Nothing big has happened the last couple of days so I have had nothing much to blog about. I must also admit to an escalating addiction to American shlock TV series - the O.C. I'm in over my head with this one, hours wasted in front of the box. And the video shop just wont quit enabling me! There are still five sparkling unwatched seasons, I cant stop. I want to but I can't.
Still, there are little amazing things, out here, in the world all the time, when I venture out and notice. Like today for the first time I saw the sharks at my local supermarket. Like you would have lobster or fishies in a tank except the tank is a bit bigger and the inhabitants are more belligerent than any fishies or lobster could ever be. Next to the tank are polystyrene pakkies of bits...shark bits. Possibly. Probably.
There is an abandoned lot about about a block from my school and last week it wasnt an abandoned lot anymore but a maze of plastic sheeting and concrete. People are building a house there. The people in question are not construction guys in hard hats and green overalls (all overalls seem to be pistachio round these parts) but a two little old ladies and a little old man. They have the entire building about a foot high already - they tend to it as you would imagine old farmers tending to crops. Slow and peaceful. The fact that they wear those big rice paddy hats only adds to my consternation that they are not growing rice - they're building a house!
The staffroom has moved into quarters at school, the only noticeable difference to my untrained eye being that this new room is carpeted. The change happened overnight. One morning I went to sign the register in the old room and the next day I was directed to register in the new room. The registers were on exactly the same cupboard as before. Every teacher's desk was in the exact same position with the exact same shmattes littered all over - papers, books and toys. The gang of midnight elves that executed the shift must be affiliated with the midnight elves responsible for the overnight transformation of all the vending machines in town. One morning you got cold coffee in a can from the machine, the next, same can, same vending machine: hot coffee. The first time you touch that can it comes as quite a shock...
In the new staff room this evening I checked out, from the corner of my eye, three of my co-workers; one sitting at his desk the other two standing on either side of him, as they watched something play on the seated man's computer screen (I was on the other side of the desks so could not see the screen, only their faces). In unison they laughed uproariously. Their laughter and the new grey carpeting and the fluorescent lights and the shmattes made the scene, just for that second, like a moment from The Office, if someone decided to remake it in Japanese. The standing man on the right roughly adjusted the seat of his pants. It was uncanny and horrifying. I was in The Office but it was in Japanese! I left quickly.
My biggest task this week has been helping a student prepare for a English speaking competition taking place next week. His English is good, and he is smart and expressive but lazy as hell so all the English teachers are very worried. Last year he was also the only pupil at the school to make it to the competition - he did no work and went totally blank when he got up for his recital (in a school hall in front of hundreds of parents, pupils, teachers and three stern judges). So this year the school does not want a repeat. We are doing everything we can to make this kid learn his speech. I'm pretending to know what I'm doing because I should right? With drama experience learning words and so on. Yesterday we were scheduled to meet for an hour or two after his exams - the poor kid is overworked!! He was and hour late for our appointment. When he turned up Kikawa-sensei the teacher in charge, a dear and mild mannered woman, let rip at him for at least ten minutes in rapid fire Japanese. She then sent him away - to bring his friend I discovered - who also got shat on from a dizzy height. The speech kid then sidled up to my desk and said mournfully and in broken English. 'Jemma-san. I am sorry. I lied to you. I said I would come and I didn't. I told you it was because I had to study but instead I went shopping with my friend. We had lunch. I am sorry.' My heart broke. Of course he bunked my lesson! I would have bunked my lesson. The sweet mannered teacher, who is to date the only person I have heard shouting in this country then coaxed Keisuke (thats the kids name) to get out his speech and we could start working. Out of his enormous bag he pulled a dripping, disintegrating piece of paper. His speech was in tatters. 'What happened?' she asked in English for my benefit, and not unkindly (for my benefit too?). 'My tea broke.' said Keisuke miserably.
There was no more shouting, his punishment and repentance done with, Kikawa-sensei helped him clean out his sopping bag and printed him a new speech. She chatted with him like his sister or his mom; teasing him gently about how lazy he was, how scatty. In Japan, if a school kid gets in a car accident or something the authourities will phone the kid's class teacher before they phone their parents. Thats the level of intimacy teachers and students have. Its remarkable and makes for a very respectful environment, hence the humble heartbreaking apology.
If we had just one more week to work on this speech I reckon Keisuke could crack it. He's doing an abridged story of The Lion King and he knows the movie backwards, he does the voices masterfully. His English is in fact, not as good as I thought, the words he is saying he often doesnt understand at all but he has a superbly fine tuned ear for phonetics and that, paired with his acting ability would, with just one more week - make one killer speech. But the contest is next Sunday. And he has a class trip to Hokkaido all of next week. Kikawa-sensei says he must must practice but come on! He aint gonna do nothing! I know because in his situation I would do nothing! Poor Keisuke!
