron [of course] I don't remember them at all, but I do remember waking up with a "was that really happening" face on....

oyasumi nasai....

How Michael Jackson got into our play for the graduating seniors? I don't think I will ever know. Not only is Maikaru a character, but the teachers are doing a dance routine to Thriller...LOL...that is some great fun right there. Every year they do a play on "Entertainment Night" for the graduating seniors. Usually the ALT is in it. If the role you receive, as the ALT, is a reflection of what they think of me, then I'm straight. They described my role as "cool", dressed really nice...my character's the one played by Uma Thurman in Kill Bill. INcluded in my lines is a line that I was told that most people may recognize, Ikuyo .I am the only teacher who didn't see the movie, so I have no idea what kind of role I'm supposed to play (I have to look it up on the net). SIDE NOTE: Last year's ALT was a big dude and they had him play a seal!

WE ran through the lines one time then folx started working on their dance routine. I added my 2 cents to get folx unified and they said I was a great teacher...yay!!! All I did was put teh moves to an 8-count b/c they were kind of varying each time they did the steps....I can't wait to see the final outcome....this will definitely bring much laughs....LOL

The same students that were great on Friday, were kind of 'blah' today. Aside from the fact that it was Friday then and it's Monday now, the only other difference was the presences of JTE2. The whole vibe of the class was so-so. It might be best to do what another JTE said...have the JTE take part of the class, not teach it.

JTE2 and I spent a half hour or so discussing the exam for next week. We finally decided on the exam, after I had to convince him to put at least a Listening Section on the test. [I mean, I guess since it IIS an Oral/Aural communications class, we might want to include somehng like that]. In class, he asked me to announce the exam and give them a general ide of what we would be on teh exam...okay...thatw as cool. Then he decided to go back over the exams and tell them exactly everything that was on the eaxm. Had I known that he would tell the class everything that would be on the test, I would have helped to design differently. It was already SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO easy as it was [basically exercises copoed from the text]....but hey, why have the students learn anything or study when we can tell them the answers to all of the questions....

This dude was completely, disgustingly in his nose TOO many times on the train. He had the nerve to roll up his dried nasal mucus (otherwise known as boogers) in his fingers....eeewwwww....I wanted to say, The amount of tissue that they pass out on the street in Japan and YOU couldn't grab a pack to clean your nose...I guess not. Instead this dude this dude decides to forgo the extra effort and just uses his fingers instead.....eeeeewwwwwwwwwww...I kept looking at him with disgust and making a face like *ewwww you nasty * I just kept my eye out to make sure that no particles were flicked in my direction......

FYI: J passes out tissues ALL of the time. There are people (usually women) on teh street that just pass out tissues for people. Most times they have advertising on the back, but there is really never a need to run out of them. And if you do, use your handkerchief. Everyone carries one of those too...even ME!

Today begins a new year for me. My bEARTHday was nice. I went to Aomori City to meet up with a friend and to get things situated for the small EARTHday gathering. I got a late start, but things worked out the way they were supposed to. I was reversing into my parking spot at the station, our little Tohouku/Ominato one-car-train pulled into Shimokita Station. I ran out of the car and grabbed my bags and the train was getting ready started to pull but the train station attendant did some signal to stop the train from pulling off and I ran to the train. It was probably the first time in history that the tarin left later than it's usual 11:11AM (it left at 11:12AM thanks to me). Of course I had to stand up b/c it's only one car and there are never eneough setas for athe amount of people going to the city. My friend met me at the station and took me to my massage appointment that I had. The woman is a friend of a friend and the herbal and aromatherapy massage ceneter is part of a women's center here in Aomori City. I thoroughly enjoyed my lemongrass/ginger massage. If I lived closer, I would get them more often. They offer classes, so maybe in the summer, I'll sign up for a few classes.

After the massage, I headed over to my other friend's house who decided to be the lovely hostess for the festivities. It's a good thing b/c I KNOW that if I had a gathering in Mutsu, it would be me and the karaoke machine.... even all of the teachers at my school were in Aomori City this weekend for another teacher's wedding/reception party. My friend made vegetarian tacos and since most people attending were not vegetarians, I made my staple even-meat-eaters-like-this dishes (stir-fried veggies and falafel) that everyone liked for the most part. There was one supertaster there and I forgot to ask about spicyness, so she wasn't able to enjoy most of the food b/c I put cayenne pepper in everything.

It was a short gathering, people started arriving around 8ish and most people left by around 11PM (which is actually what we planned). Some folx had car troubles to deal with, some folx had a long drive ahead of them, some folx had other plans, so it worked out okay...mass exit. So my friend and I ended the evening out my talking a bit before going to sleep.

I know I wasn't home, but I was surprised not to get a phonecall (on my ketai) from any of my family members. They usually call my home phone, so I'm sure they probably called me there. But who knows...

I was supposed to catch and noon-esque train to head back to Mutsu, but I didn't feel like rushing to catch the train. I just got a manicure a little while ago so my nails look healthy and shiny (the basic manicure here is just a file and color, but since I got clear polish it was way under $10). That kind of pushed my schedule back. I think I'm going to go to a restaurant and have lunch....

GRANOLA MONOLOGUES
To my surprise, at the party, most people did NOT enjoy my famous popcorn. They couldn't hang. I think it was too hot for most people. It was a tough crowd

Somebody must have put something on my 2nd year class... I had a GREAT class today! JTE2 was absent today (he's having a wedding reception tomorrow) and for a hot second I thought that they were going to be a bit difficult with the talking and stuff...but they were great. They had the usual group activities where they had to discuss something and talk about it. I gave them only 7 minutes to do it and they DID it! The class was conducted completely in English and they responded, volunteered and raised their hands and everything! It was great. I was really proud of them today! After class, JTE1 who was next door in the Language Lab teacher's room mentioned that my class was all in English...I guess he was surprised b/c JTE2 usually 'has' to use Japanese... it would be great to teach class w/o him at least once a week, especially if classes are going to be like that! WOW!

Move over Miss Cleo, I'm putting you out of the psychic business....well I guess that alreday happened...but anyway....As predicted, I did NOT pass the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (Level 3) that I took back in December. I did get kind of close to passing the Writing/Vocabulary and Reading/Grammar sections ...but oh well. I told myself that this test will let me know where I am in terms of my Japanese abilities and it did. I plan on taking a course either this summer and in the fall. Prayerfully, I can get study leave for the language classes, so I don't have to take vacation. I really want my Japanese to improve significantly...

I FINALLY got some feedback about my teaching at THS. I heard that the JTEs were really excited and happy that I decided to re-contract for another year. I was even told that I was punctual and a great teacher....I raised my eyebrow at the `punctual` b/c I have been late at least 5 times since I got here in August....but oh well

Recently I wondered about feedback. They don't really give much here (or in most placesa), so a lot of times you have to assume or infer that things are okay. I know they (my school) has to give feedback to my supervisors at the Prefectural Board of Ed, but I also know that since being here, I have yet to have a convo with anyone about anything in reference to my overall performance here.

Today, I just sat in front of the computer and browsed the JETs Teaching in Japan ring at Xanga. Of course I checked e-mail all day, too.

I am having a get together at a friends house in Aomori on Saturday evening for my (b)EARTHday...it should be a fn small gathering. It's only for a couple of hours...so I may end of doing something else afterwards too.

I came home and decided rearrange things to see if my kerosene heater could heat my apartment (like so many other people claim they can do). I moved the heater from the veranda door to in between the kitchen and my tatamai mat room...it didn't work. The heater is back in it's original place and I can still see my breath in my kitchen and bathroom.

GRANOLA MONOLOGUES:
I LOVE "Peace Vanilla Almond Cereal"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I Just returned from Sapporo's Yuki Matsuri. I enjoyed it a lot. I got to Sapporo on Saturady evening...wait, wait, wait...I'm putting things in reverse for a moment....

Can I live? ...that's all I'm asking. So I left my house on Saturady midday. Not that I was hiding or that my trip was a big secret, but as soon as I get the train station here I see about 15+ of my students. So I receieved the first onslaught on questions about where I am going, who I'm going with, etc. Cool! I wasn't expecting to see them in their school uniforms coming from scool on a Saturday...but hey, it's Japan...so what's new?! Upon arriving in Aomori City and I decide to walk around for a bit before catching the bus to the airport. I was standing on a corner getting ready to cross the street but I decided to just step back a bit under the shelter (b/c it had been snowing pretty heavy at that point) and all of a sudden I hear a Takeyah-sensei out of no where. It was my Kocho-sensei [Principal]... TWO and a half hours away from my house...okay, so we do the usual convo "where are you going? who are you going with? whem..? where...? why...?"...always a ot of questions. more questions than necessary. A miute later while I'm talking to kocho-sensei JTE2 and his wife (?-sensei at my school) show up...so it's one big "let's ask Takeyah all her business reunion right on the streets of Aomori City"...I know that there are not any bad intentions in all nthe questioning, but all I'm saying is can a sistah live? ...

So back to arriving at Sapporo. I ended up going to karaoke and hanging out until 7AM on Sunday morning. So I just relaxed all day Sunday. I went to the fesival on Monday, then walked around in the "big city" life, then on Tuesday, I went to another snow festival site, then walked arfound in the "big city" The highlight of the trip was being able to hang with some cool people. I stayed with another sistah JET who has been here for four years. I realized on Sunday that karaoke with the 5 sistahs on Saturday night was my first time hanging with more than one sistah since Tokyo Orientation last August...it felt good!

with a new year begining for me soon, there are some things that I really want to focus my energy on....spirituality...creativity....prosperity....it begins now and it begins then...

it's only 2:09 PM!!! This day is really dragging on. I am happy that today is Friday! I am going to Sapporo tomorrow for the Yuki Matsuri [Snow Festival]. It is a very spectacular production. I am looking forward to going and being in a city. Wednesday, Feb 11th, is a holiday (Foundation Day), but I am taking vacation on Monday and Tuesday to go. I am only missing one class though. I wanted to go to the festival, but it is pricey from Mutsu, even though we are close. So I am using my birthday fare with the airline (you can fly for under $100 per leg to anywhere in J along with your friends for the time around your birthday). My birthday happens to fall at a time that is blocked off, so if I don't use it now, it will get 'wasted'. So I decided to take advantage of the fare and make a trip of it.

I am also excited b/c I am going to be staying with a sistah (JET) who has been here for a couple years with her 10 year old daughter. I want to talk to her and her daughter to get their take on things. I heard her daughter is fluent already! I think that is wonderful. It is a great experience to be able to live in or visit another country at a young age.

Going back to last night...

I was too tired to elaborate yesterday...I recently watched a movie called I am Sam. I thought about it again yesterday when I was thinking about JTE2. He is not mentally challenged like the character Sam, however in the movie, there was a focus on the question: Can the father, with the intellectual capacity of a 7 year old, continue to teach a child who is 7 and will soon be 8? What happens when he intellectual needs exceeds what the father can offer? I can not say whether the students have passed/can pass the JTE in terms of intellectually capability b/c that is not my place or area. I must say that I can see how it can be diffcult teaching students from a text that you do not understand. I think the key would be to study or improve your abilities so you can be a better teacher and know the material from experience. In the end, I guess this situation is might be like when ALTs get placed to teach English at schools where no one else speaks English..but then again it's different b/c usually in those schools, the students speak/understand very little English, if any at all so the challenge isn't presented....I have to think about it more

30 min later... Now that I actually have spare time at the school, I take the time to think of different activities to do with the students. I don't use most of them, b/c the only time we stray from the textbook is for the 10-15 minute Warm-Up. I also spend time figuring out how I can be a better teacher...when that dies down...I...who knows..but now I about to go watch the sister-city exchange video from this past year. That should be fun....

my neck, my back, myneck and my back.... my whole body is aching. I wonder if J makes a full body shippu [medicated cold compress]. The shippu is like the cure-all for everything. I have some left over from the car accident so I put one on my knee yesterday. I need one on my arm too b/c that hurts too.

I went to yoga tonight. It really helped me work out some of the kinks in my muscles. Although I didn't feel like leaving the house after getting in from work, I did want to practice tonight. So I made it to yoga (10 minutes late though). I had a great practice, like usual. The teacher still is not allowing me to pay. I brought some bangles (the ones the Indian girls wear with their saris) from Singapore and I gave them to the teacher. I want to get her something, but she doesn't read/speak English at all...I think I will get a yoga DVD for her. The books may not be as interesting as looking at a recording.

Today at work, I had to really ask teh question...

What happens when the teacher's abilities are not advanced enough to teach the students?

I wasn't really looking, but I think THAT is the issue with JTE2. I think the book is very difficult for him, therefore he has a difficult time trying to teach the students. We met today to talk about the next lesson and I realize that he didn't really know a lot of the vocabulary. Since we started this new book, he seems really nervous when it comes to the lesson planning. I have been in a place before when a concept (not here in J...but at UM) was not really concrete in my mind. So I studied before trying to teach the students. I don't think he has to know everything, but I think that taking the time to learn about the material before class would be good. I don't know, I can see it as something that will prevent the students from learning...but this is also just my perspective from the outside looking in, sio I could be incorrect.

I'm tired.....

mo hitotsu! i'm giving it another round...

why does a 40 year-old man have his car decorated in Hello Kitty (stuff!) highlighted with pink and white fur? I don't know...somebody has to have an explanation for the CUTEness in J. During my usual blog-browsing, I came across an article that talks about Japan and it's cuteness and characters. It's rather lengthy, but it was a good read.

Skiing was great today! I actually skiied instead of just sliding down the hill. I felt really good. I learned how to turn and even do a fancy stop (like a pro)! We started out at the beginner's slope then after lunch, we headed up the hill on teh ski lift then learned a few more things. The teacher that I had was really good. Although she doesn't speak English much, she was able to show me what I was doing wrong and how I can fix everything (she's one of the teachers who I taught to crochet). As we went down the hill, she skiied behind me giving me directions. I still had teh super speed problem, so I even figured out how to regulate it. I may try to take ski lessons AND I will make the investment of buying some goggles and proper gloves. My ski suit held up nicely [like I knew she would], but my hands got cold within the last hour and my sunglasses helped with the sun, but it didn't do much for the blizzard like snow pelting every which way.

It wouldn't be skiing without a couple of falls. But I actually made it down the intermediate slope a couple times without falling. I really started to get the hang of it...until I got TIRED! whew!! I got my workout on, so now I'm really tired and I don't feel like facing the snow that has been falling all day. Not only was there snow on the slopes, it started snowing agin last night. Although the Creator blessed us this weekend by melting some of the snow, we were greeted this morning with about 1/2 foot (maybe) and it hasn't stopped snowing since.

dinner...Eikaiwa...

I just got in fron our school "ski day" for the 2nd year students. I had a lot of fun falling on my butt the whole time. When I signed up I told them that I was a beginner. I guess they forgot that I was not Japanese and that I wasn't just being modest b/c they put me with a group of non-beginning students. So everytime the leader/teacher showed something (that I couldn't understand b/c it was in Jaoanese), Takeyah-sensei just landed on her booty. After a goo dnumber of falls, I decided to rest until lunchtime. So I took off my skis and walked all the way down the slope. I was sooooooooooo tired by the time I got to the lodge and it was close to lunchtime too...

After lunch, I got back out there and placed myself in the right category...beginners. Since I wasn't really with a group, I just followed behind another group that was practicing. After an hour of practicing going straight, I moved on to teaching myself to do the turns, based on what I saw other people doing. It worked out okay, but for some reason, I kept going much faster than everyone else that I followed behind. So I kept on going even after a couple more falls. My falls started to slow down as I was gettung the hang of things, but I moved on to skiing downhill and turning and fell very HARD on my face...that was it. Normally I wouldn't stop b/c of falling, but this time it hurt. It was cool though I I got to practice a bit of Japanese. Although there were a JTE (Japanese Teachers of English) there he didn't really speak English.

The day ended well, and I plan on hitting the slopes again tomorrow. The good thing about skiing here is that no matter how much I fall and look crazy, I can always count on my students to tell me kawaii...cute!!!!. I want to try snowboarding so I may see if I can get a lesson sometime in the near future. I think I would like it.

And of course, it wouldn't be "a day in the life of a Mutsu City super star" if I didn't see someone that I know who is very, very happy to see me!!!!!!!! YAY!! THIS is why gaijins come here and get big heads. I saw one of my Eikaiwa students on the slopes today. It was nice seeing her b/c we hadn't seen each other since December....oh well...the life of a housewife here leaves room for daily skiing and things of that nature.

In related news...I saw a teacher today while I was getting changed in the teachers bathroom and although she wasn't going with me, what did she say, Let's enjoy skiing today!!!!!!!!!...

my students have a lot of jokes....going back to last week, with my ni-nensei students. They had a lesson on friends where to look at pictures of people and figure out what was happenig in each picture. So one studenst decides to describe a picture as 'The girl with the long hair is mad.` Why? `Because she though the girl with the short hair was a girl that used to be a boy`. What do you think will happen next? `They will be better friends now that he is a girl`.....right.....

let's hear if for my kotatsu! I finally have a working kotatsu. Another appliance to try to keep me warm throught thi swinter.

This weekend wasn't evry eventful. I did taped teh radio show last night. Most of the conversation was baout me beinga a vegetarian and then the Japanese education system. I* was asked to come to the show again, so I'll be on sometime in February again. Afterwards, we decided to go to a coffee shop and the chat. We decided to leave around 7ish, but thene the other JET/CIR and I decided to get something to eaqt. As we were getting ready to go, the JTE that was on the show with me (that also happens to be a friend) told us that her car got locked in the parking garage AND her house keys were in her car. So she ended up coming to dinner with us and spending the night at my house. It was cool, we ended up talking at the restaurant until 12:30 AM.

The JTE was a bit stressed b/c her half of her bonus might get taken away for having her car locked in the parking lot. As a government/city worker, teachers have to be angels. So the fact that she parked in the bank parking lot (and she wasn't a customer) AND her car got locked in there is "major business", so now her bonus may get taken away. We got up on Sunday morning and the garage was unlocked so hopefully everything will be alright in vthe long run...but we'll see on Monday.

I ended my day by renting movies and working on a sweater that I started when I got here. I only have the collar left to finish...then I can wear it....yeah!

GRANOLA MONOLOGUES:
Today I have one of my favorite dishes. Curried red lentils over brown rice. It was very tasty, as always. The curry was a mixture of somer stuff that I brought from America and some curry that I bought in Malaysia. I still think I need some Jamaican or Trinidadian curry to really bring back memeories, but what I made definitely did the trick.